"I swear to God I didn’t know he was gonna be here," Julia exclaimed in a hushed whisper when they spotted Eminem sitting in the back of the room with his daughter and the members of D 12.

"Sure you didn’t, Ju," Justin teased.

"Come on, lets sit down before they notice us," JC suggested, pushing the two a long.

"What is that about?" Billiam asked.

"We’ve gone out to eat several times since we’ve been here--" JC started to explain.

"Because JC is too busy watching TV all day to make us dinner," Justin cut in.

"-- And almost every time he’s been there or showed up," JC continued, tempted to flip Justin off but decided not to test his luck. "So Justin teases her and says she picks the places we eat out by where she knows he’ll be."

"I see," Billiam nodded.

"So what’s special about this place?" Justin asked when they were seated.

"My friends and I came here everyday after school to hang out before our activities began," Julia answered. "They used to have the cutest workers, I swear."

"God you were hormonal even before you moved to Orlando," Justin shook his head.

"Just got even more hormonal after I moved cause the guys down there are hot," Julia shrugged. "Besides we were still coming here after I moved, every time I was back we were here."

"Is there anywhere in Detroit you haven’t eaten?" Justin asked.

"That place Eminem worked at," Julia nodded. "We weren’t allowed to go to that side of town," she whispered after looking over her shoulder to make sure the rapper wasn’t in range.

"Since when did that ever stop you?" Billiam joked.

"It doesn’t usually but none of us were old enough to drive and if our parents had even heard we’d thought of taking the bus they’d kill us," Julia answered. "Besides after Lily and Kevin’s adventures Cobbs weren’t too welcome over there."

"If it’s anything like why you, Joey, and I can’t all go to the south side together anymore I can understand why you aren’t welcome," JC said.

"Worse."

"How so?"

"Lily liked to play with the boys on that side of town and Kevin was Kevin. So they pissed a lot of people off and only like my cousin Philip and his family were welcome cause they lived over there," Julia explained.

"I was wondering how you had family who’d went to school with Eminem," JC said. "Didn’t think Eminem was attending your private schools."

"They’da chased my kind off if we’d stepped on the property," said the blonde rapper.

"More like before we got a chance to step on it," muttered Bizarre.

"So what do we own tonight’s visit for?" Julia asked.

"Actually I was wondering if you were free sometime and maybe wanted to get together, like take the kids to the park or something?"

After recovering from the shock Julia replied, "Well my friends are in town visiting from Europe for another couple of days but if you’d like we could get together after that."

"All right, yah, that’d be cool. Call me when you got time, huh?" he said handing her a piece of paper.

"All right, I will," Julia smiled.

"Okay so um what was that?" JC asked after the rapper was gone.

"What?"

"To me it looked like Eminem asked Julia out and she accepted," Justin said.

"He didn’t ask me out!" Julia exclaimed. "His daughter doesn’t get to spend time around other kids her age--"

"So he just asks someone he doesn’t know?" Justin replied, rolling his eyes.

"Micah and Haley go to Rock Ridge together, thank you very much," Julia said. "So it makes sense for them to get together to play."

"Whatever."

==

"I can’t believe she’s going out with him," JC grumbled after Julia and Micah had left.

"Why?" Justin asked.

"It’s Eminem!"

"So? They’re getting together to take their kids out."

"That’s just an excuse! That’s how she got started with Drew."

"And they broke up because they didn’t have anything to talk about besides their kids. Who’s to say Julia and Eminem have more to talk about then Micah and Haley?"

"Who’s to say they don’t? They both grew up here, probably went to a lot of the same places, know the same people..."

"So?"

"So they’ve at least got that."

"They’ll probably piss each other off so much today they won’t get together anymore, anyway," Justin said.

"What makes you think that?"

"Between the way he talks about us and gay people Julia’s gonna go off on him then lets not forget if they should talk about growing up here they’ll have two different views of it. I wouldn’t worry about it."

=

"Admit it," Julia demanded.

"No way," Eminem shook his head.

"Come on, I won’t tell anyone!"

"I do not like their music or their videos! Hay likes *NSYNC and that’s what she wanted to listen to."

"Sure," Julia teased.

"Not everyone is into the same fruity music their kids are," Eminem countered.

"It’s not fruity!" Julia exclaimed.

"Admit it, if you hadn’t grown up with those two you wouldn’t’ve given their music a second thought," Eminem prompted.

