Oreos
for Breakfast: Chapter Two
By The Paperbag Princess and The
Pumpkin Coach
Page 1 | Page 2 | Page 3 | Page 4 | Page 5
I couldn't do this. We walked into the restaurant and I saw her immediately, sitting at table in the back corner, flipping through a newspaper. She was so pretty, every time I saw her, all three or four times now, she got prettier. She glanced up when the door opened, smiling when she realized it was me.
My heart
skipped a beat at her smile.
I couldn't do this, I couldn't sit here alone with her and not make an idiot
of myself. They'd all left me out to dry, I couldn't convince any of my friends
to come with me. Talking to her on the phone was one thing, but I couldn't think
of thing to say when she smiled at me.
She stood up with a grin as we approached her table, motioning me to sit down.
"Hello, pop star. I can hardly believe you made it, I watched you this
morning."
"Why?"
"Good god, how many little girls were out there screaming for you?"
I shrugged, sitting down across from her. "Lots."
"Nine bazillion, they said." I laughed, taking the chair across from
her next to the wall. What was a bazillion? "Frank, where are you going?"
He was pulling out the chair to the table next to her. "I'm sitting down.
Am I allowed?" Frank always sat at the table next to me when I was with
friends. It was just what he did. I guess it was to give me a shred of privacy,
I never thought about it.
"No! You're sitting with us, and I'm buying you both breakfast." He
started to say something, and she held up her hand, not listening. "Siddown,
boyfriend. Stop working for about 3 minutes, OK?"
Frank was too much of gentleman to argue with a lady, so he held out her chair
for her, and then sat next to me, glancing around for stray fans. I could see
three outside, peering in the window to see who we were with.
"So how was it? Is Katie Couric honestly that adorable? I think you're
her favorite."
I picked up the menu, hoping I wasn't blushing. "She's very nice. I hate
doing morning shows, though. Sound check was at 5 in the morning."
"Christ! No wonder you look tired. You need a nap, you should go after
we eat."
I hesitated for a second, looking at her. On one hand, I felt entirely tongue-tied
and shy, being practically alone with her. On the other, it was Rachel…
"You promised me record shopping!"
She smiled, "Alright. Will you die if I take you to places that don't believe
in Sound Scan?"
"But then you don't get the units when I buy your entire back catalogue!"
I teased, rewarded by a deeper smile. The waitress appeared, taking our order
for drinks and then I looked at the menu in earnest. "Pancakes?"
She rolled her eyes. "You are not good with details, are you? This is the
Royal Canadian Pancake House! They have pancakes the size of this table! Look!"
She pointed as a waitress walked by, and they were the biggest pancakes I'd
ever seen.
"Cool."
"I've never finished one, and James and I come here all the time. He lives
right around the corner."
I wish I could figure out if James was the boyfriend. She talked about him all
the time and sometimes they shared a room.
"I bet
Frank can finish one of the monster pancakes," she said, smiling over at
him.
Maybe it's Frank she likes. She was always nice to him.
"What do you recommend, Rachel?"
He talks to her! He barely talks to me!
"Chocolate chip, whipped cream. I get the little ones. Same damn thing
every time, I'm a terrible creature of habit." She leaned over the table,
pointing at something on his menu, teasing him about the super monster triple
pancake.
She was leaning right in front of me, and I tried not to stare down her shirt.
But she was just wearing a tank top and her breasts were practically in my lap.
Man, Carter. Get a hold of yourself. You're 21 years old, and girls throw themselves
at you at every turn. Why are you staring down this one's shirt like a horny
teenager?
The waitress reappeared, and Rachel sat back in her chair, freeing me from my
adolescence. I ordered the chocolate chip pancakes, I'd never really even looked
at the menu, and Rachel said we'd share. We were quiet for a moment, sipping
our coffees, then she looked at me. "Are you OK, sweetie?"
No. I'm not.
