Author's Note-- Hi everybody! Miss Eradic Update Queen here with another chapter of Grand Finale for you. Didn't see ths one did ya? Oh well suprises in life are good things. And on another note... did like NO ONE like chapters 10 and 11 of Pieces? Or are y'all just so infuriated with me that you will not send me the thing I thrive on, which is feedback? Cause all I've gotten is like TWO emails on those chapters... oh well. As to the status of chapter 12 (for all you people that CARE) I'm in them middle of it. It's getting there slowly but surely...
Disclaimer-- Not mine goshdarn it. I don't own Kevin's disgusting eyelid trick, AJ's popping vein, Nick's belching technique, Brian's Donald Duck voice, Justin's shaved off curls (but I bet someone bought them off Ebay by now...) or the scissors for JC's hair- cause I think Lance has those and is holding them hostage for a little while. The only thing I do own is this cute little moments tape that has all of the obvious things James and Josh do on camera... and NO ONE is getting that!
But Taylor is mine!!... even though her sass runs away from me sometimes.
Relative Disclaimer-- In this chapter I touch on Taylor's past. Some of it might be kinda heavy, but hey it's what came out of my computer and I like it when I read it over. And if you're wondering how much of Taylor is me, and how much is fabrication, well you're just gonna have to guess.
Chapter Three
The ride back to our hotel was rather uneventful, unless you count the mushy words whispered between Justin and Nick an event. Lance and JC were also contributing rather nicely to my first limo ride with these guys.
About twenty minutes later we pulled up in front of the Fort Lauderdale Hilton. For some weird reason no fans knew where the guys were staying so we were able to slip into the lobby quietly without incident.
Trent was leading the way into the main lobby of the hotel while he was telling the two groups what was going to happen tonight and tomorrow. "You have tonight off, but tomorrow you need to wake up by 7 am so we can load up the buses and make sure they are in working order. Then after that you have a radio interview and final sound check after lunch, with a meet and greet right before your first concert." He said as he walked towards the front desk. "Taylor, come here. I need to give you your room key for the night."
I skipped towards Trent as he talked to the receptionist behind the counter, presumably getting my key for me. I heard the some of the guys try to suppress their laughter as I skipped to the counter. "Yes Trent?"
Trent turned around with a plastic keycard in hand. "This is yours, it's the key to room 1123. Your baggage is already up there."
"Okay." I said as I took the keycard.
Just as I turned around, I saw six women walk slowly up to the guys. A woman with long blonde hair, whom I recognized immediately, put a finger up to her lips in a motion for me to be quiet. That same woman crept up right behind Brian and placed her hands over his eyes. "Guess who?" the woman whispered into Brian's ear.
"Leigh?" Brian said, slightly shocked.
"Maybe." Leighanne Littrell said as she uncovered Brian's eyes and kissed him on the neck.
"Leigh!" Brian exclaimed as he turned around and gave her a large hug. The rest of the guys turned around at Brian's exclamation.
"Hey boys. Did ya miss us?" Kristen Richardson smiled as Kevin ran up to Kristen and gave her a hug.
"Definitely baby." Kevin muttered into Kristen's shoulder as he continued to hug her, slightly swinging her back and forth.
The four other women in the group were hugged by their respective guy while Nick, Justin, JC, Lance and I watched the happy little reunion.
After the girls were released from their hugs, the six of them came over and gave a hug individually to the four remaining guys.
"And who might you be?" Leighanne asked me with a critical eye.
"Leigh this is our new web-page designer Taylor Mackenzie." Brian said as he wrapped his arm around his wife's waist.
"Hi Leighanne. It's a pleasure to meet you." I smiled as I left my hand out for her to shake.
Leighanne was able to warm up to me almost immediately. "Pleasure to meet you too Taylor." She said as she shook my hand.
The other five guys came up and held their girls in various loving embraces as they introduced me to them. Kristen, Amanda and Danielle I already knew of, but I had never known that Joey and Howie had girlfriends as well.
"Taylor, I want you to meet my girl, Crystal." Joey said as he introduced me to his girlfriend. Crystal was slightly shorter than Joey, with long, curly, chestnut brown hair and bright hazel eyes.
"Hey Taylor." Crystal said warmly.
"Hi." I said back.
"And last but not definitely not least, Taylor I want you to meet the love of my life, Amy." Howie said as he arm snaked around his girlfriend's waist. Amy had long black hair that was tied in a ponytail and braided, as well as deep brown eyes.
