Nick sighed as he cracked his neck and set his book bag down on his bed. He loosened his school tie and flopped down beside his book bag. The meeting and last minute preparations went smoothly, without a hitch, and he was happy glad for the extra volunteers they've had, including Lance and Josh. Nick smiled as he thought back to how fidgety Brian had been the whole time because of Josh and how he was always besides Nick but had one eye on the preparations and the other eye on what Josh was doing. But then Nick frowned when he thought back to the way Lance had been looking at him and... flirting? with him. He sighed as he fell back on the bed and stared up at the ceiling.

He missed Justin. And the only reason that he was so eager for tonight's event was because he would get to see Justin. In fact, tonight would be the only time he'd get to see Justin until Monday at school. He and his family were going to drive upstate tomorrow afternoon to visit his grandparents for the Thanksgiving break.

Just then there was a knock on his door and soon his mom's face was looking down at him. He smiled at her. "Hi mom," he said chuckling.

"Hey sweety," Jane replied smiling back too. "Just making sure you didn't fall asleep 'cause we have only an hour and a half to get ready before we have to go."

Nick sighed as he nodded his head. "Yah, I know," he said. "I wasn't asleep, just thinking."

Jane nodded her head and put Nick's outfit for the night beside him on the bed. "You're clothes are here," she said. "Your dad bought them this afternoon."

Nick sat up and looked at the clothes and smiled. "I like this," he said nodding his head and touching the fabric. He then looked over at his mom. "What color dress are you wearing, mom?"

Jane nodded at the clothes. "I'm wearing a blue one, similar to that color," she said. "But if you don't want that then I can wear the white one or the black one."

Nick shook his head. "No," he said. "No, the blue one is fine." He smiled. "I asked because I wanted us to match." He chuckled.

Jane smiled big as she ruffled his hair and turned to head out of the room. "I'm going to go and get ready."

Nick stretched his body and slowly got up before walking over to his closet, he began to take his clothes off. He left his boxers on and as he passed his dresser he grabbed another pair of clean boxers to change into and walked to the bathroom so he could take his shower.

It wasn't until thirty minutes later that Nick emerged from the bathroom wearing just his boxers. He threw on a old t-shirt and his sweats before padding his way to his parents room to get his make up on. Knocking on the door he asked, "Can I come in?"

Bob walked over and opened the door. "Yeah, son," he said letting Nick in. "Do you like your suit?"

Nick smiled and nodded his head as he walked inside and saw that his mom was styling her hair. "Yah," he said. "Thanks so much dad. I love it."

Bob nodded his head with a smile and ruffled Nick's hair before walking over to his computer desk in the corner of the room to check up on some of his e-mails and stocks. He figured he should get all that done before Nick and his wife left so that he would have time to spend with his daughters.

Nick watched as his mom as she blow dried, straightened, curled, then twirled her hair before grabbing everything and pulling it up in a pony tail of falling curls. "Whoa," he said, fascinated by it all. He'd never paid too much attention to things like this before but now as he watched what his mom was doing he was amazed what all hair can do. "You should really think about that salon type thing," he said with a nod. "Definitely.

Jane smiled and then chuckled. She added a little bit of curling gel to her curls to keep them intact and then hairspray to her whole hair before adjusting the bangs in the front. "And I am thinking about it," she said and then paused. "I have thought about it and honey, you know I can't and don't have the time for it..."

Nick rolled his eyes as he pouted at her. "So? Just open up a place and be like manager, hire some really good people, and they can work all the time and you can go in whenever you're free!" He smiled, thinking that was a really good idea.

Jane just shook her head and stood up indicating for Nick to take a seat. "We'll see about that," she said.

"Hmm," Nick said getting up and sitting in the chair so his mom can finish up his make-up.

Jane went about mixing the usual foundation and powder for Nick. As she was dabbing and then smoothing the foundation on she said, "You know, Charlie, these bruises are fading away rather quickly."

"Uh huh," Nick said. "I'm happy about that. I don't like wearing this make-up stuff."

Bob chuckled as he turned around in his seat and looked at them. "That's good to hear, son," he said. "Like I said I wouldn't want you to become a metro-sexual or like a cross dresser or something."