I'm fucking crazy about you, and I know this is completely one-sided. You think
its fun to be friends with a Backstreet Boy, and all I can think about or talk
about is you.
I shook my head. "I'm just tired. Sorry."
"Is that all?"
God, Rachel, don't act like you care. It's just going to make it worse.
"And I'm sick of being followed everywhere I go," I nodded towards
the window, and Frank glared at them. Rachel looked out the window, smiling.
"It's OK, honey, we're so freaking them out. Because they all think that
I'm AJ's little girl on the side."
"What?"
Man, I should have known. AJ is totally her type.
She grinned at me, obviously amused. "You haven't been reading your message
boards lately. Well, maybe you shouldn't. But someone saw me with AJ in Raleigh,
and then… oh, they saw him singing to me in Pittsburgh."
I sang to you in Pittsburgh. Every stupid drippy love song. Right at you.
"All of this is spurred by the fact that they don't want to believe that
you like me. Because you're everyone's favorite."
I rolled my eyes. "Yeah." I'm not your favorite, and you're the only
one who matters.
She giggled. "I'm finding it really amusing. I love that they can't possibly
believe that we're just friends. They're amazing, though, your fans. They knew
you were at our show in Pittsburgh when I didn't! Hey, speaking of which, where's
my CD?"
I pulled it out of my pocket, handing it to her.
"Cool!" She flipped open the case, pulling out the insert I'd done for her, and glanced up at me. "Did you do this?"
He nodded, and I had to look back at it before his sad eyes broke my heart. What was wrong with him this morning? He was not the bundle of energy I was used to. Where was that amazing guy I just saw on TV?
"Wow. I didn't know you were multi-talented, Nick."
The cover was hand-drawn, 'Sudden Silence, 6/25/01, Pittsburgh' in block letters, each letter painstakingly decorated in bright colors. But the best part were the portraits of each of us in the corners, done like little anime heroes.
"It's nothing."
I smiled at him. "No, its fucking cool. Can I get you to do our tour shirts?"
He smiled back, and this one actually reached his eyes. "Those would be a hot commodity on the Backstreet black market."
"Oh, that would kick ass." I couldn't help teasing him. "But there will be no Sudden Silence comic book!"
"Not even if Stan Lee did it?" He teased back.
"Especially then."
"I promise I'll make you an ass-kickin' super heroine who saves the world."
"You just want to put me in those skimpy super heroine outfits."
"Duh!" We giggled at one another, and I caught Frank rolling his eyes.
"Tell me you've done Frank as a superhero."
Nick shook his head. "He's already got super powers. He can stop a fan at 20 paces with one glare."
"I know. The fans are scared of him, they say he's the meanest bodyguard." Frank raised an eyebrow at me. "Yes, Frank, you're on the message boards, too. You also win 'hottest bodyguard' in the online polls."
Nick completely cracked up at that, and Frank shook his head. "It's not like I have any competition."
I giggled. "Speaking of which, where is your competition? I was expecting others."
Nick went serious on me again, goddamnit. He picked up one of the crayons sitting on the table and started doodling on the paper tablecloth. "Sorry. They're all busy."
Damn, that tablecloth might be worth something on the Backstreet black market now.
"Don't be sorry! You just usually travel with an entourage, since I was making you come out in public, I thought there'd be a whole security force surrounding you."
He shook his head, concentrating on his drawing. "I don't get bothered too much. Well, not in New York."
"Yeah, you don't exude rock star like AJ. Does he ever dress like a normal person?"
"Not really."
He was quiet again, and I wanted to stroke his hair and get him to tell me what was wrong. I looked over at Frank, and he just shrugged at me. Damnit.
He was tired, he said. He looked it, circles under his eyes. Probably homesick, too. God knows I was.
It could not possibly be that I was talking about AJ. He wasn't being pouty and jealous, he was just tired.
"Oh my god!" I exclaimed, and both of them looked at me.
