Pairing: Lance and Chris
Words: leather; husband; cherry; journal


Chris keeps a journal.

It's bound in dark brown leather and small.  It has to be, so that
he can take it anywhere.  The pages inside are the kind that can be
removed and replaced by new ones.  He's constantly taking out old
ones and mailing them home and putting in new sheets.  At home,
he's got a couple of volumes of journals.  Not as many as he could
have, but then, the best time for writing is when he has to be both
quiet and still.  It gives him something to do instead of
fidgeting.

Chris writes.

'Nepal.  Tuesday, April 26, 1957.

As we ascend higher, tempers grow shorter.  I'm unsure as to
whether this is due to the strain of the altitude, or due to the
knowledge that we will not be ascending Everest.  Hopes had been
high that we would be able to attempt this journey, but it becomes
clearer as we progress that the fair weather we had hoped for is
not going to happen.  With the arduous three week journey to get
this far behind us, the dashing of hopes is all that much more
painful.

Our saving grace is still the Southerner, James Bass.  Devoted
husband and experienced climber, he keeps everyone's spirits up
simply by being there and not indulging in the complaining and
muttering being done by the rest of the group.  I believe I may be
growing very fond of our Mr. Bass.'

Chris looks up from the journal, to Lance, sitting there calmly in
front of his laptop, while Joey's got a neck hold on Justin, who's
been ever so quietly whining about how long this is taking.  They
were told the interview would start in 5 minutes.  That had been a
half an hour ago.  JC's pulling at his hair, which is going to look
awful by the time they actually go on.

'Yes,' Chris writes, 'very fond indeed.'

Lance glances up just in time to catch Chris's eye.  He winks and
looks back down.

Chris grins.  He puts pen to paper.  'There are signs that Mr. Bass
may return my regard.  I would be grateful for his friendship in
these difficult times.'

Lance stands and stretches as they're finally called to the
interview.  He pats Chris's shoulder as he passes to remind the
older man to come out of his book.  Sometimes Chris gets a little
lost.

Chris regretfully tucks the pen away.  He's not supposed to like
sitting still, but somehow it's easy when he's got his journal.  He
gets up and follows Lance, mentally composing his next entry.

Lance catches Chris with that look throughout the interview.  The
one that makes Lance think Chris should wear glasses and be a
professor somewhere, like he's contemplating the makeup of time.

After the interview, they're free to go and Chris no longer has to
be quiet or still.  Or watch his words, which is an issue with
interviews.  Not once they're out of the studio anyway.  He beats
his chest and yells, "The great Kirkpatrick is free!  Let the world
beware!"

Lance slings his arm around Chris's neck and drags him toward the
bus.  The two man bus.  "You're my Kirkpatrick for the afternoon. 
The Js are gonna sleep off the sniffles."  Since all three have
been feeling ill lately, Lance proposed this arrangement.  It will
give the others a full day of quiet time, and not bore Chris to
death.

Chris bats his eyes at Lance.  "I knew you were secretly in love
with me.  Tell me, is it my long luxurious hair, my highly
attractive ass or my fabulous personality that got you?"

"I liked the braids better, your ass is hidden in your baggy
clothes, and you have split personalities," Lance replies, pushing
Chris before him up the steps.

"Aha!" Chris says, over his shoulder as he pretends to resist
getting on the bus.  "You just want me for my mind!"

"Sure, I do."

"I knew it!" Chris crows as he bounds up the last step.  He throws
himself on the couch, sprawling on his back.  "Take me, Bass!  Make
me yours!"

Lance tosses a towel over Chris's face and gets himself a bottle of
water.

Chris wipes his face off with the towel.  It's hot under the lights
and he hates that kind of makeup.  Some of their stage makeup is
occasionally cool, but the other stuff just makes him look like a
really bad female impersonator.

Lance drops a water on Chris' stomach and takes a seat.

"Thanks," Chris says, unscrewing the cap.  He'd rather have
something with caffeine in it, but the water's what he needs.

Lance sighs and tilts his head back.  "Tiring, isn't it?"

"Hah!  Us real men can handle being interrogated for hours under
bright lights and not give away all the secrets stored inside our
heads..."  Lance gives him a look and Chris sighs.  "Okay, yeah. 
I'm tired."

"Being someone you're not.  It's hard."

"Oh, that part.  That's easy.  That's where having multiple
personalities comes in handy."

Lance laughs.

