Lindsay Campbell was all about her job, and she had been for as long as she could remember. All she’d ever wanted to do was be a lawyer – at least as successful as her father, if not more so – and at 26, she was well on her way to accomplishing this goal. It was all she ever focused on, friends and family coming a close second, with romance being the farthest thing from her mind. Which was why her best friend, Shira – her roommate in law school and quite possibly the only friend she saw on a regular basis – was more shocked than surprised when their weekly lunches slowly became more and more frequently littered with mentions of someone named “Justin.”

“Okay, it’s official,” Shira finally said during lunch one day in mid October, holding her hands up as if alerting Lindsay to the fact that she was about to make a very important announcement. Lindsay had just been telling her about the cute message Justin had left on her voicemail the night before and Shira had been forced to interrupt. “I need to meet this Justin guy. When do I get to meet him?”

“Oh, Shira, I don’t think we’re at the ‘meeting each other’s friends’ stage yet,” Lindsay argued. Her cheeks were slightly red, indicating her embarrassment at Shira’s suggestion. She rarely asked to meet Lindsay’s boyfriends. Probably because Lindsay rarely had boyfriends, but that was beside the point.

“Really?” Her friend, who was the complete opposite of Lindsay in almost every way possible, raised one recently waxed eyebrow. “You guys have been dating for, what, two and a half months now? That, sadly, is like your longest relationship ever. And every week you’re telling me new stories about him. It’s always, ‘Oh, Justin said the nicest thing to me last night at dinner,’ or ‘Oh, Justin is so smart and motivated,’ or ‘Hey, Justin is a damn good kisser.’”

Lindsay’s cheeks reddened even more at the final statement – one that she was regretting making at a lunch a few weeks earlier. “Yeah, but I mean…I don’t know. I’ve only really met his best friend Trace, so…”

“So, he can only really meet your best friend Shira,” the brunette interjected with a grin. “Come on, I have to meet him. I have to see what’s so special about this guy. He sounds kind of girly.”

“Shut up!” The comment elicited a short laugh from Lindsay as she slapped Shira on the arm. “You can meet him soon, I promise. It’s just hard. He’s really busy and he travels a lot. He’s been in town pretty consistently lately, but I still only get to see him a couple of times a week.”

“Only a couple of times a week?” Shira repeated, mocking a scandalized tone. “But how ever do you get your work done, Miss ‘I Can’t See Anyone More than Once a Month’?”

“I have my ways.” A sly grin spread across the blonde’s slender features and Shira’s eyebrows raised once more in response.

“Why are you smiling at me like that? He’s changing you, isn’t he? I’m not sure how I feel about this guy.”

Lindsay chuckled. “He’s great, trust me. Even my parents might like him.”

“He’s got money?” Shira knew very well that this was the Campbell family’s biggest concern when it came to the men in Lindsay’s life. They were a very prominent, very wealthy family in New England, and they would take nothing less than the “best,” which translated into the “richest,” for their daughter. It was bad enough she’d moved to the West Coast, there was no way they would tolerate her dating anyone even remotely less well off than they were.

“Well…yes. Fairly new money, but yeah. It’s really odd. He’s all chummy with his servants and such. Clearly doesn’t understand the etiquette yet, you know? But we can work on it.”

“Ah, already working on changing him, huh?” Shira laughed. “You must really like him.”

***

Whenever the question of how my mother and I came to live in the situation in which we do, there is one stumbling block that seems to plague people to the point where they can never resist asking. “So, when your mom first started working for Justin Timberlake,” they begin, generally in awe when they say the name. “You still lived in Watts.” They wait for confirmation and I give it in the form of a nod and a “yeah.” They usual look at me for another moment or two before continuing. “But why do you live with him?”

It’s a reasonable question, to be sure. I would probably ask it if I didn’t already know the answer. I guess it was sort of an unusual turn of events. It happened maybe 5 or 6 months after the first day I met Justin. He was rarely around, traveling all the time, but whenever he was home and my mother was working, he and I would play HORSE and he would attempt to help me with my homework. I soon came to think of him almost like a big brother, my friend more than my mother’s boss. One such day, it must have been in August because it was a few weeks before school was supposed to start, we were in the back yard and I was beating him at HORSE, when he paused to ask me a question.

“Hey, Miri, let me ask you something,” he began. He never asked whether he could ask me question, it was always “let me ask you,” as if he were asking for permission, but not in such a way that I could really turn him down.

“Okay,” I replied slowly. I was pretty sure that he was just trying to stall his inevitable loss of the game to a kid who had only learned said game a few months earlier.

“Where do you live?”

The question came as a surprise to me, to say the least. I had always assumed that he knew this information. It must have been on my mother’s resume, or something, right? Or surely he would have asked her this question in the interview or at some point during the 10 months she had worked for him. The fact that he was asking led me to believe that Mom had purposefully kept the information from him or that he didn’t believe her for some reason.

