Chapter 29
Chapter Twenty - Nine
Elisabeth shut her eyes, leaning back in the chair at her desk. That’s SO not what she wanted. She didn’t want to use that to gain the show my viewers or anything else. That’s the last thing she wanted.
“Andrew,” Elisabeth said as Andrew stopped talking and looked at her. Lance knew what she was going to say and sat back in his chair, crossing his leg, listening to her, “I don’t want to use Nick to gain more viewers. Sure people will find out that we are dating, but I don’t want to go and broadcast it all over the place. I’m not using him. I don’t want to, and furthermore I know how his fans work. If you ‘use’ my relationship with him to gain more viewers, I’ll get backlash. It’s happened before. It’s not going to happen to me,” Lance nodded his head agreeing with her and looked over at Andrew who crossed his arms, looking at her still, “He wants people to know but it’s not like I’m going to mention my boyfriend every day on the show.”
“You’re right,” Andrew said as Elisabeth smiled a little, looking over at Lance, “You can’t risk your relationship over something like that. But your relationship with him, as much as you choose to put out there, is good for business. The fans want to know all about celebrities’ private lives, and since you are a part of his, and he has a big fan base, that will lead them to CMT to watch you,”
“Yeah, that’s true,” Elisabeth said as she looked down for a minute, “But I’m not mentioning him on the show,”
“Of course,” Andrew said as he stood up, looking over at Lance and then back at Elisabeth, “We’ll be having a meeting first thing in the morning at 10 with the guys in Rascal Flatts before they go and rehearse for the awards to discuss the special more,”
“Okay,” Elisabeth said as she looked down at her desk. She did not like waking up that early, much less coming to work that early, “We’ll be here,”
“Oh and don’t forget about the People interview today,” Andrew said as he pointed at both of them and walked over to the door, opening it up and walked out of it. Elisabeth put her hands over her face as Andrew shut the door back and Lance started laughing at her.
“Joe Don has a thing for you,” Lance said as he stood up, leaning over her desk, looking at her, “Think you’ll be able to handle it?” Elisabeth moved her hands from her face and looked at him, “Didn’t think so,”
“No, I can,” Elisabeth, said as she stood up, and crossed her arms, “I can handle Joe Don. I’ll just take Nick to Daytona with me,” she said as Lance started to laugh at her, while he walked over to the door laughing, and walked out. Elisabeth stood there, looking around her office.
She walked around her desk, over to the window that over looked part of Nashville, and rubbed her temples on her forehead, wondering how this week was becoming even weirder than last.
Besides that interesting tidbit, Lance and I did the interview with People magazine, and when they asked about our personal lives. I told them I had a boyfriend named Nick that I had known for over two years. They never asked what he did and well, I never told them what he did either. I guess word will get out after Nick and I show up at the awards together, along with Aaron now who’s coming along, and when that interview comes out.
I finally snuck away from the office today, for a little bit and went to the mall for a whole thirty minutes. I didn’t see the people that I usually see because well, it was late afternoon when I went. There were a lot of teens there, which are interesting to watch too, especially when it’s girls and boys.
They basically hang all over each other in public and they’re only like fifteen or sixteen years old. You wonder exactly what the hell do they really know about love? When I was sixteen, yeah I had a little boyfriend, but I didn’t claim to love him. I went to school dances and other things with him. But I never told him I loved him, because I didn’t. I liked him a lot, but not love. I have only told one guy that I loved him - that’s Nick.
Teenagers these days and wow I really sound old, but they take love for granted, thinking that they are really in love before they actually are. They go off and have sex and then break up with the guy two weeks later. They take everything for granted when it comes to love or they aren’t serious enough. That’s why my sister is in the shape that she is now.
Kids.
She’d been sitting there for a hour.
She wasn’t just drawing on the piece of paper. She was writing things down. They weren’t just any ‘things’ either. It was things she loved about Nick. It wasn’t stupid, cheesy things like his smile or the way he calls her baby. It was weird things. She wrote how she loved the way he would always make this weird sound in the back of his throat when he woke up every morning, as if he was scratching it. When they first met and started spending the night together, it got on her nerves so bad; he did it anyway.
She wrote about how she loved the way he had to have salt on everything he ate. Once when he came to eat with her and her family before her parents divorced, her whole family sat there watching him put salt on everything that was on his plate - including the rolls. He always said that some things never had taste to them, and he needed something that had taste. It was stupid really but the more she sat there thinking about it, the more she smiled.
In fact, she loved a lot of things about him. So far, she loved 239 things about him. That seems like a lot of different little things she loved about him, but really - it was only the beginning. She could go on and use every sheet of paper in the office about things she loved about him. She figured that she should just stop while she was ahead since for some reason, they hated for their employees to waste paper that didn’t need to be wasted. Elisabeth didn’t understand that, because she figured writing down the things she loved about Nick wasn’t wasting paper.
So what if it took over 500 sheets?
She smiled, moving her left elbow from the desk and took her list, folding it up and putting it down in a drawer. She would be finishing that list tomorrow while she had some free time - although with the awards coming up, there wasn’t going to be a lot of that. She had to figure out a way to ask Nick to come to Daytona with her. She knew he would come. That wouldn’t be a problem. The problem would be the amount of jealousy he would have after he found out that she had to show Joe Don around Daytona Beach, probably half dressed since it’s a spring break special.
