Imperfectly Beautiful (Jordan Knight Fanfic, Liadan #3)

Paparazzi and Papas

-NATE-

"Nathan! Nathan, over here, can we get a smile, buddy?"

"Are the rumors true? You're quitting music? Isn't 22 too young to retire?"

"Nate, was last night really your last show?"

"Nate, any plans for the holidays?"

The flash of the cameras practically blinded me and the myriad of questions sputtered in my direction only served to irritate me as my head throbbed from a lack of sleep, bad airplane tequila, and a long day of traveling. I kept my eyes down and moved towards my awaiting car outside of LAX with security surrounding me until I quickly ducked down into the butterfly doors of my Beemer and turned on my engine to leave, but that only seemed to encourage the paparazzi to move to the front of my vehicle.

My bodyguards tried to get them to back up, but it was obvious they had no intentions of listening and I groaned as I shoved my shades on my face and stuck my head out the window, "C'mon guys, do you really want to get ran over? Really? Back the fuck up."

I was pretty sure all the videos they were filming of me would be on TMZ and Perez Hilton and Hollywood Life and all the other gossip sites in a matter of hours and I'd be the center of a bunch of social media posts claiming I was rude and had turned into an entitled jerk, but at the moment I didn't care.

I'd been working almost nonstop for the past four years and I was beyond caring what anybody had to say about anything.

"Back up, back up, and let him out guys," Oliver boomed and tried to make a large enough space for me to exit.

The second I spotted a clear opening, my foot slammed on the gas and I zoomed out of the airport lot. To say that I was relieved to be away from the paps was an understatement—even the LA traffic and moving at a snail's pace all the way to Calabasas was a welcome change in scenery. I was sick and tired of flashing lights and being chased around.

I fiddled with the radio and let the sound of Christmas music that was oddly out of place in warm California filter through my speakers as I let my memories wander back to snowy, cozy childhood Christmases in Boston.

I was terribly homesick and frankly tired of working.

That fact hadn't exactly crossed my mind until I'd been standing in the middle of a crowd of thousands of people screaming my name in Europe and I'd suddenly gotten an overwhelming desire to eat my mom's French toast, see my siblings, hear my dad's laugh, and play with my niece. All I wanted was to just go home and be a normal person for a while.

A good five minutes passed before I realized that I'd actually said as much into my microphone in front of all of the staring faces gazing at me blankly and ever since the press had been going crazy trying to figure out if I was serious.

I could imagine my label execs were probably somewhere cursing my name, but I hadn't picked up my work phone to see. Instead, I'd simply used my personal device to tweet out a message that the rest of the tour was canceled and packed up my stuff and left without waiting around for permission.

If I had to pay a fine for a contract breach, then so be it—I hadn't worked myself to death to accumulate a net worth of over a quarter of a billion dollars to not be able to take a vacation whenever the hell I wanted to. Thus, as far as I was concerned, my first stop in America was my place to pack a bag and my next stop was Boston.

The sound of Michael Bublé's cover of I'll Be Home For Christmas just made me all the more determined as I gripped onto my steering wheel and navigated through the traffic until I finally pulled into the driveway of my dad's old L.A. house that I'd had completely remodeled and modernized to bring it up to date.