God, Give Us Love In The Time That We Have (Pt 1)
Joseph, fifteen years old and scared out of his mind, stares wide eyed at a spot on the wall, his form still and tense with nerves. If any of his prayers are ever going to be answered, he wants it to be this one. His mouth forms the words over and over, the silent pleas falling from his lips in a desperate bid to the heavens.
Don’t take him away from me.
Nicky’s in the hospital, frail and weak and dying and all he knows is that this feels different from the time that Mom had pregnancy complications with Frankie, from the time that his dad had a heart attack, from the time that Kevin fell off the roof trying to fly when he was ten. Their family has had such a string of bad luck when it comes to health, but Nick, his Nick, has always been fine. Always.
And that’s what this feels like. Nick is his suddenly. It’s something he’s never felt before, a connection that’s never been overt, but now that he’s close to losing his baby brother, he feels like he can’t ever let him go. He wants to run in there and scoop him up, hold him tight, but he’s afraid of the weak-armed hug that he’ll receive in return. He’s afraid of breaking Nick, of hurting him in some irreparable, unforgivable way. He could never live with himself if something like that happened.
He stares at the wall because he knows that if he looks at Nick, really looks at him, he’ll see glassed over eyes and his body slack on the bed, all sharp angles and sunken features.
But then his next thought (and, really, it’s more terrifying than anything that’s run through his head yet) is that if Nick were to die right now, right this moment, he would miss it. He would miss the last few seconds of his baby brother’s life. The idea of losing those last few precious moments shocks Joe into motion, forces his body to turn to the bed next to him, and he grasps the bony hand lying near him, suddenly and sharply, startling Nick awake.
The younger boy blinks sleep from his eyes slowly, stares down at their entwined fingers, and Joe watches as Nick flicks his attention to him, waits with bated breath for him to say something, anything, that will convince Joe that Nick’s not going to slip away, not going to disintegrate into hollow nothingness.
“Hey, Joey,” he says, his voice hoarse and soft but steady and warm.
Joe’s shoulders relax, taking all the tension out with a relieved sigh. “Hey, baby bro,” Joe says shakily, squeezing Nick’s hand gently.
He smiles a little, hoping that it doesn’t look too much like a grimace, as he feels a tear or two escape the corner of his eye. He blinks roughly, sniffing a little, but a few more fall before he can get control of himself. Nick just looks so helpless lying there staring at him. He just can’t halt the emotions coursing through him in that moment.
“Sorry,” he mutters, the hot flush of embarrassment on his cheeks, “I’m just…I…God, I’m such a girl.”
He looks down, breaking Nick’s gaze while he tries to pull himself together. He hears the shifting of sheets, feels Nick pull his hand away, feels his little brother’s fingers tapping his chin upward and holding his face steady.
“Hey,” Nick says soothingly. “Hey, it’s going to be okay. I’m going to be alright. I promise. I can fight whatever this is. I’m gonna make it.”
And Nick holds his arms out in the clear gesture for a hug, and when Joe collapses into him, hot tears wetting his shoulder, soaking the thin hospital gown, his embarrassment is suddenly gone. He knows that Nick will never judge him. Ever.
The diagnosis comes back as diabetes. It’s something that comes completely out of left field, knocking them all over, stunned into silence. Joe’s sitting in the bedside chair, clutching Nick’s hand as the doctor explains that, no, not all types of diabetes are caused by obesity and that, no, it can’t be fixed like type two. This is for life. He squeezes Nick’s fingers tightly when the doctor clutches the clipboard to his chest and utters the words “insulin dependent” to them for the first time.
The silence is penetrating and terrifying, and no one dares to speak, dares to break through the quiet beep of the heart monitor, until Nick opens his mouth. The clearing of his throat practically echoes from the walls of the small room, and they all flinch when he asks the most obvious question.
“Am I going to die?” he says, voice sounding impossibly scared, and Joe looks at him, eyes filled with shocked betrayal.
The doctor smiles at him kindly, understandingly, delicately. “No, you won’t die,” he says. “It’ll be hard to manage at first, though, and I suggest that you take a few weeks off from your little band in order to get things in order.”
Joe knows that the doctor means well by his suggestion, but he also knows Nick. He knows by the stubborn set of his little brother’s jaw and by the new light in his eyes that he’s taking that as a challenge. Nick never backs down from a challenge.
Just as Joe suspected, Nick is up and out of the hospital and insisting on continuing this tour within three days of being diagnosed with a life altering disease. And as Joe watches Nick closely during the first show afterward, he can’t hide the proud glint in his eye.
Something has changed between the two of them after Nick gets back on track. It isn’t something obvious, not something that Joe can put his finger on exactly, but it’s like he’s attached to Nick in this newly profound way. He was never closer to Nick than he was to Kevin before this, but now he feels like he can’t let Nicholas out of his sight.
For at least the first two weeks that Nick’s out of the hospital, Joe sits next to him in the back seat of the van, staring intently at the younger boy’s sleeping face as they travel from city to city. It takes two weeks of ignoring his mother’s whispered urging to just get some sleep, two weeks of feeling like a failure when his eyes finally droop shut at the first crack of dawn, for him to be convinced that Nick’s not going to drop dead in his sleep.
In what Joe considers to be a swooping act of solidarity, he pricks his finger twelve times a day, right along with Nick, until Nick finally gets an OmniPod to plug into his back. Although Nick rolls his eyes and tries to explain to Joe why it’s completely unnecessary for him to prick his finger as well, Joe knows that Nick appreciates the gesture. He can just tell somehow, can feel the quiet gratitude that Nick sends his way.
As they move toward stardom, toward busses and hotels and private jets and screaming fans and tabloids, Nick and Joe remain close. They remain as a unit through the swarms of paparazzi and girls and heartbreak. They tell each other everything. Everything. They share a room when they’re out on tour (which is most of the time) and a bed when they’re not. They watch movies together, eat side by side, and share iPod headphones in the car.
They have girlfriends over the years, of course, but it’s not like they ever really have the time to spare for relationships when they factor in their schedules. Even if they did have the time for real outside relationships, Joe would never consider some girl to be more important to him than his little brother. He’s fairly certain that Nick feels the same way, judging by the fact that things ended so abruptly with Miley when the poor girl made an offhand remark about Joe’s hovering and clinginess.
Their relationship with each other isn’t something that either of them want to put a label on, (maybe because they’re afraid of what that label would be) but Joe knows that Nick is the most important thing in his life. He doesn’t need a label for that.
One night, years later, after they’ve made the step from vans to busses, from an audience of Mom and Frankie to an audience of 20,000 shrieking girls each night, from roadside motel rooms shared between all four brothers to multi-roomed suites larger than most Manhattan apartments, Joe is sitting on the counter of the small kitchenette in the room that he’s sharing with Nick, watching his little brother cook macaroni and cheese on the stove top.
It had taken an hour to convince Dad to let the two of them venture out to the only WalMart in the nameless Midwestern town to buy food for themselves and another fifteen minutes of Joe whining and prodding at Nick to get him to actually cook it. (Joe can’t cook, and Nick sees no point in doing it the hard way when he could just press a button, wave his hand, and have a steaming bowl of mac and cheese delivered to the room like that.)
Joe’s trying to hide the smirk that’s spreading across his face as he watches his brother putter around the kitchen in his low-slung pajama pants like some sort of bulked-up rockstar version of a housewife when Nick turns to him, wielding a spatula.
“Stop it,” he says dangerously, pointing the utensil in Joe’s face.
“What?” Joe asks defensively, kicking at the cabinets under his feet.
“I can tell how much enjoyment you’re getting out of this. I’m going to stop cooking for you if you don’t stop being so smug about it,” he replies, and Joe watches as his eyes narrow, lips twitching upward into another smirk despite himself.
“It’s better when you make it,” Joe says, feeling somewhat childish.
“The people in the hotel kitchen can’t mix cheese powder and milk as well as I can?” Nick asks sarcastically, quirking one eyebrow upward as he gives Joe a deadpan stare.
Joe looks down at his bare feet and wriggles his toes a little. “Yeah. Yeah, that’s it,” he says, and although he tries hard to sound like he’s joking, he knows he means it, word for word. Because when Nick makes it, it tastes like home and childhood. It makes Joe feel like he’s loved, like someone cares about him. It makes him want to hug Nick tight and tell him how much he needs him, how much he’ll always need him. And he knows how stupid it is to put that much significance into a bowl of macaroni and cheese, so Joe doesn’t say any of that out loud. He doesn’t know if he has the words to say it right.
“Okay, Joseph. Because that makes so much sense,” Nick says, rolling his eyes exaggeratedly and turning back to the stove after running a hand through his messy curls.
Ten minutes later, Nick unceremoniously plunks the bowl of food onto the counter next to Joe, huffing out a barely-there acknowledgement of Joe’s gratified stream of thank you’s.
“Oh my God, Nicky, I love you,” Joe says around a mouthful of food. “This is the best mac and cheese I’ve ever had.”
“I’m a master chef,” Nick replies as he pops a few pieces of bread into the toaster for himself. “What can I say?” He turns and leans against the counter, watching Joe eat with a small affectionate smile on his face.
Joe, sitting there in nothing but a pair of sweats and his glasses, stares evenly back at his little brother, dropping his dignity by shoveling macaroni into his mouth by the spoon full, feels so far away from the person who wriggled around onstage a few hours ago belting out lyrics about girls and heartbreak and parties. He feels something swell in his chest, something like the most perfect happiness he’s ever experienced, and it’s hard for him to even think around whatever this is.
Just as he opens his mouth to tell Nick just how happy he is, Nick whips around, distracted by something behind him. Joe smells the acrid burning scent of overdone toast a second later and sees the smoke curling from the toaster in thick wafts, watches Nick fumble as he tries to figure out how to fix it.
