Chapter 85

“Empty… spaces… fill me up with holes,” I sang, savoring the rumbling sensation of my voice vibrating up from the hollow inside my chest. “Distant… faces… with no place left to go.” My hands floated across the keys of my piano, playing the chords that accompanied my raw vocals as they crescendoed. “Without you… within me… I can’t find no rest. Where I’m… going… is anybody’s guess…”

It had been six days since I’d broken up with Natalie. Six days since she’d packed up everything she had brought to Lexington, including her cat, and left. Six days since we’d said goodbye for the last time.

At first, I was in denial. It didn’t feel real. With as much traveling as the two of us did, it was easy to pretend that Natalie was just on another one of her long-haul trips and would return in a few days. I had to remind myself that she wasn’t coming back this time.

Then came the anger. I felt bitter and resentful toward Natalie’s father for making me believe I wasn’t good enough for her. I was mad at her mother for siding with him, even though she had always seemed supportive of our relationship. But, most of all, I blamed Natalie for allowing her insecurities to come between us, especially after how hard I had worked to overcome my own.

As my anger faded, though, I began to wonder if I was the one at fault. I should have known that Natalie would be upset about what happened in Vegas. I should have thought about her feelings before inviting Dawn to share my bed, or, at the very least, respected the boundaries she had tried to set afterward. Maybe if I had been more understanding, we could have worked through our issues. Had I given up on us too quickly? Could I have tried harder to earn back her trust and her parents’ respect? Should I have chosen her over Dawn?

I kept questioning everything that had happened in the last two weeks, asking myself, What if? What if I hadn’t gone to Vegas? What if Dawn hadn’t gotten sick? What if Bill had said yes? It was painful to think of what could have been.

Eventually, bargaining gave way to depression as I grieved the end of my relationship with Natalie and the loss of the future I had envisioned for us. In some ways, it felt like losing Kristin all over again. The obvious difference was that Natalie wasn’t dead. I could have called her any time and begged her to come back, but I resisted the temptation, telling myself she would be better off without me in the long run.

That was the hardest part for me to accept. After doubting myself for so long, I had finally begun to believe I could be a good husband again, in spite of my disability. But her parents’ rejection had hit me like a wrecking ball, demolishing the fragile sense of self-worth I had spent the better part of five years rebuilding and knocking me right back to square one.

While a part of me would have liked to lock myself in a dark room and wallow in my feelings for a few weeks, I didn’t have that luxury. I was flying to L.A. the following morning for a month of meetings, rehearsals, appearances, and events leading up to the start of the Backstreet Boys’ promotional tour in China at the end of May.

“I tried… to go on like I never knew you.” My voice cracked as I plunked the keys with the pair of styluses I used in place of my paralyzed fingers. “I’m awake… but my world is half asleep.” Dawn had come up with a simple solution for my pedal problem, wedging a block of wood between the base of the piano and the sustain pedal to hold it down. It was far from perfect, but it made my choppy playing sound much smoother by filling the silence between chords as one now flowed into the next. “I pray… for this heart to be unbroken, but without you, all I’m going to be is… incomplete…”

Music gave me a sense of purpose, a reason to get out of bed in the morning and push my mind and body to be performance-ready. It motivated me to listen to the tracks we had picked for the new album, to sing along until I’d memorized the lyrics and harmonies, and to practice the piano, which I planned to play on tour. It provided an outlet for me to express the wide range of emotions I’d felt over the past week.

In spite of my grief, I was grateful to be a Backstreet Boy again. I found myself looking forward to going back to work, which would be a welcome distraction. At least, I would have less downtime in L.A. to dwell on my break-up than I did in Lexington, where I had far too much free time to let dark thoughts fester in my mind.

Despite Dawn’s daily cleaning, I kept finding little reminders of Natalie around the house. Strands of long, brown hair clinging to the pillowcases and shower walls. A bottle of Moscato in the fridge. True crime documentaries saved to my Netflix watchlist. Each one hit me like a jolt of electricity, causing my heart to skip a beat and my breath to catch in my throat. Try as I might to move on and forget about her, I couldn’t seem to let go.

