Patrick puts his phone down very carefully, because if he doesn't, he's going to throw it across the room.

"Motherfucking asshole son of a bitch idiot!" He seethes. It's only when someone grabs his arm that he even realizes he's throwing a punch.

"Concrete!" Andy yells urgently into his ear. It's about the only reason Patrick's next move isn't a swing at him.

Andy's seen him like this often enough to know better than to tell him to calm down. He also doesn't let go of Patrick's arm.

"On a scale of one to killing Pete..."

"Not Pete's fault." Patrick manages to spit out.

"Huh." This gives Andy pause. "That's kind of new and special."

It sort of is. Patrick doesn't usually get this mad at anyone but Pete and various members of his own family. Joe and Andy know where his buttons are, but they generally refrain from pushing them too hard.

"Doors just opened," Andy starts.

Fantastic, he's got over two hours before he can channel this into his Gibson. Assuming he can do it without breaking too many strings, or possibly snapping the neck right off.

"Maybe Joe will lend you Hemmy?"

Patrick stares at Andy. Hemingway doesn't quite hate him exactly, but he is a main reason they have two buses.

Andy shrugs. "Pets are supposed to be soothing. And it's better than letting you break something, man."

Breaking something would feel incredibly satisfying right about now. However, Patrick's willing to admit that he's currently not calm enough to guarantee that the something he breaks wouldn't be one of his own bones. He shrugs and starts out of the room in search of Joe, or whoever Hemmy's with at the moment.

"Do you need me to come with you, or are you okay to walk the halls without kicking everyone's ankles?"

Patrick ignores the comment and heads down the nearest corridor. He's not seventeen anymore. He can walk through a crowd of people without taking his anger out on random people.

"Hey man," Marcus, however, is not random people. "You heading outside?"

"Don't know." Patrick says, walking faster. "Fuck off."

"Not if you're going outside."

"Looking for Hemingway. Don't need another guard dog."

"Patrick..." Patrick senses rather than sees the hand coming for him and ducks away, yelling "DON'T TOUCH ME!"

The phrase seems to echo down the corridor as everyone in the vicinity stops to look. Patrick isn't sure if he'd rather die or hop on a plane and kill Nick Carter. Kicking the wall seems like a good third option. Just before Patrick decides he doesn't need toes anyway, Pete pokes his head out of Cute Is What We Aim For's dressing room.

"Patrick?"

"Fuck off, Pete." He stands there, shoulders hunched, studying his sneakers and wishing the entire world would just go away. Pete's stare burns into his skin for ages before he finally turns away.

"Okay, show's over. Some of you are totally supposed to be onstage in two minutes, so get moving, already!"

As sound and movement start up around them, Pete somehow slides under his radar, appearing right by his shoulder, one arm already around his waist. "C'mon Lunchbox. Let's get away from these assholes."

Somehow, Patrick isn't precisely sure how, Pete gets them onto his bus and curled up under his covers, still fully dressed, Hemingway snuffling at their feet.

"Tell me a bedtime story, Patrick."

"Pete, I have to start warming up in an hour." Patrick protests, although the anger from five minutes ago doesn't seem to be able to penetrate the cocoon of Pete's blankets and the solid warmth of Pete's hug. "We don't have time for a nap."

"Who said anything about a nap?" Patrick can hear Pete's grin, for all he's spooned up behind him. Bastard. "Tell me a stoooory. A story about a boy named Patrick and how his best friend Peter Pan saved the world and made him smile again."

"Have I mentioned lately what an asshole you are?"

"First time today. We haven't been spending enough time together. Now talk."

Patrick sighs the sigh of the long-suffering. He knows he was going to tell Pete eventually, but it would have been really nice to beat someone up first. Except Patrick's supposed to be the grown-up in this relationship, or so Pete keeps telling him.

"I talked to Nick."

"Dammit, I was starting to like that kid. Now I have to go kill him."

"Hey!" Patrick reacts automatically, before he realizes what he's saying. "I mean. Okay. He really pissed me off. But he maybe didn't mean it."

"Oh." Pete digs his chin into Patrick's shoulder. "I wouldn't know anything about that."

"No." Patrick can't help the fondness in his voice. Pete is Pete, after all. "No, I bet you don't." And because he can't not say it, not when it's just the two of them. "I don't know anything about that either."

"No experience whatsoever." Pete agrees. "So what'd he say?"

"He um..." And now he really doesn't want to say it. "It's possible he sort of implied the only thing I cared about while I was working on his stuff was the money."

Pete squeezes him tight. "I'm killing him. Just a little. You can beat him up after."

