JC rolled his eyes helplessly at the thought, but it really was a dark and stormy night. Earlier there’d been a huge, bloated full moon hanging ominously in the sky, but now rain lashed the window panes of his kitchen and the rumble of thunder in the distance made the coffee cup on his counter rattle. He leaned closer to the window just as a streak of lightning lit up the sky, making him jump, and the kitchen lights flickered alarmingly. He watched tensely until they steadied and then snorted with impatience at his own behavior, but still. It was dark, and it was stormy, and he was all alone in his very large house with the big, dark yard and the dark, dangerous looking lake on the other side of it, and honestly, if there had ever been a decent scary story that didn’t start with it being dark and stormy, he hadn’t heard it.

This was a big storm for this early in the autumn and the news had said earlier that power outages were likely, but that wasn’t going to stop him. He wasn’t superstitious, and he wasn’t nervous about a little foul weather. He had places to go and tasks to accomplish, and right how he was on his way to buy groceries. It was something he’d meant to do ever since the tour ended and he’d returned to his peaceful, sane house in Orlando -- he was going to really settle in now, he was going to buy furniture, and hang things on the walls, and maybe even buy real towels instead of using the ones he’d ripped off from the fancy hotels they’d stayed at. He was a bona-fide homeowner with the mortgage and property tax bill to prove it, and it was time he started acting like one. Like his mother said, this meant that it was time to stop mooching off friends and eating out. It was time to stock the pantry.

He’d been meaning to make it to the grocery store all day, along with other normal and sane places like the drug store and the dry cleaning shop, but he kept getting derailed when he wasn’t able to find the keys to either of his vehicles. This was despite the fact that he’d carefully left an extra set on the ceramic wall hanging that announced "KEYS!" mounted on the kitchen wall by the garage door in addition to the set that he routinely used. That’s where he was now, scowling at the empty hooks on that wall hanging in complete exasperation and annoyance as thunder rumbled menacingly outside. He patted his own pockets without much hope, as he’d already checked them numerous times that day. Since the tour had ended and he’d come home he’d been on a record-breaking key-losing binge. His keys seemed to be disappearing out of his hand, out of his pockets, and off his helpful KEYS! wall hanging like . . .

Well, like magic. He pushed that thought away and started to hunt through the kitchen.

It was another half-hour of retracing his steps through the entire house and garage before he found them. He didn’t recall putting them inside an empty coffee mug, and he certainly didn’t recall putting that empty mug inside the almost completely empty refrigerator, but there they were. His car keys. Finally. He grabbed them, checking that they were the right ones twice more, and headed for his car.

JC paused in the doorway leading from kitchen to garage and eyed his gorgeous new car warily. The door closed too quickly behind him and slammed him in the ass, making him jump and knocking him into the garage before he had a chance to turn on the lights. He groped for the light switch, cursing in the pitch darkness, finding it only when a huge flash of lightning illuminated the quiet garage where his car sat waiting. JC hesitated again.

His brand new, beautiful, silver Mercedes convertible. It had been delivered the day he returned home, and he’d been so pleased and excited. Then its rims had been stolen the following day while he was eating lunch (In broad daylight! On a busy street! He was still so outraged by this), and the dealer had informed him regretfully that it would be a week before replacements could be obtained. And the car, an amazing vehicle that he really enjoyed driving, seemed to have transformed itself almost overnight from a flawless piece of European machinery to a twenty year old beater loaded with eccentricities. Since JC had been home from the tour the car often refused to start, inexplicably and frustratingly, and when it did start it sometimes put its convertible top up and down with no rhyme, reason, or direction from JC. The expensive sound system changed radio stations spontaneously. It was starting to die every time he tried to drive certain roads. It had been that way for almost a week, now. Ever since the tour had ended and he’d finally come home, ever since . . .

He gripped the keys in his hand and eyed his car, sitting smugly in the garage as the storm raged outside. It was an effort, but he forced himself to say it aloud. "Ever since the voodoo queen put a curse on me."

~ ~ ~

JC hadn’t meant to offend the elderly lady telling fortunes from a small shop tucked into a side street in Manhattan. In fact, had he known where he would end up he would’ve tried to avoid the entire scenario, because visiting a fortune teller was on that list of the things he didn’t ever intend to do, right up there with getting a tattoo. He should’ve been more suspicious of Justin’s elaborately nonchalant "oh, I’m just going to run into this place for a second," but at the time he’d been hungry and distracted, and JC had just assumed that Justin was as hungry as he was. If he’d known Justin’s objective had been the fortune telling shop and not the promising-looking Chinese restaurant next to it, he would’ve refused to leave the Suburban.

The morning had actually started out in a very promising fashion. Justin had been cordial at breakfast instead of silent and morose for a change, and when Joey had complained of a headache he’d immediately volunteered to take his place at that morning’s promo rounds even though that meant spending the better part of the morning and early afternoon alone with JC. This was something they’d both avoided since their insane relationship had ended earlier in the month, but this time there were no sullen looks, no silent treatment, and no veiled accusatory comments disguised as answers to interview questions. The interview had gone very well; Justin had gone out of his way to be calm and friendly and JC felt more relaxed and at ease with him than he had for weeks, certainly since the break up.

Yes, things were finally looking up. JC felt cheery enough to be giving the driver directions and advice on navigating the busy streets, and when Justin asked the driver to stop the vehicle and turned to JC and suggested a quick stop, half questioning, JC, still thinking of food, was feeling benevolent enough to nod and say "Sure, let’s check it out."

He should’ve known better, really. The driver dropped them off on the street so he wouldn’t block traffic, and their security went into the restaurant to make the appropriate arrangements. JC had about two seconds to pull his hat down over his face and take one nervous glance around the busy sidewalk before Justin grabbed his elbow and yanked him up the sidewalk toward the restaurant. JC was still distracted by the sudden physical contact -- something else they’d both avoided lately, for obvious reasons -- when Justin had suddenly released him. "Go on," he’d said, his voice a little strangled. "I’ll meet you inside."

JC was still holding his arm where Justin had gripped it, and he’d stared at him in growing suspicion. "Where are you going?" he asked as Justin turned away.

Justin turned back with a big, fake PR-worthy smile. "Just a quick errand, won’t take me more than a second," he said with completely transparent nonchalance. "Go on in, I’ll be right there."

From across the street there was the sound of a strangled shriek that could only come from a teenaged girl, and they both instinctively turned toward the wall and hid their faces. "It’ll only take me a second," Justin said more forcefully, and when a second scream sounded he dove in to the almost-hidden doorway just on the inside of the access alley. JC, without thinking, bolted after him, colliding solidly with his back just inside the door. Justin reached out to steady him and JC looked around in confusion.

The door shut out both sound and light when it closed behind them, and when his eyes adjusted to the light JC found himself in a tiny, airless room heavily hung with purple and black draperies. It was strange and disorienting and Justin still had a hold of his elbow, his large hand distractingly warm on JC’s arm, and just as JC realized that Justin’s fingers were making what could only be caressing movements on the thin skin of his inner elbow, Justin suddenly released him.

"You don’t have to wait, I’m just going to be a minute," Justin muttered, and JC glanced at him in suspicion. He was looking straight ahead into the darkness and his face was red. His eyes starting to adjust, JC took a closer look around.

The door they’d come through had opened directly into a small, round room draped with black and purple draperies. A round table sat in the center of the room, covered by a midnight blue velvet cloth. There was even a crystal ball in the center of the table, catching the light from the small chandelier suspended above it. The entire scene was too cliched for words, and JC scowled in puzzlement and irritation.

"What the hell is this? Why are we here?" he asked, exasperated, and Justin nudged him sharply with a large, bony elbow. "Ow."

"Look, keep your voice down, will you?" Justin hissed at him. "There’s someone I have to see here. It’ll only take a minute, and then I promise I’ll feed you."

JC looked around in disbelief. "There’s someone you have to see? Here?" Justin nodded silently, looking straight ahead and stubbornly refusing to meet JC’s eyes. "Who?"

"Her name is Marie LeCoeur." Justin’s southern accent made a gala appearance, rolling the name off of his tongue like he’d been born and raised in the bayous of Louisiana. "She’s from Haiti, and my granny told me to stop in and see her." He flickered a warning glance at JC, a flash of blue from behind long, thick lashes that JC really, really wished he could stop noticing. "She knows her from Memphis -- says she’s the real deal."

JC stared at him. For a moment he tried to picture his own grandmother -- a very proper and upright Mennonite -- referring him to a voodoo queen for any reason, and then he shook the distressing image out of his mind. "Your granny?" he whispered derisively. "The one who discusses your private life with the tabloids?" He was ready for the elbow this time, dodging nimbly away even as he rolled his eyes. "You’ve got to be kidding, man."

At first he thought that Justin was going to completely ignore him. He recognized the set of his jaw and knew it meant that he was determined to get his way, and would forge ahead to see the fortune teller and force JC to trail after him. He was about to refuse and take his chances on the sidewalk when Justin turned to him with a smile, a slow and brilliant smile, the blue eyes earnest and appealing and JC gulped, the words he was about to say dying in his throat.

Reason number nine, he thought automatically, and sighed.

In the few weeks since he and Justin had broken up, JC had spent a great many sleepless nights listing answers to the question, "so, why did you get together with him in the first place?" They were reasons he gave his parents, reasons he gave Joey and Chris and Lance, reasons he gave himself when he tossed and turned and couldn’t sleep at night. And here was reason number nine: that smile. It was such a gorgeous thing; it made JC believe that every insincere cliche that came out of Justin’s mouth was the sheerest poetry composed only for him.

JC knew for a fact that Justin practiced that breath-taking smile in the mirror. He’d seen him in action. But somehow it just didn’t seem to matter. The nerve-tingling and incendiary effect it had on JC now was just as powerful as it had been when they were -- well, dating, sleeping together, whatever it was that they’d been doing for the better part of the past year.

He was still trying to recover and was formulating a pointed demand that he be fed, immediately, when the draperies at the end of the room twitched and a tall woman entered. She had black curly hair, and sharp black eyes that swept over them both before narrowing coldly and dangerously at JC. He lifted his chin and scowled back, and then blinked in astonishment as the woman pointedly turned away from him and greeted Justin with a warm smile and a hug.

"Oh, here’s Sadie’s boy," she said, her accent thick and richly exotic. "Child, I knew you was coming. I’ve been waiting all morning for you."

"Yes Ma’am," Justin said politely, on his best behavior and with a smile that would’ve melted a glacier. JC groaned out loud and the two near the table had both turned to glare at him, Justin with exasperation and Marie LeCoeur with a glowering suspicion.

"What’s your problem, boy?" she asked belligerently.

"My problem?" JC repeated incredulously, waving a hand to indicate the draperies, the table, the crystal ball, and the woman herself. "Where do I start?"

Marie LeCoeur frowned darkly at him, then leaned forward to murmur something in Justin’s ear. Justin nodded slightly, his cheeks staining red, and JC heard her whisper "Well, then, you make him behave with some respect, child." JC huffed in irritation and Justin took a few steps toward him, his expression somewhere between impatient and cajoling.

"Look, this’ll only take a minute, JC," Justin said quietly as the woman took a seat at the table and started to whisper and mumble to herself. His smile was small and private and extremely persuasive, and it worked on JC pretty much like it always did. "You don’t mind, do you?"

JC sighed with poor grace and retreated to an uncomfortable wooden stool positioned as close to the exit as he could manage. He felt stiff and strange, much like he did when his parents insisted that he attend church with them when he was home visiting, but really, this didn’t even compare. This wasn’t church, this wasn’t religion, this was just a woman setting up shop and cheating people out of their hard-earned money. He couldn’t believe that such things actually went on in modern day New York City.

He watched with concern and growing disgust as Justin seated himself at the little table and conferred quietly with the woman, then pulled a small bandanna out of the pocket of his cargo pants and handed it over. She placed it carefully in front of her and began to hum and murmur, and JC’s tension level, already substantial, began to spiral upward. At least when he went to church with his parents he knew what to expect -- the strangeness of this entire encounter made him very, very tense.

Marie LeCoeur made some suspicious gestures over the bandanna which Justin and JC watched in tense silence. She whispered to herself as she finally unwrapped it; JC sat up straighter and craned his neck to see what it contained.

"Keep your doubtin’ eyes to yourself, son," she said, without lifting her eyes from Justin’s bandanna. JC shifted in his chair and sighed again, and the woman froze. She slowly looked up, her dark eyes laser-sharp on him.

"Why," she demanded imperiously, "are you fidgeting? I must have silence and respect if I’m going to be able to work."

JC gave her another incredulous look and glanced at Justin, who was still red-faced and silent beside the table. He felt the anger and tension curl tightly in his chest. "Pardon me," he said, knowing full well that he was doing a very poor job of masking his sarcasm. "I didn’t realize that running a fortune-telling scam required silence."

"JC," Justin started, but Marie LeCoeur cut him off.

"Boy," she said ominously, getting out of her chair and drawing herself up to her full height until she towered over them both. "You’re asking for a whole lot of trouble. I cannot talk to the spirits if you will not show the proper respect."

"Talk to the spirits," JC repeated with amazement. "Talk to the . . . Oh, no. You can’t possibly expect me to believe this. You can’t possibly."

