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Brian Kinney Saves the Universe

Queer as Folk US. Brian/Justin. Post episode 504. Spoilers and images through 504, but no spoilers beyond 504. Images made from screencaps from paddies' site Queer Eyes. If any of my political information is incorrect, please feel free to point it out to me, as I did zero research for this.

One morning as they were eating breakfast Brian set down the newspaper he was reading and said, "I should be a senator."

Justin didn’t look up from his Frosted Mini-Wheats. "I thought you weren’t going to do acid anymore."

Brian flicked the empty box of cereal so that it fell against Justin’s bowl. "I’m not on acid, you twat."

Justin rolled his eyes and pushed the cereal box away. "So you’re going to run for the Senate? In between running an advertising agency, owning a club, being a father, and fucking every guy in the tri-state area, you're going to manage a successful campaign for a state-wide office, and then live nine months out of the year in Washington DC representing your constituency in a roomful of old flabby men you wouldn't touch with someone else's dick?"

"Yes."

Justin sighed. "The funny part is, you probably could."

"Look at this." Brian slid the open newspaper across the table. "The Democratic nominees. Sanderson, who's under investigation for tax fraud. Miller, who had to resign from the board of his company because of falsified financial statements. And Goodwin, who won't even be able to make the primary debates, since he's under house arrest for perjury."

Justin looked at the article and nodded. "But there's still the incumbent to beat. Tim Merp; he's pretty popular."

"He killed a prostitute."

"That was never proven."

"Because his confession was inadmissible." Brian rose to his feet and kicked the leg of Justin's chair. "Get your crayons, Sunshine. You're making my posters."

Justin stood up slowly. "Get your checkbook, Kinney. I don't work for free."

To be considered for the primary election Brian needed a thousand signatures, which he got in one night at Babylon. Justin watched, alternately amused and amazed, as Brian met with campaign managers and strategists, delegated his advertising accounts to his senior executives, and ran Babylon by meeting with his managers twice a week while getting blown in the backroom. "It's called multi-tasking," he said, his face damp with sweat, one hand on the back of a guy's head.

The first few posters Justin did were jokes, created late at night as he and Brian shared a joint in bed and laughed over the increasingly ridiculous slogans:

They settled for a simple design: dark letters on a light background reading, "Brian Kinney for Senate". These immediately appeared in storefronts and on front lawns all over Pittsburgh. There were also posters with Brian posed in a suit, looking so hot that once when he got home and Brian was out at a meeting, Justin jerked off to one of them.

On the day of the primary debates, the public hall in Harrisburg was half-filled by Brian's friends. The other half - former tricks.

"You drove over three hours to see Brian talk about politics?" Emmett asked one of the men sitting near them. "That's kind of creepy."

The man shrugged. "It's not like I'm sitting at home jerking off to his campaign posters."

Justin slid down in his seat.

The debates began, and Brian spoke confidently about education, healthcare, and employment. Then the moderator asked each candidate about various accusations against them that had been brought up in the media since the primaries began.

Sanderson and Miller gave stock "no comment" responses concerning their respective fraud charges, and then the moderator moved to Brian, asking, "It's been alleged that you live with another man, Mr. Kinney. How do you respond to that?"

Brian responded with a sudden laugh. "Is that all you've got on me? I live with a man? Come on, I must've forged my mother's name on a report card once in elementary school." He leaned against the podium and raised his eyebrows challengingly. "Jaywalked, perhaps?" He shook his head. "If that's all you have, I'm looking pretty damn good."

"Well I find it immoral," Miller said with a huff.

Brian's eyes slid to the side. "Is that how you find it, Bob? Tell me, did you divorce your third wife before or after you started fucking your assistant?"

"Language, Mr. Kinney," the moderator warned.

"And this one," Brian said, gesturing to Sanderson. "Steve here is being investigated for, among other things, hiding assets from his wife in offshore accounts when he ran off with last year's Miss Pennsylvania."

"Allegedly," Sanderson said weakly.

"Me, I've been with someone for five years, which is longer than all of Miller's marriages combined. If that's the worst thing I've done lately..." Brian shrugged. "I should abandon this whole deal and run for pope."

"Did he just imply he's married to you?" Emmett whispered to Justin.

"Did he just compare himself to the pope?" Ted muttered.

Justin covered his face with his hands. "This can not end well."

Two weeks later, Brian won the party nomination.

Justin had been inside all day working on the comic book, so he didn't hear the news until Brian came home. Brian casually draped his coat over the kitchen counter, took off his shoes, unbuttoned his shirt, and undressed at a maddeningly slow pace as Justin sat watching with a pencil between his lips. When Brian was completely naked he spread his arms out, smiled widely, and said, "I hereby present you with the nine-inch cock of an official candidate for the US Senate."

