BEYOND THE YELLOW BRICK ROAD
CHAPTER 14-MILESTONE
BRIAN’S POV
every day's an endless stream
of cigarettes and magazines
The drive home the night Justin returned, the onslaught of headlights coming at you one after another in the opposing lane, seemed a fitting visual representation of your life—the past and the present. Your trip began as it did every night, at least fifteen minutes of cars coming at you, not one distinguishable from any other. Their lights were bright and caught your attention, but they were always forgotten as soon as you passed them by. And then the cars would thin out and a few would pass, occasionally turning your head, but your focus was changing to the cars in front of you then, keeping time with them as they traveled ahead of you, your foot always ready to hit the brakes when things got too close for comfort.
Ultimately though, every night, the lanes would narrow bit by bit until it was just you on a dark road where you needed your brights to be able to see anything at all. The congestion and distraction were gone, but as always on a two lane road in the black middle of nowhere, there would be that one car, that one beacon, that demanded to be followed, that demanded to set the pace all the way home.
“Mr. Kinney, you are one mile from your destination. Have a nice evening.”
As a younger guy, the frustration of being forced to slow down for anybody would irritate and enrage you, but as you got older, you became grateful for that steady light in the distance that, if you just followed it, would eventually lead you home.
As you wound along that road that night, you turned off the radio because you just didn’t want talk radio chatter invading your thoughts. You wanted to think about him, the fact that he was really home, really in your house, and patiently waiting for you to get to him. He was so much better at waiting than you were; you’d actually entertained notions of abandoning your car and commandeering a private helicopter so the waiting would be over. But somehow, you didn’t think an emergency landing in your front yard was what Justin had in mind for that night.
The picture forming in your mind of him waiting inside the house kept changing.
Sometimes you were walking into the living room, approaching him, as he stood at the bar with his back to you. He wouldn’t turn around, even when you said his name.
Sometimes he was sprawled out on the sofa—completely nude—sketching a picture of you, also sprawled on a couch and totally nude, on his chest with a permanent marker.
Sometimes he’d lead you on a wild chase throughout the house that always ended with him running out the back door and disappearing into the thick woods.
Distraction.
As you took the last, winding mile to your house, you glanced down at your gloved hand wrapped around the gearshift and wondered who was really driving this car.
You or your dick.
After all, you had your dick to thank for introducing you to Justin in the first place. And tonight, you were going to thank it properly.
If the powerful force of your car’s turbo engine had failed you, your dick seemed to have enough kinetic energy to get all three of you home. And strangely enough, it seemed to have an amazing sense of direction tonight. Usually the only place it was familiar with was due north.
You had sympathy for it, though, because it’d literally been fasting for over three months. Three months. Hell, they could’ve built Rome in three months. You’d been compelled on several occasions, albeit mostly when it was just the two of you, to explain to it that it wasn’t being punished.
Not at all.
“You’re being rewarded,” you told it. “I promise, rewarded.”
It didn’t seem to believe you, though, and threw up on you every time you had that conversation. But, like most cocks, it still woke up early in the morning and crowed, so to speak, as if by reminding you of its neglected presence, you’d give in to its demands.
*********************
home, where my thought's escaping
As you got closer to home, parts of your body that you hadn’t even realized had gone into hibernation started to wake up. You gripped the wheel, steering with a determination that rivaled even your innate tenaciousness, and as you approached the house, you saw him.
In the window.
His blond hair in sharp contrast to the dark shirt he was wearing, his thumb propping up his chin, his index finger laying across his lips as if he was studying the front yard. He moved his hand and smiled when you turned in the driveway, and as you walked up the sidewalk, you watched him pass in front of another window out of the corner of your eye. You fumbled with your key out of habit, but he was right there when you turned the knob.
The door opened and you quite literally fell in love.
It was everything you could do, every impulse you could fight, not to just pick him up off of his feet, toss him over your shoulder, and drag him to your cave. Maybe he sensed this, his hands clutching your arms, graciously keeping you in the moment.
It would be the first night that your car ever spent in the driveway.
*********************
JUSTIN’S POV
right here, right now
there is no other place I want to be
The thick wool of Brian’s coat bunched underneath your fingers as he held you. Finally, when you felt his grasp loosen, you looked up at him and apologized again, “Sorry I made you trip.”
He just smiled and then said in a voice that was quieter than you’d expected, “Sorry I couldn’t be there to pick you up. It was right in the middle of a huge presentation.”
“S’okay. I’m used to taxis.”
His hand rolled down the back of your head, “Yeah, I guess you are.”
……
……
What was probably only a few seconds felt like an eternity to you, and you were grateful when Brian stepped away, walked into the living room and offered you a drink. You gladly took the whiskey he handed you, anxious to have something to do with your hands.
“You look really nice,” you said, thinking that you remembered whiskey burning a lot more than it did that night.
“Presentation,” Brian reiterated as he hung up his coat, as if he only looked fantastic when he was performing for clients.
“This house is so big, and it’s kind of cold in here,” you told him, thinking, after you said it, that you sounded like a simpleton.
“I can change that,” he said, throwing you off guard when he walked past you to the fireplace. It was only then that you noticed that the fire had been prepped; he only had to light it. The wood crackled as it came to life. “Better?”
“Yeah, that’s nice.”
He motioned to the sofa, “Sit down, relax. Are you hungry?” You were hungrier earlier, but your appetite had mysteriously disappeared.
“No, not really. But if you are—"
“I’m fine. Had a late lunch.” He sat beside you on the sofa, and almost immediately, you felt his outstretched hand resting on your shoulder, warm even through your sweater. He squeezed your shoulder, “It’s nice to have you back.”
“It’s nice to be back.” Brian studied your face as if trying to ascertain if you were serious.
……
……
He leaned forward, his fingers wrapping more tightly around your shoulder as he took your empty glass out of your hand and sat it on the table with a muted clunk. “Justin, come here,” he breathed, his grip tightening again as he pulled you to him.
You felt yourself lose all semblance of free will and unable to do anything else besides stare at his necktie as it came closer and closer to your face. He lifted your chin with his index finger, and for some reason, when he leaned down to kiss you, you started talking again, “I missed you.” His response to you, as always, was more physical than verbal. You caught your breath briefly when your lips parted, “so much.”