Joe hops down and snatches a fork off the counter. Without really thinking about what he’s about to do, he nudges Nick aside and moves to pry the bread out with it.
“No!” Nick shouts out, trying to catch Joe’s wrist before he really does it, but it’s too late.
Joe sinks the fork into the toaster and, before he can ask Nick why he’s freaking out, his arm is shaking with the force of electricity pumping into his veins. He feels his muscles clench against the surge, watches Nick’s eyes blow wide with the pain of being latched to Joe’s wrist, unable to move away, before everything goes black and he slumps to the floor in a heap with his little brother.
Joe groans painfully as he’s pulled into consciousness by the sound of his phone alarm going off loudly. He huffs out a breath of air without opening his eyes, trying to remember why his head hurts so badly and why his arm is throbbing and why he’s lying on a hard floor.
His first thought is that he finally convinced Nick to try a beer or two with him, but he figures that he would at least remember buying the stuff. And, although he’s never actually had a beer, he’s pretty sure that one or two would not cause this much of what feels like a horrible hangover.
The alarm keeps going, and Joe feels around for it experimentally, fully intending to smash the thing against the wall if that will make it be quiet. It’s nowhere near him, so he forces his eyes open, intent on finding the phone.
He vaguely notices that he his vision isn’t the least bit blurry, and even though he’s pretty certain that he remembers taking his contacts out last night, glasses are the least of his worries right now. He pays no attention to Nick who, of course, is probably still curled up on the floor, fast asleep. Making a beeline for his phone on the counter, he grabs it and punches in the code without thinking about which numbers he’s pushing.
“Incorrect Password” flashes across the screen.
Joe frowns, pushing the numbers carefully. The code works, and the alarm finally shuts up, but now, finally, the fact that something is seriously wrong begins to creep into Joe’s mind.
He’s staring at the hands gripping his phone. They’re his hands. Clearly. He’s using them. But they’re not his hands. The fingers are thicker, longer, more calloused. He flexes one hand experimentally into a fist and unfurls it slowly. He knows this hand.
“Nicky?” he asks as he turns to nudge his brother awake. He claps a hand to his mouth, and can feel his eyes pop open widely, can feel his body go rigid in panic. “Nick, shit! Nick, wake up!”
The body on the floor squirms and stretches out of sleep, scratching at its stomach and frowning at the noise. It bats at the glasses on its face, knocking them to the floor in an annoyed half-awake state before rolling over and starting to fall back asleep.
Joe moves forward cautiously, staring down at the body on the floor. Because the body on the floor is his. He’s looking at himself stretched out in sleep. He kicks himself in the side, hard and sharp, and it’s like the weirdest sensation in the world when he doesn’t feel anything from it.
The body jerks awake with a yelp of pain, scrambling away defensively.
“Joe? What the hell, man?” it asks before freezing in place, the same look of shock and terror crossing its face that Joe is sure is plastered on his own face. “Why’s everything so blurry?”
“Who are you?” Joe asks himself through his panic, trying not to pay attention to the fact that that was definitely not his voice. “What is this? Am I dreaming?”
The person on the floor rubs at its eyes frantically and looks around wildly. Whoever it is seems to be just as confused as Joe is, and it blinks rapidly like it’s trying to get something out of its eyes.
“What the…Why can’t I see?” asks the person on the floor. “Why is my voice all wrong?”
“Who are you?” Joe asks again, standing stock still against the counter. He’s clutching his phone tightly in his hand, wielding it like some kind of weapon.
“What-I’m Nick,” the person says. “Can’t you tell that? Now, why can’t I see?”
Joe’s tempted to call the person out on whatever the hell this is, because that person on the floor definitely doesn’t look like Nick. But then he sees the patient, methodical look in the person’s eyes, in his eyes, really. He sees the way that the person begins nibbling on its (his, he tells himself) bottom lip carefully, and he knows that there’s no way this isn’t Nick. There’s no way that expression would happen on his face if it weren’t.
Joe sighs, resigning himself with hesitant acceptance, and picks up the discarded glasses from the floor. “Here,” he says, handing them to Nick. “Put these on.”
Nick frowns and tries to protest. “Dude, I don’t need glasses. That’s you. And why do you sound so much like me?”
Okay, like, Joe knows his vision is pretty bad. But is it really this bad? That Nick can’t even tell that he’s not really looking at Joe? Can’t he tell that he’s technically looking at himself? Seriously?
“Dammit, just take my glasses, Nicky,” Joe says impatiently. The curse sounds foreign uttered in Nick’s voice, and the gravity of this situation begins to sink in a little.
Nick puts them on, jutting out his chin like he thinks he’s being looked down on, and stares up at Joe with defiance in his eyes.
When he can finally see clearly, he shrieks in surprise, scrambling backward, away from where Joe is standing, trying to look calm and understanding. If this weren’t such a serious situation, it would probably be funny to watch himself nearly piss his pants in shock.
“Nick, calm down,” he says slowly, hands raised in something like a peace offering. “It’s just me. It’s Joseph.”
“No, but-you’re…me and-I-what-who-how-What?!” Nick’s babbling and shaking and he looks like he’s getting ready to cry.
“Nicky, calm down. I promise it’s just me,” Joe says, still speaking slowly and clearly to make sure that Nick doesn’t misunderstand.
“Okay,” Nick says, taking deep panicked breaths. “Okay, all I have to do is wake up. I have to wake up and this has to not be happening. You can do this, Nicholas. Come on.”
Joe watches as he squeezes his eyes shut as tight as he can, watches the furrowed look of concentration that he never thought he’d see on his own face. When Nick cracks open an eye, Joe’s staring at him evenly, eyebrows raised.
“It didn’t work, did it?” he asks Nick sarcastically because, well, Joe’s a pretty accepting guy. And although he’s kind of freaking out, (who wouldn’t be?) he’s more or less already decided to just go with this.
“We need to figure this out, then,” Nick says seriously, and it sounds weird in Joe’s voice, the intonation all wrong and too deep. “What were we doing last night before we passed out?”
“Umm…I was eating dinner and sitting right there,” Joe says, pointing to the empty macaroni bowl that’s still sitting on the counter. “And I think you were cooking or something. It’s kind of hazy.”
Joe watches Nick think and tries to ignore the headache pounding in his temple. He wipes a hand at his forehead impatiently when he feels himself start to sweat. It isn’t even hot in the kitchen, but Joe feels like he’s about to fall over from exhaustion. And, God, he’s really, really dizzy right now. He holds onto the counter tightly to steady himself, but he can feel his hands starting to shake, feels his fingers slip on the cold marble surface.
He realizes then that Nick’s talking, more to himself than anything, mumbling something about toasters and forks and Nick looks up at him with an accusatory glint in his eye.
“You!” he exclaims, and Joe’s feeling too dizzy right now to even bother to put up a fight. “You stuck that fork in the toaster! You electrocuted us! Dude, this is all your fault!”
Joe opens his mouth to respond, to defend himself, but all that comes out is a weak little whimper. He slides to the floor clutching at his head, trying to make it stop pounding. “God, Nick, what is wrong with your body? Are you sick or something?” he asks, trying to sound annoyed, but failing miserably as his voice comes out shaky and barely above a whisper.
Nick frowns at him slightly in confusion before jumping up in a sudden realization. “Oh! Joe, I’m so sorry,” he says. “I should have thought of this sooner.”
Nick shoves a small black bag into his hands, and Joe understands why he feels like he’s going to pass out. He knows that his could be really, really bad, and he scrambles with the test strips, pricking his finger through the haze of his swirling mind.
Nick is crouched down next to him, brow furrowed in a worried panic, and Joe wonders if this is what he always looks like when he’s hovering over Nick. It’s weird, looking at this situation from the other side. He always thought he could imagine what a low felt like. Nick had once told him that it was kind of like the feeling you get after you run too much in the heat, but Joe knows now that he was just trying to stop his worrying. A low is so much worse than that. He feels like someone just beat the shit out of him then forced him to run a marathon while wearing a winter parka during the middle of August in the Sahara.
The machine beeps at 74, and Nick moves quickly toward the mini fridge, pulling out a single serving bottle of orange juice and passing it to Joe. It’s like being pulled out of quicksand, the way that Joe’s mind slowly unclouds as he obediently drinks it down.
“Jesus, Nicky,” he says, still clutching at his hair. “You never told me it was that bad.”
Nick smiles sympathetically. “You’ll get used to it,” he says. “I promise. You just have to eat more often and be more careful.”
Joe nods but doesn’t reply. They’re standing there staring at each other, staring at themselves, really, and neither of them knows what to say next. This situation is so incredibly cracked out and strange that it kind of doesn’t require words. They both know that they need to figure out what the hell happened, so that doesn’t really need to be said again. And Nick’s response of ‘You’ll get used to it.’ doesn’t really do much to suggest that this is going away on its own. Joe would be lying if he said he wasn’t still panicking a little (or a lot) on the inside, but there really isn’t anything they can do about it now. Not when they have a completely full schedule for the day. They just don’t have the time to deal with the fact that something is clearly and seriously wrong with them. It’s time to work.
They end up downstairs a little later than they normally would. It had taken Nick at least four tries and four painful jabs to each eye before he got Joe’s contacts in the right way, and Joe had gotten distracted in the bathroom when he looked in the mirror and couldn’t help poking at the solid muscle on his new arms. Joe had also nearly fallen over and cut off his circulation trying to get his own jeans onto Nick’s body before he realized he was doing something wrong.
When they step out of the elevator and into the otherwise deserted lobby, the rest of their family and some of the band are lounging in chairs waiting for the SUVs to get there. Joe slouches over to the group and pushes Kevin’s head to one side playfully, clapping him on the shoulders from behind with both hands.
“Hey, bro,” he says. “What’s up?”
