The next few days were hell on them all. Press hounded outside of their house, right alongside the gay bashers and the fans. It created quite a crowd. Brian and AJ had to practically hide inside their home, stepping only into the backyard to take Nina outside. All the people drove her crazy. She barked at them any time she saw them, and they had to work to keep her from running down there. But luckily enough no one had made it up to the house. Security was doing their job by keeping them away.
Hiding out wasn’t going to be an option much longer. AJ and Brian both knew that they needed to get out and talk to the public. Hiding away would only make things worse. People would be more interested if it was going to be kept a secret. So they made plans, finding a boarding place for Nina. That broke AJ’s heart to have to do, but he knew he couldn’t leave her there and he couldn’t take her with them.
So, three days after they found out about the leak, all four guys were on a plane, heading out for the first event that their PR agent had set up. They were going to do a talk show interview like Howie had suggested, both about their relationship and about Brian’s heart. To that end they’d picked the show they wanted to go on, hoping to get the best interview possible. PR had chosen the Janet Lynn show.
Since their relationship was in the open, Brian figured that he didn’t need to be reserved in public anymore. So when they stepped off the plane and into the airport terminal he took hold of AJ’s hand. It relaxed him and gave comfort. He saw surprise flash in AJ’s eyes for a split second, and then they softened and warmed.
They’d put off flying out until the last minute, mostly to milk as much time with Nina as possible. AJ and Brian weren’t ashamed to admit that they already missed her. But that meant that now they had to hurry, bags and all, to the studio to get ready for the show.
Once there, time seemed to zip by for Brian. He felt like everything was suddenly in fast forward. The time that it took to drive to the studio was shorter than he had thought it would be. Then they were in there, and in makeup, then getting their microphones on, and being prepped on the topics, and the show was going and they were waiting for their cue to come out.
AJ reached his hand out, taking hold of Brian’s hand again as if he sensed his inner turmoil. “We’ll be fine, Bri.” He whispered to him. Then he pulled back to look Brian over from head to toe. The long look had Brian smiling at him, and the look in AJ’s eyes when he brought his head back up at him flushing. “Damn, Rok, they sure got you dressed all hot.” AJ said huskily. Brian didn’t see anything special about his clothes. A pair of blue jeans, a white undershirt, and a button up blue shirt that almost matched the color of his eyes. Other than that he had on his normal sneakers, and nothing else special.
Now, AJ, on the other hand, looked devastating to him. “I think you got this backwards, Alex.” Brian teased him as he pulled back to take his turn looking at AJ. “Mm, sexy baby.” He said with a wink. AJ was dressed just as simply in black jeans, a short sleeved, collared, white button up shirt and a thin black tie. He had on what was becoming his trademark fedora, and the chain that ran from his front belt loop to his back pocket where his wallet sat. He’d kept the jewelry minimal, just his earrings, a skull ring on his middle finger, and a chunk of jelly bracelets.
Before either one of them could continue their flirting, which was actually helping Brian calm down, they got their cue and had to head out on stage. They’d planned how they wanted to do this, down to the minutest moves. Brian headed out first, smiling and waving to everyone, with AJ a few seconds behind him. They met Janet in front of the chairs where she hugged each of them in turn while the applause sounded around them.
Even the seating had been prearranged. Brian took the part of the couch closest to Janet’s chair, crossing his legs. He put one arm on the armrest. AJ sat next to him, close, but not so close that it would look like they were glued together. In two deliberate moves, AJ put his arm around the back of the couch, behind Brian, and Brian laid the hand closest to AJ on his thigh as if it was the most casual thing in the world. Really, at home, it was. But Brian almost felt shy since this was their first time sitting together publicly so intimately. As if he sensed that, AJ moved his free hand over, sliding it under Brian’s hand. The contact was reassuring.
“Well, welcome!” Janet said. For a second the screams built and she turned to grin at the audience. “Ok, ok, let’s tone it down now. Gosh, how do you guys ever talk over top of all the screaming girls that follow you everywhere?” she teased.
Brian chuckled, looking out at the audience and back to Janet. “After a while you just learn how to talk a little bit louder.”
“Or you just go deaf.” AJ chimed in.
Janet chuckled while the audience slowly died down. “Ok, well, at the risk of setting off the girls in here again, I just want to say I imagine you all know why we’re here today. There’s so much to talk about I don’t wanna waste time beating around the bush. Recently it looks like a crop of pictures of the two of you have been showing up just about everywhere!”
On the monitor behind them some of the pictures started going in a slideshow. Brian and AJ looked back at them. Some were casual embraces, some were them holding hands. It flashed to the one on the couch and AJ lifted the hand that was behind Brian’s head and pointed. “I want that one!” he told them all. The audience cheered and he looked out at them with a big grin. “You think I’m joking, but I’m not. That’s an awesome picture.”
“We don’t have all of them. There’s one that we didn’t think we should show up here, because of the reaction of the girls, but…” Janet gestured and very briefly the picture flashed up of them in the office. As she’d predicted the girls in the audience went while, screaming and cheering.
Once the pictures were done and the audience quiet, Janet settled in to ask her questions. “So, I guess the biggest question everyone has is, how long has this been going on?”
They’d known this question would be coming, and AJ had been voted to answer it. As much as possible they’d planned their answers to a whole assortment of questions on the plane ride there. AJ shifted in his seat, his one hand starting to play with the collar of Brian’s shirt without realizing it. “Actually, if wasn’t that long after I got out of treatment. I learned a lot of things while I was there, one of which was that life is too short and too precious to waste it hiding from yourself.”