"What?" Nick asked.
"That is so cool!" He was drawing me, and I think we both realized it at the same time. I grinned at him and he was blushing. It was red crayon on a paper tablecloth, but it was fucking awesome. He'd made me into an ass-kickin' superhero, as promised, with a guitar strapped on my back, my hair out of control. "I always wanted to be anime."
He grinned back, relieved that I wasn't mad, I think. "What's your name? SuperRache? GuitarGirl?"
"Can I be in the next issue of your comic book?"
He laughed. "I thought you didn't want a comic book."
"I'll be a special guest star."
"GuitarGirl and the Backstreet Boys unite to defeat the forces of darkness!" He crowed, making me giggle. This was more like the Nick I knew. We joked about our plotlines, and he added to the picture, drawing himself next to me. The waitress came with our food, and I stopped her.
"Hey! We've got art here!" I pulled the tablecloth off the table, rolling it up and motioning to her. "OK, go ahead."
She rolled her eyes at Frank and put our food down. Had to love New York waitresses. Nick was looking at me, a funny little shy smile on his face. "What are you going to do with that?"
"Keep it. Don't worry, I'm not going to auction it on Ebay or anything."
"Dunno, it's probably worth a fortune now," he mused, considering our pancakes.
"It'll be my retirement fund. I'll fucking need it, I think we're about to get dropped by our label." I took a bite of the pancakes, smiling at him. "Dig in. Frank, how's yours?"
I swear he'd eaten half of it already. "Excellent, Rachel. Nice suggestion."
I grinned at him. I liked Frank. I didn't think he got much downtime with Nick to look after all the time. "Rache!" Nick said, and I looked over at him. "Go back. Dropped?"
I shrugged. "We're meeting with them after I leave you. The last time we met with EMI live and in person is when we signed the contract."
He looked completely stricken and I couldn't help but giggle at the expression on his face. "It's OK, Nick. I'll be fine. We'll get another deal, or we won't."
"But… I could…" I fed him a bite of pancakes to stop him from saying another word.
"We hate EMI. They ignore us. OK, so maybe we fucked up a bit…" like that time when we had a hit single and were so busy fighting we couldn't tour it. "But we don't precisely get along. We don't see eye to eye on our marketing."
"Damn, those are good," he said, picking up his fork before looking back at me. "Then they are idiots. Because you are a great band, and you should be way more successful that you are."
I smiled at him. I loved that he loved my band. "We don't all get to be pop superstars. I would love it, yes, but I'm pretty resigned to where we are. We have fans, we sell some albums and it pays the bills."
"You should be more than that," he insisted, taking a huge bite of our pancakes. I'd better catch up, or he'd eat them all without me.
"Did you know that only 5% of albums out there make any profit whatsoever? You would be that 5%. I'm hanging out with the rest of the no money losers."
He shook his head. "Totally unfair. You're really good."
I shrugged. "We're not marketable like some cute boy bands I know. No Doubt has cornered the chick lead singer market, and I'm not as cool as Gwen Stefani."
"You are so much cooler than her."
I smiled at his earnestness. "I don't have the cool hair and the outrageous clothes. Chick guitar players are way too threatening for the status quo, and I'm not about to stop. Reason one million why EMI hates me."
"Why? They wanted you to stop playing guitar?"
I shook my head at him. "And they wanted to put me in tiny little dresses and make me all girly. I could write the songs, but not play on them. A couple years ago, some record companies were courting me. But they wanted just me. No guitar, no band. Oh, and I'd get the 'privilege' of singing the songs they wrote for me. Boys get to play guitar, girls don't." And I was so pissed off at Jeremy at the time that I'd considered it. I pushed that thought out of my head.
"But…" He stopped, considering me. I smiled at him, taking another bite of the pancakes.
