Justin collapses on top of him, pushing Brian back down against the mattress. It’s fucking annoying because he’d been jerking off, and now he can’t any longer. He hadn’t come, but then again, he hadn’t expected to.

Justin pulls out of him and gets up to throw away the condom. When he returns, he sucks Brian off, all the while lightly tracing the rim of his asshole with his finger and giving it a gentle flick now and then. Justin knows how it feels to be sucked and fingered after he’s been fucked, so he knows what to do. Brian comes quickly and hard when Justin unexpectedly sticks his finger deep enough to touch his prostate – everything is so deliciously excruciatingly sensitive down there. Justin pulls his mouth away from Brian’s cock with a final, satisfied slurp and lifts his head to smile at him like he always does after inducing a particularly energetic orgasm. He’s pleased with himself. He should be. He’d put on a grade A performance.

Brian smiles back at him. This is always the moment that Justin gets up to go to the bathroom to clean himself up, but he doesn’t need to this time. It’s Brian who needs to. He feels strangely awkward, almost embarrassed and is glad when Justin goes to the kitchen for a glass of water. He gets up slowly, his ass squeezed tight, which is silly. Justin had worn a condom. There’s no come up there to trickle out. Still. He doesn’t want to be open any longer.  He wants his asshole to return to its normal shape – its proper shape.

He closes the bathroom door, which is something he almost never does. He just wants some privacy. There’s a lot of lube that needs wiping up. He wets a face cloth in the hottest water he can stand and squirts some hand soap on it. The material feels rough; everything is so raw down there, but that’s not a new thing. He’s had any manner of things up his ass and as recently as that morning. But for some reason this is different. And not entirely pleasant.

Justin knocks on the door and asks a tad nervously if he’s okay, and Brian snaps at him. “I’m fine.  Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Okay,” Justin says uncertainly. “I’m going to go to bed. It’s almost dawn.”

“You do that,” Brian says.

“You’re joining me, right?” Justin asks, still sounding uncertain.

“In a minute. Christ, stop nagging me.”

There’s a brief silence, and then Justin says, “Okay, good night then.”

Brian stands for a long time just looking in the mirror. He looks like shit. That jail cell was not conducive to taking a nap. He can feel a hangover thudding like a second heartbeat in his temples. He’d tried to stave it off by drinking a beer as soon as he got home, but obviously, it hadn’t done the trick. Time for a hair from the dog.

He turns the bathroom light off and goes downstairs. Justin’s already asleep. He must be tired too. Who the fuck knows what went down at the Sap’s party. Brian’s not going to ask, and he’s pretty sure Justin’s not going to tell. He wouldn’t if he was in Justin’s shoes. Obviously, something happened though.  Justin had been so fucking stubborn about taking the money Brian had offered him.

He puts some ice in a glass and pours a couple fingers of whiskey on top of it. He’d sit down, but his asshole is too sensitive. He’d rather not think about what had just happened and doesn’t want his asshole reminding him. He walks to the windows and looks out. Justin was right; it is dawn. He can hear the beep beep beep of the bread truck backing into the nearby bakery’s parking lot. Made by hand on site this morning! Who’re they trying to kid?

Brian chuckles and empties his glass. Already his headache is receding. He goes over to the kitchen island and gets his pack of cigarettes. There’s only one left. He’d better make it last.  He returns to the window, looking through his reflection at the world outside. He doesn’t want to think about it – he doesn’t want to read more into it than there really is – but his mind won’t let him dodge his troubling thoughts.

The biggest question is “why?” Why had he let Justin do it? Justin had tried to top before, and Brian had always said no without even a nanosecond of hesitation. Why had tonight been different? Was it because he was so relieved that Justin had finally come to his fucking senses and accepted his help?  Maybe. Brian certainly was relieved. Justin had been making some pretty stupid decisions lately. Cutting classes. Not doing his homework. Taking the fucking drugs the Sap plied him with. Stupid, stupid, stupid. But Brian hadn’t been able to say something. The couple times that he did, he’d felt like a father nagging his bratty teenaged son. There were many irritating things about that burgeoning dynamic, but the most irritating thing was that it was a fucking turn-off. He didn’t want to be fucking some go-go boy with a coke habit. It was . . . it was kind of gross.  And the boys hadn’t been shy about discussing it right in his face. Who else was “discussing” it?  Probably half of Liberty Ave.

Not to mention that fact that he didn’t want Justin to be a go-go boy with a coke habit. It’d be a fucking waste of talent and initiative. Shit like that might not ruin your entire life, but it could certainly fuck things up in the short term. Dig a hole in your twenties and you’ll spend your thirties trying to claw your way out of it. He doesn’t want that for Justin.

So, yeah, he was relieved when Justin finally accepted his offer. It was amusing – the whole “it’s a loan” thing. Right.  Like Justin’s going to have the money to pay off a loan anytime in the near future – that is if he keeps doing what he should be doing which is pursuing his talent and not flipping burgers at a fucking McDonalds somewhere.

But how did relief translate into letting Justin fuck him?  Was it that he could sense the humiliation Justin felt for having to admit he needed help?  If he were in Justin’s place, he’d feel humiliated even though he knew it was the smart thing to do.  So, did he want to give Justin back some of his self-esteem?  Did he want to show Justin that this isn’t about who’s indebted to whom but about just being fucking savvy about things?  Had he wanted to “level” some kind of playing field?

Maybe. But altruism had never resulted in letting someone shove their dick up his ass before.

