I couldn't take it anymore. I had to meet the man. We had to stand face to face so I could look into the eyes of my destiny. It had to happen. There was no other way about it.

Last night, I woke up with a most brilliant plan. I'd kidnap Raleigh. In order to get her back, Clayton would have no choice but to meet me. Desperate attempt, I know, but desperate times call for desperate measures. Besides, it was foolproof. Nothing could go wrong.

Since this was a two-man job, I elected the help of my good friend Alyssa. She used her stealth and expert flirting to get the tour bus driver to tell her the exact trajectory of his course across the state of Virginia. Using this information, I was able to calculate the distance, speed of travel, weight of busload, weather, and traffic to determine exactly when the bus would have to stop for gas. Then Alyssa and I headed to that rest stop.

We were there 2 hours ahead of schedule. We sat inside some bushes, dressed in black, war paint on our faces, eating vending machine chips. After a long silence, Alyssa spoke up, "Do we really need to be wearing black since it's broad daylight out?" I glared at her. "We're on a black op. Shut up and eat your chips."

"You eat your chips."

It was over 100 degrees out and we were hot and itchy underneath our black clothing. When we started to bicker over the length of my shoelaces we knew we had to separate before fists flew. "I'm gonna go sit over there." I moved to the other side of the bushes.

I must have fallen asleep while waiting, cause the next thing I knew I was being slapped upside the head. Sweat dripped into my eyes as I tried to shake myself out of my groggy state. The same hand that had slapped me was now forcing my head to turn to the left. "Look." I pushed the hand out of my face and turned to look at its owner. It was Alyssa. She was frantically whispering and pointing to a grassy area about 40 yards away. All I saw was a man with a dog. "All I see is a man walking a dog."

"Look closer at the dog!"

"What? It's just a do-" I suddenly remembered why we were there. I stood up quickly and hit my head on a giant tree branch. It knocked me off my feet. I grunted loudly as I hit the ground. The man walking Raleigh turned to look in our direction. Alyssa grabbed my under my armpits and dragged me back behind a tree. The guy turned back to the dog and started walking in the opposite direction.

"We need a plan." Alyssa said loudly.

"Shut up! If they hear you, they'll come over here and kill us to death!"

"Sorry." She whispered.

"Here's the plan." As I explained my plan, I crawled along the ground to find my black cap that the tree branch had knocked off my head. "You go distract Mr. Dogwalker. I'll grab the dog and run."

"How should I distract him?" She asked.

"I dunno. Use your whorish ways."

"Gasp!" She slapped me across the face. "That was one time!"

The guy with the dog turned and we ducked. But he wasn't looking at us. He was looking at the tall lanky figure stepping off the bus. I couldn't make out the face, but I could tell by the feyish walk and the white light surrounding his crotch, that it was the one and only Clay Aiken.

I climbed to my feet. The very breath of Clay Aiken was just yards in front of me. The heavens opened and "Run To You" began to play in the sky.

I wanna run to you -
But if I come to you -
Tell me will you stay -
Or will you run away.

Clay's high-pitched giggle broke through the imaginary music. Then he began to sing. "We are living in a material world and I am a material girl." He giggled again.

I got into my runner's stance and bolted for him. 2 steps later I smacked head first into that giant tree branch. I landed hard on my back. I felt myself being dragged back into the bushes as the sky above me faded to black.

Hours later, I was awaken by a phone ringing. I sat up and looked around. I was in Alyssa's apartment with a pounding headache. I could see the night sky outside the open window. The phone kept ringing. It pierced my raging headache so I picked it up. A voice was singing on the other line. "I will be your father figure, put your tiny hand in mine."

"Seacrest! How'd you get this number?!"

"Call me Seacrest again."

"AUGH!" I slammed the phone down.

I got up and stumbled into the kitchen for a glass of water and some aspirin. Alyssa was leaned back in a chair with her feet up on the table. She had her headphones on. No wait, those were my headphones. I'd been looking for them for weeks. She had her eyes closed and was moving her lips to the music of Nick Carter, which I could hear all the way across the room. I called her name. No response. I called her name again as loud as my headache would allow. She didn't flinch. I grabbed her feet and pushed them off the table. She opened her eyes and tore off her headphones. "What?!"

"What are we doing here?! We're supposed to be on a mission!"

"The mission is accomplished, my friend. No thanks to you."

I was confused.

