testdog65 (![[info]](https://www.insanejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} testdog65) wrote in ![[info]](https://www.insanejournal.com/img/community.gif){kind=small} qaf_challenges,@ 2006-11-05 19:36:00 |
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PUSH/PULL
When did he get so nervous? Round about the third month of no phone calls, he thinks. And that was three months ago. Showing up here, in front of the familiar door, he feels himself faltering. Wondering if somewhere, somehow he’s made a false step. Tries to recapture the feeling he had six hours ago when he decided to leave home and board a plane and try to pull his partner close to him again. What if the push and pull doesn’t work anymore? What if this seesaw is broken?
~*~
Justin looks up at the sky, sees the warm autumn sun through the nearly-bare branches of a tree in Central Park. A memory comes to him like a flash, Daphne on a swing-set in his backyard, ponytails flying, head tilted back while her feet reached for the sky.
“Push harder, Justin, harder! I want to fly higher!”
Justin pushed until his shoulders ached.
~*~
He pulls a key fob from his coat pocket, sterling silver and engraved with two initials intertwined. Ridiculously romantic, he remembers thinking at the time it was given to him. Now he hopes that a thread of the romance is still there. That he can walk it like a tightrope, carefully and with determination, and remind him that they’re good. That together they make sense, they balance, they fit.
With a sharp inhalation, he tries the key in the door – realizes the lock hasn’t been changed – and exhales.
~*~
Brian sits idly at his desk, surveying his small Kinnetik kingdom, waiting for inspiration to strike. His client is trying to scare people into purchasing a whiplash prevention device that he doesn’t fully understand. He hasn’t been able to come up with a single decent idea, which he’s mostly blaming on the recurring image of Michael and he at 16, ice skating at the park down the street from Debbie’s house. He remembers repeatedly grabbing Michael’s hand, pulling him behind him in a straight line, then whipping him forward and letting him go. Michael kept falling into the snow bank at the edge of the rink, getting his only pair of Guess jeans wet.
“If you wouldn’t pull so hard, I wouldn’t keep falling!” He exclaimed in his patented nasal whine. But then Brian would offer his hand again, and Mikey would take it. Every. Single. Time.
~*~
A slow turn of his wrist, and he hears the pieces of the lock slide into place. Slides the doorknob and pushes slowly, listens to the grate of metal on metal as the door opens. As he takes his next breath, sense memory overtakes him and nearly causes him to falter. Instead gives him the sense that he’s doing the right thing, that he’s in the right place, that the time is right. That if he doesn’t pull now he’s going to lose the only thing he’s proud of.
~*~
Justin decides he’s put off the inevitable long enough, looks down at his sketches of people walking through the park and shuts his notebook. Something about going “home” to a place that feels increasingly foreign has driven him outside lately. He’s noticed he wants to be near people, but doesn’t have the time or energy to try to actually interact with them. He’s sure that means something, on a deep psychological level, but he doesn’t want to examine it too closely. He doesn’t want to examine many of his recent actions closely these days.
It’s been five years since he moved to New York, and the last six months have been the most difficult. When he first moved to the City, there was so much happening in his life outside of Brian that he barely had time to miss him. Now that his career was on track and his New York family was in order, now that he was used to Brian being around in his way, the absence was harder to bear.
~*~
Brian loved to push things. It started in childhood, when a frequent admonishment in the Kinney household was, “Sonnyboy, don’t push your luck.” He rarely listened, and had the broken ribs to prove it.
When Justin first came into his life, Brian felt a spark and years later realized it was because he’d met someone who pushed as much as he did. In the beginning, it seemed they were pushing in different directions. The more Brian tried to push Justin away, the harder Justin pushed back. On varying levels, that push-push-push had defined their relationship, until the day when Brian pushed Justin to New York City and Justin went. He didn’t push back.
Then, three days after leaving Brian naked and sprawled on the bed in the loft, Justin pulled.
~*~
Justin’s new apartment in the East Village redefined small. His bed was a couch that he suspected would pull out to a bed if there were enough room in the hallway between bedroom/living room/kitchen portion of the apartment and the bathroom. Justin spent the first day sitting in Union Square, watching the city fly by and sketching surreptitiously. The second day he found a job as a waiter in a nice-looking Café in Chelsea. The third day he worked on more sketches, and found a new bottle of allergy medicine he hadn’t purchased in his duffel bag. He quickly text-messaged Brian: Thanks for insuring I’m not a sniffling loser in the Big Apple. Brian’s response, a mere 3 minutes later: Only losers call it the Big Apple. I think I need to see you in the City to make sure you aren’t ruining my good name. I have a reputation to uphold.
