“Lance!”

Joey rushed over to Lance’s bedside with Chris following him. He watched as Lance moved slightly as he started to wake up. Out of the corner of his eye he saw JC get up from his position on the floor across the room and leave. Part of him wanted to grab him and make him explain what just happened. But he knew JC would need some time to process before they hounded him with questions, which gave them the time to check on Lance.

Less than a minute later the movement increased and Lance’s eyelids fluttered before they opened. Joey watched as his eyes blinked a few times to adjust to the dim lighting of the bedroom. Finally Lance looked at Joey and Chris before he asked, “What are you guys doing in here?”

“How are you feeling?” Joey asked.

“I’m fine,” Lance said frowning in confusion. “Why?”

“You’ve been sick for the past couple days,” Chris replied.

Lance nodded, sitting up. “Yeah, a cold, but I’m better now.”

“No, Lance.” Joey shook his head. “It was worse than that. You were delusional.”

“I was?” Lance looked surprised and glanced at Chris for confirmation.

“You thought we were doing things that we had already done months ago. You were really out of it, man,” Chris affirmed.

“I don’t remember any of that,” Lance said, a look of fear crossed his face. Joey could only imagine how scary it would be to wake up and not remember anything that had happened in the past couple days.

Joey frowned. “What’s the last thing you do remember?”

Lance thought for a few seconds before he said, “We were sitting here like this talking about JC needing therapy.”

“That was Tuesday. It’s Thursday now, and the therapist has already been here,” Joey replied.

“And?” Lance prompted.

“And we’re never doing it again,” Chris replied.

“What? Why?”

“Because Derek was trying to get through to JC and he had a major freak out,” Joey answered.

“Is he OK now?” Lance asked.

Joey nodded and shrugged. “We think so. Chris took him clubbing earlier to get his mind off it.”

Lance turned his attention to Chris. “Did it work?”

“I think so, yeah,” Chris said.

“So I guess Derek didn’t talk to Justin then?”

“No. JC went in first and Chris threw Derek out after he learned what he’d done to JC,” Joey said. He couldn’t believe they were carrying on a conversation with Lance considering how out of it he had been. Now Lance was sitting in bed and talking to them like nothing had happened.

“Chris,” Lance admonished.

Chris rolled his eyes. “I already called and apologized. Everything’s good.”

“So you’re really feeling better?” Joey asked, eyeing Lance critically. His face had a better color than it had in days and his eyes looked clear and focused.

“Yeah. Whatever I had seems to be gone now,” Lance said. Joey sighed in relief and visibly relaxed. Lance raised an eyebrow as he glanced between Joey and Chris. “Did something else happen while I was sick?”

Joey exchanged an uneasy look with Chris. He wasn’t sure if it would be a good idea to tell Lance about his suicide attempt. Finally he nodded to Chris to go ahead and tell Lance. It would be better to get this out in the open now than to have him find out later.

“You uh…tried to kill yourself,” Chris said.

Lance’s eyes widened and looked at him in shock. “What!”

“Don’t worry. JC thinks that something made you do it,” Joey quickly tried to assure his friend.

“He does?”

The three of them turned to see Justin just inside the doorway. Chris waved him over to Lance’s bed and nodded. “Yeah.” Chris looked back at Lance. “He was convinced that you couldn’t have done it yourself, and he wanted to prove it.”

“How?” Lance asked.

“He went inside your mind. Said that he knew it would work because you’d done it to him before,” Joey said.

“Went? What do you mean ‘went’?” Justin asked confused looking back and forth between Chris and Joey.

“He did it a few minutes ago,” Joey answered.

“What did he find?” Lance asked.

“We don’t know. We didn’t get a chance to ask him. You started to wake up and he left the room. He has a lot to explain though,” Chris said.

Justin leaned forward. “Why? What happened?”

“Well, for starters he was shivering while he was in your head,” Chris said looking at Lance. “And then that thing came out.”

“What thing?” Lance frowned at Chris.

“It was like smoke or something,” Joey said. “It came out of your ear and after JC. The smoke or whatever it was formed itself into a hand and reached out to grab him. As soon as it touch his shoulder though it disappeared.”

“What do you think it was?” Justin asked.

Chris shrugged. “Who knows? It was damn creepy though.”

