AJ stared unblinking at the top of Brian’s head. He watched as the one he loved shook with his silent tears. Everything that he had said seemed to echo through the room, a testament to his pain. He couldn’t believe what he had heard. How the hell could someone be so cruel? More so, how could someone be that cruel to Brian? Sweet, kind, loving Brian? Part of him ached to reach over and comfort Brian and tell him how wrong the other man had been. The other part wanted to go back to Kevin’s room and pound Stephen to a bloody pulp.
As usual, temper won out.
Rage filled AJ to the brim. Who the hell did this guy think he was? To use him that way, and insult him, was the worst kind of crime. No one treated Brian like that and got away with it!
AJ didn’t even realize that he’d risen to his feet until he heard Brian speak and turned to look down at him. “Alex?” One of his hands came up, wiping away the tears as he sniffled. “Where…what’re you doing?”
“I’m gonna fucking kill him.” The words came out hard and cold. AJ turned to storm from the room. He heard Brian move quickly and felt a hand grip his wrist.
“What? AJ, no!”
“Why the fuck not?” AJ shouted as he spun back around. His body was vibrating with his anger and the need to set it free. Nothing, nothing, had ever pissed him off this much before. “He deserves it!”
Still sitting on the couch, Brian tightened his grip on AJ’s wrist and gave him a beseeching look. “Please, Alex, it’s not the answer. All of this is said and done, it’s over with. Nothing you do can change what he did.”
A scream tickled the back of AJ’s throat. He held it in, but just barely. It made his voice rougher when he spoke. “No one, and I mean no one, has the right to treat you like that. He can’t get away with those…those…lies! He can’t just use you and hurt you and walk away as if everything’s ok! I’ll make him bleed for every fucking tear he made you shed!”
To AJ’s surprise there seemed to be a light growing in Brian’s eyes. A love. Almost as if AJ’s temper was reassuring him and making him feel better. “He’s not worth it.” He insisted softly.
“But dammit, you are!” AJ shouted back at him. He pulled on his hand, trying to get it free. But Brian just rose as if AJ had been pulling him up. He stepped close, reaching his other hand out to lay it on the side of AJ’s neck.
“To hear you say that means more than you’ll ever know, Alex. To look at you and know that you really mean it. That you love me that much. Even after everything I said, you still love me that much.”
“Well no shit? Why wouldn’t I! You didn’t do anything wrong. It was that mother fucking, cock sucking little rat bastard wh-”
Brian leaned in and pressed his lips against AJ’s, effectively cutting him off. The kiss carried so much emotion to it that it staggered AJ. He could do nothing but stand there and kiss him back with all of his love.
When he pulled back, Brian’s eyes were warm and bright. Still slightly damp from his tears they almost seemed to sparkle. There was no more pain there. Only a love that burned so bright and strong that it left AJ speechless and drained the last of his anger away. “Alexander James Mclean, I can’t deny it to myself anymore. I don’t want to. I love you.”
Joy spiraled through AJ. He didn’t think about it but simply responded. On a small cry he leaned in and kissed Brian. Those three words were the ones he had always wanted to hear, and never thought he would. He pulled back and smiled widely. “Say it again.” he begged.
Brian chuckled happily. “I love you. I love you, Alex.”
Crying out with the joy of it, AJ flung his arms around Brian’s neck and kissed him again. The exuberance of his embrace had them falling onto the couch. AJ just barely managed to catch himself on his knees. It left him straddling Brian’s lap. When he broke their kiss he would have moved, but Brian’s hands found his hips and his eyes were twinkling.
“You gonna say anything to me?” Brian asked him teasingly.
AJ realized that he’d been so overjoyed that he hadn’t even responded with words. He did so now, saying them between kisses. “I…love…you….Brian.” He ended with one long kiss that had both of them pushing against one another.
The sound of the door banging open startled the both of them from their kiss. AJ barely had time to turn his head to see what the hell had made that noise when something grabbed the collar of his shirt and yanked him backwards, sending him flying to the floor.
“Kevin!” Brian’s voice echoed through the room, full of surprise and anger. He rose to his feet.
“What the hell is this?” Kevin was shouting. He looked absolutely livid as he stood over them both. “What the fuck are you two doing?”