Kevin turns and looks at him a little strangely before shrugging him off. “Nothing…” he replies, and it comes out almost like a question. He sounds kind of unsure. “You okay?”
Joe frowns and opens his mouth to ask what Kevin is talking about when their mom stands and walks to him.
“Good morning, sweetie,” she says with a smile on her face, kissing him on the forehead. “Were you just going to ignore me?”
Joe’s even more confused for a moment. Why is she acting like it’s out of the ordinary for him not to greet her? It’s always Nick who makes sure he says good morning to-Oh. He is Nick right now.
“Sorry, mom,” he says sheepishly, wrapping his arms around her like he normally would in his body. It’s a little weird, and she feels smaller now than she usually does, but he just goes with it.
Nick walks up behind him then, hands in his pockets and back too straight for Joe’s body. It looks a little strained, but Kevin doesn’t seem to notice. He stands and holds a hand up in the gesture for a high five. Nick just stares at it, seeming a little taken aback before raising his left hand to meet Kevin’s halfheartedly.
Kevin seems to notice something strange in his hesitation. “Dude, what’s up with you?” he asks cheerfully, cuffing Nick on the arm.
Nick’s eyes flash to Joe, looking uncertain, and Joe nods encouragingly. He knows that Nick and Kevin don’t have much of a relationship, that Kevin alternates between seeing Nick as his baby brother or as, like, his boss or something, so it must be weird for Nick to act like he’s actually friends with him like Joe is.
“Nothing, Kev,” he says, trying not to sound shy, and laughs experimentally. “Nothing.”
After the show that night, Joe drags himself into the bathroom to take a shower. It has quite possibly been the longest day of his life. Like, he knew that Nick did a lot of work, more than a normal human, but he never realized how hard it was to keep going through his day while this…thing…was constantly beating him down, always putting pressure on him to eat right and check his blood sugar and not pass the fuck out from insulin shock. He’s got, like, this whole new respect for his little brother’s determination.
The show that night hadn’t been horrible per se. It had just been really off. The whole band (and probably most of the fans) could tell something was up after about the first song. Nick had insisted to Joe backstage that like 99% of playing music was muscle memory. So, according to Nick, all Joe had to do was stop thinking about what he was doing, and his body should be able to take over and do the job.
Easier said than done.
Not only could Joe not stop himself from thinking, but, okay, he’s not really a natural front man. That’s kind of Nick’s forte. Joe only flips his shit and acts crazy to make up for Nick’s slack when he’s feeling low or whatever. And this tour has really been more about “Nick Jonas: shining rock superstar,” than it has been about “Jonas Brothers: vaguely attractive trio of boys.”
So, understandably, Joe got a little bit of stage fright when the spotlight fixed on just him. And only him. As he stood there trying to play music that he didn’t really know how to play.
The muscle memory thing worked for like half of “Paranoid” before Joe’s brain kicked into overdrive and he fucked up the bridge and started singing along to his own parts instead of Nick’s. So yeah, they did pretty much the whole show in like a two part harmony, playing each other’s parts while Kevin tried really hard to figure out what was up.
But now, back in the hotel, Joe can feel the annoying drone of screams long dissipated ringing in his ears, the fatigue of a hard day’s work beating and throbbing in his muscles, the sag of his features as he lets the “Nick Jonas serious business” face that felt so unnatural to his normally cheerful, goofy personality drop from his face. He blinks slowly at Nick’s reflection in the mirror, rubbing a hand in his face and trying to wake himself up enough to not drown in the shower.
He peels his clothing off carefully, has to call Nick in for assistance on taking that damn OmniPod out of his back, and tries his best to not flush with embarrassed jealousy when he realizes that, okay, Nick is a lot more…endowed…than he is.
It isn’t until he turns to adjust the shower handle that he catches a glimpse of…it. At first, he thinks that he saw wrong. (He must have seen wrong. This is Nick.) But he twists in the mirror deliberately, and, yep, there it is. Joe’s mouth drops open in shock.
Music notes, scores of them in black ink, twist their way around Nick’s backside, carefully placed into a snaking staff. And it’s not like it’s just some stupid, cliché conglomeration of notes. It looks precise, perfect, pristine. Just like Nick.
Joe stares down at himself for a long time, just staring in something like a mixture of shock and amusement before swinging the bathroom door open dramatically. He’s, like, fully naked and not even trying to cover himself up, but he figures he doesn’t need to be embarrassed because, well, this is Nick’s body. And Nick has clearly seen himself naked before.
Nick glances up from his magazine when he hears the door hit the wall. “Jesus,” he says, sounding shocked, and Joe has to fight to hold back laughter. “What the hell are you doing, Joe?”
“Turning you into an exhibitionist,” Joe replies sarcastically. “I was planning on walking down to the lobby to grab something from the front desk.”
“Very funny,” he says dryly, returning to his magazine. After a minute of Joe just standing there, though, he looks back up, quirking an eyebrow. “Seriously, though. Why am I so naked right now?”
“Why didn’t you tell me about this?!” Joe asks, voice cracking a little with this new surge of excitement and pride he has in his little brother. He twists his body so he can see the smudge of black ink curling its way around his ass. “How the hell did you even get it done?”
“Miley’s brother knows a guy who did it for me a few months ago. That day that we had lunch together in LA,” he says, glancing up again to look.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” Joe asks again, grin nearly splitting his face in two. He wouldn’t have pegged Nick to be the first one in the family to really defy the Disney machine. And he knows Nick really well.
Nick shrugs nonchalantly. “I wanted it to be a surprise,” he says like that’s the most normal thing in the world.
“A surprise for when?” Joe asks, still amused. “When I accidentally saw you naked between showers?”
“I don’t know,” Nick says, and he sounds a bit uncomfortable. “Just a surprise. Whatever. It’s not that big of a deal.”
“Not that big of a deal?” Joe says, laughing again. He’s pretty sure that Nick’s body might be overdosing on laughs today or something because, really, it’s not used to this much. “Dude. Your ass is, like, covered in ink. That’s awesome! Why here?”
“It’s the only place I can keep covered without looking like a total creep at the beach or whatever,” Nick says, sounding kind of distracted. “Now will you please put some boxers on or something? This is weird.”
“What, like you’ve never seen yourself naked before?” Joe asks, smirking at Nick’s discomfort. “What would you do if I just stayed like this the rest of the night?”
“Joseph, please,” Nick mutters, and it almost sounds like he’s begging instead of being bitingly sarcastic like he should sound. Like, if this was actually Joe sauntering around their hotel room nude, Nick would just whack him on the side of the head and tell him to ‘tuck it back in’ before going about his business, totally nonplussed. That had actually happened a few times. Because, well, Joe wasn’t lying when he said something about exhibitionists. He really doesn’t care if Nick sees him naked.
“Nicky, what’s so bad about seeing yourself naked? It’s not like you’re all weird looking like I am,” he says, laughing lightly like his own bad looks don’t bother him.
“God, Joe, I don’t know. Just put some clothes on, okay? This is strange enough as it is,” Nick says. “And you’re not weird looking.”
“Whatever, dude,” Joe says, kind of put off by Nick’s tone. He pads back into the bathroom and pulls his boxers back on before returning to the bedroom. He sits on the other bed, opposite Nick’s and just stares.
“I don’t know why you’re so pissed at me,” Joe says after a while. “It’s not like this is my fault.”
Nick throws his magazine down in a sudden fit of fury, turning on Joe. “Yeah, Joseph, it kind of is like it’s your fault. You’re the one that electrocuted us!”
Joe throws his hands up. “Well, how the hell was I supposed to know that a fork in a toaster was going to do that?” he asks. “I don’t know kitchen stuff! I’m not a girl!”
“Well, what the hell does that make me then?” Nick yells, and Joe thinks for a second that he’s going to dive across the beds and punch him. “Joe, if you hadn't been so careless, we wouldn’t be in this mess at all!”
Joe falls silent after that, and so does Nick. They stare at each other, Nick taking deep anger breaths for a few minutes before his face smoothes out into something blank, something that’s unrecognizable on Joe’s warm features. Joe feels like he’s looking into a mirror, except what should be his reflection is moving and breathing and staring right back completely of its own accord.
He can’t help but notice his flaws like he always does when he stares at himself for too long. Too skinny, too scrawny, face too blotchy, hair curling stupidly by his ears, and that obnoxiously placed freckle in the hollow of his neck. He wants to actually be looking into a mirror right now so that he can just stare at Nicholas like he always does.
Nick is always so pretty and smooth and…just…perfect, and he can’t help but feel that Nick got the short end of this whole body-swapping deal. He feels bad for his little brother, bad that he has to hang out looking like Joe for God knows how long. He feels really bad because he knows that he pushed this too far, this whole joking about Nick’s body thing.
“I’m so sorry, Nicky,” he whispers after a long time, voice cracking in this new, strange voice before he can even think about what he’s saying. “So, so sorry.” He isn’t sure if he’s apologizing for the toaster or for his looks or for practically calling Nick a girl, but he feels so much remorse right now.
Nick says nothing; he just averts his eyes, stares at his hands (Joe’s hands), and, God, this is so messed up. Joe really doesn’t want him to say anything. He doesn’t want to hear the accusation in his little brother’s voice, doesn’t want to hear his own voice coming out of his own mouth, directed toward him, and his mind is spinning from this all because it’s just so damn confusing. Is it Nick sitting in front of him? Or is he sitting in front of himself? Or is he still dreaming some horrible, detailed dream? He doesn’t know what to think, what else to do, and he curls in on himself, rolling over on the bed to face the wall. He feels a tear leak out of the corner of his eye and fall to the mattress, because if Nick had hit him or kept yelling at him or something, anything, it would have been better than that stony faced silence that he had given him. That Nick: silent, disappointed, mature Nick isn’t something that Joe’s too great at dealing with. That’s not his Nick. Joe closes his eyes miserably.
