Meredith’s Dressing Room, 9:30 p.m.

It's weird how being around someone else and their family can make you miss your own.  I was never as close to my parents as Meredith seems to be to hers.  My parents are older and while I know they would never call me a "mistake," I sure as hell know I wasn't planned. They didn't go to the doctor and start the process before they even tried to conceive, all smiles and nerves and holding hands in the doctor’s office.  They weren't a giddy young couple excited about the possibility of a drooling, smiling baby in their arms.  They probably didn't cry together when they found out mom was pregnant or call their parents and tell them they were going to be grandparents.  No, at that point all that were left of my parent's parents was my mom’s parents who were both in a rest home; my grandfather had dementia and died when I was three.  

This afternoon, I found myself wondering about how my mom acted when she found out she was pregnant with me.  If she freaked out and made my dad go get a pregnancy test and waited around, pacing and gibbering and rambling.  But then I remembered my mom telling me that before pregnancy ever crossed her mind, menopause did.  She thought the missed period was her body finally telling her she was too old to have kids.  When she finally went to the doctor because of stomach pains they told her she was two months pregnant.

I have never really thought about it until today, but I think a lot of my, I don’t know, I guess issues or personality quirks might stem from the fact that my brother is ten years older than me, that my parents were in their 40s when they had me.  Maybe that's silly to say, maybe that's just me not wanting to take responsibility for my own actions.

But still, I wonder what would have happened if she had been younger, or if she had used a pregnancy test and if she would have cried when she found it was positive.

Meredith cried because it was negative.

She's lost it.

She's better now, happier, I can tell the weight of the world isn't on her shoulders as much, but it all hasn't disappeared.  She's still distant, especially towards Justin, and she better watch herself or he's gonna figure her out.  I know I hurt her feelings this afternoon when I was cold to her and when I laughed at her when she first told me.  I know I was a bitch to her.  I really, really didn't mean to be like that.

I guess I still sometimes treat Meredith a little too childish.  She wears her heart on her sleeve and I don't and just because she does I shouldn't assume that means she's immature. 

When I thought I was pregnant a couple years ago, I held all my fears and emotions inside.  I didn't even cry.  I tried to keep a level head.  Went to the store on my own, took the test on my own, handled it own my own.  No friends, no assistants, no one else was there.  And I was fine.  And I didn’t freak out like Meredith did.  No, I took the test, saw it was negative and sat on the couch and watched a movie and fell asleep.

I shouldn't compare the situations though.  They were completely different and we're completely different people.  And I honestly can’t tell you how I would have acted if it had been positive.

I'm starting to realize that maybe that's why we clash.  We just are opposites on the personality spectrum. It's not a bad thing; it's just how it is.  I'm going to sound like a bitch here, but Meredith is not the type of person I'd be friends with outside of this situation.  She's just not.  It doesn’t mean to say I don’t think she's a sweet, nice girl.  She's just not my cup of tea.  And so I wish she'd stop forcing me to be her friend, or stop assuming that that's what I'm here to do.  I'm not here to be her "Trace," I'm here to be her assistant.

Trace says I'm just scared of letting someone in, of being friends and opening up to someone.  But I just tell him that he's my friend and that I've opened up to him.  Then he usually makes some perverted joke about “opening up” and we both forget the conversation for a while. 

I honestly don't know what I would have done today if she had been pregnant.  Maybe I'd be different.  Maybe I'd freak out with her.  She'd have to tell Angie and her family.  And she'd have to tell Justin.  Part of me wonders if she would have kept it from him.  And while she took a nap with Megan on my bed this afternoon I started to think about it, think about all the shit Justin's done to me on this tour.

I still think I would tell him.

Not out of spite, if I was out for spite then I'd go tell him now what happened this afternoon, but I think he'd deserve to know if he was having a child and I think maybe, maybe it would make him realize I'm not this horrible person, that I'm looking out for his girlfriend and him.  Is it bad to say part of me wanted it to be positive this afternoon?  Just so I could have the satisfaction of saying, now...now you can grow up, Meredith.

But then I just felt bad for assuming my version of "maturity" was wishing an unwanted pregnancy on someone else.

