Fic: So Hard To Do
I'm still alive. Yes, really.
Title: So Hard To Do
Author: Ninalyn/technicolornina
Fandom: Adam Lambert
Pairing/Characters: Adam/Brad, Tommy
Word Count: 10 042
Spoilers: Nope, it's futurefic/AU.
Story Rating: PG-13
Story Summary: Someone has to take care of the things Adam can't, before it all comes tumbling down.
Disclaimer: If you think any of this happened, I have a unicorn going cheap. (By contrast, if you have proof it happened, I want the motherfucking videotape.) Standard disclaimer about "if you're in it, please don't read it!" goes here.
Notes: Prequel to Own Your Heart, and the first (chronological) story in the Pain is So Close To Pleasure series.
Feedback: I really do appreciate it when I get it, so if you care to make an author happy, please do.
Special Thanks/Dedications: For my two wonderful, patient, lovely betas, choose2live and the_minx_17. ♥
I just want to be with you
'Cause living is so hard to do
When all I know is trapped inside your eyes
The future I cannot forget
This aching heart aint broken yet . . .
"Time For Miracles," Adam Lambert
It all starts with that damned kiss.
Brad is watching on a stream-to hell with all that waiting three hours stuff-and when he sees it, he sucks in a sharp breath and reaches for his phone to shoot Adam a text. They've been sort of talking again, but Brad can let go of "sort of" for a night after the shitstorm he already knows is coming.
Adam’s not long in showing up at his door, close to a full-on red rage and swearing as soon as Brad lets him in. Brad all but shoves him inside and shuts the door.
"Those fuckers!" Adam yells, and Brad winces as his coffee table takes a direct hit from Adam's foot; the table is a solid oak slab he picked up at a flea market and doesn't so much as budge, but Adam's going to feel that kick tomorrow. "Someone backstage called me a fucking pedophile, Brad, those assholes-" And the foot swings again, this time into the sofa. Brad simply stands quietly in the kitchen doorway. He learned a long time ago that even Adam's most violent outbursts never get physically directed at people he could actually hurt. Brad is safe, and what little he owns that Adam can lay hands on to destroy is expendable.
But then Adam kicks the rickety little table with the picture of Brad and his parents on it, the only one he has with his mom and his birth father, and when the whole thing tips over and the frame shatters on the floor, Brad is the one raising his voice. "Adam, stop that!"
Adam, for a wonder, stops. It occurs to Brad, briefly, that Adam looks like a toddler caught in a tantrum, and as Brad moves to rescue the picture from among the glass Adam becomes Adam again-angry and restless and ready to lash out, but no longer an uncontrolled animal actively seeking to hurt whatever he can reach. Brad picks the picture out of the glass and muffles a curse, switching the print from one hand to the other before he can bleed on it. Adam takes the picture.
"Shit," he says, and reaches for Brad's other hand. "Fuck. Shit, Brad, I'm sorry." He squeezes Brad's finger. Brad hisses as a bead of blood wells up, but doesn't pull away. He doesn't think there's any glass still in there, but it doesn't hurt to give it an outlet. Adam sets the print carefully down on the coffee table to tend to Brad's finger, first brushing away the blood and crumbs of glass and then raising the cut to his lips. Brad lets him kiss it before looking past him at the darkened television and asking the question he really shouldn't.
"Why did you do it?"
Adam tenses. "Don't fucking start with me," he answers, and drops Brad's hand. Brad is sure he can feel whatever tentative thing they've built back up between them disappearing, shattering like the picture frame at his feet, and suddenly finds himself praying to a god he no longer strictly believes in that Adam won't just walk out. If it ends, it ends, and Brad can make himself be okay with that; he can't make himself be okay with it ending like this.
"I was only asking."
"You were only asking," Adam mocks, and Brad bites his tongue. "You were only asking. Just like every single person backstage. And the producers. And Lane, and you know what, Brad, this isn't a bump in the road, this is the fucking end of the road, do you know how many interviews I got cancelled tonight? It's fucking over, I fucking killed it, ten years I worked for this shit and I got excited and fucking blew it all!" Adam's voice rises an octave, and the cup Brad was drinking his evening tea out of turns into a lesson in abstract art on the far wall. "Over some guy I barely even fucking know who, guess what I found out tonight, he's fucking straight!"
And there's the trouble, Brad realises, with a gasp he's quick to cover. Adam's been hesitating to call what they're doing "dates" because he's been nursing a crush on the little rocker boy he picked up to play bass. But by now Adam is off to the races again, this time about assholes who think he'd be better off dying in a gutter than getting his deviant all over a bunch of little kids who probably weren't even watching (and Brad would roll his eyes at Adam's theatrics except he kind of agrees), crunching picture-frame glass and raising his voice enough Brad hears a warning thump from the wall he shares with a neighbour, and that's when he realises Adam never said all his interviews were cancelled. Just some of them, just a lot. And that's why he raises his own voice again, not just saying Adam's name but declaring it, telling him to sit down and shut up before they both have a stroke or something. Adam stops, shocked.
"Did you go deaf listening to that shit I put on TV, or something? I said-"
"I heard what you said," Brad interrupts. His patience is gone. "And I sure hope you heard me, Adam, because I love you but that does not give you the right to bust the hell out of my apartment. And I really, really don't want to tell you to get the fuck out because I don't like having those kinds of barriers between us, but if you keep screaming and waking up my neighbours and throwing my glasses, I will."
Adam stares. His mouth trembles. Brad nods at the sofa. "Sit."
Adam sits. He looks down at the laces of his boots, like he's not sure if he should take them off, and Brad feels a tiny cut in his heart to match the one on his hand. "Leave them on until I sweep this up," he says. "You'll get glass in your feet."
Adam nods. Brad goes for the broom and dustpan, and when he comes back he looks at Adam clenching and unclenching his fists on the sofa and puts a hand on his hip. "Adam Lambert, you stop that. Take some deep breaths or something."
He hears Adam do as he suggests while he gets to his knees with the whisk broom and sweeps up what's left of the frame-note to self, he thinks, never get those cheap-ass plastic frames ever again-before running a damp paper towel over the floor and moving on to repeat the process with the coffee cup. He dumps the shards in the dustbin and returns to Adam's side with a pair of fresh cups out of the kettle on his stove. "Should we start over and try that again? Or is there really absolutely nothing you can do to fix what happened?"
Adam sits, silent. Brad nudges his cup, and Adam drinks. It's nothing fancy-Brad can't afford any really good chamomile until he gets another paycheque-but it's something. Adam looks down at him as he sets down his cup, and Brad feels his heart ache; the fear on Adam's face doesn't belong.
"I'm on the ABC blackout list," Adam whispers, and Brad watches his shoulders hunch in and actually shake. "They told me tonight Good Morning America is off."
"And?"
"And, I-shit, Brad-" Adam covers his face with his hands. Brad pulls them away, suddenly scared. Adam looks away.
"Adam, look at me," Brad pleads, and when Adam drags his face around, the expression in his eyes a clear why are you making me do this? a pair of unconscious thoughts click together in Brad's head and make a cohesive whole. Oh. Oh.
So that's it, he realises. Not a straight boy Adam was nursing a crush on, a straight boy who likes to look like a fragile little flower when in reality he could probably beat Adam senseless, although on the surface it might look like that. That's not it at all. If somebody handed Adam a whip and a blindfold and a ready and willing Tommy right now, Brad thinks, Adam wouldn't be able to put them together in the intended combination-or, if he did, wouldn't get from it what he once did.
And so he pushes Adam's cup further back on the table, looses the laces on Adam's boots, slides them off and pulls Adam into his arms, where Brad rocks him like a small child. Adam's whole body locks up, rigid, unyielding, and then his head falls on Brad's shoulder and he lets out a loud, braying sob. Brad rubs his back, tiny soothing circles as Adam cries into Brad's neck so hard Brad's body shakes, the kind of deep, heartbroken bawling that's going to end with Brad giving him water and ibuprofen to soothe his head and stomach when this is all over. Brad turns his head and kisses Adam's forehead. Adam's breath hitches, and Brad pulls his hand away to give Adam space to breathe.
"Brad, I can't-I can't-"
Brad suddenly feels like he's carrying something very old and fragile through a room full of loose marbles just waiting to make him trip and fall. He's suddenly aware that Adam's entire career might hang on what he says next and how quickly he says it. And so he puts a hand between Adam's shoulders again and speaks with a confidence he doesn't feel, letting the script of this old dance take over. "Yes, you can."
Adam shakes his head so violently he knocks Brad's head to the side, and Brad moves his hand to Adam's head before they both end up with bruises. He considers contradicting Adam, or asking why he thinks he can't-he, Adam, the most emotionally-comfortable person Brad knows-and then thinks about Adam fleeing from the afterparties and It People who could, maybe, have dug him a little out of the hole he's in, thinks about Adam coming here instead. And so he tilts his mouth very close to Adam's ear, and whispers: "My apartment's in the back of the building, Adam. Nobody can see. It's just us."
That's when Adam breaks, sliding down Brad's body and practically oozing into the places where they don't meet, burrowing into Brad's side as he cries-no, not cries, Brad is pretty sure nobody's invented a word for what Adam's doing. It's not pretty; his face turns red in patches through his expensive new makeup and his eyeliner only washes mostly away in the flood of tears running down his face, leaving ghostly dark lines tracked through his concealer, mascara and gloss and tears and spit smeared on Brad's tee-shirt where Adam is clinging and mumbling half-coherencies about what he fears could happen to him, how he let everyone down, didn't think and let everything go to hell.
Brad strokes his hair and stays silent, hoping he's doing the right thing and praying it's close enough to put Adam back together. Eventually Adam lets out a big snuffle and wipes his hand across his eyes, smearing what's left of his eyeliner across his face.
"I'm sorry."
"Don't be sorry," Brad answers, still rocking Adam even though his shirt is soaked through and starting to get a little sticky from the mix of makeup that's probably rendered it unwearable. Adam is sluggish, and Brad knows what he wants to say next is way overstepping his bounds, but maybe, maybe-
Maybe it's not about bounds. Maybe it's about making sure Adam has what he needs. And so he uses a corner of his shirt to dab carefully at Adam's eyes as he speaks. "Thank you for sharing with me." And then, because Adam still looks doubtful: "I want you to stay here tonight."
Adam pulls away. Brad sits up. His right hand is kind of numb, and it occurs to him trapping his hand between himself and Adam's deadweight wasn't the smartest idea he's ever had. Adam looks away from him, and Brad reaches out a single hand to touch his face. Adam turns back with absolutely no pressure at all. Brad thinks about Adam's week, interviews and cleanses and a workout routine that would make Jillian Michaels cry, stress and stress and stress, and thinks about the week ahead of him still to come.
Adam hasn't destroyed himself, not yet. But if someone doesn't get in between him and everything pressing down on him, he will.
And so Brad lays his hand against Adam's cheek, lets him feel the pressure there, waits until Adam meets his eyes before speaking. "Please, Adam. Let me help you."
Adam looks away again. Brad stands up and pulls Adam to his feet. "Come on. Don't shut me out. Let's just get this week under control for now, okay?"
"It's never going to be under control."
"Yes, it is," Brad tells him. "Right now I want you to eat and shower and then get some sleep and we can talk about it tomorrow."
"I don't want to talk about it." Adam looks at the floor. Contrary to everything, Brad feels encouraged; if Adam can be pissy enough to rebel, he can be spirited enough to put the pieces back together. Brad tips Adam's chin back up with his fingers.
"Tomorrow," Brad answers. "Come with me."
Adam glowers, but lets himself be led to Brad's bathroom, where Brad turns on the shower before sitting Adam on the toilet lid and pulling out some cold cream to get rid of the makeup Adam's tears left behind. He tosses used makeup pads in the trash one at a time, stroking Adam's skin lightly and trying to be especially gentle around his swollen eyes. Then he sticks his hand back under the shower spray.
