Chris' sleep was disturbed by a pounding on his hotel room door. He jerked upright, completely disoriented. Nick made a displeased sound beside him and burrowed under the covers. The pounding repeated, and Chris scrambled out of bed, afraid it might be someone with an extra room key.

"Coming!" he barked, grabbing his boxers from the floor. Without his glasses, he couldn't make out the numbers on the clock radio, but whatever they were, they were blinking. Bad news. He hurried to the door and found a pissed-off Justin.

"We're late!" he snarled, storming into the room before Chris could react. "Fucking power outage. Joey and Lance are trying to wake C. Get dressed, we're leaving in five."

"Shit." Chris stood frozen for a moment. He stared out into the hall, not willing to witness the inevitable explosion.

"Kirkpatrick you slob, would you get a move on?" Not the explosion he was expecting. He turned to see Justin sitting on the bed, glaring at him. The bed, which had only the fitted sheet still on it. Deciding not to question the miracle, Chris hurried to his suitcase and grabbed clothing while Justin kept up a running monologue. "It's only radio, thank God, so just grab anything. Lance thinks we'll have time to clean up before the hospital visit. And we'd better or your scary face will scar the kids for life. Maybe you can do anti-hygiene tips. Like "Hey kids! Wanna learn how to look like Uncle Chris? Step one, dump all the bedclothes, including the pillows, off the bed every morning. Mommy and Daddy will *love* the nice, soft pile in the middle of your floor...""

Chris peeked at the mound of sheets and blankets on the floor next to what had been Nick's side of the bed and suddenly realized just how tenuous his miracle was. He struggled into a shirt. "I'm done already, quit it with the peanut gallery and let's go see if C's conscious yet."

"You're not even going to..." Chris grabbed Justin's wrist and yanked him up off the bed. Fleetingly he noted that the power of adrenaline really wasn't a myth.

"Yo, we're late here! Let's go, let's go, let's go!"

"I hope the radio station has Captain Crunch," Justin grumbled and followed Chris out of the room.

Nick and Leslie had been shopping for nearly three straight hours, and Nick was beginning to think he knew what a clothes horse felt like.

It wasn't that he didn't enjoy spending time with his little sister. It wasn't as if Nick wasn't doing his fair share of shopping either, especially in vintage stores like the one Leslie was currently headed for. It was just that Nick was beginning to feel that the distribution of shopping bags was a little one-sided. He shifted the bags again and tried to restore circulation to his left hand.

"Oh my God! Nick, isn't this darling?"

Then there was the question of his dear sister's taste in clothing.

"Over my dead body," he growled at the "darling" micro-mini dress.

"But Nick, aren't the colours just perfect?" she cooed, removing the dress from the rack outside the shop.

"It's *purple* and *green*," Nick pointed out, on the off chance Leslie had recently gone colour blind. "It's blinding. Plus, it's way too short."

"It's *retro*," Leslie said, as if this somehow made up for all its other sins. "Feel the wool. It's so soft!"

Nick was spared the necessity of a reply when his cell phone rang. He had to off-load a large number of bags to get to it.

"Please, for the love of cute puppies, tell me I didn't just see you turn left on Massachusetts Ave."

"Chris?" At the tone in Nick's voice, Leslie started scooping up shopping bags.

"I'm hallucinating, right? Crazy old boybander finally snapped? The shock of near-discovery this morn..."

"Chris shut up. We're at a vintage store in Harvard Square, near... " Nick shoved his glasses back into place, trying to make out a street sign. "Uh oh. Yeah, that was us."

"We're about a block behind you. Flee!" Chris hung up.

"He *saw* us?" Leslie squeaked. Considering her vocal range, it was a neat trick. The bruises from Nick's quick roll to the floor that morning began to throb a little.

"Fuck. Ok. We can... Wait..." Nick looked at the throngs of people. Even on a Wednesday afternoon, it was pretty well populated. At least one of the universities was probably on Spring Break too. "Maybe we can just..."

"No, come on." Leslie shook her head. "I know you're tired of shopping anyway. Why don't we split up? You grab a cab back to the hotel with some of our crap, and I'll go head NSYNC off at the pass."

"Hey, I thought we were having lunch!"

"Well, the best defense is a good offense, right?" Leslie cocked her head at him. "That's like, Nick Rule Number 4 or something, isn't it?"

"When did you start listening to me?" At his little sister's shrug, he grinned. "You're hoping to score a date with JC, aren't you?"

"Am not."

Nick waved at her magnanimously. "Go. Have lunch with JC. If he puts the moves on you, I'll kill him."

"Nick!"

"If you want to date someone 10 years older than you, wait till you're 21."

"You're not my dad, Nickolas."

"Look, I bet you fifty bucks if JC tried anything, Chris'd kill him *for* me."

"You suck!"