It’s the first night in years that they go to sleep without saying goodnight to each other.
Joe wakes up the next morning with another pounding headache and, Jesus, no wonder it’s so hard to get Nick out of bed in the mornings. It kind of sucks to feel the effects of a hangover without getting, you know, the fun that comes before a hangover.
He huffs out a breath and snuggles deeper into the pillows on his bed. He’s kind of surprised to feel the bed sink next to him after a few minutes because, well, things didn’t end too well with Nick last night. He shrugs away from his touch, still feeling moody from whatever happened between them (or, well, okay, it’s probably just his blood sugar acting up).
But Nick is persistent. Joe feels the spread of his own hand on his lower back, feels Nick card his fingers through his hair just like Joe does most mornings. And then there’s his body, pressed up flat against his back, warm and secure and helpful. He feels Nick kissing his temple lightly, and the pain of waking up starts to ebb away. Nick continues to rub small, firm circles into his scalp, and his mouth drops open and he groans embarrassingly loudly as the pain in his head shuts off like a switch.
Nick obviously knows which tricks soothe the pounding the best, and Joe feels him smirking into the back of his head where his nose has replaced his fingers. Even though they really should be getting up, should be dressing for the day, Nick keeps his body curled tight around Joe’s, their legs tangled in a messy heap.
“I'm sorry I snapped at you last night,” Nick mumbles into his hair after a few moments of comfortable silence.
Joe twists in Nick’s arms, and it surprises him a little when he’s, like, looking at himself, but Nick knocks their foreheads together gently, smiling at him in that confident, affectionate way.
“I know that you’re just as freaked out by this as I am,” he continues. “It’s not your fault at all. I should have stopped you sooner.”
Joe smiles, small and timid, and he knows how out of the ordinary it is for Nick to initiate this kind of physical contact. He ducks his head to rest under Nick’s chin.
“I never realized how much it helped when I woke you up like this,” Joe says, and his voice is muffled in skin.
“Yeah, well, you’d be surprised,” Nick mutters, so soft that Joe almost doesn’t catch the words.
He chooses not to respond, opting instead for a deep sigh of contentment. It’s weird, breathing in his own scent. Even though his mind knows that he’s really smelling himself, his body (Nick’s body) recognizes what it’s used to and melts into the arms that are cradling him securely. Joe feels the way that his head automatically moves to rest in the hollow of Nick’s throat, the way that Nick has done to him so many times. It just feels so strange to think that this kind of a reaction is purely instinctual, entirely void of thought.
Nick seems to be noticing the same thing in Joe’s body, because Joe feels the surprised little huff of air that blows at the top of his curls when one of his hands hook in the edge of Joe’s boxers securely, the other sliding into his hair.
Joe is falling, mind spiraling, body tingling all over. He fits perfectly into Nick’s arms. Well, Nick’s body fits perfectly into his arms, and it’s so intense, knowing what it feels like from both sides. He knows what it feels like to hold Nick like this, but now that he’s felt it from Nick’s side, he has a whole new appreciation. It’s too much sensation for him to handle, really, and it goes straight to his dick.
His cheeks flush red with embarrassment, because, really, he hasn’t popped a boner out of nowhere like this since he was, like, sixteen. He flushes even deeper when he realizes that, technically, he is sixteen right now. Okay, so another unexpected part of this deal: puberty.
He groans into Nick’s shoulder in frustration.
“What?” Nick asks, pulling back to stare down at him.
“You’re pubescent,” Joe says, grimacing dramatically at his brother.
Nick stares at him for a second, and then pushes his head away with a laugh. He obviously knows what Joe means by that, and he’s clearly a little embarrassed by his body’s reaction.
“Go take care of yourself,” he says, slipping out of bed quickly.
Joe stumbles to the bathroom and stares at himself in the mirror. He blanches at the thought of what he’s about to do. “I can’t do this,” he mumbles to his reflection.
His boxers fall to the floor easily, and he looks tentatively down at Nick’s swollen dick. He can’t figure out how to go about this without feeling like he just molested his little brother.
“Dude, I can’t do this,” Joe calls desperately through the bathroom door after a few minutes of careful consideration.
“What? Why not?” Nick asks, and Joe wonders why he doesn’t just get it.
“Because, Nicholas, I can’t just feel you up,” Joe says, rolling his eyes. “I’d feel like a total creep!”
There’s silence on the other side of the door for a minute. “Well, you have to do something about it,” Nick says, and Joe can almost hear the laughter in his voice. “You can’t just walk around like that all day.”
“It’ll go away eventually,” Joe says slowly, weighing his options. “I could take a cold shower.”
“That won’t work,” Nick says with conviction, and Joe absently wonders how many times Nick has tried to will one away.
“Well, I’m trying it,” Joe says, starting the water. “I’m not jacking you off. That’s just not gonna happen.”
Joe can’t hear very well over the spray of water, but he’s pretty sure he hears Nick mumble something like, “We’ll see about that.”
Ten minutes later, and Joe is pulling at his hair in frustration, which really only makes this whole situation worse, because apparently Nick has a thing for hair pulling. By now, it’s past being just a problem of some stupid, hormone induced morning thing; it’s moved on to Joe being painfully hard and losing all composure in the face of what he’s trying not to do. He turns off the shower and steps out.
“Nicky,” he whines through the door, feeling lost and frazzled. “Dude, this is ridiculous. You should have warned me about the hair thing.”
Nick sighs from the bedroom. “I’m coming in,” he says, sounding defeated.
“Nick, no! That’s even worse!” Joe says, panicking, but Nick’s already, like, opening the door.
“Joe, I need to get ready to go, too, and you need to get something to eat so that you don’t repeat yesterday morning. Let’s just get this over with, okay?” he says, like what he’s about to do isn’t any big deal.
“Nick, this is just as bad! I’m still jacking off my little brother if you do this,” Joe says, rubbing at his face.
“Okay, indirectly, yeah, but you’ve got to get dressed,” Nick says. “Just…let me do this.”
“Nick, no--oh!” he says, his protest turning into a throaty moan when he feels Nick wrap his hand around his leaking erection. “Oh, my God. Holy shit, Nick.”
Nick is stroking him slowly, twisting his hand as he moves up and down. Joe stumbles forward into the contact against his will, forehead falling onto Nick’s shoulder, fingers scrabbling at his back. He groans loudly when Nick slides his thumb over his slit, smearing precome down his length. His head turns to the side, mouth biting and sucking at Nick’s neck of its own accord.
Nick moans throatily, tilting his head to give Joe better access, and Joe remembers too late that biting is, like, his version of Nick’s hair pulling thing. But by now, he’s way too far gone to care. He continues to nip at Nick roughly, sinking his teeth in heavily, because he knows which spots on his neck feel the best with just the right amount of pressure.
“Fuck, Joe,” Nick grunts out. “I need-shit.”
Joe gets the idea quickly, unbuttoning Nick’s jeans hastily, and, well, he’s pretty well practiced when it comes to his own dick. He takes it in his hand with practiced ease, stroking Nick off in time with their jolting bodies.
Nick’s yanking hard at his hair with his free hand, and Joe’s eyes roll back into his head, mouth dropping open as he comes onto Nick’s stomach. He’s shaking, the world gone completely and blissfully white, and he clamps his teeth down where Nick’s shoulder connects to his neck as he comes down, holds onto him tightly, nails digging in.
He’s backed up to the sink, slumping down onto it, and Nick collapses into him, groaning at the pleasure of it all. Joe strokes his back gently, still holding him tight. They stay like that, heavy breathing evening out until they hear a sharp knock at their door. Nick grumbles into Joe’s neck, and Joe laughs lightly into his hair.
“Put some pants on and answer the door, you deviant,” Joe says, and he’s amazed at how quickly he can just go back to joking around with Nick. Nick laughs and tugs playfully at the hair on the base of his neck, and Joe makes himself shove him away. “Not right now. We’ve got to get dressed.”
Joe finally has to answer the door after like five minutes of Nick quietly protesting that it’s awkward talking to Kevin, that if that’s who it is (and, judging by the knock, it probably is), Nick doesn’t want to have to deal with their older brother that he hardly knows. When Joe opens the door, Kevin is standing there with an angry look on his face. “Dude,” he says, sounding annoyed. “We were supposed to leave for the airport ten minutes ago. What’s taking you guys so long?”
Joe scratches the back of his head awkwardly. “Uhh…”
“My hair wouldn’t go flat,” Nick says, finally emerging from the bathroom. “You know how it is. Sorry, Kev. We’ll hurry.”
“Yeah, okay,” Kevin says, looking between them, obviously caught on to the fact that something is up. “Umm…I’ll be downstairs. We’re all waiting for you, so, uh, hurry I guess.”
After the door clicks behind him, Joe turns to Nick. “What, you just wanted to make fun of my hair?” he asks, laughing.
“Actually, I was making fun of my hair,” Nick says, gesturing to Joe. “Look in a mirror. You look ridiculous.”
Joe darts back into the bathroom, and, yeah, there are curls sticking up everywhere. He looks like he got in a fight with a wild animal. Or, more accurately, he looks like he just had crazy almost-sex with himself in a hotel bathroom.
“Well, this is fucked up,” he mutters to himself, smoothing his hair back in place.
When he walks back into the bedroom, Nick is adjusting a scarf around his neck. “Dude, take that off. Scarves look stupid on me,” he says, pulling at the end of it impatiently.
“I think you’d rather me wear it,” Nick replies, and when it slips off, Joe flushes and puts it right back on him.
Angry purple bruises are already blossoming across his neck, teeth marks included. They’ve welted up, and before Nick can cover them up again, Joe reaches a curious hand out to touch at it lightly. Nick hisses in pain, but leans into the touch instinctively. Joe has to force himself to pull his hand away and finish getting ready.
