Snap Shots Series: Picture Perfect

Eight:


"I'm not doing it!" Willa yelled into her cell phone. "I swear if I have to put up with another one of that guy's little fits!"

"Honey, it's MTV. It's the best television exposure you've gotten in the last few months. I think that this would be a great opportunity to get your face out on television a little. It'll open up a whole new market for you..."

Willa paced across her small living room and stared out the window while her booking agent went on and on about the new market and the whole strategy of getting her face out there.

"MTV is about as wide spread coverage as anyone could get. I mean Cindy and the whole House of Style thing really shot off a lot of people's careers."

Willa stomped her foot. She was cranky from having a bad week and really had thought she'd be done with NSYNC and everyone associated with them when the video had wrapped up two weeks before. "Elena, I don't want to be with THEM!"

There was a pause for a moment and she could almost hear Elena's brain working. The two of them were fairly close despite the fact that had purely a working relationship. Elena was the one who booked her shoots for her and made sure that everything was set for her to travel. The woman was a saint and in the last few months had become somewhat of a friend. Willa knew that Elena was going to ask about the video shoot. Willa had given her a short answer to her question of how it had gone just after the wrap party, but now she was going to want an explanation.

"What happened?" Elena said calmly. "I thought that you were the one who volunteered to be in the video in the first place."

"I did…" she sighed thinking of how excited she'd been to see Lance again. He hadn't made the best first impression with her, but after seeing his face on numerous magazines she'd formed a little crush on him, but since the video shoot she'd found it taxing for her to even look at his face in a picture. She definitely didn't want to have to face him in person if possible.

"You won't have to be there with them. It'll be just you and Carson there for the premiere."

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah. The guys are going to tape a message to be played, but you'll be there live with Carson."

Willa thought about it for a moment. She wanted to say no, but she knew that Elena was right about the exposure. MTV would make her face visible to a lot of people, and although Willa didn't love her modeling career, at the moment it was paying the bills and the more exposure she got, the more bills would get paid.

"I guess I can make it then."

"Honey, if this video goes big you're going to have to be seen with them in public at least if it gets nominated for something at the video music awards."

"Yeah well that's at least a few months away, so I can have all this time to prepare myself to deal with them!"

Elena laughed into the phone. "Good lord girl. Calm down. It's not like they are that bad."

"You've never met them in person." Willa knew that she really shouldn't be bad mouthing the whole group, but dealing with Lance for the photo shoot had soured her to the whole group.

"They can't be that bad. Most of them have model faces."

"Yeah well they have supermodel attitudes to go with them," Willa said knowing how Elena thought of her as a normal person and not a supermodel.

"Honey calm down and go enjoy the rest of your day off. You'll be going to the studio on Tuesday. Now do you want a car to come and drive you up there or do you want to get their on your own?"

"Can I get a car?" she asked, "And will someone go with me? I hate doing press stuff by myself."

"I'll make sure that someone is with you and that the car picks you up at the apartment."

"Thank you Elena."

"Hon, go and eat some ice cream or something."

"I'm planning to."

"You seem stressed out. You need to relax a little."

"I know, I know."

Willa hung up with Elena and went to make herself lunch. She'd been at a shoot for the last two days and was trying to make up for the stress of the event by making herself a huge lunch. She knew that if she was going to deal with working another shoot the next day she was going to have to eat a load of food. She didn't like to deal with the stares of the makeup people and crew when she actually ate a real meal on the set so she usually ate heavily the day before she had a shoot.

She was about to sit down to watch cartoons and eat lunch when the phone rang.

"Hello, Willa speaking."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

He hadn't expected her to pick up. Well he'd called her and wanted to talk to her, but he'd been praying that he'd get her voicemail or something.

"Willa, its Lance."

"What do you want?"

Great. She remembers me. His sarcasm didn't ease the tension that could be felt across the phone line.

He wanted to groan. He hadn't been the one to think of calling her. The guys all wanted him to talk to her and make sure that she was going to show up at the premiere thing for MTV since they hadn't parted a few weeks before as friends.