Nick decided his sister wasn't going to want an answer to that one and started looking for a cab.

Leslie found Chris outside a bookstore, waiting for JC and Justin to emerge with their purchases. Chris wasn't sure whether to shake her for her audacity or shake Nick for sending his sister out as a diversion. Instead, he opted for the cool, casual approach.

"Is that little Leslie Carter?" Okay, so maybe not 'cool' per se.

"Shut up, dork." Leslie rolled her eyes at him. "What are you, the look-out?"

"I'm the one who doesn't get asked for his autograph at the register," he explained with a grin. He didn't always grin about things like that, but considering that Justin had been recognized while buying "Taming Your Gremlin: A Surprisingly Simple Method for Getting Out of Your Own Way" and three other self-help books, Chris could afford to be cheerful about it. "You look like you've been busy."

"You should see..." she cut herself off as Justin emerged from the store. "Yeah, I've been shopping for a couple of hours."

"Good," Chris decided. "Then you're hungry, right? Please, pretend to be hungry. JC doesn't listen to us, and if someone doesn't stop him, he's going to hit every bookstore in the Square."

"And that's a lot of bookstores, man." Justin put in.

" "A lot" !" They chorused, complete with air quotes and Leslie muttered something about the incredible dorkitude of popstars and their stupid running jokes as they cracked up.

"Save me!" she exclaimed, throwing herself on JC as he joined them.

"Um, hi Leslie." JC looked down at her, a little confused.

"We're driving Leslie bonkers because we're hungry and making stupid jokes," Justin explained, pulling out his puppy eyes. Chris gave him points for effort -- the puppy eyes hadn't worked on JC in at least four years.

"You two will make stupid jokes with or without food. In fact, you make *gross* stupid jokes when you have food," JC pointed out, unimpressed. "Just one more..."

"Food first," Chris said firmly. "We have a guest. We should feed her. There are rules about these things."

With a sigh of defeat, JC asked. "Les, are you hungry?"

" A little," she admitted. Her shy little girl act worked a lot better than Justin's puppy eyes.

"Ok. Somebody pick something."

"I passed a place - " Leslie waved behind her. "Grafton Street Pub?"

"Sounds safe," Justin approved. "To Grafton Street!"

Only JC heard the quiet comment that actually, the pub was on Bow Street.

"Are you coming to the show tonight?" JC asked, stealing a fry from CHris.

"Uh huh." Leslie swallowed her mouthful of cheeseburger. "I'm on the list."

"How'd you swing that?" Justin wanted to know. Chris snorted.

"Leslie has connections, dimbulb."

"No, no, I get that." Justin waved him away. "But I know those people at Jive, man. You practically gotta show up at the office in person with like, an affidavit to prove you're really who you say you are." He jabbed a fry at Leslie. "You didn't really call up Jive and go, "I'm Nick Carter's sister, get me on NSYNC's guest list for Boston", did you?"

"Maybe I asked my Mom," she returned with a grin.

"Yeah sure," Justin drawled sarcastically.

"Your parents don't know you're here?" JC asked, frowning.

"I'm fine. It's fine. I'm here, I'm safe, I'm going home tomorrow to the huge empty house, the pets and my homework, okay?" Leslie bit off, now clearly upset. "Newsflash JC, my parents don't *care* where I am."

JC went red, speechless, but it was Leslie who looked away. Chris felt a little sorry for both of them --- JC wasn't used to thinking of Leslie as anything much more than Nick's kid sister, and Leslie wasn't used to having the sort of parental concern C seemed to pull out of nowhere sometimes. "She's on break C, lighten up." He ruffled JC's hair. "I promise you can report her if we catch her committing a major felony. Now, ask the nice lady what she thinks of the album."

This moved the conversation on to safe ground as JC and Justin got into a friendly argument about which song was most likely to be Leslie's favourite. Chris entertained himself and Leslie by imitating both sides of the argument until Tiny felt Chris should go for a walk for his own safety.

"Tired of walking," he declared. "I'll take the car, these fuckers can walk."

"Or we could finish our lunch in peace and Tiny can pick us up later," JC suggested.

"Yeah, yeah, whatever." He grinned. "See you tonight, Les!"

Safely ensconced in the rented minivan they were using to get around Boston, Chris got out his phone again.

"Hey."

"Your sister is not a decoy, genius."

"She makes a great decoy. And it was her idea," Nick defended himself. "We'll have dinner before the show, and then we've got the whole rest of the week together."

So she had been playing it up a little. "She's not going home to an empty house tomorrow?"

"Not till Sunday. I didn't want to do Florida on Spring Break so she came to me instead. We'll go back to New York tomorrow morning."

"All right. I guess I can forgive you, then."

"Thanks."

Chris stretched a little, propping his feet up on the opposite seat. It was nice to have the limo to himself once in a while. "So, you're coming to the show tonight, right?"

