Me, Myself and I Part One
New fic!!! Part one is kind of Nick/Selena, but not really. You'll get it when you read, I suppose :)
They don’t really know what causes it. There hasn’t been any trauma in her life that would screw her up this badly, and they think that maybe it’s nothing more than inherent brain chemistry, something that has always been there, beneath the surface.
They do, however, know what triggers the split.
*****
At first they think it’s just the stress getting to her, the exhaustion, making her absentminded and forgetful. People will ask “But you were there, don’t you remember?” and she’ll shrug and say nothing, because she doesn’t remember at all. She tries not to let it worry her.
It’s only the sudden appearence of a tattoo drawn on her arm in ball point pen, with her having no recollection of how it got there, that finally makes her mother take her to see a therapist. He’s the one that, after talking with her for two hours, diagnoses Dissociative Identity Disorder. He also, when they’ve filled Mandy in and she’s stopped crying, was able to explain a possible trigger for it’s sudden appearence.
“Miss Gomez tells me that her friendship with Demi Lovato has recently ended, in a rather unpleasant manner. I believe that the loss of this connection with a person she’s known for most of her life, this raw, visceral fear of being alone, has triggered the personalty split and caused these other personalities to appear.” He explains it all in a quiet, somber voice, whilst Selena tries to make sense of what he’s saying. “This way, in essence, she’d never be alone.”
“How-how many personalities are there?” Mandy asks, weak and shaky, and Selena feels kind of bad that she’s upsetting her mother, but she can’t help but feel relieved. She won’t have to be alone anymore.
“I believe there are two, a male and a female.” The therapist explains.
They keep talking, about possible treatments and how to handle Selena’s new condition. When he asks if they want him to help work on integrating the personalities back into one, Selena says no.
She won’t have to be alone anymore.
*****
When the personalities begin to talk directly to Mandy, she declares that they need to have names. They decide to name the female personality Sara and the male personality Logan, because Brian had been watching X-Men when he first emerged and thought it would be awesome. Selena liked the names and didn’t seem to mind. It was difficult at first, telling the personalities apart, but they learnt how to pretty quickly. Sara’s accent was thicker, she flirted more and cracked less jokes, standing with cocked hip and a sly look in her eye. She was also, for some reason, better at the piano than Selena. Logan was easier to differentiate, if only because he had a deeper, huskier voice and didn’t wear a bra. He dressed in more masculine clothing and was pretty awesome at the guitar. Neither of them wrote lyrics, but both were good actors. They also both understood the importance of Selena’s career, and promised not to do anything to ruin it.
*****
About a month passed, and the only people who knew about Selena were her family. Until Sara started hanging around with Nick Jonas. She went to a couple of his concerts, on a dinner date. He thought he was hanging out with Selena, and Sara was too scared to tell him otherwise. She liked him a lot, and pretty soon they were dating, with Nick thinking nothing was wrong. He did however, get confused when he phoned and got Selena, or Logan, who treated him as nothing more than a good friend instead of a boyfriend. It was this, and encouragement from her mother, that caused Sara to finally tell him the truth.
She decided to tell him on their golfing date, when they were halfway around the course, relaxed and having fun.
“Nick,” she starts off slowly. “What would you say if I told you you haven’t been dating Selena for the last couple of months?”
Nick turned slowly to look at her, squinting slightly. “I’d ask who I had been dating then.”
Sara took a deep breath before blurting out “What would you say if I told you my name was Sara?”
Nick looked at the face in front of him, the full lips, sculpted eyebrows, rounded cheeks. “Sara,” he said slowly, testing how it sounded, how it felt rolling off his tongue. “I’d say it suits you,” he remarks finally. They both pick up the clubs and start moving to the next hole.
“So, uh, you’re saying you aren’t Selena?” He ventures finally.
“Well,” she sighs. “I’m not.”
She glances at him quickly before sighing again at his confused look. “The thing is, I’m here-I’m talking to you right now, but most of the time it’s Selena. But I’m not Selena, and I’m not part of Selena, we’re all just here, you know?”
“All?” He said.
“Yeah, me and Selena and Logan.”
“Oh.”
“It’s like, you have your body to yourself, and you’re there all the time,” she tries to explain. “We all have to take turns.”
“So when you’re onstage or filming...” he trails off.
“That’s usually Selena, maybe Logan, rarely me,” she answers.
“And when you’ve been visiting me?” He asks.
“That’s been me.”
Nick nods, letting it all sink in. It explains some things, like the odd, just-friendly phone calls, which he realises must have been Selena or Logan that he was talking to. He doesn’t really know what to do with this information, except he really likes Sara, and it’s not like Selena’s bad to look at, but.
“Do Selena and Logan know you’re dating me?” He asks quickly.
“Yeah. At first we had no idea what the others had done when they were in control, but now it’s kinda like dreaming, we get images of what the others are doing or have done.” Sara explains quickly to him.
“Does Selena care? That I’m, kinda pseudo dating her?”
“No she knows that I’m happy, and you’re her friend so it doesn’t bother her much,” she replied, smiling reassuringly at him, calming him down.
“Ok then,” he says simply, making her sigh in relief.
“But, Nick, listen, I told you because I- well I had to, I wanted you to know. But you can’t tell anyone else, not even your brothers. We don’t ever- if people find out, the media’ll just make it a big circus, it would be awful, and Sel would- I just-”
“I won’t tell anyone, you have my word,” he butts in quickly, making her finally relax.
“Thanks.”
“It’s ok,” is all he says.
They quickly get back to their game, ignoring the paparazzi whenever they appear.
*****
They manage to see each other several more times, and Sara even buys him a gift, a pocket watch with an engraving on the back. He immediately loves it. The downside to this, however, is the media thinks that it’s Selena doing these things, and immediately rumours of 'Nelena’ start being resurrected, which is stupid because he and Selena never dated in the first place. She’s always been too in love with Demi.
