Kelsey Morrissey woke up and grabbed her phone next to the bed. 2:30PM. She had to be at the theatre at 4:00. Beckett had a playdate with two friends from school and then the nanny was picking him up at 6:00. She would see him after the show that night as usual. 

She pulled herself up from bed, grateful for the hour nap she’d been able to sneak in after having appeared on two morning shows that day plus a taping for Jimmy Fallon.  The revival of Neil Simon’s Rumors had been a surprise hit and Kelsey had been nominated for a Tony for Best Actress in a Play this year. On top of that she was the star in a new blockbuster film directed by Christopher Nolan about a spy in the Cold War. She was playing opposite Chris Pratt and this had boosted her popularity even more, as if she needed it. The next two months were going to be busy with movie premieres and she was with Rumors until her contract ended in July, that is if she didn’t win the Tony.

Kelsey saw the message from JC immediately and her heart did the flip flop it always did where he was involved. 

Kel, guess what? Tinsley said yes! Need to talk to you about wedding plans and Beck being a jr groomsman. Call me.

Tinsley Shackelford had been his fling after the divorce was finalized last year. It had taken them three years to get the papers signed because of their never being in the same place for longer than 24 hours. Finally, their lawyers were able to snag them both and the final papers were signed in the summer of 2016.

The marriage had ended long before 2013. Kelsey had known it probably would. She’d been the “other woman” and after he’d left Sabrina for her, her mother had warned her that she’d be next. Kelsey had ignored it. She was smitten by him from the beginning. And it wasn’t as if she’d sought him out to have a torrid affair. He’d come onto her. 

Sort of.

He was guest starring on her short-lived comedy, Rachel and Ben, a sitcom about two college best friends who were to end up dating at the end of the first season. Kelsey played “Rachel” and Ryan Gosling played “Ben.” This had been, of course, before he was a household name and Kelsey had been fresh off a national tour of Fame. It was a risky move for ABC to buy thirteen episodes but the writers had written for Mad About Youand The Golden Girls so they figured they had nothing to lose. 

JC and Ryan had been in touch since their MMC days and Ryan had contacted him to guest star as the best friend of “Ben” who had come to visit for the weekend for the fourth episode. Kelsey hadn’t remembered much else except when JC walked onto the set he smiled at her and that smile had made her want to get to know him better.

“He’s married,” Ryan had said to her when they were in the table read the next day.

“I’m not going to try anything!” Kelsey had snapped back.

She was lying to herself and to Ryan. After filming that day, Kelsey had knocked on his trailer door. JC had just gotten off the phone with his wife. He looked forlorn and sad. Kelsey had jumped on his vulnerability. His wife missed him. Their baby girl was sick and she’d been alone in Orlando. Kelsey had listened intently. Sometimes his wife didn’t understand that he had to be away. He loved her but….Kelsey hadn’t listened to much else after that. 

She asked him to get a drink with her down the street. He’d said yes. They got drunk. She dragged him into the bathroom in the bar and went down on him in the handicapped stall. He followed her home and woke up the next morning in bed with her. He felt guilty. He’d never cheated on his wife. He needed to leave.

They still had to tape that day. Kelsey drove him back to the set. Ryan wanted to know what the hell she’d done. She told Ryan it took two to tango or something to that effect. Ryan was pissed at her and it made filming that day extra-long.

JC wouldn’t look at her during their scenes together. She had started to feel terrible for what she’d done. She’d never slept with a married man. 

She’d gone back to her trailer and pulled out a wine cooler from the small refrigerator and had just finished it off when he knocked on her door. She opened it and JC pushed her onto the couch and before she knew it, they were fucking again. 

Again, he told her he’d never done this, he loved his wife, he shouldn’t be here.

But she was addicting. He’d been with Sabrina for a long time. Longer than he’d ever been with any other girlfriend. He didn’t want to cheat on her. Kelsey said she understood.

She invited him back to her place anyway. They did it on the kitchen counter, the shower, and the stairs. He was done filming for the show and was leaving the next day. He wouldn’t ever see her again, he said. Kelsey once more told him she understood.

Two months later, *NSYNC was in L.A. for a tour. Sabrina and Aria had come along. Kelsey went to the concert. She scored a backstage pass from her agent. She met Sabrina and Aria. Sabrina told her how much she loved watching JC on Kelsey’s show. Kelsey hadn’t batted an eye and told Sabrina how much she enjoyed working with her husband. 

JC invited Kelsey out with him and Sabrina after the concert. They had a late dinner. Sabrina stated she was tired and needed to get back to the hotel because her mother had been watching Aria. Kelsey said goodnight to both of them. An hour later, he was at her doorstep. They hadn’t seen each other since he’d left L.A. two months before and wasted no time. Kelsey was all JC thought about, he told her. He wanted to leave Sabrina but he couldn’t bear to leave his daughter and he knew Sabrina would never let him see Aria.

