Time After Time 5 страница

“Justin…” His voice was raw and I could barely even make out that he was saying my name.

“Gus do me a favor and go turn on our shower.” He ran as fast as he could out of the room and I heard him stomp up the stairs.

“Brian, Brian. Open your eyes.” He moaned and slowly opened his eyes and I brushed his hair out of his face.

“Justin, I-I-I’m sorry.” He could barely get any words out.

“Shhhh…No. Don’t talk, okay? We need to get you cleaned up.” I stood up and gently lifted him up. All his weigh was on me, and here was what I was saying about the adrenaline rush. Brian is obviously bigger than me, but right then I was the one supporting his weight as he walked up the stairs.

When we got to the bathroom, the shower had been started, 2 towels were laid out and Gus was sitting on our bed, trying to breath. I lied Brian down next to him on the bed.

“Sonnyboy….” Brian reached a hand out to his son. Gus lied down next to him and hugged him tightly. I watched with tears in my eyes as Gus sobbed into his father’s chest. Brian could barely keep his eyes open but he reached his hand up and placed it on Gus’s head.

“Gus, can you do me one more favor? ” He sniffled and sat up nodding.

“Can you please go make some soup for your Dad? ” He got up slowly and as he passed me, I touched his shoulder. He looked up at me, dazed.

“Gus, I’m so sorry.” He stared straight into my eyes.

“Don’t ever fucking leave again.” And with that he was out the bedroom door.

I watched him leave and let out a huge sigh. He was just like his father. He couldn’t say he forgave me. He couldn’t say much of anything but what he does say comes out with venom and it hits you right in the gut.

I undressed Brian and myself and got us into the shower. I washed his body and hair gently and slowly, letting the warm water wash over him. I know he must have been aching from lying on the floor all night. I wanted to be angry and scream at him for being so god damn stupid. But right then, none of that mattered. He was alive.

I dried him, and put him in a loose pair of sweatpants and a worn white t-shirt and helped him downstairs. His bowl of soup was waiting on the kitchen table and Gus was putting the dirty pot in the dishwasher. Gus knew Brian and I needed time together and he gave me a gentle smile as he exited the kitchen. I wondered to myself how one kid could be so amazing.

I made Brian eat. At first I had to force feed him but finally he took the spoon from me and started to feed himself. I watched him. I just memorized every inch of his face. It was like I was seeing it for the first time.

He looked up at me, eyes red and blood shot, face scruffy with stubble, hair wet and tussled. We kept each other’s gaze for a long time.

“You could have killed yourself.” It wasn’t a question. It was a fact.

“Well, that’s not the worst thing that could happen.”

I winced and he reached across the table and took my hand.

“Justin…I’m just so sorry….”

“Shut up. Just…shut up.” He closed his mouth and looked down at the table. He rubbed his thumb over mine.

“If you ever, and I mean ever say anything like what you said to me again, I will kick your fucking ass. That is what I am going to start doing. Instead of yelling and queening out I’m just going to start punching you in the face.”

He let out a short laugh. “That seems fair.”

“And don’t you ever fucking lie to me again.” He frowned and looked away. I put my hand to the side of his face and forced him to look at me.

“Ever again.” He nodded. He tugged on my hand, pulling me closer to him across the table. I knew what he wanted.

I stood up and sat gently in his lap on the chair. He wrapped his arms around me and pressed his nose into my hair. I stroked his head and made soothing noises as his body relaxed under me.

“Don’t you ever do this again. You cant fucking leave me. Or Gus. We need you. Do you understand? ”

“Yea….” His voice was muffled in my hair.

I knew we had so much to work through. This wouldn’t just fall back into place. Gus was destroyed and that alone was going to take a lot of work to repair. On both our parts. I had to regain Gus’s trust again. And Brian, who was Gus’s hero, was no longer the adult in that relationship.

And Brian and I had to rebuild the trust we had between each other as well. My trust in him that he would never lie to me. And his trust in me that I wouldn’t leave again.

But right then none of that mattered. He was alive. I was back home. And all we wanted to do in that moment was hold each other.

***

“Life is like a rainbow. You need both the sun and the rain to make its colors appear.” - Anonymous

Chapter 13

It had started raining around 2 AM last night, and hadn’t stopped yet. I remembered, because I was still up at 2 AM. Both of us were.

