Emily's favorite part of working at Rocque Records was when Kelly and Gustavo went on business trips to scout new talent. She always got a few days off and embraced every second.

The last time her superiors took a trip, they brought back four hockey players. This time Emily was stuck with the hockey players.

The same hockey players who stood in the recording booth before her, singing the first song she's written and presented to her boss.

You wanna be famous (famous), you wanna be the one who's livin' the life.

"And cut!" Gustavo called to the guys.

"It sounded great, right?" Kendall asked, proud of their work.

"No. Green day sounds great. You guys didn't make me want to vomit."

Emily and Kelly gave each other a tired glance as Gustavo muted the booth so he couldn't hear their protests. Each girl smacked the man on the back of his head, making him groan in pain and spin in his chair to face them.

"Why can't you tell them they sound good?" Kelly asked.

"Or thank them for all their hard work?" Emily added.

Gustavo took off his headphones, "Showing thanks is a sign of weakness. And besides, you don't hear them thanking me," He retorted, just as the boys came out of the booth.

"Gustavo," Kendall called, his friends following behind. "We just wanted to thank you."

Emily smirked at the irony of the situation as the boys talked over one another, thanking the producer.

"I just wanted to say... You guys are... done for the day," Gustavo slurred out, Emily sighing at his harsh exterior and interior. "Kelly and I are off to North Carolina," He told the boys.

"Ooh, can you bring us back a tar heel?" Carlos asked, excitedly.

"Ooh, I'm thinking about bringing back a hot new band, that I can replace you with when you inevitably fail me," the man mocked, walking out with Kelly and a shrugging Emily.

The girl could hear the shouts of fear from the boys trailing behind her. The boys stopped besides Emily, facing Gustavo and Kelly.

"You're not gonna replace us, not after you see my new head shots," James said, whipping out two new headshots of himself. "One hot young doctor, one hot greasy mechanic."

"Ooh, I'll put these with the others," Gustavo told the boy, taking the headshots and throwing them furiously in the air, causing a yelp out of James who scrambled to catch them. Emily outwardly rolled her eyes at his attitude.

"Kelly, who'd you get to house-sit my mansion?" Gustavo asked, walking into his office.

"Oh, you said that you would take care of that," She told him, defending herself.

"There is no way I would have ever said-"

Kelly pulled out a small recorder, hitting a button, and playing back the recorded voice of Gustavo.

"Kelly, I'll find someone to house-sit my mansion. "

As the man groaned in defeat, Emily turned to the boys, "We record everything now," telling them of their new strategy. The boys nodded in approval.

"You can play your blame game later. Meanwhile, who's gonna dust my 100-inch plasma, feed my exotic pets," Emily tensed up at the feeling of someone inching right behind her, "And make sure my $1 million media room stays set at 68 degrees?" Gustavo rhetorically asked.

The feeling of multiple hands gripped her shoulder, huddling around Emily, as the boys cried in chorus, "We'll mansion-sit for you!"

"Oh, you want me to let the monkeys mansion-sit?" Gustavo cried, giving Emily a look for help, only for her to shrug, bored and ready to get on with her day.

"Yeah, I thought we were dogs," Logan pointed out, from the end.

"You're monkey dogs!" Gustavo shouted, "And the answer is no."

"Can I see you in your office, please?" Kelly, sweetly asked, as her and Emily pushed Gustavo to his work space.

Emily shut the door behind her, seeing the boys begin to conspiracise as they left the room.

"I think you should let the guys house-sit. It would be a great way to thank them for all of their hard work," Kelly mentioned.

"It's "mansion-sit,'" He corrected, "and the answer is still no. Get Freight Train to do it."

Concerned with his idea, Emily stepped forward, "Do you not remember what happened the last time Freight Train watched the mansion?" She reminded him, thinking of how upset he was to see a shattered statue in his foyer.

"Good point."

"Our flight leaves in 49 minutes. You need a house sitter now," Kelly said, pushing him to make a decision.

"Get them in here," Gustavo said, motioning for Emily to open the door. "Only if you promise to be there! I'll pay you overtime," Gustavo added, bringing a pleasant nod to Emily as she went to open the door.

