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After the End	By : Bloodyrose82 Category: M through R > Queer As Folk Views: 2114 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Queer As Folk, nor any of the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
- 1-After the End
- 2-515
- 3-516
- 4-517
- 5-518
- 6-519
- 7-520
- 8-521
- 9-522
- 10-523
- 11-524
- 12-525
- 13-526
- 5
- 6
- 7
Prologue.

Some people say that they try to live their lives minute by minute, taking hold of every opportunity with both hands, refusing to let go.

But is it realistic to live like that, without plan or preparation? It�s one thing to say after an event that you have no regrets, because you can learn from each situation, even if the lesson is as simple as �never again�. But to live life on the edge of a knife, spouting �no regrets, no apologies�, isn�t that as na�ve as forgetting how to live in the first place?

You never used to think so, but then again there had never been anything in your life worth regretting.

Not until he came along.

-*-

I. Brian

You hated the stomach-clenching feeling of waking up in the morning and knowing instantly that you had done something you should regret.

It wasn�t unusual to roll over and find yourself facing a guy who had seemed interesting - attractive even - the night before, to discover he had turned into something you wouldn�t even pass onto Ted during one of his more desperate moments.

But this�this was something new. You�d never been in any particular rush to get away from Justin, not even after that first time. He had been a good fuck and had managed somehow to look even better when you weren�t seeing double.

Not that you had ever planned on keeping him around of course, however great he had been in bed. It wasn�t that you didn�t like him, but there were rules to be kept, and it seemed rather pathetic to break ones you had created yourself, to give you an easy life.

But waking up at noon, disorientated, lying on musty smelling sheets in a room you didn�t instantly recognize, you wished you could turn back the clock, just a bit, and walk out of the front door instead of relenting in the face of his kiss.

You dressed quickly, wrinkling your nose in distaste that you of all people had to wear the same clothes two days in a row, and crept downstairs.

Seeing him almost made you want to stay.

He laid there on the floor, curled in on himself, the dying embers of the fire smoking behind him. His face was relaxed, his eyes shut, his lips twitched into an echo of a pout. He looked so small, his hair mussed, and you had to force yourself to look away from him and grab your coat.

It would be too easy to kneel down next to him and smooth a crease from his cheek with your thumb. He would shift and murmur under his breath, and reach out to you, his eyes still closed, and pull you close, like his personal security blanket, tangling his limbs with yours.

It would be so easy, but in the end you knew you would pay, just as you did for everything else that had ever been good in your life. It wouldn�t be enough, for either of you, and an hour of lying together dozing would turn into an afternoon of lazy sex. Which would be dangerous because lazy sex with him was always slow, punctuated with ferocious discussions over politics. He would tease you because you would try to act as if you had heard of the artists he was talking about. Uncultured, he would call you, and you would gape at him and poke him in the side, telling him to mind his elders.

That in turn would lead to a miniature wrestling match on the floor, and he would end up screeching for time out as you found that sensitive spot underneath his ribs and tickled him until he begged for mercy.

Then you would both lie there, panting heavily, and he would give you a tiny smile, the kind nobody else ever got to see, and it wouldn�t be big or bright, or filled with the beaming essence of him that lead to Debb�s christening of him in the first place.

But it would be yours, and you�d chastise yourself for getting sentimental as you stared at him in awe, one of the most beautiful things you had ever seen.

There was no way you could allow it to happen, and you turned away, leaving him a wad of bills for a taxi back. You closed the door behind you and stepped out into the light.

You didn�t know it then, but if you were asked years later to recall the pivotal moments in your life, driving away from that house would be one of them.

You never lived in it, but there inside�that was your home.

-*-

II. Justin

In total you had barely spent a few months sleeping in a house or apartment alone, and it was almost jarring the way your body woke up and responded to the lingering silence.

If you didn�t know better you would think you had a problem with your own company, but really, you could entertain yourself for hours. You never felt truly alone when your head was crammed with ideas for new sketches, but there was something about waking up to find yourself on your own that left a shaking in your gut.

You stretched your stiff back and popped the joints in your shoulders, staring around.

Britin.

Your eyes landed on the pile of cash on the table and it all came flooding back to you: the conversation, the dread you felt when you thought he had walked out, trying to ignore the fact of the matter that the empty house told you he now had. The almost painful ache of him inside you, and his scent, lingering on your own skin like an unwelcome visitor.

You looked back at the cash. It was so like Brian to do something like that, upping and leaving before you could wake, leaving no indication that he was anything more than a figment of your imagination, if not for the money.

But ghosts didn�t leave tips.

It was almost like his calling card; a very loud declaration that while he couldn�t - wouldn�t - stick around to deal with the fallout, he could still pay for you to get home.

You almost felt cheap.

You found your clothes and pulled them on, checking that the fire was out before gathering the debris of the night before and shoving them into a bag to dispose of in the refuse can outside.