It was that easy. Brian arrived the next weekend and a routine was born that neither of them talked about. About two years in, Justin realized the “long distance shit” had at some point become routine. There was lots of bitching about shitty blow jobs, lots of late night phone sex, and very many nights spent exploring the better boutique hotels of New York City. Between Justin’s burgeoning art career and Kinnetik’s ever-growing client list, they were both individually busy enough that it somehow worked. There was never any official arrangement, never any schedule of visits. Somehow, right when Justin started feeling like nameless tricks and the palm of his own hand weren’t going to do it any longer, Brian showed up and plowed him into the mattress.
They seemed to be in a good balance, and a lot of the trivial bullshit that had gotten them into trouble in years past – to trick or be monogamous, to go out or stay in – was negated by the physical distance between them. The push and pull became less of an issue, became a more subtle undercurrent to their interactions. They were settled somehow, which neither one of them ever would have expected.
~*~
The beginning of the end, as Justin has come to think of it in his more maudlin moments, happened at brunch on the first nice weekend in April. He and Brian were sitting out on the sidewalk in front of the very café where Justin had worked his first three years before he was able to support himself entirely through his art. Since the move, they spent more weekends in New York than the Pitts and had some routines that Justin suspected Brian would deny no matter how the evidence was presented. One such routine was to pick up a bunch of trade magazines – advertising for Brian and art for Justin – and head to the café for brunch. Often they’d skim through each others’ magazines as their fields weren’t completely unrelated.
And so one Sunday with the first signs of spring blooming all around them, Justin grabbed a copy of Advertising Age off the table to flip through while enjoying his mimosa and waiting for his Eggs Benedict (Brian always bitched at him about that selection, but Justin’s metabolism hadn’t slowed down appreciably yet). Kinnetik had grown in leaps and bounds in the four and a half years since Justin’s departure, and Brian’s trips to New York were frequently joint endeavors in business and pleasure. It wasn’t a huge surprise to find an article about Kinnetik between the pages of the magazine, though Justin was shocked that Brian had given an interview but hadn’t mentioned it. The more Justin read, the more shocked he became.
Kinnetik’s clientele isn’t confined to the Pittsburgh market. In fact, Senior Account Executive Cynthia Moore says that, “At least 75% of our clients are in New York.” Manhattan-based designer Kenneth Cole has been thrilled with the work Kinnetik has done over the last three years for their historically brash campaigns. “I’ve been after Brian for at least the last two years to just move Kinnetik to New York, but so far I’ve been unable to pry him from the Pitts.”
“Yes, a number of my clients have made requests that I be in New York on a more permanent basis, but the timing just hasn’t been right so far,” company founder Kinney remarks from Kinnetik headquarters in a converted bathhouse on the edge of Pittsburgh’s tiny gay neighborhood. “Besides, Kinnetik is known as a Pittsburgh company. Part of our charm is forcing higher-end clients to come to our offices here. Honestly, I can’t imagine leaving.”
Justin didn’t read any more of the article. He remembers thinking, “I will not queen out and cause a scene.”
Apparently, he did a pretty good job because the only thing he said to Brian was, “I just read your article. I can’t imagine why you’d want to leave Pittsburgh for New York either. Enjoy your egg white omelet, you unbelievable prick.” Then he calmly stood up and walked down the sidewalk toward his loft. He made it a full block before he had to stop, leaning onto the back of a bus shelter and trying to get his breathing under control.
Four and a half years. Four and a half years. Fourandahalffourandahalffourandahalf….It became a mantra, and helped him to center himself. Next came the anger. Just as his calming mantra changed to fuckfuckfuckfuck in his head, he felt an arm on his shoulder.
~*~
The place smells the same, and now that he’s made it to his destination, he feels pathetically grateful for that fact. His first stop is the coffee table, which he runs his hand over fondly. He moves slowly to the bathroom, sees two toothbrushes in the holder and loses his breath for a moment. A few steps and he opens the closet, sees all the familiar clothing. No new color palette, no new sizes. Looks around and finds a picture of the two of them, laughing from two years ago on the bedside table. He slowly realizes there’s hope for them yet. Maybe, just maybe, this trip wasn’t the biggest mistake of his life.
