“What’re you talking about?” Johnny inquired and looked at Justin. He was smiling, laughing, joking, acting like he normally would. He showed none of the external signs of substance abuse. “Joe, I think you’re reading a little too much into this.”
Joey sighed in frustration. His surroundings were as pleasant as ever with no reason for Johnny to worry. They were in the studio working on the single voice tracks that afternoon and surprisingly, Justin had been on point all day nailing rift after rift in song after song. He was currently sitting on a stool beside JC with his leg up. As Joey took this all in, he began thinking about what Justin had said the day before about promising his full recovery before Chris’s return. He nodded slightly.
“Joe?” Johnny asked. Joey’s mind snapped back as soon as he heard his name. “You got anything else to say?” He shook his head. “Okay. And Joe? Justin’s a smart kid, nothing’s gonna happen to him okay? Now lets go to the studio, We’ve got stuff we need to discuss.” Johnny led Joey into the studio with his hand planted firmly on his shoulder.
“Guys, where’s Lance?”
“Right there,” JC and Justin said and pointed to the door.
Johnny moved forward to give Lance room to enter then reclaimed his spot in front of them. “Okay. We’ve got TRL on Wednesday and they want you to sing a few unreleased songs. Like one s from way back.”
“Totally unreleased?” JC inquired.
“No, like ones form Europe that never came out over here.”
“Like ‘More than A Feeling?”
“Exactly.” The members of NSYNC nodded. “So which ones do you guys wanna sing?”
“I think we can do ‘More Than A Feeling’” Justin offered up. “How many do they want?”
“Three.”
“What about ‘I’ll Never Stop’?”
After some discussion, they ruled it out saying they wanted to keep the way back theme. After overturning both ‘Riddle’ and ‘Together Again’, they settled on ‘U Drive Me Crazy’ and a song called ‘Here & Now’ from a European film called Widows. Johnny approved their choices and had them sing for him and their musical trainer to see where and if they needed work. They’d call Chris so he could practice his part and they’d put it all together on Wednesday before the show.
Joey couldn’t stop thinking about Justin though. Sure he seemed fine now but who was to say he wouldn’t overdose again? Last night’s OD had been acute but Justin was the type who liked to test his limits and that kind of attitude could be fatal in the kind of business he was dealing in. Joey silently vowed to keep an omnipresent eye on him during their trip to TRL, he just hoped he could keep his word.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~*~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“Chris!” Justin shouted and gave his best friend a hug.
“Hey guys,” Chris said and returned it. “We still doing ‘More Than A Feeling, ‘Drive Me Crazy’, and ‘Here & Now’?”
“Yup,” JC confirmed.
“Well then let’s do this. I wanna make sure it sounds all right.”
They got into a circle with Chris next to Justin, next to JC, then Joey, then Lance and back to Chris. JC set the beat and they sang all three a cappella, stopping only once in ‘Here & Now’ where Lance forgot the words to his solo.
“We’re hot,” Lance said and walked out into the hall to MTV’s photo booth. He took Joey and JC with him The time alone would be good for Chris and Justin. Maybe NSYNC’s oldest member could talk some sense into their frontman. It wasn’t often Chris talked sense but…no harm in trying.
“How’s the ankle?” Chris asked Justin and leaned against the green room wall beside him.
“Good.”
“Really or are you just saying that?”
“No I mean it. It’s getting better.”
“It hurt?” Chris asked and nudged Justin’s foot with his toe.
“Kinda. Sometimes more, sometimes less.”
“Right.”
Justin knew what Chris was trying to get at. “I don’t OD,’ he said flat out. “It’s just, it helps me sleep.”
“I know. It helps your insomnia.”
“Yeah.”
“Just be careful.”
“I am.”
Chris patted Justin on the back and looked down at his ankle again.
“Do you think you could go out there without the crutches? I just don’t want our fans to worry. I’ll help you if you need it.”
“Yeah I can walk without them.”
“You sure? I’m not trying to force you.”
“No, it’s fine.”
“Great.”
One of the producers for TRL waved for Justin and Chris to join the others in the hall. It was almost time to go on. Confident that Justin would be just fine, Chris led the way, slowly, to the studio.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~*~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“You hear that?” JC said pointing to Greg, one of their guitarists, “that’s guitar language for ‘shut up’!”
Joey hung his head as the audience erupted into laugher. Carson chuckled. “So you guys have another song for us?” A couple of them nodded. “This one is U Drive Me Crazy?”
“Yeah, this one’s from our Winter Album,” Lance informed.
The crowd cheered as the boys stood up and the band played the intro to the song. It started off good for Justin but somewhere in the middle, his head started reeling, he went in and out of bouts of vertigo, his mouth dried out and he forgot his words. He shook his head but the feeling didn’t clear. Maybe he shouldn’t have taken that hit in the limo before the others got in earlier. Before he could get his head straight, everything went black.
Story Tags: rehab
