Popslash Ficlets: 14 Songs
About 9 months ago, I made a mix CD as a Christmas gift for darkseaglass. One thing led to another, and I decided that it would be a fabulous idea to write ficlets around each song on the CD. Most of the ficlets I've written in the last nine months have been in some way based around these song prompts. I didn't make it all the way through the CD, but I got a fair way, before deciding to, shall we say, strategically scale back. I've decided that the time has come to release these ficlets into the world. Fly free, little stories!
ETA: A link to the zipped songs. Sendspace, 80MB. Link courtesy of darkseaglass.
1) Angel
“Hey, J, what’s up?” JC’s voice on the phone sounded like it always did when Justin called, surprised and happy.
“Nothing, man.” Justin closed his eyes and pressed his forehead to the cool tabletop. “Just haven’t talked in a while, figured I’d see what you been up to.”
“Busy, so busy, it’s wild,” JC said. “I met the coolest cat-he thinks he knows a producer who’ll get me in to work with some Gospel singers-“
Justin smiled and kept his eyes closed. “That’s great, huh.”
JC laughed. “You know me, man.”
“Yeah,” Justin said, and opened his eyes, staring down at the patch of dun-brown carpet under his sneakers. His script lay in the corner where he’d thrown it that morning, pages twisted under each other from hitting the wall.
Someone rapped sharply on the trailer door. Justin sat up. Another of the endless PA’s popped her head in. “Mr Timberlake?” He waved a hand, phone still pressed against his ear. “We need you on-set.” She disappeared back out the door.
“Supastah,” JC said, then laughed again.
“Gotta go, man,” Justin said. “I want-next time I’m in L.A., play me your song, okay? The one that needs a Gospel choir.” He took a breath. “I want to hear it.”
2) Extraordinary Machine
“Dude, here’s what I don’t get,” Chris said. Joey looked up from sorting through Chris’s DVD collection. Chris gestured at the TV. “That.” Lance was on the TV-screen, mouth moving without sound.
“Is that his Ellen interview?” Joey asked, trying to lip-read. Lance looked like he was telling a story about his dog. Either that or he was confessing to smoking pot, which, while it had the benefit of being true, seemed kind of unlikely.
“Probably,” Chris said. “Not my point. My point is, he gets up there on national television and sells whatever the fuck it is he’s selling, right? Which is gonna be a flop, by the way. He isn’t tired of people laughing by now?”
“Hey, man,” Joey protested, sitting up on the couch. “He’s just doing what makes him happy.”
“Yeah,” Chris said. “That look like happy to you?”
Lance gave Joey a plastic smile from the TV screen. Joey looked back down at the copy of The Usual Suspects in his hands and thought, who is Keyser Soze?
“Maybe,” he said instead.
3) Dying to Live
Tonight was a drinking night on the bus. They had two days off in Detroit, which Chris had decided should be commemorated by getting completely shit-faced on the ride over. JC had stopped thinking throwing up on a moving bus was cool approximately five seconds after the first time he’d done it, but Chris could be implacable when he had a plan. JC wasn’t quite drunk, he didn’t think. Just a little fuzzy. He smiled, feeling warm down to his toes.
“Fucker!” Justin swore from in front of the TV. He elbowed Chris away from his controller, missing and hitting him in the head.
“What the fuck, asshole?” Chris yelled, and then JC had to look away, because all the rapid movement and flailing limbs was making him dizzy.
He leaned over the edge of the couch instead. Lance waved lazily at him from the floor, a pillow balled under his head. He blinked slowly, eyes half-lidded.
“Hey,” JC said, putting his hand down and hitting Lance a little too hard in the breastbone. “Oops.” He felt the blood start to rush to his head. The couch cushion felt rough against his cheek.
“Hey,” Lance said, drawing the word out. JC pressed his fingers into Lance’s shirt, feeling the thrum of sound from Lance’s chest radiate up his arm. Lance had round red patches on his cheeks from the alcohol.
“You’re all red,” JC said, and slid his hand up to pat at Lance’s cheek.
