Dark Smudge
He slammed the drink down on the counter of the bar, sending the coaster sliding towards the edge. He didn�t care as long as he got another shot of whiskey. It was a drink he rarely drank, but tonight had deemed it very necessary.
She had broken it off with him.
After all of the sneaking around and the hearts broken, she decided that she couldn�t handle it anymore. It wouldn�t be right to continue what they had together.
Fuck that, he thought to himself.
Yes, their relationship wasn�t normal by a long shot. But, it was all theirs. It wasn�t programmed, perfected and molded into what the public wanted. A large part of that was because it had always been secret. But, he knew that what he had with her was different. It had been from the start.
They hadn�t liked each other when they first met. She was young, too young. And completely na�ve. He was old, not yet too old, but old enough. And had way too much experience under his belt. But whereas he could make most people stand back in shock when they first met him or roll their eyes in annoyance, she did neither. She stood up to him. Yes, she was afraid, he could tell by the widening of her eyes when he had strode up to shake her hand the first time. But she stood her ground and took everything he threw at her. All of the stupid jokes, innuendos, and general attempts to rattle her, were never truly effective. That had always bugged the shit out of him. Even Justin had been an easy target at first, but she never gave any indication that he and his taunts affected her.
So, he had started to ignore her. That was the easiest plan to put into motion. She didn�t visit them that often and when she did, she spent most of her time with Justin. He could tell that she and Justin were in the beginnings of a tentative relationship. If it irked him that Justin had decided she should be the one he devoted all his time to, then he hid it well. Justin was his best friend and he would be happy for him.
Over the following year or so, he made a distinctive effort to be nice to her. It wasn�t that she was hard to get along with or wasn�t a nice person, because she was. It was just this feeling he got when he was with her that bugged him. He could never explain it. It was this sick feeling in his stomach that would bother him whenever she was around or mentioned in conversation. He realized now what that feeling had been, but at the time he had been clueless. Because his mind would never have thought of that possibility. He was too old for her. She was 16 when he first met her for god�s sake. So, he shoved aside any wayward thoughts he had and ignored the pangs in his stomach when he heard her name.
And it was impossible to escape hearing her name. She was huge now. Bigger than even his own group, in a way. He couldn�t believe the quiet, yet strong, little girl he had first met was this behemoth in the music industry now. But her name was in lights for the whole world to see. And he hadn�t been able to ignore her for long.
After awhile, he had noticed the looks she gave him. At first, they were on the sly, given out of the corner of her eye when no one else was looking. He thought he was imagining the implication in those looks. But when she had resorted to finagling her way into his conversations and purposefully brushing up against him when leaving a room, he knew that something was up. He had forced the issue, one night, when she had decided to visit Justin in their hotel. He hadn�t expected her reply.
His back had hit the wall behind him as this little speck of a girl pushed him against it. Her lips had ravaged his, prodding and trying to find a way inside. He had been in shock at first, but quickly quieted his brain and responded in kind. She had tasted like mint cookies, since that was what she had been eating earlier, and a dark, honeyed warmth he couldn�t quite name. It didn�t matter. He knew that this was wrong. But she was in his arms for now and that was all that mattered.
It had ended too quickly. Her lips had been swollen, lipstick smeared onto her chin. But he couldn�t think of anything more beautiful at that moment than the girl standing in front of him. And when that girl took his hand and led him towards his room, he knew that nothing would be the same after that.
And so it had started. The sneaking around, the lies and the double-crosses. It was inevitable, because she couldn�t break it off with Justin and he wouldn�t be the one to tell him and wreak their friendship. So, they were careful. She spent her requisite amount of time with Justin, but she always ended up with him.
It had killed him at times to hear her say, �I love you� to Justin, but he had treasured the times when she had screamed it out, followed by his name. It meant more, he thought, when she said it like that. It meant more than when she said it to Justin�s face, surrounded by their public. That wasn�t real. What they said in the dark recesses of hotel rooms was real. He had believed that wholeheartedly.