"It's warm now," he declares. "Get a shower. I'll heat up some soup for you."
He heats the soup, and then, when he hears the shower crank up to its sorry excuse for full blast, creeps to the living room and pulls Adam's phone out of his jacket. By the time Adam appears fifteen minutes later wrapped in the robe Brad keeps on the back of his bathroom door for guests and with his hair down in his face, the phone is back in his jacket and the list of interviews Lane gave to Brad is hidden carefully on the fridge behind a peanut butter coupon.
Adam sips unenthusiastically at the soup Brad sets before him, which is genuinely no fault of Brad's; his vegetable soup was a favourite of Adam's before they broke up. Brad sits with him quietly and drinks his now-cold tea without comment. Eventually Adam's spoon scrapes the bottom of the bowl, and when he sets it down Brad puts the bowl in the sink before taking Adam's hands and leading him out of the kitchen and down the teeny little hallway into his bedroom, untying the robe, pushing it down, pulling back the covers and indicating to Adam that he should slide beneath. Adam hesitates.
"I don't want to kick you out of your bed."
"I'll fit," Brad says, and sits down to take off his socks before Adam can argue. It's a double and they'll be a close fit, but Brad's okay with that. Adam, from the sound of his breathing when Brad strips down and snuggles in behind him, isn't.
"Relax," Brad tells him. "Sleep."
"This is really playing with fire," Adam answers, and the baldness of the comment-just the facts, pure flat admission and fear-makes Brad feel the need to pull Adam closer, spoon around him and curl his arms around Adam's head and chest.
"Smart people know you can do a lot with fire without getting burned," Brad answers. "So be smart and take it for what it is, and let the rest take care of itself."
Adam shifts, and turns, and does all of the million things that make sleeping with him in a double bed a small taste of hell. Brad waits him out, stroking his hair and shoulders until he settles down and his breathing lengthens, and then he lets his own eyes close, and sleeps alongside.
---------------------
"Adam."
Adam mumbles and snuggles into Brad's pillow. Brad strokes his hair and brings the cup of coffee closer to Adam's face-not close enough for accidents, just close enough to smell. "Adam. Baby. It's seven-thirty. You've got a plane at one."
Adam lets out a confused-sounding "Drake?" and Brad tries not to get angry all over again. Some people, he reminds himself, can deal with the spotlight. Some can't. It's just a personality thing.
"No, baby, Brad," he corrects. "You stayed with me last night, remember?"
Adam sits up and lets out a sleepy, confused snuffle. Then he blinks. "Brad?"
"Mm-hmm. Here," he says, and hands Adam the coffee. Adam smells, then sips. Brad rubs his back. Adam jumps and pulls away, either just noticing that he's naked or that Brad is clothed.
"I-should get going," Adam mumbles. Brad checks the level of coffee in the cup, then plunks on the bed.
"No can do, sugar, your clothes are in the wash. I checked the tags," he adds helpfully. "The jacket's in the living room. But nothing screams 'walk of shame' like driving home in the same clothes you wore to last night's awards party, and the only stuff I had of yours was in my hamper."
Adam looks panicked. Brad picks the borrowed robe off the chair by his bed and offers it. Adam slinks into it and ties it tightly. Brad hears the toaster.
"Want breakfast?" he asks, and when Adam shakes his head Brad frowns. "Adam, that was a rhetorical question. You know what kind of stuff they feed you on planes these days. If they feed you."
Adam doesn't respond. Brad puts his hands on his hips. "Adam."
"Don't pull this shit on me," Adam says. Brad watches his hands curl into fists. "Just-don't. Not today. I don't need the fucking lecture." And he turns to stomp past Brad, only to find himself back on the bed with Brad's knee on his chest.
"I don't give a damn if you want it," Brad tells him. "Whether you think you do or not, you need it. And we can do this over breakfast or we can do it here, but I promise you, Adam, if you make me do this imitating a flamingo you will not like me later."
Adam's mouth falls open. Brad tries not to start laughing at the look on his face . . . almost succeeds . . . fails. Adam finally grins back. Brad rolls to his side, wraps his arms around Adam's waist.
"Really," he murmurs into Adam's ear. "Please. Let's talk."
Adam rolls away restlessly, the moment broken. "There's nothing to talk about. Lane's gonna kill me if I miss my plane."
"You won't miss your plane if you have breakfast. I'll help you pack. If you're not already. You already are, aren't you? Pre-packing freak of nature, that's what you are," Brad accuses. Adam giggles. Then the smile crashes off his face, like he's realised it means he has no excuse not to stay and eat. Brad reaches over onto the nightstand, scrabbles, finds a necklace he wore out to some club a few nights ago, drapes the cord around Adam's neck.
"When you're ready to talk-"
"Give it back to you," Adam interrupts. "I know how this works. I hope you weren't too attached to this thing."
"You'll give it back," Brad announces. Adam rolls his eyes as the buzzer to the dryer goes off, and darts out of the bedroom and off to the utility closet.
Brad follows quickly, but Adam's already pulling on an old T-shirt by the time Brad gets to him. Brad lets him get into a pair of jeans before clamping his arms around Adam's shoulders, pulling himself onto his tiptoes, and kissing Adam's cheek.
"I want you to know I'm on your side," he whispers into Adam's ear. "I don't want to watch you go down in flames. I want to watch you fly. And I want to do whatever I can to help you get there, if you'll let me."
There's a long pause. If Adam pushes past him and leaves the apartment, they're most likely through, and no amount of trying to explain will put them back together again. Brad waits, hands on Adam's arms, wondering if Adam can feel the heavy beat of his heart slamming away inside his chest.
Then Adam's arms curl slowly around him, and Adam buries his face in Brad's hair.
"I'm scared," Adam whispers, and Brad strokes his back in the sweet spot between his shoulderblades.
"I know," he murmurs back. "But I'll help you get through this. Somehow. You're going to bounce back and next thing you know you'll be one of those living-legend people." He puts his hands on Adam's shoulders. "Get dressed. Breakfast."
Adam nods.
-----------
It's two days later when Brad gets woken up at six in the morning by the dying-mosquito buzz of his doorbell. He throws on one of Adam's T-shirts, grumbling, and goes still half-asleep to the door. He signs for his package, and he's on the verge of tossing it on the table to deal with later when he sees the return address: New York, New York, no name.
And so he tears the open-strip-because who knows, maybe it's a Jake Gyllenhaal script, and even if it's not, he can always hope that if he keeps opening strange nameless packages sooner or later it'll turn out to be one-and his necklace falls out on the table.
At first he just blinks at it, wondering why he got his own necklace in the mail. Then he remembers why it's been not in his apartment for the last two days, and grabs his cell phone.
Adam's voicemail picks up, but it's so cool and professional-so far removed from the All tied up, I can't come to the phone that Brad remembers-that at first he almost hangs up, thinking he's got the wrong number. Then he hears Adam's name and realises he has no idea who listens to Adam's messages anymore.
"Hi, baby," he says, and then draws a momentary blank before his eye lights on the envelope again. "It's Brad. I just wanted to let you know I got your package." And then, because he still has no way of knowing who has Adam's voicemail password and wants to make sure the point is clear: "That was so sweet, thinking of me like that." Just the wee, barest touch of a simper, in case somebody listening wants to know what kind of mysterious packages Adam's been sending-let them believe it's some silly wish-you-were-here love-trinket, Brad thinks. "Give me a call when you have a minute, okay? I miss you." He makes a kissing noise into the phone. "Don't work too hard," he says, and to anybody who isn't Adam it'll sound like a joke, but Adam-who knows Brad's every tone and turn of phrase-will know better, Brad thinks. Adam will recognise Brad's very real concern.
He makes coffee and sits down to a script, pretty sure his phone will ring before long anyway, and he's half-right: his phone stays silent, but the little chime telling him he's getting a Skype call goes off, and when he answers it, a poshy-posh hotel room with an exhausted-looking Adam in it is on the other end.
"Hi, baby," he greets. Adam blinks at the screen and mumbles a hello. Brad tilts his head. "You okay?"
Adam hesitates. Then he shakes his head. "I didn't sleep last night. I tried, but I'm . . . " He trails off and shrugs. Brad considers.
"Wired?"
"Yeah," Adam agrees. "Good word. Wired."
"Have you eaten yet today?" Brad asks, and when Adam directs a shifty glance offscreen Brad folds his arms. "Adam . . . "
"I . . . no," Adam admits. "But I didn't have time for breakfast, really, I just grabbed a cup of coffee and-"
"So you didn't sleep at all, but you also didn't have time for breakfast," Brad interrupts. "Do they have room service there? Wait, that's a stupid question. What do they have for room service?"
"Uh-"
"You didn't look," Brad fills in. It's not really an interruption; the look on Adam's face tells Brad there really isn't anything to go beyond the 'uh'. "Let me see the card. Or, you know, book, or whatever." He settles into a waiting position. Adam makes a face.
Brad holds up the necklace and watches Adam's shoulders slump as he reaches for the hotel room service book. Brad scans the menu and thinks.
"How long do you have before you get spirited off again?" he asks. Adam checks the time on his phone.
"In theory I'm free until one-thirty-New York time, I mean-but Lane wanted to go over-"
As if the name is a cue, someone unleashes a series of hard, unfriendly rap-rap-raps on Adam's door. Adam closes his eyes. Brad is pretty sure he can see him grinding his teeth.
"Can I have just one hour alone, please!" Adam yells at the door, and there's a muffled reply Brad can't hear.
"Tell her you're napping," Brad suggests. "Naps always work."
"She's gone already," Adam tells him. "Probably not for long, but I can hope." He sighs and buries his head in his hands. "She's not a bad person. I just . . . everybody wants a piece of me and I'm starting to wonder when I get to claim a piece for myself."
"I don't want a piece of you," Brad says. "Not the way you're talking about, anyway."
"I know," Adam answers, so immediately Brad's ready to protest before Adam rides right over him. "I've known that since our pictures leaked. You know, no matter what happened later because of that-I'm kind of glad it did, in a way." He looks back up at his webcam. "Because it's good to know there's somebody you can trust."
Brad tangles his fingers in the chain of the necklace, out of frame where Adam can't see. "You went to an awful lot of trouble to get this back to me right away," he says, and lets the chain dangle from his fingers. Adam nods again. Brad raises his eyebrows. Adam shifts in his chair.
"Well?"
Adam shifts again, but this time, Brad thinks, he's not dodging-he's thinking, waging an internal war with himself before he gives in. Brad just waits.
"I," Adam says, and stops. Brad bites his tongue to keep from filling the silence. "I . . . shit. I don't know how to do this," Adam admits, and Brad wishes-wishes-wishes they were in the same room because what he wants more than anything is to pull Adam into his arms and cover his face with kisses for coming to terms with one of his biggest stumbling blocks. Instead he says "thank you for telling me, baby" and waits for Adam to continue.
"I'm scared," Adam confesses, and he pushes his face through his hands like a little kid playing peekaboo. "I mean, I'm not sorry I'm me, but . . . Kris could do some kind of really dumb shit, and apologise for it, and two days later nobody would care. But I do dumb shit, people keep going on about it like I've never done anything else, and I'm scared I'm going to fuck up by saying the wrong thing at the wrong time trying to do damage control and it's just going to snowball, instead."
What Brad wants to say is Adam, get your head out of your ass, when you're in the zone you could sell deep-freezes to Eskimos, stop the pity-party. What he lets himself say is "Do you think you're going to do something like that?"
Adam shrugs with an effort so great it looks like he's trying to raise a fifty-pound iron bar with nothing but his shoulders. Brad watches his face and stays quiet. Just when he thinks he's going to have to say something-he has to, if he doesn't the silence is going to end the conversation for him-Adam speaks up again. "I want to say no," he answers. "But how the fuck do I know? I'm going into my third day on two hours of sleep, it doesn't take a whole lot to just, you know . . . . " He waves his hands in circles.
