Easy

By: Dayse

Things had changed pretty drastically when he found out that Joey was into guys, too. And it had all happened so damn casually, so easily for everyone else, that Justin had wanted to just sit up and demand something a little more dramatic, a little more *fancy* thank you, for dropping this nice little, Joey-shaped bombshell in their laps.

But of course, he didn’t do any of that. Joey had just looked up one day, no smile on his face, and said, “I’m, like, bisexual.” and he had calmly put his head back down and gone back to playing with his drumstick, beating out a rhythm on his jean clad thighs. Everyone had just sort have stopped before they mumbled their little encouragements and ‘it’s cool, man’s before going back to whatever it was they had been doing.

And Justin had just sat there, looking at the top of Joey’s head where the hair was spiky and red-tipped. He had sat there and tuned out the conversation that went on around him, conversation that Joey wasn’t meant to hear even though he was sitting *right there*, because if Joey wasn’t making a big deal out of it, they weren’t going to either.

Justin wanted to walk over to where Joey sat, still drumming his thighs, and tell him he was maybe proud of him. Tell him that he thought that was a pretty brave thing to do, to just say it like that and shit all to what anyone else said. Because it *was* a big deal, damn it, it had to be. That’s why he hadn’t told, after all…

It bothered him. Damn it, it did. Because if Joey could just say it like that, and all the others guys were cool with it, why couldn’t he say it, too? It was easier when it was something worthy of being called an Issue. When it had metastasized into something huge in his head where he’d be shunned by family, friends, God, and everyone else in the WORLD who’d somehow find out; because the World would have been listening at the door or some shit.

And when Joey had come out, just like that, it would have been the perfect opportunity for Justin to do so, too. A simple ‘me too’ and he could have stopped stressing about it, stopped imagining scenarios while he lay in his bunk late at night, surrounded by his snoring bunk mates. But he hadn’t, he had just added his own ‘it’s cool, man’ before going back to playing Playstation with Chris.

It had just been easy that way.

Justin watched Joey idle around his room, looking for his jacket and shoes while he talked around a mouthful of candy. He was sitting cross-legged on Joey’s bed, his expression slightly pinched as he bit his lip and pulled at the covers with his fingertips.

A candy bar landed in front of him and he jumped slightly, looked down at it with a raised eyebrow. “What’s this?”

“That, my friend, is a Coffee Crisp. From Canada. And it’s…oh man, words can not even explain. It’s like coffee, and it’s chocolate,” Joey said, smiling as he continued to hunt for his other shoe. “It’s good.”

Ripping back the yellow wrapper, Justin took a bite and had to agree that it wasn’t bad. “Mmhf, good…Hey, Joe, can I ask you something?”

“They’re that big, cold country next to us, Just.”

“Ha, funny. No, seriously, Joe, can I ask you something?”

“Usually when people ask if they can ask something it means they’re about to ask something really serious. Should I be sitting down for this?”

Justin continued to chew on the candy, suddenly no longer looking at Joey. He shrugged and shoved the rest into his mouth, “It’s not that serious.”

“Well…then, what?”

"Why'd you...tell us? That you were bisexual?"

Now Joey stopped completely and looked at Justin for a long, silent moment before asking, “Is it something I shouldn’t have told you?”

“It’s not that, just…Well, why now? Why the way you did? Just…uh, why?” Justin asked sheepishly. “I mean, you just said it like it was no big deal…”

“Is it a big deal?”

“No!” Justin said quickly. “Well, yeah…Well, fuck, Joey, it just kinda surprised me.”

Joey frowned a little and pulled a chair away from a desk and straddled it. “Do you have a problem with this? Is it gonna be a problem?”

“No problem,” Justin mumbled, picking at the candy wrapper.

“I told ‘cause I was tired of not telling. I told ‘cause I kinda wanted you guys to know, and the truth is it kinda pissed me off that you just *assumed* I was straight. I mean, not that being straight is an insult or anything, but…” Joey rolled his eyes. “I told just ‘cause I wanted to, J.”

Just like that. It was just that easy for Joey. He wanted to do something so he did and it was just that easy. Justin looked at Joey with a mixture of contempt and admiration before he finally crawled off the bed and stood to go. “Well, okay. Yeah, glad you told us, Joey.”

