Yup, it's true -- chapter 7 is here. (Try to keep the cheering down, though, because the neighbors will complain.) Oh, and by the way, could you please write to me and tell me what you think of this chapter, and the story so far. I really (REALLY) everyone who has written to me so far -- especially dezi -- so thanks so much. My email address is denis141@hotmail.com
DISCLAIMER: I don't know any member NSYNC. (I wish!) What follows is a work of fiction, and solely a product of my imagination. As a result, it is not intended to imply anything about the person or sexual orientation of any member of NSYNC. The story also involves sex, sex between boys, and if that is not your thing, or if you are not old enough to read such things, you should stop reading now.
ALONE/TOGETHER
CHAPTER 7: What Makes a Heart Suffer Most.
"Why don't people's hearts tell them to continue to follow their dreams?" the boy asked the alchemist.
"Because that's what makes a heart suffer most, and hearts don't like to suffer."
-- Paulo Coehlo, The Alchemist
JC hadn't expected to see Lance when he turned on the TV to watch the Today show, but there he was, slouched in an overstuffed chair, his legs stuck straight out and crossed at the ankles, wearing black cowboy boots, blue jeans, and a gray v-neck sweater. Lance was being interviewed by Gabrielle Morrisey, the show's new host since Katie Couric had quit and moved to CNN.
"Well, let's get right to it, Lance," Gabrielle said, smiling and tapping the arm of her chair with a pen. Your new movie, The Ghost Road, it's a huge hit."
Lance laughed, and shrugged his shoulders and nodded his head, something that JC had seen Lance do hundreds of times before when he was embarrassed, but trying not to show it. "So they tell me," he said.
"Well, it's only been out for two weeks and it's grossed over a hundred million dollars. I'd call that a hit, wouldn't you?"
"I guess," Lance said. "But, you know what? It's not really grosses that count. What counts -- to me, at least -- is that people seem to like the film, and want to see it, and are talking about it. That's what really counts."
"And people are talking about it," Gabrielle said, leaning forward in her chair and tapping her pen again, this time on the note-cards she held in her lap. "Just yesterday, four different people asked me whether I'd seen it, and wanted to know what I thought, and how it'd made me feel."
"Well, that's a good thing," Lance said. "I mean, this war on terrorism thing has been going on for so long, and people are pretty sick of it. But I think it's easy to forgot that, if something was worth fighting for to begin with, then you can't just give up when things get messy or tough -- you know?"
"Right, right," Gabrielle said, nodding her head and trying to look serious.
"And, so, I guess if my film manages to remind people of that," Lance continued. "That there are things in life worth fighting for, and if it gives them courage to do it, then I'm real glad about that."
"Well, I think that's just great," Gabrielle said, tapping her note-cards again. "I really do."
"Thanks," Lance said and smiled.
"Now, then," Gabrielle continued. "How about those amazing reviews? Huh? That must make you feel pretty darn good, doesn't it?"
"To be honest, Gabrielle, I never read reviews. I mean, if they're bad, why be all depressed, and if they're not bad -- I don't know -- it just seems kind of conceited to get all happy about someone liking what you did in a movie."
"Well, if you don't mind, I'd like to read you an excerpt from last week's review in the New York Times, because it's really something, and I think our audience might like to hear it as well. Would that be okay?"
"Sure," Lance said, obviously not meaning it.
"Great," Gabrielle said, picking up a note-card and beginning to read.
Among the many characters in this astonishing new film, foremost is Billy Prior, a handsome working-class lad who is fatalistic, intelligent, and isolated from everything but his experience of war.
Lance Bass plays Prior, and he is nothing short of amazing. While nothing in this actor's career prepared me for this performance, one must concede that hints of it were there all the time. In film after film, Bass has always managed to be the best thing in it, always providing a touchstone of honest emotion.
To watch The Ghost Road is to watch an actor not only come into his own, but to surpass what one might have thought possible, not just for this actor, but for any actor. Lance Bass manages somehow to recreate the singular experience of an individual who reveals, in his particular story of grief and horror, the true cost and tragedy of war.
To paraphrase the haunting song by Joshua Chasez that brings this film to a soul-shattering close -- there are no words to describe how Bass manages to reveal not only Prior's courage, but also his deeply conflicted love for the men he is to lead into battle. In this movie, Bass not only reinvents the portrayal of a doomed soldier, digging down through dense layers of stereotypes, he has here recovered something of war's true horror. Billy Prior is a remarkable creation, and one that you will never forget.