Without a second glance you swiped the money off the table and pocketed it. It was the least he could do.

You trekked the half-mile towards the liquor store he had been to the previous evening, and stuck a couple of quarters into the payphone outside, dialling the number for the cab company.

As you rode away, slumped in the backseat, you realized you�d never wanted Britin after all. Not really. Fuck the house, fuck the courts and the stables. What you wanted was what it could represent.

And now even that had gone.

-*-

III. Brian

You spent the rest of the day at the baths, trying to wash all traces of him out of your system through a series of quick, sharp fucks.

None of your tricks looked the same or fucked the same, and as you passed yourself from mouth to mouth like a living piece of communion bread, you almost laughed out-loud. It was your redemption you were searching for as you plunged into the depths of their bodies, submerging yourself in the one ritual you had always thought you could rely upon.

But it didn�t work. Ironically your body started to compare them all to him without your blessing: too tall, too strong, too dark, too small. Too tight, too loose, too clingy, not enough muscle. Too old, too young. Not hung.

Monday morning didn�t fare any better and you struggled through a sleep-inducing meeting with a soda company, trying to banish all thoughts of him from your head.

Lunchtime rolled around and you lifted your head from your desk as your door opened.

"Fuck off."

Theodore slipped into the room and tentatively put a pile of papers by your elbow.

"Tough week, Brian?" he asked, and you groaned.

"We were all a little worried when you weren�t at Babylon last night," he admitted. "Emm was sure you had run off with Justin but we saw him at the diner this morning and he said he hadn�t seen you."

Hm. Taking up lying in his spare time, was he?

"That�s right."

"Well, good! I mean�not good, because there would be nothing wrong with it if you had been with him, but good because Mikey would have pitched a fit and--"

"Theodore?"

He swallowed visibly. "Yes?"

"Take your foot out of your mouth and close the door on your way out."

"Right!"

You shook your head and closed your eyes again, the beginnings of a headache tightening in your temples. You doubted Mikey would take a brush off this easily. Well, fuck him. Fuck them all. You were a big boy and if you wanted to walk through a field of land mines then it was your business.

Even if you lost a vital organ in the process.

-*-

IV. Justin

You had spent most of Sunday riding around in the taxi, wasting Brian�s money. You couldn�t think of anywhere you could go. You didn�t want to go back to your mother�s house, answering uneasy questions about where you had been, and there was nowhere else.

You finally pulled up outside the diner late in the evening, not particularly wanting to go inside, half-expecting to find Brian sitting there telling everyone what an idiot you had been. But it was just Emmett and Ted, and although they didn�t verbalize it, they knew something was wrong. How could they not? You had always worn your heart on your sleeve.

You�d always hated being transparent, especially when you met someone like Brian who seemed as if he was stuck behind a blank sheet of glass. You tried to model yourself on him for a while, carefully rearranging your features until they slipped into a mask, but you always slipped up just when it mattered.

Then after a while, as the months passed and you had more of a chance to study Brian, you realized that he slipped up too, he just did a better job of covering it up.

Your personal favorite moment was after the bomb at the club. Everything had moved so quickly, in a series of flashing colours, as you stumbled about in the wreckage, your heart flailing wildly in your chest like a tiny trapped bird, and you imagined that was what it had felt like for Brian after you had been bashed: completely and utterly hopeless.

He left to go to the hospital with Mikey and the others, and you couldn�t quite bring yourself to ask him to stay, however much you had wanted to. He had done his bit, pushing through the club, his voice cracking as he called out your name, the relief palpable on his face as he saw you and pulled you into a bone-crushing hug.

He needed to be with Mikey, and you had to allow him that. He wasn�t yours anyway by that time, and it wasn�t right to ask him to stick by your side. You found your mother and her boy-toy and stood around with them until the paramedics had checked you over. It was cold, bitterly cold, and you remember a fire fighter throwing his heavy coat over your shoulder as you began to shiver. You felt oddly detached, an unwelcome intrusion on your mother and her boyfriend, even though you knew she had been giddy with worry before Brian had found you.

You slipped away as they chatted to the cops, wandering aimlessly along the street, weaving through the mess of people clinging to each other and sobbing their losses.

Then there he was, stalking towards you through the mist like a fucked up superhero. All he was missing was the mask.

His eyes were on you, and you�d never seen such single-minded determination on his face before or since. He didn�t stop until he was right in front of you, and you glanced up timidly into his face, feeling small and rather powerless under his gaze.

"I was so worried�" He was almost laughing at himself, at how raw he knew he was, at how much he was exposing just by opening his mouth.

He pulled you into another hug, just as strong as the first but with less bite. Less full of panic. And you held on, allowing him to wrap you in his arms where at last you could feel safe.

"I love you."

You can�t describe, even now, what it felt like hearing those words from those lips. The same mouth that had chanted so many times before that it was all bullshit. That he didn�t believe in love.