"JC," Justin said again, a little desperately this time. "Look, why don’t you just wait for me . . ."

"What are you sayin’ to me?" the woman demanded angrily. "What do you mean coming in here with your bad ass attitude and your disrespect?"

"Look," JC said impatiently. "I’m no one to criticize how anyone makes their living, I just don’t believe in any of this stuff."

"Stuff?" she demanded angrily. "And what is it you don’t believe in, boy? In magic? In the spirits? In the forces that are all around you every day? What kind of stupid are you?" In response JC snorted and rolled his eyes again, and the woman glowered at him. "You’d be a fool to anger the spirits, boy," she warned. "Ain’t no power on earth can help you if you anger the spirits." With that she took a step around Justin and pointed imperiously at the door, and JC immediately got to his feet.

"No problem," he said, and shot another derisive glance at Justin. "When you’re done wasting your time and money with the spirits here," he advised him sarcastically, "I’ll be waiting for you next door." Justin said nothing, and JC let himself out the door and slammed it as hard as he could behind him before cautiously edging out of the alley and around the corner to the restaurant.

Security had already paved their way with a private room near the back, furthest from the windows and hidden from the rest of the restaurant’s patrons, and they greeted him with thinly-disguised relief and urgent questions as to Justin’s whereabouts. Lonnie was dispatched to guard the fortune teller’s door until Justin emerged, and in truth it was only about ten minutes later when Justin slid, red-faced and with a guilty smile, into the chair opposite JC. JC was already halfway through his second spring roll, and he ignored him.

"Hey," Justin said quietly. His foot nudged JC’s under the table and JC yanked his foot away, pulling it under his chair and out of Justin’s reach. "Oh stop it," Justin said crossly. "I told you to just wait for me here. You didn’t have to go in."

"I just can’t believe that you did that," JC said dismissively. "I mean, I can’t believe you’d spend time and money on something so ridiculous."

"Oh, just because you don’t believe in it, that makes it ridiculous?" Justin asked. "C’mon, JC. You’re not judgmental like that."

"It’s not judgmental," JC argued as a waiter slid identical bowls of miso soup in front of them. "It’s just, you know, using your brain."

Justin stared at him as he calmly picked up a spoon and started to eat. "So, you don’t believe in luck? Or fate? Or magic? Anything like that?"

JC considered. "Nope."

"Aw, c’mon," Justin scoffed. "You can’t mean that, JC. Look at our lives, look at everything that’s happened here in the last few years."

"Hard work and dedication," JC said, his mouth full.

"What about the lawsuit?" Justin asked, pausing to lift his soup bowl to his mouth and empty it. "What about Jive and No Strings and this tour? You just got done telling the radio station that we were the luckiest people on earth, man."

"But honestly, Justin, what did any of that have to do with luck?" JC countered. "Lou ripped us off because we were too stupid to know better, and Jive picked us up because they heard No Strings and knew it was going to be huge. And it’s huge because we worked really, really hard, dude, and because we knew where we were going and how to get there. Not because we got lucky."

Justin stared at him and then leaned across the table, smiling that small, private smile that he knew was absolutely irresistible to JC. "Okay, so maybe there’s no such thing as luck," he conceded. "But c’mon, JC," he continued quietly, his low tone inviting intimacy and making JC shiver just a little. "You can’t look me in the eye -- me, dude -- and think about how long you and I have known each other, and what we’re like when we’re together, and tell me that fate doesn’t exist and magic doesn’t exist. You just can’t do that."

JC took a deep breath and steeled himself to do just that. He met Justin’s eyes levelly and opened his mouth to say the words and Justin smiled very, very slowly. It was a smile JC had seen dozens, hundreds of times, the smile that Justin used when it was just the two of them, the smile Justin used when he was thinking about nothing and no one except JC. He tilted his head, his eyes bright and appreciative, forcing JC to remember things he absolutely did not want to dwell on, and just like that he was sinking again, just like that he was forgetting all the extremely reasonable and intelligent reasons why he and Justin should not, could not be together. He was forgetting that the affair that had begun as mutual comfort and distraction during the miserable and panic-stricken days of the lawsuit had exploded into an all-encompassing and out-of-control love affair that had threatened their careers and JC’s very sanity.

Everything sane and logical thing JC was about to say slid out of his head like water through a sieve. He opened his mouth and then closed it again, and Justin smiled a small, very satisfied smile. "Thought so," was his only comment, and JC sighed.

"Justin," he said, casting an eye around to make sure that nobody, not even their security, could hear. "You know all this, but let’s go through it again. We got together because we were both freaked out about the lawsuit and stuff, which was probably stupid and bad enough, and we stayed together because it was really convenient. And, um, really good, too." He didn’t need Justin’s raised eyebrows to tell him how completely inadequate that description was, and he felt his face turn red as he plowed forward. "But it’s just chemistry, you know? We didn’t get together because of any sort of fate or destiny, and we broke up because . . ."

"We did not break up," Justin interrupted him with some dignity. "You dumped me. And you dumped me because you were scared."

JC stared at him, momentarily speechless. Justin dabbed his mouth neatly with his napkin and nodded in a self-satisfied way. "Scared," he repeated serenely. "Scared of the way I make you feel."

"Oh, that’s ridiculous," JC scoffed. "It was stupid and risky. That’s why it had to end."

"It was only stupid and risky," Justin offered, "when we took chances in places where we could get caught. And honestly, JC, that only happened," he added with a steadily growing smile, "because we couldn’t keep our hands off each other."

JC found himself nodding in spite of himself, and forced himself to stop. "Stupid and risky," he repeated grimly. "And over, Justin."

Justin gave him a beautific smile. "For now," he said gently. "Just until you get over your, uh, issues."

"Oh for christ’s sake," JC muttered and Justin had grinned at him over a mouthful of mushu chicken. They’d finished their meal in silence.

It had been as they exited the restaurant and were waiting to climb back into the SUV that JC glanced over his shoulder and was alarmed to see Marie LaCoeur standing in the alley, murmuring under her breath and sprinkling some sort of blue powder on the sidewalk they’d just crossed.

"What is she doing?" he muttered out of the side of his mouth, and Justin looked back, blinking.

"Huh," he said consideringly. "I really don’t know." He waved to her, but she didn’t look up or even acknowledge them, and he turned back to JC. "Maybe you pissed her off, and she’s cursing your footsteps or something."

JC turned to climb into the waiting SUV. "Oh for fuck’s sake, Justin. Will you stop?"

Justin grinned at him.

~ ~ ~

Nine hours later JC was having one of the worst concert experiences of his entire life. It wasn’t quite as bad as the time he’d performed half a show in front of a sold-out crowd of screaming German teenagers with his fly down, or the time he’d almost lost his Leo pendant and had risked life and limb in a seething crowd to try to get it back, but it was right up there.

"What the fuck is wrong with you tonight?" Chris hissed in his ear, crowding roughly around him to get to his costume change area. "I can’t believe you missed that note! You never miss that note, JC. Never."

"I don’t know," JC gasped in response. "I don’t . . . do you think anyone noticed?"

"Noticed what?" Lance asked from Chris’s other side, and Chris turned to him in exasperation. "Kidding," Lance said with a grin. "Honestly, JC, I don’t think anyone heard anything over this crowd. Don’t worry about it."

"We all have off nights," Joey said cheerfully, slapping JC’s ass as he squeezed by. "I’ve been waiting for you to have one for three years."

"Shut up," JC mumbled, lifting his vest and turning around so the tech could reattach his mic wires.

"Yeah, just don’t do it anymore," Chris said. "You start fucking up, you’re gonna infect all of us. It'll be the worst concert in the history of pop music, and all the little teenies will demand their money back, and they'll cancel their fan club subscriptions, and we'll never sell another album or concert ticket, and we'll be on the Ten Worst list for everything, and . . ."

"Jesus Christ," JC said with some exasperation. "It was one note. Lay off."

Joey slapped his ass again and Lance said something that made Chris and Joey both laugh, but JC tuned them out. The fact of the matter was that he couldn’t quite believe it himself. They’d been singing that song for years, and JC had been hitting that note for the same number of years, and that note was never, ever an issue for him. Missing it had made him burn with fury, and in the back of his mind it made him worry. Why had he missed it? What was it about tonight that was different from the other five hundred times he’d sung that song and easily, reliably, hit that note? Had his warm up been insufficient? Was he losing his range?

"What are you doing?" Justin was standing right behind him, his voice pitched low. "Stop it. It was one note and it’s never gonna happen again. Stop obsessing." His hands, Justin’s long-fingered, warm hands, were pressing firmly into JC’s hips and his body was steaming warmth against his back. For a moment JC allowed himself the luxurious and forbidden pleasure of relaxing back against Justin, of leaning against him and letting him take his weight. "Hey," Justin said, softer this time, his chin hooked on JC’s shoulder and lips right against JC’s ear. "Are you okay?"

"I can’t believe I fucked up that note," JC said slowly. His eyes were closing and the little hairs on the back of his neck were standing up as his heart rate accelerated. Against the side of his neck he could almost feel Justin’s smile.

"It happens to the best of us," Justin said, his hands squeezing more firmly on JC’s hips, his chest a solid and reassuring bulk behind him. "It’s just bad luck, dude. That’s all."

"No, it must’ve been something I did," JC said fuzzily. "I did something wrong, or I didn’t do something that I should’ve done to warm up, or maybe . . ."

"Stop it," Justin said more sharply, giving him a little shake. "Sometimes things just happen, JC. These sorts of things just happen to you a little less often, that’s all. Now, shake it off, dude. We have to go."

With a start JC realized that Joey and Lance and Chris had all pushed by him and were waiting for their cues backstage. He had less than ten seconds and he’d just been standing there, staring into space and calculating the end of his career until Justin . . . With a start he bolted upright, checked hastily that his fly was up, and ran to his place with Justin right behind him.

~ ~ ~

Unfortunately, things did not improve. JC focused fiercely on his singing and as a result messed up on the choreography, finding himself in the wrong place on stage at the wrong time not once, or even twice, but three separate times in the last half of the show. He exited after the encore shaking his head in disgust, and no amount of cajoling from his band mates could persuade him to go clubbing afterwards. He just wanted to go back to his hotel room, have some red wine, preferably in a glass the size of a fish bowl, and forget this entire day had ever happened.

This was easier wished for than accomplished. When he returned to his suite JC learned that about half of his luggage had mysteriously disappeared, leaving him without his shaving kit, various personal items, or comfortable sweats to lounge in. He’d checked with security, the tour manager, the hotel concierge and finally with Melinda who’d promised an all-points bulletin to figure out how JC’s suitcase had disappeared between the bus and his hotel suite, but none of that really helped him now.

It took three glasses of wine on an almost-empty stomach before JC began to feel a little less frantic about the entire mistake-filled evening. He’d taken a long shower and worked through some scales and even then his tired, post-concert vocal chords had performed perfectly. He sat on the couch in his suite wrapped in the thick terry cloth robe provided by the hotel and mentally ran through the choreography for the last five songs on their set list with no glitches. He sipped his wine and grimly considered the idea of getting off the couch and actually practicing the choreography to full music, and he tried to suppress the far-off little voice of panic that said no matter what he did, how hard he prepared, sometimes shit was just going to happen.

That thought galvanized him into action, forcing him to set aside the wine and move the suite’s furniture until there was sufficient room for a run through of Space Cowboy. It was almost 2 in the morning and he was digging through his remaining luggage for his back-up copy of the show’s music when the knock sounded on his door.

JC hesitated, looking around his chaotic hotel suite and rubbing his forehead wearily. He didn’t even have to check the security peephole or hesitate before opening the door. He knew, with a sense of inevitability, who was on the other side of it.

Justin stood in the doorway, only half-visible in the soft hotel hallway lighting. His hair was damp from a recent shower, and the curls looked soft and product-less. Everything about Justin seemed a little blurred around the edges, softened with tiredness and relaxation despite the dark scowl on his face as he stood there, one hand thrust into the front pocket of his jeans, the other behind his back.

"Jesus Christ, JC," he said without preamble. "What the hell do you think you’re doing?"

JC blinked. "What?"

"Opening the door without asking who it is! You didn’t even look through the peephole, dude, it could’ve been anyone."

JC stared at him. "I can’t believe you came over here at this hour to test my security skills. What do you want?"

Justin leaned to the side and looked past JC into his suite. JC leaned to block his view, but he was too slow and Justin’s face relaxed. "Ah," he said, amused. "I figured you were at the must-practice-until-I-kill-myself phase. My timing is, once again, perfect."

JC suppressed a surge of gargantuan fury and considered slamming the door in Justin’s smug face, but Justin shouldered past JC with the ease of long practice as if he’d read his mind. When JC held out a hand to prevent him Justin brought a carton of chocolate chip mint ice cream from behind his back and thrust it into his hand.

"Figured you’d need that," he tossed over his shoulder with obnoxious cheerfulness, and with a sigh JC shut the door.

JC turned his back on him, prying the lid off the carton and grabbing a spoon from the kitchenette. The first mouthful was everything comfort food should be: creamy and cold and sweet, and when he looked up from his fourth spoonful it was to see Justin, leaning against the messily disarranged couch and watching him with amusement and something else. Something darker that JC really, really didn’t have the strength to deal with tonight.

