Gob returned to Michael's hotel room, and started to say, "Hey," but clumsily ducked from Michael's attempt to kiss him hello.

Michael was becoming suspicious. "Why do you keep doing that, Gob? Didn't you rinse with mouthwash yet?"

Gob picked up the keycard that he dropped. "I forgot to."

"Then go do it now." Michael just gestured to the bathroom.

Well that lie only bought him, like, two seconds. Gob went and used the mouthwash.

Michael waited for him to return and tried to kiss him again, but Gob turned aside and kissed his cheek instead, holding Michael still so he wouldn't turn. Gob tried to linger on his cheek like he used to do sometimes, but it felt awkward now rather than passionate.

Michael was puzzled and backed away to look at Gob carefully. "Are you all right?" He tried to search Gob's eyes, but Gob looked away. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing." He shrugged. "I'm just, I don't know, still groggy from the pill."

"Maybe you should stop taking the pills."

Gob was irritated, and he moved to sit down on the bed. "Stop controlling me."

Michael sat too close to him and caressed his cheek. "I'm just worried."

Gob got up and went onto the balcony for some air. "I can take care of myself."

Michael wanted to suggest seeing a doctor or therapist in Malibu, but there was something off about the way Gob kept his back to him. So he remained sitting on the bed, and he gestured to his luggage. "I'm all packed now."

Gob stiffened when he was reminded of Michael moving in.

Michael pouted and lay back on the bed. "Can't I move in tonight? Will you ask him?" He sensed that Gob kept putting this off for a reason. If it wasn't the secret about the syphilis, then what was it?

Gob took a breath and tried to look tender as he turned back to Michael. He knelt by the bed and took his hand. "Honey, I think we should wait until your birthday. Make it special."

Michael stared at him; he knew when he was being placated. He deflected, "So we're having a party here? That's why you were going to see the manager?"

Gob nodded.

"Who's going to come?" Michael didn't know anybody else in Malibu except the entourage, and he wasn't sure if he'd like seeing them at the party with who knew how many drunk girls.

Gob kissed his hand. "You know, all the guys, and Mark Cherry said he could invite a few celebrity friends from music and TV."

"Yeah?" Michael felt impressed, though it nagged him that Gob had previously said that the birthday plans would be a surprise.

"Don't know if we can get Julie Bowen. Maybe just the kids."

Michael smiled and shrugged. "Maybe next time." He tried to pull Gob near for a kiss.

Gob kept talking. "We'll have a nice dinner in a private room. Open your presents. Get some autographs."

"And then we'll come back here for one last night?" Michael asked. "And we'll check out in the morning and you'll let me move in?"

Gob nodded and swallowed, hoping that he'd be able to make love to him by then.

Unfortunately, then Michael asked, "Can we have some makeup sex now?"

Gob blinked. "What? Did we fight again?"

Michael said, "No, but you don't remember the sex we had last night. I wanna do it again, and refresh your memory."

"No, I-I don't have time now. Gotta get back to Mark Cherry's."

"No, please. Something quick then. I could blow you."

"I've got syphilis, remember."

"Then we'll do it with a condom on." He let go of Gob's hand to go open the bedside drawer, and Gob took the opportunity to get up and start for the door.

He said apologetically, "No, Michael. I can't right now. Wait until I feel better."

Michael got up and went after him. "Gob!"

"I'll see you tomorrow, okay? We still have to go to Mexico and all that." He hoped that Michael would not want to get tested and examined together.

Michael grabbed him to stop him at the door. "Wait. At least kiss me goodbye."

Gob could see he was upset and getting more suspicious. He tried to give him just a quick peck on the lips, but Michael was insistent, holding him still so he could really kiss him.

Gob closed his eyes and tried to imagine it was someone else. Any of his past lovers. But of course, Michael didn't smell or feel like a woman. Michael tried to open his mouth, but Gob pulled back, saying again that he didn't have time and had to go.

Michael looked unconvinced and hurt. "What's wrong? Are you mad at me? Did I do something?"

Gob shook his head. "No, it's not you. I just-"

Michael suddenly kissed him deeply, catching him off guard.

It made him too nauseous to hide it, so Gob pushed away and hurried to the bathroom.

Michael watched him being sick and for a moment tried to convince himself that this was something to do with the syphilis. That he should try to clean him up and take him to a hospital. But then he just returned to the bed and sat hugging his knees.

He listened as Gob continued retching in the bathroom, and he tried to remember how to block things out, how to hear only what he wanted to hear.

Gob finally recovered and washed up, and he tried to think up a good excuse for the vomiting. Something about his syphilis maybe, or maybe he had a flashback to the storage unit and got sick at the thought of candy vines again. But when he returned to the bedroom and saw Michael, he felt too guilty. "Honey." He sat down and hugged him.

Michael begged, "What's wrong?"

So Gob tried to tell him the truth, as gently as he could. "It's not you. It's me. I've been feeling weird since lunch-"

"Sick," he corrected.

Gob nodded reluctantly. "Since you were talking about us as kids, I felt bad about us being together."

"But why?"

"Because we're brothers."

"So?" He didn't see the point. "We've always been brothers. We've always known that. You said you weren't gay because this was about us being brothers. About all the horrible stuff we went through when we were kids."