He’s smoked his cigarette down to the filter and drops the butt into his empty glass, listening to the brief sizzle and then silence. Time to get some fucking sleep. He puts the glass in the sink, drinks a bottle of water and goes upstairs. Justin is sprawled across the bed like he owns it. It annoys Brian more than it should. In the bathroom, he decides to take a shower.  Christ, he’d been in that fucking cell for hours. It’d stunk like sweat and piss and clothes that drunks have been wearing for months without a bath. Damn Mikey and his mommy issues.  Although, it hadn’t been without its amusing moments.  Sometimes Ted could be genuinely funny, which is a good thing or else Brian wouldn’t be able to put up with him.

He steps under the hot spray with a sigh. Ah!  He should’ve done this as soon as he got back. He soaps his body and is not all that surprised when his finger searches out his asshole even though he’d rather just leave it alone. Justin had fucked him pretty thoroughly and quite well – surprisingly well. Drawing isn’t the only thing the kid’s talented at, although unlike the drawing, Brian takes full credit for the fucking. It’d been good enough that he might have been able to come if Justin had fucked him just a couple minutes longer. It also would’ve helped if he’d had some lube to jerk off with and his face hadn’t been buried in his pillow making it tough to breathe. He’s not going to do it again anytime soon – if ever – but that didn’t mean he regrets it. No, he doesn’t regret it. If he regrets anything . . .

. . . if he regrets anything, it’s not the fucking itself. It’s what happened before the fucking that troubles him. He hadn’t really tried to resist, and he hadn’t said anything. He should’ve said something like “enjoy it, Sunshine, ‘cause you’re never having my ass again.” He hadn’t made it crystal clear that it was a one-time thing. He’d not only opened his legs, he’s opened a door that was going to be hard to slam shut if he needs to.  Which he will need to someday. Doors that stay open . . . what had that guy said?  Ah, right. Leave the door open and you never know who’ll sneak in and rob you fucking blind.

Would Justin get it? Would he get what a big fucking deal it was? Or was it just a kind of victory to him. Brian had won the Money War, and now he, Justin, was going to win the Fucking War.  If that’s how Justin did view it, Brian wouldn’t blame him.  He’d feel exactly the same way in Justin’s place. A conquest!  A trophy! A notch on his belt! Topping the Top!

He lets his finger slip inside himself. The sensation reminds him like a bullet between the eyes that he’d just been fucked. And not just by anyone – he’d been fucked by Justin.  Justin owned a part of him now, but he hadn’t stolen it. Brian had given it to him. He’d given it to Justin because he’d wanted to. Not for the pleasure – hell, having a dick up your ass isn’t much different from having a dildo up there. If he’d wanted to have his ass fucked for pleasure and nothing else, he would’ve told Justin to fetch his latest silicon purchase. He definitely would not have rolled over and said, “I’m horny. I want something shoved up my ass. Hey, why don’t you use your cock this time?”  Hell, no.

So if it hadn’t been about pleasure, and it hadn’t been about “leveling the playing field,” then what had it been?  What’d caused him to let a man come inside his ass?  To use his body to get off with?

Was it love? Was that what it’d been? Love of all fucking things under the sun? Had he told Justin that he loved him?  Had he said, “Here, have me, do what you want with me, I trust you and not because I’m afraid you’ll fuck my asshole into mashed potatoes – I’m trusting you with more than my body. I’m trusting you with my heart. With me, with everything I am – and everything I hope to be. Here you go, Sunshine. My asshole. Take it. Sorry I didn’t have time to wrap it in shiny paper and put a bow on it. I hope you’ll like it anyway.”

He rinses himself off and shakes the excess water from his hair. He won’t bother drying it; he’ll have to take another shower before he leaves anyway, so why bother. He’ll just cover his pillow with a towel. He leaves the bathroom and enters the bedroom.  Justin is still sprawled everywhere like a Goddamn giant octopus. Brian gets under the covers and shoves him aside. Justin grumbles a barely audible “fuck off,” but Brian’s pretty sure he isn't conscious enough to know what's going on. Apparently “fuck off” is Justin’s default setting.

He lies on his back staring up at the ceiling.  He’s tired . . . actually, he’s really tired, but he senses he’s not going to be able to sleep. The second Justin wakes up, he’s going to fuck his brains out. And then he’s going to fuck him again after breakfast. In fact, he intends to fuck Justin all day in every position and on every accommodating surface available. And it’s not going to be about love. It’s going to be about fucking.  Just fucking, nothing else.  He’s going to fuck the memory of what they’d just done right out of Justin’s head.  Hell, he’ll fuck Justin until the kid won’t remember his own name let alone the fact that he’d made Brian stick his ass in the air and spread it open so Justin could fuck him deeper – as deep as fucking possible. Nope. Justin would not remember that. Brian really doesn’t want him to. He doesn’t want Justin jerking off over the memory of his dick sliding in and out of his asshole . . .

. . . But what he does hope is that Justin remembers what Brian has given him, that Justin can fucking see what it is.  Brian’s trust, his vulnerability, hell, his love.  If Justin didn’t see that, well, Brian is fucked and not in the literal sense.

Justin stirs and says his name. Brian’s not sure if he’s still asleep. He likes to think he is. Something about knowing that Justin might be dreaming about him is comforting, and he needs that comfort right now. He will never ask for it, but that doesn't mean he needs it any less because who knows what the future holds.

Who knows if Justin is as smart as Brian thinks – as smart as Brian hopes to god he is.