Date: Thu, 12 Jun 2003 22:31:44 -0400
From: Writer Boy <writerboy69@hotmail.com>
Subject: rebound - part 42

Obligatory warnings and disclaimers:

1) If reading this is in any way illegal where you are or at your age, or
you don't want to read about male/male relationships, go away. You
shouldn't be here.

2) I don't know any of the celebrities in this story, and this story in no
way is meant to imply anything about their sexualities, personalities, or
anything else.  This is a work of pure fiction.

Questions and commentary can be sent to "writerboy69@hotmail.com". I enjoy
constructive criticism, praise, and rational discussion. I do not enjoy
flames, and will not tolerate them.

That said, we now continue.

***

I supposed, as I was gathering up mine and Justin's clothes, trying to
avoid putting my fingers in any sticky spots, that it could have been
worse. Rather than coming in and maybe seeing a scattered collection of
clothing, depending on whether he'd even come through this room, and maybe
smelling something, or seeing the lubricant, or stepping on a condom
wrapper, none of which I was even sure he had done, it could have been a
lot worse. JC could have walked in while Justin and I were having sex all
over the music room, rather than maybe wandering through the aftermath and
figuring out on his own what had happened while he was out.

Like I said, though, I wasn't even sure if he had seen any of this. He
could have come in and gone straight upstairs, or even have come in through
that side door that I'd noticed earlier, the one that connected directly to
the bedroom hallways. Still, even if he hadn't seen anything, I still felt
guilty as I carried the clothes to the laundry room and dropped them in
Justin's hamper. The laundry room had four hampers, oddly enough, two for
each of them. I guess they didn't want their clothing confused or
something.  I figured it was ok if I mixed my clothes with Justin's,
though, since I didn't have a hamper pair of my own, and dropped the bundle
into the "Justin - Laundry" bin next to the "Justin - Dry Clean" bin.

I wasn't sure why I felt guilty, though. After all, JC must know that
Justin and I were having sex. He had dated Justin for years, and had to
know that Justin's libido was apparently always on, and that Justin was
always ready to go. I wasn't saying that it was a bad thing, as I had more
than enjoyed the benefits of Justin being well into the prime of his life
and right at his sexual peak (not that my own was so far behind me), just
that JC must know that we were doing more in that bed upstairs than
sleeping.  Knowing wasn't the same as having it thrown in his face, though,
and that was the way I felt about this. I felt guilty because I remembered
the hurt look on JC's face last night, and I didn't want to be the one who
helped put that look on his face again. From now on Justin and I would have
to be more careful, and confine our activities to appropriate times and
places.

Whatever damper I was feeling, though, wasn't affecting Justin at
all. While I quietly cleaned up, and then settled in to actually read my
book, he sat at the table working on his paperwork, beatboxing quietly to
himself. I was still getting a weird guilty vibe from the music room, so I
sat across from him in the kitchen as he worked, signing things, reading
things, making notes on the sides with his pen. I knew that he had lawyers
and an agent and a manager of his own to look at all this stuff, not to
mention his mother, but I was still impressed with the way that he read
through things himself first and made notes where he thought things should
be changed or something was unclear to him.  Justin had a better idea of
his needs and his goals, at least where his career was concerned, than
anyone around him, anyway, so he was the best person to make a preliminary
scan.

Realizing that it was quiet, and that I had no idea how long ago he'd
stopped beatboxing to himself as he worked, I looked up to see his eyes,
wide and blue, sparkling at me above his small smile.

"What?" I asked, looking down at my shirt to see if I'd spilled my drink on
myself or something. I lowered my book.

"I've been watching you for five minutes," Justin answered, smiling wider.
His hands were neatly folded under his chin, holding his head up, the
papers he'd been working on all stacked up with his pen on top of them.

"Was I doing something interesting?" I asked, blushing a little. Justin
reached out and took my hand, turning my book over with his other hand so
that I wouldn't lose my place.

"Just being you," he answered, squeezing my hand tightly in his firm, soft
grip. "Come to the garage with me?"

"Sure," I answered, both of us standing.

We walked through the first floor to the garage, and as we walked in Justin
hit the button to open the door. I raised my eyebrows, curious, as he
picked up his bag of golfclubs, which was hanging by its strap from a hook,
and he pointed at another bag next to it.

