Lustful Memoirs
By: Gina - gina@basic-nstynct.com
Chapter Forty ThreeMy eyes fluttered open all too quickly as the rays from the morning sun filtered into the room. I pulled myself from his arms and watched this exquisite creature, that was far too beautiful for the world in which I lived, sleep. For the few hours that we slept, he wasn’t a part of my world and I was not a part of his, we created a new world, one where we both could be free of our outward personas, where we could just be us. I had much I wanted to ask him, much to say to him, but I was in no hurry to wake him. His eyelashes lay across the baby soft skin of his cheeks, cheeks slightly red from sleep. His hair a mass of golden brown curls halloing his face. He was indeed an angel, and for just a little while, he had belonged to me, been my angel and with that knowledge I was strong enough to go on and do what I knew needed to be done.
I watched as he stirred, his body pulled from the realm of unconsciousness. He looked down, his deep blue, fatigue riddled eyes meeting mine, and he smiled.
"Feeling better this morning?" He asked.
I nodded in reply, continuing to observe him, before I had gathered the courage to ask the question that could not go unanswered.
"Justin, we have never talked about me, you know very little about me, what about me compelled you to say the beautiful words you said to me last night?"
He grabbed my hand tenderly, washing away the insecurity I felt as I waited for him to answer.
"Blake, you don’t know just how beautiful you are on the inside and out. I don’t need to ask you questions to get to know you, I don’t need to know anything about you to know the type of person that you are. All I have to do is look at you, take a peak into those expressive eyes of yours and listen to your voice and I have all the answers I ever needed. This all started out because of management, this entire plan of theirs. When they brought this idea to the table, I balked. I couldn’t believe for a minute that they were serious. The suggestion was pointed directly at me. JC and Lance would never approve of this idea, and management really didn’t care about them anyway. Neither of them would do anything that would worry management, they are the good boys in the group. Management wasn’t concerned with Chris and Joey either. It’s a needed twist on the good boy-group image if we have the bad boy and that’s Joey. He’s known as the flirt, as the womanizer, he’s not the one that gets the little teenybopper’s panties wet, so they let him go do his thing, because the older fans like him and they also like the fact that with Joey they might actually have a chance. And Chris, as sad as this is, no one really pays attention to anything that Chris does. Not our fans, not management, no one really, so he’s free to do whatever the hell he wants. But me, I’m the wildcard, the unknown, the one they want to control, the one they feel they have to control. They have to know what I’m doing and who I’m doing it with every damn moment of every damn day. It’s suffocating. They thought that if they could get someone to go on tour with us to satisfy my physical needs then they wouldn’t have to worry about any bad publicity in relation to Nsync’s golden boy, no paternity lawsuits, no unbecoming pictures, just a discrete affair in the secrecy of some random hotel rooms. That way our younger fans and more importantly, their mothers could feel secure that it was my picture hanging on their wall. They want to preserve the image that after a show, I go back to the hotel, drink milk, eat cookies, call my mom, and then fall asleep with her good night wish ringing in my ears. They know it’s not reality, they know I’m nineteen, they know I’m a typical hormonal teenager, so this was their solution. I never wanted any part of it. Initially, my plan was to be as mean as I possibly could to you, that way you would want to leave, no one wants to be with Justin, he’s a conceited prick. What they didn’t count on, what I didn’t envision, was you. The way my attitude didn’t seem to affect you, the way you cared about JC, the way you wanted to solve his problems for him, the way his pain shown in your eyes. None of that was in my plan, certainly the idea that I would grow to like you never crossed my mind, but that’s what happened, and Blake, I don’t need to know your favorite color, or what your favorite subject was in school, or what your parent’s names are to know the type of person that you are. You’re passionate and headstrong, your determined and caring, your confident, yet not so much that it overwhelms everything else about you. You’re perfect."
Once again his words held me speechless. To hear him describe me, I felt like I should be going to Washington to run for president, not back to LA to figure out the meaningless point to my life. I couldn’t allow this picture of me to linger in his mind though. He didn’t see who I truly was. He hadn’t listened to JC when JC had informed him of what exactly I am. I felt compelled to do that in that instant. He couldn’t think that I was perfect, he couldn’t think things about me that I knew were not true.