"Feel better?" Justin asked innocently, turning to flop down on JC’s couch. He stretched until his back cracked loudly, making JC wince, and then relaxed. He crossed his feet -- bare, but JC wasn’t really noticing that -- at the ankles and reached his arms over his head, letting them dangle over the arm rest. "You look like you really needed that."

JC gave him a dark look and threw himself down in the chair more or less opposite him, taking pains to tuck the ends of his robe neatly around him before digging back into his ice cream. "Yeah, whatever," he said with poor grace. "Thanks."

"No problem," Justin said quietly. He still sounded amused and JC made a huge effort to keep from looking at him. The room had gotten smaller and more intimate, somehow, when Justin had come in, and having him spread out on JC’s couch late at night with the lights low and the sounds of the city muffled and far away created an intensely familiar and comforting sense of intimacy that was setting off every warning bell JC possessed.

"So, are you really at the must-practice-until-I-kill-myself phase? Or did you just really hate the furniture arrangement?" Justin asked innocently, and now JC did look at him. Justin was wearing what JC knew to be his most comfortable, rattiest jeans and a black t shirt that had been a part of Justin’s luggage since Germany, and there was no way he should’ve looked as good as he did. JC swallowed his ice cream and cleared his throat, and Justin held his hand out for the carton and the spoon.

"I, uh, was thinking of going over some choreography," JC said, and yeah, it sounded even more lame out loud than it had when he’d been pushing the furniture aside and actually thinking it.

"Hmm," Justin said neutrally, his lashes hiding his eyes as he dug through the carton of ice cream for the mint chips. "Is that right. And do you think that’s going to make a difference for our next show? I mean, do you think you actually forgot the choreography tonight?"

JC stared at him. "Well, I must have. I mean, I screwed up the steps over and over."

Justin nodded agreeably and JC narrowed his eyes at him. "So you figure some extra practice will take care of the problem," Justin said, still neutral and rather encouraging, and JC jumped up and started to pace.

"Well, you know, I have to do something," he said, the agitation that had held him captive since the first flubbed note rising up in him again. "I mean, I have to nip these mistakes in the bud right now, because there’s still a week’s worth of shows left, and I can’t finish out the tour like this, I just can’t."

Justin had scooched up the couch so he was sitting cross-legged, watching solemnly as JC moved back and forth across the room. He took another mouthful of JC’s ice cream and held up the carton so JC could snatch it out of his hands when he passed by.

"I know you think this is stupid," JC said furiously around a huge mouthful of ice cream, stabbing the spoon in Justin’s general direction. "I know you think that I’m being stupid and ridiculous, but this is how I am. This is how I work, and this is the way I have to deal with things when they go . . . when they get . . . "

"What? Out of your control?" Justin supplied quietly.

JC swivelled on his bare heel and paced back across the room to the window. "Yeah, whatever. I don’t want to talk about it," he said, and even to his own ears he sounded grumpy. Behind him Justin sighed.

"I know, JC. I know how you are. And you know, I don’t think it’s stupid." His face, when he looked up at JC, seemed very young and very somber, and JC’s agitation drained slowly away. Wordlessly he held out the ice cream carton, and Justin accepted it with a small smile.

"It’s not that I think I can control everything," he said hesitantly. "It’s just, the things that I can control, I need to make sure I have a handle on. You know?"

Justin nodded silently. JC tried to move back to his chair but he was drawn almost against his will to sit on the couch beside Justin, his eyes on Justin’s head as he bent over the softening ice cream. Something about the set of his shoulders and the curve of his neck below the soft curls made JC’s heart squeeze painfully. He leaned forward to pick up the wineglass he’d discarded when Justin had shown up with the ice cream, and took a long sip. The sofa wasn’t very large, and even though he was on the opposite end, he was still far too close.

It always happened this way, JC thought over that far-off little voice of panic that had become his constant companion today. Things would be just fine, he and Justin would be sharing space, working, sometimes even not working, and everything would be fine and then it would happen. They’d find themselves alone, and Justin would give him one of those quick, sidelong looks -- like he was doing right now, JC thought with a start as Justin glanced sideways at him from the ice cream carton, his eyes dark and his mouth moist and red from the cold -- and then JC’s heart would start that deep, regular thumping that it always did when he was alone with Justin, and Justin was looking at him like that, and no matter what JC did it wouldn’t resume a normal rhythm until . . .

"Hey, maybe it was Marie LeCoeur," Justin said suddenly, and JC’s mind snapped back to the here and now. For a moment he had no idea what Justin was talking about. "You know," Justin said helpfully as he scooped up the last of the ice cream. "The voodoo lady we saw this morning? The one you pissed off? Maybe she put a curse on you and made you fuck up your performance tonight." He grinned, and JC just stared at him.

"That is so not funny," he said flatly. "It was a crappy, off performance for me, but it was my own fault. Nobody made it happen, nobody else gets blamed."

Justin’s grin faded and he raised his eyebrows. "So, did you figure out what’s going on, then?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, it’s not like you to lose focus, you know? Something must’ve distracted you." His posture was completely relaxed as he leaned forward to set the empty ice cream carton on the carpet beside the sofa, then leaned back to stretch his legs out and fold his arms across his belly. He wouldn’t meet JC’s eyes, but JC could sense the tension that crept into his muscles and played the subtlest of undercurrents in his voice. He was reluctantly riveted by it. "Maybe," Justin continued very, very quietly, "you have something else on your mind."

JC dragged his eyes away and determinedly breathed in and out. Justin was so close, way too close, and his nearness was dizzying. He leaned forward and hung his head down, looking determinedly at the carpet between his bare feet. He could feel the pulse in his throat and the reverberation of his heartbeat and the way it echoed throughout his body, and he felt a moment of pure despair. Why didn’t Justin leave? Why had he come here at all, now, tonight, and the end of a very long day and a very upsetting performance and when JC was already exhausted and emotionally depleted?

Justin sat very quietly and he seemed utterly relaxed, but a sideways glance showed JC that his hands were clasped tightly across his belly, knuckles white above that slice of skin exposed by a soft, up-ridden shirt and loose, faded jeans. JC refused to look lower, and as he was fighting that battle Justin levered himself up and slid across the sofa, right beside JC. Those capable hands turned him efficiently until his back was toward Justin, and then both those hands settled on JC’s shoulders, thumbs digging into the knots under his skin. Sensation soared through his body, sparking nerve endings with excitement even as his eyes closed in rapture.

Everything JC was about to say melted away under the soothing movements of Justin’s strong fingers. He tilted his head forward, helplessly inviting Justin to dig his thumbs into the tight tendons of his neck, and he stifled a groan as Justin obeyed. Dimly he was aware that Justin had repositioned himself so that he was kneeling on the sofa cushion behind JC, but the soothing rhythm of the massage never stopped and it wasn’t until he felt Justin’s breath on his ear and the clasp of his lips on the side of his neck that he roused himself.

"We can’t do this," he mumbled almost hopelessly. "You know we can’t do this again, Justin."

"Just this once," Justin whispered from behind him, his skilled fingers kneading the knots in JC’s shoulders in soothing, mesmerizing circles. They slipped beneath the collar of JC’s terry cloth robe for an electric trip across the bare skin of his shoulders, digging luxuriously into the tight muscles around his shoulder blades.

Just this once. Yes, absolutely. "We can’t," JC said, almost whispering now as Justin moved closer, the heat of his body both seductive and alarming. "We can’t just once. It never stops there, and it’s never enough, and you know it as well as I do."

"I know it," Justin said, his voice husky and strained as he nudged the robe further off JC’s shoulders and smoothed his palms over his skin. "I just don’t get how that’s such a bad thing, JC. That’s where you lose me in all this."

JC arched his neck and his eyes slipped closed as Justin’s hands bunched up the tension and stress and cleverly soothed it away. His heart rate had accelerated and his breath was shortening, and it was becoming impossible not to sway closer to those clever, knowing hands and the seductive and irresistible heat of Justin’s body.

"It’s bad because . . ." There were dozens of reasons, really, but none of them seemed particularly compelling just then and Justin knew every one of them as well as he did. Justin’s fingers were now sliding down JC’s back, moving the robe out of their way and digging into the skin down his spine just the way JC liked it, just the way Justin knew he liked it and he shivered in delight even as the fading voice of sanity urged him to stop, stand up, move away before it was too late.

"JC?" Justin whispered, his fingers still firm on his skin but hesitating at the point where the robe wouldn’t push down any further without some cooperation from the person wearing it. Justin’s breath was warm and shallow in JC’s ear, his hands making small circular motions on the thin skin over JC’s ribs.

JC sank his teeth into his lip, searching for control and the means to move away. Then Justin pulled his hands away from his bare ribs and looped his arms around JC shoulders from behind, pulling him against his body and bringing their cheeks together. JC could feel the roughness of Justin’s jaw against his own and Justin’s heartbeat, hard and steady against his back. He turned his face and kissed JC lightly, almost chastely on his cheek. "JC," he whispered, and JC absolutely melted.

He reached up for Justin’s hands, threading their fingers together and at that moment thought he could be perfectly content to sit forever in the circle of Justin’s arms and just breathe. Justin curved around him, drawing him back against his body and nuzzling his nose into the side of JC’s throat. "You realize," he said with a smile that JC could feel against his skin, "that you’re going to regret this?"

"I already do," JC answered ruefully. Justin started to laugh and he turned in his arms and brushed their mouths together and then froze, hovering a fraction of an inch away. Justin stopped laughing. JC felt his sharp intake of breath as he slowly slid his hand where it had been wanting to go since Justin showed up at his door: right to the soft skin where that damned shirt would not meet his jeans. Justin gave a strangled sort of groan as JC’s fingers spread against the soft skin of his waist and then stood up, pulling JC to his feet to face him.

JC wrapped both hands around Justin’s narrow waist, his fingers closing around handfuls of soft cotton t-shirt. He dragged them upward, eyes on the tensing of Justin’s stomach muscles as he lifted his arms overhead and allowed JC to strip the shirt off him. JC dropped the shirt, already forgetting it as he dragged his hands down, rediscovering Justin by touch -- the smooth skin of his shoulders, the harder planes of his chest, the feathering of hair over his belly. Justin groaned as JC lowered the zipper of his jeans and slipped his fingers inside the elastic of his briefs. He tugged them down, hard, and both garments pooled around Justin’s ankles.

He’d never been able to resist Justin’s long, lean legs, and he leaned forward and placed his mouth on the inside of his thigh, just resting there and tasting with his tongue. His hands stretched upward, closing on Justin’s hips and sliding around to his ass. All the while his tongue circled upward, searching, teasing. Justin’s scent, faintly spicy from the soap he’d used and intensely sexual to JC, seemed to fill his head and mix with his blood, making him light-headed with need.

Justin drew another deep, sharp breath and his hands closed carefully on JC’s shoulders, not guiding, just encouraging and communicating his pleasure. He took slow, deep breaths and JC knew that if he looked up Justin’s eyes would be closed and his mouth would be hanging slightly open, and that his brow would be furrowed as he concentrated. His soft "oh God," was almost reverent as JC tongued the length of his cock, and he shuddered under JC’s hands.

Justin couldn’t take it for long, he never could when he wanted more than just a blow job. He kicked his way out of his jeans and briefs and reached for JC with a hoarse "C’mere," his hands slipping underneath JC’s arms as he straightened and reaching for the belt of his robe. JC tasted the salty skin under Justin’s jaw with the flat of his tongue and pressed a kiss into the hollow of his throat. His nerves hummed with growing urgency and he opened his mouth on the lobe of Justin’s ear, tasting, drawing him in. Heat flared as Justin struggled to hold him close with one hand and undo the knot in his belt with the other, hissing in irritation when the knot tightened and refused to come undone, and cursing viciously when he found JC wearing underwear beneath the soft terry cloth. JC smothered his laugh against Justin’s neck. It was like coming home. Every plane and contour of Justin’s body was familiar to him, every variance of texture and taste, every action and reaction, and yet it was as exhilarating and dizzying as it had been the first time. It was Justin, and the joy of having him near flooded him and left him weak.

Justin abruptly gave up his struggle with the belt of JC’s robe and instead wrapped his arms around him, almost lifting him off his feet as he pivoted and started moving them toward the bedroom. His mouth found the sensitive skin below JC’s ear and drugged him all but insensible, making him only dimly aware of the distance traveled. They sank into the depths of the overstuffed comforter, JC’s arms and legs tangled in what suddenly felt like yards of terry cloth. Justin’s body, long limbed and lean but heavy and urgent, pinned him down, and helplessly he opened his mouth for Justin’s.

Justin’s mouth was as soft as velvet and tasted like sweet ice cream, and JC was drunk on him, helpless and reeling with sensory overload. The very air seemed saturated with Justin’s taste and scent and his very presence; it was thick and hard to breathe. But each breath sent a new rush of intoxication to JC’s brain, wonder surged through him in waves that alternated with a deep, tearing need that was so intense his very skin ached for him. He couldn’t get enough of Justin -- his touch, his long, hair-roughened limbs, the softness of his freshly-washed hair, the smooth planes of his body. He shoved impatiently at his robe, still tangled around his body and impeding his movements, and Justin sat up to divest him of it by simply yanking the entire garment down JC’s body and tossing it aside. He made very short work of JC’s underwear too, although he thankfully used a little more care, and then finally they were both naked and all JC could do was hold Justin tight, his arms and legs enfolding him and pressing him close, covering himself with Justin’s warm, firm body.

