Prologue.

He wasn't sure just how he knew it, but Justin was sure that something special was going to happen that day. From the moment his eyes had opened that morning, he'd known. He'd come suddenly awake - no gradual awakening as he drifted softly out of the arms of his dark dream lover - not this morning. Instead he was jolted into full consciousness as if shot by a stun gun. His heart was pounding with a thundering and irregular beat, beads of sweat dropped from his clammy forehead and he felt like he couldn't get enough oxygen.

Justin looked at the radio alarm clock on the bedside table and noted that he didn't actually have to be up for school for a least a half hour. He tried to relax his body while lying back on his pillows, but his nerves were still sparking. His senses were all on hyper-alert. He could hear faint stirrings from the kitchen a floor below as his mother bustled about getting coffee ready and breakfast set out for the family. He could already smell the aroma of the French Roast coffee that his father preferred drifting up the stairs. From outside he could hear the neighbor's wheezing old Volvo sputtering to life. The bright springtime sunlight felt like it was pelting down onto his skin, insistently demanding that Justin get out of bed and investigate the morning.

The high schooler sighed audibly but didn't try to fight it. He rolled out of his comfortable, warm blankets and shuffled to the window to look out on the burgeoning day. It was May 5th. He had less than a month to go before he finished his senior year of high school and then he could escape from the narrow-minded confines of Pittsburgh's St. James' Academy and the suburban hell where he'd grown up. Before he was so rudely awakened, his only plans for the day had been to survive another day of torture by the school bullies, do his homework and then retreat once again into his private fantasy world where he was able to be his true self.

You see, Justin had secrets.

His biggest secret was that he was a homosexual. He'd known since he was fourteen that he was attracted to men, not women. Unfortunately, he also knew that this was NOT acceptable to his family or his community. It had been less than a year since the famous Stonewall Riots in New York's Greenwich Village. He'd watched the news reports with his family and heard the disparaging remarks his father had made about the gay men trying to stand up for their rights against a corrupt police force. He didn't have to be told that he wouldn't be welcomed home with open arms if he admitted his sexual orientation to his parents, so he hid his true self from them.

Justin's other secret, while it may not have seemed as monumental, was even more closely guarded by the lonely boy because he knew it would set him apart from others just as surely as his sexuality.

His other secret was that he KNEW things; things that no one else knew, things that were going to happen, things about people who hadn't even been born yet. He'd always had this strange ability, even as a small child, but had been told early on, and often enough, by his mother and all the other adults around him that he shouldn't say THOSE things. His brothers had laughed at him and told him that it was 'weird' or 'creepy'. So Justin learned not to share what he knew for fear he'd be ostracized.

But regardless of how hard he tried to hide his otherness from those around him, Justin always felt like an outsider. He was always alone. He had no real friends. He didn't feel close to his parents or siblings. And he never got along with the other kids his age. Somehow, everyone automatically sensed how different he was, even when he didn't say a word.

If it weren't for his absolute knowledge that there was someone waiting out there for him - someone who needed him and would love him unconditionally - he was sure he never would have lasted till the age of seventeen. But luckily Justin did know just that. There was someone that was meant just for him, he simply had to wait, and bear with the stifling loneliness, until they could finally meet.

He'd seen glimpses of his future life in his dreams. Almost every night he slept in the comforting arms of this lover who would cherish him and protect him, no matter what. The man he saw in his dreams was beautiful - tall, strong, dark-haired and he had the most astounding hazel eyes that seemed to penetrate to his very soul every time their gazes met. Justin knew this man was coming for him someday. Yes, it sounded like some hokey Grimms Brothers' fairy tale, but that didn't mean that Justin didn't believe in it with his whole heart. If he had to play the part of the wilting princess held captive in the tower, he would, so long as he knew he'd get the metaphorical prince in the end.

So Justin waited and guarded his secrets jealously.

And, as he stood at his window looking out at the brilliant May morning, Justin had the distinct feeling that today might be the day. The air around him tingled with electricity. It was the feeling he always experienced when he was about to have one of his 'episodes', as his mother called them.

He closed his eyes, feeling the warmth of the new day on his face. The strong sunlight penetrated through the thin membranes of his eyelids, creating a glowing backdrop upon which he saw the image of a dark-haired, rosy cheeked baby. He knew the baby was a newborn because of the pinched look about him. Justin didn't immediately know why this baby was important. He sensed a great deal of anxiety and tension circling around wherever the baby was. The environment seemed sterile and cold, but that's not what was generating the disquiet. It was more a feeling of unease and . . . anger?