“We need to talk to JC,” Lance said stating the obvious.

Joey nodded. “The sooner the better I think.”

“Well, let’s go.” Chris started to get off the bed when Justin held up a hand to stop him.

“He’s sleeping. Let’s all get some sleep and we can talk to him tomorrow,” Justin said.

The three of them nodded in agreement and after bidding each other good night, Joey, Chris, and Justin walked down the hall and into their separate bedrooms. Joey was a little worried about leaving Lance alone, but knew that he should try to get some sleep. If anything did happen, he was only down the hall and would be able to run into Lance’s room.

Joey lied in his bed unable to fall asleep. It was partially because he had already gotten a few hours before Chris had called him, but the other part was the wheels in his head were still churning, trying to process everything that had happened in the few short hours since he first arrived at Lance’s. It was bad enough finding out that Lance had tried to commit suicide, but things only worsened when JC went into Lance’s head and drew out some creepy hand that tried to attack him. Though, it obviously had worked, which was a good thing. Lance woke up feeling better than he had in days.

He honestly hadn’t expected anything to happen when JC went into Lance’s head. Shows how wrong he had been. Based on what he saw after the smoke escaped Lance and attacked JC, he had to admit that JC was right about something causing Lance to attempt to commit suicide. At least that was the only reason that would explain what had been in Lance’s mind and why. They wouldn’t know what really happened until they talked to JC.

Thinking back to the creepy hand that reached out to grab JC gave him chills. He could only imagine how it affected JC. It was understandable that he had left the room right away because just watching it had freaked him out. Joey could only hope that JC would talk to them about what happened. They certainly didn’t need a repeat of before. With that thought in mind, he fell asleep.

Down the hall behind a closed door JC too couldn’t sleep. He had been lying on his bed for about an hour not even bothering to try to stop his thoughts. Exhaustion had set in quickly after he finished crying, but he didn’t dare try to sleep. Not while it was still dark. So he gave in to his thoughts.

He knew that he would have to answer questions whenever he decided to come out of his room and face the rest of the guys. It wasn’t a task he looked forward to, but he knew that was going to happen sooner or later. As much as he may want to, he couldn’t stay in his room forever. But he would worry about that later.

As JC watched the early morning light filter the room, he felt his eyes grow heavy. It was much easier to give into sleep now that the sun chased away the dark shadows. Slowly he closed his eyes and fell into an exhausted sleep. However, that sleep didn’t last long because his eyes flew open when he heard a loud banging noise. Quickly his eyes scanned the room for any danger only to sigh in relief when he realized that the air conditioner had kicked on. It must be broken. That thought set his mind at ease and allowed him to fall back asleep.

Another fifteen minutes passed before a creaking noise sounded outside his door. JC roughly jerked awake afraid that maybe the demons were back to finish what they’d started only to realize that one of the guys must be up and had walked past his door. The carpet did nothing to muffle the creak that could be heard if someone stepped on the spot in front of his door. He lied still for a minute, listening for any more noises, and was lulled back into a slumber when none came.

Justin softly walked down the hall not wanting to disturb any of his sleeping band mates. He cringed when the floorboard creaked as he walked past JC’s room, hoping the noise hadn’t woken him. Slowly he walked downstairs trying to find something to do until the others woke up. After getting a couple hours of sleep, he decided that he’d had enough. As soon as his feet reached the bottom of the stairs, he looked to the left and noticed that a soft light was coming from the study.

It didn’t surprise him to find it empty. He walked over to the end table next to the couch to turn off the light. Just as he was about to twist the knob to turn the lamp off, he looked down and saw an open notebook sitting on the couch. Immediately Justin knew that it was JC’s and he must’ve been in the study last night before Lance’s suicide attempt.

Bending over, he picked up the notebook. His first instinct was to close it and set it aside because he knew how pissed JC would be at him for reading what acted like his journal. But he wanted to know what was on JC’s mind that he wouldn’t talk to them about, and he couldn’t help himself. Justin sat on the couch and read through a couple of the most recent entries.

Justin read the most recent entry and was slightly disconcerted that JC hadn’t mentioned therapy at all. It had been a big deal and he was sure that JC would’ve written about it, or at least mentioned it. He was going to keep this in mind for whenever he talked to JC and ask him about it. That thought allowed him to move onto the other entries.