“So’re you,” Lance said, changing the shape of his face under JC’s fingers. His mouth moved, and JC stared, fascinated, at the fluctuating curve of his lower lip. It stopped moving, and Lance lay quiet under JC’s hand. His eyes reflected the light from the TV until he closed them, eyebrows furrowing slightly. JC moved his hand to trace drunkenly down the dark arch of Lance’s eyebrow, feeling the thin soft hair against his fingertips. Lance got his eyebrows waxed into precise curves that slid neat and orderly beneath JC’s raggedly-bitten fingernails.
Lance smiled, eyebrows moving like bird’s wings under JC’s hand. JC braced two hands on either side of Lance’s head. Lance’s mouth moved again, and JC followed after.
4) This I Promise You (Atlantis Version)
“I’m not singing it at my wedding,” Justin said. “I don’t care what my momma says.”
“Fuck no,” Chris said, and fouled him.
5) Mississippi
Monday through Friday Lance opened for his dad’s hardware store. He helped customers find lug nuts, washers, screws, and toilet balls. He sweet talked the ancient cash register into opening the money drawer on command and restocked shelves. He gave advice to the desperate, harried yuppies coming in from the upscale condos in the housing development a block away, and counted down the seconds until the afternoon rush was over and he could give the till over to his dad to close out. Saturday, he worked the morning but got off two hours earlier. Sunday he went to church.
Saturday night he followed a broad-shouldered, slim-hipped young man with a shiny silver dollar grin and freckles on his neck into an anonymous hotel room on the south-east side of town and found out how far down the freckles went. The guy, Justin, tensed when he traced them with his tongue, shuddered against the tired old sheets.
“God,” he said when Lance fucked him, “God, God,” until Lance had to cover his mouth for fear of waking the next-door guests.
Afterwards, they lay on the unmade bed and Justin slid a hand down Lance’s chest and talked about the future. “I’m getting out of here,” he said, voice hushed in the dimly-lit room. “Goin’ out West. California, maybe.”
Lance listened to him spin his web of words and traced a thumbnail over the dent in Justin’s ring finger.
Monday morning he rang up another sale, cursing when the drawer stuck again. “Here you go, Mr Timberlake,” he said, handing over a bag filled with a box of nails and two lightbulbs. Justin took the bag, standing tall and slim in his well-fitting grey suit. His fingers didn’t linger on Lance’s. “You have a nice day now, “ Lance said, and watched him walk out the door.
6) Round Here
AJ knows how to sleep on the bus. One of the first things he learned after “never miss a show” and “don’t listen to Lou’s shit.” The bus jolts a little, and AJ officially can’t sleep. He reaches out and pulls open his bunk curtain. It rattles against the curtain rod, shockingly loud next to his ear. Nick had left the door open when he went to bed, and light from the windows in the lounge paints moving patches on the carpet as the bus passes cars on the freeway.
In the other bunk, Nick sighs once and rolls over, exposing the long line of his back, naked skin where his boxers have gotten pulled down. He’d followed AJ onto the bus after the show, dragging his duffel behind him. Nick doesn’t like his own bus; AJ thinks he’d like it better if he could stand being alone for longer than five minutes. Instead, he’s with AJ, leaving his shoes where AJ will trip over them on the way to the bathroom, and making terrible coffee in the mornings when AJ’s not awake enough to lodge a protest.
AJ pillows his cheek on his hand, body balanced on the edge of the mattress. The wooden raised lip of his bunk is a cool stripe against his face as he looks. The rest of the bunks are hidden in shadow, properly curtain-clothed. The aisle between the two bunks is narrow. AJ reaches out his hand and touches the small of Nick’s back, feeling the fine hair laid over bare skin. Nick’s a hard sleeper, as if to make up for his restless energy and twitching feet during the day. AJ wants to pull that sleep over himself like a blanket, take in the easy rhythm of Nick’s breath and make it his own.
The bus rocks again, pulling AJ’s hand away, and he lets it drop down to the carpet, closing his hand against the smooth feel of Nick’s skin. Nick dreams, mouth ajar, arms wrapped around a pillow. The bus hums a familiar asphalt lullaby around them. AJ, awake in the night, dreams.
7) Sleeping to Dream
Chris wakes up. He wakes up and the pillowcase is smooth under his cheek until he rolls over to check the time. He’s too far away. The bed is too big, and he slept on the wrong side, so he’s left grasping for his glasses on the end table before squinting at the clock on his dresser. Twenty minutes until the alarm is set to go off. He closes his eyes for a few seconds. A few seconds and then he’ll get up, shower, get dressed. Start his day.
