Midnight Whispers
QAF Brian and Justin Fanfiction

I’m changing clothes in the bedroom while Brian showers when there’s a knock on the loft door. Today was Brian’s last radiation treatment, so we’re celebrating by going out to dinner with Gus – if the little shit would hurry up and get home. I jog happily down the steps to the door and slide it open, revealing a handsome man, probably in his late thirties with short dark hair, a scruffy face, and gorgeous blue eyes.


“Hi, can I help you?” I ask politely. The mystery man is dressed in snug black jeans, black boots, and a light blue button-up shirt covering what I imagine to be an impressive body. I wonder who he is.


He looks shocked for a moment, and then glances behind me into the loft. “Is – Brian here?” he asks hesitantly.


I nod. “He’s in the shower.”


Suddenly, I hear footsteps rushing up the stairs. “I’m late, I’m late, I know – oh,” Gus’ steps falter as he notices the man standing in front of me. “Kevin.”


Kevin. Hm, Brian hasn’t mentioned a Kevin; neither has Gus. My curiosity peaks.


“Hi, Gus,” Kevin replies with a weak smile. “I, uh – I came to talk to your dad.”


Gus shrugs. “You can try.” He walks past us into the loft. I glance back at Kevin and gesture for him to come in. He tentatively steps forward and his eyes go straight to the bathroom door as we hear Brian open it and walk through, looking beautiful in worn jeans and a tight gray t-shirt, his hair wet from the shower. When he sees the three of us standing in the living room, he stops dead in his tracks. His eyes flash with something I can’t identify.


“What the hell are you doing here?” he demands, his eyes fixed on Kevin.


I glance at Gus, the question in my eyes, and he shakes his head.


“I wanted to talk to you,” Kevin tells him.


Brian shakes his head. “We have nothing to talk about, Kevin.”


Kevin’s eyes plead with Brian. “Please,” he whispers, almost desperately.


I look at Brian to see what his response will be, confused as hell about what’s going on right now, and then I feel Gus touch my arm. When he catches my eye, he jerks his head toward the door and starts to pull me toward the hallway. I reluctantly let him lead me out, but Brian’s voice interrupts us.


“No, you two stay,” he insists, and then raises an eyebrow at Kevin. “Well – go head, talk.”


Kevin nervously glances at me. “Can’t we be alone?” he asks.


“No,” Brian answers. “Either talk with them here or leave.”


I see Kevin take a deep breath. “I’m sorry,” he breathes.


“Sorry’s bullshit,” Brian replies, just as I knew he would.


Kevin nods. “Yeah, I know. I just – I never wanted us to be like this,” he begins. “I always thought we’d still be friends, even if we didn’t stay together.”


My eyes widen. Together? Brian and Kevin were – together? As in, a couple? A relationship?  Brian’s eyes cut to me for a moment before returning to Kevin. “So – you’re here because you want to be friends?” he asks.


Kevin sighs. “No. I want to be – us again,” he tries again. Suddenly my throat goes dry. Brian laughs humorlessly and walks across the floor until he stands about three feet from Kevin.


“That’s impossible,” Brian tells him.


“No, it’s not. Come on, Bri,” he takes a few steps towards Brian, but is stopped when Brian holds his hand out. Kevin puts his hands up in surrender. “I just – I want another chance. I fucked up, I know that. Things just got so crazy and everything with you – it scared the hell out of me. I couldn’t imagine losing you; I still can’t – but I’d rather be here until then than to lose you now because of my stupidity.”


“You’ve already lost me,” Brian says softly.


Kevin’s breaths are shaky and I can tell he’s trying hard to keep himself together. “I love you,” he blurts out suddenly. The words nearly knock the breath out of me. I look back at Brian, anxious to hear his response. It doesn’t come for a long time, though. I can’t decipher his facial expression. I feel like we’re in the middle of a soap opera; I look at Gus, who has moved to the window, obviously uncomfortable.


Finally Brian speaks. “Let’s go into the hallway,” he says. Kevin nods and follows Brian out of the door, closing it behind them. After a few moments, I hear their voices, but I can’t make any of the words out. I wish I could hear what they were saying. Did this guy really love Brian? More importantly, did Brian love him? And who was this guy, anyways? It’s obvious he and Brian were together, but when? How long had it been over? Is it – is it still over?


