"You what?!"

The words echoed in his ears, his head throbbed and he desperately wished he was back that the hotel asleep. He was drunk, yes, but he still had that cold; and now she hated him. He honestly had no idea who she was. If he had known he wouldn’t have taken advantage of her like that. He wouldn’t have pushed that far. He definitely wouldn’t have kissed her. Not because he didn’t want to, but because he had more class than that. He wouldn’t have molested her on the dance floor and then kissed her in front of the world.

God, he thought. I'm a slut.

It registered in his brain that he had just kissed someone he thought he didn’t know. What class did he have? He had picked the first hot girl he had seen and taken her to the dance floor, practically humped her and then forced himself on her on the couch.

Of course she knew who he was and he had asked her if he could kiss her.

It was official knowledge now. She had a crush on him. Moments before flashed in his head and he realized how hurt she must have been by his words. His head hurt badly. It was thinking too much. Too many questions were floating around. Why did he kiss someone he thought he didn’t know? What made him get that bold? Was he over Britney? What was she doing right now? Did Kristen hate him? Did he like Kristen? How the hell did she get that hot?

"HELLO!"

He was startled by her voice and jerked his head up. "S- sorry."

He felt her eyes on him. Soon she scoffed and looked away from him mumbling, "God Justin. You're such an…"

"A what?"

Her head whipped around. If she weren't so angry with him he would have smiled. She really did look beautiful. "An asshole!"

Justin shook his head and looked down at his hands in his lap. He wished he could have rewound to five minutes ago. He would have given anything. He would have been able to stop all this mess from happening. "I didn’t mean to hurt you Kristen."

He looked up at her and could tell right off the bat that she was more angry at him than someone had been with him in a long time. Her voice bit into his ears and he really wished he could have been in bed where it was quiet. "You didn’t hurt me. Believe me that wasn’t really all that great anyway. I cant believe you didn’t know who I was. God do you usually just make out with girls you don’t even know. That's gross Justin, God knows what else you do."

Great. Now she thought he was a bad person. This night was going downhill fast. He needed an escape. With a rub of his eyes and a sigh, he groaned, "I think I'm gonna go back to the hotel."

"Is that all you have to say to me?!"

"Well what do you want me to say?" He had snapped and she drew back a little from him. His night was getting worse by the moment and she was getting more pissed by the moment.

"An apology would be nice. God you don’t know how fuckin' shitty I feel right now!"

Of course she would only think of herself. He was the one who had fucked up. He was the one that was drunk. He was the one with the cold. He had grown up around a woman, she was his best friend, but even his mother hadn't prepared him for everything and there were somethings about women he just didn’t understand at all. He was the one that should be embarrassed and upset. He reminded himself that Kristen had a crush and was a defensive kind of person so tried to take it all in stride. "I feel kinda shitty myself."

"Go fuck yourself. I'll save you the trouble and I'll be the one to leave. Thanks for inviting me, its been fuckin' great." He could see that she was a few seconds from slapping him. But good thing for him she stood up and stalked off, stumbling a little with her boots.

He watched her disappear into a crowd. He stared at the crowd for a moment and then leaned his head back against the couch and closed his eyes. "Shit."

He had one minute of rest before he heard a gravely voice. "What the fuck just happened?"

"I don’t know," he said with his blue eyes still closed.

"It looked like you were fuckin' making out with her."

He opened his eyes and saw Rick standing before him, arms across his chest, staring down at Justin. Worse and worse the night went. "Listen Rick if you wanna give me the big brother speech save it for later. I already feel pretty horrible about everything, ok?"

Rick seemed to have some sympathy for Justin and it showed when his arms fell to his sides and he said in a more worried tone, "Dude just, what the hell is going on?"

"Nothing. I didn’t know it was her."

"You didn’t?"

Justin sat up and pointed over to where she was now standing, her back to them, gulping down some drink. "Look at her. She's…hot."

"Who'd you think it was?"

He suddenly felt nauseous. He was normally a beer drinker but that night he had drank more hard liquor, a lot more. He knew he might be spending his night staring down a toilet. "I dunno."

"You don’t look so good."

"Thanks." He said sarcastically

Rick looked over to where Kristen had another drink in her hand. "I'm taking her back before she gets smashed. See ya"

He started to walk away, but Justin called out to him. "Tell her I'm sorry, I'm just…pretty drunk…and stupid.

"Yeah…"

Justin watched Rick walk over to Kristen, watched him say something to her, watched her yell at him and then watched him drag her by the arm. Obviously he said something threatening to her because she rolled her eyes at him and stomped off to the exit with him following her.

As she walked passed Justin she didn’t look at him at all. Justin stared at her, though. She looked angry and confident and sure of her self and, to be honest, sexy as hell. Justin licked his lips and could taste her. He could feel her tongue sliding against his. He could hear her moaning. Most of all he could feel her hand gripping his thigh.

