Chapter 1 - The Dregs.

When Brian Kinney and Justin Taylor arrived in the quaint rural town of Yamhill, Oregon, they just missed seeing each other by less than twenty minutes - although Justin didn’t know that yet. The romantic blond youth and his cohorts had actually arrived in Portland almost a day earlier, but they’d gotten distracted numerous times on their way to wine country. Justin was beginning to regret asking his two best friends, Daphne and Emmett, to join him on this little adventure. In fact, it was starting to look like this whole trip was going to be one gargantuan waste of time. At this rate he’d never manage to find the elusive and ever-desirable ‘Brian’. As he sat in the passenger seat of the compact economy rental car, listening to yet another local trying to give them directions to the Winery they were looking for by referencing ‘Old Bernie’s Barn’ and ‘The old Auto Parts store’ that had been closed for near on ten years, Justin’s mind drifted back in time to the moment that this whole mess began . . .

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“But . . . but . . . but, I thought he LOVED me,” Emmett sobbed for the tenth time as Daphne and Justin both patted him on the back ineffectually. “He said he only wanted to be with me. He wanted to take me away from all this and show me the fucking world, he said . . . He even bought these stupid tickets to Costa Rica, for fuck’s sake, and then what . . . the night before we’re supposed to leave he just has to go out and fuck some lame assed trick? And he didn’t even have the decency to do it someplace discreet! That’s what really fucking chaps my ass! He was fucking the guy in the back seat of MY car parked in the middle of Liberty Avenue! Can you fucking believe that?”

“No, Em, I can’t believe that and I couldn’t believe it the last twenty times you told us about it,” the younger blond man said, his tone indicating that, while he was still sympathetic, he was getting a little bit fed up with His buddy’s whining.

“Justin!” the equally young brunette woman sitting on the other side of the weeping Emmett admonished at the boy’s insensitivity. “Now, Em, you just need to cheer up, honey. We all agree that Calvin is a fucking prick who deserves to have his dick bitten off by the very next trick he talks into sucking him off. But, honey, you sitting here crying your eyes out isn’t going to help anything. We brought you out tonight to cheer you up, Em. We’re here to dance and drink and meet some NEW guys to help get your mind off that asswipe, Calvin. “ Daph handed the blubbering older queen a handful of paper napkins, “now, blow your nose, sweetie, and then go wash your face and fix your eyeliner and then we’ll dance until you’re happy again. Okay? Don’t worry, honey, someday we’ll all meet our princes.”

With a little bit more cajoling and sympathetic patting, Emmett was eventually convinced to retreat to the men’s room to get himself cleaned up.  Both Justin and Daphne heaved huge sighs of relief. Not that they didn’t feel bad for their friend, but since this was Emmett, it was really a pretty common occurrence and didn’t warrant too much serious compassion. It seemed like the big-hearted nelly-bottomed queen fell hopelessly in love every second tuesday of the month - followed regularly by the inevitable messy, crying breakup approximately five days later. The two teens knew that by the end of the night, Emmett would be back in his element, picking up another guy or two at the club and would be back to his usual happily effervescent self by the next morning.

While they were waiting for Em to return, the two friends headed out to the dancefloor of the already hopping nightclub, bopping along to the standard ‘thumpa thumpa’ beat until they found a relatively open spot where they could seriously start shaking their groove. Just as they started to get warmed up, the DJ switched over to a remix version of Lady Gaga’s ‘Born This Way’ that seemed to be a favorite of several of the people in the crowd. Everyone on the dancefloor started jumping up and down like popcorn kernels in a hot frying pan. Daphne squealed with glee at the new song, grabbed Justin’s arm and pulled him after her even deeper into the throbbing crowd of half-dressed sweaty dancers pulsating along to the beat of the music.