"Stumble?" Brad suggests. Adam frowns at the word. Brad considers. "Break loose?"
"Not exactly. But closer," Adam agrees. "Yeah. Like a retaining wall. Hit it in the wrong place and all kinds of shit spills out. And, you know, I can talk to a couple of people and know I'm not going to end up plastered all over the front of the National Enquirer, but all it'd take is one wrong word to one wrong deejay and it'll all be over."
"So let me make sure I've got this straight," Brad says. "You haven't slept, you haven't eaten, and because you're running on empty you're afraid you're going to make a mistake while you're trying to fix what happened before."
Adam nods. Brad laces his fingers together under his chin and thinks. One conclusion he quickly comes to is that Adam knows. He may not like it, but he knows what he needs, or he wouldn't sit so quietly while Brad sorts through the information Adam provided him.
"Can you trust me to help you get through the week?" he asks at last. Adam hesitates. "We can talk more about this when you come back to LA, but I think it needs to be face-to-face. And right now you need somebody to . . . " He almost says take care of you. Then he reconsiders. Adam can take pretty good care of himself when he's got a schedule and his own little quirks and oddities are respected, and that phrase out of Brad's mouth will make him balk even when he knows he's rebelling just for the sake of rebelling. "You need somebody to give you a framework," he supplies at last. "Instead of just running from one appointment to the next."
Adam nods and rubs at his eyes. Brad checks his own clock.
"All right," he announces. "Here's what you're going to do." He ignores Adam's single raised eyebrow. "You're going to call Lane, and you're going to tell her you're very tired, and if she really wants to talk you'll meet with her at one. Then you're going to call room service and tell them you're Adam Lambert in whatever room it is you're in-"
"Come on, that do-you-know-who-I-am bullshit is lame," Adam whines. Brad makes a face.
"I don't care," he throws back. "You're going to be very sweet and very polite, but if you plan on actually getting food when you order it, you had damned well better tell them who you are. You're going to order something out of that 'On the Go' panel on the right-hand side and tell them you'd like it in an hour and a half, if they can do that, please, and then you're going to come back over here and I'll be waiting for you."
Adam doesn't move. Brad gestures with his head and hands. "Do you think I'm making this stuff up for my health or something? Go on, call Lane."
Brad thinks while Adam makes his phone calls. Then he flips on some quiet music. Adam returns to the screen. He still looks tired, Brad thinks, but not half-panicked. Good.
"Okay," Brad greets. Adam hears the music, and Brad watches his shoulders relax. "Thank you, baby."
Adam nods two or three times and reaches over the top of his computer to put the menu away. Brad wishes he could reach out to take Adam's hands. "Let me guess. Now you want me to take a nap."
"Not quite," Brad answers. "But that's coming. First I want you to relax. So close your eyes and do a couple of yoga breaths, and when you're ready I want you to tell me the biggest thing that's got you stressed right now."
He's not waiting long; Adam's barely taken his breaths before he spits out what he said before, a worry about saying the wrong thing to the wrong person at the wrong time. Brad reaches for one of the legal pads he scribbles ideas on and tears off the top two pages to find a clean sheet, then writes it down.
"Good," he says. "Now take a couple of deep breaths and give me another."
One at a time, Adam breathes out his worries: taking care of his mom if the album falls through, what he might end up doing for a job, the fake rivalry Idol keeps trying to set up between him and Kris Allen. Then he takes two deep breaths and shudders.
"Also," he says, "I haven't talked to Tommy except about work since the show, and I know he said it was okay when we ran into each other backstage but . . . "
Brad fights the urge to swear. Of course Adam hasn't talked to Tommy, there hasn't been any time, and of course that's part of the dual crux of the matter. Instead he bites his tongue, writes it down on his pad of paper, and then looks back up at Adam, who opens his eyes and shrugs. "I guess that's all." Then he looks surprised. "That's all?"
"Good," Brad praises, and then-because he wants to lavish praise and reward and can't-he kisses his fingers and holds them up to his cam lens, smiling a little when Adam reaches out for his own screen as though they can actually touch. "Thank you for letting me take this, baby."
Adam nods. Then he yawns. Brad glances down at the six or eight items on his legal pad, then back at Adam.
"So go lie down," he says, "and I'll worry about this for you for now."
Adam nods. Then a faint dusting of pink appears over his nose. "Could you-leave the call open?"
Brad feels a tremor of worry, slight as one of the little temblors he's gotten used to sleeping through. They've come so far from the days when neither of them could get out of bed without being nagged by the other, and the last thing he wants-
"Not like that," Adam cuts into his line of thought as neatly as he did when they were still together. "It's just-I really like whatever it is you're playing, and I don't think it's something I have."
" . . . oh," Brad says at last. He's relieved, sure-but more than that, surprised and a little dismayed at his own forgetfulness. Adam may like to cling, but there's steel buried in the tangled web of traits that make him up, too. "Sure, baby."
Adam's answering smile is tentative and uncertain, but as soon as Brad turns up his volume, it solidifies. Brad closes his eyes as Adam picks up the computer and ferries it to the nightstand by the bed. When he opens them again, all he can see is the edge of the nightstand and part of the bed-Adam's screen is mostly closed. He hears a few shifting sounds-Adam settling in-and then the screen opens again.
"I don't know if I'm going to hear anybody coming to the door," Adam admits. Brad dips his head once.
"I'll wake you."
Adam hesitates, then nods and pulls the screen down again. Brad minimizes his webcam window and goes back to work, listening as Adam's breath evens out and deepens. He considers the items on his legal pad-some of them probably just Adam's habit of worrying about everything, all the time, in typical control-freak manner, but some of them legitimate concerns-and turns them over in his mind, occasionally writing potential solutions on his pad.
He keeps a close eye on the time, and about five minutes before Adam's food is due he sends a pair of Skype messages, putting little binks and bonks out into Adam's consciousness before softly calling his name. There's a rustle of fabric, and Brad calls him again. "Adam. Babydoll."
Adam makes a soft sound, and Brad sees a hand creep into his limited field of vision. The screen opens up on Adam stretching and reaching for something out of frame. Brad watches as Adam puts in some eyedrops.
"Feel better?"
"A little. A lot, actually," Adam agrees. There's a knock on the door, and when he comes back he has a small salad and some fruit. Brad waits until Adam starts to nibble-slow but steadily-and then he talks.
"I did some thinking while you were asleep," he announces. "Also some research. So the first thing I want to tell you is based on your album sales so far and Internet buzz, if you handle this tour right, I don't think you need to worry about finding another job or taking care of your mom. The number one complaint I found on message boards was people saying they have to wait to get a physical copy of the album because it's sold out."
"Sold-out?" Adam pauses with his mouth full of cantaloupe. Brad motions at him, and he shuts his mouth.
"Sold out," Brad agrees. "Complaint number two is that everybody knows you're gay already and your fans would really like someone to ask questions about what's actually on the album, instead of about who you're fucking." He laces his fingers together and eyes Adam's salad until Adam goes back to nibbling on the lettuce. "So really, I think-if you keep on steady and get some good airplay, you're going to be okay for now. I mean, you can't just relax once you've got the new single set and on its way, but 'disaster' isn't really it. One thing's for sure, you definitely got their attention."
He watches the tension in Adam's shoulders melt away and smiles. "So, about this rivalry thing-Kris knows it's a bunch of nonsense, right?"
"I think so. I mean, we don't get to talk a whole lot, but he's never sounded, you know . . . pissy or anything."
"Good," Brad says. "So-worry about that if you want to, but really, I don't think you need to. He never seemed like a shithead when I was at the mansion."
"He's not," Adam agrees, and Brad gives himself major points for not rolling his eyes at Adam's vaguely wistful expression. Some crushes always come with a lingering case of what-might-have-been, that's all, Brad decides. "I think he was more laughing at it than he was upset when we were on tour. He's really sweet."
Brad shrugs a single shoulder: there you go, then. "Then let it go. He went through the same media training you did. A few years from now when there's no way to compare the two of you anymore you can both laugh at it." He reaches out to brush Adam's hair back from his face, stares at his own hand, and drops it back to the table with a little laugh. "Whoops."
Adam grins at him. This time Brad does roll his eyes. "As for Tommy . . . " Adam instantly tenses. Brad waits for him to return to a neutral position before he finishes. "I can't tell you what to do." He could, actually-if this turns out the way he thinks it will, he could-but he won't. "But I can tell you that if I was in your position, what I would do is think out a few different ways that conversation could go. Including the ways where he really was okay with it, and you're worrying about nothing. Then talk to him, and at least you'll know where you stand."
Adam sighs and takes a vengeful bite out of a carrot. "And in the meantime? Before I get back?"
"You mean the next four days?"
"Yeah."
Brad considers carefully. Lane's list of interviews migrated from his coupons to his desk while Adam was sleeping, and he reads it over, thinking through his options. There's being over-cautious, and then there's being an asshole. Abusing Adam's trust might be worse than never having had it at all.
"Call me," he decides at last. "Every night, before you go to bed. If I don't hear from you by midnight-New York time-I'm calling you. If you can't call by midnight-I don't know, if you get dragged to a deejay party or something-text me. I'll wait up for you. But I want to hear from you and make sure you're doing okay."
"I can do that."
"Good." Brad hears a knock on Adam's door-not the same drill-sergeant rap-rap-rap from earlier, but definitely from the same family. "Lane?"
"Lane," Adam agrees. "And I should probably let her in this time."
"All right. Get back to the rockstar business, sugar. Give me a call tonight."
They say their goodbyes and disconnect. Brad stares at the screen.
Then he puts his head down on his arms, exhausted from the early morning and the weight he's just taken on. There are conversations they need to have, lots of them, and about far more than just safewords and Adam's eating habits-much more, if they don't want to crash and burn again. It's going to be up to Brad to lead them, at least until Adam finally starts talking, and he needs a second-just a second-to let his brain catch up and his body rest so he can plan, make this work for them instead of against.
He only means to rest his eyes for a minute or two, but when he opens them again twenty minutes have gone by and his computer desktop has disappeared and turned into an aquarium full of tropical fish, and so he decides he should take his own advice.
Which is why, as Lane wonders what happened to leave Adam so peaceful when only ninety minutes earlier he was ready to tear her throat out for asking if he wanted anything to eat, Brad naps.
------------------
"Oh my god, I smell barbecue. Tell me you made that tonight. Please."
"Last night, but it cooked today," Brad says, as Adam shrugs off his jacket. "It's always better when you let it si-mmmph!"
Adam nips at Brad's lower lip, then pulls back, grinning. "It's good to be home."
"I missed you too," Brad answers, giving himself just a couple of drops of petulant to go with the sincerity. If he starts letting Adam think he's okay with being interrupted by kisses, it's not going to be long before-oh, who the hell is he kidding. He nods toward the kitchen.
"I got a table while you were gone!" he announces. "Fifteen bucks at the flea market, finally. And a couple of chairs. They're ladderbacks, but I threw some cushions on them and they're not bad." He leads Adam into the kitchen. "Well-if you ignore that they don't match. One of them is pretty generic, I can probably find one that matches it in a couple of weeks."
Adam tries to get plates out of the cupboard. Brad shoos him, and after a couple of tries, Adam sits. Brad fills a plate with barbecued ribs and sugar-snap peas and corn bread and hands it to him with a glass of milk-beer has its place at a barbecue, but Brad is still in favour of milk with cornbread-before making up his own plate.
"Welcome to Texas," he says, and plunks down in the other chair. It lets out a warning creak, and Brad rolls his eyes. Seven dollars was probably too much, but his options were limited.
Adam tears into the food like he's starving, which isn't such an exaggeration, Brad thinks; Adam ate before their phone call last night, but his dinner consisted of a single sandwich and a scoop of cottage cheese. Airsickness and Adam are old, old frenemies.