Justin was whispering in his ear, soft, low words that made no sense and JC didn’t even try to decipher them because Justin’s hands were starting to move with real purpose, stroking across JC’s chest, around his nipples and down to his waist. He gasped and strained against him when Justin leaned down to circle a nipple with his tongue, arching his neck and feeling the need tighten inside him, starting to gallop out of his control. He fisted his hands in the comforter so he wouldn’t grab Justin too hard as Justin’s clever mouth started to move down his body.

But he couldn’t keep himself from responding, he couldn’t even keep his body from slowing down, squirming against Justin, lifting himself against him, wrapping a leg around Justin’s hip. Justin muttered a filthy curse and grabbed JC’s knees, drawing them up on either side of him and he moved downward, sliding his tongue along the midline of JC’s torso, dipping into his navel, opening his mouth low on his abdomen, moving lower, and lower still. JC writhed mindlessly beneath him; through the roar of his own pulse he distinctly heard Justin say his name before he stopped making any noise at all.

He’d given up trying to keep his hands under control and had them plunged into Justin’s soft hair, scooping through the fuzzy curls and scratching against his scalp as Justin worked him over. He knew exactly what to do and how much to do and for how long -- and he also knew precisely when to stop, knew exactly how much JC could take without losing it completely and he knew it because he was right there, experiencing it all with him. It was always like this between them: what should have been a simple and uncomplicated wanting would escalate suddenly to crippling need, an insanity that was the overpowering, intensely focused need for each other. For JC it wasn’t just the need to get off, it wasn’t ever just the need to get off. It was the need for Justin, and only with Justin had JC ever known the difference.

Justin released his dick and licked his lips in a way that made JC shudder, but before he could think reason number four Justin was sitting up, pulling JC to a sitting position to kiss him while he stretched out his own legs and laid down, pulling JC on top of him. "I have stuff in my jeans pocket," Justin said breathlessly, and JC thought oh. He didn’t even spare a moment to marvel at Justin’s sheer gall.

Preparations didn’t take long but it was difficult to go slow with Justin writhing beneath him, his arms and legs clinging, pulling, demanding. JC wanted to enter him by inches, to sink into him with nothing more than gravity drawing him in, to go slow and savor each sensation. He wanted to watch the way Justin’s eyes would go wide as he felt him fill him; he wanted to feel Justin’s breath go still, he wanted to touch and taste and memorize with every pore of his body the moment when Justin sighed and opened his eyes and the two of them started to breath together.

He pushed slowly, agonizingly slowly, just like he wanted but only because Justin allowed it, because Justin lay very still, his face turned up to JC’s, his eyes open and rapt on his face, and his hands warm and heavy and steady on JC’s lower back. Justin could’ve changed everything, it wouldn’t have taken more then a word, a sound, the deliberate movement of his hands to make it fast and greedy and desperate. But Justin knew him, Justin knew him very, very well and he knew that JC needed it to be like this. He needed this slow, controlled joining because he was so close to losing it all.

It couldn’t last forever, though. JC went as far as he could go, buried himself deep in Justin’s body and ferociously battled back the urge to flex his hips and plunge to his release. He bit his lip and eased out just as slowly, with just as much exquisite control. Justin allowed it. He looked up at JC, his mouth swollen and red and his eyes glassy with arousal, and he smiled sweetly, gently, pityingly. JC stopped, feeling the panic gather in the corners of his sex-fogged brain as Justin adjusted himself carefully, and then spread one big hand on JC’s ass, and curved the other around his neck, pulling him down to kiss him. "I love you," he whispered into JC’s mouth, smiling a little as he felt JC shudder. "Now fuck me." His hand left its gentle pressure on JC’s neck and plunged into his hair, pulling sharply, and the other hand dug in hard. "Fuck me," he whispered, the smile gone, and JC took his muffled groan into his mouth and all his hard-won control splintered painfully, and he drove into him, hard.

JC groaned, helplessly, feeling the bite of Justin’s short fingernails on his back and the shock wave of sensation that made him tremble as he ground into Justin’s body. His vision greyed out; he couldn’t stop, he couldn’t slow down, he couldn’t even pause to made sure that he wasn’t hurting Justin or himself. He could not get deep enough inside him and he could not have enough of him against him; he wanted to bury himself inside Justin’s body and breathe his breath and feel his blood.

JC closed his eyes but if anything it brought his senses into sharper focus: the rough touch of Justin’s hands and the taste of his skin and smell of his sweat and the sound of his voice, low and hoarse as he said JC’s name over and over. And then came that crystal clear moment when Justin strained against him and he felt his own body begin its helpless shudder, that moment when the world began to splinter and Justin gripped him tightly with his arms and legs while his very soul seemed to spill out. That moment when JC could feel the terrifying split awareness between the simple sexual need with its all-consuming goal, and the deeper, more powerful longing so fierce and overwhelming that he could not bear it, could not acknowledge it, didn’t dare voice it out loud because saying it also meant admitting to himself that he could not live without Justin.

He did not know how long they lay together in the knot of damp skin and mussed comforter, legs and arms and breath tangled, drifting. Justin murmured wordless contentment and ran his hand heavily up and down JC’s back, and it should have been soothing. It almost was, but JC’s mind was already starting to circle and after a few minutes he got up and made his way to the bathroom in the dark. Justin made it difficult for him, his hands trailing after him as he left the bed, urging him back. JC returned in only a few moments with a big, fluffy towel from the bathroom and began to clean them up, first Justin’s body, then his own. He tossed the towel to the floor and sat on the side of the bed, shoulders slumping.

Justin levered himself up with a groan and sat beside him, his bare leg knocking companionably against JC’s. "I’d try to tell you how I feel," he said with a lazy smile, his voice quiet in the dark room, "but I’m afraid I’d sound like a perfume commercial or something."

JC exhaled a combination of laughter and despair, already feeling the panic begin to jitter in his stomach. Justin’s heat was mesmerizing, completely seductive, and the conflict within JC made goose bumps break out on his skin. He didn’t want to think about how desperately he wanted Justin, even now, when the sweat from their bodies had barely cooled. But by leaning over and kissing him again, touching that warm skin and rolling him back onto the bed he could keep those thoughts at bay. His head pounded.

"I can’t do this again," JC said tiredly. "I can’t -- we can’t keep doing this."

Justin sighed heavily. "So you keep saying," Justin agreed, his tone carefully neutral. "And I know you don’t want to hear this, JC, but saying you don’t want to have sex with me because it’s too good? Is really, really fucking stupid."

JC raised his hands to his face and rubbed his forehead tiredly. "It’s not that," he protested automatically. "It’s just -- we’ve got to stop doing this, Justin. We just cannot do this."

"We can," Justin said stubbornly. "We do. We just did." He leaned closer, his breath ghosting against JC’s ear. "We can even do it again, if you’d just stop telling me that we can’t."

JC jumped to his feet and moved away before he could betray himself again. "Justin, we are a huge fucking disaster just waiting to happen," he said rapidly. "We could ruin everything, blow everything, with one second of carelessness. After everything we’ve gone through to get out from under Transcon, with everything we have riding on this tour and on No Strings, why are you so willing to risk it? How can you even think about risking this?"

Justin stared at him, eyes narrowed in the darkened room. "Oh for Christ’s sake," he said in disgust. "It’s just not that goddamned complicated, JC. I don’t understand what the fuck your problem is. This isn’t about how we can’t do this. It’s about how you can’t. Isn’t that it? Why can’t you . . . This isn’t about risks, this is about you and your fucking inability to let yourself just relax and be happy."

"I am happy," JC shot back at him. "Everything’s coming together for us, and I’m happy. And it’s going to take all of us, working together, working hard, to be able to grab the brass ring here, Justin, and this," he indicated the space between them and the mussed bed, "this is something that . . ."

Justin cocked his head. "Something that what?" he asked levelly. "Something that’s not worth the risk?" he said, his fingers making little air quotes in the darkness. "Or is it just something that you can’t control?" He raised a cool eyebrow and let his eyes run down the length of JC’s body. "Don’t tell me it’s something you don’t want," he drawled, "‘cause you’ll never convince me of that."

JC stared at him. His heart was pounding painfully hard, and he couldn’t quite draw enough air. "That’s not the point," he managed, but with an exasperated gesture Justin got to his feet and moved past him, shaking his head in disgust as he strode naked to the other room and reached for his pants.

"Whatever, JC," he said. "I’m too tired to deal with any more of your neuroses tonight, but when you figure out what your problem is . . ."

"I don’t have a problem," JC interrupted furiously, but Justin simply raised his voice and kept talking.

". . . you know where to find me." He pulled his shirt over his head -- inside-out, JC noted -- and threw a dark glance over his shoulder at JC. "For now, anyway."

~ ~ ~

The next day JC’s luggage was, unbelievably, still missing. That meant he had to get on the bus unshaven and with out-of-control hair due to the lack of shaving kit, proper hair products, and the use of an inferior shampoo. He also had to do without the book he’d just gotten to the good part on, and his favorite lounging-on-the-bus sweats. This made him grind his teeth and swear to himself that from now on he would be handling all his luggage needs himself. The missing luggage also handed him the additional stress of fretting about what sort of incriminating things might be found in his shaving bag if it fell into unfriendly hands.

None of these things made him happy, and other than complaining to Melinda -- again -- there was nothing he could do about it. That made him even more unhappy.

Justin strolled on to the bus with his game face on. He was calm and remote during breakfast, and nobody commented on the dark circles under his eyes, although JC couldn’t help but notice that he was wearing the same clothes he’d had on when he walked out of JC’s suite in the early morning hours, right down to the inside-out shirt. Justin disappeared into his bunk right after he finished his cereal with the offhand comment that he hadn’t slept well the night before. Chris raised his eyebrows and widened his eyes elaborately at JC with a snide, "oh, is that right?" but Justin didn’t respond and JC refused to rise to the bait, taking refuge under his noise-eliminating headphones.

He couldn’t block out the sight of Justin sauntering down the little hallway, the slow way he walked, his bare feet, and the leisurely way he stripped off his shirt, exposing his impossibly long and elegant back before disappearing into the bunk. Reason number twenty-two, JC thought with a sigh, and closed his eyes.

His walkman batteries ran out less than 20 minutes later, and a thorough search of the bus that included everything except Justin’s closed bunk revealed that they were completely out of AA, although he found 14 AAA and, inexplicably, 37 A batteries. A call to Johnny confirmed what JC had dreaded -- they were on too tight of a schedule to make a stop for batteries. JC would just have to deal.

"Geez, JC. It’s like someone’s put a curse on you or something," Chris commented cheerfully when JC bitched about it, and it took everything he had not to scoop up all 37 A batteries and throw them at Chris’s head.

"It’s not a curse," he hissed through grit teeth. "There’s no such thing, you moron."

Chris’s smirk was evil. "Whatever you say," he said smartly, settling down in front of a video game. "You sure are pissy, for someone who actually got laid last night."

"Oh shut up. You know we broke up," JC muttered. "Weeks ago."

"Yeah, we heard," Chris said sardonically. "And by the way, thanks for keeping us all in the loop on that. It’s a good thing you let us all know, because quite honestly, I’m not sure we would’ve known otherwise, what with the late-night visits to each others rooms and the lack of sleep and the general bitchiness and stuff."

"Well, you know, it hasn’t exactly been easy," JC said defensively, and Chris raised a single eyebrow without turning away from his video game.

"No? Really? And why is that, JC?" he asked innocently. "We’ve all been dying to know why this whole break up had to happen in the first place, you know?"

"I don’t want to get into it," JC said wearily, wishing desperately for a working walkman and his headphones. "It’s just impossible, that’s all. Shouldn’t have ever started it in the first place."

"Then why did you?" Chris asked.

JC’s mind suddenly swirled with all 73 impossibly vivid reasons why, and he kept himself from glancing at Justin’s bunk with an effort that made goose bumps break out on his body. "I don’t know," he said shortly. "It was sort of an accident, really. And no, I don’t want to talk about it."

"Well, you must know, JC," Chris said, attention still focused on the game. "I mean, what was it, a year? More than a year? That’s kind of a long time to be sleeping with someone accidentally, right?"

JC fought grimly to keep his mind from heading into dangerous, Justin saturated territory. "I said I didn’t want to talk about it," he said firmly, and Chris laughed.

"Fine, JC. Sit down here and play this game with me, and I promise I won’t ask you about the grand forbidden boyband passion ever again. At least not on this particular bus, on this particular highway, in the late summer, ever again."

JC lost the first five games in a row, and that’s when he started counting the hours until the tour would be finished and he could go home.

~ ~ ~

And now he was home, he thought ruefully, jolted out of his reverie by a sharp car horn as he cautiously negotiated his way through town. He was finally home, and he should be able to relax, but nothing was really going the way it should.