Justin let the strong beat of the music infiltrate his soul. It felt almost like the music was physically lifting him up and then dropping him down repeatedly. The enthusiasm of Daphne and the other dancers around him added to the almost weightless feeling as Justin let the music take over his body. Before long, the crowd wasn’t only hopping up and down, but also bouncing off each other as if they were all part of some giant pinball machine. Justin allowed his body to be carried along with the flow of the music as he ricocheted further and further across the lighted dance floor. At the moment of the final phrase of the song - I’m on the right track baby, I was born this way, hey! - the impassioned young man leapt higher than ever and at the apex of his jump was slammed backward by his neighbor into the the body of whoever happened to be standing right behind him at the time. Justin rebounded off the wall-like body and toppled back over face first with no way to stop himself.

About a foot before he hit the floor, two incredibly strong arms stopped Justin’s descent. When the youth craned his neck enough to look up at whoever had saved him, he caught a glimpse of the most beautiful man he’d ever imagined. The gorgeous stranger tightened his grip incrementally and then flipped Justin’s slighter body over so he was forced to look up into the magnetic eyes of the man who was still holding him.

“Let me guess, you didn’t mean to knock the shit out of me . . . you were just born that way - clumsy as fuck!” the Adonis said with a handsome smirk as he chuckled down at my completely disconcerted countenance.

“I . . . I . . . I’m sorry. Somebody else knocked into me and I lost my balance,” Justin stuttered, having to yell the last part of his explanation as the music for the next song was overlaid on the end of Lady Gaga and the volume crescendoed.

The tall hulking handsome man slowly helped Justin upright but seemed a little reluctant to let go of his grasp on the smaller blond man. Even when Justin was back on his own two feet, the man’s hands didn’t completely unwrap from their firm grip around the younger man’s biceps.  There was even a mischievous gleam in the dark-haired man’s eyes that struck a similar chord in Justin’s soul. Before the other man could release him and move off, Justin clutched at the only thing he could think of to try and keep the man with him for a little bit longer.

“Dance with me!” Justin shouted up at the man. “Let me make it up to you and prove that I’m not a complete klutz. And I’ll even buy you a drink after,” Justin offered, looking up from under his lashes and smiling his most enticing smile at the man he didn’t want to let go of.

The tall brunet hesitated for just a fraction of a moment, looking intently down into the face of the younger man still in his arms. With just a hint of a smile, the handsome stranger shook his head slightly but didn’t move away. Justin took the chance and accepted the response as at least tacit  agreement. Wrapping his arms around the taller man’s waist, Justin started to guide the man’s hips into a swaying motion as the sounds of Lifehouse’s ‘You and Me’ reached the chorus.

‘And it's you and me and all of the people,

And I don't know why I can't keep my eyes off of you’

The words seemed so prophetic. Now that Justin had seen this God amongst mere mortal men, he didn’t think it was possible for him to tear his eyes away for even the briefest of seconds. Justin realized that he was staring and probably looked like some idiotic love-struck schoolboy, but he just couldn’t help himself. THIS was the man he’d always dreamed of. The one who would ride in on his big white horse and rescue him from a life of drudgery. This man was a prince.

The man was looking down at Justin with amusement clear in his eyes. He wasn’t oblivious to the adoration being projected back at him from the hot little blond in his arms - Brian Kinney was used to that response from the majority of his tricks. But, there was something about this young man that seemed different. Maybe it was the kid’s overt innocence. That contrasted sharply with the ballsy arrogance he’d displayed when demanding that the older man dance with him. It was intriguing, if nothing else - fragile innocence combined with rock solid courage. It was a combination that proved attractive as hell. Which explained why Brian ‘Fucking’ Kinney was now dancing with some little blond twink that he normally wouldn’t have given a second look.

‘Something about you now, I can't quite figure out

Everything he does is beautiful. Everything he does is right . . .’

