QAF: Partners
Summary: In which Justin follows his head and heart instead of following crappy advice. Season 2 to post-513.
A/N: Just little fix-its here and there throughout the series because sometimes, what was written didn't fit the characters in my opinion. Goes post-series into what one version of an ideal future would have been (for me) if the characters were canon.
Also, as I'm re-reading this before I post it, I realize that it comes off slightly anti-Munchers. And there's barely any mention of Michael or any of the Pittsburgh gang. I'm not usually anti-Munchers and the Pitts gang just didn't fit in here. Hope that doesn't bother anyone.
It started with the nightmares.
It's not like they stopped – not really. He'd go a few days without them – weeks even, sometimes – but they'd come back. They weren't consistent, and when they do re-emerge, it would only be for a day or two before retreating into the part of Justin's brain that forgot.
Until, for some odd inexplicable reason, the nightmares started up again. Every single day. Five weeks ago.
Justin didn't want to talk about it.
Brian definitely didn't want to talk about it.
A mid-afternoon stop in Woody's for a secret meeting with Dr. Alex Wilder where no one would be able to witness or overhear gave Brian the reluctant resolve to try to talk about it.
Justin threw temper tantrums.
Brian often ended the huge blowouts they had by either fucking Justin's brains out, or storming out of the loft, getting his dick sucked or fucking some nameless, faceless trick and coming back to the loft drained and wary and confused and hurt.
He was losing it.
They both were.
It wasn't like before. He wasn't able to reach Justin in this darker place he'd found himself in. And with Ryder suddenly retiring and Gardner taking over...Brian's attention was split into two. He wasn't giving his all to his job or to Justin, and it was running him ragged.
Finally, after a business trip to Chicago that landed him Gardner's most coveted account – Brown Athletics – Brian returned to Pittsburgh feeling a little more like the Brian Kinney he used to be.
Confident and happy and willing to give Justin his all, he slid the loft doors open with a bottle of champagne (even though champagne usually ran right through him and had him peeing twenty times in a night) and called out for his partner.
Justin was dead asleep on the couch and he didn't even stir at Brian's loud entrance. Grumbling a little at the thought that he might not get a celebratory fuck after all, Brian locked the door and set the security alarm, placed his briefcase and the champagne on the kitchen island and shed his Prada jacket.
Justin had a sketchbook dangling between the fingers of one hand, precariously close to drooping off onto the floor. A little relieved that Justin was drawing again after a particularly horrid creative block since the nightmares started again, Brian gently snagged the sketchpad before it hit the floor.
He ran his fingers through Justin's soft golden locks before looking down at the pad.
His blood froze.
Violent.
Red.
Anger.
Hatred.
He was looking right into the face of Chris Hobbs, expression twisted into something dark and ugly, bat swinging down...
"Brian?"
Justin's sleepy voice broke through the fuzzy thoughts buzzing in his head. He looked up and, disoriented, wondered why Justin was suddenly blurry. A few blinks and a droplet of water on his cheek made him realize he was crying.
Any other time, any other day...Anyone else...And he'd have deflected. And turned away.
But this was Justin.
And he'd drawn the last thing that he had seen before he'd been bashed. From a night that he had forgotten completely thanks to Hobbs.
Brian couldn't move. Or speak.
Justin, more awake now, bit his lip as he took in the sketchpad in Brian's hand and the crushed look on his face.
He reached out and took the sketchpad away, putting it on the coffee table, face down.
"I started to remember," his confession was hushed. "The nightmares started again, and I started to remember. I don't know how. Or why."
He peeked beneath long lashes to see if this elicited any response.
It didn't.
He continued.
"At first...It's just Hobbs. I remember the bat. And it made things so much worse," he shuddered, sitting up and drawing his knees to his chest, looking so lost. Brian reached out with a trembling hand and placed them at the side of Justin's face, fingers stroking that soft, soft hair.
"Then...I remembered other things. Daphne. And getting dressed. At Debbie's house..." beautiful blue eyes looked up at Brian, soft and pained and loving. "And I remembered you."
Brian's eyes closed, trying not to show how much it hurt, but Justin knew. Justin always knew.
"You showed up. And we danced. And I felt like...Like I was flying," Justin scooted closer to Brian's still, frozen body. "It was the most ridiculously romantic night of my life."
Brian pulled him in, mouths crashing and searching, bodies coming together. They were desperate and it was intense, and it made his head spin.
It wasn't like they hadn't fucked since Justin's nightmares started. They had. A lot.
Sometimes Justin would be desperate for it, clawing at Brian like he was the only thing anchoring him to the land of the living. Sometimes they were hard and fast, and sometimes it was almost like their second first time.
But this...This was more intense than anything Brian had ever felt.
His skin was on fire. His mind alternated between ridiculously romantic and the taste, touch, feel, smell of Justin. His every nerve was electrified. The loft was too hot. Every touch was magnified – he could feel everything.
The first time, they couldn't make it to the bed. Justin's warm, nimble hands had worked Brian out of his clothes before his mind could stop spinning and the next thing he knew, Justin was naked, and he was guiding Brian, hard and gloved and slick, into his body, and everything was exploding into fireworks.
The second time was on the floor, two feet away from the couch.
The third was against the kitchen counter – Justin had wanted water and Brian had had self-control for about half a minute before he had to have Justin again.
