Chapter Twenty - Eight

So Nick’s little brother wants to come visit him because they haven’t seen each other recently. He’s been busy recording his album and Nick’s been busy with his solo career. Now Nick has time off and well, obviously he’s here with me, and his brother wants to see him.

That’s great.

It’s not that I care, but I mean, with the awards coming up, the Shania special in London that I have to go do and God only knows what else CMT will throw up at me, Nick will need something to keep him busy. But do I really want a 15 year old around? Not really, but he’s his brother. I like the kid. It could be interesting.

“Hey sunshine!” Nick said that morning as Elisabeth walked downstairs. She looked over at him, standing in the kitchen, and pushed her hair out of her face, wondering what the hell had him so happy. It was way too early to be that happy. She walked away from the stairs, going over to the sofa and sitting down, “You okay?”

“Yeah, just waking up,” Elisabeth said as she reached over for the remote, turning the TV on, “What are you doing up so early?”

“Couldn’t sleep,” Nick said as he started to laugh, “And it’s almost eleven. You like died when you went to sleep last night.” He said as he walked into the living room, leaning up against the back of the sofa, “You were really tired. You do work a lot,”

“Yeah I do,” Elisabeth, whispered, staring at the Rascal Flatts video on CMT for “These Days”, “I mean it’s not an 8 to 5 job, but still.” Nick leaned over, kissing her on the cheek, as he walked back into the kitchen. Elisabeth looked back at him, smiling, and looked back at the TV, “Remember what you said about Aaron last night?”

Nick laughed. She knew that couldn’t have been good.

“Yeah, I called Mom. He’s coming tomorrow,” Nick said as Elisabeth closed her eyes sighing, “You’re alright with it, right?” he asked as he walked back into the living room, sitting down beside her on the sofa, “I mean if you’re not, you can just say no and -”

“No, it’s fine,” Elisabeth said as she smiled, cutting her eyes at him, “I haven’t seen him in a long time. He’ll be here for the awards?”

“Yeah I think so,”

“Great, I’ll have two dates.” Elisabeth said as Nick laughed, putting his arm around her. She took a deep breath, looking down at her hands and then closed her eyes, “I’ve got a long day. There’s like some more interviews and then there’s someone on the show tonight but Lance is doing that interview. There’s a meeting today too,”

“Busy day at work huh?” Nick asked as Elisabeth nodded her head, looking at him.

“Don’t you get bored here during the day?” Elisabeth asked. Nick shrugged his shoulders, taking a sip of the glass of orange juice in his hands and then sighed, as he began to laugh.

“Yeah, but I go out. I go and visited some publishing places and some people that I actually know, you know?” Nick said as Elisabeth looked over at him, “I am working a little but only when you’re working and when you’re not, then I’m right here.”

“Becoming a housewife or something?”

“Yes, what do you want for dinner?”

“I don’t know,” Elisabeth said as she layed her head on his shoulder, smiling, “Pizza?” Nick laughed, wrapping his arm around her even more; “I won’t have time to go to the mall today. I have to get ready and get to work and that really sucks because it’s the first time in a long time that I haven’t been able to go there,”

“You can sit here for a little bit and watch me,” Nick said as Elisabeth lifted head up, looking at him as he scrunched his nose up at her, “Oh shut up. You know you would,” He had a point, she would sit there and watch him all day, “My girlfriend,”

“You like that,”

“I really do,”

“I bet,”

“Well, go ahead and get ready and I’ll go get some lunch and we can have lunch before you go to work oh great business woman,” Nick said as he leaned over, kissing her on the lips lightly. Elisabeth smiled, kissing him back lightly as she leaned up, wrapping her arms around his neck and he started to kiss her back more deeply.

“You know what I really want for dinner?” Elisabeth whispered as Nick nodded his head lightly, looking her in the eyes. She smiled at him, rubbing her nose against his lightly and started to giggle. She didn’t know what she was doing, but she liked it, “I want you,”

“I.. I can arrange that,” Nick said as Elisabeth cracked up laughing, kissing him on the cheek as she stood up from the sofa, looking down at him, “I can,” She couldn’t stop laughing as she crossed her arms, looking down at him, as he held his arms around, smiling up at him, “I can have dinner ready for you when you come home,”

“Pizza,” Elisabeth said as she laughed, turning around and began walking upstairs. Nick sat there, watching her until he began to laugh, realizing how desperate he must have looked. He shook his head and stood up, walking back into the kitchen to see what else he could find to eat.

After taking a shower, and getting ready for the day, Elisabeth and Nick had a lovely meal of what else but McDonald’s. Somehow that’s all Nick seemed to know and buy for lunch or dinner, and honestly, Elisabeth was getting pretty tired of it, but it’s not like she was going to tell him that. After all he was now her boyfriend.

