BRIAN 

I waited for Justin to go to sleep because I didn't want him to hear this call. I don't think anyone realizes it's not just that I don't want Justin to hear it, but also how is he going to feel that I let Michael have a pass on it? I go outside and light up while dialing. 

“Is there a reason you're calling me this late?” Lindsay asks me. 

“I need you to tell me Justin will be okay if he finds out what Michael said.” I tell her. 

“Please tell me he hasn't heard about it?” Lindsay asks me. 

“It's only a matter of time, then how's he going to feel that I let Michael get away with it?” I ask her. 

“He loves you enough to understand that you aren’t perfect. No matter what Michael did or said, Justin will see through it to know you didn't let it go, but protected him from it. We all owe you an apology for not asking why.” She tells me. 

“Jen and Deb found out.” I tell her.

“How did that happen? Never mind, it's the same way everything happens there. Brian, tell him before he finds out the wrong way.” She tells me. 

“I know, I just needed you to be my friend tonight.” I tell her. 

“I hope I did it without interfering, I'm working on that.” Lindsay tells me. 

“I also wanted to talk to you and Mel about our plans.” I tell her. 

“Has something changed?” She asks me. 

“Justin and I were thinking of staying in New York. I wanted to know if you and Mel would consider living here instead of Pittsburgh?” I ask her. 

“It would solve a lot of problems that we both see moving back. I'll see what Mel thinks and we will get back to you.” She tells me. 

“It really helped you two to get away, didn’t it?” I ask her. 

“It changed how we deal with things, I couldn’t run to you anymore. I shouldn't have been doing it anyway if I wanted it to work with Mel. I found out that if we talked, the problems weren’t always what I thought, but us not telling each other things. I leaned on you when she was the person who I owed it to.” She tells me. 

“When did we leave Wonderland?” I ask her. 

“I wish I could say when Gus was born, but I think it was when Wonderland didn’t offer us the people who made our lives complete.” She tells me. 

“You'll always be my Wendy, but I couldn't help wanting Prince Charming more.” I tell her. 

“Peter, you couldn't compete with my Princess.” She tells me laughing.

“If you repeat that in front of her I want front row seats.” I tell her. 

“If I do I promise to make sure you’re there. About Justin, I think you're thinking too hard about it, he's level headed enough to understand you were hurting at the time. He'll most likely surprise us all on what he thinks of the whole thing.” She tells me. 

“You think Jen is going to understand?” I ask her. 

“Nope, but she's a mother. I couldn’t let something like that pass if it was said about Jenny or Gus. Michael is going to find out how it would have gone if everyone knew, because Jen doesn’t care about Michael.” She tells me. 

“I always wondered if I made the right decision to let it go.” I tell her. 

“Should have, would have, and could have, doesn’t change anything. Except at the time it was what you did, right or wrong.” She tells me. 

“Give Gus a kiss, tell Smelly Melly about New York. Thanks for listening.” I tell her hanging up.

I put out my cigarette and realize Justin needs to hear it from me. 

MICHAEL 

Ma was pacing in front of me. I didn’t know what to say to calm her down. It was years ago and she's acting as if I said it now. I don’t feel that way about Justin anymore. I figured out that Brian wasn’t going to return my feelings and stopped hating Justin for being the one Brian wanted. I found Ben who puts up with my crap and manages to see I'm worth something.

“Ma, it was a horrible thing to say, but Brian forgave me, why can’t you?” I ask her. 

“I doubt he forgave you, he probably just let it go. Could you forgive someone if they said it about Ben?” She asks me. 

“I don’t know, but he’d hurt Brian and I was mad.” I tell her. 

“Mad is saying he didn’t deserve Brian’s love, not that he should be dead.” She tells me. 

“I wasn’t thinking about anything but Brian at the time.” I tell her. 

The door opens and Carl comes through looking at us. I watched as he took a breath and walked in.

“Do I want to know?” He asks us. 

