Last night I fell asleep in Justin's arms, and I slept like a baby. I'd wake up every once and a while and feel his breath on me and I thought I was dreaming every time. Less then 24 hours ago I was just a college student living in Boston, and now I'm waking up in the arms of Justin Timberlake. He stayed true to his word too, he didn't try anything. He put me into bed and almost left to sleep in the other room, but I made him stay with me. When he got into bed I curled up next to him and felt his arm go around me and he rubbed my back until I fell asleep. I felt a soft kiss on my forehead about an hour later and soon after felt his breath become steady and heard him snoring lightly. His alarm went off at 7am, a measly four hours after we had fallen asleep. He rolled over to turn it off and I immediately got cold the moment he rolled away from me. I couldn't open my eyes so I reached for him to pull him back over to me. He pulled me close to him and kissed the top of my head.

"Ris?"

"Mmhmm," I said while putting little kisses on his bare chest.

"My flights at 10," he said softly.

My mind started racing. His flights at 10. In 3 hours he'll be leaving for a different state, and my life will be back to normal like none of this ever happened. I knew all along this was going to happen but I made myself forget. I never meant to have feelings for him; none of this was suppose to happen to little old me. Questions started running through my mind. Will he find someone else just like he found me? Does he really mean it when he says we'll work something out? Was this a one night thing?  Will I ever see him again? Does he feel the same way I do? Is it even possible that this would work? Whatever this is. One thing I knew for sure was that I didn't want to lose whatever we had. I didn't want another day to go by that I didn't wake up next to him. It felt so right, so comfortable, and so perfect. I wasn't looking at him as Justin Timberlake anymore, he was just Justin. A person that I have a connection with, someone with whom I've enjoyed nearly every moment we've spent together.

"I know you're flipping out," he said with his chin on my head and his hand rubbing up and down on my back, "don't."

"I can't help it," I replied with my eyes still closed savoring each moment he was next to me.

"I know I'm going to be busy, but you will be too with school and work and stuff. The time will go by faster then you think, and if you want to come out to some shows I'll fly you out. I definitely want you there for the last show; it's a Saturday so you don't have class. IChat is a beautiful thing that should be put to use, and once I'm done with the tour we can figure everything else out."

"Yeah," was all I could manage to say.

He scooted down further on the bed so that we were eye level. I kept my eyes closed in fear now that I would cry if I looked at him. I couldn't help but think that this was all going to be over the minute he got on a plane and flew to Ohio.

"Look at me," he said softly. When I didn't open my eyes I felt soft lips go from my forehead to my nose, to each cheek, and land effortlessly onto my lips, "please?" he said after pulling away. I opened my eyes and looked into his. I could see that he had some fear in his eyes to. Maybe he thought I wouldn't want to do it, or that I couldn't handle it. Or maybe he thought that I would turn around and say whatever we had meant nothing. "I will do everything in my power to make this work," he said to me.

"What is this?" I questioned.

"Me and you."

"But what are we Justin? Friends or something more? Should I expect you to go on tour and hook up with other people and not get upset about it?"

"That's not going to happen."

"Then tell me what this is."

"It's new and different for me," he said after a moment, "I want to explore what a relationship with you would be like. I have no intentions on dating anyone else and I would hope that you don't either. But I can't tell you exactly how it's going to work because I've never done this before.  What I can tell you is that I will make it work, somehow, someway."

"I've been told I'm awful at relationships."

"I really don't give a shit what you've been told," he said laughing.

"I'm scared."

"I will not hurt you. I know that you can't fully believe that and I don't take offense to it because I know it's not because of me, but Marissa," he said while placing his hands on both sides of my face, "I will not hurt you."

"I have this fear of people just leaving me...it's happened so much that I think it will always happen again, and you'll be leaving me all the time."

"I'm a phone call away, I might not physically be with you but I'm not going to leave you stranded. We WILL figure this out...I promise. You're something special Marissa, and I'm just as scared as you are, but we can make this work."

"You'll call when you can?"

"Everyday."

"We'll IChat regularly?"

"As much as you want."

"You'll tell me if it's not working and won't drag me along?"

"That's not even a question because it will work."

"Justin..." I said giving him a stern look.

"I will tell you if it's not working and won't drag you along."

"You'll kiss me right now and stay in bed with me until you absolutely have to get ready to leave?"

