Chapter 30 - Carefree Little One

Friday, September 10, 2004.
Ellie pursed her lips as she gazed over the invitation to Miles and Molly Sue's wedding, tapping the number into the phone in her cubicle.
"Good afternoon, Senator Robert Clement's office," Molly Sue answered the phone in her sweet, Southern belle purr.
"Um...Molly, it's Ellie."
"Well, ain't that the berries," Molly Sue exclaimed. "I did not think I'd be hearing from you when I woke up this morning. What do I owe you the pleasure?"
Ellie traced the gold embossing on the invitation. "I'm actually calling out of courtesy because I'm afraid I won't be able to attend your wedding on the 25th."
"Oh..." Molly voiced lost its joyful tone. "I'm so sorry you can't make it."
"I'm sorry, too. I've been given my first assignment to cover a few interviews in Los Angeles over the last week of September. I also don't really have to money to fly out to Baton Rouge, especially if I want to fly in for Thanksgiving and Christmas. I really am sorry. Especially on such short notice."
"The plantation's only free Saturday until next June was the 25th."
"I understand."
"I was honestly surprised when Claire said you were coming. I thought you would want to stay away…’cause, you know."
"Because your fiancé cheated on me with you?" Ellie said bluntly.
"Um...yeah. Anyway, since it's been so long—"
"Four years."
"That's actually a really long time, Ellie. We really should start trying to settle things down between us. I really miss when we were best friends."
"I really need to go," Ellie said, looking up at Maurice as he approached her cubicle. "My boss is waiting to tell me something."
"Ok, bye."
"Bye." Ellie quickly slammed the receiver into the phone's cradle, sighing.

"Tough call?" Maurice asked, shifting through a stack of folders.
"I just had to reject an invitation to my ex-fiancé's wedding." She tore the invitation into quarters, throwing the scraps into her waste paper basket. "I specifically told my roommates not to say I was going, but noooo, Claire can't stand the idea of me and Molly Sue fighting." She slouched down in her chair. "It's not that she stole my fiancé, she can have him for all I care, it's just that she's more upset that I'm angry at her than the fact that she kind of helped him break my heart. I can't forgive her if she won't even acknowledge that she's sorry."
"Why were you going to their wedding?"
"I wasn't, at least I didn't want to. My roommate thinks it'll be a good idea to go. Find myself a good old boy to marry."
Maurice shook his head. "I don't know what it is about Southern women and the urge to marry themselves and every eligible belle within a twelve mile radius off." He placed some of the folders he was carrying onto her desk. "Here's what I need you to edit and here's the information you need to start preparing for the interviews I want you to do."
Ellie flipped through the top folder, finding a blank promo CD marked “JC Chasez: Dear Goodbye.” "Do I need to listen to this?"
"It might help. That's the song that he's filming the day you’re doing the interview." Maurice adjusted the folders in his arms. "Anyway, try to get those edits to me by tomorrow." He started to walk away, turning back with a smirk on his face. "Anyway, you might find yourself a husband in L.A."

Tuesday, June 13th, 2006.
Ellie flipped through a stack of mail as she and JC waited at the hospital for her 20-week ultrasound.
"Oh, God." Ellie sighed. She turned the pastel pink envelope over, seeing “Mr. and Mrs. M&M Henderson’s” address on the back in Molly Sue's looped handwriting in silver ink, two hearts dotting the “I”s in Louisiana.
"What?" JC asked, never looking up from the tatty magazine he had found on his seat.
Ellie ripped open the envelope. "Molly Sue has invited us to Izzy's baptism reception. She's chosen the second of July." She slouched down as far as she could in her seat. "You would think that she knew I was considering spending the 4th back home. Claire will not keep a damn secret."
"Do you want to go?"
"I don't know."
"Honestly?" He looked at her.
"Not really. Despite the whole thing where I try to avoid Miles as much as I can..." She sighed again. "Do I have the obligation to be civil to the woman who was the catalyst of what broke up my first engagement? Even if we were friends for twenty-one years? I mean...she chose to sleep with him."
"Do you have to go?"
"Well, the baptism's going to be during that Sunday's church service. If we're in town, we're going to have to go to the service. If we attend the service, it's only common courtesy that we attend the reception if we've been invited. People will talk if we don't."
"I thought you didn't care about that business?" he asked with a hint of sarcasm.
She huffed. "I'm not in the mood for this right now. This is supposed to be a happy moment. We're going to see our baby again." She placed the stack of mail into her handbag. "Are you sure you want to know the gender?"
He gave off a small chuckle, changing position to face her. "We've gone over this a million times since we found out we were having a baby. 950,000 of those times have been since you booked the appointment last month. Every single time we've agreed that we want to know."
"What if we're disappointed?"
"We won't be." He kissed the back of her hand. "We'll love them no matter what they are."
"Yeah," she whispered.
"Yeah." He softly kissed her.