They'd fucked five times before they ever reached the bed. They were sticky and sweaty and they smelled of nothing but sex. They decided on a shower before getting the sheets dirty.
They finally made it to the bed for round eight.
Justin rode him, long and slow and sweet and it lasted forever...Brian was losing his mind. He was losing everything...And it didn't matter.
A part of him, a part he'd thought was dead, had been brought back to life.
They woke up at four thirty and drank champagne and ate lemon squares. Justin giggled when Brian 'fed' him some dessert and ended up just smearing him with the pastry and making a mess everywhere.
If Brian had a heart, his would be soaring.
Justin began staying out late.
He wasn't at Woody's or Babylon.
And he didn't smell like tricks.
But there was a difference...His step was lighter. He smiled more. And...His abs were getting more defined.
Not that he hadn't been beautiful before, but he'd had a twink's body. Now he was starting to put on a little more muscle...It was strange. Hot, but strange.
Brian spent a little more time running his hands down Justin's body, examining each and every new facet every chance he could. Justin didn't say anything, but he definitely enjoyed the extra attention.
Finally, a few months later, Justin blurted out the truth. Brian hadn't expected him to hold out – the kid was terrible with secrets.
"I met someone at school," he told Brian. "Riley."
"Is he hot?"
"Riley's the butchest lesbian I've ever met in my life," Justin replied dryly. "I'm not the best judge for that."
Brian snorted.
"She's a sculptor," Justin continued. Brian ate his wantons in silence, head down, but Justin knew he was listening, knew he was paying attention. "She takes boxing lessons at this MMA gym near campus. I've been going with her."
Brian stared at him.
Justin shrugged. "It helps. With the nightmares," he admitted quietly. "I don't know...Just working out makes me feel better. The nightmares don't come on the days that I do. And when I box...It's like...I'm taking all my anger out, and it disappears for a while, you know?"
Brian rolled his lips together.
"If that works for you, then no one else needs to understand it," he told his boy. "For what it's worth, I'm glad you've got something that helps."
And a little relieved, too, though he'd never say that out loud. It was daunting and exhausting being someone's life line. In some ways, he'd been Michael's life line for fifteen years. It was tiring and when Michael failed at something, it always felt like it was his fault. This way...Justin would learn to stand on his own two feet. Brian would never stop being there for him. Justin and Gus...They were his Sonny Boys. But Justin would know what it was like to depend on himself, and that was a relief.
Justin's eyes twinkled, and Brian had a feeling that even if he never said these things out loud, Justin knew anyway.
Justin left for the entire summer after his first year at PIFA.
He had applied for and gotten a place on a prestigious European summer program PIFA hosted each year. Ten students out of each discipline got to go. Out of the ten students in fine arts, only one was a freshman. Justin was that freshman for this year.
He was thrilled when he got the news, told everyone from his mother to the homeless man who always sat at the curb a block away from the loft.
Then he panicked.
Brian fucked him to calm him down.
Justin's trip was set to begin the day after the Rage party Brian threw for him and Michael at Babylon. They celebrated the fucking huge success of Rage and Justin's trip by fucking their Rage and JT counterparts. It was the hottest foursome either had been a part of. They left Babylon at 2.45 am and stumbled into the loft, drunk, giggling and half fucking their way to the shower.
Debbie threw him a going away dinner during which Emmett hysterically broke down and had to be peeled away from Justin by Brian several hundred times.
Jennifer got him new weather-appropriate clothes to bring along.
Lindsay extolled the many benefits of going on such a prestigious trip and advised Justin repeatedly to grab every opportunity he could.
Brian – secretly – bought Justin brand new Yves Saint Laurent luggage and a cell for him to use to call home.
"Don't forget to charge it," he warned the blonde.
"I won't."
He did, actually, forget. On more than one occasion.
But he enjoyed his trip immensely.
He learned from some of the greatest artists and masters alive in Europe, he got to visit some of the grandest museums and, as Lindsay did tell him, he was given a number of opportunities.
One of the organizers for the trip was an art critic turned PIFA professor. She was impressed with his talent, especially considering the hurdle of the bashing and the impact of it on his hand.
There was a showcase for the students on the trip to display their work. It would happen at the end of their trip, on their last stop – Milan.
They were each to hand over their best work before the trip, one piece per student, and PIFA would handle shipping it over to Milan where it was stored the entire summer until the end. They stayed in Milan for a few weeks, where they were each asked to create a new work of art. Each student would then have two of their pieces displayed at the showcase, one pre-trip and one post-trip.
Justin told Brian about the showcase, nervous beyond belief.
Brian responded by showing up in a surprise visit with Jennifer and Lindsay in tow.
Students were allowed to invite their families over to the showcase to witness their group show.
Lindsay and Jennifer kept crying and hugging him. It was embarrassing.
Brian looked around, unimpressed with the other students' works, before appraising Justin's pieces with a pleased look. He told Justin that his work was "not bad", which was the highest form of compliment in Kinney-speak, and fucked Justin twice in the men's room.
When Justin finally returned to Pittsburgh, he had a tan, an even bigger smile than before and a renewed sense of confidence in his art that he'd somewhat lost thanks to the bashing.
He had a week before school started up for the second year, and he spent it celebrating with Brian at Babylon and the baths, going to three different welcome home dinner parties hosted by Debbie, his mom and Mel and Linds, and getting his school supplies together.
Justin went behind Brian's back and got himself a paid internship in Vangard's art department.