Something opened up inside you, a gaping hole that originated in your chest and moved right down to your toes. It was as if your body was finally letting go of its need to hear him say that, as if it was making space to feed upon it, devouring his words like a hungry animal.

You made a whimpering sound in the back of your throat and he pulled back from the hug, looking at you with complete certainty.

"I love you," he said again, more sure, with conviction in his voice, and all you could do was blink and just keep staring at his face.

But all of that was gone now. You missed the assurance in his face. Not that you thought any of it was ever real anyway, after you had recovered from the shock. It felt like he had said it in the heat of the moment, so scared he was losing Mikey that he couldn�t stand the thought of losing you too.

You almost felt it again when he had proposed, trying to convince you that it was what you both wanted.

But that fell apart too.

As you lay in your bed at your mother�s house, listening to the tiny sounds of a clock ticking, a dog barking outside, partly wishing it wasn�t Monday so Molly would be around to distract you with her noise, you wondered if you and Brian had always been fated not to last.

You were both so different, total opposites in so many ways, thrown together by chance and somehow developing a weird mutual understanding. But it wasn�t enough, you knew that now, not when you both kept on doing things that made you both keep on hurting.

The phone rang, jolting you from your thoughts, and you pulled yourself up, tearing down the stairs in your underwear.

What if it was�?

"Hello?"

It was your mother, calling from work to tell you about a new client.

Apparently one Mr. Brian Kinney had a sudden desire to sell a house.

-*-

V. Brian

It was a decision you made on a whim, standing by the water cooler listening to one of the women in the art department telling her friend about the amazing offer she had just received for her second home, an unneeded property now she was divorced, and that apparently house prices were high at the moment. Enough to make a mint.

Back in the office you got Cynthia to put Jennifer Taylor on the line, a double purpose really. She was one of the best real-estates you knew, being honest and upfront where she could, but better than that, she was Justin�s mother, which meant you wouldn�t have to tell him about this yourself.

She seemed surprised but she slapped on her business voice and kept her questions professional, for which you were grateful.

At the end of the conversation she thanked you for your business, assuring you that she would send someone round to take photographs of the house, and told you she would see you tonight.

What?

Before you had time to ask, the dial tone was sounding in your ear, and you replaced the receiver. Tonight? Was something supposed to happen that you had forgotten about? You wracked your brain but came up blank.

You picked up the phone again, getting Cynthia to put you through to Ted.

"Theodore?" you asked, trying to sound casual. "Why would I be seeing Jennifer Taylor tonight?"

"Ah, that�s right. Forgot to tell you. Debb told us last night that everyone is invited to her place for dinner this evening. Some sort of thank you for her party."

"Who�s going to be there?"

"The usual crowd: Mikey, Emm, me of course, Ben, Hunter, Mel and Linds, Gus and JR, Justin and Jennifer."

Fuck.

"Is something the matter Brian?" he asked when you didn�t answer.

"No. Nothing. Such a shame I can�t make it. Washing my hair tonight."

You put down the phone without waiting for his response.

You refused to go, and that was all there was to it.

-*-

VI. Justin

So Brian was selling the house. Well good, you�d never wanted it in the first place. You were surprised he had hung onto it for as long as he had. It was just standing there empty, and surely a house like that deserved owners who would get some joy out of it?

You swallowed and distracted yourself by putting the coffee pot on.

You knew this was all about Saturday night, but you weren�t quite sure why. What had gone wrong? The conversation had been a little stilted, sure, but then you had kissed him and everything had changed. The sex was good, very good, as it always was, but there was something bittersweet about it, a tang lying at the back of your throat as you had pushed back to meet his thrusts.

You�d known it was just a temporary arrangement, something nice to do to pass the time, to remember what it had been like, what it could have been like if you had stayed.

But there was something reserved about it, a quiet hesitation as if you were both going through the motions as you searched for release.

You remember how much you had wanted it, how you had craned your neck trying to watch him. How you wanted him so completely but knew he was out of reach.

There was a moment, just after sex, where you felt that familiar connection with him, as if you were fully understood, but you felt the need to sever it somehow, creating distance between you so that it wouldn�t hurt quite so much when you left.

That was the problem really. You wanted to be close to him. You wanted to be the recipient of those little looks, as if you shared a secret with him that nobody else could understand. You wanted to kiss him and talk to him, and show him how much you felt: an overwhelming screaming of a feeling that was too strong to be put into words, as if your skin was too tight for your body and everything inside was pushing to get out. But you knew that by allowing yourself that, by coaxing him into laying bare the parts of himself he reserved only for you, it would make everything so much more difficult to bear.

So you pushed and pulled, dancing close and then slipping from his grasp, torn between the thumping of your heart and the lecture in your head. And in doing so you created a whole new set of complications.