Together they nibble their way down to bones and crumbs, and after Brad clears their plates into the dustbin he pulls a container out of the freezer. Adam takes one look at the name and gapes.
"Brad, no, you can't afford tha-"
Brad turns around, container in hand, and gives Adam a Look-he has no interest in listening to Adam go on about his financial situation-and Adam quietens immediately.
"I got dessert."
Adam nibbles at the bowl of ice cream and flavoured vodka Brad sets in front of him-one of the good brands, a fruit ice cream with actual citrus pieces mixed in-but he doesn't make any real headway, and finally Brad sets his spoon down in his own bowl.
"Do you want to talk here or on the couch?"
Adam looks down at his ice cream. "Couch, I guess," he says, and then takes a huge bite-almost like he's doing it just to spite what's left on his spoon-before standing up. Brad follows suit, tucking his hand through Adam's arm like they're walking a lush red carpet surrounded by photographers instead of a worn-to-gray one with no audience but a cat sitting on Brad's outside windowsill. Brad sits with him on the sofa, thinking in a far-off, startled way of the first time he came to Adam's bed, the way the two of them sat down holding hands before Adam told him not to be afraid and pulled him close.
This isn't quite the same thing as Brad's fumbly, embarrassed admission that he somehow reached twenty-one-and-a-half-plus-change without ever needing a condom, but he remembers that moment on Adam's futon and the way his heart beat so hard he thought he might be on the verge of blacking out, the way words wouldn't form properly in his mouth when Adam reminded him, quiet, sweet, that he could always say stop, and if Adam knows where this conversation is going-and he must, he hinted as much before he ever left for New York-Brad thinks he must feel the same way, or close to it.
"You know you have an out if you need it, right?" he asks. Adam lets out a short bark of laughter.
"Isn't this a conversation we should've had a week ago?"
"You weren't ready to have it a week ago," Brad supplies. "In case you forgot, a week ago you were pretty much racing to get out of my apartment." He squeezes Adam's hands. "So let me point this out again. You have an out if you need it."
"You say that like there's something to get out of."
Brad takes a deep breath. "Listen," he says. "Yes, you're right. A whole lot of people would say I should have laid this all out for you a week ago. But if I'd done that, let's face it, Adam-you wouldn't have asked for the help when you needed it."
"Who says I needed it?"
Brad pulls his necklace out of his shirt.
Adam's eyes widen. Then he sort of huffs-but he drops his eyes down to his lap as he does it, and Brad strokes the backs of Adam's hands with his thumbs.
"I didn't start this so I could scare you," he says. "I did it to help you. The best I knew how."
"I can't call you Sir," Adam blurts out. "I'm sick enough of having to do it to a bunch of suits, I can't do it anymore."
"I wouldn't ask you to." Brad lets go of Adam's hand-just one-and reaches out to stroke his hair. "What I want-if you'll let me-is to give you a safe space. No sirs, no cameras, no legalese." He pauses and considers. "No bullshit."
"No such thing." Adam sounds a level of bitter that twists something deep in Brad's heart. Brad bites his tongue.
"You know, sweetheart, I really hope you don't believe that." He slides his hand out of Adam's hair and under his chin, forces Adam to look at him. "Because I have never. Ever. Bullshitted you." He pauses. "Except that one time about whether or not you should dye your hair pink, but I didn't think you'd actually do it."
Adam's lips quirk. Brad continues, heartened. "You're right about there being a lot of it out there. But it's not everywhere. And it doesn't have to be. Even when we weren't doing so hot together, we were real."
"I have one question."
Brad looks at him expectantly. Adam meets his eyes with a new steel behind his gaze. "This time last year, you told me you thought we were better off staying friends and not taking a second chance because we could never succeed as individuals if we kept-I think 'leeching off each other' were your exact words." Brad can’t help a wince as his own words get echoed back to him. "So what happened? What makes you think we can do it now when you were so sure we couldn't before?"
"I think . . . " Brad trails off and stares up at the ceiling. Adam makes a sound like he's about to start the tide of questions again, and Brad hushes him with a finger against the lips. "I'm not ignoring you. I'm trying to think how I want to put this."
"Honestly would be a good start," Adam says, and Brad bites back a reprimand. Adam isn't being catty; he's being serious.
"The plain way to put it is, Idol happened," he answers, lowering his head to meet Adam's eyes again. "I know how that sounds when you put it that way, but that's not what I mean. What I mean is I watched you fulfil yourself and become this really strong, really independent person I don't think you knew how to be before. Sure, you had Drake around, but you weren't doing-what we used to do, what I called leeching, I didn't see any of that and I didn't hear it when you called, even when you guys weren't doing so hot. That's the dangerous thing, you know-going back to that. But I think if we're careful, if we make sure we're talking-not just throwing words at each other about our feelings that neither one of us actually hears, I mean really talking-things could be different. You scared me, in New York. But then I realised I wasn't giving you enough credit. It'll take hard work not to go back to the way we were, but I think . . . I think you've grown in ways where you know enough now to know you can sit or you can stand, but you have to take responsibility for the consequences either way. And having a little balance in your life right now can't exactly hurt you."
"That's what I said twelve months ago," Adam retorts. Brad shakes his head.
"You said it, but you didn't really believe it yet. You know what I started noticing, right around Top Six or so? When it started getting really obvious you were going to get signed whether you won or not? You stopped being angry all the time. When I came to the mansion to see you, or when we went out to lunch, you were actually excited with all these really specific plans and ideas instead of this vague dream you didn't know how to start on. It was like watching you be born, and you didn't even know it was happening. I think, and I could be wrong but I don't think so, I think that's what you needed before you could even think about having a good relationship again. You needed to come into yourself, and when you put yourself out there and got on Idol and made something of yourself, that happened." He touches Adam's cheek. "It was like all these years we'd been living with this Adam in a shell we didn't entirely know was there. And then the shell split open and the real Adam stepped out."
"I think you're thinking of cocoons," Adam protests. Brad rolls his eyes.
"You know what I meant," Brad tells him. "What I was getting at is that what happened to you on that shitty little soundstage was really kind of seriously amazing. But when something is born, you have to protect it, no matter how hardy it looks like it is on its own or how independent it can be. Even baby tigers need help learning to hunt." He squeezes Adam's hand. "You did that for me when I came to LA for the first time, when we met. It went wrong near the end, but baby, we fucking blazed." He lowers his other hand, does his best to cover Adam's with his own. "I want to do that for you. And I want you to not have to be afraid."
"You want-" Brad watches Adam swallow around a few words. "You want to be my Dom. For real. Not playing."
"I think it could be good for you to have one," Brad says. "I mean, if we're holding elections here or something, I'm not exactly the most qualified candidate. But I'd do my best. And I wouldn't sell you out."
"I know," Adam murmurs. Then his lips quirk again. "Anybody offered you a million yet?"
"Yes," Brad confesses. "I told him if he'd give me thirty percent up front I'd sell him our pictures from our orgy with Leonardo DiCaprio and Elvis Presley in Aruba. And the ones where you turned into a werecat for half."
Adam practically howls laughter, snorting through his nose and dying down to helpless little gasps when he can't stop long enough to breathe. Brad smiles at him, and finally Adam winds down enough to rest his forehead against Brad's.
"You want me to give this stuff up," he says, and his voice is quiet. "So you can protect me. But who's protecting you?"
"I don't know what you mean."
Adam brushes a finger over the mole by Brad's lips, traces it down to tug at a repaired button on his shirt, and tucks it into a belt Brad didn't need when he bought these jeans. "You need a doctor. And the last time I told you that, it turned into a screaming match."
"Adam, this isn't about me, it's about you," Brad protests, and Adam points at him.
"That's my point. How am I supposed to trust you with my life if I can't trust you with your life?"
"I'm a starving artist. Minor health problems go with the territory. And don't tell me you'll pay my way, you know how I feel about that." Brad sets his mouth and tries to look as stern as he can while staring up Adam's neck, wondering all the time whose brilliant idea it was to make adults come in fun-size.
"So let me help you," Adam says. "I won't try to pay your way. Just give you a hand with the stuff that really matters."
"Are we talking about me helping you, or you helping me, here?" Brad tries to look stern. He has the impression he's failing horribly.
"Both," Adam tells him. "You want to help me-okay." Brad watches him take a deep breath, one that looks like it goes all the way down to his toes. "I can try to do that. But you have to try too. This isn't an either-or proposition, Brad, it's a two-way street or nothing. Unless everything you just said is a way for you to feel good about yourself without actually changing anything, you should know that."
Brad thinks about the ice cream he couldn't afford, melting into a light vodka froth on the kitchen table. He thinks about the monthly juggling act-how low can he push his gas tank so he can afford groceries, and how many grocery sales can he find so he can keep his electricity on until the iTunes cheque comes in?-and the mole on his face, the physical he's been putting off for three years, the stack of emergency ramen in his pantry.
He looks at the T-shirt Adam is wearing, one that fits his body and didn't need any creative tailoring to hide old tears or dropped hemlines, and he thinks that already Adam's forgotten the little inconveniences-shopping in Juniors instead of Men's because of tailoring costs, hanging out at the bar trying to look cute enough to earn a drink when the spare money drops to zero, cutting the bad spots out of the apples-are just that, little.
And then he thinks about Adam sitting on the toilet lid, eyes swollen and face streaked with dark makeup ghosts, and about how even with cut-rate cold cream it took longer for Brad's shower to heat up than it did to take off layer after layer of designer, made-to-last foundation and mascara. He thinks about how in a perfect world he would have taken Adam into the shower himself, stroked his face and scrubbed the product out of his hair and washed his back and still had time to get out, throw a towel around his head, and go heat up food, because in that world Adam would not be trying to bolt out before the water went from lukewarm back to cold again.
He thinks about what would happen to Adam if he, Brad, ended up sick and unable to fulfil his part, and raises his eyes back to Adam's face.
"I can get my clothes and bills," he says. "If you want to help me so badly, you can bring me fruit and replace my damned picture frame."
"I was going to do that anyway," Adam protests. Brad pins him with a Look-a Dom's look, one he's now entitled to give. Adam grins. Brad keeps the look turned on as high as he can, and eventually Adam drops his eyes.
"Okay," he says, and then glances back up at Brad's face. "You're gonna tell me I can't get it actually matted and framed right, aren't you?"
Brad makes an evil face at him. "Fine. But only for that one, Adam. If I come home and find a bunch of professional frames in my hovel I'm going to flip you over my knee and tan your ass."
Adam mutters something that might be "like to see you try." Brad lets it slide; he can do plenty more than 'try' if and when the time comes. Instead he takes Adam's face in his hands.
"Are we doing this, then?" he asks. "You're agreeing to be my sub, at least until . . . what kind of trial period are we putting on this?"
Adam bites at his lip. Brad has time to think it's something he never sees Adam do, and then a blush-Brad would swear that was a blush-spreads quickly across Adam's nose before fading again.
"One day at a time?" he asks. "I mean, if I change my mind-one way or the other-I'd let you know."
"You can't stay in limbo forever, baby," Brad points out. Adam shrugs a single shoulder.
"I wouldn't want to," he answers. "But who knows where I'm going to be tomorrow, or next week, or next month? It isn't really that helpful to say 'let's try it for a month' if I end up being gone for 28 days."
It's a point Brad has to concede. And so he lets his hands slip from Adam's face, down to rest on his shoulders, fingers lacing behind his neck.
"One day at a time," he agrees. "Now that we've established that, I'm also going to order you to pay for that ice cream you left on my kitchen table. My brand-new kitchen table, Adam," he scolds. "You know that's going to leave a ring."
Adam laughs and leans their foreheads together again. As his laughter dies down, their eyes meet . . . and catch.
And then he leans forward and whispers something in Brad's ear: three syllables in a string. Brad nods.
