In the hotel room where Natalie and Justin were in, it was now quiet and dark throughout the whole room. Justin was laying down on the bed looking up at the ceiling just staring. He looked over to his left to see Natalie curled up under the blankets, sleeping. A soft sigh escaped his lips and his attention turned back to the ceiling. Nothing could ruin the moment they had going on there.
Except for Justin's own thoughts.
It was all too good to be true to him, and that worried him. Natalie and him hit it off immediately and then they hooked up almost right after. That had never happened to him before and he didn't like it because it was different. He never expected for a love, or true love, could come so quickly to him without any problems. Natalie was never anything but all nice and sweet to him. She never did anything to him that would make him think that she was betraying him. Sure the relationship was still new and fresh, but it seemed like they were together forever at that point and that was also another weird feeling for Justin. Normally with his relationships, they either were short-lived or they just felt like it.
This relationship with Natalie was different. It almost seemed rushed, but things were catching up with them now and they were finally getting things together. They were getting to know each other even more and it only made the relationship better and better.
He was now actually worrying himself. What if they were rushing things? What if this was all a game and no true feelings? What if she was planning on hurting him? What ifs quickly invaded his mind. He knew for a fact that Natalie would never purposely hurt him, but it was something he thought about.
The pathetic thing was that he didn't want to be thinking right then. He wanted to go to sleep. It was late, and he had to be up the next morning really early. Going to bed was something he never enjoyed, but he needed to do so that night because he didn't get much sleep the night before due to Natalie invading his thoughts once again and that wasn't going to happen again.
Justin smiled to himself when he thought of Natalie and wanting to watch 'Beauty and the Beast' earlier that night and they did watch it. They argued about certain characters in a very jokingly manner. He found it completely adorable when she was defending the beast at certain parts.
He then slid down the bed some more and scooted closer to Natalie, wrapping an arm around her. He pulled the covers up a little more and let his heavy eyelids close.
Laura stood outside of JC's door still, just waiting for an idea to pop in her head. She didn't know what she wanted to do. All she knew was that she had to talk to Wade. Even though she was still confused as to of what she should do, she still needed to go in there and give it her all. With a deep, loud sigh, she walked slowly to their room which was right beside JC's. She took baby steps to avoid getting there too soon.
Randy, who was standing across from JC's room which was Justin's room, smiled at Laura. "How you doing tonight?"
Laura jumped and looked back at him and shrugged her shoulders, trying to release the tension. "I'm fine I guess. So you're on duty now?"
He clapped his hands together and got an evil look on his face. "Yep, and if that fro boy tries anything on me in the morning, he's going to be in for it."
Laura laughed to her self and waved. "Well, um I'm going to get going, but we'll be seeing you around."
"All right."
With a hesitant motion, Laura moved her hand to door to her room. Slowly, she opened it and crept inside. She could feel the warm air from the bathroom. When she smelled Wade, who obviously took a shower, she sighed. It was now or never.
When she got to a point in the room where she could see the beds, she looked around. The t.v was off and only the lamp beside the bed was on. She looked around the rest of the room to see that it wasn't changed at all. Then she saw Wade. He was sitting on the bed with his legs under the covers with a magazine.
Laura turned her head and got her bag of clothes and went into the bathroom to change into her pajamas. She just needed more calming time for herself. Unfortunately, the changing session didn't do much damage in time for her. Her shoulders slumped and she walked out of the bathroom, throwing her bag to the wall to sit there. Slowly she walked over to the bed and crawled up on it to sit right next to Wade.
She started to read the magazine over his shoulder as he continued to read. Eventually he looked over at her and raised an eyebrow. "You done reading that page?"
Laura bit down on her lip and pulled the magazine out of Wade's hands and leaned over him to set it on the table. She then sat back and looked into his eyes. "Uh, maybe we should talk."
Wade turned towards her on the bed and smiled. "Ok, what do you want to talk about?"
She looked down first and then back up to Wade. "I've been thinking."
