“How can you not like flying?”
It was as though that question was on a constant loop in Trace’s mouth and he could say nothing else. “I’m just wild, I guess,” I mutter sarcastically, turning the page of my book.
“But it’s so much fun!” Trace exclaims, propping his elbow on the leather armrest of his chair and leaning over the aisle to talk to me. “You’re like…thousands of feet in the air.”
“Exactly. You’re suspended ‘like, thousands of feet in the air’ with nothing to support you but the clouds, completely dependant on the hope that the little piece of steel you’re locked in doesn’t suddenly plummet down to the ground at a record-breaking speed.”
Trace seem slightly stumped by my less than optimistic outlook on flying and leans back in his chair, frowning. “But flying is four times safer than driving,” he says eventually.
“Right,” I reply distractedly from the book. “I’ll think about that when we’re doing a spectacular nose-dive into the earth’s crust.”
“Cat, you’re going to make him cry,” reprimands Justin, pulling at his headphones. “I know for a fact you’re not scared of flying, so stop pretending that you are just so you can make Trace fear for his life.”
I let out a tiny smile. “As if I would do such a thing.”
Justin shakes his head at me before replacing his headphone and leaning against the headrest, his eyes closed. I return to my book, ignoring Trace’s shuffling in the seat across from me as I hear the rumble of the engines preparing the plane for take-off.
I suppose I should be doing cartwheels or some other form of excited anticipation, but I spent so long fussing over New York and what it will be like to leave Tennessee, any enthusiasm for the move as been vacuumed out. Justin has spent the last few days glued to his cell phone, talking with producers, managers; all those middle-aged had-beens with too much gel in their hair that I love so much. Therefore, his customary zeal has been somewhat lacking as of late, and Trace seems to be on some sort of self-deprecation thing where he doesn’t talk much, except to make a really stupid comment. Justin said it was his way of coping with change.
It was actually less hard than I thought it would be saying goodbye to Tennessee. I had a little bit of a tearful adieu with Diane, but I was quick to be assured she would visit me whenever I felt lonely. I even bid her hillbilly boyfriend a nice goodbye without mentioning the fact he wears cowboy hats in all seriousness, which I thought was an astounding show of maturity when all I’ve ever wanted to do was rip those stupid things off his head.
I’m not completely pessimistic however. Trace (who is actually Justin’s personal assistant--a fact that had completely slipped my mind in a year of knowing him) booked our flight tickets in first class, which meant we were ushered onto the plane by a model-esque flight attendant, and seated in extravagantly leather bound chairs that were about a mile wide. It’s a ridiculous amount of money of course, and I did hold up an admirable three minute dispute that we’d be better off in coach, but it’s sort of fun to be in the company of people who could leisurely burn hundred dollar bills.
“What are you reading?” Trace asks, poking me in the arm.
Ignoring the urge to cut off his finger, I murmur, “Just some stuff about New York,” in response. I hate it when people disturb my reading; I always get this incredible impulse to turn around and smack them, shouting “Can’t you see I’m busy?!” But as we’re seated in first class surrounded by tired Japanese business men, I keep my initial reactions to myself.
“What does it say?”
“It’s quite interesting actually,” I reply, straightening up in my seat. “Apparently, the Statue of Liberty was appointed a National Monument in 1924, forty years after its opening.”
Trace’s bored facial expression does not budge. “Is that so?” He was clearly hoping to hear that I was reading some Harlequin romance where some aging housewife gets involved in an intricate affair with her son’s seventeen-year-old friend.
“Yeah, and look, America reciprocated the favor to France by giving them a replica about a quarter of the size in bronze,” I point to a photograph.
Trace rolls his eyes and reaches over me to prod Justin. “Justin, Cat’s being a geek,” he whines as Justin wraps his headphone cords around his iPod.
“Are you still reading that American History crap?” he asks, stretching.