He wakes up to the harsh buzz from the alarm, and it’s harder this time, but he gave himself a bullshit schedule, so he stumbles out of bed and slaps off the alarm on autopilot. His face in the bathroom mirror looks old, with lines under his eyes and sallow skin. He rubs his hands across his cheeks, drawing the skin down, trying to pull the remnants of dreams out of his body by touch. It doesn’t work, and Chris is left with the memory of sweat-slicked skin and JC’s lips on his mouth when he turns on the shower.
It’ll get better. He knows it’ll get better because these things always do. And next time they see each other Chris will be ready with a joke and a smile, something to make life less awkward. Just not right now, not when he can still see JC standing in the living room with his arms pressed against his chest, can still hear the echo of their final tired argument, can still feel the dry press of JC’s lips to his mouth in a kiss that felt more like an ending than any amount of words ever could. He steps out of the shower, wraps a towel around his waist, and goes back to bed.
( 8. I Should've Known :|: Maybe I should've known now baby/To leave you alone now maybe :|: Joey/Lance)
9) Don’t think twice it’s all right
The road stretches on in front of Justin, black asphalt cracking at the edges but still solid underfoot, heat already starting to radiate in waves. He’s walking, one foot in front of the other, pretending he knows where he’s going.
The sun is strong today, burning his shoulders through his black t-shirt. It’s so dry. Dry enough that Cam’s been complaining about her skin ever since they arrived, one more sour note in a symphony of bad chords. Too hot to be walking in this brushfire territory, but he can’t figure out anywhere else to go but away, and his body wants to move, anger jittery in his abdomen. An argument ostensibly about whose turn it was to get milk, and Justin had to leave, had to get out before he said something too true to take back. It was an in-joke back in the day, Justin always needing to be in motion when he got mad. Cameron understands a lot about him, and some day when he’s thinking more clearly, he’ll remember that, he tells himself. He likes being fair.
But Cameron hasn’t ever accepted that he works things through action. She always wants him to just calm down, sit with her, talk things through. Justin likes to talk, but he’s out of good words, and that, maybe, says it all.
She’s sitting on the porch swing when he gets back, his feet kicking up clouds of dust behind him. He takes her hand when she holds it out, sits down next to her on the bench, but it’s habit more than anything. The old swing creaks underneath them, a slow timekeeper marking the quiet.
“God, it’s so fucking hot here,” Cameron says, squinting at the Rockies in the distance. “I want to go somewhere green.”
“I’m headin’ back home tomorrow,” Justin says, running his thumbnail down a crease in her knuckle. “There’s this thing in Memphis, I said I’d show, like, three months ago.”
Her hand tenses. “What, am I going too?” she asks. “And Jesus, Justin, you could’ve said two days ago.”
Justin looks down, traces his eyes over the lattice of veins and tendons in the back of her hand.
She doesn’t say anything for a long moment, just nods slowly and pushes the swing backwards with her toe. She finally says, “That’s a pretty chickenshit way for this to go,” not looking at him.
“What?” he says. “I got a commitment.” It isn’t a lie, but the commitment is only a party for a record exec, and Justin had bowed out of it months ago against his manager’s advice.
“Right,” she says, pulling her hand away. “Fine.” She gets up from the swing and walks inside. They sleep in the king bed that night like strangers, and he doesn’t wake her when he leaves.
The road is dark, spooling out endlessly beneath his tires. Justin cranks down the window and lets the hot, dry wind wipe away the need for words.
( 10. Your Winter :|: I won't be your winter/And I won't be anyone's excuse to cry/We can be forgiven/And I will be here :|: JC/Chris)
11) Annie
Nick wandered around the hotel suite, tired but awake, too restless to sleep. He picked up the remote and flipped through five channels in rapid succession before turning the TV off and throwing the remote back on the coffee table. Howie, already dressed for sleep and lying with his feet up on the arm of the couch, opened one eye briefly to look at the remote.
“Howie,” Nick said. “D.” Howie didn’t twitch. “D D D D D.”
“What.” Howie settled his arms more firmly over his chest.
“I’m tired.”
“Then go to bed,” Howie said. “Not rocket science.”
Nick flopped into the easy chair. “I can’t sleep.”
