Part of the excitement was he didn’t know who would be joining him that night. He of course knew it was going to be either Chris, Justin, Joey or Lance but he didn’t know who would get there first and lock the door keeping the others out.
Glancing over at the clock on the nightstand he realized it was 2’o clock in the morning. Normally someone would have already claimed him for the night by that point. Sometimes two since none of the guys stayed around long when they were finished leaving the opportunity open for another member to visit him.
The minutes ticked by on the clock as he waited.
Soon those minutes turned into hours, yet he still waited.
Finally he fell asleep still waiting for someone to arrive.
*~*~*
It started years ago when they were first in Germany. Chris had been the first one. They were all so homesick during their first trip overseas it was natural for them to become closer.
JC didn’t even think about it that first night when he was comforting Chris after a long, hard day in his hotel room. They both had wanted love and attention that night; they were both so lonely.
It felt right to JC when Chris started kissing him and even more right when Chris gently leaned JC back onto the bed and sprawled out on top of him.
That had been JC’s first night with another male, but Chris was gentle with him and he knew that Chris wouldn’t hurt him; Chris made him feel special. Afterwards, they had both felt better.
The next night, Chris came back again and from then on Chris knew that he could always go to JC whenever he was feeling down for some cheering up.
Eventually Chris became less gentle with JC, bringing various toys to try out. JC however, liked the kinky Chris and it always excited him when Chris brought a new toy to test out.
Joey started not long after Chris. It had been Joey’s first birthday away from home; away from his family. JC had gone to him that night since Joey had the single room since it was his birthday.
At first they talked, like Chris and JC did the first night. However it hadn’t been long before JC leaned over and kissed Joey.
Joey had surprised at first but he soon began kissing back. Soon JC had fallen back on the bed, dragging Joey down on top of him.
If possible Joey had been even more gentle treating JC, almost girl-like. But it still had been just as enjoyable. Unlike Chris, however Joey never changed throughout the years and always remained his gentle self.
Justin and Lance came into the game much later. Lance started one night in early 1999 when he had been sick. JC like always went to Lance to comfort him and they ended up sleeping together, despite some early protesting from Lance.
Justin on the other hand knew for a long time what was happening between his band mates and wanted some action as well, but JC had refused until he felt that Justin was old enough.
That day had come almost six months ago during the lawsuit when Justin almost had a nervous breakdown from the stress. Since then, the four of them fell into an easy pattern of sharing JC. Every night a person would visit him when they were on tour and sometimes when they weren’t. They never stayed the night, never touched each other besides JC and JC was always the bottom.
JC didn’t mind though. For the first time in a long time he felt loved and he didn’t know what he would do if he wasn’t loved by his band-mates.
*~*~*
The next morning, JC slept in later than normal. He didn’t get much sleep the night before because he kept on running things through his mind on what he did to make his band-mates mad at him.
Slipping on a pair of sunglasses to hide his tired eyes, JC quickly boarded the bus he shared with Chris and Justin bypassing all the fans that had waited hours to see him. JC didn’t care about the fans at that moment though. All he cared about was finding out why no one came to him last night.
“Hi guys,” he said casually walking into the kitchen area, finding Justin seated at the table eating cereal and Chris seated across from him talking quietly on his cell phone.
Expectedly, Justin mumbled a good morning. Chris however ignored JC all together which hurt his feelings even more.
“Are you okay?” asked JC to Justin, petting Justin’s curls gently. The younger man looked more tired then normal.
“Quit it!” growled Justin, causing JC to yank back his hand in fear.
“Leave him alone!” hissed Chris quietly to JC while glaring at him as he went back to his call.
“Okay,” replied JC quietly, glad he was wearing sunglasses so they couldn’t see the tears forming in his eyes. Quickly, before he could annoy them any longer, he made his way to the safety of the back of the bus. There, he flopped down on the couch and began to softly cry as he stared out the window at the passing vehicles.
*~*~*
“Are you okay?” asked Joey sitting down next to JC on the couch in the Quiet Room. It was later that same day and JC had been withdrawn the entire day since for some reason Chris and Justin weren’t talking to him.
“I’m fine,” reassured JC giving Joey a weak smile. He wasn’t fine but it was nice having someone to talk to again.
“Okay,” shrugged Joey standing up. “Let me know if something is bother you though.”