“Justin, this is not crap,” I defend, jabbing at my book with my finger. “How can you call the Statue of Liberty crap? This is a noble peace-offering from France in the wake of the American Revolution. It’s a milestone marking our ever-steady move towards more national alliances.”
“Cat, what the hell are you talking about?” Justin moans, burying his face in his hands.
“Merely trying to inject a bit of culture into you boys,” I tut disapprovingly, opening up my book. “You can’t just go to a place and not know anything about it.”
“Why can’t you be like the rest of my girlfriends and just read Cosmo?”
My head snaps to look at him and I deliver an appropriately pissed off look. “Oh, I’m so sorry, but my brain isn’t exactly capable of handling some of the important issues addressed in Cosmopolitan.”
He laughs, furthering my inclination to smack him on the head. “You read them sometimes.”
“It’s called boredom Justin, it makes one do crazy things. I don’t make them my staple reading material, unlike your past, and clearly highly “intellectual”, girlfriends.”
He shrugs and smiles, clearly very pleased with himself for irritating me so soon into our flight. “But aren’t they chockablock with helpful hints to make yourself a self-confident, sexier woman?”
“All they do is come up with weirdly wonderful sexual positions that I’m perfectly capable of coming up with myself without the assistance of a magazine, thank you very much.”
“Oh really?” he raises an eyebrow. “Care to share, baby?”
“Care to cease with the irritatingly chauvinistic comments, baby?”
He laughs and pats my leg. “I’m just teasing you.”
“Justin, the drinks person is coming!” Trace suddenly whispers urgently, pointing down the blue-carpeted aisle to the slowly moving flight attendant handing out drinks to passengers.
“He’s not your type, Trace,” I say apologetically, laughing when Trace scowls at me.
“Okay…Cat, ask for a decaffeinated Coke,” Justin says anxiously, glancing down at the man as he steadily approaches us.
“What? Why?” I protest, turning my head to look at him.
“Because he’ll have to go get some out of the refrigerator.”
“So?”
“Just do it,” he whispers through gritted teeth, smiling up at the man who had advance up with a cart of refreshments.
“Can I get you anything to drink, madam?” asks the sickeningly peppy man, smiling down at me.
“Um…yes, do you have a caffeine-free Coke?” I ask, feeling Justin squeeze my leg when I hesitated. I don’t even like caffeine-free Coca-Cola. Hell, I even draw the line at Diet. Where’s the fun in a sugarless soda?
“Of course madam, although I’m afraid I’ll have to fetch it from the refrigerator. I don’t have it in my cart at the moment.” He smiles for absolutely no reason whatsoever.
“Sure,” I beam at him, utterly clueless as the man turns around to get my drink and Trace and Justin dissolve into a fit of giggles. “Okay, what’s going on?”
“Come on Trace, go quickly,” says Justin, standing up slightly to talk to Trace.
Trace nods and immediately unbuckles his seatbelt before diving into the refreshments, rummaging through its contents.
“What the hell are you…” I trail off, suddenly feeling an overwhelming disappointment in the two idiots. “Oh no…please don’t tell me you’re stealing peanuts, Trace.”
“Hey, these peanuts are the shit,” says Trace, emerging with no less than ten packets of salted nuts and throwing a few at me and Justin.
“We have peanut wrappers from like, twenty different airlines,” says Justin proudly, opening a packet and popping a few in his mouth. “They’re high-quality, baby.”
“What an achievement,” I say sarcastically, torn between disbelief and depression in the knowledge that seeing Justin and Trace do mind-numbingly stupid things was the norm.
“Here you go, madam,” says the man, quickly pouring my no-caffeine, no-fun drink into a glass with some ice in it. “Anything for you, sir?”
“Can I have some peanuts, please?” asks Justin, smirking, hiding his previously opened bag
“Of course, Mr. Timberlake,” beams the man, quickly bringing out far more than the customary two-packet-per-person and passing them to him, his wide eyes doing little to conceal his excitement at meeting ‘Mr. Timberlake’. “I hope you enjoy your flight, sir.”