"Could you grab those?" he asked, pulling on a baseball cap. He handed me
one, and I put it on before slinging the bag over my shoulder, the way he
was carrying his.

"Where are we going?" I asked, glancing toward the cars. Between the two of
them, Justin and JC managed to keep four cars here, and I knew that Justin
had others, his Viper and his big Cadillac SUV, at his mother's house in
Tennessee. Justin and Britney had another house that they shared in
California, a smaller one, but I had no idea what kind of vehicles they
kept there.

"The back yard," Justin answered, snickering. "We're having a quiet day,
remember?"

"Yeah," I answered, nodding. "What are we doing, then?"

"I'm going to teach you how to play golf," Justin answered matter of
factly.  "Come on."

I had no interest in learning how to play golf. I'd seen it on television,
and had friends who played it in college. Both of my parents played it on
the weekends, too, but somehow I had never learned and never wanted to. It
just struck me as extremely boring, following a little ball around all day
and cheating on your score so that you could claim to be better at
following the little ball than all the other guys were.  Justin had
explained to me a few times about the skills involved, and I recognized
that there was a lot more involved, but that didn't mean I wanted to learn
it. I didn't want to walk around in stupid pants (Justin assured me I could
get by in most of my regular casual clothes), tapping my little ball
(sorry, "putting" the ball, or "driving" the ball, or whatever one did to
the damn thing), and talking about these clubs in glowing terms like the
damn things were made of gold (maybe Justin's were, since they were somehow
better than the set I was carrying that looked exactly the same to me).

Not only did the game itself hold no attraction for me, but I was also a
little tiny bit miffed at the way Justin had decided this. Not, "Do you
want to learn how to play golf?"  or even, "Please come out back and hit a
couple of balls around with me," but, "I'm going to teach you how to play
golf." Justin was going to teach, I was going to learn, and apparently that
was the end of the discussion. What I wanted was apparently negligible
compared with what Justin wanted.

Still, this was something Justin loved. I remembered how he had tried so
hard to fit in at the bookstore, learning the layout and how to use the
register, doing his best to help the customers. If he was willing to do
that for something that was important to me, then trying to learn the
basics of this stupid game was the least I could do for him. I followed him
to his usual spot in the backyard, where he had a few holes set up and his
gardener kept the lawn carefully groomed, and set my clubs down next to his
as I waited expectantly. Justin smiled, and gestured at the bags.

"OK, first I'm going to teach you the clubs," he explained, leaning his bag
against his leg and hip. He stared at me, waiting, and I sheepishly assumed
the same position with my bag.

Justin was a very patient teacher, and rewarded me with a hug or a kiss on
the cheek every few minutes as I paid careful attention to everything he
told me.  After we reviewed all of the clubs, what I would use them for,
and why I might want one more than another, we began to work on what Justin
referred to as my "short game". He claimed this was one of the most
important skills to be mastered, and that it could make or break you. I was
under the impression that I was supposed to be able to hit the ball really
far, as on most of the golf courses I'd seen the hole was really far from
where you started and I didn't think I was allowed to "short game" up to
it, but Justin said that we would practice at a driving range sometime
soon. In the meantime, we could spend the rest of the afternoon working on
this.

The afternoon went a lot faster than I thought it would, and Justin and I
had a great time.  He was smiling and laughing, trying to instruct me in
technique, making up little competitions and games to try to get me
motivated to improve. I thought I was doing really well for a beginner, and
figured that half the reason he was having so much fun was that he kept
winning. Still, it turned out to be the nice, quiet, relaxing day I had
wanted to begin with, so I couldn't complain. The hot bout of sex after
breakfast might have had something to do with our good moods, too, of
course. We were both still laughing as we carried the clubs back into the
garage, returning everything to its proper place and rolling the door back
down.

"What do you want to do for dinner?" I asked, listening to my stomach
grumble.

"Let's order something," Justin said quickly. I snickered, knowing that
unless I cooked that would be Justin's answer. Well, maybe unless I
enlisted JC's help in cooking, as he seemed to know his way around the
stove pretty well. Where was JC, anyway?  He hadn't come downstairs all
day, unless he had while we were in the backyard.  "Chris?"

