Summer 2000, the end of the first leg of the No Strings Attached tour.

JC has glitter on his lips, from the show or maybe after. Glitter on his lips and a glazed look in his eyes, and Lance remembers when all it took for JC to seem so content was the chance to sing and people who would listen.

There were girls backstage, there were drinks on the bus, there was whatever was in the sweet sugar tabs Chris slipped in their mouths as they rode back to the hotel. All that and it should be enough to cap off three months of touring the same way he has the last four shows. Him and JC, standing at the foot of a king-sized bed, kissing with their hands dancing on each other's chests.

Lance spreads his fingers wide across JC's breastbone, and JC nips along Lance's eyebrow, his nose knocking against Lance's cheek. They've both already showered and gotten dressed to go out. They're all going out.

"We're gonna be late," Lance whispers, and JC nods seriously. "They're gonna wonder where we are," Lance says, and JC nods again, kissing the corner of Lance's mouth.

This is all new and not in the plan and Lance has found that he handles things not in the plan best by not thinking about them at all. JC is tough not to think about, though. Lance has pretty much been thinking about JC for years, and having his tongue in his mouth doesn't make it easier to concentrate on the bigger picture, it just makes it wetter.

"JC," he says, working hard to push his lips together and make words.

"We should go, I know," JC says. He holds Lance's biceps, slides his hands up and down the bare skin. Lance traces a neat line down the center of JC's body, finger trailing from throat to waist, and JC licks up the side of his neck in return. "We should," JC breathes over Lance's shoulder, "someone might --"

"Where are we meeting them?" Lance asks, slowly pulling JC's hair into neat spikes and kissing his jaw.

"We should go," JC says, but doesn't move except to shift his weight from foot to foot and palm Lance's lower back, drawing him closer. Their hips collide and Lance closes his eyes. If he doesn't think about it, if he doesn't see it, it's not really happening. If it's not happening it doesn't have to fit into his plan or make any sense. It just is what it is. It can just be more of the same.

The problem with more , the problem with everything, is it's not ever enough now. Girls backstage, boys at the after-parties, drinks and drugs and more cities in a month than he has fingers to count. When they never go anywhere twice, it's easy to think that whatever they've done in Ohio, or Virginia, or Massachusetts, just stays there. The other times he's kissed JC don't count in the bigger picture, they just exist somewhere else, away and forgotten from where they are now.

Now they're here in Chicago, on the verge of a break before the second half of the tour, out of breath. Sweat is running down Lance's spine under his clean shirt like he's been dancing again. JC's eyes are closed tight like he's singing. "We should," Lance says.

"Someone," JC says, but their mouths are locked again and when the door opens in a crash there's no time to pull away, nowhere to go to leave this behind.

"Hey, are we --" Chris stops and stares.

Lance turns his head toward the windows, like somehow that hides what they've done. He tries to step back but JC doesn't loosen his arms around Lance's waist and so he just stands still, waits for Chris to start yelling, waits for JC to say it isn't anything at all, that there's nothing going on.

"Oh," Chris says, low and surprised.

JC lowers his head and sucks on the skin behind Lance's ear in response. Oh. Lance holds very still and waits for someone to laugh, for someone to deliver worst-case Behind the Music warnings.

The door shuts with a click. "You two..." Chris says, and there's something like admiration in his voice.

JC raises his head and Lance feels a cold roil in his stomach, something like fear at the idea that they might do this. Or that they might not.

Chris clears his throat. "Don't stop on my account," he says, and Lance can feel JC grin against his forehead. He tilts back and JC meets his eye, nods and smiles sweetly.

JC kisses him and Lance tries to forget Chris is there. Watching. Like they're some show. If he were backstage and nervous at some show that for some reason just him and JC were going to sing, JC would stroke his back and say something about how it's nice to be the center of attention, how it's nice when all those people love you too much to look away.