Resisting the urge to roll my eyes, I turn to Justin, trying to block out the sound of Trace asking for even more peanuts. “So this is how you two amuse yourself when you’re working?”
“Yep,” he nods, opening a bag and scooping up at least half of its contents in one handful. “And plus, first class is always really over expensive. They expect you to steal their snacks; it balances it out.” At my frown, he continues. “It’s like when you’re at a hotel and you take the little bars of soap and the bathrobes.”
“You’re not supposed to do that,” I interrupt.
He rolls his eyes, throwing a peanut at me. “Alright, Saint Catherine.”
Laughing, I pull out his iPod, running my finger over the touch-sensitive circle to activate it. “Do you have your album on this?”
He leans over my shoulder to look at it. “Probably. When I’m not listening to myself talk, I like to listen to myself sing,” he grins.
“Alright Justin, that’s enough of the narcissism for today,” I mutter playfully, scrolling down the menu at an alarmingly slow rate. I hate the whole circle thing; it always manages to outsmart me.
“Cat, I’m going to die watching you do this,” Justin snaps eventually, snatching the iPod from my hands. His long fingers expertly dance around the keys, before he hands it back to me, the faint notes of Senorita pouring from the headphones.
I put one headphone in, smirking when I remember Justin teaching me how to play it on the piano., before just begging to kiss me. I would smirk smugly, but it’s really Justin’s job in the relationship to be the irritatingly conceited one.
“What’s with the sudden interest?” Justin asks, rubbing my thigh in a very distracting and yet fantastically enjoyable way.
“I just figured if I have dragged my ass all the way to New York for your career, I may as well know a little about it.”
His eyebrows shoot upwards. “Really? You’ve never shown interest in it before.”
“That’s not true,” I defend. “I went to one of your concerts. I even helped my sister make a freaking banner, for Christ sake.”
“What did it say? ‘I Love You, Justin?’”
“Probably something more along the lines of, ‘Impregnate me, Justin’.”
He chuckles. “I’d be happy to.”
Shaking my head vigorously, I look down to see the song change. “Don’t even joke about it, Justin. The last thing we want to do is bring a human being containing our matching DNA into the world quite so soon. Can you imagine how screwed up that kid would be?”
He laughs. “Well, anyway, you might have to know snippets about me if you’re going to be my girlfriend.”
I frown. “I thought I’d been your girlfriend for the past seven months, or did I dream it all?”
“But ‘publicly’. My manager will think it very odd if you don’t even know what my second group album was called.”
“Let me guess…Let’s All Have Perfectly Legal, Innocent Fun? No? Um…how about, We Are Sexy Pretty Boys, But We Don’t Take Drugs And Neither Should You, Kids.”
As I was chuckling at my own wit, Justin was scowling at me. “No, it was called No Strings Attached.”
I raise an eyebrow in concern. “I hope you don’t mean that in the casual-sex sense of the phrase. Can you imagine the drastic rise in teen pregnancies from all the teenage girls taking your advice and getting in ‘no strings attached’, purely physical relationships?”
“Ha ha, very funny,” he replies sarcastically, folding his arms grumpily.
“Cat, it’s really not interesting,” says Trace lowering his magazine. “Here’s how it goes…skinny kid gets into Mickey Mouse club, skinny kid gets into band, skinny kid releases solo album and tries to be black.” He shrugs. “Simple.”
Laughing, I turn to a very displeased Justin. “Is that how it went, skinny kid?”
“No!” he protests, glaring at Trace. “It’s a really great story, but if you guys don’t wanna hear it…”
“No, no…I’m sorry, please tell me,” I smile at him and rub his arm in what I hope is an encouraging manner.
“Yeah Justin, I could always hear this story for the fifteenth time,” says Trace, tucking his magazine into the little pocket on the back of the seat in front of him.
