The next morning, much to the chagrin of both Kevin and Nick, they began work together on learning their parts for the recording of the song, “The Only Star,” Nick wrote, which was going to be on the soundtrack to a Disney movie this coming summer. The session started pretty well with the two of them warming their voices up for a good half and hour. Then they started going over what notes each of them would be singing, trying different things. They had been working for several hours when Kevin noticeably starting paling and sweating and struggled with what Nick wanted him to be doing. The practice, only preliminary work on the song, was not that important so Nick decided they should quit and pick it up later on. Kevin did not agree.

            “Okay, Kevin. We’re done. We can pick up later on next week when we have more energy,” Nick said, choosing to include himself to avoid anymore hostility than there already was.

            “No, I’m fine. Lets keep going. I want to get this part done,” Kevin said, annoyed at the suggestion. He may not have been strong enough to practice.

            “Kevin, this song is hard. The notes are higher that we both usually sing. Lets just rest it for a week. Besides are you okay? You’re looking kind of pale,” Nick asked concerned. Throughout the morning, Kevin had grown increasingly paler with sweat dripping down his face.

            Kevin was in a lot of pain, but being the stubborn butthead that he was, he refused to admit it, so through gritted teeth he told Nick he was fine. “Nick, I’m fine. My knee is just sore. Lets just continue,” Kevin said but not five minutes later, he was curled up (the best he could be), pain racing through his leg. Nick, not knowing what was going on, called for a nurse.

            “Stacy!” Nick yelled at the top of his lungs as he repeatedly pressed the call button. Stacy, Kevin and Nick’s nurse, came rushing in not two minutes later.

            “What’s wrong Nick?” Stacy asked, rushing over to him.

            “Something’s wrong with Kevin, please!” Nick said desperately as Kevin riled in pain in the bed next to him. Stacy quickly moved to Kevin’s bed and put a hand on his head to let him know she was there and quickly pulled it back surprised by hot it was. Stacy, acting quickly, grabbed the phone by Kevin’s bed and quickly paged Dr. Bell.Tthen went to quick work of Kevin’s vitals all the while trying to calm Nick down and make Kevin as comfortable as possible.

            Five minutes later Dr. Bell came running in looking quite flustered. “What’s wrong?” she asked, coming to Kevin’s side.

            “His temp in 102. He says his leg feels like it’s on fire. He’s pale. His pulse in about 120 and his blood pressure is falling,” Stacy said, reading from the chart she had in her hand, then passed it to Dr. Bell. After a couple seconds of looking at the chart, she handed it back to Stacy then proceeded to unwrap Kevin’s leg. Upon looking at Kevin’s leg, Dr. Bell swore up and down.

            “What? What’s wrong? Why are you scared?” Nick asked desperately.

            “Nick, Kevin’s leg is infected. We must have not gotten all the dirt out from when he was stuck,” Dr. Bell said, wrapping Kevin’s leg back up. “Stacy go get an OR ready. We got to get going and fast. He could loose it,” Dr. Bell said and Stacy was gone, sending in orderlies to bring Kevin, who had been knocked out with pain meds and extremely strong antibiotics.

            “Nick, I’m going in to surgery now to try and get all the infection out of Kevin’s leg. I promise I will have Stacy come and update you as often as possible,” Dr. Bell said, talking to Nick slowly because he looked like he was quickly losing it. “Where’s Brian and them?” Dr. Bell asked.

            “At the hotel. They have work they needed to do and we were going to be doing song stuff then PT. Please, is Kevin going to be okay?” Nick said desperately. He saw the look of terror on Kevin’s face and that alone made Nick ten times more scared than he had been before.

            “We’re going to do the best we can, Nick. I promise. I have to go and help Kevin now. I’m going to have Stacy call Brian and have him come over then she’s going to come sit with you until they come okay?” Dr. Bell said, trying to reassure an increasingly hysterical Nick.