I bit down on my lip, trying to decide how to respond. Finally I decided to just tell him. It seemed like an innocent enough conversation. “Watts,” I stated simply.

“Oh.” Even as a child, I was pretty perceptive. I usually knew when someone was mad, or upset, or lying to me. But I couldn’t read the expression on his face. He just looked…thoughtful, I guess. “Do you like it there?”

“I guess.” I shrugged, having nearly forgot about our game of HORSE. I did like it fine. It wasn’t the nicest place in the world, and it wasn’t home, but it was okay. “It’s not Maui.”

Justin nodded and laughed a little. “No, it certainly isn’t.”

That was the end of the conversation and, as far as I knew, the minute we returned to our game and I began to kick his ass again, the subject was no longer on his mind. I certainly forgot that he had ever even asked me the question within a matter of hours. That is, of course, until the next day when I was, once again, stuck at his house while my mother cooked and cleaned for him.

I was sitting out by the pool reading that afternoon when I heard voices coming from the kitchen. Normally I wouldn’t have been able to hear, but Mom had left the door open for some reason and it was so quiet otherwise that the voices traveled easily.

“Look, I know that you like to have your space,” Justin was saying. “But you guys could live in the guest house. It has a kitchen and everything, so you wouldn’t even have to see me any more than normal.”

“Why are you asking me to do this?” Mom’s voice drifted through the soft summer air. I could hear her professional demeanor slipping as she asked the question. I was intrigued by the conversation, so I pulled my feet out of the pool and crept quietly towards the house to hear better. “Am I not doing a good enough job? Is there something you’d like me to change?”

“No, I just think it would be more convenient to have you here. You wouldn’t have to make the long commute every day, it would be good to have you here to keep an eye on things while I’m gone, Miriam could go to a better school-“

“Oh,” my mother’s sharp tone cut him off briskly. “So that’s what this is about? It’s not about work at all, it’s about where I live not being good enough for my daughter? Do you think I don’t think these things through?”

“No, not at all!” The pleading tone was a stark contrast to Mom’s voice. “I really do think it would be more beneficial to have you around more often to keep up on everything. Getting to raise your daughter in a nicer neighborhood would just be an extra benefit. Wouldn’t you rather she go to a school with better funding and better resources?”

There was a long pause and I could picture my mom, pursing her lips together and knowing that she had been beat, but not quite ready to admit it. I couldn’t believe a word I was hearing. Justin wanted us to move to Beverly Hills. No one was even asking my opinion, which bothered me immensely.

“I’ll think about it,” Mom finally said, which I knew meant that she wanted to say yes, but she couldn’t give in quite that easily.

***

Lindsay was beginning to get impatient as she stood outside Justin’s front door, arms folded across her chest, and finger almost sore from ringing the doorbell. She had been standing there for at least five minutes, and she couldn’t imagine what was taking so long. He had to be home. He was the one who’d invited her over for dinner, after all. She tried again, and finally heard the padding of feet and a muffled voice responding. She couldn’t make out the words, but it sounded encouraging. Finally the door flew open, and a woman she didn’t recognize stood on the other side.

“You must be Lindsay!” the woman greeted her, flashing a smile and brushing a strand of hair out of her eyes. She seemed a little rushed, as though she’d been trying to do a million things at once when she’d come to answer the door. She stood back to allow Lindsay entrance.

“Yes,” Lindsay confirmed slowly as she inched past this unfamiliar woman and the door swung closed behind her. “And who are you?”

“Oh, sorry. I'm Kalani, but you can just call me Kali,” she introduced herself while bending down to pick up a pair of shoes, a backpack, and a hooded sweatshirt. “Sorry about the mess. I keep telling Miriam that Justin's living room is not her closet, but she never listens. Of course, he doesn't really help matters by telling her not to worry because that's why he has a maid.” She laughed and pointed to herself with a playful roll of her dark brown eyes. “He spoils that kid way too much. I'm sorry, I'm babbling, you probably want to see Justin. Hold on, I'll call him.”

Lindsay just stood there speechlessly as Kali pushed a button on the intercom on the wall and informed Justin of her presence. She was in shock at the woman standing in front of her. When Justin had told her he had a live-in maid with a young teenage daughter, she had certainly not being expecting the slim, perfectly tan, twentysomething Hawaiian woman with the sparkling smile and long black hair that stood in front of her. And she hadn't been expecting her to be clad in jeans and an oversized button up shirt that could have easily belonged to Justin, and walking around the house barefoot as though it were her home and not her place of employment.

“He said he'll be down in a sec, but that's probably a dirty lie 'cause he's recording and he always loses track of time, so if you want to head up to the studio, feel free,” Kali informed her, heading towards the kitchen, her arms still full of her daughter's things. “You know where it is, right?”