Gabrielle stopped reading, and waited for a response from Lance.
"Wow," Lance finally said, tossing his head back and opening his eyes wide in mock surprise. "Was that my movie they were talking about?"
Lance laughed nervously and toyed with the ring on the chain around his neck.
"When I was making the movie," Lance continued, speaking slowly. "I think I came to understand Billy better than any other character I'd played before. And so, in the end, I felt like I really owed it to him to give it everything I had."
"Well, it shows," Gabrielle said, and then lightened her tone. "So, what's next for Lance Bass?"
"I'm off to Paris for the European premiere, and then I go to Brazil to finish my next movie, which is a remake of an old Alfred Hitchcock film, Notorious, directed by Steven Soderbergh. So I'll be out of the country for a couple of months."
"Well, Lance," Gabrielle said, "Thanks for making the time to come on the show. And congratulations on The Ghost Road."
"Thanks, Gabrielle. Thanks very much."
JC had not noticed at first that Lance was wearing his ring on a chain around his neck, and not on his finger. But once he noticed, the sound of the interview receded into the background as JC stared at his own hand and the ring still on his finger. It had never occurred to him to take it off. The ring was as much a part of him as the finger on which JC wore it, as much a part of him as the memory itself -- still clear -- of the day on which Lance first slipped it on his finger, a memory that JC always remembered as a fairy tale, a fairy tale that began with the words Once upon a time, and ended with the words, They lived happily ever after. And even though the memory ended differently now, it remained no less true, and JC could still remember it, almost as if it was happening right then.
It had started out as just a housewarming party -- nothing too complicated, just a small get-together for a few close friends so that Lance and JC could show off their new house. Then Lance woke up one Sunday morning, three weeks before the party was set to occur, and he kissed JC softly on the shoulder, and said, "I think we should invite our families. I really want them to see the house too."
JC slid over next to Lance and laid his face sideways on Lance's chest, looking up at him, and said, "I think that's a great idea. We could fly them all out for the party, and the guys too, because I think they're still in Orlando."
"Yeah," Lance said, pulling JC on top of him, and licking JC's lightly stubbled chin, because he loved the way the whiskers scratched his tongue and sent shivers up his spine. "That would be great."
Then, as the bedroom filled slowly with soft morning sun, JC and Lance's not- too-complicated housewarming party was transformed -- between laughs, long kisses, and making love -- into an all-day event for more than a hundred people, an event where there would be food and drink and music, and JC and Lance would share their home for the first time with everyone important to them and their life together.
Over the next two weeks, while JC made sure that their house and the landscaping would be done in time, Lance concentrated on making most of the arrangements for the party -- sending out invitations by email and Fedex, making airline reservations for the people who lived too far away to drive, and keeping track of the RSVP list on a big chalkboard he set up in the downstairs living room.
Lance and JC also spent hours planning the menu, pouring through cookbooks that JC had bought at Barnes & Noble. They finally settled on Mexican food for lunch, laid out buffet-style next to the pool, and a formal, sit-down dinner of grilled steaks and seafood. The dinner would take place at sunset on their big back lawn, with linen-covered tables arranged so that everyone had a good view of the ocean. After dinner, a jazz quartet would play from the upstairs balcony so that people could dance if they wanted to or just relax and sip champagne and eat dessert.
Six days before the party was set to occur, at about midnight, Lance and JC lay in bed exhausted, but excited too. Laying there next to Lance, JC wondered whether it was possible to be happier than he was at that moment, and he doubted that it was. Then JC realized that Lance had gotten out of bed, and he watched as Lance walked across the room, turned around, and crouched down on one knee.
"Is something wrong," JC asked.
Lance didn't answer, but instead extended his left arm, palm up, and said, "Come here, Josh, I want to ask you something."
JC pulled the sheet off his legs, slid his feet to the floor, and then walked toward where Lance was waiting for him. As JC approached, he reached out and brushed the hair from Lance's forehead and out of his eyes, and then gave Lance his hand to hold. Lance smiled up at JC, his eyes glistening with reflected light.
"Josh -- I've been thinking about our party, and I've been thinking how everyone we care about will be coming here -- and -- well . . . "
Lance stopped, cleared his throat again, and then spoke again.
"Since everyone who cares about us will be here on Sunday, I want to stand up before them, with you next to me, and I want to promise myself to you, I want to promise to be yours, and I want to promise to love you always, and to care for you, and promise to be your husband. Will you let me do that, Josh -- please?"
