Snap Shots Series: Picture Perfect

Four:


"Beep! Beep! Beep!"

Lance pulled his hand out from under the warmth of the covers and slammed his hand down on the alarm clock next to his head and let out a groan. He'd gone to bed as quickly as he could make it up to his room the night before, but had spent most of the night tossing and turning thinking about Willa. It was almost five in the morning, and although the thought of faking sick seemed to be a good way to catch up on his sleep he knew that he had to go to work. It was a video shoot after all and there was no real way to get out of it without completely messing up the schedules for at least fifty people. He hated that about his job. Most of his friends back home had the luxury of calling in sick. They could get away with it, but he couldn't. He was one of the front men of a huge corporation of people and he had to be "on" whenever needed. It was tiring.

"Beep! Beep! Beep!"

"Hit the freaking button LB!" Justin called from the far side of the room. He knew he should have turned the alarm off, but instead he'd just hit the sleep button.

"I got it!" Lance called out into the darkness of the room and rolled over and flipped off the alarm permanently.

"Sham bo for the shower?" Lance asked. They usually called dibs for the first shower, but that morning he thought that he'd be able to trick Justin into taking the first shower, which would give him an extra twenty minutes of sleep. He never lost when they sham-bo-ed for things.

"You go furmnst!" Justin called smothering his face into his pillow, cutting off the last of his reply.

"Fine," Lance mumbled and pushed himself up into a sitting position. He dropped his feet to the floor and took a deep breath then got out of bed and headed for the shower.

He made it through his shower in a flash. He usually was sluggish in the mornings, but being with Justin made him seem like the hare in the tortoise and the hare story. Justin was the slowest man in the world anytime before eleven in the morning.

When Lance had gotten into his jeans and shirt for the morning he nudged Justin with his knee. Checking his watch he saw that they were going to be late if Justin didn't get up so he nudged him again and called out, "Get up and get in the shower Fro. We gotta hit the road."

Just as Justin looked up to acknowledge Lance there was a knock at the door followed by the sound of Mike yelling through the door. "Get your butts up boys!"

Lance ran over to the door, threw it open to find Mike with a cup of coffee in his hand. Lance was amazed. The guy had gotten in as late as the others the night before, but probably had been up for at least an hour and a half before everyone else had to be up.

"We're on our way."

"Get his ass in the shower LB, I don't want to have to drag his ass out of here," Mike warned.

"I'm going! I'm going!" Justin yelled and Lance heard the door to the bathroom slam shut.

Mike left the doorway to move on to the next doorway so Lance shut the door and began to pack up his stuff. The room was going to be cleaned that day, but Lance liked to pack up. He'd had things stolen before so he liked to do a little inventory check before he left his things for the day.

Justin came running out of the bathroom, grabbed on some jeans and pulled a T-shirt over his head and was sliding into his loosly laced running shoes when Mike knocked again.

"We’re coming!" Lance called.

The person knocked again. "Damnit! We're coming Mike."

The knocking didn't stop. "Christ Mike. We're on the way!" Lance grabbed his backpack and went for the door. He swung it open. "Stupidass we're--"

He was cut short when he saw Willa standing at the door. Her hair was already done and she was wearing a good coating of make up, but was wearing work-out clothes.

"You kiss your mother with that mouth?" she asked.

Lance leaned against the doorway. "Yes, but that's no the only person."

Willa blushed a little and looked in. "Justin, honey, you ready yet?"

"But of course," Justin said in a formal tone as he passed Lance and joined Willa in the hallway. She smiled evilly at Lance before she took Justin's arm and went down the hall.

"You look great Willa," Justin was saying as Lance locked the door to their room and followed them. "Well the clothes need a little work, but other than that you look like you just stepped out of a magazine."

"It's her job dumbass," Lance mumbled.

"Did you say something?" Justin asked over his shoulder.

"No." Lance sneered at him and kept his head low as they waited for the elevator.

"Did you get up on the wrong side of the bed this morning?" Willa asked then laughed at her own comment. "Oopps. I forgot. You're always an asshole."

"Whoa!" Justin said and stepped back from Willa. "That wasn't cool."