The next thing you knew, he was lying back on the couch and you were going with him. You kicked your shoes off and started unraveling his tie. You untucked his shirt and ran your hands underneath it, half rubbing, half holding him. He was warm and smooth and he smelled like the Brian you knew with a splash of the Brian you didn’t. A shiver went through you as his lips moved over the side of your face, behind your ear, and down your neck, his fingers wound tightly in your hair.
You had no idea who or what was driving this thing because the energy between you seemed to propel itself from you to him and back again every few seconds. You couldn’t harness it if your life had depended on it.
Neither one of you had any intention of going gentle into that good night.
*********************
as I remember what a night
After several minutes of kissing him, of feeling his tongue trace the inside of your mouth, he mumbled into your ear, “On the floor,” as he sat up and more or less pushed you off the sofa. Brian began to undress you and then himself, puling you down on the rug in front of the fireplace. Before you knew it you were on all fours facing the flames, the fire certainly not to blame for the rising temperature in the room.
His hands ran down the sides of your body and your back with purpose, and you got the distinct impression that he was admiring you. You felt his cock, warm and hard, pressing against you, and you knew he was going to take you. For a split second you worried about coming all over his expensive, oriental rug, but that second vanished into your memory when you felt his hand between your legs, his fingers lightly stroking the inside of your thigh, the sounds of his breathing competing with the sound of hot smoke being whisked up the chimney.
This wasn’t an elegant but sterile hotel room in the city or even the loft where the two of lived together. This was his house, and you were on his turf, in his territory, and he was claiming you.
His hand left you for a second and returned warm and wet, and your upper body sank into the carpet. He felt you take a deep breath, “Relax.”
“Fuck me.”
And he did, just like you wanted, leaving you within an inch of your life.
And then he took that, too.
It started out rough and almost awkward, as if your bodies needed to get re-acquainted with each other, but within mere seconds the two of you were moving in one fluid motion. Your eyes locked on the intricate designs in the carpet underneath your fingers, sliding in concert with Brian’s thrusts. You reached back and slapped his thigh when you couldn’t stop the ecstatic rush inside you, and he immediately looped his right arm underneath you, pulling you back and up so that you were kneeling on his lap facing the fire. Sweat burst from your pores as you came, your cock held tightly in his hand. You rode him as you rode the wave rolling through your body, arching your back to accommodate the sheer force of it. The third time you sat down on him, he came, squeezing you, grazing your shoulder with his teeth. Brian brought his hand to your mouth and you laughed; it was so hot, it was already dry.
“Justin,” he moaned, kissing the back of your neck and your shoulders, “Welcome home.”
*********************
sweet surrender, what a night
Brian looked down on you where you lay in his bed, kissing the side of your face, commenting on how hot your skin was.
“The fire,” you reminded him.
“Right, the fire,” he mumbled, his lips now buried in your neck, “very hot.”
You smiled, tugging on him until he rose up and looked at you, “Brian, come here.”
He lay partially on top of you, holding you in his arms, “Hmm?”
“Can we just slow down for a second?”
“You okay?” he asked.
You smiled and rubbed his face with the back of your fingers, “Just a little overwhelmed, that’s all. Just give me a minute.”
Brian laid his head next to yours on the pillow, “You can have all night. In fact,” he kissed the top of your head, “you can have anything you want.”
You turned to face him, “I want you,” and then closed your eyes, your body absorbing the warmth of his.
“Mmm.”
……
……
Something about the way the two of you were laying made you suddenly remember your first night, or rather, first morning, with him; how you’d wanted so badly to reach out and touch him, almost to prove to yourself that he was real. Now when you touched him, when you reached for him, he didn’t ask you what your name was, he moaned a little and held you tighter.
……
……
“Brian, the house looks amazing.”
“It looks a lot better with you in it.”
……
You laughed, “I’m serious.”
“So am I.”
……
Lying with him like this, with your face pressed against his chest, had to be the most wonderful place in the world to be. You reached up and tucked his hair behind his ear as you asked, “Who knows I’m here?”
He laughed quietly, “Nobody, really,” and then he paused a second before continuing, “I didn’t really tell any of our friends.”
……
“Because you didn’t think I’d really come back?”
“Didn’t want to jinx it, I guess,…but I’ve been in a really good mood this week, so knowing Cynthia, she’s probably figured it out.”
“She won’t tell anybody. She’s more loyal than a Golden Retriever.”
“I know.”
“You have two blonds in your life that love you, huh?”
“You forgot Lindsay.”
“Right. Three.”
“Couldn’t handle another one, that’s for sure.”
“How’s Gus?”
“Unbelievable. He’s great.”
……
The next few minutes passed without words, Brian’s hand smoothing down your back, his kiss strong and soft at the same time, your fingers toying with his hair. It became hard for you to believe that you’d mostly gone without this for six years, as your heart, mind, and body easily settled back into being with him, listening to him, touching him.
Wanting him.
Every breath he took as he held you felt like a quiet confirmation of your love for him.
……
After a while he rolled on top of you, both of you hard, and moved against you, his hand wrapping around your bottom as he kept you as close as he could. You tore open the condom and handed it to him when the wanting became so overpowering that you feared you might disintegrate underneath him. His deep, low moan washed over you as he raised your legs and made his way inside you.
You loved being fucked like this, being powerless under the weight and movements of his body, being the source of that delicious smile that spread across his face. He lay on top of you, slowly stroking your cock as he moved, kissing you with a tenderness that almost drove you mad.
The kind of mad that made you want to grab him, bite his earlobe, and beg him to fuck the shit of you.
But after six years of waiting to have you back in his bed, he was in no hurry.
You tried to prepare yourself emotionally for what this was going to be, but it was futile even to try. There was no explaining this or rationalizing it; there was only the unfuckingbelievable sensation of having him inside you, of being so completely full and loved, spread and open.
……
“God, I love you, Brian,” you whispered in his ear, the words feeling far too inadequate for the moment. “I don’t even know how to express it.”
“I’m sure it’s on a canvas somewhere,” he teased you, an attempt to make you laugh through the intensity.
He’s right, you thought, It’s on all of them.