He doesn’t mind though, and Sara, even Selena herself sometimes, all reassure him that they don’t care. As long as they’re happy, it doesn’t matter.
There have, however, been a few bumps in the road. Like that time he visited the Wizards’ set, hoping to see Sara. He’d knocked on Selena’s dressing room door, only to have the door open to reveal who he guessed to be Logan.
“Um,” he found himself floundering with what to say, he and Logan never really talked. “Um, I was hoping to catch Sara.”
Logan’s eyes flickered, but his expression didn’t change. “Sorry,” is all he said, and it was definately Logan, Nick could tell by the deepness in his voice, the way he stood.
“Could you just, uh, maybe tell her I stopped by?”
“No.”
Nick pressed his lips together, eyes narrowing. “Right, sorry to bother you.” He turned to leave.
“Wait, Nick,” Logan blurted, grabbing his arm. “I’m not trying to be a dick, even if it sounds like that. It’s just, yeah we see vague images of what the others do, but we don’t see each other. We can’t communicate. I can’t tell Sara anything, not for you or anyone else.”
Nick just nodded.
“You could- you could leave a note? If you wanted? I’ll put it somewhere she’ll see. Or you could hang with me, I’m sure she’ll turn up soon.”
“No, it’s ok, I have to get back to the JONAS set anyway. I’ll just leave a note.” Nick fumbled in his pocket for a pen and some paper, before quickly writing Hi S, just wanted to let you know I stopped by, call me later, Nick.
He handed the note to Logan, who managed to stick it in the corner of Selena’s mirror.
“So, um, she’ll probably call you, or whatever, or just come back and try again.”
“Right,” Nick said, before hastily retreating back to his own dressing room.
*****
Things get a little crazier after that. Joe and Demi confirm their ‘relationship’ and it’s mostly what he and Sara end up talking about, how sad it makes Selena and how much Selena misses Demi. Nick also spends more time hanging around Logan, who helps him get a few guitar parts down for some songs he’s writing and generally plays Xbox and basketball with him whenever he goes round to Nick’s house. Selena, however, never actually goes to Nick’s, it’s usually Logan or Sara, because she’s too scared to run into Demi being all lovey-dovey with Joe. It’s a rational fear considering they have been hanging around a lot, but they mostly stay up in Joe’s room doing God knows what. There are some times, however, when things are different.
*****
Sara is visiting, and Nick and her are doing the usual couple-y things like cuddling on the couch and watching TV together. Joe and Demi are upstairs, but they’re ignoring them for the moment. Nick finds himself smiling widely at Sara, how cute she is when she giggles at the movie they’re watching, how she scrunches up her nose when she smiles.
“Hey,” her voice startles him, and he didn’t realise he’d zoned out whilst he was staring at her. “Whatcha smilin’ about?”
“Nothing,” he says, and he grins wider when she gives him a mock offended look before leaning in to kiss him. Her lips open to his, hot and soft against his tongue, some of her lipgloss slicking onto his mouth. He thinks she tastes like strawberries. Her fingers brush against the curls at the nape of his neck and he gets hard from one breath to the next. God Sara is an amazing kisser, and he finds himself lost in her mouth.
A cough breaks them apart, and they both turn to see Joe and Demi standing there. Joe is grinning like a lunatic, but Demi has this weird look on her face, like she kind of wants to punch Nick in the mouth. Sara blushes and ducks her head, eyes slipping shut, whilst Nick glares at Joe and tries to avoid looking at Demi.
“Do you want us to go back upstairs and let you finish?” Joe asks with this smug, stupid grin on his face. “Cause dude, people have to sit on that couch.”
“Shut up,” Nick grumbles, scowling and adjusting his pants to hide his obvious erection. When he looks back to Sara, she’s gone, and in her place sits Selena, looking wide eyed and panicky. He can tell it’s her by the slouch of her body and the fact that she keeps glancing at Demi and Joe’s intertwined hands and wincing. He’s disappointed, but Selena is his friend and he quickly acts to get her out of there, pulling her by the hand up to his room and closing his door.
“You do know that they’re gonna think we’re doing something up here, right?” Selena asks, smirking at him gratefully.
“Whatever, you just know you’re glad I got you away from them,” he says back, and he watches her face fall.
“Yeah, it was... hard... being around them. Sorry about this though, I know you wanted to spend the day with Sara,” Selena says apologetically to him, smiling sadly.
“It’s ok, you can still hang around here. We’ll play Guitar Hero or something. It’s just the same.”
They both know he’s lying.
*****
When she’s gone and he’s alone in his room he jerks off, thinking of Sara’s lips on his throat and the curve of his jaw. He’s gone within a minute.
*****
It gets weird. Selena flat out says she’s not dating him in an interview, and he gets it. He’s not dating Selena either. His parents, Joe and Demi seem to be confused with it all, especially because Sara spends a lot more time hanging around their house kissing him and generally acting like a girlfriend. But they’re only seeing Selena, not Sara, and he can’t tell them the truth because it’s not his truth to tell. He can’t tell them about Sara or Logan or how he’s kind of in love with a third of a person. So he just shrugs and avoids most of their questions the best he can.
Things with Sara, however, just keep getting better. Like right now. He’s got two fingers tucked up the hem of her shirt, the backs of his knuckles just touching the soft skin of her hip.
“Can I take this off?” He asks nervously, because he’s never done this before and he’s kind of freaking out.
“Yeah,” she says, ducking her head and blushing, and he just has to kiss her again.
She has a pale blue bra on under her shirt, and he traces the top edges of the cups, just barely brushing against her skin. He pulled her in with a hand around her jaw, licking into her mouth and moaning as she pulls his shirt off, nails scraping against his abs. His thumb brushes against soft material, and on his next pass he pushes the cup aside, tweaking her nipple. Sara gasps into his mouth, breaking the kiss so he moves down and takes her nipple into his mouth, sucking hard. She groans, sinking both hands into his hair to hold him there.
