After Brian
Part 1
Justin
If I close my eyes, sometimes I think I can still feel him inside me and I know he will always be there. When he first told me that no matter who I was with he would always be there, I thought it was a declaration of love. I know now that it is a curse. His specter follows me around day and night, in and out of consciousness.
My life is cut in half - BB and AB. Before Brian and After Brian. I can name the date that I went from child to man. Ha ha, I thought I did, the night I met Brian. After Brian there wasn't Ethan, there wasn't anyone, it was still Brian. So I guess it is 'after the physical Brian', but AB is shorter then APB, and then there is that whole police connotation. Regardless of what label you put on it, there was no Brian. And yahoo! I got to clean up my first real adult mess all by myself …so the first person I called after I left Babylon, all adult and all was….my mother! Thank God for vibrating cell phones, she came tearing out of Babylon like a woman on a mission, Mom to the Rescue! She met me around the corner, I said good-bye to Ethan and my AB life began.
My mother was waiting in the wings the whole time - waiting for Brian to hurt me, crush my heart and leave me for dead on the side of the road. She was a little stunned that the break up conversation wasn't going to go the way she and everyone thought it would, that Brian would have been the one to fuck it up, not me. She was kind enough not to rub it too much in my face. The others were not so kind.
First came the apologies to the 'gang', which fell on deaf ears. Sorry is bullshit and all that, but I was the one at fault really, not Brian. Ted, Emmett, Lindsay and Mel were convinced that Brian had gotten what was coming to him, and they gathered around me like they were protecting me from the big bad wolf. Brian became estranged from his own family and it wasn't even his fault. Slowly I pulled back from them, hoping they would return Brian to the fold, where he belonged, and forget me and my past sins.
Mike and Ben, damn, they were nice too. Mike even tried to apologize for his role in messing up the relationship. What a shit, like it was his fault I am a liar and a cheat. Debbie, now that was a surprise, was furious with me. She didn't speak to me for the entire two weeks that I had left to work at the diner after I gave my notice. She always could cut through all the shit and get to the heart of the problem. This time it wasn't Brian, it was me, and I was properly punished by being banished from her attention. On my last day she stopped me as I left and simply said, "I expect you to come over for ziti on Monday nights. Bring your mother, Molly or who ever." And then I knew the punishment was over. If it all could have been that easy.
I sent my mother over to pick up my belongings at the loft, too scared chicken shit to go over myself. I moved back in with her and Molly. Nothing like taking two steps forward and then twenty back. But it was nice to be home, knowing that someone was always going to be there when you got home, have something nice to say, ask how your day went. Let me tell you something, there is something to the unconditional love a mother has for her son, even if it tends to be on the suffocating side.
My mother let me have four days of self pity, then she kicked my ass out of bed where it had been 24/7 since she had brought me home from the Rage party, and sent me back to work. I did what I was told, unable to form a reason not to. Brian never called, and I never called him. Brian never came to the diner when I was working and I never went by the clubs or his loft. The end. Yeah, right.
Ethan tried to make an effort at a relationship, but he was too smart not to realize that he was a convenient player in the tragedy that was Justin Taylor's life. He knew he had been played, just like Brian. He stopped calling after a few days.
I went for a run, my new drug, Adrenalin, and then to school. A year had passed since my father had denied my money for tuition. My mother had gotten so pissed about the tuition thing that she fired her divorce attorney and found a real shark. Ultimately, the divorce decree that my mother and father signed, bargained the country club membership and family cabin in Vermont for my tuition. Xoxox Mom! I was back in the family fortune so to speak, so school fees and art supplies were no longer a great worry. I went to summer school, took as many classes as possible and fell asleep at home every night exhausted from keeping up with the work load. Fell asleep alone. What did Hamlet say about sleep? Dreaming was the down side all right. At night I sometimes dreamt great dreams, where I would wake up soaked in my own spunk and the memories of a night with Brian. The worst nights, I would wake up, panicked and alone. Oh, wasn't that every night? Yeah, night time was hard, but the realization that morning was there and it was another day without Brian killed me.
Monday nights, ziti nights, was the only time that I really interacted regularly with the gang from my time with Brian. Mike and Ben were frequent guests, the others less often, but never, ever, Brian. His name was not mentioned in my presence, and I did not mention him. There was usually enough chatter between Debbie, Vic and my Mom to fill any holes in conversations about life to even notice that everyone was trying very, very hard not to talk about Brian.
Emmett, what would I have done without Emmett? We met several times a week for coffee on the way to class or afterwards. He became my therapist, best friend and fashion consultant (joke!) all in one. At first, AB life was almost Emmett-free…he and Ted had decided to make a go at being more than friends and go they did! But after a few weeks, the newness of the relationship part, ok the sex part, was wearing off a little like it does and the relationship that they had based on years of friendship just …I don't know how to say it, it just was. It was interesting watching from the sidelines, Emmett and Ted had always been together emotionally, adding the sex and sex love thing just seemed like another level of their friendship. I personally thought Ted would fuck it up in a week, he is just so strange. Really, have you noticed that whole thing with Blake, he was controlling everything about that relationship. And don't get me started on the whole Jerk at Work thing.
Ted sits in his chair and directs the sex lives of tens of thousands of men across America and beyond…he just doesn't seem to control Emmett. Emmett has fulfilled his ever-present wet dream - he is now the beefy brutal top to Ted's ever happy little suck pig bottom. True love. Puke. Let's just skip that shall we?