His heart went out to JC as he read through the entries that were filled with guilt for not being able to stop all of the bad things that had happened lately. He was sure that what happened to Lance last night only increased those feelings. Justin wished he would stop believing he was responsible for everything that happened to them, but he knew that was like asking a fish to stop swimming. It was impossible.

With a sigh, he closed the notebook and set it on the end table. He decided that he wouldn’t bring up what he did with JC because he didn’t want to fight with him. Instead he made a mental note to try to get him to talk about his feelings later.

Finally Justin turned the knob on the lamp and let the morning sunlight fill the room instead of artificial light. Deciding that he needed a drink, he walked into the kitchen only to stop in surprise when he saw Joey, Chris, and Lance already at the table drinking coffee. It was only eight o’clock in the morning and they had just gone to bed a few hours ago. They looked up as he came in and greeted him.

“What are you guys doing up?” Justin asked, moving further into the kitchen to grab a glass to fill with water. He didn’t feel like coffee right now.

“Obviously the same thing you are,” Chris answered dryly. Justin nodded. They must’ve not been able to sleep either.

“I assume JC’s still sleeping,” Justin said, taking his glass of water and sitting at the table next to Chris and across Lance and Joey.

“Yeah. We haven’t seen him,” Lance said.

“Think someone should wake him?” Joey asked.

Chris nodded. “Yeah. We need to talk.”

“No. Let him sleep,” Justin said. “We can’t push him.”

“Ain’t that the truth,” Chris muttered.

“He’ll talk when he’s ready,” Lance said.

“How can you be so sure? That didn’t really work before,” Joey replied.

“Yeah, if it had we wouldn’t have had to bring Derek to talk to him,” Chris agreed.

“Why were we even worried to begin with?” Justin asked.

The room was silent for a minute before Lance said, “He wasn’t sleeping.”

“Yes he was,” Justin denied. “He was always asleep when we woke up.”

“But he wasn’t sleeping when he should’ve been,” Lance objected.

“At least he was sleeping,” Justin shot back.

“I don’t know about you, Joe, but I was worried because of his paranoia about the demons,” Chris interrupted loudly. It was then that Justin realized in the midst of talking to Lance he had forgotten Joey and Chris were there.

Joey turned his attention to Chris. “Was he really paranoid? I mean, with everything that’s happened.”

“So you think he’s right?” Justin asked.

Joey shrugged and nodded. “I think it’s a possibility. How else can we explain what happened to you,” Joey looked over at Lance, “and what happened after?”

“Let’s say he’s right. What are we going to do?” Chris asked.

“We’re going to keep an eye on each other,” Lance said.

“But shouldn’t it be over now that you’re better?” Joey asked him.

Lance shrugged. “I don’t know. It probably depends on what JC found out.”

“And who knows when he’ll come downstairs,” Justin replied.

“Well, I’m not going to sit around waiting all day. JC will probably take his sweet time,” Chris said, rising from the table before opening the basement door and making his descent. Not even a minute later Justin stood up and followed him.

Once the two of them vanished into the basement, Lance turned to Joey. “I’m going to get some work done.”

Joey nodded. He had figured that Lance would get to work right away since he hadn’t done anything in a few days. Lance left the room, no doubt going down the hall to his office. After a few more minutes of sitting at the table, Joey decided to get up and go into the living room to watch some TV to occupy his time.

Grabbing the remote off the coffee table, Joey turned on the TV. The picture quickly came alive to show the local news. Joey quickly changed the channel, deciding that he didn’t want to hear about any more bad things happening for a long time. After flipping through the majority of the channels he stopped on the Home Shopping Network to see what they were selling this time.

It turned out they were selling shot glasses of your favorite sports team. As Joey watched them talk about how it was a great addition to any sports fan’s collection it made him want a drink. He knew that Chris was right and that he shouldn’t. But one drink wouldn’t hurt him. With that thought in mind Joey rose from the couch and grabbed a glass from inside the liquor cabinet and filled it with whiskey.

Joey set the glass on a coaster and let it rest on the coffee table. He sat back on the couch and stared at the amber liquid in front of him. As much as he wanted to drink, he knew that if he was caught the guys would be furious with him. But he hadn’t had a drink in a long time and he felt that he deserved it.