As she did, four heavy forces stumbled in, falling to the floor, seeming to have been listening in.

***

Gustavo gathered them all in the practice room, lined up.

"There are five mansion-sitting rules at Casa Gustavo," the producer said, holding up his five fingers. He crossed to stand in front of James, "One, stay out of my media room."

James gave the man a smiley thumbs up.

"Two, do not open my living room fridge," He said, standing across Carlos who held up an 'okay.'

He stepped in front of Kendall, "Three, keep the butts off my $40,000 Federico Benini couch." Kendall smirked and whipped the fingers guns to his boss.

"Four, do not touch my Peruvian hairless cat, Monty."

"Ooh, I love cats," Logan responded, pleased to hear Gustavo had a cat.

"Don't touch him!"

"I don't even like cats."

He stepped to face Emily, keeping an eye on Logan, finally meeting her eyes. "And five, if anything, anything is broken in my mansion, you are all fired!" He shouted. Gustavo stepped back to his original position besides Kelly, taking his luggage from her. "Are we clear?"

Emily nodded her head furiously and the boys cheered and screamed "Yes!" in unison.

***

Emily made it crucial she was in the house before the boys arrived. Insuring they would never be left unsupervised in a million dollar mansion.

She had been sitting on the steps, waiting for their arrival, when the door burst open and four cheering teenage pop stars came jumping into the main foyer.

They all dropped their bags against the wall, staring up in awe of how massive Gustavo's home was.

Emily pushed herself up from her position, and came down the few steps to be on their level. Thankfully.

"A helmet rack!" Carlos cheered, charging towards the statue Freight Train had once broken, placing his helmet on top.

A chorus of cries and protests followed the boy, as Emily pushed them all away from the statue after returning the helmet into Carlos' possession.

"Look, we promised we'd do this in a responsible manner," Kendall reminded his friends. "Now, we have 80 years of experience between us-"

"That's not how that works," Emily corrected.

"and who am I kidding? I'll race ya to the media room!" Kendall challenged. He and the three others took off down the hallway, tripping over each other and the red rug, ignoring all of Emily's demands behind them.

The girl shoved all her frustration down, and pulled out the vacuum from the front closet, following after. When she walked in, Kendall and Logan were already comfortable in two bean bags with a bucket of popcorn each, and James and Carlos were playing virtual golf.

"This is totally awesome. The four of us kicking back in a mansion," Carlos commented, taking a swing.

Emily plugged the vacuum into the wall, rolling her eyes, beginning to clean up their mess.

"Where we've broken rule number one by entering the media room," Logan reminded his friends, slightly pleasing the only girl in the room.

"And it stops here, okay?" She said, giving them all a stern look.

"Right," the boys responded, giving her a pointed look.

And not to her surprise, but dismay, that was a lie.

She ended up standing alongside the hockey players, staring at the living room fridge, which they which not supposed to touch, that had a chain wrapped around it, tied together with a padlock.

"Why do you think Gustavo locks his fridge?" Kendall asked the group.

"I bet he keeps his heart in there," James answered.

"Or his victims," Logan countered.

"Or food," Carlos gushed, getting antsy wondering what could be in there that's so special.

"But we'll never know, because we're leaving it alone," Emily responded, making an effort to stand as close to the fridge as possible for when, eventually, one of them tries to break in.

"Yeah," Kendall hummed, absentmindedly. "Only one way to find out."

Emily groaned, stepping in front of the boy, as Logan held him back.

"Woah, woah. Are you crazy? Don't you remember mansion-sitting rule number two?"

Emily nodded in agreement with Logan as all the boys looked up, probably remembering together in their minds.

Logan was the first to snap out of it, "That was not it!"

"Yes it was," his friends retorted together.

Emily ran in front of the fridge, her back against it, "No, you're not opening this fridge," She told them.

"C'mon, Em! What if we just unlock it, see what Gustavo is hiding, and put it back?" Kendall asked, as all the boys gave her begging faces.

She sighed, "Put it back," She warned them.