"In the pop world, there aren't any. There are sweet singer songwriters, which I am not; there is Chrissie Hynde from the Pretenders, my fucking idol, but we're not in their league; and there is Hole. Also out of my league." He made a face when I said 'Hole' and I pointed my fork at him. "Don't even start. Courtney Love is a fucking amazing person. Back to my point, we're a pop band and pop bands don't have girls playing guitar. Bands with loads of indie cred have girls playing guitar, but they don't write silly pop songs like we do. Thus, we are unmarketable."
"That's so stupid."
"Tell me about it. So that's gonna be my day later. What are your plans?"
He shrugged, glancing over at Frank. "Go to Philly. Sleep. Go record shopping with you?" He finished hopefully, and I grinned.
"I will instruct you in the ways of chick rock, grasshopper. You'll understand the genius of Hole when I'm through with you."
He wrinkled his nose. "I doubt it."
I stuck my tongue out at him. "So, Frank, what music do you like?" Frank shrugged at me, typically stoic. "You strike me as a … show tunes sorta guy."
Nick giggled and Frank raised one eyebrow at me. Damn. He was good at that cold stare thing. Does Nick not know that his bodyguard is gay? Is that possible?
"Frank likes dance music." Frank turned his stare to Nick. "Dude! Your room is always next to mine. I do pay attention sometimes."
"Never about anything important, of course," Frank deadpanned, and I had to laugh.
Our waitress wandered by, taking Frank's empty plate and leaving the check. Frank started to pick it up and I snatched it out of his hand. "I told you I was buying you breakfast," I said, searching my bag for my wallet.
"It's his money," Frank informed me, and I laughed.
"I'm buying him breakfast, too."
"Rache, I can…" Nick started to say, and I looked over at them, shaking my head.
"I haven't lost my job yet, I'm buying you both breakfast. Frank because he does not need to be here, he should be sleeping on the bus on the way to Philly, and Nick for the totally cool presents."
"What presents?"
She gave me a 'duh' look, handing some money to the waitress. "The CD and the drawing! Totally awesome, I can buy you breakfast in exchange for those."
"But those were…" I stopped myself. Those were free. Those weren't presents, they didn't count. Mandy would have said they didn't count.
"Those were what?" Rachel questioned, and I just shook my head.
"Never mind. Thank you for breakfast. It was very good."
She smiled at me, and I hoped I didn't look like an idiot as I grinned back.
"Yes, Rachel, thank you," Frank said, and she smiled at him, standing up.
"You're both welcome. Excuse me for one second, then we can go record shopping."
Frank waited until she was around the corner to punch me in the arm. "You are so gonna fuck this up."
I glared at him. "Shut up!"
"I don't even know why she's sitting here, a nice girl like her. I've never seen any of your other girls pay for a meal."
"My tastes are improving with age."
"Thank god. Nice ones like that, you have to be nice back."
I sighed at him. "I am nice."
"Uh-huh." The door opened and he glanced over at it. "Do you want me to get rid of the fans outside before we leave?"
"Um…"
He looked back at me and knew exactly what I was thinking. "Wanna see how Rachel is with them?"
That was so unfair of me. Mandy hated my fans, Tiffani ignored them. Rachel's only barely my friend, I should not put her to the fan test.
Frank shrugged. "Ten bucks she's good with them."
I didn't doubt that. But if we walked out of here together, the rumors would be flying all over the internet within minutes. She reappeared while I was still considering it. "Why the long faces, guys?"
Frank stood up. "Fans. Do you want to leave first?"
She looked out the front window and smiled, "Nah. The boards think I'm AJ's little chickie, I can't wait to see what they say if I walk out of here with Nick." She grinned at me as I stood up. "Should we hold hands? Should I kiss you?"
"Sure!" I said, hoping I sounded casual and flirty. She just grinned at me, motioning for me to follow Frank outside.
Frank led the way, and I lagged behind, putting my cool drawing in my bag. By the time I got outside, Nick was surrounded by six girls, all of whom looked like they were about to come out of their skin with excitement.