“Voices… tell me… I should carry on,” I continued, hammering the keys harder. “But I am… swimming… in an ocean all alone. Baby… my baby-”

A knock on the door caught me off-guard, causing me to hit the wrong key. “Damn,” I swore under my breath as the discordant sound of my clinker reverberated through the music room, sustained by the pedal. Heaving a sigh, I called out, “Come in!”

The door opened a crack, and Dawn poked her head into the room. “Sorry to interrupt,” she said, “but dinner’s ready.”

“I’m not hungry.”

Dawn opened the door wider and gave me a reproachful look. “How can that be when you’ve hardly eaten all day? Your body needs fuel, even if you don’t feel hungry. And your son needs his dad, even if you don’t feel like talking. So quit hiding out in here and come have one last meal with him before we leave in the morning.”

Her little guilt trip worked. “All right, all right, I’m coming,” I said, using my teeth to tear off the wrist cuffs that held my styluses in place. “Don’t let me forget to pack these.”

“Just toss them in the basket at the bottom of the stairs, and I’ll take them up and put them in one of your bags next time I go upstairs,” she offered.

“Thanks.”

“No problem.” She smiled at me. “You sounded real good, by the way.”

“Thanks,” I said again, managing a sheepish grin back at her. I knew I hadn’t been the easiest person to live with over the past week, but Dawn had handled my mood swings with plenty of patience and just a tad bit of tough love.

I followed her into the kitchen, where the aroma of garlic made my mouth water. Dawn had made lasagna for our last dinner in Lexington. “Smells delicious,” I said as I took my place at the table. Mason was already sitting in his chair, his short legs swinging in anticipation.

Dawn dished us both up servings of lasagna, salad, and garlic bread before filling her own plate. “Dig in,” she said as she joined us at the table.

Threading my thumb and forefinger through the loops on my fork, I cut through the steaming layers of noodles, meat sauce, and cheese. The first bite tasted just as good as it smelled, but the flavor took me back to London, where Natalie and I had begun our relationship, bonding over our shared love of travel, sports, and Italian food. In fact, it had been exactly one year since we’d met on the flight there, one year since our impromptu first date. The realization left a sour taste in my mouth.

“What’s wrong?” Dawn must have seen my face change as I took a bite, because she gave me a questioning glance. “Too hot?”

I shook my head, my mouth still stuffed with lasagna.

She frowned. “Not good?”

I wasn’t sure whether to shake or nod my head to that, not wanting her to think I didn’t like the lasagna. But my hesitation only seemed to heighten her concern.

“Are you choking?” She stood abruptly, nearly knocking her chair over, and was halfway around the table to give me the Heimlich maneuver when I shook my head again.

“No!” I managed to say through a mouthful of food. Swallowing quickly, I forced it down my throat before adding, “I’m fine.”

Resting her hand over her heart, Dawn released a huge sigh of relief. “Jesus, Kevin! You could have said something sooner! You scared me for a second there.”

“Sorry. I was trying not to talk with my mouth full. Table manners, you know…” I glanced at Mason, who was watching me with wide, worried eyes. “But I’m good – and so’s your lasagna,” I added, forcing a smile onto my face to reassure both of them that I was really all right.

“Thanks,” said Dawn as she sat back down. But, even after we’d resumed eating, she continued to keep a suspiciously close eye on me for the rest of the meal.

I forced myself to eat as much as I could stomach, not wanting to give her another reason to worry about me, but I was only going through the motions. Food had lost its appeal. Not even lasagna and garlic bread could assuage my grief.

After dinner, Dawn sent Mason upstairs to play in his room. “Your dad can help me clear the table,” she said, giving me a significant glance as she carried our glasses to the counter. She waited until he was gone to address me directly. “Kevin, are you sure you’re okay?”

“Physically? Yeah, I’m fine,” I replied as I rolled around the table, carefully picking up our plates and stacking them in my lap.

“And emotionally?”