“Hey.” Joey held his arm, stalling him from leaving. “What is it?” he asked softly, everything about his tone exuding ‘nice friend’ and ‘understanding guy’. “Talk to me, man.”

 But Justin *couldn’t* because he wasn’t Joey and things just weren’t that easy for him.

 “No,” he said, and shrugged out of Joey’s hand before he walked out, throwing the wrapper into the garbage as he went.

When Justin kissed people, he usually got a positive reaction. The smear of lipstick or blistex across his lips, the slightly glazed look that followed a really good session of groping tongues and mouths and dark wetness that left everyone a little out of breath. It was pretty much a given that anyone who kissed Justin Timberlake would walk away weak-kneed and satisfied.

 Unless, apparently, if you Joey Fatone. Then the reaction was a punch across the face.

 It had been accidental, really. The kiss, not the punch. Justin was pretty damn sure the punch wasn’t an accident at all. Accidental punches had a certain feel to them, the one Joey delivered so precisely to his jaw was all about calculation and aim and just plain power. It rocked his whole face, and Justin was left leaning heavily against a wall, his eyes wide and the pain a numb sensation all over his head.

 “You fuck!” Joey yelled, shaking out his fist, his eyes wide and angry. “Where the HELL do you get off?!”

 “’scuse me?” Justin held his jaw tenderly, his eyes slightly watery from pain. He had never really been punched before. Not that deliberately.

The sounds of the club were muted and distant behind them, the parking lot nearly empty. They had snuck out from the noise and from the watchful eyes of the bodyguards for a joint or a smoke, and Justin had just put a hand on the back of Joey’s neck and squeezed, and pulled, and their lips had met.

It had been an okay kiss, it would have been nicer if Joey had maybe kissed him back instead of just standing there in shock. It would have been a HELL of a lot better if Joey hadn’t hit him afterwards. Which was still kind of a shock in and of itself; Joey didn’t hit people.

“What are you doing?” Joey grinded out between clenched teeth, and Justin noticed warily that his hand was curling and uncurling at his side. He also noticed that Joey hadn’t wiped his mouth, his lips were wet.

 “I’m getting beat up, apparently. Ow, Joey.”

 “What are you doing?” Joey asked again, taking a step towards him, his voice a low, guttural rumble that sounded very unlike him.

 Justin backed up a little more against the wall, his eyes blinking heavily as he kept his head down. “I don’t know,” he mumbled. “Kissing you?”

 “Why?”

 “Why do people usually kiss? ‘Cause I wanted to.”

And for a long moment Justin just felt Joey’s eyes burning a hole into his head. Like Superman’s X-Ray vision and ha ha, Joey, I’d share that little bit with you if I felt it could make you smile. Then the air shifted and Justin looked up and Joey was opening the back door to the club again.

“I’m not your fucking science experiment, don’t do it again.”

Club music was loud again as Joey stepped back inside, and Justin was standing in a momentary rectangle of light before the door closed again, quietly and with a light woosh of air.

Joey hadn’t even bothered to slam it.

The thing was, there really was no way to tell Joey it hadn’t just been some sort of experiment for him, although he supposed he could see why Joey would see it that way. It had all happened kind of abruptly; amidst a cloud of pot and darkness and the sort of comfortable you could only get from getting stoned with a friend. It had just seemed so right, at that moment.

Joey’s smiling eyes, laughing with him about some weird joke that could only be funny when you were trashed; his hand occasionally coming out to touch his shoulder, or ruffle his hair; his goddamn lips pursing and moving over the tight role of a white joint.

It had just seemed so right.

But now his jaw was swollen, his high was gone, and he was feeling more than little sorry for himself. Joey wouldn’t have punched him if he had just told him the truth from the start. He brought a hand up and touched the puffy, slightly shiny skin.

Bastard. He shouldn’t have punched him at all.

After that whole thing with the club, Justin hadn’t bothered to go back inside. He didn’t think he could handle it if he bumped into Joey on the dance floor or back at the table, and those laughing eyes were gone; replaced by the anger and hurt he had somehow put there, however involuntary it had been on his part. So he had called Dre and they had gone back to the hotel and he had made up some lame excuse about the bruise on his face.

