How Surprised Were You?

It had been a long Fourth of July celebration at Point State Park. The weather had been good and the whole gang had assembled as usual. Justin had expected Brian to comment on one particular part of the program but he had not. Justin was not about to bring up the subject himself. Even though it was almost midnight when the guys found themselves entering the loft, Justin decided to light the fireplace. He plopped himself down in front of the flickering flames and waited for Brian. It was not long till he had company. Nothing was said for a while but Justin became a little concerned when Brian's arm did not end up pulling him closer.

"Another good Fourth of July," Justin eventually ventured.

"Yep," Brian agreed without elaboration.

"What did you think?" Justin continued.

"Well," Brian opined. "I think Malcolm needs to change that skit he does for the kids. He's done pretty much the same thing for three years now. The kids are bound to remember."

"Seems to me the kids all liked it pretty well," Justin responded. "Kids like to see the same things over and over as long as they like them. I guess you might be right though. Maybe I'll suggest to Malcolm that he make some changes. Maybe he can write roles into the program for us. Why should Mikey get all the glory even though he's a great Yankee Doodle?"

"Are you trying to make me mad?" Brian wondered with a smile. "I don't know why you'd want to do that."

"I wouldn't," Justin declared. "I wouldn't ever. I was just trying to be funny, Bri. I don't want you to be mad."

"I think the fireworks tonight were the best of all the years we've been going to the park together," Brian recalled, "And the symphony sounded real good too. They just play the same stuff every year though so maybe Malcolm doesn't need to do any tweeking of his program. People sometimes don't like surprises."

"Cut it out, Brian," Justin pleaded. "You know very well what I want you to talk about, so talk. If you're mad, just say so. Maybe we should have told you. I just didn't know what to do."

"Why would you think you had to tell Brian anything?" Brian laughed. "Who cares if Brian knows as long as everybody else knows? Just let Brian be surprised."

"It was Gus' idea," Justin explained. "He was a little nervous about the whole thing. We told him he didn't have to do it if he didn't want to. I think he was afraid he'd back out at the last minute and he didn't want to disappoint you. He wanted it to be a surprise for you. You're the most important person in his life."

"Let me get this straight," Brian mused. "My kid gets a chance to play a violin duet on the Point Park stage with our own symphony fiddler, Ethan the great, and he was allowed to make his own decision about whether to do it."

"Yeah," Justin seemed surprised. "Why not? We wouldn't want him to do it if he didn't want to. Would you? What's so strange about that?"

"Well, if it was me who got the offer to play some duet with Ethan," Brian conjectured, "You'd just order me to do it and that would be that. There wouldn't be any stuff about me making my own decision. Nobody would care if I wanted to do it or not."

"Get off that stuff, Kinney," Justin gritted his teeth slightly. "I have never ordered you to do anything in my whole life. I don't even ever try to influence you to do anything you might not want to do. You know what though. If I thought I could get away with it, maybe I would order you to do some things, for your own good of course."

"I'm sure everything you do is for my own good," Brian laughed. "I can't imagine you trying to get me to do something for your own good."

"OK," Justin decided. "I am not going to get mad at you no matter hard you try. I was afraid that you might be just a little bit mad because we didn't tell you, but I can see now that you're not the least bit angry so, if you don't want to talk about it, we just won't talk about it."

"OK," Brian answered, and a short period of silence ensued. Justin felt Brian's arm tightening around him, which made him feel better.

"Brian," Justin soon broke the silence, "Gus was real nervous and he was afraid he'd disappoint you. That's why we didn't tell you. He's really good on the violin but he's still just a kid and he was scared. We didn't want him to worry if he wanted to back out at the last minute. So we really didn't tell anybody. Nobody knew but Mel, Linz and me. Even Mikey didn't know."

"Geez," Brian echoed. "Even Mikey didn't know. Why would I be mad about not knowing if even Mikey didn't know?"

"OK, Kinney," Justin surrendered. "You win. I don't know what that means but you win anyway. I'm sorry you weren't told. It won't happen again. But weren't you even a little bit pleasantly surprised? And proud of your son?"

"Of course I was surprised," Brian responded. "Why wouldn't I be surprised since nobody told me what was up? And of course I was proud of Gus. Maybe not quite as proud of him as you were. But didn't I tell him how well he did? He knew I liked it and how impressed I was."

"Yeah," Justin admitted, "I guess I'm feeling just a little bit guilty. I wish we had told you. But Gus…."

"Hey, Baby," Brian ran his hand through the kid's hair. "You know how mean I am. You have to expect me to give you a hard time when I get the chance. The truth is that I'm really proud of you too. I think you handled the situation perfectly. I don't want you to feel guilty. And I do want you to use your judgment in those kinds of situations. You did good, Sunshine. You always do. Just don't expect me to admit it very often. OK?"

Justin didn't answer immediately so Brian went on. "You're not mad at me for trying to have a little fun at your expense, are you?" he asked the twink. "You know how I am. You shouldn't be surprised."

"Oh I'm not surprised that you pick on me all the time," Justin grinned as he nestled himself a little closer to Brian. "But you know what I'm always surprised about? I think I know what a great guy you are and how much I love you, and then I find out you're even greater than I thought you were and that I'm more in love with you than I ever thought I could be."

"So maybe you don't know me as well as you think you do, eh?" Brian cajoled. "I know how mysterious I can be but I'm surprised you'd admit it."

"Well I do know you're still picking on me, Mr. Kinney," Justin countered. "I know that's your favorite thing to do. You know what? I'm not going to fight back at all tonight. I'm so happy and I love you so much I'm just going to let you win if that's what you want. What do you say to that?"

Brian squeezed the kid even tighter. "Now I really am surprised," he told Justin.

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