JC could not speak at first; instead, he stared into Lance's still glistening eyes, and watched as Lance bit his lower lip to stop it from trembling. JC then pulled Lance gently to his feet, and kneeled before him, just as Lance had done moments before.
"You can make your promise," JC said quietly, his voice wavering, but in no way uncertain. "But only if I can make the same promise to you."
JC had barely finished speaking these words when Lance got down on his knees, cupped JC's face in his hands, and kissed JC, softly at first, but then with greater force. JC leaned into the kiss, but then allowed its force to bend him back and on to the floor. JC pulled Lance with him, hanging on to the kiss that connected them, until both of them were on the floor, their arms and legs tightly intertwined, flesh to flesh, making love like it was their very first time, and finding in each other's touch everything they had ever thought to want.
JC still remembered making love that night, the night that the housewarming had become something so much more. It made him sad to remember it, just as it made him sad to remember the night of "the promising" -- which is what Lance had called it, saying, "That's what it is. It's not a wedding. It's a promising."
JC smiled, thinking about this, remembering how Lance was always so concerned with calling things by their correct name. "It was a promising," JC said, looking once more at his ring, and then sliding it off and looking at the inscription inside -- T.I.P.Y.
"This I promise you," JC said out loud, as if to remind himself of what the letters stood for even though it was something that he could never forget. Just as JC could never forget Lance asking their guests that night to please gather round, and to please be quiet for a moment because he had something that he wanted to say. And then Lance had reached into his pants pocket and pulled out the ring that JC was looking at now, and he slipped it halfway down JC's left ring finger and turned to JC and said:
"In the Bible, St. Paul wrote that "There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear." Before I met you Josh, my heart knew nothing but fear, and it knew nothing of love. It was as if I was living my whole life in the dark, with my eyes closed, because I was afraid of what I might see."
Lance paused, blinking back tears, and taking a long, deep breath. The night sky was a deep indigo blue, with the moon not yet visible. The air smelled liked the ocean and everyone could hear the waves crashing against the nearby shore.
"But then I met you," Lance continued. "And I fell in love, and suddenly my eyes opened, and I could see. And what I saw was the most caring, beautiful, sexy, authentic, talented, kind, loving man in all the world. I saw you, Josh. I saw you standing there, just like I see you standing here now, as the man I want to spend the rest of my life with."
"And so today," Lance said, his voice now low and emphatic, and more certain. "Today, in front of all of our friends and our families, I want to put this ring on your finger, Josh, and I want to make a promise to you -- if you will let me."
Lance paused, biting his lower lip, and waiting for JC's reply.
"I will," JC said. "Of course, I will."
"Good, then," Lance said, moving closer to JC as he spoke. "Joshua Scott Chasez, today I promise that no person or thing will ever be more important to me than you. I promise that I will be always faithful, and that I will hold you always in my heart, above all others. I also promise that what you say Josh, and what you think and feel and believe, will always matter to me more than anything else, and that I will always take your hopes and dreams as seriously as I take my own. I promise to be your partner, and your lover, and your best friend, and your husband, and anything else you ever want or need for me to be. And I promise you that if you need something from me -- anything, at anytime -- I will do my best to give it to you. But most of all, Josh, I promise that I will never stop loving you, not until the day that I die."
Lance looked at JC and watched as tears rolled down JC's face and wet the collar of his shirt. Lance could hear the sounds of other people sniffing softly, and he could see his mom standing behind JC, and she was crying too. Lance winked at his mom, and she winked back, smiled, and squeezed his dad's arm.
"And so, Josh, I give you this ring to wear as a symbol of the promises I made to you, and I hope that you will wear it always and know that I love you, and I always will."
Lance then slipped the ring on JC's finger and said, "I love you Josh."
"I love you too," JC said, his voice cracking, and barely a whisper.
JC shifted his feet back and forth -- as if trying to make sure they were still there, because he could hardly feel them -- and he straightened the front of his shirt with his right hand, the one that Lance wasn't holding.
"I want to make a promise too," JC said, speaking up so people could hear him.
JC then pulled his hand back from Lance, and took a ring from the inside pocket of his suit jacket. As JC looked at the ring that he was about to place on Lance's finger, JC marveled at the synchronicity of their having bought identical rings without having together decided to do so. It was an idea that had obviously occurred to each of them independently, and without discussion or planning. To JC, this was no mere coincidence; it was proof of how well they had come to know each other.
Slipping the ring on to Lance's finger, just as Lance had done before with him, JC surveyed the crowd around him and then looked back at Lance.
