Angela laid back on her pillow and relaxed beneath the covers. Until now things had been moving so fast she'd not had time to consider how truly exhausted she was. The fact that she hadn't slept well the previous night only added to it. She suspected that Nick was tired, too. He had to be - the guys had traveled all that morning to get there.
The doorknob rattled and Angela jumped. The door creaked open slowly and Nick called out "Angela?" mocking her from earlier. He didn't wait for an answer and slipped into the room sporting her bra on his head and her clothes draped over his arm. As he expected, Angela cracked up laughing. "Wha-a-a-a-t?!?" he asked as he threw her clothes on the floor. "I'm sorry, Ange, but I couldn't find your bra anywhere. AJ musta took it."
Angela cleared her throat and eyed the top of his head. Cued from her look, Nick patted around until he "found" the bra. "What the heck?" he asked, wide-eyed. "Now how did that get there?"
"Nick!" Angela giggled, amused by his routine. "You're ridiculous. How old are you again?"
Nick grinned and threw the bra at her, then turned and flicked the light off. He stumbled through the darkness to the other side of the room, pretending to trip as he went.
"What are you doing?" whispered Angela.
"Gettin' around," Nick whispered back, snickering. "Why are you whispering?"
Angela giggled again. "I don't know!" she said loudly, overcompensating for the earlier whisper. "I guess because you turned the light off."
"Okay!" Nick whispered again. "Just checking."
Angela's eyes were still adjusting to the darkness, but she could make out Nick's large frame perched over the numerous duffel bags he'd packed his clothes in. She watched him curiously, but said nothing until she heard him cussing under his breath. "What's wrong?"
"Oh… I can't find my shirt," Nick replied, still concentrating on his mission. He continued digging and mumbling to himself and even picked up one of the bags and tossed it angrily. "Piece o' shit!"
"Why don't you turn the light back on?" Angela suggested. "It might help, you know."
"What?" Nick asked, stopping to glance at her. He found her question more distracting than worth answering, though, and didn't reply. There was no way in hell he was changing in front of her with the light on - not since he'd gained weight. Maybe if AJ hadn't made such a big deal about it earlier it wouldn't have been an issue. But he had, and now she would be looking for it. "No way," he muttered, picking up a shirt, looking at it, and then discarding it back to the floor.
"What?" Angela asked, propping up onto her elbows. "Do you want me to turn the light on?"
Nick ignored her again and grabbed the shirt he had just thrown. "Found it!" he said loudly. Quickly, he slipped off his current shirt and pulled the other one over his head. Inevitably, he recalled his final fight with his ex-girlfriend when she'd yelled out across her backyard for the whole neighborhood to hear. "Fine! No one will want your FAT ASS anyway!" It was a messy breakup and neither one had been very nice about it, but the words still held their power over him. "Bitch!" Nick said loudly to himself, glancing over at Angela resentfully.
"What's wrong, Nick?" Angela asked, seeing the irritated expression on his face in the moonlight.
Nick took a deep breath and sighed. No sense in taking things out on Angela. She didn't know - and didn't need to know - anything about that part of his life. "Nothing's wrong, Ange," he answered apologetically. He smiled at her then turned away to slip the rest of his clothes off, down to his boxer briefs and the T-shirt.
Angela's heart raced a little faster with each piece of clothing Nick removed and she could feel herself trembling a little from nervousness. "Stay calm," she thought. "It's about time you caught up with the rest of the world."
Nick dropped to all fours and crawled toward the mattress. He stopped at the edge and a sappy grin spread across his face. "Can I come in?" He kept his eyes locked on hers, waiting for a response.
"Why, Nick," Angela blurted out, "what big TEETH you have."
Nick laughed and hung his head before looking into her eyes again. "All the better to bite you with," he taunted. "Now let me in or I'll huff and I'll puff and I'll - "
"You got the wrong wolf," Angela interrupted as she pulled back the blankets inviting him in. "That's the three little pigs."
"A wolf is a wolf," he snipped back. "They're all big and they're all BAD." He climbed into the bed beside her, shivering and grumbling. "I HATE this Indiana weather." He snuggled immediately up to her body for warmth.
Angela's first instinct was to jolt away when Nick's cold legs touched hers, but she fought it and instead pressed her body closer. "Better?" she whispered.