Before JC could protest, Joey was out the door of the Quiet Room off to bug the other guys.
“But I do need you,” replied JC quietly into the empty room.
*~*~*
“You coming with us JC?” asked Lance that night as the four *NSYNC members were getting ready for a night of clubbing since they didn’t have a concert the next night.
“No,” replied JC. Rarely he went out with him, as he always wanted to leave the offer open for anyone to be able to return at any time for some comforting.
Hours later after everyone else had gone out, JC stripped naked and laid on his hotel bed and waited. Waited for someone to return. Waited for someone to want him. Waited for someone to need him. But no one came and for the second night in a role, JC fell asleep with tears in his eyes having being forgotten again.
*~*~*
Days went by. Soon the days turned into weeks, and then the weeks into months, yet still no one would come by.
Gradually JC became sick from all the sleepless night he was having wondering what had happened. Wondering what he had done to upset his band mates.
Unfortunately he became sick right as the group had started the second leg of their “No Strings Attached” tour, which made JC believe they hated him even more since he was unable to perform to the best of his ability during the tour.
By the end of the tour, JC assumed that the reason they had stopped was because they didn’t feel he was being his true self. To change this he started growing out his hair, grew a chin strip and wearing clothes liked better and thought were more his style. Even if things didn’t turn back to the old ways, he expected for them to at least be his friend again since they had pretty much ignored him all throughout the second leg of the tour and had even stopped asking if he wanted to go with them when they went clubbing.
Still the guys continued to ignore him.
To counter the missing of his friends, JC started spending more time with his “girlfriend”, Bobbie, whom the guys, especially Chris, hated. In reality however, JC had been out to his close friends and family for years and Bobbie was just a cover to keep the gay rumors down.
However the more time he and Bobbie spent together, the more they fought. Soon, JC had asked Bobbie to stop traveling with them halfway through their Pop Odyssey Tour and rumors started to fly about a break-up. Finally near the end of the tour in August, they officially broke up; leaving JC all alone again since now he no longer had Bobbie.
*~*~*
9/11 came as a blow to everyone. Following the events of the terrorist attack, JC called the other guys, several times a day, checking up on them. He, however, never received a phone call in return.
After 9/11, JC only saw the other guys when they were performing since they were on a break from tour. He did show up at the On The Line premier but Lance and Joey barely thanked him for showing up even though Chris and Justin never showed. Other than that, the other guys stayed away from him and he grew tired of his efforts since it was obvious they didn’t want to spend time with him.
Withdrawing himself from the group, it was a miracle that the other members remembered that he was still a part of the group as they planned their Celebrity Tour which was scheduled to start in just over a month.
*~*~*
One day, late in January, Chris being bored invited himself over to JC house since it had been awhile since he had heard from his younger band-mate. Plus he was bored and JC was the only other person in Orlando besides Joey who Chris knew was spending the day with Kelly and Brianna.
Walking inside without knocking, Chris heard blues music coming from somewhere deep in the house, so he began the long trek to where JC was.
Making his way past various rooms, Chris finally discovered JC in the studio area of the house, playing a piano and singing a blues song that sounded vaguely familiar to Chris. After a few minutes of listening to JC sing, Chris recognized the song as “I Want You Back” in a blues remix style.
Chris watched JC in awe as the skinny man belted out the last note of the song. “Wow,” he announced walking fully into the room startling JC. “That was great!”
“Thank you,” whispered JC avoiding Chris’ eyes.
This concerned Chris, he knew that JC had been acting weird recently, but when the other guys were around he really didn’t noticed it that much. Now that he was alone with JC, he could see that something was very wrong with his friend.
“What’s wrong?” he asked.
“Nothing,” mumbled JC, absentmindedly tapping at the keys on the piano.
“Then start acting like something isn’t wrong,” ordered Chris unsympathetically, not noticing the tears that were forming in JC’s eyes.
“I’m sorry,” whispered JC choking back his tears.
“Good,” replied Chris. “Because it’s fucking up the group with you ignoring us all the time!”
This lit a spark inside of JC deep inside of himself.
“Me?!?!” he cried, jumping to his feet as tears fell from his eyes. “Two years Chris! It’s been two years since any of you have ever treated me like friend! For two years, I’ve blamed myself, thinking it was something I had done, but I’ve tried everything I can think of and you guys still hate me! So tell me Chris, what the hell am I suppose to do to change something!”