JC is twisting his fingers in Lance's hair and pushing his tongue in this staggered rhythm like a samba. Lance thinks of it like that, don't step on JC's toes, like all they're doing is some new dance. JC puts his hand on Lance's chin and kisses more forcefully but even that isn't quite enough for Lance to lose the room entirely. Chris is right there .

And then there's a slam, and "Guys, I thought we were meeting downstairs --" and it's Justin, Justin and his impatient must-party-now voice. Lance tries to pull back, to tell Justin they're ready to go, to pray that Chris will go along with him when he plays like it was all a big joke on JC. But JC holds his jaw in place, sucking on Lance's tongue and gripping the back of his neck.

He is immobilized by JC's mouth, which sounds like a weak excuse for doing anything, or not doing something, or just continuing to do what he's doing. If he wanted to fight it, first he'd have to claw his way out of the lacy glow of whatever Chris gave them before, and then he'd have to summon some kind of superpower to push JC away, to stop this without making JC think he didn't want it to happen.

Lance wants JC to happen. He's wanted it in this slow burn way for months until it's started to spill out in all the wrong places. He knows he touches JC in front of too many people, in ways that say too much. He knows Chris and Justin probably aren't surprised at what they're seeing. He knows all of that should be more...something.

More. He just wants more. They've sold almost seven million albums in four months, he's twenty-one and a millionaire already, he breathes and in and out and they've sold another record, and still what he wants is more. More of this, more of JC. More of it all.

Justin looks behind him out to the empty hall. Someone will walk by any second. Someone is always walking by. He shuts the door, but that's the last rational decision he feels capable of making for a while. After that he just stares. He watches JC and Lance and they're kissing, they're totally fucking making out right in front of him, and it's not even just him, it's him and Chris, and it's not like they don't know they're there.

He looks down and realizes he's dug his nails into Chris' forearm like some girl at a horror movie. He can't seem to let go, either. He leans toward Chris and whispers, "They're --"

"Shut up, J." Chris says it so low it's like Justin only imagined it, like the voice was inside his head.

Justin sneaks a glance with his peripheral vision at Chris. Chris' eyes dart over and meet his.

Chris says, "Shut your mouth."

Justin clacks his teeth back together with a little more force than he'd intended. All he'd intended in the first place was to figure out why they weren't already in the damn limo and on their way out for some more partying.

This is kind of a party. This is a really private kind of party, like even more exclusive than the kind they've all been having with fans after the show, cause those were all pretty much one-on-one, or maybe two-on-one. But still. The odds were more. Balanced. That's the word. This strikes him as being very unbalanced.

He whispers, "What are we doing here, Chris?"

"We're watching a show." Chris leans up to speak right in Justin's ear and his breath flutters across Justin's cheek. "You know how that works, right? Someone performs, someone watches. Later maybe we applaud."

"We're just supposed to." Justin is still holding Chris' arm and he tries to at least loosen his grip. "Watch?"

Chris elbows him and mouths "shut up ," and so Justin does. He usually does what Chris tells him, he just feels obligated to give him some shit about it so Chris doesn't think he's become a total fucking pushover.

Lance and JC are kissing a lot. Like, a lot. Justin doesn't think they normally kiss this much. Or at all. Not each other, anyway. The cool thing about having a bunch of best friends who get the sometimes liking guys thing but are totally professional is that no one really had to tell them it wouldn't be a good idea to bring it back to the group. It's like he told his mom. They're all kind of gay. Just not with each other.

He and Chris, take him and Chris for one. Or two. They don't kiss each other like that. Sometimes they have the long hopped-up moments when they're wrestling on the bus and Chris has him pinned to the floor, but it's not like Justin lays one on him just because he feels like it. And Chris, Chris has never made a move.

Chris is holding really really still, watching Lance and JC. JC trails two fingers down the side of Lance's neck, down his chest, down until they're woven through the belt loops on Lance's jeans. Lance gasps and one of the muscles in Chris' arm jumps a little under Justin's fingers, like a fish flopping on a line.

