***


"Hey, Ben," Justin greets his latest customer brightly. "What can I get you?" 

Ben glances at his watch. "Some company," he replies flatly. "I've been on my feet all day, going to conferences with students' parents. Haven't had any time to talk to anyone."  

"I think I can spare a few minutes," Justin says, looking around at the otherwise empty diner. He takes a seat across from Ben in the glittering green booth. Conversationally, he asks, "How's Hunter?"

"Pretty good, actually," Ben answers. "He's looking at colleges – nothing prestigious, since he says he prefers a low-key environment, but if he wants something better I might be able to pull a few strings. And on a tour of one of his favorite schools, he met a girl."  

Justin makes a show out of cringing. "From hustler to hetero," he murmurs. Ben swats him on the arm.  

"And how's Michael?" Justin asks.  

Ben shrugs. "You know him. Nothing big ever goes on with him." 

"Yeah." Justin falls silent, searching his mind for something else to say. 

"Well… Brian and I are doing fine," he says at last, lamely, staring at the ring on his finger as though it holds all the secrets of the universe. 

"Really?" Ben sounds surprised.  

Justin shrugs. "Yeah."  

"You know," Ben says, taking a sip of water, "when I first met you and Brian, I thought he was going to hurt you, if he hadn't already. That's what everyone thinks, right? Because he's so much older. But I realized after a couple days that he's not like that. Everyone says he's so manipulative and such an asshole. He isn't, though. They see the worst in him and he lets them – why the fuck does he let them?" 

The younger man's answer is immediate. "Because he loves them," he says. "They're the first people he ever trusted enough to get close to. Mikey was the first person he ever loved, then Debbie and Vic and Lindsay. And just because he's a little unconventional – stubborn, outspoken, uncensored – they bring out all the worst in him. He's someone to blame. And instead of being kind to him because he loves them and they love him – do they love him? – they respond by hurting him. Which is the power he was afraid to give people in the first place."  

Ben nods seriously. "Yeah. Yeah. Exactly."  

"So do they love him?" Justin persists. "Can they love him, if they say those things about him? Make him a scapegoat? What is love, anyway?"  

It takes several moments for Ben to respond. When he does, his voice comes out of silence in a deadpan, as though echoing off the walls, even though it isn't. "I think love is that when you're with a person, there's a different you. And if that person died, that part of you would be lost."  

"So the person changes you? That doesn't sound like love," Justin muses. 

Ben shakes his head. "No. It's the opposite. Like, to love is to be a whole new person just around them. Are you the same Justin with me as you are with Brian?"  

"Well… no…" Justin admits. He smears his thumb across the ring on his finger. "But I love you too. Don't I?"  

"Sure. Are you the same with me as with, say, Hunter?"  

Justin snorts. "Well, I sure as fuck don't love Hunter, so yeah."  

Ben grins smugly. "So am I right? Love is when you're different for someone?"  

"No," Justin says quickly. "That's not it. It's not changing to suit a person's wants or needs. It's changing because they make you different just in being who they are. They don't ask you to be any different, but you just are. Naturally."  

And Ben nods, taking in every word Justin says. "You're right. You're a hundred percent right."  

Justin can't help but grin in a self-satisfied manner.  

Looking across the booth at Ben, Justin suddenly feels the need to draw something. He grabs his sketchpad from its place in his backpack, sitting on top of one of the swiveling chairs at the island in the middle of the diner. When he returns, dropping the sketchpad on the table and fishing a pencil out of his shirt pocket, he sees that Ben has a spiral notebook out and is busy scribbling something down in his surprisingly legible handwriting. After a moment, Ben looks up and sees the beginnings of Justin's drawing.  

"You mean – we both just naturally – " he begins. 

Justin nods, grinning.  "It makes sense," Justin says after a pause. "I mean, we're artists. It's what we do. When we feel something strongly, or when we're thinking about something meaningful… this is what we turn to. Especially when we're at a loss for sexual partners." 

Ben laughs. "Well, that's for sure. If I had to pick, just for one night, between writing or sleeping with Michael…"  

"I kind of don't want to know your answer," Justin cuts in, because the image of Michael in bed is just too much. 

Ignoring him, Ben finishes, "I'd pick writing. How about you? With Brian?" 

Justin smiles, but his cheeks redden, and Ben knows what his answer is going to be. "Well – Brian's really good," Justin mumbles, embarrassed. 

Ben snorts, remembering his night with the Sex God of Liberty Avenue. "You can say that again."  

"Oh, right – I forgot you two had that thing."  

Another pause.   

"So, about the wedding," Ben says brightly. "Congratulations." 

"Thanks," Justin replies automatically. His mind is still on what he and Ben decided love means: automatically changing just because of somebody else's influence. "You know, I'm nervous," he says at last. "I don't know what to do. I'm scared, because Brian is changing – for me, mostly, but for everyone – and I don't know if I still know him."  

Ben is sympathetic. He knows this problem, because how can you teach college students and not know a million different love stories? "You still know him," he tells Justin, placing a hand on the other man's hand. "Love is about learning the person. And they change, and you change, but you have to keep up. It's hard work, but it's the most rewarding thing on earth."  

"How do you know all this?" Justin asks in amazement, looking into Ben's eyes. 

The professor shrugs a single shoulder. "I teach," he says simply. 

"Right, right." 

Justin pauses, clearly contemplating something. Ben knows enough to not interrupt his thought process, so he merely sits, his hand on Justin's own, quietly. 

There is a ding, and Debbie saunters in, rainbow vest standing out from everyone else in the whole world. "Sunshine!" she yells. "Shift's over."  

Justin slides out of the booth. "Mind driving me home?" he asks Ben hopefully, all too aware of the fact that Brian drove him to work in the morning, and now he has no other way of getting home.  

Ben slips an arm around the younger man's shoulders. "Sure."  

"Wait," Justin says. "No. Forget that. Can you take me to Kinnetik?" He looks away abashedly. "I need… to talk to Brian."