Chapter 2: There's no going home

Tuesday, March 5, 2002

Brian sat with his back pressed hard up against a support beam in the loft, the almost empty Beam bottle swinging from his hand between drawn up knees. Chuckling to himself, lightheaded from the liquor, he suddenly found it quite funny that the almost empty bottle felt so much heavier than it had when he was sober. Curious that. He thought about opening his eyes – and then thought better of it. He knew what he'd see. Fuck knows he'd seen it often enough, he didn't need a reminder. Not with the spin his head was doing right now.

Not tonight.

He heard the key in the lock, heard the four high-pitch beeps disarming the alarm, and grinned widely to the darkened room, knowing exactly what his intruder was going to say. Ahh, routine.

"Jesus, Brian. You could answer your phone. And turn on a light in here!"

"Love you, too, honey." Six months ago it would have been Mikey making sure he was okay, joking with him. But Mikey was gone. Off being happy with the good doctor, living in some treehouse. Just as well, Brian thought, he wouldn't be so happy with me these days.

Daphne looked around the room at the disaster that was the loft. She uprighted one of the overturned chairs, cringing at the thought of the expensive leather getting scratched during one of Brian's Tuesday Night Tirades. "Why do we do this every week?" she asked with a sigh, sitting down beside him on the hardwood, her head against his shoulder.

"Routine? Habit? Karmic repetition?" He reached out one arm and pulled the girl tightly to him, kissing the top of her head, breathing in a slightly peppermint aroma. It suited her. She was – refreshing.

"We both know you're going to ask me to call. We both know you're not going to answer your phone. And we both know I'm going to come over anyway to find you've trashed the place again. Why don't we conserve a little energy and just skip the first two steps in that process? Hmmm?"

"Now where's the mystery in that?"

"Where's the mystery in the way we do it now?"

Brian, looked at her with hooded eyes, gave her a grunt and nodded slowly. "I'd call you a twat, but since you actually do possess one, the insult would feel wasted." God, he was glad they had finally found each other, had been able to have this connection to the man they both cared so much for.

Daphne snorted. "I call you a dick and, quite happily for you, you possess one of those. And believe me I don't feel a thing is wasted." She fought off most of the grin that threatened to break through. But just as quickly as that bit appeared, it settled into a hard line as her serious demeanor returned. "Speaking of insults, I ran into Jennifer Taylor today." She felt the immediate change in his body. The subtle tensing. Arm muscles that seemed to harden beneath her hand. "Brian…"

"Tell me," he demanded, his brain suddenly feeling much less affected by the alcohol. He'd had a few of his own encounters with mommie dearest and knew just what the Taylors were capable of. And what they weren't.

"She…they…" Shit! Brian was going to explode. She knew it… but they had promised each other. Total honesty. Never hold anything back. No lies, no omissions. Those had cost everyone enough.

"Daph. Just fucking tell me." He could feel the anger prickling at him already.

The young woman drew in a deep breath, holding it for a moment as she snuggled into the man holding her. She let it out slowly. "The Taylors are going to speak on behalf of Chris Hobbs at Justin's parole hearing in May."

"Motherfuckers!" Brian pulled violently away from Daphne, crashing the Beam bottle against the far wall of the loft. "He's their fucking son!"

"He is NOT their son!" Daphne shouted out a denial. "They threw away any right—any right to that the day… that day…" Hurt and anger poured down her pretty face as she fell apart. "Christ, Brian… how could they… Why? Why hurt him again like this? Oh, god, if his own parents speak against him…"

Brian pulled the sobbing, broken girl onto his lap, rocking her as he sometimes would his son. "Shhh. Shhh, baby. I know. I know." Christ! He could fucking kill those parasites for the pain they had caused. To Justin, to Daphne. They had done all they could to take everything from them – their innocence, their futures, their fucking kid… And there was not a goddamned thing he could do but hold on a little tighter, to try to comfort this girl who had lost almost as much as Justin. Almost as much.

Maybe more.

TCTCTCTC

Justin lay on the small, hard bunk connected to the wall of his cell. Lights out had been hours ago and he was still laying there willing sleep to take him. Their visits always did this to him. This was the only day of the week that reflected anything of him, anything unique, and he hated to give the day up. As much as he knew that Mercer was his life right now, on Tuesday nights everything else simply felt like filler. Like a waiting game he was playing until his real life showed up again in a week. Like hide and seek.

