Once they were back on the bus after their pit stop everyone was wide awake. That meant that there was no chance that Brian would be able to corner AJ somewhere and steal a kiss from his sweet lips. So he satisfied himself with picking on Nick for a short while. He climbed into Nick’s bunk with him, the second one off the floor, and left his legs dangling. “Hey, Frack!” He giggled and laid his head back over top of Nick’s Gameboy.
“Damn, Frick!” Nick swore. He yanked his Gameboy out, glaring for a minute before swearing again and tossing it down. “It took me fucking forever to get to that level!”
“Language, Carter!” Kevin shouted from the back room of the bus.
As expected, Nick made a face toward the front of the bus but wasn’t dumb enough to actually shout anything back to Kevin. None of them were, really, except for AJ. That man backed down from no one if he didn’t want to.
“Yeah, Nick-o, watch your language.” Brian told him in a fatherly sounding voice. Nick’s response was to shove him. Brian grinned and reached around Nick to get into the candy stash he kept under his pillow. After grabbing a sucker he unwrapped it and stuck it in his mouth before picking up Nick’s Gameboy. “What level’s kicking your ass, oh young one?”
“Shut up! I didn’t say it was kicking my ass. It’s just taking me a while, and I can do it myself!”
Just for the sheer joy of irritating Nick, he started playing the game and busting through the level he was on. For a moment Nick watched. Then he started to grumble. “Give that back! I don’t want you to do it for me, Frick. Come on, give it back.”
“Nuh uh!” Brian stretched sideways, keeping the Gameboy out of Nick’s reach as he chuckled and kept playing. Nick squirmed around in the bunk to better be able to try and steal it back. Brian used his elbow and shoulder to try and keep Nick back away from it. Instead of just trying to take it, Nick started to tickle him, making Brian laugh and squirm.
“Give it to me, Rok!”
“Never!” Brian yelled in a goofy voice.
Squirming from Nick’s tickling, Brian kicked his legs out. He’d had no idea that anyone was coming down the hallway until his legs connected with someone’s stomach. There was a grunt as they impacted and then Brian was sliding out of the bunk, down to the ground with whoever he’d hit.
Nick took advantage of the moment to reach down and nab his Gameboy out of Brian’s hands. The legs that were tangled with Brian’s moved and in that single charged instant Brian knew who it was. No one else caused that kind of instantaneous physical reaction in him but for one person. AJ.
Laughter sounded from Nick’s bunk as AJ flipped around, lightening quick, and sat on Brian’s waist so that he was pinned on his back on the ground. Without preamble he started to tickle Brian’s sides. Brian was laughing and squirming, trying to find a way to get free. He finally managed to grab AJ’s wrists and roll them around so that AJ was pinned. There was a sparkle in AJ’s eyes in the quick second that his sunglasses moved enough for Brian to see them.
Chuckles tickled the back of Brian’s throat. Damn the freak. He was doing this on purpose! Part of Brian knew they had to be careful or everyone was going to see their physical reaction to this simple ‘playing’. But the other part of him didn’t care. It felt good to wrestle and laugh with AJ.
Before Brian could think of how to retaliate, Nick was stretching down from his bunk to jump on Brian’s back. It quickly turned into a three way wrestling match that took them in both floor bunks as well as in the small hallway space.
“Enough!” Kevin’s deep voice shouted to them. He waded in without hesitation and grabbed the first collar he could reach, Nick’s, and yanked him off before dumping him on the empty ground. Next came AJ. Then he crossed his arms over his chest and glared down at them.
Flushed from laughter and more turned on by wrestling with AJ than he wanted the others to know, Brian leaned back against the wall and curled his knees up to hide his obvious state of arousal. That would go over really well if Kevin happened to see the tent he was pitching. A sideways glance revealed AJ was having similar problems. He’d drawn his legs up too and was laying his hands in his lap. At some point his sunglasses had slipped down his nose so that now Brian could look right into his eyes. The look AJ gave him back was both amused and aroused.
“What the hell do the three of you think you’re doing back here?” Kevin barked at them. Knowing his cousin well, Brian could see the slight twinkle in Kevin’s eyes that said he was more amused than annoyed by all of this. He often played ‘daddy’ to them all, to the extent that the others thought him a hardass sometimes. But Brian knew better. He knew that Kevin more often than not waited until they weren’t around and then laughed, not wanting to encourage them all.
Flashing his famous Littrell smile, Brian winked up at Kevin. “They tickled me.” He said, as if that explained it all.
“He stole my Gameboy and wouldn’t give it back!” Nick whined.
Brian elbowed him and pretended to glare. “I was just trying to help you! But then you started tickling me!”
“Hey!” AJ stuck in. “I was just walking down the hallway and country boy here decided to kick me in the gut! I was an innocent bystander!”
“Innocent bystander my ass! You pinned me down and tickled me too!”
“Well, you knocked me over! It was Nick who jumped down on us and made it a wrestling match!”
“I didn’t jump” Nick lied through his teeth, pretending indignation. “I fell out of the bunk from laughing at you two lunatics!”
The banter would have gone on but Kevin chose then to roar at them again. “Quiet!” When he had all their attention he gave them each a stern glare. “You three will get to the front of the bus so we can discuss the show and the hotel reservations. I want you three to sit there and be good or by God I’ll be the daddy you all accuse me of and take each and every one of you over my knee!”
The three pretended horror and scrambled, tripping one another and tumbling in their effort to run away from Kevin. From his seat up front Howie was smothering laughter and when Brian sat down in a booth and looked back at Kevin he saw the flash of a smile and the humor in his cousin’s eyes. Oh yeah, Kevin was more relaxed than any of them knew. He just felt that, as the oldest, he had to be responsible for them.