Kelsey told him this was a fling. It wasn’t meant to last.

She told him this consecutively for the next six months whenever they were able to sneak away and be together. But she knew she was falling in love with him. And she knew he was falling in love with her.

In the fall of 2003, JC and Sabrina divorced. She’d found out about the affair and given JC no ultimatum. 

JC married Kelsey in the spring of 2004. He was touring with his album while Kelsey stayed in L.A. and filmed two movies with Ashton Kutcher. The marriage was starting to take its toll. 

Kelsey knew JC was cheating on her.

They separated for three months. When she moved to New York to star in Chicago, JC had met her at her new apartment. He didn’t want to divorce her. He loved her. This wasn’t going to be like Sabrina. 

Two years passed and Beckett Roy, their son, was born. JC sunk into a deep depression after Beckett’s birth. He missed his daughter. Kelsey had called Sabrina and asked her to move to New York so that JC could see Aria more often. Sabrina had politely told her to go to hell, that JC would see Aria when she deemed it and how dare Kelsey call her, Sabrina, and tell her what to do. 

JC stopped working. He stayed at home with Beckett while Kelsey performed. He didn’t do anything except mope and get high while the baby slept. Kelsey was starting to get worried. She called his agent and begged him to get JC a gig. Something. Somewhere. It didn’t have to be in New York.

She hired a nanny because she couldn’t trust JC not to be high when she got home from the theatre. JC was mad that he couldn’t take care of his son and how dare Kelsey do this to him. Kelsey told him to get rid of the drugs, get off his ass and do something. 

So he did. He wrote a show and got it into the hands of Benj Pasek and Justin Paul. Back to June was a smash hit and won the 2008 Tony Award for Best Musical. 

JC was working again, Kelsey was happy again, and all seemed right with the world.

Until Kelsey found out about Nora Dungess, the lead in Back to June. JC and Nora had started sleeping together after previews for the show. She was a Broadway veteran. Nora had sent an explicit email to the account that JC and Kelsey shared instead of the private one. Kelsey had opened it and that had been that. She kicked JC out of the apartment.

It was during this time that Sabrina had moved to New York on her own terms. She’d been hired to choreograph for the revival of A Chorus Lineand on top of that had been choreographing for JustinTimberlake’s Future Sex/Love Show tour, which had made JC even angrier with her. 

Aria had been enrolled at The Dalton School and they lived in Tribeca, that much Kelsey knew. She didn’t know that JC had confided in Sabrina about his affair and that Sabrina had encouraged him to try and work it out with Kelsey, even though she couldn’t stand her.

JC moved back in with Kelsey. She wanted to try and have another baby with him. Or at least try five times a day. She wanted him to remember why he was with her. She wanted him to know that she was going to love him forever.

At least until she joined the cast of Barefoot in the Park and started sleeping with Paul Walker who’d been her co-star for a month. She kept it a secret from JC and only until a picture of Paul and Kelsey appeared on Page 6 with them locking lips at a bar in Midtown did he find out.

By now it was 2009 and their marriage was on the brink of being over. Kelsey fought to make him stay with her. No, she hadn’t been with another man. Just Paul. And now Paul was back in L.A. and Neil Patrick Harris was her co-star and he was gay. This was supposed to have made JC feel better. Instead, he’d befriended Neil and Neil had made a smart remark to Kelsey one day backstage about her infidelities.  

Kelsey decided once her contract was up she wanted to go off with JC to a remote island off Bora Bora. The two-week long vacation was filled with steamy nights in bed, romantic dinners for two on their private deck, and lots of long talks. They loved each other. They just needed to break away from New York for a while to see that they loved each other. 

But the city was proving too tolling on their marriage and once they moved back and got back into the swing of things, they were fighting all over again. 

JC moved out in the summer of 2010. They stayed separated for longer than either of them wanted to admit. Kelsey sometimes forgot they hadn’t gotten a divorce. She was dating other men and he was dating other women. Aria still came over every other weekend because Sabrina told JC she would rather him be in an apartment with a familial atmosphere than the hotel he was more or less living in in Soho.  Kelsey didn’t mind it. Aria had been in her life for as long as JC had and she was good with Beckett. JC and Kelsey were cordial with one another during those weekends and once or twice he’d end up in her bed for old times’ sake. But the marriage had ended and one day JC met her at a café with divorce papers.

Kelsey realized she’d been daydreaming for forty-five minutes. It wasn’t until she looked at her phone again, saw the unanswered text message from JC, and realized she had about five minutes to get to the theatre.

JC Chasez had, once again, taken up too much time in her brain.