He breathed just for Tuesday.

Other than George Pappas' occasional visits, Daph and Brian were the only ones he saw from the outside. Not one time in the ten months he had been here had Jennifer or Craig visited him. They hadn't even answered the few letters Justin had sent. He squeezed his eyes shut and told himself he didn't miss them. Didn't miss them on Christmas. Or his nineteenth birthday. And he didn't miss who they were now. He missed who he always thought they were – who they were before Hobbs, before they knew he was gay, before Bryn. Before they royally fucked us over.

His thumb ran over the tattoo healing on his middle finger – he felt the still raw, raised skin that signified the word. And he knew no matter what Jennifer and Craig Taylor did to him, no matter what lies Hobbs and Mackey and Turner told against him, no matter what a jury decided about him, he knew the truth. And he had Daphne and Brian, even Bryn. Because of them he would fucking always be free.

TCTCTCTC

Eighteen months earlier…

"Oh, my god, Justin! Justin!" Daphne screamed across the lobby of the jail. They hadn't been able to talk with each other since before the attack at St. James four days ago. Justin had been taken into custody right there on school grounds in front of half of the student body as Chris Hobbs was being driven away in an ambulance, unconscious and bleeding. At the time Justin had slipped into a state of semi-shock, barely able to respond to the officers' questions, making little protest when he was handcuffed and led to back seat of the police cruiser. He thought he heard a vaguely familiar voice yelling his name, but he wasn't sure. Everything was like a dream – a nightmare.

He did remember coughing, his throat being sore and his windpipe feeling swollen. He did remember the crushing headache and a blur of faces and yelling and shoving. Everything swimming together. He did remember being fingerprinted and photographed and calling his mother.

I'll take care of it honey. I'm sure it's some mistake. Don't worry.

So Justin had waited. For his mother. His father. Anyone. But there was no one. When he tried to sleep that first night in holding, he huddled in the corner of a broken wall cot, a thin blanket wrapped tightly around him like a protective shell, scared shitless of the other man in the holding cell with him.

And he waited.

On the second day he was led, in handcuffs chained to a leather belt around his small waist, through the back hallways of the judicial center to the courtroom. At every turn, every doorway, he craned his neck hoping to see his parents. He never saw them. As his name was called, he stood in those handcuffs before a lectern in the center of the too bright courtroom and listened as someone spoke words he didn't hear. Beside him was a man – he thought he must be a lawyer – who Justin felt he should remember from somewhere, but didn't. The man placed his hand at the small of Justin's back – Not guilty your Honor, no prior record your Honor, request a reasonable bail your Honor – and led Justin back toward the officers who had led him through the back hallways. And still he waited for his parents.

They never came.

But they must have paid the bail because Daphne was dancing around him, hugging him tightly, and he knew he should be happy, but he wasn't.

"Where are mom and dad? Are they waiting in the car?" He looked expectantly at his friend and saw the apprehension on her face. "Daph? Where are my mom and dad?"

"Justin… they aren't here." She spoke quietly and calmly as if he was a child. Maybe he was. A child would be this scared, this confused.

"Of course they are. They paid the bail, Daph. Mom told me she would handle it, it was all a mistake of some kind." His eyes searched the room, scanning each and every face they came across. Of course they were here. He was seventeen. They were his parents.

"Your mom called me. Someone called her when you were being released. She told me to come pick you up." Still calm and quiet. Still the apprehension on her face.

"Oh… they're waiting for me at home. Of course, mom couldn't leave Molly." A truth nagged at him. He thrust it aside, hanging on to his hope. It was all he had right now.

"Justin." Her heart was full of pain for her friend and fury at his parents. She knew her next words would crush him. "They said you can't come home."

"Wha…? Can't go home?" The stunned look of disbelief on his face slowly turned to astonished fear. "I have no place to go, Daph," he whispered as he stood in the center of the jail lobby in the dirty school uniform that had been returned to him, a backpack full of books slowly sliding from his now limp arm. "I have no fucking place to go!"