"You're kidding." Justin leapt to his feet and rushed up to hug him. "You're fucking kidding! You won?"

"I won," Brian said proudly, pulling him in for a kiss that didn't end until they were lying tangled and sweaty on the couch.

"So," Brian said. "How do you feel about doing a little campaign traveling? Seeing the great state of Pennsylvania. I hear there are some interesting farms, Amish people..." He lazily ran his hand over Justin's hip. "Long stretches of utterly boring fucking nothing."

Justin pressed his nose against Brian's and grinned. "How can I resist?"

Justin turned to retrieve his pants and noticed his sketches spread out across the table. He pulled himself into a sitting position and studied the top drawing, where Zephyr was helping Rage escape the villain's lair after Rage's flying motorbike lost an engine.

"Why don't you bring Michael?" Justin suggested.

Brian rolled off the couch and headed into the kitchen to get a bottle of water. "Why would I do that?" he asked coldly.

"Wouldn't it be fun? One last adventure with your best friend before you both become respectable adults?"

Brian drank half the bottle in one gulp and then tossed it into the sink. He walked back to the couch, where he leaned over, kissed Justin quickly, and then spoke in a low, gravely voice.

"I will never be a respectable adult," he said. "And Michael and I are no longer friends."

Campaigning was much more boring than Justin had expected, and he had expected it to be pretty damn boring. They traveled from small town to small town, with Brian giving the same speech in each one. Justin spent a lot of time sitting in hotel rooms drawing, both for himself and for Rage, until Brian would inevitably burst in through the door, undo his tie, and say something like, "I have ten minutes until the next press conference. Take your pants off."

The trip ended where it had all begun – in Harrisburg. But this time Brian was debating Tim Merp, the incumbent senator. Initially Merp refused to debate Brian, not believing he was a serious threat. But as Election Day approached and Brian gained in the polls, Merp relented.

Brian was, as usual, brilliant. He was smart, witty, charming, and had strong answers for every question. And even if he hadn't, just the way he wore his suit, the way he moved his hips as he turned to look at his opponent, and the way he'd let his tongue dart out to touch his lower lip in the split-second before he spoke – every woman in the room and half the men were enthralled. Brian Kinney, Justin thought, Always the center of attention.

The moderator asked about why Brian left Vanguard, but he had his answer ready: "creative differences". He'd never officially been fired, just forced to resign, and the success of Kinnetik had Vance scared enough that he'd rather keep his mouth shut than make an enemy of Brian by spilling the real story to the press.

Everything else from his past looked surprisingly good on paper. He'd graduated at the top of his class in high school, and earned high grades and honors in college. He'd excelled in all of his advertising jobs, been promoted quickly, and gathered a host of awards for his work.

"However, Mr. Kinney," the moderator said after reading off his long list of accomplishments. "There was a story in yesterday's Patriot-News accusing you of being promiscuous."

Brian leaned close to the microphone. "Yes, I am promiscuous."

"And you don't consider this a sign of moral weakness?"

"I don't consider this applicable. Who you sleep with has nothing to do with how well you do your job. I've been successful in all my various business ventures, and it's never been connected to my sex life."

"Do you think this opens you up to accusations of impropriety, even blackmail?"

Brian chuckled. "Not if I have nothing to hide. I've spent my entire life doing whatever I think is right, with no regret. So I have nothing to fear from blackmailers, the press, or my opponents. I can go out, I can sleep around, and I can patronize a prostitute without murdering them." He glanced over at Merp and smiled wickedly. "For example."

Brian turned his attention back to the audience, his gaze steady and determined. "I'm queer, I'm a slut, and I'm the most honest man you'll ever meet, because I make no apologies for who I am." He took a step backwards and held his arms out in a gesture of sincerity. "I fuck people literally," he said. "Not figuratively."

He won by a landslide.

The celebration on Liberty Avenue that Election night was bigger than the Stockwell defeat and the last Pride combined. Halfway through the festivities, Brian motioned for Justin to follow him into the alley behind Babylon, where they walked past a crowd of men engaged in various sexual acts before settling on a semi-quiet area between a trash can and a brick wall.

They'd both been drinking, and the sweet smell of alcohol on Brian's breath made Justin's head spin even more that it already was. Brian pinned him against the wall, put his face close, and didn't move for a moment, just stared at Justin, his breath warm on the side of his face.

Finally he said, "We’re not married."