"Leave it alone Justin," Lance warned.

"What? You're gonna let her talk to you like that?" he asked.

"I didn't say that." Lance spoke to him, but was looking at Willa. "She is a little bitch and she'll get her dues."

"Lance!" Mike said from beside them.

"What?" Lance questioned. "She can call me an asshole, but I can't call her a bitch?"

Mike nodded and pulled Lance away from the elevator while Justin and Willa boarded to ride down.

"Hey! That was my ride." Lance protested and tried to pull away from Mike, but he had him by about sixty pounds so he was stuck there.

"Lance, I know I didn't just hear you call that girl a bitch…"

"You did."

Mike smacked the side of his head in a not so playful manner. "What are you thinking?"

"Owe!" Lance said and rubbed his head. "Physical abuse isn't part of your…"

"And verbal abuse isn't in your job description."

"You didn't hear the things she said to me." Lance wanted the guy to know his side of the story since it was clear that he was taking her side.

"Since when do you let girls get on your ass?" Mike asked.

"Since never."

"Then do you want some cheese with that wine?"

"No," Lance said.

"So are you going to apoligize?"

"No," he said defiantly.

"Well are you at least never going to do it again?" Mike asked.

"Whatever Mike," Lance said and made his way to the elevator again.

He stepped into the elevator and Mike joined them and the two of them rode down to the lobby in silence. Lance could hear Mike breathing in the silent room and felt the guy staring at him angrily.

It wasn't often that the guys fought with their security team, but that was one subject that Lance wasn't going to back down from. He knew rationally that he shouldn't treat her that way, but for the first time in a long time he was fed up having to be the nice guy that everyone thought he should be. If his fans only knew some of the things that went through his mind, he knew that they would drop him off their "Most Whatever" list in a heartbeat.

There had been so many times when he wanted to lash out at people the way he'd ripped into Willa. All the times that they interupted him at dinner or flashed pictures of him while he was in the grocery store or even while he was driving or even when they pulled on his clothes or on his hand when he did reach out to shake hands with them. He knew that he should be sorry for treating her badly, but deep down it felt good to get out that pent up anger.

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

[ A few hours later… ]

Willa was exhausted as she stripped out of her outfit and changed back into the running pants and sweatshirt that she'd been in that morning when she'd arrived at the set. It wasn't the most glamourous of outfits, but she wasn't thinking about looks at the moment. She needed comfort. She'd been in costume all day, including during the lunch break and although she liked the outfit they'd chosen, she wanted back into her pajama-like outfit from the morning. She knew that the next day was going to be even longer.

Today she'd been stuck with Lance dancing around and pretending to have a picnic, but tomorrow they would have a kissing scene and would be half naked together for a scene, a thought that any normal person would have been excited about, but she found herself dreading.

"Willa dah-ling!" Justin called to her from outside the door.

"I'm coming," she giggled a little at his fake accent then adjusted her sweatshirt one last time before heading outside.

When she stepped out and found Justin waiting for her she smiled at him. It was about a quarter until midnight, and although Justin had been whining most of the evening about being tired, he sure wasn't tired now. When the mention of a party came up through the grapevine the guys instantly knew that they were going to go out to their friends' house, which had given Justin a second wind.

"You aren't going to take a long time to get ready are you?"

"No longer than it took you to do your hair this morning," she joked.

"Funny one girl."

"No seriously. I'm already ready." She twirled around and did a few overly dramatic poses. "I hope people like the casual look at this party."

"They'll like whatever you're in," he said. "Now the imporant question is…how do I look?"

"Horrible," she said then laughed at his shocked look. "Justin have you ever looked bad? Of course you look mav-e-lous!"

He pulled her into a hug as they made their way over to the van where Joey, JC, and Chris were climbing in, all wearing the casual clothes that they'd had on that morning.

"Lanceten isn't going?" Justin asked as a group lined up to get into the van parked next to the van that they were in.

"Nah, Mike grounded him."

They all laughed, but Willa frowned at the comment. She watched as Lance loaded up into the other van with some of the other staff members. As they pulled out of the driveway the two vans split and while they headed south, the other van headed north.


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