These paper boats of mine are meant to dance on the ripples of hours, and not reach any destination. - Rabindranath Tagore

Part I

Their lives were little paper boats, like the ones Gus folded and shaped and set out to sea at the park, no particular destination in mind. When the water was glassy and calm, the boats sailed side by side. When the water was disturbed, even with a little ripple, they separated and wandered, taking their own path of least resistance. At times, their paths would cross again. But there were long spaces of water where the boats would be out of sight of the other.

That was their life. Drifting with no particular destination in sight. No shore to aim for, no port in the storm. And the ripples... oh, there were ripples. Ripples left by bats and bombs, by cancer and California, by violins and viruses, by friends and enemies. And sometimes those last two were hard to distinguish from one another.

Justin was always waiting for the ripple. He'd become accustomed to the agitation of the water beneath his feet, his land legs unused for such long periods of time he imagined nautical vertigo. They'd had a long stretch of calm sea and their little paper boats were sailing side by side. It was inevitable that the ripple would come. It was only time.

Surprisingly it was Ben who tossed the rock into the water, upsetting the surface. Justin couldn't blame him, after all he'd carried the boulder on his shoulders, like Atlas, for years now.

He left Michael.

It was an angry, acrimonious split, to no one's surprise. Justin suspected it had been in the offing for some time. One can, apparently, only share the affections of a spouse for so long before there is little left to cling to. He was finally finished, Ben said, with Michael's feelings for Brian. He'd endured them for over five years and hadn't been able to wish them away. His own life was on a shortened course, and he didn't want to spend what was left of it playing second fiddle to 'the other man'. Justin couldn't help being slightly amused by the reference, given 'the other man's' distaste for that particular stringed instrument.

Debbie railed, Emmett consoled, Ted paid little heed, and Brian... well, he was Brian. Being so far away from the center of the non-tempest, Justin simply watched from the sidelines. New York had been a ripple in and of itself, one Justin had paddled against with a fervor he'd never known before. He'd tossed out tether line after tether line until Brian couldn't avoid catching one. They'd then ridden out the ripples, waited for the return of the calm sea, and sailed on. Side by side, Justin had thought, their little paper boats lashed together against inevitable onslaught.

When Ben sailed away in his own little boat, the inevitable wake rippled the smooth water yet again, with the force of a tsunami. Michael felt adrift, crashing himself into in whirlpool of insecurities and indecision and loneliness. He soon tossed out his own tether lines and moored himself against the object he felt was most secure.

By the time Justin realized the size of the waves crashing around them, the deed had been done and the entire horizon had been changed. It was, of course, Emmett who punched the fatal hole in Justin's vessel just before his return to Pittsburgh for the holidays.

"There's something you should know, baby. I don't want you walking into anything without being prepared."

That's how Justin came to understand the full impact of the tidal shift, the tectonic nature of change. Brian had comforted a drifting Michael in his own inimitable way. After more than twenty years, Michael had finally found his port. And Justin felt himself a castaway, lost on the island that his new home had become, the tethers connecting him to Brian being slowly slackened until the moorings weren't there at all.

Brian had set Justin adrift in order to provide harbor to Michael. Such ironies life holds.

Justin stayed in New York for Thanksgiving. And for Christmas. And for New Year. Once in a while he'd wander down to the Hudson and set out a little paper boat, watch it sail and circle and, ultimately, sink alone into the icy, murky waters. It seemed fitting.

In February, Jennifer Taylor died. Tragically and unexpectedly, her car spun out of control on a patch of late winter ice and came to rest, a tangled mass of metal, against a nondescript abutment three blocks from her destination. It had been six months since Justin had seen her and he folded beneath the double burden of grief and guilt. But he pulled himself together enough to return to his home city to be by his sister's side and honor their mother.

It was a small, private ceremony, none of them up to hosting wakes and viewings and condolence calls from friends and family and co-workers. He refused to think it was because he didn't want to face Deb. Or Brian.

The first night after his mother's burial, Justin huddled in the middle of her large bed, hiding himself beneath her blankets still filled with the scent of lavender and peony. He remembered every slight he'd given her, every moment of angst and tried so hard to recall a time when he'd actually made her proud. In his grief he couldn't think of one. He sank further into the soft comfort of her bed, which only increased the hardness of his missing her. He wept.

He had boxed up some of Molly's things and took them with him when he visited the attorney's office. He left them there for his father to pick up. Justin didn't want to see the man, to be reminded of yet another loss. As he left the office he heard the voice he'd tried to forget for months.

"Justin." It was all Brian said.

"I have to go."

"I'm sorry... about your mother."

Justin laughed. A dry, barren sound. "Yeah, well, sorry's bullshit. Right? And neither she nor I need any more bullshit."

"Justin, hang on..."

"That's what I thought we were trying to do, Brian," Justin replied, irritated that his voice gave away a bit more hurt and anger than he was going for. "Apparently I was wrong... Leave me alone, Brian. I hope Rage and Zephyr have a marvelously fucked up life. JT has left the building." Justin turned and walked toward the double doors of the hi-rise building. There was nothing for him here but angst filled memories.

"He was alone, Justin. He fell apart when Ben left..."

Fuck. He should have just kept walking out the door, walking away from Brian, from Pittsburgh, from everyone who had ever meant anything to him. Why couldn't he just leave it the hell alone? Justin stopped and turned back toward Brian. He was so fucking elegant and beautiful and Justin had never hated anyone more than he did Brian Kinney right that minute.