"I must admit," JC said. "That I knew I loved you long before I had the courage to show you how I felt, or to tell you. It was like a secret I kept from you, and it made me feel bad, like I was betraying you somehow, by not telling you how I felt. But my love for you kept growing, Lance, and eventually it was a secret that I could no longer keep; my heart would not keep quiet, and it insisted that it be revealed, and so it was."
JC swallowed hard and then continued.
"So, Lance, if you will let me to put this ring on your finger, I want to promise you this: I promise I will never hide my heart from you, because you are my one and only love, and the life I share with you is the only life I ever want to live."
Lance looked at JC and smiled through tears, "Yes, Josh. Please."
Hearing Lance's words, JC slipped the ring on Lance's finger.
JC and Lance then looked at each other, and said nothing more, because there was nothing more to say. A kind of solemn silence settled on the crowd gathered around them, a silence that was suddenly broken by Joey shouting, "Isn't this the part where someone says, You may now kiss the bride."
As everyone gathered around them burst into laughter and applause, Lance and JC kissed, each one holding the other's face in their hands. And despite the shouts and whooping laughter and emphatic clapping that surrounded them, the only sound Lance and JC heard at that moment was the beating of the other's heart.
JC stared at his ring, not knowing what else to do. JC felt a soft breeze blowing in through the open doors that lead to the deck and decided to go outside. Standing on the deck, JC watched as terns darted across the morning sky. It was just past eight o'clock, and it was already warm.
Maybe it doesn't matter whether I wear it, JC thought, looking at the ring again. JC knew that he still wanted to wear it, but wanting to wear the ring was not the problem for him. The problem was that JC could not decide whether he still had a right to wear it.
JC closed his hand into a fist, and felt the edge of the ring press against the inside of his hand. "I don't know what to do," he said. And he really didn't.
Maybe I should just throw it in the ocean, he thought. Or bury it.
JC looked across the lawn at the avocado tree that grew to the left of the pool. He and Lance had planted it on their fourth anniversary, planted it right where they had stood on the night they'd made their promises to each other, and exchanged the rings.
JC remembered how Lance had insisted on digging the hole for the tree himself, and he had spent the better part of a day doing so. JC had sat on the deck and watched him dig the hole. Every hour or so, JC had taken Lance a glass of sweet ice-tea, made just like Lance's mom had taught JC to do on their visits to Mississippi.
JC remembered handing Lance his fourth glass of ice-tea, and how Lance had set it down, shoving the base of the glass into the dirt piled next to the hole. Lance had then pulled JC down on to the grass with him, and crawled on top of him, pulling JC's T-shirt up with one hand, and his shorts down with the other.
"Lance!" JC yelled, trying to sound stern, but laughing instead.
"Stop squirming," Lance laughed, trying to hold JC down, while at the same time taking JC's penis into his mouth and coaxing it erect with his tongue.
It had taken less than a minute for JC's penis to become hard as Lance's mouth moved up and down on it, obviously intent on bringing JC quickly to orgasm. JC moaned and ran his fingers through Lance's dirty, sweat-dampened hair, shutting his eyes and arching his back so that his penis slid deeper down Lance's throat. JC could hear the sound of Lance's forehead slapping against his stomach, and he could feel the familiar tightening in his balls that told JC he was getting really close. JC then felt a growl forming in the back of his throat, and then there was no more holding back.
Lance felt that final swelling in JC's penis that told him JC was about to orgasm, and then -- there it was -- and his mouth was flooded with it, and he let it spill across his tongue, and loll there, intentionally not swallowing, but holding it in his mouth until JC was finally done convulsing, and his softening penis slipped from Lance's mouth.
Lance looked at JC, and his eyes were blinking, as if in shocked surprise, and his cheeks were red, and his smooth-muscled chest was damp with sweat, and red too. JC smiled at Lance, who smiled back, with lips pressed together tight. Lance then leaned over the hole he'd dug and let JC's semen leak from his mouth and into the hole. When his mouth was finally empty of it, Lance looked back at JC with a wicked grin on his face, and said, "Now it'll grow."
Looking at the tree now, and seeing how much it had grown, and how laden it was with avocados waiting to be picked, JC realized that it was not the ring that he needed to bury or discard. It was the house he could no longer live with. It was the house he had no right to anymore. The ring was his, and it still was. Lance had given it to him. But the house had never been his alone; it had always been theirs together.
JC looked once more at the tree, this time with tears in his eyes. He then put the ring back on his finger, went inside the house, and shut the door behind him.