His luggage -- undisturbed, thankfully -- had caught up to him soon after he’d arrived, but not until after he’d replaced his half-finished book and the entire contents of his shaving and toiletries bag. Now he had two of everything, and it was deeply annoying.

But not as annoying as his car, he thought with alarm as the sleek machine began an ominous rattling and shaking. He was several miles from home, and other than the radio refusing to turn on he hadn’t had any other problems. He’d had some hope that the quirks were finished, but it seemed he’d once again been unduly optimistic.

He stopped at a red light and grimly weighed his options as the car rattled and growled. He was less than three blocks from his destination. Did he dare chance it? The light turned green and his car stalled. Someone honked at him, and the as he turned the key lightning flashed and the rain, which had slackened somewhat, intensified.

He took a deep breath and eased down on the gas. To the right was the road leading to the grocery store, his original destination three hours ago. To the left was the winding road leading around the sprawl of Orlando toward Justin’s house, and he had no interest in going in that direction. None. He wanted to go right.

The car started, then shuddered ominously and he waited, tense. Cautiously he turned the steering wheel to the right. He wasn’t at all surprised when the engine promptly died.

~ ~ ~

He got to the grocery store by virtue of taking a circuitous route with a number of left turns, going in a huge square until he was able to enter the grocery store parking lot from the back. He pulled into the nearest parking spot and turned the car off before it could stall again. It subsided with a resentful series of grumbles and he snarled back at it as he climbed out and jogged the long way to the entrance through the rain.

He shook the water from his hair and grabbed a cart, wheeling it efficiently to the dairy aisle and getting fresh milk. He started to skip the produce aisle, heard his mother’s lecturing voice in his head, hurriedly grabbed salad in a bag, and then turned with relief to the frozen food aisle. He felt better already. Maybe things were starting to look up.

With that thought, there was a crack of thunder that made the ground tremble, and the entire grocery store went dark. JC froze, suddenly blinded, and waited tensely for the generators to kick in.

They did, sluggishly providing a dim, yellowish light, and JC shook his head in disgust. Nothing was going to go right for him today, it seemed. And then things, if possible, got even worse.

"Hey," said an all-too-familiar voice. "Fancy meeting you here."

JC had a split second to notice fatalistically that all the hairs on his arms were standing up, not in response to the sudden darkness or the overly-air-conditioned store interior, but because of that voice. Then he turned to face Justin, who was just a dim outline but one he would’ve known anywhere, at any time.

"How the hell did you do that?" he demanded.

"Do what?" Justin asked with what sounded like genuine confusion.

JC sighed, resisting the sudden weakness that urged him to lean against his grocery cart. He took in Justin’s cargo shorts, his thin t shirt, the fine, even features and the impossibly blue eyes with resignation. Why did he look so good? "Never mind," he said tiredly. "Justin, what’s going on? Are you stalking me or something?"

Justin frowned, moving a little closer and eyeing him carefully. "Uhm, this is the grocery closest to my house?" he offered. "I needed some stuff, and this is the best time to go without being, you know, recognized. I mean, of course you know," he said with a small laugh that almost sounded nervous. "I mean, that’s why you’re here. Right?"

"Right," JC muttered, determinedly looking away from Justin. "Although now that the power’s off . . ."

"Yeah. Must be the storm," Justin said, easing a little bit closer and making JC clench his fists on the grocery cart handle. "Do you think this means the registers won’t work either?"

JC paused as a voice shouted from the front of the store that all customers should check out as soon as possible. "I guess that answers your question," he said as pleasantly as possible. "I don’t think there are very many people here tonight anyway. So, I’m going to get out of here." He risked a glance at Justin’s face and froze.

"Yeah," Justin said somewhat absently, and he didn’t move either. Silence stretched between them as they stared at each other, and JC felt his heart start to pound.

"Stop it," JC said tightly.

"What?"

"Stop looking at me like that."

Justin blinked once but otherwise didn’t move. His voice dropped a full octave. "Like what?"

JC dragged his eyes away from Justin’s face and waved a hand that encompassed his cart, the frozen food aisle they were standing in, and the darkened grocery store. He lowered his voice to a whisper. "Like I’m a frozen dinner you’re planning to have for your main course."

Justin eased slightly closer, his grin a masterpiece of wide-eyed innocence. "Like a Hungry Man?" he wisecracked, and JC rolled his eyes. Justin watched him, the grin slowly fading into something warm and intimate. "Oh c’mon, JC," he said quietly. "You used to like it when I looked at you like that. You used to like it a lot."

JC tried to steel himself. "I used to like a lot of things a lot, Justin."

Justin held his gaze and answered quietly, "You know, I don’t think you’ve changed that much, JC. I really don’t." He took a slow, deliberate step into JC’s space and paused there, just on the wrong side of JC’s comfort zone. And it wasn’t even his physical proximity, JC thought disjointedly, because they were this close together a dozen times a day during the course of their work. It was Justin’s posture, the way he stood lightly and completely balanced on the balls of his feet, the way his neck curved just slightly, the sheer intent in the way he was leaning toward JC that made the hair on JC’s neck stand up. It was like hearing a siren’s call. JC grit his teeth and tried to move away, but in reality it took everything he had to keep from moving closer.

Less than six inches separated them. If JC leaned just a little bit to the side his chest would brush against the front of Justin’s thin, worn tee shirt. The dim generator lights reflected subtly in Justin’s eyes, part desire, part challenge. JC could feel his warmth, smell his unique scent, a combination of spicy soap and salty skin that was unmistakably Justin, and it was as erotic as a hand sliding down his bare waist, and he was so close that JC’s mouth watered in memory of the taste of him. His own heart was beating slowly, steadily, and he couldn’t look away.

Finally he said, "Justin. We’re not doing this."

Justin’s smile was just a little slow in coming. "Of course we’re not," he said. "We’re in a grocery store."

"I mean it," JC warned. He still couldn’t move.

"Hey, you said we’re not doing this, we’re not doing this. You’re calling the shots. Again." JC looked at him sharply, but the grin was gone and now Justin’s eyes were completely unreadable. "You can walk away, JC. I’m not forcing you to stand here in this dark aisle with me."

But he wasn’t moving aside, either. JC started to edge past him, intent on moving away and forgetting to push his cart before him. His left foot kicked the cart’s wheel sharply, and Justin grabbed his arm to steady him, and their eyes met.

It was an insignificant movement, an automatic gesture, the kind of thing a complete stranger might have done if someone he’d never seen before stumbled trying to move past him. But when Justin put his hands on JC’s arm it was more than the physical contact, it was the gesture and the ease with which he performed it that struck JC as so intensely familiar. A wave of recognition so sweet it was almost a welcome shot through him, closing off his throat. Fuck, he thought helplessly. And again, oh, fuck.

He saw the slow dilation of Justin’s eyes as they moved down the front of JC’s body from mouth to groin to mouth again. It was as though he could actually feel Justin taking him in, absorbing, tasting, savoring. The tension between them seemed to hum and shimmer, and fuck, it was always like this when they touched each other, JC thought with despair. Despite his best efforts, despite his determination not to get swept up in it again. Since the beginning, it had always been like this.

"JC," Justin whispered hoarsely, his hand starting to slide up JC’s arm. "You said something about not doing this?"

"Yeah," JC said quietly. "We . . . right, we’re not." JC couldn’t seem to look away from Justin, the way his long lashes moved as he blinked, the way his soft mouth fell slightly open as his gaze drifted over JC’s body. After a moment he forgot why he should look away. The trouble with Justin was that he was impossible to resist, like chocolate or salted nuts or red wine or warm firelight on a cold rainy night. Just a taste, just a touch, and before he knew it the moment turned into an hour, and the hour into a night, and, terrifyingly, a night into a lifetime. JC knew the temptation, and he knew the danger, and he knew very well the panic that would immediately follow this one indulgence, but it felt like it had been so long, it seemed like forever since Justin had touched him like this and thinking about how long it had been made his heart swell until it filled his chest and left no room for air. Just one touch. Just one.

Reason number three, he thought dimly and, leaning forward he angled his face and swept his tongue across Justin’s full lower lip. He tasted salt. He tasted Justin. The sensation sent a helpless shudder of anticipation through him, a tightening of greed deep in his abdomen. He opened his mouth and drew in Justin’s air, hot and quick. He felt Justin’s fingers tighten on his arm, and one hand curve like steel into his waist, and it almost seemed he could feel the pulse throbbing in his veins, an erratic counterpoint to his own. Justin sucked in a quick breath, licked his lips, and opened his mouth on the side of JC’s neck, and colors exploded inside his head.

The feel of Justin’s tongue on the thin skin beneath his ear sent a shudder through his entire body. JC’s hands went to Justin’s waist to steady himself and then helplessly dropped lower, shaping his hips through the bulky cargo shorts and then sliding over the tops of his thighs and slowly, slowly between his legs to the warm heat cupped by the soft khaki material. He tightened his fingers and felt Justin’s swift indrawn breath, the tensing of his muscles. He leaned back and almost groaned with despair as Justin’s mouth covered his.

His head was spinning, his entire awareness narrowed down to a spinning collage of impressions: Justin’s dark, dark eyes, the steamy heat of his body, harsh breathing, the sweep of his tongue on the lobe of JC’s ear; the trip wires of sensation that exploded across the network of his central nervous system.

And sweet Jesus, they were in the aisle of a public grocery store. A dark and power-less one, but a public one nevertheless. "Justin," he muttered, "Justin, we can’t . . . this isn’t . . . Justin . . ." But even as his mouth formed the words his hands were tugging at Justin’s shirt, pulling it from the waistband of his shorts.

"I know." Hot breath skated across his face, strong hands cupped his ass and moved down, stroking the crease of his thighs. "I won’t, I promise," and his mouth covered JC’s again.

JC thrust his hands beneath Justin’s shirt, spreading his fingers avidly against hot, damp flesh, stroking around his waist and tangling greedily in the soft hair of his belly. He breathed him in, dizzy from him, drunk on him, weak with the battery of sensation and the power of his need.

With the ease of one for whom understanding JC’s signals was second nature, Justin slid one hand around to his lower back and pulled him close, angling one long thigh between JC’s legs, right where he needed it the most. JC pressed his teeth against Justin’s neck, fighting a groan, and then his breath stopped as, without prelude or warning, Justin’s fingers slid right down the front of his jeans. With maddening, wondrous skill they moved, stroking, gently pressing, tightening those fine wires of pleasure that twisted from his touch to every part of JC’s body.

"Ohgod," JC gasped and Justin muttered unintelligibly. "Ohgod, we can’t do this . . ."

"Can’t do this here," Justin whispered, his head lifting and glancing furtively around even as his free arm gathered JC greedily closer. "Have to get out of here. You have to come home with me."

Yes, JC thought fuzzily. Right now, wherever was closer or maybe even in the car, whatever. Justin’s hand was doing everything right and JC was having trouble focusing on anything but his own spiraling pleasure, the clean line of Justin’s neck, the smoothness of the skin at the edge of his jaw, the pounding of the deep pulse beneath his ear. On the edges of his consciousness he heard voices, still encouraging everyone to move to the front of the store. Unbelievably, JC realized that less than a minute had passed. He tried to push away the panic beginning to jitter in the back of his mind, meshing unbearably with his arousal. "Oh fuck," he managed to whisper. "We have to get out of here."

Justin shuddered, his hands moving to JC’s waist and gripping hard as he tried to muscle them around and turn them both toward the exit. "We’re going," he said thickly, taking a purposeful step. "Now."

They tried to untangle themselves and took one uncoordinated, stumbling step toward the entrance of the store before colliding solidly with JC’s shopping cart. He stared at it like he’d never seen it before. Justin’s hands were on him, urging him around the cart, his voice low and rough, and then a stranger appeared at the end of the aisle and Justin’s hands dropped slowly away.

The stranger was, of course, a store employee, and he was walking toward them in the gloom of the emergency generator lights talking about the power and the store closing. Justin was even answering him, somehow. JC couldn’t speak, but he managed to gesture at his cart with its carton of milk and bags of pre-made salad, and that was enough to have the store employee making garbled assurances that he would take care of the items, return them to their shelves, something unintelligible that JC missed because Justin was touching him again, his heat of his hand pressing carefully against the small of JC’s back.

It was easier to move this time, the red exit lights like a beacon in the dim building, Justin walking close beside him. The panic that had been threatening started to spread through his chest, making him walk faster and faster. Outside the door the rain was falling heavily and JC dove into it almost blindly.

God, he thought with a mixture of despair and painful self-loathing. God, it had happened again.

He kept his eyes forward but was hyper aware of Justin, staying close beside him and not flinching at his breakneck pace or the pouring rain. JC didn’t speak or slow down and they strode silently through the darkened parking lot, the night lit at intervals with flashes of lightning and the lights of the few other cars leaving the lot, and right about the time JC figured out that he was headed in the opposite direction from where his own car was parked, he found himself, of course, standing in front of Justin’s light blue Escalade. Justin came to a halt beside him, close enough so their wet arms brushed, and JC shivered.

