Beautiful Mistakes
SS by Amanda

I slowly walk up the stairs and down the hallway toward the room at the very end.

My room.

Coming back to this place is always special to me.  After all, I don’t get to come home to Memphis very often.  Whenever I do get a rare day off, I normally spend it wherever Britney is or at my Orlando home.

But holidays are almost always spent here.  I don’t know, there’s just something about spending the holidays in your hometown.  It’s bittersweet. 

I can smell the aroma of apple pie and roasted turkey from downstairs as my mother and grandmother fix our Thanksgiving feast as Bing Crosby Christmas songs play in the background.

There’s something about the smell and the music that turns me back into a 12 year old.  I hope I never loose that feeling.

As I open the door and enter my bedroom, a smile instantly forms across my face.

The memories are everywhere.  My grade school basketball picture.  A hat I bought on our first group trip to Germany.  My Star Search participant plaque.  And my favorite.  . . . . . A picture of me and Brit taken on our last day in Orlando for the Mickey Mouse Club. 

That picture has been on my dresser since the day I returned to Memphis and it will stay there forever.  It’s a constant reminder that Britney is part of my past, my present and my future. 

I laugh to myself as I notice a photo album laying on my bed.  I figure my mom has been looking through it as she does often when I’m not here.  She’s probably saw each picture at least a hundred times but she still admires them as if they were new.

I sit down and begin to flip through the pages, thousands of memories running through my mind.

There’s pictures of everyone.  The guys.  The MMC castmates.  Johnny.  Even Lou. 

Pictures of people that all, in some way or another, defined who I am.

“Justin.”

The sound of my mother’s voice startles me and I look up to see her standing in the doorway smiling.

“There’ someone here to see you,” she says softly as she takes a step back and allows my visitor to step forward.

“Huckleberry Finn,” I exclaim as I feel a huge grin come across my face, “It’s been a long time.”

Veronica tentatively steps into the room and walks toward me as I stand up and greet her with a hug.

I see my mom walking back down the hallway out of the corner of my eye as I walk over to the desk at the side of the room and pull the chair out.

“How’ve you been?” I ask as I sit down.

I watch as she begins to move around the room aimlessly, her eyes rarely meeting mine.

“Good.”

I can feel my forehead furrowing as I look at her trying to comprehend her nervousness.

She’s never been nervous around me before, even after our relationship ended.

“How’s the group?”

She stops and turns to me, placing one hand on the post of the bed as the leans against it.

“We’re doing ok.  This year has been rough loosing Amanda and then Jenny not working out.”

She’s beginning to relax more though I still sense some tension in her voice.

“I’m sure it will all work out,” I laugh, “Adversity just builds character.  You all are talented enough that this won’t hurt you.”

She nods her head slowly as a small smile forms across her face.

“What about you?” she asks as she crosses her arms in front of her, “You certainly seem happy.”

I can’t help but smile as she speaks. 

“I have a lot of reasons to be happy,” I say as she turns and begins to walk around the room, “The guys and I have been blessed with this success.  I’m finally getting to do a little acting . . . . . . . .”

I’m about to go on when I see her pick up the picture of me and Britney off of my dresser and turn around.

“And Britney?” she asks.

I nod my head, my face beaming as I acknowledge my happiness with Brit.

“Absolutely.”

She laughs slightly as she turns to the side and looks down at the picture.

“You know, I used to hate this picture.  When we were together,” she looks up at me and smiles softly before returning her gaze downward, “It drove me crazy for you to have this picture here, always reminding me of your bond with her.”

“I didn’t know.  You could’ve told me.”

She turns her head to look at me and I see what I think is sadness in them. 

“Would it have made a difference?”

I lean back in the chair as my eyes move to the frame in her hand.

“I don’t know,” I shrug, “maybe then it would have.”

She shakes her head slightly as she places the picture back down.  I watch her as she sits down on the bed and folds her hands in front of her.

“I came here for a reason, Justin,” she whispers as she begins to rub her hands together, “I came here to tell you something that I’ve wanted to say for a long time.”

“Ok,” I utter, looking at her curiously as she fights diligently to avoid my glare.

Finally she looks up, tears lining the edges of her eyes, and laughs slightly at herself.

“I wanted to tell you that I’m sorry.”