Ending his lecture, JC flopped back down on the piano bench and refused to look at Chris as he started to bang out tunes on it.
“C, I’m sorry,” began Chris, shocked by what just happened as JC’s words sunk in.
“Just leave Chris!” ordered JC, still refusing to look at his friend.
“Okay,” replied Chris as he walked quickly out of the room.
Knowing that Chris had left, JC quickly broke down sobbing, however what he didn’t know was that in the hall, Chris had stopped and had been about to turn around to try to talk to him again when he heard the sobbing.
Quietly Chris slipped house, not wanting JC to hear him. He needed to call the other guys right now. Something was very wrong with their band mate.
*~*~*
“So what’s up?” asked Justin a few days later as he, Joey, Lance and Chris sat around in Chris’ living room for a group meeting. “Why did Lance and I have to rush back here to Orlando and why are we having a group meeting without JC?”
“JC’s not here because he’s what the meeting is about,” explained Chris before filling them in on what happened three days ago.
“So C thinks we hate him?” asked Joey confused and hurt.
“Yeah,” nodded Chris. “He’s really fucked up over this too.”
“So what happened two years ago to make him think we hate him?” asked Justin equally hurt and confused as Joey.
“It’s when we stopped . . . you know,” replied Lance quietly. “Remember, we agreed to stop using JC cause we thought it wasn’t fair to him.”
“But we quit for him!” protested Justin. “I mean come on, JC was the best lay I ever had. I would of never given that up freely!”
“That’s our best friend you’re talking about Justin!” replied Lance in shock. “It wasn’t right to play on his feelings like that!”
“It was just sex! What feelings?!”
“Justin’s right,” added Chris. “It was your idea anyways that we should stop Lance. I would have been quite happy continuing on and then we wouldn’t be in this mess right now.”
“So it’s my fault now!” cried Lance. “What about the two years since then? None of us ever did anything to include JC and you all know it. I’d be upset too if I thought the rest of us was just using me for my voice and sex!”
“We were just joking around!” protested Joey. “Teasing him on his new hair and clothes. We all tease each other!”
“Maybe he didn’t realize we were teasing him,” sighed Lance. “Look I’m going over to talk to him right now. Explain things to him. I suggest you all either call or see him tomorrow because we need to fix this!”
“Sure Lance,” replied Justin as the other two nodded their heads. “We all love JC. He’s our brother, let him know that Lance.”
“Okay,” nodded Lance.
*~*~*
An hour later Lance was pulling into JC’s driveway.
Ringing the doorbell it wasn’t long before JC answered the door giving Lance the shock of a lifetime. His hair was all mess up, he was pale and it looked liked he hadn’t slept or eaten anything in days.
“Are you okay?” asked Lance with concern as JC let him inside and led Lance to the living room.
“Yeah,” replied JC quietly. “Everything’s great, I’ve just been really busy lately.”
“I need to talk to you about something,” admitted Lance ignoring JC’s reply. “About what happened two years ago.”
“Something happened two years ago?” asked JC trying to look confused but failing.
“I told the other guys to stop,” whispered Lance. “The others didn’t want to but I made them. I know that’s what started this whole mess.”
“Why did you do that?” asked JC hurt with tears filling his eyes. “I felt like a cheap whore whose john had gotten tired of. Except in this case the johns were my so-called best friends. I thought they loved me but you took that away from me!”
“It wasn’t like that Josh,” whispered Lance as tears started to fall down his cheeks. “I did it because I love you and couldn’t bare the thought of you being with the other guys. But I was too scared to tell you how I felt.”
“You . . . love me?” asked JC as Lance’s words processed in his mind. “Like, Love love? Not in a brotherly way?”
“Love love,” admitted Lance. “I’m gay Josh. I always have been but it took me so long to admit it.”
“The guys don’t hate me?”
“No, they plan on stopping by or calling tomorrow,” replied Lance. “They didn’t know you were taking the teasing seriously. They love you too C, but like a brother, not like I love you.”
“I love you too,” admitted JC. “From the moment I saw you, but I figured you would never love me in return.”
“We’ve wasted so long because I was so stupid,” sighed Lance sadly.
“We can start making up that lost time right now,” whispered JC reaching over and taking Lance’s hand.
“I’d like that,” replied Lance softly leaning in for a gentle kiss.