Howie looked at him. “First step. Here, let me demonstrate.” Howie closed his eyes again.
“Need someone to sing me to sleep.”
“Oh, jeez.” Howie didn’t open his eyes. “I thought you grew out of this.”
Nick flexed his fingers and tapped his toes in a rapid-fire rhythm on the floor. “One itty-bitty lullaby.”
“Go listen in on Brian when he sings to Baylee.”
“Brian’s lullabies are lame. He does, like, ‘Daddy’s gonna buy you a mocking-bird,’ and shit like that.”
Howie sighed and sat up. His hair stuck up around his head, and Nick covered his smirk with his hand. “One,” Howie said. He walked over and pulled on Nick’s hand until Nick stood up. “And we’re gonna do this right.”
“Aw,” Nick said as Howie pushed him toward his hotel room. “You tucking me in?”
“Watch it, man. I usually only sing lullabies to my nieces,” Howie said, and made Nick get in bed with the covers pulled up to his chin. He turned off the light and sat down cross-legged next to Nick’s bed.
“Sing me the water one,” Nick muttered, turning on his side, already feeling sleep brushing over his eyes now that he’d stopped moving.
“El oceano,” Howie said, and began to sing softly in Spanish. His hands were held loosely in his lap, shoulders curving in under his white t-shirt. Nick blinked twice, eyelids drooping, and watched the light from the open door slide across Howie’s face as he sang.
Nick had kissed Howie once, a long time ago. He’d been sixteen, and Howie had pushed him away, saying, “No!” sharply, like Nick was a puppy or something.
Nick had said, “Why not?” and then, “Fuck you!” and stormed out of the room to punch holes in the closet door that Johnny would lecture him about while Nick sneered and replayed the brief wet press of Howie’s lips and tongue against his. He’d caught Howie in midword, mouth open.
Howie had pulled Nick aside to talk to him the next day, eyebrows inscribing worried lines in his forehead. He’d kept Kevin in the room, an oblivious presence reading a National Geographic in the corner, while he explained that it wasn’t that there was anything wrong with Nick, but Nick was young, and so he’d appreciate it if Nick didn’t do it again.
“Fine,” Nick had said, because he didn’t need Howie, didn’t need anyone who didn’t fucking want him.
The song ended while Nick was still thinking about it, charting the course from there to here. Howie leaned over to look at him, gusting his hand over Nick's forehead. Nick closed his eyes at the touch.
"Sleep well," Howie said softly.
There were layers of want, Nick knew now.
"Okay," Nick said.
( 12. Halloween :|: We are here to help you sing your songs/Because tomorrow's gonna come/And no one's going to call :|: Justin/Chris)
( 13. This Is Crazy Now :|: This is crazy now/Fill the space somehow/I can't walk away from you :|: Justin/JC)
14) Geneva
"Oh, fuck." Justin flopped backwards, hitting Lance on the way down.
"Ow, asshole." Lance shoved at Justin. His hand skated over Justin’s rucked up tee shirt and stomach to hit bare skin. Lance pulled his hand back, alcohol weighing down his motions. The memory of Justin’s skin was hot against his fingertips.
"I am so wasted," Justin declared. He rolled up on one elbow. Lance stopped looking at his hand. "Do that again."
"What?" Lance blinked slowly; black spinning darkness, then half of Justin’s face, then spinning darkness again.
"Do that again," Justin repeated.
*
"Fuck," Justin said. "Fuck."
Lance curled one hand around Justin’s cock through his open fly and whispered, "Don’t you know any other goddamn words?"
Justin pushed against Lance’s hand and licked a long line down Lance’s neck. "Faster," he said in Lance’s ear, and Lance did.
*
Light edged around the gap between the hotel drapes, shining a narrow line across the bed. Justin stirred next to him, face scrunched up. Lance sat up. Justin’s pants lay on the armchair along with Lance’s jacket and a white athletic sock.
Justin rolled over and squinted, all stubble cheeks and morning breath.
"Huh," he said, and Lance snorted, covering his mouth, but it turned into a laugh anyway.
"Fucking stop laughing at me," Justin growled. "I’m still kind of drunk."
Lance lay back on his pillow, still feeling bursts of giggles rising fom his belly like champagne bubbles. "Oh, god, Justin," he finally said.
