For turtlepatch. A lovely reviewer, a lovelier person, an even finer piece of ass, and the only man to ever share my bed.
Warnings: ridiculousness and cracky prose.
It started, as things for James and Carlos sometimes do, with the Jennifers.
The Jennifers, walking in slow motion through the lobby, a melancholy droop in their shoulders, a wistful sigh in the clicking of their high heels. The Jennifers, deadly and cunning, like a pack of wolves crossed with cougars, genetic freaks, who set their sights and dug their nails in, left nothing of their prey but bones and gnawed on guts.
Those Jennifers, the Palmwoods' Jennifers, who would someday become diva-actress-singer-extraordinaires and rule the fashion world with their J3 collection, were lamenting their inability to find and sustain male friends. They were bitches, strong and fierce and true, but the life of a bitch could get lonely without a compliant, cheerful bro.
And Carlos, whistling, head in the clouds, clouds shaped like corndogs and helmets and the faces of his best friends, was a fond memory for two of the Jennifers, an honorary bitch, and those two got to thinking. And thus their grand, catty plan was formed.
"Carlos," Jennifer Two said, the perk back in her hair and heels and step. "We want you to be a Jennifer again."
Carlos, shocked because the Jennifers were talking to him, and not talking at him, stared up at them in wonder, like a child at the sight of his first storm. As with any fever, his memories of that time of Hollywood Fever were dim, warped like a steam-smudged mirror, but he knew that he had looked good, and that he'd felt good, and that he'd enjoyed his stint as a snarky, glorious bitch. He had more in him than people realized. He was good and pure and silly, but all that could get boring, and he thought he looked really smokin' walking all in sync and slow.
"Will I get to wear a fedora?" He asked, finally, because to Carlos that really was the selling point. He had to replace one form of headgear with another. In adulthood he would cure the habit with four solid years of therapy, but for now it was a compulsive, erotic need.
"Duh," Jennifer One said, mouth open like she thought Carlos was crazy. Which she did. Of course he would need to accessorize to be part of their clique.
"Awesome." Carlos beamed.
And that was that.
James caught sight of Carlos at eleven in the morning.
Carlos the Jennifer, clad in black silk shirt and designer pants, pink tie, pink scarf to match. Carlos walking smoothly in slow motion, perfect bitchy pout, giggling with the Jennifers like they were girlfriends. Carlos who couldn't have Hollywood Fever because James wasn't a lovely shade of manjerine. Which, if you asked the executives at Cuda, was really just an extra vibrant shade of orange spray paint rebottled and sold to dumb, conceited kids.
Were James' life a cartoon, a light bulb would have instantly appeared above his head. Only a two watt, though. If the boys' brains were light bulbs, James' would certainly be dim.
It made sense. Carlos' fascination with the Jennifers wasn't attraction like he assumed. Adoration, hero worship, even. Carlos (Jennifarlos?) was clearly gay. Flamingly gay. Rainbows and sparkles gay.
And James wondered why his heart beat a little faster at the prospect of Carlos' rampant homosexuality. Why his palms got sweaty. Why he felt a smile tugging up his lips.
Carlos, off to enter the world of the Jennifers and fashion, left James poolside to ponder his new, confusing thoughts.
"You seem more excited than usual," Logan said, posing, finger placed contemplatively beneath his chin. "Do you have a date tonight or something?"
James opened his arms and said, happily, proudly, loudly
"Carlos is gay and we are soulmates."
"Oh," Logan said, hands falling to his sides, because well, that was new. And unexpected, too. "Kendall!" He called and he felt a little woozy. A little out of place. Why was he always the last to know?
"Yeah?" Kendall hopped the couch in an impressive leap. He kept his shoulders back, spine straight, and there was a theatric flair to his posture as he stuck his landing. A remnant from his training as a figure skater, perhaps.
"Say it again." Logan demanded, wondering if it would sound as crazy the second time.
