Church | Hymns | Psalms | Testify
This site is not intended for those under 18 years of age.
The End Done Right
by Vamphile
Chapter One
Brian was drunk, that wasn’t new, lately Brian was drunk a lot, it felt good, well, not good but better. It had been three months since he’d said goodbye to Lindsay, and to Gus, and to Justin.
He lay on the mattress, it had been delivered to the house a couple days after the wedding had been scheduled, but he’d never bothered to have them set up the bed, he’d simply gestured towards a room, he hadn’t even been paying attention to which room… so now, when he passed out in bed, he was in the room that he had planned to be Gus’s.
The house had too many rooms. “I used to live in one big room that had everything,” he thought now I live in a hundred rooms with nothing. And nothing was only a slight exaggeration. He had sold a lot of the furniture with the loft, modern Italian leather wasn’t really the style for a Tudor country manor, and so, when he left the loft, a few hours after Justin had, he’s taken his clothes, and little else.
The movers came and packed up what he hadn’t sold with the loft and delivered it…
It was all in boxes in the room closest to the front door, he hadn’t bothered to unpack a thing. Sometimes he felt like he was living in the castle in Citizen Kane, and sometimes, he was too drunk to think about it.
A couple of times a week Mikey stopped by and brought food from the diner, and lemon bars, which was convenient because then he could throw out the old food from the diner, and the stale lemon bars that were still sitting on the counter from the last time he’d visited.
Brian worked hard, and then worked out after work, and would sometimes stop by Mikey’s for dinner, but mostly he just did anything to avoid coming back to the house, the big empty house that he lived in…alone.
He drove by Mel and Lindz’s a few times, but they were gone…they called, and he talked to Gus, who was at a chatterbox age, and he smiled then as he listened to stories about t-ball and his friend Sam, who it turns out is imaginary, and then he hangs up the phone and stops smiling.
It wasn’t supposed to be like this.
He stops by Mikey’s tonight, he just can’t go back to the house yet (he just can’t think of it as home either). He’s already half buzzed from the joint he was smoking in the car when he knocks on the door.
Michael answers, and Brian leans in and kisses him, “hi honey I’m home, what’s for dinner”
“Brian” Michael whines, “You’re stoned”
“Yes, good point, so got any cheetos?”
Michael looks back at Ben apologetically and Ben just shrugs, somewhat understanding how lost Brian is.
Brian collapses on the sofa in an easy sprawl
“So, how bout a drink?” he looks at Michael
“Don’t you think you’ve had enough to drink lately? Christ Brian, you look like hell”
“I look beautiful” Brian rubs his face; “I mean, I think so, Christ, did remember to shave today?” he’s mumbling now, in that way he has.
“Never mind, I’ll get it myself” he pops up with surprising agility from the sofa and finds a bottle of vodka in the freezer…
“I can always count on Mikey to have cheap vodka in the freezer, I love you Mikey”
Michael is aggravated, but sad for his friend, who is taking a very long pull straight from the bottle.
He looks at Ben and shrugs “I guess he’s sleeping here tonight” Ben smiles and gives Michael a peck on the cheek,
“I’ll go finish dinner, when he finds out its tofu and beans, he’ll be less interested in eating anyway”
Brian, having heard the conversation takes out his phone and makes a call, he orders two large pizzas to be delivered to Mikey’s and then settles onto the Sofa, which for all it’s lumpy faults, isn’t in that stupid ass house he hates.
NEW YORK.
Justin hates having roommates, he’d lived with Brian, which was…well, never easy, but had it’s perks, and he and Daphne had been friends for so long that sharing a place with her was pretty easy, but sleeping on someone else’s sofa while trying to find a place that wouldn’t cost him more than 600 a month to split was killing him, and there were already three people living here, four fags, one bathroom, this s not a happy equation.
The guys were interesting enough, but they were young, well, okay they were exactly the same age he was, but they were just discovering some of the things that Justin was already bored with. They went out every night, coming home in the early hours of the morning laughing and joking about the men they’d seen, and done.
The tricks they brought home were laughable…well, maybe not, but to Justin there was nothing but Brian and he was trying to clear his mind of that. He did so by working. He found a studio space. He shared it with two other artists. One worked with classical techniques, painting Italian frescos on pieces of concrete, the other was a woman who worked with “found metal” she picked up pieces off the street, welded them together and called it art.
Justin painted, he was working on large canvases, and covering the cost of the studio space, and paint and supplies was digging deeply into his funds, but he had a couple of meetings with galleries this week, and was hoping to sell some pieces.
He missed Brian.
Justin shook his head, the idea was to NOT keep thinking that, and each time the phrase “I miss Brian” shot unwelcome into his head, he doubled his efforts to succeed, to be able to afford a place of his own, with studio space, a place where he could work, and build a life, and not feel like he’d made a huge mistake.