It was hot and intense working under Brian. Despite trying to adhere to a no-fucking-at-work policy in the beginning, both gave in to temptation about a day after Justin started his internship.
Justin's talent and eye for good artwork went noticed by more than just Brian. The head of the art department noticed it too. And so did several clients. When Justin managed to save the Eyeconics account and help them land it by tweaking a few things on the spot in front of the client, Vance Gardner started to notice him too.
Working together brought about a whole new level of sex appeal, and Justin suddenly could totally understand Brian having the need to fuck hot clients or co-workers.
Their creative energy flowed. Their minds worked in sync. Their nights out were intense.
Justin went behind Brian's back and started to sabotage Stockwell's campaign.
He was a vigilante artist, putting up posters and painting over billboards.
He had a group of vigilante friends from PIFA help out.
They started to make an impact on Stockwell's image.
When Brian found him out, he was pissed.
They had their worst fight to date, and Brian stormed out, firing Justin on the way.
A trip to see his son changed his mind, and he tracked Justin down where he was putting up a whole new batch of posters and helped him.
They started to sabotage Stockwell's campaign together.
Being vigilantes together was even hotter than just working together.
Stockwell's new policies meant that a lot of businesses on Liberty Avenue started to close down. Including the baths. It was like communism, but worse.
Brian and Justin were found out.
Brian got fired.
Justin got suspended.
Brian went into debt by being a one-man Citizens Concerned for the Truth, and airing an ad on national TV that pretty much guaranteed Stockwell's campaign was smeared for good.
Michael and Ben's foster kid Hunter gave Stockwell the final nail on the coffin – he was involved in the cover-up for the brutal rape and murder of a street hustler committed by a long-time friend and cop buddy. He probably wouldn't serve time – justice wasn't so sweet – but it was enough to get him thrown out of the running and out of the office.
Once Stockwell was out of the picture, things started to look up for a while. Gardner wanted Brian to come back, even sort of begged for it in his own way. PIFA contacted Justin about possibly ending his suspension early.
But Gardner wanted Brian to get a pay cut and PIFA wanted Justin to apologize for something he was damn proud of. Both of them stubborn and confident in their talents, refused and struck out on their own into the big bad world.
It sounded a lot cooler than it really was.
Justin was officially a college drop out. He was working three shifts at the diner.
Brian was asking Torso, the trashy clothes shop where Emmett got ninety-nine percent of his wardrobe from, to take him on as an independent one-man ad exec.
These things didn't really work out for them, and when Brian decided that it was time that he stopped sitting on his ass and build his own ad agency like he'd always dreamed of, Justin lent a helping hand. First he gave Brian the name for his new company, Kinnetik, and then he became a one-man art department for it.
They won a few smaller names, and then a few bigger ones. They got Brown Athletics and Eyeconics and a few other big names to follow them to Kinnetik once their contracts with Vangard ended. Some of Brian's big clients held out but once Kinnetik rose as a contender for even Vangard, they bowed down to Brian and Justin's genius.
As the business grew, so did their staff.
First on board, other than Brian and Justin, was Cynthia.
Justin got a few PIFA students to intern. And, later, a few PIFA graduates applied for permanent jobs at Kinnetik.
The office was in the old bath house, sold to Brian by Jennifer, and renovated within three months.
Once Kinnetik was off the ground and flying, Justin decided to lessen his duties at Kinnetik. Brian wasn't pleased but Justin felt it was better this way. Brian should hire someone who was the best at what they did – and who had the education and experience to back it up. Justin was greener than grass. He'd screw up eventually.
So Brian hired an art director with fifteen years of experience and the talent to back it up.
And Justin continued at Kinnetik as a paid underling in the art department, working part-time at the diner during the weekends and coming up with more issues of Rage with Michael.
Vic died, which wasn't such a shock, but still somehow was.
Brian got cancer, which was an even bigger shock to the both of them.
Brian refused to cry. But Justin did. A lot.
He didn't think Brian ever noticed. He only ever did it whenever Brian drifted off to sleep. But one night, while he was trying hard not to make any sounds, Brian rolled over and hugged him close from behind. Justin started, heart racing. Brian didn't say a word and he would've thought it was just Brian shifting in his sleep, but Brian reached out and wiped at his wet cheek and pressed a kiss to his hair, and that was that.
The night after Brian first started chemotherapy, he held Justin close in bed.
He'd spent hours just being...Exhausted. He could barely stand, barely walk. He'd stubbornly tried to work after his appointment, but had to go home early. Justin made it look easy, 'stealing' Brian away so that no one at Kinnetik knew the real reason, but Brian still hated it all. He'd thrown up everything he'd had before chemo, fallen asleep from sheer exhaustion, drank some water after waking up and threw that up too until he was just gagging on an empty stomach.
Justin was shocked when he felt Brian's body shake behind him. He felt the tear drops on his shoulder. He wanted to turn around but Brian held him tight. If he'd been at full strength, maybe he'd succeeded. But he was weak from chemo and Justin managed to turn around anyway. He kissed away Brian's tears and held him close and ran his fingers through Brian's hair until he fell asleep.
Brian whispered a barely audible "thank you" right before he fell into the realm of dreams.
Justin kissed his brow and prayed to a God he barely believed in that he would have at least seventy more years with Brian.
The day Brian got the all-clear, he and Justin went out to dinner. It was technically their first date, four years into their relationship.