"Well." Justin yawned.
Lance turned his head. "Yeah."
Justin raised his eyebrow. "Wanna do it again?"
Lance started laughing again, feeling the world spin again around him, and didn't stop until Justin hit him with a pillow.
End
ETA: A link to the zipped songs. Sendspace, 80MB. Link courtesy of darkseaglass.
1) Angel
“Hey, J, what’s up?” JC’s voice on the phone sounded like it always did when Justin called, surprised and happy.
“Nothing, man.” Justin closed his eyes and pressed his forehead to the cool tabletop. “Just haven’t talked in a while, figured I’d see what you been up to.”
“Busy, so busy, it’s wild,” JC said. “I met the coolest cat-he thinks he knows a producer who’ll get me in to work with some Gospel singers-“
Justin smiled and kept his eyes closed. “That’s great, huh.”
JC laughed. “You know me, man.”
“Yeah,” Justin said, and opened his eyes, staring down at the patch of dun-brown carpet under his sneakers. His script lay in the corner where he’d thrown it that morning, pages twisted under each other from hitting the wall.
Someone rapped sharply on the trailer door. Justin sat up. Another of the endless PA’s popped her head in. “Mr Timberlake?” He waved a hand, phone still pressed against his ear. “We need you on-set.” She disappeared back out the door.
“Supastah,” JC said, then laughed again.
“Gotta go, man,” Justin said. “I want-next time I’m in L.A., play me your song, okay? The one that needs a Gospel choir.” He took a breath. “I want to hear it.”
2) Extraordinary Machine
“Dude, here’s what I don’t get,” Chris said. Joey looked up from sorting through Chris’s DVD collection. Chris gestured at the TV. “That.” Lance was on the TV-screen, mouth moving without sound.
“Is that his Ellen interview?” Joey asked, trying to lip-read. Lance looked like he was telling a story about his dog. Either that or he was confessing to smoking pot, which, while it had the benefit of being true, seemed kind of unlikely.
“Probably,” Chris said. “Not my point. My point is, he gets up there on national television and sells whatever the fuck it is he’s selling, right? Which is gonna be a flop, by the way. He isn’t tired of people laughing by now?”
“Hey, man,” Joey protested, sitting up on the couch. “He’s just doing what makes him happy.”
“Yeah,” Chris said. “That look like happy to you?”
Lance gave Joey a plastic smile from the TV screen. Joey looked back down at the copy of The Usual Suspects in his hands and thought, who is Keyser Soze?
“Maybe,” he said instead.
3) Dying to Live
Tonight was a drinking night on the bus. They had two days off in Detroit, which Chris had decided should be commemorated by getting completely shit-faced on the ride over. JC had stopped thinking throwing up on a moving bus was cool approximately five seconds after the first time he’d done it, but Chris could be implacable when he had a plan. JC wasn’t quite drunk, he didn’t think. Just a little fuzzy. He smiled, feeling warm down to his toes.
“Fucker!” Justin swore from in front of the TV. He elbowed Chris away from his controller, missing and hitting him in the head.
“What the fuck, asshole?” Chris yelled, and then JC had to look away, because all the rapid movement and flailing limbs was making him dizzy.
He leaned over the edge of the couch instead. Lance waved lazily at him from the floor, a pillow balled under his head. He blinked slowly, eyes half-lidded.
“Hey,” JC said, putting his hand down and hitting Lance a little too hard in the breastbone. “Oops.” He felt the blood start to rush to his head. The couch cushion felt rough against his cheek.
“Hey,” Lance said, drawing the word out. JC pressed his fingers into Lance’s shirt, feeling the thrum of sound from Lance’s chest radiate up his arm. Lance had round red patches on his cheeks from the alcohol.
“You’re all red,” JC said, and slid his hand up to pat at Lance’s cheek.
“So’re you,” Lance said, changing the shape of his face under JC’s fingers. His mouth moved, and JC stared, fascinated, at the fluctuating curve of his lower lip. It stopped moving, and Lance lay quiet under JC’s hand. His eyes reflected the light from the TV until he closed them, eyebrows furrowing slightly. JC moved his hand to trace drunkenly down the dark arch of Lance’s eyebrow, feeling the thin soft hair against his fingertips. Lance got his eyebrows waxed into precise curves that slid neat and orderly beneath JC’s raggedly-bitten fingernails.
