Enough
Lance’s ass hurt. He really needed to find Anthony. His damn mechanical bull had some sort of grudge against him, Lance was convinced of it. “Anthony!” he yelled as he spotted the tell-tale ponytail and tattoos moving among the crowd around the crew’s lunch table.Anthony turned when he heard his name. “What are you doing here?” He looked at his watch. “Don’t you have soundcheck in-”
Lance rolled his eyes and interrupted before Anthony really got going. “Yeah, yeah, I’m on my way there now, chill out. But I need to talk to you a minute.” He looked around, then confided in a low voice, “Listen, that bull is killing me. I can barely sit down, that’s how sore my ass is.”
Anthony pressed his lips together, obviously struggling not to either laugh or say something completely unprofessional. Lance waited patiently for him to get over it, tapping his watch and raising his eyebrows significantly.
Anthony grinned. “Yeah, yeah, kid,” he mimicked. “I’ll see what I can do. Maybe some wiseass thought it would be funny to crank the speed up, or something.”
“Can you at least pad it more?” Lance asked plaintively.
Anthony snickered. “Sure, Bass, I can do that. We’re almost finished with load-in, the bulls should be around here somewhere.” Like he didn’t know exactly where everything was at all times. Lance realized that it was truly heroic of Anthony not to make any remarks about Lance’s natural padding, and he grinned appreciatively back at him.
“Thanks,” he said and he gave Anthony a one-armed hug before hurrying off to see if he could catch fifteen minutes with the massage therapist before soundcheck started.
Lance was conscious of the appraising looks his ass was getting from at least one member of the rigging team as he left, and he could only hope Anthony hadn’t noticed it. He didn’t like his guys fraternizing with the talent, and there was no reason to upset him. Lance casually turned his head in Luke’s direction as he passed him by, and gave a slight nod as their eyes met. Britney was scheduled to join the tour for the weekend, and she and Justin liked to keep the first night for themselves.
Shaking his head as he hunted down Sarah, Lance told himself he wasn’t going to think about it. But as her fingers worked their magic on his sore muscles, he couldn’t help wondering how things had gotten to the point where they were this fucked up.
The next day, Lance didn’t even try to hide the beard burn on his neck. They had a free day in Chicago before they were scheduled to leave for the next stop on the tour, and Lance slept most of the morning. Whatever Justin and Britney were planning for the day, he was sure they’d let him know whenever they were ready to hook up.
Chris was hanging out being annoying when Lance showed up in Joey’s room to ask him if he wanted to go out to lunch. There were a couple of restaurants they’d really liked when they were here filming On The Line, and Lance was hoping Joey didn’t have any other plans yet. Chris looked at Lance funny, his sharp eyes on Lance’s neck, but he didn’t say anything. That was just as well, because Lance was in no mood for Chris and his comments. It wasn’t any of Chris’s business what Lance did while Justin was with Britney.
It wasn’t even about sex at this point. Lance knew very well that Justin and Britney almost always kept their promise and didn’t do much in the way of sex without him being there with them. That was great. Lance thought it was probably the idea that Justin wanted to do it without him that bothered him, and he knew very well that it was usually Britney who made Justin keep their promise. Lance got that Britney was a girl, but he was tired of pretending that made it okay.
Lance had had enough, he was tired of it, and fuck Justin.
Lance’s mood lightened after about ten minutes in Joey’s presence, which is why he was there in the first place. He was relaxed and giggling over the reruns of I Love Lucy that Joey found on one of the local cable channels, and he was even laughing with Chris by the time the first commercial for Kraftmatic Adjustable Beds came on.
After, Lance and Joey put on baseball caps and scared up a couple of security guys and went to Johnny Rockets for big, juicy hamburgers that weren’t on either of their diets, while Chris went off to find JC, promising darkly that JC would be very sorry that he’d slept so late and kept Chris waiting. Lance got the impression there would be sexual favors involved.
Justin was waiting for him in Lance’s half of their suite when he and Joey got back to the hotel. “Where did you go? Me and Brit thought we’d go have lunch, but we couldn’t find anyone.” Lance tried to ignore the hint of accusation in Justin’s voice.
“Justin,” Lance said, waving his phone around before putting it on the dresser, “I have a cell phone. I carry it with me at all times. You have the number. I programmed it into your phone myself.”
“Right. Well,” and here Justin looked around the room, “I’m not sure where my phone is, you know?”
Lance didn’t bother to point out that Britney had a phone, too. He just sighed and said, “Joey and I went out to eat, and I think Chris and JC stayed in. I didn’t ask, because I didn’t really wanna know, what with Chris’s talk of sexual vengeance. I don’t even want to think about what he’s doing to JC right now.”