My confusion continues to mount as I lean forward, placing my elbows on my knees and look at her.

“What are talking about?”

“I never told you.  All of those years.  I never told you I was sorry for cheating on you.”

I can feel my heart start to ache slightly as I see the pain in her face as she recalls a time nearly four years ago.

“Veronica . . . .”

“But I am Justin.  I am sorry.  It kills me to read some interview you’ve done where you talk about having your heart broken and know that it’s me that you’re talking about.”

She lowers her head as tears begin to fall slowly down her face.

I take a deep breath and pull my body out of the chair, slowly walking over to sit across from her on the bed.

She jumps slightly as I place my hand on hers.

“You did me a favor,” I whisper as she brings her eyes to mine.

Now she is the one who’s confused.

“At that time in my life, I thought I was invincible.  I took everything I had and everyone around me for granted, including you.”

She lowers her eyes to our joined hands as I continue to speak.

“When you cheated on me, it made me realize that I was loosing myself.  That I was changing and I didn’t like it.”

Slowly, she looks back up at me, her face now streaked with mascara.

“I can’t help but think of what might have been had I been faithful.”

I shake my head as I move my hand to her face and wipe away her tears.

“We both know that we would have never lasted.  It wasn’t meant to be.  I loved you Veronica and part of me will always love you, but we provided more of a comfort to each other than love.”

She nods her head as she looks down at my hand on hers and lightly touches my pinky ring.

“You loved her then,” she whispers as she turns the ring on my finger and brings her eyes to mine, “I knew it but I refused to believe it.”

She laughs slightly as she continues to speak.

“And then when she came to Orlando to audition, I couldn’t ignore it anymore.  The way you looked at her, the way you talked about her, I wanted that so bad.  You were a different person when she was there.  You were the person I always wanted you to be.  And when she left, you began to distance yourself.  I knew then it was because you loved her.”

My heart begins to ache as I watch Veronica speak, the memories flooding my mind.

“I did love Brit,” I whisper as I lower my head, “But I loved you too.”

I take a deep breath before I raise my head to look into her eyes once more.

“When Brit came to Orlando, all of the magic that I remembered about her was back.  But I loved you and she was dating Reg, so I tried not to think about what that magic meant.  I realize today that I gave you every reason in the world to cheat on me.  I subconsciously pulled away from you because I began to distinguish my feelings.”

“But I should’ve never cheated on you.”

“I was hurt,” I say as I look into her eyes, “because I felt that we meant more to each other than that.  I knew that our relationship was ending but I thought that we cared about each other enough not to intentionally hurt the other.  It wasn’t about the love.  It was about the friendship.”

She nods her head as the tears again fall down her cheeks.

“You did mean more to me than that.  That’s why I’m here.”

“Hey, hey,” I laugh as I place my hand under her chin and move her eyes to mine, “like I said before, you did me a favor.  You taught me not to take things for granted.  Now, I make sure that everyone around me knows exactly how I feel.  I tell my parents how grateful I am for them.  And I tell Britney how much I love her every day.  I was burned by our relationship, but now I understand true love and what we had was not true love.”

I slowly rise from the bed and walk over to my dresser, picking up the picture once more.

“See this,” I say as I turn to Veronica and hold up the picture, “this is true love.  And it took our relationship to make me realize that.  We both grew from those mistakes.”

She stares at me intently as I point at Britney in the picture.

“I found my heart right here and eventually you will find yours.”

She stands up slowly and smiles genuinely at me.

“I’m trying to.  But this was something I needed to do before I allowed myself to find that love.  I had to get closure.  I had to tell you how I truly feel.  How I’m truly sorry.”

I shake my head as I place the picture on the bed and walk to her, gently pulling her into my arms.

“Forgiveness is the answer to all problems.  I forgave you a long time ago.  You broke my heart that day, but in many ways, you opened it as well.”

She slowly releases her arms from around me and begins to move closer to the door, her eyes locked on mine. 

“No, I didn’t open your heart Justin, she had already did that long before me.  I just opened your eyes.”

She nods toward the picture as she partially moves into the hallway.

“That picture remained on your dresser for a reason.  You wouldn’t have moved it.”

She smiles once more as she turns and leaves.  I slowly walk over to the bed and pick the picture back up.