I just watched him for a moment. He was good with them, posing for pictures and signing things, telling one of them to breathe when it looked like she was going to faint. I had to wonder how they even found us here. Did they follow him when he left the studio?
Did I want to think about it that hard? There was already stuff about me all over the boards, and they thought I was with AJ. If they thought I was with Nick, everyone's favorite, it might get ugly.
Frank caught my eye and mouthed 'one more minute,' so I stepped over to the curb, flagging down a cab. One pulled over and I told him to hold on for a second, and glanced back over to Nick and the girls.
One of the girls backed away from the group, shaking, and she bumped into me, jumping a mile when she did. I smiled at her. "Are you OK?"
She nodded at me. "I just… he…"
I patted her arm. "He's just a guy in an ugly shirt."
"Hey! I like this shirt!" Nick whined, joining us.
"Nick, that shirt needs to be arrested for crimes against fashion. Everyone on the boards thinks so." It was an orange and yellow striped thing, god knows where it came from. "Right?" I asked the girl. "Isn't it horrible?"
She blinked at me for a moment. "But it looks good on him…" she managed, and Nick laughed.
"See?" he gloated, and I rolled my eyes at him.
"She's blinded. Now, that shirt you had on this morning on TV that was a good shirt. Am I right?" I said to her again, and she smiled, nodding.
"He looks good in blue."
"You should wear that blue shirt at all times," I informed him. "Looked good with your eyes."
He flashed me the cheesiest grin, and I had to laugh. "I'll steal it from wardrobe, then."
"Rachel?" Frank asked, motioning me into the cab. I smiled at the girl and slid in. Nick posed for one more picture and then joined me in the backseat. Frank glared at them all once more for good measure and sat in the front. We pulled out to a rain of flashbulbs, and Nick smiled at me.
"You're gonna be all over the boards in about an hour."
"I can't wait!" I told him. "They all think I'm AJ's secret girlfriend, what will they make of me being seen with you?"
"They'll think I've stolen you away from him."
"They'll say you're taking me to him. Ten bucks."
"He already owes me ten bucks," Frank informed us from the front, and Nick scowled at him.
"Why?" I asked, looking at Nick.
"Nothing!" He grumbled, glaring at Frank, and I let it drop, continuing to tease him about his ugly shirt instead.
The cab let us out at the corner next to my favorite record shop in New York, and Nick glanced around, looking a little nervous. "Here, we'll buy you a disguise," I joked, stopping in front of a store with rows and rows of sunglasses on display.
"I'm fine," he muttered, looking a bit embarrassed, but I handed him a huge pair of sunglasses and he put them on, posing for me.
I laughed, shaking my head. "You look like Bono. You were wearing sunglasses on TV this morning, what happened to them?"
He shrugged, putting back the glasses I'd given him and handing me a cute pair with rhinestones to try on. "Dunno. They're probably with wardrobe."
"You're the sort of guy who loses sunglasses, are you?" I asked, taking off my sunglasses that I was already wearing to try on the new ones.
"Yeah," he admitted, looking at me. "I like those, they look cute on you."
I glanced into the mirror hanging next to me and smiled. "They are cute. They're two for ten bucks, we need to find you a pair."
"I'll just lose them," he protested, but he picked up a pair with blue-tinted lens to try on.
"They're five bucks. You'll live."
We spent about 10 minutes playing with the sunglasses. I tried to get Frank to join in, but he was too busy glaring at everyone around us to have any fun. "You'd attract less attention if Frank wasn't around," I whispered to Nick and he nodded.
"Probably. But I'd rather not take the chance."
"Wimp!" I giggled, handing the clerk a ten-dollar bill before Nick could pull out his wallet.
"Hey, you paid for breakfast!" He protested, and I shook my head.
"Whatever. Now they're a gift, maybe you'll take better care of them. C'mon, we're going around the corner for records."