Justin shifts until his back is to the window so he can face Trace and I, his expression serious. “Well, I started off slowly. Doing things like mall shows, beauty pageants--”
“Aw, did you wear a pretty dress with a tiara?” I ask, sticking out my bottom lip.
He smiles. “No, I wore a white tux.”
“I thought beauty pageants were for girls.”
“They are,” says Trace. “It really says a lot about Justin’s confused youth.”
Justin rolls his eyes before continuing. “The main point is that I won it.”
“Really?”
“Yep. I have tapes of it somewhere. I’ll have to get my mom to root them out for you.”
“Cat, they are the funniest thing,” snorts Trace, scrunching up the bag of what might just be his fifth packet of peanuts. “Justin thought he was this big hotshot with the basketball, and then he goes and freaking drops it before he got off the stage! Oh, and then he wears this really fucked up shirt in the fashion bit which kinda looked like a patchwork of cellophane--”
“Then I did Star Search…” Justin tries to interrupt Trace’s steady flow of criticism.
“Oh yeah, the shirt for that is even funnier…”
“Did you win?” I ask, trying to keep the grin from my face as Trace’s criticism of Justin’s fashion choices lingers in the background.
Justin shifts uncomfortable. “Not exactly. But at least it got me into the Mickey Mouse Club.”
I roll my eyes. “Oh yes, the infamous Mickey Mouse Club.”
“It was the first big thing I had done. It had Britney, Christina, JC…people like that. We sang, danced, acted--”
“I used to watch it,” I interrupt, biting back my smile. “And I think regarding a collage of equally unfunny kiddy sketches ‘acting’ is taking it a bit far, don’t you?” Trace lets out a loud snort and we high five, much to Justin’s annoyance.
“You guys are hilarious, really.” Justin rolls his eyes at us before continuing, “Anyway, when I was about fourteen or so, I got into Nsync.”
“Fourteen? But that’s so young!” I screech. He shrugs in response. “At fourteen I was becoming increasingly more secluded and moody, my only achievement was winning the school Spelling Bee...and you were in a goddamn band?”
He grins cockily. “Yes. And by fifteen, I had an album out in Germany.”
“What the hell could you sing about at that age? Your job at the movie theater and how much you wanted a BMX?”
He crosses his arms defiantly. “I was incredibly mature at fifteen.”
“What, you had your own cell phone?” I say in a mock serious tone. I should really stop teasing Justin, but I’m finding it’s speeding along my journey very nicely.
He sneers at me. “Excuse me, but I was already in a sexual relationship,” he says smugly.
My eyes widen to unattractive proportions. It sounds more disturbing every time I hear that. “What? You were having sex at fifteen?”
“Fourteen, actually. And keep your voice down.”
My mouth gapes open as I stare at him in astonishment. “That’s so…”
“Admirable?” he grins.
“No. Disgusting,” I grimace. “My God, what a scandal. I didn’t even get kissed until I was fifteen, and it was by my lab partner who became a priest after I left, so it really isn’t something to brag about.”
Justin laughs. “Well, I did start a little early.” He shrugs. “But we broke up because I was so busy with the album. It did really well in Germany, and over a lot of Europe.”
“So you were this mega star by the time you were sixteen?”
“You could say that.”
“What were you doing at this point?” I ask, swiveling around to face Trace.
He laughs. “Basically the same thing that Justin was doing with all of those German girls, only I stuck to Tennessee’s own brand.” If the aisle wasn’t so damn wide, I would have reached over and smacked the smirk right off of Trace’s face.
Justin must sense my readiness to launch into a sermon about the women’s rights movement, as he swiftly interrupts me. “But then we came back to the states, and released the album here.”
“And it did great?”
He chews his lip thoughtfully. “Well…no, I guess it didn’t. But then we did this concert for Disney, and it exploded.”
“Would I recognize any of the songs.”
He pauses, titling his head back to think. “Well, what you like to refer to as the “God Song”, um…I Want You Back, maybe?”
“How did it go?”