And as REM played softly in his stereo and Justin lay on his bed staring up at the ceiling, all Justin could think about, and wonder about, and worry about, was if things would ever be okay. A part of him knew it would, but it was hard to focus on that part when was so…unlike himself at the moment.

He had HIT him.

Pushing himself up on the bed and sitting with his back against the headboard, Justin just sat until someone knocked on his door. He had a pretty good idea who it was, why they were there, and what they wanted, but he wasn’t in the mood to answer.

“Justin.”

Justin just pursed his lips and made no move to get up. He looked at the wall, contemplating the pastel picture that hung there.

The knock came again, a little louder. “I know you’re in there. Here’s a tip, man, if you want people to leave you alone, don’t put the ‘Do Not Disturb’ sign on the door knob.”

Justin looked back towards the door.

“Um…” Joey’s sigh was audible, which meant it had to have been a pretty loud sigh. “Um, come on, I – “

Justin dangled one leg over the side of the bed.

“Fuck. I’m *sorry*, okay? Can you just open the door?”

But that wasn’t easy either, because if he opened the door then he would have to let Joey in and Joey would see his shiner and then he’d feel guilty and he’d apologize again and Justin would accept his apology (of course) and then he would go on to tell him everything and of course…That wasn’t easy at all.

“No,” Justin said softly. Then, louder. “No, Joey. Go back to your room.”

There was a very long pause in which Justin wasn't sure if Joey had left or not, but finally, another one of those really loud sighs sounded and something knocked gently against the door. Maybe Joey's head.

"Okay, man," he said, his voice just barely audible. "I'll see you tomorrow."

At least, that's what Justin think he said. He sat there for a long moment until he was sure Joey was gone before he got up and walked to the ice machine at the end of the hallway. His cheek was really swelling up.

"So…”

 “Yeah, so…”

 “Um, I’m real sorry about – uh…” Joey gestured vaguely towards Justin’s face.

 “What? Oh…” Justin touched his jaw with tender fingers, as if he had forgotten. “Sure, no problem, it’s cool, man.”

 Joey nodded. “Okay, that’s…um, good, sorry, but…yeah.”

 “I’m sorry about the whole…kiss thing.”

 “It’s cool.” Joey played with his towel, wiping it across his brow and chest. “We should probably, um, probably get back to rehearsal now.”

 “Yeah. Right…Uh, Joey…?”

 Joey dropped the towel around his shoulder, couldn’t quite seem to meet Justin’s eyes. “Yeah?”

 “Never mind.”

Joey had once had Kool-Aid hair. Bright, bright red that you could see from a football field away in a crowd of other heads. With hair like that you would think it’d be stiff, or brittle, or sharp and pointy. But it hadn’t been.

It had been on the tour bus. Joey had been sitting in the rec area, his head bent over a comic book and his whole upper body bobbing to the music blaring from his head phones. Justin had happened to be walking by when the tires skidded across the icy streets, making the whole bus swerve.

“Whoa!” And Justin’s hand had reached out and grabbed Joey’s head, knocking the headphones off and tangling in all that bright red hair.

Joey had laughed and grabbed his waist, two big hands circling where the waist of his jeans met the bareness of his stomach, and gently straightened him. “Watch the doo, man.”

And he had replaced his head phones and gone back to his music.

Justin wondered if Joey’s hair was still soft, if it would still fall limply in between his fingers and thread easily out.

He supposed, looking back on it now, it had been naiveté of him not to realize what it had all meant, not then, not even until a little while ago.

Why couldn’t Joey just make it easy for him? Just get it and walk into his hotel room and tell him he understood. If everything was just so fucking easy for Joey, why couldn’t he make it easy for Justin, too?

Fuck. Justin slumped.

The mixer blended the music with their voices. He stooped over his control panel and made their songs from a patch work of sounds and random beats and tempos that came from the chaos of their recording studio. Justin admired him. Admired how he could make something good out of something so…hectic. How he could pick and choose what would stay and what would go to make it all complete a perfect song.

He only wished everything else could be so simple. Maybe take that scene when Joey had told them and add in his own coming out. Take that and add the Coffee Crisp and the kiss, but take out the punch. Remove that nasty, awkward apology, too. Add a bit of music here and there. That would be nice, if he could do that. If he could cut and paste his life.