You were still sitting there at the counter in your underwear, the coffee going cold in front of you, when your mother returned that afternoon, Molly by her side.

"I hope you�re going to get dressed before tonight," she said, giving you a look as she threw her keys down.

You shrugged, making a face, and drained the dregs from your cup. "Why? It�s not like I�m going anywhere."

"Oh yes you are!" she said, and stuck one hand on her hip. "We�re going over to Debbie�s house for dinner."

You groaned and looking up at her pleadingly. "Do I have to?"

"Yes you have to!" she replied. "It�s to thank all of us for her party. It would be rude not to go, even if you�re going to feel awkward with Brian being there."

"Brian?" your head shot up. Your mother ignored you and gave you a smug look.

Great, all you needed was to see Brian again. On the one hand, at least it was in a situation where you could avoid him and focus on other people instead.

But on the other, you knew that even though you could avoid talking to him if you wished, he would still stick out like a beacon, a human lighthouse, reversed to throw you onto his rocks.

You knew immediately that you would drown.

-*-

VII. Brian

Mikey turned up just as you were getting ready to go out, your most expensive pants and a new black shirt from Prada lying on your bed, the silver threads winking in the low glow from the lights overhead.

"Brian?" he called out as he pulled open the door, and you heard his footsteps tripping across the hardwood floor as you wondered if it was too late to hide.

"Oh, there you are," he said as he came up the steps and peered into the bedroom, taking in and then promptly avoiding your naked state. "Hurry up, we�re going to be late."

You turned around and grabbed his face in both hands, kissing him on the lips. "I�m early actually," you told him, and bent over to grab your pants, giving him a nice view of your ass. "Babylon doesn�t open for another hour."

You could tell he had pursed his lips behind you, and you suppressed a smile, trying to fight the urge to laugh. You buttoned up your pants and picked up the smoking joint from the ashtray beside your bed, taking a deep drag.

Mikey stepped forward and plucked it from your lips. "What the hell do you think you�re doing getting high before we go to my Mom�s?"

"I�m not going to Debb�s," you said, giving him a slow, serpentine smile. "Didn�t you hear me? I�m going to Babylon."

"The fuck you are!" he said and ground out the joint. "You helped organize her party and you can damn well be there to let her say thank you."

"She already did that," you replied. "I was there, remember, during that long drawn out speech."

Mikey glared at you and you slung one arm around his shoulders, pinching his cheek. "Come on, Mikey, forget the little dinner. Come to Babylon with me. I promise I�ll show you a good time." You gave him a wink.

"No!" he shot back, and pushed your arm away. "You can go to Babylon later. We�re doing this first. Everyone�s waiting."

"I don�t care if the god damn Pope is waiting," you said, and shrugged into your shirt. "I�m not interested."

"Is this about Justin?" he asked, and you scowled.

"This has nothing to do with Justin," you lied, and walked through into the bathroom and began fixing your hair in front of the mirror. "This is about me wanting to get wasted and fuck a few men."

He followed you into the bathroom and rolled his eyes. "I knew something had happened when I saw his face last night. You slept with him, didn�t you?"

You pushed a strand of your hair off your forehead and straightened your shirt, turning to face him. "No actually, I slept upstairs in a bed and he slept downstairs on the floor."

"I knew it!" he declared, and stood in the doorway, blocking the path back to the bedroom. "You went to the house with him and something bad happened, which is why you�re selling it all of a sudden."

"How the fuck do you know about that?"

"Ted told me, but that�s beside the point. Did you fuck Justin?"

You shrugged and glanced back in the mirror, smoothing one finger over an eyebrow.

"Oh my god, Brian!" his voice was horribly high-pitched. "What the fuck made you think that was a good idea?"

"Stop queening out," you chastised him and put one hand on his shoulder. "It was just sex."

"It is never �just sex� with Justin!" he said. "Even you know that. Christ, you�re an idiot."

"That may be so," you told him, and carefully maneuvered him out of the door, pushing him back into the bedroom. "But I�m an idiot who is about to go to Babylon and have a fucking good time."

Mikey got a murderous look in his eyes and planted both hands firmly on your chest, pushing you back down onto the bed.

"Why, Mikey," you said, looking up at him coyly. "Whatever will the Professor say?"

"Shut up!" his hands balled into fists at his sides and he gave you his �don�t fuck with me� look. You were reminded horribly of Debbie.

"I don�t care if you want to screw yourself up by fucking the boy wonder," he said. "I don�t even care that I will be the one who has to pick up the pieces when he leaves again." You snorted at that but remained silent. It wasn�t wise to interrupt Mikey during one of his rants. "But I do care that my mother has been slaving over a hot stove all day to hold this little get-together, and if you know what�s good for you then you will get the fuck up and come with me now!"

"But�"

"No. I don�t want to hear it. I don�t care if Justin is there and it makes you uncomfortable. That�s your own god damn fault."