We’d talked a little. There would need to be more talking soon, but last night there was only so much we could say with words. I’m a lot better at expressing myself with my body, anyway.

It seemed like it had been forever since I’d tasted him, or kissed him, or fucked him. I made sure to make up for the lost time last night. We’d barely made it to the bedroom before we were all over each other, and we didn’t separate until almost 5 AM. At that point, we both passed out. I don’t know where I got the energy.

When I woke up at noon, he was already in his studio with his headphones on, painting a large canvas. The colors he was using were cool, lots of blues and grays, but they weren’t sad. I’ve gotten good at reading his art. The painting meant he was in a good place, and I decided to leave him to it, at least for a while.

I went downstairs and made myself a protein shake, and threw a banana and some yogurt in for good measure. Usually I’d have the mostly flavorless smoothie and be fine with it, but I had a feeling my body could use the nutrition. Then I went outside onto the back deck, and settled into a chair and watched the rain.

The rain here wasn’t like the rain in ml: namespace prefix = st1 /> Pittsburgh, where it turned everything gray and filthy and dead. The rain here was soothing. The rain here was warm, and smelled incredible, and made all of the already green landscape brighten.

Fuck, living with Justin was really rubbing off on me. I sounded like such a fag.

I lit a cigarette and sat there, staring out at the rain and the green and enjoying the coolness in the air, when Gus settled into the chair next to me.

“You should really quit smoking, ” he said, staring at me.

I glanced at him and arched an eyebrow. “Oh? ”

“You’ve already had cancer, why would you want it again? ” He frowned at me.

Fuck the DARE program.

“Don’t worry sonnyboy, I’ve got the best health insurance money can buy.”

He sighed and rolled his eyes. He was giving up far too easily. That meant he was after something. Shit.

“I have some questions, ” Gus said, and he pulled his chair closer to mine, giving me a serious look.

Oh, hell.

“And I suppose you want me to supply you with answers, ” I said, stubbing my cigarette out.

He nodded. “I want the truth. No bullshit. No pretending. No trying to hide your feelings.”

“When do I ever try to hide-“

“Dad, ” he said in a tone that was annoyingly like Michael’s when I was frustrating him.

“Alright, alright, ” I said, folding my hands in my lap. “Shoot.”

“I wanna know about you and Justin, ” he said.

I arched an eyebrow at him and said nothing. What the fuck was the kid after?

“You owe me, ” he said. His look said it all. He wasn’t going to forgive and forget. Good for him. He shouldn’t. I’d been a failure of a father and a complete asshole. He should be angry. This just wasn’t how I expected him to deal with it.

I just shrugged. “What about us? ”

“How did you meet? You said he was there when I was born, but that’s all you told me.” Gus scooted a little closer and now we were facing each other, and he had an eager look on his face that suited his age much more than the anger and stress he’d been carrying around lately.

So I decided I might as well play his little game and give him answers. He was old enough to ask me shit and get a real response. And he was right. I owed him. “We met the night you were born, ” I replied.

“What? ” He looked confused. “And he came to see me? ”

“I brought him along, ” I replied simply.

Gus peered at me suspiciously. “So where did you meet? ”

I felt myself grin a little. “Under a streetlamp.”

“What? ” he asked, wrinkling his nose in confusion.

“He was on Liberty Ave, that night. It was his first time there. I was leaving Babylon with Mikey, and I saw him. So I picked him up.”

“Just like that? ” he asked.

“Just like that, ” I said.

“Why? ”

I frowned. What did that mean? “Why? ”

“Why him? There’s tons of hot guys all over the place there, why would you pick him up? Wasn’t he like, a kid? ”

I snorted. “He was almost eighteen.”

“So why him? ”

Tongue in cheek, I thought about it. “I don’t know, ” I said.

“Dad! ”

There was that exasperation again.

“I really don’t, ” I said. “He caught my eye.”

“Why? ” Gus leaned forward a little more, and I realized I wasn’t just dealing with typical curiosity. He was trying to understand us. He was trying to understand me.

I sighed and leaned back in my chair, staring out at the rain again, thinking. “It was just something about him. He had this… glow.”

“A glow? ” Gus asked.

I looked back at Gus and shrugged. “He glowed. He’s so pale, and his hair is so blond, so the way the light hit him he sort of… glowed.”

