“Jello, Christopher speaking.” Chris answered his phone with a burp.

A smile was plastered on Emma’s face as soon as she heard Chris on the other end of the call. He never answered the phone properly when he knew it was her. With the day she’s been having at the publishing company, she was more than happy to put up with Chris’ craziness. “Hallo,” she replied, trying her best at imitating a German accent.

“Oy, Emmett. What’s up?” Chris gave her that nickname when they were younger. Their moms had introduced them when Chris was nine and Emma was six. She had shorter hair than he did at the time which made her look like a boy and instead of saying hello when his mom told him to, Chris had asked his mom if Emma was short for Emmett. In turn, Emma gave him a misgendered nickname too.

“Hi Chrissy, just wanted to say hello. What are you eating?” She fiddled with the pen on her desk as she thought about the endless options of food Chris may have been devouring.

“Eyeballs and mozzarella sticks.” He answered casually.

Emma made a face even though she knew he couldn’t see her. “You’re eating tacos, aren’t you?” She knew those were his favorite.

He swallowed the last of his food and put the phone on speaker, placing it on the table before answering. He’d wanted to lay back and relax while he talked to her. “If you knew, then why’d you ask? I thought you were supposed to be the smart one.”

“Can you guess what I’m doing?”

Chris bit his lip and thought for a while before answering her question. It was probably a quarter past eight in Florida and he knew she could’ve been doing a multitude of things based on what she’s told him the for the past few weeks. She worked at her boyfriend’s publishing company, King’s Scribes, and apparently she’s been swamped with work. Tons of reading which required her to pick out the best ones to be sent to print. He frequently called her the goddess of books, whatever she said went. He had a choice to reply by saying she was in the middle of reading something extremely interesting or making notes on the margins of a book which she did a lot of recently. He chose the latter.

“Ding, ding, ding! You’ve just won yourself a lifetime supply of friendship with Emma!”

“Eh, I already have that. Got anything better? Her humor sucks.” Chris joked.

They both laughed, enjoying being able to talk to each other again. The last time they saw each other was years ago, when NSYNC was barely getting started. His busy schedule always clashed with her’s. Any kind of communication they’ve had was either through text or phone call. She felt horrible each time she couldn’t see him whenever he was back in Florida for a little while. Her job sometimes required her to attend conferences out of town which unfortunately always coincided with when he was back in Orlando. She’d only been to two of their concerts but that was at the very beginning. Other times, she was free but his time crunch blocked any opportunity to hang out. Another reason that really made her feel guilty was that sometimes she would be with her boyfriend, Jeremiah, and she just wasn’t sure how to split their time. She always tried her best to let Chris know how proud she was of him and that he had her full support even though she was mostly MIA.

He’d asked about her day and she spared no expense at wringing out all her complaints she had. He listened quietly without interrupting her. Emma complained about a lot of things and usually he would cut her off and spit out a joke or two to lighten up the mood but right now, he just enjoyed listening to her rants. “Rough day?” He asked, after she had finished speaking.

She groaned, “Did you not just hear everything I said?”

Chris laughed and waved a hand at Justin who started to make kissy faces as he took a seat across from him. It was Chris, Justin, and JC on one bus while Joey and Lance shared the other. They were on their way back to Florida for one last concert to finish off their tour. The guys have only met Emma a handful of times and from what Justin could see, Chris was crazy about her, even though he denied it. Chris was very protective of her and he always backed up his reasoning by saying she was like a sister to him. It was just Justin’s opinion though since Chris never really did make any moves. The other guys never thought more of it. Justin was the only one who liked to tease him.

“So how was your day, Mr. Popstar?”

“Just as grueling as yours. I danced and sang and got chased after girls and then we were fed food from a buffet and I played some Playstation with Justin and then I ate my taco and now I’m talking to you.” Chris spoke in the same tone as Alyson Hannigan’s character in American Pie whenever she spoke about band camp. He grinned as she cursed at him through the phone. “Sucks to suck.”