He looked down.

He groaned and realized he was getting a hard on. So now Kristen had managed to embarrass him, cuss him out, make him feel like shit, give him an amazing kiss, and then caused him to get hard.

All he needed was a call from Britney, and then his night would totally be from hell.

-----------

She had never been a smoker. That's not to say she had never smoked before, she had, maybe 9 times. This was time number 10. It was cool outside her small balcony. The moon and stars were out and the bitter smell of smoke surrounded her.

She inhaled.

She exhaled.

A stream of smoke blew out her mouth and she flicked the cigarette that was in her fingers in between the rungs of the railing.

Life sucked for her right then.

Not even the couple cigs she had bummed off Rick were making her feel better. What did she expect? She had made a complete, utter, unmistakable fool out of herself that night.

"Dammit." She muttered and then thought, "I should have known he wouldn’t like me. I should have known."

She had always gotten her hopes up, and they always seemed to crash down in her face. Her life until this point had been very boring, events had happened, but they weren't worth repeating or talking about in her mind. She had developed a minuscule crush, started to have some feelings and in the end she got "crushed," hence the name.

It was pathetic; she was pathetic.

"Maybe I just need to get laid." She chuckled. No, last time that happened it had blew up in her face. She didn’t like thinking about things like that. A pro, she could be called, at pushing back the pain and laying on a thick bitchy attitude to hide the reality. It was funny to think how everyone called her miss innocent, lil Kristen. If only they knew.

But to hell with the past was her motto. And now Justin was in her past, just like every other thing in her life at this point. She would finish this gig with Rick, then move back up to Michigan and try to find a job at a punk club or record store.

How would she pay for rent? Food? Clothes? More importantly: concerts?

Life definitely sucked.

She heard mumbling from above her and looked up at the bottom of the balcony above her. With a deep inhale of her cigarette she stood up from where she had been sitting up against the stucco wall and then dropped the cig to the ground, letting her Sketchers smear the cement with ashes.

She had two cigarettes left. She planned to finish them all off so by tomorrow she might have a dry throat and people would give her sympathy thinking she was sick. Maybe Justin would feel bad, thinking he had given…"Stop it," She thought.

She needed to get over him fast.

So she went inside, searched for her portable CD player and her Cake CDs and went back outside to sit on the cement balcony, listen to her music, smoke a little and completely clear her head of everything in her past, the Justin Timberlake crush included.

--------

Of course. Absolutely. Definitely.

Now that his night was ruined, why not just ruin it anymore. He said before that a call from her would be the topper, and sure enough, as soon as he was walking into his room his little cell phone had to start ringing. It was her. Instead of being smart and not answering or cutting his phone off, or even blocking her number, he flipped it open and sighed out a "Hey Bee."

They had chit chatted for a while about what they had been up to. And it was when he slid the g lass door of his balcony open and inhaled the night air when she laughed slightly and said in her shy voice, "Bet you're wondering why I called."

"A little, yeah. I mean you were the one that said no more calls."

"I..." He immediately wished he hadn't answered the phone. He could read her like a book. She wanted something, needed him to help her some how. He couldn’t count how many times she had called him in that same tone before, worried about some magazine cover, news article, image problem, not getting to see him or her sister. He hated it. He knew how she felt, but it was hard to reassure her so much, and he had a feeling she was about to start complaining about her celebrity situation…again.

He sighed and sat down in the chair, relaxing and placing the Coors can he had snatched from the mini bar on the glass table beside him. He knew he probably didn’t need to put any more alcohol in his system since he was just now wearing off his other dosage, and his stomach was starting to churn a little; but beer always seemed to relax him and he needed some relaxation after the night he had had, and kept having. He figured one can of beer wouldn’t do any more damage, not like the hard liquor he had had earlier. That had been a terrible mistake.

He was starting to think about Kristen . He needed to stop. He should have his mind on his ex now. She needed him. "You know if you need anything I'm here for you."

"I…I miss you Justin."

He stopped mid sip. The can slowly came from his lips and was placed back on the table. Apparently she needed him in a different way than he had imagined. "Y...you miss me?"

"Yeah, crazy huh?"

He closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. "I miss you too, you know that."

"It's just…I'm starting to think that I've made a big mistake. I…I love you Justin, that wont ever change."

"I love you too, Bee." He said the words without thinking, and as soon as they slipped out he wondered if he should have said them. It had been routine for him for a while, and even though he hadn't talked to her in a few weeks, it still felt natural.

"Some of the girls and I were having a night out tonight and they all started talking about the guys they were dating and seeing and all these little cute things. I…I caught myself starting to talk about you. "

He sighed her name. "Britney…" She didn’t need to pull him down this road.