The rest of the club seemed to melt away into a hazy background. The two men swayed together, barely moving, Justin’s arms around the taller man’s neck and Brian’s hands resting lightly on the younger man’s hips. It was like that particular moment had slipped out of linear time altogether. They were the only people who existed at this singular moment. The bubble of music that surrounded them and kept all the rest of the world outside was all they could hear except for the beating of each others’ hearts. The taller man pulled the slighter boy’s body even closer to his own, sensuously pressing their hips together and relishing the heat that radiated back at him from the hard package of the man in his embrace. It was the single most intimate moment that either man had ever experienced and it didn’t matter in the least that it was happening in the midst of a crowded dance club with hundreds of others around to watch.

“There you are, Bri! Sorry to interrupt but we’ve got a fucking emergency.” The jarring words unceremoniously ripped apart the bubble of harmony in which the two men had been lost during their dance.

“Fuck, Ted,” the tall brunet turned toward the small mousey-looking man with more than evident irritation. “Can’t you see that I’m a little busy at the moment? I know it’s been ages since you got any yourself, but even you should be able to recognize that when I’m with a trick I don’t want to be disturbed. Now, go back to your little accountancy hole and leave me and my new friend here alone.”

“I’d love to, Brian, but I just got a call from Cynthia. There’s an emergency with the Winery account,” Ted was yelling at the top of his lungs to get his meaning across over the top of the loud club music.

“Theodore, what the fuck emergency could there be with a bunch of winos off in bum-fucked Oregon? Can’t you and Cynthia handle it?” Justin’s dance partner yelled back, his left hand not leaving the small of Justin’s back even as he addressed the man who’d disturbed them.  

“Not this time, Bri. Cynthia got a fax telling her that they want you and your presentation at some big meeting the Winegrower’s Association is having in three days in ‘Yamhill, Oregon’.”

“Three fucking days! That campaign isn’t even close to being ready. How the fuck are we supposed to have it ready in three days and get to the middle-of-nowhere-Oregon to boot? Shit!”

“That’s what I thought you’d say, Brian,” Ted smirked somewhat apologetically.

“Call in the entire team, Theodore. We’re going to have to work all night on this. I’ll meet you back at the office in fifteen minutes,” the authoritative man directed even as his employee started to trot away to get everything taken care of. “Now, my little ray of sunshine,” Brian turned back to the young blond he still hadn’t completely let go of. “I’m afraid that I’ll have to take a rain check on the rest of our evening. It’s too bad, really . . . you would have fucking loved it!”

Without warning, the taller man swooped down over the shorter young blond and, with his left arm behind the youth’s shoulders holding him up, his lips drove into Justin’s, causing him to dip backwards, deeper and deeper as the breathless kiss went on and on. Just about the time when Justin started to get dizzy from the combined lack of oxygen and overwhelming romanticism, the large man pulled back, smiled down at the helpless teen almost swooning in his arms and chuckled quietly. With one effortless movement, the older man pulled them both back upright and gently patted the younger man’s soft cheek with the palm of his right hand.

“Later, Sunshine,” the magnificent man whispered as he leaned in leaving one last light kiss on the soft pale cheek of the little twink.

Then, without looking back, the man/prince/god swaggered away and was quickly swallowed up by the crowd as Justin stood there completely dumbfounded. “Later!” he finally yelled, about five minutes too late and then shook himself, not sure if what he’d just experienced had really happened or was just another - really, really great - fantasy.

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"Justin. Justin? Justin, wake the fuck up!" Daph giggled and threw a couple Cheerios into her friend's face, interrupting his third bout of day-dreaming just since they'd started eating breakfast. "What the hell is with you this morning, Jus? I know that neither of us got much sleep last night, what with Em and his Rebound-Boy-Toy-#324 pounding the headboard of Em's bed against the wall all night, but enough already. Snap out of it."

"Sorry, Daph. I was just . . . um . . . what were you saying," Justin's blushing face was a sure fire giveaway that the nature of whatever he'd been thinking about was probably XXX rated.