Lance smiled, eyebrows moving like bird’s wings under JC’s hand. JC braced two hands on either side of Lance’s head. Lance’s mouth moved again, and JC followed after.
4) This I Promise You (Atlantis Version)
“I’m not singing it at my wedding,” Justin said. “I don’t care what my momma says.”
“Fuck no,” Chris said, and fouled him.
5) Mississippi
Monday through Friday Lance opened for his dad’s hardware store. He helped customers find lug nuts, washers, screws, and toilet balls. He sweet talked the ancient cash register into opening the money drawer on command and restocked shelves. He gave advice to the desperate, harried yuppies coming in from the upscale condos in the housing development a block away, and counted down the seconds until the afternoon rush was over and he could give the till over to his dad to close out. Saturday, he worked the morning but got off two hours earlier. Sunday he went to church.
Saturday night he followed a broad-shouldered, slim-hipped young man with a shiny silver dollar grin and freckles on his neck into an anonymous hotel room on the south-east side of town and found out how far down the freckles went. The guy, Justin, tensed when he traced them with his tongue, shuddered against the tired old sheets.
“God,” he said when Lance fucked him, “God, God,” until Lance had to cover his mouth for fear of waking the next-door guests.
Afterwards, they lay on the unmade bed and Justin slid a hand down Lance’s chest and talked about the future. “I’m getting out of here,” he said, voice hushed in the dimly-lit room. “Goin’ out West. California, maybe.”
Lance listened to him spin his web of words and traced a thumbnail over the dent in Justin’s ring finger.
Monday morning he rang up another sale, cursing when the drawer stuck again. “Here you go, Mr Timberlake,” he said, handing over a bag filled with a box of nails and two lightbulbs. Justin took the bag, standing tall and slim in his well-fitting grey suit. His fingers didn’t linger on Lance’s. “You have a nice day now, “ Lance said, and watched him walk out the door.
6) Round Here
AJ knows how to sleep on the bus. One of the first things he learned after “never miss a show” and “don’t listen to Lou’s shit.” The bus jolts a little, and AJ officially can’t sleep. He reaches out and pulls open his bunk curtain. It rattles against the curtain rod, shockingly loud next to his ear. Nick had left the door open when he went to bed, and light from the windows in the lounge paints moving patches on the carpet as the bus passes cars on the freeway.
In the other bunk, Nick sighs once and rolls over, exposing the long line of his back, naked skin where his boxers have gotten pulled down. He’d followed AJ onto the bus after the show, dragging his duffel behind him. Nick doesn’t like his own bus; AJ thinks he’d like it better if he could stand being alone for longer than five minutes. Instead, he’s with AJ, leaving his shoes where AJ will trip over them on the way to the bathroom, and making terrible coffee in the mornings when AJ’s not awake enough to lodge a protest.
AJ pillows his cheek on his hand, body balanced on the edge of the mattress. The wooden raised lip of his bunk is a cool stripe against his face as he looks. The rest of the bunks are hidden in shadow, properly curtain-clothed. The aisle between the two bunks is narrow. AJ reaches out his hand and touches the small of Nick’s back, feeling the fine hair laid over bare skin. Nick’s a hard sleeper, as if to make up for his restless energy and twitching feet during the day. AJ wants to pull that sleep over himself like a blanket, take in the easy rhythm of Nick’s breath and make it his own.
The bus rocks again, pulling AJ’s hand away, and he lets it drop down to the carpet, closing his hand against the smooth feel of Nick’s skin. Nick dreams, mouth ajar, arms wrapped around a pillow. The bus hums a familiar asphalt lullaby around them. AJ, awake in the night, dreams.
7) Sleeping to Dream
Chris wakes up. He wakes up and the pillowcase is smooth under his cheek until he rolls over to check the time. He’s too far away. The bed is too big, and he slept on the wrong side, so he’s left grasping for his glasses on the end table before squinting at the clock on his dresser. Twenty minutes until the alarm is set to go off. He closes his eyes for a few seconds. A few seconds and then he’ll get up, shower, get dressed. Start his day.