Justin was digging a wet hand into the pocket of his shorts and pulling out his keys. The Escalade beeped obnoxiously and its lights flashed as the alarm disengaged and the doors, presumably, unlocked. "Getting in?" he asked quietly, studying the vehicle intensely and not looking at JC. He was all but vibrating with tension; JC could tell without even looking at him.

JC stared at the truck, breathing hard. Two steps to the door, and Justin beside him, and they’d be out of the rain and they were less than ten minutes from Justin’s house. The temptation was all but overwhelming. His body was still thrumming in agitation from the fevered moments inside the store, but he knew he should turn around and march across the parking lot to his eccentric, ill-mannered car immediately. To stay here, to get into Justin’s car and go home with him, to once again experience the terrifying emotions and utter loss of control that characterized each and every encounter with Justin, would be madness. Why was he still standing here? Why couldn’t he just walk away?

Lightning flashed from beneath the heavy clouds and thunder rumbled, farther away now, but the rain intensified. JC could feel each individual drop pelting his bare head, forming rivulets that dripped down his face and neck. His clothes clung to him and despite the warm and heavy air he had goose bumps on his arms, and he was so painfully, unbelievably exhausted. So tired of fighting it, so tired of worrying about it, so tired of thinking about all the things he couldn’t and shouldn’t do.

Beside him Justin groaned, and in one fluid motion he had the driver’s side door open and one unyielding arm around JC, and suddenly he was right there, nose-to-wet-nose with him. Adrenaline and arousal collided and suddenly JC couldn’t breathe.

"Stop thinking so hard about it," Justin said quietly, the movements of his mouth completely fascinating. "Please. You are making it so much harder then it ever needed to be. Honest to god, JC . . . Just get in the car."

The words made a vague sort of sense, but the movements of Justin’s lips as he shaped them were completely distracting. There were tiny droplets clinging to his eyelashes, and his wet shirt made his shoulders look much broader than they actually were. The ferocity of JC’s need was overwhelming, making the air too thick to breathe and then, unbelievably, Justin smiled at him. Gently, almost sympathetically he said "C’mon, JC," and JC went.

The inside of the truck was shockingly quiet after the loudness of the storm but it was just as warm and humid as it was outside, and JC still couldn’t breathe. His heart was pounding and his lungs compressed and then Justin was sliding across the leather seat and reaching for him with both arms, his elbow knocking the armrests up and out of the way. He slithered easily across the wide console separating the seats, somehow managing to make a completely awkward maneuver look sexy, and JC thought, fuzzily, reason number fifty-seven. Then there was the shock of his large, sodden body weight half on and half beside him and Justin’s arms were wrapping around him, pulling him close and holding him tightly, tightly, and JC had just enough time to register that Justin was trembling furiously before he closed his eyes and stopped thinking at all.

"Why do you do these things to me?" Justin muttered distractedly, his large hands worming their way beneath JC’s back. The angle was impossible but somehow he found JC’s mouth with his own, his cool lips a welcome shock against JC’s overheated skin.

JC found that both of his arms were clamped around the impossible length of Justin’s torso, his fingers digging hard into his wet shirt as he strained to pull him closer. The windows were partially fogged already, there was no sound but their harsh breathing and the distant sound of rain on the roof and the windshield, and for the first time in weeks JC felt a giddy sort of relief.

"God, I miss you," he said against Justin’s mouth, the words causing an almost physical pain as they fought their way out. Justin’s arms tightened, cutting off the little air he did have.

"You don’t have to, y’know," he said matter-of-factly, and it sounded as if he was smiling. He squirmed closer and fumbled a hand down the side of JC’s seat; there was a discreet whirring noise and the seat began to slowly, smoothly recline.

"Nice," JC commented breathlessly as their bodies started to stretch out and come together in all the right ways. He caught Justin’s self-satisfied smirk out of the corner of his eye as he squirmed closer and eased one of his long thighs between JC’s legs, making him groan. The seat stopped moving and Justin’s hand reappeared, running unsteadily up JC’s hip and crawling beneath his wet shirt. JC had time to gulp one breath before Justin leaned in and opened his mouth warmly on the side of JC’s throat.

It was a very sensitive area and Justin knew that very well. Lights exploded behind his eyelids as Justin licked and then sucked and then nibbled, very carefully, just enough to make JC move restlessly, aching for more contact. He released his iron grip around Justin’s body and fumbled for the bottom of his shirt, searching out the waistband of his cargo shorts and when he found it he shoved both hands down the back and under Justin’s briefs, spreading his fingers over Justin’s warm, damp skin and drinking in his delighted gasp as he gathered him closer.

After the miserable few days JC had had, everything was suddenly going smoothly. He squirmed a leg between Justin’s and bracketed his narrow hips with his hands, bending his knee a little and rolling his hips, and was rewarded with Justin’s choked groan. Justin shuddered and redoubled his efforts to get the fly of his shorts open, hampered by the wet cloth and the closeness of their bodies and how tightly JC was holding him. Justin squirmed in a way that should have hurt and didn’t do anything of the sort, making JC grit his teeth and hiss, and then he had his own shorts open as well as the front of JC’s jeans and with a muffled curse he was pulling their bodies together.

Sensation surged through JC’s already overloaded nerve endings, spiraling through his limbs and concentrating swiftly in his abdomen. He widened his legs as much as his jeans and Justin’s weight and the confines of the seat would allow, straining for more contact, more friction. Justin dropped his head to his shoulder and moaned breathlessly, working his hands around JC’s hips and beneath him, lower, gripping him hard. They moved fluidly together for a few gorgeous, breathless moments and then Justin went suddenly still. JC opened his eyes, buried beneath Justin and seeing nothing but darkness and fogged-over windows spotted with still-falling rain.

"What?" he whispered.

"I’m waiting for the ‘we can’t do this’ speech," Justin murmured into his neck. He was grinning, JC could feel his teeth -- and then his tongue, dear god -- against his skin. "I don’t think I can go on without it." Justin’s mouth opened lewdly on the lobe of his ear, and JC shivered.

"Oh, fuck you," he muttered, tightening his hold on Justin’s ass and rolling his hips purposefully. Justin’s "um, yeah," was choked and almost unintelligible, and then it was much easier to think about nothing at all.

This part had always been almost too easy for them, JC thought dimly, automatically gauging the rhythm of Justin’s movements and instinctively matching them. Even at the very beginning, when there had been recklessness and nervousness and other first-time-with-new-person anxiety, it had always been so easy, like a dance they already knew the steps to and had practiced dozens of times.

The surges of Justin’s body were becoming more deliberate and JC twisted just the slightest bit, pulling his belly tight and hissing through the mind-numbing friction of Justin’s hair-roughened belly on his dick. Justin’s hand fumbled carefully between their bodies and JC could’ve helped him because he knew exactly what Justin was going for, but to do that they both needed to kick out of their impossibly-confining clothes and legs would need to be maneuvered and JC could tell that for Justin it was already too late. His hips were moving faster and started to lose their fluidity and JC hurried to catch up, clamping his legs around Justin’s thigh, bracing one foot against the dashboard, closing his eyes and starting to shudder as Justin began to pant in his ear.

"Ready?" Justin whispered, but he didn’t really expect a response, he already knew the answer, but he waited until JC sank his teeth into the side of his neck and moaned before dropping his head to JC’s shoulder and beginning to move in earnest. He shoved JC’s shirt out of the way with his chin, searching for skin and burrowing into the curve where neck met shoulder in a typical Justin move that never, ever failed to make JC’s stomach flutter and clench. He’d assigned a number to it, but Justin was going for it now and he couldn’t remember that now. Delicious sensation curled from his abdomen and shot like lightning up his spine and Justin’s body tightened, the long muscles bunching powerfully under JC’s hands, his breath hot on JC’s neck, and JC was right there with him, right where he knew he belonged.

When it was over JC kept his eyes closed and listened to Justin’s shuddering breaths and his own galloping heart and the rain still falling on the roof of the car. If he was honest with himself he could admit that these were moments that he lived for -- the aftermath, when his mind and body were completely and immensely satisfied and peaceful, that lovely, floating space right before his brain kicked on and started reminding him that he’d once again done something stupid and reckless, that he’d once again demonstrated to all and sundry his utter lack of control where Justin was concerned and started listing all the reasons why this must not happen again. JC fought for air -- Justin was much heavier than he looked, always had been -- and tried desperately to hang on to that moment of peace for as long as he could.

Still twined around him and meshed impossibly close in the cramped space, Justin sighed deeply. "Come home w’ me," he muttered groggily, and just like that JC’s reprieve was over. He felt unease flicker to life in the recesses of his brain and opened his eyes, looking at the sunroof of the truck in slowly growing horror. He lifted his head and jostled Justin in an effort to get him to move up and away.

Justin didn’t even twitch. If anything he got heavier, and his fingers dug into JC’s skin hard before slowly, deliberately relaxing, like a big cat.

"Oh god," JC said with dawning despair. "We’re in a grocery store parking lot." Justin made no response, and JC nudged him. "C’mon, Justin," he said. "Get up."

"No."

JC blinked in astonishment and nudged him harder. "Get up, man. This is gross. We’re all sticky. And we’re in a fucking parking lot."

Justin absolutely did not move. "We wouldn’t be if you’d just come home with me in the first place. Or come to see me since we’ve been home. Or returned one of my calls this last week." JC said nothing, and Justin continued. "Just -- come home with me," he said again, and JC sighed.

"I really don’t think that’s such a good idea," he started, and was startled when Justin exploded into action, levering himself up and getting right in his face.

"Fuck," he said tightly, hissing it between his teeth. "No more, JC. Okay? Just . . . look. This is stupid. I’ve been really fucking patient, I think, but this is just stupid! You love me, JC. You do. And you know I love you. Why do you keep doing this to me, to us? Why do you keep doing this to yourself?"

Justin was trembling, his eyes huge and black and his face ghostly in the strange darkness of the now-deserted parking lot. JC took a deep breath, realized as he did that he hadn’t been breathing.

"It’s not because you don’t want to," Justin continued, his voice much more subdued.

JC finally found his voice. "No," he said quietly. "That’s not it at all."

"Then what?"

JC took another deep breath. And then another. He stared intently through the windshield at the pattern of rain. "The thing is, Justin," he said slowly, "the thing is, that you make me crazy. Like, insane crazy. Like, when you look at me that way? I can’t even fucking think crazy."

Justin was staring at him. "But, that’s a good thing," he said quietly. "I can’t believe you don’t think it’s a good thing."

"It’s not a good thing," JC insisted. "This -- you and me, and this, this wasn’t supposed to be like this. It was supposed to be easy, and just something to, you know . . ."

"Take our minds off shit," Justin supplied. His voice was very, very subdued.

"Yeah. But it’s not," JC said painfully. "It’s this thing, Justin, for me it’s this huge, crazy thing now, and it’s too much. It wasn’t ever supposed to get like this."

Justin was quiet for a moment but he did not move, his body still heavy against JC’s, their skin still stuck together. "But it’s that way for me too," he said. "You know that. So what if this isn’t what it was supposed to be? Now it’s better. And that’s good."

"It’s not good," JC insisted.

"Okay, JC. So, it was supposed to be casual sex, and it’s not. Not anymore. Not ever, if you want to be perfectly honest," Justin said a little impatiently. "What else? What else is there about this, about you and me, that makes you so miserable?" he asked. "There’s more, right?"

JC closed his eyes, shutting out the darkness, the rain, the foggy windows and Justin’s face. "There doesn’t have to be more," he said, his voice edgy. "I don’t like feeling like I have no say in how this goes, I can’t stand worrying about saying something wrong or doing something that’ll give things away or feeling all the time -- all the fucking time -- that I need to watch everything I say and do and think. I can’t stand the fact that you can do this to me, anytime and anywhere. I didn’t sign up for this," he said warningly when Justin opened his mouth to respond. "And I don’t want it."

Justin closed his mouth with a snap, and carefully climbed off JC, somehow levering himself up and away and over to the driver’s side while keeping his cargo shorts closed with one hand. JC found the knob that would un-recline the passenger seat and when he was upright again Justin silently handed him a messy handful of paper napkins, relics of a trip through Burger King’s drive-through. They cleaned themselves up as much as they could, without speaking. The cab smelled thickly like sex.

JC slowly put his hand on the door handle and forced himself to turn to look at him. Justin’s profile was straight and stern as he stared out the still-fogged windshield, and JC felt his heart wrench viciously. He opened his mouth to say something, he didn’t know what, but Justin turned suddenly to him with a crooked, breathtaking smile that made the words dry up in his throat.

"Don’t say it," he said simply. "Don’t say it, because it won’t be the truth. Just, you know, go on home."

JC blinked at him. "Justin . . ." he started, and Justin shook his head vigorously.

"Nope," he said. "It was a good try, JC, it really was. You had me going for a minute, but you’re not getting rid of me that easy. You’re not getting rid of me at all. So, fine, go on home and do what you need to do, and I’ll see you later."

Justin gave him another beatific smile, and JC felt his mouth drop open. Reason number thirty-eight he thought, half-annoyed, half-admiring. Justin absolutely did not know when to give up. He shook his head a little and pulled the door handle, propelling himself out of the cab and into the rain.

