Title: Chances Are 15/?
Author: Red (redfirewitch@yahoo.com)
Disclaimer: In cases of major discrepancy it's always reality that's got it wrong....reality is frequently inaccurate. --Douglas Adams
Dedication: I wrote this part because I really needed a break from working on the site. :D I want to thank everyone who's been writing to me and giving me so much support for both this story as well as the site. I really appreciate it.
"Rrrrriiiiiing. Rrrrriiiiiiing. Rrrrriii..."
Justin grabbed the phone without looking up from where his face was buried under the pillow.
"Hello?"
"Justin? What happened? We were waiting last night outside the room. We thought you would come out and tell us what happened but after an hour, we gave up and went back to our rooms."
It all came back to Justin in a second as he heard Lance's worried voice. "I'm sorry. I just fell asleep with Josh."
"So did he tell you?" Lance asked, cautiously.
Justin sat up. Looking at the other side of the bed, he got a shock. JC wasn't there.
"Justin?"
"Shit! Josh isn't in bed." Justin stood up, looking around frantically.
"Huh?"
Justin dropped the phone and rushed to the bathroom to check but that too was empty. Running in hands through his hair, Justin looked around helplessly. He picked up the phone again.
"Lance! Josh isn't here! I don't know where he went!" Justin cried.
"Ok, calm down, Justin. He can't go anywhere without one of the guards having seen him. Ask them. I'll be there in a second."
Hanging up the phone, Justin rushed out of the room. Frantically looking around, he ran towards the elevator just as Lance came out of his room. Lance followed Justin to the elevator. They saw Dre and Mike, standing there, talking.
"Mike! Did you see JC? He isn't in his room!" Justin yelled, running towards the man.
"Woah! Slow down, Justin." Mike said. "Yeah, I saw him. He's in the hotel gym. House went with him so he should be ok."
Justin closed his eyes in relief, then opened them in confusion. "Gym? Now? But...did he seem ok?"
Mike and Dre exchanged looks. Mike hesitated before answering. "Seemed is the operative word here. He seemed normal. Like yesterday never happened."
Justin didn't like the sound of that. He turned around and pressed the button for the elevator. He was going to find out what was going on with JC. There was still so much between them that they had to talk about.
Lance grabbed Justin's shoulder before he could enter the elevator. "Wait! Justin...was he...?"
Even Mike and Dre seemed to be waiting for the answer.
Justin's eyes softened with relief and thankfulness as he shook his head. "No. Thank god, no." Justin stepped into the elevator and pressed the button for the floor where the gym was situated.
**
Lonnie watched as JC worked the weight machine like a mad man. From the minute he had arrived at the gym, JC had gone from one machine to another, non-stop. That had been about an hour and half ago.
'How he hell is he going to do the concert at this rate?'
The gym was empty so when he heard the sound of the door opening, Lonnie turned to look. He saw Justin standing there, watching JC as he continued with the weights machine. JC didn't seem to notice as his back was to the door. Lonnie walked over to where Justin was standing.
"Good, you're here. You better stop him, Curly. He's been going at it for almost two hours. He's going to be too exhausted for the concert." Lonnie said softly.
Justin nodded without taking his eyes away from JC and Lonnie stepped outside the gym, closing the door behind him to give them some privacy.
Justin just stood there and watched JC for a moment. He was dressed in sweat pants and a T-shirt. The shirt was almost soaked with perspiration. Even his hair was wet. Justin walked over to where JC was, slowly. He saw the fading bruise on JC's face and the intense look of concentration in his eyes. Like as if he was driving his demons out. If only.
As he came into JC's view, Justin saw the brunet stop momentarily. Then seeing that it was only Justin, JC began again. "Hi Justin!"
Justin frowned, noting the false cheeriness in JC's voice. It dawned on him that dealing with the aftermath of the assault, was going to be harder than he had thought because JC hadn't even started to deal with it yet.
"What are you doing, Josh?"
JC laughed. Again it was just a mockery of the usual humor in the JC's voice. "What does it look like? I'm working out."
"Lonnie said you've been exercising for almost two hours. Don't you think you're overdoing it?"
"I don't feel tired. Besides, with our schedule, we are not going to have much free time in the next two weeks at least." JC replied as he continued with the forearm press.
"But after last night..."
JC suddenly stopped and got off the seat. "But I think I better stop now. Got to shower and get ready. We're leaving at 9 right? That means I only have an hour left."
"Josh, we need to talk." Justin tried again.
"We are going to be spending the next few months on a bus, Justin. We can talk then."
