Okay here is the third and fourth part to Justin and Redemption, I hope you like it.
Legal Stuff: this story is totally fictional and does not imply anything about any members of NSYNC, or any other characters involved. If you are under the age of 18 don't read this as it involves male/male relationships and sexual content.
This is still all part of what I had written down beforehand so I wont be getting to any new creativeness until perhaps parts 5,6 or possibly 7, any comments or suggestions would be appreciated, send them all to silverjunky@hotmail . com
Justin and Redemption. Part 3: Home.
Earlier on: The main character Gavin gained a contract with maverick and a manager..
This is how I got my foot in the door of music entertainment. That very day after I had expressed my thanks to John Shaw, the Maverick guys drove me to their office and proceeded to set me up with a private manager. His name was Kacy, about 40. I hit it off well with him, as he understood my poverty situation immediately. After driving me to a temporary flat, he paid my last rent bill at my old crummy flat, with a company card.
I packed up all my clothes (not many) and my CD's (very precious) then, as that was it we left back to my temporary flat in a good hotel.
He arranged to meet me the next day to take me down to Maverick and sort out some details, I took a shower and fell asleep my mind running in circles.
Over the period of two weeks Kacy managed me perfectly, he argued fairly for my contract with Maverick, (a 4 album deal), and just as it sat in front of me, I had an urge or some sort of longing, indescribable, but it wanted me to go back home to Orlando.
I paused considering this, pen in hand.
"You ok Gavin? Anything you would like to ask or something?" Kacy asked me concernedly.
I looked up hesitated then said, "I want to do this my way, I would like to go back home.to Orlando and start my career there". Kacy nodded knowing some of my past, he took my contract shredded it and then forged out a new one to be faxed to Maverick's offices in America for me to sign when I got there.
Kacy helped me sorting things up. Then a week later Kacy and I boarded a plane for Orlando.
I was on my way home, scared shitless about how I would cope but knowing this was what I wanted, I was on my way home.
We arrived in Orlando early morning, we went straight into a car and down to the local Maverick offices there, where I was introduced to my 'local' team, the ones who would be my home base here in Orlando. We then sat down and I signed the contract. An hour later the paperwork was all processed, Kacy argued and won me a small 2- bedroom bungalow in a nearby area.
We moved my things over and I spent the week alone allowing kacy to sort out a studio and a music director for the first album. I spent most of that week familiarizing myself with my new home.
I noticed that at the top of my street, and seemingly it was a rather well to do area, that a huge house was situated there, very modern looking, cars were permanently going to and from the place. I dismissed it thinking it was someone famous or something.
I hadn't changed my appearance in the least I wanted part of my image to be how I am. Kacy got this straight away realising that my scruffy image was part of who I am what I have been through and done, and I certainly wasn't gonna change into some overdressed trendy looking thing. That wasn't me at all.
I didn't remember much from my early years living in Orlando so nothing seemed familiar, but I did have a sense of place now.
The second week I was down at the studio, kacy had bought a full two months; I slept there a lot as I worked constantly with thoughts coming into my head at 4 in the morning. The director for the album sat me down early on and we discussed where and how this album should go and all the ideas I had in my head.
Then I wrote the few songs I had down in music, then I wrote about 20 more in the space of two weeks, Orlando had given me oceans worth of emotions and ideas. I put them all to music.
Then the actual business began of hiring musicians and getting all the percussion, bass and effects, down. I added my vocals shortly after this, along with the guitars, I had loads to pick from, electric, acoustic, unplugged, building up layers into my songs, until eventually we had about 25 completed, Kacy, the director and I sat down and chose about 12 of these songs to put onto the album. Then those twelve songs were ripped apart again by myself and a genius called tizzy, who knew everything about music, and we mixed them all to a semblance of what I heard in my head.
Eventually we had the album, I was bubbling all over the place happier than I had been for years.
I designed the cover and CD artwork then we sent it to Maverick. They produced an initial 200,000 copies and sent them out to radio stations across America.
I had been rather forceful in not doing any promotional work until the album had been sent out; I wanted to be judged by the music alone.
Once they had been sent out kacy organised promotional photos and descriptions of my music and myself. However there was no mention of my sexuality, Kacy knew but we had decided to keep it under wraps, I didn't want to be labelled the gay singer or unintentionally block any possible demographics linked to the liking of my album.
For two months kacy and me set up a band to perform with. I connected with 2 people, a percussionist and a bassist called Oz and Lucy. I had a bond, I became not friends but in a way close to them as we worked and rehearsed.
Maverick had expected a good but not huge interest in my album and that to me was good I didn't want to get my head in the clouds and then come crashing down.
Part 4: Dark Redemption.
It was a bright Saturday when I woke up after a tiring rehearsal on the Friday, I was at home, I closed my eyes relishing the word.
Slipping out of bed to pee, I then had a shower and got dressed in some skater jeans and a new but to my taste t-shirt, kacy had taken me shopping on a day off earlier and I had raided all the charity shops and found some cool stuff.
I still hadn't bought any shoes and wasn't going to, I had survived this long without so I didn't need them now.
Walking to the kitchen I made a cup of tea and shuffled out to a bench in the garden, sitting down and having a cigarette. I tuned the radio on for some background noise and zoned out.
".A song called 'Zack's Garden'" I snapped upright, it was one of my songs! I'd written it for Zack back in England. I listened to it play admiring the work done on it, my heart racing like I was on E.
Straight after the song had finished the phone started up, I ran into the kitchen and answered it "hello?"
"Hey Gavin it's Kacy, you wont believe it." he was talking so excitedly I couldn't understand him.
"What, what, I cant understand you" I said interrupting him.