They're not "I love you," but they mean about the same.
Title: So Hard To Do
Author: Ninalyn/technicolornina
Fandom: Adam Lambert
Pairing/Characters: Adam/Brad, Tommy
Word Count: 10 042
Spoilers: Nope, it's futurefic/AU.
Story Rating: PG-13
Story Summary: Someone has to take care of the things Adam can't, before it all comes tumbling down.
Disclaimer: If you think any of this happened, I have a unicorn going cheap. (By contrast, if you have proof it happened, I want the motherfucking videotape.) Standard disclaimer about "if you're in it, please don't read it!" goes here.
Notes: Prequel to Own Your Heart, and the first (chronological) story in the Pain is So Close To Pleasure series.
Feedback: I really do appreciate it when I get it, so if you care to make an author happy, please do.
Special Thanks/Dedications: For my two wonderful, patient, lovely betas, choose2live and the_minx_17. ♥
I just want to be with you
'Cause living is so hard to do
When all I know is trapped inside your eyes
The future I cannot forget
This aching heart aint broken yet . . .
"Time For Miracles," Adam Lambert
It all starts with that damned kiss.
Brad is watching on a stream-to hell with all that waiting three hours stuff-and when he sees it, he sucks in a sharp breath and reaches for his phone to shoot Adam a text. They've been sort of talking again, but Brad can let go of "sort of" for a night after the shitstorm he already knows is coming.
Adam’s not long in showing up at his door, close to a full-on red rage and swearing as soon as Brad lets him in. Brad all but shoves him inside and shuts the door.
"Those fuckers!" Adam yells, and Brad winces as his coffee table takes a direct hit from Adam's foot; the table is a solid oak slab he picked up at a flea market and doesn't so much as budge, but Adam's going to feel that kick tomorrow. "Someone backstage called me a fucking pedophile, Brad, those assholes-" And the foot swings again, this time into the sofa. Brad simply stands quietly in the kitchen doorway. He learned a long time ago that even Adam's most violent outbursts never get physically directed at people he could actually hurt. Brad is safe, and what little he owns that Adam can lay hands on to destroy is expendable.
But then Adam kicks the rickety little table with the picture of Brad and his parents on it, the only one he has with his mom and his birth father, and when the whole thing tips over and the frame shatters on the floor, Brad is the one raising his voice. "Adam, stop that!"
Adam, for a wonder, stops. It occurs to Brad, briefly, that Adam looks like a toddler caught in a tantrum, and as Brad moves to rescue the picture from among the glass Adam becomes Adam again-angry and restless and ready to lash out, but no longer an uncontrolled animal actively seeking to hurt whatever he can reach. Brad picks the picture out of the glass and muffles a curse, switching the print from one hand to the other before he can bleed on it. Adam takes the picture.
"Shit," he says, and reaches for Brad's other hand. "Fuck. Shit, Brad, I'm sorry." He squeezes Brad's finger. Brad hisses as a bead of blood wells up, but doesn't pull away. He doesn't think there's any glass still in there, but it doesn't hurt to give it an outlet. Adam sets the print carefully down on the coffee table to tend to Brad's finger, first brushing away the blood and crumbs of glass and then raising the cut to his lips. Brad lets him kiss it before looking past him at the darkened television and asking the question he really shouldn't.
"Why did you do it?"
Adam tenses. "Don't fucking start with me," he answers, and drops Brad's hand. Brad is sure he can feel whatever tentative thing they've built back up between them disappearing, shattering like the picture frame at his feet, and suddenly finds himself praying to a god he no longer strictly believes in that Adam won't just walk out. If it ends, it ends, and Brad can make himself be okay with that; he can't make himself be okay with it ending like this.
"I was only asking."
"You were only asking," Adam mocks, and Brad bites his tongue. "You were only asking. Just like every single person backstage. And the producers. And Lane, and you know what, Brad, this isn't a bump in the road, this is the fucking end of the road, do you know how many interviews I got cancelled tonight? It's fucking over, I fucking killed it, ten years I worked for this shit and I got excited and fucking blew it all!" Adam's voice rises an octave, and the cup Brad was drinking his evening tea out of turns into a lesson in abstract art on the far wall. "Over some guy I barely even fucking know who, guess what I found out tonight, he's fucking straight!"
And there's the trouble, Brad realises, with a gasp he's quick to cover. Adam's been hesitating to call what they're doing "dates" because he's been nursing a crush on the little rocker boy he picked up to play bass. But by now Adam is off to the races again, this time about assholes who think he'd be better off dying in a gutter than getting his deviant all over a bunch of little kids who probably weren't even watching (and Brad would roll his eyes at Adam's theatrics except he kind of agrees), crunching picture-frame glass and raising his voice enough Brad hears a warning thump from the wall he shares with a neighbour, and that's when he realises Adam never said all his interviews were cancelled. Just some of them, just a lot. And that's why he raises his own voice again, not just saying Adam's name but declaring it, telling him to sit down and shut up before they both have a stroke or something. Adam stops, shocked.
"Did you go deaf listening to that shit I put on TV, or something? I said-"
"I heard what you said," Brad interrupts. His patience is gone. "And I sure hope you heard me, Adam, because I love you but that does not give you the right to bust the hell out of my apartment. And I really, really don't want to tell you to get the fuck out because I don't like having those kinds of barriers between us, but if you keep screaming and waking up my neighbours and throwing my glasses, I will."
Adam stares. His mouth trembles. Brad nods at the sofa. "Sit."
Adam sits. He looks down at the laces of his boots, like he's not sure if he should take them off, and Brad feels a tiny cut in his heart to match the one on his hand. "Leave them on until I sweep this up," he says. "You'll get glass in your feet."
Adam nods. Brad goes for the broom and dustpan, and when he comes back he looks at Adam clenching and unclenching his fists on the sofa and puts a hand on his hip. "Adam Lambert, you stop that. Take some deep breaths or something."
He hears Adam do as he suggests while he gets to his knees with the whisk broom and sweeps up what's left of the frame-note to self, he thinks, never get those cheap-ass plastic frames ever again-before running a damp paper towel over the floor and moving on to repeat the process with the coffee cup. He dumps the shards in the dustbin and returns to Adam's side with a pair of fresh cups out of the kettle on his stove. "Should we start over and try that again? Or is there really absolutely nothing you can do to fix what happened?"
Adam sits, silent. Brad nudges his cup, and Adam drinks. It's nothing fancy-Brad can't afford any really good chamomile until he gets another paycheque-but it's something. Adam looks down at him as he sets down his cup, and Brad feels his heart ache; the fear on Adam's face doesn't belong.
"I'm on the ABC blackout list," Adam whispers, and Brad watches his shoulders hunch in and actually shake. "They told me tonight Good Morning America is off."
"And?"
"And, I-shit, Brad-" Adam covers his face with his hands. Brad pulls them away, suddenly scared. Adam looks away.
"Adam, look at me," Brad pleads, and when Adam drags his face around, the expression in his eyes a clear why are you making me do this? a pair of unconscious thoughts click together in Brad's head and make a cohesive whole. Oh. Oh.
So that's it, he realises. Not a straight boy Adam was nursing a crush on, a straight boy who likes to look like a fragile little flower when in reality he could probably beat Adam senseless, although on the surface it might look like that. That's not it at all. If somebody handed Adam a whip and a blindfold and a ready and willing Tommy right now, Brad thinks, Adam wouldn't be able to put them together in the intended combination-or, if he did, wouldn't get from it what he once did.
And so he pushes Adam's cup further back on the table, looses the laces on Adam's boots, slides them off and pulls Adam into his arms, where Brad rocks him like a small child. Adam's whole body locks up, rigid, unyielding, and then his head falls on Brad's shoulder and he lets out a loud, braying sob. Brad rubs his back, tiny soothing circles as Adam cries into Brad's neck so hard Brad's body shakes, the kind of deep, heartbroken bawling that's going to end with Brad giving him water and ibuprofen to soothe his head and stomach when this is all over. Brad turns his head and kisses Adam's forehead. Adam's breath hitches, and Brad pulls his hand away to give Adam space to breathe.
"Brad, I can't-I can't-"
Brad suddenly feels like he's carrying something very old and fragile through a room full of loose marbles just waiting to make him trip and fall. He's suddenly aware that Adam's entire career might hang on what he says next and how quickly he says it. And so he puts a hand between Adam's shoulders again and speaks with a confidence he doesn't feel, letting the script of this old dance take over. "Yes, you can."
Adam shakes his head so violently he knocks Brad's head to the side, and Brad moves his hand to Adam's head before they both end up with bruises. He considers contradicting Adam, or asking why he thinks he can't-he, Adam, the most emotionally-comfortable person Brad knows-and then thinks about Adam fleeing from the afterparties and It People who could, maybe, have dug him a little out of the hole he's in, thinks about Adam coming here instead. And so he tilts his mouth very close to Adam's ear, and whispers: "My apartment's in the back of the building, Adam. Nobody can see. It's just us."
That's when Adam breaks, sliding down Brad's body and practically oozing into the places where they don't meet, burrowing into Brad's side as he cries-no, not cries, Brad is pretty sure nobody's invented a word for what Adam's doing. It's not pretty; his face turns red in patches through his expensive new makeup and his eyeliner only washes mostly away in the flood of tears running down his face, leaving ghostly dark lines tracked through his concealer, mascara and gloss and tears and spit smeared on Brad's tee-shirt where Adam is clinging and mumbling half-coherencies about what he fears could happen to him, how he let everyone down, didn't think and let everything go to hell.
Brad strokes his hair and stays silent, hoping he's doing the right thing and praying it's close enough to put Adam back together. Eventually Adam lets out a big snuffle and wipes his hand across his eyes, smearing what's left of his eyeliner across his face.
"I'm sorry."
"Don't be sorry," Brad answers, still rocking Adam even though his shirt is soaked through and starting to get a little sticky from the mix of makeup that's probably rendered it unwearable. Adam is sluggish, and Brad knows what he wants to say next is way overstepping his bounds, but maybe, maybe-
Maybe it's not about bounds. Maybe it's about making sure Adam has what he needs. And so he uses a corner of his shirt to dab carefully at Adam's eyes as he speaks. "Thank you for sharing with me." And then, because Adam still looks doubtful: "I want you to stay here tonight."
Adam pulls away. Brad sits up. His right hand is kind of numb, and it occurs to him trapping his hand between himself and Adam's deadweight wasn't the smartest idea he's ever had. Adam looks away from him, and Brad reaches out a single hand to touch his face. Adam turns back with absolutely no pressure at all. Brad thinks about Adam's week, interviews and cleanses and a workout routine that would make Jillian Michaels cry, stress and stress and stress, and thinks about the week ahead of him still to come.
Adam hasn't destroyed himself, not yet. But if someone doesn't get in between him and everything pressing down on him, he will.
And so Brad lays his hand against Adam's cheek, lets him feel the pressure there, waits until Adam meets his eyes before speaking. "Please, Adam. Let me help you."
Adam looks away again. Brad stands up and pulls Adam to his feet. "Come on. Don't shut me out. Let's just get this week under control for now, okay?"
"It's never going to be under control."
"Yes, it is," Brad tells him. "Right now I want you to eat and shower and then get some sleep and we can talk about it tomorrow."
"I don't want to talk about it." Adam looks at the floor. Contrary to everything, Brad feels encouraged; if Adam can be pissy enough to rebel, he can be spirited enough to put the pieces back together. Brad tips Adam's chin back up with his fingers.
"Tomorrow," Brad answers. "Come with me."
Adam glowers, but lets himself be led to Brad's bathroom, where Brad turns on the shower before sitting Adam on the toilet lid and pulling out some cold cream to get rid of the makeup Adam's tears left behind. He tosses used makeup pads in the trash one at a time, stroking Adam's skin lightly and trying to be especially gentle around his swollen eyes. Then he sticks his hand back under the shower spray.