You blinked and pouted up at him. "I hate you sometimes, Mikey," you said.

"Good," he replied and hauled you back onto your feet. "Because there are times when I�m not so keen on your either."

And so that was that.

-*-

VIII. Justin

"Sunshine!" Debb pulled you into a hug and drew you inside the house. "I�m so glad you could make it!"

She had a huge smile on her face, the kind she only got when she knew everyone she loved was going to be in the same place at the same time, and you fondly kissed her on the cheek before she let go and moved to hug your mother.

Emmett waved you over and pulled you down on the couch next to him. "He did it then?" he asked. "Brian finally decided to sell the house."

You shrugged and took the drink Ted offered to you. "It�s no big deal," you replied, painfully aware that Mel and Linds had stopped cooing over JR to listen to you. "He may as well get the money for it."

Melanie snorted. "Stupid thing to buy in the first place," she said. "He had no idea you would even want to live in it."

"I took a chance on love."

You strained a smile at her and knelt down on the floor next to Gus. "What are you drawing?" you asked him, and looked over his shoulder.

He beamed up at you and moved his arm. Your heart clenched.

There on the page in neon crayons he had drawn a picture of himself. On the left was what only could be Mel and Linds, and on the right stood you and Brian. Holding hands.

You forced a smile and patted the back of his head. "It�s great, Gus. We�ll make an artist out of you yet."

He grinned, obviously pleased, and turned his attention back to his picture. You looked up as Linds touched your shoulder.

"I know it�s hard," she said, worry crossing her face.

You stared back at her blankly. She had no fucking idea. It was one thing knowing that you loved Brian, entirely another seeing it executed in vivid colour at the hands of a child who obviously thought you belonged together. You wish everything was that simple.

"Michael�s late," Debb said, as she joined you all. "But that�s not going to stop us. Shall we all sit down?"

You all piled into the kitchen and crowded around the table. There was hardly enough room but you managed somehow, scrunching up, elbows and knees banging together.

Debb hovered around and began serving everyone, refusing to sit down until you all had full plates.

"Sorry we�re late. You know how Brian is about picking his clothes."

You looked up as Mikey entered and gave Debb a bunch of flowers and an apologetic look.

"You should be sorry!" Debb said. "Almost ruining my dinner."

Brian sauntered into the kitchen wearing what were obviously clubbing clothes, his eyes unfocused.

"Debbie!" he exclaimed. "How lovely of you to invite us." He eyed the food as if he hadn�t eaten for weeks. "Something smells good!"

Oh god, Brian was high. You could tell from the obviously annoyed looks that Mikey kept giving him, that it had been a struggle to get him here.

Debb smiled at Brian�s obvious enthusiasm and pushed him into a seat, placing a full plate in front of him that he immediately attacked with gusto.

Emmett and Ted exchanged a look.

"I hear you�re selling the house," Mel said to him as she helped herself to some bread, ignoring the angry glance Linds gave her, telling her to shut up.

Brian swallowed his mouthful and looked in her general direction. "Property market is good at the moment. Makes sense to sell before it slips."

His comment was answered with silence, and you glanced uneasily around, looking at Emmett as he nudged your leg.

"Uhm. The pasta is good, Debb." you said, trying to tease out conversation.

Everyone nodded, chiming in with their own appreciative noises.

Ben, who practically had Mikey sitting in his lap, gave Debb a smile and gestured with his fork. "You�ll have to give me the recipe for this sauce sometime. I never manage to get it this good."

Brian snorted from across the table and you glanced across at him, meeting his eyes. He shrugged as if to say �what?�

"Of course I�ll show you, honey!" Debb said, and turned around, grabbing a jar from by the sink. "Aisle thirteen, near the ketchup," she smiled, holding it up.

Everyone laughed except Brian, who was already helping himself to seconds.

"Tell Justin about what we discussed last night," Ben said to Mikey.

Michael cringed, his gaze falling for a split-second on Brian, and then turned to face you. "We were thinking of coming up for your next show," he said. "There�s a comic-con on that weekend and I�d like to see it. Thought we could do both."

"And I want to check out that chick again," Hunter chimed in, a long strand of spaghetti hanging from his lips. "The one that works at the coffeehouse at the end of your street."

"That would be great!" you told them. "I�ll make reservations for you at the same hotel you stayed in last time you flew up."

"I wish we could come," Linds said as she spooned some sort of mush into JR�s mouth, catching a dribble with the edge before it fell onto her dress. "But I�ve got a heavy workload at the moment. Barely managed to get time off for this."

You smiled at her and took a sip of your wine. "It�s okay. You�re not missing much."

Brian snorted again and you caught sight of Mikey kicking him hard under the table.

It was going to be a very long night.

-*-

IX. Brian

Christ, it was like your own personal nightmare, this queer faction of the Brady Bunch. Everyone sat around acting like everything was fine, making small talk and completely wasting what could have been a perfectly good evening fucking your way through the backroom at the club.