After her nap this afternoon I woke her up and the four of us, me, her, Megan and Teddy, all went back to the venue to eat dinner with her family and Justin.  Meredith was quiet during the dinner, but she sat by Justin the whole time and I noticed the quiet gestures they were giving each other, a touch of the shoulder, a small rub of her lower back, a smile, and lord knows what their hands were doing under the table.  I’m sure it wasn’t much though, not with her family right there.

It's amazing how Justin fits in so well with her family, charming the socks off her mother, talking sports with her dad.  It really made me see how well they are together, how much they work together, how…as much as he's a dick to me, he's perfect for her.  Then I started to wonder how Trace would fit in with my mom and dad and brother, if he'd be perfect.  I started to feel uneasy and my stomach started to hurt.  So I stopped thinking about it.

Trace barely touched me all through dinner. He never touches me when other people are around, especially Justin.

Meredith's folks are very kind and very sweet.  A little simple, a little...dare I say it, redneck, and when Trace and her dad started talking about NASCAR I really thought I might fall out of my chair.  I had no idea he even kept up with it or watched it?  And here he goes talking about "Junior"?  And then when I asked him who Junior was, all of them, even Megan, the girl Mere's dad calls "Yankee Doodle" turned and just stared at me.

I felt like an outsider.  But what's new. 

I've been hanging out with Megan's boyfriend Josh a little bit this evening while Megan and Mere did their friend thing.  He's a nice guy but he seems a little out of his element here with Megan. Megan works her way around the madness of this lifestyle easily, making friends and not carrying about the cameras and the interviews and the questions.  She treats Mere and Justin and everyone else like just a normal person on the street.  Nothing seems to faze her.  But Josh seems timid, unsure, like he's afraid he's gonna mess something up.  It's how I feel most days, though I don't let anyone know it.

But now I'm alone.  Meredith's on stage. Her family and Megan and Josh went to go watch and Justin's in his dressing room.  Trace is headed back this way, I hope.  He went to the hotel to grab something he left there and texted me a few minutes ago and said "wait for me in M's room, don't move."  I wonder what he wants.

I hope he wants me.

I could sure use some affection right now, some familiarity.  Sex with Trace, honestly, is the best sex I’ve had in my life.  He’s good in bed, often rough and hard, but not selfish.  He always, always makes my body feel amazing, and even though he tends to pass out after sex, its not…he’s not weird about it.  He won’t just roll off and be like “nice…” and fall asleep.  He’ll lay there on me a bit, he’ll pull away and tug me closer.

It’s like, when we’re in bed together like that, he really does like having me near him. I want to be near him, in that way…now.

Maybe I just don't want to be alone.  Maybe I want someone to help me shut my mind off.

Meredith's mom tried to convince me to go sit with them during the show but I declined.  Sometimes I wish my mom was more like Meredith's mom; sweet, kind, quiet, handing everyone an individual Ziplock bag of homemade chocolate chip cookies.  My mom can't cook, and she's uptight and even though she doesn't talk a lot when she does she's usually very opinionated and getting on me for something…anything. 

I frown.

I guess I could go talk to Justin.  Ha!  He's been avoiding me the past few days, probably per Mere's request.  But in a way I've been avoiding him as well.  If I see him walking down the hallway towards me in the venue I'll immediately pull out my phone and pretend to be calling someone, or if he and Mere come into a room with me, if they're arguing or kissing or just sitting there yawning, leaning against each other, watching TV, I usually get up and leave.  I just, I can't just sit there and smile in his face and pretend that he's not the biggest asshole I've ever met.

Well, Keith is probably the biggest, but Justin's running a close second.

I don't know, maybe Justin is worse.  Keith, I realized after I had been so blinded by everything, was just an asshole to everyone.  But Justin seems to only be an asshole to me.  Which, in a way, makes it worse.

Makes me wonder what's wrong with me. Makes me stay up, combing through every encounter I can remember with him and see where I offended him so much.  It must have started that first day when Meredith wanted to go visit him, before they were dating, at least I think that was before.  And I came down on her in front of him, in his hotel room.

I guess that was it. 