“Um, I’ve never done this before with a guy,” Sara mumbles shyly, hands fumbling against his belt buckle.
“Me neither,” he rasps out, backpeddaling when he catches her raised eyebrow. “I mean- I’ve never done anything like this. Anything you do will be good,” he finally manages to fumble out.
“Well ok then,” is all she says, before bending her head down and taking him in her mouth. His brain blanks out and his eyes roll back and it’s not long before he comes with a helpless gasp into her mouth. When he can finally focus his eyes again, she’s smirking at him. So he decides to retaliate by pulling her sweats down and returning the favour.
He feels pretty smug when she calls his name.
*****
Joe and Demi are holed up in the living room when he comes in from spending time with Sara at her house. They look like they’re discussing something important. He knows they’re concerned, about him, about Selena and what’s actually going on with them. That’s when he makes up his mind that maybe he needs someone on his side, someone in his family. He pulls his cell out of his pocket and dials Selena’s number.
“Hello?” the voice is Sara’s, he can tell by the twang of her accent.
“Hey, it’s me. Baby I wanna tell Joe. About you,” he gets right to it, knowing he would have chickened out if he’d hesitated.
She gasps, words spilling out in a frantic rush. “You can’t, Nick you promised! Selena would-”
“I just wanna tell Joe,” he rushes out, perfectly aware of the tears in her voice and hating himself for causing them.
“Nick you can’t, cause he’ll tell Demi, Demi can’t know. Nick...”
“Ok, ok, I won’t tell anyone,” and he really can’t stop the bitterness in his voice, because it’s just not fair that he can’t even tell his own family who he’s in love with.
“I’m sorry. Maybe we shouldn’t-” Nick has to cut her off there, because he doesn’t like the way that thought is going.
“No. It’s fine. It doesn’t matter ok? I don’t care,” he blurts out frantically. “Look, no one’s gonna be here tonight.”
“Mhmm,” she murmers, and he can hear the playful innocence in her voice now. Relief floods him.
“You can come over? I could pick you up,” he tries again.
“Right,” is all she says, and she’s definately teasing him now.
“Do you want to come over to my house and have sex with me?” he finally asks bluntly, hearing Sara laugh over the other end of the phone.
“Yes. Pick me up at seven,” is all she says before hanging up on him.
*****
When he rings the doorbell, he’s face to face with Logan.
“Hey Nick,” he says, looking kind of sheepish. “Not who you were expecting, huh?”
“Oh, um, no not really.” God Nick just has no idea what to say or do. Should he leave? “Me and Sara kinda had plans. I was hoping she would be here.”
“Yeah I know. I’ve been trying to let go and let her take over but it’s not been working. I think she’s just nervous for tonight,” Logan says, sighing slightly.
“You can do that?”
“Sometimes, but not always,” Logan clarifies for him. “Why don’t we just both go, I think she packed a bag. I’m sure she’ll turn up,” he suggests.
“And if she doesn’t?” Nick asks.
“Then you’re buying pizza and I’m whooping your ass on Call of Duty.”
Nick can’t help but burst out laughing.
*****
They’re on the way to his house, talking about the radio and laughing. Nick looks away to the red light and when he turns back, Sara is sitting there. He immediately turns the radio off.
“Hey you,” she says playfully.
“Hey,” is all he says back, leaning in for a kiss as the light turns green.
*****
Once they’re in his bedroom, Sara pulls her makeup from her bag, shoves it back in, then takes the whole bag into the bathroom. Nick takes his shirt and socks off, thinking for a second before wriggling out of hs jeans and laying on the pillows. He wonders if he should have lit some candles.
When she finally comes out, Nick feels his breath catch in his throat. She’s wearing darker makeup, smoky and sultry and making her eyes look impossably black. A silky black slip and thigh high stockings with a garter belt are all she’s wearing, and she looks absolutely stunning.
“You look beautiful,” he gasps breathlessly, feeling himself harden in his boxers.
“Why don’t you take those off?” she nods towards his boxers, and he quickly slips them off and throws them into the corner. She moves up, legs on either side of his thighs, straddling him. They kiss, and he let his hands slide down her body, from her collarbone to her shoulders to her hips, finger slipping beneath her stocking.
“Take these off,” he breathes into her mouth.
“Why don’t you do it for me?” She asks playfully.
He lays her down, hands skimming from her ankles to the inside of her thighs, followed by his lips. He pulls the stockings down, tongue trailing after, all the way down to her feet where he slips them off. Sara watches him keenly, even as her leg starts to tremble.
He lays back over her, pulling the slip free from her body and gasping at the sight. “You look so beautiful,” he whispers softly to her, fumbling for a condom. She wraps her legs around his waist, puling their hips together.
“Make love to me,” she whispers softly, and he groans.
“Yes,” he breathes back, pressing forward.
*****
He wakes up early to her shifting out of his bed, the daylight weak and gray through his curtains. “Shhh, sleep more," she whispers when she sees his open eyes. He watches through sleep-hazed eyes as she walks towards her bag, picking up her phone and walking to the bathroom.
“Mom it’s me, Sara!” He hears her say before the door closes and he slips back to sleep.
*****
The light is stronger when he wakes up again, and Sara is sleeping next to him. He touches her shoulder, and she opens her eyes and smiles at him.
“Hi,” she mumbles quietly.
“Morning,” he grins back before leaning in to kiss her. They kiss more in the shower, then again at every red light and stop sign on the drive back to her house.
*****
He knocks on Selena’s dressing room on the Wizards’ set, smiling happily when Sara opens the door and yanks him in, waving at David and Jennifer when they start cat-calling. She pulls him into a kiss, sweet and easy, and they stumble onto her couch, Sara’s hands already pulling at his belt and jeans. She scrunches down enough to get her mouth on his dick, and she’s even better than he remembers.