Gus stared at me for a moment, and then nodded. He didn’t get it. He would, someday, if he found someone he felt that strongly about. In a way I hoped he wouldn’t. Caring this much about someone sure hurt a hell of a lot. Then again, Gus was a lot smarter than me. He probably wouldn’t fuck it up like I always did.

“So you picked up a seventeen year old kid, and fucked him, and then let him tag along when you got the call? ”

I nodded. “More or less.”

“So why’d you bring him along if you just met him? ” Gus asked.

“He couldn’t go home, his parents thought he was at Daphne’s. I could have kicked him out, but…” I sighed and shrugged again. “He was interesting.”

Gus grinned. “You were already in love.”

I rolled my eyes. “Bullshit. I was in lust. He was hot, and I hadn’t even gotten to fuck him properly yet.”

Gus laughed. “So you brought him along.”

“So I brought him along, ” I replied.

“And then he kept coming around, right? ”

I arched an eyebrow at him. Where had he heard that?

“Uncle Mikey told me Justin was a great stalker, ” he said, grinning mischievously. Oh, so they’d been talking about me, had they?

“I let him stalk me. He was hot and enthusiastic.”

“And? ” Gus asked.

I paused, wanting to ignore him and tell him that’s all it was. But he was right. I owed him. If this is what he wanted, I guess this is what I’d have to give him. “He got under my skin. He was smart, and he could keep up with me, and he seemed to get me, even though he barely knew me. He kept me interested.”

“And you went to his prom? ”

Smiling, laughing, spinning, dancing, kissing, screaming, blood all over the pavement, blood on blond, blood on-

“Yeah. I went to his prom.”

Gus must have seen the way I tensed up and paled, because he looked like he felt bad for even bringing it up. “He told me about that.”

I just nodded, and lit another cigarette. This time he didn’t scold me.

“So what then? ”

I exhaled a long plume of smoke and watched as it disappeared into the humid air. “We fucked a lot. He chased me. I told him I didn’t give a shit. I told him I didn’t believe in love. He gave up a couple of times, but he always came back. Every time he left I felt like shit, I was a fucking mess. But he always came back.”

“Just like now, ” Gus said.

I nodded.

“But then he went to New York, ” Gus said slowly. “And it was really over? ”

I licked my lips quickly. “We were going to get married.”

Gus nodded slowly.

“But he had his future and his career to think of. He had to go to New York if he was going to succeed as an artist. And I couldn’t go with him.”

“So you just let him go? ” Gus asked.

I lifted the cigarette to my lips again and inhaled deeply, remembering the long goodbye, the long fuck, the bullshit about not needing rings, and it only being time. “I let him go.”

“Do you even love him? ”

I almost dropped the cigarette in shock. “What? ”

Gus shrugged, nonchalantly. “He loves you.”

“I know that, ” I said. “But what the fuck did you say? ”

“I said I don’t know if you really love him.”

I stared at him, at my son, and wondered how he could even say that after what we’d just been through. “I love him.”

“Yeah, I guess, ” he said. He sounded unconvinced.

“What the fuck does that mean?! ” I asked, getting pissed. I stubbed out the cigarette and glared at him.

“It means you let him go. You let him go over and over again! How could you do that if you loved him so much?! ”

Fuck. Sometimes I forgot that Gus was still a kid. “Because that’s what you do when you love someone. You let them go if that’s what they need to do.” I relaxed back into my chair and sighed.

Gus was silent for a long time, and we sat there, side by side, listening to the rain fall on the grass and the roof.

“Then how come you’re not married? ” he asked softly.

I didn’t look back at Gus. I just shrugged. I didn’t have a real answer for him.

“Is it because you like fucking other people? ” he asked, almost challengingly.

“I don’t, ” I said.

“Bullshit! ” he exclaimed, turning to look at me again. “I’m not stupid! ”

I turned my head and stared him straight in the face. “I don’t fuck other people. I haven’t since he got back, except when he was with me, fucking them, too.”

Gus stared at me silently in surprise. “That’s why you were so pissed, ” he said.

I blinked at him, wondering what the fuck the boy was on about this time.

“On his birthday, ” Gus clarified.

