For a full minute after she was gone the two men stood in the hotel room and stared at the door. The shock of the whole situation had them almost frozen. Brian was having a hard time reining his temper back under control. Was that woman serious? They couldn’t do this to them! They had no legal rights to come in to their lives this way and order them around, not over something this personal. There was nothing in their contracts that controlled who they dated or what they did in their free time!
He turned his head to look at AJ, a furious remark on his lips. It died away when he caught sight of AJ’s face. Every ounce of temper drained away under a wave of love and concern. There wasn’t temper in AJ’s eyes like he had thought there would be. Instead there was fear and devastation.
“Alex, baby, it’ll be ok.” Brian whispered as he stepped close to him.
This kindness between them was so new that sometimes they weren’t sure how to act when it came on them. They were too used to fighting with one another. But Brian felt no hesitation as he wrapped his arms around AJ’s neck and pulled him in close.
AJ took a deep, shuddering breath before he brought his arms up around Brian’s waist. “They can’t do this to us.” AJ’s words sounded more like a plea than a statement. “They have no right to do this. Not now, not when everything’s starting to go good for us.”
“No, they can’t do it. We won’t let them.” Firmly Brian looked at AJ as he spoke. Right then he knew that his lover didn’t need soft words and whispered reassurances. He needed firmness and strength. “If our own fights haven’t separated us, what do they think they can throw at us that’ll break us apart? Face it, you’re stuck with me.”
As he’d wanted, Brian’s words had a small smile tugging at AJ’s lips. It faded quickly though. “If she goes through with it and releases my past to the press, Bri, it’s not going to look good. I did a lot of things I’m not proud of. I can handle having people talk about me, but I…part of me doesn’t want that part of my life touching you, or my friends.”
“I’m not going to run just because you did stupid things as a kid, AJ. Give me a little more credit than that.” Brian let some of his annoyance leak into his words. Not just because what AJ said annoyed him, though it did, but because he knew that AJ would respond to temper with temper and he hoped that it would bring some of his strength back.
Sure enough, AJ’s eyes darkened a little. “You don’t know what I was like back then. Don’t talk about giving you credit before you even know what the hell you’re talking about.”
“Why don’t you tell me then? Or do I only get to know about it when it comes out in the papers? We’re a team. Partners. Shouldn’t you trust me with this?”
AJ yanked back, pacing over toward the wall. “How the hell did this end up being about trust?” he snapped out, turning to face Brian again. There was temper in his eyes and his color was back. This was exactly what Brian had wanted. A good fight would clear the air nicely. “Damn it, Littrell, I’ve trusted you with more than anyone else in the world! Who I was back then isn’t who I am now. I left that little punk behind in the streets where he belongs.”
“Well, they’re going to bring him back whether you like it or not.” Brian snapped at him. He was frustrated to hear AJ talk about himself that way, for one. For two, he thought he was overreacting. “What’s the big deal about it anyways, AJ? You were a kid back then. What’s the worst they could bring up? So you fell in with a gang for a while from the sounds of it. Big whoop.”
AJ’s eyes grew wide in his face. “What’s the worst they could bring up?” he repeated it slowly, as if the words didn’t make any sense to him. “You have no fucking idea what you’re talking about!” Pointing a finger at Brian, he took a few steps forward. “You think it’s no big whoop? How would you like the most stupid time in your life out there for everyone to read? I’ve worked my fucking ass off to bury that little shit and in one move this ice bitch is going to bring him back up!”
“Who you were is a part of you, AJ. You can’t deny it. Wouldn’t you rather tell me about it than let me read about it in the paper? At least then I’d get your side of things, and you’ll see how little I care about what stupid thing you did when you were young. How the hell am I supposed to fight for you, for me, for us, if I don’t even know what I’m up against?”
The look on AJ’s face was something that Brian had never seen before. Part fury, part shame. It was harder to see then watching AJ spin and plow his fist into the wall. The only thought Brian gave to that was that he was glad AJ hadn’t put a hole in the plaster.
“Why the fuck can’t people just leave that shit in the past?” AJ roared at him. He kicked the suitcase in front of him. “You want to know who the fuck I was back then. Sit the fuck down and I’ll give you all of it. Every little fucking detail. Then you can tell me it’s no big fucking deal, Littrell.”
