"Justin," Nick said, coming up to him backstage. "Hey, bro." He slapped Justin on the back, hard enough that Justin jolted a little forward, but not nearly hard enough to hurt. "Bro," Justin repeated and smiled. Nick said it as though it was true, easy, but Justin knew that it wasn't and that it never would be. There was no more room for anyone else in Nick's circle. "Carter, hey." Justin had a special smile that he reserved just for Nick Carter, and if people said there was a hint of condescension in it, if they said there was some superiority there, well then, at least they didn't recognize the truth. It had been years, and Justin guessed that Nick must be used to the smile. He didn't even flinch anymore. Instead Nick kept grinning the same smile he smiled for all of his friendly acquaintances, the one that stared back at Justin from countless magazines and advertisements, the one that was quickly being replaced by Justin's own face. Nick grinned and said, "The accent, man. You sounded pretty authentic up there. You do a lot of rehearsing?" "Everyday," Justin said, though it was a lie. Like he was going to spend his time rehearsing awards show banter. They'd just handed him the page of script ten minutes before he had to be on stage. But then Nick had presented too. Nick knew that, and Justin squinted at him a little, then turned to scan the crowd. "Where's Howie? Didn't I see him earlier? Are you guys here together?" Nick shrugged and looked around much like Justin had just finished doing. "He's around somewhere," Nick said. "I thought we should present together, you know, since Howie knows about this kind of stuff, and also I just want him there, you know, but they already had everything set up." "Yeah, man," Justin said. He knew all about Nick wanting Howie. He knew way too much about the fucked up lives of the Backstreet Boys. * * * * * * "Who was your first?" Justin asked, bouncing his legs back against the headboard of the bed. He and Nick had been goofing around, fooling around, for a few weeks, and Justin was starting to get curious. He didn't get to see Nick very often, only when their paths collided as both groups crisscrossed around Europe, and Justin had a lot of time to think. Justin had a lot of questions. But like most boys his age, the most important ones were the ones about sex. Nick blushed and shook his head. "Come on," Justin said. "I'm your boyfriend now, right? You have to tell me." "Um," Nick said. He buried his face in his arms, peaking out with one eye so that he could still see the television. Justin could see that he was still blushing. Maybe he hadn't yet. Maybe the farthest he'd gone was what he and Justin had done while they were fooling around. Maybe they shouldn't have rushed into it so quickly after the game when everyone else was out getting drunk and they were left behind. The babies. Lance had been left behind too, but Lance was boring then, so Nick and Justin were on their own. "Hey," Justin said, because now if Nick hadn't, well then he kind of felt like a jerk. "You don't have to." "No, no," Nick said, turning to face him. His eyes held secrets and Justin leaned in to hear them. "You just can't tell anyone. Like, anyone." "I won't," Justin said. "Not even Chris." Justin frowned. It was only a few weeks and Nick already knew him. "I won't. I promise." Chris wouldn't want to hear about Nick Carter's sex life anyway. "AJ," Nick said, and grinned. Justin gasped and banged his shin against the top of the headboard hard enough that there would probably be a bruise in the morning. "Shit. Really? I thought you were going to say like some girl that only spoke German or something." And that was all it took for Justin to go from feeling experienced, thinking that maybe he was Nick's first, to feeling incredibly young, because he'd only ever been with foreign girls with an aversion to shaving. "Well, the guys think it was this girl, Greta," Nick smiled. "That's why you can't tell." "Oh," Justin grinned and nodded and felt special for at least a week because he shared a secret with Nick Carter. Because he was young and stupid and didn't realize then that Nick wasn't telling him everything, that he would never be everything because Nick already had four others that would never be replaced. Justin wasn't even sure if Nick had ever planned to tell him. He might never have even found out if he hadn't come bounding onto the Backstreet Boys tour bus looking for Nick. The bus looked pretty empty, but Johnny had said the guys were around and Justin headed for the back, pulling the curtains to the bunks aside as he went. It was behind curtain number four that Justin found Howie and AJ making out, AJ's hand