"It's warm now," he declares. "Get a shower. I'll heat up some soup for you."
He heats the soup, and then, when he hears the shower crank up to its sorry excuse for full blast, creeps to the living room and pulls Adam's phone out of his jacket. By the time Adam appears fifteen minutes later wrapped in the robe Brad keeps on the back of his bathroom door for guests and with his hair down in his face, the phone is back in his jacket and the list of interviews Lane gave to Brad is hidden carefully on the fridge behind a peanut butter coupon.
Adam sips unenthusiastically at the soup Brad sets before him, which is genuinely no fault of Brad's; his vegetable soup was a favourite of Adam's before they broke up. Brad sits with him quietly and drinks his now-cold tea without comment. Eventually Adam's spoon scrapes the bottom of the bowl, and when he sets it down Brad puts the bowl in the sink before taking Adam's hands and leading him out of the kitchen and down the teeny little hallway into his bedroom, untying the robe, pushing it down, pulling back the covers and indicating to Adam that he should slide beneath. Adam hesitates.
"I don't want to kick you out of your bed."
"I'll fit," Brad says, and sits down to take off his socks before Adam can argue. It's a double and they'll be a close fit, but Brad's okay with that. Adam, from the sound of his breathing when Brad strips down and snuggles in behind him, isn't.
"Relax," Brad tells him. "Sleep."
"This is really playing with fire," Adam answers, and the baldness of the comment-just the facts, pure flat admission and fear-makes Brad feel the need to pull Adam closer, spoon around him and curl his arms around Adam's head and chest.
"Smart people know you can do a lot with fire without getting burned," Brad answers. "So be smart and take it for what it is, and let the rest take care of itself."
Adam shifts, and turns, and does all of the million things that make sleeping with him in a double bed a small taste of hell. Brad waits him out, stroking his hair and shoulders until he settles down and his breathing lengthens, and then he lets his own eyes close, and sleeps alongside.
---------------------
"Adam."
Adam mumbles and snuggles into Brad's pillow. Brad strokes his hair and brings the cup of coffee closer to Adam's face-not close enough for accidents, just close enough to smell. "Adam. Baby. It's seven-thirty. You've got a plane at one."
Adam lets out a confused-sounding "Drake?" and Brad tries not to get angry all over again. Some people, he reminds himself, can deal with the spotlight. Some can't. It's just a personality thing.
"No, baby, Brad," he corrects. "You stayed with me last night, remember?"
Adam sits up and lets out a sleepy, confused snuffle. Then he blinks. "Brad?"
"Mm-hmm. Here," he says, and hands Adam the coffee. Adam smells, then sips. Brad rubs his back. Adam jumps and pulls away, either just noticing that he's naked or that Brad is clothed.
"I-should get going," Adam mumbles. Brad checks the level of coffee in the cup, then plunks on the bed.
"No can do, sugar, your clothes are in the wash. I checked the tags," he adds helpfully. "The jacket's in the living room. But nothing screams 'walk of shame' like driving home in the same clothes you wore to last night's awards party, and the only stuff I had of yours was in my hamper."
Adam looks panicked. Brad picks the borrowed robe off the chair by his bed and offers it. Adam slinks into it and ties it tightly. Brad hears the toaster.
"Want breakfast?" he asks, and when Adam shakes his head Brad frowns. "Adam, that was a rhetorical question. You know what kind of stuff they feed you on planes these days. If they feed you."
Adam doesn't respond. Brad puts his hands on his hips. "Adam."
"Don't pull this shit on me," Adam says. Brad watches his hands curl into fists. "Just-don't. Not today. I don't need the fucking lecture." And he turns to stomp past Brad, only to find himself back on the bed with Brad's knee on his chest.
"I don't give a damn if you want it," Brad tells him. "Whether you think you do or not, you need it. And we can do this over breakfast or we can do it here, but I promise you, Adam, if you make me do this imitating a flamingo you will not like me later."
Adam's mouth falls open. Brad tries not to start laughing at the look on his face . . . almost succeeds . . . fails. Adam finally grins back. Brad rolls to his side, wraps his arms around Adam's waist.
"Really," he murmurs into Adam's ear. "Please. Let's talk."
Adam rolls away restlessly, the moment broken. "There's nothing to talk about. Lane's gonna kill me if I miss my plane."
"You won't miss your plane if you have breakfast. I'll help you pack. If you're not already. You already are, aren't you? Pre-packing freak of nature, that's what you are," Brad accuses. Adam giggles. Then the smile crashes off his face, like he's realised it means he has no excuse not to stay and eat. Brad reaches over onto the nightstand, scrabbles, finds a necklace he wore out to some club a few nights ago, drapes the cord around Adam's neck.
"When you're ready to talk-"
"Give it back to you," Adam interrupts. "I know how this works. I hope you weren't too attached to this thing."
"You'll give it back," Brad announces. Adam rolls his eyes as the buzzer to the dryer goes off, and darts out of the bedroom and off to the utility closet.
Brad follows quickly, but Adam's already pulling on an old T-shirt by the time Brad gets to him. Brad lets him get into a pair of jeans before clamping his arms around Adam's shoulders, pulling himself onto his tiptoes, and kissing Adam's cheek.
"I want you to know I'm on your side," he whispers into Adam's ear. "I don't want to watch you go down in flames. I want to watch you fly. And I want to do whatever I can to help you get there, if you'll let me."
There's a long pause. If Adam pushes past him and leaves the apartment, they're most likely through, and no amount of trying to explain will put them back together again. Brad waits, hands on Adam's arms, wondering if Adam can feel the heavy beat of his heart slamming away inside his chest.
Then Adam's arms curl slowly around him, and Adam buries his face in Brad's hair.
"I'm scared," Adam whispers, and Brad strokes his back in the sweet spot between his shoulderblades.
"I know," he murmurs back. "But I'll help you get through this. Somehow. You're going to bounce back and next thing you know you'll be one of those living-legend people." He puts his hands on Adam's shoulders. "Get dressed. Breakfast."
Adam nods.
-----------
It's two days later when Brad gets woken up at six in the morning by the dying-mosquito buzz of his doorbell. He throws on one of Adam's T-shirts, grumbling, and goes still half-asleep to the door. He signs for his package, and he's on the verge of tossing it on the table to deal with later when he sees the return address: New York, New York, no name.
And so he tears the open-strip-because who knows, maybe it's a Jake Gyllenhaal script, and even if it's not, he can always hope that if he keeps opening strange nameless packages sooner or later it'll turn out to be one-and his necklace falls out on the table.
At first he just blinks at it, wondering why he got his own necklace in the mail. Then he remembers why it's been not in his apartment for the last two days, and grabs his cell phone.
Adam's voicemail picks up, but it's so cool and professional-so far removed from the All tied up, I can't come to the phone that Brad remembers-that at first he almost hangs up, thinking he's got the wrong number. Then he hears Adam's name and realises he has no idea who listens to Adam's messages anymore.
"Hi, baby," he says, and then draws a momentary blank before his eye lights on the envelope again. "It's Brad. I just wanted to let you know I got your package." And then, because he still has no way of knowing who has Adam's voicemail password and wants to make sure the point is clear: "That was so sweet, thinking of me like that." Just the wee, barest touch of a simper, in case somebody listening wants to know what kind of mysterious packages Adam's been sending-let them believe it's some silly wish-you-were-here love-trinket, Brad thinks. "Give me a call when you have a minute, okay? I miss you." He makes a kissing noise into the phone. "Don't work too hard," he says, and to anybody who isn't Adam it'll sound like a joke, but Adam-who knows Brad's every tone and turn of phrase-will know better, Brad thinks. Adam will recognise Brad's very real concern.
He makes coffee and sits down to a script, pretty sure his phone will ring before long anyway, and he's half-right: his phone stays silent, but the little chime telling him he's getting a Skype call goes off, and when he answers it, a poshy-posh hotel room with an exhausted-looking Adam in it is on the other end.
"Hi, baby," he greets. Adam blinks at the screen and mumbles a hello. Brad tilts his head. "You okay?"
Adam hesitates. Then he shakes his head. "I didn't sleep last night. I tried, but I'm . . . " He trails off and shrugs. Brad considers.
"Wired?"
"Yeah," Adam agrees. "Good word. Wired."
"Have you eaten yet today?" Brad asks, and when Adam directs a shifty glance offscreen Brad folds his arms. "Adam . . . "
"I . . . no," Adam admits. "But I didn't have time for breakfast, really, I just grabbed a cup of coffee and-"
"So you didn't sleep at all, but you also didn't have time for breakfast," Brad interrupts. "Do they have room service there? Wait, that's a stupid question. What do they have for room service?"
"Uh-"
"You didn't look," Brad fills in. It's not really an interruption; the look on Adam's face tells Brad there really isn't anything to go beyond the 'uh'. "Let me see the card. Or, you know, book, or whatever." He settles into a waiting position. Adam makes a face.
Brad holds up the necklace and watches Adam's shoulders slump as he reaches for the hotel room service book. Brad scans the menu and thinks.
"How long do you have before you get spirited off again?" he asks. Adam checks the time on his phone.
"In theory I'm free until one-thirty-New York time, I mean-but Lane wanted to go over-"
As if the name is a cue, someone unleashes a series of hard, unfriendly rap-rap-raps on Adam's door. Adam closes his eyes. Brad is pretty sure he can see him grinding his teeth.
"Can I have just one hour alone, please!" Adam yells at the door, and there's a muffled reply Brad can't hear.
"Tell her you're napping," Brad suggests. "Naps always work."
"She's gone already," Adam tells him. "Probably not for long, but I can hope." He sighs and buries his head in his hands. "She's not a bad person. I just . . . everybody wants a piece of me and I'm starting to wonder when I get to claim a piece for myself."
"I don't want a piece of you," Brad says. "Not the way you're talking about, anyway."
"I know," Adam answers, so immediately Brad's ready to protest before Adam rides right over him. "I've known that since our pictures leaked. You know, no matter what happened later because of that-I'm kind of glad it did, in a way." He looks back up at his webcam. "Because it's good to know there's somebody you can trust."
Brad tangles his fingers in the chain of the necklace, out of frame where Adam can't see. "You went to an awful lot of trouble to get this back to me right away," he says, and lets the chain dangle from his fingers. Adam nods again. Brad raises his eyebrows. Adam shifts in his chair.
"Well?"
Adam shifts again, but this time, Brad thinks, he's not dodging-he's thinking, waging an internal war with himself before he gives in. Brad just waits.
"I," Adam says, and stops. Brad bites his tongue to keep from filling the silence. "I . . . shit. I don't know how to do this," Adam admits, and Brad wishes-wishes-wishes they were in the same room because what he wants more than anything is to pull Adam into his arms and cover his face with kisses for coming to terms with one of his biggest stumbling blocks. Instead he says "thank you for telling me, baby" and waits for Adam to continue.
"I'm scared," Adam confesses, and he pushes his face through his hands like a little kid playing peekaboo. "I mean, I'm not sorry I'm me, but . . . Kris could do some kind of really dumb shit, and apologise for it, and two days later nobody would care. But I do dumb shit, people keep going on about it like I've never done anything else, and I'm scared I'm going to fuck up by saying the wrong thing at the wrong time trying to do damage control and it's just going to snowball, instead."
What Brad wants to say is Adam, get your head out of your ass, when you're in the zone you could sell deep-freezes to Eskimos, stop the pity-party. What he lets himself say is "Do you think you're going to do something like that?"
Adam shrugs with an effort so great it looks like he's trying to raise a fifty-pound iron bar with nothing but his shoulders. Brad watches his face and stays quiet. Just when he thinks he's going to have to say something-he has to, if he doesn't the silence is going to end the conversation for him-Adam speaks up again. "I want to say no," he answers. "But how the fuck do I know? I'm going into my third day on two hours of sleep, it doesn't take a whole lot to just, you know . . . . " He waves his hands in circles.
