Renee picked up a good cluster of the jasmine scented bath bubbles in her hand, and with a quick puff of breath sent them flying into the air. She giggled manically when a big tuft of them settled on Justin's nose. He stuck out his lower lip and attempted to blow them away, but only succeeded in getting them stuck to his eyebrow instead.

"You know sometimes baby I think you're really 17 and your ID is fake."

"Or maybe you're getting old and grouchy before your time," she riposted, running her hands over his chest and enjoying watching the droplets of water run down it, disappearing into the bubbles. "I'm just havin' some fun."

"Oh we haven't got to the 'fun' portion of the evening yet."

"Dirty."

"And?"

"Just stating the obvious."

Renee couldn't help lowering her head and planting a kiss on his wet shoulder before tenderly nuzzling his neck. They were having a rare month together - normally their visits were much shorter but with them both recording they had a lot more freedom over their schedules - and they had been curled up watching Pretty Woman when she had idly commented that she'd always thought the whole bath scene was cute. She should have learnt by now not to mention any fantasies to Justin, because eight times out of ten he quickly started trying to make them come true.

So here they were (despite his complaints that she was going to make him smell like a girl), and he was lying back against her, playing with her fingers. She had had relationships in the past but never one where she had been this intimate with somebody - sharing baths and having somebody in the bathroom while you brushed your teeth seemed more intimate to Renee than even the sexual aspect of a relationship. Being with somebody the way she was with Justin was a new and giddy experience for her, and she took great pains not to take the little things like this for granted.

She had learnt an incredibly hard way about that.

Justin could never be told that she had visited an alternate dimension and met another version of him: likeliest scenario, he'd probably call somebody for a straightjacket. However, she had learnt a lot of painful lessons from the whole exercise. For one thing she had learnt that while she wanted to be a successful musician, fame did her more harm than good and she should keep her mind on the music not making her name. That sounded obvious, but until you knew the inside of the industry you wouldn't understand how easily the two got confused.

More importantly, she had seen what too much fame had done to her other self and her relationship with her Justin. She had compromised her body, her image and her entire life. She had cheated on him, pushed him away and had taken all her frustrations with her existence out on him. Unbelievably this didn't make her a terrible person - just a very confused, encaged and lonely one. That said it wasn't exactly desirable either.

Renee was determined that would never be her. She wasn't as skinny as her alter ego, or as famous. She'd declined the boob job and despite a brief flirtation with the blonde of her alter ego she had preferred being dark and enigmatic. More importantly, however, she was in charge of her own life, and she had never been more determined about anything in said life than treating Justin well. She was all too aware after her cross-dimensional trip that everybody was capable of anything, and that it was your choices that made you - so she made the choice to be very proactive in appreciating her boyfriend.

Possibly she went a little over the top on occasion, but he had yet to complain.

"You had any more thoughts on the anniversary? It's less than three weeks away." Justin reminded her, idly reaching his hand back to play with her wet hair.

"I don't know." Renee shrugged, her skin brushing against his as she did so. "You still keen on Vegas?"

"I would have preferred Hawaii or somewhere but we only got so much time and we can't do long flights." His lips pursed in concentration. "I mean we don't have to go anywhere, we could find somewhere around here and just do the classic dinner date, but…"

"But the mighty Justin Timberlake is never satisfied unless his gestures are grand." She knew him too well. He couldn't even do a simple bunch of flowers without doing it extravagantly (not that she minded, she knew it was just his way). "I'm just kidding ya babe, Vegas sounds good. Dinner and a show and some great clubs, what more can we ask?"

"Is that a definite vote for Vegas?" He felt her nod in response. "Great, I'll get something booked. Can you believe it's a year already?"

Renee pondered this as his lips trailed her jaw. "Feels like longer."

"It was longer. I spent six months chasing after you before you finally let me take you out, remember?"

Again, this was something she'd never be able to explain to him. She had fed him a line about her career being at a crucial starting stage and that she needed to concentrate on it. The truth was it had been fear of falling in love with him (she'd certainly developed feelings for the other version, so she'd had a sinking feeling that this one would do even worse) and repeating her other self's mistakes and hurting him. She'd seen how the other Justin had got screwed up over that. It was true enough that he'd be a distraction, but it had been her insecurities which really explained the reluctance to get involved.

However, he had been persistent. They had originally met when they bumped into each other at a recording studio, and he had then done some producing for her before she dropped the whole RnB sound. The songs had never seen the light of day, but by this point the sparks had already flown and Justin had already started to pursue her. She had held out for as long as she could, but finally she had decided that she could apply the lessons she'd learnt not just to her career but to also to him.

There was only so long you could resist a guy who was constantly sending you cute and funny e-mails and text messages asking you out in incredibly dorky yet amusing ways.

At this point, they were at a year and counting and they'd never had a single argument (at least, nothing more than light bickering). He liked to point this out to her regularly, usually as a tease that it had to be coming soon.

"What can I say, I like to play hard to get."