Nick latched onto her tightly until he was half lying on her and nuzzled her neck. "Much better," he murmured into her ear, breathing purposely into it. Angela tensed up beneath him and shrugged from the tingling sensation that ran through her body. "Tickle?" he teased, propping up onto his elbow to look down on her.
"Yeah," Angela replied softly. She gazed up at him logging every feature into her mind. His hair was dark on top, but as her eyes slid down to the bottom of the strands she noticed it evolved into a light blond. "You swim a lot, don't you?" she asked.
Nick cocked his head, confused. "I swim a lot?" he repeated back to her.
Angela giggled. "Your hair. It's really blond on the bottom." She put her fingers into his hair and slid them through it, down the length of it. "My friend Talia had the same color of hair and in the summer it would be really blond from being out in the sun swimming all the time, but in the winter it would turn almost a brown color."
Nick smiled, amused by her misplaced observation. "I love to swim, but actually I, um, get my hair highlighted, Ange."
"You do?" Angela crinkled her nose in disbelief. "Why?"
Nick relaxed onto his elbow and slid his hair behind his ear. "Cos I'm the blond one," he answered jokingly.
"The blond one?" Angela didn't understand.
"Backstreet Boy," Nick elaborated. "They call me 'the blond one.'"
Angela laughed loudly. "Are you serious? You dye your hair because they call you the blond one?"
"No," Nick smirked. "I like it blond… and so do the chicks." He winked at her. "Don't you?"
Angela smiled guiltily. "Yeah, I like it."
Nick leaned down and nuzzled her nose with his. "See? It works."
"I don't like you because of your hair, Nick," Angela retorted.
"You don't?" Nick contemplated asking the next question -- and couldn't resist. "So why DO you like me?"
Angela froze momentarily. Should she tell him the truth? Or would he find it so pathetic that he'd laugh? She looked into his eyes, still pondering, and saw his serious expression as he waited for her answer.
"Well?" Nick prodded.
Angela's stomach churned with nerves as she tried to put her feelings into words. "I like you because you treat me like I'm a person." She bit her lip, waiting for his response. Did that sound too stupid?
Nick stared at her long and hard, playing her answer out in his mind. "You are a person," he answered, unsure of how else to respond. He didn't want to discuss HIS feelings with her by any means. They were looking less than admirable at the moment.
Angela sighed and looked away, toward the moonlight from the window. "I know that, Nick. I just mean that you treat me like a person. Like… a friend… like… Sandra treats me." She looked back at him to see if he thought she was crazy, but couldn't detect any sign of it in his eyes. "And you make me laugh," she added quickly. "Everything you do makes me laugh. You can take anything and make it funny. I… I like that." She smiled at him and looked away again, embarrassed. "You sound like an idiot," she thought to herself as the moonlight beamed back into her eyes.
Nick felt the control he'd had over the night slipping away as an unexpected power struggle emerged inside of him. He remembered Brian's alter ego example - Backstreet Nick? Or Good Boy Nick? But then he also recalled the part that both were capable of the same decision. "I'll be gentle," he thought as he leaned down and kissed her face. He turned her toward him and kissed her again, on the lips. Gentle….
Angela felt a wave of desire sweep through her and she slid her fingers back into Nick's hair and pulled his lips harder onto hers. He slid his elbow down so that he was again lying halfway on her and slid his free hand into her hair, caressing her face with his thumb. He kissed her harder, trying to gauge her reaction for any sign of hesitation, then pulled back to look into her eyes and then started the kiss all over. He was surprised that her kiss was becoming more urgent than his own, but he still held back. He would do this right, even though he wasn't used to being so attentive to a woman. Usually he could just participate at will and let things happen as they did. He pulled back again and glanced into her eyes before moving his lips to her neck.
Angela turned her head willingly and clenched her hand into Nick's hair as he kissed her neck. Her breathing was becoming more erratic and heavy with each touch of his mouth, but she didn't care. Instead, she wondered why the hell she'd waited so long to experience such feelings.
