Chris sighed and stared at the metal contraption in his mouth. Whose bright idea was it to put braces on his teeth anyway? It made his smile look awful. It made him not want to smile anymore, actually. And Justin kept making fun of him about it, dubbing him such loving cliché names like Braceface, Traintracks, Tin Teeth, and his favorite, Antenna Head.

He hated the stupid things. He knew they would make his teeth look better but they were damn ugly. He wasn’t even allowed the change the colors of them yet, he had to stick with boring silver. He hated silver. And don’t get him started on how he wasn’t able to eat food normally anymore. Who cuts their pizza anyway? He figured he might as well keep his mouth such and only open it when he needed to sing and he wouldn’t even think about smiling.

The door suddenly opened and the curly-haired bane of Chris’s existence barged in. Damn!

“How’s it going, Tin Teeth?” Justin asked with a big smile.

“Fuck off, Timberlame,” Chris growled, moving to leave the bathroom.

“Looking at your antenna’s again?” Justin asked, taking Chris’s place in the mirror and leaning forward, crossing his eyes to try and look at his hairless upper lip.

Chris swore to himself for being so obvious. “Of course not, Timberflake.”

“Think of it this way, they’ll make your smile a lot better than it was before,” Justin commented, bringing a hand up and tugging at his curls, as if that were to suddenly make his hair straighten.

“Waddya gumming about?” Chris grumbled.

“Well, braces are to help make your teeth straight. But you don’t really need them aside from your overbite. You have great teeth. It gives you a really good smile,” Justin replied, looking at Chris through the mirror.

Chris grunted and left the bathroom. What does Justin know anyway? He doesn’t have to wear braces. He’s so perfect. So amazingly disgustingly perfect. So…Justin.

Yet he always knew the right things to say to get Chris to smile.