“Less than fine,” I admitted, placing the last plate on top of the precarious stack. As I carted it over to the counter, where Dawn was loading the dishwasher, I added, “The last time I had lasagna was in London last summer, when Natalie came to surprise me there. We ate at an Italian place, just like we did on our first date.” I paused to hand her the plates. “Today’s the one-year anniversary of when we met. I was gonna take her out for dinner tonight and give her those diamond earrings I bought in Vegas last weekend.”

Taking the plates from me, Dawn offered me a sympathetic look. “I’m sorry. I know how hard it is to constantly be reminded of what you had,” she said, bending down to slide them into the bottom rack. “It helps me to focus on what I have. And you still have a lot, Kevin: an incredible career… a great group of friends… a supportive family… and an amazing son, who loves you and looks up to you. Don’t let him see you slip back down into the pit of despair you had to pull yourself out of after Kristin died.” Her voice took on a sharp, warning tone as she straightened up and fixed her gaze upon me again. “I didn’t know you then, but I know that dark place well. It’s not where you wanna be right now, not when you’re about to go back to work. You’ve got a whole bunch of people who are counting on you to be okay, both physically and emotionally.”

I nodded, knowing she was right. If anyone could understand how I felt, it was Dawn. Although she had stopped talking, I could still hear her voice echoing inside my head.

“After Ben moved out and Michael died, I felt so lost and empty, like I had nothing more to give and nothing left to live for. But that was before I met you and Mason. Hokey as it may sound, y’all filled the hole in my heart and helped me find my purpose again.”

Unlike Dawn, I hadn’t lost everything. I still had a purpose and plenty left to live for. I may not have been Natalie’s boyfriend anymore, but I was still a Boy, a friend, and, most importantly, a father. For the sake of my fans, my friends, and my family, I had to get myself together. I couldn’t let my break-up break me.

“I am gonna be okay,” I said aloud, talking to myself as much as to Dawn. “I just needed to wallow for a few days to work through my feelings, you know? But, once I get back to work, I won’t have time to keep dwelling on Natalie. I think it’ll be good for me to be busy again.”

As I spoke, I wheeled myself back to the table to finish clearing it. Tucking a bottle of Italian dressing between my legs and laying a container of Parmesan cheese across my lap, I carried both condiments over to the fridge and put them away. But, before I closed the door, something else caught my eye: the bottle of Natalie’s favorite white wine. Upon sudden inspiration, I carefully pulled it down from the top shelf and put it between my knees.

“I agree,” said Dawn, giving me a curious glance as I opened a nearby drawer and took out my electric corkscrew. “But, in the meantime, I don’t think drowning your sorrows with wine will do you much good.”

“I’m not gonna drink it,” I said, fitting the wine opener over the top of the bottle. With one touch of a button, it cut through the foil cover and pulled out the cork for me. “I’m gonna dump it down the drain.”

“Oh. Well, all right then.” She stood back out of the way, so I could reach the sink.

Watching the wine circle the drain was strangely therapeutic. It reminded me of the day Nick was diagnosed with his heart condition. After coming home from the hospital, I had persuaded him to pour out all of the alcohol I had in the house in an effort to take away his temptation to drink. Similarly, I hoped that ridding my house of reminders of Natalie would help me to forget her.

“Feel better now?” Dawn asked hopefully as I tossed the empty bottle into the trash bin.

I wanted to shake my head, but I forced myself to nod instead. “Yeah… I do.”

***

There were plenty of reminders of Natalie at the house in LA, too. Dawn and I spent our first night there getting rid of them, one by one, until only two remained.

One was the blackbird painting I had done on Valentine’s Day, which Natalie had hung above the headboard of our bed the last time we were in LA together. “Do you want me to take that down, too?” Dawn asked, pointing to it as she tossed a pair of decorative pillows aside and began turning down the bedcovers for me.

I opened my mouth to say, “Yes, please,” but the words died on my lips when I saw her pause to stifle a yawn with one hand. Her other hand was braced against my nightstand, and I noticed the way she was leaning heavily on it, her shoulders hunched. After a long day of traveling, she looked as tired as I felt. “Nah… not tonight,” I replied instead, telling myself it could wait for another time. “Let’s just finish my night routine and get some rest.”