“Oh, fuck, ” I said, running a hand through my hair. “I was pissed because I’m an asshole. That wasn’t his fault.”

“Well duh, ” Gus said, rolling his eyes. Sometimes the little brat looked so much like me it was eerie, but right now he looked just like Lindsay did whenever she thought I was being stupid. It made me miss her, a little. “But that’s why you got all pissy. You were jealous.”

I shrugged again.

“So why don’t you tell him? ” he asked.

Another shrug.

“Come on, you owe me, remember? So spill! ”

I couldn’t help but laugh a little at that. “Fine, ” I said. “I was going to, that night.” I looked back at him. “But like you said, I got ‘all pissy’, and then we got the call about Ben.”

“And then he got all pissy, ” Gus said.

“And then I was an asshole again, ” I said.

“And then he left, ” Gus said.

I nodded.

“One more question, ” Gus said slowly.

“Only one more? ” I asked.

“Yeah. Then you have to go tell him you’re not fucking anyone else so the two of you stop queening out over the littlest shit.”

I laughed again, and felt myself smile. “When you put it that way, I guess I have no choice.”

He grinned at me and nodded. “So, last question-“

“I can hardly wait, ” I said.

“What the fuck is it that everybody thinks is so hot about him? ”

I stared at my son for a long time before responding. “Do you really want to know? ”

“Yeah. Only keep it PG13. I don’t want to hear any weird kinky shit.”

I snorted and shook my head, and thought for a long moment, listening to the rain fall. Why did I think he was so hot? Why did I think he was beautiful? “It’s his eyes, ” I said.

“Huh? ” Gus asked, making a face.

“Well, and his hair, ” I said. “But he could shave his head and that wouldn’t really change anything.”

Gus nodded slowly.

I ran a hand through my hair and sighed. This was the most awkward fucking conversation I’d ever had. “It’s his eyes.”

“I don’t get it, ” Gus said. “What about them? ”

I felt myself grin.

“What? What are you thinking?! ” Gus asked, pointing at me. “You’re making that face! ”

“What face? ”

“That dopey face you make whenever you think mushy shit! ”

I frowned sharply and glared at him. “I don’t think mushy shit, and I don’t make dopey faces.”

“Yeah, sure, whatever, ” Gus said, rolling his eyes again.

“Alright, enough with the inquisition, ” I said. “I’m going upstairs.”

“Try not to fuck up, ” Gus said.

I snorted. “Thanks for the vote of confidence, ” I said, standing up.

“And dad? ” Gus said softly.

I turned and faced him again, one hand on the doorknob. He grinned slowly at me.

“Thanks.”

Fuck. I couldn’t help but grin back. Had I actually just had a father-son moment? Had I actually just done the right thing in talking to him? Maybe.

I just hoped the next conversation I was going to have would go that smoothly.

Happiness often sneaks in through a door you didn't know you left open. ~John Barrymore

Chapter 14

That’s the thing about old houses.

You can hear everything.

I had woken up around nine in the morning to sound of the rain hitting the roof. I laid there a long time, listening to the rain and Brian’s heavy breathing through his deviated septum. I looked over at him, all peaceful, arm wrapped strongly around my middle and took in my surroundings - my beautiful house, the sound and the smell of the rain through the open window in our bedroom, his face that 15 years after he picked me up under that streetlamp was still the most gorgeous face I had ever seen.

We didn’t talk much. We should have. You know me and my constant need for conversation and analyzing things till they don’t even exist anymore. But for some reason I just couldn’t do it. All I wanted to was to feel him. Kiss him. Touch him. I wanted him inside me so badly we barely made it to the bedroom. We knew Gus wouldn’t want to see that, even though in a way I’m sure he would be more relieved than grossed out.

We went into the bedroom around 4 in the afternoon and fucked all day and night. We finally passed out around 5am, I think, only because I remember glancing at the clock the last time I came. I lifted up the sheet that was bunched up around my abdomen and smirked. I was disgusting. And I loved it.

I brushed Brian’s now graying hair out of his face and quietly got out of bed. I showered and went into my studio. I needed to paint. My whole body was buzzing to get these emotions down on the canvas. I started with dark blues and let my hand take over. My emotions poured out of me. But, it wasn’t a sad blue or an angry blue like the blues I used to use in New York. This was a soothing blue, kind of like the rain that was falling outside my open window.