He grins, before clearing his throat and delivering an embarrassingly loud rendition. “You’re all I ever wanted! You’re all I ever needed…”
“Yeah-eah!” Trace adds, his deafening adlib draw the attention of a few irritated passengers.
“Alright, alright!” I exclaim, blushing furiously at their public display. “That’s enough.”
Justin giggles. “Well, did you like it?”
“It was musical genius,” I mutter, still holding my head down in case anyone thinks I’m with these geeks. “Were you with Britney at this point?”
Justin’s eyes snap to mine in surprise. We’ve never talked about Britney, as I’ve never expressed any interest in her. My sudden curiosity is a little out of the blue. “Um…sort of. We started seeing each other when I was about seventeen or so. Maybe later.”
I nod. “I remember my sister freaking out when you and Britney came to this award show together. She thought you two were the most adorable couple.”
He bends his head to trace a pattern in the salt from the peanuts on his table. “We were, I suppose.”
Knowing I was getting into dangerous ground, I quickly pulled away from the Britney topic. “So, how many albums did you do with Nsync?”
“Three,” he answers. “But with the second one, we had a court battle with Lou because of financial issues, and--”
“Lou Pearlman?” He nods. “The guy that screwed over the Backstreet Boys?”
He frowns. “How do you know?” I shrug nonchalantly, sipping my no-caffeine Coke. “Were you a Backstreet…fan?” he asks quietly, with a hint of a smile on his face.
“No,” I deny hotly, returning my drink to the table with a bang. “I just liked one or two of their songs, that’s all. And I just happened to be interested in what was going on in their careers, for business purposes alone. It wasn‘t like I liked them.”
“Don’t worry Cat, so did I,” Trace says reassuringly. “I just couldn’t tell Justin. He still maintains that his hair is better than Nick Carter’s.”
Laughing, I turn back to Justin, who was looking not unlike his younger brother with his ridiculous pout. “Sorry. Proceed with your heart-wrenching tale of devastating youth exploitation.”
“Well, we were getting our asses sued for hundreds of millions,” at my gasp, he smiles. “But don’t worry, we won, and released No Strings Attached.”
“Which broke a ton of records by selling millions in the first week,” adds Trace.
“Really?”
Justin nods. “Yup. That was stuff like Bye Bye Bye--”
“So if they didn’t hear it the first time, you repeated it twice just to really get that message across?”
He ignores me. “This I Promise You…”
“Promise me what? That you won’t give me an STD?”
“Then we did Celebrity,” he finishes, throwing me an irritated glance.
“Oh yeah. I remember one of your videos. My sister taped its TRL premiere and played it over and over.”
Justin rolls his eyes. “I suppose I should prepare myself for another verbal bashing?”
“No! I actually liked it.” I protest. “I think it was…Gone? Something like that?” He nods. “I loved the way you went straight to the refrigerator for comfort. You’re my kinda guy.” My smile fades as I try to keep a straight face. “But that bitch left you out cold, man. No furniture, no food, no…shoes?”
Trace snorts as Justin smiles begrudgingly. “It was the director’s artistic touch to show how I was left with nothing.”
“Indeed. And what’s artistic about the way her ass fell out of her shorts when you two were frolicking in the meadow?”
He shrugs. “Well, that was a little touch of my own.” He dodges my slap and carries on. “Anyway, after Celebrity, I broke up with Britney and decided to do a solo album.”
“Why?”
He pauses to think about it. “I guess…I guess I just wanted to see if I could do it on my own. And plus, I wanted complete freedom on a record. To say exactly what I wanted to say.”
“And you hired our friends Chad and Pharrell,” I add, proud of my little tidbit of knowledge.
“Exactly,” he nods.
“Yeah, I remember that. Everyone went crazy when you did that scandalous video for Cry Me A River.” I send him a disapproving frown. “That was a little low of you.”
He nods mournfully. “I know. But it was a good video.”
“It was, just a little accusative.” Running my finger over the edge of my glass, I look at him carefully. “Is that actually what happened?”
