After the screen fades to black and Justin joins the standing ovation, his eyes stray for a moment as a familiar head pops out from the front rows. He’s sporting shorter hair now, Justin thinks, and he certainly hadn’t expected to run into him so soon after his birthday, but that is undoubtedly JC.
Justin’s next coherent thought as he’s sitting down is that he can’t believe JC would go out of his way to come watch Justin’s new movie, given how JC is very vocal about the fact that he’s not particularly fond of these type of events, but at the same Justin’s not surprised. Even after all these years, JC has been nothing but supportive of his projects.
It’s not well after the next movie has started however that his stomach twists, suddenly mortified. Up there on the screen, playing an exaggerated version of himself as the antagonist of the movie was none other than JC.
He snaps out of it after registering the light laughter from his wife as she leans towards him.
“You didn’t tell me JC had started acting again!” she chides him gently. “He’s always been so funny, hasn’t he?”
Justin only smiles gingerly in response. He can’t tell Jessica he didn’t even know.
He can’t focus on the movie afterwards—some kind of musical where JC is the main star? Whatever it is, Justin can’t concentrate anymore after the theme of one-hit wonders becomes painfully clear. Making matters worse is JC’s last scene in the third act, which makes Jessica sigh with sympathy while Justin’s gut only churns uncomfortably.
When it finally ends, Justin is one of the first to start clapping among the audience. He stares at the back of JC’s head the whole time, willing him to turn around so Justin can flash him a winning smile and nod his head and get rid of that awful pit in his stomach, but JC is too busy sharing cheers and smiles with his castmates beside him to even contemplate turning around.
As the next film comes into the screen, Justin decides to look for JC after the end of the festival.
Jessica, ever his loving wife, insisted on joining him the whole time they made their way outside the venue, giving it another shot as they waited for a car.
“Are you sure you don’t want me to come with you?” Jessica asks one last time as Justin helps her with her coat. “We can just call your mother and say we’ll be an hour later than expected, surely she won’t mind?”
“No, no, it’s fine,” Justin just says with an easy smile. “You know Silas gets fussy if you don’t get home to put him to bed, right?” Not to mention Justin would rather deal with this whole thing alone. Out of the corner of his eye he catches the car slowing down to their location and immediately reaches out to open the door. “I won’t be long anyway.”
Jessica regards him for a few moments, pensive, before she finally smiles.
“Alright then,” Jessica concedes, giving him a quick peck goodbye. “Don’t be late. And say hi to JC from me, okay?”
Justin waits until after she gets on the car and drives off before turning back. He takes a moment to breathe and steel himself, staring past the people flowing out of the main entrance, and makes his way back inside the venue.
As soon he does, however, producers and hopeful directors seemingly manifest out of thin air to block his path and Justin puts on a charming smile again. They want to shake his hand, introduce themselves, congratulate him on his fantastic soundtrack and is he taking on any other projects as well? Justin smiles and nods and remembers to excuse himself after exchanging possible prospects as he keeps aimlessly walking through the gradually emptying venue, but he can’t find JC anywhere.
Barely an hour has gone by. He knows JC isn’t so big on public events, but he always tends to linger behind to chat with his friends. Surely he hasn’t left yet?
(He briefly contemplates simply calling JC directly on his cellphone to ask where he is, he had oh just so happened to spot him on the front rows and he knows JC would readily accept that as innocuous, but Justin would much rather casually run into him instead).
“Excuse me?” Justin asks the nearest lone security guard he can find as soon as he’s left alone again. At this point he’s starting to feel a little desperate, but he makes a point to ignore the organizers in groups of two and three that want to catch his eye and ask if he needs anything. The less people find out about what he’s doing, the better. “I’m looking for JC Chasez, have you seen him by any chance?”
Said security guard blinks a few times in probable star-struck before he finally replies. “Uh, NSYNC, right?”
Justin’s eye almost twitches, but he nods and smiles.
“Yeah,” he says slowly as if recalling. “Yeah, I saw him passing by with a group? Down that hall.” He points towards a left turn in the distance that marks the entrance to a different wing in the venue. “Don’t know where they went though. You want me to ask around, Mr. Timberlake?”
“That’s fine, thank you.”
Justin stalks down the end of the hall and promptly turns to the left. If he hurries he might casually catch JC just as he’s leaving for dinner with his group.
As such, Justin doesn’t notice the security guard following his trail a few seconds later.