The day Brian managed to get it up again was...Odd. It was thanks to his mom. Which was...Creepy. But he left work early, got dressed in his hottest clothes and went to Babylon. Justin's golden hair was a homing beacon for him, and he found his little twink within seconds of entering the club.
They celebrated with a weekend-long fuck marathon. They continued the celebration the next weekend with an orgy.
Thanks to Justin not being in school anymore, Brian could surprise him with a trip to Ibiza – the trip they were supposed to take together before the C bomb dropped. They were there for two weeks and fucked to their little hearts' content.
After Ibiza, things just continued to get better.
Kinnetik was nominated for several ad awards. They won two.
Justin and Michael were approached by Brett Keller about turning Rage into a movie.
The GLC got tricked by a skeevy con artist who stole all their money for what was supposed to go into the aids hospice. It was suggested that they do a charity bike ride all the way from Pittsburgh to Toronto and back.
Justin and Brian set out to do it together. Brett wanted Justin in LA during the bike ride but Justin managed to finagle a later meeting date. He'd have to take a flight the moment they returned to Pittsburgh, but it was worth it. He was there for Brian's broken collarbone and Ben and Michael's wedding, and he wouldn't have wanted to miss that for the world.
LA was a good thing. Justin managed to retain creative control and he fought for Rage to be made better than what Brett had in mind. There were a lot of rewrites and a lot of meetings with the studio.
In the end, Justin was asked to come on board the Rage ship, staying on as assistant art director for the movie. Which meant he had to stay in LA for about six months. Longer if necessary.
Justin went, and Brian visited, and they fucked. A lot.
California was a change, but a good one.
The movie had a lot of road bumps, but in the end, it received a summer release date. It was controversial and, of course, there were a lot of conservatives and Bible thumpers who made a big fuss, but they ultimately had a lot of supporters and it garnered a lot of positive feedback.
Justin stayed in LA for eight months. He picked up a healthier eating habit, which Brian said he was grateful for but was secretly upset about because who else was going to keep a cupboard full of junk food at the loft for him to rifle through whenever he was high? He also participated in a charity triathlon for a local LGBT rights group. He didn't come in first, but he enjoyed it so much that he bought his own bike and started running and swimming two to three times a week.
Kinnetik handled the ad campaigns. It had been one of Justin's conditions and Brett had worked hard for the studio to agree. Justin wasn't choosing favorites. It was just that Brian was the only one who could understand how to portray the movie to the public – they had based the movie off of the first issue of Rage, and had turned it into a tragic love story stemming from a gay bashing victim and the superhero who saved him.
Brian took on the account himself, and he did it brilliantly.
The movie was a box office success and broke barriers. Critics loved it. Viewers loved it.
The studio contacted Brett who contacted Justin before the movie even premiered about Rage the Sequel.
Any work for the sequel had to wait a year thanks to conflicting schedules for the main actors involved.
Justin settled back in Pittsburgh, where he moved back in at the loft. He had been doing a lot of thinking while in LA. Surrounded by people who loved what they did and could hone their creative side daily while at the studio had him itching to get back to his passion.
He loved fine art, but he also loved animation. It had been what he'd wanted to do when he was a kid, ever since Yellow Submarine.
So he looked at schools and made lists to decide which school was right for him. He'd missed the deadline for the current school year. In fact, he was several months past the school year starting. He'd have to apply for next year.
He decided to apply to Carnegie and University of Pittsburgh, but he also decided to apply to two schools in LA and two in NYC.
In the end, he got into four out of five colleges he applied to.
Mel and Linds separated for what felt like the billionth time.
Mel had gotten pregnant – they'd wanted another kid and had looked around at their friends. Lindsay had wanted Justin to do it, but he was too young and he wasn't quite sure that he wanted to give up his rights to his own kid if he ever had one. Brian had been the number one choice but he'd laughed in their faces when it was revealed that Mel would be the one carrying the baby this time round. By the time he'd agreed to do it, Mel had decided not to go through with using him as the father. Michael was a serious contender for a while before the Novotny clan showed Mel and Linds just how intrusive they would be.
Brian ended up being the one they chose.
Justin helped him with the 'donation'.
She was pregnant on the first try.
Brian and Justin 'celebrated' with cigars.
The baby was born two weeks after Mel and Linds separated thanks to Lindsay's affair with Sam Auerbach. Brian thought it was stupid. Justin thought it was gross.
The baby was another boy.
They named him Ezra, after Mel's favourite grandfather.
Brian asked for the middle name to be Justin. Mel had absolutely no objections.
Gus was besotted with his little brother. He complained that they couldn't spend enough time together because he was living with Lindsay in a tiny apartment while Ezra stayed with Mel at the house.
Unlike before, Brian didn't have anything to offer to fix Mel and Linds' relationship. His parental rights to Ezra had already been given up for Lindsay when Ezra was born. They'd had to fix it themselves.
Brian bought Babylon, and Justin helped to make the change a success.
Justin decided that he would attend Parson's in NYC. He'd be leaving in a few short months. Brian tried to pretend that he didn't think this changed things. Justin saw right through him.
Babylon hosted a charity concert for the aids hospice. Brian managed to get Cyndi Lauper to come and perform. It was a big step for Brian, but not enough to fix Brian's broken friendship with Michael.
Brian and Justin were set to go to Australia for the White Party right after the concert, but Babylon blew up. It was chaos. And there was fire. And smoke. And Brian thought he'd lost Justin for the second time in five short years.