~*~
Brian sat very still for a moment after Justin’s departure. Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck. Why hadn’t he realized the article was in this month’s issue? Why hadn’t he read it before letting Justin get his hands on it? Brian threw a wad of cash on the table, jumped over the small shrub separating the tables from the sidewalk, and started running after his partner.
About a block from the café he found Justin, wheezing like the asthmatic he was and hissing something that sounded suspiciously like “Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck,” under his breath. He reached out and put a hand on his shoulder, at which point Justin turned sharply. Brian thought he’d seen Justin angry before, had a flash to a pink tee-shirt and shaved head, and realized he didn’t really know what angry was before that moment.
“Four and a half fucking years, Brian! And all this flying back and forth, this keeping two places, this almost but not quite a full partnership! You could have been here years ago!”
Brian took a step back, and glanced around the sidewalk. For all the talk about rampant population growth, New York was really a small town, and he felt like the icing on this particularly irritating cake would probably be some client he was trying to land walking by while Justin channeled every queen who had ever lived.
“Don’t you even have a response? Why did you always act like it wasn’t even a possibility? Why did you let me think that the majority of your clients were still in Pittsburgh?”
“Justin – “ Brian tried to move them to the edge of the sidewalk, but Justin stood his ground.
“I’ll tell you why. You’re a chicken-shit faggot, Brian. It’s all fine when you feel like you have control of the situation, but if you moved here you might be happy and become some sort of monogamous creature. We might become boring and enjoy brunch and magazines while we gossip about people we know. Well, look in the mirror, asshole, because we already are that couple. We’ve been that couple for years! And I’m tired of having to act like I’m surprised when you show up, or that I don’t know what we’re going to do on a Sunday morning when you’re in town! I’m tired of pretending that this is enough for me!”
“Justin – “ Brian reached for his hand, but Justin dodged him, annoyed.
“Don’t ‘Justin’ me. I’m done. I can’t take this any more. It’s been nine years of this shit. When are you going to stop keeping me at arm’s length? When are you going to realize that we’re better together than apart?”
“I realize that, Justin. Jesus! You know I love you!”
“But you don’t want to be with me? When are you going to stop pushing me away? Fuck you, Brian. FUCK! YOU! I’m going to my studio. Please don’t be at the loft when I get home.” And with that, Justin turned on his heel and crossed the street.
Brian swallowed, “When did you stop pushing your way closer to me?”
~*~
Justin climbed the stairs from the subway, and stood dutifully on the curb as the early rush hour traffic crawled past him. He idly reviewed the contents of his refrigerator and decided he should probably order in tonight. Steven had mentioned some opening for a mutual acquaintance, but Justin didn’t feel up to people he knew tonight. Too many questions that he didn’t feel ready to answer, and a Brian-shaped space next to him in the gallery was more than he could face.
The light changed, and Justin walked the last block toward his apartment. He checked the mail and tried not to let that moment of hope completely crush him. He slowly walked the three flights up to his apartment, working out his excuse for when he called Steven later. Somehow, “I’m still licking the wounds from my partner announcing to the world he doesn’t want to live in the same city as me,” had lost its power after the third month.
~*~
Brian couldn’t believe how out of proportion Justin had blown the article. Things had been going so well between the two of them with the Pittsburgh-New York distance, he didn’t want to change anything. The last time he’d tried to make a formal commitment with Justin, it had been a disaster. Why go down that road again?
He figured Justin needed a few days to calm down, so went back to the New York loft (that was always how he referred to it in his mind), packed up his things, and checked into the Soho Grand. He had meetings through Tuesday, and figured at some point Justin would call for make-up sex and to apologize. He didn’t.
Brian didn’t exactly wait around for the phone to ring, but when it didn’t, he was at a loss. Justin was the one who’d had the major queen out. Justin was the one with the problem. Tuesday night he boarded a plane bound for Pittsburgh, and was greeted by a box containing everything of his that had been at the New York loft, except his second favorite pair of sweatpants.
The only thing Brian could think was, “Well, shit.”