"That's not exactly safe..."
That got a smile out of Laura, which was Wade's goal in that comment. "You meany."
Wade shrugged. "Eh, oh well, so where were you?"
Laura sighed deeply. "I was outside of our room thinking and JC came out and offered to talk so we were talking and now I'm here."
Wade's shoulders lowered in jealousy. She was talking to JC about her problems? Sure JC was great and all, but she was HIS best friend and he liked the whole ownership sounding of that. She was his in his mind. When she has problems, she goes to him; no one else. He figured that if she was going to talk to him now, then he shouldn't bring up her being in JC's room talking. "Yep, now you're here."
Laura shook her head quickly and rolled her shoulders, trying to get comfortable. "I'll come out flat and say it Wade. I don't know what I want right now. Even after thinking about it for a while, I just don't know what I want right now out of all of this. I have so many options right now, and I don't like it. You know me, I've always been able to make decisions, but I've never crossed something like this, and it's hard for me to deal with this right now. For once, I'm thinking of all of the problems this could cause, Wade. I just don't know what to do."
Wade leaned in closer, listening more intently than ever, yearning for her next words.
"You think you know what I want, and it amuses me, because you've always been right in the past, and there I was not too long ago, denying that you could be right. There are just too many 'what ifs' in this game right now."
His spirits started to lower again. "I understand."
Laura put her hand under his chin when she saw his head lower. She lifted it up so he was forced to look in her eyes. "Please Wade, don't do this. Try to stay here with me, please?"
He just nodded.
"All right. So like I said, I don't know what I want, but what about regrets, Wade? I could very well regret possibly getting together with you. And then there's the whole thing that I could very easily regret not doing this with you. What if it would have worked out and I wouldn't have tried? What if I really would be missing out? But of course then I have to remember how easily everything in our lives could be ruined."
Wade's head lifted in somewhat higher spirits for a first. He lifted his hands to Laura's shoulders. "Whatever you want to do, I'll do."
"The thing is, what kind of person would I be if I wouldn't even try? I really don't want to regret now trying."
"Laura, if you don't want to, we don't have to. I don't want you to think that it would be the end of the world if we don't hook up. I'll still be your best friend no matter what. I promise you that. Even if we would get together and break up, I'll STILL be there for you. I've known you too long to give you up now. Besides, the thought of someone else being your best friend is very depressing. I would never let that spot go for anything."
Laura just nodded her head. Wade saw the look on her face of complete confusion and he leaned over to wrap his arms around her. Laura sighed into his chest and wrapped her arms around his back. She was so confused and she didn't know what to do. Wade leaned down and kissed the top of her head and then set his on top of her own.
He slowly rocked them back and forth. "I'm sorry for this whole mess. If I would have kept my mouth shut, this wouldn't have been such a mess."
Laura pulled away slightly and shook her head. "No Wade, you can't hold things back, you know that, especially from me. We've never really been secretive away from each other, and it's not starting now. We'll deal with whatever comes our way whenever it does. Just don't push it."
A smile escaped his lips and he sighed. "Well, this is getting pretty confusing, isn't it?"
Laura nodded her head and smiled back at him. "Yes, it's complicated, but I'm willing to figure it out, if you are. I don't know exactly what we should do, but I just don't want to ruin things, you know? What if make a wrong move and ruin everything? It would be so easy to do that, and to think of not being around you for the rest of my life right now is heartbreaking. You've always been there for me, and not having my best friend at my side would make me one lost puppy."
Wade grabbed her hand and held it tightly. "I already told you, I will always be there for you. If something would mess up, I'll still be there. I can't just leave the person I've known my whole life and have been friends with my whole life without a best friend. That would be completely heartless, and you know me, that's not me. Besides, I think my mom would have my head on a stick if I ever left you."
"That's the truth. You know yourself that my mom adores you."
"Who doesn't?"
Laura pushed his shoulders and grinned when he fell backwards. "Don't turn into Justin on me. I'm not one for huge egos."