I’m not sure how long I was painting. I just knew when it was done. I took my headphones off and stood there, staring at my finished work for a long time. I took in all the emotion I had just let out. Fuck, I was exhausted.

As I started to clean out my brushes in the sink, I heard the faint sound of voices outside my window. Were Brian and Gus outside in the rain? I walked closer to the window and listened.

“It was just something about him. He had this… glow.”

What? What the fuck was he talking about?

“A glow? ”

Gus’s voice now.

“He glowed. He’s so pale, and his hair is so blond, so the way the light hit him he sort of… glowed.”

Oh my god. I huge smile spread across my lips. I just couldn’t help it. Is that really what he thought? All this time, that’s the first impression he got of me? My heart could have burst.

I continued to listen as Brian told Gus about how I stalked him, but honestly how he liked it, which I always suspected.

Gus brought up the prom which didn’t go any further than them just confirming that yes indeed Brian had gone to my prom.

Then the words hit my ears like a knife to my heart.

“We were going to get married.”

Fuck.

Then the conversation turned a little heated. Gus accused Brian of not loving me. Oh dear god.

“I love him.”

“Because that’s what you do when you love someone. You let them go if that’s what they need to do.”

I felt tears form in my eyes and it took everything I had not to scream out the window down to him, to scream at him that I didn’t want to go. I wanted to stay with him, that I loved him so god damn much. That I always had, and I always would.

Fuck.

And the words floated up through the sky, into my window and straight into my heart.

“I don’t fuck other people. I haven’t since he got back, except when he was with me, fucking them, too.”

Holy god fucking shit.

No. That cant be true. I mean….he’s at Babylon at least twice a week. How could he not be getting laid or at least a blowjob? I mean…he’s Brian Fucking Kinney. We never even discussed….

Oh, god.

Then Gus said it. The answer to why the past two fucking weeks happened in the first place.

“But that’s why you got all pissy. You were jealous.”

God I am such a fucking little twat. I swear to god.

He wanted to tell me that night. That was his plan to tell me, to have this fabulous birthday dinner, the flowers, romance, and he was going to tell me the one thing I had wanted to hear from him all along.

He wanted to be monogamous.

And what did I do? I went and got sucked off by some model in the bathroom of a restaurant and acting like a whiny little brat. Oh, god. I will never understand for the life of me why he puts up with me.

I was just about to close the window and go back to washing up the blue mess I had made in my studio when Gus’s question caught my interest.

“What the fuck is it that everybody thinks is so hot about him? ”

So call me curious. I had to hear Brian’s answer on this one.

Even though I already knew. My ass, probably. My perfect twink physique. How big my cock was for my size. I knew the answers to that question. I was just curious to see if he would tell his 16-year-old son.

“It’s his eyes.”

What?

“Well, and his hair. But he could shave his head and that wouldn’t really change anything.”

I already did.

Oh my god. Now I was crying. I was crying like a fucking little faggot, and I didn’t care. I know it was wrong of me to listen in on their conversation, but COME ON, who knew when the next time Halley’s comet would appear and Brian fucking Kinney would confess his feelings.

I could tell their conversation was dying down so I quickly rid my cheeks of my tears and went back to the task at hand of cleaning off my brushes.

He appeared in the doorway of my studio not long after.

“Hey.”

“Hey.”

“You were up pretty early.” He rubbed his hand over his face. I didn’t look at him.

“Yeah, I know. Sorry. I kinda just had to paint.” I waved my hand toward the canvas and watch out of the corner of my eye as he walked to it. He stood there a while, head cocked to the side, admiring it, analyzing it.

“It’s good.”

“It’s genius.”

He laughed and nodded. “Like always.” He paused. “We should hang it.”

“If you want.”

“I want.”

I smiled and turned off the water in the sink.

He cleared his throat and I turned around and looked at him.

“So, Gus was asking some questions.”

“Oh? ”

“Uh, yea.” He looked around the room nervously. “About you. About us.”

I nodded.

“So I told him.” He shrugged.

“Okay.”

“Don’t you wanna know what I told him? ”

“Nope.”

He gave me a confused look. “Why not? Brian Kinney actually TALKED about his feelings and Sunshine doesn’t want to know what was said about him? ”

I let out a loud sigh and start to put the lids back on my paint cans.