“When?”
“When you and Britney broke up. Did she cheat on you?” I ask quietly, ready to retract my comment if he got upset or said it was none of my business.
He sighs, looking down at his fold-out table. “Well, yes, but it’s my fault we didn’t get back together. She made a mistake, and I was too pigheaded to forgive her for it.”
Feeling slightly uncomfortable, I turn away to meet Trace’s sad gaze, and it hits me how much this must have affected Justin. Knowing my sister and how she loves to keep abreast of all the latest celebrity news, she was probably right when she said they were the cutest couple. Put two gorgeous people together and you get an even better looking couple. They must have been great together.
Which brings me back to the faint, lingering point always in the back of my mind…what the hell is Justin doing with me after Britney? It would be like driving a Mercedes for four years and then suddenly being downgraded to a Volvo. Or having your local McDonalds shut down to be replaced by a health food shop.
“But you and I work a lot better than me and Britney did,” Justin says, interrupting my thoughts as he shifts in his seat.
My head snaps up. “Really?”
“Yeah, Britney didn’t have any of your fire,” Trace laughs. “You know when you and Justin argue, it’s like World War Three has erupted?” I nod sheepishly. “Well, with those two they had the piddliest of arguments, and then two minutes later it was, ‘love you baby’, and ‘no, no, you have better hair!’”
Justin laughs but quickly tries to scorn him. “We were not like that!”
Trace raises an eyebrow before putting headphones over his ears in a very, ‘whatever’ way.
“So that was your career in a nutshell?” I ask, placing my hand in Justin’s.
“No. He’s conveniently left out all the parts where he wore skin tight velour shirts and used bleach to achieve that natural, sun-kissed hair look,” says Trace over his music, loud enough to get the person in front of his to stop his typing and snort.
Justin blushes slightly, but acts as though he hadn’t heard him. “Yes, a very small nutshell. But we’ll find you a “Justin Timberlake’s whirlwind adventure of a life” program filling you in with the rest. You’ll just die when you see me at the beauty pageant.”
“I know. I can just envision the masculinity pouring off of you.”
“Shut up,” he prods me in the side, giving my hand a squeeze. “Oh! When we land, you’ll get to meet Tiny.”
“Tiny who? Tiny Tim?”
He smiles and brings my hand to his lips, giving it a quick kiss. “No, my security guard. I’m going to need him a lot more in New York.”
I make a face. “Is he going to be there all the time?”
“Pretty much,” he says apologetically. “But he’s really nice.”
“I’m sure he is,” I agree, yawning and resting my head on Justin’s shoulder.
“You tired, baby?” he asks, dropping a kiss on my forehead.
“Mm,” I mumble in response, snuggling up to him slightly.
Justin places another tiny kiss on my forehead, before very slowly pulling out a magazine and turning the pages at an agonizingly deliberate pace, so that the crackling won’t disturb me.
For a moment I debate whether I love him for being so sweet, or hate him for making me buy that caffeine-free crap. A normal, eight-spoonfuls-of-sugar-per-can of Coke would’ve boosted my energy sky-high.
Feeling his warm touch lifting my head to insert a pillow between the stuffed leather seat and myself before smoothing my hair away from my face, I decide on the former.
--------------------------------------------------
“Cat…Cat, wake up.”
My eyes sluggishly agree to open, squinting when the overhead lights blind them. “Are we there yet?” I ask groggily, rubbing my eyes as Justin smiles at me.
“Yes, we’re here.”
Stretching, I buckle my seatbelt and hear a monotonous voice announcing we are “preparing for landing”. My bleary focus adjusts to the light and I peak out of Justin’s window, still only seeing the fluffy white clouds obstructing my view of the city. Justin let out a small chuckle at my eagerness before leaning back in his seat. The plane dipped, causing my stomach to have that strange empty feeling, like the one you get one roller coasters where you’re at the very peak before you hurtle down a vertical drop.