Emmett quit work at Jerk at Work and the 'clothing' store. He settled down into a routine to make his and Ted's life as fabulous as he knew it always could be. Well, not a life he envisioned with Ted, per se, just a life he imagined when he fell in love with his true love. True love, Ted and Emmett. I know, but it's kinda sweet. You will have to trust me on that. Really. I mean it. Don't laugh!
For the first few times out with Em, he did all the talking. He 'bumped' into me coming out of PIFA on my way to the bus stop. He had Ted's car and Ted's credit card and he was taking me out to lunch, no ifs ands or buts about it. So we went out to lunch and Em just talked and talked and talked. Stories of Ted and his affection for Em, Em's affection for Ted and the mutual admiration society that had blossomed between the two of them for the couple that was Ted and Em. At first I wondered why even invite me out if all you were going to do was talk about yourself. Then I realized that this relationship, the torturous detail, the excruciating accuracy of last night's candle light dinner and make out session, was just another one of life's great queer lessons. Class is now in session, "Intro. To Great Gay Love 101." See, in his own way he knew what I was aiming for with Ethan, no…actually, he knew what I was aiming for with Brian but so terribly fucked up on the way towards it with Ethan…fuck! Em knew that one day, my prince would come, and he just wanted to make sure I was paying attention for it. Em knew. The fucker, he knew that Brian was my prince. He knew before I even realized it.
It was hard at first to talk to Em about me and Brian. I knew if Brian ever found out that Em was acting the part of Father Confessor to my penitent sinner about our relationship that there would cease to be Me on this earth. I would have been found by some poor person in a trash bin, like dumpster boy, unceremoniously dead by the hands of the man I loved…
Em would listen, I mean really listen. He listened without judgment, he listened with concern and caring, he would smile at the right times, pat my hand soothingly at the right time, and leave me wondering if this guy could take on Dr. Phil and Oprah all at once. I realized once that when Em did speak he wasn't saying anything other than mirroring back what I had said to him, in question form. Now, for all those who have had a semester of college psychology, we all know this is an effective way to work out one' s problems with a trained professional. Kids, don't try this at home. Em is an expert, this isn't for amateurs.
Amateur, that's a fitting adjective for me. I was a fucking amateur at relationships. What the fuck did I know about what was going on between me and Brian? I'm just a kid. Oh, that got Em going, slipping out of his professional role and stopping me in my tracks. "Honey," he said seriously, "you're no more a kid than Gus is an adult. You were born with the soul of a hundred year old man who has seen things that ought not to have been seen, and lived through things that ought not have been lived through, so don't go getting all, 'but I'm just a teenager' on me. We all know that's a load of crap." Great, someone else now knows this is all my fault too. Wonder if Brian feels the same way?
Hey, now, just so you don't think that I have completely given up my role as Brian's personal stalker, just because I wasn't getting information from the gang, didn't mean I wasn't keeping up with him. Oh, no, to the contrary. I have my sources. First there was Cynthia, queen of the illicit emails. At first, in the early days AB, nary a peep from Brian's loyal assistant. Then all of a sudden a flurry of emails concerning 'the proper care and feeding of Brian' hit. Seems that Mr. 'I don't need anyone' was getting cranky about his dry cleaners, so which one did I used to send his suits to, by the way? There was the email about the coffee beans, the lavender and mint French milled soap, just about everything that Brian had gotten used to being there without having to ask - his supply was dwindling and he had begun to notice when things weren't the way he had them and he didn't like it. And he was taking it out on Cynthia and just about everyone he possibly could. That's my man!
It felt good to be helping Cynthia out. It made me feel like I was giving a little joy back to Brian in some very, very small way. The email relationship was going well, well enough until I started making things up. I hadn't meant to put Cynthia in the middle but it was too much fun to explore things that I had always wanted to do for Brian but knew he would kill me for. Such as, you ask? Well, I had always wanted to get Brian with Gus more often, on a regular basis. Sure they saw each other, but sometimes it killed me that Brain was content to being just a spectator in his son' life. So that's when the play dates began. Cynthia set up an out of office conference for Brian at a specified site… which turned out to be a 'mommy and me' class with Gus at the local gym. Lindsay walked in and dumped Gus in Brian's hands and turned on her heels and left. Brian just stood there, clad in Armani surrounded by women and screaming toddlers, with a gurgling happy Gus staring at him wide-eyed. Two weeks later the same thing, only this time he was in the local library's children's section just in time for story hour!
Oh, did I mention my other ally in stalking? Lindsay, how'd you guess?! Linds and I found our way back to each other accidentally on purpose. One day I came back from my run and she was sitting on the steps of my mother's home, waiting impatiently for my return. "This is all your fault, you shit!' she yelled in that 'nice' 'little' shrill voice of hers.
"I know," I sighed, giving it my best drama queen sigh.
"You are a shit. Do you have any idea what you have done to him?"
"No, Linds," I replied honestly. "I don't. Has he even noticed that I am gone?" I swear to God if she wasn't such a pacifist lesbian goody two shoes she would have slapped me in the face. Instead she punched me in the arm. Hard. "Ouch!" I yelped.
"I'll give you something to 'ouch', Mr. Justin Taylor! Get your bubble butt in that house, you have some explaining to do, young man and some making right!"
Oh, another true friendship was born that afternoon at the very first meeting of the "I heart Brian Club." Mikey, the first life time member and founder (in spirit), Lindsay and me made up this small elite group. Mike was never in body at the club meetings. Luckily he seemed to have passed over to a more rational relationship since Ben came into his life. Lucky him. I, on the other hand, had just begun a life time of "I heart Brain." Poor me.