Fic Fest Entry, Part Two
“This is a very bad idea, Adam.”
Adam sipped his drink with an innocent smile, ignoring Brad’s warning as he scanned the room for a likely prospect to use for his latest - and ultimate - plan to incur Kris’s jealousy.
“Do you really even think this is necessary?” Brad persisted. “The fact that he’s here tonight is evidence that he cares.”
Adam raised a single brow in dubious question, letting out a soft, sarcastic huff. “How do you figure?”
“He hates me. The only reason he’d show up to my birthday party is if he was scared to let you be alone with me without him there - which he obviously is after that last stunt I helped you pull,” Brad explained. “So there’s really no point in going through with this…”
Adam had chosen the night of Brad’s birthday party as the perfect time to put the final phase of his plan into action. The party was being held at a very exclusive club where no paparazzi were allowed inside - which would prevent the surfacing of incriminating pictures after the fact - and Adam would have the moral support of his friend to help him go through with his rather daring plan.
Except, at the moment - Brad utterly failed at providing said moral support.
“Kris doesn’t hate you,” Adam objected, his tone distracted as his gaze swept the crowded club. “And if he did, he’d still come to your birthday party, with me - because you’re my friend, and he’s my boyfriend, and he’s the prince of good southern manners.” Adam paused barely a moment before nodding and tilting his glass slightly in the direction of a pretty brunette dancing across the room. “That one.”
“What if you piss him off a lot more than you’re planning to, Adam?” Brad warned.
Adam let out a derisive pfft sound, his lips set in a tight line, his eyes betraying the barest glimpse of hurt as he retorted almost under his breath. “Not likely. He barely noticed when I spent the night with you. He’ll probably just ask me if I’m having fun and then turn and walk away.”
“But… the whole point of this plan is… you’re hoping that he won’t do that,” Brad pointed out. “I just think you should be prepared for the consequences if it works out the way you’re hoping.”
But Adam was already halfway across the room, eyes narrowed over a predatory smile as he closed in on the pretty piece of eye candy who was going to help him regain his boyfriend’s interest.
************************************
Kris was relieved to find that there were quite a few guests at Brad’s party that he found much less irritating than Brad himself, and he busied himself making small talk with them, and keeping away from the bar, where Adam stood next to the man of the hour, sipping his drink. Kris didn’t feel like putting up with Brad at the moment. Lately, for some reason, he found him more irritating than ever.
Still, he couldn’t help sneaking glances toward the bar every minute or so, wishing Adam would walk away from Brad for a few minutes so he could talk to him.
He was afraid of what he might do if he actually had to talk to Brad.
Adam said they just lost track of time - and that’s what happened, he told himself for the hundredth time since his early morning phone call to Adam a few days earlier. It’s no big deal. They’re just good friends. Nothing to worry about.
Just… really good friends… who happen to have… used to sleep together…
And still… occasionally… have sleepovers…
No, Kris was here because it would look bad if Adam’s boyfriend did not attend the party with him - but he knew better than to go anywhere near Brad tonight.
He glanced up again toward the bar, feeling a vague sense of relief when he noticed that Brad was alone, leaning against it and surveying the room. Kris followed his gaze, looking for Adam - then froze, his stomach lurching with a sensation of horrified disbelief when at last, he found him. Adam was across the room, entangled with some random stranger in a dark corner - and apparently attempting to use his tongue to perform a tonsillectomy.
Kris strode across the room without hesitation, some part of him that was less in tune with reality than his eyes insisting that there had to be some logical explanation. Perhaps Adam was kissing this guy on a dare, or as a joke, or… Kris’s eyes widened as he watched the strangers hand slip downward from Adam’s waist toward more intimate territory - and Adam do nothing to stop him.
No. There is no logical explanation that makes that okay…
He cleared his throat as he reached them, folding his arms across his chest and waiting as Adam lazily withdrew from the kiss to give him a casually questioning look.
“Yes?”
Kris raised a single brow, feeling a low, furious heat beginning to build in his chest at Adam’s flippant tone and teasing smirk. His voice was taut, clipped and warning as he finally found his voice and managed to speak.
“Having fun?”
“Yeah, actually,” Adam replied, glancing appreciatively back toward the stranger, whose pretty face Kris very much wanted to punch through the mirrored wall behind him. “I am.”
Kris’s jaw worked with repressed emotion as he struggled to control the rage coursing through him. His fists clenched at his sides, aching to make contact with yielding flesh - to shatter the calm curiosity of the stranger whose hands were still all over Kris’s boyfriend - or worse, to wipe the smug, careless smirk off of Adam’s face.
That was when Kris knew that he had to get out of there, before he did something he’d regret.
“Good for you,” he muttered, spinning on his heel and striding quickly toward the door.
*******************************
Adam’s stomach dropped as he watched Kris walk away, his fury obvious in his swift, purposeful pace. Suddenly, he felt sick with the utter certainty that Brad had been right all along - this had been a terrible plan. He gradually realized that the young man he’d been making out with was still touching him, trying to engage him again - but Adam just pushed him away, heedless of his indignant sound of protest as he started hesitantly toward the men’s room door through which Kris had just disappeared.
“Wait.” Brad intercepted him with a gentle hand on his arm, though his tone was sharp and authoritative. “I’ve got this.”