He took a huge breath. "I was wondering if they'd called you about going to the MTV studios."

"I just got off the phone with them and I'm going to go, only because I know that you won't be there."

Lance bit his tongue and thought about his next move.

"Well I was thinking of seeing if you wanted to go to lunch the next time I'm up your way, but I guess that you wouldn't want to be seen in public if you can't stand to see me in a professional setting."

"You guessed right."

Lance was stunned when she hung up the phone on him.

Fuming, Lance got up and began to pace the room he was staying in that night.

"How'd it go?" Justin asked peeking his head into the bedroom.

"What a bitch!" Lance said, not to Justin really, just into the air.

"Tell Willa I said hello when you call back," Justin said and ducked out of the room again.

Lance stared at his phone again. He wanted to throw it across the room. How could this girl get him so pissed off in such an off beat way? She didn't scream or yell, she just was herself and she'd gotten under his skin.

He dialed her number again and waited for her to answer.

"Hello?"

"Look, you know what? I'm getting tired of your stupid attitude. You've been giving it to me since we met and I just don't understand…" Lance felt his head begin to ache as the air left his lungs with the words he was spitting out at her.

"Oh, hello again Lance." She took a breath and spoke in a lazy tone to him as if she didn't care at all that he was yelling at her. "Goodbye again Lance."

The click of the phone going dead on her end of the line filled his ears. Lance punched the end button on his phone. "Damn it!"

He heard a noise and turned to find JC now watching him from the doorway. "Why don't you just ask her out already?" JC laughed and left the doorway.

Lance thought about dialing her again, but figured two calls was enough for one day. He didn't turn off the phone. He found himself calling up the group's travel agent.

"Hello, I need a flight to New York…JFK…yeah, for Tuesday…and I need a car and driver to get me to Times Square…MTV Studios."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Willa sat back on the couch and munched on her sandwich. She had things to do, but she kept staring at the phone thinking, hoping more like, that Lance would call back. She may not want to see the guy, but playing phone games was always something to fill the afternoon.

Finally when the phone rang about twenty minutes later Willa picked up the phone.

"Took you long enough," she said with a harsh tone thinking that it would be Lance.

"Took what long enough?"

"Who is this?" she asked.

There was a pause. "This is Mark Catchem. I was wondering if you have a comment on your recent engagement to Lance Bass."

"What?" Willa sat up quickly and knocked her soda onto the hardwood floor. "What did you say?"

"Your recent engagement?" the man repeated.

"Look, I don't know who you are…" She thought about it for a moment. "Did Lance put you up to this?"

"Put me up to what?" Mark asked. "I just wondered if you had a comment that I can print in tomorrows edition of…"

"Goodbye!" Willa slammed down the phone and prayed that the guy wouldn't call back. She was going to have to change her cell phone number. If he'd gotten her number then she figured a few other people probably had it to.

Her phone rang again. She tried to ignore it, but after ten rings she finally picked it up. "I told you I don't have a comment!"

"Willa?"

She paused and listened to the voice. "Elena?"

"What's going on?" Elena asked with true concern in her voice. "Who were you yelling at?"

Willa took a breath. "Did you know that someone floated a rumor that Lance and I are engaged?"

"What?"

"That's what I said. Someone just called to ask if I had a comment…" She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "I'm going to kill Lance if I ever see him in person!"

"Honey, calm down."

"I'm sorry," Willa said, "Why did you call again?"

"I just wanted to tell you to dress warmly tomorrow. They're planning on doing some shoots outside so I wanted you to bring some warm clothes with you."

"Thank you MOM," Willa laughed. "I'll stop by the office if we get done early."

"Ok," she said, "Calm down honey. I'm sure the rumors will fizzle out soon."

"I hope so," Willa said. "See you tomorrow."

"Get some rest. I'll make sure that everyone around here knows that you and Lance aren't a couple."

"We aren't a couple. Hell, we aren't even friends!"


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