"She's also our resident African queen." AJ joked suddenly, while Amy hit AJ lightly on the arm. That was another thing about Howie's girlfriend that I hadn't expected... she was African American.
"AJ!" Amy said playfully.
"But I mean that in the nicest way possible." AJ smiled as he gave Amy a peck on the cheek. All Amanda did was shake her head in amusement.
"Why are you here?" Kevin asked as we all made our way towards the elevators.
"You don't want us here?" Kristen asked. "Kevin, I'm hurt." She said in playful shock.
"Oh believe me I definitely like that you're here." Kevin said as he kissed and nuzzled the side of her neck. "I was just wondering how you got here. Me and the rest of the guys thought that you wouldn't be able to come on tour till next week sometime."
"Well we were all able to get off early, so we decided to surprise you." Danielle said.
"And what a nice surprise you are." Chris said as he kissed Danielle on the cheek. The bell dinged for our floor seconds later.
As we all stepped out, and I started to approach my room, Amanda called out, "Taylor why don't you accompany us to dinner tonight, so we can get to know you better."
I turned around to Amanda, as well as AJ, Justin, Nick, Kevin and Kristen, who were still in the hall. "Sure. That sounds great." I said as I smiled.
"Be ready in two hours." Amanda said as AJ opened the door to the room and started to lead Amanda inside.
I shook my head as I slid the card for my room into the slot. The green light went on, and I pushed the door open. It was a rather nice hotel room, with a single bed and a medium sized TV in the corner being held up by a mini-refrigerator. Sitting on top of the bed were my two duffels. I pushed the bags off of the bed and placed them on the floor, putting my book bag on top of the bed. I plopped down onto the bed and started rummaging through it, looking for my personal journal. I didn't normally keep a journal, but I figured that I would want to remember this experience and had bought one at a local bookstore. I took out my CD collection, which contained practically every type of music you could think of, my Discman, a few books, a candy bar or two, my folder and then I finally found the journal.
It was a simple journal with a black binding and crisp white pages on the inside. But instead of the normal tan cover the journal had come with, I had taken some pictures of both groups and had pasted them on the cover.
Placing the journal on the pillows at the front of the bed, I packed the rest of the things back into my bag, keeping out my CD collection and the Discman. Once I was done repacking, I placed it next to my suitcases. I rummaged through my CD collection, finding my Three Doors Down CD and replacing it with the Blink 182 that was already in my Discman.
I started playing the CD, and taking my journal, I laid lengthwise on the bed and started writing.
After I had written in my journal, I had taken out one of my books and had been reading pretty intensely as soon as I had started. One thing with me and books is that I can become so engrossed in a novel that I completely lose track of time. That same occurrence happened again as I laid down on the bed in my hotel room. I was so engrossed in Anne Rice's `Interview With A Vampire', that I was actually startled when I heard a loud banging on the door, disrupting me from my reading. Putting my bookmarker in place, I threw my book down onto my bed and walked over to the door, yelling out, "What'd you want?" "It's just me Tay." Lance said through the hotel door. "Yeah?" "Um... we're leaving in like ten minutes, just to let you know." Lance said through the door. "Shit." I swore under my breath. I had actually taken up almost two hours by reading. Told ya I lost track of time when I read. "Okay, I'll see ya in a few." "Just meet us down in the lobby." Lance said as I heard him walk away from my door. Walking over to my suitcases, I zipped one open, throwing clothes onto my bed as I looked for a nice dinner-type outfit. Finally settling on black dress pants and a dark blue shirt with a Chinese dragon design, I grabbed my makeup bag and went into the bathroom to freshen up. After applying a thin layer of dark red lipstick and some blue eyeliner, I walked back into my bedroom and stuffed my clothes back into my bag. I was so going to look forward to living out of my suitcases for the next four months. I hope you detect the sarcasm here. Taking my purse out of my bookbag, I stuffed in my wallet and my keycard, as well as my cell phone and the digital camera. Hey, you can never let a good camera opportunity pass you by. Checking my hair in the mirror for a quick second, I fluffed up my hair and left the room. Closing the door, I saw the elevator door close, and I yelled, "Hold that elevator." A tan hand poked out and held back the door as I ran into the elevator. Inside the elevator were Kevin, the hand that had held the door for me, Kristen, Nick and Justin. "Hey guys." "Hey Taylor." "So where are we going tonight?" I asked. "Well, we were thinking about going to this really nice Italian