“Take a look at this!” Trace shoved the magazine in front of Justin’s face.

It was now the next day, and Justin was just finishing up his song, when Trace interrupted him.

“Trace, you know I’m in the middle of recording, what do you have for me that is so important?”

Trace waved the magazine in front of him again, Justin yanked it away from his hand, “Give me that.”

On the front page of the “US” magazine, there was a photo of Britney and JC together swimming in the pool, by the looks of the photo, it looked like it was taken from a distance, the paparazzi must’ve snapped a few photos when they weren’t looking. Justin looked up at Trace in slight confusion and then back on the cover again, he rapidly flipped the pages open to look for the article, when he found it, he read it out loud, “Britney Spears getting cozy with former *NSYNC member JC Chasez, in his humble abode, the pair were seen together swimming and in the last week were holding hands, looks like sparks are flying for this happy couple.”

Justin saw more photos of them, they were kissing and Britney had her arms around JC, and Justin also noticed her kids in the water.

“Her kids were with JC too?” Justin asked

Trace just shrugged.

Justin was furious, if JC and Britney were serious about eachother, why didn’t they tell him? Let alone, why didn’t JC tell him, his best friend, his so-called brother, his bandmate, was JC trying to get back at him for some reason?

Without thinking, Justin closed the magazine and grabbed the keys from the small table in the studio.

“Where are you going?” Trace called from behind him.

“I’m going to see what’s up.” Justin stormed out of the studio and headed into his Audi, he was really getting steamed, okay, maybe he wasn’t supposed to, and maybe he wouldn’t have been feeling like this if JC told him in the first place. He sat down in the vehicle and placed the key in the ignition, putting the car in drive, he flew out of the parking lot.

Speeding down Studio City heading to the direction of JC’s house, he didn’t bother calling him, he decided to just show up, and he still remembered the key code to enter his abode. He winced at the sound of that, he had word for word memorized in that article, he stared at the magazine on the passenger seat, he gripped the steering wheel even harder, and sped up, decreasing a bit when he saw police cars, and he was not in the mood to get stopped right now. When he did arrive to JC’s house, he saw his car, he breathed out a sigh of relief when he didn’t see Britney’s car. Justin pulled into his driveway and turned off the engine.

He slammed the door of his car and walked to the front entrance of his house, punching in the four-digit number, he heard a beeping sound and the door opened with a click. Justin was greeted by the familiar homey smell of JC that he once knew; looking around the living room, he didn’t hear any sort of sound, but he did hear a faint piano playing in the distance, a beautiful yet powerful ballad piece, and he could hear a JC singing over it. Justin listened closely and followed the direction of the sound, and immediately felt at ease, and the music started to pull on his heartstrings. Justin started to feel selfish, and was gonna forget this whole argument and leave, but no, he wanted to know if the rumors were true, he had to get this settled.

Creeping down into the hallway, he found JC’s studio, and saw him singing ever so melodically, he had his eyes closed and his hands were moving over the piano keys, and he was in his own little world, one world that Justin was gonna shatter.

Justin knocked gently, than he knocked again.

JC opened his eyes and looked to the direction of the door, startled by Justin’s appearance, he stopped playing altogether.

“Justin, um what are you doing here?” He stammered.

“I uh, but first let me tell you that was a nice piano piece you played.”

JC looked over at the piano and then back at Justin, “Oh that? That’s nothing.”

Justin hated that fact, he hated that whatever JC wrote or sang, he told himself that it wasn’t good enough, even if the song was perfectly good already, he always had to put in an extra one hundred and ten percent.

“Justin?” JC interrupted his thoughts.

Justin snapped back into reality, and remembered why he came here in the first place.

“I came here to show you this.” He handed the magazine to JC so he can read it.

JC looked at the magazine, an expression motionless on his face.

“Are you dating her?”

JC knew that he couldn’t keep his feelings for her any longer and he knew that he couldn’t lie to his best friend, but the words couldn’t come out.

“Answer me!” Justin demanded.

JC looked at Justin with a sincere look on his face, “Yes Justin, I am dating her, and we are having a nice time together, so why does it concern you? I don’t have to tell you everything about my life.