Justin shifts his weight, not trying to do anything except, okay, so they're watching live porn, it's normal that he's getting hard. So he sort of moves from one foot to the other and Chris' shoulder twitches, and suddenly Chris isn't like a flailing fish so much as a cat that paws at the phone cord over and over until you play with it.

Lance is running his hands up and down JC's back now, and every minute or so JC makes this noise that's kind of a giggle and kind of a groan, and their tongues are showing, for chrissakes, they're making this wet, sloppy noise over and over again, of course Justin's gonna get a little excited.

He turns to Chris to make a joke about it. Chris' lips are parted, and he's not panting exactly but he's breathing a little rough. When Justin flexes his fingers around and down to circle Chris' wrist, he inhales sharply. "Shh," Chris says, and Justin hasn't even spoken. Chris looks like one of those kids on their first trip to Disney, Magic Kingdom and hey, there's Mickey Mouse.

"Hey," Justin whispers, making a quarter turn so he's looking right at Chris' profile. He doesn't let go of Chris' wrist.

Chris shakes his head, doesn't look away from where JC is mouthing Lance's throat, Lance's head thrown back and his eyes closed. Chris' jaw is still hanging slack.

Justin raises his hand slowly, because everything in the room is happening slow like it's a video shoot with playback at half-speed. He touches Chris' face. Chris blinks and looks away from the action with a little sway, like he's gotten all spun around. Justin leans down and kisses him. No tongue, just pressing lips to lips. When he pulls back, Chris blinks again, a long, slow click of a shutter at full exposure.

"Justin?" His arm twitches and Justin smoothes his fingers through the soft hair there.

"I don't wanna watch," Justin says.

Chris' lips tremble for a pinch of a second and then his hand is on Justin's shoulder, tugging him down, one foot kicking at Justin's shin like he's trying to scale him. Chris' shoes are heavy, with steel toes and heels but even so he's shorter and it fucking hurts.

Justin takes a breath and hisses, "Quit kickin' me!"

When Chris laughs, Justin puts his hands on Chris' shoulders and pushes him back to the wall. He pins him there with his mouth and one hand around his waist, and it's just like Justin had thought it would be. Everything's finally in real time, everything's too fast to be anything but blurred.

It's like Chris is coming out of hibernation, and every time Justin wakes things up a notch, Chris takes them and comes back twice as hungry. It's like they've just started kissing and then Chris' hand is down his pants.

Chris has done this before. Justin remembers the story. One of the a capella groups Chris'd been part of in college, the kind where everybody else assumed you were a bunch of fags to start off with and then somehow on a road trip to Miami there'd been a circle jerk and then you all sort of were, so what the hell.

Chris told him the story just a few weeks ago, laughing and winking like it was a dare. It was just the two of them that night, though, so Justin wasn't sure how to make the translation. He looks back over his shoulder and Lance's hands have slid down the back of JC's pants, and he wonders who else Chris told the story to. Justin figures that's about right. Whatever this is, this thing with JC and Lance and Chris' fingers wrapped around his dick where it's trying to push out of his jockeys, this is right.

Chris has done this before, so it'll be okay. Everybody already thinks they are, anyway.

"I guess I'm late," Joey says, and he means it just like that, just like he says. But he guesses when you walk into a room where your four best friends are all trying to crawl down each others' throats, it's easy for something like that to sound like he means it in a different way.

Joey watches as Chris drags his mouth away from Justin's throat -- Chris' mouth! On Justin's throat! Where the hell has he been, Jesus, he was just running a little behind on account of his bags getting mixed up and he hadn't wanted to go out just wearing a wife-beater -- and winks lazily at Joey, like Joey's supposed to have known this is what they were doing tonight, like Joey was supposed to have come ready and willing.

He's thinks he's almost ready already, and then JC replaces his tongue in Lance's mouth with his fingers, and Lance's eyes are wide but his lips close and suck, his cheeks hollowing. "Jesus," he hears, but Chris and Justin are still playing tonsil hockey and JC's kissing Lance's neck and Lance's mouth is...busy. He must have said it himself.

