"Speaking of which..." I intejected "Some of the fans can get really mean..I don't think I've ever been pintched as many times as I have in the last few days... One girl actually tried to knock me over last night it was incredible, I don't know how you guys do it!" I said with bewilderment and aww. "You should have told us. We shouldn't have let you sit in the crowd. Man I really don't think sometimes. I should have just let Rob escort you to the bus.." Nick said apologizing to me and a bit angry at himself "It's all our fault, we forget that you aren't used to this kind of stuff.." The rest of them added in an apologetic tone "Hey guys don't worry about it..its all part of the experience, I wouldn't trade it for anything in the world." I responded trying to cheer up the mood "I love things just the way they are and I don't want to make you all worry so forget I said anything." The mood in the bus returned to its gaiety but they all looked as if they were in deep thought.
"Changing the subject again.. ET what were you writing yesterday while we were warming up on stage?" AJ asked me seeming truly interested. "Yeah I saw you sitting there too, you looked so concentrated that I didn't want to interrupt.." Brian added interested "Actually I wasn't writing at all, I was drawing you guys in Conte. I tried to draw Nick and AJ but you guys were running around like chickens with their heads cut off saw I drew you and Kevin instead.." I answered Brian. I then got up and reached in the over head compartement for my journal. I roamed my hand around but couldn't find it so I stood on the edge of the couch and stuck my head in it. To my dismay my dear journal that had the last 4 months of my art work in it was not there. I got off the couch and worriedly asked the guys "Did any of you see my art journal? its that big black book that won't close, and I always have it with me. I took it with me yesterday into the stadium. I was sitting in the front row drawing....I went to wash my hands and I put it somewhere so I wouldn't lose it..." By now I was really worried. While I talked to the guys I was looking through my duffel bag very meticulously. I started to get jittery. "If I lost that book I lost 3 months worth of work...did any of you guys see it? Denise did I hand it to you by any chance?..oh I have to find it!" By now I was really alterated and the guys had started looking for it too. I was standing in front of my clothes closet and all of a sudden a hand behind me held my precious journal in front of my face. I happily grabbed my journal and turned around to see who my savior was. I turned around and found Nick standing there smiling. "You must have put it in my bag so you wouldn't lose it.." He said extremely pleased with himself. I hugged him with such happiness and such strength that all he could do not to fall was lean against the wall "Oh thankyouthankyouthankyou... you have no idea how much you've saved my butt. I thought I would have had to start all over again..thankyou." I said really fast, the happiness in my voice evident. I let him go and said thank you again "No prob, glad to be of service my lady." I sat back down at the table with a long sigh. "Can I see it?" Aaron asked me "I won't lose it.." He smiled "Knock yourself out, man..I don't know what I would have done..." "You can put it in my bag whenver you want, thats one of the few things I NEVER forget" Nick said smiling as he sat back down next to me. "I had forgotenn you never finished showing us your work." Kevin eagerly said. "You guys can pass it around if you won't. Just be careful not to touch the pages cause the media might come off on your fingers" I told them. I just sat there as they looked at my journal.
At first I was a bit worried about showing them but then I realized that their critiques wouldn't really affect me all that much. Every once in a while I answered some questions they had. When they got to the drawings of them their eyes popped out, they just stared "You guys OK, you look strange ..." I asked them amused "WOW you are talented, that almost looks like a picture of Nick sprawled on the floor and AJ passed out on the couch." Howie said complimenting me. "Do I really look like that when I sleep you guys?" Nick asked them. "Nahh she was being nice cause you can't see the drool.." Aaron told Nick laughing. "Oh yeah.." Nick grabbed Aaron and gave him a noogie.We all broke out into laughter. "So are you going to persue art as a career?" AJ inquired of me. "Nope, I want to keep it my hobbie and a sparadic way of making some spending cash. I want to persue marine biology as my career. I dream of being on a cutter in the open ocean studying the life patterns of whales and dolphins." The guys kept looking at the drawings and 5 minutes later turned the page to the drawing of Brian and Kevin at the piano. "That one's not finished yet" I interjected. "It doesn't matter it looks awesome" Aaron said staring at the page. "Thanks you guys". "Hey mom come look at this..It's Erika's drawing of B-rok and Train. What do you think?" AJ called his mom over. Denise took the Journal out of Howie's hands and looked at it. "These are really good Erika..do you mind if I show them to some people?" She inquired of me "Thanks, no I don't mind at all, can I get it back by tonight though?" "Yeah no problem."