I wish I could take back that first impression.  I would have sat down with them, had a beer and everything would be normal and fine and happy now.

Right?

Yeah... right.  I'd never in my life have been able to just sit down with them on that first day and be normal with them.  I had a job to do.  I still have a job to do.

Angie was supposed to come down for this show but got hung up in New York. I wish she would have come down.  I could have hung out with her and we could have gotten a drink and gone and set in the private boxes and talked and watched the show.  Even though I know I fucked up in the beginning with her, she's starting to warm up to me now.  She calls me almost every night to ask me how Meredith’s doing and we usually get talking about other stuff.  I told her about Trace and I thought she was going to yell at me, but she was really, really happy for me.  I was surprised how calm she was during the whole Meredith being sick incident.  I thought she was going to flip out and blame me for stuff, but she didn't.  She just wanted to talk to Meredith and Teddy and just told me to report to her any health issues or concerns with her.

I talked to her earlier today and she actually let me vent to her about everything that's going on with me and everyone.  She's a damn good listener.  I like her.  Maybe, maybe I'll slowly get closer to her and finally have a real friend in this world.

Besides Trace.  But Trace....Trace is much, much more than a friend.

He's...

The door swings open and I gasp and almost drop the glass of sweet tea (another Meredith's mother donation) all over my lap.  I look up and see Trace barging into the room.  The door bangs against the wall and he immediately turns and slings it shut with a slam.  I suck in a deep breath, set the cup on the table in front of me and wipe my hands on my thighs, trying to prepare myself for whatever is about to come out of his mouth.

Shit...What in the world happened?  Why is he-

"Are you pregnant?"

I blink.

He's standing there, arms by his side, fingers twitching as if they want to clench or punch something.  He's narrowing his eyes at me and all I can do is open my mouth and stare back at him.  "God dammit Courtney!  Don't just sit there and stare at me.  Are you pregnant?!"

Before I can even open my mouth and try to explain myself or figure out where the hell he got that idea, he's there rambling, pacing right in front of me, running his shaking hands over his head.

"I know we don’t use condoms every time, but I figured you were on birth control.  I should have fucking asked.  I thought you told me one time that you were on it!  Shit Courtney what are we going to do if you are pregnant?  What am I gonna do?  I'm ...I'm not ready to be a dad."  He chokes in a breath, stops all movement and stares at me, his narrowed eyes widening.  "I mean, I will...shit girl, I will but..."  He sighs and hangs his head down before plopping into the couch across from my chair and pressing his forehead down into his palms. 

It's quiet and then I hear him sniff.

Oh my god.  Oh my god, he's crying! 

"Trace!"  I say quickly and stand up and swiftly go to him and grab his arm as I sit down right beside him.  He won't look at me and I lean down to him and say in a clear voice, "I'm not pregnant!"

"What?"  He almost hits my head with his own when he jerks up and he wipes violently at his eyes.  God...  I don’t think I’ve ever seen him cry.

I shake my head at him and try to smile so he knows I'm alright. "I'm not pregnant, I swear.  I'm on the pill and I've been pretty regular with my periods for a while now."

Part of me feels so bad at him for stressing out; part of me wants to hit him for freaking out.  But I know that's unfair.  God, if...if I was pregnant, right now with Trace’s baby, I don't know what I'd do.  Maybe I'm a hypocrite.  Maybe I would have acted just like Meredith and freaked out and not wanted anyone to tell Trace, afraid it would stress him out too much.

Honestly, I don’t know what I'd do.  I don’t know how I'd feel.  I know I don't want children right now.  I'm actually not sure if I ever want children.  And I'm pretty fucking sure Trace would never, ever let me get an abortion.  Well, I don’t know.  I don’t know what he thinks about that.  He just freaked out, so maybe he really wouldn’t want a baby.

Or maybe he just wouldn’t want it with me.

God, I'm fucking worse than Meredith.

I blink and focus in on Trace who's just staring at me, shaking his head "no" and looking at me like he doesn’t believe a word I said to him, still worry in his eyes, still fear.  His voice is a harsh whisper when he asks, "But why in the world would you have a pregnancy test box in your bathroom, Courtney?"