"Sorry," I said, shaking my head. I smiled. "Ordering is fine. What did you
have in mind?"

"There's a really good Italian place that'll bring dinner, and salad, and
appetizers and everything," he answered, glancing at the clock. "And they
can have it here really quick."

"We should order enough for JC," I said, watching Justin's face for a
response. He shrugged impassively, and I felt a sudden urge to kick him,
just for a second. If he wanted to be JC's friend, it wouldn't kill him to
make the tiniest bit of effort.  "Unless you don't want to?"

"No, no," Justin said quickly, holding up his hands. "We should definitely
order enough for him. I'll call right now, and start setting the table, if
you want to, um, go invite JC to dinner?"

I paused for a second, wanting to ask Justin to invite JC himself, but it
was such a small point. I was going to get them to the same table, and I
decided right then that if it didn't work, if all Justin did was snap at JC
again like he had last night, then I would call a stop to this whole stupid
living arrangement. Ever since we'd walked into this house I'd doubted
Justin, doubted my place with him, and worried continuously about comparing
myself to JC. The only reason I had come here was because Justin said he
wanted to be JC's friend again, and if he wasn't going to try to be, then
there was no point at all in staying. We could go back to Joey's, or a
hotel, or even back to Boston, as long as we were somewhere together
without all this extra stress and grief.

And if Justin didn't like that plan, then I would go without him. I might
be starting to fall in love with him, but I couldn't love someone who would
treat other people that way, especially not people he called his
friends. Justin put us in this situation through his own choices, and if he
wasn't going to follow through with them, then I wasn't going to follow
through with him. I didn't want to believe the things that Chris had told
me about him, but if he kept proving that they were true, I wasn't really
going to have any choice, either. I couldn't love someone I couldn't
respect, and the way Justin had treated JC last night had cost him a lot of
that in my eyes.

"Sure," I said, shrugging, feeling everything shifting inside me. "I'll go
up and let him know."

The music was still playing loudly in JC's room, and I could hear it
through the door as I stood in the hall, working up the courage to
knock. It didn't sound like something that should be really difficult, but
he'd been in his room for the entire day, for hours, with music playing. He
hadn't come down for food, unless he did it while we were out in the yard,
and I had no idea what he was doing in there. I knocked at the door,
softly, and then shook my head and knocked louder. There was no response,
and I called his name, but he didn't answer. Not really knowing what else
to do, and figuring that he mustn't be able to hear me over the crashing
symphony. I couldn't place it, but the thought that sprang to mind was
Wagnerian opera. It was big, and loud, and full of blasting horns and
voices singing in a language I didn't speak.

"JC?" I said, raising my voice a little as I pushed the door open.

The curtains were all drawn tightly, barely the slightest edge of daylight
creeping around the sides, but the room wasn't dark. It flickered orange in
the light of the candles that stood everywhere, all of them the same scent,
a thick vanilla that filled the air. It wasn't overpowering, but they stood
on every available surface, on the nightstands, the dresser, all along the
windowsills. The bathroom door was partly open, and I could see them in
there, too, all along the edge of the tub, on the counter, even on the top
of the toilet. JC was curled up on the bed, facing away from me, in a
t-shirt and lounge pants, barefoot. I couldn't tell what he was doing, but
I thought maybe he was asleep. One of his arms was resting on the pillow
next to him, but the other must be against his chest or stomach.

"JC?" I asked again, a little louder. The music was soft for a second, and
he heard me.  Rolling over slowly, he reached for a remote on the
nightstand, and the music dropped down. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to bother
you. Did I wake you?"

"I wasn't sleeping," JC said. His voice was very soft, and I had to walk
closer to the bed to hear him. He lay on his side, watching me, and as I
got closer and saw more of him in the flickering glow of the shadows and
candlelight, I saw that his face looked a little strained.

"Am I bothering you?" I asked, suddenly feeling like an intruder. He was
obviously having some sort of personal quiet time. Was this because of
Justin and I?  Had he seen something when he came home after all?

"No," he answered, just watching me. He blinked, slowly, his eyes already
almost closed.  I waited for him to say something else, but he didn't move.