My favorite store was so tiny and crowded that Frank didn't even bother to come in with us, and Nick and I flipped through albums and CDs, calling out comments to one another over the racks. He went immediately to look for my stuff, shaking his head when he finished. "I have all this."
I gave up looking through the Backstreet stuff, there was so much I didn't know where to begin, and I looked through the section marked 'Sudden Silence.' "You're joking! You have the Canadian printing of our first album with the extra tracks?"
He shrugged, looking up from Soundgarden. "Yeah."
"I don't have that!" I protested, and he grabbed it out of its slot.
"Now you do. Do you have the Canadian single for 'Long Island'?"
"Um… yeah. Darien's the archivist, he's got two copies of everything. But I've got all the 'Long Island' stuff," I admitted. I had it all because I had loved seeing my name next to Damon's. It was all hidden in a box in my attic at the moment, because now I hated seeing his name anywhere near mine.
"Hey, I never asked you, who's that Dan Abnormal guy who wrote it with you?"
"A friend," I told him, moving on to the 'T's. He read the liner notes? Sure, he's crushing out, Rache. You spent hours reading through their stuff.
A boyfriend, I assumed, from the way she couldn't meet my eyes. "It's a cool song, why didn't you ever do anything else with him?"
"That was a freak accident, 'Long Island', we were just fucking around one night and came up with it." She smiled over at me, tucking a stray curl behind her ear. "It's actually about me, I changed the words when we released it."
I sang the first line quietly - "You're pretty dreamy for a girl from Long Island…"I grinning at her. "Yeah, that fits." She was from Long Island, I'd found that on a web page somewhere.
She smiled at me and went back to flipping through CDs, then grabbed one, handing it to me. "They cover one of your songs, they're friends of mine. You'll like them." I took the CD, flipping it over to read the track listing. None of them were Backstreet.
"What do they cover?" I asked, and she leaned over to read the tracks, her arm touching mine. I was way too excited by that, what an idiot.
"Hey, its not on here, I know Jeff told me they re-released it…" She took it out my hand, moving back to the CD's, and all I could do was watch her. She was so pretty, the sunglasses she'd just bought on top of her head, pulling her hair away from her face, so I could see her big eyes and those cute freckles on her nose. "Ooh! It's got an extra EP, cool." She pulled out two copies, handing me one and keeping one for herself. "Larger Than Life, totally rocking."
Nodding, he took the CD. "They're making fun of us, aren't they?" he worried, and I laughed, shaking my head.
"Nope, they honestly do like you. I must admit I didn't know what they were going on about until just recently."
He looked at me with a pleased little smile on his face, and I wasn't sure if it was because of me or Tsar liking his music. "Yeah?"
I smiled back at him. He was so cute in those little blue sunglasses I'd just gotten for him, even if they did clash with the horrible orange shirt. "You guys make really good pop music. That gets lost in all the hype, and that's really not fair. You're all good at what you do."
"Not that we have… what did you call it? Indie cred?"
Giggling, I went back to looking at CD's. "Indie cred is totally fucking overrated. I'd rather have the bitchen tour bus."
"You can come back with us, I'll show you around, and we can drop you at EMI," he suggested hopefully, and I laughed at the thought of pulling up to EMI in that bus. The guys would kick me out of the band on the spot.
"Uh, no. If we have time, though, I'll take the tour." I glanced at my watch. Barely noon, I had at least an hour, more if I pushed it. I should probably change before going to EMI, though, my jeans and tank top didn't really make me look professional.
"You said I had to buy Hole," he told me, moving over to the H section. "Which one?"
"Oh, don't buy it here. There's a place around the corner, everything's 2 for 25 bucks, this place is for the weird rare import stuff. We'll go there next."
"Ooh, do they have Backstreet? I like to see what's out there that I don't know about."