“He came to my room one night and told me he had to talk to me.” Brian interjected. The memory made him smile, even now. “He went about things in his usual, blunt, AJ sort of way, and, well, we’ve been together ever since then.”
“But if you’ve been together that long, why haven’t you told the fans yet?” Janet asked. Surprisingly, the audience was silent.
This was a question that Brian fielded. He fiddled absently with AJ’s jelly bracelets, turning them around his wrist as he tried to find the right words. “You know, at first we didn’t tell anyone. I do mean nobody. The other guys didn’t even know.”
“The rest of the group didn’t know?” Janet asked in surprise.
“No. See, it’s like I told them. In our life, being famous and such, when you have anything of your own, it immediately becomes backstreet property. Especially in relationships. Once people know you’re with someone, suddenly there are photos everywhere, and people are dying to get the scoop on you being together. It’s not just the fans or the press, either. It’s your family and friends. You’re always being asked how things are going. If you fight-“
“Which we do frequently.” Said AJ.
Brian chuckled at him but kept on talking. “-if you do, and people know you’re dating, they make it so much more serious, and are so much more involved. We were still so new to ourselves, and we’d never felt this way about anyone else before. It was important to us to see where it went first, and to make sure that it was going to work. Even then, though, AJ was ready before I was.”
AJ took a sip off his water, smiling at them all. “Naturally.” He said, winking. “I’ve always had, and more so since treatment, this screw it all attitude. I was happy. Happier than I’d been in years, and all I wanted was to climb up and shout it from the rooftops. But, I’m a more exuberant kind of guy. In some ways Brian mellows me.”
The smile Janet gave them was genuine. It was one of the reasons they’d chose her, for her sincerity. “So would you say that you two are compatible? Because, to be honest, the personalities you two show to the world seem so different from one another. I mean, AJ, you’ve got this rep for being a bad boy, a rebel. An Brian, you’ve always been the country boy for everyone with the zany humor.”
Unable to do anything but, the two laughed. Brian gave that wide grin he was famous for, wiggling his jaw the way Jim Carey did. “Really?” he asked in a false high voice, putting one hand over his heart. “Why, I do declare, I never knew.”
The audience laughed and cheered with them. With a more normal grin, Brian looked at Janet. This was an easy question to answer for him, and one they’d known would come. “We’re really not that different. For the people who’re closer to us they could tell you that really, we’re not. AJ’s may not show as much for everyone to see, but sometimes his humor is a little crazier than mine. I mean, I’m not saying that we’re not different.” He gestured at AJ, indicating the differences that were visible.
AJ crossed his legs, moving his hand to lace his fingers with Brian’s. “Brian’s right. There are a lot of areas that we’re just polar opposites. Like, Brian’s a pretty neat guy. Puts things in the drawers, all folded and stuff.”
“Where you can generally tell where AJ’s been when the days done because he leaves things where he takes them off at.” Brian shot back. “I usually pick up the trial he leaves and toss them into the basket. There are other things too. Like it takes more to get me angry than it does him. So we’ve got that steady balance between our tempers.”
“No one can calm be as quickly as Brian can.”
Janet led them through a few more basic questions, just giving the public a general feel on their relationship. But at one point she happened to catch sight of Brian’s hand. The couple smiled slightly when she said “Well, it looks like you’ve got a new tattoo there, Brian.”
He held his hand out, allowing the camera to zoom in on it. The image was magnified on the screen behind them so that the audience could see the cross ring tattoo. With a devilish grin, AJ stuck his hand up as well so that the image showed both their rings.
“We figured that a couple like us can’t get married, and traditional rings aren’t really something that we felt suited us. But this, well, this just seemed right. It combines our faith with AJ’s love of body art, as well as a lasting promise to one another.” Brian explained to everyone. “I have no doubts in my mind about what I feel for AJ. He’s the other part of me, and he’s stood by me through the ups and downs of that life’s thrown at me.”
That gave Janet the opening to start talking about his heart surgery. Discussing that carried them through the rest of the interview. By the time they were done, Brian almost felt relaxed. Almost. Their day was so packed, though, that once it was done they had just enough time to get the equipment off before they had to rush to head to the next appointment.
There would be no checking into a hotel for them. They went from Janet’s show, to a radio interview, and were back on a plane to fly to Kentucky where they would stay the night at Kevin’s house, and Brian was insistent on going to see his father. He knew that the idea bothered AJ, and he knew that it probably wasn’t going to do any good, but he couldn’t get the idea out of his mind. All he knew was that it felt right.
By the time they reached Kevin and Kristen’s house, the two men were beat. Kristen took one look at them and ushered them back to the guestroom she had ready. “You can all visit in the morning.” She insisted, stopping Kevin before he could say anything. “There’s a bathroom connected to your room, so you’ll have that privacy, and it’s full of essentials. You two just sleep off the jetlag, and we’ll be here when you wake up, ok?”
Brian leaned in and kissed her cheek gratefully before hugging Kevin. He heard AJ hug them both, and then they were stepping into the room and Kristen was pulling the door shut.
As tired as they were, the two barely had the energy to take their clothes off and pile them on a chair before they collapsed in the bed, tangled around one another under the covers. Within a minute they were asleep.