~*~
The whiplash copy was clearly a bust, so Brian packed up and headed home. Considered calling Mikey to reminisce about ice-skating and Guess jeans, but realized it was 10:30 when he took out his phone to call. Just as well. He’d been rather annoyingly on Justin’s side for this whole ordeal. Brian was starting to think Michael actually wanted to get rid of him.
Six months and no contact at all, save the box Justin had sent that first week. After the first month, Brian just couldn’t figure out how to make things better. Justin had been the one to push his way back to their relationship after the fiddler, after Brian had kicked him out when Justin figured out he hadn’t been to Ibiza. It had taken a stolen credit card and a bomb at Babylon to get Brian to go after Justin.
It wasn’t that Brian was lonely. He was 41 but he still had his looks. As the manager at Babylon he was able to “go to work” and pick out some hot younger men whenever he wanted. It was just that no one sucked his dick like Justin. No one else knew the spot on his right clavicle that guaranteed a moan. No one else knew when to be quiet and when to speak. And absolutely no one could smile in a way that made it hard to remember he was supposed to be a heartless bastard.
~*~
Justin opens his door, drops his messenger bag just inside and to the right. Heads for the kitchen and the phone to check messages. Nothing new on the Caller ID, and he silently berates himself for continuing to have any hope for that to change. Maybe five months ago, not now. Since the Incident on the Sidewalk, as he’s come to think of it, he’s been giving himself silent pep talks like a high school football player. At the lack of new messages, he thinks, “What do you expect, Taylor?” He suddenly has a flash of Chris Hobbes in the locker room, smacking other guys in the ass and making homophobic comments. It puts him a little on edge, which is why he starts talking to himself.
“Relax, Taylor, get a grip.”
His head spins as he hears something – someone? - in the bedroom. He moves in that direction, and is stopped in his tracks by a small box sitting on the coffee table he and Brian found at an amazing studio when he first bought this place.
“Okay, Taylor. Now you’re hallucinating.”
~*~
Brian decides he’s not in the mood for 21-year-olds who don’t know shit, and heads home to the loft. Pours himself a Jim Beam and decides to find the pictures from when he and Mikey were in high school.
As he moves the shoeboxes in the closet, he hears a small “thud” as something falls to the ground. Picks up a jewelry box he recalls from long ago, and opens it. Two platinum bands shine at him from the dark velvet interior, and he’s struck with determination. This time, it feels right. This time, he knows what he wants.
He places the larger ring on his finger, pockets the box and heads to the door, calling his car service as he goes. He’ll book a ticket on the way to the airport.
~*~
“Have you always talked to yourself like that?” Brian is walking down the steps from the bedroom, and Justin has a vague sense that he should be surprised by Brian’s being there. He’s not, he’s just so fucking relieved he can feel his face being nearly split by his smile.
“No, I started after my partner callously left the city and stopped calling me.”
Brian can’t help but chuff a laugh, “Is that what you’re telling yourself these days?”
“Yes, but I don’t really believe it.” Justin’s features turn dark and he looks away. Brian can’t stand what he sees as his eyes sweep away.
“Justin, I need you to look at me.” Justin slowly turns back toward him. “I love you. You were right. Somehow moving to New York was freaking me the fuck out. I liked how things were going. But it’s time. It’s been time, for years, really. I want to be here… In New York… I mean, I know Kinnetik will do fine –-“
“So this is a business decision?” the corner of Justin’s mouth starts to curl upward.
“No, damn it. I’m trying to be profound here.”
“How’s that working for you?”
“Fuck off and listen to me. Sometimes, when I think I know what’s best for us, I’m full of shit. And then you push me and I realize maybe you’re right.”
“Well, duh.” Justin starts to walk across the living space, toward the bedroom stairs with a real smile and a predatory sparkle in his eye.
“This time it just took me a little longer, because this time it’s going to be permanent.”
“And that scares the shit out of you.”
“Maybe a little, but that’s not the point. I know we can do this, now. I don’t have any doubt in my mind.” Brian steps off the bottom step, and bypasses Justin for the coffee table. When Justin spins to follow him, he finds Brian on one knee with the ring in front of him. “Do you promise to never marry me, and to always keep pushing me? And to give me blowjobs whenever I want them?”
“Yes,” Justin breathes, then pulls Brian up for a kiss.
“I do.” Brian whispers as their lips meet.