"Step aside, my uncle was a lock smith," Carlos told her, gearing up to open the lock, slightly soothing her nerves knowing knowing would be broken in this process. "Just place your hands between the cylinder and the central housing," He spoke aloud, "And then hit it with a sledgehammer!"

The boy appeared back in a flash, with a sledgehammer, swinging back to break the lock, screaming.

Emily screamed in fear, running forward to stop the sledgehammer from going forward from the swing. Logan and James each grabbed a tight grip on her shirt, pulling her right back, and away from their wild friend.

At the sight of the lock falling, Emily felt her stomach twist. The boys all gathered around, opening the fridge together, to be greeted at the sight of stacks and stacks of chocolate pudding.

"Pudding!"

Emily's neck whipped back around to the fridge, seeing all four boys diving into it, each leaving with arm-fulls of pudding. "No, no, no, no!" She whined, knowing rule number two is broken.

***

The boys were eating their combined weights in pudding while Emily ran around the couch they were sitting on, the Binini couch, with a trash bag to collect the empty cups.

"Em! Heads up!" Logan called, throwing his empty cup her way, landing in the open trash bag. In victory, his friends applauded him. Emily, huffing, tied the bag into a knot, and went out to grab her third trash bag.

She just wanted a few days off.

Hearing screams, she dropped the trash, running back into the room, seeing the boys standing side by side in front of the couch, in fear.

"What?" She screamed, running to see what they were freaked out about.

It was worse than anything she could've imagined.

A pudding stain on the $40,000 white couch.

Her heart picked up, her palms started sweating, and then the oxygen stopped coming in and out and she couldn't breathe.

She wheezed in and out, not able to take her eyes off the sight of what would ultimately get her fired.

Logan rubbed his hand up and down her back, holding to get her breathing back in control.

"Gustavo is going to kill us, and we're only 80 years old!" James screamed.

"Which means we are more than capable of removing a pudding stain from a couch. Logan, brain, now," Kendall said, snapping for Logan to start thinking of solutions.

"Right, um..." The boy left Emily's side, pacing as he thought of a way out of this. "Gustavo has a cat, right? And cat litter's main ingredient is bentonite, which as we all know, is a natural absorbent."

Logan smirked proudly, as the boys nodded, happy with the new plan, leaving Emily to find oxygen without their help.

"Carlos, get the cat litter. James, open the door to air out the smell. Emily, start breathing. Move!" Kendall yelled.

Logan turned Emily to face him as he tried to bring her heart rate down. "Em? Emily, I need you to say something."

"You idiots!" She screamed, her breath shaking.

"Okay, good, you're talking."

"I'm here!" Carlos announced, running back into the room, handing the box of cat litter for Logan to pour over the stain.

Successfully covering the stain with the grains of sand, Logan stepped back, "Okay, now we just relax and wait."

"Yeah, relax," Kendall said, pointedly to Emily, who's arms were resting over her hand, in attempt to open her lungs.

A pink colored cat, hairless, jumped onto the couch, no doubt Monty, causing the boys to jump and scream in fear.

"Woah! What is that?" Logan questioned.

"It must be his cat."

"That's a cat?" Carlos demanded.

"Just get him off before he-" James started to say, before the cat had done what it's expected to do on litter.

"Marks his territory," The boys groaned in unison, seeing it was too late.

"Emily forgot how to breathe again," Carlos commented, pointing to the hyperventilating girl beside him.

"Get him off the couch!" Kendall shouted.

Carlos went forward to grab the cat, making Emily's heart fly out of her crest as she saw rule number four breaking before her eyes.

The cat squealed as Carlos picked him up, causing the boy to fling the animal across the room and out the door. "Uh, oh."

"That was rule number four!" Emily shouted, finally gaining a voice again.

Logan, who sat down on the side table, accidentally hit a button, dropping a disco ball with lights and music, startling everyone, but especially Carlos who hid behind the couch.

"Rule number five: if we break anything we're fired!" James shouted over the noise.

"Everybody just calm down!" Kendall said, "All we gotta do is find the cat, get rid of the stain, and raise the disco ball. We can do this! Together!" He told them all.