"Pete."

"Nobody gets to say that kind of crap to my Patrick but me." It's phrases like this that Patrick stores up from Pete, better than all the "I'm sorry"s and "I'll be better"s in the world.

"He had kind of a tough week."

"Don't care."

"I probably pushed some buttons I shouldn't have."

"La la la, still killing him."

"What will you do if I decide to forgive him?"

"Find more effective threats on his life. He clearly wasn't listening the last time."

And that does it. Patrick laughs and laughs. The smugness doesn't fade from Pete's expression until about halfway through their set.

Nick has dug himself in so deep he isn't sure he even wants to try to start digging himself out again... except the label has to go and throw salt at him.

"Jive is coming down for a meeting about the tour. They're taking us all out to dinner."

"Mmm hmm," Kevin clearly thinks Nick is working up to a point, instead of hitting him with the point straight off. Of course he hasn't told Kevin everything.

He sighs and lets his head fall back against the couch cushions. "I sent them my new stuff about two weeks ago."

"Oh, Nick." Nick has to close his eyes against the sympathy in Kevin's voice.

"It took me a week to get an appointment for a phone call." He gnaws on his front lip, trying to keep his voice even. "And I had to call and ask for it."

By now Kevin knows what's coming. "How many did they...?"

"None of them. Not radio-friendly enough. Not exciting enough. Not..." Nick rubs the heel of his free hand against one eye. "Not good enough."

"Oh baby, you know that's not true." He stops there, and Nick is grateful. He's still not ready to hear someone sing the praises of the music that's never going to be heard by anyone else.

"I'm so tired of this shit Kev." He hugs his knee to his chest. "I'm supposed to sit down with these assholes tomorrow and be professional."

"And of course you haven't told the guys yet." Technically, Kevin's guessing. Except he knows Nick really fucking well.

"Maybe not?" There's a loose thread in the knee of his jeans. He picks at it idly.

"Do you want the "keeping it all in is unhealthy" speech from me, your therapist or AJ?"

"I might have... what do they call it? Inappropriate venting?" Nick swallows. "All over Patrick."

"Nickolas Gene."

"I know, Kev." Nick's lip is getting bloody. He prods at it with his tongue. "I know."

"You gotta tell 'em, Nick. You know they'll have your back. And they'll kick your ass if you let them walk into that meeting without knowing. And," Kevin sighs. "I'm too far away for a hug."

"Miss you, bro." There were days growing up where Nick just wished Kevin would leave him the fuck alone. He regrets every single one of them.

"Miss you too. Now go find that cuz of mine."

"Yes, dad."

Nick means to go talk to Brian, honest he does. But he only wants to say everything once and calling a band meeting has old implications of Bad Things. Stupid friends, letting him come to them in his own time. It's so much easier to be prodded into saying things.

And he has to think of what to say. Think and plan, because if he blurts it all out... There's Howie's wedding, and the tour, and AJ's solo album, and Howie's solo album and what kind of guy does that make him, to say "I'm really happy about all of this, but..."? Nick's been That Guy before, the one that stands up and fucks up everybody else's plans with his own album. Sure, it's different his time - the worst he's going to do is harsh everybody else's glow - but just thinking about the conversation five years ago makes his stomach hurt. And that just makes it worse. Because he should be able to go to them with stuff like this and expect to be supported and cheered up without question. Except they're only human and it's stupid to be mad at them for that but if he opens his mouth to talk about this, he might let himself be mad anyway.

So he puts it off, flipping channels on the TV, messing around online, checking his e-mail... A little reminder pops up from his organizer: "P. Stump, day off!!"

For a second he feels sharp relief. He thinks of calling Patrick, having someone to help him fix his words, someone he's allowed to be mad at the Boys with, someone who might actually get it if he talked long enough. Then he remembers what a stupid loser he was, what he said. He almost throws his laptop off the bed.

Except that conversation would still be easier than the one he needs to have with the guys.

Nick picks up the phone.

Patrick has found himself a record store and is happily flipping through the racks of vinyl when his phone rings. Apparently Pete's been playing with the ringtone again, because what blasts from his phone is Toni Basil singing Hey Mickey. He flails to answer it, not wasting any time checking the caller ID.

"What?" he half-whispers, his voice harsh with embarrassment. They split up only half an hour ago, for crying out loud.

"Um... Hi."

No. Patrick is not having this conversation in the middle of a record store. And dammit, he just got here.

"Your timing sucks ass." He snaps.

"I... sorry."