"Mr. and Mrs. Chasez?" An African American woman wearing a white lab coat over a floral summer dress addressed them.
"Yes?" Ellie replied.
"I'm Aisha. I'll be doing you're sonogram today." They shook hands, walking through to the office.

Aisha gestured to the examination bed. "You know the drill."
Ellie lowered herself onto the bed, lifting up the long, baggy, white v-neck t-shirt and folding down the thick, dark blue band on her maternity denim shorts, lying down to reveal her large peach-coloured belly. "I feel like I'm smuggling a turtle under my shirt," she joked.
"Is ‘Turtle’ one of the nicknames you've given the baby?" Aisha asked as she tucked a wad of paper towelling into Ellie's waistband.
"Not really." JC leaned onto the bed by Ellie's legs, trying to get a better view of the screen. "We've used 'Pumpkin,' 'cause they're due in November."
"Bubble." Ellie smiled down at him.
"Sunshine."
"And simply 'baby,' of course."
"You two must be really excited," Aisha commented as she prepared the machine.
"It's like waiting for Christmas."
"Cool." Aisha shook a squeeze bottle. "This is going to be a little cold." She drew a squiggle of gel onto Ellie's bump, pressing the probe into her skin. "There we are, looks like baby's getting comfortable."

They watched as Aisha made points of measurements, labelling parts of the body.
"Baby's a good size, just under twelve inches top to toe. It'll probably be a big one. Do you want to know the sex of the baby?"
"Yes," Ellie and JC responded in unison, JC clasping her hand in both of his.
"She's a little girl." Aisha smiled as she revealed what they had come to expect.
"Yay," Ellie whispered, JC kissing the heel of her hand.
"I think we're done here." Aisha handed some more paper towelling to Ellie. "Just give me a minute to get everything in order."

Ellie carefully sat up, swinging her legs over the side of the examination bed as she reached over to pull JC into her arms. "Wow," she whispered as they kissed, laying her head on his shoulder. "We're having a baby girl."
JC pressed his mouth to her cheek, not quite kissing her as she held her breath, slowly exhaling. "Yeah."
"Yeah."
"Awesome."

Later on, the two of them lay as the setting sun filled their bedroom as Ellie laying on her side, cradling JC's head in the crux of her elbow as he flipped through a worn baby name paperback she had purchased for a quarter at the beginning of their pregnancy.
"Darcy?" he suggested.
"For a girl?" She ran her fingertips through his hair. "I've always thought of it as a boy's name."
"Why not? It's listed as a girl's name here."
"Do we have to name her right now?"
"I kind of imagined that the mother of my children and I would do this whole ritual thing of sitting down and agreeing on a name."

"I don't know," she said. "I'm not sure we want the same kind of thing."
"What do you mean?" He placed the book on his chest, turning his head to face her.
"I think I want something more traditional and feminine, whilst you want some a little more...I don't know."
"What?"
"Unisex?"
"Hey, Riley Chasez works."
"I'm not saying it doesn't. It just doesn't...I'm not sure I want that."
"What do you want?"
She pursed her lips. "I don't know."
He sat up. "Seriously, what name have you always loved? What name did you dream of naming your little girl when you were little?"
She paused. "Charlotte."
"OK then. How about we just compromise on Charlotte Riley for the moment, and if we decide on anything else, we can choose that?"
"OK. Charlotte Riley."
"Charlotte Riley Chasez."
"Charlotte Riley Chasez," she repeated, cuddling into him as he snuggled back down beside her. "I actually kind of like it."
"Yeah, it has a nice flow to it. We can call her Charlie for short."
A huge smile crept over her face. "That's actually really cute. We have a daughter named Charlie."
"Josh and Ellie and their daughter Charlie."
"Joshua and Elizabeth Chasez and their daughter Charlotte Riley," she said in a delicate Southern accent. She giggled as she kissed his lips. "I love it."