"Shit."  I cover my mouth after I say it and lean forward against my knees.  Dammit!  The maids were supposed to come clean, they were supposed to get rid of it for me.  Fucking shit!

I don’t know how to explain this now.  Without pissing everyone off.

"I saw it there Courtney."  He stands up from the couch and points his finger at me in an accusing gesture.  "You can't lie to me.  I went to your room to get that folder I left there this morning and went to pee, looked down and it was right there.”

"Shit."  I don’t know what else to say and I run my hands over my head and mouth "shit" to myself again about five more times.

She's going to kill me.

She's going to hate me.  Fire me.  Something.  ‘Cause I can't get myself out of this now. And he's gonna tell Justin.

"So you thought you were pregnant."

"No Trace..."  I sigh.  Maybe I should just lie, sacrifice myself for her.  But no, I'm not going to do that.  Because I doubt she would do it for me and she needs to grow up and take responsibility for her own actions.  It's not that big of a deal.  She's not pregnant, it was just a scare, it happens all the fucking time.  "No."

"Well explain it to me why in the-"  His voice cuts off short and when I look up at him, his mouth is opened slightly and he's just staring at me.  Suddenly he sits down on the coffee table in front of me, first moving my tea out of the way.  He sits on the edge,  grabs my forearms that were resting against my knees gently and stares right at me, saying softly, "Courtney....who's is it?"

He knows before I even say it, "It's not mine."

"Then who's..."

I can see the wheels in his head turning.  And when I quietly whisper, "I can't say," it's almost as if I had written Meredith’s name in black sharpie all over the test box.  It’s as if I had told him before he even left here to go get his folder, as if I called him up right after she took the damned thing and blabbed to the world.

"Fuck." He says and leans back from me and looks off to the side.  "Was it positive?"

"No."

I can hear him sigh.  I wonder, I have to fucking wonder if he's more relieved that she's not pregnant than he was that the test wasn’t mine.  I don’t know what that means.  I don’t know if that means he wouldn't mind if I were pregnant, if he knows he can handle a baby more than they can.

Or if he's just more concerned about Justin and Meredith than he is us.

It's something I've been wondering.  It's probably the reason I've pushed him to try and stick up for himself.  It's probably why I get mad when he doesn't.  I'm slowly starting to realize that with Trace Ayala, every fucking thing comes in second to Justin fucking Timberlake.

And I just, as much as I've fallen for Trace, I don’t know how in the hell I can deal with that for much longer.

"He doesn't know, does he?"

"She doesn’t want him to.  She doesn’t want to stress him out and it's not your place Trace..." 

Trace immediately stands up.  He can’t look at me anymore and when I look at him, he's staring off into space.  I can just see his mind, and I know he's thinking up how he's gonna break this to Justin.  "No, no look at me.”  He finally raises his eyes to mine.  “It's not your place to go and blab to him."

The look he gives me makes me feel small and stupid.  He blinks at me and then says, "He's my best friend, Courtney."

As if that's the fucking answer for everything.

I see red and I stand up and put my hands on my hips, I just have to put them somewhere.  I just, I feel so angry right now at him.  "Since when?  He's been a bitch to you for the past few months.  You just let them handle this themselves.  You don’t owe him anything."

He shakes his head and sighs, "I owe him everything, Courtney."

"Just drop it, ok?"  I snap.  "She's not pregnant, no one is.  Everything is fucking fine!  You know how she gets.  She was just overreacting."

He goes to lean against the counter by Mere's make-up station.  Shanda was in here earlier but she said it was too quiet in this room and probably went to go talk with Justin or someone else.  He crosses his arms over his chest and stares at a spot on the carpet.  His forehead is wrinkled and I can tell this isn’t just going to go away.  Meredith was right when she didn’t want me to tell Trace.  Maybe she knew that this would be some huge ordeal in the Trace-Justin world. 

Which is stupid.  Fucking stupid.

This has nothing to do with Trace.  And it was a fucking false alarm.  Get the fuck over it!  I need a fucking cigarette.  I suck in a deep breath.

