Chapter 31 - Discoveries.

Think left and think right and think low and think high. Oh, the thinks you can think up if only you try! Dr. Seuss

***

After thinking about it long and hard, Kevan had decided that the fuzzy, fluffy, white things bouncing all around him this afternoon were simply oddly-shaped and very tiny people things.

At first he hadn't been sure what they were. He'd been happily distracted by what he assumed was just another afternoon stroll with The Papa and the nice soft person thing who came with all that fuzzy brown stuff on its head - the one Kevan most often thought of these days as The Curly One. But then The Papa had taken Kevan out of his stroller and plopped him down on a patch of cold ground covered by intriguing hard small golden brown pieces of something. Kevan was in the process of putting one of the somethings in his mouth to see if that would help identify what the somethings were made of, when The Papa rudely knocked the piece of something out of Kevan’s hand.

“No, Kevan! Don't blah blah wood shavings blah blah blah.”

Kevan was just about to launch into a full blown protest about this abominable behavior on The Papa’s behalf - The Papa had been using that ‘No’ sound a lot lately and Kevan wasn't at all fond of that particular sound - when he was almost scared out of his diapers by the arrival of one of those fluffy white things. The thing had just bounced up to Kevan without any warning, lowered its tiny head and then run right into him. Kevan didn't even have time to cry out before his magic got loose and he accidentally made the world topple over.

The Papa must not have liked the fluffy things either because as soon as Kevan’s world rolled to a stop again, he was snatched up and held tight, as if the Papa was seeking protection from the fluffy things. Kevan didn't mind the tight hug since he was very unsure about the fluffy thing’s intentions himself. When The Papa sat down, keeping Kevan in his lap for safety, the little boy allowed himself to snuggle into the arms even more. He didn't mind offering whatever reassurances he could to The Papa.

But then, the next thing Kevan knew, they were surrounded by a whole passle of the scary fluffy white things. And if that wasn't bad enough, one of them came right up to where they were sitting and yelled at Kevan.

“Baaaaaaaaaaaa!” The fluffy thing screamed at him.

“Gaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhh!” Kevan screamed back even louder.

Then there was a moment of utter chaos when another of the fluffy things bumped into the first fluffy thing and The Papa was making his loud happy sounds and The Curly One was clapping and . . . Well, by the time all the ruckus died down, Kevan found that one of the fluffy things was sitting next to him in The Papa’s lap.

Kevan wasn't inclined to share The Papa's lap with just anyone. He was prepared to do his magic, flip the world around and thus throw the interloper out of the lap. But before he could even get started, the fluffy thing looked up at Kevan with a sad expression, gave Kevan a small quiet “Baaaa!” and then rubbed its tiny head against Kevan’s cheek.

Kevan thought the thing was very soft. It smelled kinda funny but Kevan figured maybe this fluffy thing just needed it's diaper changed too? And it WAS warm.

Kevan reached a chubby hand out and grappled on to the first bit of fluffy thing he could reach - a soft floppy part on the side of the thing’s head. Fluffy just blinked at Kevan. Kevan decided to investigate further into the nature these fluffy things and promptly put the floppy piece of Fluffy into his mouth to assess its taste. It even tasted fluffy.

Kevan then spent the next few minutes thinking and thinking in order to figure out exactly what kind of thing Fluffy was. He thought about it really hard while absentmindedly continuing to gnaw on the floppy piece of Fluffy. This Fluffy was a tough thing to pin down though. And Kevan was relatively new at this type of determined thinking. But he thought and he thought and he considered and then he compared and then he thought some more . . .

The conclusion Kevan reached was that Fluffy moved around, he talked with mouth sounds, he was warm, he tasted good, and he smelled like a dirty diaper. Hence, Fluffy must be just a really oddly shaped little person thing. And since Fluffy didn't seem to mind Kevan chewing on his ear, he must want to be friends.

‘Cool!’ Thought Kevan. ‘I've just made my first friend!’

To: BAKinney@VanGard.com

From: JTaylor@PIFA.edu

Re: Fun.