Nick nuzzled at her neck and ear for a while, enjoying the light bursts of breath she would let out with each kiss, but soon swooped in for a final strong taste of her skin before he would move on. Angela's body shuddered. "Oh my God," he thought, both surprised and amazed by Angela's intense reaction to him. He slid his hand from her hair and moved it downward, brushing it across her breast slightly before sliding it firmly under her hips. Angela closed her eyes tightly and gripped his hair in her fingers pulling it until it hurt. He could feel himself getting excited and pulled his hips back slightly, afraid he would freak her out. Desperate for a distraction, he paused to look at her and whispered the first natural thing that came to his mind, "You're so beautiful." Pretty? Yes, but beautiful?
Angela stopped suddenly, taken by the power those words held for her. She searched Nick's eyes, unable to respond. No one but her father had ever called her beautiful. Did he mean it?
"Yes," Nick thought as his eyes continued poring over her beneath him. A strand of hair was across her cheek almost falling into her open mouth and her youthful face shimmered in the moonlight. "You are," he whispered again before kissing her softly.
Angela smiled beneath his kiss and pondered his words. She doubted them entirely, but decided against making an issue of it. Instead, she kissed him back fully, hoping to eliminate the necessity of a verbal response. The moment passed as quickly as it had happened.
Nick moved off of Angela's lips again and back to the side of her face. He wanted to hear her breathing in his ear whenever he touched her someplace new. It wasn't the first time he'd heard such things from a woman, but somehow, this was different. All the recent "Oh Nick's," and "Yes Nick's" from the girls he’d met on tour meant nothing to him now. This was so much more than that… this was… real. He slid his hand cautiously beneath her T-shirt and eased it up toward her breast, teasingly, stopping just before reaching it.
Angela froze with anticipation and held her breath, waiting for Nick to touch her, but he didn't. She breathed once and waited again, but he still kept his hand just beneath, sliding his fingers softly back and forth as if considering whether or not he should do it. "It's okay, Nick," she urged into his ear, frustrated by his hesitation. "Go on."
"Good," Nick thought, as he slid his hand upward. "Just keep telling me what to do." He could feel her hips pressing against his and knew that his own arousal could be no secret to her now, so he pressed back. He then backed away slightly and pulled her toward him firmly, pushing more of his weight against her.
When their bodies touched again, Nick suddenly pulled away to look at her, straight into what Angela thought had to be the depths of her soul. Never before had anyone's eyes looked that deeply into hers and it gave her a sense that he had reached her very spirit. He was just stuck there, peering at her with his bright blue eyes. She wondered what he was feeling, but being unsure of her own feelings, she remained quiet as he stayed focused on her face.
Nick felt like everything had stopped, including time and space, and just stared blankly at Angela - caught in a puzzled and confused whirlwind of emotion. He couldn't believe what was happening and how unexpectedly powerless he felt. Angela was initiating everything and he was the one having doubts. He swallowed hard and heard himself say, "Take your shirt off."
Angela sat up, her eyes locked on Nick’s and slid her shirt up over her head, tossing it to the side of the mattress. She sat quietly, her eyes wide and anxious for a reaction from him.
Nick slid his eyes slowly down her torso and back up to her face and smiled. Everything was so surreal and inside him was an immense tug-of-war between his stage persona and the man he had always hoped to be. "What is happening?" he thought to himself. "I should feel great about this.”
Angela locked her eyes on Nick's and laid down with her arms draped above her head in surrender. He enveloped her in his arms and placed himself against her again, trying to keep his thoughts from interrupting the pure physical aspect of the moment. He could feel her tensing up beneath him and stopped moving against her, pulling away to kiss her. “Gentle,” his mind whispered to him. The kiss was so different now. It was softer, sweeter, and more pure than it had been in the beginning.
Angela kissed him back, but she was somewhat scared about why he'd stopped pressing on her body again. Could it be that he was afraid she didn't want him? Was he that blind? Or that young and inexperienced? The way Sandra and Kim Ann had made it all out to be, he would be all over her. He HAD been all over her earlier. She stroked his hair and moved her mouth to his ear. "I want you," she whispered as she repositioned her body, wrapping her leg over his.
Nick looked longingly into her eyes again as if he were in a trance, yet the expression on his face looked to Angela like he was on the verge of feeling pain. He pulled away again and traced her lips softly with his index finger as she smiled up at him. "What's wrong?" she asked, growing worried about the dazed look that occupied his face. All her inexperienced anxieties began to come to the surface.