*********************
BRIAN’S POV
reunited
and it feels so good
You fed him your cock in the shower, holding his head firmly as it collided with the back of his throat. You’d suggested the shower as a way of cooling things down a little, your bodies and your emotions. It failed on both counts when you were stroking his hair after you came and remembered how you could always see his scar when he was on his knees in the shower.
You took your mind off of that by washing his hair as he knelt in front of you and making a stupid joke about trying to have rubber knee-pads installed in the shower before he got home. His response was to laugh and pull you down there with him, and he turned around and leaned against you as the water streamed over both of you.
……
The two of you descended the stairs together to be sure the fire had gone out and to close the flue. For some reason that night, it seemed like a two person job. You turned off the lights downstairs and led him to the sauna, watching as his face lit up in amazement when he walked inside.
“Get the fuck out. We have a sauna?”
There was a sadness, a palpable sadness in the air, when he slipped out of the thin, gray, clingy pants that he was wearing and you were worshipping.
“Yes, we do.” He stretched out of one of the ample benches, and you sat one step below him and faced him as he tucked one hand under his head, lazily stroking your thigh with the other. He closed his eyes, and you ran your fingers through his wet hair, “New York was great, huh?”
He opened them and smiled, “Beyond great. It was fantastic.”
“Gonna miss it, aren’t you?”
“There’s a lot of it I’ll miss: my friends, the endless inspiration, the anonymity of the whole place, you know?”
“Contagious.”
He propped his chin on his hand, “You know, Brian, I understand now why you wanted to go so badly. It’s like you can be anybody you want there.”
“It’s liberating.”
“Exactly…We wouldn’t happen to have an indoor pool, would we?”
You laughed at the change of subject, “Not yet. But you never know.”
“That’s a Jacuzzi in our bathroom, isn’t it?”
“Absolutely. And that other door in the bathroom goes to the tanning bed.”
“Man, we are rich.”
“That we are.”
……
“Thanks for letting me come back…for waiting for me.”
*********************
JUSTIN’S POV
knockin’ at the door of your candy store
Brian rose and moved up to where you were, lining up over your body, and even though you were in a steamy sauna, you felt a chill for a moment as his lips pressed lightly between your shoulders, “Don’t thank me. This is your home.”
Your fingers wrapped around the edge of your step as he kissed his way down your back, his hand sliding simultaneously down the right side of your body. When he got to the curve of your lower back, he stopped, letting you feel his hot breath hovering over your ass.
Maybe he was reading those articles, after all…
Rimming can be delightfully nasty, or a deeply tender act that two lovers share.
Some say there is nothing as arousing as having their lover’s warm, soft tongue and lips give them pleasure in such an incredibly intimate place, and those who love to give it find the experience equally as arousing. If you aren’t sure if your partner will be interested in this activity, always ask before just diving in!
……
Do you like to rim?
I love it.
……
“Up on your knees.”
……
The easiest position for rimming is doggie-style, with the rim-ee on all fours. This way you can gently spread their cheeks with your hands, and see everything clearly as you dip your tongue in and out.
……
Or maybe Brian wrote it.
For many people, rimming is a delicious experience, both on the giving and the receiving end.
……
Or maybe Brian paid someone to write it for him.
……
Or maybe some other guy that Brian rimmed wrote it.
……
You could tell that Brian only had one hand on your ass after a while and knew that he was jerking off. So you pressed back against his mouth, smiling when you felt him shoot, felt that warm wetness run down your leg. Brian followed it, licking the back of your leg clean, his tongue spending too much time behind your knee where you’re ticklish.
“Stop it. Oh my god, stop it,” you begged, squirming underneath him. He knew better than to do that; he tried it once to rouse you from sleep and ended up getting clocked smack in the back of the head with your heel when you woke up. He complained for a week that he was disoriented because of you, instead of whiskey and poppers.
For a week.
And then you realized that that incident happened ten years ago.
Ten years ago.
It’d been a decade since you kicked Brian in the back of the head. Granted, he was probably due again.
But tonight he was spared that fate, and after he’d had his (temporary) fill of you, he helped you put your sweat pants and one of his sweatshirts on and led you to the kitchen, “I know you’re hungry. Fucking always makes you hungry.” Which would explain why you were always hungry when you lived with Brian. You munched a bowl of Cheerios while Brian ate a spoonful of peanut butter, telling you, “This is really incredible peanut butter, but it can’t hold a candle to your ass.”
The two of you were eating like peasants, cursing like sailors, and fucking like kings.
*********************
man it's a hot one,
like seven inches from the midday sun
Rejuvenated, as only Cheerios and peanut butter can do, you both meandered back upstairs, stopping halfway up because Brian wanted to make out, his hand slipping effortlessly underneath the waistband of your pants. He insisted on taking your pants off for you once you were finally back in the bedroom, staring lovingly at them before letting them hit the floor.
“What is your affliction with my pants?” you asked, as he came to bed and laid on top of you.
“They’re sublime.”
“They’re just pants.”
“They’re a cruel mistress whose very existence taunts me into madness.”
You laughed, “And they love every minute of it.”
“Clearly.”
……
Outside your house, skeleton-like trees were becoming slick with a slow rain that slid down the ruts in their trunks, the indentations years in the making. The wind blew like insulation on the other side of your bedroom windows, muffling the occasional sound of weak tree limbs cracking and falling. Inside, the sweet smell of pot filled the room as Brian lit up and passed it to you.
“I missed seeing you smile,” he said as he handed you the joint, stroking the side of your face, making you smile again.
Your bedroom was toasty, the fireplace and Brian emitting a steady warmth that negated the need for sheets and blankets at that moment. Between that and fucking, showering, and steaming with him, your body was relaxed and receptive. Once the pot was gone, Brian’s mouth was soft on yours, his kiss drawing out everything that he wanted from you bit by bit. When he pulled away now and then, your mouth followed his, your head rising up off of your pillow in an attempt to bring him back to you. You moaned when you heard him snap open the lube right next to your ear. He held you close as he kissed you again, his right hand moving between your legs. You felt your body expecting him, wanting him, and then shaking for a second as he slipped his finger inside you, Brian’s long fingers and strong arms always rendering you useless. Your finger traced the outline of his bicep as you listened to him,
“Feel good?”
“Yes.”
