Nick looked over at him, his eyes wide and unbeleiving. "Did you see what Justin just did?"
"Yeah. So?" AJ watched him for a second, then took in a deep breath. "Hey, let's go check out the food table." He said, standing up suddenly.
"We already did, remember? There's nothing but an assortment of nuts and some fruit." Nick pointed out.
"I could really go from some nuts right now." Aj said. "Come on, let's go." Nick stoo up unsurely, and followed him over to the table. Once they were out of hearing range of anyone else in the room, AJ asked, "okay, what's going on between you and Aimee?"
Nick shook his head, a little too quickly. "Nothing." He said. "Nothing. We're not even really friends."
AJ laughed. "Do you really expect me to beleive that? Come on, Nicky, we've known each other way too long to keep things like this from each other. Something happened between you two on the way over here, didn't it?"
Nick looked at him for a moment, debating whether or not he should tell him the truth. Finally, he sighed, and hung his head. "Not exactly." He took a deep breath. "I mean, something happened. It was a long time ago, though. We. . ." his eyes met AJ's, "slept together."
AJ's eyes widened. "What?! How could you do that? Knowing how Brian feels about her?"
"Brian's with Leighanne, remember?" Nick asked, growing angry. "It's not like I'm doing anything that hurts his relationship with Aimee."
"But you're hurting his relationship with you." AJ said. He shook his head. "But he'll understand. It was a one time thing. And after what happened with Leighanne, he can understand about those."
"Uh. . ." For Nick, this conversation was going farther and farther downhill with every minute of it. "It wasn't exactly a one time thing." AJ's eyes got even wider, and he looked like he was about to start yelling. "I'm in love with her!" Nick burst out. AJ closed his mouth.
"Damn. That girl has some power over people." He muttered, more to himself than to Nick. "Good luck, man." He said after a while.
Nick wasn't sure whether he meant good luck with Aimee or with Brian, but he decided that it didn't really matter. He needed it with both of them.
"Brian? Hey! Brian!" Leighanne hit Brian lightly on the arm. "What's wrong?"
Brian looked away from Aimee, standing in the middle of the dance floor, staring at Justin's retreating back. He glanced at Leighanne, then did something that he'd been wanting to do for the longest time. He pushed his girlfriend off of him, and walked over to Aimee. "What happened?" He asked, grabbing her arms.
She looked up at him. "I'm not sure. He asked me to dance, and then he just kissed me all of a sudden. Well, first he asked if I was with Nick. Then he kissed me, and told me to say hi to Nick, and then he walked away."
Leighanne walked up to Brian and Aimee, and glared at Brian. "Why did you leave me like that?" She asked. He didn't even answer. He walked away from her again, and caught up to Justin.
"Justin." He said, catching him by the arm. Justin turned around and eyed Brian.
"Hey, man. What's up?" Justin smiled at him. They weren't exactly friends, but the Backstreet Boys and 'N Sync weren't really as uncordial to each other as the press made it seem.
"What was that?" Brian asked, nodding to Aimee.
Justin laughed. "Oh, nothing. Just paying back a debt to Nick."
"So you kissed my girlfriend?" Brian snapped.
Justin looked surprised. "Wait, she'd your girlfriend? I thought she belonged to Nick. I didn't mean-" He stopped. "Wait. If she'd your girlfriend, then what was Nick doing feeling her up over at the table."
Brian's heart dropped out of his chest onto the floor. "What?!" The place that used to hold his heart filled with anger. He raised one fist, and smashed it into Justin's face as hard as he could.