They kiss for a while afterwards, soft brushes of lips and teasing tongues, lazy and slow, pulling back until they’re just breathing against each others mouths, bodies pressed against one another. They fall asleep like that.
He wakes up to someone shaking him.
“Nick, yo Nick wake up.” He opens his eyes to see Selena lying next to him. He blinks a couple of times.
“Selena,” he says, suddenly eternally grateful Sara had passed him his boxers and put her shirt back on before they fell asleep.
“Sorry to wake you, but I need to get up,” Selena says with a lopsided smile on her face.
“Right, yeah of course.” He rolls out of bed and quickly struggles into his jeans. “I’ll uh- I’ll just get dressed and out of your hair.” He points helplessly at the dressing room door.
“What? No, Nick,I’m not kicking you out, you can go back to sleep if you’re not needed on your set.”
He felt like he could have slept for another 12 hours, but it felt too weird to sleep on Selena’s couch without Sara there. He quickly pulled on his shirt and wandered out to the communal rest area on the Wizards set. There he found David, Jennifer and everyone from the JONAS, Sonny and Hannah Montana sets. It’s only then that he realises it’s lunchtime.
As soon as David sees him he smiles a big, shit-eating grin. “Hey little Jonas, enjoy yourself?” He teases loud enough to catch the attention of all their friends. Nick blushes wildly whilst trying to avoid Demi’s stare. If looks could kill, he’d be so dead right now.
He sat down to eat with everyone else, picking up a sandwich and a diet coke whilst Joe and David press him for details. Selena eventually walked out of her dressing room in a fresh shirt, picking up some food and flopping down next to Nick, engaging him in a conversation about his tour and ignoring the looks everyone else is throwing them. He’s just glad she appeared, because now Demi’s eyes have stopped trying to burn a hole in the side of his face and have now moved on to Selena. He can tell she’s aware of this by how much she’s squirming. He smiles to himself at her discomfort before she catches him doing it and punches him in the arm. Hard.
He just laughs.
*****
“Nick?” The voice is soft, and he looks down to where Sara is sitting on her couch. “We need to talk about what’s going to happen when I go on tour.” She tugged on his hand, and he sat next to her reluctantly.
“What do you mean? We can call each other, video chat, email, and I’ll try to visit you whenever I can,” he tries to assure her, but deep down he knows what she’s going to say, no matter what he does.
“No, Nick, listen. I’ve been in control a lot more than usual, you’ve managed to bring me out. But when I leave, I’m going to fade away a bit. You could call, but it won’t just be a long-distance relationship. It could be months before we ever even got contact,”she explained sadly, tears beginnig to glisten in her eyes.
“I don’t care about that, I’ll wait as long as it takes-”
“There’s something else. It’s not fair on you to be in love with a third of a person, not when the other parts are in love with someone else. I want you to be with someone who can give you everything”
“So both Logan and Selena are in love with Demi now...” He lets his voice trail off, he knows he’s losing this battle.
“Yeah, it’s hard not to fall in love with her when all you can see is how fantasic she is in Selena’s eyes. Honestly sometimes I feel a little in love with her,” Sara tries to joke, but it falls flat.
“I-I get it. I hate it, but I get it.” He picks up his jacket. “I gotta go meet up with my brothers.”
“Are you coming back here tonight?” Sara asks, small and unsure.
“Are you?” He fires back, then immediately regrets it when her face crumples and she starts crying in earnest. “Shit, I didn’t mean that, that was a shitty thing to say, I’m sorry. Of course I’ll come back. I just-I need to go away for a while.”
He walk away towards the door, hearing the beep of her phone keys.
“Mom, it’s Sara,” he hears her say, voice thick with tears.
He climbs back into her bed later on in the night, smiling slightly and pressing a kiss to her hair. She shifts in his arms, pressing her face against his collarbone and sighing.
“Can we just sleep tonight?” She asks quietly.
“Yeah, we can,” he whispers. He’s convinced he won’t be able to sleep at all tonight, but he’s alseep before he knows it.
*****
They spend the rest of their days together, with Nick actively trying not to sulk. There doesn’t seem to be anything else to say, so they mostly spend all their time watching movies and making out.
There was one more night where they had a house to themselves, and they used it to make love at length and leisure, knowing it would be the last time. He kissed Sara’s throat as she arched into him, and he still thought she was the most beautiful thing on the planet.
“You could still text, or call, if you wanted,” he says to her as they lay there intertwined. “Just because we won’t be together doesn’t mean I won’t be there for you.”
“Maybe,” Sara whispers back, lips pressing against his. “Maybe.”
On the last day before the tour Nick had planned to sleep in, to escape reality for a little while. However, he found himself waking up early. When he turned to Sara, he saw she had her eyes open and was watching him.
“Morning,” he murmurs despondantly. “You wanna shower first?”
“Sure,” Sara whispers back quietly before disappearing into the bathroom. They’re in his bedroom, so he quickly gets some new clothes and waits for her to come out of the bathroom before taking her place. When he comes out, he finds her fully dressed in her favourite comfy clothes. She stands up and presses a kiss to his lips, her arms around his neck.
“I have to go home and get packed, so I’ll say goodbye now. You can get in touch whenever you want, and I’ll call when I can.” She leans up and kisses him again before stepping back and closing her eyes.
“Wait!” He reaches for her, and Selena blinks up at him.
“Nick, hey,” she says, sounding confused. Nick tugs at the hoodie covering her tank top.
“Take this off,” he asks.
Selena stiffens and pulls away. “Nick,” she says again, sharper this time.
“No, Sel, look I know it’s you, just take it off, please,” he begs.
She shoots him a look, but does as he says. He grabs Sara’s discarded lipstick and writes GOODBYE on her forearm in glistening red letters.
“Leave that on until she sees it,” he says.
