There was nothing that I wanted to do after a brutal day at work other than go home, take a hot bubble bath, and relax in front of my brand new plasma TV with left over pork chops and potatoes my neighbor made for me but that would be way too easy (and my life is anything but). As soon as I put my key in my front door I heard the barking of the beasts caged up in my kitchen and the annoying blare of my house phone inside, and of course I couldn’t get to it fast enough; my key broke in the lock when I tried to juggle the grocery bags and my work bag and unlock the door to get to the phone. My machine picked up and I dropped the bag with the carton of eggs when I tried to jump over the gate to pick up, incase you were wondering.

“You’re probably looking for Alana, this isn’t her obviously, but it’s her phone. She’s probably being too lazy to pick up, but I’m sure if you leave a message she’ll get back to you eventually, and I say eventually because I never get my phone calls returned that often and we’re best friends…”

“LaLa, where the hell are you? You know, I never get tired of hearing my own voice on your machine but you’re not picking up your cell or the house phone and I’m beginning to worry that…”

“Hello?” Fuck the eggs and the mess they just made of my kitchen floor. It’s been a while since we’ve spoken and I have a bone to pick with the man on the other end.

“There you are. What’s going on?”

“We normal people have day jobs Justin and we don’t have a PA to do our grocery shopping for us, I’ve got to eat somehow. And I was just making my way in the door when you decided to call.” I opened up the gate separating my kitchen from my living room and stepped aside as the two massive beasts went charging towards my bedroom, it was only safe that I followed after them.

“I called your cell a few times.”

“I think I left it in my desk at work. I rush around too much now that I have to rely on the NJ Transit to get me around.”

“You need to look for a new car LaLa, I don’t know if I like you taking the city bus around Jersey at all hours in the night to get around. Anyways, I’m calling to see if you got the gift I sent you.” Funny he should mention that, because that’s exactly what I wanted to talk to him about. I glanced over at the Dell box that was sitting in the corner of my bedroom and rolled my eyes.

“Yes I got it Justin. You didn’t have to buy me a new laptop though. I don’t need you spending your money on me all the time. Next time you want to give me something, donate money to my school for new books or something.”

“First of all Alana, I think I sort of did have to. If it weren’t for you watching Buckley and Brennan while I’m on this leg of my tour your laptop from 1980 wouldn’t have gotten busted. They are my dogs and they knocked your old shit on the floor; I think it’s only right that I bought you a new one, one that you can actually bring places with you and not have to worry about it blowing up in your lap.”

“Whatever, you didn’t have to; I could have bought my own.”

“Oh, and if you want money donated to the school for books and computers all you had to do was say the word. And how have you been inputting grades without a computer?” I hate the fact that he’s always right, I was having a hard time keeping track of my student’s grades without my grading program; I suck at math and hate doing everything out by hand (good thing I’m an English teacher, right?)

“The old fashioned way, a grade book. Shouldn’t you be in rehearsal now or something?” I heard a loud crash from the front of my small house and winced as I walked down the hall to assess the amount of damage his “babies” were causing to my living area.

“That my babies making all that noise? Damn LaLa I’m sorry if they’re fucking up that little shack of yours, I’ll pay for whatever they break.”

“How many times have I told you not to insult my house? Look I’d love to chat but I’ve got to go Justin, and I’m sure you do too.”

“I don’t have to go and I’m sure you don’t either, it’s not like you have a date or something to get to.” I chose to ignore the last comment he made; Justin was always getting on my case about not dating. So while I was ignoring his dating comment I paid attention to the yelling in the background.

“Yeah I bet you don’t have to go, which is why I hear your tour manager yelling at you that you’re late for sound check. Call me tonight after the show okay?”

“Shouldn’t you be in bed by the time I get out?”

“I’ll be up Dad, I promised my AP class that I’d have their papers graded and handed back by tomorrow.” I heard him chuckle on the other end before telling the person who was standing in his room to ‘quit bellyaching’.

“Good luck with that Alana. Talk to you later.”

“Bye Jay, make me proud to be your best friend tonight. I want to hear good reviews from critics in a few days when I get my US Weekly in the mail.”

“Oh you know it baby. Don’t I always turn it out for you?” I couldn’t get in another goodbye because Buckley chased Brennan into my sliding glass door and which made them start fighting.

Justin Timberlake and I have been friends since he was 18, and since he’s now 27 that makes it about 8 or 9 years, I think (I told you, I teach English not Math). Coincidentally we got paired up at my Uncle Johnny’s (who just happens to be his manager) wedding to walk down the aisle together. If you know anything about weddings that meant that we had to spend a lot of time together and between pictures, dancing, and everything else we formed a pseudo friendship for the pictures (and I say pseduo because we didn't exactly get along all that well to begin with), and to make Uncle Johnny happy as well, that turned into us being extremely close friends. Hell, we’re close enough that he can go away on tour for three months, get tired of lugging his two bad ass dogs with him, and dump them off on me. But I can’t really complain because he’s done some pretty over the top things for me in the past.

Most of my friends have these extravagant jobs and I’m a lousy high school English teacher for bad ass 16 and 17 year olds; Justin is this superstar who makes millions of dollars a year, Noel (my childhood best friend) is a lawyer in Manhattan who was on the verge of making partner by 26, and my brothers (who are two of the most influential people in my life) both are over in Iraq in the Army. So while Justin is out entertaining the entire world, and Noel is putting murderers where they belong, and Jimmy and Isaac are fighting for…well we won’t start on my opinion of what they’re fighting for, I’m stuck in New Jersey, far away from home, reading MacBeth over and over and teaching kids about syntax, diction, and more meaningless literary devices they’ll never use.

I grew up in a small town in Connecticut with my mother and two brothers; Dad and Mom divorced when I was 3 and Dad moved back to Laconia (New Hampshire) where all of his family is, and I was never really exposed to a lot of the glamour that everyone is so into today; I was always the girl in the jeans, tee, and sneakers during high school. So when my Uncle Johnny invited me to his star-studded three million dollar wedding I was definitely surprised that the Justin Timberlake (insert sarcasm here) was my butt buddy for the week long event Uncle Johnny and Aunt Elaine had planned. Who has week long weddings anyway?

Don’t even get me started on weddings, I hate them. Maybe it’s because of the fact that I haven’t had a good man in 4 years and I’m pretty sure that I’ll never get married. You know the saying “always the bridesmaid, never the bride”, well whoever first said that must have known that I was going to be born into this world. Every guy I’ve ever dated has broken us off because ‘we’re better off as friends’ or ‘you’re too much like one of the guys’ (with two older brothers can you blame me?). Fuck love, fuck relationships. I may complain about my job a lot, but I love my students. Besides my friends and family they are the only ‘relationships’ I need in my life to be happy.