Justin was too distracted by the proximity of Brian's lips to care about whatever it was he was talking about. "I'm aware," he said.

"So I don't expect you to come to DC with me." He paused, this time so still that he didn't even appear to be breathing. "But I want you to."

Justin blinked. "Huh?"

"I want you," Brian continued. "If you're not going to school and you don't have anything else going on here, I want you there with me."

They rented an apartment in a Virginia suburb where a lot of politicians and federal workers lived. Justin took a part-time job at a graphic design firm that he didn't love but he didn't hate, and it left him with enough free time to begin painting again.

As Justin had predicted, Brian complained that everyone in the Senate was completely unfuckable. But a month into his term an older Senator from Nevada resigned due to health problems, and Brian followed the election carefully, since the Democrat campaigning for the seat was a thirty year-old man with a slender waist and muscular arms.

They flew back to Pittsburgh at least once a month, where Brian kept up on business at Kinnetik and Babylon, and Justin visited with his friends and family. On the weekends they stayed in DC they hit the clubs hard, and soon were so well-known in the area that the minute they walked into a bar a crowd of people gathered to buy them both drinks.

Justin didn't pay much attention to Brian's political career, since the one time he tried to watch the Senate on C-Span it was boring as hell. But one day as he was painting in the living room with the television on softly, he heard the terms "gay marriage" and "Senator Kinney", and he rushed to turn up the volume.

"Brian Kinney, an openly gay man, is among the five Senators on the Federal Marriage Amendment committee," the newscaster said. "The committee is reviewing a bill written by Senator Rick Santorum, which would limit the federal definition of marriage to an institution between a man and a woman, effectively ending the possibility of same-sex marriage. Surprisingly, Senator Kinney sides with those opposed to gay marriage."

An image of Brian outside the capitol building came onto the screen. "I said during my campaign that my personal life would not affect my ability to do my job," he said. "If the bill passes the House, it's obviously what the people want, and I won't stand in the way."

Brian came home a few minutes later, and wasn't even inside the door all the way before Justin shouted, "What the fuck are you doing?"

Brian looked up at him innocently. "I'm taking my shoes off. Then I'm ordering out for Japanese, and then I'm fucking you in the ass. Any other questions?"

"What the fuck are you doing on the Federal Marriage Amendment committee?" Justin asked. "Jesus Christ, Brian, just because you don't think gays shouldn't get married, you're going to join their side?" He threw up his hands in a gesture of defeat. "Rick Fucking Santorum? These are your friends now?"

Brian threw his keys onto the coffee table. "Do you trust me?"

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

"Do you trust me?" Brian repeated.

Justin sighed. "Of course I trust you."

Brian walked up to him and put his hand on the side of Justin's face. "Then trust me," he said softly.

Justin set down his brush and headed for the door. "I'm going out tonight."

"You don't want sushi?" Brian asked.

"Go eat sushi with Trent Lott," Justin called back.

The next day at work Justin's phone was ringing so much he had to turn it off. When he finally got a chance to listen to his messages, there were angry recordings from nearly everyone he'd ever known in Pittsburgh, including his mom ("Honey, is Brian okay?") and Debbie ("What the fuck is that asshole doing?"). Justin knew that, "Brian told me to trust him" wouldn't sound like a reasonable defense, so he just stopped returning his calls.

It wasn't a reasonable defense for him either, and in the weeks that followed he and Brian spoke to each other less and went out alone more. Meanwhile, the Federal Marriage Amendment passed the House, though just barely, and was scheduled for a vote in the Senate, where it was expected to be close.

The Thursday night before the vote, Justin came home from work to find Brian sitting in front of the television with a cigarette and a bottle of whiskey. Though the screen was muted, Justin could see that the cable news channel was playing a clip from earlier that day where Brian had announced his intention to vote in favor of the bill.

Justin sat down next to him and they watched in silence for a moment. When Brian ground out his cigarette and made a motion to stand, Justin put his hand on his arm to stop him.

"Please don't do this," Justin said. "Please. And not for Debbie, or for the guys at Babylon, or for the gay activists calling you a traitor." Brian turned his head away, and Justin tightened his grip. "I haven't asked you for much, Brian, but I'm asking you for this. Please."

Brian shook his arm free roughly. "I told you to trust me," he snapped.

"Jesus, Brian!" Justin stood and moved to the far side of the room. "You think queers in little suburban house are stupid. Fine. You don't want to be monogamous. Fine. You don't want to be committed to anyone. To me."

"This has nothing to do with you," Brian muttered.

"You said we're not married, and I'm fine with that," Justin continued. "You didn't have to amend the Constitution to prove it!"