Tuesday, June 20th, 2006.
JC waited as the radio producer gave the signal to the host as the Rihanna song winded down.
"Welcome back, my peeps. It is 9am on the dot and you’re listening to ah-ah-ah-rooooo R.Dog in the morn-naaaang, here on KPFM, your only L.A. station for the sweetest of pop hits, spiciest of Latin beats and chocolatey smooth of R&B grooves." The host chewed through his intro like the bleach chewed through the highlights in his hair. "We have a special guest this morning: twelve years ago he was hitting the marks as a Mousekeeter, five years ago he was tearing up our hearts in the premium boy band, *NSYNC, and just last year he won not one, but two, count them two, mother trucking Grammy Awards. I present to you the one and only, Mr. Timberlake's best friend himself, JC SHAZ-AY!" Fanfare filled the studio.
"Actually, it's SHA-ZAY; the Z is in the second syllable."
"That's what I said."
"No, you said Shaz-ay, not Chasez."
R.Dog paused for split second. "Ahhhh! Always goofing with me, man!" He laughed. "Let me tell you, man, let me tell you, I've missed you and that incredible voice on the airways. What y'all been get up to since we last spoke. I hear y'all moved out east to New York. What, wasn't the weather perfect enough for you in L.A.?"
"Um...life kinda just blew me in that direction."
"I heard that a pretty lady is what blew you that way."
"Maybe," JC said slowly, in a coy manner.
"There's been a lot of rumours what the two of you have been doing out there. Since I hear that tomorrow's gonna be your six-month anniversary, would you mind confirming that there is indeed a Mrs. JC Chasez."
JC shrugged. "I cannot tell a lie."
R.Dog pressed a button, a canned version of Handel's wedding march playing through the studio. "Here it is folks, the world exclusive confirmation that JC Chasez is indeed married and off the market. The sound you here right now is millions of hearts breaking." He pressed a cued up sound effect of glass breaking. "What happened, man? Not two years ago you were in here saying that you were enjoying the single life."
"I don't know. I guess I just met..." JC paused. "I don't really know how to describe it. For a long time, everything was dedicated to my career. When I tried to imagine my future beyond what we had scheduled, I kind of drew a blank. When I met Elizabeth—"
"Elizabeth is the name of your wife?"
"Yeah. When I met Elizabeth, I finally not only started to see a future outside of my work, I also started to see a future where no matter what happened, I was going to be OK. Some really negative stuff was going on when I met her; I didn't feel the best within myself. She not only showed me that everything was OK, but I was OK as well. As long as I'm with her, everything will be OK."
"That's great, man."
"Yeah."

R.Dog looked over a piece of paper. "Now, the reason we've got you in here is because you're debuting a new single to radio today."
"Yeah."
"Little ditty called 'Until Yesterday.’"
"Yep," JC responded.
"Can you tell us a little about the song."
"Um...OK. A while back, I was kind of fiddling around with this idea of being in love with someone, then they do something and it just shuts off. Whatever drew you to them just snaps away and you can't be in the same room with them. I wasn't making a record at the time, so I kind of just put the idea into the back burner. Last October, J—"
"I'm guessing co-writer and producer, Justin Timberlake?"
"Yeah, Justin kind of popped by with a similar idea, the idea that you're completely in love with this person until you find out that they've done something unforgivable. We were talking about getting some songs down and he came to me with this idea. I showed him what I had been working on and it kind of went from there."
"Cool, man, cool. Lot of people have been saying the song's about Eva Bitchface."
"It's not. It's not about anyone in particular. I mean, the thought didn't even cross our minds. We just hooked up one day and said, 'You know what would be a great idea for a song.' It's not that deep."
"You planning on putting a record out?"
"Like a full album? Probably spring next year."
"Great. Any of those songs about Eva?"
"Oh, God," JC whispered under his breath. "No."
"You two were pretty smitten. What do you think of the rumours that her and Tony Whatshisface are getting engaged?"
"Look, dude. I'm married. I've got a kid on the way. I've got my own stuff. It's not like I'm holed up away pining for a relationship that was never going to work out. She is doing her thing. I'm married to the most incredible woman. I'm in love; I'm going to be a father. I've got a record coming out. Eva is honestly the last thing I'm thinking about right now."
"Do you wish them the best of luck?"
"Whatever, I guess. It's not like she sent me a card when I got married."
"Damn boy! Burn! Anyway, let's get this track lined up for the world debut of JC Chasez's hot new single, 'Until Yesterday.' After the break, industry hotspot news with our lovely Shari, what's going in Hollyweird and who's been seen hanging off Jessica Simpson's arm now. Nice to talk to you again, JC!"
"Bite me."
"HA! Always goofing, always goofing."
JC immediately left the booth as the on-air sign went off. "I swear, if God could strike me down," he whispered under his breath as he walked down to a room filled with fans and station workers. He signed as many autographs and posed for as many pictures as he had to, him, Eric and Carlos leaving around an hour later.