Patrick refuses to feel guilty about the defeated tone in Nick's voice. There is vinyl, for the first time in weeks and Nick is an asshole and...

"I'll see you 'round or something."

"Fuck." Patrick is going to make Nick pay for this later, but that requires Nick to be still speaking to him later. "Nick, don't... just... give me half an hour."

"Yeah?" Dammit, Nick is not allowed to sound so hopeful when Patrick is mad at him.

"Lemme finish up here and get back to the hotel. I'll call you."

"Okay." Nick definitely sounds brighter. "Talk to you soon."

Patrick has never heard anyone sound so eager for what promises to be a hell of a conversation.

Patrick makes it back to his hotel room in a little over the half hour, with a plastic bag full of records. It meant talking to one of the clerks instead of spending hours wallowing, and taking a taxi back, but all in all, a good day, retail-wise.

He sets his treasures down carefully on the desk and sits on the bed. Andy is still out somewhere, thank goodness. He stares at the "last call" display for a good minute before finally hitting send.

Nick picks up on the first ring. "Thank fuck. I know I'm an asshole, and I know you deserve to make me wait, but I was going a little crazy."

"I wasn't even ten minutes late," Patrick protests, amused despite himself.

"Patrick, you're a songwriter. You should know we can change the world in less than four minutes. A minute is a long fucking time."

"Who replaced my boyfriend with such a hardcore idealist?" The words are out before he even thinks.

"You know, I'm supposed to apologize first," Nick says after a moment's silence. "I'm pretty sure you should be making me grovel. And I really, really need you to get why I was so harsh on you, but you're making me feel like more of a worm for even bringing the whole thing up again. Are we just not talking about this?"

That is definitely not what Patrick wants. "No. No, you're totally talking about this, dude. I worked fucking hard on those songs, I was proud of those songs, they're my songs too, Nick. And fuck you for making me feel like some kind of whore."

Nick inhales audibly. "I hope you know I didn't mean it. I'm really, really, unbelievably sorry I said something so shitty, but I swear, Patrick, I didn't mean it."

It's a good start, but it still doesn't tell Patrick why. "Look. You realize that if, and it's still kind of a big if, I forgive you, we're probably going to be working together again. I'm gonna need more than "I'm sorry", I need to know why you said it, and if you're going to pull some kind of similar shit on me later."

"I... maybe." Nick sounds really ashamed of himself, and Patrick should appreciate the honesty but he really doesn't. "I'm a mean asshole when you set me off. Used to punch people out, too, but now I mostly run my mouth."

The thing is, Patrick knows how to deal with that. Patrick does deal with that. Patrick doesn't want to have to deal with that with his boyfriend. "What do your guys do?"

"They don't usually let me get that far. AJ threatens to kick my ass if I open my mouth, Howie walks away, Kevin gives me the eybrow till I calm down... sometimes Brian sends me to my room."

"Or...?"

"He hugs it out of me." Nick sounds even more ashamed of that.

"I can do that."

"Yeah?"

"I can also totally hang up on you. I'm told I'm talented at that."

"Yeah, that works too." Nick manages a laugh. "But I've been told that I should communicate more. Actually I've been told it a lot."

"So communicate."

"The thing is..." Nick sighs. "This is going to sound totally lame, but... you're the only one I could actually get mad at."

"Excuse me?"

"Like... if I got mad at you, it got you off the phone, it got you away from me, it got you mad... it did stuff." Nick shifts the phone a little, maybe shrugging. "There's no point in getting mad at the label. It never does any good, unless you bring in the lawyers and that's just long and ugly."

Patrick has no words.

"That's what happened last time. They fucked the guys over by offering me a solo contract, and the guys brought in the lawyers, and they fought the label, and they fought me, and they almost went on and did an album without me and..." Nick's voice cracks.

Patrick closes his eyes. He knows, at least, what that must have meant to Nick, to think, even for a little bit, that his guys might actually leave him behind.

"If I stand up and fight for our stuff, Patrick... if I remember how fucking good our stuff is, and how awesome you were and how much I want to say fuck the label and put it all out there, it'll mess up all their plans again and I can't do that to them. I can live without the solo career. You were asking me to do something I just can't and that pissed me off, that you didn't get that."

Patrick starts to say something, but Nick just keeps babbling, the words almost tripping over themselves as if he knows that if he stops, he won't be able to start again.

"And I'm sorry I didn't explain right, that I let you think there was a chance in hell Jive wasn't going to fuck me over, but you really liked what I was doing, and you were so enthusiastic, and I had so much fun.... sometimes I forgot what was at the end of the tunnel. So I got mad at me, and I took that out on you, too."