She stood up from her desk, reaching up to turn her computer’s monitor off and walked around her desk, picking up her jacket and slipping it on. She knew Nick was probably wondering where the hell he was. She laughed a little to herself, picking up her messenger bag and slipped it over her body as she walked over to her door and walked out, shutting the door behind her.
If he only knew she was actually writing down the ways that made him her ‘one’.
He looked over at Bunny, who was sitting on the chair, staring at him. The cat loved to stare at him for some reason. He knew he looked good, but damn, was he that pretty? About that time, Nick heard some keys jingling and he tilted his head back, to see the door open and Elisabeth walked through, turning around and locking the door back.
Nick just looked back at her, watching her upside down as she turned around, looking at him and then laughed. He just smiled in return as she took her messenger bag off and walked over to the sofa, sitting down at the other end, ran her hands over her forehead. She smiled down at him, not even saying a word to him and began kissing him upside down; sucking on his lips slowly and backed away, looking in his eyes.
“I’m home,” Elisabeth whispered as Nick smiled at her and she ran her fingers through his hair, looking down at him. Nick just looked back at her in return, wondering what was going through her mind for her to come in and give him such a warm welcome, especially since she came in so late.
“What’s wrong?” Nick asked as Elisabeth closed her eyes, putting her hands over his eyes and he moved them, “Seriously, you were late coming home and you’re acting weird,”
“I love you,”
“I love you too,”
“Wanna go to Daytona this weekend?” Elisabeth asked as Nick looked at her questionably, “Fly down Thursday and come back Sunday?” Nick sat up on the sofa, looking at her as she smiled at him, “CMT is doing a spring break special and Lance and I have to go. I’m hosting it and doing some other stuff for it. I want you to come with me,” she whispered as Nick gave her a little smirk, “Please?”
“I’m where ever you are baby,” Nick said as Elisabeth smiled at him, “So who’s going to be doing the special? Is it like a concert? Who’s singing?” Elisabeth smiled at him even more, looking down at his hand and taking it in hers, intertwining their fingers together, “Elisabeth?”
“Rascal Flatts,” Elisabeth said as Nick looked away, “Trust me, I’m not going out with Joe Don anymore,” she said as Nick smiled at her, “I have to show him around Daytona, but that’s for work. They assigned me to do that, but you,” she said as she moved their hands up against his chest, “You are my boyfriend,”
“I’m your boyfriend,” Nick said as he smiled even more, moving their hands up and kissing hers lightly, “And I’ll go to Daytona with you. I’d go anywhere with you,” Elisabeth smiled at him, leaning up to kiss him lightly on the lips, “You know, I’m really glad you’re giving us a second chance. I really didn’t think you would,”
“Why not?” Elisabeth asked as she sat back, looking at him as he smiled, looking down at his hands. He nodded his head a little and laughed as she continued to look at him. She was actually kind of scared of what he was going to say.
“I thought that you had a secret boyfriend up here that you didn’t want me to know about, you know?” Nick said as he looked back up at her, “You’re beautiful and everybody likes you. Who wouldn’t want to go out with you?”. Elisabeth just smiled in return. “And I just didn’t know if you’d want me back as your boyfriend. I laid there every night before I finally got the nerve to come here thinking about what I would do if you told me no, that you didn’t feel anything like that for me anymore -”
“But I do, so you don’t have to worry about that now,” Elisabeth said as she smiled, pulling on his nose lightly as he laughed, “Because I never stopped feeling those things for you. You know what I think?”
“What?”
“I think that the whole newness of the relationship wore off, and we were just what we are now, but we had never experienced anything like that before. We didn’t know how to react to it. We thought the ‘romance’ died and that was it,” Elisabeth said as Nick tilted his head a little, looking at her, “But I really don’t think anything died. I think we just became really comfortable around each other, and we thought that we were just friends, but we were more than that. We just didn’t realize it and we kinda went our separate ways, and tried to move on, but couldn’t,”
“You’re so smart,” Nick whispered as Elisabeth smiled, leaning back on the sofa and laying her head on his shoulder, “I think all of that is true,”
“So do I,” Elisabeth said as she moved her eyes, looking up at him, “I have to go to work really early in the morning for a meeting about the special this weekend before Rascal Flatts goes and rehearse for the awards the next night. Then that morning before the awards, we have to go and rehearse for presenting the award,”
“Sweet,” Nick said as he leaned over, kissing her on her forehead, “And Aaron’s flight lands at 10 in the morning, so I’ll go and pick him up,” Elisabeth leaned her head up, and smiled over at him, “I promise that he won’t be any trouble. He’s just staying for a few days and he’ll leave when we go to Daytona now,”
“Okay,” Elisabeth said, as she leaned up, giving him a little kiss, “Now, where’s that dinner that you had planned tonight?”
“Oh that?”
“No, pizza,”
“Oh, um, I’ll go order it,” Nick said as he gave her a quick kiss on the cheek and moved off of the sofa. Elisabeth sat there, leaning back on the sofa, looking at him as he picked up the phone book, looking through it to find the number of the pizza place. She smiled, watching him concentrating so hard that he was getting the little wrinkled on his forehead.
If he only knew what she was thinking.