Just as Joey was about to reach out and grab the glass to drink he heard a deep voice say, “Eight o’clock is hardly the time to be drinking.”

Joey turned to look at Lance. “It’s after eight.”

“You know what I mean,” Lance said.

“I thought you were working,” Joey accused.

“I was, but I came to get some contracts I’d left in here last time.” Lance paused, taking the opportunity to sit down on the opposite end of the couch. “You want to tell me why you were going to drink?”

“No, not really,” Joey replied.

“Joey,” Lance warned.

Joey held up a hand. “Save it, Lance. I’ve already heard it from Chris.”

“Then why?” Lance asked.

“Because this is what alcoholics do,” Joey answered.

Lance frowned. “You’re not an alcoholic, Joey.”

“Then quit treating me like one!”

Lance was quiet for a second before he said, “We just don’t want you to hurt yourself.”

“I know.” Joey sighed. “But you’ve got to trust me. You can’t keep me from drinking forever.”

“That’s not our intent. We just don’t want you to use alcohol to solve your problems. If this isn’t over and something else happens, we’re going to need you and we can’t deal with problems that could’ve been dealt with,” Lance explained.

Joey nodded. “You’re right. We will go clubbing again, right?”

“Yeah, Joey,” Lance said. Joey couldn’t help but wonder if Lance was just saying that to make him happy and that they would continue to treat him the same way, or he really meant it. Time will tell either way.

Chris’ right hand held the yellow dart with a plastic tip out in front of him as he lined it up with the red bull’s eye in the middle of the board, and his left held the rest of the darts. Lance used to have darts with a metal tip, but after an incident involving a rogue dart breaking a glass that had been in Joey’s hand, it had been decided that plastic would be safer and wouldn’t hurt as much. A small smile tugged at Chris’ lips as he remembered Joey sitting at Lance’s bar to the left of Justin, who had been throwing darts at the time, with a mixed drink in hand and how he jumped up in surprise when the glass broke in his hand.

A sigh of frustration escaped Chris’ lips as his dart that he had released didn’t even come close to hitting the red circle in the middle of the dartboard. He grabbed another dart from his left hand and this time threw the dart at the board immediately. Missed again. Chris let another one go only to have it come a little closer to reaching its target this time. As he let his last dart go, his eyes drifted over to the right where Justin sat on the leather couch sitting in front of the TV. Justin winced as the dart connected with the board.

Chris shook his head as he walked over to the dartboard to pull the darts out and start over. It was obvious from Justin wincing that he had a headache, and it made him wonder why Justin didn’t get up and leave if it bothered him. Maybe he’d had enough of being by himself and was looking for some company.

It was remarkable to think that it had only been last night that Lance had attempted suicide, but it was even more remarkable how quickly they all fell into old routines. It was almost like it was an ordinary day of hanging out at Lance’s house, but Chris knew that wasn’t true. He remembered how Justin had reacted to seeing Lance and how it took him a few hours to work up the courage to check on Lance for himself.

But that was only the tip of the iceberg. It was hard to believe that it was only a few days ago that Justin had passed out in the middle of the driveway and having nightmares. Chris returned to his original spot and began to throw the darts again, but tried to do it softer so he wouldn’t agitate Justin’s headache too much. He spared Justin a quick glance before his right hand forced the yellow dart to go sailing across the room and smack into the dartboard. It used to be so easy to tell how Justin was feeling when he was younger because he could see it all in his face. Now though his face was a little weathered from growing up and it wasn’t as easy for Chris to know how his young friend was doing.

After a few seconds of debating with himself Chris finally asked, “Are you all right?”

Justin raised his eyes to look at Chris. “I'm fine.”

“You're fine?” Chris raised an eyebrow.

“Well, I don’t feel like jumping for joy, but I’m good considering,” Justin said.

“Yeah, I understand, but you kind of freaked me out with that catatonic thing you had going on there,” Chris replied.

Justin shook his head and objected, “I wasn’t catatonic. Just shocked.”

“I was shocked. You wouldn’t even move,” Chris said.

Justin shot to his feet. “You weren’t the one who’d seen it happen!”

“Uh…Justin, I was there. I saw it too,” Chris replied, giving him a confused, concerned look.