As soon as his feet hit the pavement the sky lit up with a huge flare of lightning, and the rain seemed to double. JC bent his head and jogged across the dark and deserted parking lot toward his car, sitting all alone on the far side. Behind him he heard Justin’s truck start up, but he was already too far away to benefit from his headlights. Mostly JC was relieved that nobody was around to see him exit Justin’s truck like a curb-side pick up, but at the same time they certainly wouldn’t have engaged in such reckless activity if there’d been people around. Certainly not.

Against his will he remembered the sweet curve of Justin’s neck, the husky timbre of his voice when he groaned JC’s name, and he shivered in the humid air. That was really the crux of the problem, he reminded himself bleakly. He couldn’t guarantee that he wouldn’t have had sex in the cab of Justin’s truck in the middle of a public parking lot, even in broad daylight and full of people. He’d like to think that they wouldn’t be that stupid, but he couldn’t be confident that the right decision would be made.

All the more reason to keep a prudent distance from Justin in the future, he reminded himself, and flinched at the heavy thunder that seemed to make the very ground shake.

There was a moment’s panic when he again couldn’t find his car keys, but there they were, safe in his front pocket. His car unlocked itself in response to the remote, thank god, and JC threw himself into the driver’s seat, wiping the rain out of his eyes. His day had been a complete and utter failure: he’d lost his keys half a dozen times, he’d failed to get groceries, his car was unreliable and he’d had sex with Justin. Again. It was time to get home.

He thrust the key into the ignition and risked a look into the rearview mirror as he turned it, watching narrowly as Justin’s truck idled on the opposite side of the parking lot. He turned on the lights and then flashed them, signaling Justin that he was safe and that he could go, and relaxed a little when Justin’s truck started to pull away. "Good, go," JC muttered, and put his car into reverse.

Immediately the car stalled, and the convertible top, which had been securely docked against the rain, started to retract. "No, no," JC said futilely as the rain poured in. Frantically he turned the ignition and pounded on the button to close the top. The car refused to start, the convertible top didn’t stop retracting until it was safely folded into his trunk, and as JC sat in the pouring rain and wondered how on earth he’d come to this, Justin pulled up beside him.

"Hey," Justin said conversationally, leaning out the window of his truck like the beginning of a bad porn movie. "Sure you don’t want to come home with me?"

JC stared straight ahead, feeling the rain drip relentlessly down his face. "No thank you," he said firmly. "I’ll be just fine." He took a deep breath and turned the key in the ignition, painfully aware of Justin watching closely. The car started on the first turn of the key, but he didn’t tempt fate by trying to put the top up. Instead he nodded blindly in Justin’s general direction, put the car in reverse, and exited the grocery store parking lot with the rain pelting him all the way. Justin followed at a discreet distance until he turned into his driveway, then made an illegal U turn and sped off into the night.

~ ~ ~

The thunder and lightning died away by the morning, although it remained overcast and threatening with thick gray clouds. JC raised himself on one elbow to look out his bedroom window at the bleak sky and then groaned, rolled over, stuffed his face back into his pillow, and prepared to sleep this particular day away. He might even have succeeded if his cell phone hadn't sounded the distinctive ring tone that meant his mother was looking for him.

He couldn't locate the telephone in time to catch her before her call went to voice mail, of course. In fact, it took him more than twenty minutes to locate his cell phone at all, although he'd been able to hear it ring. He finally found it in the toe of a shoe underneath his bed -- a shoe that he couldn't remember wearing, like, ever. In fact, he was certain it was one of Justin’s. He sat on his bed and stared at it, turning it over in his hands before shaking his phone out of it and pitching it back under the bed. He'd think about that another time.

His mother’s message was alarming. It was an invitation to meet her and his dad for lunch that afternoon, something about seeing him before his sister’s birthday party and had he remembered to get her a gift? JC stood and jogged down the stairs and to the calendar in his kitchen. It was still flipped to May. Quickly he flipped it to September and stared in dismay at the bright red letters that said HEATHER BDAY NYC on what could only be today’s date.

He stared at the calendar in mounting horror. How could he have possibly screwed that up? He’d been thinking about that trip to New York just a day or two ago, he knew it was right around the corner. It wasn’t like he was still on tour, or working, it wasn’t like he had excessive busyness as an excuse. What on earth was wrong with him?

He took a few deep breaths to calm his racing heart and tried to think what he could do. Missing his sister’s birthday dinner wasn’t an option -- neither of the women in his family would stand for it. His next frenzied thought was to get in his car and start driving as fast as he could, but that wasn’t an option either -- even if his car was reliable, it wouldn’t get him there on time.

He wasn’t proud -- he called Johnny’s office and asked Melinda to help him get on a flight to New York City immediately, even if it was a private one, and also to get him a room at the Plaza. And also to get an appropriate gift for his sister, and have it sent, wrapped, to said room. Melinda mocked him, but promised it would be taken care of and he keyed off his cell phone with a sigh of relief.

It was, sadly, to be the last bit of good luck he experienced for the rest of the day.

Forcing himself to be calm, he ran back up the stairs to his bedroom and took stock. He didn’t want to go to New York -- he sort of felt like he’d just been there -- but it would be a short trip. His sister’s birthday would be celebrated that evening with dinner at her favorite restaurant; Tyler and his parents were certainly already there; flights left all the time, he could totally make it. He just had to clean up, pack, and get on a plane. He could totally do this.

His brain buzzing in circles, JC moved quickly to his closet and started throwing clean clothes indiscriminately onto his bed in a pile. He grabbed the first suitcase he could find from his hall closet and tossed items into it with the sort of haphazard chaos that usually horrified him in his brother, or Joey.

With that job half-done, he turned his back on the suitcase and dove into the shower, where he was greeted with nothing but a low groaning noise when he turned on the hot water. His heart started to pound painfully. He slowly turned the lever off, let it sit for a moment while chanting "oh please oh please oh please," and then turned it back on. But the pipes merely moaned mournfully and JC accepted what that sinking feeling of dread in his stomach had been trying to tell him. No hot water for him, not today.

Melinda called back as he was jogging down to his basement to look at his water heater. She said the best she could do was a flight that left in less than two hours, otherwise he’d have to wait until late in the afternoon. She also laughed hysterically when he asked her what she knew about water heaters and pilot lights, so he hung up on her. He squared off against the water heater for a long, intense moment before realizing that he simply did not have time for this; he’d have to clean up when he got to NYC.

He threw the rest of his luggage together, closed his suitcase, carried it down the stairs and had was pulling it out the door when one of the wheels came off, lurching the suitcase sideways and inexplicably spilling everything he’d packed onto the floor of his entry way. As he stared at the mess and his broken suitcase in disbelief his phone rang again and he realized that he’d forgotten to call his mother back. He keyed on his phone without looking at it and said "Sorry, sorry, I’m sorry."

There was a brief silence and JC stopped breathing. "Oh," Justin said slowly. "Um, actually, that was my line."

JC took another deep calming breath and wondered crazily how many of those he’d taken in the last week. Too many. "Hi," he said calmly. "I can’t talk right now, I’m on my way to the airport."

"I know," Justin said unexpectedly, and JC pulled his phone away from his ear to stare at it. "Heather’s birthday, right?"

"How did you know that?" JC demanded. He crouched down and started throwing his clothes back into the suitcase before remembering that it was broken. Turning wildly away, he headed back up the stairs to the hall closet for another suitcase.

"Hey, I know when your sister’s birthday is," Justin said, mildly affronted.

JC snorted. "Yeah, well, apparently I don’t," he said, dragging out a suitcase that was far too large for his short trip and pulling it down the stairs. "I forgot all about it."

"How could you forget that?" Justin asked, laughing a little. "I mean, you told me about it, what, two weeks ago?"

"I don’t know," JC said, throwing open the too-big suitcase and throwing his clothes furiously into it. "Nothing’s going right these days. I can’t find things, I can’t remember things. It’s making me fucking insane."

"Is that right," Justin said thoughtfully. His voice dropped half an octave and his accent seemed to get thicker. "You know, JC, it seems like a lot of things are making you fucking insane lately," he said conversationally. "Have you thought about why that is?"

JC grit his teeth against the effect of The Seduction Voice (reason number thirty-one, he thought) and focused on getting his suitcase closed. "No," he said shortly resisting the urge to stop moving and let Justin talk some more to him in that voice. "I don’t have time to think about it, I just know that everything I touch seems to go wrong lately, and I don’t have a clue what the fuck is going on. It’s like . . ." he trailed off, watching his own reflection in the hall mirror as his eyes got wide and his mouth dropped open.

"JC?" Justin asked alertly, The Seduction Voice gone for the moment. "Are you there?"

JC looked down at the luggage disaster at his feet. He thought about his cranky and unpredictable car, his always-lost keys, the lost luggage on the tour, his stolen hubcaps, and all the disasters that had befallen him over and over when in Justin’s company over the past few weeks. Since the last time he’d been in New York City. "Wait a minute," JC said slowly. "Justin -- did you make that voodoo woman put a curse on me?"

Justin’s silence was, in JC’s opinion, incredibly damning. "What?" Justin finally exploded. "A curse? On you?"

JC clenched his teeth. "The timing’s pretty convenient, you know," he pointed out. "Things were going along fine until you dragged me in to see that woman, and ever since then everything’s been going wrong!"

Justin made an incredulous sound. "What the fuck, JC? You don’t even believe in that stuff, you’ve told me a hundred times you don’t believe in it. Shit."

JC blinked at his reflection in the hall mirror. "You did do it, didn’t you?" he almost shouted into his phone. "Why?" he asked furiously. "All this shit that’s gone wrong in my life lately! Why did you do this to me?"

"Goddamn it, JC," Justin interrupted furiously. "I can’t believe you. After everything . . . after all of . . . fuck! You know how I feel about you! How could you think I had a curse put on you? Something that would, like, put you in danger? I can’t even believe you’re even accusing me of this!"

"What am I supposed to think?" JC fired back furiously. "We break up, you’re not happy about it, you drag me to see this creepy voodoo woman . . ."

"I did not drag you!" Justin shouted. "I told you to wait for me at the restaurant!"

". . . and now every time I turn around something’s breaking or getting stolen, and I keep running into you and . . ."

"Running into me? We fucking WORK together!"

"Not at the goddamn grocery store, Justin!"

They both fell silent, breathing hard. "Look," Justin said finally, obviously making a herculean effort not to shout. "I would not, and did not, ask a voodoo woman to put a curse on you. I was running an errand for my granny; that is all." He paused. JC waited. "In fact," he continued with dignity, "I think you owe me an apology for that accusation."

JC glanced at his watch, saw that it had stopped sometime in the night, and bit off a curse. "Yeah," he said sarcastically. "My water heater’s broken and I have to get on an airplane without a shower. I’m not feeling all that forgiving right now. If I get to New York and back in one fucking piece, I’ll think about the apology. Now, I have a plane to catch."

He keyed his phone off without saying goodbye and started hunting for the keys to his car. They weren’t on his KEYS! hanger, or in any of his pockets, or on the counter. With another glance at the clock on the wall, he cursed and called a cab.

~ ~ ~

Late the next day JC stood on the sidewalk outside the little alley that housed Justin’s granny’s voodoo queen. He was wearing a baseball cap and his sunglasses in an effort not to be recognized. He also was wearing a t shirt of Justin’s with a silk screened BMW on it that had somehow gotten mixed up in his luggage and turned out to be the only clean item he’d packed. His socks didn’t match. He felt completely and utterly defeated.

He was grateful that the voodoo-created bad luck hadn’t disabled or crashed the airplane he’d been on from Orlando to New York City. Nor had he been harmed or delayed by the transportation waiting to take him from airport to hotel. The fact that he felt grateful for things he should be able to take for granted showed him just how far he’d sunk.

He’d made it to New York in plenty of time for his sister’s birthday dinner. His mother had scolded him for cutting it so close, his brother had made fun of him for having mismatched tennis shoes on (how had he missed that?), and the first thing his sister said to him was "Hey, doofus. Where’s Justin?" Nevertheless, he’d made it, and it had been fun, or as fun as family gatherings could be. His siblings were in their respective classes today, he’d had a late brunch with his parents before they left to go shopping, and now he had one last thing to do before catching his return flight home.

He sighed, kicking the heel of one foot against the toe of the other. He didn’t want to do this, he didn’t want to believe that Justin would arrange a curse, he didn’t want to believe that such things existed, and he really didn’t want to believe that such things actually worked. But he had to admit that something was going on. Just looking at his mismatched shoes seemed to bear that out.

His mother had examined him with concerned eyes while Tyler had laughed hysterically at his footwear malfunction, and during the confusion of sorting out the dinner reservation and waiting for a table she had pulled him aside to ask him how he was doing. She meant business, too; his mother had never asked an idle or polite question in her life. His smile and light "everything’s fine, Mom," had just made her more suspicious.

"Really," he’d protested weakly. "Everything’s great."

"Hmm," she’d said thoughtfully. "How’s Justin?"

"Mom," JC said with some exasperation. "We broke up. I don’t know how he is; I’m sure he’s fine or someone would’ve told me."

"What I really meant," she said deliberately, "is how are you and Justin."

He’d stared at her. "Mom, I told you," he said with some surprise. "We broke up. You knew this. I told you this weeks ago. Why are you asking me?"