That's what got him discovered. The owner of the place swooped down on him, asking him to autograph some stuff, and it was 15 minutes before we left. I got my Tsar CD for free, I wasn't complaining. Frank tried to break up the autograph session and I waved him away. Hell, that one sloppy signature just doubled the price of those CD's, who could blame the guy for a little commerce? Nick talked me up and I signed a couple of our CDs, not that it increased the price any. We finally left and I took his arm with a smile.
"Thanks for trying to make me seem important in there."
"Watch, in a couple of years, you'll be considered a creative genius, and they'll be worth a fortune."
I giggled. "I'll hold my breath, OK? Here, all cheap CDs, all the time." I held open the door for him. "Are you coming, Frank?"
He shrugged, following Nick inside. Nick headed for 'H', and I followed, flipping through them for 'Live Through This.' "Do you like Nirvana?" He nodded, considering the cover. "This is better. This is one of the most important albums in my life."
"Why?" He actually had the grace to look interested.
"Because… because its so fucking real. It's all about love and anger and obsession and sex. Their last album wasn't as good, but it doesn't matter. If all Courtney Love ever does is this one perfect album, that's a pretty good life's work."
He took it from me. "Alright, what else? You're instructing me in the ways of chick rock, right?"
Her eyes lit up and she pulled me down the aisle to P's. "The Pretenders. Man, which one…" she mused, dropping my hand to flip through the CDs. She picked one, handing it to me with a little dissertation on why it was good, then picked up another CD. "Liz Phair. Another album that changed my life."
Twenty minutes later, I had 10 CDs and my head was spinning about which ones were which. Was it Elastica or Sleater-Kinney that was British? I couldn't remember why that mattered, even.
I should have taken notes. I never listened to girls, the things I'd do to get Rachel to like me. She was so excited, debating over which CDs were the important ones for me to listen to. She knew so much about music, about who influenced who and why, and she had all these theories about why girls never got any airplay that just went right over my head.
Homework. To impress this girl, I was going to end up doing homework.
It was worth it, the way she was smiling at me now. She took my hand as we walked out of the store, even, continuing to go on about the Pretenders or Garbage or somebody. "It's nearly one, Rachel, don't you need to go?"
I swear, sometimes I hated Frank. She scowled back at him and sighed. "Yeah, I should."
"Your meeting's at two, right?" I asked her. "You still have an hour!"
She shook her head. "It's across town and I have to change first."
I tried not to pout, but I don't think I succeeded. "I could wait. After your meeting, you could get the tour of the bus. I don't have anything else to do today." She actually looked like she was considering it, and I went on. "You could come to Philly with us! You love Philly, you were telling me that the other night on the phone."
She had a boyfriend in Philadelphia, I suddenly remembered. So did she, she shook her head again with a smile. "No. Gotta go, Nicky."
Then she hugged me, and I was so surprised I just stood there for a second before wrapping my arms around her. She felt good there, pressed up against me. "I had a nice time," she said quietly, and I had to stop myself from kissing her cheek.
"I had a great time. Now I've got something to listen to on the drive to Philadelphia."
Laughing, she stepped away from me. "Not too loud, don't drive Frank crazy."
Frank shrugged and she kissed his cheek. "Thanks for chaperoning."
A cab pulled up right in front of us, letting someone out, and she looked over at it. "Definitely my cue. You guys want it or can I take it?"
Frank held open the door for her. "Ladies first. Nice to see you again, Rachel."
She slid inside the cab with a smile. "You too, Frank. Nick, call me?" She asked as Frank shut her door.
"Absolutely. I want to know how it goes with the label." She scowled at me, waving as the cab pulled away. It turned the corner and Frank smirked at me, starting to say something.
"Shut up," I told him.
Chapter
2:
Page 1 | Page 2 | Page 3
| Page 4 | Page 5
Disclaimer
| Sudden
Silence
Website
Feedback to Authors | Tragical
Fiction (home)
(c)
2001
Some content not suitable for children. You have been warned.