Original poster: _alicesprings
Title: Push/Pull
Written By: ley_rae
Timeline: Post-513
Rating:.R
Summary: When Justin first came into his life, Brian felt a spark and years later realized it was because he’d met someone who pushed as much as he did.
Author Notes: Thanks to my husband for helping me get this finished. Not officially beta-d, so let me know if there are glaring errors.
Inspired By Icons:
When did he get so nervous? Round about the third month of no phone calls, he thinks. And that was three months ago. Showing up here, in front of the familiar door, he feels himself faltering. Wondering if somewhere, somehow he’s made a false step. Tries to recapture the feeling he had six hours ago when he decided to leave home and board a plane and try to pull his partner close to him again. What if the push and pull doesn’t work anymore? What if this seesaw is broken?
~*~
Justin looks up at the sky, sees the warm autumn sun through the nearly-bare branches of a tree in Central Park. A memory comes to him like a flash, Daphne on a swing-set in his backyard, ponytails flying, head tilted back while her feet reached for the sky.
“Push harder, Justin, harder! I want to fly higher!”
Justin pushed until his shoulders ached.
~*~
He pulls a key fob from his coat pocket, sterling silver and engraved with two initials intertwined. Ridiculously romantic, he remembers thinking at the time it was given to him. Now he hopes that a thread of the romance is still there. That he can walk it like a tightrope, carefully and with determination, and remind him that they’re good. That together they make sense, they balance, they fit.
With a sharp inhalation, he tries the key in the door – realizes the lock hasn’t been changed – and exhales.
~*~
Brian sits idly at his desk, surveying his small Kinnetik kingdom, waiting for inspiration to strike. His client is trying to scare people into purchasing a whiplash prevention device that he doesn’t fully understand. He hasn’t been able to come up with a single decent idea, which he’s mostly blaming on the recurring image of Michael and he at 16, ice skating at the park down the street from Debbie’s house. He remembers repeatedly grabbing Michael’s hand, pulling him behind him in a straight line, then whipping him forward and letting him go. Michael kept falling into the snow bank at the edge of the rink, getting his only pair of Guess jeans wet.
“If you wouldn’t pull so hard, I wouldn’t keep falling!” He exclaimed in his patented nasal whine. But then Brian would offer his hand again, and Mikey would take it. Every. Single. Time.
~*~
A slow turn of his wrist, and he hears the pieces of the lock slide into place. Slides the doorknob and pushes slowly, listens to the grate of metal on metal as the door opens. As he takes his next breath, sense memory overtakes him and nearly causes him to falter. Instead gives him the sense that he’s doing the right thing, that he’s in the right place, that the time is right. That if he doesn’t pull now he’s going to lose the only thing he’s proud of.
~*~
Justin decides he’s put off the inevitable long enough, looks down at his sketches of people walking through the park and shuts his notebook. Something about going “home” to a place that feels increasingly foreign has driven him outside lately. He’s noticed he wants to be near people, but doesn’t have the time or energy to try to actually interact with them. He’s sure that means something, on a deep psychological level, but he doesn’t want to examine it too closely. He doesn’t want to examine many of his recent actions closely these days.
It’s been five years since he moved to New York, and the last six months have been the most difficult. When he first moved to the City, there was so much happening in his life outside of Brian that he barely had time to miss him. Now that his career was on track and his New York family was in order, now that he was used to Brian being around in his way, the absence was harder to bear.
~*~
Brian loved to push things. It started in childhood, when a frequent admonishment in the Kinney household was, “Sonnyboy, don’t push your luck.” He rarely listened, and had the broken ribs to prove it.
When Justin first came into his life, Brian felt a spark and years later realized it was because he’d met someone who pushed as much as he did. In the beginning, it seemed they were pushing in different directions. The more Brian tried to push Justin away, the harder Justin pushed back. On varying levels, that push-push-push had defined their relationship, until the day when Brian pushed Justin to New York City and Justin went. He didn’t push back.
Then, three days after leaving Brian naked and sprawled on the bed in the loft, Justin pulled.
