Johnny could practically feel the hostility in the room. He could tell most of it was directed towards him because he was blocking the only exit out of the room. Since they got back from New York he’s gotten reports from Wade that they were missing steps that they would easily get and that they didn’t seem as focused as they used to be, so he staged an intervention at their compound.

“Johnny, we have to rehearse,” Mack commented from her seat in between Joey and Lance.

“From what I’ve heard your rehearsals haven’t been going well,” Johnny replied. “And you’re partially to blame.”

She lifted her eyebrows. “Me? I haven’t been able to do anything since I got the freaking sling on my arm, how could this be my fault?”

“Wade says that there’s a problem between you and JC, a problem that neither of you are addressing, which I believe to be part of the focus problem,” he responded as he looked back and forth between the two he mention. JC was slumped in his chair, his hands in his pockets, staring up at the ceiling. The room was silent for a couple of minutes. “Well? This problem isn’t going to be solved unless either of you say something.”

“There’s nothing to say,” Mack replied. She glared when JC started chuckling from where he was sitting. “What the hell’s so funny?”

He lowered his head and sat up in his chair, a small smile was on his face. “The fact that you can just sit there and lie to one of your bosses,” he replied calmly.

“I’m not lying, I’m stating the truth: there’s nothing to say.”

“That’s a load of crap and you know it.” The smile left JC’s face but his eyes were shining as in mischief.

Mack scoffed. “You didn’t want to talk to me three days ago, why do you want to bring it up now?” She brought on a child-like tone to her voice. “Is it because Princess Bobbie is insecure?”

The light faded from JC’s eyes as he glared. “Leave her out of this. She has nothing to do with our problem.”

“There is no problem.”

“How can you just sit there and deny it?” JC shouted. The other boys were in shock. He rarely ever raised his voice at anyone. He usually took the calm voice approach but now he must be really pissed. “How can you just…ignore this?”

“The same way you can ignore me for the past three days,” she shot back, standing and stomping over to him so they were almost nose to nose.

“You’re the one who avoided me!” JC pointed out, getting to his feet and glaring down at her.

“Are you sure? Maybe Bobbie made you blind to everyone else around you that your vision is distorted whenever she’s hanging off your arm.”

“Don’t you get it? She’s the one causing all of our problems!” Chris shouted overtop of their arguing. Mack and JC turned to look at Chris who had gotten to his feet. Justin and Lance were struggling to pull him back down in his chair. “Let go of me! They need to know!” He shouted.

“Shut up, Chris!” Justin hissed.

“Yeah, you’ll ruin everything,” Lance added.

“Boys, let him go,” Johnny said from where he was sitting. Justin and Lance slowly let go of Chris’ arms and gave each other a scared look. “Now, what is it you want to say?” He asked calmly.

Chris shifted from foot to foot. Joey was biting his lip, Lance was looking around the room, Justin was messing with his bandana, and Johnny, JC, and Mack were staring at him intently, waiting for him to say what he was going to say.

“What’re you talking about?” JC asked, breaking the silence.

“It’s Bobbie, don’t you get it?” Chris asked in exasperation. “Bobbie’s the reason why you two are at each other’s throats. Johnny, the only reason they’re fighting is because of JC’s girlfriend, girlwhore, whatever the fuck she is, I really don’t give a shit about her but the fact that she’s messed up their friendship kills me.”

“What do you mean Bobbie has something to do with this?” JC asked, his arms crossed over his chest. Chris looked away from JC’s piercing gaze. His eyebrows slowly knitted together when he looked at each of his friends’ faces and noticed that none of them were looking back at him. “What is it guys?” His voice cracked. His stomach dropped and his hands flooded. “Guys?”

“She’s cheating on you!” Justin shouted before dropping to the floor on his knees. “Bobbie’s been cheating on you! Every time she went to New York she’s been hooking up with someone else!” The words fell out of his mouth before he could stop them and JC merely stared at him, stunned. “Just last week she went to New York before us. Remember that?” He didn’t wait for JC to answer. “She went a day earlier than the rest of us to be with Wade. Yes, Wade. She’s been cheating on you with him. The only way I know is because I caught them making out in the restaurant. I told Mack–”

“You knew?” JC demanded, turning to her. She backed away from him rapidly, almost tripping over her own feet. Justin stood and she ducked behind him.

“Jace, I made her not tell you. Then I told the guys–” Justin continued.

“They knew too!?” JC rounded on Lance, Joey, and Chris who looked up at him with wide eyes. He was taking deep breaths and his face was void of any emotion except for his eyes. His eyes showed that he wanted to throttle them.

“I told them not to tell you. We didn’t want you to have to find out on your own, or worse, have Bobbie tell you so we came up with a plan to expose her ourselves but it kept backfiring in our faces,” Justin continued. “Don’t be mad at us, we were trying to protect you. We were being your friends.”

“My friends don’t keep secrets from me!” JC shot back. Justin winced at the tone JC was using with him and lowered his voice to the ground. “I can’t believe you guys! I can’t believe you would keep something this important from me! I just…I can’t wrap my head around it. I’m floored.”

Despite the mood, Chris burst out laughing. JC was the only one they knew that actually used an expression as weird as that in a sentence. He immediately stopped laughing when JC glared at him. “Don’t be mad at us, C.”

“Then who should I be mad at?”

“You should be mad at yourself for not noticing the fact that your girlfriend was straying. The fact that she’s a gold digger is another one. Oh, how about the fact that she’s controlling your life without doing much?” Chris replied with an eye roll.