"Untrue! I’m an equal opportunity music listener," Julia said. "Besides if I chose my music by who I knew would I listen to you? You’re mean to them."

"That’s different, it’s the Detroit thing," Eminem shook his head.

"Detroit thing?"

"You listen to Kid Rock, Uncle Kracker, and Madonna, right?" Eminem listed.

"Yah, so?"

"They’re all from Detroit, you’re from Detroit, so you listen to them."

"Hardly! I listen to them because they’re good."

"Whatever," Eminem replied.

"Besides you aren’t really from Detroit, you were born in Kansas City."

"Oh don’t even start that!"

Julia laughed and grinned at him. "You’re fun."

"Huh?"

"You’ll fight with me," Julia explained. "Most the other guys I hang around with give up after a while but you’ve come back at me each time. It gives me something to work for, the point where you’ll back down."

"I’m not gonna back down so you’ve got a while," he replied.

"We’ll see, won’t we?"

==

"You said I wouldn’t have to worry about it," JC muttered, glaring at Justin when he entered the kitchen.

"What?" Justin said looking at JC confused.

"Guess who’s sitting in the living room," JC replied.

"Who?"

"Eminem."

"What?! No way!" Justin exclaimed.

"Yah, he, Julia, Micah, and Haley are going to the park again."

"You’re shitting me, right? He’s not really sitting in there, is he?" Justin said.

"Yes he is."

"Julia’s still on set, though."

"I know, she’s running behind and asked him to wait here for her if he didn’t mind."

"So then why are you sitting in here?"

"I’m not gonna sit in a room with him," JC exclaimed.

"Why not? Come on, you’re being rude," Justin said starting out of the kitchen.

"Am I the only person who remembers the fact that he raps about killing us? Of course I’m jumping at the chance to go sit in a room with him!"

"Dude, he’s not gonna kill us. Come on," Justin said, pulling JC out of the kitchen. "Uh, hi. I wanna apologize for JC, he shouldn’t have left you by yourself," Justin said pausing at the doorway of the living room.

"Why? I ain’t gonna steal nothin," replied the rapper. "Even if I wanted any of it I could buy it myself."

"I didn’t think you would. And I know you could buy it if you wanted it," Justin said quickly.

"Whatever," he replied. "What’s wrong with him?" he asked gesturing to JC who stood in the doorway. "I ain’t gonna kill you, shit."

"Of course you aren’t," Justin said.

"But I could if I wanted to."

"I’m sure you could."

"Stop patronizing me, man, shit," exclaimed the rapper.

"Sorry," Justin apologized quickly.

"Dude will you sit down or something? Y’all are making me nervous," Eminem said glancing between Justin and JC, neither of who had sat down yet.

"So um where are Micah and uh Haley?" Justin asked sitting down quickly.

"Julia’s supposed to pick Micah up from Rock Ridge," JC answered.

"She’s with her mother," Eminem grunted.

JC sat fidgeting for a while then got up and started out of the room.

"Where are you going?" Justin asked.

"To my room to write."

"More fairy pop songs, just what the world needs," Eminem muttered.

"At least my kid can listen to my music without being scarred for the rest of his life," JC mumbled.

"Excuse me?!"

"You can’t deny that listening to songs where your father raps about killing you mother would mess a child up severely," JC said. "At least I don’t have be shamed of my music when it comes to Micah."

"I’m not a shamed of my music when it comes to Haley, she’s just not old enough to listen to it."

"You’re never old enough to listen to your father give ideas about how he’d like to kill your mother," JC replied walking out of the room.

=

"Josh," Julia called, knocking on his bedroom door.

"Yeh? Door’s open," he replied.

"Hey," Julia said letting herself in. "I uh heard what happened earlier."

"Yeh?"

"Em was out of line."

"Yeh?"

"And I wanted to apologize for him. He shouldn’t have said that."

"It’s not your fault. You can’t control what your boyfriend thinks or says."

"My boyfriend?" Julia laughed. "Em and I aren’t dating, Josh! We’re just friends! Even still he shouldn’t say shit like that to you."

"What can you do about it?" JC shrugged.

"Talk to him, although I’m not sure how much good it’ll do."

"Don’t worry about it. His opinion of my music doesn’t even rank so what do I care what he says?" JC replied.

"Still."

"Don’t worry about it," JC repeated.

"We still cool?" she asked after a minute.

"Always," JC replied.

"Good," Julia smiled giving him a hug.

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