The night that Brian spent with AJ was exactly what he needed. It made him feel desirable, loved, cherished, and so much more. It gave him strength and helped him find that calmness inside. Nothing in life could be too bad with this man by his side. They could conquer anything. Even telling the guys about his past with Stephen. Even saying it all with Stephen right there in the room.
AJ wasn’t happy about that part. He let Brian know the next morning, in no uncertain terms, exactly what he felt while Brian had him sitting on the bathroom counter so he could clean and bandage his arm.
“Why would you let him in there? I mean, you’ve got to know that he’s not just going to let you say your piece. He’s going to start shit.” AJ stopped to swear as Brian dabbed at the cut with peroxide.
Watching the way the liquid bubbled in the cut had Brian glaring up at AJ. “Clean, huh?” he scolded him. Everyone knew that the more peroxide bubbled the dirtier the cut was.
AJ shrugged it off. To him that was just a minor annoyance. He was like a dog with a bone on the topic of Stephen. “Are you listening to me, Brian? The last thing we need is for him to start more shit!”
“I heard you, Alex.” But he wasn’t intending on arguing about it. Methodically he cleaned the cut up and then dried it off. Next he too out the butterfly tape and pinched the skin together, ignoring AJ’s muttered curses, before taping it shut. “There.” He proclaimed when he was done. “That should let it heal better. Still going to leave a scar, most likely.”
“Oh, who gives a shit.”
With a growl AJ hopped off the counter. He put his hands on his hips as he stood there and glared at Brian. The sight was almost enough to have Brian laughing. Somehow he managed to hold the chuckles in. They would have only irritated AJ further.
“You’re just going to do what you damn well please, aren’t you?” AJ asked irritably.
Brian let his grin unfold as he gave a little nod. “Mm hm. But you can keep trying to talk me out of it.” His grin grew even bigger. “It’s kind of cute.” He wiggled his eyebrows at his lover. For an instant AJ stayed glaring. Then his glare melted and he laughed, shaking his head. “You’re a freak, Littrell.”
“Hey now!” Brian squawked in his Donald Duck voice. That just made AJ crack up more. Still chuckling, he moved to leave the bathroom, bumping his shoulder against Brian’s. It felt good to see AJ laughing like that. Brian had worried most of the morning that AJ was going to make this difficult. But he was also learning that it didn’t take him much to really diffuse AJ’s temper.
“You call me the freak, bone, but who’s the one currently touching up his nail polish?” Brian called out as he gathered up his medical supplies and put them away. He didn’t even have to look to know that was what AJ was doing. Years of being friends had taught them all about one another.
There was a muffled thump echoed by loud laughter. “Would you rather I go around with chipped nails? How embarrassing would that be!”
“God forbid your nail is chipped! Oh, God, the world is ending!” He put a hand dramatically over his heart as he stepped out of the bathroom. A flying shoe caught him in the gut. Laughing, Brian caught it and threw it back, catching AJ’s ass even as he tried to dodge. “Son of a bitch!” AJ swore loudly. He froze in place.
Curious, Brian lifted an eyebrow, wondering worriedly if he’d done something wrong. That little fear was still in there, even if being around AJ had tempered it down. “Is everything ok?”
AJ turned annoyed eyes up toward Brian. “You made me smear my damn pinky nail.”
Laughter tickled up Brian’s throat even as he tried to force it down. But AJ was looking so livid, holding his hand out and inspecting that one offending nail. Mirth danced in his eyes, though, he wasn’t able to hide that. AJ saw it and suddenly he was stalking forward, still holding his bottle of nail polish. “Alex, what’re you doing?” Brian chuckled and backed away. AJ kept coming.
“You want to laugh at me, Rok?”
“Alex, I’m warning you, get back.” The laughter kept coming the closer that AJ got. His lover was grinning now in a way that warned Brian he had something in mind. He gave up dignity and, laughing fit to burst, tried to take off down the hall. AJ caught him right at the bedroom doorway, tackling him to the ground and tickling him until he couldn’t breathe through his own laughter.
“Alex! Alex, stop!” he choked out. Tears ran down his cheeks from laughing so hard. AJ’s fingers were merciless.
“Nope, you’ll pay for ruining my nail and laughing at me.”
Now that Brian was breathless from laughter, AJ set about grabbing his hands and pinning them to the ground above Brian’s head. To hold them the way he wanted brought his hips awfully close to Brian’s face. Unable to help himself Brian gave a happy little hum. It distracted him long enough that he didn’t realize what AJ was doing until it was too late.