He wakes up to the harsh buzz from the alarm, and it’s harder this time, but he gave himself a bullshit schedule, so he stumbles out of bed and slaps off the alarm on autopilot. His face in the bathroom mirror looks old, with lines under his eyes and sallow skin. He rubs his hands across his cheeks, drawing the skin down, trying to pull the remnants of dreams out of his body by touch. It doesn’t work, and Chris is left with the memory of sweat-slicked skin and JC’s lips on his mouth when he turns on the shower.
It’ll get better. He knows it’ll get better because these things always do. And next time they see each other Chris will be ready with a joke and a smile, something to make life less awkward. Just not right now, not when he can still see JC standing in the living room with his arms pressed against his chest, can still hear the echo of their final tired argument, can still feel the dry press of JC’s lips to his mouth in a kiss that felt more like an ending than any amount of words ever could. He steps out of the shower, wraps a towel around his waist, and goes back to bed.
( 8. I Should've Known :|: Maybe I should've known now baby/To leave you alone now maybe :|: Joey/Lance)
9) Don’t think twice it’s all right
The road stretches on in front of Justin, black asphalt cracking at the edges but still solid underfoot, heat already starting to radiate in waves. He’s walking, one foot in front of the other, pretending he knows where he’s going.
The sun is strong today, burning his shoulders through his black t-shirt. It’s so dry. Dry enough that Cam’s been complaining about her skin ever since they arrived, one more sour note in a symphony of bad chords. Too hot to be walking in this brushfire territory, but he can’t figure out anywhere else to go but away, and his body wants to move, anger jittery in his abdomen. An argument ostensibly about whose turn it was to get milk, and Justin had to leave, had to get out before he said something too true to take back. It was an in-joke back in the day, Justin always needing to be in motion when he got mad. Cameron understands a lot about him, and some day when he’s thinking more clearly, he’ll remember that, he tells himself. He likes being fair.
But Cameron hasn’t ever accepted that he works things through action. She always wants him to just calm down, sit with her, talk things through. Justin likes to talk, but he’s out of good words, and that, maybe, says it all.
She’s sitting on the porch swing when he gets back, his feet kicking up clouds of dust behind him. He takes her hand when she holds it out, sits down next to her on the bench, but it’s habit more than anything. The old swing creaks underneath them, a slow timekeeper marking the quiet.
“God, it’s so fucking hot here,” Cameron says, squinting at the Rockies in the distance. “I want to go somewhere green.”
“I’m headin’ back home tomorrow,” Justin says, running his thumbnail down a crease in her knuckle. “There’s this thing in Memphis, I said I’d show, like, three months ago.”
Her hand tenses. “What, am I going too?” she asks. “And Jesus, Justin, you could’ve said two days ago.”
Justin looks down, traces his eyes over the lattice of veins and tendons in the back of her hand.
She doesn’t say anything for a long moment, just nods slowly and pushes the swing backwards with her toe. She finally says, “That’s a pretty chickenshit way for this to go,” not looking at him.
“What?” he says. “I got a commitment.” It isn’t a lie, but the commitment is only a party for a record exec, and Justin had bowed out of it months ago against his manager’s advice.
“Right,” she says, pulling her hand away. “Fine.” She gets up from the swing and walks inside. They sleep in the king bed that night like strangers, and he doesn’t wake her when he leaves.
The road is dark, spooling out endlessly beneath his tires. Justin cranks down the window and lets the hot, dry wind wipe away the need for words.
( 10. Your Winter :|: I won't be your winter/And I won't be anyone's excuse to cry/We can be forgiven/And I will be here :|: JC/Chris)
11) Annie
Nick wandered around the hotel suite, tired but awake, too restless to sleep. He picked up the remote and flipped through five channels in rapid succession before turning the TV off and throwing the remote back on the coffee table. Howie, already dressed for sleep and lying with his feet up on the arm of the couch, opened one eye briefly to look at the remote.
“Howie,” Nick said. “D.” Howie didn’t twitch. “D D D D D.”
“What.” Howie settled his arms more firmly over his chest.
“I’m tired.”
“Then go to bed,” Howie said. “Not rocket science.”
Nick flopped into the easy chair. “I can’t sleep.”
Howie looked at him. “First step. Here, let me demonstrate.” Howie closed his eyes again.
“Need someone to sing me to sleep.”
“Oh, jeez.” Howie didn’t open his eyes. “I thought you grew out of this.”