restaurant downtown, and then Joey, Chris, AJ and the blondes over here insisted on going clubbing." Kristen said. "Sounds cool." "So Taylor..." "Yes Justin?" "You never did tell us much about yourself. Besides the fact that you aren't homophobic I mean." I sighed exaggeratedly, "Do I have to tell you my life story Curly?" "Um, no." Justin said, blushing slightly. "Hey, Justin just wants to get to know ya better." Nick said, slightly defensive about his boyfriend. "In fact we all do. I mean we are going to be spending the next oh, five months with you. So it only seems fair." "Geez Nick, I was just playin'. No need to go all boyfriend protective on me. Sure I'll tell ya about my lovely self. The thing is, what do you want to know?" I asked as we stepped off the elevator. "You mean you aren't going to go off and give us this long tangent about your life history?" Kevin asked. "Nope. You wanna know, you gotta work for it." I said. "Gotta work for what?" AJ asked as we came up to the rest of our group. "What we want to know about Tay." Nick said. "She isn't gonna bore us with some tragic childhood memory?" Joey joked. Crystal playfully hit him on the arm, saying, "That's not very nice." "Oh I don't mind. And I'm not some freak girl with a crazy past that you need to know about. You wanna know, you ask. Simple as that. I would think by now that you would know that I do absolutely nothing by the book." I said as we stepped outside to the two awaiting limos. "Ain't that the truth." I heard AJ mutter under his breath. "Now Alex, it isn't very nice to talk about people behind their backs." I said as I faced him. "You heard that?" "Yup I have excellent hearing... for a mortal that is." I said jokingly. "Um..." Alex trailed off. "What?" "Tell me you're a Goth girl or something." Chris sighed. "Well I do believe the occult could exist, and I am a Wiccan. Nothing big though." "Nothing big she tells us." "Yes nothing big. I'm not a good Bible-toting Christian or anything like that. In fact I don't believe God even exists." "Well you wouldn't if you're Wiccan." Lance said. "Why don't you believe in God?" Nick asked me curiously. "Why? Why not?" I questioned back. "If God does exist, and he is the righteous loving creator the Bible paints him as, then why the hell is the world the way it is? I've seen too much hurt, and read too much pain to actually believe that God even has the possibility of existing. If he loved everyone like we all think he does, then there wouldn't be the sick bastards in the world that there are. And the fact that people can even write stories where these sick-fucks exist, fiction or not, unsettles me to the core sometimes." I said as I opened the door to the front limo and stepped inside. I looked outside, and saw that more than half of the people standing there had their mouths slightly agape in some form of shock. That sure as hell got them thinking. "Well, are we going to dinner or are y'all gone stand there catchin' flies all night long?" Everyone who had their mouths open in shock quickly closed them, and started walking towards the limos. Lance, JC, Howie, Amy, Chris, Danielle, Kevin and Kristen sat in the front limo with while everyone else went into the other limo. "That was some pretty heavy stuff Taylor." Chris said. "Well you asked." Was all I said. "And you sure don't dick around." Lance filled in. "Never said I would." I said as I looked at him. "When people ask me a question, most of the time I give them my honest opinion. That is unless I was playing with them." "And you weren't playing with us were you?" Kevin asked me. "Nope." I said as I shook my head. "I never kid about religion." "Have you been Wiccan all your life?" JC asked me. "Well no." I said as I sighed. "I had to go to the Dump..." "The Dump?" Howie asked. I laughed at the old childhood memory. "CCD. Religious education when I was younger. Never did find out what it actually stood for. But me and my friends always called it the Central City Dump, and it just got shortened to the Dump as we got older." "Oh okay." "Well anyway, I had to go to the Dump and get communion and confirmed, but after a while I stopped going to church all together. Then when I turned sixteen I started reading about Wicca and realized that that was more of my... calling than Christianity was. To top it off, I was seriously starting to doubt the existence of God as I grew older and heard more about the world. I was Atheist for a little while, but then I found the Wicca religion." "Wow." "More than you ever cared to know about me huh?" I laughed slightly. "Well maybe. But we did ask. So I guess we deserved it." Kristen said. "Well... anything else you want to prod me for? I promise I won't get so detrimental anymore." "Okay... here's an easy one." Amy said as the limo stopped and we stepped out. "Parents? Siblings?" "Yeah, that's a piece of cake." I laughed. "I grew up in your normal family, with a slight 50's feel to it. My mom stayed home and was the little homemaker, my dad worked in his own business, and my younger brother and I went to school. We even had