Justin was momentarily confused about why he was seeing this particular infant. Usually his visions had more purpose to them. Then the most amazing thing happened - the baby opened it's eyes and Justin realized he was seeing the most perfect hazel green orbs he'd ever seen. The baby looked directly at him and smiled knowingly.

It was HIM!

~**~**~**~**~**~

Justin managed to struggle through the school day. He wasn't sure what he was supposed to have learned because it felt like one big blur to him. He didn't actually remember even how he got to school that day, but he supposed his younger brother, Four, who had earned enough money caddying at the country club last summer to buy a used '65 Mustang convertible, had driven them as usual. He barely registered when he was embarrassed in math class for not knowing some equation or when the school jocks knocked his lunch tray off the table, spilling his food everywhere with a laughing, sarcastic 'sorry, dude'. All Justin's concentration was focused instead on the baby he'd seen that morning.

As soon as school was out, he ran home, threw his school bag on the chair by the kitchen table and, yelling 'hello' to his mother in passing, he rushed up to his room. He needed to be alone in order to concentrate. He desperately needed to find this baby. He sat tailor fashion on the rug in the middle of the floor in his bedroom, closed his eyes tightly and tried to calm his breathing.

For the longest time he felt nothing but a sense of vague anticipation, but he didn't give up. Then, just as the sun set, Justin felt an excruciating pain shoot through his entire body. There was unbearable pressure, repetitive aching pain and finally a stabbing sensation causing him to gulp large lungfuls of air. His emotions, caught up with those at the scene, were chaotic and bewildering. As the pain gradually receded, his sight cleared and he could see a room encompassed by bleak, colorless walls.

Gradually the swirling, confusing sensations of Justin's vision coalesced and steadied until he felt a single, strong, individual consciousness. The pull he felt from this small bundle of personality was relentlessly strong. He didn't really have any choice other than to get up and follow the connection. Justin snuck quietly down the back stairs, grabbed Four's car keys off the kitchen counter and carefully closed the back door behind him as he tiptoed out of the house.

Borrowing his brother's car, he drove steadily towards the southwest, following the source of the magnetic force drawing him. He crossed over the Allegheny River and eventually found himself pulling into the parking lot of Allegheny General Hospital. He was vaguely worried about how he was going to find the baby now that he was here - he was sure they didn't let just anyone into the nursery. But, as luck would have it, just as he came up to the large glass entry doors of the main lobby, an older couple carrying flowers and a balloon saying 'It's A Boy' entered in front of him. Justin followed the couple, trying to look like he belonged, as the duo got directions to the maternity ward from the nurse at the Information desk. After that it was easy for him to make his way unobserved to the correct floor where he immediately found the glass fronted nursery full of newborns.

It had apparently been a busy day in the maternity ward. There were at least twelve bassinets displayed behind the glass that allowed guests to view the new arrivals. Nurses were bustling around inside the room and there were several people standing by the glass pointing to one or another of the identically wrapped bundles. Justin knew HIS baby was here in this nursery - he could still feel that dogged pull - but from out here he couldn't determine which of the small mewling forms was the one he needed.

Justin waited in front of the viewing window with one hand against the glass for a long time, trying to figure out what he was supposed to do next. The cool glass touching his palm slowly began to warm - he could feel the surface vibrating with an undefined energy that grew out of the connection between himself and the kindred soul he was here to find. The atmosphere inside and around the little room felt heavy, like the air outside right before a thunderstorm. Nobody except Justin, though, seemed to notice anything different.

One by one, the other observers in front of the nursery began to leave until he was the only guest left. Justin heard a commotion down the hallway behind him and, almost immediately, several of the nurses rushed out of the nursery and trotted brusquely down the hall. After a few more minutes, another nurse left, following in the direction of the distant hubbub, and then there was only one attendant left in the creche area. Finally, there was a loud ringing from the wall-mounted phone at the back of the room and the last nurse moved to answer the call. A minute later, the remaining nurse strode officiously over to one bassinet, kicked off the brake mechanism and began to wheel the baby-filled contraption out of the room and around the corner. Justin smiled as he noted that the nursery door didn't close all the way behind the retreating nurse.

When the coast was clear, Justin slipped through the door into the nursery. As soon as he was across the threshold he could feel an attraction to one particular bassinet at the farthest end of the second row. He skipped over to the waiting infant and stared down at the sleeping baby.

