CHAPTER TWENTY

When you were young and on your own

How did it feel to be alone?

I was always thinking of games that I was playing,

Trying to make the best of my time.

But only love can break your heart,

Try to be sure right from the start

Yes, only love can break your heart

What if your world should fall apart?

    Only Love Can Break Your Heart -  Neil Young

JUSTIN

I hardly speak to him for the rest of the morning.  I know I’m being an asshole, but I can’t summon the energy to make the effort required to stop.  My mind just keeps running over the same thought; Mom’s dead.  How many times am I going to have to tell myself that before I can believe it?  I’ll never see her again, never hear her.  And Molly … how the fuck is she dealing with it?  I need to call her, to make sure she’s okay.  I wonder about Dylan, and where he is; Brian said there were none of his clothes or anything else at the penthouse; I guess he must have cleaned everything out in case I set the cops on him.

And Mom’s dead.

I can’t let myself think too much about that, or I’ll end up a hopeless wreck like I did last night and I know Brian has no time for that shit.  He’s being fucking amazingly good, actually: trying to occupy me with films and stuff, getting my Demerol and making me eat.  Unfortunately there’s something perverse in me, so the more patient he’s being the worse I’m acting.  I don’t really care; every movement, every breath, stabs like someone sticking a knife in my ribs, and I’m glad in a way because it’s blocking nearly everything else.  I just want him to stop fussing and leave me alone.

At last he seems to get the message, and goes to work on his laptop while I sit watching some moronic chat show, although it’s really just background noise: I may as well be staring at a blank screen.

After an hour or so I hear Brian close down his laptop and he comes over.  “I’m going to have to go out for a while … I need to get some more groceries and some mats for the shower, and I’ve got to drop in at Kinnetic to sign a contract.  I’ll be an hour or so, tops.”

“So what, you’re going to leave me locked in here?  What if there’s a fire?”

“You’ve got your cell, haven’t you?   You can ring me if there’s a problem.”

“Well, get me off this fucking couch first.  If I’m in the wheelchair at least I can move around … I can get myself a drink or something.”

He comes to help me.  “If everything in this fucking place wasn’t so low, I’d be able to get up by myself,” I gripe.

“Well, I didn’t pick the furniture with handicapped twinks in mind,” he smirks back, and I glare at him.

“Do you want the leg support up?” he asks, as I settle into the wheelchair.

“No, it just gets in the way.  I’ll manage like this.”

“Just remember to put the brake on if you try to stand up.”

“Yeah, I had the lesson, too.”

He puts on his coat, then pauses.  “Do you need to use the john or anything before I go?”

“No.  Just fuck off.”

He grins and comes to place a kiss on my forehead.  “Won’t be long, dear,” he says sweetly.  “Shall I bring back some Thai?”

I shrug irritably, and watch as he goes to the door and pulls it closed behind him.  I hear him lock it, so he wasn’t kidding about keeping me here.

Never mind.  I have a plan.

I wait to make sure he isn’t going to make a surprise return, then I grab my crutches.  Laying them across the arms of the wheelchair I head for the bedroom steps.  I’m going to raid his stash.

I put the brake on and lean the crutches carefully against the panels beside the steps; brace my hands on the chair’s arms and, taking a deep breath, push myself up.  That wasn’t so hard.  I’m on my feet.  Now for the tricky part.

I pick up the crutches and settle them under my arms.  Leaning on them as I much as I can bear, I put my left foot on the first step and transfer my weight to it, bringing my broken leg up to join it.  Not so bad, as long as I move slowly.  I make sure the crutches are seated firmly before I do the same thing again, and again; and then I’m in the bedroom.

Hah.  Sucks to you, Kinney.

I hobble over to the bed and let myself flop onto it.  I’ll worry about getting back up later.  I carefully lean down to open the drawer in Brian’s nightstand, ignoring the pressure the manoeuvre puts on my ribs, and pull out his tin.  Setting it on my knee, I open it.  Fuck, he wasn’t lying.  There’s some weed wrapped in shrink-wrap, but nothing else except cigarette papers.

I can’t fucking believe it.