"We have another hour before we get to the hotel and we have to be at the stadium at 6 so we can practice some of the choreography." Howie announced as he got up. "That means that when we get there we get five whole hours to waste, you guys up for some sight seeing?" Brian asked the group. "Yeah, anybody else up for wandering the streets of Atlanta?" Howie asked "I'm in""I'm in." "Me too." "Me three." We all answered. "Let's have lunch in the city I'm so sick of hotel food." Kevin commented. "Cool, sounds good to me." I answered we all got up and went to did our own thing.
I sat in one of the couches on the left side of the bus so the sun wouldn't hit me in the face. I sat with my feet on the couch and read a book I'd been wanting to read for a while. Kevin and Denise worked on some paper work. Howie sat down and was working lyrics for a new song. AJ and Nick sat in front of the TV playing Superstation, while Brian read a book and Aaron worked on some math homework. When we got into the city I noticed that Aaron was having some problems with his homework so I put my book down and went to help him. I sat down next to him, "So, what are you working on?" "I'm having problems with these algebraic sentences" he told me a bit frustrated "Ahh Algebra, how I hated it till I understood it." I helped him for the next twenty minutes. "Thanks Erika, you explain it so much easier than Nick or mom." "No prob bud, I know whats it's like when you don't understand math and you get frustrated with it. Sometimes you just feel like screaming, am I right? "Yup, instead I just sing really loud and annoy these guys." We both lughed.
We sat around for another ten minutes talking about cartoons until we reached the hotel. "Ohh man I really need to go running or swimming, my legs feel all cramped." Howie said as we climbed off the bus. We had to park in the front of the hotel and there were tons of people there. The guys all wore caps and glasses so as not to be recognized. The bell boy offered to take care of our bags but we all wanted to do it ourselves. We got our bags out of the external luggage compartment. The guys were recognized twice and had to stop to give autographs and pictures. We finally got to our rooms, they were all onthe same side of the hall and had connecting doors. I got to my room and unpacked. We would be there only one night and two days so I only took out the clothes I would use that day for when we went out and for the concert. I collapsed on my bed and slept for ten minutes. I got up and put on my bathing suit. Since it was 11 AM, I decided to go swimming before we went out. I put on a sundress over my bathing suit, put on sandals, and grabbed a towel from the bathroom. I left my room and before going downstairs knocked on Brian's door. He opened it and they were all in there. "Oh Ok, good I'll only have to say it once. I'm going swimming at the pool, I'll be back in time to change before we leave so don't worry about me, I'm not missing..." I told them smiling. "OK cool, maybe we'll join you" AJ said "Allright see you guys in a while. Bye" I said and headed for the elevator. In the lobby I found three girls wearing BSB shirts looking around. I went up to them and they gave me snobby looks. "Are you guys looking for BSB?" They said yes, their in the hotel two blocks down I saw themir bus pull up to it. I got a picture with them before at that hotel" I realized that I was being mean butI also knew that the guys probably didn't wan't to spend their afternoon signing autographs and taking pictures. The girls thanked me and ran out the front door. I headed for the pool.