“I’ve made a huge mistake” he shook his head again, and stood back from the canvas he was working on to take it in more fully, only he knew what it was.
Most people who had seen it (about half a dozen that had wandered into the studio as friends of his “studio mates” had called it abstract but intense.
The canvas was huge, brown, almost black, with stripes of hazel, and gold emanating from the center. It was Brian’s eyes, when the looked at him just before he was about to come…or yell at him, it was that stormy darkness with the light behind it that only Justin knew, well, Justin and a hundred thousand other men in Pittsburgh but only Justin had ever had the chance to really study it, most of those men, had never seen that color, they’d been in the dark, in a back alley, in the baths, they hadn’t seen him in broad daylight, his eyes wide with anger, or fear, or lust, Justin had, and this is what they looked like, or would look like if they were ten feet tall and 7 feet wide.
The pattern was burned into Justin’s brain, and now, it was coming to life on the canvas.
ONE MONTH LATER
Justin came back from the show very satisfied, he had sold ALL of his pieces. It had been a multiple artist show, he wasn’t ready for his own show yet, but he made money, good money, enough money to get a place, and…there was a knock at the studio door.
Brian was in his office. Ted was rambling something about money, and taxes and… he tuned out, and continued to consider the copy in front of him for a new line of men’s accessories, but nothing was jumping out at him.
“Brian” Ted tried to get his attention.
“Brian!” louder this time.
“What Theodore”
“I um, need you to sign these” Brian signed his name wherever the red arrow told him to. It and Ted started to walk out of his office…
“WAIT”
Ted stopped dead in his tracks.
“What did I just sign?”
“Nothing major, mortgage insurance, life insurance for Gus, a 10% salary increase for your top level executives.”
“A what? For who?”
Ted had known it couldn’t be that easy, but Brian hadn’t been listening to him. “Brian, you’re impossible”
“Thank you Teddy, I appreciate the input”
“No Brian, listen to me, you’re im-poss-i-ble, you’re driving everyone insane, you work 90-100 hours a week, on a slow week, you’re here all the time, you’re cranky, and snippy, and if you don’t start shelling out some extra incentives we’re gonna lose our talent pool”
Brian looked at Ted, and saw the logic to what he was saying
:”Cyn’s getting a raise too?”
“Of course”
“And you Teddy, did you take care of yourself?”
“Brian, I’m one of the top execs, I am included in the package”
“Fine, but give Cyn a 20% raise, and you, well, make it 25%”
“Brian are you sure?”
“Do you want to talk me out of giving you more money Ted? I thought you were a better accountant than that”
Ted smiled “right, not another word, I’ll put the paperwork through”
Brian sat back down in his chair and collapsed his head onto his desk. He vaguely remembered mornings of fresh clothes in his office after he’s spent the night at Mikey’s he’d never really questioned how they got there. He considered the mornings he’d woken up on the sofa in his office, to find coffee and juice, or even more amazing, hot scrambled egg whites from the diner. Cynthia had been putting in more than her share of hours lately he realized, and Ted had probably been covering his ass in ways he couldn’t imagine when it came to the business.
“Kinney” he said to himself, “it’s time to get your head back into the game”
NEW YORK
Justin answered the door to find Jason Ranston, the owner of the gallery from the show last night.
“Mr. Ranston, come in” Justin was confused as to the mans appearance here today. They had already made arrangements for him to pick up his check at the end of the month once the pieces had been delivered.
“All of your work sold Mr. Taylor”
“All of it?”
“You’re the only artist in the show who doesn’t have a piece left”
“Really?” Justin was smiling and he couldn’t help it, it wasn’t about the money, it was about…well, it was a little about the money.
“Do you think you’re ready for your own show?” he asked
“I’m not sure I have enough pieces yet” Justin answered truthfully, and gestured towards his space in the studio, which had about a half a dozen finished canvases, the rest were only partially complete, or blank.
“Mr., Taylor, here’s my proposal, I’d usually take you out for coffee, at least to pitch this but I’ll be honest, I’m a busy man, and there are going to be others knocking on your door today, I wanted to get here first. I need to keep your name, and your art in the public eye, so I’ll take what’s complete now, and I show them throughout the next few months, a few pieces at a time, and in nine months, That would be December, we feature you in your own show”
”that’s very generous Mr. Ranston”
“Bullshit, I’m not being generous, I’m being proprietary, I gave you your first show, and you’re going to be big, HUGE, and I want the show, I want my gallery to remain the one who discovered you, I want my gallery to be the one that reaps the profits, shared handsomely with you of course”
“Of course” Justin tried not to smile too wide.
An idea occurred to him, it was an idea he KNEW he should push back into the depths of his brain, and simply shake the mans hand, sign the papers and get to work.
“Mr. Ranston? Do I need to paint in New York”?