"He's not THAT bad."
"Oh yes, he is."
"Ok, maybe he is, but geez, I would never be like that. You would probably kill me if I ever let my ego flare up too much too often."
"I would completely disown you."
Wade grinned and sat up again. "You own me? Hmm, now that's interesting."
Laura rolled her eyes, shaking her head. "You know what I mean. Stop wishing I owned you."
"Oh you know it."
Laura moved her hand down Wade's arm and rested it over his hand. "Thank you for talking to me. I really was worried about coming in here and talking to you, surprisingly. I walked in that door and I just didn't know what to do."
"No problem Laura. That's almost stupid to think. I'll ALWAYS talk to you when you want to, you know that. I love talking to you. The thought of you being nervous because of me just completely amuses me."
"You smell really good by the way."
Wade took a sniff and grinned with a nod. "Yep, I sure do."
"You're too much."
Wade's hands moved over to Laura and his fingers softly moved against her stomach, tickling her. Laura growled and glared at him, pushing him away. He gave her a mischievous look. One of his hands slowly made its way up to her neck and he tickled it a bit, causing her to scream. "STOP!"
He moved his other hand up and started massaging her neck. "I was going to massage your neck."
"No you weren't. Why do you have a fascination with tickling me?"
Wade shrugged his shoulders dramatically. "Because it's just so darn funny?"
The mood turned very awkward when they were both silent. Wade could see the serious look in Laura's face, which was similar to the one she had earlier when she came back into the room. Wade knew himself that he was also confused. He wanted to take this possible relationship wherever he could, but he was scared. Now he would never tell Laura that, mainly because she probably already knew. "So where are we now?"
Laura slowly reached up and touched his lips with two fingers. "Where do you want to be? Wade, I'm not going to try to fight whatever this is anymore. I don't have the time."
Wade grinned against her fingers and kissed them once before she took them away. Laura smiled back and scooted up to pull the covers back and get underneath them. Wade moved under them also and then they ended up on their backs again, staring at the ceiling. "Laura, I want you to know something."
"What?"
"If you want to wait to do anything with this, I'll wait for you."
Laura looked over at Wade and sighed. "Thank you. You don't know how nice that sounds right now. That just made this a whole lot easier on me, but uh, I'm tired...Do you want to go to bed?"
Wade turned onto his side and shrugged. "I don't know. If you want to, we can."
Laura started to stare at his now messy hair and then down to his lips. Slowly her eyes traveled back up to his eyes. She moved foward and touched her lips to Wade's. Wade moved closer to her and placed one hand on her stomach and another one on her back.
Laura moved her hands to rest on Wade's chest and took full control of the kiss that she had started. Wade was thrilled with this kiss because he had started all of the other ones they had shared. This was the first piece of evidence for him that Laura was feeling something. Laura opened her lips over his quickly and he followed by opening his against hers also. She moaned into his mouth and slowly kissed his soft, tender lips.
Wade was beginning to feel the need of controlling the kiss, so he took it to his will to set the pace. He started moving his lips faster against hers causing them to breathe harder. When he started pushing his body closer to Laura attempting to get closer to her, she started to get nervous. She felt the kiss being cheapened way too much. When she felt his tongue on her bottom lip, she pulled away a little bit and smiled up at him. "Maybe we should go to bed."
Wade looked down to see Laura there who looked practically squished. "I'm sorry for uh cheapening that a little there."
Wade rolled off of her and shrugged his shirt off, tossing it to the side. Laura yawned tiredly. "Ok, well I'm going to bed..."
"Are you ok?"
Laura shrugged her shoulders and cuddled under the covers with Wade's arms wrapped around her. There was something in her that still told her that she shouldn't get into a relationship while on this tour, but toying around with these feelings was going to have to do now. She didn't like the idea of 'toying around or experimenting' but she knew that it would help her with a decision later on. "I guess. Well, I don't know Wade, I just don't know."
