Disclaimer: I don't own Queer as Folk or any of its characters; they belong to Showtime, Ron Cowen, Daniel Lipman, etc.
A/N: So, I recently finished watching all five seasons of QAF, and can't get the characters out of my head. I didn't want to write about something that had already been written about a lot, however, so I decided to try something different. Each chapter in this series is based on one of the prompts from 64 damn prompts by rashaka over at LiveJournal. I'm going to go in order, mostly, but will skip prompts if they don't inspire me at all and may occasionally do some out of order. Also, the story will start around the beginning of Season 2 (mainly because that's when I started to ship Brian and Justin) and continue on chronologically from there. I won't do anything that I think seems completely out of canon unless and until I get to the end of the series. Reviews, especially questions and constructive criticism are always appreciated.
Prompt: 1. 2am
It's 2 am, and Justin can't sleep. Or rather, he won't sleep, because he's afraid that if he does, he'll just have another nightmare. He knows that if he does, Brian will wake up, put his arms around him, and tell him that everything's going to be okay, but as nice as being held by Brian is, Justin doesn't want to have to go through the pain and terror of the nightmares to get there. He also doesn't want Brian to keep feeling like he has to take care of him – he's always prided himself on being strong and independent, and he'd like to maintain that façade for as long as possible.
So instead of relaxing into Brian's arms, he quietly slides out of bed and walks into the bathroom, shutting the door so that the sound of the faucet turning on and Justin splashing water on his face won't wake Brian up. He pauses for a moment at the sink to steady himself before heading to the kitchen to look for something, anything caffeinated to keep him up for the next few hours. The nagging voice somewhere in the back of his mind tells him that he can't stay awake forever, but he does his best to push it away, at least for tonight. He finally finds some instant coffee that Brian clearly forgot about, as it was shoved to the back of one of the cupboards, and makes himself a cup. He spends the next half an hour pacing around the loft, trying in vain to make himself forget about what happened. His mind, however, betrays him – makes him hear the crack of the bat in every creak of a floorboard, see Chris Hobbes' face in every shadow, feel his life slipping away every time he touches something cold and hard, like the cement floor of the parking garage. It's been over a month since he got out of the hospital, and two and a half months since the attack, so why can't he just get over it? He realizes he has stopped walking and begins again, wondering if he'll ever be able to lead a normal life after the bashing, one where he can brush up against someone in the street without shuddering, one where he can draw for more than a few minutes at a time without his hand cramping up, one where he'll stop feeling like a victim and start being a normal human being.
"Justin?" he hears Brian's voice ask from the bed. Shit, he didn't mean to wake him up. "Where'd you go?"
"I…couldn't sleep," Justin hesitates, finally deciding on a version of the truth.
"You mean you wouldn't sleep," Brian replies with a tone that forbids any argument.
"Why do you have to always be so fucking insightful?" Justin asks without moving any closer.
"It's part of my charm," he replies, not missing a beat. "Come back to bed." But Justin can't do that – he feels as though his feet are glued to the spot on the floor right behind Brian's very expensive couch. So instead Brian gets out of bed and crosses the loft in three big steps, placing a hand gently on Justin's shoulder and forcing him to turn around and face him.
"Look at me, Justin. Are you looking at me?" Brian asks. Justin slowly forces his head up and looks directly at Brian, his bright blue eyes expressing every emotion, from fear to guilt to exhaustion to vulnerability to anger, that he's been feeling and trying to hide ever since the bashing.
"I'm looking at you," he replies defiantly, with a tremor in his voice so slight that only someone who knew him as well as Brian would catch it.
"It hasn't been that long. It's okay to still be scared. It's okay to still have nightmares."
"No it's not! It's not okay!"
"So what's your plan – stay awake until you pass out from exhaustion?"
"No," Justin retorts, although until this moment, that is about as far as his plan has gotten. "Maybe I'll sleep during the day, and the nightmares won't be so bad then. I'll just take night shifts at the diner."
"Yeah, which will work great for the next couple of weeks until you start school," Brian replies sarcastically. Justin has to laugh at that notion.
"I can barely draw for ten minutes before my gimp hand freezes up. What do you think are the chances that that's going to change in time for me to start art classes?"
"You'll figure something out; you always do. You're not giving up the Institute of Fine Art, you're too good, and you're not going to waste that talent. Or give up on being the best homosexual you possibly can be."
"Why do you even give a shit? What does it matter to you if I fuck up my life?"
"Because I was there, remember? I was there when we danced together, and I could pretend that nothing else in my life mattered, because I could dance with you at prom and we could laugh and sing and kiss and shut out the world for a few minutes. And then I was there when he came out with the baseball bat, and when I was so angry I couldn't think straight, and so scared that you were going to die in my arms in that fucking godforsaken parking garage, and when I had to call 911 and wait for the longest five minutes of my life for the ambulance to come. So don't you dare try to tell me that I don't give a shit or that this doesn't involve me too!"
The two of them stand and stare at each other for a few minutes, both afraid to say or do anything that will set the other off. With anyone else, Justin knows he would start off by saying he's sorry, but Mr. "no apologies, no regrets" Kinney wouldn't like that very much. So instead, he tries for some brutal honesty.
"I hate them. I hate having to relive the bashing, I hate that everything reminds me of it, I hate that you feel like you have to take care of me, and I hate that you feel guilty about what happened."
"They'll go away eventually. And I don't feel like I have to take care of you. You would do the same thing for me."
"If you'd ever let me," Justin points out. Brian sighs, knowing he's onto him, once again.
"Fine, would it make you feel better if I told you the next time I had a nightmare?"
"You have nightmares? About what happened to me?" Justin asks, surprised.
"I told you, it didn't just happen to you…and yes," Brian admits reluctantly, only doing it so that Justin will stop this ridiculous attempt to stay awake indefinitely.
"Yes, it would. It might also make me feel better if you stopped feeling like the bashing was your fault," Justin replies. They stare at each other again, Brian still unable to voice how much he wishes he hadn't come to the prom, how much he wishes Justin would be whole and well and innocent…well, at least semi-innocent again. But Justin knows anyway, although he won't push his luck tonight. He knows how much it took for Brian to talk as much about the bashing as he just has.
"Well it would make me feel better if you would come back to bed and go to sleep."
"Okay," says Justin softly.
"Okay," says Brian in return, and he leans in for a gentle kiss as he takes Justin's hand and walks with him back to their bed as partners…although God knows, it will take him quite a while to use that last word even to himself.