Without another word, Brian moved to the bed and sat back against the headboard. He kicked his shoes off and got comfortable. AJ’s temper was high enough now that Brian knew he’d get the whole story out of him. He had no need to say anything as he settled in and looked at his boyfriend, waiting.
It wasn’t just fury that was vibrating through AJ now, but nerves as well. He paced the floor at the foot of the beds, his arms wrapped around his waist. When he spoke, his voice was hard and distant, as if he was trying to separate himself from the words he spoke. “I told you how nerdy I was back then. How I learned to finally fight back and I built myself a rep for being a scrapper. How, after a while, I never lost. Doing that didn’t just prove something to everyone else though, it changed who I was.”
Nervously AJ stuffed his hands into his jeans pockets. He stopped pacing, staring instead at the wall. “I met all these people who had never bothered talking to me before. They hadn’t wanted to know the nerd but they were all for knowing this scrappy little punk. They called me Xander and they accepted me in their group. I’d never had that before, so I was thrilled to be a part of something. The first time I was with them and they bought some dope, I wasn’t comfortable with it, but I figured what the hell. I didn’t want to do anything to jeopardize being in the cool crowd.”
He snorted and looked down at his feet. Some of his temper had faded away now under a look that Brian couldn’t quite place. But Brian said nothing, simply waited for AJ to continue. He knew there’d be more.
“It took three months before I started to join them in doing drugs. No particular kind, just whatever was handy. Whatever we wanted at the time. There was always something being passed around. Didn’t take much from there before I moved on to selling. I think I was eleven at the time.”
That threw Brian for a loop for a second. Eleven years old? At eleven years old AJ had been not only doing drugs, but selling them as well? He looked at the man he loved, at the way AJ’s shoulders were hunched and how he was still staring at the ground, and Brian felt his heart break for the boy he had been. For the boy who had wanted so badly to be accepted that he’d fallen in with a bad, bad crowd.
AJ didn’t look up as he kept talking. “I earned a lot of money that way, and I started slipping it in the house, little by little. I’d put some in my mom’s purse, or in my grandmother’s, and they never noticed because I did it so small. One time I put money in an envelope and left it in the mailbox and let Ma wonder where it came from. Another time I lied and said I won a contest and it was prize money. But I gave most of it to her. At least, what I didn’t keep for my own habit.
“I ran drugs for a year before shit started to get bad. I was fighting more and more, and coming home bruised and bloody. I was spending more time with those assholes that I was friends with. I didn’t even realize at first that they were a gang. They were just my buddies. But they bought me a jacket like theirs, and I did everything with them. We did shitty things. Stupid things. Boosted a few cars, vandalized a few places. I, well, one night we broke into a convenience store. Just barely managed to make it past the cops. Ma wondered what was going on with me, and she and I started to fight a lot. She was terrified that I was going to end up dead from whatever we were doing.”
Pausing, AJ took a ragged breath. It was obvious that the story was getting to a hard spot for him. If anything, his muscles grew tighter. He almost looked like a marble statue standing there. For Brian’s part, he couldn’t get past not only being shocked by what he was hearing, but feeling sorry for the young child.
AJ’s voice dropped lower as he continued his story. “One night I got in this huge blow out with Ma at bedtime. My grades had slipped, I’d stopped singing and dancing for a little while, I just was stupid. So fucking stupid. She was on my back about straightening up my act and shit like that and I just fucking blew on her. I said the most vile things a person can ever tell their mother. Then I stormed out the front door and just left.
“I met up with my friends, all pumped up and pissed. She didn’t know what she was talking about. I told myself that over and over. God, I was an idiot. I was twelve, and so fucking sure I knew the whole world and all that was out there, and so angry at everything. When my friends said that a rival group was starting shit that had to be taken care of, I knew what it meant. We geared ourselves up and went over to their turf, ready to fight, but they were waiting for us.”
Absently AJ brought a hand out of his pocket to rub at his side. The gesture caught Brian’s eye, but he said nothing. He had to hear what happened next. His stomach was in knots from fear of what AJ would say, but he knew he had to know.
