AN: My apologies for the extended wait between chapters. I had minor writer's block concerning this story (hopefully cured now) and let myself be distracted by the angry mob of eager Labyrinth fiction readers, many of whom were resorting to death threats to get me to update... Add a malfunctioning Geocities into the mix and voila, an extended absence. So in other words, sorry for the wait. ;) inspiredthoughts@hotmail.com ************************** Blindsided: Chapter Twelve **************************** JC was waiting for Chris when they stopped for the night at the hotel. It was a night off so they had the concert the next day, early evening, after a full day of interviews and publicity appearances. Chris got off first and JC stopped him. “Care to tell me what the hell that early morning phone call was about?” Chris rolled his eyes and stepped aside so that Laura could get off the bus. Chris and JC both offered their hands to help her down and with a slight blush, she took them both and hopped down. Chris started to walked away but Jayce stopped him. “Come on Chris, talk to me…” Laura tugged on his sleeve and JC looked down at her. His heart skipped. It didn’t matter that she was rumpled and tired and grimy from staying on the bus all day- Laura Danon still was and always would be the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. “Chris isn’t talking to you.” JC blinked and wet his lips. “Did he tell you why?” Laura blushed darker but merely shrugged. There was more going on here than met the eye but Jayce wasn’t about to pry, not if she didn’t want him to. “He just told me to tell you that when you started talking to the right person about the right things, then he’d start to talk to you again.” JC’s mouth snapped shut abruptly as he blushed. Laura gave his arm a sympathetic pat before shouldering her duffel bag and running to catch up to Chris. Justin, with a yawn, finally appeared in the doorway of the bus. The younger star scratched his stomach absently as he clattered down the stairs of the bus. “Are you ignoring me too?” JC demanded. Justin shrugged with boneless grace and yawned hugely again. “Its not our fault you’re a pansy assed moron. The girl loves you. You love her. Are we missing some other part of the equation?” Jayce pinched the bride of his nose in nerves. “Its not that simple,” he replied tiredly. Justin frowned fiercely, blue eyes angry, “Maybe its not that simple C, but is it really this complicated?” JC looked away; when he looked back Justin was already gone. *************************************************************************************** Chris was in one of his moods. Normally, normally Laura was all for Chris’s moods. They made life more interesting without causing any lasting harm to others. She cared enough for Chris as a friend that she liked to be around him no matter his particular bipolarity choice of the day. Today though, was not a day that Laura was in a mood of her own equipped to deal with Christopher Kirkpatrick’s mood swings. It didn’t help that both of their attitudes had a lot to do with Joshua Chasez. Unfortunately, Chris was taking out his annoyance with Jayce, with everyone else in the forms of bitter sarcasm and taunts. Laura had grown up with jeers and insults and had as much emotional baggage as any shy twenty something who had never quite grown out of ‘awkward’. Usually anything people said just rolled right off her, unless they were her friends. Laura let few people close to her heart but Chris had some how managed to weasel his way in, squirming and slithering like a worm into an apple. He had squirmed so well that she was about to cry again, this time over Chris instead of his band mate. She wasn’t an emotional woman and was becoming thoroughly sick of feeling like she was always in tears. Two breakdowns in less than twenty four hours would not reflect well upon her. She was glad that she was off the infernal bus for the day and away from close confines with her moody friend. “Laura, darling, can I see you for a few minutes?” She looked up at Johnny who had flown out for a few weeks of the tour before continuing on with some more business trips. He was standing at the doorway of his hotel room and she nodded. None of the guys would need her for anything for awhile. They were all settling in at the hotel for a few hours before the tour continued with its usual force. Not that she particularly wanted to be around any of them, needed or not, right now. Laura wasn’t exactly in a great frame of mind. She took a deep breath and nodded, clutching a nearly ever present clip board to her chest as she slipped in behind the man who was officially her boss. He gestured to the sofa of the mini living room/ office in the hotel room and Laura took it as Johnny took an upholstered chair. He looked at her, face grave and serious, and Laura, already stressed, felt the tension forming a ball between her shoulder blades. Johnny started to speak, paused, and, after running a nervous hand through his hair, continued. “Laura, I want you to know what a blessing you’ve been to this tour. The boys have never been so organized or happy and we’ve all been doing this a long time. “You came into a difficult situation and handled it like a pro. I have no qualms with how you’re doing your hob because you’ve been doing it wonderfully. I am mildly concerned about a small matter that I’ve been aware of, but not worried about, until this morning. Care to guess what this situation is?” Laura shook her head dumbly. Johnny Wright sighed. “I didn’t think you’d guess.” He reached over for a briefcase he had leaning up against the chair he was sitting it before rifling through things for a moment. He pulled out a magazine and tossed it to Laura who caught it. “Flip to page fifteen,” he said quietly. Laura Danon, with a swallow, did as she was told and turned to page fifteen of the latest Entertainment Weekly, and promptly turned white at the article that glared out at her with accusation. It featured her, and JC, two pages of sightings and speculations and full color pictures. She