“Right now, you could knock me over with a fucking feather.”

AJ chuckled and shifted the phone to his other ear as he opened his refrigerator and pulled out a soda. “Told you.”

“Yeah, well, fuck you too.” Marshall replied, a twinge of humor in his voice.

“Aw, that wasn’t nice baby. Come on, you didn’t really expect me to let that one pass me by did you?” AJ replied with a smile on his face, not taking Marshall’s jab seriously.

“Oh no, couldn’t have that. Just cuz I’m sitting here with my head about to explode in shock, why the hell not laugh at my expense?” Belying his words, he smirked as he heard AJ chuckle again over the phone line.

“As long as you understand.” AJ paused as he walked into the living room and sank down onto the couch, taking a sip of his soda before grabbing the remote to flip the TV on. “I still don’t know how you didn’t see it coming.”

“Because I still can’t figure out why exactly I’m so fucking famous. Yeah, I’ve got skills. I’m not braggin’, it’s just a fact. But this…number one on the charts and I wasn’t even out a whole week? It’s ridiculous.” Marshall said, sinking back against his chair by the pool.

“You’re the whole package. Skills and looks, and you’re real. That’s what gets to people the most, or at least as much as your talent.” AJ asserted.

Marshall snorted and rolled his eyes. “Yeah, well, it’s still fucking ridiculous.” He paused to watch Hailie playing in the shallow end of the pool with a beach ball, then added, his voice taking on a somber note, “I keep waiting for the day everyone figures out I don’t deserve all this and it all gets yanked the fuck away.”

AJ’s voice sobered too. “I know. I wait for the same thing. Yeah, me and the guys have talent and looks and shit, but really, what the hell makes us so different from all the other groups out there like us that have all that stuff and still don’t make it?”

“Exactly. It’s fucked up.”

“Exactly.”

For a minute, they both sat there lost in their own introspections on how they got to the point they had, then Marshall suddenly chuckled.

AJ’s lips twitched as he asked, “What’s so amusing?”

“Us. We’ve both got the world at our feet, and instead of enjoying it, we’re sitting here being all philosophical about it.”

“Philosophical isn’t your thing huh?” AJ replied, flipping channels, finding nothing worth watching on.

“Not unless I’m stoned on weed, and fuck, haven’t done that in a long ass time.” Marshall answered.

AJ rolled his eyes. “Yeah, because when you’re high on pot you have such deep thoughts and have all the answers to the world’s problems.”

“Damn straight.” Marshall said, with a nod of his head.

AJ snickered. “Babe, there ain’t a damn thing straight about me. You should know.”

Marshall bit his bottom lip to stop a groan at the suggestive tone in AJ’s voice. “Fuck. Don’t start that shit. Hailie’s only twenty feet away. Don’t need to be explaining my sudden erection to my six year old daughter.”

AJ laughed, picturing that conversation in his head. “Okay, then I won’t mention that this Saturday’s the day then either.”

“The day? For…what exactly?” Marshall asked, having an idea, but not wanting to get his hopes up.

“Oh no. Wouldn’t want to bring anything up that might, you know…bring things up.” AJ said, laughing at his own lame joke.

“Ha, ha. You’re a laugh a fucking minute.” Marshall said sarcastically. When AJ only laughed harder, he commanded firmly, “Talk.”

“After you tape the movie awards, I’ll be at your house waiting…to collect on the bet.”

“Fuck.”

AJ smiled at the lust Marshall had managed to convey in that one word. “Oh, there’ll definitely be some of that.”

Marshall bit back another groan and asked, “Can’t you give me just a little hint at least? It’s still three goddamn days away.”

AJ shook his head, clicking the TV back off after discovering that not a damn thing worth watching was on. “Nope, no can do. It’s a surprise.”

“Asshole.” Marshall muttered under his breath.

“Yeah, but you love my asshole, don’t you Marshall?” AJ asked in a husky voice, deliberately trying to arouse the other man.

That time Marshall had to adjust himself on the chair to hide the swell in his swim suit. “You are so fucking going to pay for this.”

AJ smiled, able to tell by Marshall’s tone of voice that he’d gotten to him. “I’m counting on it.”

