I threw on my hoodie, baseball cap, and sunglasses; grabbed the bag I packed, then went out my backdoor. Praying that for once no one would notice me. I had spent all night getting my hair back to normal, not the jet black it had been for the last few years. I wanted to spend my two-month break where my life was and just being no one special. I always come here to this house, because reporters think I stay here to write the next hit song. I was able to leak it that when I wanted to write, I stay in this house until my album is complete. My agent seems to believe that bullshit too.

I  can't believe the crazy shit they'll do just for a picture of me eating a banana or buying a coffee. Really, how is that interesting to people? I really wanted to take a poll on that, to see if it was me peeling the banana or the fact that they are fixated on the way I bite it. I jokingly thought of finding anything phallic and deep throating the sucker. To me that's interesting. Well okay, it could have something to do with my avid interest in the subject and the lack of having anyone I want to do it with, although people are more than willing if I would let them.

Here's the thing, I always thought being a rock star sounded cool, but the reality sucks. People tend to kiss your ass, even when you're being an absolute asshole to them. Don’t even get me started on how being nice seems to make my privacy a thing of the past. I knew it was time to escape when my agent told me that they were hiring a new firm to work my PR.

Every time she does that I end up with a person telling me that I need to use the press to my advantage. They want to alert the press to catch me when I’m out, telling me that it will make it so they aren’t chasing me everywhere. Do you want to know what really happens? I stand next to a person who I don’t even know and suddenly we’re having secret dates, someone is having pregnancy scares, or I’m cheating with someone on the person who was unlucky enough to stand next to me. How they get me sleeping with a woman when it’s been established that I’m well and truly gay really just screams that they’ll do anything for a story.

I wanted to spend time with my son, who I’ve managed to hide from the world. I hoped to wait for a relationship before having a child, but my relationships seem to be short-lived when it seems they only want to walk on my arm and be invited to the parties they wouldn’t be invited to without me. I told my agent this was a part of my life she didn’t have any say in, so Ryan is something she doesn't know about. She would be all over me about it, trying to use him to make me seem more family oriented. I didn’t want Ryan raised in a world where he couldn’t go outside without someone scaring him. Ryan has no clue what Daddy does, other than work away from home.  

My agent is only hiring the PR firm because she's pissed at me for telling her I want to take a year off. I had a child and I want to raise him, not let my best friend do it for me. Daphne helped me find a surrogate and arrange for a place for Ryan to have a normal life. I didn’t want to spend weeks away from him anymore, but I also didn’t want people taking pictures of him.

I made it down the street to where a friend left a car for me. I'm sure Rita is going to have an aneurysm when she brings the guy who is going to clean up my image to my empty house; too bad I won’t see it.

BRIAN

We waited in the den while Rita went to search for her client. She really needs to get better at masking her emotions. Ted and I weren't fooled when she hustled us in here, saying her client must be taking a walk. This secrecy over who we were here to meet ended when we had to drive through reporters trying to see if Jus T was in the car.

Rita represents a lot of artists, but Jus T is her premier client. I knew he fired the last PR group a few weeks ago. Adam called to tell me all about how big of an asshole Jus was. He said Jus kept disappearing every time they wanted him for some asinine public appearance. Adam seemed to think Jus needed more publicity since he tends to keep quiet about his life. The guy is raking in money because he seems mysterious in everything but his music.

I know there is a song he wrote recently that people are still trying to hunt down the meaning of. It was a ballad, which was enough to get people curious when he never did them before. It was as if he was singing a lullaby to someone. It's just with no one in his life, I couldn’t figure out why he did something so drastically different for him. He hit the top of the charts with it, but wouldn't answer any questions on why he strayed from what people loved about his music. Most of the time he would tell his motivation for a song, but not this time. I know Gus is a big fan of all of Jus’s music. He's going to be all over me if I take on Jus T.

I could respect that he was not hiding his sexuality, but since he didn't date, people thought he might have just said it for shock value. It didn’t help when other PR firms were throwing out pregnancy scares with people who would do anything for a minute in the press. I have never understood some of the things PR firms handling Jus were doing. He wasn’t getting bad press, but he was just not always willing to cooperate when they wanted personal details.

I was seriously going to turn Rita down. I don't have time to deal with someone who expects me to kiss his ass when I'm trying to keep it covered. I looked around the den and it's almost like he staged the house to be what people expect to see. There were pictures of him with famous people, but none that seemed personal. He had sheets of music scattered all over as if they weren't worth much when his songs are worth a fucking fortune.

“Why does this remind me of a place you'd have if you wanted people to believe you're a self-absorbed primadonna,” Ted asked, looking at the awards lining the shelf.