Five Minutes Later

Red lights were flashing, and a siren going off as Emily slowing paced in distress.

Kendall extinguished a fire in a small trash can.

Logan couldn't find the cat.

James broke the statue.

And Emily's head started bouncing around as her vision got flurry and her eyes rolled back into her head as she collapsed in front of James and Kendall.

They looked at the fainted girl, and back at each other, "Well, at least this can't get worse," Kendall thought, bending down to pick up the girl and move her.

"The alligator's loose!" Carlos screamed, running through the house.

"What? Why is there a- Why is there an alligator?" Logan asked, before dropping himself, right besides Emily.

"Get Logan!" Kendall told his friends, as he picked up Emily, and ran upstairs with James, Carlos and an unconscious Logan following.

***

The boys had woken up their two friends, explaining how their plan was the lure the animal into the bathroom with meat and shut the door.

James, alongside an awake Emily and Logan stood on the side of the stairs, leaning over the rail to see the activity happening. Kendall and Carlos shared a ladder, holding out a broom handle, dangling raw steak off the end.

"How did an alligator get in here?" Kendall asked.

"I opened the back door to let the smoke out, and it crawled in from Gustavo's moat," Carlos explained.

"His moat?" Logan and James questioned.

"He got it last year. However, the alligator was supposed to be fake," Emily explained to the boys.

"Nice alligator... Follow the meat..." Kendall said, coaxing the gator to go after the meat. He chucked the broom into the bathroom, gator following. "Go!"

Logan and James jumped down, closing the door, alligator inside.

They all sighed in relief, knowing it was safe, partially.

Emily dropped herself on the stairs, her head in her lap, as the boys took seats around her.

"Now, just to find Gustavo's freaky bald cat, so he doesn't kill us," Kendall said.

"His name is Monty!" Emily corrected, her voice muffled from her legs.

"Call the FBI!" James demanded.

Emily's head shot up, turning to give the boy a look.

"For a missing cat?" Logan repeated. "The FBI deals with serious crimes."

"Oh," James realized. "That explains a lot. But I know one of you used all my Cuda Massive Hold!" He complained, pointing a finger towards Logan.

"Focus!" Kendall snapped. "There's only three possible places the cat could be hiding. 1. He's roaming the neighborhood-"

"It's a big neighborhood," Emily mentioned.

"2. He's hiding up a tree-"

"With lots of trees."

Suddenly, a loud echo came from the gator in the bathroom, signaling to the teens the gator had just eaten.

"And that would be three."

They all groaned, realizing the cat was probably dead while Emily stood up and started pacing, unable to sit still anymore.

"What are we going to do?" She frantically asked.

"Ooh! I have an idea!" Carlos offered.

***

Back in the living room, an orange tabby-like cat sat on the table.

"You can't shave a cat!" Logan told them.

The new plan was to shave a random cat, and say it was Monty, which both Logan and Emily knew would never work, but they were outnumbered.

"No?" James repeated. "Oh, would you rather tell Gustavo we lost his and have him replace us and destroy my dreams?!"

"Where did you get the cat?"

"I know a guy," Carlos shrugged.

"Quiet! Hold him down steady," Kendall said, taking the razor from James.

"No, no, nope," Emily said, shaking her head. "I cannot let this happen. I am drawing the line here. We are not shaving this cat!" She protested, stealing the razor out of Kendall's hand.

The boys all looked at each other, Logan grimacing more than the other three.

"Fine," Kendall hummed, "Carlos, hold the cat down. James, hold her down."

At his statement, Emily's eyes widened when it clicked they were going to do it anyway. Kendall took back the razor, as two strong arms wrapped around her torso, pinning her arms to her sides and pulling her back against his chest, locking her in.

"James, let go," She told him, pushing against his hold, only swinging their bodies to the side, as he gripped tighter and tighter. "Okay, stop, let go of me."

"Someday, we'll laugh about this as we tell our grandchildren-"

"If you don't let go of me, you are losing all chance of ever having grandchildren with me!" 

The fighting stopped as realization hit James and he stopped moving, still holding tightly to the persistent girl. "Wait. I have a chance?" 