"Fuck you, Brian. Just fuck you. Michael did this to himself, brought every bit of this on himself with his fucked up fourteen year-old's fantasies. He threw Ben away and then went into self-pity mode. He parlayed that into a fulfillment of his childhood dream." Justin's voice rose with every sentence. "He's thirty six years old, and he was not fucking alone! He had Deb and Emmett and Ted and his daughter... He has no fucking idea what alone really means. Not a goddamned clue."

Brian just stared at the anger radiating off of the man in front of him. This man he'd almost married. This man he'd pushed and pulled like a contortionist for so many years. He couldn't meet those eyes, so full of hurt and betrayal and disillusionment. This wasn't an Ethan moment and Brian knew that. Justin had done nothing to deserve the abandonment he'd received at Brian's hand. Nothing. The one who was really alone was Justin. No father, no mother, not even a sister now if dear old dad had anything to say about it... and no lover. Justin was entirely alone. And they both knew the fault for that lay at Brian's feet. The recognition of that stirred up Brian's defenses.

"What do you want me to say, Sunshine? You left and headed off to the big city. You were there... Michael was here." He shrugged. And yeah, he knew he was being a prick. It came naturally.

Justin smiled sadly and, before he turned away one last time from this man who had been his life, he said, "I just buried my mother, Brian. Neither you nor Michael should really expect any understanding from me right now." The young man squared his shoulders and walked out into the cold afternoon sun.

Jennifer had left her town-house to Justin, with all remaining property to be divided between her two children. She had placed Justin in control of Molly's share until she turned twenty-one. It was at least one way to insure that Justin remain in his sister's life, if only on the periphery, and Justin said a silent thank you for his mother's foresight. His mother had been a frugal businesswoman and, though neither Justin nor Molly would be rich through her legacy, she had left them both comfortable. Justin would no longer have to work two jobs simply to pay the rent on his third floor walk-up.

Although he wanted nothing more than to leave Pittsburgh immediately and forever, to finally turn his back on all the heartache and pain he now associated with the city, Justin remained in town long enough to begin the sale of the real estate and disburse the contents. He sorted through old family photographs, mementos of younger and happier days, his emotions raw and naked in the face of what he would never have again.

"I was hoping you were still here, Sunshine."

The voice was softer, gentler than he recalled, but it was unmistakeable. He mentally kicked his own ass for neglecting to lock the front door.

"Temporary situation, Deb. I'll be gone in a few days." Justin braced himself. The last thing he wanted to do right now, with his emotions at full mast, was to navigate the torturous waters of Debbie Novotny.

"You've been pretty scarce since you got back in town. Avoiding your family, Sunshine?"

"Jesus, Deb," Justin said with a painful sigh. "In case you've not heard, my family is pretty much all dead now."

"You know that's not true, Sunshine. You'll always be family to me. You're as much my son as..."

"Stop. Just... stop now." Deb was being sincere. Justin knew that, but he also knew she was wrong. He was not her family. Not anymore. Never had been, really. "You helped me so much when I needed it, and for that I'll always be grateful. But they're your family - not me. And I'd appreciate it if you never called me that name again. Believe me, the Sunshine you knew ceased to exist several months back."

"You hold it right there, young man. You will always be a part of my family, no matter what happens..."

"No! I'm not, Deb. I'm not your family, not your son! I never was and I never will be." He hated hurting her and he could see that he was doing just that. But the truth had to be said. It certainly never had been before. "I'm not your son, adopted or otherwise. You know why?" He paused to hand Deb a tissue. "Because I'm a grown-assed man. An adult. And it seems to be a requirement for your sons that they remain children all their lives - tied to some childhood fantasy regardless of who the hell they hurt in the process. To never be able to stand on their own two fucking feet and take the consequences of their actions like men. To never grow up and leave their childhoods behind them. To be men."

"How the hell can you say that? They are men," Debbie cried. This was a boy she'd loved and taken under her wing. Someone she'd nurtured and cared for. But he was someone she just didn't seem to know anymore.

"No, Deb, they aren't. They are emotionally stunted little boys playing dress up, battling to see who will play the rescuer and who will play the damsel in distress today. And fuck anyone who gets in the way of their infantile temper tantrums. They are judgmental, cruel, selfish brats." Justin took a deep, cleansing breath and walked toward the door. He held it open. "I think they truly deserve one another... And unless you want me to get into what part I believe you played in making them that way, I think you'd better leave now."

Debbie stared, speechless, at this angry stranger. Her face blotched from tears, her makeup running down her cheeks, she pulled the lapels of her fuzzy red coat close to her body. "I don't know who the hell you are anymore, Sunshine."

Justin gave a wan smile. "I'm the man who was thrown overboard for your pretentiously needy son. The man who wasn't even given the respect of being told he was being dumped. I'm the son of a woman who died less than a week ago. But... I'm not Sunshine."

Justin left Pittsburgh within hours of the closing on his mother's house. Unless Molly needed him, he'd made a promise to never set foot in that city again. He returned to his third floor New York walk-up and his part-time job at the gallery. He quit his job at Cobb's Steakhouse without notice. As the weeks passed, he was surprised at how seldom he thought of his Pittsburgh life. Of Brian. Betrayal, he found, was a great motivator for forgetting the good times. And the bad times... well... remembering those kept his mind off the loss. He dated occasionally, but never seriously. He wasn't one to trick. That had all been for Brian. He painted, he worked, he ate and slept. And if, on occasion, he wandered to the Hudson and set out little paper boats, there was no one there to question him.