It had inevitably gone bad. Justin had found out. They both, to this day, had no idea how, but he supposed they had forgotten that Justin wasn�t clueless, just selfish. But for some reason, Justin had believed Wade was the culprit. She did nothing to dissuade him of that notion. And neither had he. In retrospect, he felt bad that Wade got pinned with all of the anger and promised retribution, but it also set him free. Justin never, once, suspected himself. He didn�t know if that showed the true markings of a friend or a selfish kid who never really understood people in the first place.
It had never been his intention to hurt Justin. He really did love the guy. More than most in fact. Except her. He couldn�t explain it, not even really to himself. But there it was, plain as day. He was tired of denying his feelings, tired of pretending that all they had was great sex. Because it wasn�t just that when you could remember her scent, remember the feel of her soft shoulders underneath your fingertips, the sound of her voice when you made her scream. It wasn�t just that when you could remember her laugh, her passion for entertaining, and her enormous heart. It couldn�t just be sex. And it wasn�t for him.
But apparently it had been for her.
As he knocked back his fifth, or maybe sixth, shot of whiskey, he recalled the visit he had received earlier in the day. He had been home, in Orlando, doing nothing of any importance. Something he had been relishing, maybe, a bit too much these days. She had knocked on his door and he had let her in. Her hair and makeup had been perfect, but she was wearing sweats and an old t-shirt. He knew something was wrong when she couldn�t look him in the face. That was the one thing he had always admired about her was her refusal to back down from anybody. Then the words had come. It was just sex, we shouldn�t have done it, Justin is so hurt now, and finally, we need to end it.
He had tried pleading, begging, things he never did with anyone. But she still walked out, leaving him clenching his fists, deciding what to hit. In the end, he had decided alcohol was the answer and had headed for his favorite bar. And that�s where he was at the present moment. Ignoring his pain, or rather dulling it, with a large amount of whiskey.
It wasn�t working.
Chris thought back to her comments, especially the ones concerning Justin. He knew that she had loved him, in her own way, but that it hadn�t been enough. Chris had a feeling that Justin knew that too, but had been holding on out of fear of what lay ahead without her by his side. That was why when they had broken up; Chris had doubled his efforts at being J�s best friend. Yes, part of that was guilt, especially since he had still been seeing her, but another part of it was that he knew Justin was feeling lost. And for all his screw-ups as Justin�s friend, he knew that he couldn�t let him down in this respect.
So, he had talked about him all the time in interviews, mentioned his solo album whenever he could. This, in a way, helped to alienate him from the rest of the band though. They all loved J too, in their own ways, but they were just a little bit afraid of what this solo album could do for the group. And they resented him for just blithely going along with everything Justin did. It appeared to them that he wasn�t worried in the least.
That was a lie. Chris was just as afraid as the rest of them of what this could mean for *NSYNC. But he couldn�t stop his �best friend campaign�. If he did, then he knew that he would never forgive himself. As he thought about it now, he realized that maybe guilt played a larger part in this whole scenario than he previously believed.
But no matter, that�s where things stood. He was Justin�s best friend. And Justin had never suspected that his best friend was fucking his best girl. A girl, who in turn, had just broken Chris�s heart.
Chris finished his drink and paid the bartender. He slowly stood up off of the stool and headed for the door. His cell phone rang, just before he reached the end of the bar though.
He answered it without checking to see who it was.
�Yah, what do you want?� he snarled into the phone.
There was a pause, and then,
�You.�
Chris clutched the end of the bar with his right hand.
�Brit, baby? Is that you?�
Another pause.
�Yah, Chris, it�s me. I�m�God, I�m so fucking sorry. Can you come over? Can we talk? Is that still possible?�
Chris�s brain seemed to freeze in shock but he was able to say,
�Yah, I�ll be there in ten minutes.�
And pressed end on his phone.
He reached her house in seven and a half minutes and flew up the walkway to her front door. He was still a little unsteady from the whiskey, but that didn�t matter. Ringing the bell, he waited in anticipation.
She answered the door, streaks of tears still present on her cheeks.
�You know I love you right?�
Chris nodded and walked into her open arms.
Later, when she had finally fallen asleep, Chris had gotten up to go to the bathroom. He noticed a dark smudge, probably from her mascara, on his neck. He touched it with his fingers, felt the warmth there. She had gotten mascara on him before, in many places on his body. It was her mark, he thought.
He would always be hers.