The other lasting remnant of Natalie was the pink bathroom she loved. It was the only room in the house that the interior decorator I’d hired had left untouched, at my request.

“Just say the word, and I’ll pick up a can of paint to cover these pink walls,” Dawn offered the next morning as she washed my hair.

“No point,” I replied dully, looking down at the pink and white tile beneath the wheels of my shower chair. “If we repainted the walls, we’d also have to redo the floor, rip out the pink toilet, and replace the pink sink. I don’t really wanna deal with a full bathroom renovation right now.”

“Understandable,” said Dawn, using her fingertips to massage the shampoo into my scalp. “But let me know if you change your mind. I could use a project to keep me busy while you’re rehearsing all day.”

“You don’t need to be busy. Just relax. Watch TV. Read a book by the pool. Pretend you’re on vacation,” I told her, knowing she would have a hard time doing nothing. “Before you know it, you’ll be back to the daily grind, taking care of Mason by yourself, so you better enjoy the down time while it lasts.”

“You know I don’t mind taking care of Mason,” she replied, rinsing the shampoo out of my hair. “That was the plan all along.”

My break-up had certainly thrown a wrench in our original plan, which was for Dawn to stay in Lexington with Mason while Natalie accompanied me to LA. But, now that Natalie was no longer in the picture, Dawn was going to spend a week in LA with me while my mom took care of Mason. They were both coming to the Star Ceremony for the Backstreet Boys’ star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame the following week, after which Dawn would accompany them back to Lexington, leaving the boys to be my caregivers.

My Backstreet brothers had stepped up in a big way, just as they had after the accident. I had reached out to Nick first, asking if he wouldn’t mind staying at my place for part of the time I was in L.A. Aside from needing someone to help with my morning and night routines while Dawn was in Lexington, I would also need a ride to and from rehearsal, since the wheelchair-accessible van I’d bought wasn’t equipped for me to drive it by myself. Nick had agreed, of course, but when the others had found out about my break-up, they’d rallied around me, too.

“I’d be happy to help with whatever you need,” Howie had offered. “Leigh’s staying in Florida with the boys, so I won’t have my wife and kids around like Brian and AJ will. Besides, I want to be more involved than I was before – you know, after your accident. I still feel bad that I wasn’t around much then. I wish I could have stepped up the way Nick and AJ did.”

“Don’t feel bad,” I’d told him. “You were right where you needed to be – at home, taking care of your dad.”

“Yeah… which gave me plenty of caregiving experience. Nothing much fazes me now, so if you need someone else to learn how to help with your bowel program and stuff like that, I’m your man.”

“I’m sure Nick would appreciate that,” I’d said with a wry smile. “Thanks, man.”

“No problem.”

AJ and Brian were both willing to help out as well, so we worked out a rotating schedule: Nick and Howie would take turns sleeping at my house on the nights before my program days, while AJ or Brian would stay with me every other night and drive my van to rehearsal the next day.

But, that morning, Dawn dropped me off at the rehearsal space we had rented for the next month.

“Kevin!” Our choreographers, brothers Rich and Tone, greeted me with fist bumps and hugs. “Good to see you again, brotha!” I had worked with them before, most recently on my last tour with the Backstreet Boys, Never Gone. But that was when I still had the full use of my body. I knew things were going to be different this time around.

We started the first rehearsal by reviewing the setlist we had put together, which included twenty-two songs, divided into three different sets, with a wardrobe change between each one. It was a well-balanced setlist that interspersed new music between old hits and spread out most of the uptempo numbers, so we had time to catch our breath after the heavily-choreographed parts of the show. Still, even though I knew no one expected me to do as much dancing as the others, just looking at that long list of songs left me feeling exhausted and overwhelmed.