down Howie's pants, and Howie had shrieked a little, which would have been funny if Justin wasn't so embarrassed. He probably even would have laughed, and maybe pointed a little, but instead he squeaked an apology, yanking the curtain closed as he backed back down the bus aisle. He guessed that Nick probably wasn't on the bus and headed back out into the parking lot, into the warm afternoon sun and the sound of cars honking on a nearby highway. Even then Justin wouldn't really have thought anything of it. So Howie and AJ were messing around together. Maybe they were boyfriends for all that young stupid Justin Timberlake knew, but as he rounded the outside of the bus he ran into Brian and Nick, who were returning from somewhere with a basketball. They were talking and laughing, but they stopped short when they saw Justin, and Nick turned a little red. "Hey," Justin said, looking from Nick to Brian. Brian wouldn't look back, so Justin turned all of his attention to Nick and that was when he noticed the blatant hickey peaking out from the stretched neck of Nick's t-shirt. Trashy, and obvious. Obviously not a mark that Justin had left there. Nick pulled at his shirt, and he must have realized that he was caught because he was suddenly an even darker shade of red, but later, after Brian had gone and Nick had told Justin the truth, Nick didn't seem too embarrassed at all. "All of you?" Justin asked, because it just sounded too ridiculous to possibly be true. "Well, not all at the same time," Nick said, as though it was a given. "Oh," Justin said. "It's okay though," Nick offered, his hands on Justin's arms. "I mean, they don't mind or anything. They know about us." "Oh," Justin said again, because the thing was, he did mind. Thinking about Nick kissing Brian pissed him off. Thinking about any of them doing anything more made him a little sick and jealous. But it was the way that Kevin watched him that drove him away. Kevin was friendly, he was always nice to Justin, but he looked at him like Justin didn't belong. Justin felt like he was trespassing when he was with Nick, and he didn't like to share. He was going to end it. Call him old-fashioned. He was going to leave, except that Nick got there first. "I don't think it's working," Nick said. "You're being weird about it." A month and twelve days, Justin's first boyfriend, and that was the end of it. * * * * * * Justin mourned the loss of Nick for nearly a month, almost equal to the length of time that they were even together. Lance and Chris made fun, taunted Justin with European magazines that had Nick's face on the cover and tried to get Justin to burn them in some girly teenage rage, but Justin wasn't falling for it. He cried once, and only JC and his mom were allowed to see. He snapped at Joey and thought that getting over Nick Carter should be easier than this, especially since Nick Carter had most definitely already gotten over him. Justin might be old-fashioned, but he guessed it was easy when you had four other boyfriends. It was kind of slutty, really. "Hey, you love me right?" Justin asked on one of the long stretches between venues. "Sure, J." Joey was reading comic books, and he wouldn't share them with anyone, which Justin thought was stupid because you could only read one book at a time. But Joey was like that and he didn't want fingerprints all over them, and when Justin tried to grab one, Joey half sat on them. Apparently wrinkling them under a big stupid thigh was better than a few fingerprints. "So why aren't we all sleeping together?" Joey stopped reading and stared at Justin. Justin shrugged and Joey blinked a few times. "I'm just going to pretend you didn't say that," Joey said, going back to reading his comic book. "That's pretty fucked up, Justin," Chris said from where he was standing in front of the refrigerator. Justin hadn't even known he was standing there, not really, and he jumped a little when Chris spoke. "Yeah," Justin said slowly. "It kind of is, isn't it?" "Yep," Chris said, grabbing a cola and heading toward the back of the bus where Justin could hear music playing. "It's pretty fucked up," Justin said again. And it really was. He hadn't really thought about it. He hadn't really questioned anything that Nick had told him, but holy shit was that fucked up. "The Backstreet Boys are fucking weird," Justin said, in awe of his realization. "Your mom would be pissed if she heard you cussin' like that," Joey said, but Justin was already over it. He was over Nick Carter, because Nick Carter was clearly fucked up and Justin could do better than that. Justin didn't need to be a fifth wheel. * * * * * * But Justin wasn't really over it. Not completely. He