When he dutifully kisses their mother on the cheek a few moments later, he can’t quite look her in the eye.
A/N: Please let me know what you think! I worked way hard on this! :)
Don’t take him away from me.
Nicky’s in the hospital, frail and weak and dying and all he knows is that this feels different from the time that Mom had pregnancy complications with Frankie, from the time that his dad had a heart attack, from the time that Kevin fell off the roof trying to fly when he was ten. Their family has had such a string of bad luck when it comes to health, but Nick, his Nick, has always been fine. Always.
And that’s what this feels like. Nick is his suddenly. It’s something he’s never felt before, a connection that’s never been overt, but now that he’s close to losing his baby brother, he feels like he can’t ever let him go. He wants to run in there and scoop him up, hold him tight, but he’s afraid of the weak-armed hug that he’ll receive in return. He’s afraid of breaking Nick, of hurting him in some irreparable, unforgivable way. He could never live with himself if something like that happened.
He stares at the wall because he knows that if he looks at Nick, really looks at him, he’ll see glassed over eyes and his body slack on the bed, all sharp angles and sunken features.
But then his next thought (and, really, it’s more terrifying than anything that’s run through his head yet) is that if Nick were to die right now, right this moment, he would miss it. He would miss the last few seconds of his baby brother’s life. The idea of losing those last few precious moments shocks Joe into motion, forces his body to turn to the bed next to him, and he grasps the bony hand lying near him, suddenly and sharply, startling Nick awake.
The younger boy blinks sleep from his eyes slowly, stares down at their entwined fingers, and Joe watches as Nick flicks his attention to him, waits with bated breath for him to say something, anything, that will convince Joe that Nick’s not going to slip away, not going to disintegrate into hollow nothingness.
“Hey, Joey,” he says, his voice hoarse and soft but steady and warm.
Joe’s shoulders relax, taking all the tension out with a relieved sigh. “Hey, baby bro,” Joe says shakily, squeezing Nick’s hand gently.
He smiles a little, hoping that it doesn’t look too much like a grimace, as he feels a tear or two escape the corner of his eye. He blinks roughly, sniffing a little, but a few more fall before he can get control of himself. Nick just looks so helpless lying there staring at him. He just can’t halt the emotions coursing through him in that moment.
“Sorry,” he mutters, the hot flush of embarrassment on his cheeks, “I’m just…I…God, I’m such a girl.”
He looks down, breaking Nick’s gaze while he tries to pull himself together. He hears the shifting of sheets, feels Nick pull his hand away, feels his little brother’s fingers tapping his chin upward and holding his face steady.
“Hey,” Nick says soothingly. “Hey, it’s going to be okay. I’m going to be alright. I promise. I can fight whatever this is. I’m gonna make it.”
And Nick holds his arms out in the clear gesture for a hug, and when Joe collapses into him, hot tears wetting his shoulder, soaking the thin hospital gown, his embarrassment is suddenly gone. He knows that Nick will never judge him. Ever.
The diagnosis comes back as diabetes. It’s something that comes completely out of left field, knocking them all over, stunned into silence. Joe’s sitting in the bedside chair, clutching Nick’s hand as the doctor explains that, no, not all types of diabetes are caused by obesity and that, no, it can’t be fixed like type two. This is for life. He squeezes Nick’s fingers tightly when the doctor clutches the clipboard to his chest and utters the words “insulin dependent” to them for the first time.
The silence is penetrating and terrifying, and no one dares to speak, dares to break through the quiet beep of the heart monitor, until Nick opens his mouth. The clearing of his throat practically echoes from the walls of the small room, and they all flinch when he asks the most obvious question.
“Am I going to die?” he says, voice sounding impossibly scared, and Joe looks at him, eyes filled with shocked betrayal.
The doctor smiles at him kindly, understandingly, delicately. “No, you won’t die,” he says. “It’ll be hard to manage at first, though, and I suggest that you take a few weeks off from your little band in order to get things in order.”
Joe knows that the doctor means well by his suggestion, but he also knows Nick. He knows by the stubborn set of his little brother’s jaw and by the new light in his eyes that he’s taking that as a challenge. Nick never backs down from a challenge.
Just as Joe suspected, Nick is up and out of the hospital and insisting on continuing this tour within three days of being diagnosed with a life altering disease. And as Joe watches Nick closely during the first show afterward, he can’t hide the proud glint in his eye.
Something has changed between the two of them after Nick gets back on track. It isn’t something obvious, not something that Joe can put his finger on exactly, but it’s like he’s attached to Nick in this newly profound way. He was never closer to Nick than he was to Kevin before this, but now he feels like he can’t let Nicholas out of his sight.
For at least the first two weeks that Nick’s out of the hospital, Joe sits next to him in the back seat of the van, staring intently at the younger boy’s sleeping face as they travel from city to city. It takes two weeks of ignoring his mother’s whispered urging to just get some sleep, two weeks of feeling like a failure when his eyes finally droop shut at the first crack of dawn, for him to be convinced that Nick’s not going to drop dead in his sleep.
In what Joe considers to be a swooping act of solidarity, he pricks his finger twelve times a day, right along with Nick, until Nick finally gets an OmniPod to plug into his back. Although Nick rolls his eyes and tries to explain to Joe why it’s completely unnecessary for him to prick his finger as well, Joe knows that Nick appreciates the gesture. He can just tell somehow, can feel the quiet gratitude that Nick sends his way.
As they move toward stardom, toward busses and hotels and private jets and screaming fans and tabloids, Nick and Joe remain close. They remain as a unit through the swarms of paparazzi and girls and heartbreak. They tell each other everything. Everything. They share a room when they’re out on tour (which is most of the time) and a bed when they’re not. They watch movies together, eat side by side, and share iPod headphones in the car.
They have girlfriends over the years, of course, but it’s not like they ever really have the time to spare for relationships when they factor in their schedules. Even if they did have the time for real outside relationships, Joe would never consider some girl to be more important to him than his little brother. He’s fairly certain that Nick feels the same way, judging by the fact that things ended so abruptly with Miley when the poor girl made an offhand remark about Joe’s hovering and clinginess.
Their relationship with each other isn’t something that either of them want to put a label on, (maybe because they’re afraid of what that label would be) but Joe knows that Nick is the most important thing in his life. He doesn’t need a label for that.
One night, years later, after they’ve made the step from vans to busses, from an audience of Mom and Frankie to an audience of 20,000 shrieking girls each night, from roadside motel rooms shared between all four brothers to multi-roomed suites larger than most Manhattan apartments, Joe is sitting on the counter of the small kitchenette in the room that he’s sharing with Nick, watching his little brother cook macaroni and cheese on the stove top.
It had taken an hour to convince Dad to let the two of them venture out to the only WalMart in the nameless Midwestern town to buy food for themselves and another fifteen minutes of Joe whining and prodding at Nick to get him to actually cook it. (Joe can’t cook, and Nick sees no point in doing it the hard way when he could just press a button, wave his hand, and have a steaming bowl of mac and cheese delivered to the room like that.)
Joe’s trying to hide the smirk that’s spreading across his face as he watches his brother putter around the kitchen in his low-slung pajama pants like some sort of bulked-up rockstar version of a housewife when Nick turns to him, wielding a spatula.
“Stop it,” he says dangerously, pointing the utensil in Joe’s face.
“What?” Joe asks defensively, kicking at the cabinets under his feet.
“I can tell how much enjoyment you’re getting out of this. I’m going to stop cooking for you if you don’t stop being so smug about it,” he replies, and Joe watches as his eyes narrow, lips twitching upward into another smirk despite himself.
“It’s better when you make it,” Joe says, feeling somewhat childish.
“The people in the hotel kitchen can’t mix cheese powder and milk as well as I can?” Nick asks sarcastically, quirking one eyebrow upward as he gives Joe a deadpan stare.
Joe looks down at his bare feet and wriggles his toes a little. “Yeah. Yeah, that’s it,” he says, and although he tries hard to sound like he’s joking, he knows he means it, word for word. Because when Nick makes it, it tastes like home and childhood. It makes Joe feel like he’s loved, like someone cares about him. It makes him want to hug Nick tight and tell him how much he needs him, how much he’ll always need him. And he knows how stupid it is to put that much significance into a bowl of macaroni and cheese, so Joe doesn’t say any of that out loud. He doesn’t know if he has the words to say it right.
“Okay, Joseph. Because that makes so much sense,” Nick says, rolling his eyes exaggeratedly and turning back to the stove after running a hand through his messy curls.
Ten minutes later, Nick unceremoniously plunks the bowl of food onto the counter next to Joe, huffing out a barely-there acknowledgement of Joe’s gratified stream of thank you’s.
“Oh my God, Nicky, I love you,” Joe says around a mouthful of food. “This is the best mac and cheese I’ve ever had.”
“I’m a master chef,” Nick replies as he pops a few pieces of bread into the toaster for himself. “What can I say?” He turns and leans against the counter, watching Joe eat with a small affectionate smile on his face.
Joe, sitting there in nothing but a pair of sweats and his glasses, stares evenly back at his little brother, dropping his dignity by shoveling macaroni into his mouth by the spoon full, feels so far away from the person who wriggled around onstage a few hours ago belting out lyrics about girls and heartbreak and parties. He feels something swell in his chest, something like the most perfect happiness he’s ever experienced, and it’s hard for him to even think around whatever this is.
Just as he opens his mouth to tell Nick just how happy he is, Nick whips around, distracted by something behind him. Joe smells the acrid burning scent of overdone toast a second later and sees the smoke curling from the toaster in thick wafts, watches Nick fumble as he tries to figure out how to fix it.
Joe hops down and snatches a fork off the counter. Without really thinking about what he’s about to do, he nudges Nick aside and moves to pry the bread out with it.