Justin laughed at that. “Dude.” Then he turned to look out the windows, squinting at Lake Michigan glinting in the sun far below. “Where’d you guys go to eat? Anywhere good?” he asked like he wasn't the least bit concerned.
Lance wasn’t fooled. “Johnny Rockets,” he answered neutrally.
“Ah. Well,” and Justin turned around and faced him, his eyes cool. “You and Joey have any plans for the afternoon?”
“For God’s sake, Justin, knock it off,” Lance said irritably. “No, we don’t have any plans. I was hoping to do something with you, if you and Britney aren’t too busy being America’s sweethearts today.”
Justin bristled at that. “Me and Brit aren’t any different than you and Joey, Lance. She’s my best friend is all.”
“And here I thought I was your best friend,” Lance said. They stood watching each other, Lance’s words hanging in the air between them.
Then Justin shook his head and looked away and said, “You know what I mean, Lance. You and Joey like to hang out, so do Britney and I. I don’t see what the big deal is. It’s the same thing.”
“Bullshit.” Lance snapped. “Sure it’s the same thing, if you ignore the fucking around.”
“It’s not like you don’t want to fuck Joe, he just doesn’t want to fuck you,” Justin snarled. Lance felt all the air go out of his lungs, and he wasn’t sure if he made a noise or not. Justin paled, looking almost as stricken at what he’d just said as Lance felt. Lance didn’t care.
“I don’t want Joe, you fucking ass, I never have, but even if I did, he wouldn’t make me feel as crappy about it as you do!”
“Me? I’m not the one-” Justin broke off and pointed to Lance’s neck. “You think I don’t know what that is? If that’s not from Joey, then who? Who the fuck did that?” Justin advanced on Lance, grabbing his arm and turning him roughly around so he was facing the mirror. “Look!”
Lance yanked his arm out of Justin’s grasp. “Fuck you, Justin! You weren’t around last night. You were with your girlfriend. What the fuck was I supposed to do?” Lance’s voice cracked on his last words, and he turned away, blinking against the sudden sting in his eyes.
It was a long time before Justin spoke again. Lance struggled to regain control, taking deep breaths, letting them out slowly.
“You were supposed to wait for us. For me.” Justin sounded suddenly lost, as if he was just a kid again, unsure of everything he thought he knew.
“I’m tired of waiting, Justin.” Lance was suddenly tired of all of it, the talking, the fighting, the way Justin made him feel so unimportant sometimes.
“What do you mean?” Justin’s eyes searched his face.
Lance looked at him sadly. “Do you remember your sixteenth birthday, Justin? When we were over in Germany, and we got our first gold record, and it was the first time we did more than just make out, we actually, almost, kind of had sex?” And Lance smiled at the memory, because neither one of them had really had much of a clue about what they were doing, but Justin had been slick and hard against him, and it had been one of the hottest things Lance had ever done, ever, in his whole life. Justin stared at him, and Lance went on. “And I said, wow, sex and a gold record for your birthday, and you said,” and Lance’s voice broke again and he had to stop talking for a minute to steady himself. Justin reached a hand out to him, but Lance took a step back, out of his reach. He shook his head.
“And I said you were enough, I didn’t need the gold record. I remember,” Justin whispered, the sound barely reaching Lance’s ears.
Lance nodded. “Although it was certainly nice to have.”
Justin smiled slightly. “It certainly was,” he agreed. He didn’t say anything else, he just waited, still watching.
Lance closed his eyes. “I want to be enough again, Justin.”
~~~~~
Chris’s party is a big success. He even buys decent beer for a change, although Justin’s been drinking Jack and Coke pretty steadily since he arrived. That’s fine, because Lance is putting back shots of tequila like there’s no tomorrow, and it’s pretty much a footrace to see who gets completely shit-faced first.
Justin thinks he may be winning.
The twins with the neck tattoos are conspicuous by their absence, and Justin thinks he should thank Chris for that. He starts to wind his way across the crowded room, intent on expressing his heartfelt gratitude to his host, when he sees Lance heading upstairs. And no, no way is Justin letting Lance make out in the bathroom with anyone tonight. Not happening, no way, baby.
He changes course, navigating the stairs very carefully, and sure enough, when he gets to the top, he sees Lance disappear into the bathroom, a skinny guy with wildly curling brown hair hot on his heels.
And this time when Justin shoves the door open, he isn’t polite, and he doesn’t retreat. He puts his hands on his hips and says, “What the hell, Lance?”
And Lance frowns at him, and Justin is really tired of seeing that expression on Lance’s face. But before he can say that, the guy with the curly brown hair, who’s so skinny Justin knows for sure he can kick his ass if he has to, says, “Justin?”