dinner and breakfast together most days." "That is a rather retro feel." JC said. "Yup. Ozzie and Harriet all around my house. It oozed that homey feel." "What oozed that homey feel?" Joey asked as the occupants of the second limo caught up to us at the doors of the restaurant. "My home." I said. "Oh. Yeah that would." "How old is your brother now?" Danielle asked me. I paused as I calculated his age in my head. "Um... he just turned 19 last month." "Where's he go to school?" "Miami. Majoring in um... Marine Bio." "Interesting." "Yeah, that's Cody for ya. He's always been an interesting little bugger." "Don't tell me you call him a bugger." Leighanne laughed as we were sat at our table. "Oh of course I do. All little brothers are buggers in my book." I laughed. "But I still love the kid anyways." "You are one interesting character Taylor." Crystal said. "That's the general consensus. AJ has even taken to calling me crazy if I recall." AJ blushed slightly. "I'm sorry about that Taylor. But you're not that bad a girl anymore." "Why thank you Aje." I smiled cheekily. "It's just that you're so overwhelming to meet the first time... and the last time I met someone as bubbly as you, they weren't right in the head." AJ explained. "I guess I'll take that as a compliment. And don't worry about feeling bad about calling me crazy, everyone has. Mike... Tom... my best girlfriends Heather and Jackie. Everyone calls me crazy, but everybody loves me anyway." "Who're they?" Justin asked as our waiter came to our table to take our orders. "Well Tom's my boss, as well as my friend. Has been for about four years now." I said as I gave the waiter my order of a white wine and a plate of Fettuccine Alfredo as my dinner. "What about that other guy Mike?" Amy asked. "My best guy friend. Has been ever since I came over to work for Tom. He even wanted to call the psyche ward of the hospital ward to try and get me set up with a psyche evaluation one time." I said as I laughed at the memory of Mike trying to avoid me since he thought I was a raving lunatic for being too friendly with him on the first day. Everyone else at the table laughed as well. "So how long have you known Heather and Jackie?" Brian asked me. "Well Heather has been my best friend since grade school. Even though we went to colleges on opposite sides of the Continental United States, we still kept in touch. Hell half the time we saw each other in person during that time was to come to Backstreet concerts. That was when we really went wild." I smiled at some of the things we had done while we were in high school and together in college. "And Jackie I met online a few years ago. Then by pure luck we found out we were both going to Berkley so we roomed together and have been friends since then." I told them as I took a sip of water. "Is there anything you haven't done Taylor?" Amanda asked me. "Sky dived." I said without thinking. "Scared as shit of heights." "Boyfriend?" Leighanne asked. "Nope. Not since Mike." "What else can we ask you..." AJ trailed off. "I don't know. You tell me." I said as I bit into a breadstick. "Okay here's one. Since you've told us that you're a fan... who's your favorite?" AJ asked me. "Why am I not surprised that that question came up?" I asked rhetorically. "So who is it?" Justin asked me, his interest piqued as well. "Like I'm gonna tell you. Yeah sure, uh huh. Yup. Like-- NO." I said as I smiled in their direction. "You aren't gonna even give us a little hint?" Nick asked, preparing his little `pout' that I bet always got him what he wanted. "Nope. And put that pout away Nickolas. It's considered a lethal weapon in 49 out of the 51 states." I joked as everyone laughed. "So the question is just beggin' to be asked... what two states allow Nicky's pout?" Kevin asked. "Oh Florida and New York. Florida cause they've had to deal with it for so long, and New York because practically everyone in the damn state loves you guys, so we can't say no." "A native New Yorker are you?" Joey asked me. "Born and raised as they say. Long Island was my home, but damned as hell if I wasn't glad to get off that frickin' rock once college came around." I stated. "So wait, how long have you been living in California?" Amanda asked. "For the last six years." "So that makes you what? 23?" Nick asked "Nick, no girl ever tells you their true age sugar pie." I said, laying my imitation Southern accent on thick. "Why dahling, I didn't know you had a touch o' South in ya." Lance said sarcastically, letting his own Southern accent lay on thick. "Oh you kidding me? I love my little Southern touch." I smiled as I sipped my newly arrived wine. "Now I've got a question for ya." "What'd you wanna know?" Kevin asked. "Why's it over?" I asked, my question getting looks of confusion and apprehension in its wake, as well as the silence that reigns whenever someone is caught in an uncomfortable position. I definitely never expected the answer I got. Dun dun dun... You'll have to wait to find out why it's over. Hehe. --Jess Email: Midnight_Violet18@hotmail.com Site: http://insidebubble.cjb.net