Selena nods, shooting him a sympathetic look before walking out of his bedroom.
They don’t really know what causes it. There hasn’t been any trauma in her life that would screw her up this badly, and they think that maybe it’s nothing more than inherent brain chemistry, something that has always been there, beneath the surface.
They do, however, know what triggers the split.
*****
At first they think it’s just the stress getting to her, the exhaustion, making her absentminded and forgetful. People will ask “But you were there, don’t you remember?” and she’ll shrug and say nothing, because she doesn’t remember at all. She tries not to let it worry her.
It’s only the sudden appearence of a tattoo drawn on her arm in ball point pen, with her having no recollection of how it got there, that finally makes her mother take her to see a therapist. He’s the one that, after talking with her for two hours, diagnoses Dissociative Identity Disorder. He also, when they’ve filled Mandy in and she’s stopped crying, was able to explain a possible trigger for it’s sudden appearence.
“Miss Gomez tells me that her friendship with Demi Lovato has recently ended, in a rather unpleasant manner. I believe that the loss of this connection with a person she’s known for most of her life, this raw, visceral fear of being alone, has triggered the personalty split and caused these other personalities to appear.” He explains it all in a quiet, somber voice, whilst Selena tries to make sense of what he’s saying. “This way, in essence, she’d never be alone.”
“How-how many personalities are there?” Mandy asks, weak and shaky, and Selena feels kind of bad that she’s upsetting her mother, but she can’t help but feel relieved. She won’t have to be alone anymore.
“I believe there are two, a male and a female.” The therapist explains.
They keep talking, about possible treatments and how to handle Selena’s new condition. When he asks if they want him to help work on integrating the personalities back into one, Selena says no.
She won’t have to be alone anymore.
*****
When the personalities begin to talk directly to Mandy, she declares that they need to have names. They decide to name the female personality Sara and the male personality Logan, because Brian had been watching X-Men when he first emerged and thought it would be awesome. Selena liked the names and didn’t seem to mind. It was difficult at first, telling the personalities apart, but they learnt how to pretty quickly. Sara’s accent was thicker, she flirted more and cracked less jokes, standing with cocked hip and a sly look in her eye. She was also, for some reason, better at the piano than Selena. Logan was easier to differentiate, if only because he had a deeper, huskier voice and didn’t wear a bra. He dressed in more masculine clothing and was pretty awesome at the guitar. Neither of them wrote lyrics, but both were good actors. They also both understood the importance of Selena’s career, and promised not to do anything to ruin it.
*****
About a month passed, and the only people who knew about Selena were her family. Until Sara started hanging around with Nick Jonas. She went to a couple of his concerts, on a dinner date. He thought he was hanging out with Selena, and Sara was too scared to tell him otherwise. She liked him a lot, and pretty soon they were dating, with Nick thinking nothing was wrong. He did however, get confused when he phoned and got Selena, or Logan, who treated him as nothing more than a good friend instead of a boyfriend. It was this, and encouragement from her mother, that caused Sara to finally tell him the truth.
She decided to tell him on their golfing date, when they were halfway around the course, relaxed and having fun.
“Nick,” she starts off slowly. “What would you say if I told you you haven’t been dating Selena for the last couple of months?”
Nick turned slowly to look at her, squinting slightly. “I’d ask who I had been dating then.”
Sara took a deep breath before blurting out “What would you say if I told you my name was Sara?”
Nick looked at the face in front of him, the full lips, sculpted eyebrows, rounded cheeks. “Sara,” he said slowly, testing how it sounded, how it felt rolling off his tongue. “I’d say it suits you,” he remarks finally. They both pick up the clubs and start moving to the next hole.
“So, uh, you’re saying you aren’t Selena?” He ventures finally.
“Well,” she sighs. “I’m not.”
She glances at him quickly before sighing again at his confused look. “The thing is, I’m here-I’m talking to you right now, but most of the time it’s Selena. But I’m not Selena, and I’m not part of Selena, we’re all just here, you know?”
“All?” He said.
“Yeah, me and Selena and Logan.”
“Oh.”
“It’s like, you have your body to yourself, and you’re there all the time,” she tries to explain. “We all have to take turns.”
“So when you’re onstage or filming...” he trails off.
“That’s usually Selena, maybe Logan, rarely me,” she answers.
“And when you’ve been visiting me?” He asks.
“That’s been me.”
Nick nods, letting it all sink in. It explains some things, like the odd, just-friendly phone calls, which he realises must have been Selena or Logan that he was talking to. He doesn’t really know what to do with this information, except he really likes Sara, and it’s not like Selena’s bad to look at, but.
“Do Selena and Logan know you’re dating me?” He asks quickly.
“Yeah. At first we had no idea what the others had done when they were in control, but now it’s kinda like dreaming, we get images of what the others are doing or have done.” Sara explains quickly to him.
“Does Selena care? That I’m, kinda pseudo dating her?”
“No she knows that I’m happy, and you’re her friend so it doesn’t bother her much,” she replied, smiling reassuringly at him, calming him down.
“Ok then,” he says simply, making her sigh in relief.
“But, Nick, listen, I told you because I- well I had to, I wanted you to know. But you can’t tell anyone else, not even your brothers. We don’t ever- if people find out, the media’ll just make it a big circus, it would be awful, and Sel would- I just-”
“I won’t tell anyone, you have my word,” he butts in quickly, making her finally relax.
“Thanks.”
“It’s ok,” is all he says.
They quickly get back to their game, ignoring the paparazzi whenever they appear.
*****
They manage to see each other several more times, and Sara even buys him a gift, a pocket watch with an engraving on the back. He immediately loves it. The downside to this, however, is the media thinks that it’s Selena doing these things, and immediately rumours of 'Nelena’ start being resurrected, which is stupid because he and Selena never dated in the first place. She’s always been too in love with Demi.