            All within five minutes, Kevin was in surgery, Brian, Leighanne, Howie, and AJ were on their way, and Nick was absolutely scared shitless. Stacy, who had come back to sit with Nick, was just explaining to Brain and everyone just what was going on when another nurse, whose name they didn’t know, came in, saying that she had instructions to take Nick down to Kevin, who was so hysterical, nothing could be done for him and he kept saying Nick’s name.

            “Nick! Nick, please help me! Nick!” Nick heard Kevin screaming as he was wheeled from his room down to the OR where they were preparing to cut Kevin’s leg back open. Once Nick was scrubbed in, the nurse wheeled him up to Kevin’s head.

            Grabbing Kevin’s hand in his own gloved one, Nick leaned in close to Kevin’s head. “Ssh, Kev. I’m here. Don’t worry,” Nick said, trying to calm Kevin down. The surgeons couldn’t do anything until they had Kevin comfortable and somewhat relaxed.

            “Nick, please I don’t know what’s wrong. My leg hurts,” Kevin asked with tears running down his face.

            “I know. There’s infection in the cut from your surgery. They have to open it up again and clean it out. That’s why it hurts. But Kevin, you have to calm down,” Nick whispered, keeping his face close to Kevin’s, who was lying flat on his back.

            Calming down quite a bit and getting drowsy from the medicine being pumped into him, looked up at Nick. “You’ll stay right?” Kevin asked, gripping Nick’s hand.

            “I’m not going anywhere. I promise,” Nick whispered harshly and kissed Kevin on his nose, a joke that they always played on each other when they were together.

            “I love you, Nick. I’m so sorry. I love you so much,” Kevin said as he started to ramble on about how sorry he was.

            “Ssh, it’s okay. Don’t worry about it. I love you too,” Nick whispered in Kevin’s ear as they applied the anesthesia. Once Kevin was fully asleep, Nick was taken back to his room where the rest of the guys, Leighanne and Kevin’s brothers, who had just arrived minutes before, were waiting.

            They all ended up having to wait five hours before Dr. Bell came and told them news on Kevin. “Hi. Sorry it took so long,” Dr. Bell said, coming into the room.

            “Dr. Bell, this is Kevin’s brothers Jerald and Tim Richardson and their wives,” Nick said, pointing them out to the Dr.

            “Hi, it’s nice to meet you. So we got all the infected tissue out of his leg. He’s in isolation now and he’ll be there till tomorrow or Thursday, depending on how these next two days go.  The recovery process has been slowed significantly by this set back but I’m still very optimistic about his prognosis, although I’m going to have my colleague Dr. Bennett, also an Orthopedist, come in and look at him further,” Dr. Bell said

            “So he can’t leave on Friday?” Tim asked.

            “No. I’d like him to stay over the weekend and we’ll see Monday how he feels,” Dr. Bell said just as her beeper went off. “I’m sorry. I got to go. Nick, I’ll be checking in on you before I go home today. Tony is going to come in around 3 to start some easy physical therapy for your leg and you’ll work on your arm when you get the cast off,” Dr. Bell said, standing from where she had been sitting and walking to towards the door.

            “When can I see Kevin?” Nick asked.

            “Well, he’s been asking for you. Unfortunately, I can’t let you in the room, but I’ll have Stacy come and bring you to his window. It has a phone that you can talk to him through though,” Dr. Bell said.

            Just before Tony, the physical therapist started with Nick, Stacy brought them all up to look in on and talk to Kevin who, until recently had been sleeping comfortably.

            “Nick?” Kevin asked through the phone as he looked at the window.

            “I’m here Kev. We’re all here,” Nick said in quiet voice.

            “Come in here. I want you near me,” Kevin said, not getting why Nick couldn’t be by his side.

            “I can’t Kev. You’re in isolation. The infection was really bad. I’ll be able to come tomorrow though,” Nick said. That did not suit Kevin at all and he started to get upset.

            “No, please. I need you here. Please, Nick! I can’t do this without you!” Kevin said, looking at him through the window with tears running down his face. Nick looked up at Brian and Tim and Jerald with tears in his eyes.  Sighing, he turned back to Kevin.