Justin peers closely at the skinny guy. Oh. “JC? What are you doing in here with Lance?” Justin’s sure he’d been picking up signals earlier that JC and Chris are in the “on” phase of their years-long on-again off-again relationship.
“We came in here to have a conversation, man. That’s a bit hard to do downstairs.” JC grinned at him. “What are you doing in here, J?”
“Um, I came to, um-” and Justin doesn’t know quite how to put it. He can’t really tell JC he came in here to kick his ass for making out with Lance in Chris’s bathroom.
“He came in here to check up on me,” Lance says, sounding annoyed, and his cheeks are that delicate shade of pink they get when he drinks. It’s not quite the same as the flush they take on after he comes, but Justin appreciates it just the same.
“Well,” Justin starts, and he peers at JC suspiciously. “You didn’t come in here to make out with Lance, did you?”
Lance snorts in disgust and JC giggles. “No, honey, I sure didn’t.”
“Okay,” Justin nods happily. He smiles at JC. JC’s his friend.
“Oh, for the love of-we came in here to have a conversation, Justin,” Lance says pointedly. There’s a pause, and then he rolls his eyes and says, “A private conversation.”
“Nah, man, that’s okay. I’ll catch you later,” JC says, and he slips out of the bathroom, patting Justin on the shoulder as he goes.
Lance and Justin are left standing in the middle of Chris’s guest bathroom, regarding each other warily. “Have you lost your mind, Justin?” Lance demands.
“No, I don’t think so,” Justin answers with great dignity. “Have you?”
“What? You’re not even making any sense, Justin. How drunk are you, anyway?”
“Pretty damn drunk, I think,” Justin admits. He’s feeling a bit dizzy, and the room is doing strange whirling things that make his stomach uneasy.
“Well, go sleep it off somewhere. I’m sure Chris won’t care if you find-” but Lance doesn’t get to finish that sentence before Justin is lunging for the toilet, falling to his knees with a painful crack and fumbling to get the lid up. He hasn’t done this in years, he usually pays better attention to how much he drinks than he did tonight.
Lance crouches at his side, one hand rubbing soothing circles over the small of his back, the other holding out a cool, damp towel for Justin to wipe his face with. Justin takes a long, shuddering breath and croaks out, “I’m done.”
“You sure?” Lance asks gently, and Justin feels his eyes burn. Great. First he pukes, now he’s going to cry. What a great way to impress Lance. He nods gloomily.
“Let’s get you to one of the guest rooms, okay?” And Lance helps him stand up, and is nice enough to wait until the room stops spinning before leading him toward the stairs. Justin pauses at the foot of the steps, and shakes his head.
“I can find the guest room,” he says, embarrassed now.
Lance shrugs. “I’ll come with you to make sure you don’t end up sleeping in a bathtub somewhere.”
Together they manage to get up the stairs and into one of Chris’s spare bedrooms. Justin realizes that Lance has had less to drink than he’d thought. Justin crawls onto the bed, not bothering with the covers, and closes his eyes while Lance tugs off his sneakers and rummages around in the closet for a blanket, which he spreads out over him.
He reaches up and grabs Lance’s hand. Lance stares down at him, his expression unreadable in the dim light from the hallway. “Thanks.” Lance nods. “Lance? Enough, okay?”
For a long moment, Lance doesn’t say anything. Justin closes his eyes, starting to drift off into unconsciousness. Then Lance’s voice comes softly out of the darkness that’s threatening to pull him under. “Justin, I don’t know what you want from me.”
“No more guys,” Justin mumbles before he passes out. “That’s enough.”
~~~~~
It felt like it was the last time. Every kiss, every touch, felt like goodbye somehow. Lance angled his head back, a silent invitation that Justin answered with his teeth and his tongue. After all these years, they could read each other intuitively, they could make love without words, with just sighs and murmurs, soft whispers and quiet moans.
It was quite a contrast to this past weekend, really. Parts of that sunny Saturday afternoon had been almost as familiar as this, the part with Britney’s hands on him, sure and knowing, preparing him, petting and soothing him.
Lance tightened his legs around Justin’s waist, pulling him in, arching his hips up, asking wordlessly for things he knew Justin would give him. Justin bent his head and kissed him, his tongue slipping inside, tasting him unhurriedly.
There had been other hands on him Saturday, ones that hadn’t been at all familiar, a different tongue, tasting like a stranger, all of it new. It was hot, to feel that with Britney there, to let someone else do the things he only ever did with Justin.
Tonight he and Justin fucked for what seemed like hours, slowly, languorously, Justin smiling down at him, kissing his eyelids, his nose, his hair. Lance smiled back, looking deep into Justin’s eyes, getting lost, almost forgetting his fear. He didn’t think he’d ever loved Justin more than he did in those moments, the moments before he lost him.