~*~
Justin’s new apartment in the East Village redefined small. His bed was a couch that he suspected would pull out to a bed if there were enough room in the hallway between bedroom/living room/kitchen portion of the apartment and the bathroom. Justin spent the first day sitting in Union Square, watching the city fly by and sketching surreptitiously. The second day he found a job as a waiter in a nice-looking Café in Chelsea. The third day he worked on more sketches, and found a new bottle of allergy medicine he hadn’t purchased in his duffel bag. He quickly text-messaged Brian: Thanks for insuring I’m not a sniffling loser in the Big Apple. Brian’s response, a mere 3 minutes later: Only losers call it the Big Apple. I think I need to see you in the City to make sure you aren’t ruining my good name. I have a reputation to uphold.
It was that easy. Brian arrived the next weekend and a routine was born that neither of them talked about. About two years in, Justin realized the “long distance shit” had at some point become routine. There was lots of bitching about shitty blow jobs, lots of late night phone sex, and very many nights spent exploring the better boutique hotels of New York City. Between Justin’s burgeoning art career and Kinnetik’s ever-growing client list, they were both individually busy enough that it somehow worked. There was never any official arrangement, never any schedule of visits. Somehow, right when Justin started feeling like nameless tricks and the palm of his own hand weren’t going to do it any longer, Brian showed up and plowed him into the mattress.
They seemed to be in a good balance, and a lot of the trivial bullshit that had gotten them into trouble in years past – to trick or be monogamous, to go out or stay in – was negated by the physical distance between them. The push and pull became less of an issue, became a more subtle undercurrent to their interactions. They were settled somehow, which neither one of them ever would have expected.
~*~
The beginning of the end, as Justin has come to think of it in his more maudlin moments, happened at brunch on the first nice weekend in April. He and Brian were sitting out on the sidewalk in front of the very café where Justin had worked his first three years before he was able to support himself entirely through his art. Since the move, they spent more weekends in New York than the Pitts and had some routines that Justin suspected Brian would deny no matter how the evidence was presented. One such routine was to pick up a bunch of trade magazines – advertising for Brian and art for Justin – and head to the café for brunch. Often they’d skim through each others’ magazines as their fields weren’t completely unrelated.
And so one Sunday with the first signs of spring blooming all around them, Justin grabbed a copy of Advertising Age off the table to flip through while enjoying his mimosa and waiting for his Eggs Benedict (Brian always bitched at him about that selection, but Justin’s metabolism hadn’t slowed down appreciably yet). Kinnetik had grown in leaps and bounds in the four and a half years since Justin’s departure, and Brian’s trips to New York were frequently joint endeavors in business and pleasure. It wasn’t a huge surprise to find an article about Kinnetik between the pages of the magazine, though Justin was shocked that Brian had given an interview but hadn’t mentioned it. The more Justin read, the more shocked he became.
Kinnetik’s clientele isn’t confined to the Pittsburgh market. In fact, Senior Account Executive Cynthia Moore says that, “At least 75% of our clients are in New York.” Manhattan-based designer Kenneth Cole has been thrilled with the work Kinnetik has done over the last three years for their historically brash campaigns. “I’ve been after Brian for at least the last two years to just move Kinnetik to New York, but so far I’ve been unable to pry him from the Pitts.”
“Yes, a number of my clients have made requests that I be in New York on a more permanent basis, but the timing just hasn’t been right so far,” company founder Kinney remarks from Kinnetik headquarters in a converted bathhouse on the edge of Pittsburgh’s tiny gay neighborhood. “Besides, Kinnetik is known as a Pittsburgh company. Part of our charm is forcing higher-end clients to come to our offices here. Honestly, I can’t imagine leaving.”
Justin didn’t read any more of the article. He remembers thinking, “I will not queen out and cause a scene.”
Apparently, he did a pretty good job because the only thing he said to Brian was, “I just read your article. I can’t imagine why you’d want to leave Pittsburgh for New York either. Enjoy your egg white omelet, you unbelievable prick.” Then he calmly stood up and walked down the sidewalk toward his loft. He made it a full block before he had to stop, leaning onto the back of a bus shelter and trying to get his breathing under control.
Four and a half years. Four and a half years. Fourandahalffourandahalffourandahalf….It became a mantra, and helped him to center himself. Next came the anger. Just as his calming mantra changed to fuckfuckfuckfuck in his head, he felt an arm on his shoulder.
~*~
The place smells the same, and now that he’s made it to his destination, he feels pathetically grateful for that fact. His first stop is the coffee table, which he runs his hand over fondly. He moves slowly to the bathroom, sees two toothbrushes in the holder and loses his breath for a moment. A few steps and he opens the closet, sees all the familiar clothing. No new color palette, no new sizes. Looks around and finds a picture of the two of them, laughing from two years ago on the bedside table. He slowly realizes there’s hope for them yet. Maybe, just maybe, this trip wasn’t the biggest mistake of his life.