Nick looked downward and sighed as he blinked away the thoughts that he kept to himself, and Angela relaxed beneath him, unsure of what would happen next. Oddly, though she felt anxious with this, her first time, she felt completely comfortable in his arms, even with her nakedness.
Nick started again and moved slowly, calculating every motion. Angela could feel his hand sliding downward to her stomach, where it stopped, caressing back and forth, side to side. He tilted his head slightly to view her stomach before kissing her again, but she stopped kissing in anticipation, knowing that he was going to touch her, and he mistook her anticipation for fear. "Relax," he assured her, breaking his silence after what had seemed like minutes. He looked into her eyes as he hesitantly crept his hand down between her legs, fighting every urge and confounded emotion sweeping him.
Angela's eyes lulled shut, preparing her mind for the moment she had dreamt of. She slowly opened her legs, inviting him to pursue what they both wanted.
Nick's hand trembled and he swallowed, his mouth feeling suddenly very dry. "I can't," he said abruptly, and with a heavy breath, pulled his hand away and moved away from her.
Angela opened her eyes to find him already sitting up on the edge of the mattress with his face in his hands. "What did I do, Nick? What's wrong?" she asked.
"It's NOT you, Ange. Oh God, please, don't even think it's you. There's just something… something's different and I feel really weird… and I don't know what it is. I can't explain it, but… I just…can't. I'm so sorry. God, Ange, don't hate me for this. I just… I don't know…"
Angela sat up and fought back tears. Her initial feeling was complete shock. How could it be that Nick was the one to get cold feet? He'd done this before -- probably lots of times before. As she thought of his undoubtedly numerous lovers, her feelings quickly turned to those of negative hopelessness. She knew this was too good to be true. She had figured it wouldn't happen. After all, who was she? She was a 'nobody' and he was a Backstreet Boy, a pop star, a celebrity. "Of course this couldn't happen," she thought, trying to justify the rejection. Insecurity crept through her and she pulled the blankets up over her body and sat still, waiting for Nick to share more if he wanted to. At the same time she feared what he might say. Maybe she wasn't wild enough. Maybe she was a waste of his time. Nick broke the silence. "Angela, I swear to God this has never happened to me before. I just cannot do this. I mean, I CAN do it – you know - in, out, repeat if necessary, but….it’s ….weird.” He shook his head and sighed from frustration. He didn’t know what to say without saying too much.
Angela’s eyes brimmed with tears and her voice cracked as she said, "Wow, Nick, for a while there I thought you really liked me."
Nick jerked around to face her. "I do like you, Angie. I really, really, REALLY like you." There was a long pause as he looked deep into her eyes, realizing he’d said the “too much” part. "That's the problem,” he finished reluctantly.
Angela sat beneath the blanket and said nothing. It was such a contrast to the Nick who had told her earlier in the day that he’d give her the week, no more. Silence wafted around them for the next minute as they both grappled with their individual perceptions of what had just happened.
The disappointment and utter confusion still on Angela's face made Nick feel horrible. He searched for something else to say to make it all better. "Maybe we can talk about this more in the morning…if you want to, that is. If you're still here, that is,” he suggested hopefully.
Another long silence fell between them before Angela acknowledged that he was even talking to her. "I still want to wake up with you in the morning, Nick,” she said softly.
"I still want you to," he replied, relieved that she had given him that much. "Maybe we should just sleep on it and sort it all out tomorrow.” Angela nodded slowly, but her eyes still looked so sad and distant. Trying to lighten the mood, Nick added quickly. “But right now, I have to pee." He got up and stood by the mattress, waiting for her okay to leave.
Angela smirked at Nick and eyed his groin, which was still producing a healthy bulge in his boxers. "With that?" she asked with a laugh.
Nick laughed back and pulled his T-shirt down, covering himself. "Painful, yet possible," he retorted playfully, grateful that she’d laughed. He hesitated, still enjoying the lightened moment, then left the room.
Despite the shock that still ran cold through her heart, Angela was
exhausted and fell fast asleep almost immediately. Out in the hallway,
Nick walked past the bathroom and down the stairs, wondering how cold
it was outside.
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