The sound of the razor being on turned Logan away, the boy refusing the look, and only made Emily fight harder, not making any progress.

At the first sign of contact, the cat got scared, clawed Kendall's arm and chaos ensued.

***

All teens sat huddled on the couch, claw marks torn threw their clothing and scratches highlighting their faces. 

"No, not the chair!" James screamed, watching the panicked and angry cat tear through Gustavo's house. 

"The silk drapes!" Logan cried. 

"Where'd he learn to spray paint?" Carlos questioned, taking notice the cat had painted the words cats rule! over a painting on the wall. 

"We're doomed," Kendall commented giving Emily a defeated look, as she watched in horror. 

Finally, the cat calmed down. 

Kendall, Carlos and James were all sitting on the small steps into the devastated room while Emily paced back and forth, waiting for Logan to come up with a solution. 

"We are terrible mansion-sitters," Kendall told them. 

A beep from Emily's phone rang, drawing everyone's attention. 

As she pulled out the device, she was greeted with a text from Kelly, reading, It was a bust. Be back in the morning.

Emily let out a small cry as she chucked her phone across the room, "Kelly and Gustavo are coming back in the morning," she told the boys, causing James to yelp yet again. 

"Don't worry!" Logan told them all, hurrying with his laptop over to the boys, showing them what he found. 

"I knew the smart one would come through! What do you got?" James asked. 

"There's a 4:00 AM flight to Bolivia, we get there, change our names, raise alpacas."

Carlos nodded along, excitedly, as Kendall and James let their heads fall in despair. Running up from the other side of the room, Emily leaned over Logan's shoulder, looking at the plane tickets. "I'm in!" 

Before Logan could buy their escape, Kendall whipped out his phone, "Yeah, I have a better idea."

"You're gonna call a cleaning service!"

"A statue repair man?" 

"And one of those places that gets the cats out of the alligators," the three boys guessed, standing and following their friend as he dialed. 

"All of the above," Kendall confirmed. 

From the back, Emily quickly shut down this plan, "No!" 

All the boys turned around, Kendall still on the phone. 

"Then we'll have to pay for it, charge it to the studio, and Gustavo is going to find out and I'm fired!" 

While the three boys caught on, they looked to Kendall for a solution. The boy merely smirked as the caller picked up and he answered, "Hey, mom." 

***

"Mom! Here's the sitch-" 

"Zip it," Mrs. Knight told her son, walking into the mansion with Katie, each holding a supply of cleaning materials. "I'm gonna need three liters of club soda, a sewing kit, a bucket of vinegar, bleach, and get on the phone and find a place that delivers super turbo bonding glue and semi-gloss white paint."

Emily furiously scribbled everything down on a note pad, nodding along to whatever the woman needed. "Got it," she commented, reaching into Logan's front pocket and stealing his phone, to his dismay, to call the company. 

"Wait," Carlos stopped, helmet on. "What about Gustavo's cat?" 

Mrs. Knight brought out a box of cat treats, shook some on the floor, and out came running Monty. 

"Monty!" The five teens exclaimed in delight to see he wasn't eaten by the reptile still locked in the front bathroom. 

"What are you all standing around for? We're going to be here all night! Go, go, go, go!" Mrs. Knight ordered. 

Emily, nodded her head, immediately took off with the vacuum, cleaning the floors. 

Kendall began picking up trash.

James restocked the fridge. 

Logan painted over the cat's artwork. 

Carlos helped Mrs. Knight clean the white couch. 

Katie took her time waiting to finally help out. 

A majority of the house was cleaned, besides the broken statue and tore drapes. 

Mrs. Knight sewed the reachable ones, and asked one of the boys to lift Emily so she could reach higher. 

Her first pick was Kendall, since he was already tall, but he was focused on fixing furniture.

Carlos was cleaning the hard floors with a dust pan. 

Logan insisted his shoulders were weak. 

Leaving Emily to turn to the smirking James Diamond, who had sat back, waiting for her to eventually come over to him. 

"Need some help?" 

"You bother me." 