……
“You know, Brian, you’re the only person I know whose drug holder cost more than their drugs.”
“Aw, I got that for free,” he said, nodding toward his sleek silver case. “It was a prize in the bottom of a baggie.”
You laughed, “And you have no idea how fucking sexy you are when you’re getting high.”
He grinned and raised his eyebrow, “Oh yes, I do,” his palm pressing against the delicate skin between your ass and your balls, his thumb gently caressing them as you moaned. You knew what he was doing, he knew that you knew, and you were more than happy to lie back and enjoy it.
An impromptu fisting rehearsal.
He was so beautiful when he was like this, his eyes were so dark, his hands were so warm and soft, and as he fluttered the two fingers inside you, you reached for your cock, stroking it with one hand and his hair with the other. When he worked up to three, you felt that familiar feeling of almost floating as his face moved down your stomach, his lips brushing over your stroking fingers, and then ending up gently licking and sucking on your balls. Having your hand on your cock, his mouth on your balls, and then four fingers in your ass was about as close to heaven as a person could get.
He knew your body wasn’t ready to take anymore, not just yet, but he stayed inside you, kissing and nibbling between your legs until your breathing and the pressure on his hand told him that you were going to come. And as you did, he pushed your hand out of the way and swallowed your cock, drinking down every ounce that was pouring out of you. You collapsed against the sheets, exhausted, and he was still inside you…mumbling something about possession being nine tenths of the law.
”More,” you said, your hand moving over his face.
He shook his head, “Not tonight.”
“Uh.”
“Soon,” he promised. “You’re not ready.”
“I want to be ready,” you whined, and he smiled at you.
“I know. You will be.” Your ass squeezed his fingers and he laughed, “Let’s fuck. Shall we?”
*********************
I am a rock
When you were a little boy and your mom finally explained sex to you because your father just couldn’t seem to get the words out, you were completely disgusted. The whole concept seemed completely revolting, but there were probably two very good reasons for that. One, you never imagined yourself ever touching a girl and your mother made no mention of boys touching boys. Two, your mother was explaining all of this to you by way of a bright yellow pamphlet (no doubt from her generation) entitled, How to Talk About Sex with Children Ages Five to Eight.
You were ten.
And therefore, of course, deeply offended that you were behind schedule.
The pamphlet went to great lengths to explain fertilization…between chickens. Not once, in the ten years of your life up to that point, had you had even a remotely sexual thought about a chicken. For a year after that, you refused to eat eggs, but then your mother made you a cake for your eleventh birthday and after you ate it, she told you it had eggs in it—so you got over it.
But the thing you remember most about that pamphlet and the reason that you stole it out of your mother’s dresser, under the guise of sparing Molly the same fate as you, was the black and white picture of the statue of David strangely placed on the page after the chicken debacle. You remember staring at that picture at night in your room, hiding the pamphlet in your pillowcase and extinguishing the flashlight when you heard your parents’ footsteps on the stairs.
The first time you got a hard on, you cried, fearing that you, too, were turning into a statue.
How you became an artist after all of that, you’ll never know.
And it was so nice to be back in bed with Brian, where he was quite clearly the artist in residence. You weren’t exactly sure what to expect the first night you met Brian, what sex would really feel like, who would do what and when, but he took all of those nagging questions away from you one by one as he stroked you, kissed you, rimmed you, and fucked you.
You were so scared when you realized that he was going to fuck you, that he wanted to fuck you. And when he undressed and began to touch you, you wanted to tell him that every time you closed your eyes, you saw the statue of David lying on top of you, and that he wasn’t as heavy as you thought he would be.
So, that night, after he’d gotten his fill of you, quite literally, and it was time to go to sleep, a question was burning inside you that you just had to ask. You waited, much to Brian’s chagrin, until he was almost asleep before you got up your nerve,
“Brian?”
“What?”
……
“I was just wondering, have you ever been to Italy?”
He rolled over and looked at you like you were an alien he’d brought home by accident, “No. Why?”
You were afraid to tell him why because maybe Brian had read that stupid booklet too, and he would know exactly what you were thinking and what you’d done at night under the covers with a flashlight, “No reason.”
That night, you decided that this man sleeping beside you didn’t even own a flashlight. He didn’t need one.
“Whatever. Just go to sleep.”
You pretended right then that he’d said, “Justin, go to sleep,” and fell asleep that much faster.
And after that night, you returned your father’s flashlight with very dead batteries to the garage, putting it back in the same place you’d stolen it from seven years ago. When your father came home from work that night, he marched into the kitchen with it, demanding that someone tell him, “Where the hell has this thing been?” You just smiled at the green bean casserole on your plate and said nothing. And that night in bed, you’d thought about Brian under the covers and how you’d never need a flashlight anymore.
*********************
no, a little birdie told me you can’t make it by yourself
The first morning you woke up in your spacious, new home wasn’t of your own accord. It was six-o-three a.m., and Brian was leaning over your shoulder and staring at your face. An alarm had probably gone off, but you weren’t quite used to ignoring them. All three of Daniel’s had gone off at four thirty in the morning and you could hear them all the way in your room. Besides, you were an artist, and artist’s don’t punch a clock.
Brian obviously thought otherwise, “Wake up.”
“No.”
“I wanna fuck before I get in the shower.” Never let it be said that Brian Kinney doesn’t believe in the direct approach.
You poked your ass in his direction, “Here, my ass is awake.” When you heard Brian fumbling with condoms and lube, you rolled over, “Honestly, you don’t even care if I’m awake or not, do you?”
The expression on Brian’s face was your answer, but he shrugged and gave you one anyway, “Not really.” And then he looked more closely at the look on your face and added, “You know I’ll have a better day if we fuck.” You were still groggy, but you could’ve sworn he was batting his eyelashes and pouting. You performed a perfect dramatic sigh as you rolled on your stomach, and Brian’s arms came down over yours, holding your hands as he fucked you. “I love you.”
You laughed, “You love fucking.”
“I love fucking you.”
……
“You have to go to work?” you asked as you realized that it was very nice to wake up this way.
“Yeah. Things will let up in about a week or so. Then I can play hooky.”
He kissed the side of your face as you told him, “I don’t want you to go.”