Suddenly AJ pulled back and stood up, a wide grin on his face. Wary, Brian brought his hands down. When he caught sight of them he felt his mouth drop open. “Alexander James Mclean, you painted my thumbs?”
“Now we’ll match, baby!”
Brian looked up at his smirking lover and gave in to the giggles that were threatening again.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Everyone in the hotel room was staring at Brian. He and AJ had just arrived to find that everyone was already gathered in Kevin’s room waiting for them. Now that they were there, standing side by side in the living area, Brian felt his nerves come back. It didn’t help that Stephen was there. So far Brian had avoided looking at him. Just knowing he was there was enough.
“So, I imagine that you guys are all waiting for my story.” Brian stammered out. He brought one hand up to wipe over his mouth, trying to calm himself down.
Nick sat forward in his chair, his eyes narrowing as he looked at him. It made Brian’s stomach do a flip flop for a moment. But then Nick burst out with “You have spent way too much time with Age, Frick.”
“Huh?”
“Black nail polish? Really?”
Looking down at his hand, the one he’d wiped at his mouth with, he saw the black thumbnail. He brought out his other hand, showing that thumbnail too, and a smile grew.
“Hey!” AJ exclaimed, putting one hand on his hip. “Look, he smeared my pinky. I couldn’t just let him get away with it!”
Even Kevin gave them a small smile. Brian considered that a good sign. It gave him the courage to ignore Stephen’s snort from the sidelines and to start in on his story. He still wrapped an arm around AJ’s waist, seeking comfort in his embrace.
“So basically you guys wanted to know what’s going on. I wanted to tell all of you at the same time so I don’t have to repeat myself. Cause honestly, unless forced, I don’t want to talk about it after today. I want to get everything in the open and move on from it. It’s why Stephen’s here too.” For the first time Brian allowed himself to look over at Stephen, braced for the hurt and the pain.
Shock filled him instead. AJ had told him about the fight, but he hadn’t realized how much AJ had fucked Stephen up. His nose looked bruised and sore, probably from when AJ said he had slammed Stephen’s face into the floor. There was small lump on Steph’s forehead from where AJ had kicked him. He also sported a black eye, but on the opposite eye from AJ’s. He held himself stiff like someone who ached in other places.
“Jesus, Age.” He whispered, turning to look at his lover. It didn’t surprise him to find AJ looking both annoyed and smug.
“Like your little boyfriends handiwork?” Stephen sneered contemptuously. “Did he tell you how he came and attacked me?”
“He told me exactly what happened, Stephen.” Brian was proud that his voice stayed calm and cold. “If you hadn’t leaked the story to the press he would never have done what he did. In case you haven’t noticed, AJ is slightly over protective when it comes to me. You did the stupidest thing in the world. You did something that hurt a person he loves. Anyone who knows AJ knows there’s no crime bigger than that in his books. It’s the only thing that would make him attack that hard.”
“I didn’t do shit to you two, Bri. I don’t know what shit he’s filled your head with but I don’t have to stand here and take it.”
“You do.” AJ said softly from Brian’s side. “Run away and it will only show everyone that what Brian says is truth and you know it.”
“What’s the truth here?” This time it was Kevin who spoke up. He was sitting forward in his chair, his arms resting on the tops of his thighs. There was a serious look on his face that quieted everyone. That is, except for Brian.
He couldn’t bring himself to sit, so he stayed standing and holding on to AJ. It made things easier when AJ brought his hand around to rub at his back in long, slow circles. They were soothing, and the added touch lent him more strength.
“I’ve been gay for a while now, guys. It just took me quite a while to be ok with it. Even when I realized that I wasn’t going to be condemned to hell for eternity just because I felt different, I still wasn’t quite ok with myself. What made it even harder was that I found myself looking at Steph different. I won’t give you all the little in between details, or tell you how it came about because I’m entitled to some privacy in this. But Steph and I ended up getting together. As in dating.”
Kevin’s eyes drifted to Stephen as if hoping he would contradict it. The look on Stephen’s voice was answer enough.
“We dated for a while and I was really happy with him. I thought we’d be together forever. Hell, I was ready to tell mom and dad for him. I even helped pay to start that stupid antique shop, thinking it was what he wanted and that I was just helping the one I loved. But I was stupid. Last break I came home and mom told me about Steph’s marriage.”
All that old pain welled up inside of Brian. He felt the hurt slice his heart again. Against his will he found himself looking at Stephen’s face, watching him as he told everyone the hardest part of the story. This was laying his heart bare not just before his friends but before the one who had done this to him to begin with.