My hand slips into Justin’s and I absentmindedly look over at Trace, who suddenly looks a lot more scared than he did when we took off. Was it perhaps wrong of me to describe exactly what speed the plane would hit the ground at?
“Hey,” I give Justin’s hand a nudge, attracting his attention.
“Hi.”
“You know I was just kidding before, right? When I was making fun of the stuff you’ve done?”
“Everything I’ve done,” he inserts, smiling. “You’ll have a field day if you hear the first album.”
I grin sheepishly. “But seriously, I am really proud of you.”
“Thank you,” he replies, kissing me quickly as the airplane hit’s the tarmac with a slight bump. His lip part to reveal a perfect set of straight white teeth as he smiles. “We’re here.”
I sigh. “Yep, we are.”
As we stepped down from the plane, Justin began frantically waving at someone. I looked in the direction his chaotic arm gestures seemed to be pointed to, to see a large black man smirking at Justin. He couldn’t have been less than 300 pounds, and yet didn’t look so much fat as…firm. His shaved head made him almost look like a convict out on parole, and his black shirt and pants did nothing to suggest anything other than murderous thoughts running through his head.
“Tiny!” Justin shouts, jogging across the asphalt the greet the man. Trace hangs back with me, placing a hand on my back to urge me forward.
I don’t want to go near that man. He could snap me in two. He’s like a big…block.
“Hey Trace,” his deep voice greets as he slaps Trace on the back.
“What’s up, Tiny?” says Trace, his short stocky figure dominated by “Tiny”’s.
“This is Cat,” says Justin, pointing towards me.
I shrink back timidly. What if he suddenly lashes out and kills me? “Hi,” I whisper.
“Hi,” he says happily. “Nice to meet you.”
“Mmmm…” I trail off uncertainly. “So…you’re Justin’s bodyguard?”
“Yup, I’ve been protecting his scrawny ass for years.”
I let out an unsure laugh. “Great.”
“Okay, I got a car for you guys parked out in the front,” he begins seriously, his face set into a frown. “We’d better get going before the paparazzi come.”
I can’t help but giggle nervously. “This all sounds very co-vert op.”
I don’t get the round of laughs I expected. “If the press see Justin, they’ll freak. If they see Justin with a girl…” Trace, Justin and Tiny shudder visibly. “Chaos,” Tiny finishes.
“Really?” I raise an eyebrow in doubt.
“You have no idea,” says Tiny, beginning to take brisk strides towards the car park.
“What about our luggage?” I ask.
“Someone will pick it up for us,” Trace waves off nonchalantly, following Tiny.
“Can’t we do it ourselves?”
“We could,” Justin shrugs. “But my people will do it.”
I stop in my tracks and let my mouth drop open in shock. “Your ‘people’?”
He rolls his eyes and grasps my elbow. “Come on, Cat. This place will be crawling with photogs in half an hour.”
“Can’t I at least get a bottle of water?” I ask, pointing towards the airport.
Tiny lets out a groan. Great, he likes me already. “Be back in fifteen minutes,” he orders.
I was tempted to make a smart remark about how it was “affirmative, commander”, but considering one of his hands is the size of my head, I quickly turned around and scurried into the airport. I wove in and out of the bustling crowd, darting into the nearest shop I could to get something to drink.
I pick up a bottle of water and waited in the queue behind an old man who took the liberty of paying in the smallest change possible. I tap my foot impatiently, thinking about Tiny’s various ways of wrath. Suddenly, a tug on my arm causes me to turn around, expecting to see Trace asking me to buy him some peanuts.
To my surprise, a girl of about fifteen was staring at me intently. “Can I help you?” I ask hesitantly.
“Hi,” she says nervously, peering at me curiously. “I’m Samantha, I’m here on holiday with my family,” she waves behind her towards a man and a woman trying to calm a screaming child. “And I was looking out of the window, and I think I saw you.”