“Why do you ask?”
“Well, I find I’ve done some of my best stuff in Pittsburgh, so my thinking is, if the idea is to have a spectacular show in December, I go back to my studio there, and create where I do it best”
Now Justin was just lying, he didn’t have a studio there, but he could get one, and he could be in Pittsburgh, with his mom, and Molly, and… Brian.
“I need you at the shows Mr. Taylor”
Justin’s heart sank, and then bounced back
“You want your studio to show my work, and you want to reap the benefits of my success, well, you will, and I will guarantee you three appearances at showings within the next eight months, keeping my name on everyone’s lips, but not over exposing myself, but in the meantime, I work in Pittsburgh, where I know my discipline is at it’s best, and my concentration at it’s most precise”
The studio owner offered his hand and Justin shook it.
“Do you have a lawyer?”
Justin’s heart twinged a little, he used to, he used to have Mel, but now…
“I’ll get one”
“Good, I’ll have the contracts messengered over today”
Justin wanted to call Brian immediately, but he didn’t, they weren’t like that anymore…were they? He was never sure where he stood with Brian these days, he always seemed so distant on the phone the few times they’d talked.
He called Mel instead, told her the good news and listed while Lindsay gushed and Mel gave him a heat felt attaboy, then they put Gus on the phone and Justin smiled so widely his mouth hurt as he listed to Gus tell him about Sam and t-ball, and his baby sister, and then Justin asked him to hand the phone back to momma, and Mel was on the line.
“The thing is Mel, the studio is sending over the papers, and I don’t have a lawyer, I was wondering if you still knew anyone in New York or even Pittsburgh whom I could trust.
Melanie thought for a moment, and rattled off a couple of names.
“You’ll come for the show?” he asked
“We wouldn’t miss it kiddo” Mel replied, and Justin got off the phone to make another call.
Two days later he was on a plane, and back in Pittsburgh, his mother picked him up at the airport.
PITTSBURGH
“Justin, you look great sweetie,” his mom said as she greeted him.
He hugged her back genuinely happy to see her.
Neither said anything much while he picked up his luggage and the walked to her car. Once she had cleared the airport she turned to look at him
“So, where am I taking you?”
Justin shrugged and then gave up the pretence of nonchalance,
“I need to see Brian, so, I guess the loft”
“Honey, he sold the loft”
“Sold it? I figured after I left he’d take it off the market”
“No, I was at the closing myself, he sold it, and kept the house”
“THE house? is that where he’s living?”
“I guess so” his mother shrugged, it’s never been re-listed” she glanced over at Justin “I check every once in a while to see”
“Well, I guess take me to the house then”
“Justin are you sure?”
“I’m sure mom, I’m finally sure”
Jennifer’s car pulled into the empty driveway, “Justin, sweetie, I don’t think he’s home”
Justin approached the front door, taking a deep breath, the door was locked, but Justin had a hunch and punched in the old loft alarm code into the number pad, and the light went from red to green, he opened the door.
He walked back to the car and kissed his mother on the cheek, “I’ll call you soon” and he walked back into his country estate.
Brian was exhausted, sleep only came lately when he was too drunk or stoned to think, and then it seemed all too soon after he lost consciousness that he was pulled back to reality by his alarm. It had been a long day, and it was well past 11 pm when he finally turned off the lights in his office and headed back to the house.
Justin had gotten to the house at around seven, since then he’d been wandering the empty rooms, he found the bed, not in the master suite, just lying on the floor, and he found a room full of boxes, dusty and unopened. There were clothes, fresh from the drycleaners hung meticulously in the closet, some things never changed. There were also piles of dirty laundry and discarded cigarette packs laying everywhere. Justin had imagined Brian still in Pittsburgh a thousand times, sometimes a thousand times in a single day, he had never pictured him pacing the rooms of an empty house like Mrs. Haversham, he didn’t know whether to be touched, worried, or aggravated.
His feelings varied depending on the debris he found, the several empty cases of scotch left him aggravated, as did the cigarettes, but the bed, looking so sparse, left him feeling touched, and well, worried was a bit of a constant.
He was worried about a lot of things; specifically what Brian was going to say when he found him here.
He pulled a sketchbook out of his backpack and started to draw the bed, the empty, crumpled sheets, the single pillow, the discarded cigarette boxes and overflowing ashtray, he was sketching intently when he heard the car pull into the driveway.
The minute Brian pulled in he sensed something was wrong…the lights were on, he knew he didn’t leave the fucking lights on, and was the door partially open? He got out of the car and carefully swung the door inwards, but the alarm had not gone off. For a moment, a thought flickered, and he pushed it away. Then he laughed, even if someone had broken in, what the fuck were they gonna steal, a couple of stale lemon bars and a half empty pack of cigarettes? He walked into the house and stopped dead in his tracks.