Nick plopped down next to Howie on the couch, and AJ threw himself into the booth beside Brian. That left the other couch for Kevin to sit on.
When Kevin pulled out his papers and started to look at them, AJ let his hand drift under the table and squeeze Brian’s thigh lightly. Not expecting it, Brian almost made a sound, just barely managing to catch himself. He slanted a glance at AJ. His lover was staring at Kevin as if he was paying total attention to the older man as he started to tell them about the show the next night, but the corner of his mouth twitched.
Well, two could play at that game. Brian shifted slightly and let his hand slide between them, just enough that he could drop it down by AJ’s ass and give a slight pinch. It satisfied him to watch his lover jump just a little. They played these kind of games out in public often enough, the risk of getting caught a slight thrill for the two of them.
After they’d let one another know about how they felt they had started to explore things, sneaking kisses and touches here and there. But there’d only been a week left of the tour, so when it had come time for them to come home, AJ had invited Brian to his place. That had been mid-March of 2000. It was now January of 2001. They would be coming up on their one year anniversary in two months. But this was going to be the first, full blown tour they would be on that they were a couple. How they were going to do it was going to be interesting, since they had trouble keeping their hands off one another.
The way the booth there were in was set up wasn’t a typical booth. There was only one side with a bench. The other was a wall that separated the booth from the couch that Nick and Howie were on. It gave them a little shelter from prying eyes, which was a plus because AJ slid his hand up higher under the table, palming the growing erection that Brian had building. It took everything he had not to moan and push against AJ’s hand. The little bastard.
There was a small notepad on the tabletop as well as a pen. They usually kept those there for if someone got inspired as they were sitting, or if they wanted to write a letter to home. Abandoning playing with AJ’s ass, Brian reached up and picked up the pen, trying to keep his eyes on Kevin as he scribbled a quick note to AJ. When he was done he shoved it at him, hidden by the little wall so none of the others could see what they were doing. Kevin was still droning on about their costumes that night, and what time they had to be at the arena. Brian couldn’t focus on any of it.
If you don’t knock it off I’m going to find somewhere to take you and you are going to pay for this
A smirk slid over AJ’s lips for just a moment when he read the note. His hand started to rub slightly even as he picked up the pen with his left hand and wrote his reply. Surprisingly, for being a righty, AJ’s left hand writing was legible.
Promises, promises
Get your mind out of the gutter!
I can’t help it. That’s just the effect you have on me
Brian snorted at that one. He shifted his hips, wishing AJ would stop what he was doing but not having the willpower to make him stop. All he had to do was put a hand under the table and he could stop him. Yet somehow he found himself simply writing back and letting him continue to rub. It felt so good that he was fighting to hold in his moans.
You’re going to make me embarrass myself in front of our friends.
Now baby, would I do that?
YES
Would you rather I just left you the way you are? Be interesting to walk into the hotel that way. Don’t know, might not even get a room together and then you’d just be left with this … problem
I’m going to kill you. I’ll be stuck with this problem either way you ass
When Kevin gets done blabbing I’ll go back to the bathroom. Meet me back there an I promise I’ll make it worth your while.
Brian looked up at AJ’s face and saw the smile that was sitting there, full of promises. God, it sounded so good! But on this small bus, with all the others there, was a risky bid. Even as he debated he knew what he would do. There was no way he was going to let AJ get away with getting him this horny.
“Are you two listening to me?” Kevin snapped.
Both men looked at him and nodded, smiling innocently. Brian saw AJ’s hand discreetly folding their note and palming it so no one would see it.
“What did I say then?”
Brian was at a loss, totally not having heard what he said, but AJ gave him a wide grin as he answered. “You were lecturing us about wake up times again, daddy Kev. I promise I won’t oversleep much this tour. I’m getting better about waking up earlier.”
“I’ll believe that one when I see it.” Rolling his eyes, Kevin consulted his sheet again. “Ok, we’re almost there, so hotel room accommodations. D, you get the single this time. I’ll share with Nick. AJ an Bri, you two have a room together. Now remember, we’ll be here for four days, so are you guys ok with those rooms for that many nights?”
Everyone agreed that they were. Brian worked to restrain his wide grin. Four nights with AJ? As if he would complain about that! Hell, imagine them getting roomed together on their first hotel! The look on AJ’s face said he shared the sentiment.
It was Nick who made a small whining sound. “When they gonna loosen up enough to give us our own rooms? It’s only two extra than what they’re paying now.”
“I know, kid. But this is what management booked, so this is what we get. We’ll all rotate getting the single as we travel. Also, after we leave here, we get another bus so we’ll have to figure out how we want that to work.”
“We could stick the young ones on here.” Howie joked, jerking his thumbs toward Nick and AJ.
Kevin laughed and rolled his eyes again. “Good God, D. We’d be short a bus and at least one member by the time we got to the next place!”
“Hey!” Nick and AJ exclaimed at the same time. AJ pretended to pout. “We wouldn’t destroy the bus.”
Just then the noise outside the bus started up. None of them had realized how close to the hotel they were. Under the blast of screams Brian let out a small sigh when AJ pulled his hand away. Now he had one hell of a hard on, and he had to figure out a way to get from here to the hotel room without drawing notice to it.
As everyone started to get up and get their stuff, Brian shot AJ a glare. “You’re a bastard.” He whispered.
AJ grinned and patted his hand on the table. As he stood up he leaned in a little to whisper in Brian’s ear. “I’ll get your stuff together baby. You sit here an try to control you’re little problem. I promise you when we get in our room I’ll take very good care of it for you.”
The urge to chuckle tickled at Brian’s throat. He held it in and turned to look out the window. As he watched them slowly converge on the crowd of fans he tried to force himself to think of something, anything, that might help make it a little easier for him to walk in public.