“No.” Justin shook his head. “I saw it.”

Chris moved closer to him. “What do you mean?”

“I saw it before it happened,” Justin clarified.

“Like in a dream?”

Justin half shrugged, half nodded. “Something like that.” He paused. “I saw everything. The pills he swallowed. Him hitting his head on the mirror…falling to the ground with broken glass and pills.”

A minute of silence elapsed as Chris took this information in. This was a big deal, and it explained why Justin had been so freaked when he had seen Lance. He hoped that it was a one time occurrence. “Does JC know?”

“Yeah,” Justin answered. Chris nodded. He would talk to JC about this later.

“Speaking of JC…” Chris looked at the clock that hung on the wall above the couch. It was a little after ten o’clock. “Do you think we should check on him?”

Justin shook his head. “He’s probably still sleeping.”

“Did you check on him before?” Chris asked.

“No,” Justin admitted.

“Then how do you know he’s sleeping?” Chris replied. “We’ll just go upstairs and peek into his room real quick.”

“OK, but if he’s sleeping, we leave him alone,” Justin said. Chris agreed and together the two of them walked upstairs to the first floor and continued on to the second floor. A minute later they found themselves standing on the outside of JC’s door.

Chris motioned for Justin to knock. Justin did and waited for a response from inside. When a few minutes passed with no response, Justin turned the knob and gently pushed open the door. Immediately his eyes fell onto the bed where JC was lying on his back with his open eyes staring at the ceiling.

“JC?” Justin asked hesitantly not sure if JC had heard them come in or not. When JC didn’t answer, Justin tilted his head toward the door silently asking Chris to leave them alone. Chris barely hesitated before leaving the room and pulling the door closed behind him.

Justin gently sat on the edge of the bed and asked, “Are you OK?”

Slowly JC’s eyes rolled from the ceiling to land wearily on Justin’s face. “I’m fine,” he said softly.

“I just wanted to let you know that Lance’s doing great. Whatever you did last night helped,” Justin said. He realized that to alleviate JC’s feelings of guilt, he’d have to prove to him how well he’s always taken care of them.

“Really?” JC asked cautiously as if he didn’t believe it.

Justin nodded. “Yeah. Lance says he’s never felt better, and it’s all thanks to you.” He paused. “You’ve always taken good care of us.”

JC looked away. “It’s nothing you guys wouldn’t do.”

Justin moved his head so he was in JC’s line of vision. “Yeah, but you’re the one who does it best.”

JC sighed and faced him. “What do you want, Justin?”

“I just wanted you to know that you did good taking care of Lance,” Justin said. He thought maybe if he was indirect then JC would be more willing to talk.

“You want to talk,” JC corrected, sitting up. When Justin didn’t answer JC continued, “What if I don’t want to?”

“We deserve to know what happened last night. With Lance,” Justin said.

JC crossed his arms. “Well, you’re going to have to wait.”

“What else is new?” Justin shot back as he glared at JC. “You never want to talk about anything when it comes to yourself!”

“I have nothing to talk about. What do you want me to say?” JC asked, standing up.

It was Justin’s turn to cross his arms. “What happened last night with Lance for starters.”

“I don’t want to,” JC said.

“You never want to talk to us, but you’ll write in your damn notebook every night about how guilty you feel about everything that’s happened!” Justin yelled.

“I don’t feel guilty,” JC denied.

“Tell that to the ten pages in your notebook!” Justin fired back only to take a step back when he realized what he’d let slip.

JC narrowed his eyes, his glare intensifying. “What?”

Justin sighed. He thought briefly about trying to deny it, but knew that JC would see right through that. Instead he said, “What do you expect? You never talk to us.”

“I expect you to respect my privacy!” JC paused before he angrily spat, “And you wonder why I never tell you anything?”

“Well, it was either that or wait for you to collapse again!” Justin shot back. The words tumbled out of his mouth so quickly that he didn’t realize what he’d said until he saw JC glare at him. That had definitely been the wrong thing to say.

“Get out,” JC replied icily, pointing to the still open door.

Justin nodded, realizing it was better to leave JC alone to cool off. He turned around once he was outside JC’s room to see JC staring at him with his hand on the door. “I’m sorry, JC.” The only response was the door slamming in his face and the telltale click of the lock.