The lights came up and everybody was onstage, suddenly, laughing and hugging and it was the same as it always was but it felt a little different. The whole show JC had been thinking that it should have felt different but it didn't, and even now, as everyone embraced and shouted around him, JC didn't feel any different. It just felt like everyone else did.

Justin slammed into him, hard enough to knock him back two steps, and threw his arms around him. "I love you," he said, and the words slammed into JC as hard as Justin's body had.

"J," he said, "come on, don't cry, come on, it's not like this is the last -"

Joey grabbed him from behind, lifting JC right off the ground and spinning him away before he could say anything else.