Part Two
Hallie According to JC
If I had known when I invited Hallie to come on tour with me that she was going to spend the majority of her time concocting new reasons to hate one of my best friends, I probably wouldn’t have invited her. I probably would have just dealt with the fact that I was lonely, sucked it up, and lived with only communicating with her and my other friends through phone calls and e-mail.
Unfortunately, though, I had thought it would be fun to have Hallie around. I wasn’t entirely wrong, of course. Hallie was arguably my closest female friend, and we had a good time together. I adored Hallie from the second I met her. I liked the fact that she didn’t care about what anyone thought of her, I liked the fact that her hair was unusually long and while everyone thought she had some deep reason for this, she was really just too lazy to go to the barber, I liked her bizarre fascination with maps, and I liked what a good listener she was. I even sort of liked the way she claimed to hate everyone and everything she came into contact with, and the way she could get pissed off by the most random things (although I must admit that if I have to sit through one more rant about how celebrities give their children ridiculous names, I think I’ll hurt myself). Having all of these qualities on tour with me was great. Beyond great, even. That first night especially was completely and totally awesome. But then she met Justin. And after that, she became so obsessed with hating him that it almost cancelled out all of her awesome qualities.
Don’t get me wrong, it wasn’t unusual for Hallie to dislike people and I was cool with that. But she didn’t usually talk about it that much. She’d meet someone, find something she didn’t like about them, tell me about it and be done with it. She didn’t dwell on it. With Justin, she dwelled on it. A lot.
“So how’d you like the show?” I asked Hallie as we stood in the dressing room after the first concert she attended. She shrugged.
“You were good,” she told me, clearly meaning me specifically and not the group as a whole. Hallie’d never been one to really enjoy pop music. Actually, let me rephrase that. Hallie wasn’t one to admit she enjoyed pop music. I knew she really did enjoy it, because the night we met, she confided to me that she was in love with the New Kids on the Block. And while she likes to pretend that’s the extent of her pop music appreciation, I know better. She likes N Sync, I know she does.
“And what did you think of the guys?” I continued my search for information and she shrugged again.
“They seemed pretty cool. Except for that Justin dude.”
“You didn’t even talk to Justin,” I pointed out with a frown. Again with the shrugging.
“Since when do I need to talk to people to know they suck? He seems like asshole. He was yelling at that stagehand when I walked in and then he interrupted us and didn’t even introduce himself. He was rude.” For someone who thrived on finding at least one reason to dislike every member of the human race, Hallie had an odd distaste for people who didn’t meet her standards of politeness. I sighed.
“He wasn’t in the best mood today. I’m sure he’ll be embarrassed about it and be really nice to you next time he sees you. You guys will get along great.”
“Ew, I hope not.”
Looking back on that conversation, I realize how dumb I was being. Justin and Hallie were not going to get along at all, and I should have realized it immediately. Justin was very self-confident and that often came off as arrogance. There’s no doubt in my mind that’s how Hallie saw it. And if there was anything she hated, it was arrogant people. All I really know about why is that there were some guys in high school who were really cruel to her and the one quality she associated with those guys is arrogance. That’s all she’ll tell me about it, and even her cousin Todd has no clue what her problem is, so I guess I’ll never know. In light of that, I suppose it shouldn’t have surprised me that Hallie was immediately turned off by Justin’s attitude that day at the sound check, but I always sort of thought she’d get over it after a couple of days. She didn’t.
The first real interaction that Hallie and Justin had with one another was the next night at an after party. I’d had to practically drag Hallie with me, but she came and she was having fun. The room was packed and people were drunk, so there was a lot of jostling going on, but it wasn’t a huge deal. Until, of course, Justin somehow decided it would be a good idea to walk backwards whilst drunk and nearly knocked Hallie over, causing her to spill her drink all over herself. She was not a happy camper.
“What the hell is wrong with you?” she shrieked at him as Justin looked at her seeming quite dumbfounded.
“Sorry,” he muttered, reaching out to try and help her, but Hallie pushed him away from her.
“Don’t touch me!” she ordered, looking at him with utter disgust.
“Dude, it was an accident. Chill.”
“Chill? You want me to chill?” I was standing next to her during this entire exchange and I still can’t believe what she did next. It was crazy and illogical even for Hallie. And that’s saying something. She grabbed my drink from me and before I could stop her, had hastily dumped it on Justin’s head. His mouth dropped open in disbelief.
“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” he bellowed. Hallie just shrugged and gave him an annoyingly sweet smile.
“Chill,” she replied.
“Chill?” Justin repeated incredulously. “I am Justin fucking Timberlake, you can’t just go dumping things on my head! Who do you think you are?” Up until this point, I’d been having an odd urge to burst into laughter at the absurdity of the situation, but it quickly left when he said those words. This was not self-confidence being mistaken for arrogance, this was actual arrogance. And as I’ve already told you, Hallie had no tolerance for arrogance. I grabbed her arm, afraid she’d punch him or something, but she was unusually calm for Hallie.
“Well, Justin fucking Timberlake, I’m Hallie fucking Evans and I will dump things on whomever I choose. Last I checked, being in a little pop group didn’t make you God. Come on, JC.” She pulled me along with her and we left the party.
“Hallie, that was way out of line,” I scolded her and she rolled her eyes.
“What are you, my mother?”
“No, but come on, you can’t just go doing things like that.” She shrugged the omnipresent Hallie Evans shrug.
“Sure I can. I just did it. And anyway, he deserved it.” I sighed in defeat, knowing it was pointless to argue with her. When Hallie thought she was right about something, and she almost always did, there was no changing her mind. I saw no reason why her feelings about Justin should be any different.
After that night, every time Justin and Hallie saw each other it resulted in a fight. Hallie will undoubtedly say he started them all and Justin will probably claim it was all Hallie's fault. Me? I think they were both to blame. They both had a knack for pushing each others' buttons and weren't afraid to use it. They each found the other profoundly irritating. They both seemed to think up new reasons to hate one another with every passing day. Or at least Hallie did. I know, because I had to hear about them. He was arrogant, he talked with his mouth full, he reminded her of Alan Woolsworth in high school who was such a dick, his hair was horrible, he talked down to the stagehands, he was obnoxious, he was annoying, he was self-centered. And those are only the reasons she came up with in the first week. There were many more in the weeks to come. And, as I said, I heard them all. Every single one.
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