It propelled him to do some serious changes.
He said the dreaded three words.
Only...He didn't dread them anymore.
He bought Justin a mansion twenty minutes outside the city. "For when you're done in New York and you come home," he told his prince.
He proposed to Justin.
Justin said yes – but only if Brian never changed who he was to please other people, and always stayed true to himself. Marriage didn't have just one definition. Open marriages were just as right as a more conventional one.
Mel and Linds got back together. Mel got so scared that she wanted to run from Pittsburgh. Lindsay was so scared she agreed right along with her. They decided on Toronto, because that's where Dusty's widow was going to move to. But a little bit of research told them what a stupid idea it was – no family, no house, no jobs. Even if they managed to get jobs, they'd be paid less. Mel couldn't even practice law in Canada.
They changed their plans and decided to move to a more LGBTQ-friendly state. They agreed on New York. Mel sold her share of the firm and got a job at one of the top boutique law firms in Manhattan, thanks to connections her senior partners had. Lindsay interviewed for and got a job at a small but impressive upscale gallery in the city. With the money from the house they sold (and a little bit of help from Brian who only wanted the best for his sons), they managed to afford a three bedroom apartment in Brooklyn.
Brian and Justin decided on a ceremony in the beautifully landscaped backyard of their new mansion. They married two months before Justin's move to NYC. They went on their honeymoon to Australia, making up for the trip that wasn't thanks to the bomb.
Justin moved to NYC to an on-campus apartment. He shared it with three lesbians and a guy who might be a serial killer in secret. He got himself studio space in SoHo to work on his art and on Rage. He peddled his art to any and every critic, gallery and agent he happened to have heard of.
Brian rebuilt Babylon (Justin came back for opening night and they drank, drugged and fucked like it was the year 2000), worked to grow Kinnetik into a brand name agency and travelled constantly to NYC to visit Justin and his sons. He bought a penthouse in a concierge building ("Only the best for my prince, remember?" he teased Justin when the blonde questioned if it was financially prudent to get another expensive property so soon after buying the mansion and rebuilding Babylon) in Manhattan, with an incredible view of the city skyline, where Justin lived permanently and Brian visited every chance he could.
A year after moving to NYC, Justin started work on Rage the sequel. The good news was that the whole movie would be produced in NYC so his studies weren't terribly disrupted.
Nearly two years after being in NYC, Justin managed to snag an agent and started showcasing his work in galleries.
Three years after Justin's move to NYC, Brian opened the New York branch of Kinnetik. He left Cynthia and Ted in charge of Pittsburgh and moved to the Big Apple to oversee the new branch. He moved into the penthouse in Manhattan, and he and Justin were officially living together again.
Justin aged calmer than Brian did.
Granted, he was only twenty-five at this point, but Brian was already buying expensive French anti-aging creams and looking into Botox at twenty-five.
He continued boxing after his move to NYC. He'd found an MMA gym near his studio in SoHo that agreed well with him. He continued biking everywhere, ran around his neighborhood every morning and swam every weekend, using the pool in the penthouse building he and Brian lived in.
He befriended an instructor at the gym who turned him onto taekwondo and judo. He ended up studying judo and MMA.
When he was younger, even just ten years ago, Brian had thought New York was the be all and end all.
He was wrong.
After seven years in NYC, he was needed elsewhere.
Kinnetik had opened branches in San Francisco, Chicago and Texas.
Now they were going international.
Brian had managed to get his best people to handle the US branches but London was a different story. He'd have to do it himself. Justin called him anal. He'd raised one perfectly shaped eyebrow and said dryly, "Look who's talking."
The hardest part about having to relocate was having to say goodbye.
Justin was going with him.
In seven years, he'd managed to make a damn good name for himself. He was a sought after artist, he'd done several Hollywood films – the Rage movies, while live-action, had opened doors for him and he'd been involved in a few box office animated projects – and he'd even built a business as a computer graphic artist.
But he could work anywhere. If Hollywood beckoned, he'd go to LA. He travelled even while living in NYC, so London wasn't a big deal.
But Gus and Ezra were a different story.
Gus was now fifteen. Everything made him surly. Ezra was ten and doted on his father. Brian would hate to leave them behind.
His move had a road block in the form of Mel and Linds splitting up for the fourth time in recent history. Gus, in a moment of total teen angst, had a screaming match with Mel.
In the end, it was decided that Lindsay was going to leave the apartment so that they didn't have to disrupt Ezra's life too much. Gus, hating the situation, begged to go to London with Brian and Justin.
He couldn't convince the grown-ups to let him live with Brian and Justin, but he did manage to get an entire summer with his dads in London.
By the time summer rolled around, Brian and Justin had been in London for nearly six months. Kinnetik was up and running but it was only halfway through the first year there so Brian was tentative and grouchy and worked very long hours. Justin entertained Gus throughout most of his stay. Gus wasn't entirely too pleased about the lack of time he could spend with Brian but he still loved being there and hated having to leave.
In London, Justin made the decision to have a child of his own.
He discussed it for over a year with Brian. And once Justin was successfully convinced that Brian was more than okay with it, it took another year to find the perfect egg donor, the perfect surrogate to carry the fertilized egg and for the whole thing to be a success.
Justin became a father at the age of 34.