“Wait, wait,” Johnny interrupted, waving his hands so he could get everyone’s attention. “Let me see if I understand this: this girl, Bobbie, JC’s girlfriend, is the main reason you all aren’t focused. JC, because you’re dating her, boys because you want to expose her?” They nodded. Johnny started laughing. “Have you boys not heard of The Beatles? Now, I’m not saying that Yoko was the number one reason for their split, but she had to be a little factor in their split. I don’t want that to happen to you boys either. You have something big here; your album sold over a million copies in one week. You were able to win a lawsuit that no one thought you would win. And you want to throw all of that away because of a girl?”

His opinion hung in the air as the guys looked at each other. They knew he was right; they just didn’t want to be the first one to admit it. They were too close to let a girl come between them. They were more than friends, they were brothers, and brothers were always there for each other.

“I don’t know about you guys, but I don’t want a Beatles repeat,” Chris spoke up.

“You don’t want to make music that people are going to remember years from now?” Justin asked, raising his eyebrows.

“Oh, I want to do that. I just don’t want to break up because of a girl…or have a few of us die when we’re still young.”

Justin scoffed. “We,” –he motioned to himself, JC, Joey, and Lance– “are still young. You’re the one who has to worry about it, Old Man.” The other guys cracked smiles. “Do you want us to get you a walker soon? Or how about a power-scooter for when your back gives out?”

Even Johnny burst out laughing at Justin’s teasing. They ended up laughing so hard tears fell down their faces. It’s been a while since they all laughed like that and JC missed it. He hated himself for not realizing how much of a difference it made having Bobbie around.

“Ok, guys, now that everything’s settled…” he leaned over slightly to look at Mack who was leaning against the wall, her arms crossed over her chest. “Rehearsal start in…about two hours?” She nodded.

“Great! Let’s get breakfast!” Justin said as he clasped his hands together.

“J, can you drop me off at the dance studio?” Mack asked him, pushing herself off of the wall.

“You don’t want to eat with us?” He asked.

She shook her head. “Nah. I ate earlier. Besides I want to get some more stuff figured out before I teach you what I’ve been working on.” She made a face at the next explosion of laughter. ‘Besides, I’m going to need the peace and quiet.”

~*~*~

“Hey Mack,” Wade greeted her cheerfully as she stretched against a wall. He stopped and looked across the room at her as she continued stretching, ignoring him. “What’s up?” He questioned, dropping his bag in a corner. She lifted her head and glared at him and recoiled. “Did I do something wrong?”

“Your gold digging girlfriend did,” she replied from her position.

“I don’t have a girlfriend,” he said in confusion.

“I believe she goes by the name Bobbie Two-Timing Thomas.”

“Ohhhh, that.” Wade chuckled a bit and ran his hand through his bleached-blond hair. “That thing between me and here was just a one-night stand. No strings attached. I was bored and horny and she was around. Honestly, I never even knew she was dating JC or else I would’ve left her alone.”

“Why’re you trying to convince me?” She asked, sitting up.

“Because your opinion is the only one that really matters,” he replied matter-of-factly. She narrowed her eyes as if trying to read his mind. “What I mean is that we should have some sort of trust between us if we’re going to be working together. At first I got the feeling that you hated the fact that I was going to be co-choreographing this tour and then I thought you hated me.”

“Oh, I do,” she replied nonchalantly. He stared at her with a mixture of shock and surprised on his face. When the corners of her mouth twitched up into a smile he relaxed. “Look, I don’t like it when people step into my territory–”

“You working with the guys,” he interrupted, nodding. “I get it. I’m not here to take your place; I’m here to help you make them better.” He smiled. “What you’ve done is impressive; I’m not going to lie. How you showed how the guys grew through their dance moves is really cool.”

“Thanks I guess,” she muttered, pulling her hair back into a ponytail. “Anyway, I’ve been thinking up dances for Just Got Paid, It’s Gonna Be Me, and No Strings Attached and I think it would be best to start with the easier songs and move up in intensity. From what the guys want to depict with Just Got Paid I came up with something really simple that doesn’t have a lot of choreography but it has to be precise to look good instead of letting them make a few mistakes.” She crouched by her bag and pulled out a white binder. She flipped a few pages before pointing to a page. “They want this song to sort of tell a little story which is why there’s less dancing and more crowd interaction. It should take them…two days, maybe three to get the steps down.”

“Sounds good to me.” Wade nodded as she closed the binder with a loud snap. “How long until they get here?”

“About a half hour. Could be a little bit later ‘cause of JC, he’s notoriously late.”

“Right.” He scratched the back of his neck. “So, um, how close are you and Justin?”

Mack sighed heavily. She hated having to repeat their relationship to people. “Justin and I are just friends. He’s more like my brother. No I’m not dating him nor have I dated him,” she replied in monotone.

“What about the others?”

Mack cut her eyes at him. “Why do you want to know?”

“Just curious.” He shrugged.

“I don’t mix business with pleasure and I don’t date.”

“Someone as…outgoing as you? Why not?”

“I don’t have time and I don’t want to have to deal with users.”

“Users?’

“Yeah.” She nodded. “People who claim they want to know but what they really want is for me to use my ‘connections’ and get them a record deal or something.” She rolled her eyes. “It makes it hard to trust people in this business sometimes.”

“How do you deal?”

“The guys protect me. They can usually spot the users from miles away so it saves me the time of having to kick their ass.”

Wade chuckled and looked out the window when a car pulled into the parking lot followed by a jeep. The guys were there. “So um,” he cleared his throat. “I know you said you don’t mix business with pleasure, but I was hoping you’d make an exception.”

Mack looked over at him before glancing out the window. Her eyes swept over the guys and rested on JC a bit before hardening. She sighed under Wade’s gaze. “Don’t make me regret it.”

He smiled. “I won’t.”