Before Marshall could reply, Hailie jumped from the pool and ran at him, leaping on top of him and soaking him and the chair with pool water. With a loud grunt as the air left his lungs, he wrapped his free arm around her so she wouldn’t fall off his lap.

AJ stood and walked out his back door to roam around his yard as he talked. “What was that?”

“My daughter. Figured since I wasn’t in the pool, she’d bring it to me.” Marshall answered dryly.

AJ laughed. “Good for her.”

“You love laughing at my expense, don’t you?”

AJ laughed again. “It’s my second favorite pastime.”

“And you’re first?”

AJ cleared his throat. “She still on your lap?”

“Yeah, I’m getting the puppy dog eyes and everything. Wants me in the pool.”

“Then you don’t want to know my favorite pastime right now.”

“Oh.” Marshall responded, trying desperately not to think about what that probably was then.

Hailie chose that moment to speak up. “Who’s on the phone daddy?”

“Alex, baby.”

Hailie squealed. “Can I talk? Please? Pretty please?”

Marshall chuckled. “Sure, baby. Just give me a minute. Go get us something to drink, ok?”

Hailie jumped off his lap with a squeak of delight and raced for the house. Once she was inside, Marshall commented, “You made a huge impression on her. She keeps talking about all the fun we had when you were here.”

AJ’s face lit up at that. “She made a huge impression on me too. I love that little girl.”

Marshall smiled in spite of himself, trying to tell himself he shouldn’t be getting all mushy over AJ loving his daughter, but he did anyway. “It’s too bad you couldn’t stay longer. I want you here…with us.”

AJ sighed. They’d had this conversation the day he left too. “I know. But I had stuff I had to do out here. Gotta stay in the public eye and avoid all the questions about the next CD. I’m so sick of this shit.”

“Then ditch it and come back here.”

There was a pause, and when it became apparent that AJ wasn’t going to reply, Marshall prompted, “Talk to me.”

AJ sat down in the grass under the shade of a tree a short distance from his house. Swallowing the lump in his throat, he admitted, “I don’t think I can do it anymore, Marshall. Brian’s been calling me, leaving messages on my machine that I haven’t been answering, bugging me about committing to a date to go back into the studio again, but I just…can’t. I can’t deal with Kevin and all that shit again. It’s too hard.”

“Damn.” Marshall said. He’d seen it coming, but somehow still hadn’t been prepared for him to actually come out and say it.

“Yeah.” AJ agreed.

“So, is that the end for you guys?”

AJ blinked back unshed tears threatening to fall, and answered, “I…I think so.”

Marshall was at a loss for words. He could feel AJ’s pain, even over the phone line and wanted to say something to make it better, but couldn’t think of anything. “I don’t know what to say.”

AJ smiled ruefully, his watery gaze focused on a bug crawling across the ground in front of his feet. “How about, you’re making the right decision?”

Marshall sighed. “Would if I knew that you were. But I just…”

When he trailed off, AJ prompted, “What?”

Marshall took a deep breath and said the words he was fairly sure AJ didn’t want to hear right then, but needed to. “You should tell them. Get it out in the open. It might make a difference.”

“I don’t see how. I’d still have to see him, deal with him. Them knowing isn’t going to change that.” AJ replied bitterly.

“Alex…”

AJ stood up with jerky motions as his irritation with this familiar topic grew. “Don’t. Don’t Alex me. Don’t tell me I need to tell them. I don’t have to if I don’t fucking want to. I can’t figure out why the fuck you keep hammering away at this. If you cared about me, you’d just give me your support and back the fuck off.”

Marshall clenched his hand into a fist as he stood too and began pacing. He closed his eyes for a second and took a deep breath, telling himself not to get pissed off at what AJ was saying to him, that he was just lashing out and didn’t mean to be an ass. It was still a near miss to keep the irritation out of his voice when he finally spoke.

“It’s because I care about you that I’m saying this. I know you don’t want to hear it, but you need to. You need to tell them. Eventually, when none of them are speaking to you anymore because they think you broke up the group for selfish reasons, you’re going to care. I know you are. You know you are.”

Silence filled the line. Marshall saw Hailie walk back out of the house out of the corner of his eye. He turned to her and shook his head, motioning for her to go back inside for a minute. Gratefully, she somehow sensed the seriousness of the moment and did as he asked.