“He's giving the world what they believe his life is,” I tell him.

I saw Rita outside, pacing while on her phone. It was time to see if this house was what I think Jus was using it for. Ted followed me, confused when I opened the cabinet and refrigerator.

“I think Rita wanted us to stay in the den not look for something to eat,” Ted tells me.

I dusted the glasses and showed Ted the refrigerator. “He doesn’t stay here for any real length of time. The glasses look like they were set up so it looks like he stays but there’s not a dish in site. The refrigerator’s only purpose seems to be to cool a couple of bottles of water. He's using this house to keep the press in front of here, while he goes somewhere else.” I tell him.

I went into the bedrooms that don’t look used, then to the attic that was completely empty. I headed back down to the den and checked to see if he made calls from the phone sitting on the desk. It was like a museum, not a home. I went back upstairs and opened the closet that had a few clothes in it, looking around, because it at least looked live in. I wasn’t really all that interested in this whole thing at first, but it puzzled me. Why buy this house if you don’t live in it?

I started looking through boxes, hating how it feels to invade the privacy he seems to want so badly, but he's becoming this puzzle I need the answers to. I found receipts for stores and a restaurant jumbled up with other things. I pulled out a keychain that wasn’t attached to keys, it had a picture of a blond haired little boy who was smiling a giant smile. I took it with me and went back to the den to look at Jus, in his pictures. It took a moment for me to see it, but that smiling little boy and Jus could be twins if not for the black hair.

“What are you doing?” Ted asks, exasperated.

Rita walked in and fell into a chair. “He took off again. I don't understand why he keeps doing this. He needs to realize a year off could hurt his career. I was counting on him listening to you.” She tells me.

“Is Jus’s hair naturally black?” I ask.

“No, he's actually blond, it's just the black makes his eyes pop. Why?” She asks.

“I just needed to know. We do a complete image makeover sometimes.” I lied.

“He won't change it, I told him the blond wasn't an issue. He can be a bit stubborn about it.” She tells me.

“I don’t see any reason for us to stick around. When Jus T resurfaces, give me a call.” I tell her.

I let Ted drive us through the mob while I  looked at the receipts. They were all from a town in Mississippi. I checked to see what was close to it and decided my party planner might need to visit his family with me. We were going to check out a farming town.

JUSTIN

I was almost to the farm and could relax. It's strange to be somewhere where no one recognizes me at all. I was just Ryan Taylor's dad. He was sitting on the steps but took off towards me as soon as I parked. I gathered him in my arms and breathed in my son. He was all the best things in my life.

“Aunt Daphne told me you'd come. I sat here all day waiting.” He tells me.

I hummed the song that I wrote for Ryan as I walked into the house.

“I've been trying to convince him that sitting there wouldn’t get you here any faster,” Daphne tells me, kissing my cheek.

“I've decided it's time for me to just be Justin Taylor for a while,” I tell her.

“My Daddy,” Ryan tells me.

“Yes baby, it's the only thing that matters to me,” I tell him.

BRIAN

I sat at Woody’s with the guys, listening to Michael talk about some travesty in the comic world. Normally I'd at least pretend I care, but this puzzle about Jus bothered me. Who was this kid and why was there no mention of his family in any article written about him? He has managed to keep his real last name from being leaked, which was hard to believe. Looking him up I found hundreds of sites and no real information about him from before his career. It was like he showed up out of nowhere like he had no past.

Reading postings about Jus just added to my confusion. The guy Adam describes sounds like a total bastard who doesn’t care about his fans, but then I find postings where he showed up at a hospital and hung out with kids who were terminal, giving them a concert and his time. One mother gushed about how Jus constantly called to talk to her daughter, and showed up and stayed with them when she was getting a bone marrow transplant. He was apparently tested himself to see if he was a match to the little girl. Another was about a father who lost his job when his son got sick. The father had to miss work, which had the company he worked for firing him and canceling his insurance. Justin visited, and a few days later the bill was paid in full for his son’s treatment. It was this article that had me looking back at the keychain. The guy commented that Justin told him the greatest gift to be able to be with your child. When I first read that I thought he was referring to the guy, but what if that wasn’t it? What if he was talking about himself?

I don’t understand what is causing me to want the answers about him. I guess part of it was that at first, I wasn’t really interested. Then, when I looked at the pictures of him, it was like he could see into my soul with those blue eyes. Every picture of him staring straight into the camera was eerie in that way, it said to me he knew my secret and would change my world to one I never thought I wanted. I hate this feeling of needing to understand him. I got up and left halfway through Michael’s story. I heard Michael screeching at me, but my head was too busy with the mystery of Jus.