"JC? Are you ok?" I asked finally.

"I'm just," he began, and for a second he looked like he would cry. His
whole face slipped for a minute, and I saw pain and hurt in his eyes for
just as second, but then it slammed closed. He sighed. "I'm just tired. I'm
so tired."

I knew without asking that he didn't mean physically. He was tired the same
way that Justin had been when I met him, completely drained, worn down by
his personal life. I could tell from the look on his face. It was the same
one Justin had, the same attitude.  Whether it was something in the
posture, or the tone, or maybe just their expressions, it was a definite
vibe they gave off. Whatever JC was fighting against, whatever personal
demons clawed and bit at him, was wearing him down, too.

"JC, is there anything I can do for you?" I asked, not wanting to intrude,
but also not wanting to just leave him like this. Didn't he have a support
system? Did he have people he could turn to? "Do you need someone to, I
don't know, do you need something?"

He seemed to think about it, and I caught just a flash of that again, that
sad, breaking look. It was like the look he'd given Justin and I in the
driveway at Chris's house, the day the plane landed, but worse. There was
more going on here than just what was happening between the three of us,
but I didn't know how to ask him what it was. I didn't know him that
well. Aside from our talk at breakfast, I barely knew him at all, and most
of the things I knew about him had come to me through Justin, who was
starting to seem more and more like a not quite reliable source.

"No," he answered finally. The music continued playing in the background,
but neither of us were listening to it. His eyes searched slowly over my
face, and I wondered what he saw there.

"Justin was calling this Italian place for dinner," I said finally, feeling
the awkwardness of the moment yawning between us. "It should be here
soon. We ordered enough for you if you want to come down. I think Justin
might like it if you did."

I didn't know if that was the right thing to say or not.

"Do you want me to?" he asked. I nodded.

"I did invite you, this morning," I reminded him.

"I'll be down soon, then," he answered, looking away. He rolled slowly back
over. "I just, I'll be down soon. Thank you, Chris."

"You're welcome," I said, stepping back. "I'll shut the door, ok?"

He just nodded, and as I closed the door I heard the music swell back up on
the stereo, blasting everything out. I wasn't sure what he was trying to
do, but I was completely certain that it wasn't working. Maybe tomorrow I
needed to call Joey. I missed having him and Kelly to talk to, and this
seemed like something he might be able to help with.  He was more of a
friend to JC than I was, and might have a better idea of what was wrong and
how to help.

Justin was sitting at the table, slouching in a chair with an issue of
Rolling Stone that had come in the mail today, and he looked up at me
curiously as I walked back into the kitchen. His face was impassive, as if
we were about to start discussing the weather rather than the man that,
until three weeks ago, he had loved with all his heart and soul and been
convinced that he would be with for the rest of his life. I wondered for a
second if Justin would be able to replace me as easily and as quickly as he
had replaced JC, but then realized that I was being unfair. I remembered
the times in my loft that I had held him while he cried, the times that he
was so upset he could barely speak through his paint and wounds and
frustration. It hadn't been easy for Justin at all, and I knew that he was
feeling a lot of pain and confusion that he wasn't always sharing, either.

"Dinner should be here in twenty minutes or so," he said. "They said they'd
call when they were at the front gate. Is JC going to eat with us, too?"

"Yeah, he is," I answered. The two of us stared at each other for a minute.
"Justin, I'm not trying to push."

"Yes you are," he answered petulantly. "Last night, that was pushing.
Telling me that you weren't going to touch me, that was pushing, Chris, and
you know it."

His eyes were glistening suddenly, and anger, sudden and hot, flashed
across his face.

"All I have, all I get from you, is the way you treat me," he said sharply,
a tremor creeping into his voice. "And what you did last night, for you to
just, to not show me you care about me, that hurt. I won't be treated like
that, Chris. I won't let you, I'm not going to let you use yourself as some
kind of hostage to make me do what you think I should. I get pushed around
enough by everyone else without getting it from you."

"I'm sorry," I said, quietly. He was right. I'd been judging him all day,
and I was guilty of acting the way he said that everyone around him did. I
had tried to bully and manipulate him just like the others did, and I
hadn't given it a second thought, either.