(two days later)
Natalie quickly got all of her hair products and make up products out and plopped them down on the table. Pacing back and forth, she looked at her watch to see what time it was. She looked at the piece of paper on the wall beside the mirror which had the order of who would be coming in that day for the concert. Justin was first on the list, and then Lance, followed by Chris and JC with Joey last. She gripped her hair when she noticed that Justin was first. He always took longer, and they were never cramping for time because he was usually last to come in.
She didn't like the fact that he was first, because she always rushes the first person to keep on time and the first person was usually Lance because his hair was always easy to do. Having Justin last on the list usually didn't make sense to her because he was the most time consuming, but it was like building from easiest to hardest. Since Lance always came in earlier than usual, she always had the extra time for Justin, so it all worked out, but she knew Justin would be late since he was first.
Five minutes had passed and Justin was supposed to have been there. Natalie looked around to see several people scattered working on things to get everything rolling. She looked around for the guys and put her hands on her hips when she saw Justin casually walking toward where he was to get his hair done. Natalie tapped her foot, waiting impatiently as he continued to say various things to people passing by while eating a blueberry muffin.
He turned his attention to where Natalie was standing, waiting there for him with her hands still on her hips and her head cocked to the side. He bit down on his lip and moved quickly to get to her. When he was standing in front of her, she raised and eyebrow. "How nice of you to finally join me."
Justin shrugged and followed her. He sat down in the chair and finished off the blueberry muffin and let her go at it. "I'm sorry Natalie."
Natalie sighed heavily. "How come I knew you'd be late?"
"Uh, because you're smart?"
"No, because you're never the first one on the list, so you have this thing stuck in your head that since you're first you can wait as long as you want... Well, I'll tell you something, now I'm going to be off schedule because you weren't here on time."
Justin's head lowered, but Natalie tugged back on his curls to get his head back up. "I'm doing your hair, don't pull that with me."
"I'm sorry Natalie, I really am."
"Justin, I still have to do your make up. It's not like I have to do much of anything, but I still have to do something. I have all of the other guys to do still and I'm running short on time now."
Justin's shoulders slumped as he could feel the anger pouring out of her. He understood why she was angry that he was late, but he didn't like how she was talking to him. Automatically, he thought back to the other night when he was thinking about how perfect everything seemed. This was it. This was where they were becoming more real with each other than they ever did. Fighting is always something that he didn't like, but he understood that if you didn't fight in a relationship at all then there was something wrong because it's impossible to never argue over a thing.
He smiled into the mirror at Natalie. She looked at him through the mirror and glared. "What are you so happy about?"
"You're cute when you're mad."
"Don't push it Timberlake. I'm not happy right now. I sure hope JC used conditioner when he washed his hair this morning, because if he didn't, I'm going to be running late really bad, and it's obvious that you didn't. You're curls are a mess."
Justin looked down at his hands and let his spirits drop. She was mad. "Well, at least I don't have the fro anymore."
"Yes, that is true, but if you had that fro, I probably would have quit by now."
Justin winced in pain when he felt Natalie grip his curls and yank. "Ow."
Natalie combed through the one section one more time before getting the spray bottle of water. "Not my fault your hair is being difficult."
"Natalie, are you seriously mad?"
Natalie sighed deeply and shrugged her shoulders. "Justin, you're messing my job up. If you would have showed up on time, I wouldn't be mad. If you would have came in like 2 minutes later, it would have been fine. Five minutes was pushing it, but Justin, I was watching you walking towards me when you were five minutes late, and you still continued to walk slowly. And how late were you?"
"Like 8 minutes?"
"Yes, that's about right. Justin, I now have two jobs on this tour, and people running late just for the hell of it isn't helping me at all."
Justin thought he understood. She was just angry, so he stood up and hugged her. Natalie pushed away quickly, but yet still softly. When Justin swooped down and kissed her lips, Natalie backed away. "Justin, we don't have time to do this, besides, I'm NOT in the mood. I'm still very pissed at you."