He doesn’t mind though, and Sara, even Selena herself sometimes, all reassure him that they don’t care. As long as they’re happy, it doesn’t matter.
There have, however, been a few bumps in the road. Like that time he visited the Wizards’ set, hoping to see Sara. He’d knocked on Selena’s dressing room door, only to have the door open to reveal who he guessed to be Logan.
“Um,” he found himself floundering with what to say, he and Logan never really talked. “Um, I was hoping to catch Sara.”
Logan’s eyes flickered, but his expression didn’t change. “Sorry,” is all he said, and it was definately Logan, Nick could tell by the deepness in his voice, the way he stood.
“Could you just, uh, maybe tell her I stopped by?”
“No.”
Nick pressed his lips together, eyes narrowing. “Right, sorry to bother you.” He turned to leave.
“Wait, Nick,” Logan blurted, grabbing his arm. “I’m not trying to be a dick, even if it sounds like that. It’s just, yeah we see vague images of what the others do, but we don’t see each other. We can’t communicate. I can’t tell Sara anything, not for you or anyone else.”
Nick just nodded.
“You could- you could leave a note? If you wanted? I’ll put it somewhere she’ll see. Or you could hang with me, I’m sure she’ll turn up soon.”
“No, it’s ok, I have to get back to the JONAS set anyway. I’ll just leave a note.” Nick fumbled in his pocket for a pen and some paper, before quickly writing Hi S, just wanted to let you know I stopped by, call me later, Nick.
He handed the note to Logan, who managed to stick it in the corner of Selena’s mirror.
“So, um, she’ll probably call you, or whatever, or just come back and try again.”
“Right,” Nick said, before hastily retreating back to his own dressing room.
*****
Things get a little crazier after that. Joe and Demi confirm their ‘relationship’ and it’s mostly what he and Sara end up talking about, how sad it makes Selena and how much Selena misses Demi. Nick also spends more time hanging around Logan, who helps him get a few guitar parts down for some songs he’s writing and generally plays Xbox and basketball with him whenever he goes round to Nick’s house. Selena, however, never actually goes to Nick’s, it’s usually Logan or Sara, because she’s too scared to run into Demi being all lovey-dovey with Joe. It’s a rational fear considering they have been hanging around a lot, but they mostly stay up in Joe’s room doing God knows what. There are some times, however, when things are different.
*****
Sara is visiting, and Nick and her are doing the usual couple-y things like cuddling on the couch and watching TV together. Joe and Demi are upstairs, but they’re ignoring them for the moment. Nick finds himself smiling widely at Sara, how cute she is when she giggles at the movie they’re watching, how she scrunches up her nose when she smiles.
“Hey,” her voice startles him, and he didn’t realise he’d zoned out whilst he was staring at her. “Whatcha smilin’ about?”
“Nothing,” he says, and he grins wider when she gives him a mock offended look before leaning in to kiss him. Her lips open to his, hot and soft against his tongue, some of her lipgloss slicking onto his mouth. He thinks she tastes like strawberries. Her fingers brush against the curls at the nape of his neck and he gets hard from one breath to the next. God Sara is an amazing kisser, and he finds himself lost in her mouth.
A cough breaks them apart, and they both turn to see Joe and Demi standing there. Joe is grinning like a lunatic, but Demi has this weird look on her face, like she kind of wants to punch Nick in the mouth. Sara blushes and ducks her head, eyes slipping shut, whilst Nick glares at Joe and tries to avoid looking at Demi.
“Do you want us to go back upstairs and let you finish?” Joe asks with this smug, stupid grin on his face. “Cause dude, people have to sit on that couch.”
“Shut up,” Nick grumbles, scowling and adjusting his pants to hide his obvious erection. When he looks back to Sara, she’s gone, and in her place sits Selena, looking wide eyed and panicky. He can tell it’s her by the slouch of her body and the fact that she keeps glancing at Demi and Joe’s intertwined hands and wincing. He’s disappointed, but Selena is his friend and he quickly acts to get her out of there, pulling her by the hand up to his room and closing his door.
“You do know that they’re gonna think we’re doing something up here, right?” Selena asks, smirking at him gratefully.
“Whatever, you just know you’re glad I got you away from them,” he says back, and he watches her face fall.
“Yeah, it was... hard... being around them. Sorry about this though, I know you wanted to spend the day with Sara,” Selena says apologetically to him, smiling sadly.
“It’s ok, you can still hang around here. We’ll play Guitar Hero or something. It’s just the same.”
They both know he’s lying.
*****
When she’s gone and he’s alone in his room he jerks off, thinking of Sara’s lips on his throat and the curve of his jaw. He’s gone within a minute.
*****
It gets weird. Selena flat out says she’s not dating him in an interview, and he gets it. He’s not dating Selena either. His parents, Joe and Demi seem to be confused with it all, especially because Sara spends a lot more time hanging around their house kissing him and generally acting like a girlfriend. But they’re only seeing Selena, not Sara, and he can’t tell them the truth because it’s not his truth to tell. He can’t tell them about Sara or Logan or how he’s kind of in love with a third of a person. So he just shrugs and avoids most of their questions the best he can.
Things with Sara, however, just keep getting better. Like right now. He’s got two fingers tucked up the hem of her shirt, the backs of his knuckles just touching the soft skin of her hip.
“Can I take this off?” He asks nervously, because he’s never done this before and he’s kind of freaking out.
“Yeah,” she says, ducking her head and blushing, and he just has to kiss her again.
She has a pale blue bra on under her shirt, and he traces the top edges of the cups, just barely brushing against her skin. He pulled her in with a hand around her jaw, licking into her mouth and moaning as she pulls his shirt off, nails scraping against his abs. His thumb brushes against soft material, and on his next pass he pushes the cup aside, tweaking her nipple. Sara gasps into his mouth, breaking the kiss so he moves down and takes her nipple into his mouth, sucking hard. She groans, sinking both hands into his hair to hold him there.