"I can't." Nick sounded as if he might genuinely regret that, so Chris figured he had some room to push a little.

"Sure you can. Two near misses today -- it's obviously your lucky day. No one will notice you."

"Chris, only you, Leslie and maybe Aaron could have picked me out of the crowds in Harvard Square." Nick made a slight "oof" sound, and there might have been bedsprings in the background. Chris tried not to picture Nick spreadeagled on his back on the bed. "There are girls in your audience who will mistake half the guys in the place for popstars. I don't want to find out what happens when they find a real one."

"Just sneak in late. Leslie can call you when the openers are done, you can come in when the lights are down. Keep a hat on. Wear your Columbia jacket. Or hey... do you have anything incredibly flaming with you?"

"Chris!" Nick laughed.

"Oh come on. You could go as one of our gay fans." Chris laughed with him.

"I think that would mean showing off the ink. Everyone knows the ink." It was funny how that somehow didn't sound conceited coming out of Nick's mouth.

"Please? Not the flaming part. Just come. I want to sing to my secret boyfriend. I have leads on this tour. A whole two of them!"

"Wellll..."

"I can beg. It won't be pretty."

"All right, all right." Nick caved, but Chris could tell he wasn't actually grumpy about it. "Leave a ticket for me at the front desk."

"You're the best."

"I'd better not get mauled, Kirkpatrick."

The concert was awesome. No one recognized Nick -- his seat was between a father with four little girls and a pair of lesbians out on a date. He passed himself off as the ride of a sister who had won passes, taken her friends and given him her spare ticket, which got him adopted by the young girls for "being such a great brother". The second youngest fell in love further when he volunteered to hold her up when she had trouble seeing over people. Although they never made eye contact with Chris, Joey made Sharon's day by blowing a kiss to her. Nick snuck out during the encore and walked back to the hotel.

Waiting for Chris to arrive, he had some time to process the whole experience. Beyond the usual amazing production that was an NSYNC concert, one thing stuck in his head -- he didn't envy Chris a bit. He'd been waiting and waiting for stage-envy to kick in; it usually did when he'd been off the road for a while. Instead he'd thoroughly enjoyed being a simple audience member. It was kind of a weird feeling. He almost felt guilty about it. Nick had learned a lot during his road trip, but he thought this might be the most important thing.

When Chris returned to his hotel room, he found Nick pretty much as he'd been imagining him that afternoon - lying on top of Chris' bed, spreadeagled with his hands behind his head, gazing up at the ceiling. Still on an adrenaline high it was an easy decision to just forego the shower and pounce. It was kind of fun to make your lover shriek like a girl.

When things calmed down they were both naked, and Chris had no desire to move. At least not for another ten minutes.

"I almost called Brian this weekend," Nick said, trailing a finger down Chris' shoulder.

"He's in town?" Chris asked lazily.

"No. But I figured... staying here... It wasn't easy to hide from them." There was no question as to who "they" were.

"We're creative," Chris grinned up at him. "You with your plans and me with my wild stories... we can hide anything from anyone!"

"You sure you want to keep hiding this from them?" Nick refused to be dissuaded. "It's gotta be hard on you. I mean, we talk on the phone a *lot*."

"What's bugging you, Nick?"

Nick stopped his perusal of Chris' body and stretched. Chris eyed the play of muscle under golden skin appreciatively, but waited for an answer.

"Early registration starts soon. For next fall." Nick studied the ceiling. "Ceili's going through this huge crisis of what major to declare and Carter's swearing about schedule conflicts. Meanwhile Paul's graduating and Darcy's working herself sick on her thesis..."

"And?"

"All I'm doing is watching."

"You're feeling left out." Chris guessed.

Nick nodded. "It feels like a game again. The pop star indulging himself. A year of university -- oooo ahh."

"It's not a game. " Chris climbed on top of Nick, forcing his boyfriend to look at him. "You worked hard. You're going to pass this year. No matter what anybody says, you've got proof that you're smart enough. If you really want to, you can tell poeple that when you go back.

Guilt and worry clouded the blue eyes. "What if, maybe... I don't want to?"

"Well then you can make something up, " Chris shrugged. "I'll help." At Nick's continued guilty look, he backtracked. "Don't want to.... You don't want to go back?"

"Maybe." Nick qualified quietly.

A thousand things clamoured in Chris' head but the pain on Nick's face, as well as that "maybe", held them back. "That's.... that's a big decision," he said instead.

"Yeah."

"Is this... like... do you want to talk about it?"

"No," Chris could feel Nick's pulse racing. "But I thought, maybe I should warn you."

"Okay." Chris forced himself to take the issue and file it away for the moment. "You'll keep me up to date," he decided for both of them. "In the meantime, there's a small matter of me leaving in a couple of hours..."
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