“Michael said Justin should have died when he was bashed.” She tells him. 

“What the hell made you say that? Do you have any idea how close to the truth that was?” He asks me.

“I said it years ago, and Brian punched me out.” I defend myself.

“That's all he did, because it sounds like you got off easy in my book. Why is it coming up now?” Carl asks me. 

“Emmett was pissed because I thought it was wrong they didn’t tell us about the baby and that Brian and Justin were here yesterday.” I tell him. 

“So once again, everyone doing their own thing without informing you and Deb caused trouble.” He tells us. 

“Carl they didn’t even visit us.” She tells him. 

“Why would they? You would have badgered them about not including you in every decision they make. They were savings their ears.” He tells her. 

“Ted thinks they're upset I told Jen.” She tells him. 

“Jesus Deb, why?” He asks her and I figure I could leave before they remembered me.

“Sit down Michael, we need to figure out how to calm Jen down after she heard your bullshit.” Ma tells me.

“What did you do, take an ad out so everyone could hear your stupidity?” Carl asks me.  

“She overheard Emmett.” I tell him. 

“Which means once again, the whole gang is going to know. You realize that as a mother, she isn’t going to pat you on the head and forgive you, don't you?” Carl asks me. 

“He doesn’t deserve it after what he said.” Ma tells us. 

“Then Deb, you don't deserve to know anything Brian and Justin or Mel and Lindsay do for running around opening your mouth. What you did took something away from them; the right to tell Jen themselves. So while you're pissed at Michael for opening his mouth and saying something that obscene, remember you’re not innocent either.” He tells us.               

“It wasn’t that bad.” She tells him. 

“Michael why don't I explain to you how close you were to the truth that night. If Brian hadn’t called out Justin’s name, you'd have gotten what you seem to want by saying that. Brian was found holding Justin while he was bleeding out, repeating no over and over, and trying to stop the bleeding. The cop who was there said he wouldn’t leave Justin, so they let him go with him. Like I said, if all you got was a black eye, you were lucky, because I would have killed you for saying something like that about Deb.” He tells me. 

“Go home, tell Ben what you said, because you need to make it right with Justin.” Ma tells me hugging Carl.

I got up and realized I was about to tell Ben something he might not be able to forgive me for saying. Why couldn’t Emmett have not opened his mouth?

 JUSTIN 

You know when you feel like someone's staring at you, it's like there's this feather light touch and it makes you turn to see where it came from. I opened my eyes and smile at Brian.

“Why are you still awake?” I ask him sleepily.

“Thinking about the past.” He tells me laying down looking at the ceiling.

“What about it?” I ask him moving to lay on his chest.  

“Things that happened and how I let them go.” He tells me. 

“Life happens and you move on or you stay in limbo.” I tell him kissing his chin.

“What if it's brought up and could affect how you view me?” He asks me. 

“We're together and it's all I care about.” I tell him, trying to understand why he seems scared to tell me what's going on in his head.

“You remember when I hit Michael?” He asks me. 

“Yeah, but you guys made up right?” I ask him. 

Brian gets up and looks at the pictures I have of us throughout our relationship. He seems to really be struggling with this, and I always wondered why he hit Michael but didn’t feel I had the right to ask him.

“Michael was upset that you showed up with the fiddler at Mel and Lindsay’s party.” He tells me picking up a picture of us with Deb.

“Okay, but I knew he was pissed at me, so that’s not really a surprise.” I tell him.

“He said a lot of things but I ended up hitting him when he said the one thing I couldn’t listen to.” He tells me putting down the picture.

“What, that I should be struck from existence because I dared to walk away from you?” I ask him.

“Close, but it was that I should have left you to die that night.” He tells me.

“Are you serious, he actually thought that?” I ask him, not knowing how to feel about it.

“It’s why I hit him, but then I protected him from the fallout by not telling anyone.” He tells me, sitting down in a chair on the other side of the room.

“Why are you telling me this now?” I ask staying on the bed.