"I still haven't told the guys everything, and we have a meeting with the fucking label tomorrow for tour stuff and, well, AJ's putting out a record in January and Howie's got one coming out next year too, and the label put them through shit before they let them even have this chance and... it's stupid wanting my second chance when they haven't had their first. So I try to suck it up and then I get mad at them for making me feel like I have to suck it up, and that's even more stupid and..." Nick finally takes a breath. "Basically, your boyfriend's a fuck up."

"Hey." Patrick says gently. "No insulting my boyfriend."

He hasn't completely forgiven Nick, and they're going to have a talk about sharing information before Nick explodes with it, but... Nick needs somebody right now. Patrick's pretty okay with being that somebody. Besides, he hasn't given up on this album just yet.

In the end, Patrick doesn't help much with what to say, just distracts Nick into a conversation about the records he bought today and gets a much less sincere apology out of him for dragging Patrick out of his place of worship. If nothing else, it clears Nick's head and lightens his mood. One conversation down, one to go.

It's already ten thirty, and Nick's tempted to just let it go until the morning, since they have yet another day of rehearsal before the meeting and sleep is worth more than gold. But if he waits and things go badly, it'll derail the entire day's rehearsals, he knows it will.

They've rented a house with a dance studio for rehearsals, which gives them all a little more privacy than there was in the old days - each of them with their own rooms - but still brings back the old feelings of hell week when all they did was eat, sleep and breathe dancing and singing. The pace is a little less hectic this time around but not so much that anyone but them and maybe NSYNC would notice.

Nick's still too much of a coward to go knocking on Brian's bedroom door first thing. He wanders into the game area and finds AJ and Brian taking each other to school over MarioKart. The screen says AJ is winning but it's pretty close, and you couldn't tell from the smack Brian is talking. To Nick's practiced eye, they're about a minute away from giving up on the game and going for an all-out wrestling match on the couch.

"Hey guys?"

"AJ McLean, does your mama know she raised a dirty rotten cheater?"

"She knows she raised an amazingly talented son who can whip your ass."

"Guys?" Nick tries again, coming closer. He considers standing in front of the TV but it's probably more than his life is worth.

"Oh, you did not just try that."

"I got away with it too, baby."

"And you're calling me a cheater."

"GUYS!"

"Hey Nick!"

"What's up?"

He sighs. "Where's Howie?"

"On the phone." Brian says without looking up.

This is not a helpful answer. Howie could be on the moon, and he'd still be on the phone. "Where?"

"In his room, I think. You have legs, go check."

"Fine. Band meeting when I find him, okay?"

The game stops abruptly and both guys look at him, concern etched deep on their faces.

"Just... stay here. I'll go get Howie."

Luckily for Nick, Howie is emerging from his bedroom, phone in hand but not to his ear. Nick was prepared to just stick his head in the room and say "band meeting" but most of Howie's phone conversations lately have revolved around wedding plans and really Nick can do without having any of Howie's extended family or his fiancee mad at him.

"Hey," he says instead and grabs Howie's wrist. "Meeting in the games room. C'mon."

Howie makes a confused "Whuh?" type sound, but Nick just ignores him and drags him down the hall.

AJ and Brian have put away the gaming console and are huddled up together on the couch, muttering in low, worried voices. It's been all of five minutes. They've probably decided Nick's about to run away and marry Nicole Ritchie or something stupid like that.

He waves Howie onto the couch next to Brian, and perches himself on the nearby loveseat. "I've been kind of an ass this week, and y'all need to know why before we walk into that meeting tomorrow."

"Please tell me that Jive doesn't know about your problems before we do." AJ asks, completely serious.

"Jive are causing the problems." He explains. It's easier to look AJ in the eye than he thought it would be. "Patrick and I finished up a couple weeks ago. Few days ago, Jive told me they wouldn't release even one song we worked on."

Howie rolls his eyes. "Here we go again."

"All right," Brian leans forward, ever practical. "Who was in your meeting? We'll make sure you don't have to talk to anybody who was there."

"Wait, stop." AJ waves his hands in the air. "Did I miss something? When did you have a meeting?"

"Teleconference at lunch the other day." Nick says. It's not quite the reaction he was hoping for but it's more or less the reaction he was expecting. "I don't really remember who all was in on it. You know what they sound like when they're poking at one of us - I just don't want 'em getting the satisfaction of a reaction, y'know?"

"Good point," Brian nods. "Thanks for the warning. You'll be okay?"

"I'll keep my mouth shut." And okay that came out bitchier than he meant it to. AJ's looking at him funny.