They returned to his house walking in on the impromptu listening party Lance, Autumn and Isaac were having around Ellie as she worked at the kitchen bench. Autumn clapped as he entered the room.
"Oh my God, oh my God." Autumn wiped a strand of the bright pink in her bleach blonde hair behind her ear. "That has to be one of the most incredible songs I have ever heard."
"Really, JC," Lance assured him, "that song is genius."
"What do you think?" JC asked Ellie.
"Me?" She lifted her head from her hand, shrugging. "You know how I feel. It's OK."
"Is that all?"
"They were playing the song so loud it startled the baby. I don't know if she liked it or not, but she kicked when they hiked the volume up." She undid and redid her hair. "Also, was that Ry-dog fellow on coke or something?"
"You just don't get it."
"I just don't get it? I just don't get it? I'm trying to write an interesting fucking interview out of a list of preapproved questions and a collection of answers from someone so inarticulate I would've gotten better answers from a five year old. I don't get it? I'm sorry I don't get it if some hack oversteps a line we like to call in the industry 'mother trucking journalistic integrity' so he can talk about a topic that no journalist worth their weight in rhino shit would bring up instead of doing his fucking job of promoting a commercial product. But I guess I just don't get it."
"Why can't you just be happy for me?" JC suddenly spat out.
Ellie's mouth dropped. She huffed as she dropped her pencil, getting out of her seat. "I'm not even going to dignify that with a response." She left the room, making her way up to the bedroom.

Ellie emerged downstairs after she had heard the guests’ cars pull away. She scavenged through the kitchen, flipping open a hot pink donut box to find it half empty. "What's wrong with you?" she asked a deflated JC in between bites.
"I don't know...I just..." He sighed, running his fingers through his hair. "I'm getting a little too caught up in the bullshit."
"Do you want to talk about it?"
"Not really. I'm just sick of never being anything other than someone who used to work with Justin Timberlake or fuck Eva Bitchface. Why can they move past me and their pasts but I'm stuck as the guy who did this shit? Why do I feel like I'm only ever going to be known as the guy from *NSYNC? Why can't I be more than just that?"
"I don't know." She shrugged. "People are going to think what they want about you. If they want to underestimate your worth or talent, that's their prerogative."
"What do I do then?"
"I don't know." She sucked the sugar glaze off her thumb. "I guess you could put a ban on questions regarding Eva and such, but that isn't really going to solve the problem."
"What would you do in this situation?"
"Again, I don't know. I haven't really dealt with this kind of thing before. The only thing I can do is give off empty advice about brushing them off and pretending it doesn't affect you. Which it clearly does."
"I guess." He sighed.

Ellie leaned on the counter as she changed the subject. "This is kind of related, but I got another email from Molly Sue inquiring about our RSVP."
"How is that related?"
"Something something something, reputation, something something something, avoiding gossip."
"What do you want to do, honestly?"
"I want to completely avoid the situation," she replied.
"OK, what should you do?"
Ellie thought for a moment. "Well, the traditional Southern thing would be to follow courtesy whilst demonstrating how incredibly wealthier we are, then sneaking upstairs and fucking on their $1000 four-poster bed and spilling your cum on their precious $120 comforter set."
JC stared into the counter blankly, trying to absorb what she just said. "Why?"
"I want you and your fat, 8-inch cock to fuck me and make me cum harder than he ever did on the sex altar of his 4-inch pencil dick."
"Alrighty."
"Does that mean..?"
"That doesn't mean shit. How long have you had this plan? Is this a pregnancy fuelled evil, or is this something you've been mulling over for a while?"
"Promise you won't laugh."
"I didn't laugh when you suggested that we fuck on your ex's bed. Why would I laugh now?"
She paused. "OK, when the three of us, Claire, Derek and I, first moved to New York, we stayed in this dinky little one-bedroom apartment in Harlem. Since Claire and Derek were the couple, they got the bedroom whilst I slept on a futon in the living room. OK, whilst this was happening, Miles was couch jumping as he had to move out from the frat house after he had graduated. What I found out was that when he started sleeping with Molly Sue, he was crashing in her father's den and sneaking up to her room during the night. She has always had the most incredibly extravagant four-poster beds. Always. It completely shitted me that he got to sleep in this beautiful white princess bed purely based on where he had managed to stick his dick and I spent a year sleeping on a mattress thinner than an army blanket."

They sat in silence, Ellie breaking the silence as she continued, "Do you know why I insist on keeping my old bed?"
"Because we haven't got around to buying a new one?"
"No, because that bed was the first large purchase I ever bought with my own money. I never earned enough from Grammy to buy anything really big, and rent is so fucking expensive in New York, but that first year I spent on that futon, I scrimped together what little disposable income I had to buy that bed. It was my first purchase as a proper adult."

"Just how cut up are you about this whole Molly Sue thing?" he asked, returning to the previous topic.
"I've known Molly Sue longer than I've known Claire. Our mother's were in Lamaze together. After Claire, she was my second best friend. I never, ever, ever thought she would do something like what she did to me. I know I should put the blame on him, and I know that she knew I wasn't happy, blah blah blah. But I can't help feel that she overstepped a line."
"That's kind of because she kind of did."
"I don't know what to do now, especially since we're having a girl. Claire and she are going to insist we raise our daughters as closely as we can."
He thought for a moment. "I don't know what to do either."