Well, at least the food was good.

You had thought it would probably be unwise to be high at Debb�s house, half hoping that by being so, Mikey would refuse to drag you along.

But now that you were there you thought it had been a perfectly fine idea. It was about the only way you could handle their irritatingly normal conversations, and you sat back, munching on your meal, leaving everyone around you to pretend they were playing happy families while you blatantly ignored the little looks Justin kept on giving you out of the corner of his eye.

Then they had to go and bring up his little art show, didn�t they?

"Why don�t you tell us all about the paintings for the show?" Linds asked him, and you felt like leaning over and punching her.

"Yes, Justin," you said before you could stop yourself. "Why don�t you tell us? We�re simply dying to know."

He gave you a strange look and addressed Linds. "They were inspired by subway graffiti," he said. "I used to see this patch at the station I had to travel from every time I wanted to do something outside of the art district. There was just something so free about it, but at the same time it�s this precise sort of art, just like any other. There are all these rules about tagging and what colours to use."

"Linds smiled. "I can see you being good at something like that."

You thought back to the Stockwell posters Justin had created that had ultimately cost you your job. Yes, you could see him being good at it too.

"So I started hanging out with some of the street guys," Justin continued. "And one of them taught me the ropes."

"Did you pay him in kind?" you asked, blinking innocently, not caring how bitchy it sounded.

Justin scowled. "Why does everything have to be about sex with you?"

The room went quiet.

"Because it is," you replied, and put your fork down. "You are a fool if you think there is anything else."

"Brian." Mikey gave you a warning look.

"What?" you asked. "It�s true. For me, at least. You and Ben go about playing the happily married couple if you wish, but it doesn�t work that way for the most of us."

"How does it work then, Brian?" Justin asked, and you could see the challenge in his eyes,

"For most of us," you told him, your eyes locked, "there is nothing else besides sex. Everything else is just make-believe, a diet of heterosexual propaganda that is fed to us from the cradle."

"Oh what a load of crap!" That was Melanie. "You�re just a bitter old queer."

"I�ve got nothing to be bitter about," you told her calmly. "I just accept what the rest of you refuse to believe."

"You do, do you?" Justin asked. He looked almost dangerous, his eyes narrowed as if he was daring you to deny what you had shared.

You�d never been one to back down on a dare.

"Sure," you said with a shrug. "The idea of making love is just crap. I don�t buy it. No matter how slow you are, how gentle, it�s still fucking. The rest is just in your head."

He stared at you for a couple of seconds and then carefully set down his cutlery.

"Well," he said, and shoved back his chair. "Fuck you." There was that wounded look. "Just�fuck you."

He walked swiftly from the room and straight up the stairs. You heard the door to Mikey�s old bedroom slam shut.

You smiled lazily and turned back to the rest of the table who were sitting with their mouths open. "So, what�s for dessert?"

Debb smacked you around the head.

-*-

X. Justin

Someone once told you that love and hate were so closely linked that sometimes the lines were blurred. You could quite believe it, even if you had never experienced it for yourself.

Not until now, at any rate.

You slammed the door shut and stalked across the room, sinking down on the bed. You would have left the house if you thought that nobody would chase after you, but you had known they would, so you had chosen this instead, complete with memories of Brian and going down on him in the dark. At least this way you could get some privacy for a while, and hopefully by the time you ventured back downstairs, Brian would have left.

A small part of you said that you shouldn�t have been surprised at what he had said. He had been angry and high, never a good combination, and something would have bound to have kicked off, sooner or later.

What you didn�t get was why he had to choose sex, of all things, to launch his attack.

You knew they were lies even as he had spoken them, but that didn�t make them hurt any less. He may well have stuck up his middle finger at all those times you felt you had shared more than just plain old fucking with him. He had just declared them null and void.

You knew the truth. You knew that he hadn�t been just going through the motions all those times, pandering to the part of you that longed for some sort of affirmation of his feelings for you.

You remembered the time after the bashing when you pulled the bloodied scarf from around his neck, and knew without a doubt that he cared about you. You needed him then, in a way you had never really felt before. It was an emotional longing that manifested itself as physical, and the only way you knew in which to show him was to place your trust in him, despite your fears, and let him fuck you.

He was so god damn tender that night, and you ached remembering how he touched you, not just to please but to reassure you that it could still be okay, that even though your world had fallen out of orbit at the swing of a bat, there were still good things to be found. And to reassure himself, you supposed, that you were still there, still his to take.

Well, fuck him. If he wanted to deny all that and pretend it had never happened just to make himself feel better about this whole sorry mess, then he could go on right ahead.

You had no desire left to stop him.

The door opened and you looked up, ready to tell whoever it was that you weren�t quite able to go downstairs just yet, that you would be there in a few minutes.