Hey, Stud! Do you remember when we went to Coney Island last summer? How we agreed you needed practice having fun? How we planned to use Kevan as an excuse to do all sorts of fun things together that you never had a chance to do as a kid? Well, today would have been one of those days if you'd been here. Daph and I took Kevan to this little petting zoo. It was hilarious. At first your son was scared out of his mind by all the animals. But then this baby lamb came bounding over to where the two of us were sitting and sort of fell into my lap right next to Kevan. The next thing I knew, Kevan was chewing on the lamb’s ear. The lamb didn't seem to mind for some strange reason. It was totally adorable. The only thing that could have made it even better would be if it had been you sitting there with our son instead of me. Then I could have looked on and sketched that beautiful scene and we'd always have that memory . . . I wish you'd come home, Brian. We need you. Please come home to us.

Love always,

Justin & Kevan

***

Justin typed out the last few letters of his name and then hit ‘send’. At this point, sending these twice daily emails had become merely an academic endeavor. He no longer expected any response from Brian. It had been more than two weeks since Brian had left him there alone in their bed. Two weeks without a single word. He didn't know what was wrong or why Brian wasn't responding. Whatever it was must be really bad. Justin wouldn't give up though. So he just kept sending the emails.

“Justin, Honey, you’ve got to stop worrying about Brian. He’s a big boy. I’m sure he can take care of himself,” Emmett directed as he walked past the dining table where Justin had his laptop set up.

“Don’t be so sure of that, Em. Brian’s not as invulnerable as everyone always makes him out to be,” Justin replied, slamming the lid of his laptop closed in frustration. “I KNOW something’s wrong. Something’s happened to him or he would have at least emailed back. I just don’t know what to do about it.”

“Well, luckily for you, I do,” Emmett asserted, handing Kevan off to his Papa and retrieving the house phone from it’s cradle on kitchen counter. After punching in a few numbers, the Manny spoke into the handset. “Cynthia? Hi there, Missy. It’s Emmett Honeycutt. I’ve got your boss’ better half here with me. Can I put you on speaker? Thanks, Hon.”

Emmett set the phone down on the table, pushed the speaker button and pulled up a chair. Just as they were getting started Zavi - the oldest of the Hulk Brothers and the one who was ostensibly in charge of the Chapel’s security detail - wandered in through the front door and joined the group. Justin was already huddled over the table’s edge, leaning into the phone, eager to hear any news Cynthia was willing to impart about Brian.

“Okay, we’re all set, Cynthia, and by the way, Zavi’s here with us now too.” Emmett informed the person on the other end of the line.

“Good afternoon, everybody. What can I do for you gentlemen?” Cynthia’s voice sounded as cool and accommodating as always, but Justin thought he detected a hint of underlying stress that really shouldn’t be there.

“Cyn, Honey, Justin’s been going a bit crazy around here because we haven’t heard anything from Brian since he left for Cancun, except for the one or two messages you’ve forwarded on,” Emmett took charge of the conference call right from the start, to Justin’s immense relief. “Now, I know Mr. High-And-Mighty left here in a bit of a kerfluffle, but enough is enough. I don’t care if he is still sulking. He hasn’t responded to any of Baby’s emails or phone messages. We need to get a hold of the man, like now. We don’t even know when he’s supposed to be getting home. Can you help us here, Cyn?”

“Well . . .” Cynthia’s voice now sounded completely off and it made the ball of anxiety Justin had been carrying around in his gut for the past week throb uncomfortably. “Actually, I don’t think I CAN help you.”

“This is getting a little ridiculous, Cynthia,” Emmett interrupted her, about to fly off on a tirade about how silly Brian was being, carrying on with this silent treatment thing.

“Let the woman speak, Emmett,” Zavi reached over and laid one of his hamhock-sized hands on the Manny’s shoulder to quell any further comments.

“Thanks, Zavi,” Cynthia went on. “I was going to say that, unfortunately, I haven’t heard from Brian in several days myself. Gardner’s been all over my ass about when Brian’s coming back to work. I’ve emailed him and left him messages a few times asking when he’s scheduled to return, but haven’t received any response. I didn’t know you weren’t in contact with him either. If I’d known that, I would have been even more worried.”

“Shit! This isn’t good,” Justin interjected. “I thought he was just still pissed off at me and that’s why he wasn’t calling me back. But if you haven’t heard from him either . . .”

“Let’s try him again,” Cynthia suggested, hitting the buttons to try to conference in Brian’s cell phone.