Well, since I’ve made the effort, I may as well get something out of it.  I skin up a joint and light it, inhaling deeply.  It feels great until I start coughing.  But I’m determined to keep going, because I know weed is a good painkiller, right?  As long as I can stop coughing.  Ouch, that fucking hurts.

I look around and notice the bottle of water on my nightstand, so I use one of my crutches to hook it onto the bed and drag it over.  A couple of swigs help, and I finish the joint.  Then I roll another.  I try not to think about Mom, or being broke and homeless.  Instead I think about Lindsay. 

I can’t believe that Brian hasn’t even spoken to Mel about what’s been going on.  No matter how acrimonious their relationship might have been, he must know that she loves Gus.  He’d never have signed over his parental rights otherwise, or let them go to Canada.  The trouble is that Brian has a blind spot where his old friends are concerned, particularly Michael and Linds.  It’s like he feels they’re the only ones he can totally trust, which is why they manage to manipulate him so easily when they’ve a mind to.

When Brian and I first got together, there was no doubt that Lindsay was one of my staunchest allies.  And yet, even then there’d been times when I’d wondered… like when Brian offered her our tickets to Miami for their honeymoon, and she’d told him that the best present she could have was for him to go and fuck as many beautiful men as he could.  When he’d told me about that, weeks later, I hadn’t been able to suppress a small sense of betrayal … it seemed that, like Mikey, Lindsay’s professed desire for Brian to grow up and put his clubbing and fucking days behind him had a very selective application.  But the way she’d gone behind my back and primed Brian about the article in Art Forum, even if she’d done it with the best of intentions … well, that was simply sticking her nose in where she had no business.  Especially when she must have known exactly how he’d react.  But I’d persuaded myself that she’d just been another interfering friend who thought she knew what poor little Justin needed and who was determined to see that he got it.  At the worst, I’d believed that perhaps she was subconsciously jealous of my staying with Brian when she was moving away, and had acted on it.  I’d been prepared to give her the benefit of the doubt.

I’ve always known she loves him, in the same way Michael does.  Hey, I’m an expert.  I recognise the look, better than anyone; and I’ve always had the greatest respect for both Mel and Ben that they’ve been able to live with it.  But I’d always believed that Linds loved Mel more, and that despite the hiccups they had along the way they would stay together.  Until Brian told me about Mel turning into an abusive parent, and Lindsay and Gus moving into Britin … the timing seems too fortuitous, somehow.  And I’ve always believed that true coincidence is a very rare thing.

But fuck it.  It’s not my problem anymore.

*********************************************************************

By the time I’ve finished my third joint I’m feeling a little calmer and more in control of myself, and I realise it would probably be an excellent idea to be back downstairs and in my wheelchair when Brian gets home.  So I carefully re-wrap the weed, put it back in the tin and replace it in the drawer. 

Now I have to get up off this fucking stupid bed.

It takes me few attempts and a final despairing grab at the nightstand for leverage before I make it and my ribs are screaming in protest, so I prop myself on my crutches and wait a couple of minutes to let them settle.  Now I just have to get back down the steps.

Well, I did it easily enough last time.  I make my way over, take a breath, and start my descent.

Maybe it was the weed, or maybe it was just overconfidence.  Whichever, I’m halfway down when my right crutch slips off the step, and there’s nothing I can do to save myself from going down hard on my back. 

*******************************************

“Justin!”  I don’t think I’ve ever heard that precise note of panic in his voice, and I open my eyes as he’s pounding across the Loft towards me.  I’m spread-eagled on my back like a fucking starfish.

“What the fuck happened?  Have you hit your head again?  Let me see.”  His hands are running gently over my skull, looking for lumps or blood or something.  “Don’t try to move, I’ll call 911.”  He’s digging out his cell, his eyes wild.

“I don’t need an ambulance,” I gasp.  “And I haven’t hit my head.  Just slipped … on the steps.  Hurt my ribs.”  That’s an understatement; I’m pretty sure I blacked out for a while.

“What were you doing up there?  Christ, I asked if you needed a piss,” he says, rubbing his hair distractedly.

“Didn’t want a piss.  Wanted your stash.  To see if you were lying.”