Brian left the room without responding, walking into the bedroom and slamming the door shut. Justin went out, got drunk, got blown in the bathroom of a club, came home at five in the morning, and passed out on the couch.

Justin couldn't bear to watch the news the next day. He tried to distract himself by painting, but he couldn't concentrate. When he finally turned on CNN, the scrolling text at the bottom of the screen confirmed his fears, reading "Federal Marriage Amendment Passes House. President to Sign This Afternoon".

Justin took his suitcase out of the closet and began packing as the channel droned on in the background. When the feature on the amendment came on they showed a clip from the House vote, where Brian not only spoke in favor of the bill, but also attached a rider to it stating that this was being done "per the wishes of our founding fathers". Justin turned off the television and then threw the remote control at it.

"Moving out?" came Brian's voice from the doorway. "You're so unoriginal sometimes."

Justin didn’t look up. "I'm just going to Pittsburgh for a visit. I'll be back in a week or so." He slammed his suitcase closed. "Or when you get an exorcism, whichever comes first."

Justin moved to the door, but Brian stopped him. He held out a thick black binder. "Read it." Justin tried to push past him, but Brian held his arm firm, blocking the doorway, and thrust the binder at him with his other hand. "It's the Marriage Amendment. Read it."

"Why the hell would I want to read that?"

Brian didn't move. "Rider C, Page eight. Read it."

Justin dropped his suitcase and grabbed the binder from Brian roughly. He opened to Rider C, in the back of what must've been at least five hundred pages. It began with, "We the Congress of the United States of American hereby enact the Federal Marriage Amendment, defining marriage as a union between a man and a woman, in accordance with the wishes of our founding fathers. Referencing the original third paragraph of the first section of the second article..." The page continued in a bland tone, saying nothing while using a great many words.

"Page eight," Brian repeated.

Justin flipped to page eight and read the first full paragraph. "As our founding fathers intended when they initially wrote the Constitution of the United States of America, this amendment in its whole will apply only to those for whom the Constitution was originally intended. Therefore marriage is defined as the union between a woman and a man who is white and owns property. No other definition of marriage will be recognized by the federal government."

Justin looked from the page to Brian a few times before he realized what Brian had done. "This is your rider?" he asked.

Brian nodded.

"And no one read it before they voted on it?"

"At least not all the way through," Brian said.

"And now it's a federal law?"

"The President's signing it as we speak."

Justin looked down at the page again. "When people realize, it's gonna be..."

"A shitstorm," Brian finished for him.

Justin looked back at him and grinned. "They'll be falling all over themselves to repeal it. Jesus, Brian, why didn't you tell me?"

"If one person on Capital Hill heard about this it would all be over," he explained. "By tomorrow morning someone should have noticed. If not, I'll leak it to the press myself. But tonight," he grabbed Justin's hand and pulled him close to kiss him. "It's Friday night, and we just dicked over the Senate. Let's go out and fuck in every public place in the city."

As Brian predicted, the next morning the news was filled with outrage over Rider C. It dominated the newspapers, the radio, and the cable news channels, and even regular programming on the networks was preempted. Those senators who supported the bill went on television and blamed Brian Kinney for it, but were hit with such a barrage of accusatory questions that they all fell silent by Saturday afternoon.

Groups began marching on Washington immediately. Hundreds of websites popped up overnight with names like repealmarriageamendment.org. Arguments raged on talk shows over what constituted "property", and if people who owned a car but not a house were still allowed to get married. Riots and protests broke out at city halls across the country as all applications for marriage licenses were put on hold indefinitely. Al Sharpton made a speech accusing several Republican senators of writing Rider C themselves in a conspiracy to repeal civil rights legislation.

Brian and Justin spent the day in bed, alternately watching the news and having sex. On Sunday Justin returned phone calls to everyone back in Pittsburgh, while Brian stayed in the bedroom all day talking on his cell phone and typing furiously.

On Monday morning Justin went with Brian to the Senate. There were crowds of protestors all over Capitol Hill, and the Visitor's Gallery was closed to the public, so Justin was able to watch the proceedings with few people around to disturb him. The session began when a thin, pasty man that Justin recognized as Bill Frist stood and began speaking into a microphone.

"Our first order of business is an emergency vote to repeal the Federal Marriage Amendment," Frist said. "But first the chair recognizes Senator Kinney, who I expect will be offering an apology and announcing his resignation."

Brian stood up at his desk and adjusted his microphone. "Obviously Billy doesn't know me very well," he began. "Because I don't apologize."

