Special Connections

The guys were on the floor – gazing at flickering flames. The usual scene? Not at all. It was not the loft floor they were settled on – and it was not exactly their own fireplace they were gazing at either. Almost though.

“This is really strange, Brian,” Justin was telling the guy next to him on that alien floor. “That is an exact replica of our fireplace – and they told you they weren’t making that model any more – like - a long time ago too ….”

“Well, I’ve found that Dave gets what he wants pretty much, Baby,” Brian concluded. “He called Acme and told them what he wanted and they made him one - exactly like ours.”

“Amazing, Bri,” Justin decided. “And he did that just to make us feel more at home on this cruise. He is something else. But how do you suppose he even knew about the fireplace?”

“He just laughed when I asked him that, JT,” Brian recounted. “But it could have been Mikey - or more probably Wendell heard about it from Malcolm – or maybe from somebody else over at the Institute where you tell everybody everything you know. I don’t know - but he got the model number and all – and Acme had to search their archives ….”

“Gee whiz, Brian,” Justin complained non-seriously. “Here we are halfway through our big three-week cruise on Dave’s big old yacht – having a great time – getting a lot of good work done on the Rage project – and you still have to pick on me – like – I do not either tell everything I know ….”

“Well if you don’t tell everything you know, I bet you make up for it by telling some stuff you don’t know. Sorry, Sweetheart - I guess picking on you is part of having a good time, Baby,” Brian conjectured. “You’d probably think something was the matter if I didn’t ….”

“Well I guess so, BK,” Justin replied dubiously. “But ….”.

“It’s a lot easier to figure how he got that painting of yours to hang on the wall here in this - the prime visitors’ cabin which we are temporarily occupying for this voyage,” Brian grinned. “He bought that from your New York gallery.”

“Yep, that’s where he got it all right. Ya know, Bri,” Justin replied. “Maybe I should paint something special for Dave to thank him for all the stuff he’s done for us …..”

“I think that would be a great idea, Babe,” Brian agreed. “But how are you gonna figure out what he’d especially like? I guess you could do that easily enough though ….. Are you satisfied by now that he’s not chasing you after all? I don’t notice the paranoia so much these days ….”

“Well the way he moons over Wendell all the time …” Justin explained. “And I still think they’re taking this thing too fast …..”

“Not as fast as we took our ‘thing’ those many years ago,” Brian laughed at him. “You didn’t think we were taking things too fast back then …..”

“Maybe not, Honey,” Justin laughed back at him, “but I kind of remember that you might have thought we were taking it too fast. Anyhow it’s not the same thing at all, I don’t think….”

There was a pause in the discussion at this point. Some observers – if there had been any - might have thought that they were even then taking ‘it’ too fast but that thought did not occur at all to the participants.

“You know what, Baby?” Brian returned to the land of reality – as much as cruising in the Caribbean on a huge private yacht could be considered reality. “You haven’t done very much painting in that upper-level cabin that Dave fitted out and equipped as a studio for you ….”

“Gee whiz, Brian,” Justin responded. “There’s only so much time in the day., I did use it to do some sketch work for Dave’s animation folks though – so they’d know where I’m coming from. They’re really good at their job too, Bri. This Rage thing – it’s gonna be my fault – or maybe Mikey’s – if it doesn’t work out ….”

“It’ll work out, JT,” Brian assured him. “But if something does go wrong, you’ll get over that too. You know you’ll have me to do some big-time comforting ….”

“I guess you’d like that too, Kinney,” Justin teased. “Bet you’re rooting for it to fail so you can ….”

“Nope,” Brian smiled as he squeezed the kid, “I don’t need you to fail. You like – always need big-time comforting, JT ….”

That would have been the opening for a pause in the conversation about 99 times out of 100 – but Justin – for some reason of his own - decided to prolong the discussion.

“Well you need some comforting yourself every once in a while, Mr. Kinney,” he pointed out. “And you’re darn lucky Dave has these great communications arrangements and like – special connections. You can spend an hour a day with Cynthia – and keep up with business – and then you’ve been spending like – a half-hour a day with Gus. That’s more than you spend with Gus when we’re in Pittsburgh … You really miss him, Kinney ….”

“Yeah, I do, Baby,” Brian conceded, “but I might miss you even more if you weren’t here….”

By this time, Justin seemed ready to go for the previously declined “pause” – and so it happened – the comforting - or whatever it was.

“Hey, Taylor,” Brian noticed the time. “It’s after 8:00 and I promised Dave we’d stop by his cabin at 8:15 and hang out for a while – and after that I think I’d like to take a moonlight walk along the deck….”

“Gee whiz, Kinney,” Justin laughed, “the sea air must make you a lot more romantic than usual ….”

“Well the moonlight on the Caribbean is a little more romantic than the moonlight on Liberty Avenue,” Brian laughed back. “But if you’re not up for the moon-lit walk, I guess I can walk alone. There’s this old song ….”

“I know the old song, Bri,” Justin told him. “You use it a lot of times …. But you won’t have to walk alone tonight ….”

“I didn’t think so, Baby,” Brian interrupted with a tinge of triumph in his voice.

“What I meant was, Sweetheart,” Justin grinned, “that Brandon and Jason will be over at Dave’s cabin too – and I’m sure they’ll walk with you – if I like – declined ….”

“OK, Kiddo,” Brian ginned back at him, “I guess I’ll ask them along – even if you do decide you can walk the deck too ….”

“You are a hateful person, Brian Kinney,” Justin told him – in a voice that didn’t sound like he meant it. “We’ll leave the fake fake-fireplace lit so it will be ready when we get back – if you don’t decide to bring Jason and Brandon back here too, Mr. Romantic B. Kinney ….”

Brian was grinning knowingly as they left the cabin and closed the door behind them.

It was a few hours later when that door re-opened and the two familiar figures re-entered – unencumbered by any guests – invited or otherwise - and plopped themselves back down onto the floor.

“How come you didn’t invite Brandon and Jason to come back with us, Bri?” Justin wanted to know.

“Well that would have been fun, Taylor,” Brian smiled gently, “but I thought maybe you were pretty tired.”

“Yeah, I guess that was smart, Brian,” Justin concurred. “But I thought you were the quiet one on the moonlight walk. Jason would have stopped to let you say something if ….”

“I was thinking about Gus, Baby,” Brian confessed. “Let’s take him on a cruise down here next year. He’d love it.”

“Now there’s the difference between us, Mr. Kinney,” Justin slid in closer to the guy next to him. “You’re always wanting to wait. Actually I talked to Dave a couple of days ago and – like – Gus will be here day after tomorrow – coming by helicopter to spend the last week of the cruise with us. And more good news too, Bri – Melanie and Linz are too busy to bring him so Hunter and Malcolm are coming with him instead. We’ll have like an army for our late-night moonlit walks on the deck next week.’

“And that’s what you want?” Brian smiled happily at him. “An army ….”

“As long as we don’t invite them back here afterwards.” Justin told him. “If you know what I mean ….”

Brian knew precisely what he meant.
 

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