His face freezes.  Then he reaches for my arms.  “Come on.  Up,” he says grimly.  He lifts me almost bodily into the wheelchair, not nearly as gently as usual, and I can’t help crying out.  He parks me by the couch, then goes to the refrigerator.  He pours a glass of milk and brings it back to me together with an Oreo and my Demerol.

I stare at him.  I feel sick and shaken.  “Do I look like I want food?”

“You need your meds.  Eat it.”  Unfortunately he’s right; not only my ribs but my back is now hurting like a mother-fucker.  He watches while I eat the cookie and wash the capsules down with milk.  Then he virtually snatches the glass out of my hand and returns it to the sink.  When he comes back he starts pacing.

“Are you telling me you risked your neck because you couldn’t keep your hands off my stash?  Because you thought I’d got some of Anita’s shit tucked away?  Is it so fucking important, you stupid little twat?  What are you trying to do, break the other leg?  Or maybe,” he turns on me with flashing eyes, his hair all awry; “maybe you want to break the same leg again, so the bones won’t heal, and you’ll end up with one leg shorter than the other and a permanent fucking limp, is that what you want, Sunshine?”

In spite of the pain, or because of the weed, I can’t help but giggle.  “You’re freaking out here, you know that, don’t you?”

“Do not laugh at me!” he roars, leaning right down into my face.  “Don’t you dare!  Do you have any idea how I felt when I heard you were in hospital and I didn’t know if you were alive or dead?  Or how I felt just now, seeing you lying there?”

“Pretty much the same as I felt when I found out you had cancer,” I snap back. 

He recoils as if I’d hit him.  “That was along time ago.  I would do things differently now.”

“Or, how about the way I felt when I came home to find Dan moved in?”

Brian grits his teeth.  “That is not the same thing.”

I’m getting pissed myself now, and adrenaline is helping to control the pain.  “The fuck it isn’t!  You gutted me, Brian!  The only thing I had to hang on, the only thing that made me different, was that I was the only one you let stay here.  How do you think I felt when you took even that away?”

His demeanour changes: his voice softens.  “Is that why you started taking drugs?”

I laugh shortly.  “I started taking drugs because they were there and they made me feel better!  What the fuck did it matter?  You might have thought we were finished when I left for New York … well, you proved it to me when you moved Dan in.  I had nothing, Brian!  Not even the hope of coming back home.  So who cared what I did?”

He shakes his head.  “It wasn’t supposed to be that way, Justin!  You were supposed to make a new life for yourself, be a big, fat fucking success …”

“Supposed to?”  I repeat incredulously.  “According to what, the Brian Kinney Law of Inevitability?  This may come as a surprise to you, but you can’t actually control fate.  And while we’re at it, let’s talk about success.  You told me once that success is the only thing worth celebrating.  Well, success means different things to different people; some people count their lives a success because they’re happy and fulfilled, not by how much money they have in their fucking bank accounts!  What if Gus shows some kind of talent, at tennis or athletics or something?  Are you going to decide he’s an Olympic champion in the making, and turn into one of those über-parents who control every minute of their child’s life?  Will you teach him that nothing counts except winning, not even enjoying a normal childhood?”

He’s watching me in silence, but I’m on a roll here.

“You know what your biggest fault is, Brian?  The same as most Americans.  We assume that the way we do things, the way we see things, is the same for the rest of the world … that all we have to do is show them what they’ve been missing and they’ll fall all over themselves in the rush to sign up for it – MacDonalds, Coca-Cola, Nike, Hollywood.  Fucking Capitalism.  It’s inconceivable to us that anyone could refuse the great American Dream, once they’ve experienced it.  And you’re exactly the same … you know what’s best for Mikey, for Linds, for Gus, for me; and by God, we’re going to get it.  And be thankful.”  Suddenly I find my eyes beginning to tear up, and I swallow hard.  My emotions are all over the fucking place.

“The thing that’s always been wrong with us, Brian, is that while I’ve always believed in you, you’ve never believed in me.”