And there he stood. The light from the hallway turned him into a silhouette, and you longed to paint him, flush against a skyscraper background in New York. He was like a star in his own show, the spotlight of the stage, and however mad you were at that moment, you couldn�t help but stop and stare.

He came into the room and shut the door, breaking the moment, and shoved his hands into his pockets.

You refused to speak first. He had created this mess and if he was here to try and clean it up he could fucking well do so under his own steam.

"Debb told me I couldn�t have any apple pie until I came up here and apologized," he said.

You almost laughed. It was such a childish thing to say, and so inexplicably Brian - this fully grown, god damn gorgeous man who never sugar coated the truth however petulant it sounded.

"And that�s your idea of saying sorry, is it?" you asked him, your voice sounding a little more tired than you had hoped it would.

He shrugged and started pacing. "I considered offering you a joint as a gesture of peace," he said, patting his shirt pocket. "But then I didn�t think it wise for us both to be stoned."

"Because we would fuck?" Your statement shocked you, but you supposed it was the truth anyway. Your resistance to each other had always been strongly compromised when you were both high.

"No, actually," he sounded amused. "Just didn�t think anyone else would appreciate it if you came downstairs laughing your head off and eating everything in sight."

Fair enough.

"Why did you say those things?" you asked him. "What the fuck possessed you?"

He shrugged again and stopped his pacing, coming to a standstill in front of you. "I don�t suppose you would accept it if I claimed ignorance because of the weed?"

You shook your head and fought the urge to stand up and face him.

"Didn�t think so." He ran one hand over his mouth, sucking in a breath. "I was bored of all that idle chatter," he said, still not quite reaching the truth. "Besides, it�s not like I was saying anything new."

You smiled slightly at that. "No, you weren�t. I�ve heard that sort of thing before. Even though you were always lying."

"Was not," he replied, sounding half-hearted.

"Sure. I�m sure the reason you were upset the last time we made love," you drew out the words, "was because sex was just so horrible it pained you to be there doing it with me."

He gave you a look. "Shut up."

"Why?" you asked, getting into your subject. "Don�t you like to hear me talking about it? Don�t you like to be reminded of how you lay me down on the bed as if I was going to break, and kissed me in such a long, drawn out way that it felt like you were trying to reach my heart with your tongue?"

"Justin�" he started pacing again, his eyes flitting around the room.

"Or what about the way you eased yourself so gently inside of me, your eyes on my face the entire time? Or the expression on your face. How utterly lost you looked. Don�t you like to be reminded of that?"

"Justin!" This time it was a shout.

"Or what about how we lay there afterwards and you buried your face against my neck, holding on as if you were afraid you were going to fall over, even though we were already lying down?"

"I�m warning you!" his face was cold, his jaw set, but his eyes, they were wild, flying around the room, landing on everything, seeing nothing. Refusing to look at you.

"What is it, Brian?" you asked, your gaze fixed firmly upon him. "Can�t you handle it? Don�t you want to remember, or is it that you just simply can�t forget?"

"I told you to shut up!" He whirled around and grabbed you by the front of your shirt, pulling you to your feet, his eyes wide and angry as he looked down into your face.

"Shut up," he repeated, his voice a whisper. "Just shut up."

You caught sight of the defeated look on his face as he pulled you against himself, pressing his face against the side of your neck.

You didn�t know what to feel. You thought it should be triumph, but the way his fingers clenched in your shirt put pay to that.

You raised your arms and wrapped them around his waist, holding him close.

-*-

XI. Brian

You thought you were in control. You thought that saying what you had, forcing him to flee like that, had meant you were the one calling the shots. It was up to you what happened with him, how far it went. You had been the one who had accepted the kiss in Babylon, the one who had relented at the house. You could choose to discard him if you wished.

You hated being wrong.

Why did he have to do that? Why did he have to bring up the past? Of all the things he could have chosen he decided to bring up the last time you had been with him before he got on his flight. It was the one thing he could choose that was bound to get to you, although you thought that as far as he was concerned it was a shot in the dark.

When it had happened you hadn�t been thinking. Everything you felt towards him had just come pouring out. It was ridiculous, and sappy, but you never thought it would be something you would have to deal with again. He was leaving and you could go on and fuck as many guys as you wanted, showing your body that was how it was really supposed to be done. Sex was supposed to be rough and hard and quick. You wouldn�t even have to remember what it had felt like with him that night.

But he was right. He was always god damn right. You never could quite forget.

So you hugged him, closing your eyes against his neck. It was strange that he was the person who had caused this mini-meltdown in the first place, using himself as ammunition, and that you knew he was the only person who could also make it stop.

His heartbeat was steady against your chest, a direct opposite to your own, and you wondered when he had grown up to become so strong. You had always considered that you were the one who held him in your hands, capable of breaking him apart and then gluing him back together again.

But he�d obviously been learning his own tricks.