“How else will I ever afford the indoor pool you want?”
“I just wanna fuck all day.”
“See what a little whore you are when you wake up?” he asked you as he gripped your hip and then whispered in the back of your neck, “I want you to come.”
“Let me up,” you whispered back, and he backed off a little so you could push up on your knees. You steadied yourself, rubbing your cock, and Brian’s hands slid under your ass, his thumbs spreading you open as he fucked you. The moment began to fast forward as Brian’s breathing became harsher, and you came right before he did, the weight of his body pressing you back into the sheets you’d just risen from. He rolled you over and kissed you, and you let your hands wander down to his ass as you held him, “You are a very sexy alarm clock,” you told him as he kissed you for the last time before getting up to shower.
“Wanna join me?” he asked hopefully.
But you were already falling back asleep.
*********************
your reason for living’s your reason for leaving
Later that morning, you were lying on black sofa in the home theater room watching a movie when the phone rang and scared the shit out of you.
"This is MCI with a collect call from, ‘Alan’. Will you accept the charges?”
“Yes. Alan?” You could hear the noise of the city rushing around him.
“Justin?”
“Hey. What’s up?” It’d been a week since the full moon.
“Sorry I’m calling collect.”
“That’s okay. You all right?”
“Yeah, yeah, I’m fine. I just didn’t get a chance to tell you goodbye.” And then he paused and you would’ve thought that he hung up, except you could hear car horns honking every few seconds. “I’m really gonna miss you.”
“I’m gonna miss you, too. I already miss everybody, actually.”
“It’s weird to go to the studio and not see you there or your stuff. It kinda freaked me out.”
“How’s Harper?”
“Fine, I guess. But she misses you; I can tell.”
“I miss her, too.”
“Justin, I just wanted you to know that I wasn’t the one who stole your computer.”
“That’s okay. That was ages ago; don’t worry about it.”
"I’m not positive, but I think some friends of mine stole it. I think they followed me to Josie’s place sometimes. They knew she fed me and stuff. I think they were sort of jealous.”
“Alan, it’s no big deal. Just—"
“Anyway, neither of them are alive anyway. They’ve been dead for awhile.”
“Alan, don’t worry about it; I’m serious. Just take care of yourself, and stay warm. It’s freezing out there. I’m sure I’ll get back to the city for something, and maybe I can see you then.”
“Yeah, that would be cool. I’d rather tell you goodbye in person. But, look, I gotta go. Some cops are staring at me like I don’t have the right to use a fucking pay phone.”
“Okay, okay. Take care, Alan. Thanks for calling.”
“Bye, Justin.”
You hung up the phone, went in the kitchen and found nothing to cook for dinner. Brian had left the keys to the ‘vette on the counter for you with a note that said,
Have a good day, Sunshine.
I’ll see you tonight.
Naked.
You drove to the grocery store with the radio blaring some obnoxious music that reminded you of the city.
*********************
now I've been happy lately
thinking about the good things to come
The grocery stores on the edge of West Virginia were nothing like the grocery stores in New York City. They were excessively bright and not at all busy. You took your time shopping, trying to remember what Brian liked to eat, what Brian wouldn’t eat, and ended up with a cart full of fruits, vegetables, the makings of a mammoth salad, chicken, wine, and beer.
You spent the rest of the day looking for recipes on line that you thought Brian would like and then made dinner for the two of you consisting of salad, vegetables, chicken, and some fresh fruit for dessert. Granted, you weren’t Martha Stewart, but you figured that your considerable skill in the bedroom more than made up for your lack thereof in the kitchen.
Brian came home on time, and you prided yourself on the fact that you hadn’t called him sixty-five times that day. In fact, you’d called him only once to ask him how to get to a grocery store in the first place. He wanted to know what you did all day, and you told him about your noise-polluting adventure to get the groceries, and he laughed and said that even though he didn’t know what to call what he was eating, it was really good.
“It’s just a chicken thing,” you said. “Found it on the ‘net.”
He molested you the entire time you were trying to wash the dishes and put everything away, badgering you about why you wouldn’t just use the dishwasher. You didn’t want to tell him that it was because you’d never seen a dishwasher like that before, and you couldn’t figure out how to turn it on. You tried once and it spoke to you, “I’m sorry, I don’t know what action you’d like me to perform.”
As far as you’d ever known, dishwashers only did one thing, so you answered it, “I want you to wash the dishes.” But It just sat there, doing nothing and saying nothing, so you kicked it and told it to fuck off, refusing to speak to it for the rest of the day.
So, while you were scrubbing pots and pans by hand, Brian whispered in your ear that he had a surprise for you and eventually led you upstairs to what was your very own studio. Your mouth fell open when you walked into the room, and when he stripped you and cuffed you to your brand new table, you remembered exactly why it was that you loved Brian—nothing with him was ever boring or unsatisfying.
*********************
lookin’ forward to a little afternoon delight
You surprised Brian at his office the next morning, and spent your first Friday afternoon home at the loft with him, making love, snoozing, and having a fabulous lunch from Brian’s own personal restaurant. You weren’t sure if the fact that Brian owned a restaurant meant that you shouldn’t worry about improving in the kitchen or that you’d better take a cooking class immediately.
After you’d come, slept, and eaten with him, he had to go back to work for some accounting-crap meeting with Ted, ‘revising first quarter projections, blah, blah, blah, whatever.’ He kissed you goodbye in front of the office and popped you in the ass when you turned to walk to back to the ‘vette. You drove home listening to some weird CD you’d found in the home theater room amongst Brian’s overflowing collection of music and DVDs. It was basically just song after song about fucking, and you started to wonder if he’d accidentally bought the soundtrack to a porn movie or something.
When you got home, you sat in bed with a bottle of wine and your laptop and checked your email for the first time since you’d gotten back. There were messages from Daniel and Harper, one from your Mom, one from Brian that he’d sent before you’d gotten home telling you to have a safe trip, that he couldn’t wait to see you, one from some freak trying to sell you ‘VIAGRAH,’ and six emails from the refrigerator.
The refrigerator.
When you opened the first one, there was a list of things that it apparently needed or a wish list or something:
3.8 ounces of butter or margarine
1.6 quarts of orange juice
4 bananas
7 grade A extra-large eggs
When you opened the other five, they were all exactly the same, all sent to you in four hour increments of one another, beginning yesterday:
Skim milk, expired.