“No!” Nick shouts out, trying to catch Joe’s wrist before he really does it, but it’s too late.
Joe sinks the fork into the toaster and, before he can ask Nick why he’s freaking out, his arm is shaking with the force of electricity pumping into his veins. He feels his muscles clench against the surge, watches Nick’s eyes blow wide with the pain of being latched to Joe’s wrist, unable to move away, before everything goes black and he slumps to the floor in a heap with his little brother.
Joe groans painfully as he’s pulled into consciousness by the sound of his phone alarm going off loudly. He huffs out a breath of air without opening his eyes, trying to remember why his head hurts so badly and why his arm is throbbing and why he’s lying on a hard floor.
His first thought is that he finally convinced Nick to try a beer or two with him, but he figures that he would at least remember buying the stuff. And, although he’s never actually had a beer, he’s pretty sure that one or two would not cause this much of what feels like a horrible hangover.
The alarm keeps going, and Joe feels around for it experimentally, fully intending to smash the thing against the wall if that will make it be quiet. It’s nowhere near him, so he forces his eyes open, intent on finding the phone.
He vaguely notices that he his vision isn’t the least bit blurry, and even though he’s pretty certain that he remembers taking his contacts out last night, glasses are the least of his worries right now. He pays no attention to Nick who, of course, is probably still curled up on the floor, fast asleep. Making a beeline for his phone on the counter, he grabs it and punches in the code without thinking about which numbers he’s pushing.
“Incorrect Password” flashes across the screen.
Joe frowns, pushing the numbers carefully. The code works, and the alarm finally shuts up, but now, finally, the fact that something is seriously wrong begins to creep into Joe’s mind.
He’s staring at the hands gripping his phone. They’re his hands. Clearly. He’s using them. But they’re not his hands. The fingers are thicker, longer, more calloused. He flexes one hand experimentally into a fist and unfurls it slowly. He knows this hand.
“Nicky?” he asks as he turns to nudge his brother awake. He claps a hand to his mouth, and can feel his eyes pop open widely, can feel his body go rigid in panic. “Nick, shit! Nick, wake up!”
The body on the floor squirms and stretches out of sleep, scratching at its stomach and frowning at the noise. It bats at the glasses on its face, knocking them to the floor in an annoyed half-awake state before rolling over and starting to fall back asleep.
Joe moves forward cautiously, staring down at the body on the floor. Because the body on the floor is his. He’s looking at himself stretched out in sleep. He kicks himself in the side, hard and sharp, and it’s like the weirdest sensation in the world when he doesn’t feel anything from it.
The body jerks awake with a yelp of pain, scrambling away defensively.
“Joe? What the hell, man?” it asks before freezing in place, the same look of shock and terror crossing its face that Joe is sure is plastered on his own face. “Why’s everything so blurry?”
“Who are you?” Joe asks himself through his panic, trying not to pay attention to the fact that that was definitely not his voice. “What is this? Am I dreaming?”
The person on the floor rubs at its eyes frantically and looks around wildly. Whoever it is seems to be just as confused as Joe is, and it blinks rapidly like it’s trying to get something out of its eyes.
“What the…Why can’t I see?” asks the person on the floor. “Why is my voice all wrong?”
“Who are you?” Joe asks again, standing stock still against the counter. He’s clutching his phone tightly in his hand, wielding it like some kind of weapon.
“What-I’m Nick,” the person says. “Can’t you tell that? Now, why can’t I see?”
Joe’s tempted to call the person out on whatever the hell this is, because that person on the floor definitely doesn’t look like Nick. But then he sees the patient, methodical look in the person’s eyes, in his eyes, really. He sees the way that the person begins nibbling on its (his, he tells himself) bottom lip carefully, and he knows that there’s no way this isn’t Nick. There’s no way that expression would happen on his face if it weren’t.
Joe sighs, resigning himself with hesitant acceptance, and picks up the discarded glasses from the floor. “Here,” he says, handing them to Nick. “Put these on.”
Nick frowns and tries to protest. “Dude, I don’t need glasses. That’s you. And why do you sound so much like me?”
Okay, like, Joe knows his vision is pretty bad. But is it really this bad? That Nick can’t even tell that he’s not really looking at Joe? Can’t he tell that he’s technically looking at himself? Seriously?
“Dammit, just take my glasses, Nicky,” Joe says impatiently. The curse sounds foreign uttered in Nick’s voice, and the gravity of this situation begins to sink in a little.
Nick puts them on, jutting out his chin like he thinks he’s being looked down on, and stares up at Joe with defiance in his eyes.
When he can finally see clearly, he shrieks in surprise, scrambling backward, away from where Joe is standing, trying to look calm and understanding. If this weren’t such a serious situation, it would probably be funny to watch himself nearly piss his pants in shock.
“Nick, calm down,” he says slowly, hands raised in something like a peace offering. “It’s just me. It’s Joseph.”
“No, but-you’re…me and-I-what-who-how-What?!” Nick’s babbling and shaking and he looks like he’s getting ready to cry.
“Nicky, calm down. I promise it’s just me,” Joe says, still speaking slowly and clearly to make sure that Nick doesn’t misunderstand.
“Okay,” Nick says, taking deep panicked breaths. “Okay, all I have to do is wake up. I have to wake up and this has to not be happening. You can do this, Nicholas. Come on.”
Joe watches as he squeezes his eyes shut as tight as he can, watches the furrowed look of concentration that he never thought he’d see on his own face. When Nick cracks open an eye, Joe’s staring at him evenly, eyebrows raised.
“It didn’t work, did it?” he asks Nick sarcastically because, well, Joe’s a pretty accepting guy. And although he’s kind of freaking out, (who wouldn’t be?) he’s more or less already decided to just go with this.
“We need to figure this out, then,” Nick says seriously, and it sounds weird in Joe’s voice, the intonation all wrong and too deep. “What were we doing last night before we passed out?”
“Umm…I was eating dinner and sitting right there,” Joe says, pointing to the empty macaroni bowl that’s still sitting on the counter. “And I think you were cooking or something. It’s kind of hazy.”
Joe watches Nick think and tries to ignore the headache pounding in his temple. He wipes a hand at his forehead impatiently when he feels himself start to sweat. It isn’t even hot in the kitchen, but Joe feels like he’s about to fall over from exhaustion. And, God, he’s really, really dizzy right now. He holds onto the counter tightly to steady himself, but he can feel his hands starting to shake, feels his fingers slip on the cold marble surface.
He realizes then that Nick’s talking, more to himself than anything, mumbling something about toasters and forks and Nick looks up at him with an accusatory glint in his eye.
“You!” he exclaims, and Joe’s feeling too dizzy right now to even bother to put up a fight. “You stuck that fork in the toaster! You electrocuted us! Dude, this is all your fault!”
Joe opens his mouth to respond, to defend himself, but all that comes out is a weak little whimper. He slides to the floor clutching at his head, trying to make it stop pounding. “God, Nick, what is wrong with your body? Are you sick or something?” he asks, trying to sound annoyed, but failing miserably as his voice comes out shaky and barely above a whisper.
Nick frowns at him slightly in confusion before jumping up in a sudden realization. “Oh! Joe, I’m so sorry,” he says. “I should have thought of this sooner.”
Nick shoves a small black bag into his hands, and Joe understands why he feels like he’s going to pass out. He knows that his could be really, really bad, and he scrambles with the test strips, pricking his finger through the haze of his swirling mind.
Nick is crouched down next to him, brow furrowed in a worried panic, and Joe wonders if this is what he always looks like when he’s hovering over Nick. It’s weird, looking at this situation from the other side. He always thought he could imagine what a low felt like. Nick had once told him that it was kind of like the feeling you get after you run too much in the heat, but Joe knows now that he was just trying to stop his worrying. A low is so much worse than that. He feels like someone just beat the shit out of him then forced him to run a marathon while wearing a winter parka during the middle of August in the Sahara.
The machine beeps at 74, and Nick moves quickly toward the mini fridge, pulling out a single serving bottle of orange juice and passing it to Joe. It’s like being pulled out of quicksand, the way that Joe’s mind slowly unclouds as he obediently drinks it down.
“Jesus, Nicky,” he says, still clutching at his hair. “You never told me it was that bad.”
Nick smiles sympathetically. “You’ll get used to it,” he says. “I promise. You just have to eat more often and be more careful.”
Joe nods but doesn’t reply. They’re standing there staring at each other, staring at themselves, really, and neither of them knows what to say next. This situation is so incredibly cracked out and strange that it kind of doesn’t require words. They both know that they need to figure out what the hell happened, so that doesn’t really need to be said again. And Nick’s response of ‘You’ll get used to it.’ doesn’t really do much to suggest that this is going away on its own. Joe would be lying if he said he wasn’t still panicking a little (or a lot) on the inside, but there really isn’t anything they can do about it now. Not when they have a completely full schedule for the day. They just don’t have the time to deal with the fact that something is clearly and seriously wrong with them. It’s time to work.
They end up downstairs a little later than they normally would. It had taken Nick at least four tries and four painful jabs to each eye before he got Joe’s contacts in the right way, and Joe had gotten distracted in the bathroom when he looked in the mirror and couldn’t help poking at the solid muscle on his new arms. Joe had also nearly fallen over and cut off his circulation trying to get his own jeans onto Nick’s body before he realized he was doing something wrong.
When they step out of the elevator and into the otherwise deserted lobby, the rest of their family and some of the band are lounging in chairs waiting for the SUVs to get there. Joe slouches over to the group and pushes Kevin’s head to one side playfully, clapping him on the shoulders from behind with both hands.
“Hey, bro,” he says. “What’s up?”
Kevin turns and looks at him a little strangely before shrugging him off. “Nothing…” he replies, and it comes out almost like a question. He sounds kind of unsure. “You okay?”