Tears streaked down the young girls' face as she touched Justin's lightly. "You are coming home with me, Jus."

TCTCTCTC

Friday, March 8, 2002

"Well, as I live and breathe… Look who's decided to grace us with his magnificence this evening." Emmett Honeycutt leaned back against the bar and smiled a genuine greeting to the beautiful man making his way toward them. The whole of Liberty Avenue had been somewhat bewildered by the sudden scarcity of Brian Kinney at Babylon over the last few months. Oh, he had been there, off and on. But more off than on. Most of the gang had arrived at the simple conclusion that the absence of Brian's number one sidekick was the reason for the man's infrequent jaunts to his self-proclaimed playground. Emmett tended to agree with them as far as they went – he just felt there was something else working to keep the stud from being quite so studly of late.

"Honeycutt, Theodore," Brian nodded his greeting as he approached the bar before turning to the bartender. "Beam, double, Scott. Thanks." No sooner had the glass hit the bar top than Brian had it tossed back, a slight grimace on his face as he felt the beloved, familiar burn.

"So, now that you have that out of the way, may I ask what a nice boy like you is doing in a nasty ol' place like this?"

"Now, Honeycutt, there hasn't been a nice boy in this place for more than six months."

"Speaking of Michael," Emmett began, "...have you talked to him lately? When are he and the illustrious doctor coming back for a visit?"

"Do I look like his warden, Emmett?" Brian winced at the choice words even as he spoke them. "However, I think he said he was coming back for Vic's birthday."

Emmett fairly jumped up and down, clapping his hands in joy, every bit the queen. "Oooo… we'll have a party! When's Vic's birthday?"

"The 26th, I think." Brian was only half hearing Emmett, his attention suddenly drawn to a small blond man dancing, glitter falling on his half naked body. His heart lurched… so much like…

"Not quite three weeks. We can do that! And you, my lovely lonely man, are going to assist me." He reached out and grabbed Brian's hand, guiding him toward the pulsing bodies in the middle of the room. "Now, let's dance, handsome."

Brian let himself be led by the thrumming beat of the music, his body vibrating, his hips gyrating as he kept half an eye on the young blond beside them. Emmett noticed Brian's distraction and wondered at the attraction there. Not Brian's usual type. Too young, too blond, too small. But there was something in Brian's face as he looked at the oblivious boy. A kind of… tender sadness. This wasn't about Michael. Not at all.

"So, I thought we could have Vic's party at your loft. Lots of open space and no chance for Vic or Michael to find out beforehand. And I promise that I will do all the clean up. I'll make it spic and span. That okay with you?" Emmett had to yell to be heard above the music and get through Brian's fascination with the young blond dancer.

"What are you going on about, Honeycutt?"

"Vic's party. The 26th. We could have it that Tuesday night at your loft."

"No!" Brian stopped dancing and looked intensely at his friend. "I mean, not Tuesday. Some other night…"

"But… we can't have Vic's birthday party on a day that isn't his birthday, Brian. That is the whole point." Emmett had pulled Brian away from the loud music. In the relative quiet he didn't have to yell to make his point.

"Not happening on Tuesday, Emmett. I won't be there. You'll have to do it without me." Brian couldn't – wouldn't – give up his Tuesday with Justin. He depended on that day. His life revolved around that day… It was… theirs. He'd never told any of the gang about Justin, about visiting him every week. Of course, they knew he had testified at a trial as a witness to the beating. When the sensational local story hit the news, Michael figured out that he was the boy they had dropped off. They also knew that he was totally unavailable for anything, anything at all, on Tuesdays. They had just never connected the dots. And he intended to keep it that way. It wasn't their business.

"But… Now, Brian, we all know that you do something every Tuesday. Teach a class in blow job technique, take dancing lessons… for chrissake I don't care if it's underwater basket weaving. You can give it up for one night! For Vic. For Michael!"

"No, Honeycutt. Just… no." Brian stared at his friend, a deep, pleading gaze. "Listen, I've got to go. Later."

As Brian walked out the door of his playground less than half an hour after arriving – no trips to the backroom, no frenzied and fevered dancing with the beautiful boys – Emmett wondered aloud. "Just what is it that has you so tied up in knots, Mr. Kinney? What have you gotten yourself mixed up in?"