"Stumble?" Brad suggests. Adam frowns at the word. Brad considers. "Break loose?"
"Not exactly. But closer," Adam agrees. "Yeah. Like a retaining wall. Hit it in the wrong place and all kinds of shit spills out. And, you know, I can talk to a couple of people and know I'm not going to end up plastered all over the front of the National Enquirer, but all it'd take is one wrong word to one wrong deejay and it'll all be over."
"So let me make sure I've got this straight," Brad says. "You haven't slept, you haven't eaten, and because you're running on empty you're afraid you're going to make a mistake while you're trying to fix what happened before."
Adam nods. Brad laces his fingers together under his chin and thinks. One conclusion he quickly comes to is that Adam knows. He may not like it, but he knows what he needs, or he wouldn't sit so quietly while Brad sorts through the information Adam provided him.
"Can you trust me to help you get through the week?" he asks at last. Adam hesitates. "We can talk more about this when you come back to LA, but I think it needs to be face-to-face. And right now you need somebody to . . . " He almost says take care of you. Then he reconsiders. Adam can take pretty good care of himself when he's got a schedule and his own little quirks and oddities are respected, and that phrase out of Brad's mouth will make him balk even when he knows he's rebelling just for the sake of rebelling. "You need somebody to give you a framework," he supplies at last. "Instead of just running from one appointment to the next."
Adam nods and rubs at his eyes. Brad checks his own clock.
"All right," he announces. "Here's what you're going to do." He ignores Adam's single raised eyebrow. "You're going to call Lane, and you're going to tell her you're very tired, and if she really wants to talk you'll meet with her at one. Then you're going to call room service and tell them you're Adam Lambert in whatever room it is you're in-"
"Come on, that do-you-know-who-I-am bullshit is lame," Adam whines. Brad makes a face.
"I don't care," he throws back. "You're going to be very sweet and very polite, but if you plan on actually getting food when you order it, you had damned well better tell them who you are. You're going to order something out of that 'On the Go' panel on the right-hand side and tell them you'd like it in an hour and a half, if they can do that, please, and then you're going to come back over here and I'll be waiting for you."
Adam doesn't move. Brad gestures with his head and hands. "Do you think I'm making this stuff up for my health or something? Go on, call Lane."
Brad thinks while Adam makes his phone calls. Then he flips on some quiet music. Adam returns to the screen. He still looks tired, Brad thinks, but not half-panicked. Good.
"Okay," Brad greets. Adam hears the music, and Brad watches his shoulders relax. "Thank you, baby."
Adam nods two or three times and reaches over the top of his computer to put the menu away. Brad wishes he could reach out to take Adam's hands. "Let me guess. Now you want me to take a nap."
"Not quite," Brad answers. "But that's coming. First I want you to relax. So close your eyes and do a couple of yoga breaths, and when you're ready I want you to tell me the biggest thing that's got you stressed right now."
He's not waiting long; Adam's barely taken his breaths before he spits out what he said before, a worry about saying the wrong thing to the wrong person at the wrong time. Brad reaches for one of the legal pads he scribbles ideas on and tears off the top two pages to find a clean sheet, then writes it down.
"Good," he says. "Now take a couple of deep breaths and give me another."
One at a time, Adam breathes out his worries: taking care of his mom if the album falls through, what he might end up doing for a job, the fake rivalry Idol keeps trying to set up between him and Kris Allen. Then he takes two deep breaths and shudders.
"Also," he says, "I haven't talked to Tommy except about work since the show, and I know he said it was okay when we ran into each other backstage but . . . "
Brad fights the urge to swear. Of course Adam hasn't talked to Tommy, there hasn't been any time, and of course that's part of the dual crux of the matter. Instead he bites his tongue, writes it down on his pad of paper, and then looks back up at Adam, who opens his eyes and shrugs. "I guess that's all." Then he looks surprised. "That's all?"
"Good," Brad praises, and then-because he wants to lavish praise and reward and can't-he kisses his fingers and holds them up to his cam lens, smiling a little when Adam reaches out for his own screen as though they can actually touch. "Thank you for letting me take this, baby."
Adam nods. Then he yawns. Brad glances down at the six or eight items on his legal pad, then back at Adam.
"So go lie down," he says, "and I'll worry about this for you for now."
Adam nods. Then a faint dusting of pink appears over his nose. "Could you-leave the call open?"
Brad feels a tremor of worry, slight as one of the little temblors he's gotten used to sleeping through. They've come so far from the days when neither of them could get out of bed without being nagged by the other, and the last thing he wants-
"Not like that," Adam cuts into his line of thought as neatly as he did when they were still together. "It's just-I really like whatever it is you're playing, and I don't think it's something I have."
" . . . oh," Brad says at last. He's relieved, sure-but more than that, surprised and a little dismayed at his own forgetfulness. Adam may like to cling, but there's steel buried in the tangled web of traits that make him up, too. "Sure, baby."
Adam's answering smile is tentative and uncertain, but as soon as Brad turns up his volume, it solidifies. Brad closes his eyes as Adam picks up the computer and ferries it to the nightstand by the bed. When he opens them again, all he can see is the edge of the nightstand and part of the bed-Adam's screen is mostly closed. He hears a few shifting sounds-Adam settling in-and then the screen opens again.
"I don't know if I'm going to hear anybody coming to the door," Adam admits. Brad dips his head once.
"I'll wake you."
Adam hesitates, then nods and pulls the screen down again. Brad minimizes his webcam window and goes back to work, listening as Adam's breath evens out and deepens. He considers the items on his legal pad-some of them probably just Adam's habit of worrying about everything, all the time, in typical control-freak manner, but some of them legitimate concerns-and turns them over in his mind, occasionally writing potential solutions on his pad.
He keeps a close eye on the time, and about five minutes before Adam's food is due he sends a pair of Skype messages, putting little binks and bonks out into Adam's consciousness before softly calling his name. There's a rustle of fabric, and Brad calls him again. "Adam. Babydoll."
Adam makes a soft sound, and Brad sees a hand creep into his limited field of vision. The screen opens up on Adam stretching and reaching for something out of frame. Brad watches as Adam puts in some eyedrops.
"Feel better?"
"A little. A lot, actually," Adam agrees. There's a knock on the door, and when he comes back he has a small salad and some fruit. Brad waits until Adam starts to nibble-slow but steadily-and then he talks.
"I did some thinking while you were asleep," he announces. "Also some research. So the first thing I want to tell you is based on your album sales so far and Internet buzz, if you handle this tour right, I don't think you need to worry about finding another job or taking care of your mom. The number one complaint I found on message boards was people saying they have to wait to get a physical copy of the album because it's sold out."
"Sold-out?" Adam pauses with his mouth full of cantaloupe. Brad motions at him, and he shuts his mouth.
"Sold out," Brad agrees. "Complaint number two is that everybody knows you're gay already and your fans would really like someone to ask questions about what's actually on the album, instead of about who you're fucking." He laces his fingers together and eyes Adam's salad until Adam goes back to nibbling on the lettuce. "So really, I think-if you keep on steady and get some good airplay, you're going to be okay for now. I mean, you can't just relax once you've got the new single set and on its way, but 'disaster' isn't really it. One thing's for sure, you definitely got their attention."
He watches the tension in Adam's shoulders melt away and smiles. "So, about this rivalry thing-Kris knows it's a bunch of nonsense, right?"
"I think so. I mean, we don't get to talk a whole lot, but he's never sounded, you know . . . pissy or anything."
"Good," Brad says. "So-worry about that if you want to, but really, I don't think you need to. He never seemed like a shithead when I was at the mansion."
"He's not," Adam agrees, and Brad gives himself major points for not rolling his eyes at Adam's vaguely wistful expression. Some crushes always come with a lingering case of what-might-have-been, that's all, Brad decides. "I think he was more laughing at it than he was upset when we were on tour. He's really sweet."
Brad shrugs a single shoulder: there you go, then. "Then let it go. He went through the same media training you did. A few years from now when there's no way to compare the two of you anymore you can both laugh at it." He reaches out to brush Adam's hair back from his face, stares at his own hand, and drops it back to the table with a little laugh. "Whoops."
Adam grins at him. This time Brad does roll his eyes. "As for Tommy . . . " Adam instantly tenses. Brad waits for him to return to a neutral position before he finishes. "I can't tell you what to do." He could, actually-if this turns out the way he thinks it will, he could-but he won't. "But I can tell you that if I was in your position, what I would do is think out a few different ways that conversation could go. Including the ways where he really was okay with it, and you're worrying about nothing. Then talk to him, and at least you'll know where you stand."
Adam sighs and takes a vengeful bite out of a carrot. "And in the meantime? Before I get back?"
"You mean the next four days?"
"Yeah."
Brad considers carefully. Lane's list of interviews migrated from his coupons to his desk while Adam was sleeping, and he reads it over, thinking through his options. There's being over-cautious, and then there's being an asshole. Abusing Adam's trust might be worse than never having had it at all.
"Call me," he decides at last. "Every night, before you go to bed. If I don't hear from you by midnight-New York time-I'm calling you. If you can't call by midnight-I don't know, if you get dragged to a deejay party or something-text me. I'll wait up for you. But I want to hear from you and make sure you're doing okay."
"I can do that."
"Good." Brad hears a knock on Adam's door-not the same drill-sergeant rap-rap-rap from earlier, but definitely from the same family. "Lane?"
"Lane," Adam agrees. "And I should probably let her in this time."
"All right. Get back to the rockstar business, sugar. Give me a call tonight."
They say their goodbyes and disconnect. Brad stares at the screen.
Then he puts his head down on his arms, exhausted from the early morning and the weight he's just taken on. There are conversations they need to have, lots of them, and about far more than just safewords and Adam's eating habits-much more, if they don't want to crash and burn again. It's going to be up to Brad to lead them, at least until Adam finally starts talking, and he needs a second-just a second-to let his brain catch up and his body rest so he can plan, make this work for them instead of against.
He only means to rest his eyes for a minute or two, but when he opens them again twenty minutes have gone by and his computer desktop has disappeared and turned into an aquarium full of tropical fish, and so he decides he should take his own advice.
Which is why, as Lane wonders what happened to leave Adam so peaceful when only ninety minutes earlier he was ready to tear her throat out for asking if he wanted anything to eat, Brad naps.
------------------
"Oh my god, I smell barbecue. Tell me you made that tonight. Please."
"Last night, but it cooked today," Brad says, as Adam shrugs off his jacket. "It's always better when you let it si-mmmph!"
Adam nips at Brad's lower lip, then pulls back, grinning. "It's good to be home."
"I missed you too," Brad answers, giving himself just a couple of drops of petulant to go with the sincerity. If he starts letting Adam think he's okay with being interrupted by kisses, it's not going to be long before-oh, who the hell is he kidding. He nods toward the kitchen.
"I got a table while you were gone!" he announces. "Fifteen bucks at the flea market, finally. And a couple of chairs. They're ladderbacks, but I threw some cushions on them and they're not bad." He leads Adam into the kitchen. "Well-if you ignore that they don't match. One of them is pretty generic, I can probably find one that matches it in a couple of weeks."
Adam tries to get plates out of the cupboard. Brad shoos him, and after a couple of tries, Adam sits. Brad fills a plate with barbecued ribs and sugar-snap peas and corn bread and hands it to him with a glass of milk-beer has its place at a barbecue, but Brad is still in favour of milk with cornbread-before making up his own plate.
"Welcome to Texas," he says, and plunks down in the other chair. It lets out a warning creak, and Brad rolls his eyes. Seven dollars was probably too much, but his options were limited.
Adam tears into the food like he's starving, which isn't such an exaggeration, Brad thinks; Adam ate before their phone call last night, but his dinner consisted of a single sandwich and a scoop of cottage cheese. Airsickness and Adam are old, old frenemies.