He opened the first folder on top of a pile of papers on his desk and began reading from it. "Members of the Senate: I understand that we have pressing issues to attend to, and it would be in our best interest if I were brief. But you can all kiss my ass, because I'm not going to be. I would like to tell you about a man named Michael Novotny.

"Michael is my best friend. He's done more for me than I can even begin to explain, and I love him like a brother, so you can believe me when I say that he's the most boring man you'll ever meet. Michael lives in a cute little suburban house with his partner Ben and their adopted son Hunter. They spend their evenings helping Hunter with his homework, managing their retirement accounts, tending to their garden, and having dinner parties with people so pathetically straight-laced they think having two glasses of wine counts as a hedonistic lifestyle.

"Michael runs a comic book store, where he holds reading groups for disadvantaged children, donates half of his profits to charity, pays his taxes religiously, and will give anyone a discount if they just make a sad puppy face and ask for one. In his free time Michael volunteers at a hospice and runs errands for his mother. On Sundays he, Ben, and Hunter all have a nice little family dinner with Mother Novotny, and Michael always brings a bottle of wine and pie.

"Michael is the greatest man I've ever known. Sure, he's no fun at parties and I can never get his boring ass out to the clubs anymore, but if you're the type of person who values kindness, hard work, commitment, and morality, you'll never find a better role model than Michael."

"And yet our country doesn't think Michael's as good as people like Bill Frist or Trent Lott. Because Michael's gay he doesn't have the same rights other people do, despite the fact that he's a better man than any of us in this room. Last Friday this Senate said that Michael, who participated in a charity walk last month, isn't as good as Rick Santorum, who last month tried to pass a law saying that health care workers can deny service to sick people if they disagree with the patient's religion.

"You want to argue that homosexuality is a sin, Rick? I'm with you." Brian spread his arms wide. "I'm the most sinful motherfucker you'll ever meet. I'll fuck you and Arlen Specter in the ass at the same time, and I'll video tape the whole damn thing." He dropped his arms and narrowed his eyes. "But I'm not going to let you pass laws that discriminate against Michael. Because you could go spend the rest of your life as a monk feeding starving children in a desert somewhere, and you'll still be nothing compared to Michael Novotny."

Brian removed a thick packet of papers from his desk and held it in the air. "This is the Federal Marriage Equality Amendment," he said before setting it back down. "It states that everyone in this country has the right to get married, regardless of sexual orientation or the gender of either party. I will not repeal last week's amendment without including in that vote a vote to pass this Federal Marriage Equality Amendment.

"Over the weekend I spoke to several of my colleagues, and at last count I had thirty-two people supporting me. I know this isn't nearly the two-thirds majority required to pass my amendment, and not even the thirty-five needed to block a repeal of last week's amendment. Therefore," he removed the largest stack of papers from his pile. "I am prepared to filibuster by reading a list of all the dates, locations, and specific sexual acts I have performed with Justin Taylor in the past five years." He cleared his throat. "May 2000; Tremont Street, Pittsburgh Pennsylvania; hand job. May 2000, Tremont Street, Pittsburgh Pennsylvania; another hand job. May 2000; Tremont Street, Pittsburgh Pennsylvania; anal."

"Thirty-three!" came a voice from the back of the room, and all heads turned to see a man standing there, waving at Brian and smiling.

A woman nearby stood also. "Thirty-four!" she called out.

The new senator from Nevada – the one Brian had been supporting because he was a young, hot guy – stood as well, and shouted, "Thirty-five!"

Brian looked down at his list and shrugged. "I'll save this for another time then." He looked up at the Senate floor. "Members of the Senate: I now have enough supporters to prevent the Marriage Amendment from being repealed unless the vote to repeal also includes a vote to pass the Equality Amendment. So there's your choice. Either allow the entire country to continue being outraged, or allow my boring friend Michael to have a stupid, meaningless ceremony that prevents him from ever having a good time again."

When the Equality Amendment passed, Justin leapt out of his seat and let out a cheer.

The Senator broke for lunch, and Justin met Brian in his office, where they stood at the picture window and watched reporters swarm around a group of Senators on the front steps of the Capitol Building.

"Now that same-sex marriage is legal," Brian said. "Do you know what I'm thinking we should do?"

"Have a threesome with that Senator from Nevada?" Justin suggested.

Brian pulled him into a hug. "It's amazing how you can read my mind."

"It's like we're married," Justin said. "So now that you've brought peace and equality to all the queers of the nation, what are you going to do next, Senator Kinney?"

Brian considered this. "Ever get fucked in the Oval Office?" he asked.

"Not recently," Justin said.

"I can change that," Brian said, and they kissed for what seemed like an entire campaign season.

The End