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ANYONE FOR DINNER Chapter 3
Not surprisingly I had great dreams that night. Most of them centering around me and Howie getting together. The guys had all left me with a parting kiss and a promise that they would see me the following day at the concert. Since I didn't get to sleep until well after four o'clock, I slept later than usual, which for me meant only about nine o'clock. I padded around the house for a while and then jumped into the shower. Just as I was drying my hair my door buzzer went off. "Hello?" I said into the speaker. I wasn't expecting anyone. "Aurora, it's Howie, can I come up?" "Sure." I buzzed him in. Why was he here? He should be at Northlands getting ready for the show. A minute later my doorbell rang. With my towel still in my hand I opened the door. "Hi, Howie." I said, standing aside to let him in. "Hi Aurora." He whispered. 'Did I catch you at a bad time?" "Not at all. Five minutes ago, yes, I would have just stepped out of the shower. This is fine. Can you just give me a minute to do my hair?" I laughed. "Sure go ahead. I'll be here waiting." I gave him a quizzical look, this was so unlike what he was like the night before. Was there something wrong? I brushed it off and figured that he was probably just tired. They had been out later than me. I was standing in front of my bathroom, my head upside down, blow drying my hair. I whipped it back up and came face to face with Howie. "Oh." I said in surprise. "I'm sorry I didn't mean to scare you." "That's okay." I turned back to the mirror, teased a little hair there, sprayed it a little here and I was good to go. "Howie, I get the feeling that there is something wrong." I started leading the way out of the bathroom. Howie was quiet until we reached the living room. Once we were sitting down on the couch he started to talk. "Never did I think that having dinner with you, that this would happen. When I got your letter I thought, hey that would be cool. We will go, have a good meal, hang out, make a new friend, life will go on." Howie looked at me, "Life hasn't gone on for me. I can't stop thinking about you." I was shocked. This was not happening. "Howie, I don't know what to say. This is the last thing that I expected." "I know. Me too. But, when you opened up that door last night, my heart skipped a beat." Howie dropped his head into his hands, "This is insane I know. I shouldn't have come." He got up to leave, but I pulled him back down. "No, Howie, I am glad that you came. I had a blast last night. I will be honest with you and tell you that I felt something last night too, but I think that we need to figure out what it is. It could just be that we are both lonely." I explained to him. "I thought of that. I thought that if I did get up the nerve to come over here and talk with you that maybe we could get to know one another by ourselves. Without the guys. Maybe we could try dating and see where it takes us." He said with enthusiasm. "Uhm ... Howie, dating? I don't know about that. I mean, you are Howie Dorough of the Backstreet Boys. I am just me, Aurora Tingle. You could have any woman in the world I am sure." I stood up and walked toward the window. I could see Howie's limo waiting there, as though he was going to whisk me away. "I don't want any woman, I want to be with you Aurora." He whispered from behind me. I stood there quietly for a minute and then turned around, "But, you are always on the road? How would that work?" "It would work, we have days off, I could come and see you or fly you to wherever we are." He explained. "But Howie, your family means a lot to you, you are going to want to spend time with them. I am at the place in my life where I need my boyfriend to be with me." I said honestly. Howie walked as close to me as he could get, "I want to be that person. We owe it to ourselves to give it a chance. The worst that would happen is that we realize that we can only be friends." He encouraged me. I turned back toward the window. Is that what I wanted? To be the girlfriend of a star? Would I be able to handle the press and all the speculation that came with dating a celebrity? Could I let Howie walk out my door without telling him that I wanted to try this as much as he did? Could I handle being alone while Howie was out shaking his booty for thousands of girls every night? But then on the bright side of things, I would have someone that loved me. Someone that wanted to be with me. "Howie." "Yes?" "Let's give it a whirl. We can try the dating thing. See how it goes. See if I can handle dating a celebrity." I whispered. "Are you sure? I don't want to push anything on you." He checked. "I really want to try this." I turned back around, "I can't guarantee that anything will come of it, but I want to try." Howie was right there when I turned around. We stared into each other's eyes for a second before he took my face in his hands and pulled me to him. Our lips met and it was like someone had lit firecrackers all around us. There was electricity in the air. I wrapped my arms around him, a little unsteady at first, but the more that we got into the kiss, the more comfortable I got. Howie was a great kisser. He wasn't sloppy like some of the guys I have kissed in the past. He was gentle, he didn't try to over take you. After a few minutes, I pulled back. "Mmmm ... as much as I was enjoying that, we had better stop." I said. I took his hand and lead him over to the couch. "That was nice." "Very." Was all Howie managed to get out. I suddenly thought of the other guys. "Howie, what do the guys think of this?" "Actually they are the ones that encouraged me to come. They think that we should go for it." Howie laughed. "They will be happy that we are giving it a shot." "Speaking of the guys, shouldn't you be at the coliseum in rehearsal or something?" I asked, Howie glanced at the clock on the wall.
"Shit, yeah. Do you want to come? You can see the rehearsal, we can
grab some dinner and then you can stay backstage with us until the
show." "Sure go ahead!" I called back. It was a good thing that I was already dressed for what I was wearing that night. Five minutes later I was ready to go and spend another day with them. I still was in shock over what Howie had said to me. But I figured that you only live once and who knew maybe things would work out with me and Howie and he was the man that I was supposed to spend the rest of my life with. I didn't know what the future held for me and Howie, but I couldn't wait to find out.
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