I glance at Gus again. He takes a deep breath and shrugs. “What was that?” I ask him in a loud whisper. He doesn’t answer, just looks down at his shoes and shakes his head.


I hear Kevin’s voice getting louder. I can make out only a few frantic, desperately spoken words at a time. “Please…sorry…need….love.” Love; I sigh and run my fingers through my hair in frustration. Brian’s replies are too quiet to make out, so I just wait, staring at the door.


What if Brian forgives him for whatever he did and they get back together? Where would that leave me? My heart starts to pound in my chest. I can’t help the jealousy that’s radiating through my body. What if Brian asks me to leave? What if he decides that if he has Kevin, he doesn’t need – or want – me around anymore? I want Brian to be happy more than anything, but I don’t want to give him up. I can make him happy – I’ve done it before, and I can do it again. I’ve made so much progress over the last month or so; I can’t just leave now.


I don’t have much time to think about it – and honestly, I don’t even know how long they’ve been out there when the sound of the door sliding open jerks me from my thoughts. Brian comes though, alone, and shuts the door behind him. He looks at Gus and me, his face giving nothing away. “Ready to go?” he asks.


“Yep,” Gus answers quickly, walking to meet Brian at the door. They both look at me expectantly. “You coming?” Gus asks.


I nod. “Yeah,” I force out and walk to the door with them. We make it down the stairs and into the Corvette without running into Kevin, and for that I’m grateful. None of us speak on the way to the restaurant, but once we get out of the car, everything goes back to normal. We talk, laugh, and eat throughout dinner, as if nothing had happened.


We get home at around nine. Gus makes a beeline for the shower and I follow Brian up to the bedroom. The silence is killing me and I need to know what happened earlier. “So –“ I begin, but then pause. He drops to the bed, removes his shoes, and then looks up at me, eyebrows raised in question. “I guess I missed a lot while I was gone,” I try, in a lame attempt to get him to bring Kevin’s name up on his own.


Lame or not, it sort of worked. He clears his throat and shrugs. “It’s a long story,” he tells me.


“I have time,” I reply. He’s quiet for a minute, so I continue. “I mean, you don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to. It’s none of my business. I just – no one ever mentioned him to me before.”


He laughs. “Yeah, Gus refuses to speak his name. He thinks it’ll set me off or something.” Set him off? As in anger? Or sadness? I don’t ask. “We were – together for awhile, that’s all.”


I plop down next to him on the bed. “Seemed like more than that,” I tell him.


Brian takes a deep breath. “We lived together for almost four years,” he admits.


Holy. Shit. “Wow,” is all I say, unable to think of anything else. Four years. Four fucking years?


“Yeah. We met at the hospital – he’s positive too,” he looks at me, waiting for a response. When I don’t offer one, he continues. “We kind of dated, I guess. It was easy with him. I didn’t have to – worry, you know? About if the condom broke or –“ he trails off and I’m biting my lip so hard I can almost taste blood. “Anyways, he moved in here after about a year. The year after that, Gus moved in. It was all really – comfortable. He was the only guy I let myself get close to after –“ He doesn’t need to continue because I know what he’s talking about. After I left.


I swallow hard. “So how long ago did it end?” I ask.


“A few months ago. Right after I got diagnosed with KS. Things had been iffy with Michael for awhile and I wasn’t – in a good place, I guess,” he tells me.


“Of course you weren’t,” I rationalize.


“It scared him. Like it scared Michael, only worse. He started not being around as much, we started fighting more, and – I don’t know, one day he just left. He said he couldn’t handle it; that he had to get out of here – away from me for awhile.”  By the time he finishes, his voice is nearly a whisper.


“And you haven’t heard from him  – until today?” I ask. He nods slightly. My chest tightens. Jesus, Brian lost his best friend, his lover, and the woman he considered his mother – for all intents and purposes –within six months. I can’t imagine what toll this took on Brian’s health. If it weren’t for Gus, who knows what he would’ve done. I understand now why he didn’t consider treatment a must – he was alone. I place my hand on Brian’s leg and, thankfully, he makes no effort to move it. “So now he wants to come back?”