"Oh hush, Robert," Jane said smiling and a few minutes later she finished up with Nick's make up. "All done, sweety."

Nick smiled and got up. "Thanks mom," he said and then stuck his tongue out at his dad before walking out of the room and into his. He walked over to his dresser and took out a sleeveless black shirt, that was chest hugging. Taking his shirt off he put on the black shirt and walked over to the bed. He picked up the button down long sleeved shirt and put it on before pulling his sweats down and wearing the slacks. Walking back over to the dresser he grabbed a new pair of socks and put those on. He then took that moment to go into the bathroom and style up his hair. As he looked in the mirror he contemplated on whether he should leave his hair down or spike it up. All the time that he was at school he had his spiked and since this was a school function and was getting all dressed up he figured to balance out all the clean cut attire he should leave it down. He smiled as he grabbed the comb and combed his hair down before walking back to his dresser and putting his deodorant and cologne on. He then went about putting on his anchor pendant chain, his diamond stud earring, and instead of putting his contacts on he decided to wear his think silver rimmed glasses. It's not like Nick had vision problems, no. He just liked to wear glasses now and then, it made him look sophisticated. He liked that.

Walking back over to his bed he picked up the tie and sighed. He wasn't at all a tie wearing person even though he wore one every single day at school. The function that night doesn't require a tie but as a member of the student council it's mandatory to wear one. Blah. He went about putting his tie on and then his dinner jacket. He grabbed his cell phone, keys, and wallet and put them in his pants and walked out of his room to his parents room. Again he knocked on the door and walked in when he heard his mom telling him to come in. He smiled at her and sat down on the bed as he watched her put the final touches of makeup on her face. As soon as she finished putting her shawl on she looked at Nick with a smile.

"You look beautiful mom," Nick said.

"Yeah," Bob said watching his wife. He was just happy that it was only a mother-son event and that no other fathers would be going because his wife was a knock-out.

Jane giggled, happy. "Why thank you," she said. "Let's go." With that all three of them walked downstairs and over to the closet. Bob helped his wife put on her long winter overcoat while Nick put on his three-forth length coat. Both Jane and him dug into their pockets and pulled out the scarves and gloves that went along with the coats and put them on.

* * * * * * * * * * *

Justin tightened his scarf around his neck as he and his mom got out of the car and walked through the parking lot into the school through the back doors. Once they hung up their coats and things in the coat room they made their way over to the gym where they were escorted to their reserved table.

"Wow," Lynne said once she was seated, looking around at the nicely decorated gymnasium. "They really went all out, didn't they?"

Justin looked around as well. "Yah," he said. "The gym doesn't even look like the gym." From the ceiling to the floor, there were brown, yellow, red, and orange streamers intertwined together hanging. There were helium balloons with those same exact colors attached at the top of every bundle of streamers. At the back, far end of the gym was a huge long table that had refreshments and snacks on it. On the opposite end, was where the DJ was set up, already spinning and mixing up songs. The bleachers were dismantled and pushed up against the wall to make room for the tables that were placed around the inside perimeter of the gym living the inner area room for people to dance. The tables had a brownish red table cloth with a paper turkey in the middle surrounded by four white candles in carved out small pumpkins, the pumpkins as bases for the long candles. All the colors in the gym were typical representation of Fall and Thanksgiving. He looked down at his watch and noted that it was a little past seven and more and more people started to come in. He scanned the crowd looking for those blonde spikes as his fingers drummed on the table and his legs bouncing.

"Honey," Lynne said, shaking her head and suppressing a smile, as she noticed her son getting all nervous and anxious. She placed her hands on top of his to still them. "Calm down."

Justin looked over at his mother and then down at his hands that were being covered by hers. He blushed. "Sorry mama," he said. "I just... I haven't seen him since Saturday and ... I don't know."

"And you want to show off your new hair do and how spiffy you look in your suit?" Lynne supplied with a smirk on her face.

Justin rolled his eyes. "Mama..." he whined, blushing even more. "No one uses 'spiffy' anymore... at least not in New York."

It was Lynne's turn to roll her eyes as he took away her hands and propped them on her elbows so she could rest her chin on her hands. "Well," she said. "When I was your age that was the 'it' word-"

"Yah, in but that was THEN and this is NOW and you are NOT my age," Justin cut his mom off with a chuckle.