Skim milk, expired.
Skim milk, expired.
Skim milk, expired.
Skim milk, expired.
You replied to the final milk expiring email:
No, it isn’t. I just bought it yesterday.
And then you paused before you hit ‘send’ and added:
But thank you for your concern.
Then you looked at the bottle of wine you’d brought to bed from Brian’s wine cellar just to make sure you hadn’t accidentally picked up a bottle of vodka by mistake. You started to answer Harper’s email, when the one you sent to the refrigerator bounced. You opened it:
Please do not reply to this address.
You thought about going downstairs to personally tell the refrigerator that it could go fuck the dishwasher, but, admittedly, you were kind of afraid, feeling like the two of them were the top rung of a Kitchen Appliance Mafia that had a contract out on you for invading their space. So, you called Brian instead.
On his cell.
Knowing full well that he was in a closed-door meeting with Ted saving the world or something.
He answered as if in a panic, “Justin? What’s wrong?”
You became immediately paranoid, “Why do you think there’s something wrong?”
“Because I told you about my meeting this afternoon, and you said you’d only call if it was an emergency.”
Yeah, well, whatever, it kind of was an emergency. Somehow on your way home you’d accidentally driven into the Twilight Zone.
“Nothing’s wrong. Sorry.”
“You sound upset.”
……
“Justin? Say something.”
“Brian, why is the refrigerator emailing me?”
You heard Brian breathe a sigh of relief, “Because you’re home all day, so there’s no need for it to email me anymore.”
Somehow that didn’t really answer your question, so you tried a different angle, “It’s telling me that the milk is expired, and the milk isn’t expired because I just bought it yesterday.”
“That’s because you didn’t reset the expiration date when you got the new milk.”
“And that it needs, and I quote, ‘3.8 ounces of butter or margarine, 1.6 quarts of orange juice, 4 bananas, and 7 grade A extra-large eggs.’”
“That’s because we have .2 ounces of butter, .4 quarts of orange juice, 2 bananas, and 5 eggs left in the refrigerator and those are high priority items.”
“Oh.”
“You won’t receive emails about anything other than high priority items, unless you want to.”
That terrified you, “No, no, I don’t want to.”
“Okay. That’s fine.”
……
“Justin, are you there?”
“I don’t like this. Somehow the refrigerator emailing me is making me feel violated.”
“Well, we can have therapy-time with you and the fridge when I get home. I need to get back to my meeting.”
“Fine.”
……
Silence.
……
“Go back to your meeting.”
“Justin.”
“See you later. Bye.” You hung up and finished of the entire bottle of wine.
*********************
dear, I fear we’re facing a problem
When Brian got home for the first Friday night of your rekindled relationship, you were still upstairs in your bedroom, still in front of your laptop, still trying to compose a response to the refrigerator that accurately reflected your true feelings. Brian sat down beside you on the bed, his eyebrow going up very, very high when he saw the empty bottle of wine you drank.
“That was a five thousand dollar bottle of wine.”
“Well, it was very good,” you told him, refusing to look at him. You knew how much that wine cost because you looked it up on the internet after you drank it.
“What are you doing?” he asked you, putting his hand on your upper thigh. It felt like some sort of conciliatory gesture.
“Nothing.”
“Let me see,” he said, turning your laptop a little and trying not to laugh as he read aloud what was on the screen:
“Dear Mr./Ms. Refrigerator,
“I guess I should introduce myself to you since you and I will be living in this house together. My name is Justin, and I’m Brian’s, well, you probably call him ‘Mr. Kinney,’ but anyway, I’m Mr. Kinney’s partner. You may address me as Mr. Taylor."
“You’re a little drunk, aren’t you, Mr. Taylor?” Brian asked, before continuing. You didn’t answer him; it was clearly a rhetorical question.
“It is my personal preference not to receive emails from you because although I don’t hold a degree of any sort, I am intelligent enough to make my own grocery list. Therefore, I would appreciate it if you would cease emailing me immediately. I do realize that it’s 2011, but you are still just a machine and should not have regular correspondence with humans without their consent.
“Thank you for your prompt attention to this matter.
“Sincerely,
“Mr. J. Taylor
“P.S. You probably are not aware of this because you’re a refrigerator, but it is considered very poor email etiquette to email someone from an address they cannot reply to. Thank you, and I look forward to an amicable relationship in the future.
“cc: dishwasher@kinneyhousehold.com”
Brian closed your laptop and moved it to the end of the bed, doing a shitty job of hiding the grin on his face.
“Don’t laugh at me,” you told him.
“I’m not laughing at you,” he said, jerking on his tie and unbuttoning his shirt.
You laid back on the bed as he undid his pants, tossing his belt on the floor, “Yes, you are.” Brian’s body felt nice on top of yours and he shed your t-shirt immediately. You drew little circles around his nipples with the tips of your fingers, trying not to look at him, “I want to be mad.”
“I can tell.” He stopped your hand and planted it back on your pillow next to your head, “It makes me want to fuck the shit out of you.”
“Yeah, well, what doesn’t?” you asked, feeling your frustration dissolve away, despite your best efforts to hold onto it.
Brian’s mouth was behind your ear talking to you in that tone that always went straight to your dick, “I was going to take you out to dinner tonight, someplace really nice, but you’re trashed, so I guess we’re staying home.”
“I had to get trashed; I was under a lot of… domestic pressure.”
“You were bored and horny.”
“Same thing.”
…..
Somehow in the course of that conversation with Brian, he’d managed to take your pants off. You didn’t notice this until he started kissing his way down your chest. When he started talking again, your entire body vibrated with the timbre of his voice, “I had a nice time with you at the loft today, Sunshine.”
You smiled, running your hand down your stomach and underneath your hardening cock, pushing it into his face, “So did I. Guess everybody knows I’m back now, don’t they?” You laughed when Brian’s nose ran the over the top of your leg and started heading south.
“Theodore asked me fourteen times where you got those walnuts because you wouldn’t let him have one.”
“They were our nuptial walnuts. Too bad, Ted.”
“Now, I’m going to have to give him some for Christmas or something. See what you started?”