Brian shrugs. “Yeah, I guess.”


I clear my throat and mentally prepare myself to ask the next question. “Did – did you love him?”


He huffs a laugh, then sighs. “I don’t know,” he answers. “Like I said, it was easy with him – effortless. We had something in common, and it just worked. We weren’t exactly going to get married and have kids, though,” he says with a dry laugh.


I’m not entirely sure how I feel about his answer. If he really loved Kevin, would he tell me? “What did you tell him earlier? Are you going to give him another chance?” I ask.


He looks at me. “What do you think I told him?” he asks. I realize it’s not rhetorical and I shrug, waiting for the answer. He shakes his head. “We’re not getting back together. I told him no,” he finally tells me.


I let out a breath I didn’t know I was holding in. “Why?” I ask him, genuinely curious to know the answer.


He holds my stare for a moment, searching my eyes. He almost looks hurt – or maybe lost – but before I can figure it out he drops his eyes to the duvet and shrugs. “I just – don’t want to be with him. I don’t have feelings for him anymore.”


I don’t know everything there is to know about Brian, that’s for sure, but I do know one thing. Once Brian loves you, he’ll always love you. He can’t just turn it on and off like some people seem to do. Was what Kevin did unforgivable? No, and I’m sure Brian doesn’t hold it against him. So does that mean he never actually loved him? The thought of him and Brian together makes my stomach tighten.


“I don’t want to talk about it anymore. It’s over – it’s done. There’s nothing more to say,” he tells me and I nod. I can honestly say I’ll be glad if I never hear Kevin’s name again.


__________________


It’s been a few days since the fiasco with you-know-who, and Brian hasn’t mentioned him again. I’m pretty sure he’s been calling his cell, though, because I’ve noticed on many occasions a call being ignored by Brian. I’m sitting in the living room sketching, thinking back on the last few days. Brian has been feeling much better now that the radiation is over. The nausea is gone and his appetite is back. He doesn’t sleep during the day anymore and it’s almost like he’s back to his old self. He’s even started to gain some of the weight back. His last blood work a couple weeks ago showed a definite decrease in cancer cells, and now we’re awaiting the call from the doctor on the most recent tests he’s undergone to see how effective treatment was.


“Justin,” I hear Brian’s voice call out from the bathroom, tearing me away from my thoughts.


“Yeah?” I answer, still sketching.


“Come here,” he demands.


I immediately stop what I’m doing, put my sketch pad and pencil on the couch, and jog into the bathroom, where he’s standing facing away from me, shirtless. He’s looking down at himself but I can’t see around him.


“What’s going on? You okay?” I ask, beginning to worry. He turns around and looks at me. I glance down at his chest and my hand automatically comes up to cover my mouth in pure shock. “Oh my God,” I whisper from behind my hand.


He glances back down at his torso. His chest, which was littered with over a dozen of those ugly purple lesions just six weeks ago, was now nearly free of any imperfections. There were three small scars across his ribcage where lesions used to be, but even those seemed to be fading. I look back up at his face and I see a ghost of a smile playing on his lips.


I shake my head and start to laugh in pure happiness and shock at the vision before me. Christ, he almost looks like he did before I left. His body still a bit too thin, his face still a bit pale, but he was the same gorgeous Brian Kinney he always had been. Unable to control myself, I rush over to him and nearly tackle him in a hug. His arms immediately come up around my waist to return the gesture. “It worked – it’s working –“ I keep saying it, nearly delirious with excitement.


“Seems that way,” he says. I hug him tighter and he lifts me slightly off my feet. A couple weeks ago he would’ve been too weak to do that. God, I can’t believe it.


When the hug ends, I pull away with a huge grin on my face. My breath catches in my throat when I see his eyes. They’ve changed – darker now, wild. I know that look. Before I know what’s happening, his hands are back on me and he pushes me roughly against the bathroom wall. I moan deeply when his lips crash down onto mine. My hands immediately go up to his back, gripping at his skin, pulling his body impossibly closer to mine. The kiss is heated and urgent; our lips, mouth, tongue, and teeth fighting for dominance. His hands grip my hips and pull them against his. I don’t think I’ve ever been this turned on, and judging by the hardness against my hip, Brian’s in much the same predicament. My body hums with pleasure and excitement.