“It was almost midnight by then. I remember it was a clear night. You could see the stars even in the city where we were. The air was a little crisp, but I was pumped up, I didn’t feel it.” AJ said softly. His voice grew less distant, his internal pain starting to leak through. “We were so stupid. We thought we could kick their asses, teach them a lesson. But they knew we were coming and they were ready. They jumped us before we even got there.
“Trev went down when one guy jumped out and swung a pipe at his head. One minute we were walking along, the next this pipe was swinging and Trev’s head seemed to just cave in.”
“Oh my God.” Brian whispered. One hand came up over his mouth as he felt his stomach roll.
AJ wasn’t paying attention anymore. He was lost in his story. “All the other guys jumped out and suddenly it was an all-out war. There were pipes and chains and blades that came out. This was the worst fight I’d ever seen. But because of some stupid turf shit, I was all for kicking their ass. I was flying high, too, which just added on to my rage. I flew in, kicking ass. I hopped on this one kid and was pounding on him when we heard the sirens. Someone had called the cops. First instinct is to get up and run. But in that moment I looked up, I was distracted. The kid underneath me reached into his pocket and pulled out a knife. Before I could stop him, or even blink, he stabbed me in the side.”
Brian couldn’t control the gasp that slid past his lips. Sweet mother of God. But AJ gave him no time to speak. No time to do anything. He just kept talking.
“The kid bolted and I dropped down to the ground, the knife still in me. I remember laying there, and looking at my hands and seeing all the blood there, seeing it on the pavement. I wasn’t angry anymore. I was just kind of, floating in shock. The sirens got closer but I didn’t care anymore. All I could think about was that the last thing I’d done in my life was blow at my Ma. Suddenly I saw everything stupid I’d been doing for over a year. I saw the little punk I’d turned into, and I hated myself. I didn’t bother trying to get up, to get help, or even to scream. I lay there and thought that it was a fitting end for a little punk like Xander.”
Slowly, AJ raised his head. There was so much pain in his eyes that it took everything Brian had not to climb off that bed and go wrap AJ in his arms. But he knew that AJ wouldn’t want it right then .He wouldn’t want to be touched or coddled.
“The cops found me and they called an ambulance. I don’t remember going to the hospital or anything like that. I just remember waking up a few days later in that hospital bed and seeing my Ma beside my bed, her head bent over her hands as she prayed. She was crying so quietly. It broke my heart. Before I knew it, I was crying. I opened my mouth to say something to her and she lifted her head and looked at me with so much sorrow on her face that I found myself bawling and telling her how sorry I was, how I never meant what I said, and I told her I loved her over and over.
“She hugged me and said she loved me. I promised her, right then and there, that I was done with it all. I was done with the streets and the drugs and the kids. I swore it with everything in me. And since then, Xander’s been buried. I became AJ, a new person. A better person. I threw myself into dance again, once I was better. I threw myself back into music. I got my life back where I wanted it and put the past behind me. The rest, well, you know all that. It brought me here.”
AJ’s eyes focused on him, locking straight on to Brian’s eyes. “Who I was then isn’t who I am now. Xander was a punk kid who was too stupid to have a backbone. He was a spineless little thief who hurt people and did disgusting things.”
Now Brian rose and moved toward him. He put one hand under AJ’s chin, forcing him to look at him. “Xander was a lost little boy who wanted to fit in and you shouldn’t hate him so.” Brian said softly.
“He was a liar and a thief and an addict.”
“He was lost and lonely and desperate to be loved. But we’ll let him stay where he is.” Running on instinct, Brian leaned in and kissed AJ’s lips. He tried to keep the pity inside. AJ wouldn’t have wanted it or appreciated it. “None of that changes anything for me, AJ. It doesn’t change how I feel about you. Thank you, so much, for telling me.”
Amazement lit up AJ’s eyes. “You never fail to surprise me, Littrell.”
“Yeah, well, it’ll keep you on your toes.”
Silently AJ closed that last little bit of space between them, his arms coming up and around Brian’s waist. He dropped his head down to Brian’s shoulder and snuggled in as Brian brought his own arms up to hold him close. Very quietly, in a voice thick with emotion, AJ whispered “I love you.”
Emotion clogged Brian’s throat for a minute. He held AJ closer as he whispered back “I love you too.”