The call went straight through to voicemail. Sadly, as soon as the voicemail connected, however, they all heard the message that informed them that Brian’s voicemail box was full and therefore they couldn’t even leave another message. Justin wasn’t the only one who groaned when they heard that announcement.

“This really is NOT good,” Cynthia stated as soon as she’d disconnected the line. “I know for a fact that Brian’s phone service provides storage up to forty voicemail messages. If he’s got that many messages that he hasn’t deleted . . .”

“Brian wouldn’t leave that many unanswered messages on his phone. He’s obsessive about clearing out his messages,” Justin observed. “Checking his messages is the first thing he does every morning and the last thing he does at night. Something’s really wrong here.”

“I agree. It’s not like Brian to let his voicemail get so full,” Cynthia added pressing some additional phone buttons even as she spoke. “Let’s see if we can reach Brian through the resort’s switchboard.”

Twenty five minutes and multiple phone calls later, the group still had not located Brian. The hotel confirmed that Brian had checked out the same day he forwarded the email to Cynthia saying that the shoot was being extended. They had no explanation for the early check out. Cynthia next called several numbers she had for the Armani marketing staff and eventually connected to the Creative Director that had been in charge of the location shoot. He informed them that Brian had left Cancun without warning stating that he had ‘Family Shit’ that he needed to get home to take care of. Cynthia then pulled up Brian’s online credit card statement and located the flight number for his homeward trip. When she called the airline, they confirmed that, according to their records, Mr. Kinney had been on the flight that arrived in Pittsburgh later that night. Another perusal of the credit card records showed two charges at Pittsburgh International Airport the night Brian was supposed to have arrived - one at an airport Starbucks kiosk and another at an airport newsstand. But after that, there was nothing more.

In the end, it was clear that Brian HAD made it back to Pittsburgh and then had simply disappeared. Nobody had heard from him since. And that had been more than a week and a half ago.

Brian was pretty much out of it for most of the day after he’d first discovered that he was being drugged. Slowly, though, the drug’s effects wore off. The heavy, almost paralyzed feeling in his limbs wore off first and then, slowly, his head cleared. Even after the drugs wore off though, Brian continued to feel like crap. The hangover from whatever he’d been given was pretty fucking bad. His muscles ached, he felt weak all over, his head throbbed and overall he felt so lethargic it was pathetic. He vaguely remembered feeling sick off and on throughout his stay in this room, but everything was so hazy and blurred in his mind that he didn’t know what was real and what wasn’t.

Meanwhile, for his captor’s benefit, he had to continue pretending to be a zombie the entire time. He made sure to be extra clumsy during mealtimes so that the food Taggart was trying to foist on him was spilled or otherwise ruined and therefore he wouldn’t have to ingest any of it. His captor was understandably a little peeved at Brian all day because of the repeated messes. Brian was laughing inside and was especially proud of the fact that he’d managed to make the entire dinner tray of red sauce covered pasta land in Tag’s lap. Amazingly enough, Taggart didn’t seem to realize that Brian had now gone a significant length of time without another dose of the drug.

Tag came into the room several times throughout the day. He was always smiling and happy, chattering away all about the happy life he and Brian and Kevan had together. It was hard for Brian not to react to some of the shit the guy was spouting. As far as Brian could tell, Taggart was completely delusional. He kept talking about events that had never happened, except in his overheated mind. At one point he was was going on and on about their wedding day and how perfect it had been. Then he segued into a fond reminiscence of their supposed first date. It went on and on, The descriptions and details he was pattering on about were strangely explicit, which frightened Brian, especially when the captive seemed to actually remember flashes of some of the occasions Tag was talking about.

And, what was even more frightening, was the way Taggart would touch and kiss Brian so familiarly every time he neared. It seemed like every time Tag came within two feet of Brian, he’d reach out a hand and pat his cheek, trail his fingers over a shoulder or his chest, weave his digits through Brian’s hair, or touch him even more intimately on his back or leg. He also kissed Brian repeatedly.

It took everything in him for Brian to sit there passively while the man petted and slobbered all over him, kissing his face, his hands, his shoulder, and even his lips. The most vile moments were when Taggart would dress Brian, which he seemed to do several times a day, treating Brian like a life-sized Ken Doll. Thankfully, except for a little bit of light fondling - a squeeze to his bare ass on one occasion and one inquiring fingertip stretched out longingly to just barely graze against his dick - the depraved man didn’t approach Brian in an overtly sexual manner. If that HAD happened, there was no way Brian would have been able to sit there quiescently. Brian just hoped that his abductor had been equally as restrained during those times when he wasn’t as lucid as he was right then. He purposely shied away from any of the partial memories he had that might contradict this hope. If there was more there, Brian didn’t really want to know.