Joe frowns and opens his mouth to ask what Kevin is talking about when their mom stands and walks to him.
“Good morning, sweetie,” she says with a smile on her face, kissing him on the forehead. “Were you just going to ignore me?”
Joe’s even more confused for a moment. Why is she acting like it’s out of the ordinary for him not to greet her? It’s always Nick who makes sure he says good morning to-Oh. He is Nick right now.
“Sorry, mom,” he says sheepishly, wrapping his arms around her like he normally would in his body. It’s a little weird, and she feels smaller now than she usually does, but he just goes with it.
Nick walks up behind him then, hands in his pockets and back too straight for Joe’s body. It looks a little strained, but Kevin doesn’t seem to notice. He stands and holds a hand up in the gesture for a high five. Nick just stares at it, seeming a little taken aback before raising his left hand to meet Kevin’s halfheartedly.
Kevin seems to notice something strange in his hesitation. “Dude, what’s up with you?” he asks cheerfully, cuffing Nick on the arm.
Nick’s eyes flash to Joe, looking uncertain, and Joe nods encouragingly. He knows that Nick and Kevin don’t have much of a relationship, that Kevin alternates between seeing Nick as his baby brother or as, like, his boss or something, so it must be weird for Nick to act like he’s actually friends with him like Joe is.
“Nothing, Kev,” he says, trying not to sound shy, and laughs experimentally. “Nothing.”
After the show that night, Joe drags himself into the bathroom to take a shower. It has quite possibly been the longest day of his life. Like, he knew that Nick did a lot of work, more than a normal human, but he never realized how hard it was to keep going through his day while this…thing…was constantly beating him down, always putting pressure on him to eat right and check his blood sugar and not pass the fuck out from insulin shock. He’s got, like, this whole new respect for his little brother’s determination.
The show that night hadn’t been horrible per se. It had just been really off. The whole band (and probably most of the fans) could tell something was up after about the first song. Nick had insisted to Joe backstage that like 99% of playing music was muscle memory. So, according to Nick, all Joe had to do was stop thinking about what he was doing, and his body should be able to take over and do the job.
Easier said than done.
Not only could Joe not stop himself from thinking, but, okay, he’s not really a natural front man. That’s kind of Nick’s forte. Joe only flips his shit and acts crazy to make up for Nick’s slack when he’s feeling low or whatever. And this tour has really been more about “Nick Jonas: shining rock superstar,” than it has been about “Jonas Brothers: vaguely attractive trio of boys.”
So, understandably, Joe got a little bit of stage fright when the spotlight fixed on just him. And only him. As he stood there trying to play music that he didn’t really know how to play.
The muscle memory thing worked for like half of “Paranoid” before Joe’s brain kicked into overdrive and he fucked up the bridge and started singing along to his own parts instead of Nick’s. So yeah, they did pretty much the whole show in like a two part harmony, playing each other’s parts while Kevin tried really hard to figure out what was up.
But now, back in the hotel, Joe can feel the annoying drone of screams long dissipated ringing in his ears, the fatigue of a hard day’s work beating and throbbing in his muscles, the sag of his features as he lets the “Nick Jonas serious business” face that felt so unnatural to his normally cheerful, goofy personality drop from his face. He blinks slowly at Nick’s reflection in the mirror, rubbing a hand in his face and trying to wake himself up enough to not drown in the shower.
He peels his clothing off carefully, has to call Nick in for assistance on taking that damn OmniPod out of his back, and tries his best to not flush with embarrassed jealousy when he realizes that, okay, Nick is a lot more…endowed…than he is.
It isn’t until he turns to adjust the shower handle that he catches a glimpse of…it. At first, he thinks that he saw wrong. (He must have seen wrong. This is Nick.) But he twists in the mirror deliberately, and, yep, there it is. Joe’s mouth drops open in shock.
Music notes, scores of them in black ink, twist their way around Nick’s backside, carefully placed into a snaking staff. And it’s not like it’s just some stupid, cliché conglomeration of notes. It looks precise, perfect, pristine. Just like Nick.
Joe stares down at himself for a long time, just staring in something like a mixture of shock and amusement before swinging the bathroom door open dramatically. He’s, like, fully naked and not even trying to cover himself up, but he figures he doesn’t need to be embarrassed because, well, this is Nick’s body. And Nick has clearly seen himself naked before.
Nick glances up from his magazine when he hears the door hit the wall. “Jesus,” he says, sounding shocked, and Joe has to fight to hold back laughter. “What the hell are you doing, Joe?”
“Turning you into an exhibitionist,” Joe replies sarcastically. “I was planning on walking down to the lobby to grab something from the front desk.”
“Very funny,” he says dryly, returning to his magazine. After a minute of Joe just standing there, though, he looks back up, quirking an eyebrow. “Seriously, though. Why am I so naked right now?”
“Why didn’t you tell me about this?!” Joe asks, voice cracking a little with this new surge of excitement and pride he has in his little brother. He twists his body so he can see the smudge of black ink curling its way around his ass. “How the hell did you even get it done?”
“Miley’s brother knows a guy who did it for me a few months ago. That day that we had lunch together in LA,” he says, glancing up again to look.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” Joe asks again, grin nearly splitting his face in two. He wouldn’t have pegged Nick to be the first one in the family to really defy the Disney machine. And he knows Nick really well.
Nick shrugs nonchalantly. “I wanted it to be a surprise,” he says like that’s the most normal thing in the world.
“A surprise for when?” Joe asks, still amused. “When I accidentally saw you naked between showers?”
“I don’t know,” Nick says, and he sounds a bit uncomfortable. “Just a surprise. Whatever. It’s not that big of a deal.”
“Not that big of a deal?” Joe says, laughing again. He’s pretty sure that Nick’s body might be overdosing on laughs today or something because, really, it’s not used to this much. “Dude. Your ass is, like, covered in ink. That’s awesome! Why here?”
“It’s the only place I can keep covered without looking like a total creep at the beach or whatever,” Nick says, sounding kind of distracted. “Now will you please put some boxers on or something? This is weird.”
“What, like you’ve never seen yourself naked before?” Joe asks, smirking at Nick’s discomfort. “What would you do if I just stayed like this the rest of the night?”
“Joseph, please,” Nick mutters, and it almost sounds like he’s begging instead of being bitingly sarcastic like he should sound. Like, if this was actually Joe sauntering around their hotel room nude, Nick would just whack him on the side of the head and tell him to ‘tuck it back in’ before going about his business, totally nonplussed. That had actually happened a few times. Because, well, Joe wasn’t lying when he said something about exhibitionists. He really doesn’t care if Nick sees him naked.
“Nicky, what’s so bad about seeing yourself naked? It’s not like you’re all weird looking like I am,” he says, laughing lightly like his own bad looks don’t bother him.
“God, Joe, I don’t know. Just put some clothes on, okay? This is strange enough as it is,” Nick says. “And you’re not weird looking.”
“Whatever, dude,” Joe says, kind of put off by Nick’s tone. He pads back into the bathroom and pulls his boxers back on before returning to the bedroom. He sits on the other bed, opposite Nick’s and just stares.
“I don’t know why you’re so pissed at me,” Joe says after a while. “It’s not like this is my fault.”
Nick throws his magazine down in a sudden fit of fury, turning on Joe. “Yeah, Joseph, it kind of is like it’s your fault. You’re the one that electrocuted us!”
Joe throws his hands up. “Well, how the hell was I supposed to know that a fork in a toaster was going to do that?” he asks. “I don’t know kitchen stuff! I’m not a girl!”
“Well, what the hell does that make me then?” Nick yells, and Joe thinks for a second that he’s going to dive across the beds and punch him. “Joe, if you hadn't been so careless, we wouldn’t be in this mess at all!”
Joe falls silent after that, and so does Nick. They stare at each other, Nick taking deep anger breaths for a few minutes before his face smoothes out into something blank, something that’s unrecognizable on Joe’s warm features. Joe feels like he’s looking into a mirror, except what should be his reflection is moving and breathing and staring right back completely of its own accord.
He can’t help but notice his flaws like he always does when he stares at himself for too long. Too skinny, too scrawny, face too blotchy, hair curling stupidly by his ears, and that obnoxiously placed freckle in the hollow of his neck. He wants to actually be looking into a mirror right now so that he can just stare at Nicholas like he always does.
Nick is always so pretty and smooth and…just…perfect, and he can’t help but feel that Nick got the short end of this whole body-swapping deal. He feels bad for his little brother, bad that he has to hang out looking like Joe for God knows how long. He feels really bad because he knows that he pushed this too far, this whole joking about Nick’s body thing.
“I’m so sorry, Nicky,” he whispers after a long time, voice cracking in this new, strange voice before he can even think about what he’s saying. “So, so sorry.” He isn’t sure if he’s apologizing for the toaster or for his looks or for practically calling Nick a girl, but he feels so much remorse right now.
Nick says nothing; he just averts his eyes, stares at his hands (Joe’s hands), and, God, this is so messed up. Joe really doesn’t want him to say anything. He doesn’t want to hear the accusation in his little brother’s voice, doesn’t want to hear his own voice coming out of his own mouth, directed toward him, and his mind is spinning from this all because it’s just so damn confusing. Is it Nick sitting in front of him? Or is he sitting in front of himself? Or is he still dreaming some horrible, detailed dream? He doesn’t know what to think, what else to do, and he curls in on himself, rolling over on the bed to face the wall. He feels a tear leak out of the corner of his eye and fall to the mattress, because if Nick had hit him or kept yelling at him or something, anything, it would have been better than that stony faced silence that he had given him. That Nick: silent, disappointed, mature Nick isn’t something that Joe’s too great at dealing with. That’s not his Nick. Joe closes his eyes miserably.
It’s the first night in years that they go to sleep without saying goodnight to each other.
