| Chris was the first to arrive; he pulled into the parking lot ten minutes until seven. Joey at six fifty-five and Lance two minutes later. Like always, Justin arrived exactly at seven; he was never early or late, just on time. Jc was the last to arrive, driving into the parking lot ten minutes after seven. It would have been out of character for JC to arrive any less then ten minutes late. Some things never change. When JC stepped out of his silver Mercedes, he slowly waved at the four men gathered around him. They slowly waved back at him; Justin even managed a `hi' for his former fellow mousketeer. There they all stood next to Jc's car, shifting their gazes from each other to the littered, concrete ground. JC opened his mouth to speak but quickly shut it. He wouldn't be the first to speak. For a few more minutes, they stayed in awkward silence until Chris finally said, "It's been a while." Justin nodded. "One year and 6 months. A year and a half. 18 months." "We got the picture," Lance sighed before Justin could get into how many days it had been, "How are you guys?" There were a few mumbled "I'm fine"s and one "doing good". The silence fell over them again. "Lance, how was space?" Through the heavy facial hair, a grin appeared on Lance's face. "It was wonderful. Everything I imagined. I heard your album was a huge success." "Yeah, I'm really proud of it," Justin replied, smiling for a brief second. Jc ran his hands through his hair, staring at the light blonde strands that fell in front of his eyes. "When did you do that?" Chris picked up a clump of Jc's blonde hair, dropping it as soon as his realized what he had done and hiding his hand behind his back. Ignoring Chris's awkwardness, Jc shrugged and responded, "A while back. Just after the…" He stopped abruptly and ran both hands through his hair. Unable to finish his sentence, Jc busied himself with chewing his fingernails. There was another long moment of silence. "I didn't think this would be this strange," Justin muttered under his breath. "Me either," Joey sighed. Another silence. Chris groaned loudly. "This is stupid! We're acting as though we don't know each other. I'm still Chris, you're still Joey and so forth. Nothing's changed! We're still Nsync." "Yeah, you're right. I mean we took a break, and now we're back. Just like we said we would. We can start working on our next album and everything just like we said we would." "Yeah," Jc replied in a small voice, "I can't wait to get back to work." Joey shifted his brown eyes to the ground, "I can't wait to get back." At least this time, they'd said more before another silence engulfed them. No one's eyes met anyone else's. Everyone busied themselves with something trivial like the skin on their fingers or the hem of their t-shirts. "I can't be in the group anymore." All eyes flew to Joey. "I'm so sorry, you guys, but things are different now. I have a movie career now. I'm an actor." Justin crocked an eyebrow, "You don't want to sing anymore, so you can act?" "Yes…no, it's part of the reason. The main reason is Bri," Joey's chocolate eyes lit up at the mention of his daughter, "I've spent so much time with her during the break, and I don't think I could leave her to go on tour. I used to be able to go long times without seeing her, but now…it killed to leave her this morning, so I could meet you guys. I don't want to miss any part of her life anymore, and if I was in the group, that's exactly what would happen. I can't do that. I'm sorry." Lance patted Joey on the back, the first familiar motion anyone had made during the entire time. Clearing his throat, Lance firmly announced, "I didn't want to be the first one to say it, but now that Joey brought it up, I don't want to continue with Nsync. Free Lance is doing really well, and I want to expand it. That would take up a lot of my time. I want to be a full- time manager. I'm sorry, you guys, but this is what I want and the group doesn't fit into my plans." "I don't want to be in the group either," Chris paused to wait for everyone to look at him before continuing, "I'm engaged to a wonderful girl, and I'm ready to start a family. Being out the spotlight for all this time, made me realize how much I missed just being normal. I want to raise children without photographers lurking all over the place. I like being normal…well, as normal as I can get." Joey smiled broadly and hugged Chris, "Why didn't you tell us that you're engaged? I want to meet this girl." "I will," Chris laughed as he struggled out of Joey's bear hug, "I want all of you guys to meet Cassie. You'll all love her. Oh, and you're all invited to the wedding." "So that makes 3 out of 5," Lance stated looking between Justin and Jc, "how do y'all feel about this?" Jc ran his hand through his hair for the trillionth time. "I wanted out too; I just didn't know how to tell you all. I'm getting quite a few calls from different artist to produce their music. Some of the people who have asked me to work with them would amaze you. I have more time for songwriting nowadays, and I love it. I still sing, but I can do the music I want to do now. No offense or anything, but in the group, we were limited to the style of music we could do," a grin engulfed Jc's face, "even though we did make a few changes to pop music." "Yeah, we did," Chris agreed, "we left our legacy to pop music. I think we can move on now. What do you think Justin?" "I think this is hilarious." Jc, mimicking Justin's favorite motion, cocked his eyebrow, "What's hilarious?" "When we took the hiatus, and even before then, y'all thought that I would be the one who would leave the group. Even the fans thought that since I was experimenting with solo work, I wouldn't come back. But here we are, and I `m the only one who was willing to continue with Nsync. I think it's funny." "You actually wanted to stay in the group? You're joking right," Lance said in disbelief, "you can't tell me that you didn't love having solo success." Justin shrugged, "I liked being solo, but I would have given it up for the group." Chris bust out laughing. "You're right. That is funny and ironic." "It's not that funny," Justin grumbled as he watched Chris bent over with laughter. Waiting for the humor to subside, Chris cleared his throat and said, "Well, I guess since its 4 to 1, it's over." It's over…those words hit hard. Nsync was officialy gone. The members parted with hugs and promises to keep in touch; some of them would, others would separate themselves completely with the exception of a phone call every few years. There were behind the music episodes, entertainment tonight: where are they now? specials, but other than that the quintet left the memories and heart of even their most loyal fans. Like Chris said, Nsync left their legacy to pop music; it was time to move on. |
| After the Break |