His tongue runs over the roof of my mouth and I battle it with mine. I almost forgot what this felt like – how good it is. I dig my fingernails into his back as he grinds his groin against mine. I feel like I can’t breathe, but I don’t care. I’m willing to never breathe again as long as I can have this. No one kisses like Brian Kinney – no one, and I’ve been wanting this – dreaming about this – for the past ten years. I briefly wonder if this is a dream; if I’ll eventually wake up on the couch, none of this having happened. I decide I don’t care, and I refuse to ruin it.


“Bed,” I urgently breathe against his lips. I feel him nod and we make our way into the bedroom without breaking the kiss. I nearly trip on a shoe, or my own feet, or – oh who gives a shit? Brian yanks my shirt over my head, our lips losing contact for a split second. He looks at my face and everything seems to freeze. Our breathing is heavy and our chests are heaving with exertion and desire. He looks confused and shocked at what’s going on and I see realization hit him like a boulder. I shake my head, trying to break the curse, and lean back up to kiss him again. No – no, Brian, don’t do this. Just keep going –


His hand is suddenly on my chest, pushing me away gently. He shuts his eyes tightly and shakes his head before backing away from me. “Brian,” I whisper.


“Sorry,” he says, still shaking his head in disbelief.


I huff a laugh. “Don’t be sorry; just keep going,” I plead with him.


“I can’t – we can’t –,“ he goes on. I feel him slipping away from me and I fight mentally to not lose the moment.


“Don’t –,” I try, but I can’t think of anything to say.


Brian makes eye contact with me, sees the pleading look I have on my face, and sighs heavily. “That can’t happen,” he finally says.


“Yes it can. We can just – a condom –,” I struggle with the words. “It’ll be fine. We can –“


He cuts me of. “Justin, if I infected you --” he pauses and shakes his head. “I can’t risk it.”


I sigh, drop down so I’m sitting on the edge of the bed, and run my hands over my face. “A long time ago, you told me it was Michael’s decision if he wanted to be with Ben. Well, this is my decision,” I tell him.


He shakes his head. “You don’t know what you’re talking about. You’d regret it when it’s over.”


“Bullshit. I wouldn’t regret it,” I insist. “I’ve been wanting this to happen for so long. Trust me, I’ve thought about it, this isn’t a heat of the moment decision. I want – you. No apologies, no regrets, remember?”


We just look at each other for a few long moments. Neither of us notices anyone else in the loft until we hear Gus’ voice. “What’s going on?” We turn our heads in his direction. I then look down at myself, realizing I’m still shirtless, and so is Brian. Shit.


Brian clears his throat. “Nothing,” he mumbles and walks into the bathroom, only to return a few seconds later, back in his shirt. I sigh and lean down to pick up my discarded shirt from the floor in front of me and pull it on.  Brian walks down the stairs toward the door. “I’ll be back,” he says, never glancing back.


“Bri –,” I start, but I’m cut off by the loft door sliding shut. “Shit,” I hiss. I see Gus standing in the middle of the loft, wide eyed and curious.


Our eyes meet and I shake my head. “Well –“ he gestures toward the door. “Aren’t you going to go after him?”


My mind races. “He just needs some time alone,” I explain. Gus sighs, but accepts my answer. We end up sitting in the living room watching TV – well, pretending to watch TV while he watches the clock and I watch the door – for a few hours.


“What the hell is taking him so long?” Gus asks, his voice frustrated. I shrug, beginning to worry. He’s been gone for three hours and it’s starting to get dark outside. “Should we go look for him?”


I shake my head and stand up. “I’ll go,” I tell him. “You okay here alone for awhile?” I ask.


He scoffs. “I’m sixteen, not six. I’ll be fine. Just go fucking get him,” he demands. I nod and head out the door, down the stairs, and into my rental car.


Now the big question – where the hell did he go?

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