"Don't," he said, shaking his head. "Don't you tell me you're sorry and
just, just."

He started to cry, his face breaking. I didn't know if he wanted me to go
hug him or not, so I just waited, and instead he stood up and crossed the
room to me. He wrapped his arms around me, and once he did I held him, too.

"I can't," he said, his voice shaking. "I can't trust you when I don't know
how you feel, and I don't know how you feel if you don't show me."

"I was trying to," I began, and realized how bad it would sound. "I thought
I was helping.  I thought you needed a little push or something. I mean,
you're the one that wanted to come back here, and you're the one who said
you wanted to be JC's friend, and the first time he tried to be your
friend, you snapped at him. It was rude, and it hurt him, and you didn't
seem to care."

"You should have said so," he said petulantly. "You should have told me."

"I tried to tell you," I argued. His tears were already tapering off, and
he was starting to sound pissy and sulking. Damn him and his swinging
moods.

"Maybe you didn't try hard enough, or, I don't know, but I don't want to
talk about that," Justin said dismissively. I pulled away from him.

"You don't want to talk about anything lately," I said. He crossed his
arms, pouting a little, but I wasn't going to let this go. "Before we moved
in, you talked and talked to me about how I felt and what I thought and
what I was afraid of, and you didn't say a word. I have to guess at what
you're thinking because you don't tell me. The minute we walked through the
front door you shut me out. All I know is what you told me before, that you
wanted to be friends with him again, and if you didn't mean that, if that's
not still something you feel like doing, then you need to tell me. I'm not
a mind reader, Justin."

We were both quiet, glaring at each other, both of us unwilling to break
off eye contact.  Finally Justin sighed, and looked at his feet.

"I'm scared, Chris," he said finally, his voice a quiet squeak. "I'm scared
of losing you, and I'm scared of hurting JC, and I'm just, I feel like I
don't know anything. I feel like I don't have anything to hold onto. I
thought, I thought if we came back here, if I came back here, that things
would start to feel ok again, and I'm just scared because it's not
happening."

"Justin, it's not just automatically going to happen," I said, shaking my
head. "We're not just automatically going to all be friends. There's give
and take there.  Last night JC tried to reach out to you, and you slapped
his hand away. That didn't just hurt him. It hurt me, because it made me
doubt you, and because I doubted you, it hurt you, too.  The three of us,
we're connected, and until we get used to that, until we get a better grip
on the way you feel, and I feel, and even the way JC feels, we're going to
have to be careful not to hurt each other again. When he reaches out, you
have to reach back."

"I know," Justin said, nodding, looking miserable. "It's just, it's so
hard."

"I know," I said, holding out my arms again. He stepped back into them,
laying his head on my shoulder. "It's hard for me, too, and I'm scared,
too. We just can't shut each other out, neither one of us."

"You're right," he said, holding me tightly. His head nuzzled against my
neck. "I'm sorry."

"I'm sorry, too, baby," I answered, embracing him tightly.

We held each other in the kitchen, both trying to comfort and reassure each
other. Justin was shaking a little, but I thought he was ok, and I realized
that I was as much at fault for what had happened as he had been. The phone
on the wall rang, and Justin hit the speaker button, both of us listening
as the guard on duty told us that the food was here. Justin reached into
his pocket and then pressed a wad of bills into my hand.

"That should be enough for the food," he said. "I'll buzz JC if you'll get
it?"

I leaned forward and kissed him quickly on the lips. It took him by
surprise a little, I could tell, but he held me and kissed back, pressing
firmly against me, from our mouths all the way down our bodies, chest to
chest and groin to groin and thigh to thigh, as far down as we could go.

"No problem," I said, reluctant to pull away. As I walked away I heard
Justin calling JC on the wall panel, something else I hadn't realized the
sound system could do.

"JC? It's Justin. Dinner's here if you want to come down."

There was a pause, but I smiled as I heard JC's voice.

"Thanks, Justin. I'll be right down."

Maybe this would work out after all. Baby steps, I reminded myself, baby
steps.

