Date: Sun, 11 Jun 2000 16:45:16 EDT
From: ARTNYC4@aol.com
Subject: Joey and Lucas-8

Warning: This story contains homosexual themes, and will in the future
contain scenes of homosexual sex.  If this bothers you then don't read
this.  If you are not old enough in the community that you live in to read
erotic material, than go away, and shame on you for being here.

Disclaimer: I have no associations with either the Backstreet Boys or
NSYNC.  I do not know the sexual orientations of any of the band
members. This is FICTION, meaning that it is not real and should not be
considered real.

Personal Statement: I'd like to thank everyone who took the time to welcome
me back after my long absence.  Again this chapter is short.  Sorry bought
that, I was running low on time and wanted to get something out.  Please
send E-mail to my new address at ARTNYC4@hotmail.com , in about a month my
AOL account will be changed, and you won't be able to send me mail there.
I also like to distinguish the mail about the story from my other personal
mail and the junk that I get.  Also, if your going to send a criticism
please be tactful about it.  Thank you.



Joey and Lucas (Chapter 8) - By Aran


Present (Joey's Point of View)

"I... I met someone last night."

"Lucas?"

"Yeah.  After you guys came back last night I left and ended up walking
through Central Park..."

"WHAT?  THAT LATE AT NIGHT?

"Calm down, its alright, nothing bad happened.  In fact something really
good happened."

"Well you still shouldn't have gone out like that.  What if you were
spotted?  What if something happened?"

"I wasn't thinking ok.  I heard you guys talking when you came back from
the club.  Are you really going to kick me out of the group?"

"No.  Not if I have anything to say about it.  Then they'd have to kick me
out of the group too."

	Lance stood up from the bed and headed towards the window.  He
stared out for a while and stared at the city outside.  I could see his
reflection in the glass and could tell that he was almost near tears.

"Tell me about him."

"Are you sure you want to hear it?"

"Joey..." Deep breathe "Joey, I'm going to honest with you.  I've been in
love with you for a while now.  I have to know who I lost to."

	I can't believe he just said that.  I can't believe that this whole
time I was struggling with telling the guys about who I really was inside
there was someone else in the group going through the same thing.  I wish I
felt the same way about Lance that he apparently feels about me, I've just
never seen him as anything other than a brother.  I also know that now that
I've met Lucas I could never pretend to love someone else.  I never
believed in love at first site before, but I guess its one of those things
that you have to experience before you can truly believe it exists.  I
don't know if its a good idea for me to spill my guts to Lance about Lucas,
but right now he is the only person who I can talk to about this.

	So I did, I told him everything about how we met in the park, about
how Lucas comforted me in the diner.  He looked shocked when I told him
about sleeping with Lucas, but I assured him that it was just sleep.  He
seemed just as surprised as I was when I told him about how suddenly Lucas
dismissed me at the hospital.

"Maybe he just needed to be alone to deal with what happened.  You said
that he was went through a lot in the past few days, maybe he wasn't
thinking clearly.  Why don't you go back to the hospital and try to talk to
him?  Maybe he's calmed down a bit now."

"Thanks Lance, I hope this works."

	He just stared at his feet.

"I'm sorry Lance.  I'm sure this was really hard for you to hear, and to
give me advice about, but I really appreciate it."

"Yeah, well good luck."

	I just threw on what I had been wearing before and left the room to
find Lucas again.


PRESENT (Lance's Point of View)

	WHAT WAS I THINKING? WHY? Why on earth did I help him try to get
back Lucas.  I knew the answer of course.  I could tell that he didn't have
any feelings for me, that even if Lucas was out of the picture that I
wouldn't benefit from it.

	I left the bedroom and went out into the central living room and
turned on the television.  I zoned out mindlessly flipping through the
channels as I thought about how close I was to having Joey.


PRESENT (Joey's Point of View)

	The ride to the hospital seemed to be taking forever as we crawled
through the traffic in midtown Manhattan.  When we reached the hospital I
threw a $50 bill at the cab driver and ran into the hospital, not bothering
to wait for any change.  As I searched the hospital for the right room I
could feel me heart pounding.  What if it wasn't just the stress talking
this morning?  What if he actually decided he didn't like me?