“Justin”
Justin smiled; he hadn’t realized he’d been holding his breath ‘til he let it out
“Brian, I’m back”
“What the fuck are you doing here?”
Justin was somewhat prepared for this, he wasn’t silly enough to think that the sentimental Brian, who had been so open with him before the wedding would remain once his heart had been broken, but as prepared as he had been, it still saddened him to think about how much reinforcement Brian had probably put into the wall around his heart…shit, that fucker was probably steel rebar and poured concrete at this point.
Justin was wrong.
“Never mind, doesn’t matter” Brian said, “You’re here”
Brian decided not to process the information further than that, Justin was smiling, arms around his neck, hugging him…whatever this meant, wherever it lead, he didn’t care right now.
He leaned in and kissed Justin’s neck, and then possessively covered Justin’s mouth with his own, his desire taking over any more thought as his tongue mapped out the terrain inside the younger man’s mouth.
Justin had been prepared for a lot of greeting scenarios and while this was the one he had hoped for, he hadn’t really expected it, but he responded, instantly. He felt Brian’s hot breath against his neck, and then was bending backwards as the taller man took his mouth like enemy territory being reclaimed.
They pulled apart for a second, long enough to inhale, push Brian's jacket off his shoulders, where it fell in a pile behind him, his tie was next, and Justin was being backed slowly up the foyer stairs into the great room.
Brian was pulling at Justin's shirt, trying to reach skin. Justin held his arms above his head, and Brian removed the offending garment, they were at each other’s flies next, grasping desperately, separating their mouths for only moments at a time, and even then, they stood, forehead to forehead, not wanting to lose contact, not even for a split second. Justin kicked off his shoes, Brian did the same and soon they were both naked, pressed against each other, standing skin to skin.
Justin started to kiss down Brian's neck, until he was even with his nipples, he took one in his mouth, licking and sucking, until Brian pulled him back up and kissed him again, Justin wrapped one leg around Brian's waist, and Brian used his hands to gesture that he should do the same with the other. Brian was holding him now, his legs wrapped around the taller mans waist as he continued to kiss him, his hands kneading Justin's ass, his mouth needing Justin's breath, he took him upstairs and fell on top of him onto the bed.
Brian raised himself up on his arms, and stared into Justin's eyes, and Justin returned the look and realized he had a million more paintings to do, because he hadn’t gotten it right, nothing he’d done came close to what he was seeing. Brian leaned down and kissed him again as if his life depended on it, while his other arm searched around beside the bed…
“Dammit, he thought to himself, there’s got to be one here somewhere” he had never brought a trick back to this house, but a Brian Kinney bedroom without a condom…not feasible. Then he remembered where there was one. He crawled over Justin, and the young blonde lifted his head to kiss the passing parts of Brian's torso as it moved towards the head of the bed. Brian reached over to a pile of rumpled clothes trying to find his jeans, as he stretched searching franticly for them, his cock was directly over Justin's face. Justin didn’t miss a beat, his tongue shot out, licking the sweet drops of precum from Brian who groaned and almost came right then. He moved back down, his jeans in hand, kissing Justin again, and searching the pockets until he found what he was looking for.
He held up the packet with a smile as if it were a winning lottery ticket. Justin wriggled beneath him, creating a delicious friction. He ripped the package open with his teeth and got back to the matter at hand.
Justin's legs were wrapped around him, and Brian put his hands behind him on the boys ankles and pulled his feet up to his shoulders…he slowly started to enter him, it took all of the restraint he had not to just pound into him as hard as he could, and Justin's eyes were still locked on his, as he pushed slowly, the plan to go slow was shot to hell when Justin bucked his body onto Brian's cock, impaling himself.
Brian pumped him hard, bending him in half to lean in and kiss him. Justin's hands were clawing at Brian's back, trying to get closer, to pull the man inside him, inside his skin where they could never be separated again, the friction of Brian against him, Brian leaned back a little, his hands finding Justin's and intertwining their fingers, he leaned back in, and they both shot, Justin into the small space between their bodies and Brian deep into the condom inside Justin.
Brian literally wanted to pinch himself to make sure it wasn’t a dream, but it wasn’t, and if it was…well, he just never wanted to wake up. He pulled himself off of Justin, reluctantly, he wasn’t trying to crush the life out of him. As he pulled out, he watched the beautiful blonde face show that small twinge of longing that he always showed when he was left feeling empty, that small moment before he would curl up against Brian and cling to him.
Brian flopped onto his back on the bed, removing the used condom and dropping it inside a half crumpled cigarette box. Justin moved closer to Brian, settling his head on Brian's shoulder.
Brian smiled, “so, how long you in town for?”
Brian could feel Justin smiling against his shoulder “how long do you want me for?”
Send feedback to vamphile @ gmail.com