Lindsay merely shook her head, still finding herself too disoriented to speak. When Justin had invited her over to his home for dinner, this was not the sort of interaction she was expecting to have within minutes of her arrival.

“Oh. Okay. Well, just go up the stairs, past the second floor with the bedrooms and everything on it, and when you get to the third floor there's a door at the top of the stairs and that's it. Just go in, they don't generally lock it and no one will probably be paying enough attention to hear you knock.” She waved the fingers on her right hand dismissively, unable to move her whole hand for fear of dropping a pair of shoes on the floor.

“Thanks,” Lindsay finally managed.

“No problem!” Kali flashed her pearly white teeth once more before continuing her trek into the kitchen to, presumably, finish the meal Lindsay would be consuming shortly.

The blonde began her journey up the stairs, following the directions she'd been given, and feeling much less excited about this date than she had earlier in the day. She knew she shouldn't feel threatened by the maid. It was stupid. It was illogical. She was rich and beautiful and powerful and she had nothing to worry about. But still, the fact that Justin had failed to tell her that the aforementioned maid was young and beautiful and comfortable enough in the house to walk around without shoes on made her feel unhappy. It was like the antithesis of everything her parents had ever taught her about the employer-employee relationship.

She soon reached the top of the stairs, her breathing a little quickened, and she placed her hand on the knob and turned slowly, worried about interrupting a recording situation or something else important. As the door opened, she heard laughter coming from the other side as music played loudly. A steady beat pumped from the speakers and Justin's voice flowed out, “She's freaky and she knows it. She's freaky but I like it.”

Lindsay stood in the doorway watching, as no one had noticed her presence yet. A young girl she recognized as Miriam from her first night at Justin's house was dancing to the music as Justin danced next to her, a huge grin spread across his face. A man Lindsay didn't recognize was sitting in a chair nearby watching and chuckling. Lindsay couldn't help thinking that the interaction of the two dancing seemed almost like that of siblings or a father and his daughter as Miriam began copying the pop and lock dance moves that Justin was doing.

Lindsay remained unnoticed and Kali soon appeared in the door next to her as Justin moved into a chair next to the other man. He beat boxed along to the track, as Miriam began shaking her backside in a way that seemed appropriate for a much older woman. Both men erupted into laughter and let out a loud, “Hey!”

“Trying to corrupt my daughter again, guys?” Kali's teasing voice finally caused everyone in the room to realize that there were two women standing at the door watching them. Miriam stopped dancing as Justin faded the music before grinning at her mother innocently.

“She's just shaking what her mama gave her, ain't nothing wrong with that,” he responded cheekily.

“Yeah, well, her mama's gonna take it away if she doesn't get her little butt downstairs and start working on her homework,” Kali informed him with a laugh, holding her arm out to Miriam, beckoning her to come do her work.

“Mom,” Miriam whined, clearly not keen on the idea of doing schoolwork instead of dancing. She dragged her feet slowly over to her mother, however, knowing that she wasn't going to be able to convince her that the latter was more important than the former.

“Oh, yes, I know, it's so horrible. Whine, whine, whine,” Kali commiserated sarcastically as she ushered her daughter out of the door. “Head downstairs, I'll be there in a minute.”

“Kal, we were just getting Miri's opinion on some of the tracks we just finished,” the other man sitting at the board informed her, and Lindsay was struck by the familiar choice of nicknames. “You don't mind, right?”

“Oh, of course not.” Kali waved a hand dismissively and chuckled lightly. “I have no problem with her hanging out with you guys up here, you know that, but she really does need to get her homework done. And I just came up to let you know that dinner's ready, J.”

It took this declaration for Justin to finally notice the woman standing next to Kali. When he did, a wide smile spread across his face and he jumped up out of his seat to greet her.

“Hey, baby.” He placed a quick kiss on Lindsay's lips and the uncertain feelings that had been steadily mounting since the moment she rang the doorbell began to subside. Still, all she could really muster was a small, somewhat forced smile.

“Hey, yourself,” she responded weakly.

“And that would be our cue to leave,” the other man, who had still yet to be introduced to Lindsay, said to Kali, standing and following her out the door.

Soon they were both disappearing down the stairs, the door swinging closed behind them and Justin's lips making their way back towards Lindsay's. However, to her disappointment, they quickly flew away as a voice drifted back up the stairs.

“Don't let your food get cold! I worked my ass off and it's fucking awesome!”

“Yeah, shut it!” Justin called back, laughing. He turned his attention back to Lindsay. “She really is an amazing cook. Are you ready to eat?”

“I guess,” she sighed, unconsciously biting down on her bottom lip, her emotions having gone downhill again. This evening was turning into a very unpleasant roller coaster. She had no idea how to deal with this world and the way these people related to each other.

“Great. I'm starving.” He grabbed her hand and pulled her towards the door, seemingly not noticing the frown that graced her soft features.