Finally, almost too quietly for Marshall to hear, AJ said, “I know. You’re right. I just…I don’t know how to say it. How to tell them.”

“You just do. It’s not your fault. You don’t need to sugar coat it, not that there’s a way to anyway, but it’s not your job to soften the blow. Kevin fucked up. Kevin is going to have to deal with the consequences. You shouldn’t have to.”

AJ took a deep breath and closed his eyes. “Okay.”

“Okay?”

“Okay…I’ll tell them.”

Marshall felt the relief wash through him. He knew AJ needed to do this to truly move on. “Good.”

“Thank you. For making me listen, and for not reaming my ass when I was yelling at you just now.”

Marshall smiled faintly. “You’re welcome. And you owe me. I don’t do calm and reasonable for just anyone you know. Lucky for you, you’re not just anyone.”

AJ smiled too. Both at the truth in those words and at the caring tone in Marshall’s voice. That was the closest Marshall had ever come to an, ‘I love you,’ yet, next to telling him he was one of the most important people in his life. AJ wanted badly to say the words right then, to let Marshall know just how much he meant to him, to say, ‘I love you,’ but he didn’t dare. He remembered the look of fear on Marshall’s face in the bedroom in Detroit just a few days ago and didn’t want to risk him running scared if he said it again.

So, instead of saying the words he most wanted to, the one’s threatening to fall out of his mouth any moment, he settled for saying softly, “I know.”

Marshall turned to his house and chuckled when he saw Hailie standing just inside, bouncing with energy, waiting to be given the okay to come back out. “Someone’s anxious to talk to you. In the mood?”

“For Hailie? Always. Put her on.” AJ said without hesitation.

Marshall’s smile broadened. “In case she hangs up on you after you’re done, I’ll talk to you tonight, alright?”

AJ nodded to his empty back yard. “Sure.”

Marshall motioned for Hailie to come back outside. “And Alex?”

“Yeah?”

“I miss you.”

AJ smiled. “I miss you too.”

A couple hours later, AJ was doing laps in his pool, thinking over his conversation with Marshall and trying to figure out how he was going to tell the guys. First, about Kevin, and second, that he was leaving the group. His stomach was twisted in knots even thinking about it, and the rigorous exercise he was punishing his body with wasn’t helping to relieve it at all.

The phone ringing from his patio table startled him out of his rhythm. He debated letting his machine get it, then decided against it, hoping whoever it was might distract him from his thoughts, at least for a little while.

Climbing out of the pool, he grabbed his towel on the way to the phone and wiped the water off his face and out of his hair. Picking the phone up, he answered it as he continued wiping down the rest of his body.

“ ‘Lo.”

“Aje?”

AJ’s stomach knotted up. Brian. So much for the call distracting him.

“The one and only.”

“Oh. For a second you sounded like Marshall.”

“Nah, he’s in Detroit with Hailie.”

“Oh, yeah, that’s right. So, did you go? Did you meet her?”

AJ smiled, plopping down on a nearby lawn chair. “Yep, sure did. She’s so sweet. And outspoken, just like her dad.”

Brian smiled in spite of himself. It was obvious that AJ was taken with the little girl. “That’s great.”

An awkward silence fell over them. AJ hated it. Before, they had never lacked for things to talk about when they got on the phone. He thought again how right Marshall was. He needed to tell them. It was already destroying his friendship with Brian.

“Aje…”, “Bri,” they said at the same time.

They both chuckled, then AJ said, “Go ahead.”

Brian took a deep breath and said, “We need to get together. All of us. Talk this out. I know you don’t want to. You’ve been avoiding…”

He was cut off by AJ’s quiet, “I know.”

There was a short pause, then Brian asked, “So…you’ll come?”

“Name the time and place.”

“My place here in LA, Sunday, say…three o’clock?”

AJ swallowed. “Okay.”

“Aje?”

“Yeah?”

“Thank you.”

“You may not feel that way after Sunday.” AJ warned.

“As long as the air gets cleared and we come to some sort of decision about what’s happening…or not happening, I will.” Brian said confidently.

As they said their goodbye’s and AJ clicked his phone off, he wished he could be that confident.


Chapter Thirty-Eight
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