Adam shook his head, bewildered, and tried to push past Brad to the bathroom, but Brad persistently blocked his way, waiting until Adam met his eyes to continue in a firm yet understanding tone.
“Let me talk to him first,” he insisted softly. “If you go in there right now, it’s going to get ugly.”
Adam didn’t understand how Brad thought he would get any better reaction out of Kris than Adam himself would - but he was too stunned and shaken by Kris’s unexpected quiet fury to protest much. He nodded dumbly as Brad headed for the men’s room door.
*********************************
“Enjoying my party?”
“Get out,” Kris snarled without hesitation, his voice low and trembling and nothing like his usual mild, easy tone. He was glaring at Brad’s reflection in the mirror, his hands clenched around the sides of the sink, visibly struggling to rein in his temper.
“My party.” Brad shrugged, though he kept a wary distance from the other man - who, though no taller than him, was certainly better built.
Kris closed his eyes, trembling with fury, as he drew in a slow breath and let it out, struggling for control. When he spoke again, his voice was slightly less threatening, carrying a note of sorrow and defeat.
“Please. Just… just leave me alone.”
“Don’t you even wanna know why he did it?”
Kris looked up with a puzzled frown, and Brad felt a rush of sympathy when he saw the tears shining in his eyes. “What?”
“Or does Adam usually just make out with random guys in clubs right in front of you?”
“No,” Kris muttered looking away. “He saves that for the stage.”
Brad tilted his head slightly in concentration, venturing a step closer to Kris, his eyes narrowed speculatively. “And… that bothers you?”
Kris looked at him as if he was quite possibly the stupidest person on the planet, not bothering to dignify the question with an actual verbal answer.
He didn’t have to.
Brad frowned, puzzled. “But… you don’t care if he goes out to clubs without you? Spends the night with his unbelievably hot ex-boyfriends?”
Brad instantly thought better of the last question when Kris stood up straight, turning to face him with his eyes narrowed in anger.
“Of course I do!” Kris snapped. “Not that that would matter to you! To either of you, apparently!” He shook his head, raising one hand to cover his face for a moment before lowering it in an angry, frustrated gesture as the words seemed to explode out of him. “I know Adam’s life is very different than mine and I’ve tried to be as understanding as I know how to be, but… but there are just some things…” He shook his head again, at a loss, before meeting Brad’s eyes with a helpless expression. “I don’t want him to think I’m trying to control him - that I’m some kind of jealous, possessive jerk or something - you know?”
“Kris…” Brad tried to suppress the smirk of amusement that rose to his lips, but couldn’t quite manage it. “I think what Adam needs right now… is that jealous, possessive jerk.”
Kris frowned in confusion. “Huh?”
“Okay…” Brad took a moment to compose his thoughts, suppressing his smile as he ventured a little closer to Kris, his hands extended in front of him in a cautious gesture. “… this may come as a bit of a shock… but, Kris… there’s a little something you need to know about your boyfriend…”
*****************************************
Adam sat in a booth across from the men’s room, waiting anxiously for any sign of Kris or Brad, for what felt like an eternity. He was trembling inside, his mouth dry and his stomach quaking with fear that he had pushed the test too far - broken Kris’s trust to the point that he had driven him away - lost him for good.
The very thought made him feel like he was going to be sick.
He rested his elbows on the table and his face in his hands, struggling to fight back the sense of impending panic creeping over him.
There has to be something I can do… some way I can make it up to him… God, I wanted to make him jealous, but I never wanted to…
“Adam.”
Adam looked up, startled by the sound of Kris’s voice, surprised to find him much nearer than he’d expected him to be. Kris was standing beside the other side of the booth, one hand resting on the table as he waited for Adam to respond. The hope Adam felt at his boyfriend’s return quelled at the sight of the restrained fury in Kris’s eyes, and he swallowed hard, waiting for Kris to go on.
“Get up.”
Adam felt an uneasy sensation in the pit of his stomach at Kris’s commanding tone. “Kris… what…?”
“Get up and head for the car. We’re going home,” Kris clarified, his voice dangerously calm and quiet.
Adam hesitated, unsure how to respond to this strange new version of his boyfriend. “I… I need to tell Brad…”
His words broke off abruptly with a stunned gasp as Kris closed the short distance between them with a single step, reaching out a hand to grip the back of his neck with just slightly more force than was comfortable, and leaning in close to speak mere inches away from Adam’s face.
“You don’t need to tell Brad anything,” Kris declared, his voice low and warning, his dark eyes blazing with a strange fire that Adam found both frightening and fascinating. “You don’t need to talk to anyone but me again tonight. I said we’re going.” His grip tightened slightly, and Adam tensed as Kris added in a clipped tone with a cool smile, “So shut your mouth… and move… your… ass.”
Adam was still for a moment, torn between alarm at this new side of Kris and relief that not only had he managed to provoke a reaction that proved that Kris did care what Adam did… but also that Kris had not given up on him, but had returned and seemed to want to work this out - one way or another.
What Kris’s way of “working it out” might be had Adam in a curious state of equal parts fear and arousal.
After a moment’s hesitation, he nodded once to indicate his obedience, and Kris released him, allowing him to slide out of the booth and rise to his feet. Kris waited with an expectant look until Adam headed toward the door, Kris following close behind him.