"She's known this for a while," he says and I get up and go over to my purse. Shit, I bet I don't have one.  I haven’t bought a pack in a couple of weeks

I don’t know how he's figuring it out but I guess he just is starting to think about how everyone's been acting lately. 

I can't hide it anymore and I really don’t know if I want to.  Go fucking tell the world Trace, go make this into a bigger deal than it really is.

I roll my eyes.  "She's known nothing because until about 5 hours ago she didn’t know if she was pregnant or not, and she's not, so fucking drop it.  I'm serious Trace. I promised her I wouldn’t tell anyone and I can't have you go blab this to Justin.  It's none of his business anyway, it's her body."

"What..."  I look over and he's got his eyes narrowed at me.  He pushes himself from the counter and comes closer to where I’m still digging in my purse.  He blinks slowly and then says louder, "What!?" 

I don’t know what's going on.  I don’t know if there's something going on I don’t know about, but Trace is acting like she cheated on Justin or something.  It's not…that serious.  At least not to me. Maybe I just don’t get it.  

But when he says, "That's bull shit and you know it," in an angry tone, I feel pathetic and on the outside of their little bubble of drama.  Even though I hate drama, I feel lonely and ignored. 

"I know you hate him but you know as well as I do that if she claims to be in love with him and all this shit she should be upfront to him about it!  I can't stand this Courtney!  I can't stand it when you women keep stuff from us, it fucking eats us up inside.  Dammit!"

Yeah....yeah something else is going on.  I swallow the lump in my throat and go to sit back down on the couch.  All this standing up and sitting down is making me dizzy.

"Calm down, Trace."

He shakes his head and says forcefully and clearly, "I will not calm down.  And you can't expect me not to go tell him."

"She'll fire me," I whisper.  I don’t even know if he cares at this point.  All that matters to him is Justin and Meredith.  Who the fuck cares if Courtney loses her job over this?

Now I'm being dramatic.

"No she won't."  He says matter-of-factly. "I promise you she won't."

"You need to stop this! Now!" I yell at him and he blinks, as if snapped from a trance and he stares at me.  "You're making this about you, about you and your guilt or debt or whatever this is you feel like you owe Justin.  This is between Meredith and him.  And it's up to her to tell him, no one else."

He sighs and shakes his head, looking at me like I’m some pitiful creature. "You don’t get it."

"Then explain it to me!"  I'm so fucking frustrated with him right now!!  I need to just go out for a smoke break.  I bet Shanda has some.  I’ll go bug her.  Even though she's probably in Justin's dressing room talking to Cathy and him. 

When he doesn’t answer me and a minute passes, I roll my eyes and stand up to go grab my purse from the counter.  I look at the clock and I have about 15 minutes before I need to be here for Meredith.  Maybe, ya know what, just maybe I'll go out there with her and sit with her family and be social.  I just need to get away from him.

I need to convince him not to tell Justin anything.  I sigh and turn to look at him.

He's moved quietly over to me and is closer than I expected.  I jump a little and he says right to me, "How long have you know about this Courtney, ‘cause you've been distant too?"

It's like I'm on trial for Meredith taking a pregnancy test.  Ya know, when I first got this job I wanted to quit.  And then Trace and I worked out our differences and I started to like my job.  And even through all my drama with Justin and Meredith being over sensitive about me not being her best friend, I like my job.

And...and I like being with him while I work. 

But right now, I want to walk out that door and never, ever come back.

"Distant?" I ask and he just keeps staring at me.  I drop my purse to the floor with a thud and cross my arms over my chest and glare.  "I didn’t know about this until she told me today, after sound check.  That’s why I met her back at the hotel."  He's still staring when I weakly add, "And I haven’t been distant Trace."

"Yes you have."  He leans in to grab my elbow and I pull away from him and walk across the room.  "See, you will barely let me touch you."

"I'm getting over a cold, the last thing we need is to be sick over and over again for this next month."  It's a poor, poor excuse.  At first I didn’t want him to get a cold again,   but honestly, I've just had so much on my mind I haven’t wanted to be close...to anyone.  It's weird because sometimes I'll be craving his attention and his affection, laying in bed wishing he would stop watching TV, or come back from hanging out with whoever and, bluntly, fuck me senseless, but he won’t and I’ll get upset.  But then when he is around and he tries to touch me sometimes I push him away.  I wish he could read my mind.