To get in the pool you had to open the gate that required your room key to be opened, at least no one off the streets could come in. There were some little kids with their family at the pool, and a couple of teenage girls and guys, one of the guys was kind of cute. I was just floating in the pool with my eyes closed when all of a sudden someone jumped in and completely slpashed me. After I came back up I opened my eyes and saw Howie and AJ with a devilish smile spread across their face. Within 30 seconds the rest of them jumped in too and we got into a water fight. As I floated there getting splashed and splashing them back I couldn't halp but gawck at how gorgeous they all are. We were laughin so hard that we all swallowed a couple of gallons of chlorinated water. We finally stopped splashing around cause we were freaking out some of the other guests. We apologized "I guess we have to act civilizd now huh?" Brian said laughing "I guess so". We acted civiized for all of twenty minutes but couldn't deal with it anymore and gotinto a chicken fight. I was on Kevin's shoulders, Nick on Brian's, and Aaron on AJ's, Howie was the referee. At one point Nick grabbed my shoulders and Aaron started tickling me. Nobody won because we all lost our balance and ended up underwater. We looked at our watches and decided to go shower and change so we could have lunch, it was already 12:15. I was climbing out of the deep end of the pool up the latter, Brian and Howie were still in. Suddenly Nick picked me up and threw me into the pool again. I finally came back up "Oh Yeah Frack you are so gonna get it.." I yelled at him laughin and started splashing him from in the pool. He and Kevin ran into the hotel laughing. The three of us got out of the pool and toweled off. The two girls finally recognized Brian and Howie andasked them for their autographs. They wouldn't let the guys leave. Finally I decided to go up "You guys I'm going to my room to change, don't take too long." I said to Howie and he agreed. I headed towards the elevator and just as the door was about to close they ran in. We didn't say much on the way up. We separated at our rooms and agreed that they would come get me when they would be ready to leave.
I showered and changed. It was really hot outside so I put on a short baby-blue sundress and white sandals. I put on sunscreen lipstic and a blue mascara. I didn't fell like blowdrying my hair so I brushed it and put it up in a transparent-white claw. I barely had time to sit in a chair that somebody knocked at my door "ET its us are you ready?" AJ's voice came through the door. "I'm coming" I yelled back. I grabbed my purse and sunglasses, turned the ligth off and walked out the room and locked it. The six guys were waiting for me outside my door. Kevin was wearing Overall shorts and a navy blue muscle shirt without sleeves, Howie wore a tight white spandex shirt and black pants, Brian wore a yellow basketball jersey and baggy jean shorts, AJ wore a Panthers Hockey jersey and deep blue pants, Nick was wearing baggy khaki shorts and a white muscle shirt with a light green short sleeved shirt over it, Aaron wore baggy jean shorts nad a plain red t-shirt. All the guys except Aaron wore baseball caps and sunglass so as to not be recognized. I laughed "Boy I'm glad I don't have to worry about being recognized".
"Alright shall we go?" Kevin asked "Let's shall" We all answered. We walked out the front door of the hotel and were almost blinded by the sunlight. I put on my sunglasses to ward off the sun's rays. Outside the front door were 5 girls obviously looking for the boys, thankfully they didn't recognize them and we walked the opposite way. When we were far away as to not be heard the boys laughed, I figured it was because they got away without being recognized. The day was gorgeous and we were all in a good mood. It took us 15 minutes to reach downtown but we enjoyed the walk, even though we purposely avoided thick throngs of people. When we finally got downtown we we argued for 20 minutes on where to eat. Kevin wanted Chinese, AJ wanted Mcdonalds, Howie wanted Italian, and Nick wanted pizza. Aaron and I were just so hungry that we really didn't care as long as it was food. Finally I said "You guys me and Aaron really don't care as long as we get food, and if you don't feed us soon we'll go eat by ourselves.." In a slightly irritated tone. "Allright since are two most important people here don't care I guess I don't care either and we can eat wherever you guys want" Nick conceded, "Allright lets go for Chinese" Howie concluded, and so we wandered around for the nearest Chinese restaurant, they guys insisted that they knew were it was. At one point I got tired of walking and went into a newstand to ask the cashier about the nearest Chinese restaurant in town. I came back out and the six of them were just standing there. "Man am I glad that none of you drive the bus, otherwise we'd never get there. The cashier said there is one just around the corner". I said laughing and taunting them. Within five minutes we were at the Chinese restaurant.