The rage that AJ had banked down before now came roaring back to life. It hazed his vision and filled him with adrenaline. Using that, he shoved off the ground and launched to his feet with the intent of ramming straight into Kevin. But Brian knew him well, and just managed to stick his arm out, catching AJ right in his stomach.
The two stumbled, AJ almost managing to grab hold of Kevin and Brian barely managing to keep them both upright. Kevin stumbled back a step from surprise at AJ’s sudden attack, but then his face hardened and he stepped forward. “Let him go, Brian.”
“Are you insane?” Brian snapped out while he struggled to hold AJ back.
“Let the little fag go. I’ll kick his fucking ass for being in here like that on you. I told you not to push yourself at him! I told you to back the fuck off, you God damn little shit! It’s a good fucking thing Stephen told me…”
Anything else Kevin would have said was cut off by a roar of rage from AJ. He redoubled his efforts to try and get free. “Enough, Alex!” Brian snapped at him. AJ just kept trying to pull free. To his astonishment, Brian suddenly grabbed a hold of him firmly and shoved him back on to the couch. “Enough!” he shouted. “Sit right there and shut up for one fucking minute!”
AJ gaped as Brian turned back to Kevin. “As for you, what the hell are you talking about? An who do you think you are, to come barging in here like you own the place?” Hands on his hips, Brian stared furiously at his cousin.
That just seemed to flabbergast Kevin. He gestured angrily at AJ. “I found out earlier that he’s in love with you. That’s why he’s been spending so much damn time with you lately! I knew he’d push himself at you! Then Stephen told me that AJ just as good as admitted it to him that he was going to try something. I knew I had to come down. Dammit, I was helping you!”
“Helping me? Did it look like I was resisting him?” Brian snapped back. His words seemed to floor Kevin. “Furthermore, I wouldn’t trust a damn word out of Stephen’s mouth.”
“Brian! You…you’re not gay. You’re not. Don’t talk like that, don’t insinuate that. You’ll only encourage him! Don’t try to badmouth Steph either! He’s been our friend for years. He was only trying to look out for you!”
AJ growled low in his throat at that, but a gesture from Brian had him settling back. He had never seen Brian this livid before. It was almost…sexy.
“God, Kevin, you have no idea what the hell you’re talking about. AJ wasn’t pushing himself on me. I was kissing him as much as he was kissing me!”
Kevin’s eyes grew wide and he staggered back again. “I don’t believe it.” The words were torn from him. His eyes drifted over to AJ and they grew hard again. “You! This is all your fault! You’ve done something to him you little faggot!”
“Dammit, enough!” Brian practically screamed it. He put one hand to Kevin’s chest and shoved him back a full step. “If you don’t knock it off I swear to God that the next time I will step out of the way and let AJ kick your ass, are we clear on that? He did not ‘do something’ to me to make me this way. I’ve been this way for a long time, Kevin!”
A crowd was gathering at the door, witness to their argument. AJ saw Howie and Nick’s sympathetic faces and was glad they were smart enough to stay back out of the way.
“How could you, Brian? You know how wrong this is! This isn’t what you were raised to be!”
“I was raised to believe in love in all its forms, Kevin, just the same as you. I love him. Do you hear me? I love him, and not a damn thing you say is going to change that.”
Kevin stepped forward again, raising a finger to point at Brian. “Brian Thomas you knock this insanity off right now. If your mother heard you talking like this it would break her heart.”
That was the limit for AJ. He had heard enough, and had sat by long enough. He took hold of Brian’s hand and stood, not making a threatening move but just staying by Brian’s side. “I’ve had about enough of this.” He spoke quietly but with that steel under his words that everyone who knew him recognized as him being furious. “This is my room. Mine. You had no right to barge in and manhandle me. But more so, you have no right to stand here and demean him. I won’t stand for it. If you want to fight with him, that’s family business and can be done on your own time. But this is my room, and I will not stand here and let you insult him and myself. Now, get out.”
“I’m not-”
“Get out!” At the end of his control AJ pointed a quivering hand toward the door. Brian stood quietly by his side. The look on his face showed them all that he was firmly on AJ’s side and wasn’t going to interfere.
After a moment of tense silence, Kevin shot them both another glare and turned to storm from the room, slamming the door shut behind him.