"C- could I come see you?"

He's body tensed up and he immediately started to feel his stomach tie itself in a knot. "I…I don’t know if that would work."

"Why not?"

Images of Kristen seeing Britney hang around flashed in his mind. He didn’t need to have them jealous of each other. He shook his head, he wasn’t dating Krsiten and Britney was an ex. But that didn’t mean he wanted Britney to come up for a nice little visit. He thought of another excuse, a valid one. "Because I'm trying to get over you. And I was just about there, and then you hit me with this. That’s not good for a guys emotions, Brit."

"What about my emotions. Do you know how hard it was for me to break up with you?"?

A bitter laugh escaped his lips and he muttered, "Seemed pretty easy to me."

"Ugh, ya know? Just forget I ever called. You can be the biggest asshole sometimes." Perfect. He had been called that twice in one night.

I didn’t really go over well with his ego. He sat up and hit the table, almost knocking off the beer can. "What the hell? Just because I'm not shitting myself over you anymore you get all angry? That's bull shit Britney. BULL SHIT!"

"You're bull shit. You know you miss me, and you know you want us to be together again, but no, you gotta let your fuckin' ego get in the way."

"I knew I should have ignored you."

"WHAT? Justin what's the real reason for you not letting me come up there and SEE you. Are you…"

He slouched completely in his seat and glared at the balcony railing. He thought he could smell cigarette smoke. "What?"

"Are you seeing someone?"

He immediately thought of Kristen again. He wondered how he was gonna make it up to her. He wouldn’t be able to live the next month or so of tour with her mad at him. It'd eat at him way too much. "What's it matter?"

"I cant believe you would do this to me."

"I never said I was, I'm just saying what's it matter?"

He could see her trough the phone now, rolling her eyes, hands on her hips, giving him attitude like crazy. "You must be. You must have met SOMEONE. Ever since you went on tour you haven't called me."

He laughed out of surprise. She was searching now. "You told me not to!"

"And when did you start listening to me?"

"Now you're just punching me for no reason. I'm going to bed. I've had a fuckin' shitty ass night."

"What's her name Justin?"

"Who's?" He was completely lost.

"The girl you are seeing. The girl that’s evidently gotten you over me pretty damn quickly."

"It's been almost 4 months!"

She corrected him in a snappy voice. "3 months"

"Who cares?! I'm not gonna spend the REST of my life waiting on you Britney. I did for a month and a half and it fuckin' tore me apart. I wont do that to myself. You made a valid point. Our relationship was too exhausting. It wasn’t my idea to break up. YOU, Brit, YOU were the one that gave up. I gave everything I HAD into this relationship, you half assed it…"

"What the..."

He didn’t acknowledge her interruption and kept talking, lecturing her, trying to get his point across. "YES you did! I'm sorry I couldn’t be there 24/7, but you know how that is. You know better than anyone, and STILL you wanted more from me. I gave you my all and it wasn’t good enough, so you gave in, didn’t sacrifice anything, just realized I wasn’t good enough…"

"Justin…"

He stood up out of the chair and started to pace the small area he had to walk in. The smell of smoke became more noticeable and it just added to his irritation. "Don’t Justin me. It's the truth. So I'm sorry that I've gotten over you. I'm happy with myself now. I'm happy that I don’t have to worry if I'm gonna be able to be for some premiere or if I'm gonna forget to call you right at 4 o clock or if I'm gonna be able to come see you for the weekend. I don’t have to worry anymore about any of that stuff and you don’t know the weight that's been lifted off my shoulders."

"Well thanks. Make me feel like shit."

"I felt like shit for about 60% of t he time during our relationship."

"What about the to her percent? " He closed his eyes at her quiet voice. He knew he had probably gotten to her, but not without hurting her feelings.

"The other percent…" He sighed. "Take me back to the start Britney. Remember then? Remember when we couldn’t get enough of each other, when no one knew, we snuck around, we'd hang out and watch movies and not stress about the next time we'd see each to her. I wouldn’t fly in at 11 get to the hotel at 12, get in bed with you for 6 hours and fly out again by 7. None of that."

When she didn’t say anything back for a moment he said calmly into the phone, trying not to stir up any more emotion. "I love you. And you know that. You KNOW that. But I cant help it that we've changed. And I cant help how our careers are. But you aren't gonna take this away from me. And I'm not gonna take it away from you. I just, I cant deal with this anymore."

"Fine. I'll see ya." She muttered.

"Britney don’t do that. Don’t write this off as nothing big."

Her voice bit at his ears. "Well what the hell do you want me to do?"

"Get over me."

She made a "hmp" noise over the phone and after a minute or so of hearing her breath fairly heavily through the phone, he said, "Ok, don’t say anything. I'm exhausted and someone's smoking downstairs…reminds me of someone…" He said with a smile, hoping to get her to do the same.