"I know, but it'll make a cute story for the-"

"We are not having grandkids together!" 

James and Emily stopped at the window. "You never know, you did say I had pretty high chances." 

Emily, who climbed on top of the nearby table, looked down at James, "That's not even kind of what I said." 

James shrugged, and turned around, waiting for the girl to climb on his shoulders. 

"I swear, if you drop me or try anything..." Emily warned as she placed her hands on his shoulders, stepping over to sit on the back of his neck. 

James rolled his eyes, placed his hands on Emily's legs, holding her steady, stepping out to the drapes. "Please, I'm a perfect gentleman. You good?" He asked, lifting his eyes up to see if she was able to reach what needed to be fixed. 

"I got it," She assured him, threading the needle through the torn material, watching the disaster slowly heal itself. 

***

Morning came around faster than ever. 

James and Carlos were holding the statue together until the glue dried, when Logan announced the limo had pulled up in front. 

Hearing the arrival of her boss, Emily stumbled out of the closet, changed into her PJ's, seeing Logan pushing Kendall's mom out. 

"He's coming up the steps!" 

"3, 2, 1, let's roll," Katie told her mom, gathering everything they came in with, running out as the other boys got into the PJ's, while Kendall thanked his mom for helping. 

Emily sat on the small seating area, where she "slept" all night. 

Hearing the lock turn, the boys collapsed besides Emily, pretending to sleep. 

"Well, look who's here," Kendall yawned, playing along. 

"It's Gustavo and Kelly," James announced, waking from his non-existent sleep. 

The two adults stood in front of the teens, both surprised how clean the mansion was. 

"We slept here because we didn't want to touch anything," Logan informed them. 

"Yeah, we're not just pretending!" 

Logan and Emily both slapped the boy besides them for his stupid comment, driving Carlos to groan in pain. 

"Silence!" Gustavo yelled. "Monty," He called out to his cat. Monty, sure enough, jumped into his owner's arms. 

"Aw, you know we would love to stay, but we should be going," Emily said, jumping over the table and starting to run out with the boys following her. 

"Stop!" 

The teens all slowly turned around, fearful he knew what had happened hours earlier. "There's something I need to say," Gustavo said. 

"Well, you can say something tomorrow, so-" Kendall started to say, allowing them to leave, until Kelly cut him off. 

"Guys! This is important," She said, a soft smile on her face, as the teens nervously glanced to one another. 

"We've been working together for a month now, and some of us for a long time now," Gustavo said, motioning to his assistant. "And I just wanted to say, I... loved the song you wrote," He told Emily, hesitantly, making the girl look up in surprise, as well as the boys who were just hearing of a song written by their new friend. "Famous might be one of my favorite ones on the demo." 

Emily responded with a repressed smile, not wanting to over do it, despite the excitement in her. 

"And I know we've had our ups and down," He said, speaking to the boys, "but the truth is, I l..." The boys, confused looked to each other, not understanding what he was trying to say, much less why he couldn't say it. "I l..." Kelly nudged the man, "I like you." 

Not a second later, the statue cracked and fell over, breaking in front of Gustavo. 

"And we like you too," Kendall said. "Run!" 

The teens dashed out of the house, as Carlos handed over the cat to Kelly, who escaped without being shaved. 

"Thanks for the pudding! See ya," James said, waving goodbye. 

Emily smacked his arm, "Why would you say that?" She exclaimed, running out the door behind Carlos. 

"Keep going!" Kendall shouted from the front, leading his friends towards his mom's car, for a quick lift back to the hotel and away from the crime scene. 

Dawning on them both, Kendall stopped as Emily ran around, back towards the house. 

"We forgot about the gator!" She told him. 

"I know," He grimaced, opening the door to see Kelly holding the cat. "Oh, and by the way, you might not wanna go in the bath-" 

Gustavo drowned out all other words with his screaming, Emily and Kendall noticed coming from the bathroom, knowing he had found the alligator. 

"Go!" Emily screamed, pulling Kendall out of the house, along with her, praying nothing bad would happen in the house they ruined the night before. 

***

I'm so sorry for taking years to update. 

Life has not been kind.