aintnosunshine_'s Journal

It had been almost three months since Brian had been able to return to something resembling a regular sex life, and things had stayed good with him and Justin. Justin had been cooking and cleaning the loft, working on his drawings, bussing tables at the diner a few nights a week for extra cash, and Brian was doing excellent at Kinnetic and recovering nicely. His last round of radiation had been over a month ago and he'd stopped vomiting all the time, had actually started to put on a ilttle weight and muscle mass again to where his ribs weren't visible at all times. It had been so good, in fact, that Justin had been waiting for the other shoe to drop.

And then there it had been.

"I have syphillis", so casual, like 'It's raining outside', and Justin's initial thought hadn't been fear or worry but anger. He could go months without sticking his dick anywhere and then the minute he was back to it, he came home with an STD and telling Justin he should get tested, and Justin had gotten indignant and then Brian had said 'Who knows, I could've even caught it from you' before he walked out of the kitchen.

Justin had made it a few days after that before he'd confronted Brian.

"I love you," he said softly, calmly, "more than anything in the world. But we don't want the same things. I want... I want what we had before, when I was... when I was the only person you were with. What're we doing?"

"Damned if I know," Brian had murmured softly, looking uncharacteristically vulnerable. And maybe a little stunned that Justin was finally going to have the balls to say it.

"I want you to let me love you," Justin murmured, stretching up to kiss Brian. "And you can't. Not the way I want it. I don't want to share you with half of Pittsburgh. This time it was syphillis. What about next time?"

He'd left the loft, but he still saw Brian. At the diner, in the club. He was staying at Michael and Ben's house when the call came from Hollywood, and Brian was the first person he'd thought to go to. Justin was being flown out, all expenses paid, to stay with producers to work on a possible adaptation of Rage as a film. And of course he'd wanted to share it with Brian before anything else, so he had thrown on his jacket and headed for the loft, knocking on the door without knowing what to expect. Would Brian have a visitor? It was ten-thirty at night, he might not even be home.