“I didn’t start it. You’re the one who—" And then Brian’s tongue was invading the Land of the Candied Walnuts, and you didn’t want to talk anymore. You sunk back into the pillows, content with the thought that you weren’t going out, that Brian was having you for dinner. Besides, you were pretty much the only thing Brian would eat after seven. When he began to roam back up your body, you put your hands around his neck and told him, “I’m very, very relaxed. I wanna rehearse.”
*********************
BRIAN’S POV
I can't care 'bout anything but you
“You little drama queen,” you said before you kissed him.
“Please,” he added, opening the lube. Justin took your hand, emptying a decent amount into your palm and closed it again, tossing it somewhere in the sheets. You rolled to your side a little, cradling him in your arm, your leg laying over one of his. There was nothing more goddamn wonderful than having your slick hand between his legs.
As you increased the width of your hand inside him, his eyes opened a little wider, and he just stared at you, his hand seemingly stuck to the side of your face. He was more relaxed than he’d been the night before, no indication of anything but ecstasy until your knuckles pressed against him. His legs were spread wide on your dark sheets, his blue eyes accentuated by the blue of the bedding. You stopped when you felt any resistance, talking to him, soothing him, “S’okay. I’m not going any farther.”
“I’m sorry I got mad about the refrigerator,” he said quietly as he kept staring at your face. “That I called you during your meeting.”
“It’s okay. I’m going to have a long talk with that refrigerator.”
“Don’t, because then it’ll know I ratted it out.”
You smiled, “Then I’ll just drop a hint to the dishwasher, and let him break it to the fridge.”
He closed his eyes for a second, and when he opened them again, his fingers were sliding down his chest. When they wrapped around his dick, he arched his back, pushing into your hand, “Want to come.”
“Okay,” you whispered, watching him touch himself, his free foot pressing hard into the mattress. You curled your fingers a little inside him and just that little bit of movement made him moan and come at the same time.
“Oh god, Brian,” and he relaxed again, sinking back into the sheets.
“You’re getting there,” you told him, and he smiled, curling against you as you held him. “How did it feel? Going a little farther?”
“Unbelievable. It’s like every bit of my body is under your control; it’s a really wicked feeling.” And then he wrapped his arm around you, burying his face in your chest, “I know it’s early, but I’m sort of sleepy…I’m just gonna sleep for a minute.”
You glanced at the empty five thousand dollar bottle of wine and then back at him as he was falling asleep, and decided that it was worth every penny.
*********************
JUSTIN’S POV
my boyfriend’s back
You spent most of Saturday morning on the telephone with every single person you’d ever known in or around Liberty Avenue welcoming you back, and after lunch, you and Brian stopped answering the phone altogether, promising to meet anyone who was interested at Babylon that night. You spent the afternoon ‘rehearsing,’ the evening at dinner at a steakhouse in Pittsburgh, and then adjourned to Babylon where you quickly found out that Brian didn’t fuck in the backroom anymore, that he conducted all carnal matters upstairs in his private lounge. For anyone but Brian, that would’ve seemed so sleazy, but somehow Brian made his personalized mixture of wealth and promiscuity seem elegant.
You learned quickly that it was impossible for Brian to walk into Babylon without having to handle business of some sort since it was his club, so you danced with him for a while and then parked yourself at the bar while he went upstairs and made a few phone calls. Babylon was a different place than you remembered it; Brian’s reconstruction after the bombing gave it the feel of being much more upscale, although in true Brian Kinney fashion, the backroom was just as raunchy when you walked through it for old time’s sake. You were hit on four times, but you just smiled and kept walking. Mostly what seemed really different was the guy tending bar. When you and Brian arrived at the club that night, Brian had introduced you to Ruben as the manager of the club and also the head bartender.
“By choice,” Ruben added. “I’m the head bartender by choice.”
You smiled and tried to shake his hand, but you couldn’t because there was a yo-yo in it. Ruben was so unbelievably different from The Sap that you were sort of fascinated just watching him, plus he barely ever looked at you but always managed to keep a fresh drink in front of you. He reminded you of a magician. At one point during the twenty or so minutes Brian was upstairs, the DJ started playing Tequila! and everyone practically rushed the bar. Ruben had the entire bar lined with shots within less than a minute and was refilling them as fast as the boys could drink them while juggling.
Even after six years in the city, you’d never seen anything like it.
Brian suddenly appeared on the catwalk, and Ruben tapped you on the arm and pointed upstairs, “Boss wants you.”
Brian motioned for you to come up, and you walked up the stairs and stood with him for a minute watching Ruben and his amazing flying bottles of liquor. “He’s amazing, Brian. He’s not a bartender; he’s a street performer.”
“He belongs in a carnival, trust me, but he brings in cash like a whore on Sunday.”
“Wow. Did you hire him because he can juggle?”
Brian laughed, “No, it’s just a nice perk. Come on.” He pulled you into his office/lounge and shut the door, sitting down at his computer for a minute to fiddle with something.
“What are you doing?”
“Disabling the security cameras in here because I’m gonna fuck you.”
Less than three minutes later, you realized the previous statement was foreplay.
“Oh—" and he was pressing you against the burgundy-colored walls, his thumbs slipping inside your waistband and tugging your pants right below your ass. He pushed into you hard and fucked you the way he used to fuck you when you first met, the entire experience straight and to the point. When he came, he leaned against you, resting his head on your shoulder, and you turned your head a little and kissed him on the cheek, his hands covering yours on the wall. “Brian, these walls are a really pretty color,” you said, “Gives the whole room this regal look to it.”
“Only fags would fuck and then comment on the décor.”
You laughed, “Sorry.”
“That’s okay; I really like the color, too.” You heard a roar from the crowd outside Brian’s door and asked him what was going on, “Ruben’s probably standing on the bar having a hacky sack contest with himself.”
“When you introduced me to him, I tried to shake his hand, but he had a yo-yo in it.”
Brian laughed, pulling your pants back up, “You should see him in our meetings. He brings a slinky. He always has something in his hand that he’s fiddling with. It drives Theodore fucking bananas.”
“Maybe he has ADD.”
“I don’t care what he has as long as he makes me money, and he does, hand over fist.”