His eyes flash.  “The fuck I haven’t!  I believe in you more than anyone you’ll ever meet!  When you were fucking seventeen years old I could see the man you were going to become; how honest you were, how brave.  And I always knew you had the intelligence and the persistence to achieve any goal you set yourself!”

“I’d be the last to deny it,” I say immediately.  “I know how much you think of me… how much you respect me.  But you’ve never got over the idea that because I’m so much younger than you I can’t possibly know my own mind: that I haven’t seen enough of the world to judge what I want.  Well, I’m sorry that the first time worked for me.  I’m sorry that the first guy I ever slept with ended up being the one I wanted to spend the rest of my life with.  I’m sorry that nobody else has ever come close to inspiring me, and fulfilling me, and making me happy the way you have.  I’m sorry that you didn’t just turn out to be some teenage crush so that you could break my heart and send me away with me tail between my legs; a little bruised but a lot wiser.  I’m sure that would have been much easier for everybody.”  I take a shallow, shaky breath: talking so much is hurting.  But I need to say this; and he needs to hear it.  “That wasn’t the way it happened, Brian.  I loved you from the first … and if it was an idealistic kid’s love to begin with, it grew up quickly.  You never understood that I would have lived in a tent with you and I would have been happy!  I would have counted every day a success, and a privilege.  I knew exactly what I wanted, Brian, and it wasn’t a picket fence in suburbia; not 2.5 kids; not wealth and fame.  Not happily-ever-after and red roses.  It was you, only you. The way it’s always been.” 

He’s silent for a moment, and then he presses his fingers against his lips in that odd little gesture which always means he’s upset.  “Then why did you let go so easily?” he asks, watching me intently.  “I thought I was going to have to kick your ass all the way to New York but you jumped at it.  You couldn’t get out of the door fast enough!”

For fuck’s sake, he’s such an idiot sometimes.  “Come on Brian, I knew how it was going to play out!  It’s not like you hadn’t done it before! You’d got it in your head that I was destined to be some world-famous artist and that you were holding me back.  You made up your mind that I needed New York because fucking Lindsay said I did, and nothing I could say or do was ever going to convince you otherwise.  And living with you would have been unbearable.”  His expression admits the truth of that statement.  “Up until you read that article, you were fine with everything, even the wedding!  Oh, you made the usual little snarky cracks, but you couldn’t hide how happy you were … it was in your eyes, Brian; your fucking eyes.  And then, after Linds got to you, it all changed.  You started doing the little Stepford fag bit, turning into all the things I never wanted you to be … but always with that little bit of regret or reluctance so I could see how much of an act it was.  Like your stag night.  Walking away from that trick and doing the ‘right’ thing by going home with me, but still making it perfectly clear that you were only going through the motions.  You knew the only thing that would make me walk away was if you could make me feel that I was trapping you, because I knew if you made those promises about monogamy and commitment you’d keep them.  Even if you didn’t want to.  And you wouldn’t have let it go, Brian; you’d have gone on and on making me feel that way until maybe I’d start to believe it myself; that the only thing keeping us together were promises we should never have made in the first place.  So it was easier to accept it, to go to New York like everybody wanted me to, stay a few months and come back and say, ‘See?  I’m no better an artist, and no more famous than I was in Pittsburgh, so I may as well come home and paint here.’  I didn’t expect everything to change.  I didn’t expect Dan.”

He’s standing quite still, his arms folded, not denying any of it.  Then he drops his head.  “You said I’d ruined your life.”  His voice is a whisper.

“I’m sorry,” I tell him, meaning it; “and I’m so sorry I hit you.  I guess I needed to lash out at someone.  I don’t need to tell you it was a bad day.”

He nods, biting his lip.  “For me, too.  I’ve never felt so fucking wretched for you, not even when you were in hospital the first time.  I should have been standing there with you and I wasn’t: I let you down, Justin, and I’ll never forgive myself for it.  So if your taking a pop at me made you feel better, even if that’s all I managed to do, then I’m pleased to have been of service.”

We look at each other, silently acknowledging and accepting apologies.  Then Brian moves, and suddenly he’s down on his knees, his head buried in my lap, his arms going round me.  “I can’t stand this anymore, Justin!  I can’t keep thinking you’re dead!  It’s fucking killing me!” 