"Don’t start. My momma caught me last night."

He laughed. She was 20 years old and still getting "caught" doing things. "Aww, momma caught ya."

"It's not funny." She said in a defensive voice. It was a growing habit of her to light up every now and then, and he wasn’t one to say he was a saint and had never had a cigarette, but he knew he could never start smoking if he wanted to keep his voice. Plus, he had no real desire to. It was a bad habit. He had thought about how it might have taken off the edge a little off that night, espeically when he saw some people smoking outside the club when he left. But then he immediately thought about how his voice would sound the next morning.

The smoke smell seemed to be getting a little heavier. "Anyway, yeah, I'm gonna go to bed and save my voice from the tar."

"You're paranoid."

She was laughing at him, so he stood up for himself and threw in other excuses. "And I'm cold. It's chilly out here."

"Go get in bed, like me."

He could tell right off the bat that the way she had whispered the last part of that phrase was an attempt to seduce him, to reel him into a sexy conversation like she had so many other times. He couldn’t afford getting another hard on. His one from Kristen died down a little while ago, but he didn’t need Britney to start getting him like that again. "Don’t even tempt me like that. You're mean."

"We did have good sex." She said with no care what so ever.

Oh yes, she was really mean. He could feel the blood start to rush down there. He actually prayed to God that it would stop. "I'm hanging up now."

"Night Justin."

At least he got her to laugh a little, even if it was more of a "hmp" than a full belly laugh. He never handled pissing off women well: From his mother on down. Britney was no exception and he didn’t want her to look at him badly. And he definitely didn’t want to give her any fuel to start the post-relationship bitching he had seen many girls do before. "Britney…I didn’t mean to hurt you, with anything I said tonight. I did have a lot of alcohol tonight and a bad night on top of it."

"Well, yeah. I'll talk to ya later." She seemed to accept his apology, kind of. But then she hung up. He thought about calling her back begging for forgiveness, but then she would have him right where she wanted: vulnerable. She was trying to get him back, and he wasn’t so sure he wanted to go back. Sure, he loved her and loved their relationship, or what once was their relationship; but she had hurt him, she had given up, and she hadn't loved him enough to suck up the problems they were facing and stick it out though the long run.

That had killed a part of him inside, and he was still getting over that. The last thing he needed was her coming back for a few days, spend that time in bed with him doing things he dreamt of, and then realizing that one of them would have to leave for a shoot or a interview or a show and figuring out that they couldn’t be together 24/7. And then she'd want to quit again.

And a little more of him would die.

He wanted to save his soul. So he made a bold decision over a course of a few months to get over her, move on, and not even glance behind him.

When he got undressed and put his phone on the charger he was able to finally get in bed and relax. He spent a long time staring into the darkness thinking about his life, thinking about how happy he was. He was hurt, no doubt about that, but over all he was happy…he was happier.

He actually enjoyed being single, not having to worry about an extra person. He was immediately slammed with the image of Kristen, dressed up, shocked look on her face, realizing he had no intention of kissing her. He liked Kristen a lot. She intrigued him and started a little flame inside of him that hadn't ever really been ignited before. She seemed uncaring and brutal and defensive at some times and then at others she became sensitive, feminine, and dare he say mysterious. There was more going on with her than she let on. He could sense it about her.

He liked Kristen, but he didn’t know how.

He loved hanging out with her, but he couldn’t decide if the tension from attraction between them was because he truly wanted something more from her than friendship, or if he was just longing for female attention.

He figured it was probably the last one. Kristen wasn’t his type. She was cute, and he saw that evening she could look nice, but it wasn’t her, it wasn’t her at all that night: it was what could have been her, what he didn’t want to be her. And even when he had kissed her, now that he knew it was her, he realized she as playing a part.

She was herself, a trait he had found lacking in about 70% of the women he had met. But he couldn’t be attracted to her any more than a friend. She seemed so different from him. So much younger. So…naïve at times.

With that last thought he flipped over on his stomach, smothering himself into one of the pillows and succumbing to sleep.

It was in the middle of the night when he changed his mind.

He woke up and his stomach was battling with him, but it was only partly from the alcohol. He couldn’t get the numerous occasions that phone numbers had been slipped in his hands, dates had been offered, set ups from friends, blunt invitations from heavenly beautiful barely dressed women in clubs that were more than willing to give him any kind of female attention he wanted.

He tried not to be too egotistical about himself, but he started to remember all the times, since his relationship with Britney had ended, that women had offered him the female attention he craved.

He had turned them all down. Every single one.

And now, suddenly, surprisingly, with Kristen, he didn’t want to turn it down. He wanted every bit of attention she would give him.