Dinner didn't go too badly, after all. JC came down, still in the same
rumpled outfit, padding barefoot through the house, as Justin and I were
opening containers and setting food out. He was nice enough to get us
drinks while we did that, and then the three of us sat down to eat. For the
first few minutes it was quiet, and I wondered if we should put the music
on, rather than just staring at each other in silence, but Justin finally
spoke, haltingly, to get us going. Again, it was a small step, but it was
better than nothing.

"I was teaching Chris how to golf today, in the backyard," Justin began,
looking toward JC. "He's not bad."

"He roped you into that?" JC asked, looking up at me with a smile. "I've
tried and tried to understand, but I've never gotten the game, I guess."

"I don't see how," Justin said, shrugging. "It's not that difficult."

"For you," I said, rolling my eyes.

>From there we ended up talking about my golf lesson, golf in general, and
the various courses they had visited on their last tour. Oddly enough,
Justin's frequent golf partner was Chris, but Justin and JC were both quick
to point out that Justin and Chris had gotten along a lot better
then. There was an awkward pause for a second as the two of them stopped to
think about what had changed, and I quickly filled it by asking if Justin
planned to golf on the next tour as well. This led to discussion about the
new tour, which was supposed to start sometime after Christmas, a second
tour to promote the "Celebrity" album.

"That reminds me," JC said, brightening for a second. "I wanted to let you
listen to something last night, and we never got to it."

"The remixes?" Justin asked excitedly. "You were working on them? What does
it sound like? Which song were you doing?"

"I was doing a little bit for 'Sailing' because I didn't want to do the
rest without you," JC answered quickly, both of them suddenly perky. "I
thought maybe we could do it with a little faster beat, not quite disco but
kind of uptempo. I started working on it yesterday, and it was going really
well, but it's not coming together the way I want it to."

"Let me listen to it," Justin said quickly, dropping his napkin next to his
plate. JC started to stand as well. "Maybe I can."

"Maybe you can both finish dinner," I said quickly, smirking. They both
looked at me in surprise, like they'd forgotten I was there. They sat down
quickly, and I saw that they were both starting to blush. "Anyone want to
explain what we're talking about?"

"For the next tour we're doing some remixes," JC began. "We want to change
some of the songs around."

"To make a different show," Justin continued. The two of them were
practically sparking with energy. "We're doing this tour without dropping
another album, which is kind of unreal and insane, but we're all sure,
management and everybody, that we can support it.  We just need to change
the show around a little, so it's not the same old, same old."

"We're redoing the stage, and the moves," JC added, nodding toward Justin.
"But we want to do the music, too."

"And JC does most of our remixes," Justin finished. "So he was going to
work on it, and present it to the guys."

"And Justin was going to help, since he did a lot of the writing on the
album," JC said, smiling at him.

"We wrote a lot of it together," Justin clarified. "And we were going to
work on this together, too."

The two of them were smiling at each other, and the tension between them
was completely gone, at least for now. I guess rather than forcing them
toward each other, I should have been looking for some common ground that
they could share, other than the house and their lives. As I watched, they
practically shoveled their food in, hunched over their plates, and I
snickered, breaking into full out laughter when they both looked up, cheeks
bulging with food as they chewed.

"What?" Justin, normally polite and well mannered, asked through a mouthful
of food.

"Nothing," I said, snickering. "I'm just wondering which one of your
mothers decided to raise you to eat like pigs."

They both blushed, and JC actually finished chewing and swallowing before
speaking.

"Sorry," he said, shrugging. "I guess we just, you know, want to go get to
work."

"And you said we had to finish dinner first," Justin added.

"Finish dinner, not inhale it," I said, rolling my eyes. "My God, the two
of you. I've never seen people eat so fast. I assume we're skipping
dessert?"

"We can't have it in the studio," Justin said, nodding down the hall toward
the small home studio. He looked at his plate with theatrically wide eyes,
and stood.  "Oh my, look, my plate is empty. I've finished my whole
dinner. Come on, JC, let's go get to work."

JC's plate was also empty, and he stood to follow Justin, who was already
walking away.  He looked back at me, and his mouth pursed a little.

"Justin, we should wait for Chris," he said, shrugging at me. Justin jerked
to a stop in the hallway.

"Oh, yeah," he said distractedly, as if he'd forgotten me.

Maybe in his excitement to get back into the studio with JC he actually
had.

***

To be continued.