"Nick, how many songs did you give them?"

Nick swallows. "Twelve. Rough-cut, mostly, but beginning to end an album."

This gets Brian's attention. "Wait. You told me you were paying for all this yourself."

"Yup." He's fairly sure he mentioned it as an album before this.

"You paid for two days of full-on studio time with session musicians."

"Is there a point here, Frick?"

"Are they at least paying you back?" Howie wants to know.

Nick has to roll his eyes at that one. "Sure, D. Also, we're totally doing this radio show tour by private jet."

"And there was that song," Brian presses onward.

"Because we all thought they were likely to release a song like that."

"You don't really want to release some other album, do you?"

"I guess I'm going to have to." Nick stands up, pushing off from the loveseat. "Look, I just wanted to make sure you guys knew."

"JC left Jive." AJ pipes up.

"JC's band broke up. JC had nothing stopping him from leaving Jive." Nick counters. "What do you think they'll do to your album if I rock the boat? To Howie's? We haven't settled on promo for half the tour yet."

"You want to sit on it for a while, that's your choice, Nick." Brian tells him. "But you want to fight, we've got your back."

And that is so completely not what Nick was expecting to hear, he has to flee.

It's somewhere around three in the morning when Nick's phone rings and he's almost proud he's coordinated enough to get it to his ear.

"It's just..." Patrick says, sounding young and a little scared. "Since this band started, no one's ever done that to me."

Nick pulls himself into a sitting position, attempting wakefulness as quickly as possible. "No one's ever said no to your music?" He knows that's probably not what Patrick's saying, but he sounds like he needs to get a hell of a lot off his chest before Nick can feel all right explaining label politics.

"Of course they have." "Moron" remains unsaid. "Pete tells me stuff sucks all the time. Andy re-writes my drum parts and Joe walks all over my guitar parts, the people I produce swear up and down I'm ruining their sound... that's part of the process. It's not the same thing."

"I know."

"Our label... they pick the singles. And maybe sometimes they'll give us notes that this song or that song is "inappropriate" for an album. Once in a while they're right, but we usually pull stuff like that before it even gets to the album stage. Pete goes to bat for the other stuff and we mostly win. But even if we don't... there's a reason."

Nick sits listening to Patrick breathe, wishing he could crawl through the phone lines and hug him.

"I know we joke about soulless corporations and "the suits". Okay, Andy's not usually joking. But I never even thought somebody could take two months of work I thought was worth something and shut it down without even saying why. Or did they say why?"

Nick sighs. "Patrick, we could have written Imagine and they would have told me it was a boring piano ballad and too political for the market right now. The reasons were bullshit, dude."

"But they were my songs."

"Yeah, they are." Nick says gently, feeling like an asshole. "I should have let you call in to the meeting."

"I think I would've made it worse."

"You could've fought. I'm too used to all this crap to stand up for myself anymore. And you had a right to be there. I got too wrapped up in my own stuff to remember that. I'm sorry, dawg."

Patrick snorts, and Nick considers it a win. Sometimes he does know what he's saying.

"I've never had a producer like you, y'know? At first the producers were like, God. They had final say in the studio for everything. And then we had the producers who came to us with like, a hook and a chorus, and we had to brainstorm the rest but didn't get any credit for it. Some of 'em didn't even like us."

"That's stupid." Nick hears Patrick thump against what sounds like a pillow.

"Different worlds, man." He says, some of the old weariness creeping back in. "Very fucking different. On the first album I was mainly hooking up with people the label set me up with. I liked most of 'em, don't get me wrong, and I got credit for what I did with 'em, but it wasn't all my choice. It was business. It was exciting 'cause hey, first solo album, but it wasn't..."

"You didn't click." Patrick says softly.

"Right. Not like us. That was fucking amazing, the way you tuned in to what I was doing and just made it better. You never talked down to me, you let me argue, hell, you said I was right a couple of times."

"You were, dimbulb." And that's his Patrick. Nick almost doesn't regret the lack of sleep.

"I didn't know what to do with that. I didn't know where to put you."

"I'm pretty sure I'd fit in your back pocket."

"If you did, you'd be living there already and Pete would out for my blood." They laugh, and finally Nick is okay with saying what he's been scared to say, but that Patrick needs to hear. "The songs are good, man. They're awesome. This had fuck all to do with you and everything to do with the fact that I work for assholes who aren't happy with having only one Justin Timberlake on their roster."

"Nick, you don't work for them. They're your label. They're supposed to work for you."

Nick yawns. "Different worlds, Yoda. Different worlds."



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