In between mealtimes, Taggart’s dress-up games and the other random visits, Brian forced himself to sit quietly. He wasn’t sure if Tag had some kind of cameras hidden in the room or not, and he didn’t want to give away his secret if he was being watched. So he just stayed wherever Tag put him and tried not to fidget even when the drug hangover was practically killing him.

The biggest downside of sitting still for so long without any distractions, was that Brian was left with way too much time on his hands. He had nothing to occupy himself with other than his thoughts. Even at the best of times, Brian's thoughts had never been comfortable companions. Now, though, he had no way to escape from them. No way to avoid the unpleasant and long buried truths that seeped up from his subconscious.

Mostly what he thought about was how in the hell he could have ended up in this predicament.

He spent a lot of time in the beginning trying to figure out how he'd become Taggart’s prisoner in the first place. Brian assumed that the drugs he'd been given had something to do with it. But he’d always thought he was smart enough not to fall for the usual club drugging schtick - he never left his drinks unwatched or anything like that - so how did Tag manage to slip him a mickey? No way would Brian have voluntarily accepted anything the stalker offered him. He didn't think a little twinkie like this guy could have overpowered him and forced him to take the drugs, either. So then, the only other explanation was that Taggart somehow tricked Brian into taking the drugs.

But even then, Brian couldn't see how the creep got him here to this apparently remote house. It was inconceivable that he would've just walked away with the stalker who'd been threatening his family. And if he'd been dragged away from one of his regular haunts by the guy, wouldn't someone have stopped him? Brian's friends wouldn’t let some stranger carry him off when he was obviously shit faced, would they? So, even if he'd somehow been tricked into taking the drugs, how the fuck did Taggart manage to physically get him here?

Unfortunately, there was no way for Brian to answer any of those questions. Try as he might, he just couldn't remember anything. He had a few scanty flashes of what appeared to be memories, but which might also have been drug-induced hallucinations. And even then the brief flashes he did have didn't fit together into any decipherable whole. It was like he was trying to put together a puzzle where half the pieces were lost. It felt like a futile effort and was only making him frustrated.

Even more infuriating, though, was the fact that he'd let his life devolve into a place where something like this could actually happen. How had Brian ended up as the object of an obsessive fan’s delusions? He'd never asked for his celebrity status - it just sort of happened along with all the other shit that befell him as a result of his mutant genetics, a broken condom and an uncharacteristic craving to bottom. He’d done the best he could under the circumstances, he thought. But, in hindsight, maybe flaunting himself in front of the camera lenses hadn't been the wisest course of action.

Well, at least that was over. He was sick of the modeling gig and the fans. The last really clear memory Brian did have was of his decision to leave Cancun and to hell with the Armani contract. He was done trying to prove that he was the most desirable man on the planet. He realized now that the whole modeling thing had just been his way of overcompensating for the latent shame he'd felt after finding out he was pregnant. He'd wanted to prove that just because he'd had a baby, he wasn‘t some effeminate, dickless loser. He'd wanted assurances that he was still attractive - still a ‘real’ man. But now that he'd achieved that goal to at least some degree, he thought the price was far too steep. All Brian really wanted now was to go back to his old, nearly-anonymous life.

Well . . . maybe not. At least, not his old life the way it had been. Not without his sons and his blond. Those parts of his new life he wanted to hold onto. Besides, it wasn’t like he ever COULD get rid of them, even if he’d wanted to. And he really didn’t want to.

Shit, he missed them all so fucking much!

The longer he sat there and thought, the more Brian realized that the ONLY thing he cared about was getting back home to his family. All the attention he got from the publicity and the fans and the men who’d been drooling after him for the past six months seemed so empty. When push came to shove, all he really wanted was to be home. To hold Kevan. To smile on proudly as his two sons played together. To kiss Justin’s soft, welcoming lips once more and then to fall into bed with the only man he’d ever dared to think might be willing to put up with him.