Justin could feel his temperture rise with anger. He knew that she was angry and she had a reason for it, but she kept pounding it in, and he didn't need that. "Natalie, I told you that having to jobs on this tour would be WAY too much, but no, you kept saying that you could handle it. Look at yourself now, you don't look like you're handling it too well."
Natalie was shocked by what he said slightly and she rolled her eyes. "Justin, I CAN handle it. You're just making it harder for me, and I don't like it. I would be perfectly fine if you weren't late."
"You shouldn't have taken both jobs, Natalie. Hey, I'm Justin Timberlake. If I want to be late, I'll be late. Besides, you practically work for me and the guys, no one else."
Natalie felt her blood start to bubble and she was seeing red as he let his ego run freely. "Your ego trip is REALLY getting old, Justin! I work for Jive, by the way. Sure, I do YOUR hair and the other guys' hair, but YOU didn't hire me, JIVE did."
Justin grinned evilly and cracked his neck. "Natalie, the thing is, if I wanted you gone, I could get rid of you. Keep that in mind, sweetheart."
Natalie normally would be crying at this point, but she was so frustrated and angry, that sadness didn't even come close to what she was feeling. She was completely confused at what was going on. Why would Justin be short with her like this? Then she thought about why she was short with him in the first place. "You wouldn't dare."
Justin raised an eyebrow and shook his head in complete confidence. "You're testing me? Why on earth are you doing that? Natalie, I'm not afraid to get you fired. Sure the guys wouldn't be too happy, but they'd get over it in time, don't you think? I know I would."
Natalie glared and started seeing red. "You really are a bastard. I knew I shouldn't have started a thing with you. After hearing reports on you and your girlfriends, I knew that it would be a bad idea, but you weren't like the person they described in the papers. I'm such an idiot for not believing them."
"Maybe you shouldn't have come here at all. This was all a mistake, but you know what Natalie? People learn from your mistakes, so maybe you should go and take this new knowledge of yours and do something with it away from the tour."
Natalie looked in the mirror to see that his hair was looking damn good. She could have easily ruined it right then, but she wasn't going to do that. She grabbed the little bit of make up that she would use and she stood in front of Justin. She leaned down and dabbed a bit on and then put everything away. "You're done."
Justin looked in the mirror and glared. "Whatever. You know, you once told me that you were never one to have a lot of relationships. Now I'm seeing why."
At that, he left Natalie in the room. She felt tears burning in her eyes. She didn't know what just happened there, but she knew that it wasn't good.
What if he would take her off of the tour?
She didn't want to leave. She was having so much fun with everyone and they were practically family to her now and she finally found a man that she felt she could possibly be in love with. Justin didn't know that, and at that point, Natalie knew that he wouldn't even care.
Never in her life did she think Justin could be like that to her, but she was sure proved wrong. Sure she had flipped out because he was late. She knew that he could have anything he wanted, and if he was late with anyone else, they wouldn't care, but she wasn't going to treat him like the million bucks he was worth and let him trample all over her. She knew better than that, and she knew that just because he was famous, that he deserved to be treated like gold.
Lance was now standing by the doorway and he walked in and gave Natalie a hug. "I'm sorry. I don't know what's going on, but like I said, I'm sorry."
Justin was now standing about 5 feet away from the door to Natalie's little room. He looked over at the wall to see Laura and JC sitting on the couch. They heard everything that went on, and so did Lance. He sat down on a chair that was a little ways away from the couch Laura and JC were sitting on.
Why was she being like that? He knew he was late, and he apologized.Wasn't that enough for her? He knew himself that if he was there on time and she was late, he'd be very angry, but that thought didn't surface enough in his mind for him to actually consider it.
Finally he was seeing a different Natalie. He wasn't seeing the same, perfect little angel that he had always seen in her before. Everyone had a snapping point, and they just reached Natalies.
But in Justin's mind, she was the wrong one and he was the right one. He completely ignored everything he had said to her, because he was too mad to think. Lately he had been really good about his temper, but today just wasn't a good day to begin with.