"Maverick are receiving thousands of calls about you from radio stations across America, and you have shifted 500,000 albums and counting." Kacy shouted in glee. "Gavin? Gavin? Hello?"
"500,000.500,000, Kacy!!" I choked; he laughed, "I know! We need to get you here now, we have work to do". I agreed and hung up and then grabbing my backpack ran out the door.
Kacy and I agreed on a battle plan of what to do.
He arranged interviews with a few small local radio stations and TV programs, and then we were going to slowly build up to the bigger stuff.
So for the next two weeks Kacy was shuttling me, Lucy and Oz about with all our music gear to all the local stations, where I would do a short interview usually about my music and general everyday stuff, and then we would perform a few songs over the air, and then pack up and be off to the next one. I grew closer to Lucy and Oz in that period and we became good friends as we shared the excitement, which was building all around us. Lucy was a petite, white blond girl with amazingly attractive eyes and a sharp cynical sense of humour; she was about 19 my age. Oz was a year older than me and Lucy, being 20, a youthful young man with black hair and blue eyes; he was easygoing but had a sharp with on him.
As the interviews and performances for radio and local TV got longer, Lucy, Oz, Kacy and I formed a bond, my little nucleus.
My tendency for barefeet soon became a catch mark and interviewers found it highly amusing. Record sales escalated the longer we interviewed reaching 100,000 every two weeks.
I was in shock, but good shock.
Eventually Kacy decided I was ready and we hit the big time stations and TV further afield in the larger cities and in different states.
Kacy hired a bus for us and a team consisting of an assistant for Kacy to help with the details which became more numerous, and a tech team who handled our instruments and so on. We were all close knit. My nucleus was growing.
After one and a half months record sales hit 1million, I received a platinum award and a hearty meal with the crew and guys in burger king.
I was also because of this growing more and more noticeable, I got girls and guys of many ages wanting autographs and photos, I didn't know how to handle them at all, until eventually one girl ripped some of my hair out, shortly after that Kacy organised some security for us all, who followed me about religiously even when I was shopping. Maverick had created an official site on the internet which received 10,000 hits a day, I wet myself a lot at the comments left on it, when I got a chance to look, and I was even voted sexiest under twenty in music bizz by some popular magazine. However the weirdness didn't really hit me, I was too closed in the bubble of promotion. But I could tell things were getting weird especially after the security team were added.
Three months passed, I was getting mobbed everywhere I went; about 200,000 fan sites were now in existence.
It was a sunny day in April in New York, where I was doing an interview for MTV then a performance and later in the day another interview and performance for TRL.
MTV was okay but the interviewer changed tack halfway through and switching from my music asked,
"So how's your love life, Gavin? Anyone special?" I was taken aback but Kacy had discussed with me what to say anticipating this type of thing.
So I replied, "No actually there isn't these past few months have been the most frantic of my life, and before? Well back then I had nothing to offer" she seemed miffed at my reply but started asking about my time in England. I didn't talk about that and glossed over it saying "ohh down and out, crummy apartment, no shoes!" and gaining a laugh from the audience would move on.
TRL, later in the day had obviously been doing some digging though, their presenter asking, "so I hear you are a native to Orlando?"
I nodded, unsure of where he was going. "Are you staying with your family now that you're back?" I knew immediately that they knew my past.
"No, I don't have any close family anymore" I replied coldly.
"Why is that?" the presenter asked with a blank face. I hated them.
I couldn't see any way out though and I knew they knew that "my parents died when I was 16, to put it bluntly they were killed coming home from a night out" hoping my bluntness would shut them up, not a chance.
"What happened then? Foster home?" they asked I swear I could see them smirk.
"Yes" I said emotionlessly.
"So you were fostered for how long? Until 18?" they had definitely done there homework, I was seething but had an outward calm that surprised me.
"No, until I was 16, I had two foster homes I ran away from the first and the second was.."the entire studio went silent and I broke out in a cold sweat knowing this was what they wanted "bad, and I ended up in a psychiatric hospital until I was 18" I said quietly.
"What was wrong with you?" they were definitely pushing it.
"I had depression, abuse problems, physical abuse problems from the second foster home, and I became schizophrenic" I hated myself and the presenter at that point, but I couldn't make myself walk.
"Not properly schizophrenic I assume?" bitch.
"No that would have been a blessing I was well its hard to describe. I just didn't like myself and ended up with a form of schizophrenia to do with esteem and self- rejection." The questions ended but I vowed never to talk to that particular presenter again.
The performance after that was the most emotional I had ever done, and on the bus to the next spot, kacy got a phone call reporting a major increase in sales. In some ways I felt bad that my problems had caused it but I was happy that the TRL people weren't causing a downfall for me, which is obviously what they had hoped.
The next interview and most after that were focused now on my early years a lot. Which infuriated me, but I changed that by saying at one, when I was asked about some of the dark lyrics and whether they related to my institutionalisation, I said
""Yes there is dark but things like 'Zack's Garden' focus on the redemption from that dark how I came out of it aching bleeding but more wise and more mature, I learnt a lot. One thing I learnt was, that if you can cope for an hour a day, a week, then you can cope for a year and then hopefully for like" the interviewer nodded smiling. After that things returned to normal although the questions about my past did occasionally pop up.
Well that's it for these two parts. Don't forget to send me any suggestions and stuff (email at top) and the rise to fame by Gavin and the number of record sales and so on may seem unrealistic but if you remember Alanis Morissette sold 28million albums of her first one in 2 years, so that's more than Gavin's in one year. And yes his rise is based a little on Alanis's rise to fame. Cheers thanks until next time.