Damn! Thinking of Justin might have been a mistake. Once he started thinking about the blond who was - surely? presumably? hopefully? - waiting for him at home, Brian’s mind sped off on one tangent after another, all of which revolved around that tempting little blond.

What was it about that boy that kept Brian interested even after all this time together? He’d never experienced anything like it with any other man - and Brian had been with a LOT of other men. But from the first night, Brian had felt captivated by the boy. He’d tried to get rid of the kid several times, but for some unfathomable reason he’d never managed to shake off the tenacious and indefatigable twat. Brian didn’t understand it at all. Yes, the small, lithe body with that absolutely luscious, perky ass was hot and he could easily see why he’d been attracted to the kid in the first place. No fag in his right mind would say ‘No’ to a chance to get into Justin’s ass. And that’s not even taking into account the nice thick cock that came along with the blond boy ass. But physical attraction alone didn’t explain Brian’s obsession with the kid. He’d had so many hot, tight asses over the years, he couldn’t count them - and he couldn’t remember them either. So Brian didn’t think it was the physical attraction alone that kept drawing him back to the younger man. It had to be something else. Something that he couldn’t name but that always drew him back to his Sunshine.

Sunshine. . . Thinking of that nickname instantly brought up the mental image of his partner’s bright, sunny smile, which was at least a partial explanation. Brian could never get enough of that smile. It was fucking infectious. And usually the smile came along with laughter and fun . . . things that Brian really didn’t remember experiencing much before Justin had come along. Oh, he’d done plenty of ‘fun’ things in his life. Things that he’d describe as ‘amusing’. But that sense of plain, simple, uncomplicated FUN that he got when he and Justin were together was new.

Before Justin, Brian had engaged in plenty of sex. He’d done plenty of drugs. He’d spent plenty of nights out dancing at clubs or trolling at the baths or hooking up with men wherever. But all those things that were meant to amuse him had somehow always felt like serious business. Looking back, Brian couldn’t point to even one instance when he’d felt like sex had been ‘fun’, until Justin had come along. Before Justin, if someone had laughed while he was fucking them, Brian would have been offended and probably kicked them out of his bed. But since Sunshine had arrived, it was a rare encounter when sex didn’t involve at least some laughter and fun and smiles. So maybe that had something to do with it?

Even when they weren’t having much fun though - like lately - Brian still felt drawn to that infuriatingly bold brat. If it was all about fun, then why hadn’t the younger man bailed on him any of the innumerable times that things had become ‘unfun’ over the past year and a half? Why didn’t Justin listen when Brian told him to leave or tried to push him away? Brian fully acknowledged that being with someone as emotionally stunted as Brian Kinney, especially living with him, wasn’t exactly a bowl of cherries a lot of the time. And yet Justin was still there. He still stuck with Brian even at his worst. Justin never judged him, but somehow still managed to get Brian to rethink his actions whenever the younger man thought Brian was acting inappropriately. He made Brian somehow WANT to be a better person. A better father. Maybe even a better partner? Why that was, Brian had no idea, but he had to admit it was another of the things that kept him interested in the boy.

So then, why had Brian felt the need to practically run away. Why was he here, alone, being used as a play toy for some nutcase after running away from home just because he was scared of the domesticated heteronormative turn his life had taken? And if he really didn’t want to be with Justin, then why had he resorted to drinking and anonymous sex in order to avoid having to think about his blond bedwarmer and his fatherly commitments back in the Pitts? Why had he felt so smothered by his life back there and yet, even when he was a thousand miles away and completely free to do anything he wanted, continued to brood over the blond he'd been so anxious to escape? Why did he miss Justin, Kevan and all those family-life responsibilities so badly now that his ties to that life seemed in danger of being severed forever?

None of it made any sense to the confused and frightened man. Of course, not much HAD made sense in his life since that night more than a year earlier when he'd given in to the itch to let the twink top him. Ever since then he'd been living in a perpetual state of bewilderment, so focused on trying to prove he hadn’t lost his studly machismo that he had brought down this newest nightmare on them.  

Well, enough of that! Brian knew that if he ever managed to get home again, he wouldn’t be wasting his time on that shit any more. He’d fucking man up, already, and prove to Justin and Kevan that he wanted to be there with them. That he wanted to be worthy of their love. That he really was the kind of man who deserved it.

But first, Brian had to come up with a way to get out of this hell hole and away from his delusional captor.