You pulled back a little and lifted your head, staring into his calm face. There were no traces left of the na�ve teenager you had first encountered all of those years ago. He was still sometimes unsure, but he had grown up enough to realize that he held his own kind of power over you. And that he was quite willing to use it to his advantage.

You�d always known he�d had that ability, and had been on the receiving end many times over. But it had always been inadvertent before, like the time he left the Rage launch party with Ethan on his arm, giving you that look that made you feel like you had never been good enough for him from the start. But that was about him, not you, and whatever you had felt had been a by-product.

But this, this was a deliberate action of a man who knew perfectly well what he was doing, and you were helpless to stop it happening.

You reached up and wrapped one hand around the back of his neck, pressing your foreheads together.

"You�re killing me," you told him, with a little laugh, cursing your inability to hold in the truth.

"I know," was all he said.

-*-

XII. Justin

You did know, and it scared you half to death. But you weren�t about to tell him that.

His reactions to your little speech were so honest and open that you wondered if it wasn�t the weed answering for him. You knew how he felt, you had always known, but to see it acted out so obviously in front of you was unnerving.

You�d discovered long ago that you had the capacity to play him as he played you, but it had never occurred to you before to even try and do it on purpose. Not seriously, anyway.

You weren�t sure you liked seeing this vulnerable side to him, even though you had always been aware of its presence. After all, wasn�t it what had made you fall in love with him in the first place? Wasn�t it what made you stay with him for so long?

There was very little you could do about this now, nothing you could say to turn everything around and sort it out again. �I�ll stay� would be easy but it would be a lie too. You weren�t going to stay, you knew that, and while he may nod and accept your words, he would know you were lying too.

But what else could you offer him? It was pretty obvious by this point that you could both go on pretending as much as you wanted, but while you were there in Pittsburgh, there would always be yet another of these encounters, where each of you pushed the other just a bit too far. You would always end up arguing or fucking, and then you would spend the rest of the time avoiding each other as you tried to forget it.

"I think I should just stay away from you for the rest of my vacation," you told him quietly, shivering at his touch on the back of your neck.

"No," he said, shaking his head a little. "Won�t work."

"Yes it will," you said, determined. "I can stay away from Babylon and the diner. It will be okay."

"I�ll still see you around," he said. "And there will always be some other gathering we can�t get out of. They will still talk about you."

You smiled slightly and let out a breath. "I�m sure you can cope."

"Is that what you want?" he asked, and looked into your eyes.

You could see it there, in the small flecks of green that circled around his pupils like little lily pads in a chocolate lake; tiny steps that if you followed you would be taken inside, deep into his brain where he kept his secrets, and you would be allowed to see. You knew by his gaze that he didn�t want any of that, even if he could manage to pull it off, but that if you wanted him to try then try he would.

"I don�t know," you said, honestly. "Can you think of any other way?"

"Maybe," he said, and wet his lips. His tongue was so close. "Maybe we just give in to it."

You kept on staring. Perhaps you already had.

-*-

XIII. Brian

It was complete madness, and even though you had done some incredibly crazy things in your time, this had to be right up there with the best of them.

You didn�t think for one moment that it was a good idea giving in to any urges regarding Justin, but it had already happened twice. You thought it was just as stupid to try and avoid each other for the rest of your stay, and even though he would still be leaving at the end of it all, at least you would have a few days where you could go about your business without your brain screaming at you.

You knew all the reasons as to why it was a bad idea, Mikey had already given you the handbook, but you didn�t think there were exactly any other choices left.

And really, what it all came down to was that this way you�d be able to touch him when you wanted to, which was all you ever longed for in the first place.

"Okay," he said, and his breath was warm against your lips. "But are you sure you won�t freak out?"

You scoffed and traced your fingertips over the tiny hairs at the base of his neck, making him shiver again. "Of course I won�t freak out, I�m not Emmett. What about you though?" You nudged his side. "Think you can handle it?"

He cocked his head as if he had to think about it. "I�m sure I can cope," he said, a small smile on his lips.

You grinned then. It was so easy to fall back into this routine of careless banter, his waist hot underneath your palms. It felt good. It felt right.

You leaned forward and captured his lips.

Consequences be damned.

-*-

Epilogue.

Some people say that they have made mistakes in their lives that they had been entirely aware of making at the time, but had felt helpless to prevent, and right now Justin had to agree.

He knew that it would probably be harder in the long run if he gave in to his desires, but he wasn�t about to let that stop him.

It was as if no matter how much distance he managed to put between himself and Brian, how many months it had been since he had last kissed him, his body remembered, and was on standby, just waiting to be switched back on and tuned in to the correct frequency.

He thought sometimes that perhaps he had been created for just this purpose, and that everything else in his life was secondary, designed to fill the spaces between each meeting with Brian.

He wasn�t even sure that the idea of that bothered him anymore.
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