What a weird girl. “Really.” I reply as more of a bored statement. “Is there anything I could do for you?”
“Um...this is going to sound a little freaky,” I haven’t heard that word in a while, “but where you with Justin Timberlake?”
“Yes,” I answer immediately, before realizing broadcasting I was with “The Justin Timberlake” was not the best of ideas. “I mean, um…no.” I am a genius. Give me a Nobel Prize.
“You were, weren’t you!” she exclaims. “See, I heard he was working on another album in New York, but--”
“How the hell did you find that out?” I blurt rudely.
She shrugs. “The internet.”
This must be the most surreal experience of my life. “Well, um…yeah…” Again, I deliver another brilliantly witty piece of banter, and try to turn away, feeling awkward. “Are you a fan?”
She nod. “I love his music.”
“Well, he loves his fans,” I say in the happiest voice I can muster.
“Are you his girlfriend?” she asks, gripping my arm intently.
“Erm…” my eyes glance towards the blonde-haired cashier as he scans my water. “No, no I’m not. I’m his…personal assistant.”
“Is that water for him?!” she exclaims, pointing towards the bottle excitedly.
“Um…yeah, sure.”
“So is Trace still his PA too?”
It took me a moment to understand what a PA was, but I nodded. “Yeah, but he can always use…a helping hand.” God, someone slit my throat before I start talking even more crap.
“Well, it was so cool to meet you,” she says, grinning at me.
“Likewise,” I reply, trying to smile.
“Thanks a lot, bye!” She waves over her shoulder, before running out of the shop and back to her parents, leaving me stunned.
Did that just happen? It was the strangest encounter I’ve ever had with someone, and I’m friends with Trace Ayala for goodness sake.
“She’s one of the good ones,” a rumble of a voice interrupts my thoughts.
My head snaps up to see Tiny standing before me, arms crossed protectively over his chest as he smiles. “You’ll get worse, trust me.”
“That was just…odd,” I complain, leaving the shop with a somewhat dazed expression on my face.
Tiny shrugs. “Hate to say it to you Cat, but it’s something you’ll have to grow to expect.”
“Really?” I ask, unscrewing the lid off of my bottle.
“Yep,” he nods, holding open the door for me. “Most of them are okay, but--”
All of a sudden a bright white flash seared through my vision, making me step back in surprise. My sight blurs momentarily, before I see a man in a white t-shirt and baggy green pants standing in front of me, his face hidden by an obtrusive black camera.
“Who the hell are you?” I demand, rubbing my eyes from the flash.
He doesn’t reply, but instead takes another picture of me. Tiny lets out an angry groan and moves himself in front of me, his overpowering physique obscuring mine from sight.
“Let’s go, Cat,” he says gruffly, pulling on my elbow and speeding towards the car.
I bite back the “What’s going on?” and follow him, bending my head to hide my face from the guy with the camera. Tiny leads me to a black Escalade, just like Justin’s back home, and quickly shoves me into it, trying his hardest to stay in front of me at all times. I crawl into the car, only feeling safe when I slam the door shut and put a protective blacked out window between myself and the man.
“Cat, what’s wrong?” says Justin, putting his hand on my knee. “You’re shaking.”
The car tilts under Tiny’s weight as he throws himself into the front seat, before bringing his door to a crashing close.
“Fucking photographer,” he mutters under his breath, hastily jabbing his key into the starter, missing a few times in his hurry.
Justin frowns, glancing out of the window where the man is doing some sort of crazy dance around the car in an attempt to get a picture through the windows. “Fuck,” he mumbles, leaning forward until his head touches his knees. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.”
My eyes dart between him and Trace, who starts to chew his lip nervously. “Was that a paparazzi?”
Tiny and Justin don’t respond, but Trace nods solemnly. “Get used to it, Cat.”
The car speeds off, leaving tire marks in the airport parking lot, before getting on the main road and racing away at a surely illegal speed.
And I realize with a jolt, that I don’t want to get used to it.
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