~*~
Brian sat very still for a moment after Justin’s departure. Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck. Why hadn’t he realized the article was in this month’s issue? Why hadn’t he read it before letting Justin get his hands on it? Brian threw a wad of cash on the table, jumped over the small shrub separating the tables from the sidewalk, and started running after his partner.
About a block from the café he found Justin, wheezing like the asthmatic he was and hissing something that sounded suspiciously like “Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck,” under his breath. He reached out and put a hand on his shoulder, at which point Justin turned sharply. Brian thought he’d seen Justin angry before, had a flash to a pink tee-shirt and shaved head, and realized he didn’t really know what angry was before that moment.
“Four and a half fucking years, Brian! And all this flying back and forth, this keeping two places, this almost but not quite a full partnership! You could have been here years ago!”
Brian took a step back, and glanced around the sidewalk. For all the talk about rampant population growth, New York was really a small town, and he felt like the icing on this particularly irritating cake would probably be some client he was trying to land walking by while Justin channeled every queen who had ever lived.
“Don’t you even have a response? Why did you always act like it wasn’t even a possibility? Why did you let me think that the majority of your clients were still in Pittsburgh?”
“Justin – “ Brian tried to move them to the edge of the sidewalk, but Justin stood his ground.
“I’ll tell you why. You’re a chicken-shit faggot, Brian. It’s all fine when you feel like you have control of the situation, but if you moved here you might be happy and become some sort of monogamous creature. We might become boring and enjoy brunch and magazines while we gossip about people we know. Well, look in the mirror, asshole, because we already are that couple. We’ve been that couple for years! And I’m tired of having to act like I’m surprised when you show up, or that I don’t know what we’re going to do on a Sunday morning when you’re in town! I’m tired of pretending that this is enough for me!”
“Justin – “ Brian reached for his hand, but Justin dodged him, annoyed.
“Don’t ‘Justin’ me. I’m done. I can’t take this any more. It’s been nine years of this shit. When are you going to stop keeping me at arm’s length? When are you going to realize that we’re better together than apart?”
“I realize that, Justin. Jesus! You know I love you!”
“But you don’t want to be with me? When are you going to stop pushing me away? Fuck you, Brian. FUCK! YOU! I’m going to my studio. Please don’t be at the loft when I get home.” And with that, Justin turned on his heel and crossed the street.
Brian swallowed, “When did you stop pushing your way closer to me?”
~*~
Justin climbed the stairs from the subway, and stood dutifully on the curb as the early rush hour traffic crawled past him. He idly reviewed the contents of his refrigerator and decided he should probably order in tonight. Steven had mentioned some opening for a mutual acquaintance, but Justin didn’t feel up to people he knew tonight. Too many questions that he didn’t feel ready to answer, and a Brian-shaped space next to him in the gallery was more than he could face.
The light changed, and Justin walked the last block toward his apartment. He checked the mail and tried not to let that moment of hope completely crush him. He slowly walked the three flights up to his apartment, working out his excuse for when he called Steven later. Somehow, “I’m still licking the wounds from my partner announcing to the world he doesn’t want to live in the same city as me,” had lost its power after the third month.
~*~
Brian couldn’t believe how out of proportion Justin had blown the article. Things had been going so well between the two of them with the Pittsburgh-New York distance, he didn’t want to change anything. The last time he’d tried to make a formal commitment with Justin, it had been a disaster. Why go down that road again?
He figured Justin needed a few days to calm down, so went back to the New York loft (that was always how he referred to it in his mind), packed up his things, and checked into the Soho Grand. He had meetings through Tuesday, and figured at some point Justin would call for make-up sex and to apologize. He didn’t.
Brian didn’t exactly wait around for the phone to ring, but when it didn’t, he was at a loss. Justin was the one who’d had the major queen out. Justin was the one with the problem. Tuesday night he boarded a plane bound for Pittsburgh, and was greeted by a box containing everything of his that had been at the New York loft, except his second favorite pair of sweatpants.
The only thing Brian could think was, “Well, shit.”
