After Brian
Part 8
Michael
It was Sunday, not Monday 'ziti night', but those of us left standing after the Rage party fiasco gravitated towards Ma's house like moths to an open flame. Comfort food with a capital "C". Never one to skimp on the cheese, Ma outdid herself - lasagna and baked mac and cheese. Vic made a chocolate cake and Ben and I brought over six bottles of wine. How did I know that Mel, Lindsay, Ted, and Emmett would all show up to? Well it's like the swallows returning to Capistrano - like I knew the sun would set in the west and then rise tomorrow morning in the east. It just was.
Ok, I know. At first I admit that it was a huge relief to have everything out in the open now. The whole thing had been making me sick, watching from the side line at the tracks knowing a train wreck was about to happen. But it was obviously all out there and then Justin left and WHAT THE FUCK was that! Justin, no that's not what was supposed to happen. Brian was the one who should have left, not Justin, and not with someone other than Brian. I hadn't gotten a good look at the guy I caught Justin cheating with out on the corner that day we were putting up posters, but I got an eye full of him at Babylon. All I have to say is 'What the fuck is that all about?' Him?! You'd think Justin would leave Brian for, hell, I don't know, um Matt Damon, before he would ever consider leaving Brian for that… thing. Hell, I would have put Justin and Ted together over that thing.
Justin leaving, fuck, hadn't seen that coming, really. Brian was the one who should have left…the injured party and yes, more than likely I am just saying that because I have been in love with him for the last 16 years. Wait, no…well, loved him, no, wait I "love" him, like a brother, now…Really! Don't laugh, you have seen Ben right? Ben, Ben, Ben, if Ben had left me like that, I don't know what the hell I would have done. My God, did you see the look on Brian's face? Well, his eyes, he had the saddest eyes, and not sad but devastated. His eyes said it all - crushed, surprised, 'Hey I just got dumped!' I know all about that look with all my vast experience as being the dumpee, the look I must have flashed each time Brian went off tricking. Brian, a serial dumper, looked like a kid just learning there was no Santa Claus. Sort of like I did the night it hit me that Justin was around and he wasn't going any where. My heart broke for Brian, right in two. I turned my head for a second, one split fucking second to watch the asshole twink walk away and then I looked back and Brian was Baaack! Back to himself. His' good' old self, grabbing the best looking guy on the dance floor and losing himself in the back room All systems go, situation normal, check, check…
Then he was gone and I mean gone! No trace. Nothing. Lindsay and Mel picked up on there being something wrong when Jennifer bolted out of the club without as much as a good bye. A while later we had formed a search party but Brian wasn't in the back room, the Jeep was parked in front of the diner, he wasn't at the baths, or at Lindsay's. Fuck, I was getting so worried I made Ted go home and make sure he wasn't there. No, he hadn't gone anywhere we could trace. No hospital, no Emergency room, and until Lindsay called to tell me he was home safe at the loft with Claire, I don't think I felt my heat beat.
Ok - quick side bar here. Listen I know, I know you don't believe that I don't love Brian in that way anymore…Some part of me always will, ok, I admit that. That night in my comic book shop, he'd have fucked me if I wanted, really, you have to know the guy. HE always does what he thinks is best for those he loves and in some twisted fucked up way he thought that was the best for me. Hell yes he loves me, but not in that way…But let me tell you, do you know what it is like to be in love with someone who loves you back so unconditionally that just being in his presence makes you feel like a better person but you know that the person you are is good enough for them already? That's what I get with Ben, I feel like a better person, that his love makes me a better person, but also that I am good enough for him just the way I am. Hell, I can't, I'm not going to over analyze it, but he seems to think the same about me, our love is a two way street. With Brian it was different - it was the possibility of being better, being special enough for him to choose me. Of changing into someone else, someone who could be good enough for him. You know, being cool enough, special enough to satisfy him. I know that I could never be that person for him. No, that was Justin's role in his life. The fucker!
Anyway, Lindsay called and told me that Claire had Brian. What the fuck? Claire? Jesus, Brian must have been desperate to drag Claire into this. I know I am probably the only person in the universe who knows how close those two are, but Brian would rather cut off his dick than drag Clair into a 'personal' problem. That's my role. Me. I clean up the left over body parts. Claire is there to, well I don't know what Claire is there to do, but not this. Christ, those problems she had with her husband almost killed Brian though he won't admit it. When Claire was in the hospital for what is turning out to be thankfully the last time, (fingers crossed!) I went over to supervise the movers since Brian had some meeting at work he couldn't get out of. I had strict orders, everything was to be packed and gone out of the house before sunset, or before that fucker made bail. I had people pack up everything except things that looked totally the fucker's. The kitchen, the kid's bedroom that was easy, the family room proved to be more tricky. Claire had, as many women do, a family shrine of photographs of her kids, her family and her husband's family. The shrine covered every inch of the built in shelves and wall space. The dilemma was that the husband was in a lot of the pictures. Better safe than sorry, I put the ones with him in a box and labeled it hazardous materials.
After wrapping about three hundred photographs something hit me. There were dozens of pictures with the husband's family, him as a boy, the wedding, etc. but there wasn't a single picture of Claire or Brian as kids or their parents. Not one, no high school pictures, prom shots, nothing. Yes, there was a Brian shrine, but we all have one of those, don't we? Pictures of him and his nephews, a framed copy of the newspaper article when he won the Clio, all that. But before Brian was in college, nothing, zippo. Well I guess that's not so strange if you know how fucked up Brian's home life was - hell, who am I kidding, how strange and fucked up it is.
Sometimes I wonder, is Brian protecting us from his family or is it the other way around? Claire, she's the only person, I mean the only person, that can make Brian squirm in one second or calm his raging down even faster. I haven't seen anyone ever make Brian hop to it before her, well…until Justin. Shit Justin!