JC looks up, his eyes a little glazed but they hone in on where Joey's standing with his back against the door. "Joey," he says, dark and serious, and it's not a question. Joey flips the deadbolt and pulls the chain and throws the extra security lock like a good New Yorker and JC says it again, low, hungry. "Joey, come here."

Joey goes, stripping off his tank top as he crosses the room, already ready already humming in his brain like that stupid jingle for that frozen drink mix and he's not even drunk anymore, he's not high, he's got no good excuse for doing this except of anyone in the world these are the four guys who won't need an excuse.

JC's fingers slide out of Lance's mouth with a wet, porn movie pop and Lance swallows hard, wiping at his lips. "Hey," Lance says, and his voice is husky and sexy and Joey remembers the year when Lance looked at him like he was a superhero or something.

"Hey," Joey says, and JC draws him closer with a hand around his waist. They're standing in a little circle now, hips side by side, and then JC shifts Lance a little so he's facing Joey.

Lance licks his lips and his eyes flutter down. JC nods and Joey touches Lance's chin. Lance looks up and whispers, "Are we really gonna --"

Joey kisses him gently but only like that for a second because Lance is so goddamn wet already, slick with spit, and Joey pushes harder into Lance's mouth as JC's fingers dig into his side. When Joey pulls back, gasping for air, JC moves in, tilting Lance's head the other way. Joey can see the muscles in JC's throat working as he drives his tongue into Lance's mouth, again and again. He can see Lance matching him stroke for stroke and Joey is so, so ready for this.

He groans a little and Lance makes a choked, deep sound from beneath JC's attack. "Okay, Joey?"

"Hey, I'm just happy to be nominated," Joey says.

JC reaches out blindly and walks two fingers up Joey's bare chest, twisting around a nipple. Joey fumbles to keep his balance and winds up grabbing Lance's shirt. Lance is still wearing a shirt, and that's not cool, that's not ready enough at all. Joey blinks hard, clearing his vision, and then he lifts Lance's shirt from the hem, pushing it up until JC seems to sense the shift of fabric and breaks the kiss, helping Joey tug the shirt over Lance's head.

Joey pulls Lance's mouth back to him and JC's a flurry of arms and glitter and sparkle in his peripheral vision and then pressed up against Joey's back, skin to skin, wet mouth on Joey's shoulder and his hands wrapped around to hold Lance's neck. It pushes Joey closer to Lance so their chests are touching, too, and Jesus this is so much better than going out clubbing.

Even better if they could be somewhere less vertical, like that big bed right there, the three of them with even less clothes on the bed all together. Joey's ready for that, he thinks, and when he looks up from kissing Lance's neck he remembers for the first time that they're not alone, that they're not the only ones making progress towards nakedness.

There's Chris and Justin, over there by the door. They skipped taking off their shirts, apparently, to go right to third base. Justin is holding Chris in place with one hand on his chest and at the same time trying to unbutton Chris' pants. Justin's pants are already around his knees, his briefs held up on his thighs by the elastic, otherwise hanging half off his ass. He's doing a lousy job of getting Chris undressed and Chris seems to be loving every clumsy minute of it, his neck rolled back and his hands wandering over Justin's face, his neck, his shoulders.

When Chris opens his eyes he catches Joey staring and smiles knowingly. All Joey can see is the back of Justin's head, the jerk of Justin's elbow as he finally hits pay dirt. Then Joey's distracted by someone's fingers on his own zipper and when he looks back Chris is almost laughing.

JC's hand, or Lance's, whoever's hand it is barely brushes over Joey's dick as they ease the zipper down and Joey breathes in hard and nods at Chris, then jabs his head toward the bed, then raises an eyebrow. He can't be expected to actually form sentences at this point.

Chris cocks his head like he's actually taking time to consider the damn idea, and then he nods back. Joey kisses Lance's ear and says, "Bed, come on," and Joey swears he can feel Lance's heart skip where it's pressed against his ribs. JC rises up on his tiptoes and kisses Lance over Joey's shoulder, just a quick peck on the lips, and when he slides back down Joey can feel JC's hard-on pressing into his thigh.