She giggled at the thought of Nick being her official boyfriend again as she walked out of the elevator in the CMT buildings and going towards her office. She said hello to the secretary, who was again, happy as hell. She walked through the hallway, telling ‘Hi’ to Lance as she passed his office, and walked up to hers, seeing all the flowers that Nick had in there the day before.

She smiled, taking off her jean jacket, and tossed it into a chair with her messenger bag, and walked up to her desk, looking to se a memo on it.

To: Elisabeth Geller; Lance Smith

From: Andrew Robinson

Subject: Daytona Beach Spring Break Special

Elisabeth sighed, sitting down in her chair and started to read it. CMT had started a Spring Break Special the year before, with Kenny Chesney doing a concert on the beach in Daytona Beach, Florida, one of the biggest Spring Break spots for college students. The concert was one of the highest rated concert specials that CMT had ever aired, and they were going to try to beat that this year. Elisabeth continued to read the memo until she spotted who was giving the concert.

Great. She’ll have to see Joe Don again, even though she was going to see him at the awards too. She looked at the date, seeing that the concert special was going to be filmed the next weekend, and look a there, they wanted her to host it. Of course they did. They had to throw her in there with Joe Don. Not that it mattered now, she had a boyfriend. She wasn’t single anymore.

“Elisabeth,” Lance said as he stood in her doorway and she looked up, “Get the memo?” Elisabeth nodded her head, looking back down at the paper, finishing reading it as Lance walked in, “They want you to host it this year. I’m going, I’m going to be doing some extra stuff with Rascal Flatts down there for some other stuff. They’re doing another episode of ‘Get Me In With The Band’ and then another small special, and I’m hosting those,”

“Oh okay, that’s cool,” Elisabeth said as she stopped looking at the paper, and looked back up at him, “Are those interview people here yet? I know that they’re supposed to be here today -”

“Anytime,” Lance said as he started to laugh, “It is a little weird, us doing interviews when we’re usually the ones asking the questions,”. Elisabeth nodded her head agreeing with him as she looked over at the small picture of her and Nick.

“The guy yesterday from Rolling Stone, all he wanted to talk about was how I know Nick and all of that and I hated it because I don’t like talking about that, but -”

“But you and Nick are only friends -”

“Not anymore,” Elisabeth said as she started to smile a little, ‘We’re dating again. He doesn’t want me to keep it quiet anymore; he said that I could tell anybody that I want. He’s going to come to the awards with me and present an award with me, and we’re back together,” Lance looked at her in shock for a second until he smiled fakely, looking a little disappointed.

“Oh, well that’s great that you’re back together,” Lance said as he laughed a little, “I guess things didn’t go very well on your little date with Joe Don, huh?” Elisabeth laughed in return, shaking her head at him, “I heard he had just broken up with Kassidy from SheDaisy,”

“That’s all he talked about,” Elisabeth said as Lance laughed when Andrew walked up to the door, knocking on it once.

“Hey, just the two people I wanted to see,” Andrew said as he walked in, shutting the door, “Did you two get the memo about Daytona?” Elisabeth and Lance told him yes, and Andrew walked over, sitting down in a chair beside Lance, “Well, what’s going to happen is both of you will be going down there. Lance, most of the day, that Saturday you will be spending the day with Jay and Gary, going to different places in Daytona. And Elisabeth,” he said as he looked at Elisabeth who looked at him nervously, “you will be doing the same with Joe Don,”

Elisabeth sat there in shock for a minute, as she looked at Lance who wanted to laugh. They were sticking her with just Joe Don? Why not Gary? He was married and safe. Joe Don was single and obviously interested in her.

“Just Joe Don?” Elisabeth asked as Andrew nodded his head yes. Great.

“And, Elisabeth, you and your friend will be presenting the Most Stylish Video Award at the awards, I just got the memo on that so I thought I would pass that along,” Andrew said as Elisabeth smiled a little, looking back down at her memo.

“Well actually,” Lance said as he looked at Elisabeth who looked up at him, “Elisabeth has some news of her own,” That ass. Damn him for bringing that up, she was going to wait and do it herself.

“Yeah,” Elisabeth said as she started to laugh a little, “Nick’s not exactly my friend anymore. He’s my boyfriend and he wants it to be known. We dated before; when I was in college, and we kept it quiet. He doesn’t want to keep it quiet anymore. So, we’re back together,” Elisabeth sat there looking at Andrew whose eyes lit up. She didn’t know if that was a good thing necessarily or not. He seemed to have just turned evil.

“Well that’s great!” Andrew sad as Lance and Elisabeth looked at him, “For you, I mean. You’re always working so hard it’s good that you actually have a outside life now,” he said as Elisabeth tilted her head, looking at him. Did he think she didn’t have a life?, “And now that he wants everybody to know. This will be great publicity for the show and the other specials,”

Great, just what she didn’t want.