recognized a lot of them from various publicity things on the tour, though some were from private outings her and Jayce and some of the guys went on. A beautifully candid shot of her and Josh dancing together was dead center. She looked up helplessly and tried to answer, but couldn’t find the words. Johnny sighed again. “Shoot Laura, I hate to bring you in here like some criminal. I know you and JC are friends, good friends, and I don’t have a problem with that. I know the media loves to gossip and spread rumors. I understand all too well the lengths they’ll go to in order to sell papers. Now I’m not asking you to account for yourself, I just want to know, are you and JC going to be a problem?” Laura flushed. “No,” she stammered, feeling pitiful and small, “no problem.” Johnny smiled sympathetically at her and nodded. “All right in, I’m sorry again to call you in here about this. I know you have a lot going on…” Laura nodded and rose, trying not to notice how shaky she was, before taking the escape that Johnny’s dismissal offered her, Entertainment Weekly clutched to her breast along with the clipboard. Of course, she ran smack into JC as she was fleeing Johnny and trying to avoid Chris. He caught her as she almost stumbled, and the horrid magazine she had been holding fell, open to the awful article, face up on the floor. “You okay Laura?” Josh asked, concerned as always, considerate, caring, as he studied his obviously distressed friend. Before she could answer he reached down to pick up the magazine she had dropped and froze when he recognized who was featured prominently in the pictures. “JC…” she tried to interject weakly but he ignored her as she scanned the short but painfully revealing column. ‘NSYNC Heartthrob Off the Market?- Numerous sightings around the country have paired up hunky pop star JC Chasez with one Laura Danon. They’ve been seen cuddling and dancing their way across the US, an easy feat considering that Laura Danon is Johnny Wright’s, the boy’s manager, assistant. ‘Evidence may point to a relationship, especially if their reported chemistry is as real as onlookers claim, but others wonder if there’s any truth to the assumptions. Laura Danon isn’t a model, an actress, a singer, or a beauty. She’s a girl next door in every sense of the word and while any normal man would probably be thrilled to have her, we’re left wondering, why does an international pop star seem so interested?’ “Shit!” JC exploded as he finished reading and Laura, standing quietly before him, flinched. He stared at her suddenly and sighed. “Oh honey, I’m so sorry you had to read trash like that…” He held his arms open and Laura went to them instinctively, needing the protection that Josh could provide. Needing his warmth, his strength. Needing to feel him need her. He wrapped her in his embrace as tightly as he dared, large hands carefully smoothing her hair as she buried her face against the broad expanse of his chest. “I’m sorry you got put into an article like that with me Jayce,” Laura murmured softly into the fabric of his shirt, “I’m sorry they said those things, that we were dating and that you wanted…” “Oh baby no,” JC said, interrupting her tumbling, tearful words. He gently pulled her back so that he could look her in the eyes, his own gaze an unsettling dark sapphire. His hands reached forward to cup her face and he kissed her brow tenderly. “I’m not mad they said I was dating you. Honey, you’re one of the people that keep me going, that makes me want to wake up in the morning. I could never, ever be ashamed of being paired with you, even incorrectly. I’m simply sorry that they printed such cruel things about you and that they invaded out privacy like that. Who and what we are, is no one’s business but our own- not the press, or the crew, or Chris Kirkpatrick, all right?” She wanted to argue, to apologize again, but there was a firm closure to JC’s words and, it was so easy not to feel insecure and helpless when he was staring at her like she mattered, mattered to him, so she ignored the small voices of doubt and accepted the praise his words gave her. “All right,” Laura said with a small smile. “Good,” Jayce replied and hugged her tightly again. “Now where on earth did you get that magazine?” She flushed again with the memory of her meeting with Johnny. “Johnny called me in to talk about it.” JC’s brows gathered like a small storm as he frowned. “What did he want to talk about?” Laura shrugged, trying to be nonchalant, though she knew that, for some reason, her answer mattered greatly to JC for reasons she couldn’t quite fathom. “He… he wanted to know if you and I, if us being friends was going to be a continued problem.” “He did, did he?” JC’s voice was collected but angry and Laura touched his arm hesitantly. “Its not a big deal Jayce, it really isn’t.” She could almost see him restraining his emotions and, after a pregnant pause, her friend let out a deep breath. “Okay, you’re right. Its not a big deal.” Not that he wouldn’t have words with Johnny about it later, but that was another matter entirely. “Come on, lets grab some lunch. Do you have any idea what’s been up Chris’s butt? He’s been insufferable all day, not that’s he talking to me yet, but he’s been driving everyone crazy…” Laura smiled and let herself be drawn away; captivated by the man she called friend with words and lover with her heart, happy to let him soothe away doubts raised by a magazine and pain caused by another friend who just wanted her to be happy. When Chris apologized for his rudeness, shame faced, that night after the concert, Laura accepted it with timid forgiveness. JC let Chris know later, on no uncertain terms, that if he ever hurt Laura’s feelings again out of perversity, that, silent treatment or not, he would pay. Chris, still ignoring JC until he declared undying love to Laura, merely snorted when given the threat, but secretly, he was pleased and, over all, in a much better mood. Maybe the two fools would actually realize their declared mutual love one day. Hopefully soon. It was hell on Chris ignoring JC.