But that's stupid.  Sometimes I feel so mature and old, and other times I feel like I'm 14 again and I’ve never even fucking kissed a boy.

"You always have an excuse, don’t you?"  He says, and it’s more sad than angry.

And his pathetic, sad voice, his weak, I'm just poor, old can't-do-nothing-for-myself Trace voice makes me want to scream. I get an attitude with him, "I can't believe someone else's negative pregnancy test is making us fight.  This is ridiculous."

"No Courtney, you are ridiculous."

I hate him. 

"You act all high and mighty and mature and like you have everything under control.  Why wont you just admit it every once in a while that you don’t have control?  You can't...you can't just expect me to be all calm about this."  I hate him for making this about us, when it has nothing to do with us.  Maybe seeing that test in my trash can really freaked him out and made him start questioning shit.  Maybe this is just a sign that me and Trace could never, ever work outside this crazy, weird situation we've been thrown into.  "I've spent the past 30 minutes freaking out wondering if you were pregnant or not and you just expect me to calm down and be normal.  And then to find out that for the past week, ‘cause that's how long she's thought about this, right?"

"It's been in the back of her mind for two weeks.  But it wasn’t until today that it dawned on her to do something about it."

"Shit Courtney.  And she didn’t tell anyone?!"  He yells.  "Not even Justin?  Do you see what I'm getting at?  This...this isn't good.  For her, for him....for us."

"Why does everything they do effect me and you?"

He's quiet and I think to myself, yeah, yeah, that got him.  I just won this little battle. 

But then he shakes his head, again...and walks over to me, again. He crosses his arms at me, again.  "Because whether you like it or not Courtney our lives are invested in them, in making sure they are ok.  If you can't handle that, if you don't want to deal with that, then you need to find a new job, now."

"Sometimes I really hate you," I whisper.  And I don’t know why but I start to get emotional.  I hate this.  I hate fighting with him.  I really do.  It's like part of me thinks that what me and Trace have, or...could have, could be so fucking good.  It could be perfect.  We could balance each other out, ya know?  But then shit like this happens and I realize that we're a lost cause.

We're wasting our time.

"Why are you upset?"  He says softly.

And what's worst about this whole situation is that I can see it.  I can see myself falling in love with him.  I can see myself saying those words to him and being happy.  But I just know it won't happen.  I know there's too much baggage with both of us, too much selflessness and selfishness, too much...them, too much Justin. 

Too little of everything else.

"I don’t know."

He sighs and looks down at his watch, "I have to go help Justin get out on stage."

"Don’t you dare tell him Trace," I say, panicking just slightly.  I'm an emotional mess right now.  I'm not gonna cry.  But I know I sound like I'm freaking out.  And when Trace just turns and walks to the door, I seriously start to panic.  "Trace..."

He opens the door and I'm on him faster than I can think.  I don’t know if I'm doing this for a favor to Meredith or if I'm doing it to grab hold of him,  but I clutch his arm and he pulls back and yanks it from me, staring at me like I’m some monster.

"Let go of me."  He says harshly.

I feel disgusting.

But I don’t give up and when he walks and is almost to Justin's room I pull on his shoulder and say right to his face, "You can't expect me to understand you and Justin and you can't expect me to feel that way about my job with Meredith.  It's different, there’s a fucking difference of 25 years Trace."

"Then you can't expect me to not tell him about this."

The door to Justin's dressing room swings open and like the gates of hell, everyone starts to file out into the hallway; his band, his dancers, his security, other random crew members and helpers.  I open my mouth to speak but then someone starts to say a prayer and everyone is clasping hands, including Trace.

But I'm on the outside of their little prayer circle.

Soon they are chanting, all jumping and getting pumped up for Justin’s set. And soon I'm rushing to follow Trace as he follows Justin down the long hallway.  I shout his name.  One of Justin's dancers looks at me funny when Trace doesn't respond and I feel like a loser.