Joe wakes up the next morning with another pounding headache and, Jesus, no wonder it’s so hard to get Nick out of bed in the mornings. It kind of sucks to feel the effects of a hangover without getting, you know, the fun that comes before a hangover.
He huffs out a breath and snuggles deeper into the pillows on his bed. He’s kind of surprised to feel the bed sink next to him after a few minutes because, well, things didn’t end too well with Nick last night. He shrugs away from his touch, still feeling moody from whatever happened between them (or, well, okay, it’s probably just his blood sugar acting up).
But Nick is persistent. Joe feels the spread of his own hand on his lower back, feels Nick card his fingers through his hair just like Joe does most mornings. And then there’s his body, pressed up flat against his back, warm and secure and helpful. He feels Nick kissing his temple lightly, and the pain of waking up starts to ebb away. Nick continues to rub small, firm circles into his scalp, and his mouth drops open and he groans embarrassingly loudly as the pain in his head shuts off like a switch.
Nick obviously knows which tricks soothe the pounding the best, and Joe feels him smirking into the back of his head where his nose has replaced his fingers. Even though they really should be getting up, should be dressing for the day, Nick keeps his body curled tight around Joe’s, their legs tangled in a messy heap.
“I'm sorry I snapped at you last night,” Nick mumbles into his hair after a few moments of comfortable silence.
Joe twists in Nick’s arms, and it surprises him a little when he’s, like, looking at himself, but Nick knocks their foreheads together gently, smiling at him in that confident, affectionate way.
“I know that you’re just as freaked out by this as I am,” he continues. “It’s not your fault at all. I should have stopped you sooner.”
Joe smiles, small and timid, and he knows how out of the ordinary it is for Nick to initiate this kind of physical contact. He ducks his head to rest under Nick’s chin.
“I never realized how much it helped when I woke you up like this,” Joe says, and his voice is muffled in skin.
“Yeah, well, you’d be surprised,” Nick mutters, so soft that Joe almost doesn’t catch the words.
He chooses not to respond, opting instead for a deep sigh of contentment. It’s weird, breathing in his own scent. Even though his mind knows that he’s really smelling himself, his body (Nick’s body) recognizes what it’s used to and melts into the arms that are cradling him securely. Joe feels the way that his head automatically moves to rest in the hollow of Nick’s throat, the way that Nick has done to him so many times. It just feels so strange to think that this kind of a reaction is purely instinctual, entirely void of thought.
Nick seems to be noticing the same thing in Joe’s body, because Joe feels the surprised little huff of air that blows at the top of his curls when one of his hands hook in the edge of Joe’s boxers securely, the other sliding into his hair.
Joe is falling, mind spiraling, body tingling all over. He fits perfectly into Nick’s arms. Well, Nick’s body fits perfectly into his arms, and it’s so intense, knowing what it feels like from both sides. He knows what it feels like to hold Nick like this, but now that he’s felt it from Nick’s side, he has a whole new appreciation. It’s too much sensation for him to handle, really, and it goes straight to his dick.
His cheeks flush red with embarrassment, because, really, he hasn’t popped a boner out of nowhere like this since he was, like, sixteen. He flushes even deeper when he realizes that, technically, he is sixteen right now. Okay, so another unexpected part of this deal: puberty.
He groans into Nick’s shoulder in frustration.
“What?” Nick asks, pulling back to stare down at him.
“You’re pubescent,” Joe says, grimacing dramatically at his brother.
Nick stares at him for a second, and then pushes his head away with a laugh. He obviously knows what Joe means by that, and he’s clearly a little embarrassed by his body’s reaction.
“Go take care of yourself,” he says, slipping out of bed quickly.
Joe stumbles to the bathroom and stares at himself in the mirror. He blanches at the thought of what he’s about to do. “I can’t do this,” he mumbles to his reflection.
His boxers fall to the floor easily, and he looks tentatively down at Nick’s swollen dick. He can’t figure out how to go about this without feeling like he just molested his little brother.
“Dude, I can’t do this,” Joe calls desperately through the bathroom door after a few minutes of careful consideration.
“What? Why not?” Nick asks, and Joe wonders why he doesn’t just get it.
“Because, Nicholas, I can’t just feel you up,” Joe says, rolling his eyes. “I’d feel like a total creep!”
There’s silence on the other side of the door for a minute. “Well, you have to do something about it,” Nick says, and Joe can almost hear the laughter in his voice. “You can’t just walk around like that all day.”
“It’ll go away eventually,” Joe says slowly, weighing his options. “I could take a cold shower.”
“That won’t work,” Nick says with conviction, and Joe absently wonders how many times Nick has tried to will one away.
“Well, I’m trying it,” Joe says, starting the water. “I’m not jacking you off. That’s just not gonna happen.”
Joe can’t hear very well over the spray of water, but he’s pretty sure he hears Nick mumble something like, “We’ll see about that.”
Ten minutes later, and Joe is pulling at his hair in frustration, which really only makes this whole situation worse, because apparently Nick has a thing for hair pulling. By now, it’s past being just a problem of some stupid, hormone induced morning thing; it’s moved on to Joe being painfully hard and losing all composure in the face of what he’s trying not to do. He turns off the shower and steps out.
“Nicky,” he whines through the door, feeling lost and frazzled. “Dude, this is ridiculous. You should have warned me about the hair thing.”
Nick sighs from the bedroom. “I’m coming in,” he says, sounding defeated.
“Nick, no! That’s even worse!” Joe says, panicking, but Nick’s already, like, opening the door.
“Joe, I need to get ready to go, too, and you need to get something to eat so that you don’t repeat yesterday morning. Let’s just get this over with, okay?” he says, like what he’s about to do isn’t any big deal.
“Nick, this is just as bad! I’m still jacking off my little brother if you do this,” Joe says, rubbing at his face.
“Okay, indirectly, yeah, but you’ve got to get dressed,” Nick says. “Just…let me do this.”
“Nick, no--oh!” he says, his protest turning into a throaty moan when he feels Nick wrap his hand around his leaking erection. “Oh, my God. Holy shit, Nick.”
Nick is stroking him slowly, twisting his hand as he moves up and down. Joe stumbles forward into the contact against his will, forehead falling onto Nick’s shoulder, fingers scrabbling at his back. He groans loudly when Nick slides his thumb over his slit, smearing precome down his length. His head turns to the side, mouth biting and sucking at Nick’s neck of its own accord.
Nick moans throatily, tilting his head to give Joe better access, and Joe remembers too late that biting is, like, his version of Nick’s hair pulling thing. But by now, he’s way too far gone to care. He continues to nip at Nick roughly, sinking his teeth in heavily, because he knows which spots on his neck feel the best with just the right amount of pressure.
“Fuck, Joe,” Nick grunts out. “I need-shit.”
Joe gets the idea quickly, unbuttoning Nick’s jeans hastily, and, well, he’s pretty well practiced when it comes to his own dick. He takes it in his hand with practiced ease, stroking Nick off in time with their jolting bodies.
Nick’s yanking hard at his hair with his free hand, and Joe’s eyes roll back into his head, mouth dropping open as he comes onto Nick’s stomach. He’s shaking, the world gone completely and blissfully white, and he clamps his teeth down where Nick’s shoulder connects to his neck as he comes down, holds onto him tightly, nails digging in.
He’s backed up to the sink, slumping down onto it, and Nick collapses into him, groaning at the pleasure of it all. Joe strokes his back gently, still holding him tight. They stay like that, heavy breathing evening out until they hear a sharp knock at their door. Nick grumbles into Joe’s neck, and Joe laughs lightly into his hair.
“Put some pants on and answer the door, you deviant,” Joe says, and he’s amazed at how quickly he can just go back to joking around with Nick. Nick laughs and tugs playfully at the hair on the base of his neck, and Joe makes himself shove him away. “Not right now. We’ve got to get dressed.”
Joe finally has to answer the door after like five minutes of Nick quietly protesting that it’s awkward talking to Kevin, that if that’s who it is (and, judging by the knock, it probably is), Nick doesn’t want to have to deal with their older brother that he hardly knows. When Joe opens the door, Kevin is standing there with an angry look on his face. “Dude,” he says, sounding annoyed. “We were supposed to leave for the airport ten minutes ago. What’s taking you guys so long?”
Joe scratches the back of his head awkwardly. “Uhh…”
“My hair wouldn’t go flat,” Nick says, finally emerging from the bathroom. “You know how it is. Sorry, Kev. We’ll hurry.”
“Yeah, okay,” Kevin says, looking between them, obviously caught on to the fact that something is up. “Umm…I’ll be downstairs. We’re all waiting for you, so, uh, hurry I guess.”
After the door clicks behind him, Joe turns to Nick. “What, you just wanted to make fun of my hair?” he asks, laughing.
“Actually, I was making fun of my hair,” Nick says, gesturing to Joe. “Look in a mirror. You look ridiculous.”
Joe darts back into the bathroom, and, yeah, there are curls sticking up everywhere. He looks like he got in a fight with a wild animal. Or, more accurately, he looks like he just had crazy almost-sex with himself in a hotel bathroom.
“Well, this is fucked up,” he mutters to himself, smoothing his hair back in place.
When he walks back into the bedroom, Nick is adjusting a scarf around his neck. “Dude, take that off. Scarves look stupid on me,” he says, pulling at the end of it impatiently.
“I think you’d rather me wear it,” Nick replies, and when it slips off, Joe flushes and puts it right back on him.
Angry purple bruises are already blossoming across his neck, teeth marks included. They’ve welted up, and before Nick can cover them up again, Joe reaches a curious hand out to touch at it lightly. Nick hisses in pain, but leans into the touch instinctively. Joe has to force himself to pull his hand away and finish getting ready.
When he dutifully kisses their mother on the cheek a few moments later, he can’t quite look her in the eye.
A/N: Please let me know what you think! I worked way hard on this! :)