He draws his fingers down Lance's arm and takes his hand, turning Lance by the shoulders and steering him toward the bed. JC follows like a shadow and Joey tumbles down after Lance onto the mattress. The last thing he hears other than JC and Lance and their bodies all slapping against each other is Chris, high and breathy, saying, "We'll be with you in just a minute."

Even expensive mattresses squeak when three grown men fall onto them in a heap. Chris blinks groggily and there's a flurry of flesh and flying clothes across the room and he was supposed to get them over there, too, he remembers that much being clear and almost desperate in Joey's expression.

But he's got Justin Timberlake's eager hand wrapped around his dick, tugging and jerking like he's forgotten everything he ever learned about getting off, and it should be a bad lay, it should be an awkward, awful lay, the kind you want to forget you never tried to stop no matter how much you wanted to get some, but fuck. It's Justin with his hand on Chris' dick and he just leans against the wall and wills himself not to tangle his hands in Justin's long curly hair and push him down on his knees. Later. There's time for that later.

Right now he's getting a lazy handjob and you couldn't pay him a million bucks to be anywhere else. That's the nice thing about being a millionaire, finally. He knows what a million bucks can buy. This. His hand on Justin's waist, his nails scratching through the dark hair just above Justin's dick, his teeth biting Justin's cocky grin off his lips because really the kid's not doing it that well even if by the sound of things it does seem like Chris might be the first one in the room to actually come.

Chris wraps his hand around Justin's, finally, changing the angle, pushing his thumb under Justin's and breathing through his nose because otherwise he's gonna say some crazy shit he can't take back after they've all come to their senses. A thin line of muscle in Justin's throat hops like his heart's trying to beat right through his skin, and Justin tilts his forehead, stuttering, almost spitting against Chris' collarbone. Chris lifts his other hand, heavy like he's dragging weights on it, and nudges Justin's chin up until their cheeks are touching.

Justin can't raise his eyes off their fingers on Chris' dick and Chris thrusts, he can't help it. Justin says "fuck" low and long and amazed like he's figured out something else he has to get good at real quick, and Chris comes. Fuck. Fucking Timberlake, Jesus, he can suck and he's still a fucking magical mystery tour and Chris is gone, gone gone gone, thinking of all the ways they can do this, all the things he can teach Justin about how to do this right, and he should've known better than to think they could do this and anything would go back to being the same.

Justin gasps against his neck, pushing his hard dick against Chris' belly, and he whispers Chris' name, whimpers it really, and, fuck. Chris pulls him into a hard, rough kiss, holding him by the hair until his lips hurt. Under the rush of blood in his ears, Chris can hear a rhythmic squeak and overlapping moans, and when he opens his eyes and lets Justin kiss down his jaw and across his throat, he can see a mess of legs and backs and Joey pushing up on one elbow, giving him an angry look.

Right. Joey. Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Joey and JC and Lance. Chris doesn't need someone say it out loud to know that this is a thing they've got to all do together if it's not going to fuck things up. He's the one who let it get this far, who told JC and Lance go when he probably should have said stop, and it's just that he's never been one to slam the door in opportunity's face.

It's one hell of an opportunity they've got knocking, and he twines his fingers around Justin's and holds his face with their linked hands, kissing him deep and slow and gentle this time, real like he's wanted for way too long and it's scary as fuck to do it like this, now, here, when Justin might be able to tell just how much he means it.

He pulls back and Justin follows his mouth like he can't stand to let go. Fuck. Justin hasn't even noticed there's anyone else in the room since he first kissed Chris and Chris has to know Justin'll come back when they're done. Chris is pretty sure. He probably will. Chris rubs his thumb over Justin's lips and says, "They're waiting for us."

Justin sucks Chris' thumb into his mouth just long enough that when he pushes it back out his breath is cool like a breeze across the wet skin. "Who's waiting?"

Chris chuckles. "Them," he says, turning Justin's head to look over his shoulder. "The naked guys on the bed."