I keep following, though. I've never done this. I usually stay in Meredith’s dressing room until she enters.  I've never gone with her up under the stage.  I just sit there and wait.  But now I'm there, under the back of the stage, dark and echoing, techs and crewmen scattered about, ready for the change over.  The crowd noise is deafening and soon Meredith is walking down a small latter in the center of the back of the stage, sweaty but smiling.  Justin is there and they start dancing to each other as someone hands her a towel and a bottle of water.  She acts like nothing happened this afternoon, nothing at all. 

Justin gets set up with his microphone. Ten feet separate them but they are happy, smiling at each other, doing this little dance move as the music keeps playing and the crowd keeps screeching. 

I look and see Trace is going up to Justin about to tell him something.

Fucking shit, if he tells him....

I turn and walk right up to Meredith and she looks a little shocked to see me when I say her name. "Meredith..." 

"Wha..." She's stunned but then her face turns into a bright, happy smile and she half yells over the noise.  "What’s up?  Did it look ok?"

I don’t know why she asked me.  I never watch her.  I have maybe twice.  "I didn’t watch."

"Aww, why..."  She pouts and people come over fussing with her, fixing her hair and Shanda is there powdering her face just a smidge as she sucks on a water bottle.

"Look, I need to talk to you?"

"What’s up?"  She asks.  It's half-hearted.  She's asking to be nice, but I can tell that she's thinking to herself, "I'm working, Courtney."  And she's right.  I shouldn’t be here bothering her when she's about to go out and perform three more songs.

But, but what if Trace is telling Justin right now?  I look over and they are in serious conversation.  Shit Trace, are you dumb?  He won’t fucking go on stage if he finds out. 

I keep staring and Meredith's calling my name, kind of annoyed, "what's wrong, Courtney?"

When Justin lets out a loud laugh and Trace smiles and they slap hands,  I immediately know he hasn’t told him.  The weight of the world is off my shoulders.

"Nothing..."  I sigh.  Still, I'll need to tell her sometime.  I'll need to let her know that I had to tell Trace.  She needs to be warned incase Trace ever does....fuck up.   "We'll talk later, ok?  Go hug your man before you both get back on stage, ok?"

"Will you go watch, please?"  She begs me.
 
I smile at her and nod.  I don’t know why, but having her be nice to me, having her want me to watch her, even though I know she probably really doesn't care, makes me feel good, like the popular girl in school has asked me over to her house, or something stupid.  It doesn’t make sense that in this moment I’m happy that she’s recognized me and yet, every other moment, when she’s begging me to hang out with her, I hate it.

"Yeah..." She smiles and walks over to Justin.  He puts both his hands out, palms up and flat and she smacks them, and he does the same to hers and then grabs her hands and pulls her into him, in a big hug.  

Soon they are broken apart...and Justin is off to the side of the stage with his dancers getting ready to enter as Meredith waits for her cue on the other side of the stage.  

Trace walks up to me when Justin and his dancers go up.  The crowd's scream makes my ears feel like they are bursting and when I turn to him I have to shout for him to hear me. "Trace....thank you."

He shakes his head, grabs my arm and pulls me back into a dark corner near the entrance to the back hallway, near Meredith's changing room.  He leans in, cupping his hand around his mouth and says directly into my ear, still yelling a little, "Don't thank me for lying to my best friend, Courtney."

He pulls back and walks away, walking towards the entrance. I'm assuming he's going to go sit with Meredith’s family and watch.  I quickly walk after him and grab his elbow. "Can I ask you a question and will you be honest?"  He nods and we walk out into the hallway which is eerie now and quiet, and perfectly empty.  "He's always gonna take priority, isn't he?"

He stares at me for a moment, opens his mouth to speak and then sighs.  "It's like you said."  He says in a distant, sad voice.  "There's a difference, a 25 year difference and I just can't ignore that. No matter what the situation, what the deal, what the fight or the conflict, whatever's going on with me and Justin…he's my fucking family."

He just shrugs at me and turns to walk away.  He fucking walks away from me. 

And I realize in that moment that no matter how long we are together, no matter how much we were in love, I would never matter as much as him.  It's like he just said, Justin is his fucking family.

I'm not.

And I never will be.