---

Chapter Eight

---

After a movie marathon and total self-indulgement on pizza, Hunter, Brian, and Justin finally tear themselves away from guilty pleasures. Well, that's not entirely true, since what's brought out next is pot. But the atmosphere changes from that of a lazy bingeing session to a casual get-together between friends.

"Don't tell your dads," Brian warns the boys, rolling a joint. Justin looks on in awe, admiring the man's dexterous fingers. Seeing this, Hunter snorts. But astute as ever, Brian catches sight of both boys' expressions and drawls to Hunter, "Hey, you drooled over me once, too."

"A dark, dark time for me," Hunter retorts, and draws a lighter out of his pocket. "Here." He hands it to Brian, who then lights the joint and takes a long drag from it. When he's done breathing out the smoke, Brian passes it to Hunter, who is quicker about it, quicker and rougher and much less refined. Brian makes smoking look like a skill; Hunter makes it look like a race: Who can get high faster?

When the joint is placed in Justin's hand, he looks at it for a moment, not quite aware of what to do with it. He's seen people smoking pot before, and morally, he has no problems with it. He does, however, object to the way people seem to lose their inhibitions after smoking it. He's afraid of what he could reveal. Still, a joint is a joint, and Brian wants him to smoke it, so he can't exactly say no. He takes a long drag, like he's slurping the last drops of a smoothie, and holds it in his hand for a few moments before passing it back to Brian.

After a few rounds of this, Brian finally fulfills Justin's greatest fear of the moment, and begins asking questions. "So, Justin," he says lazily, voice thick with the smoke. "What's your last name?"

"Doe," Justin replies smartly. "I'm J. Doe." He avoids the question entirely – his last name, the one used by his biological parents, is something he's never repeated. Not to the foster home, not to anyone. Not that he hasn't been asked. His best answer is "I don't remember." And quite honestly, at this point, he wouldn't be surprised if that were the case. If after so many years, it turns out that what he does remember from his childhood is incorrect.

Brian rolls his eyes. "Don't give me that bullshit. Everyone knows their name. Although I do believe you've never told a soul what it is."

"So why should I tell you?" Justin asks sharply. There are a few obvious answers – that his dick stands straight up for Brian; that he wants more than anything to get into Brian's pants; that he is eyeing the painting of the naked man with no small amount of distaste, thinking of what Brian might look like in the same pose.

It seems Brian is thinking along the same lines, because at this point, his answer is, "Because I have something you want."

Oh, and now, here's where it gets interesting. Justin sits up straighter, no pun intended, and looks Brian in the eye. "And what's that?"

Smugly, Brian blows out some smoke and, passing the joint to Hunter, replies, "My cock."

"You think I'd tell you my deepest, darkest secret for a fuck?" Justin asks. He knows how to bargain. He's been doing it all his life. He wants something, and if it's being offered to him, he may as well try to get a little more out of it.

Hunter coughs, and, handing Justin the joint, points out, "It's a very good fuck."

Justin snorts. "I'm sure it is," he says, taking an elegant drag on the joint. "However, I don't think one will quite do it for me."

"I don't fuck people twice," Brian informs him.

"And I," says Justin brightly, "don't go around revealing my secrets for sex."

"Why not?" Hunter asks. "The rest of us do."

Brian rolls his eyes. "I'm trying to do you a favor, little boy," he tells Justin smoothly, snatching the joint from Justin and tucking it at the side of his mouth. With expert practice, he speaks around it, his voice sounding unruffled. With one's eyes closed, one could never tell that there is something in Brian's mouth. "If I find out your last name, I'll know who your parents are."

"And?" Justin asks dryly.

"And," Brian continues, stretching out the word for both dramatic tension and the the chance to think of a really good point, "that way we can go after them in a courtroom. Melanie's a lawyer."

Justin shakes his head. "No."

As Brian hands off the joint to Hunter, he whines, clearly inebriated by the marijuana, "But why?"

"Because I'm done with them. I don't care about them anymore."

"I'm sure you don't," says Brian solemnly, "but some of us want to take action when they see kids being abused."

Justin's voice softens. "I'm not being abused anymore," he says, and accepts the joint from Hunter, but does not smoke it.

"Emotional and mental abuse lasts forever," Brian retorts.

Hunter is nodding in complete agreement, but it may just be the pot.

Shaking his head, Justin props his chin up on his hands, offering Brian the joint, which he did not smoke this round. Brian takes it. "I just don't... I mean, they're my parents, you know? I hardly even remember them." But that is a lie, and Brian knows it. So does Justin, for that matter. Justin remembers them in phases – before Molly's birth, in the week before she died, and just after, when his father became abusive. He remembers his father's smile in three degrees: warm, nonexistant, and maniacal.

Brian grunts. "I remember my parents."

"You knew them for eighteen years," Justin reminds him.

Brian shrugs. "I knew them for half my life. You knew yours for half your life."

Hunter whistles. "Good math," he remarks. Brian and Justin flatly ignore him.

"The intention of the foster care system," Justin says, twisting his fingers around each other as he itches to sketch something, "is to reassign families. To make kids recognize new people as their parents, and forget the 'monsters' that tortured them with emotional, physical, mental – uh – well, various types of abuse."

Brian nods. "I agree, but wouldn't that be much easier and healthier with closure?" he shoots back, sucking on the joint and exhaling deeply.

"In some cases, yes," Justin replies. "But in my case, I happen to know that my father was placed in an inpatient unit for several months immediately after I was placed in the foster care system. As for my mother, it was my impression that she immediately divorced Dad and moved in with her parents."

"You see," Brian interrupts, with the tone of someone who has had a brilliant idea, "You're still calling them Mom and Dad, mother and father. You can't have picked new people as your parents."

Justin shakes his head. He doesn't see how Brian can't understand, but then again, it itches at him that maybe Brian does understand, and is disinclined to admit it. "At this point, Michael and Ben aren't prominent enough in my life or well-known enough to me for them to be considered my parents just yet. However, it is my full intention that at one point, I will be able to consider them my family... and you as well."

But that stings him, because Justin doesn't want to consider Brian his family. He wants to consider Brian his boyfriend.

He takes a sharp, angry drag on the joint and exhales like there is no tomorrow.

Why does life have to be this complicated?