Their egg donor had little to nothing to do with the whole thing. She had been chosen based on her looks, her mental and health history and her family background. Brian had surprisingly had a lot to do with choosing the egg donor. While Justin had wanted someone with auburn hair and hazel eyes, Brian steadfastly wanted a blonde-haired, blue-eyed egg donor. There was just a bigger chance that the kid would pop out as Justin's carbon copy that way.
Their surrogate had been a surrogate twice before with no complications. She did it to help others, and earning the extra cash didn't hurt either.
Justin went to all the doctor's appointments and he started a scrapbook that started with the first sonogram.
Brian took Justin on a 'babymoon', which was for them essentially just a vacation in Santorini where they fucked their brains out and had orgies every day.
They returned home to their loft in London and found a message from their surrogate telling them her water had just broke. A mad dash to the hospital later found Justin holding his newborn son, born just ten minutes after they reached.
The little boy was perfect, and he was named Aiden Victor Kinney Taylor.
Aiden did, as Brian had wanted, grow up to have perfectly golden blonde hair, beautiful blue eyes and a beaming sunshine smile to light up the darkest rooms.
They stayed in London for five years, and when it was time to leave, Brian asked Justin where he wanted to go. Justin chose to return to NYC. Gus was nineteen and had been attending Columbia for the past year. And Ezra needed Brian around more than Gus had as a teenager – emotional, sensitive and moody all the time, his mothers couldn't understand him no matter how hard they tried.
The penthouse they'd lived in the last time they were in NYC had been sold before they moved to London and now, with four year old Aiden running around wreaking havoc, they couldn't live in a place like that anyway – too many sharp edges and tall stairs and breakable things. But they weren't a suburban couple, either, both of them shuddering at the thought for different reasons.
In the end, they decided to get a townhouse in Manhattan. It was a gorgeous brownstone, five stories high and boasting old world charm on the outside and modern luxuries on the inside. It had a garden terrace perfect for outdoor dining and entertaining, and a rooftop terrace swanky enough that Brian had used it to host plenty of Kinnetik parties. Justin's favorite room was their bedroom, which had a spa-like en-suite bathroom and a walk-in closet large enough to pacify even Brian's obsession.
Ever since Aiden was born and, of course, living with them full-time, Brian had insisted that they hire a live-in nanny to help them with the day-to-day. Her name was Olesya and she was a sweet, kind woman in her early twenties. She had no issues with Brian and Justin being gay and, more importantly, she had no issues with the two of them being Brian and Justin. She'd caught them in flagrante delicto more than once and had been discreet about it, which made Brian happy and Justin embarrassed. She was a gem with Aiden, and he loved her in return, considering her part of the family.
They also had a housekeeper and a chef (the chef was a bit much for Justin, but Brian was insistent – Justin was too busy most days now to cook meals that were perfectly tailored for him and he'd be damned if he'd gain weight by eating out every day just because of that).
Gus decided to go into advertising, just like Brian. He interned at a few agencies around NYC that had nothing to do with Kinnetik, not wanting to be given special treatment based on who his father was.
When he graduated from Columbia, he got a job as a junior ad exec at an agency based in Boston. Brian thought it was stupid – Gus should work for him. Gus agreed, but he wanted some experience before he did that. Brian thought Gus should spread his own wings and fly.
It lasted a year before Gus came to work at Kinnetik NYC.
Ezra didn't want to be an ad exec. He wanted to be an actor. And, even without paternal bias, Brian and Justin could clearly tell he had the talent to back it up. He went to Juilliard for a year before dropping out, choosing to travel the road more frequently taken and auditioned until he got a role.
As luck would have it, Brian and Justin weren't the only ones to see Ezra had talent. He booked several guest and recurring roles before landing his first main role in a TV series at the age of twenty. With his good looks and his natural talent, he quickly became a Hollywood star. He moved to Vancouver for most of the year, which was where his TV show was being filmed.
They hit a tiny bump in the road when Aiden was nine years old.
They were attending Melanie and Lindsay's wedding – the third they've had so far, following what felt like their billionth time getting back together – and one of the waiters caught Justin's eye.
Chris Hobbs.
His blood ran cold. He froze on the spot and, Aiden, having had slumped against him in exhaustion from dancing up a storm on the dance floor with almost every guest at the wedding (he'd inherited Justin's dancing abilities, too, apparently), looked up at him in concern.
He'd rushed to get Brian, but the man had been giving a toast (he'd been named Lindsay's best man) so he'd gone for the next best thing.
Gus, of course, was in attendance. He'd brought along his date, seventeen year old Cole Daniels. Much like his father, Gus had been a bit of a playboy starting puberty. He was a beautiful boy turned gorgeous young man, and he knew it. He was confident and good-looking and it attracted others to him like moths to a flame. He was, also, very gay much to Melanie's consternation (but obvious support).
He didn't give much thought for relationships until, like Brian, he was caught off guard by a blonde seventeen year old kid showing up in his life and turning it topsy-turvy.
Unlike Brian, Gus was twenty-six instead of twenty-nine when it happened. He didn't have a baby on the way and he didn't resist that seventeen year old kid. Having witnessed Brian and Justin's love his whole life and having none of Brian's cynicism despite Melanie and Lindsay's best efforts, he embraced Cole wholeheartedly.
Now, eight months into their relationship, Cole was turning eighteen in a few weeks and was set to attend Columbia in the fall as a pre-med student.