"Frickin' near impossible to get!" Justin scoffed, running his hands over her legs beneath the surface of the water. "Lucky for you I liked ya so much, because most guys would have quit long before I did. I'm not even sure why I didn't quit long before I did."

She smiled, biting her lip coquettishly before finding his, kissing them sweetly. "I am a lucky girl," she breathed.

"You'll be getting luckier later."

"Actually…" She began shifting, sitting up further in the bath and forcing Justin to move, sitting up himself. "If it means going to bed I'm thinking now would be good. This water's going cold and a nice warm bed sounds awesome."

Ever the gentleman (one of her favourite things about him), Justin immediately got up and out of the bath and headed for the towel rack. Renee couldn't help it as her eyes trained themselves on his body; he was far too pale and needed a little sun, but every girl liked a few rippling muscles on her man and she sure as heck had them on hers. Quickly tying one around his waist, he walked back over to the bath and offered a hand to help her up, wrapping the warm but slightly too scratchy towel tightly around her as soon as she had her feet back on the floor.

"Thank you kind sir." She gave him a teasing grin.

"Really, the view was thanks enough."

She smacked his arm playfully. "You're a bad, bad man and you know it... okay, what?"

Renee knew that expression. Justin had a knowing grin on his face, and she didn't know what she had said but obviously there was some joke going on here that she was not privy to.

He leaned in and pushed his lips to her ear, where she could feel every movement they made. "Did I mention how beautiful you are lately?"

"Nice distraction tactic buddy. Not at all obvious."

She couldn't help being slightly mollified, however, especially as he took her face in his hands, thumbs brushing over her lips.

"You are beautiful."

She flushed pink, eyelashes batting shyly. "I love you." That was all she could think to say.

"I love you too." Justin told her as his lips descended on hers once more.

***

"So, Mr Voyeur…" Claire tutted disapprovingly as the Justin she was babysitting finally emerged from the suite. "We done spying?"

He shifted uncomfortably from foot to foot, not meeting her eye. Claire had point blank refused to follow them into their hotel suite, saying it was a step too far with invasion of privacy. She had also bluntly pointed out they could very well be having sex in there, said it was fairly perverted watching other people have sex without their knowledge.

Justin had left before that had happened, couldn't stand the idea of watching it. Once they had got into bed and the kisses had become more making out, that was when he had chosen to leave - he figured it wouldn't be long before they were making love. It had been strange enough just observing them together; he knew it was still Justin Timberlake, knew it wasn't like she was really with another man, but it still felt that way. It was confusing and it made the resultant jealousy even harder to get a handle on than if it had been some random stranger.

He supposed it didn't help that his own Renee was really not this affectionate with him right now. It had been hard watching the two of them; it wasn't like they were constantly making out or groping, but they were always close and seemingly always touching in some way. The banter was quick and easy, they were obviously completely comfortable with each other and very in tune. That much had been obvious even when they were just sitting on the couch watching a movie, let alone once they'd hit the bathroom. Everything about them screamed synchronicity and togetherness.

He really missed that.

"I'm done." He sighed heavily, unsure what to make of everything. He was also having slight guilt about watching them in the bath, though he honestly would have left if anything sexual had started happening. "I can't believe we end up together in this dimension too. How weird is that?"

Claire shrugged. "Destiny's a funny thing. There'll be dimensions somewhere in which you two never set eyes on each other, but… well." She neglected to mention that she had played a part in leading Renee to Justin's recording studio that day; after everything she'd gone through Claire had thought she deserved the opportunity, although it had been up to her to capitalise on it.

"You know, sometimes I wonder what life would be like if I'd never met Renee, almost wish I hadn't." He told her.

"That's normal."

"Except I can't figure out whether it's my Renee or this one I wish I'd never met."

"That's… okay, not so normal, but fairly understandable." She sympathised. She had quickly worked out that trying to make he sure he got as much out of this trip as possible was the safest way to stop him doing anything else with the necklace, but more than that she honestly did feel sorry for him. His life hadn't exactly been made easy for him of late.

"They seem really in love." Justin said quietly, fiddling with a loose thread on the hem of his t-shirt.

"Well…" Claire said softly, "if you paid attention last time you know there's a core of a person that never really changes, even if their circumstances do. He's just like you underneath it all, and it seems to me you're a guy who falls pretty hard."

"Yeah… so I guess he probably is too."

"Probably." She smiled wryly.

"Do you think she ever thinks about me?" He asked. "Wonders what would have happened if she'd stayed?"

"I don't think crossing dimensions is something you forget in a hurry."

That had not been what Justin meant, at all. Claire's flippant remark overlooked the subtext of what he had said - the one that said he thought about it all the time, incessantly in fact. By the time she had left, he and this reality's Renee had developed some complicated feelings towards each other. He couldn't help wondering if she thought of it like he did. Obviously she was happy so he doubted she was torturing herself the way he was, but he wondered if she ever thought of him as more than an idle recollection.

Sometimes he just couldn't help wondering how things would have turned out if she'd made another choice.