His fag hag laughed at Justin's evasion but decided to let him get away with it this time. "I was trying to get your opinion of what we should do with our long weekend. Since we don't have school on Monday, I was thinking we should go somewhere fun and just get the hell out of the Pitts for a few days. What do you think?"

"I think it's a fabulous idea," Emmett declared as he flounced out of his room wearing his favorite red and black silk kimono that just barely covered all his important parts. "So, do either of you want to come to Costa Rica with me for a week?" Em flung the tickets he was supposed to be using this afternoon with the now-dumped Calvin onto the kitchen table, where they landed in a puddle of milk next to Justin's cereal bowl.

"Sorry, Em," Daphne said as she rescued the plane tickets before they became completely soggy from the milk. "Jus and I only have three days, not a whole fucking week, and no offense, but spending a week holed up at a gay couples' resort in the middle of the jungle listening to you moan about how rotten Calvin was to you, doesn't sound like much of a vacation."

"You're right there, sweetie," Emmett admitted, flopping dejectedly down into the chair next to Daph. "It seems a shame to waste these tickets though . . . "

"You should trade them in and go someplace else, Em," Daphne suggested. "Someplace fun. Someplace with lots of beautiful, rich, half-naked men who are all just waiting to fall in love with the man, or woman, of their dreams."

Daphne, the hopeless romantic, gazed off into space, looking into her dreams of the perfect fantasy vacation where she'd meet her very own Prince Charming - wherever the hell that mythical place might happen to be. Justin and Emmett watched her for several seconds and then both men cracked up with laughter over the sickly sweet romanticism of their completely delusional friend. Justin threw a handful of Cheerios back at his friend and Emmett slapped her not so softly upside the head in rebuke.

"Dream on, Sister!" Emmett chided Daphne until she even laughed at herself. "When you find that perfect place, just let me know and I'll be on the first plane there. But, in the meantime, I still don't know what to do with these stupid tickets."

"I'm serious, Em," Daphne insisted, dropping the starry-eyed look and putting on her serious thinking look. "You really should cash them in and go someplace else. Live a little, why don't you? Go someplace you've always wanted to visit. Take a chance. Go someplace off the beaten track. You never know what will happen. You know, take the path less travelled, and all that shit. Maybe you WILL find your prince after all. Maybe he's been waiting for you all along in say . . . Miami, or Chicago, or maybe . . . I don't know . . . fucking Disney Land. . ."

"Or, maybe, Yamhill, Oregon," Justin added from his spot at the table, his voice hushed as if he hadn't really meant to make the suggestion out loud.

"Huh?" Daphne and Emmett both said at the same time, looking over at Justin as if he'd just suggested something completely insane, like taking a vacation on the moon or something.

"You feeling okay, Justin, baby?" Emmett asked, his concerned voice snapping Justin out of a moment of private reverie and causing the younger man to blush furiously. "What the fuck is in 'Squash-fucking-hill'?"

"It's 'Yamhill', Em, and they have wine, I-I-I think, and . . . a guy, maybe . . . " Justin stuttered, not sure why he was confessing anything to these two doubting thomases. "A really, really HOT guy . . ."

Twenty minutes later, Justin had been forced to fully disclose his chance meeting on the dance floor the night before with the handsome prince, known only as 'Brian' who was destined to be found in a little wine town in Oregon.

Emmett, who'd been around Liberty Avenue a lot longer than his younger friends, had an idea about just who this beautiful 'Brian' might be, and was all ready to dissuade the more naive Justin from pursuing the well-known local lothario. "You know, honey, I doubt that some guy you literally bumped into at Babylon is gonna turn out to be a Prince. I've already personally sampled a fair share of what's on offer there and I have to say there's not a Prince in the bunch. Even the ones that aren't complete trolls mostly turn out to be frogs, baby."