"You ran into a tree and I had to carry out the mission myself."

"Ah." I remembered the tree. And I remembered having a dream about angels carrying me over their shoulders to Clayton's love pad, where he was anxiously awaiting me.

"How did I get here?"

"I carried your fat ass over my shoulder."

"If ever there was a fat ass, it would be yours." "

Yours!"

"Yours!"

She held out her hand in a truce. "Let's say neither one of us is fat and call it even." I shook her hand and sat down at the kitchen table. "So you got the dog?"

"I got the dog. He's in the bathroom."

"She."

"Okay. She's in the bathroom."

I smiled mischievously. "You ready to make that call."

She laughed a loud evil laugh that frightened even I. She picked up the phone and dialed Clay's cell phone. When he picked up, she put him on the speakerphone.

"Hello?"

I giggled. Alyssa slapped me.

"Hello?" He said again.

She cleared her throat and spoke in a deep voice.

"Hello, Clayton. We have your dog."

"Raleigh?"

Alyssa put her hand over the speaker and whispered to me. "Raleigh? His dog is the capital of North Carolina?"

I shrugged. She removed her hand from the speakerphone and deepened her voice again.

"Yes Raleigh. We have Raleigh."

"Raleigh's right her with me."

Raleigh barked over the phone.

Alyssa yelped in her regular voice. "Then what the hell is locked in the bathroom?!" She hung up the phone and we tiptoed over to the bathroom.

"Are you sure it was Raleigh you nabbed?"

"It was wearing the blue On Air dog shirt that Ryan gave to Clay."

We heard more scratching. I slowly turned the doorknob and opened the door a crack. I peaked my head in the door. I didn't see anything, so I pushed the door all the way open and stepped inside. Alyssa stepped in behind me. The room was quiet except for a dripping faucet.

"Maybe she escape and found her way back to Clay." I suggested. Then we heard scratching coming from the bathtub. We inched closer to it. I took hold of the shower curtain and yanked it open. A raccoon sat in the corner of the tub scratching the wall. It had a on a blue On Air dog shirt. I screamed. It flew out of the tub and latched itself onto my face. "Oh my God!"

Alyssa bolted out of the room and came back with a broom. By the time she got back, I was rolling around on the floor with the raccoon still stuck to my face. I tried pulling it off, screaming all the while. I the harder I screamed, the tighter it held on. Alyssa swung at it repeatedly with her broom, but succeeded only in hitting me in the back of the head." I tried pulling at it some more, but it was like a leech. "It's stuck! It's stuck!"

Alyssa started crying. So did I. She ran out of the room again and came back with a vacuum. She turned it on full power and put the end of it on the raccoon's back. She held on tight to the vacuum as the raccoon held on even tighter to my face. It's bottom legs dug into my neck. Alyssa screamed above the noise of the vacuum. "Is Clay's love worth this?!"

"I can't feel my neck!"

The vacuum sucked the shirt right off the raccoon's back. It got stuck halfway in the vacuum and jammed it. The raccoon freed itself from my face and ran out the open window. Alyssa shut the vacuum off and fell to the floor. We laid their exhausted. Neither of us said a word for a good 10 minutes. Then Alyssa looked over at me. "My bad."

"How do you mistake a raccoon for a dog?"

"It had that shirt on!" She motioned toward the shirt that was sticking out of the vacuum. At the same time we both noticed a small flashing red light on the edge of my collar. She pulled it off and held it up. "It looks like some sort of tracking device."

"Who would want to track a raccoon?" I took the tracker from her and examined it more closely. I turned it over and looked at the back. In tiny engraved letters it said 'Property Of Ryan Seacrest'. I read it aloud to her.

"Damnit!" I yelled.

"Damn you, Byron Seabrain!"

I threw the tracker at the wall. "How did he know?!"

I heard the sound of dreadful singing coming from the open window. I got up and walked over to it. Ryan was up in a tree, wearing a Speedo and a bowtie. "I will be your father figure. Put your tiny hand in mine."

"Dear Lord, what have I done to deserve this?!" I went to the bathroom and pulled the dog shirt out of the vacuum. I came back to the window and tossed it at Ryan. It hit him in the face and he tumbled out of the tree. On his way down, he reached his hand for me and shouted. "I'll return, my love!"

Alyssa poked her head out the window. I'll get you for this, Rye Seabiscuit! This still isn't over!"