“What? ”

I turned around and give him a serious look. He looked scared.

“So why aren’t we married? ”

He paled. “What did you just say? ”

“I asked you why we aren’t married, if you want to be monogamous, if you love me, then why don’t we get married? ”

He opened his mouth to say something then quickly shut it. He really had nothing to say to that. He rubbed his hand over his face and let out something that was a cross between a groan and a whimper.

God, I was so stupid. I knew better now than to push him. That’s usually what sends him straight out to the backroom to trick. FUCK.

“Never mind. Forget it.” I shoved my paints back up on the shelves.

“Okay, then.”

Huh?

“What? ”

“Okay.”

“Okay? ”

“Lets do it.”

Oh my god. Was he….did he actually….HOLY SHIT. Okay, I had to stay calm. It took everything I had not to jump around like a little kid and squeal and throw my arms around him. Part of me wanted to run out to the streets and scream; “He wants to marry me! He wants to marry me! Brian Kinney is going to marry me! ”

I huge grin formed on my face and I folded my arms and gave him a challenging look.

“Say it.”

“Yes.”

“Yes, what? ”

He laughed and walked quickly to me and pulled me into his arms.

He put his lips to my ear and sighed heavily.

“Yes I will marry you. I’ll marry you. You little twat.”

In that moment it occurred to me just how much 10 years changes things. How much Brian Kinney’s walls had come down. How even 10 years ago when he had made his declaration of love and asked me to marry him, if I had pulled this stunt instead, it never would have gone like this. But for once he allowed it to be on my terms. He gave me control. He let me have this moment.

I wrapped my arms around him and giggled into his chest. He kissed my forehead, my hair, my cheek, my ear, and every bit of skin he could reach in that position. I breathed in his scent. The smell of his skin underneath his t-shirt. The warmth of his arms. The sound of the rain hitting the roof and windowpane.

God, I was beginning to love the rain.

“So are we gonna tell people? ” I asked.

“You know what they’re all gonna say.”

“What? That it’s about fucking time? ”

He let out a short laugh. “They wont believe us.” His voice sounded a bit sad. I pulled back and looked into his eyes.

“What? Why not? ”

He nuzzled my cheek. “Cause isn’t this what we do, Justin? We never follow through.”

I frowned at him and he looked deep into my eyes.

“Do you want to marry me Brian? ”

“Yes, I just told you yes.”

“Do you believe that I’m not leaving again? ”

He didn’t answer me.

“I don’t mean queening out, packing a bag and sleeping on Daphne’s couch for a few nights leaving. I mean REALLY leaving. Like I’m not going to pack up and move back to New York or leave YOU, leave.”

He thought about it for a few minutes while our eyes were locked. He really thought about it.

“I believe you.” He finally let his breath out with that statement.

“Then who the fuck cares what everyone thinks? ”

“Well, I’m sure they’ll believe it after we have the huge fabulous wedding of your dreams, with… white bows on the fucking bushes, right? You’d better call Emmett and get his ass in gear to get you your golden gardenias from Japan or China or wherever the fuck they grow.”

I laughed at him and hugged him closer to me.

“I don’t want any of that.” He pulled back and gave me a LOOK.

“Is this going to be that thing you do when you tell me you don’t want something because you think it’s what I want and then 5 years from now you queen out about it and blame me? ”

I smirked and shook my head. “No. I really don’t want all that. We could do something small. Just us. And Gus and my mother. If you want Michael to be there, that’s fine. But if you do I have to invite Daphne. She’d fucking kill me, otherwise. And with her fucking hormones these days from the pregnancy I’m sure she really would.”

“Wait, what? Daphne’s PREGNANT? ”

I smiled. “Yup.”

“Well, fuck me.”

“With pleasure, Mr. Kinney.”

“Nice try, Sunshine.”

He held me for a long time, running his hands through my hair and kissing the top of my head.

“Marriage, huh? ”

I nodded into his chest. “And monogamy? ”

He tensed for a minute then I felt him relax slightly.

“Christ, Sunshine, are you gonna let me do ANYTHING today? First you ask ME to marry YOU and now I don’t even get to make the great declaration of telling you your ass is the only ass I want to fuck till death do us part? ”

I kissed his chest through the fabric on his shirt.