	I finally found the right room and slowly opened the door.  Once I
was through the door I could see that Lucas wasn't in the room, instead I
was looking at a very dignified looking couple that looked like they were
Ben's parents.  His mother turned and spoke to me.

"Hello, are you a friend of Ben's?"

"Um... no, I was actually looking for Lucas.  Is he still here?"

"oh.  No we sent him home a few minutes ago.  He was a wreck about this
whole thing."

"Yeah, he was pretty shaken up this morning.  Thanks I'll try him at home."

	I didn't even wait for a response as I dashed out the door.  Shit,
I had gone in the complete opposite direction.  Now it's going to take me
forever to get there.  I managed to get a cab that someone was getting out
of in front of the hospital and told him where to take me.

	It actually took almost twice as long to get to Lucas' apartment
from the hospital then it did for me to get to the hospital from the hotel.
When I finally got there and rang his bell I got no answer.  Shit, what was
I going to do now.  I can't just sit here on the stoop and wait, I'm sure
I'll get recognized eventually.  There aren't that many people on the
street, nut all it takes is one person before all our fans in the are know
we're here.

"Can I help you?"

	I turned around and was looking at someone who was almost exactly
my height and build.

"Um... no. not really.  I'm just waiting on someone who isn't home yet."

"Let me guess, your waiting for Lucas.  Right?"

"Uh... yeah, how'd you know."

"Cause those are my clothes.  Come on you can wait for him upstairs.  My
name is Jason by the way."

	I went to shake his hand.  Then he unlocked the downstairs door and
aloud me to follow him up towards his apartment.

"So what do you do Jason?"

"I'm a freelance writer, mostly for sports magazines but I can write
anything, I was a football player in college so that's what I know most
about.  I don't think I caught your name."

"Oh, sorry, it's uh... Joe"

	We made it up the stairs and to Lucas' apartment.

"Well Joe, why don't we leave a note on his door, so when he gets home
he'll know you're at my place."

	Jason pulled a pad of Post-it Notes and a pen and wrote a quick
note, saying only that a "friend" was waiting at his apartment.  Then we
continued down to his apartment.


MEANWHILE (JC's Point of View)

	This sucks.  We are hardly getting anything done in the studio and
the producers are getting pissed.  It's not just them, all of us can't stop
bickering over every little mistake that is made.  It's usually between
Justin and Chris, but I'm guilty too.  Finally, after three hours of wasted
studio time the producer decides to call it a day and tells us to work
through our problem tonight so that we won't be wasting everyone's time
tomorrow.  Luckily the limo already came back so we didn't have to wait.  I
opened the divider between us and the driver.

"Where did you drop Lance off?"

"I took Mr. Bass back to the hotel like he asked me to sir."

"Oh, thank you."

	I closed the divider between us and turned to Justin.  He looked as
confused as I felt.  Chris also looked confused.

C: "I thought Scoop said he was going to catch a movie or something?"

J: "I guess he changed his mind.  I guess that's better, less chance he'll
get recognized if he's in the room."

JC: "Yeah, or maybe he meant that he was going to watch a movie on the
Pay-Per-View"

C: "Or maybe he lied to us so he could go back to the hotel to suck Joey's
dick."

	Justin and I just looked at each other and shook or heads.

JC: "Come on Chris, Lance isn't even gay."

J: "And beside that, you have to stop bashing on Joey like this.  We're
still gonna be in the same group."

C: "Whatever, I still got free speech."

	We rode the rest of the way back to the hotel in silence.  When we
got upstairs I we saw Lance sitting in the living room, mindlessly flipping
through the channels.  It also looked like he had been crying a little.

J: "Lance, is something wrong?"

	Lance's head shot towards us as he stared rubbing his face to hide
the tears.

L: "Uh, no.  Nothing's wrong."

J: "Then why were you crying?"

L: "Oh... um... sad movie.  How was recording?"

JC: "Don't ask, so where's Joey?"


TO BE CONTINUED...