“You wouldn’t know.”

“Did you call just to ask me if we were still on for tomorrow?” Chris asked.

Emma bit her lip. She hated when Chris figured out that she called for another reason. With their busy schedules, his calls to her were for reasons just to talk and to have a real conversation while her calls were just to blow off some steam or ask a simple question. This time was a little different though, aside from the reason Chris was waiting an explanation for, she really did just want to talk to him. “I wanted to make sure we were still on for tomorrow.”

“I knew it. You only want me for my looks!” Chris pretended to whine as he kicked Justin’s shin under the table for giving Chris a nasty look and pointing at his face, quietly laughing.

“Tomorrow has nothing to do with your looks.” Emma laughed.

“Yeah it does, you want me to look at you try on different clothes for you to wear on your big date with Jeremy.”

“It’s Jeremiah.”

“Jeremy, Jeremiah, same thing. One’s just fancier.” Chris didn’t really have any issues with Jeremiah except for how whenever he was in town, Jeremiah always seemed to have already made plans to be with Emma. They were really never in the same room for longer than a few minutes so it’s hard for him to have an honest opinion. Jeremiah was slightly possessive of Emma which kind of bothered Chris but he shrugged it off seeing how happy she was with him.

“So… are we?”

“Are you still coming to the concert after we do that?” Chris was hopeful. It was their last concert of the tour and nothing would make his night better than to see his best friend watching them perform.

“Yup. I’ve somehow managed to clear up my night.”

“You got it, kiddo.” Chris couldn’t help but smile, he couldn’t wait for tomorrow night to come. “But I don’t know why you need me there. You know I’m no help since I think you look great in everything… hold on, Em.”

Chris hit mute on his phone and leaned over to smack Justin on the head but when he missed, he ended up chasing Justin to the bunks and tackling him onto the floor. He straddled Justin and smacked his face and arms a few times like a bongo drum as Justin tried to block off his attacks. Justin had been mouthing things like ‘Oh Emma, you’re so beautiful in the moonlight,’ and ‘I can’t wait to see you tomorrow, you’ll make my day SO much brighter.’ JC groaned in his sleep, the commotion happening next to his bunk wasn’t enough to wake him up. “Quit, dude!” Chris whispered, trying not to wake up JC as he got off of Justin.

“Alright, alright! You’re no fun when you talk to her.” Justin mumbled as he got up and followed Chris back to the table.

“You’ll love her once you get to know her better. I thought she was a boy the first time I met her.” Chris eyed Justin to make sure he wasn’t going to distract him again and unmuted the phone when he was sure Justin was done. “Still there?”

“Yeah, what happened?” Emma yawned. She had packed up her things and was making her way out of the building while she waited for Chris to come back.

“Someone smuggled a curly haired chimp onto the bus.”

“Hey, Emma.” Justin called out, ignoring Chris’ glare.

“Hi, Justin. Is he pouting?” she asked.

“Like a baby.” Justin smirked. “Gonna go play some Playstation, though. See you tomorrow!” He didn’t want Chris attacking him again so he figured that he’d let Chris have his time with her.

“He seems nice.” Emma commented.

“I’m nicer.”

“Angie’s going to be with us tomorrow when we pick out clothes. She’s excited to see you.” She explained while opening the door to her car, starting it, and rolling the windows down. It had been hot earlier that day and the inside of her car felt like a sauna even though the night had gotten a little chilly.

“I want to see her too but with her being there gives me all the more reason to not come. She’s married so I’m pretty sure she knows what’ll sweep a guy off his feet when it comes to clothing.” It’s not that he dreaded going shopping with them but he always preferred seeing Emma in her usual t-shirt, jeans, and Converses. Emma never really shopped for clothes. She was a simple person. If she did go to the mall, it was always to hit up GameStop, the bookstore to buy novels and comics, or just to spend time at the arcade.

“What’s a better way to decide what a guy would like to see his girlfriend wear? Asking a married woman or an actual guy?”

