An Unsung Melody

Chapter Eight

Chapter Eight

Justin: Heard from JC and Mack, they're in Orlando right now. BBQ at my mom's place, bring your people.

Chris: We're still in town and we'll be there.

Joey: Me and my girls will be there.

Lance: We'll be there as well.

Chris: What happened to Ashley?

Justin: What do you mean?

Chris: Where's the reunion talk, we're all on one text thread?

****

Lynn's Orlando home had an oasis of a backyard, complete with pool, hot tub, basketball court and a shaded patio and Ashley had the whole yard to herself. After swimming, she laid out on a lounge chair with a book she was intent on reading, but after reading the same paragraph three or four times and still not comprehending it, she gave up.

She dragged the lounge chair under the shade of the patio and retrieved the papers and notebook Lynn had given her the day before.

The top sheet of paper held a list of proposals and engagements that had been in the correspondence that Lance's team had sent over, and Lynn wanted Ashley's consideration on. The engagement or project was listed with dates and the name of who had officially reached out to her manager. She found the note about the voiceover movie project with Justin's name officially attached to it, as she had started to suspect.

She put stars next to the things she was interested in, including the VMA's, the movie project and even a couple podcast interviews. Once she'd read the list twice, she had marked maybe seven or eight things she'd be interested in and set it aside to give to Lynn later.

The second page from Lynn was trickier. It was full of introspective questions about what it was that Ashley truly wanted out of her career. What were her short term goals? Longer goals? Projects she'd like to be considered for. The last dreaded question; where do you want to be in ten years? The notebook was to spend time and space writing out her answers.

"Well," Ashley said to herself, setting it all aside. "That is a project for tomorrow."

She adjusted the lounge chair to lay flat and flipped over onto her stomach for a nap.

Sometime later, her peaceful nap was suddenly disrupted by cold needles piercing her back and waking her with a start as she shot up from the lounge chair in a panic.
"Justin?!" Ashley winced as she tried to shake off the sleep fog. Justin, shaking with uncontrollable laughter, stood over her in his swimsuit, still dripping the cold water on her. "You. Are. A. Jerk!" She said, trying to punch him with each word. He was laughing so hard that he couldn't do anything but back up to try to escape her blows.

"I..." Justin tried to speak but still couldn't through his laughter. She caught sight of the pool behind him and with both hands on his chest, she pushed him as hard as she could, sending him into the water.

While she waited, hands on her hips for him to emerge from the water, she heard more laughter ringing out from behind her and she turned to find an audience, including Lynn, JC, Mackenzie and Logan all in stitches of laughter over the performance.

"That's my girl," Mackenzie said with obvious pride in her voice as she walked forward to give Ashley a hug. When Ashley had first joined Britney on the *Nsync tour, after her mother's death, it was Mackenzie who'd been her tutor and a kind of substitute mother when she was missing her own fiercely.

"Hey Mackenzie," Ashley said, returning the tight hug. "I didn't know you were in town!"

"My sister's getting married next week so we came down a few days early so we could see you guys as well," Mackenzie explained as JC came up behind them, slipping an arm around Mackenzie's waist and giving Ashley a side hug.