"Carlos is gay and we are soulmates," James repeated, smiling wide as ever. Carlos was his soulmate, after all. He'd saved himself so much turmoil by finding Carlos early. Now he could skip the years of distracting teenage and young adult angst by trying to find the other half of his heart and focus on his career. It was another thing to check off his list. Find soulmate: done and done. Next: square dance with a Georgian cowboy.
Kendall choked on his own spit. It was messy and he coughed and sputtered saliva down the front of his shirt. The action still didn't express the amount of surprise he felt. He didn't know James or Carlos at all, apparently.
"What?" Kendall said and it was as close to when and why and huh as he could get.
And while James regaled Kendall and Logan with the tale of his and Carlos' true and epic gay romance, Carlos neatly hung his silk scarf on a hanger beside his neatly arranged silk shirt, and allowed himself to be neatly pressed back onto satin sheets and touched by three different sets of neatly manicured nails. The Jennifers were very careful, precise. They knew what they wanted and Carlos was happy and eager to give it to them, the three of them, at once, as often as they would let him. He learned a lot that afternoon, like how Jennifer Two was wicked deadly with her tongue, in his mouth or on his chest or on his dick, how Jennifer Three climbed on and took what she wanted, rode him hard and set the pace, how Jennifer One tasted different from the others, sweeter, and had thighs that locked like iron bars around his head.
Carlos, exhausted and triumphant, strut his way into 2J at one in the morning, head held high. The stories he had. No one would believe him. He felt like a boy gone into battle and come back a god.
"There you are," James, in his most seductive, stretched languidly and purred. A smile completed the charm trifecta, one full of dimples and white, white teeth. He had Carlos in the bag. He was sure of it. The corndogs arranged suggestively over his dick were merely the icing on top of a sexy cake aimed directly at Carlos' heart and penis. Which, as a man, James knew were essentially the same thing.
"What are you doing in my bed?" Carlos screeched, half blind, from the massive loss of semen and the horror. James was on his bed with only corndogs to cover his nakedness and his shame. And, had Carlos still been a virgin, and desperate, always desperate, yearning, wanting something other than his hand to touch his cock, he might have pondered some interest in the sight, but as it was he was now thoroughly experienced, and the sight held no allure. "Dude, not cool!"
"You mean this doesn't arouse you?" James tried not to let the disappointment creep into his voice. He gave one last, desperate pose, puckered his lips, fluttered his lashes, wriggled the corndogs with his cock.
"No," Carlos sighed, feeling bad about it. He wanted to be gay for James, if only to make him happy. He just wasn't wired that way. "Not even a little," he said it like the tragedy it was. James hung his head. Now he had to go and re-make his list. He'd crossed find soulmate off with Sharpie. There was no taking it back.
"Friends since we can't be soulmates?" James held out his hand, suddenly aware of his nudity, and tried not to jiggle enough that the corndogs slid off his dick. How embarrassing that would be.
"Always." Carlos took James' hand, pressed their palms together.
Then he reached for a corndog and took a bite.
It was slightly warm, from either the microwave or James' skin.
"Oh man." Carlos grinned at the breakfast table. He carefully put on an apron to keep his new Armani shirt clean. "Do I have a story to tell you."
When Carlos was finished, Kendall, James, and Logan were all fidgeting with uncomfortable erections because Carlos was very specific in his details, veering off into TMI territory on multiple occasions. Still, they managed to voice their disbelief.
"No way," Logan said, simply, before rushing off to find Camille to relieve some pressure. He thought Carlos could have a future in composing erotica, if he could be even a fraction as graphic with the written word.
"You were dreaming," Kendall told him, convinced. Of the three of them, Carlos wasn't nearly so lucky. Carlos was socially awkward at his best. He had to admire him for dreaming big, however. "Wheelchairs?" He asked, then shook his head. He really didn't want or need to know.
"The Jennifers aren't the kind of girls for a foursome," James said, which was really the only flaw he found in Carlos' story, aside from the part where Carlos was involved. "They'd double team a guy at max."
Later, as the Jennifers rolled through the lobby in slow motion, wheelchairs decked out in glitter and fashion glam, Carlos basked in the smug righteousness of vindication.