Nick flexed his fingers and tapped his toes in a rapid-fire rhythm on the floor. “One itty-bitty lullaby.”
“Go listen in on Brian when he sings to Baylee.”
“Brian’s lullabies are lame. He does, like, ‘Daddy’s gonna buy you a mocking-bird,’ and shit like that.”
Howie sighed and sat up. His hair stuck up around his head, and Nick covered his smirk with his hand. “One,” Howie said. He walked over and pulled on Nick’s hand until Nick stood up. “And we’re gonna do this right.”
“Aw,” Nick said as Howie pushed him toward his hotel room. “You tucking me in?”
“Watch it, man. I usually only sing lullabies to my nieces,” Howie said, and made Nick get in bed with the covers pulled up to his chin. He turned off the light and sat down cross-legged next to Nick’s bed.
“Sing me the water one,” Nick muttered, turning on his side, already feeling sleep brushing over his eyes now that he’d stopped moving.
“El oceano,” Howie said, and began to sing softly in Spanish. His hands were held loosely in his lap, shoulders curving in under his white t-shirt. Nick blinked twice, eyelids drooping, and watched the light from the open door slide across Howie’s face as he sang.
Nick had kissed Howie once, a long time ago. He’d been sixteen, and Howie had pushed him away, saying, “No!” sharply, like Nick was a puppy or something.
Nick had said, “Why not?” and then, “Fuck you!” and stormed out of the room to punch holes in the closet door that Johnny would lecture him about while Nick sneered and replayed the brief wet press of Howie’s lips and tongue against his. He’d caught Howie in midword, mouth open.
Howie had pulled Nick aside to talk to him the next day, eyebrows inscribing worried lines in his forehead. He’d kept Kevin in the room, an oblivious presence reading a National Geographic in the corner, while he explained that it wasn’t that there was anything wrong with Nick, but Nick was young, and so he’d appreciate it if Nick didn’t do it again.
“Fine,” Nick had said, because he didn’t need Howie, didn’t need anyone who didn’t fucking want him.
The song ended while Nick was still thinking about it, charting the course from there to here. Howie leaned over to look at him, gusting his hand over Nick's forehead. Nick closed his eyes at the touch.
"Sleep well," Howie said softly.
There were layers of want, Nick knew now.
"Okay," Nick said.
( 12. Halloween :|: We are here to help you sing your songs/Because tomorrow's gonna come/And no one's going to call :|: Justin/Chris)
( 13. This Is Crazy Now :|: This is crazy now/Fill the space somehow/I can't walk away from you :|: Justin/JC)
14) Geneva
"Oh, fuck." Justin flopped backwards, hitting Lance on the way down.
"Ow, asshole." Lance shoved at Justin. His hand skated over Justin’s rucked up tee shirt and stomach to hit bare skin. Lance pulled his hand back, alcohol weighing down his motions. The memory of Justin’s skin was hot against his fingertips.
"I am so wasted," Justin declared. He rolled up on one elbow. Lance stopped looking at his hand. "Do that again."
"What?" Lance blinked slowly; black spinning darkness, then half of Justin’s face, then spinning darkness again.
"Do that again," Justin repeated.
*
"Fuck," Justin said. "Fuck."
Lance curled one hand around Justin’s cock through his open fly and whispered, "Don’t you know any other goddamn words?"
Justin pushed against Lance’s hand and licked a long line down Lance’s neck. "Faster," he said in Lance’s ear, and Lance did.
*
Light edged around the gap between the hotel drapes, shining a narrow line across the bed. Justin stirred next to him, face scrunched up. Lance sat up. Justin’s pants lay on the armchair along with Lance’s jacket and a white athletic sock.
Justin rolled over and squinted, all stubble cheeks and morning breath.
"Huh," he said, and Lance snorted, covering his mouth, but it turned into a laugh anyway.
"Fucking stop laughing at me," Justin growled. "I’m still kind of drunk."
Lance lay back on his pillow, still feeling bursts of giggles rising fom his belly like champagne bubbles. "Oh, god, Justin," he finally said.
"Well." Justin yawned.
Lance turned his head. "Yeah."
Justin raised his eyebrow. "Wanna do it again?"
Lance started laughing again, feeling the world spin again around him, and didn't stop until Justin hit him with a pillow.
End