~*~
The whiplash copy was clearly a bust, so Brian packed up and headed home. Considered calling Mikey to reminisce about ice-skating and Guess jeans, but realized it was 10:30 when he took out his phone to call. Just as well. He’d been rather annoyingly on Justin’s side for this whole ordeal. Brian was starting to think Michael actually wanted to get rid of him.
Six months and no contact at all, save the box Justin had sent that first week. After the first month, Brian just couldn’t figure out how to make things better. Justin had been the one to push his way back to their relationship after the fiddler, after Brian had kicked him out when Justin figured out he hadn’t been to Ibiza. It had taken a stolen credit card and a bomb at Babylon to get Brian to go after Justin.
It wasn’t that Brian was lonely. He was 41 but he still had his looks. As the manager at Babylon he was able to “go to work” and pick out some hot younger men whenever he wanted. It was just that no one sucked his dick like Justin. No one else knew the spot on his right clavicle that guaranteed a moan. No one else knew when to be quiet and when to speak. And absolutely no one could smile in a way that made it hard to remember he was supposed to be a heartless bastard.
~*~
Justin opens his door, drops his messenger bag just inside and to the right. Heads for the kitchen and the phone to check messages. Nothing new on the Caller ID, and he silently berates himself for continuing to have any hope for that to change. Maybe five months ago, not now. Since the Incident on the Sidewalk, as he’s come to think of it, he’s been giving himself silent pep talks like a high school football player. At the lack of new messages, he thinks, “What do you expect, Taylor?” He suddenly has a flash of Chris Hobbes in the locker room, smacking other guys in the ass and making homophobic comments. It puts him a little on edge, which is why he starts talking to himself.
“Relax, Taylor, get a grip.”
His head spins as he hears something – someone? - in the bedroom. He moves in that direction, and is stopped in his tracks by a small box sitting on the coffee table he and Brian found at an amazing studio when he first bought this place.
“Okay, Taylor. Now you’re hallucinating.”
~*~
Brian decides he’s not in the mood for 21-year-olds who don’t know shit, and heads home to the loft. Pours himself a Jim Beam and decides to find the pictures from when he and Mikey were in high school.
As he moves the shoeboxes in the closet, he hears a small “thud” as something falls to the ground. Picks up a jewelry box he recalls from long ago, and opens it. Two platinum bands shine at him from the dark velvet interior, and he’s struck with determination. This time, it feels right. This time, he knows what he wants.
He places the larger ring on his finger, pockets the box and heads to the door, calling his car service as he goes. He’ll book a ticket on the way to the airport.
~*~
“Have you always talked to yourself like that?” Brian is walking down the steps from the bedroom, and Justin has a vague sense that he should be surprised by Brian’s being there. He’s not, he’s just so fucking relieved he can feel his face being nearly split by his smile.
“No, I started after my partner callously left the city and stopped calling me.”
Brian can’t help but chuff a laugh, “Is that what you’re telling yourself these days?”
“Yes, but I don’t really believe it.” Justin’s features turn dark and he looks away. Brian can’t stand what he sees as his eyes sweep away.
“Justin, I need you to look at me.” Justin slowly turns back toward him. “I love you. You were right. Somehow moving to New York was freaking me the fuck out. I liked how things were going. But it’s time. It’s been time, for years, really. I want to be here… In New York… I mean, I know Kinnetik will do fine –-“
“So this is a business decision?” the corner of Justin’s mouth starts to curl upward.
“No, damn it. I’m trying to be profound here.”
“How’s that working for you?”
“Fuck off and listen to me. Sometimes, when I think I know what’s best for us, I’m full of shit. And then you push me and I realize maybe you’re right.”
“Well, duh.” Justin starts to walk across the living space, toward the bedroom stairs with a real smile and a predatory sparkle in his eye.
“This time it just took me a little longer, because this time it’s going to be permanent.”
“And that scares the shit out of you.”
“Maybe a little, but that’s not the point. I know we can do this, now. I don’t have any doubt in my mind.” Brian steps off the bottom step, and bypasses Justin for the coffee table. When Justin spins to follow him, he finds Brian on one knee with the ring in front of him. “Do you promise to never marry me, and to always keep pushing me? And to give me blowjobs whenever I want them?”
“Yes,” Justin breathes, then pulls Brian up for a kiss.
“I do.” Brian whispers as their lips meet.