When Joey knocked at his door that night, he let him in easily, smiling even a little as he did. “Joey, what’s up?”

“Eh, nothing, just kinda bored, knew you were here. You wanna watch a movie?”

They got popcorn and cherry coke. They sat on the bed, lying side by side as Bruce Willis blew stuff up on the screen. Joey’s elbow brushed Justin’s side just a little bit as he shifted for a better position. And he laughed and threw popcorn at the television during the really cheesy parts.

This time, Justin reached out and held Joey’s hand, pinning it a little to the bed. When Joey looked over at him in confusion, Justin just smiled and leaned his head in, tilted his head to the side, and half-closed his eyes.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m, uh…” Justin tilted his head in a little closer, tightened his hand over Joey’s.

“Justin, come on…”

“Jesus, Joe!” Justin pulled back impatiently, glared into Joey’s confused, slightly sad eyes. “Why can’t I just *kiss* you, huh? Am I that revolting? Is the whole concept *that* foreign to you? Just fucking let me –“

Joey’s thumb flicked over Justin’s wrist and Justin figured that maybe that was his ‘mute’ button because he shut up pretty fast when Joey did that.

“Why?” Joey asked, sighing softly. “We’re *friends*, man, do you get that? You don’t…you don’t fuck around with your *friends*.”

“But you can punch them in the face?”

Joey flinched. “I apologized for that.”

“Right, good, so you did.” Justin frowned and tried to pull his hand away, somehow it had gotten so that Joey was the one doing the holding now.

“Do you like me or something? Is that it? Are you gay, bi, curious? What is it, Justin? You can’t just – just kiss me, or try to kiss me, and expect me to just sit here.”

“Why not? Isn’t that how this works? Isn’t that’s why it’s called ‘kissing’ rather than ‘talking’?” Justin snapped, sucking at a kernel stuck between his teeth. “What do you want me to say?”

“You are so goddamn mouthy, you know that? I’m *trying* not to fuck things up here. I mean – what, we make out now? Just like that?” Joey frowned and looked down at their hands, they were about the same size and clasped together perfectly. “I told you I wouldn’t be some experiment for you.”

“It wouldn’t be.”

Then Justin gave Joey a significant look that he hoped conveyed enough information for him to not actually have to talk. Joey seemed to get it, his eyebrows knitted together and he breathed out slowly.

“Oh.”

“Yeah, oh.” Justin was silent for a long time, and now he was looking down at their hands, wondering how they had gotten to be like that. Not just linked by some fingers and palms, but by just lying so closely, by their faces hovering close to each other’s. “I, um…kinda like you, Joe.”

“Did this happen before or after I told you guys I was bi?”

“Why does *that* matter?”

“I guess it really doesn’t.”

Justin groaned softly. “I just wanted a fucking *kiss*, Joey. Jesus Christ, I’ve never had so much talk involved in a fucking *kiss*. I mean…damn it. Is this killing the moment?”

“We were having a moment?” And a bit of teasing is back in Joey’s voice, and the familiar infliction in his tone makes Justin practically sag with relief. Because there was something kind of wrong about Joey being so serious and grown-up.

“If we were I think it has effectively been killed.”

Joey’s hand moved up slowly, and rested on the base of Justin’s neck. His thumb flicked over the soft, short hairs that curled there before it drifted down to his back and traced a half-circle. His mouth moved in and grazed the corner of his jaw, his cheek brushing Justin’s lips as he kissed him there. And it all moved so slow that Justin felt everything sinking around him in a haze of feeling and touch.

“Oh.”

Joey chuckled softly, drew his head back and smiled at Justin with his eyes, his lips curled slightly. “Yeah.” And he kissed him. His lips pressed against Justin’s lips, and his tongue tasted Justin’s tongue, and his eyes shut because it wasn’t polite to stare. His hand kept moving on Justin’s back, making the material brush against his skin.

Justin sighed and just sank against him, put a hand to the broadness of his chest and just let the kiss go on and on and on. Bruce Willis played on with them, the sodas went flat by the bed, and popcorn cooled. Justin just kissed Joey, slowly and continuously and with his eyes shut and head tilted back. Joey’s thumb rested on his chin, as if afraid his mouth would suddenly close.

They kissed, and it was just easy like that.

 The End

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