"Gussy!" Aiden tugged at his brother's sleeve, eyes shining. "Something's wrong with daddy!"
Gus had immediately gone to Justin and, when the older man had snapped out of it, he'd panicked and had wanted Brian, Aiden, Gus, Cole and Ezra to leave the wedding with him immediately. He almost had an anxiety attack.
Brian finished his toast, went to find Justin and was immediately shocked by the whole thing. He found out the reason quicker than Gus had – he'd thrown Hobbs off the property and made a fuss big enough that the catering company that had hired Hobbs in the first place were scrambling to make things better.
Hobbs was fired, and he showed up at Justin's gallery the next evening drunk out of his mind and waving a gun in Justin's face.
"You think you're such a big shot, Taylor," he sneered, reeking of vodka. "But all the money in the world isn't gonna change the fact that you're a faggot."
Security had intervened. Hobbs struggled and a shot went off.
The bullet ricocheted and hit Justin in the shoulder. He was rushed to the hospital where he'd had surgery to remove the bullet. It didn't cause any permanent physical damage but Justin was shaken up, traumatized by Hobbs' sudden reemergence in his life.
Brian had been furious and he'd contacted the best lawyer in NYC to prosecute Hobbs. New York was a more LGBTQ-friendly state, especially when it came to their laws, and Hobbs was no longer able to use being a stupid kid as an excuse. He was given real jail time for intent to kill and it was considered a hate crime. The judge had not been lenient and Justin took comfort in the fact that if Hobbs was on his best behavior in prison, he might get out just as the arthritis hits him in his old age.
The whole thing had put Justin on edge. Aiden was constantly in a state of worry that something bad was going to happen again. Brian decided that what they needed was some time away to get their heads right.
They ended up going on a round-the-world trip with Aiden, bringing along Olesya and a tutor specially hired for Aiden's home-schooling. They were on their extended trip for a year. Gus, Cole, Ezra and his on-again-off-again high school girlfriend Robin often met up with them – once in Greece, another in the Caribbean, once in Japan and another in Spain.
Their trip was wonderful and Justin loved that Brian had given him this, a whole year's worth of cherished memories he'd treasure forever. But eventually, they had to return, and once that thought no longer made him anxious enough it itched, the three of them returned to New York, Olesya by their side.
The year Aiden graduated from high school was a big year for all of them.
Brian had decided that, following a health scare during which he and Justin had both thought that the cancer was back, he would be stepping back from most of his duties at Kinnetik. Gus replaced him as CEO and Brian retained a mostly silent partner type of role.
Justin left his graphics and animation company to a younger CEO as well, ready for early retirement so that he could spend it with Brian in any way they pleased. He'd been grooming Stella Franklin to take over the company for over five years and she was more than ready. Justin was happy just painting whenever inspiration struck and having a gallery where he could display his artwork should he feel like it. He had made his mark and his career had been more than what he'd imagined for himself.
Gus would have lost his hair if he didn't have such good genes (Brian, at the age of sixty-four, had a full head of hair to boast home about; vain about imperfections, he kept his hair dyed in almost the same exact shade of auburn he'd had in his youth but Justin loved it when the silver would pop out every few months – Brian was a silver fox and it made him hot). Not only did he take over as Kinnetik's new CEO, he and Cole were new parents to a pair of fraternal twins.
They'd gotten married two years ago and had spent a year of marriage baby-free before going through with their previously thought-out plans. Their babies were theirs and theirs alone (this was important to Gus, who was no stranger to custody battles thanks to his moms' constant changes in relationship status). Logan Brian and Gabrielle Justine Kinney (Gus had changed his last name when he was twenty-two for reasons that Melanie and Lindsay still couldn't bring themselves to accept) were beautiful and though they made Brian officially a grandpa, he loved them more than words could express.
Ezra won an Oscar, came out as bisexual and got into a relationship with an A-list action star the rest of them had seen on the big screen for years. It was a new thing, but Ezra seemed pretty happy.
Aiden was as creative as Justin was. He wasn't an artist, but he was a pretty talented writer. Two weeks after his high school graduation, his first novel was published. He became a Columbia freshman as a published author, and it made both Justin and Brian swell with pride.
Brian and Justin took another round-the-world trip, this time just the two of them. The brownstone back in Manhattan had been given to Gus, Cole and their newborn twins – it was too big for just the two of them now that Aiden had decided to live in his own loft near campus (he'd bought it with his own money despite Brian and Justin offering to buy him an even bigger place, gotten from the sales of his first novel; he was fiercely independent and, again, it made his two dads beam with pride).
Their second trip around the world was a much raunchier one than they'd had the first time around. With no nine year old kid around, they pretty much indulged in any and every act of debauchery they wanted to. It was a year-long honeymoon filled with cabana boys and sandy beaches and beautifully intimate moments where it was just the two of them, being together.
The night before they were headed back to New York, at the end of their year-long extended trip, Brian treated Justin to one of those rare ridiculously romantic nights, with a candlelit dinner out on their private beach at the Santorini villa they'd been staying at for the past five weeks.
"So, there's something I want to talk about," Brian said, just as their waiter took away their fourth course and brought out dessert.
Justin eyed him speculatively. "You sound serious," he noted. "If this is the part where you tell me that you've decided to run off with Nikos the waiter, I'm killing you both."
"Your violent tendencies are always a turn on," Brian joked, reaching for Justin's hand. "But, no, Nikos and I are not running away together. This is about…Me."