wasn't quite completely over it until No Strings Attached shattered the Backstreet Boys' record. He wasn't completely over it until he was on top of the world. And even then they kept poisoning his happiness, and it sounded harsh and dramatic, but that was the way Justin thought about it. Justin was doing great. He had his best friends, he had a number one album, they were the biggest thing going, and he had his absolutely gorgeous girlfriend that he was 87% sure he wanted to marry someday. He didn't even know what the Backstreet Boys were up to anymore. He wondered sometimes. He wished that the Backstreet Boys were boring so that he didn't have to care, so that he didn't have to wonder. He'd wondered a few months earlier when he'd been flipping through the paper and saw that suddenly both Brian and Kevin were engaged. "That can't be good," Justin said, showing Britney. Britney was painting her toenails. She had people to do that for her, but she never liked the color that she picked out during the pedicure and always redid them later, filling the room with the noxious fumes. Britney slipped the brush back into the bottle and took the paper from Justin. "What do you mean?" she asked after reading the section. "Good for them. I think it's sweet." She frowned at Justin and it felt like she was accusing. Britney had no idea and she thought that everything was so sweet, so of course she wouldn't see the problems with the blurb in the paper. There were definitely problems, and Justin wasn't happy about it, happy about what it might mean for Nick, but he wasn't exactly sad or sorry either. They must have seen it coming. The next time he ran into the Boys at a fundraiser he watched, he looked for the tension and the heartbreak, but he didn't see it. And the more it seemed that it wasn't there, the more Justin looked for it, until finally Chris smacked his back and said, "Justin. Back to earth." He ran into Howie later in the evening as he searched for the bathroom. Howie was one of the friendliest guys Justin had ever met. So friendly that Justin almost wanted to mock the friendliness, but he never did. It seemed wrong, like kicking a puppy wrong, and Justin would never kick a puppy. "Hey!" Howie said, coming up behind Justin and sliding his hand over Justin's back. "Oh, hi," Justin replied, glancing around to see if there were other Backstreet Boys in the proximity. "How's it going?" Howie asked, folding his arms over his chest, his dark eyes trying to hold Justin's attention, probing. "Pretty good," Justin said, nodding. "I can't find the bathroom, but other than that - " Justin grinned and shrugged sheepishly. "It's that way," Howie said, hooking his thumb behind him. Justin nodded and moved to go, but then stopped and looked at Howie still standing there. "Hey," he said, and his hand drifted to Howie's arm. "How are you? I mean, I read about the engagements and -" "What?" Howie's forehead was creased now and he looked confused. "Oh. The engagements. No, no. We're fine. We're doing great." Howie nodded for emphasis. "Really." Justin said, because Howie didn't seem like a liar but that was really hard to believe. "Yep. Still together and happy," Howie confirmed. And as Justin followed Howie's instructions to the bathroom he couldn't help but notice the bitter taste the conversation left in the back of his mouth. Two engagements and they were still fucking each others' brains out. Or in Love as Nick had liked to say, and it just didn't seem possible. * * * * * * Justin watched as they fought, as they went in and out of rehab then fought some more. Britney broke his heart and then stomped on it for good measure and the Backstreet Boys went on. Justin watched his first solo album debut well above Nick's. He watched Nick's disappear off the charts immediately. He watched Nick smile and throw things around on stage. He noticed the other Backstreet Boys disappear off the face of the earth and noted the talk of tensions within the group, and yet they still held on. And now Justin was happy. He had everything he'd ever wanted. He was there. He had the successful group, the successful solo career, the friends, the fame, and the ability to take care of his family. It was all there, but he looked at them. He looked at them with their silence and their in fighting and Justin couldn't help but feel that there was something he was missing. That there was something he'd never have. People talked. They talked about the way Justin smiled, about the way he talked to Nick. They said things like superiority, condescension, success, and it was exactly what Justin wanted them to think. It wasn't true, not really, but better that than petty jealousy. Next