"You're probably right, Em," Justin admitted, turning back to his now soggy bowl of cereal. "Besides, I'm sure a guy that looks like that wouldn't be interested in me, anyway. Shit, he could fuck anyone he wanted. Even if I did get his attention for a minute or two, he probably just wanted to get into my pants, like all the rest, and then he would have blown me off like the guy I hooked up with last weekend. And the weekend before that. And the weekend . . ."

"Shit, Justin!" Daphne wasn't about to let her friend continue down the slippery slope of self pity he seemed to be headed towards. "You're too young to be that fucking cynical. You're not exactly a troll yourself. Any guy would be lucky to find you. You just have to show them what you're really like, you know? I'm sure this 'Brian' guy would fall totally head over heels for you if he took the time to get to know you . . ."

Daphne kept ranting on, her only objective being to bolster her best friend's faltering self esteem. She didn't really take any notice of Emmett waving to her from behind Justin's back or making chopping motions at his neck to try and get her to cut it off. How was Daphne supposed to know the the 'Brian' her friend was lusting after was NOT the kind of guy who'd turn into a prince after the first kiss and then romantically sweep little Justin off into the sunset? All Daph knew was that her friend was the kindest, sweetest man in the world and she wasn't going to let him mope about over some missed opportunity with a beauty he'd bounced into on the dance floor.

"You know what, Justin? You're completely right - maybe your prince really is waiting for you in some unlikely place like . . . what was it? Yamhill, Oregon? We should go there and find out!" Daphne had let her innate enthusiasm totally run away with her by this point and there wasn't any hope of stopping her. "You said the guy was going to have to be there for some important winery meeting in three days, right? Well, we don't have anyplace else we have to be until Tuesday, so . . . why don't we go and crash their meeting? Em and I will come with you and we'll all go to Oregon and find your prince!"

"But, but, but, Daphne . . ." Emmett was still trying to derail the spontaneous vacation train that his friend was on, but she had her engines fully stoaked and wasn't about to slow down to see reason.

"That's just silly, Daph," luckily Justin seemed as adverse to the idea as Em was. "A guy like that isn't going to simply fall in love with me just because I decide to stalk him all the way across the country. Besides, I don't even know where the fuck, Yamhill, Oregon is or where to find Brian even if we did go there."

"You are sooooo, right, sugar," Em was quick to offer agreement. "It would just be a silly wild goose chase."

"No it wouldn't, Em," Daphne countered from her speeding vacation train of thought. "How big can a place called 'Yamhill' be? We just go there and ask for directions to the local winery and, voila, we're there. It'll be a piece of cake! And, Justin, how do you know that this guy wouldn't fall madly, passionately in love with you? He might get turned on by the mere fact that you were willing to chase him all that way? I know I'd be totally flattered. Besides, we don't have anything better to do this weekend, right?"

"If nothing else, it'll be an adventure. Please? Please, Em, please. You're not going to do anything else with those tickets and you know it!" Daphne insisted, turning on the older man in order to get his support. "They're expensive seats and all - I'm sure we could cash them in for more than enough to get us all three tickets to Oregon and back. It'll be fun! Come on, Em. Please? You can't just let poor Justin here sit around all weekend long moping after some hot guy he almost caught, can you? Please!"

Emmett felt trapped. Even knowing what he did - assuming that the beautiful 'Brian' his friend had encountered at the club was who he thought and therefore the last man he'd want his romantic friend running after - how could he say 'No' to Daphne's pleading or Justin's hesitant hopefulness. If it was Brian Fucking Kinney they were pursuing, this endeavor was doomed to failure from the start. But he looked at the faces of his two younger friends, their eyes sparkling up at him with expectation, and he just couldn't dash all their romantic dreams like that.

"You guys know this is fucking insane, right?" Em tried one last time to deter them. When neither of the sad, expectant little faces relented even a tiny bit, he gave up.

"Fine. Whatever . . . It's completely crazy, but . . . Well, go on. You two better hurry and get packed. We have a plane to catch to Oregon!"

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