Challenge #151: Author's Choice Title: Guilty Author's Note: 8 x 100. *smooches* to Red for the encouragement and the rapid fast beta. And the condom goes to: Babylon, baby!
Guilty
The first time Brian meets Debbie, he's left completely speechless.
She's loud. And obnoxious. Long, garish fingernails. Ridiculous, crooked red wig. Cracking gum and saying words like cock and sex and you old queen. She ruffles Mikey's hair, leaves a red lipstick impression on his cheek and embarrasses the shit out of her son.
But she loves her son. Really loves him.
Even Brian can see that.
Brian's so jealous of that, he doesn't talk to Mikey for at least a week.
But every day he sneaks down to Liberty Diner and watches Debbie through the windows, wishing and wanting.
* * *
Finally on his own, no longer under Jack Kinney's thumb, Brian stays in bed until noon, leaves his clothes all over the floor, and lets the dishes pile up.
Cleaning is the last thing on his agenda. Because he doesn't have to. Because he has his freedom.
Then, when his apartment is a disaster, his beard full and thick, he hears his mother's voice in his dreams: you're just a lazy good-for-nothing.
Brian wakes up a different man.
He cleans the house, himself, and vows to never be that again.
Because he doesn't have to. Because he has his freedom.
* * *
Spying Justin for the first time, Brian's groin tightens and his heart flips over once. The world around him fades a bit, becomes a hum of background noise.
This is nothing like the thrill of the hunt, of chasing a trick and getting off.
It's a pure, unadulterated lust. Desire at its most basic. And something Brian has absolutely no experience with at all.
He takes Justin home and fucks him. Not just once, but again. And again. And again.
And it never gets old. Never gets boring. All that flitters through his mind is yes and more and…
…mine.
* * *
Another hit. Another bump. Another drink. Another trick.
There is no such thing as too much. Not for Brian Kinney, stud of Liberty Ave.
Especially not when the memories overwhelm him and all he wants to do is feel the pleasure, the release, the euphoria he'd found the first time he got high.
But it takes more now. More drugs. More Beam. More sex.
More fucking effort. Effort on Brian's part. And on the trick's part.
More effort than its most likely worth.
But Brian has to indulge to the extreme.
It's the only type of pain management he understands.
* * *
Never settle for less. A mantra Brian's starts using in high school, when he realizes that escaping the strong arm of the Kinney household is only as far away as a scholarship and good grades. It's attainable.
The mantra grows into motto in college, and then, once Brian is on his way in the advertising world, a lifestyle.
His wardrobe, his loft, his Jeep. All of it an image that Brian creates, crafts as gingerly as a mason lays each brick.
Because in the end, Brian wants it all, wants everyone to look at him and want to be him.
* * *
The anger is an all-consuming rage that has had years to smolder, burning white hot deep in Brian's gut. And like adding oxygen to a fire, Jack's announcement sets the beast free.
All of Brian's childhood dreams of revenge and comeuppance are squashed out by three little words: I have cancer.
And left behind, bubbling and festering, eating Brian from the inside out, is a blinding angry heat echoing with the memories of a drawn back hand, of words meant to cut fast and deep, of feeling like no matter how good he was, it would never be good enough.
* * *
Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall.
The Bible verse skitters through Brian's mind as the first the television and then the sofa are carted out of the loft. And Brian releases a sardonic snort.
It's a hell of a time to be remembering words that a doddering priest told him years ago.
If he'd only told Stockwell to fuck off. Or pushed Justin and his posters out the door. Or if…
He shakes head, stops that line of thought. He made his bed and now, better or worse, he'll lie in it.
Most likely alone.
* * *
Brian holds it together until Joan stalks out. Pushes it away until Justin finally leaves. And then, bottle of Beam in one hand and cigarette in the other, he sinks to the floor as the sound of his laughter, nearing hysterical, fills the loft.
Of all the things he's guilty of, all the Cardinal Sins he's broken, it's taking it up the ass that's sending him to Hell.
Forget pride and envy and lust. Forget the greed and gluttony.
Cock, according to Joan, will be Brian's downfall.