“Steph and I talked and I found out that he’d been married longer than I thought. He’d been married the last time he’d seen me and we’d spent the entire time together fucking. Even then, married, he’d come to me and hadn’t told me. We fought about it and he said some things that hurt. But it all basically boiled down to one thing. He’d used me for money, and he didn’t want to lose the money.”
“That’s just-”
Brian spoke over top him, not allowing him to attempt to contradict anything he was saying. “He showed up here and I knew what he wanted. When we talked on the patio he tried to say he loved me, that he wasn’t with his wife anymore, but I’m not as stupid as I used to be and I told him that. He gave up all pretenses of being nice. He threatened me, and demanded money. When I tried to leave, he grabbed my shirt and slammed me into the wall.” Gasps echoed around the room and all eyes seemed to move to Stephen. “AJ came out on the patio and threatened him until Steph let go and I could get away.”
His eyes traveled the room, looking from friend to friend. “So he’s not as pure as you thought, and this isn’t as simple as you thought. None of you understood so any problems from before can be forgiven. But I won’t tolerate the bullshit continuing. Because I wouldn’t give him what he wanted, he went to the press to try to ruin me. To try to fuck things up with AJ and I.”
“Why on earth would what you and AJ have matter in the least bit to him?” Kevin asked them all quietly. “If…with all of this, he gave you up. Why the hell should it matter? Fucking you up with Age won’t get him the money you say he wants.”
Brian held on to the hope that bloomed inside of him. Kevin didn’t sound angry with him, or anything but shocked really. There was something in his eyes that suggested he believed them. It was there in the way he turned his sharp glare to Stephen, pinning the man to the wall with a look alone.
With a snort, AJ leaned into Brian, kissing his temple. “Because he’s figures if he can’t have Bri, no one will, so he’s gonna fuck it up for him as best he can. Plus, he don’t like me.”
On unsteady feet, Kevin rose. He turned and walked carefully to where Stephen stood. The entire room was quiet as the two men who had been friends for years stood face to face. “Is this true, Steph?”
“Not like they put it, Kev. I mean, yeah, Bri and I dated a bit. Nothing serious. But not like they put it! You know me! You have to believe I’m telling you the truth.”
“See, the thing is, I know Brian.” Kevin cocked his head thoughtfully. All of them flinched a little as they recognized the tone to his voice. Boy, was Kevin pissed. But they were spellbound by the interaction. No one could have moved to stop it even if they wanted to. “He’s not a liar, and he never has been. Never once has he stood and lied to my face.”
“Kev…”
“I want you out of my room. I’ll ship your things home to you, but I want you out, now.”
“What?” Stephen screeched.
Reaching into his pocket, Kevin pulled out his wallet. He grabbed the bills there and thrust them into Stephen’s shirt pocket. “Buy a ticket home, Stephen. Don’t plan on coming back. You’re not wanted around here.”
Stephen looked around the room as if looking for an ally. When he saw none, only glares, he huffed and moved toward the door. Halfway across the room he stopped, looking at Brian’s face. “You’ve made a big fucking mistake.” He cursed at him.
Sighing, Brian nodded. “Yes, I did. The first time I ever let you between my legs. I’m belatedly correcting that. Goodbye, Stephen.”
One last long, heated glare around the room and then Stephen stormed away. The door slammed shut like the crack of a bullet, echoing around them. Everyone stared silently.
That is, everyone but AJ. A smile was spreading over his face and he was shaking slightly with the giggles he held in. Slowly everyone’s eyes turned toward him, which only had AJ giggling more and trying to hold it in more. Brian felt his own lips curve as he watched his lover try to contain his laughter. “What is so funny, Alex?”
“The first time you ever let him between your legs?” AJ snickered out. His giggles grew as he slowly lost control over them. “God, Bri, that’s such a chick thing to say!”
Laughter erupted around the room. Brian shook his head and chuckled before wrapping his arms around AJ’s waist. “I guess you think that makes me the chick in this relationship, huh?”
“Honestly, sugar? I think we’re a little equal in that one.”
“What?” Brian said in surprise. The others in the room were still watching and chuckling gat the little interplay.
AJ shrugged his shoulders and moved his hands so they rested behind Brian’s neck. “Look at it this way. You’re the softy, sweeter, nicer, and all domestic and shit. You fold your clothes so they won’t wrinkle and put things where they go. You don’t leave dishes in the sink or dirty towels on the floor” The chuckles around them grew louder
The grin on AJ’s face was bigger now. “But I’m the one who cries at movies and paints my nails and takes an hour to get dressed and ready to go. I love to shop and can max out a shopping card in no time flat. Face it, Rok, we’re both bitches in our own way.” He gave his lover a grin and kissed his nose.