"Maybe because nobody believes you," she said bluntly, and patted his arm as he gaped at her. "I’m sure you can straighten it out when you get home, and talk to him."

JC felt like an elephant was suddenly sitting on his chest. "Mom," he said deliberately. "We are not together anymore. In fact," he continued, inspired, "we never were all that serious about each other in the first place. It was just a . . . " he paused, and waved a hand around vaguely, suddenly remembering who he was talking to. "You know, it was just a casual thing."

She looked at him as if he’d suddenly sprouted horns, and then burst out laughing. "Oh honey," she said sympathetically. "You don’t actually believe that do you? No wonder you’re such a mess." She leaned up to kiss his cheek, ignoring his sputterings. "I’m sure you’ll straighten it out when you get back to Florida," she said serenely, and then, to his great relief, their reservation was called.

Tales of his recent vehicular and appliance misfortunes made entertaining dinner conversation, but as he hesitated in front of Marie LeCoeur’s door JC reminded himself that he couldn’t live this way. Something had to be done, and quite frankly, JC couldn’t think of anything else to do. He took a deep breath and stepped forward, preparing to push open the almost-hidden door. It opened from inside before he could touch it, and after a long and painful hesitation, JC walked inside.

It was much as he remembered: the long draperies enclosing the small room, the round table placed precisely in the center with the clear ball on its pedestal seeming to throw off its own light. And standing on the far side of the room was the voodoo queen, also much as he remembered, standing majestically with her hands folded in front of her as she nodded at him. She did not look in the least surprised to see him.

"Um, hi," he said uncertainly, and was thrown off guard by the wide smile she gave him. She motioned him forward with a gesture that could only be construed as friendly.

"Oh, well, here he comes. I can see you been having some problems, child," she said, amusement making her dark eyes sparkle. "It’s written all over your face."

"Yeah," he said with even more uncertainty. "I don’t know if you remember me," he began in a rush, and paused when she clapped her hands together and started to laugh.

"Remember you?" she asked, still chuckling. "Of course I remember you! Child, I actually expected you here three, four days ago -- you’re much tougher than you look, that’s for sure."

JC hesitated, still confused. He’d expected her to be more . . . what? Gloating and triumphant? Something, but he truly hadn’t expected this kind of amused sympathy. He took a deep breath and plowed forward. "Well, I’ve come to apologize," he said in a rush.

She nodded regally, still smiling. "Yes, of course. I knew you would."

JC swallowed that with some difficulty but carefully kept his expression serious. "I know I made you really mad when I was here last, and that I was very, um, disrespectful," he said carefully. "And I want to say I’m sorry about that," he said, and paused in surprise when she burst out laughing again.

"Oh my goodness," she said, a little breathless as she shook her head. "It looks to me like someone has learned himself some lessons about magic," she continued, and broke into a fresh chuckle.

"It’s really not funny," JC said tiredly.

She gave him what could only be termed a superior little smile. "Oh child, from where I’m sitting it sure is. It always is."

"Yeah," JC answered wearily. "Well, I don’t know about magic," he said, and winced a little as her grin broadened. "But I guess I’ve learned some lessons about bad luck," he conceded. "I’ve come to ask you to please take that curse off of me."

Marie LeCoeur tilted her head, her eyes bright on his face. "Curse? What curse are you talking about, son? I don’t deal in curses, don’t you understand?"

"Yes," JC said and then shook his head. "I mean, no. I know Justin had you do something to me . . ."

"If I recall correctly," she interrupted with an enigmatic smile, "you’re the one who doesn’t believe in magic, no? So, what do you think has been happening to you?"

"Well, he must have had you do something," JC said helplessly. "I mean, my life’s been hell for the last few weeks, everything’s gone wrong . . ."

"And you blame that young man for all this? What sort of thing did you think he wanted done to you?" she asked him with perfect seriousness. "That fine young man who loves you so much, worries about you so much. What sort of mischief do you think he’s up to?"

JC stared at her, guilt curling painfully in his stomach. "He must have . . . I mean, he’s been pretty upset with me, for awhile now, and I thought that when he came to see you . . ." he trailed off uncertainly and she slowly shook her head.

"Child, you’re so busy staring at that tree two inches from your face, you’re forgetting about that whole beautiful forest, just waiting for you to discover it," she clucked with more sympathy than rancor. "What’s really on your mind?"

"Okay, I thought he paid you to put a curse on me," he finished miserably. "But if that’s not it, than what’s been happening to me?"

She stepped forward and placed a large hand on his chest. "That magic you don’t believe in," she said seriously. "It’s in you, child. It’s you, all the time. It’s always you that makes the magic, good or bad." She tilted her head, considering. "Do you understand?"

JC stared at her, hardly daring to breath. "I don’t understand," he finally said. "Everything was fine until we came here, everything was good, and since then it’s all been so wrong."

She gave him a sweet and kindly smile. "Has it all been so fine and so good?" she asked gently. "Are you sure about that, boy?"

JC thought about Justin, their relationship which had started so casually and ended so intensely and that he seemed, after all this time and effort, to be unable to walk away from. "You didn’t do something to me?" he asked almost plaintively.

She gave him a sympathetic pat on the shoulder and turned him toward the door. "All I did was give you a little nudge toward seeing what you already knew was there," she said cheerfully. "You go away now, and think about the good magic and the bad, and which side you want in your life," she continued firmly. "Nobody in the world has more power over your life than you, child. You remember that, now."

The door closed behind him and JC found himself back on the street in a daze.

~ ~ ~

For a two and a half hour flight, the trip back to Florida seemed to take forever. JC sat huddled in the almost-empty first class and stared blankly out the window, his thoughts circling around from Justin and their so-called relationship of convenience, and how he kept insisting on calling it that long after Justin had stopped. He thought of their very civil break-up and the very un-break-up-like encounters they kept having, and his own inability to stop. He thought about Marie LeCoeur and damaged luggage, missing keys, temperamental vehicles and household appliances. He thought about hard work versus good luck, and the power of positive thinking and the possibilities of the subconscious inflicting catastrophes on a person, and bad luck.

Then he thought about Justin some more, because he couldn’t stop himself. Because for far too long now, it had been impossible not to think about Justin.

The flight, though endless, was uneventful. His luggage was waiting for him on the carousel, and seemed to be in one piece. He had no trouble getting a cab, and when he reached for his house keys in a panic on the drive home they were there, in his front pocket, right where they belonged. He kept his fingers wrapped around them and stared thoughtfully out the window.

He was somehow not in the least bit surprised to see Justin’s Escalade inside his security gates and backed up to the front door. He’d never demanded that Justin return the keys to his house when they’d broken up, had he? JC couldn’t remember, but he looked more closely at the keys held tightly in his hand as the cab driver pulled up to the gates, and sure enough, there was the key to Justin’s house, right next to the key to his own. He stared at it for a long minute and found himself smiling. He wondered if he was starting to catch a glimpse of that forest.

The cab deposited JC and his suitcase on the front porch just as Justin emerged from JC’s open front door, wrestling a huge, empty cardboard box out the doorway. He didn’t see JC at first, grunting and scowling at the oversized box, and JC felt that weird thump in his heart, the one he always felt when he saw Justin, the one he’d been feeling for years now and refusing to admit to.

Justin threw the mountain of cardboard down on the driveway and looked up when JC spoke to him, obviously startled. But immediately came that grin, that instantaneous, wide grin, the grin that Justin always gave him whether he’d been gone for a few hours or for a week, the grin that JC never, ever saw on Justin’s face unless it was aimed at him. Reason number eight, he thought wryly, and to cover up his confusion and inexplicable shyness, he gestured at the box.

"What are you doing?" he asked mildly, for all the world as if finding Justin doing manual labor on his front porch was an everyday occurrence.

Justin was still just standing there, grinning at him, and at JC’s question he blinked and looked confused for a moment until JC nodded toward the cardboard box again. "Oh," Justin said, his cheeks turning red. "I, uh, remember you said your water heater had gone out, and I figured I would take care of that for you. It wasn’t just your pilot light," he continued in a rush, as if JC was going to interrupt him. "I know the difference, I helped my dad change theirs when I was home for Christmas. Yours was just old and needed replacing, so, uh, I just did it."

"You just did it," JC repeated slowly. He kept his eyes on the box because looking at Justin right now would confuse him.

"Yeah," Justin said quietly. "Um, Trace helped with the heavy lifting, but I did everything else. He told me to tell you that if it doesn’t work, it’s not his fault." He paused, eyeing JC carefully when JC said nothing. "I hope you don’t mind, man. I mean, I hope I didn’t step on your home improvement toes. Do you even have any of those?" He sounded a little worried.

"No, you didn’t. And, well, that was really nice of you. Thanks." JC said. Tension was coiling in him like a snake; he didn’t know where to put his hands and settled for stuffing them into his jeans pockets.

"Oh, and it’s not because you accused me of having a curse put on you," Justin added, his chin lifting a bit. "It doesn’t have anything to do with that. I just know how you get when you can’t have a shower every day, that’s all." He hesitated a moment, and then turned around to gather up the unwieldy box and stuff it in to the back of his Escalade. "It’s all done," he said over his shoulder. "I’ll just get out of your hair now."

Reason number eleven: Justin could, on occasion, be the most thoughtful person alive. "Wait," JC said slowly, still staring at the ground. On the peripheral of his vision he saw Justin freeze.

JC swallowed hard. He was so tense now that it was a huge effort to even move, but finally he lifted his head to look at Justin, really look at him. Justin was standing beside his truck in the bright Florida afternoon, his shirt damp with sweat and filthy. There was a cobweb in his messy curls, and he was looking at JC with a heartbreaking combination of hope and resignation on his face, and all 73 reasons why hit JC at once.

It was because Justin was not only charming and sexy, but because he was vulnerable, and of all the people in the world he had chosen JC to show that side of himself to. Because to JC he was beautiful and infinitely desirable even in filthy old clothes and covered with dust and sweat from installing an appliance at JC’s house. Because Justin had stood patiently in the middle of the night, in a rainstorm, and waited for JC to say yes or no. Because JC had said no to him dozens of times in the past month, and because Justin still came back to him, and asked again. Because Justin knew that JC was stupid and neurotic and insane, but he didn’t, wouldn’t, give up on him.

And then there was reason number one, the one that made all the other excellent reasons pale and insignificant. Because JC loved him, and because he knew that Justin felt the same about him.

Justin was still waiting.

"Actually," JC said slowly, "after I dropped off this luggage, I was on my way to your house," he continued, and felt warm at the way Justin’s eyes brightened.

"Oh," he said quietly. "Mismatched shoes and everything?"

JC stifled a laugh that felt like hysteria. "Just like I am," he said.

Justin smiled a little. "So, I saved you a trip, maybe?" he asked quietly, and his voice was so hopeful.

"Yeah, maybe," JC answered, and then he took a deep breath and stepped easily into Justin’s personal space. Justin didn’t move away, just bent his head a little to keep his eyes level with JC’s.

"Why were you coming to see me?" Justin prompted. He cracked a tiny, encouraging smile that made JC’s heart beat a little faster.

"I was just thinking," he said slowly. "I saw you here, in my house, and you know, I still have keys to your house too, and in a lot of ways it’s like we never broke up at all."

"Yeah," Justin said, the smile growing. "Yeah, I noticed that. I wasn’t sure when you were going to get on board with it, but I know what you’re talking about."

JC risked a step closer, watching as Justin’s eyes widened and his mouth went slack. "I’ve been thinking about things," he continued. "Like, things that maybe started off as one thing, but was something else all along. And despite my, uh, issues . . ." here Justin bit his lip and JC raised an eyebrow sternly, "it seems pretty clear that I’m a lot happier and my life goes a lot better when I’m not fighting . . . things."

"Well, hallelujah," Justin said, his smile brightening his face like the sunrise on a perfectly cloudless morning. "Just when I was beginning to wonder if you’d ever see the light. I’d go so far as to say it’s like magic, but I know you don’t believe in that."

JC let an answering smile spread across his face. "I don’t know. Maybe I’m not so sure of that anymore."

"No?"

"I still don’t believe in voodoo," JC said, inching closer and hearing Justin suck in a deep unsteady breath. "But I guess there’s magic out there. Or, there is here, between us. And I’m not going to fight with it anymore."

Justin closed the distance between them deliberately, his arms reaching out for JC like something he was desperate for. "JC," he said a little unsteadily. "I never got to tell you, the other night . . ." His arms crept around JC’s waist, tightening slowly and JC’s eyes closed in bliss. "You said, then, that you can’t stand that I do this to you," he continued quietly, his voice serious. "I just . . . you know, right, that you do it to me too? That it’s a two-way street, between us, right?"

JC smiled, wrapping his hands around Justin’s warm body and holding him tight. "Yeah," he said, starting the lose the thread of the conversation as Justin’s body eased against his. "I know."

"We do this to each other," Justin mumbled into the curve of his neck, his warm breath making JC shiver. "It’s always been like this for me," he confessed. "It’s always felt like magic, to me."

JC pulled away and kissed him, short and hard, a promise. "Me too," he said gently, starting to lead Justin back into the house. "Always."

~ End