“Um, I’ve never done this before with a guy,” Sara mumbles shyly, hands fumbling against his belt buckle.
“Me neither,” he rasps out, backpeddaling when he catches her raised eyebrow. “I mean- I’ve never done anything like this. Anything you do will be good,” he finally manages to fumble out.
“Well ok then,” is all she says, before bending her head down and taking him in her mouth. His brain blanks out and his eyes roll back and it’s not long before he comes with a helpless gasp into her mouth. When he can finally focus his eyes again, she’s smirking at him. So he decides to retaliate by pulling her sweats down and returning the favour.
He feels pretty smug when she calls his name.
*****
Joe and Demi are holed up in the living room when he comes in from spending time with Sara at her house. They look like they’re discussing something important. He knows they’re concerned, about him, about Selena and what’s actually going on with them. That’s when he makes up his mind that maybe he needs someone on his side, someone in his family. He pulls his cell out of his pocket and dials Selena’s number.
“Hello?” the voice is Sara’s, he can tell by the twang of her accent.
“Hey, it’s me. Baby I wanna tell Joe. About you,” he gets right to it, knowing he would have chickened out if he’d hesitated.
She gasps, words spilling out in a frantic rush. “You can’t, Nick you promised! Selena would-”
“I just wanna tell Joe,” he rushes out, perfectly aware of the tears in her voice and hating himself for causing them.
“Nick you can’t, cause he’ll tell Demi, Demi can’t know. Nick...”
“Ok, ok, I won’t tell anyone,” and he really can’t stop the bitterness in his voice, because it’s just not fair that he can’t even tell his own family who he’s in love with.
“I’m sorry. Maybe we shouldn’t-” Nick has to cut her off there, because he doesn’t like the way that thought is going.
“No. It’s fine. It doesn’t matter ok? I don’t care,” he blurts out frantically. “Look, no one’s gonna be here tonight.”
“Mhmm,” she murmers, and he can hear the playful innocence in her voice now. Relief floods him.
“You can come over? I could pick you up,” he tries again.
“Right,” is all she says, and she’s definately teasing him now.
“Do you want to come over to my house and have sex with me?” he finally asks bluntly, hearing Sara laugh over the other end of the phone.
“Yes. Pick me up at seven,” is all she says before hanging up on him.
*****
When he rings the doorbell, he’s face to face with Logan.
“Hey Nick,” he says, looking kind of sheepish. “Not who you were expecting, huh?”
“Oh, um, no not really.” God Nick just has no idea what to say or do. Should he leave? “Me and Sara kinda had plans. I was hoping she would be here.”
“Yeah I know. I’ve been trying to let go and let her take over but it’s not been working. I think she’s just nervous for tonight,” Logan says, sighing slightly.
“You can do that?”
“Sometimes, but not always,” Logan clarifies for him. “Why don’t we just both go, I think she packed a bag. I’m sure she’ll turn up,” he suggests.
“And if she doesn’t?” Nick asks.
“Then you’re buying pizza and I’m whooping your ass on Call of Duty.”
Nick can’t help but burst out laughing.
*****
They’re on the way to his house, talking about the radio and laughing. Nick looks away to the red light and when he turns back, Sara is sitting there. He immediately turns the radio off.
“Hey you,” she says playfully.
“Hey,” is all he says back, leaning in for a kiss as the light turns green.
*****
Once they’re in his bedroom, Sara pulls her makeup from her bag, shoves it back in, then takes the whole bag into the bathroom. Nick takes his shirt and socks off, thinking for a second before wriggling out of hs jeans and laying on the pillows. He wonders if he should have lit some candles.
When she finally comes out, Nick feels his breath catch in his throat. She’s wearing darker makeup, smoky and sultry and making her eyes look impossably black. A silky black slip and thigh high stockings with a garter belt are all she’s wearing, and she looks absolutely stunning.
“You look beautiful,” he gasps breathlessly, feeling himself harden in his boxers.
“Why don’t you take those off?” she nods towards his boxers, and he quickly slips them off and throws them into the corner. She moves up, legs on either side of his thighs, straddling him. They kiss, and he let his hands slide down her body, from her collarbone to her shoulders to her hips, finger slipping beneath her stocking.
“Take these off,” he breathes into her mouth.
“Why don’t you do it for me?” She asks playfully.
He lays her down, hands skimming from her ankles to the inside of her thighs, followed by his lips. He pulls the stockings down, tongue trailing after, all the way down to her feet where he slips them off. Sara watches him keenly, even as her leg starts to tremble.
He lays back over her, pulling the slip free from her body and gasping at the sight. “You look so beautiful,” he whispers softly to her, fumbling for a condom. She wraps her legs around his waist, puling their hips together.
“Make love to me,” she whispers softly, and he groans.
“Yes,” he breathes back, pressing forward.
*****
He wakes up early to her shifting out of his bed, the daylight weak and gray through his curtains. “Shhh, sleep more," she whispers when she sees his open eyes. He watches through sleep-hazed eyes as she walks towards her bag, picking up her phone and walking to the bathroom.
“Mom it’s me, Sara!” He hears her say before the door closes and he slips back to sleep.
*****
The light is stronger when he wakes up again, and Sara is sleeping next to him. He touches her shoulder, and she opens her eyes and smiles at him.
“Hi,” she mumbles quietly.
“Morning,” he grins back before leaning in to kiss her. They kiss more in the shower, then again at every red light and stop sign on the drive back to her house.
*****
He knocks on Selena’s dressing room on the Wizards’ set, smiling happily when Sara opens the door and yanks him in, waving at David and Jennifer when they start cat-calling. She pulls him into a kiss, sweet and easy, and they stumble onto her couch, Sara’s hands already pulling at his belt and jeans. She scrunches down enough to get her mouth on his dick, and she’s even better than he remembers.