"Oh," Justin says, sounding a little shocked. "They're." He turns back. "Really?"

"Really," Chris says. "C'mon."

"But I --" Justin stops. "Do you." He bites his lip and it shouldn't be as fucking cute or beautiful or heartbreaking as it is and is Chris an idiot, what the hell is he doing here, Jesus, to let that go for a minute. "Really?"

He sounds a little excited and Chris smiles hard. Maybe he'll pick up some tricks along the way. "All for one and one for all," he says lightly, and Justin grins, pulling his shirt over his head and kicking off his shoes and pants all at once.

JC can tell Lance is still thinking too much, and for a second he wishes they were alone so he could just whisper in his ear how everything's going to be all right, how there's nothing wrong in making each other feel good. But they're not alone, and that's kind of the point. Lance would never do this if they were alone, that's what JC has finally realized after all these nights by themselves when they never got anywhere near this far.

It took Joey just to get Lance's shirt off. And even now, when they're all finally on the bed, when it should be clear that if this is a mistake it's one they're all going to make together, even now when JC eases a finger under the waistband of Lance's pants, Lance sucks in a breath, holding his stomach tight like he's scared of what JC will think or do now that he's got him there.

Joey bends his neck and kisses Lance just below the belly button, the edge of his goatee scratching the back of JC's hand. JC feels a touch at his elbow and it's Justin, Justin who's already totally naked like it's just a day at some nude beach. JC smooths his palm over Lance's stomach and reaches up to Justin for a kiss. He loves Justin like this, not the nude beach part because they've never done that, but Justin sure and smiling and so ready for anything they might dream up. Justin wears curious well.

Justin kisses him sloppily, mouth wide open, tongue moving fast, and pulls back before JC's even caught his breath. He grins and from behind Joey, JC can hear Chris groan a little. Chris' hand is on Joey's neck, and Joey is still licking Lance's stomach except he's made a little progress down, the pants unbuttoned but not pulled off. Joey sucks hard on Lance's hipbone and Lance arches his back off the bed, choking down a noise deep in his throat, and Justin whispers, "Wow." JC nods and presses his lips to Justin's ear, tonguing lightly. Justin sighs and says, "Can I?"

"Take his pants off," JC says, and Justin flushes down his chest but moves closer. Chris catches JC's eye and he doesn't smile, exactly, but he nods like he approves. Joey kisses his way up to one of Lance's nipples and JC scoots back and bends to take the other. Justin elbows him as he unzips Lance's pants, and JC feels the bed dip as Chris climbs up to the pillows and settles in against the headboard.

Someone's hands are on Lance's ankles, but he doesn't know whose. There are fingers in his hair and teeth on his chest and someone's hair brushing his stomach as someone's mouth swallows him again and again. He thinks it's someone else's tongue on his balls, but he doesn't know, he can't keep track of all the body parts, he can't see anything because he can't remember how to open his eyes or if he even wants to, this is almost too much already.

There aren't an infinite number of variables, he tells himself as someone breathes hot in his ear, there are only five of them altogether, only ten hands and his are pinned up above him, so only eight hands, only four other dicks to slide against his thigh or his ribs, only four mouths sucking and licking. Numbers float through his mind like a chant, like a song, math the only thing standing between him and an embarrassing howling orgasm.

It's been an exponential year, numbers that rise and soar and tower above the rest of the world, and there's no way it makes sense as a whole so he breaks it into pieces and then divides again, seven million in four months, two albums every three seconds, he figured it out last week on the bus. Every three seconds of mouths on his skin, fingers stroking him, they sell another two records, an hour of this and it's almost twenty-five hundred, and he has no idea how long they've been on the bed, how long since JC kissed him, since the bus, since the show, since they met. Two albums every three seconds split five ways and a thumb presses into him and he comes, gasping and being kissed and trying to say all their names at once.

 

END.

 

Credits: The first time I heard the indigo girls, in a crowded room full of college kids, somebody said, "Aren't they gay?"

"Sure," someone else said. "But not with each other."

 

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