“Because Emmett and Michael decided to fight about how secrets shouldn’t be kept. Your mother was there to hear it.” He tells me looking at the floor.

“Fuck, don’t they know better than to let my mom hear shit like that?” I ask him, getting up and trying to figure out what to do about Mom.

“Justin, look at me.” He begs.

“Brian, do you have any idea how my mom is going to feel about this?” I ask, looking at him.

“Right now I need to know how you feel that I didn’t hate Michael for it.” He tells me.

“Is this what you're worried about?” I ask him, walking over and sitting on his lap.

“It’s the thing I’ve always worried about. I didn’t make Michael deal with the consequence of running his mouth. I pretended I didn’t care and went on being friends with a guy who could say that shit about you.” He tells me.

“It’s not what I wish anybody would say about me, but I had left you for someone else. You didn’t do anything but wish me well, and if you needed Michael then I can’t really be mad at you for it. It doesn’t make me happy that he got off that easy.” I tell him.

“He’s feeling it now most likely, because Deb knows too.” He tells me.

“I think he needs to feel how I feel about it.” I tell him.

“How do you?” He asks me.

“By saying it, it’s like what happened was a joke and could be used like a bat to my head again.” I tell him.

“I never wanted you to know.” He tells me.

“You can’t protect me from everything, just stand by me when I need you too.” He tells me.

“Lindsay and I talked tonight about it and she seemed to think you wouldn’t see what I did as betraying you.” He tells me.

“It wasn’t, it was your way of dealing with what I did to you.” I tell him.

“Are you going to be able to get past this with Michael? Because if we need to keep him out of our lives, I’ll do it for you.” He tells me.

“Where would be the fun in that?” I tell him, smiling.

“You're going to make him pay for it, aren’t you?” He asks me.

“No, but it will remind him that he doesn’t need to know everything. I think he needs that lesson for a while, because I have a baby and a life with you to think of.” I tell him.

“How about if we practice baby making.” He smiles at me.

“You think Mel will let you?” I tell him running to the bed.

“For that you don’t get to top.” He tells me leaping at me.

When Brian fell asleep I got up and walked to the kitchen and called the only one who would be level headed about this. 

“Hey, what’s with all the late night calls lately?” Ted tells me.

“Hey, what’s with letting my mother hear that shit.” I tell him.

“Justin, we didn’t know she was there. I tried to stop Emmett and Michael. Are you okay?” He asks  me.

“I don’t know, part of me wants to tell Michael what it took to be able to do things like eat with a fork or not be afraid of someone being behind me. The other part of me doesn’t want to dredge it all back up. How do I not hate him for saying it?” I ask him.

“I don’t know what to tell you.” He tells me.

“Brian was worried that I would be pissed at him for forgiving Michael and I’m not thrilled about it, but it’s not like he said it.” I tell him.

“I don’t think he ever forgave Michael for that or for the night you left him to stay with Michael. I think he just lets it go or he’d have to hate someone he once depended on.” Ted tells me.

“I wonder if it’s why he seems to want us to stay here?” I ask him.

“Justin if you two came back here, it would be the same shit just a different time. I think he realizes that he wants you both to have time to be you and not the people you were here.” He tells me.

“Can you do me a favor?” I ask him.

“Anything you need.” He tells me, which makes me smile.

“Tell Michael that right now I can’t do Rage or talk to him. That I need time to forgive him if I can.” I tell him.

“I’ll tell him and make sure he gives it to you.” He tells me.

“You know you turned out to be one hell of a friend, don’t you?” I tell him.

“So did you and Brian.” He tells me.

“Kiss Blake for me and thanks for always being there.” I tell him hanging up.

I sat and watch the sunrise out the window and decided that we couldn’t live somewhere near Michael again. I don’t see being able to forgive him completely, just do as Brian did and let it go. 

“Why aren’t you in bed?” He asks me.

“I wanted to see the sunrise because we are starting a new life soon.” I tell him.