He put his lips on mine and tangled his fingers in my hair. I slipped my tongue in between his lips to let him know that I wanted it just as much as he did. After what felt like hours of the most unbelievable make out session of my life, he kissed me on my nose and pulled me as close to him as possible. I could feel his heart beating on my chest, and I kissed every inch of his body that was readily available to me. I was about to fall back to sleep when he looked at the clock at saw that it was 8:00. Even though he was Justin Timberlake he still had to be at the airport at least an hour before take off. I knew that he was going to say he had to go but deep down I was hoping that he would just stay with me and forget about everything he had to do.

"Please don't go," I said before he could say anything.

"You know I have to."

"Justin..." I whined as he rolled over and threw the covers off of us. 

"Come on, help me pack up and I'll take you back home," he said.

"Take me with you?"

"Don't tempt me woman, I know how important school is to you I'm not going to let you quit just for me."

"Ugh...why do you always have to be right?"

"Don't you read the magazines? I'm perfect!"

I mumbled a 'yeah right' under my breath as I got out of bed. I helped him pack up his clothes and clean up a little bit. We had room service bring us some breakfast and we ate at the table practically in silence. Neither one of us wanted this moment to come, but we both knew that it had to. My life was about to become a whirlwind, and his life was going to be filled with new challenges. We agreed to not go public with anything until we figured out how it was all going to work. He told me I could tell my friends but I don't trust them enough, so I had to figure out a way to secretly date America's most Wanted Bachelor. I cleared the plates and left them outside of the door, and when I went back in he had his luggage in one hand, and my bag in the other.

"We're taking the elevator," he said.

"Correction, YOU are taking the elevator, I'm taking the stairs."

He grabbed my hand and pulled me towards him.

"You're getting in this elevator with me, and you will be fine, I won't let anything happen to you."

"Justin, I am not getting in that elevator," I said.

The next thing I knew he dropped his bag, picked me up and threw me over his shoulder. I tried kicking and screaming, but it wasn't working, and I soon realized that if I were to ever get mugged I had no chance. He didn't seem effected in any way by my kicks or punches to the back so I gave up when I heard the elevator doors open and with one last unsuccessful plea Justin walked into the elevator and put me down when the doors closed.

"Just talk to me, you'll be fine," he said not taking his eyes off of me.

Every time I was in an elevator it brought me back to where I didn't want to be. I felt the walls closing in on me as the elevator started its decent. I couldn't focus and I could feel a panic attack brewing. The elevator stopped on the 10th floor and I attempted to run off but Justin grabbed me by my arm and pulled me back up against that back of the elevator. He took my face in his hands and looked my in the eyes, "Look at me," I heard him say and I did as I was told. I got lost in his eyes and was able to focus solely on him, and not soon after we were walking off of the elevator into the lobby.

"See, nothing to worry about," he said

"I'm never getting in another elevator again, that was a limited time offer and the time has now expired" was my response.

"We'll see about that."

 I spotted Eric and the security guard that was near the elevator yesterday. Justin kept his head down as we walked over to them hand in hand.

"Told you I'd see you soon, I'm Lonnie," the other guard said.

"You were right," I chuckled, "I'm Marissa."

Justin told them that before they went to the airport they had to drop me off at my dorm. A black Escalade with tinted windows was waiting for us out front and right before Justin opened the door to the lobby to go outside he let go of my hand. It was my first taste of what it was like to be Justin Timberlake's girlfriend, but not being allowed to let anyone know. I stopped in my tracks for a moment but then I felt Eric's hand on my back pushing me along to the waiting SUV. Justin held the door open for me and I was a little surprised to see three people already in the back seat. He got in after me and officially introduced me to his cousin Rachel and two members of his "team." I only lived a couple of blocks away, so Justin had the driver pull into a side ally by my building. He grabbed my duffle bag and got out of the car while everyone else in the car was giving him a look as to say 'what the fuck are you doing?" 

"It's broad daylight Justin," I said after I closed the door to the car.

"We're in an ally it's fine. I can handle myself and if for some reason anything happens where I can't, there are 2 very capable people just a few feet away." He looked at me with sad eyes when he saw the first of many tears starting to fall. "I know it's hard, and I know you're scared, I am too. We're going to figure this out, we'll figure out a system and make this work okay?" he asked pulling me into a hug.

"Okay," I said through sniffles.

"I'll call you when I land and after the show." I shook my head but couldn't bring myself to say anything. It was this moment that was either going to change the rest of my life for the better, or for worse and at that time not knowing which way it was going to go scared the shit out of me. "Trust me," he said before placing a gentle kiss on my lips.

"I'm trying," I managed.