"But, Justin, you forget to mention the part where I sleep with men for money." I had to say it, had to paint the realistic picture of myself for him, for he saw me with rose colored glasses.
Once again the deep blue of his eyes showed the fury of anger. He pulled his hand from mine, raising himself from the bed.
"You just don’t get it do you?" He asked the question, his voice rising. "That means absolutely nothing to me, because I know deep within me that you have done what you needed to do to survive. We all do things that we don’t want to do, every single one of us. Do you think that every day in my life I’m proud of every single thing that I do? Is that what you think? Because if it is, Blake you have no idea. Every day in front of thousands of people, I lie. I act a certain way, I say certain things, I hold my head at a certain angle, pull my facial features into a certain expression and do you know why? Because it makes money, because it sells records. I have become what I hate worse then anything in the world, I have become fake. This Justin Timberlake that everyone sees does not exist. He’s not here, never has been. But he comes alive as soon as the camera starts rolling, as soon as the interviewer enters the room, and I hate him, and hate myself for being him. So if you think for one minute that I can hold what you do for a living against you then I might as well burn both of us at the stake."
Tears rolled down my cheeks, and he approached me. "I said you are perfect, your profession doesn’t change that. But if you don’t want to do it, why don’t you stop?"
"I’m going to." In that instant, I knew it was true, the reality of saying those words aloud cemented my future plans. I would do this for me, and in some small way, though he would never know it, I would do it for him, because although he could not change his life, I could change mine.
"You could stay you know, stay here at the house, there is enough room, you would never have to go back to that life."
Stay here, in this house, surrounded by him, close to everything that is him. I let my mind wander, thinking of all the advantages that would come should I allow myself to accept. Not leaving him or the security that he offered, never having to return to the chaos that awaited me in LA, never having to face those demons. The thoughts were tantalizing, held out before me like a drug to an addict. For a minute, I could have thrown myself into his arms, begged him to take the world away and he would have complied. Doing everything in his power to make things easy for me, yet it wasn’t for him to do. It wasn’t his responsibility. It was mine, and I had to accept it. I knew that staying with him would be great, for the first few weeks, until the self-doubt and the insecurities returned. No, this time, I couldn’t run, he offered me the strength I needed to finally deal with the atrocities of my life, to put them behind me, so that I could start fresh. Perhaps then, I could return to him, fight for him, feel as though I deserved a place in his world, but for now, I did not. I must return, for me and for him. I turned to him, with a smile, I suppressed the lump that was rising in the back of my throat.
"I appreciate the offer, Justin, I really do. But I need to go back. I need to tie up the loose ends, I need to finally do something for me. Thank you for all you have done."
He glanced away from me. "So, you are leaving."
"Justin, I have to. I know you understand."
"Yes, I do. So, come on, let’s get back to Johnny’s, so that you can catch your plane."
With those final words, Justin had reverted back to being the closed, unapproachable person that I had first met. I knew he had to be, he had exposed so much of himself to me that day and I understood his need to pull away. I had my own need to do the same, because if we didn’t, I wouldn’t get on that plane and he wouldn’t let me. I could never thank him enough for what he did for me during that long, glorious, wonderful, day. He would never know how much he helped me, never know how much he had given me the fight and the determination to not let the past consume my future. He would never know that he had given back to me the one thing that was missing for so long, the ability to love. Because as we made our way out to his garage, and settled ourselves into his truck, I glanced over to him and knew that I loved him. Every part of him, even those he tried so desperately to hide. He was special, and given different circumstances, I might have fought to make him mine. But I couldn’t do that, I couldn’t be the person he needed at that moment. I knew what he needed, whose security and love he sought, the one that had hurt me and forced me forward all in the utterance of a single word. Justin needed JC, and I hoped that during my time back in LA I could put the pieces of the Renee mystery together, to bring closure for JC and at the same time give Justin what he so desperately needed, his best friend.