Together they nibble their way down to bones and crumbs, and after Brad clears their plates into the dustbin he pulls a container out of the freezer. Adam takes one look at the name and gapes.
"Brad, no, you can't afford tha-"
Brad turns around, container in hand, and gives Adam a Look-he has no interest in listening to Adam go on about his financial situation-and Adam quietens immediately.
"I got dessert."
Adam nibbles at the bowl of ice cream and flavoured vodka Brad sets in front of him-one of the good brands, a fruit ice cream with actual citrus pieces mixed in-but he doesn't make any real headway, and finally Brad sets his spoon down in his own bowl.
"Do you want to talk here or on the couch?"
Adam looks down at his ice cream. "Couch, I guess," he says, and then takes a huge bite-almost like he's doing it just to spite what's left on his spoon-before standing up. Brad follows suit, tucking his hand through Adam's arm like they're walking a lush red carpet surrounded by photographers instead of a worn-to-gray one with no audience but a cat sitting on Brad's outside windowsill. Brad sits with him on the sofa, thinking in a far-off, startled way of the first time he came to Adam's bed, the way the two of them sat down holding hands before Adam told him not to be afraid and pulled him close.
This isn't quite the same thing as Brad's fumbly, embarrassed admission that he somehow reached twenty-one-and-a-half-plus-change without ever needing a condom, but he remembers that moment on Adam's futon and the way his heart beat so hard he thought he might be on the verge of blacking out, the way words wouldn't form properly in his mouth when Adam reminded him, quiet, sweet, that he could always say stop, and if Adam knows where this conversation is going-and he must, he hinted as much before he ever left for New York-Brad thinks he must feel the same way, or close to it.
"You know you have an out if you need it, right?" he asks. Adam lets out a short bark of laughter.
"Isn't this a conversation we should've had a week ago?"
"You weren't ready to have it a week ago," Brad supplies. "In case you forgot, a week ago you were pretty much racing to get out of my apartment." He squeezes Adam's hands. "So let me point this out again. You have an out if you need it."
"You say that like there's something to get out of."
Brad takes a deep breath. "Listen," he says. "Yes, you're right. A whole lot of people would say I should have laid this all out for you a week ago. But if I'd done that, let's face it, Adam-you wouldn't have asked for the help when you needed it."
"Who says I needed it?"
Brad pulls his necklace out of his shirt.
Adam's eyes widen. Then he sort of huffs-but he drops his eyes down to his lap as he does it, and Brad strokes the backs of Adam's hands with his thumbs.
"I didn't start this so I could scare you," he says. "I did it to help you. The best I knew how."
"I can't call you Sir," Adam blurts out. "I'm sick enough of having to do it to a bunch of suits, I can't do it anymore."
"I wouldn't ask you to." Brad lets go of Adam's hand-just one-and reaches out to stroke his hair. "What I want-if you'll let me-is to give you a safe space. No sirs, no cameras, no legalese." He pauses and considers. "No bullshit."
"No such thing." Adam sounds a level of bitter that twists something deep in Brad's heart. Brad bites his tongue.
"You know, sweetheart, I really hope you don't believe that." He slides his hand out of Adam's hair and under his chin, forces Adam to look at him. "Because I have never. Ever. Bullshitted you." He pauses. "Except that one time about whether or not you should dye your hair pink, but I didn't think you'd actually do it."
Adam's lips quirk. Brad continues, heartened. "You're right about there being a lot of it out there. But it's not everywhere. And it doesn't have to be. Even when we weren't doing so hot together, we were real."
"I have one question."
Brad looks at him expectantly. Adam meets his eyes with a new steel behind his gaze. "This time last year, you told me you thought we were better off staying friends and not taking a second chance because we could never succeed as individuals if we kept-I think 'leeching off each other' were your exact words." Brad can’t help a wince as his own words get echoed back to him. "So what happened? What makes you think we can do it now when you were so sure we couldn't before?"
"I think . . . " Brad trails off and stares up at the ceiling. Adam makes a sound like he's about to start the tide of questions again, and Brad hushes him with a finger against the lips. "I'm not ignoring you. I'm trying to think how I want to put this."
"Honestly would be a good start," Adam says, and Brad bites back a reprimand. Adam isn't being catty; he's being serious.
"The plain way to put it is, Idol happened," he answers, lowering his head to meet Adam's eyes again. "I know how that sounds when you put it that way, but that's not what I mean. What I mean is I watched you fulfil yourself and become this really strong, really independent person I don't think you knew how to be before. Sure, you had Drake around, but you weren't doing-what we used to do, what I called leeching, I didn't see any of that and I didn't hear it when you called, even when you guys weren't doing so hot. That's the dangerous thing, you know-going back to that. But I think if we're careful, if we make sure we're talking-not just throwing words at each other about our feelings that neither one of us actually hears, I mean really talking-things could be different. You scared me, in New York. But then I realised I wasn't giving you enough credit. It'll take hard work not to go back to the way we were, but I think . . . I think you've grown in ways where you know enough now to know you can sit or you can stand, but you have to take responsibility for the consequences either way. And having a little balance in your life right now can't exactly hurt you."
"That's what I said twelve months ago," Adam retorts. Brad shakes his head.
"You said it, but you didn't really believe it yet. You know what I started noticing, right around Top Six or so? When it started getting really obvious you were going to get signed whether you won or not? You stopped being angry all the time. When I came to the mansion to see you, or when we went out to lunch, you were actually excited with all these really specific plans and ideas instead of this vague dream you didn't know how to start on. It was like watching you be born, and you didn't even know it was happening. I think, and I could be wrong but I don't think so, I think that's what you needed before you could even think about having a good relationship again. You needed to come into yourself, and when you put yourself out there and got on Idol and made something of yourself, that happened." He touches Adam's cheek. "It was like all these years we'd been living with this Adam in a shell we didn't entirely know was there. And then the shell split open and the real Adam stepped out."
"I think you're thinking of cocoons," Adam protests. Brad rolls his eyes.
"You know what I meant," Brad tells him. "What I was getting at is that what happened to you on that shitty little soundstage was really kind of seriously amazing. But when something is born, you have to protect it, no matter how hardy it looks like it is on its own or how independent it can be. Even baby tigers need help learning to hunt." He squeezes Adam's hand. "You did that for me when I came to LA for the first time, when we met. It went wrong near the end, but baby, we fucking blazed." He lowers his other hand, does his best to cover Adam's with his own. "I want to do that for you. And I want you to not have to be afraid."
"You want-" Brad watches Adam swallow around a few words. "You want to be my Dom. For real. Not playing."
"I think it could be good for you to have one," Brad says. "I mean, if we're holding elections here or something, I'm not exactly the most qualified candidate. But I'd do my best. And I wouldn't sell you out."
"I know," Adam murmurs. Then his lips quirk again. "Anybody offered you a million yet?"
"Yes," Brad confesses. "I told him if he'd give me thirty percent up front I'd sell him our pictures from our orgy with Leonardo DiCaprio and Elvis Presley in Aruba. And the ones where you turned into a werecat for half."
Adam practically howls laughter, snorting through his nose and dying down to helpless little gasps when he can't stop long enough to breathe. Brad smiles at him, and finally Adam winds down enough to rest his forehead against Brad's.
"You want me to give this stuff up," he says, and his voice is quiet. "So you can protect me. But who's protecting you?"
"I don't know what you mean."
Adam brushes a finger over the mole by Brad's lips, traces it down to tug at a repaired button on his shirt, and tucks it into a belt Brad didn't need when he bought these jeans. "You need a doctor. And the last time I told you that, it turned into a screaming match."
"Adam, this isn't about me, it's about you," Brad protests, and Adam points at him.
"That's my point. How am I supposed to trust you with my life if I can't trust you with your life?"
"I'm a starving artist. Minor health problems go with the territory. And don't tell me you'll pay my way, you know how I feel about that." Brad sets his mouth and tries to look as stern as he can while staring up Adam's neck, wondering all the time whose brilliant idea it was to make adults come in fun-size.
"So let me help you," Adam says. "I won't try to pay your way. Just give you a hand with the stuff that really matters."
"Are we talking about me helping you, or you helping me, here?" Brad tries to look stern. He has the impression he's failing horribly.
"Both," Adam tells him. "You want to help me-okay." Brad watches him take a deep breath, one that looks like it goes all the way down to his toes. "I can try to do that. But you have to try too. This isn't an either-or proposition, Brad, it's a two-way street or nothing. Unless everything you just said is a way for you to feel good about yourself without actually changing anything, you should know that."
Brad thinks about the ice cream he couldn't afford, melting into a light vodka froth on the kitchen table. He thinks about the monthly juggling act-how low can he push his gas tank so he can afford groceries, and how many grocery sales can he find so he can keep his electricity on until the iTunes cheque comes in?-and the mole on his face, the physical he's been putting off for three years, the stack of emergency ramen in his pantry.
He looks at the T-shirt Adam is wearing, one that fits his body and didn't need any creative tailoring to hide old tears or dropped hemlines, and he thinks that already Adam's forgotten the little inconveniences-shopping in Juniors instead of Men's because of tailoring costs, hanging out at the bar trying to look cute enough to earn a drink when the spare money drops to zero, cutting the bad spots out of the apples-are just that, little.
And then he thinks about Adam sitting on the toilet lid, eyes swollen and face streaked with dark makeup ghosts, and about how even with cut-rate cold cream it took longer for Brad's shower to heat up than it did to take off layer after layer of designer, made-to-last foundation and mascara. He thinks about how in a perfect world he would have taken Adam into the shower himself, stroked his face and scrubbed the product out of his hair and washed his back and still had time to get out, throw a towel around his head, and go heat up food, because in that world Adam would not be trying to bolt out before the water went from lukewarm back to cold again.
He thinks about what would happen to Adam if he, Brad, ended up sick and unable to fulfil his part, and raises his eyes back to Adam's face.
"I can get my clothes and bills," he says. "If you want to help me so badly, you can bring me fruit and replace my damned picture frame."
"I was going to do that anyway," Adam protests. Brad pins him with a Look-a Dom's look, one he's now entitled to give. Adam grins. Brad keeps the look turned on as high as he can, and eventually Adam drops his eyes.
"Okay," he says, and then glances back up at Brad's face. "You're gonna tell me I can't get it actually matted and framed right, aren't you?"
Brad makes an evil face at him. "Fine. But only for that one, Adam. If I come home and find a bunch of professional frames in my hovel I'm going to flip you over my knee and tan your ass."
Adam mutters something that might be "like to see you try." Brad lets it slide; he can do plenty more than 'try' if and when the time comes. Instead he takes Adam's face in his hands.
"Are we doing this, then?" he asks. "You're agreeing to be my sub, at least until . . . what kind of trial period are we putting on this?"
Adam bites at his lip. Brad has time to think it's something he never sees Adam do, and then a blush-Brad would swear that was a blush-spreads quickly across Adam's nose before fading again.
"One day at a time?" he asks. "I mean, if I change my mind-one way or the other-I'd let you know."
"You can't stay in limbo forever, baby," Brad points out. Adam shrugs a single shoulder.
"I wouldn't want to," he answers. "But who knows where I'm going to be tomorrow, or next week, or next month? It isn't really that helpful to say 'let's try it for a month' if I end up being gone for 28 days."
It's a point Brad has to concede. And so he lets his hands slip from Adam's face, down to rest on his shoulders, fingers lacing behind his neck.
"One day at a time," he agrees. "Now that we've established that, I'm also going to order you to pay for that ice cream you left on my kitchen table. My brand-new kitchen table, Adam," he scolds. "You know that's going to leave a ring."
Adam laughs and leans their foreheads together again. As his laughter dies down, their eyes meet . . . and catch.
And then he leans forward and whispers something in Brad's ear: three syllables in a string. Brad nods.
They're not "I love you," but they mean about the same.