"You can't avoid..."
"I'll see you at breakfast." With that JC grabbed his towel and headed out the door.
Justin stood there speechless.
**
Breakfast was a silent affair. Chris, Joey and Lance continued to take sneak peeks at Justin and JC. After finding out that JC hadn't been raped, they had all been relieved. They knew that it wasn't over so easily and had prepared themselves to help out JC as much as they could. However, the JC who showed up for breakfast was not the JC they expected. This guy was smiling and seemed happy. It was not even the JC they knew. This guy seemed too happy. As if by smiling he could make them all think that yesterday had never happened.
Even Julian who had no idea as to what had happened to JC noticed something strange with JC.
"JC? Are you ok?" Julian asked.
"I'm fine." JC answered not looking up from his plate.
"Good because the last thing we need now is for one of you to fall sick." Julian said, attributing JC's strange behavior to his break-up with Justin. Justin's frown only seemed to confirm his suspicion.
"What time are we leaving?" Joey asked.
"In an hour. I need you guys packed and ready in half an hour. I'm figuring at least 15 minutes of autographs signing for the fans outside."
The guys all agreed and finished their breakfast. They then headed to their rooms to pack up. Justin was about to follow JC into his room too when Chris stopped him.
"Give him time, J." Chris said, seriously.
"He's just ignoring everything, Chris. Even me. It's like...like we never happened."
"I know. But rushing him is only going to make things worse. He has to realize for himself that something is wrong with the way he's dealing with this. JC's a smart guy. He'll will learn that sooner or later."
"I don't know if I can wait that long." Justin replied, looking at the door that separated him from JC.
"If you cared for him, you will."
Justin became angry. "That's unfair, Chris. You know I love him."
"Yeah, J. Then give him some space. Everything has been happening way too fast between the two of you."
"Fast? We've known each other for years, Chris.
"Sure. You've known each other for years but your relationship...this new one is not even a week old. That assault could not have happened at a worse time but it did and you've got to find a way to work through it with him. Just not now. He's got to want to work through it first."
"And I can't help him with that?"
"Not until he realizes that there is a problem and that he needs help."
Justin slumped in defeat. "Alright."
"Go and pack up, J. I'll see you in the bus." Chris said, patting Justin shoulder in support.
Justin looked once more towards JC's room. He then sighed and headed for his room.
**
The next few days were a whirlwind of activity. Already JC's ordeal and its aftermath was affecting the group as a whole. It just wasn't the same. Although JC tried to act like everything was fine, none of the guys could ignore the gap between JC and Justin. JC didn't ignore Justin. On the contrary, he joked around and acted as if they were good buddies. But only buddies. And even then, JC was careful never to touch Justin even in a casual way.
Everyone was aware of the tension between JC and Justin but no one knew Justin was continuously reminding himself of Chris' advice every time he felt like he was going to scream if JC withdrew from him one more time.
JC also didn't seem very keen on meeting fans. Especially when there were male fans around. The moment he saw a guy amidst the hordes of girls, he would stop signing autographs and head back into the bus or the arena. Surprisingly, Joey was the first one to make the connection.
They were leaving yet another hotel to head for the next concert venue. Joey and JC happened to leave at the same time so they were side by side, signing autographs and taking pictures with fans. Joey winced every time he heard another girl scream but smiled it off. He noticed that JC didn't offer any hugs. That had kind of been the routine ever since the assault on him. Prior to that night, JC hugged many of their fans. These days he just shied away with just a smile.
Suddenly, from the corner of his eyes, Joey saw JC tense up. He looked to see what happened and saw that a male fan has grasped his arm. The guy was rather young, maybe 17 or 18 and seemed rather harmless but JC backed away immediately and headed straight for the waiting bus, leaving the fans waiting down the row, sighing in disappointment.
Joey frowned and quickly moved on to fans on JC's side, flirting and joking his way on. He finally got on the bus, where Lance, Chris and Justin were already waiting.
"Where's JC?" Joey asked, although he had a pretty good idea judging from Justin unwavering gaze towards the back of the bus.
"Where he's always is these days. In his bunk." Lance replied.
"Did you guys notice something strange about him?" Joey asked as he sat down on one of the seats.
All three pairs of eyes looked at him with a collective but silent 'DUH'.
"Stranger than normal or maybe additional strangeness. Actually I think it is a resultant strangeness."
"Is there a point to this or are you trying out some new words?" Chris asked.
"Just now, we were signing autographs and this guy touched his hand. JC suddenly just stopped and walked in here." Joey stated.