You turned around in his arms, and pulled him down so you could kiss him, “Speaking of hand over fist…”
“Good lord, all the world’s a stage for you, isn’t it? Rehearse. Rehearse. Rehearse.”
“Take me home. I don’t want to miss my curtain call.”
Brian took your hand and led you down the catwalk, “I think I’ve created a diva.” As you walked out, a hacky sack came zooming at both of you and Brian reached up, caught it right on cue, and threw it back to Ruben.
“Whoa. That scared me.”
“He does that every time I leave. It’s a tradition.” Driving home, you asked Brian if Ruben was gay because you didn’t get much of a vibe off of him. Brian smiled and laughed and said, “That’s the sixty-four thousand dollar question. If he is, he doesn’t dip the dill at the club. When he first started working for me, Theodore and I had a pool going on it, but we never got any indication either way, so we donated it to a charity and gave up. If you think you can figure it out, knock yourself out.”
“Maybe you can get Ruben to teach you how to juggle because you’re not very good.”
Brian laughed and said, “You haven’t seen me juggle in eleven years. For all you know, I’m a pro now.”
“Ha, I doubt it.”
“Well, let’s see; I run four businesses with almost two hundred employees, have two homes, two cars, a son in another country, and a partner who calls me at work because he feels violated by the refrigerator. I think I juggle quite well.”
“Okay, fine. You win.”
*********************
all my plans depend on you
On Sunday, the thirteenth of February, you went to one of those warehouse grocery stores and took Brian’s car—while he was in the bathroom. When it asked you for your destination, you told it to fuck off. Apparently that pissed the car off, and it kept asking all the way to the store. If the car hadn’t been full of cases of cereal and condoms on the way back, you would’ve left it on the side of the road and told Brian that the car left him for some other car, it so clearly needed a companion.
You hadn’t gone to the warehouse store just to buy Cheerios and condoms, but they really didn’t have everything you needed, and the prices were so good, you felt like you had to buy something. So, you bought a shit load of two things that you knew you’d go through like gangbusters. Needless to say, Brian was not impressed. When you suggested to him that maybe he should take the car out to dinner for Valentine’s Day the next day, he followed you upstairs and fucked you.
Twice.
Monday was Valentine’s Day and Brian said nothing about it all day. Not when he fucked you before work. Not when you called him in the middle of the day to ask him what he wanted for dinner. Not when he got home and the two of you were eating said dinner. The movers had arrived that morning, and you spent most of the day unpacking your stuff in your studio. While you were cleaning up after dinner, you told yourself that Brian detests holidays in general, and you shouldn’t take it personally.
After dinner, Brian helped you unpack some of the heavier things in your studio and arrange the furniture the way you wanted it. Then he announced that he had to piss, but didn’t return for over half an hour. So, after wandering around looking for him and coming up empty handed, you decided to test out the intercom system in the house and paged him, “Brian, where are you?”
He buzzed back after about fifteen seconds, “Downstairs.”
The only ‘downstairs’ when you were on the first floor was the basement, so you opened the door to the top of the stairs and called, “You’re down here?”
“Yep.”
The stairs to the basement were steep, and you balanced by putting your hand on the wall as you went down. When you got to the bottom, you followed the only light you could see—in the wine cellar.
Brian was waiting for you with a glass of wine in his hand and when you scanned the room to see where the bottle was, you saw it, on top of a barrel next to another wine glass and a small red box with a white bow. You gave Brian a curious look as he handed you the glass of wine and started to pour another one, “What’s going on?”
Still in his work clothes, Brian looked a little overdressed for the wine cellar. Although you were really glad he didn’t change when he got home because he looked scrumptiously hot in his black dress shirt and his black pants. Suddenly, you felt underdressed for the occasion, whatever occasion this was, glad that your jeans hung long over your sneakers.
“It’s Valentine’s Day, isn’t it?” he asked with a smile.
“Yes, but—" Brian tapped your glass with his and nodded, indicating that you should go ahead and have some. You tasted it, and, “It’s really good.”
“It should be; it costs about a hundred and fifty.”
“Dollars?” you asked, as it almost dribbled down your chin; you caught it with your finger and put it back in your mouth.
“Thousand,” Brian corrected you.
You started to drink a lot slower.
“What’s in the box?”
“Open it.”
You handed him your wine glass for safekeeping and picked up the tiny box. The lid lifted right off the top, the way they unwrap gifts on soap operas, with the bow still in tact. There was white tissue paper inside and you lifted it, revealing a key.
“What’s this? A key to the wine cellar?”
Brian laughed, “Absolutely not. You’re banned from the wine cellar unless I’m chaperoning you.”
“Then what is it?”
“The ‘vette; it’s yours.”
“What?”
“You heard me. It’s yours. I don’t need it, and I was going to buy you a car like mine, but clearly, that’s not what you want.”
“Oh my god, but you love that car. You love it.”
“And you.” Brian sat the box down and handed you back your glass of wine. “I figured you should have it because I got a car just like that when I was about your age. If you want, we can go down tomorrow and sign the title over.”
You laughed, “God, I feel so sexy all of a sudden. I love that car…but I didn’t get you anything. Shit.”
“Do you really think there’s anything I need?” Brian asked, looking around at the wine cellar and gesturing upstairs and beyond. “Besides you?”
……
“Brian, I don’t know what to say.”
“Say you’ll blow me.”
You blushed, “Okay, I’ll blow you.”
You started to walk to the stairs, but Brian pulled you back, “No, Sunshine. Right here.”
So that Valentine’s Day and for many more to come (so to speak), you went down in the cellar so you could go down in the cellar.
Lyrics taken from Simon and Garfunkel’s Homeward Bound twice, Jesus Jones’s Right Here, Right Now, Franki Valli’s and the Four Seasons Oh What a Night twice, Peaches and Herb’s Reunited, Michelle Branch’s The Game of Love, Santana’s (featuring Rob Thomas) Smooth, Paul Simon’s I Am a Rock, Harry Connick Jr.’s Recipe for Making Love, ABC’s The Look of Love, Cat Steven’s Peace Train, The Orlean’s Afternoon Delight, The Cardigan’s Lovefool twice, The Angell’s My Boyfriend’s Back, and Art Garfunkel’s All I Know.