            “I’m not going anywhere, Kev. I promise. One day, that’s all. Just until your safe,” Nick said with tears running down his face.  “Tomorrow I’ll be right here. I promise and I’ll call you before you sleep tonight. I promise,” Nick said into the phone as the nurse started to wheel him away. He handed the telephone to Brian.

            Once back inside his room, Nick was forced to go through an hour of excruciating physical therapy despite his pleas to start the next day. AJ and Howie were with him the entire time, helping him through. All Nick wanted was to crawl into bed and Kevin’s arms and sleep for the next two or however many weeks.

            The guys, Kevin’s brothers and their wives, and Leighanne were going back and forth between Kevin and Nick’s rooms all night and Brian, Howie, and AJ once again had to go and do some work that night to reassure the public that Nick and Kevin were in fact okay. “I swear to God, Brian. Tell Jack no more interviews,” AJ said annoyed as he and the other two walked into Nick’s room, which was now more or less the central meeting point for anything since it had couches and chairs, as well as, an extra bed, which was where Leighanne was laying taking a nap.

            “I know. I already told him, AJ. Don’t worry,” Howie said, speaking for Brian, who was over talking to Leighanne who had just woken up. As the two of them sat down on the couch, they grabbed slices of the cold pizza, which was on the coffee table

            “Hey, Tim, you hear anything from Kevin?” AJ asked as he munched on his pizza.

            “Chew, then speak. And no, last time I checked on him he was sleeping.” Tim said dryly.

            “We’re going to be on ET tonight. That’s where were all afternoon. They’re doing some special on us. I don’t quite know why, but anyway, they said we should watch it cause there were going to be some surprises,” Howie said idly.

            “Brian, AJ, Howie. Good you’re here. Um, BJ called. Aaron, Leslie, and Angel are really needing to see Nick. Jane’s not around this weekend. She had business in Orlando. I told BJ she could bring them this weekend since we’re going to still be here,” Jerald said, walking back in from getting coffee and calling to check on his and Jerald’s kids who were staying with Brian’s parents at home in Kentucky.

            “Oh, okay. Um, I’ll call her later on,” AJ said, storing it in his brain to call Nick’s sister with all the other calls he had to make that night. Right now AJ was going to take a nap. “Hey, Leigh, you mind if I join you on the bed? I got to sleep,” AJ said, standing from the couch.

            “I’m done, AJ. It’s all yours,” Leigh said, getting up from the bed. “I ordered dinner. It should be here around 6:30,” Leigh said.

            “Cool. Just wake me when it gets here,” AJ said, pulling the earphones of his CD player on and curling up, determined to get at least an hour of sleep. For the next hour and half, all of them pretty much sat around and relaxed and waited for the dinner Leigh ordered to arrive.

            In the middle of eating dinner, Stacy, who was working a double, knocked and entered the room. “Hey, Nick, you done eating?” she asked.

            “Pretty much. Why?” Nick asked, wiping his hands.

            “Dr. Bell wants you to go and sit with Kevin for a while. He’s okay, still asleep, but a little to restless for her liking. She thinks if you sit and hold his hand for a while it will help,” Stacy said, smiling.

            Nick looked up surprised. “I get to go in?”

            “Yup. I got to bring you and put sterile scrubs and stuff on you and scrub your hands, but yeah you get to go in,” Stacy said, coming to his bed to help him into the wheelchair, which was by his bed. As she helped him into the chair, Leigh went about cleaning up from their dinner.

            “Hey, chaos, since your hanging with Kev tonight, you mind if we bail early?” Howie asked.

            “No, go ahead. I’ll probably be pretty tired by the time I get back. I’ll see you all in the morning,” Nick said.

            “Thanks, Nick. If Kev wakes up, tell him we love him and we’ll see him tomorrow,” Brian said.

            “No problem. See you in the morning,” Nick said as Stacy rolled him out.