"Maybe he's ill. He looked rather pale and he just hurried towards the back." Chris said.
"This is not the first time either. Yesterday, we were heading back to the hotel and some guys ask us for autographs to give to their sisters or something. JC side-stepped them and just walked on. I had to tell them that he was ill."
Chris frowned. "Damn! JC did that?"
"He's been rather cold at meet and greets too." Lance said. "I think he's having some anxiety about meeting people."
"Not people, Lance. He's fine around all the screaming girls."
"But...?" Chris said, waiting for Joey's explanation.
"I think what Joey's trying to say is that JC only reacts badly when there are male fans around." Justin said, tonelessly from where he was sitting.
Everyone was silent for a while as they realized what was going on.
"So what do we do about it?" Joey asked, finally.
"What can we do?" Lance asked.
"If this goes on, JC's going to freak and lose it totally one day." Joey said.
"Justin, maybe you should talk to him." Lance said, softly.
"Why?"
"Huh?" Lance looked at Justin with wide eyes.
"Why me?"
"Because you...he...you are his..." Lance stammered.
"His what? I'm not anything to him that you aren't to him, Lance." Justin spat. "He made that pretty clear the past few days."
"J, you know it's not because of you." Joey said.
"Do I? Maybe he's blaming me for it. After all if I hadn't blown up at him, all this wouldn't have happened." Justin stood up, running his hands through his hair in frustration.
"Damn it, Justin! I asked you to give him time to face the problem. Not for you to start blaming yourself." Chris scolded.
"What else can I do, Chris? That guy in there is NOT JC! He looks and talks like he is but that's not him. That guy doesn't give a damn about his fans. He's on the stage like some robot doing what he's been programmed to do. And you think it's all because he was nearly raped? Or was it because of what I did to him?"
"What do you think you did to him, Justin?" Chris asked.
"I came on to him. I made him face the fact that he was gay. Then I caved in to pressure and broke it off. I did the very thing I accused him of trying to do! Sure, he questioned my motives but I should have known that he was just looking for reassurance. Instead I act like a prick! I'm his best friend. I should have known better."
"As know-it-all as you like to act, Justin, you're in the same boat as JC. You don't have all the answers. You have to deal with being gay yourself. You're only human and you made a mistake."
Justin wanted to be able to see it that way Chris did but he was too angry at himself. The past few days of the distance between JC and Justin only made him blame himself more and more.
"This wasn't how it was supposed to be. I wish I never kissed him. At least then I would still have my best friend."
"Um, guys." Joey interrupted, looking at the aisle that led to the back.
All of them turned and saw JC standing there. His face was an emotionless mask. He had obviously heard their conversation.
"JC, you...er...heard every..."
"Yes, I heard, Lance." JC replied evenly. His gaze was fixed on Justin. Justin stared back at him wondering what was going to happen. He wished anything would happen. That JC would cry or yell or even hit him. Anything except that, 'everything is fine' attitude.
"Josh?" Justin called out, standing up.
"I don't blame you, Justin. I never did." JC stated, shaking his head slightly.
"Then why are you pushing me away? I feel like I've lost a best friend, Josh. Why can't you talk to me?"
"I don't know, Justin. I just... don't know what's going on in my head. I know I'm avoiding facing up to what's happening. I know I'm screwed up. Every guy fan I see, I wonder if he's another Caleb. I hate being this paranoid but I can't help it. It's stupid but I just can't stop."
"It's not stupid. I can't say I know how you feel, JC but I can guess. The important thing is what are you going to do about it." said Chris.
JC sat down on one of the chairs, looking down at the floor. "I know. If it makes you guys feel any better, I'll talk to someone when we get to Chicago."
"It's not us who has to feel better, JC. You have to get this sorted out or it's going to screw you over."
Lance hit Joey's arm. Joey looked confused for as second then realized his faux pas. "Sorry. Wrong choice of words."
It wasn't even funny but something in JC broke as he started laughing. Hard. Until he began crying. And then he was only crying.
Justin moved near him slowly, afraid to touch him for fear that JC will move away like he had done the past few days. He slowly touched the brunet's shoulder and slid his arm around him. JC turned into the embrace and let Justin hug him as he buried his face in the crook of Justin's shoulder.
Joey, Chris and Lance stood up and patted JC's shoulder. Then they went to the back so as to leave JC and Justin alone to talk.
** tbc...
===== ******************************************************** IF THEY DON'T HAVE CHOCOLATE IN HEAVEN, I AIN'T GOING.