"I know."

"We called each other hermano. We still do sometimes." He supposed that Gob didn't remember saying it last night during sex.

Gob nodded. "I know." That was what made this strange turn in his feelings so nonsensical and bewildering. It was so sudden, and he just wanted to feel the way that he used to, the way that Michael still felt.

Michael looked hurt. "Why are you ashamed of us now?"

"No, I-" He couldn't explain it. "It's not like that. I want to be with you, Michael, but it-it feels wrong when I remember us before." He didn't often think about the time before he had feelings for Michael. It was so long ago. "You were so different then."

"So were you."

"When you were little you were so innocent. You used to believe in fairies."

Michael snorted. "I used to believe Dad would take me to the cabin in the woods too. It was stupid to keep falling for it. I don't even like fishing, but he said that fishing on the lake would be calmer than on the choppy ocean." Also, Dad had said he wouldn't take Gob along, that it would be their secret to make up for all the hot summers working at the banana stand. Michael felt guilty now about agreeing to exclude Gob. He should have just asked to go out for ice cream or to play on the beach with his siblings for once. But knowing Dad, he and Gob would probably have had a Boyfight over who could build the better sand castle.

Gob said, "It feels wrong to kiss you or touch you now. Not hot wrong. Regular wrong."

Michael recalled their conversation at lunch and he looked surprised. "I upset you by talking about stuff we used to do? But it's why I love you, Gob. Because you're my brother."

"But you didn't want me to come onto you back then. That would be creepy."

"Of course, but you didn't come onto me, Gob. You didn't feel that way then, did you? You didn't even like girls yet." In fact Michael suspected that Gob had never really liked girls; Tracey said that he probably used them as a distraction from his gay feelings. Gob would not admit that, though. Michael said, "You weren't creepy then. We were just brothers, trying to be friends, while they kept ripping us apart." He lay his head on Gob's shoulder and sighed. "But we grew up and we fell in love later."

Gob was stunned that he could call their strange and tangled history "falling in love."

Michael shrugged. "It just took a long time, but it was worth it, Gob. It's like me and Tracey. She didn't even notice me in high school, and she didn't date me in college until she started to care more about money. And she lied to me and she didn't really love me when we first got engaged and married. But I loved her and she stayed and she loved me at the end. I'm sure of it." Tracey would not have gone to so much trouble for him if she didn't really love him. It was just hard for Michael to pin down the exact date that her "I love you"s became sincere, and too many of her final days were lost to the coma.

Gob hadn't been sure before that Michael realized that Tracey was a gold-digger. Dad had been sure about Tracey from the start, and Gob had not spent enough time with her to form his own opinion prior to the wedding. After the three-year estrangement, Tracey had practically admitted it to Gob, but he never brought up the subject with Michael afterward. Gob didn't want to burst Michael's bubble of denial, if that was what he was living in. But it seemed now that he did know all along. He just didn't mind the deception because he loved her anyway. Bluths were used to love being mixed with lies.

Gob patted his head and said, "She gave you George Michael too." What a good kid. Not like the rest of the family. Gob worried again that George Michael would hate them when he found out. He didn't want to lose him but couldn't see a way around it.

Michael remembered Tracey with their son. "Yes, and she was a great mother. She was always there for him whenever I worked too much and wasn't home. She saved all of George Michael's stuff for me and gave me a folder to keep at my desk at work. I'm just glad that she never took him away to save him from the family."

Gob shrugged and wondered if Tracey should have done that after all. If it would be better to lose that kid before they had a chance to alienate him themselves.

Michael got back to his original point. "I'm sorry that it took me so long to love you back, Gob, but I didn't understand you in college, and then I was married to Tracey. I'm sorry for shunning you and not being there for you. I'm sorry I made you wait. I wasn't ready before, but I do love you now. I really do. I don't want to lose you."

Gob shook his head and took his hand. "No, um, I'll get over this. Give me some time."

"How long?"

"I don't know. Let's just not have sex for a while."

Michael looked disappointed. "And we can't kiss either?"

Gob said, "I'm sorry, but I'll make it up to you. We'll have your big party, and you can still move in. We can fall asleep together and wake up together." He tried to be cheerful. "Come on, it's like when you were in the hospital and couldn't move from all the surgeries. Or when Buster dropped me from the crane at Christmas and you moved in for a couple of weeks. We couldn't do anything but talk then."

"And kiss. We could still kiss," Michael pointed out with a pout.

"Michael, I'm sorry. I'll try, just give me some time to get over this and forget." If drugs couldn't do it, then maybe just seeing Michael in his bed would make him ache again to count the freckles on his skin.

Michael still looked hurt, but he clung to Gob's hand. Gob must still love him. He wasn't even talking about going back to Mark Cherry's house yet. "Okay, but you'll tell me when you feel better?'

"Of course." If he felt better, then he hoped to show it by climbing on top of him and-Ugh, no he couldn't think about that now.

"Can you stay a while? Stay for dinner?"

Gob didn't feel he could eat again right now. "Can you just get me some water? I just have to lie down for a minute."

Michael frowned, but he got up and got the water.