"It is!" Chris insists, enthralled by the idea of laughing Lance. 
"No matter who they want me to be, I've always got someone stashed
around who can fit the bill."

"I think you do, Chris.  I think you do."

Chris waggles his eyebrows at Lance.  "And just who do you need me
to be, honey?  Dashing Yankee gentleman here to sweep you off your
feet?  Hardened gambler and gunslinger who'll shoot you as soon as
talk to you unless he sees the color of your money?  Cute, fluffy
but horribly spoiled superstar?  Big daddy?"

Lance snorts.  "I want to know who you are when no one tells you
who to be."

Chris shrugs.  "How would I know?  It's not like I spend a lot of
time getting interrogated by me."  He squints, thinking of his
journal.  "Unless you mean how I make up people to be to entertain
myself.  Does that count?"

"I think so, yeah.  They're parts of you."

"Then I'm a lot of different people."

"I know."

"Then why'd you ask?"

"There has to be a default.  The one that you are the most."  Lance
shrugs.  "Besides, it wasn't a question.  Just a desire."

"A desire for what?"

"To know you."

"I'm right here.  What's there to know?"

Lance smiles a little.  "Never mind."

"Tell me!  Tell me, tell me, tell me!"

"I just want to know you, Chris.  I can't really explain it."

Chris throws himself backward across Lance's lap.  "Here I am. 
Feel free to get to know any part of me you want."

Lance rubs big circles across Chris's torso.  "Hi.  How are you? 
Who's in there?"

"Joey.  It's what's for breakfast."

Lance tips his head back and comfortably thinks of nothing, even as
he keeps touching Chris.

Chris lays his head back, daydreaming.  'Dateline: Bangladesh. 
Although we had been warned about the primitive conditions, what
can produced for even a small amount of American money is simply
fantastic.  I sit here writing this from what can only be described
as a palace.  My longtime companion, Leftenant Bass, is dozing at
my side.  I have never been more grateful to have him along than
this trip.  Not for his extraordinary shooting skills, although it
is true that the man could have a cherry off a tree at 100 paces
with ease and without disturbing so much as a leaf.  No, it is more
that I find I have grown lonely in my travels, and he is good
company.  In more ways than I had previously anticipated.'

"What're you thinking?" Lance asks, voice soft.

"Mostly?  That I like you rubbing my stomach."

Lance smiles at nothing.  "Okay."

"What're you thinking?" Chris asks.

"I like you.  I like you when you're noisy and when you're quiet. 
I like your glasses."

Chris feels his face.  "Nope, no glasses here.  You hallucinating
or something?"

"When you wear them."  Besides.  When *Lance* imagines, Chris has
glasses.

"Huh.  So glasses really do it for you.  I'm gonna have to wear
them more often if I wanna keep you."

"You're gonna keep me?"

"But not in a pumpkin shell, because those are damp.  Only palaces
for you.  Well, sometimes bedrolls on the hard ground after a long
day's march.  But palaces whenever they're available."

"Good deal.  However, you forgot to tell me I was being kept.  I
didn't know."

"Well, you weren't.  We were just comrades who'd gotten thrown
together on a mysterious and hazardous journey.  But then you
dragged me back to your dwelling and swayed me with your many and
diverse blandishments, and I found I had no other choice."

"My, my.  How bold of me.  I'm a brazen hussy-type guy."

"No!" Chris corrects him.  "Bold, yes, hussy, no.  You're...
asserting what you want in your quiet yet firm way.  And besides,
I've been wanting it all along.  You just sorta grabbed me and made
me face up to what I was really after all this time."

"Did I?  Kinda like this?" Lance leans over and kisses Chris upside
down.

The inside of Chris' head, the storytelling part, goes silent with
shock.  The rest of him, that isn't dumb at all, just
underutilized, clings to Lance and kisses him back.

The kiss finally breaks, and Lance smiles softly.  "So.  Kinda like
that?"

"More like that?" Chris asks hopefully.

Lance smiles.  "Let's move somewhere more comfortable and explore
this concept?"

"I'm comfortable," Chris says.

Lance gestures to himself, completely hunched over Chris in order
to reach.  "I'm not."

"Okay," Chris says, nodding.  "Definitely then.  Whatever you say." 
This is real, he's coming to grasp.  Not fantasy at all.  A lot
more mundane than his stories -- but a lot better, too, for being
real.

Lance stands and brings Chris with him.  "So, d'you happen to like
role playing stories?"

"C'mon, Lance.  You know I can't read."

Lance laughs and takes Chris to bed.