The fragile form inside seemed altogether too small, but perfect nonetheless. A blue and white striped knit cap was pulled down over the infant's small head, but wisps of soft chestnut brown hair still escaped around the tiny shell-like ears. A lightweight white blanket had been tightly wrapped around the little body, with only one defiant little hand able to break out of the confines to rest curled against a pale pink cheek. Justin, who previously hadn't spent any more time than the average seventeen year old boy thinking about babies, nevertheless thought that HIS baby was absolutely beautiful.

The compulsion to reach into the bassinet and pick up the child was irresistible. Justin didn't want to fight the urge anyway. He gently scooped the small form into his arms and stood there holding onto the precious bundle, completely lost in the feelings of peace that overcame him at the mere touch of this little person. For the first time in his life, Justin felt complete, like he finally belonged, and was no longer alone.

The identification label at the foot of the bassinet caught his eye then. The name on the tag read, "Kinney, Brian. 5/5/70". It was followed by other identifying numbers and information including the names of the parents, "Mother: Joan Kinney. Father: Jack Kinney."

“Well, hello there, Brian,” Justin cooed into the baby’s perfect little ear. “I’ve been waiting for you for a long time. I’m so glad you’re here finally.”

At the sound of Justin’s voice, the baby opened it’s eyes and stared straight into those of the man holding him. The child’s eyes were already a kaleidoscope of swirling greens, browns and golds, rather than the usual undifferentiated grey-blues of most newborns. As the man’s crystal blue gaze met the hazel glance of the infant, there was an instant connection - a sense of recognition and knowing that both souls acknowledged immediately.

Justin wasn’t sure just how long he stood there holding the baby and silently communicating with the newborn. But, after a long period, he finally became aware of an increasing amount of noise coming from the hallway outside the creche area. He looked up and noted that there was a crowd of people coming down the hall, looking like they were headed directly for the nursery. Justin knew he didn’t have a legitimate reason for being in the room, let alone for holding this baby that he had no overt relationship to, so he hastily deposited the little bundle back into it’s bassinet, left a tender kiss on the infant’s precocious little nose and surreptitiously slid back out of the room.

Mere moments after he was clear of the doorway, Justin was surrounded by the boiling mass of people that had been struggling down the hallway together. Now that he was in the middle of the roil, he could make out more about what was causing the commotion. At the center of the hubbub was a tall, middle-aged man with greying brown hair and a slight beer belly, who was talking loudly and arguing with several of the hospital staff. The boisterous man was trying to free his arm from the grip of a burly looking young man dressed in white scrubs. Two nurses were tagging along beside the pair, apparently trying to reason with the angry man. Behind this group trailed a small child, who appeared to be about four or five, crying loudly and dragging a small blanket behind her as a tall woman dressed in a hospital gown and robe pulled at the little girl’s arm to get her to hurry along as she also dashed after the rest. Everyone was talking at the same time and the noise level was escalating rapidly.

“Get your goddamn hands off me,” ranted the tall man at the center of the melee, finally pulling his arm free of the grip of the burly man next to him. “If I’m going to have to pay through the fucking nose for the little bastard for the next twenty years of his life, then I want to see him at least. The ‘Warden’ over there tells me I’m its father so I have every right to see my little Sonny Boy, don’t I?”

“Sir, you are inebriated!” complained a stern looking older nurse who was ineffectually trying to restrain the man. “Now is NOT the time to be meeting your son. You should go down to the cafeteria, get some coffee and then come back when you’re more able to control yourself. I will not let you at that baby in your current condition, Mr. Kinney. Now, if you don’t stop hollering and raising such a ruckus, I will call security and have you thrown out of the hospital altogether. There are patients here who need their peace and quiet, including your wife, and I won’t have you upsetting everyone with your outbursts.”

“I want to see my fucking SON!” the man yelled loudly, causing everyone around to cringe at the excessive noise and waking several of the slumbering infants in the nursery, all of whom began to wail.

“FINE,” conceded the charge nurse. “You can see your son if you promise to leave here immediately afterwards. I’ll get the baby for you and you can see him, but I’LL hold him because I don’t trust you not to drop the poor thing in your condition. Is that acceptable?”