He’s crying: a furious storm of tears, his sobs wracking his body.

How can I blame him?  So much our relationship has consisted of dealing with the fall-out from my personal disasters: Chris Hobbs, the Sap, Ethan, Cody.  Too many times Brian has had to pick me up, dust me down, and get me going again.  And if I ever needed proof of how much I’ve hurt him and scared him over the years, here it is.  I’m too stunned and shaken to do anything except stroke his hair.  “You don’t have to do it again, Brian,” I say, trying to keep my voice steady, trying to make it easy for him.  “As soon as I’m well, I’ll find a place to stay and get out your hair permanently.  No more dramas, no more rescues.  I promise.”

“For fuck’s sake!” he cries, looking up at me with streaming eyes.  “Why can’t we communicate?  I don’t want you to leave, you twat … I love you!  I want us back together … back the way we were before all this shit started!  I want to be fucking happy again!”

I blink.  He wants me back: just like that.  I think my heart may have stopped and I’m not sure whether it’s with joy or surprise or disbelief.   In the end I’m just pissed.   “Brian! Everything is about what you want!  You want me to stay, you want me to go … well, I want things too, just like the last time!  Only now I want a partner who knows I’m his equal!  One who makes joint decisions with me, not just executive ones!  One who doesn’t push me out of his life whenever he thinks it’s good for me!  One who doesn’t use my love for him as a weapon against me!  Because I can’t stand letting myself trust, leaving myself vulnerable, knowing that in a month or a year or in fucking ten years time I’m going to get my heart broken again!  That’s what’s killing me!”  I can’t say any more, because my voice chokes me.

He shakes his head, his expression full of regret and raw pain.  I’ve never seen this side of him.  I’ve never seen him fucking cry: I never knew he could.  He takes both my hands in his, clasping them with his fingers and caressing the backs of my wrists with his thumbs.  “Justin, you’re right; I didn’t trust you.  I could never get away from the idea that you’d only ever come back because things didn’t work out the way you’d hoped they would; because Ian turned out to be a love-rat, or because the film canned.  Not because you needed me!  I figured that if you had the chance to begin a new life, away from me and all the shit, then you’d realise what you were missing: that you wouldn’t look back.  Well, did I get that wrong!”  He manages a little rueful laugh.  “I may be a slow learner about some things, Sunshine, but I get there in the end.  You and I are opposite halves: together, we work; alone, we’re always out of balance. I finally get it.  I swear on Gus’ life, I’ll never push you away again: but if you don’t want me … if you find you can’t trust me any more … fuck knows, I can’t blame you.  But you’ve loved me for so long while I was an asshole …” he gives me the sweetest smile; “surely you won’t stop loving me just because I’m a fool?”

I can’t resist him, not when he looks at me like this.  My closed, closeted, Brian, baring his soul for me like he did after my bashing, after the bombing.  How can I doubt him, when he’s letting me see his fucking heart?  And he knows it, the asshole.  He knows how to get me.

I place my hands on his cheeks, holding him so that he can’t look away.  “Brian, I love you.  And I believe you love me, and that you’re telling me the truth.  And if you’re willing to take the chance, and try again, then I am too.  So listen to me now: if you ever, ever, push me away again, for whatever reason, I won’t come back.  No matter what happens.  And that’s my promise.”

He’s on his feet, leaning down to me.  “Put your arms around my neck,” he says softly, and when I do he scoops me straight out of the chair; I can feel his biceps quivering with the strain but I know he’ll never drop me.   He sits down on the sofa with me in his lap, my left leg tucked against his chest, my stupid cast sticking out over the cushions.  He wraps his arms around me, folding me against him so that I can feel his heart beating against my shoulder.

“Never gonna let you go again,” he whispers fiercely.  “You hear?  Never,” and then he’s kissing my eyes and cheeks and lips, over and over like he can’t get enough.

“Gonna get you well,” he breathes against my neck.  “That’s the most important thing.  You are not going to fight me anymore.  And then we’re going to show all of our fucking friends just what we can do together.”

TBC