"That's all I can ask for." He kissed my nose before my lips and assured me again that it was all going to work out, and I believed him. For the first time in years I believed the words coming out of someone else's mouth. This was either a turn in the right direction or it was going to come back and bite me in the ass, I would soon find out. I gave a wave goodbye with teary eyes to everyone in the car before he closed the door after he got back in. I couldn't watch the car drive away so I turned and started walking to my building before it did, and no sooner did I take two steps, I heard Justin,

"Maris," I turned to see his head sticking out a moving vehicle, "I'll call you, I promise," he said with a wave. I couldn't help but laugh at how foolish he looked and I waved back before watching the big black truck fade to nothing after it turned the corner.

I walked into my room and threw myself face first onto my bed before screaming as loud as I could into my pillow not realizing that my roommate heard me scream. I jumped 10 feet in the air when she came into my room and asked if I was okay. After assuring her I was fine she asked the one question I had hoped no one would ask me.

"So...where were you all night?"

"Out," was all I could come up with.

"Who is he?"

"Who is who Amy?"

"The guy, you must have been with a guy if you come strolling in here at 8:45 in the morning wearing the same thing you wore last night."

"It's a very long story," I said while getting up off of my bed attempting to make an exit.

"I have time," she said sitting down on one of my oversized chairs.

"Well I don't." I grabbed my bathrobe and started walking into the bathroom to take a shower and clear my head.

"I WILL GET THIS OUT OF YOU MITCHELL," I heard Amy scream down the hall. 'Good luck' I thought to myself.

I got out of the shower and took a deep breath to fill my lungs with all of the steam that filled the now foggy bathroom. After one hour in a burning hot shower I realized that I just need to go with the flow. Whatever happens happens and I just couldn't get too attached. These first two weeks should tell me if I'll be able to do this distance/traveling thing, and if I can't handle it well I haven't invested too much of my time into anything yet and maybe we could still be friends. And if things worked out okay, well then this could lead to something great and unexpected. Either way it was a win/win situation, I just had to think positive. I opened the bathroom door and let the stream travel into the hallway. Halfway to my room I heard a beep from my phone indicating that I had a missed call, and a double beep telling me I had a voicemail. I looked at my phone. Two missed calls, the first was from Jen who I yet again forgot to call, and the second was from Justin. My heart immediately skipped a beat when I saw his name, and then almost automatically I started to worry because there was no way he was already in Ohio. I held down the 1 to listen to my messages.

"MARISSA NO MIDDLE NAME MITCHELL, you better call me immediately or I'm going to kick your ass. First you leave me stranded outside and won't tell me what the hell you're doing, then you don't call me when you get home. You're lucky there is security in your building. Please call me when you get this I need to know that everything is okay. I know where you live." I will definitely get in trouble for that, I thought to myself as I hit 7 to delete Jen's voicemail and prayed that I would never hear her scream like that again.

"Next new message," said my always chipper answer machine lady.

"Hey it's me...Justin. I'm not in Ohio yet, I'm sitting in airport security waiting to board my plane and I wanted to make sure you were okay. I'm suppose to be boarding in about 5 minutes," I turned and looked at my clock 10:35, 'shit' I thought to myself, "I hope you're okay and you're not ignoring my call. I'll call you the minute I land and I expect you to answer or else I'm going to get on the next flight to Boston and come kick your ass," that's the second person that's threatened to kick my ass in a matter of 2 minutes, I'm on a roll I thought to myself. "Seriously though, it's going to be fine. WE are going to be fine. I pinky promise. Talk to you in a couple of hours, and no more tears. Bye Ris."

I felt a huge smile creep on my face as I hit 9 to save the message. I threw my phone on my bed and let out a deep sigh of relief.

"What's that smile for?"

"Jesus Christ Amy, must you continue to sneak up on me?"

"Sorry...but not sorry enough to not bug you for answers."

"UGH AMY, yes there is a guy and no I don't want to talk about it. Not yet at least."

"When do I get to meet this mystery man?"

"Not anytime soon," I said surprising myself that I said it out loud.

"And why is that?"

"Because I won't be seeing him for 2 weeks, and when I do see him it will be in a different state. And plus you know I don't let you meet guys unless I think they could be the real deal."

"Is this why I've never met anyone you've dated?"

"They've never been the real deal now have they?"

"Touché," she said walking out of my room.

I closed and locked my door to avoid any more mystery man discussion with Amy. I picked out a cute outfit and got dressed and ready for class. I walked out of my building and felt the hot sun on my face and began to regret taking summer classes like I did every other day of my life. I looked down the ally where Justin and I were just a couple of hours before and saw people walking to and from the shops at Downtown Crossing. "This," I thought to myself, "could just be the real deal."