"Whatever," Lynne said smiling at him.

Just then there was a bit of commotion by the entrance doors and when Justin turned around and looked he might as well have had a heart attack. Quickly he turned around and looked at his mother with wide eyes. "Mama," he said in a loud whisper. "It's HIM!"

Lynne looked over and as the crowd of people cleared a bit she noticed Nick in deep conversation with three other boys and Brother Joseph and Brother Mathew. When Justin made that statement she looked at his oddly. "And why are you acting like you've just seen a pop star?"

Justin looked at his mom as if there was something wrong with her. "You're kidding me, right?"

Lynne shook her head.

"Mom!" Justin said. "He looks so good." He looked at the clear plastic spoons on the table and wished that they were silver instead so that he could check out his hair in its reflection.

And that made Lynne laugh. "Honey..." She drawled out. "I know how good looking he is... the first time I saw him and the second time I saw... not much has changed. He still looks good."

"I know," Justin said nodding his head. "But he looks even better, more hotter with his hair DOWN and GLASSES!"

Lynne looked over Justin's shoulder and smiled at the person walking towards them.

* * * * * * * * * * *

"Alright, double check everything, make sure all the tables have everything on the list," Marshall said as he looked around the cafeteria, then at the clipboard in his hands, and then at the other student council members.

Scott, Nick, and Brian, nodded their heads and mock saluted Marshall before splitting up in three different directions to check on everything. After a few minutes all four members returned to the main buffet table after checking on the tables.

"Everything's perfect," Scott said.

"Same here," Brian said.

"Ditto," Nick said.

"Great!" Marshall said and put on a smile on his face as he saw Brother Joseph, their principal, and Brother Mathew, their assistant principal, along with the four Dean's make their way over to them.

The next few minutes were spent talking about this and that in regards with everything that's going on with the dinner and dance. Before long they were making their way over to the gym.

Nick sighed as he looked around the gym, getting bored with this talk. He tuned everything out and pinpointed his mother walking over to some table to talk to whoever she recognized. From his position Nick couldn't tell just who his mom was talking to much less recognize the teen seating at the table. Mentally shrugging it off he began scanning the room in hopes to spot Justin and Lynne. Looking back in the direction of where he last saw his mom he noticed that Josh and his mother, Nick assumed, as well as Jackie, Brian's mother, were also there. Jane having introduced the Chasez's and Mrs. Littrell to whoever she was talking to. He gently nudged Brian.

"Hmm?" Brian questioned looking over at Nick.

Nick nodded over to where their mothers were, all talking and laughing, and whispered to Brian. "Looks like your mom and Josh's mom are getting along well."

Brian looked over and groaned. "Oh man," he said. "I just hope she doesn't go into her baby story telling mode with them. Oh god." But he didn't mind his mom befriending Josh's mother. That meant that they could be good friends which means that Brian and Josh might be able to meet up and stuff when the mom's get together or someone. He looked over at Nick and made a face, not knowing whether to go for being embarrassed or being happy.

Nick looked at Brian and tried to contain his laughter. "You look like you're having a hard time doing number two..." he said and cleared his throat when Brother Joseph and Brother Mathew excused themselves to go and get ready to make the introductions and greetings in a few minutes. As soon as they left he looked back over at Brian, wiggling his eye brows. "So we going over there or what?"

Brian rolled his eyes and titled his head to the side to get a better look before looking back at Nick and shaking his head. "Noooo."

"Noooo, what?" Marshall questioned looking between Nick and Brian, curiosity written on his face.

"Nothing," Nick snickered. "We're just 'bout to head over to our table," he said instead.

Scott joined in on the conversation. "We gotta head to our table now," he said. "I think they're just about ready to make the greetings."

They all looked over to the podium that was set up by the DJ and headed over to where their respective mothers were. As Nick and Brian got closer to the table their mother's were Nick's confusion grew. He noticed Lynne sitting there but where was Justin? When they reached the table and Nick stood beside his mother. He smiled and greeted Lynne ad looked around the table, and it was then that he noticed Justin. He let out a light gasp of shock and surprise, he found himself not being able to tear his eyes away from Justin.