Alarmed, Justin gripped Brian's hand tight. "The cancer?" his voice trembled. "It's back?"
"No, no, no, I'm fine," Brian hastened to reassure him, rolling his lips together as Justin took in a deep, calming breath.
"Shit, Brian, you scared the crap out of me," Justin looked on curiously.
Brian rolled his eyes. "Yeah, that's on me for trying to be romantic about things," he said sarcastically. At Justin's urging look, he confessed, "I've actually been thinking about something for a while now…And I know you said, a long time ago, that you didn't want me to change but…It's been a couple of decades between then and now, and I have. Changed, I mean. And…"
Justin interrupted him, confused. "Brian, you're rambling," he said.
"I want to be monogamous."
Brian's blurted confession knocked the wind out of both of them. Justin leaned back in his chair, staring at his husband seated across from him. The steady sea breeze ruffled his hair and turned his red cheeks pinker. His eyes darted around nervously. He was beautiful.
"What?"
"I want to be monogamous," Brian repeated, shocking Justin yet again. He'd half convinced himself that he'd imagined that confession. "I'm not doing it for anyone but myself."
"But…You're…You," Justin said faintly.
Brian smirked at him. "Yeah, and I've had enough fun for a thousand gays," he admitted. "I don't regret any of it, and I'm glad that you and I have had an open marriage this whole time…I don't regret that either. But I want us to be just us now. I'm ready for it."
"Aren't you gonna miss all the hot young studs?" Justin teased him, the roaring in his ears slowly dulling.
"I have my very own hot young stud right here," Brian leered at Justin, making him laugh. It was true, however. His workout regimen, much more stringent than the one Brian had, had kept him in a very fit physique. His good genes made him look twenty years younger than he really was. Brian wasn't surprised. Mother Taylor was much the same way.
"New gay boys turn eighteen every year."
Brian snorted. "I don't know about you, but I've had my fair share of troublesome teenagers," he said pointedly, tugging on Justin's hand until he stood from his seat, made his way around the table and settled down in Brian's lap. "Look, nothing about Brian Kinney is pathetic but if I become a seventy year old clubbing fuckboy in a few years, then there's no salvaging that mess. I've had my promiscuous fun. I'm good with my one-man commitment from now on."
"And you mean that?" Justin wondered, looking him dead in the eyes. "Really and truly?" He hadn't regretted their open marriage as well, but he would be lying if he said he didn't want the two of them to be monogamous to one another. It had, secretly, been his goal for someday but maybe someday had already come about.
"Really and truly," Brian promised, pulling him close for a deep kiss. Thirty six years later and Justin's toes still curled when Brian kissed him like that. Cheeks flushed, Justin pulled back and grinned at Brian.
"So, this is it, huh?" he said, only half-joking. "No more cabana boys or orgies or threesomes…"
Brian raised an eyebrow at him, amused. "Are you sad for me or sad for you?" he wondered.
Justin shrugged. "Just reminiscing," he said. "I'm ready, too."
"You sure?"
Justin nodded. "Monogamy's a harder sell for you than it is for me, remember?" he kissed Brian again, hands threading in his soft hair.
"Well, I'm ready to be with just my Prince from now on," Brian promised, and Justin knew that no matter how tempted he might be in the future, Brian would never break his promise. He never did.
"I'm old enough to be King now," Justin teased. "Does that make you Queen?"
Brian looked at him as if he were crazy.
"We're gay, not lesbians," he chided. "We rule our Kingdom with two Kings."
They returned to New York in time to spend some quality time with their family for Thanksgiving and Christmas and by the time New Year's came around, they'd decided what to do next.
Despite the fact that there was a beautiful mansion waiting for them in Pittsburgh, Brian and Justin decided to stay in New York City for the time being. Leaving the brownstone to Gus, Cole and the twins, they bought a penthouse nearby on Fifth Avenue instead. It was a beautiful place, a three-storey masterpiece, in a concierge building. It was a very open space, with architecture that slightly resembled the loft back in Pittsburgh. There was a home office that Brian felt needed little to no remodeling and an observatory with a skylight that Justin decided to use as his own home studio.
The day they held a housewarming party at their new penthouse was also the day that they were officially cleared by their doctors – Justin had wanted to throw out their condoms in a symbolic fire and get right to it, but Brian had negotiated him down to throwing out their condoms in the trash (symbolically, of course) and making out hot and heavy before their guests arrived.
"If we're going to be bare-backing, Sunshine, I'm going to need more than fifteen minutes before there are people everywhere," Brian had murmured into his neck and, yeah, it sucked that the doorbell had rung right after that.
After the last of the stragglers had left (unsurprisingly, it had been Gus' brood – the twins were big fans of Brian and Justin and, even toddler-aged, hadn't wanted to leave their presence), Brian and Justin stood together in front of the huge glass wall in their living room overlooking the city, They each had a glass of wine in hand, a final nightcap before it was time to turn in.
"Are you disappointed that we're not moving back to the house in the Pitts?" Brian asked, genuinely curious. Justin loved that house.
"A little," Justin admitted. "But I love this place, too. And maybe we will move to that house one day. Maybe not. Whatever it is, I have no regrets, Brian."
Brian smiled, his lips rolled together, as he took both their glasses of wine and put them aside. Taking Justin's hand in his, he led this man he'd loved for over three decades up the stairs so that they could start the next chapter of their lives together.