They kiss for a while afterwards, soft brushes of lips and teasing tongues, lazy and slow, pulling back until they’re just breathing against each others mouths, bodies pressed against one another. They fall asleep like that.
He wakes up to someone shaking him.
“Nick, yo Nick wake up.” He opens his eyes to see Selena lying next to him. He blinks a couple of times.
“Selena,” he says, suddenly eternally grateful Sara had passed him his boxers and put her shirt back on before they fell asleep.
“Sorry to wake you, but I need to get up,” Selena says with a lopsided smile on her face.
“Right, yeah of course.” He rolls out of bed and quickly struggles into his jeans. “I’ll uh- I’ll just get dressed and out of your hair.” He points helplessly at the dressing room door.
“What? No, Nick,I’m not kicking you out, you can go back to sleep if you’re not needed on your set.”
He felt like he could have slept for another 12 hours, but it felt too weird to sleep on Selena’s couch without Sara there. He quickly pulled on his shirt and wandered out to the communal rest area on the Wizards set. There he found David, Jennifer and everyone from the JONAS, Sonny and Hannah Montana sets. It’s only then that he realises it’s lunchtime.
As soon as David sees him he smiles a big, shit-eating grin. “Hey little Jonas, enjoy yourself?” He teases loud enough to catch the attention of all their friends. Nick blushes wildly whilst trying to avoid Demi’s stare. If looks could kill, he’d be so dead right now.
He sat down to eat with everyone else, picking up a sandwich and a diet coke whilst Joe and David press him for details. Selena eventually walked out of her dressing room in a fresh shirt, picking up some food and flopping down next to Nick, engaging him in a conversation about his tour and ignoring the looks everyone else is throwing them. He’s just glad she appeared, because now Demi’s eyes have stopped trying to burn a hole in the side of his face and have now moved on to Selena. He can tell she’s aware of this by how much she’s squirming. He smiles to himself at her discomfort before she catches him doing it and punches him in the arm. Hard.
He just laughs.
*****
“Nick?” The voice is soft, and he looks down to where Sara is sitting on her couch. “We need to talk about what’s going to happen when I go on tour.” She tugged on his hand, and he sat next to her reluctantly.
“What do you mean? We can call each other, video chat, email, and I’ll try to visit you whenever I can,” he tries to assure her, but deep down he knows what she’s going to say, no matter what he does.
“No, Nick, listen. I’ve been in control a lot more than usual, you’ve managed to bring me out. But when I leave, I’m going to fade away a bit. You could call, but it won’t just be a long-distance relationship. It could be months before we ever even got contact,”she explained sadly, tears beginnig to glisten in her eyes.
“I don’t care about that, I’ll wait as long as it takes-”
“There’s something else. It’s not fair on you to be in love with a third of a person, not when the other parts are in love with someone else. I want you to be with someone who can give you everything”
“So both Logan and Selena are in love with Demi now...” He lets his voice trail off, he knows he’s losing this battle.
“Yeah, it’s hard not to fall in love with her when all you can see is how fantasic she is in Selena’s eyes. Honestly sometimes I feel a little in love with her,” Sara tries to joke, but it falls flat.
“I-I get it. I hate it, but I get it.” He picks up his jacket. “I gotta go meet up with my brothers.”
“Are you coming back here tonight?” Sara asks, small and unsure.
“Are you?” He fires back, then immediately regrets it when her face crumples and she starts crying in earnest. “Shit, I didn’t mean that, that was a shitty thing to say, I’m sorry. Of course I’ll come back. I just-I need to go away for a while.”
He walk away towards the door, hearing the beep of her phone keys.
“Mom, it’s Sara,” he hears her say, voice thick with tears.
He climbs back into her bed later on in the night, smiling slightly and pressing a kiss to her hair. She shifts in his arms, pressing her face against his collarbone and sighing.
“Can we just sleep tonight?” She asks quietly.
“Yeah, we can,” he whispers. He’s convinced he won’t be able to sleep at all tonight, but he’s alseep before he knows it.
*****
They spend the rest of their days together, with Nick actively trying not to sulk. There doesn’t seem to be anything else to say, so they mostly spend all their time watching movies and making out.
There was one more night where they had a house to themselves, and they used it to make love at length and leisure, knowing it would be the last time. He kissed Sara’s throat as she arched into him, and he still thought she was the most beautiful thing on the planet.
“You could still text, or call, if you wanted,” he says to her as they lay there intertwined. “Just because we won’t be together doesn’t mean I won’t be there for you.”
“Maybe,” Sara whispers back, lips pressing against his. “Maybe.”
On the last day before the tour Nick had planned to sleep in, to escape reality for a little while. However, he found himself waking up early. When he turned to Sara, he saw she had her eyes open and was watching him.
“Morning,” he murmurs despondantly. “You wanna shower first?”
“Sure,” Sara whispers back quietly before disappearing into the bathroom. They’re in his bedroom, so he quickly gets some new clothes and waits for her to come out of the bathroom before taking her place. When he comes out, he finds her fully dressed in her favourite comfy clothes. She stands up and presses a kiss to his lips, her arms around his neck.
“I have to go home and get packed, so I’ll say goodbye now. You can get in touch whenever you want, and I’ll call when I can.” She leans up and kisses him again before stepping back and closing her eyes.
“Wait!” He reaches for her, and Selena blinks up at him.
“Nick, hey,” she says, sounding confused. Nick tugs at the hoodie covering her tank top.
“Take this off,” he asks.
Selena stiffens and pulls away. “Nick,” she says again, sharper this time.
“No, Sel, look I know it’s you, just take it off, please,” he begs.
She shoots him a look, but does as he says. He grabs Sara’s discarded lipstick and writes GOODBYE on her forearm in glistening red letters.
“Leave that on until she sees it,” he says.
Selena nods, shooting him a sympathetic look before walking out of his bedroom.