“I don’t know, I’m stupid.”

Emma laughed as she heard Justin in the background agreeing with Chris’ statement. She rolled up her windows once she was sure that all the hot air had escaped her car. “Alright Chrissy, I’ll have to talk to you tomorrow.”

“Heading home, now?” Chris frowned, not ready to say bye to his friend yet.

“Yeah, I’m in the car.” Emma’s heart filled when she noticed the change in Chris’ voice. He got on her nerves a lot but he was always so sweet to her.

“Drive safely.” Chris knew her apartment she shared with her boyfriend was only a short drive away from her work but he couldn’t help but worry about her. She was always so dependent of other people that sometimes he would freak out if he didn’t know where she was for fear that she’d gotten herself into trouble. It annoyed him how she never carpooled with her boyfriend, or Angie, since she also worked for Jeremiah.

“Yes, mother. I’ll text you when I get home. Love you.” Emma said, turning on her headlights.

“You better or else you’ll have to hear from your father. Love you too.” Chris mimicked a woman’s voice before ending the call.

He leaned back in his seat as he stretched his limbs, groaning as his muscles released tension. He’d been sitting still for the rest of the conversation after his tussle with Justin that he started to get a little stiff. Justin reclaimed his seat across from Chris and grinned as the other man frowned.

“So, when are you gonna bang the lights out of her?”

“Jesus tiger, don’t you have any filters?” Chris mumbled as he rubbed his face with his hands. They’d had a long day and wherever they were, it was almost two in the morning.

“She barely just left work?” Justin raised an eyebrow. “Isn’t it a little late? Doesn’t her boyfriend cut her some slack for sleeping with him?”

Chris glared at Justin. The man was definitely uncensored. “They have to get through a lot of books by the end of the month. She has to meet a quota. I’m sure Jeremiah doesn’t like her staying late, she just works hard.”

Justin studied his friend for a bit. Chris hadn't shut up about how excited he was to finally be spending time with Emma tomorrow before the concert. He could see that Chris was tired but that phone call really pumped him up again, mentally at least. “She seems nice. Kinda afraid that she could be a female you. We're already struggling with just one of you.”

“I guess she's sorta like me. Her humor sucks though. A lot calmer, too.” Chris chuckled as he thought about his friend's dry sense of humor. “And sometimes she's like Josh where it takes her a while to understand the joke. Her favorite kind of jokes are the ones with the cheesy puns. Those crack her up good.”

“What do you expect? She reads shit for a living.” Justin enjoyed seeing the look on Chris’ face whenever he talked about Emma. It just added to the arsenal of evidence he was keeping in the back of his mind whenever he wanted to tease Chris about her.

“If she's just like me, I think it helps her out to be a brainiac to get people to see the differences.” Chris said, grinning.

“So… who’s her favorite guy?” Justin caught the glare from Chris again and thought of something quick to say before he got hit again. “Other than you, obviously.”

“I forget. She doesn't really talk to me about that stuff. She gets super descriptive.” He cringed, not wanting to know what kind of fantasies Emma had of his band mates.

“It's me isn't it?” Justin winked. “She sounds hot.”

“Don’t even think about it.” Chris’ voice was a little louder than expected, causing JC to turn in his bunk.

“What? I’m old enough for her, aren’t I? She’s only a little older than Joey so it’s not even bad.” Justin frowned. “Why do you get so protective anyway?”

Chris’ brow furrowed as he let out a sigh before answering Justin. “She’s a lot calmer than me but she does get into a lot more trouble than I do. Especially with guys. Jeremiah’s her first long term relationship in a while and it’s nice to see her happy. She gets involved with guys too quickly and it sucks to see her cry. So don't even try hitting on her tomorrow. I know she’s taken but still. I'll break your neck.”

“Isn't breaking my neck her boyfriend’s job?” Justin smirked. “Are you her pseudo-boyfriend or something? Do you ever control who she dates?”