The soup-bowl balances precariously on Brian’s knees, as one hand is occupied with the spoon, and the other is curled protectively around his lower abdomen. Justin tries not to watch as he eats, but as Brian bites back a gasp at every slight movement he makes, Justin can’t help sneaking careful glances. He knows Brian is aware of it, because Brian always knows when someone’s watching. But Brian doesn’t say anything, and in return, Justin isn’t stupid enough to offer help, despite the way Brian’s hand trembles as he slowly lifts the spoon to his mouth.

Justin listens to the scrape of metal against china, worries the thousand-dollar sheets between his fingers, and wonders, ‘what now?’ He hadn’t really thought beyond the point of being allowed back in, worried it might jinx his chances of success.

Which is funny, since he knew when he was seventeen and fucking clueless, that when push (Brian) came to shove (Justin), that shove would inevitably win. He can close his eyes and see Brian sprawled naked on the old chaise, hear his own voice telling Brian that he couldn’t push Justin away ‘for his own good’. Persistence is the key to everything with Brian. Something he keeps forgetting now.

Brian will always keep pushing, but it scares Justin how close he came this time to finally walking away.

He’s tired of having to fight, all the fucking time. Michael and Ben get to play happy families, and okay, maybe they have their problems, but they get over them. Him and Brian just implode, over and over, and it doesn’t seem like too much to want life to be uneventful for a while.

He wants to be able to harass Brian until he admits to ‘kind of liking Justin’, again. He wants to have Gus for the weekend, and to try to be disapproving as Brian teaches his son how to say ‘Munchers’. He wants to persuade Brian, through use of copious blowjobs, that the boss can definitely take a day off to stay in bed.

He doesn’t want Brian to have to stay in bed because he’s too sick to do anything else.

That it’s not really his fight this time is possibly the most frightening part of all. It’s not that he doesn’t believe in Brian, but he wonders how carefully Brian really considered getting on a plane to Ibiza.

He’s never been in this position – being the one to take care of someone. All his experience is from the other side of things, and he doesn’t have a clue what to do, apart from love Brian, and that hasn’t always turned out so well under normal circumstances. He’s hyperaware that one wrong word, and he could be on his ass outside the loft again. He wonders if this is anything like how Brian felt after the bashing.

The clatter of plates and quiet cursing make Justin look back at Brian. Soup slops over the sides of the still almost full bowl as Brian lowers it onto the cabinet.

Justin isn’t even considering saying anything when Brian looks up at him and says defensively, "I’m only going throw to it up again in ten minutes anyway."

Justin just looks at him. He doesn’t want to argue. He hadn’t even wanted to yell the way he had to get himself back through the door, had promised himself he wouldn’t get mad just because Brian was a stupid son of a bitch, because he was also a freaked, insecure son of a bitch.

But maybe it was for the best since Brian responds to shouting and insults, accepts them in a way he never would anything that resembled pity to him. Justin does know the Brian Kinney manual. He’d just temporarily misplaced it.

Brian is watching him warily and Justin has no idea what it is he’s waiting for. More shouting maybe, only there’s no one to be angry at, despite how all-over furious Justin feels. For Justin to burst into tears possibly, but Justin won’t do that in front of Brian, even if several of their friends would. Maybe he’s just waiting for Justin to say *something*, but since Justin can’t think of the right thing to say, he’s just going to stay quiet.

So he turns away from Brian’s tired gaze, picks up the dishes and carries them out to the kitchen. Washes them and clears up. Checks that the alarm’s on. Switches the main lights off. All routine, even if it has been displaced considerably earlier into the day than usual.

Brian’s curled on his side in the middle of the bed, one hand clutching loosely at Justin’s pillow, when Justin returns. He toes his sneakers off and crawls onto the mattress, careful not to jar Brian, though he knows by his breathing that he isn’t asleep. He lays his head below the curve of Brian’s arm. Brian shifts and threads his fingers through Justin’s cropped hair.

Brian doesn’t open his eyes or stop stroking Justin’s scalp as he says, "My dad’s laughing right now. The ‘fucking fairy’ gets what he deserves."

"Don’t…"

"My mom would agree, if she knew. An eye for an eye; a testicle for being a disgusting abomination."

"You don’t believe that."

"No. But I know that’s what they’d think."

Justin shakes his head and reaches out because he can’t not touch any longer. He smoothes out the lines in Brian’s forehead with his thumb, strokes the shadow of stubble on his cheeks. Brian kisses the tips of his fingers as they linger on slightly chapped lips.

"Fuck ‘em. They’ve never even known you," Justin whispered.

He shifts himself closer until their noses and foreheads touch, and their breath mingles between their parted lips. Justin imagines somehow breathing his healthiness into Brian.

"I can’t ask you to stay," Brian says quietly.

And the answer to that is easy.

"You never have to."

Brian pulls Justin tightly against his chest. Justin strokes his back and breathes in the warm scent of Brian’s skin through the open neck of his shirt. Maybe this is all he can give. Maybe it will be enough.