“I have to know, why didn’t you tell me in the first place?”

“Because, I knew that you were always jealous of every little thing that I have done, I know that for a fact.”

“Me?” Jealous of you? Justin was taken aback by his response.

“Oh come on Justin, it’s so obvious.” JC scoffed.

Ok maybe he was right, Justin had always been slight jealous of JC, back then during their MMC days, it was Justin that was always following him around, and JC was the one that mentored him and everything, then during their days in *NSYNC, and Justin knew that JC had the better voice out of all of them, it all started during rehearsal for the Challenge for the Children 2005; they each had to do warm-ups,  and had to do a few high notes, there vocal coach was there with them, and she arranged their voices, “Ok Justin, one more time, let me see.” Justin was trying to impress her and the rest of the band that maybe just maybe he could out-sing JC, of course, that didn’t work.

“Justin.” His vocal coach said, you are a falsetto, you can’t do those notes that JC does, your voice is for smooth purposes only.

“JC your turn.” When JC sang, the rest of the guys followed, and they harmonized their verse pretty well. But Justin wanted to try a knack at doing a power note again, but no sound came out when he wanted to sing, his voice came out raspy, and his throat was sore. He realized that he couldn’t sing for the rest of the show, so they had to cancel their performance and hire a children’s school choir for the event.

They had to remove his throat nodules in order to continue singing again, how embarrassing it was for him.

Justin stopped reminiscing about the past and looked at JC, who was standing there with his arms crossed. “I think I am still jealous of you.” He told at him coldly.

“Figures.”

“You want to know why?” Justin asked.

“Yes, I would like to know why, please explain.” JC said sarcastically.

Justin started to say something but couldn’t.

“What’s the matter Justin, your own guilt can’t let you speak? No matter what I do Justin, I am always gonna stand in your shadow, go on, keep doing what you are doing, look I am very proud of you really, so keep on hogging the mic and keep making records and make people happy, and keep rising on top of the charts, while my seven-year bad luck streak continues to be in the dust, but you wanna know something? Britney, the other night told me that I can do an album again, and this time we would help eachother, I actually helped her produce a track for her next album, and you know damn well if I sing I can easily bring you down, but I don’t want to do that, because I know that you would be upset with me, which is why I never accomplished anything, but when Britney came into my life, everything started falling into place, and I’m glad cause you wanna know something? I’m in love with her, and she’s in love with me, and we might go on tour together sometime in the future, and there is nothing you can do about it.

Justin was shocked at JC’s response and then spoke:

“I-I can’t believe what I’m hearing.” Justin said.

“I can’t believe that we were best friends in the first place, admit it Justin, without me mentoring you all of these years I don’t think you wouldn’t have accomplished anything.”

“I have accomplished on my own, so I don’t know what you are talking about!” Justin shouted.

“We were in a group Justin, we worked together, we worked so damn hard, and then when Britney broke up with you, you changed you changed dramatically.”

“It was Wade’s fault!”

“Yeah Wade, a guy that you hired for a choreographer, you were even jealous that the two of them were hugging, they were just hugging Justin.”

“And they kissed too!”

“How many girls have you kissed Justin? Don’t think you are so faithful, besides I’m more   faithful than you; I’m honest, unlike you.” JC said coldly.

At that moment, JC’s phone started ringing, looking at the Caller ID, and saw Britney’s name flash on the screen.

“Who is it, is it your girlfriend?”

JC gave Justin a death glare but picked up anyway and gave his sweetest voice, “Hi honey, how are you?”

Justin couldn’t take it anymore, he was really getting steamed, and wanted to fight JC for what he was doing to him, I mean, he was married to Jessica Biel, but something about JC and Britney really ticked him off.

“JC I have something to tell you, are you busy?”

JC looked at Justin again, who was boring holes by the way he was staring at him, and Justin could hear Britney’s voice clearly and wanted to get every detail of this conversation.

“No, I’m not busy, what’s wrong, are you okay?” JC told her, trying to keep his voice calm.

“I’m okay, but JC-I-

JC noticed a slight pause in her voice.

“Britney, what is it? Tell me, whatever it is, its fine.” JC held the phone close to his ear, his hands were trembling.

“I’m pregnant…”