The fuming man grumbled something not quite intelligible but it was apparently enough to satisfy the nurse. She immediately hustled up to the nursery door, unlocked it with a key from the bunch attached to her belt and entered the creche, followed by the second nurse who took it upon herself to quiet the still wailing infants. The older nurse walked directly over to the bassinet where Justin’s baby was waiting, lifted the child into her arms and then carried the infant over to the viewing window. As the indignant father stood next to the pane of glass, he stared at the child and seemingly deflated once he finally got to see his offspring.

“There you are, Sonny Boy,” mumbled the man with a frown on his face. “At least he looks like a ‘Kinney’, so maybe the bitch wasn’t lying after all, hmm? Shit . . .” Then the man turned around and confronted the woman dressed in the robe. “I guess you got your way after all, didn’t you, Joanie? Well, I’ll tell you for the last time, this better be the LAST one. You hear me? I didn’t want that one,” the irate man said pointing to the sniffling little girl trying to hide behind her mother’s legs, “and I definitely don’t want this one,” he added as he pointed through the glass to the infant still in the nurse’s arms. “So, whether your fucking religion agrees or not, there will NOT be any more kids - at least no more that Jack Kinney’s going to slave away to support. You fucking hear me, Joanie? Are you listening? I wasn’t meant to be a family man and I’m not raising any more of your goddamned brats.”

Then, without more, the man turned away from the viewing window, straightened his jacket which had been pulled askew by the orderly and walked off towards the bank of elevators at the far end of the hall. The older nurse just shook her head in disapproval and then put the Kinney infant back in it’s bed, tucking the baby in before she turned to see to another of her tiny charges. The orderly who had been trying to restrain Mr. Kinney wandered off by himself. The remaining nurse gathered up the still weeping Mrs. Kinney and began to escort her back down the hall, presumably back to her room, as the little girl shuffled behind, her thumb in her mouth, snot dribbling down her face mixed in with some remaining tears, and pulling her blanket behind her. Justin stood, still in shock at the drama that had just transpired in front of him, and tried to figure out what he was supposed to do next.

Justin knew that the baby, Brian, was the one he’d been waiting for all his life. He didn’t understand how it was going to happen, but he knew that they were somehow destined to be together. He’d seen the two of them together in his dreams. It didn’t matter that, on the surface at least, it looked like it would be impossible for them to ever be together, Justin knew it would happen somehow. If he had to wait for another seventeen years until Brian was finally his, he would just have to do it.

But, in the meantime, Justin was worried about that man, Jack Kinney. He sensed that Brian wouldn’t have an easy life, forced to grow up with that man as his father. He needed to somehow be there to protect his Brian, to shield him from that man. But that task was seemingly impossible - how was he going to be able to protect Brian from the boy’s own father when Justin had no valid connection to the family? Well, it didn’t matter. He would figure it out. He would forge a connection to the Kinney family somehow and he would find a way to be there to take care of his Brian, no matter what.

“Goodbye for now, Brian,” Justin whispered as he stood at the viewing glass trying to get one last glimpse of the infant for the night. “I’ll be back for you, don’t worry. I’ll take good care of you, Baby. I’ll always be there for you, no matter what. Just wait for me, okay?”

Justin saw the baby’s hazel eyes blink at him, the connection between them still strong. Then the young man turned and made his way out of the hospital, his mind whirling with ideas about how he would contact the Kinney family, offer his babysitting services or . . . something else . . . anything to get an in with the family so he could be near to Brian as much as possible. He knew he would find some way to make this happen.

He was still concentrating on his plans as he got back in Four’s car, started the motor and pulled out of the hospital parking lot. Justin could still feel the pull from the infant lying in the hospital behind him, and he was trying to figure out what time he could make it back the next day to see the boy. He was so happy that he had finally found Brian! All the pain and loneliness of the past seventeen years was erased by the one moment he’d spent holding the baby. He knew that he would never be lonely again and the effervescent joy of that knowledge bubbled up in him making him giddy.

Justin was so busy with all his plans for the happy future that was dancing in front of his vision, that he wasn’t really paying much attention to what was going on around him. He didn’t see the stop sign at the end of the block as he drove past the cross street leading to the hospital’s emergency bay. The speeding ambulance, racing to get the cardiac patient they were transporting to the hospital, was already in the intersection when Justin drove his brother’s borrowed car through the stop sign. The ambulance slammed broadside into the small sportscar going at least fifty miles an hour. Justin was so happy and engaged with his plans to be with Brian that he never even looked up.

~**~**~**~**~**~