Saturday, when it was over, he’d wanted to die. He’d wanted to take it back, to never have done it. He fought down the panic that threatened to overwhelm him, managed to get himself out of bed and into his clothes without making a total fool of himself. Britney had followed him to the door, a sheet wrapped carelessly around her soft, beautiful body.
“Darlin’, it’s okay. It’ll be fine.” She reached up to brush Lance’s hair off his forehead, pushing it back, trying to make it stand up in spikes, laughing at him when it fell again.
He closed his eyes and rested his forehead against hers for a moment, just breathing. Then he raised his head and looked at Wade, sprawled naked on the bed behind her, one arm propped behind his head, the other resting on his stomach, his fingers carelessly stroking his flaccid cock. He smiled at Lance, a curious smile, almost triumphant, and Lance felt sick to his stomach. He couldn’t seem to remember how he’d ended up here, why he’d said yes.
He brushed a brief kiss across Britney’s lips, nodded at Wade, and left as quickly as he could get himself out the door. He found a bathroom and spent the next fifteen minutes throwing up, trying not to panic. He wasn't very successful. He stared at himself in the mirror as he wiped his mouth, not recognizing the hollow expression in the eyes that stared back at him.
Now he lay beneath Justin, blinking back tears, and Justin gazed down at him, looking worried. He kissed Lance’s damp eyelashes, saying, “Your cheeks turn the best shade of pink when you come, man.” Justin had always loved that, had teased Lance about it for years. “What’s wrong, baby?”
Lance could just not say anything, there was nothing that said he had to tell. Britney and Wade wouldn’t, that much he knew. Justin never had to know, no harm, no foul. It wasn’t like they were both perfect, or perfectly faithful, even. But this seemed different, more important somehow. The tour was almost over, only one more show, and then they'd have time, time away from the frenzy, at least for a little while. Lance and Joey had the premiere of their movie, and promo to do for that, and Justin and Britney had things to do, sure, but they would at least have a moment or two to catch their breaths, away from the others. Maybe they could stop being so angry at each other if they could just have that.
Lance kissed Justin’s neck, then pushed him gently to the side. He rolled over and sat up, poised on the edge of the bed, his back to Justin, hands clasped between his knees. Justin put a hand on Lance’s shoulder, rubbing gently. “Lance?” The concern in his voice made Lance feel like the biggest asshole in the world.
“Justin,” Lance said with despair. He couldn’t do this. He wasn’t sure why he thought he should. He took a deep breath. “You know Saturday? You know how you and Chris took the bikes out? And, um, Brit flew in to talk to Wade about her tour?” Justin’s hand stilled on his back. Lance’s voice was thick with tears. “We-I, um Britney and Wade, they wanted-we, oh, shit, Justin, I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have. I don’t know why I did.” He stopped, unable to continue.
Justin’s hand was gone, and Lance’s back felt cold where it had rested just a moment before. He shivered, afraid to turn around. “I didn’t mean to.” He didn’t, it hadn’t been premeditated, it had just happened. He hadn’t sought it out, he just hadn’t said no.
He’d always had an unshakeable faith in him and Justin, but he himself apparently wasn’t worthy of that faith.
“You son of a bitch,” Justin said in a hard, low voice, and Lance forced himself to turn around then. Justin was pale, his eyes dark and glittering. Lance’s stomach lurched.
“Justin, it’s not any different than-” but Justin cut him off.
“Like hell it’s not! I can’t even-how could you do that?” Justin stared at him as if he’d never seen him before.
And Lance realized he had hit on the one thing he could do that would hurt Justin the most. He must have known that on some level or he wouldn't have done it. He looked helplessly up at Justin, too afraid of what he’d done to know what he should do now. “I’m sorry,” was all he could think to say, and he said it again as Justin jerkily pulled his clothes on, not caring that his shirt was on inside out, he said it as Justin randomly threw things into his bags, and he said it as Justin walked out of their room without another word.
Lance stood stock-still in the middle of the room, completely lost. He was too scared to even cry. He sank down onto the edge of the bed, the sheets behind him rumpled and smelling like Justin, and twisted his fingers together, trying to think.
His eyes darted around the room, not knowing what he was looking for, and they landed on his cell phone, laying on the dresser. He got up again to reach for it, his movements stiff and clumsy, like those of his grandfather on a rainy morning. Clutching it in his hand, he stumbled to a chair, avoiding the bed where he had said goodbye to Justin.
He pressed a number on his phone and waited. The tears finally came when he heard his mother’s voice in his ear.
~~~~~
enough a:occurring in such quantity, quality, or scope as to fully meet demands, needs, or expectations b: in or to a degree or quantity that satisfies or that is sufficient or necessary for satisfaction c: in a tolerable degree