He had been off schedule all day. Earlier, when getting off the bus, they ran into a bunch of fans and ended up signing a lot of autographs. That threw him off schedule by about 15 minutes, so he just went along with it like that. When he saw that he was the first person on Natalie's list, he thought to himself that it would be ok if he was late because she was a kind and forgiving person.
If he had known that this would have happened, he would have never taken his time getting to Natalie. Justin breathed heavily, rolled his eyes and stormed away, irritated. He didn't want to deal with something at that moment that he didn't think was his fault at all.
All he cared about right then was finding a way so he wouldn't have to see Natalie every show night.
Laura looked over at JC and raised an eyebrow. "Ok, I've only seen him like that about two other times."
JC nodded his head slowly in concern. "And they were about relationships."
Laura sighed deeply and looked at the door that was now closed where Natalie and Lance were. "His hair did look pretty damn good."
JC grinned and put his right arm around her shoulders. "Lance is in there now, comforting Natalie. I told you this would all turn around."
Laura elbowed JC in the stomach. "Now that's not right, you shouldn't be doing this now. Justin's mad. Natalie's probably mad and upset, and you're worrying about the bet?"
They both turned their heads when they heard a door slam. Justin was now in the dressing room. JC turned back and picked up a magazine. "I know, but it's funny to think about."
Laura didn't want to talk about the bet right now or about Natalie and Justin's obvious fight, so she changed the subject. "I want to thank you again for the talk we had the other night."
JC smiled warmly and put the magazine down. "Did you talk to him?"
"JC, I'm still confused. This is way too complicated, but I know I'll figure it out and all. I did talk to him. After I left your room I went straight to ours and we had a short little chat. I told him that I didn't know what I wanted, which is very truthful. I didn't want to leave him hanging any longer, so I told him that it would be foolish of me to ignore everything and not even give it a chance."
He hugged her to him tightly and kissed the top of her head. "Well I'm glad that you talked to him. It's the truth though, Laur. Who knows what would have happened if you didn't talk to him. He probably would have moved on. So, are you guys a couple?"
"No. We're just seeing where things go, kind of experimenting. I don't want things to get even more complicated, you know?"
"I understand."
Laura looked down the hallway and grinned when she saw Wade walking towards them. She stood up when he was only a few feet away and hugged him. "I haven't seen you all day."
Wade hugged her tightly, lifting her off the ground. "That's true.. and might I add that it was extremely nice and quiet?"
Laura rolled her eyes and pushed away from him by pushing his shoulder. "You're rotten."
Wade shrugged and cocked his head to the side. "Yea, that's true." He took her hand and they started to walk down the hall together.
Laura turned around and smiled at JC. "Hey, I'll see you later. After the show?"
JC nodded his head at Laura and smiled at the pair. "Yea, after the show. Maybe we'll talk again."
JC still saw in the little body movements from Laura and Wade that they still were just friends. Laura wasn't lying when she said that they were just experimenting, but he could tell that there were feelings there. He always saw them in the two, but now they were even more evident, even though they would never even think about admitting them.
He shook his head when he saw them pushing each other around in the hallway, laughing and joking about something, but that was them. JC really did love being around Laura. She was fun to talk to and easy to talk to. She was always a joy and very nice to him. She was definitely one of his better friends, but seeing her and Wade walking down the hall together made a jealous feeling come out of him. There was no reason for it because her and Wade were always together, but he couldn't help but with that it was him who was walking with her down the hallway.
He wished that the feeling he was having right then was more of a protective feeling, but he knew it wasn't, and there would be no reason for him to feel protective. Wade and his need to protect Laura was stronger than anyone else he knew.
JC's head lowered when he saw Lance come out and Chris go in. He also couldn't help but notice Natalie's still very upset face when she opened the door. Everything on the tour was about to get a whole lot worse.
It wasn't only the fight that had just occured between Natalie and Justin, but this new jealous and awkward feeling for Laura he was having could ruin almost everything.