Doubts had begun to creep back into my brain. Was I kidding myself in thinking I could do this? I couldn’t even dress myself in my own bedroom, let alone do a quick-change backstage. And how foolish was I going to feel, wheeling myself across the stage to songs like “Get Down” and “We’ve Got It Goin’ On” while the other guys danced around me?

My imposter syndrome only intensified as Rich and Tone started teaching us their new choreography for “The Call,” which was to be our opening number. In no time at all, Nick, AJ, Brian, and Howie were able to match their crisp, precise movements almost perfectly, while I was still struggling just to keep up. With my curled hands, bent elbows, and hunched posture, I stuck out like a sore thumb in my wheelchair, which put me several heads shorter than even Howie, who was standing next to me. My body moved differently than theirs, so most of the dance moves had to be modified to match my abilities. Even then, every step and turn took careful planning and coordination to execute. It was hard to get the timing just right.

“…five, six, seven, eight,” Rich counted as I pushed my chair across the floor, my eyes fixed upon the tape mark I was trying to reach by the end of the eight-count. I didn’t realize how close I was to Nick until I felt a bump beneath one of my wheels and heard him hitch in a sharp breath between his teeth as I rolled past him.

“Fuck!” he swore. “That was my foot, dawg!”

“Shit, man, I’m sorry,” I said, turning to see him rubbing his toes through the top of his sneaker. “I’m like a bull in a damn china shop. You okay?”

“Yeah.” Nick took a deep breath and nodded, but I noticed him limping as he walked to his mark.

“Why don’t we take ten?” Tone suggested, to my relief.

“Good idea,” Howie agreed, giving me a reassuring pat on the shoulder as he walked past me to pick up his water bottle.

I resisted the urge to shake off his hand as I rolled away, not wanting to be treated with kid gloves. My arms felt like limp noodles from doing the work of all four limbs, but I leaned forward and pushed through the fatigue, following Nick over to the corner where he’d left his bag.

I found him sitting on the floor, unlacing his left shoe. He winced as he gingerly slid it off his foot.

I cleared my throat as I approached him. “You’re not okay, are you?”

“I’ll be fine,” Nick insisted, now peeling off his sock. Propping his left foot up on his right leg, he leaned over to inspect the damage. “It’s just my big toe. Looks like a bad bruise, that’s all.”

Carefully, I moved closer to get a better look. The sight of dark blood pooling beneath his discolored toenail made me cringe. “Damn, brother… I’m really sorry,” I said, staring down at it in dismay. “That’s gotta hurt like a bitch.”

“Yeah,” he admitted, “but I don’t think it’s broken or anything. I can still move it okay.” He demonstrated this by wiggling his toes.

“That’s good. Gonna make it hard to dance, though,” I pointed out, a fresh wave of guilt washing over me. We weren’t even halfway through our first rehearsal and already had one man down – and it was all my fault.

Nick shrugged. “I’ll manage,” he said, easing his sock over his injured foot.

I knew he was putting on a brave face for my sake, masking his pain so I wouldn’t feel worse than I already did. “Maybe we should get you a wheelchair, too,” I joked, forcing myself to smile. “Then I wouldn’t be the only one. You’d balance me out and make me look less awkward.”

Halfway through tying his shoelaces, Nick laughed and shook his head. “You don’t look awkward.”

“Yeah, I do… but, as long as y’all don’t mind, I guess it doesn’t matter. This is what I signed up for,” I said with a sigh, my own mask slipping. “Too late to back out now, right?”

“Right,” Nick said firmly, giving me a reproving glance. “We’re never gonna let you quit this group again, Kev, so you can knock it off with that kind of talk. You’re in it for the long haul now, baby – another twenty years, at least! You know that, right?”

“Right,” I echoed hoarsely, my voice catching in my throat. I swallowed hard, trying to temper the rising swell of emotions that threatened to erupt from deep inside of me.

“Good. Glad that’s settled,” said Nick, reaching out his hand to me. “Now help me up, would ya?”

I couldn’t exactly grip his hand, so I held out my arm and allowed him to grip mine instead as I wheeled backward, gradually tugging him to his feet.

***