All Good Things: The Final Fanfiction Saga

Chapter Ten: Retreat

"Hey, Chris," said a familiar voice on the phone.

Chris smiled. "What's going on, Fat One?"

"Easy on the nickname, man. I'm working out."

"I don't think lifting French fries counts, brother."

"Anyway," Joey sighed. "Did you hear about Emma?"

"Yeah." Chris looked at his feet. "It's terrible. I can't believe how much that kid has gone through. Kind feels like déjà vu, doesn't it?"

Joey adjusted his cell phone. "Yeah. It just doesn't seem fair, since we're always watching it happen to her."

Chris was silent for a moment. "So ... where are you, anyway?"

"Brooklyn. Stuck in traffic."

"What are you there for?"

"Seeing the old stomping grounds," Joey said, peering out the window. "I just spent some time in Orlando with the family, and then went to Germany ..."

"Let me guess," Chris said with a grin. "Tracing the path of your life thus far?"

"Uh-huh. What've you been doing?"

"Same thing. Went to see the family, then to Orlando, then Germany, then high school."

"Wait a minute. You were in Orlando and Germany and you never called me? I coulda used you in Munich, you know."

"You went to The Nachtlokal again, didn't you?"

Joey grinned. "You know it's my favorite hot spot in all of the Deutscheland."

"I skipped that one, since you were always the more popular one there. It would've been funny to watch Herr Joey back in action."

"Which brings me to my next point. Why haven't you been in touch? We've been leaving a zillion messages. We were about to send out some bounty hunters."

Chris lifted his bag out of the cart and fished around his coat for his book of tickets. "I just didn't want to be tied to a phone while I did my soul-searching, so I turned it off. I had a nice voice-mail box full of messages waiting for me though. I'd just finished listening to Justin's about Emma's dad when you called, and I decided to ignore you no longer."

"So where you headed now?"

"Stopping in Atlanta to see a friend for a few days, then home."

Joey laughed. "Where's that?"

The comment stopped Chris short. He glanced at his last ticket, which read "New York/LaGuardia." But New York wasn't his home. New York was the headquarters of Jive, where they were due to meet in a week before entering a recording studio in Orlando, which would mean publicity in Los Angeles, and then ...

He hadn't meant to call it home, but in a strange way, it was. He hadn't been with his family longer than two weeks for the last six years. For him, home was where the group needed to be, mostly in a hotel suite, sometimes on a bus.

In other words, Chris didn't really have a home. He shook his ticket again and stared.

"Are you there, man?"

"Joey," Chris said, suddenly feeling heavy. "When I get in, we have to – "

"I know," the voice on the other end said. "We have to talk."

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

She stared at him.

On reflection, Justin and Madeline's courtship had actually been pretty tame, considering their rocky start. Ever since their first meeting, sparks flew, usually negatively, until they realized their battle of wits were bringing them closer together. Justin found his mission in wearing down her ironclad walls, and when he succeeded, found the vulnerable woman underneath.