Pairing: Joey and AJ
Words: counterfeit; drought; ogre; aquarius
He woke up alone, and was disappointed. He didn't tell Sarah this, but one of the reasons he'd wanted to make their relationship serious was because he'd realized, after rehab, that he liked having someone to sleep with on a regular basis. He didn't think she'd appreciate that, even though she was surprisingly understanding of the workings of his mind, for a woman.
Maybe she was in the bathroom. Not the kitchen, because neither of them were morning people. He hoped she hadn't left altogether.
AJ sighed and rolled out of bed. He really didn't like to sleep alone anymore. It bothered him, made him irritable and wakeful.
Eyes mostly closed, he stumbled toward the bathroom by memory. He'd done it blind drunk often enough.
And ran into a wall.
He stepped back, rubbed his nose and opened his eyes all the way. What the hell? Yeah, that was a wall all right. Looked for the door. No door. Just two corners on either end. What the fuck?
He turned back to the bed, and did a double-take. Not his bed. Not even a good counterfeit of his bed.
And, okay, so he'd slept in a lot of places. Touring meant hotels and buses, but this wasn't a hotel and it sure as hell wasn't his bus. Back in the day, he'd slept in a lot of strange women's beds, and maybe the occasional man's, but he'd stopped doing that shit when he got engaged. Stopped being confused about where he was waking up about the same time he'd stopped drinking.
And yet, somehow, he was here, wherever he was. AJ shrugged, scratched himself and went to look for the bathroom. At least he was used to this. And it was easier to deal with without an accompanying hangover.
Once out of the bathroom, he was mildly disturbed to not be able to find his clothes. Again, though, this wasn't the strangest thing he'd ever done, and he shrugged it off and wore some of the clothes he found in the walk-in closet. The bedroom's owner was male, larger than AJ, and obviously well-to-do, which made him think that maybe he'd crashed at Kevin or Nick's place, except he'd never been here. Still, maybe this was someplace new they'd bought.
It was the most reassuring explanation, even if he was still mildly disturbed that he couldn't remember how he'd gotten here. He hadn't fallen off the wagon, he didn't think. He didn't feel like shit, and he clearly recalled the night before. Barring having been kidnapped in his sleep by one of the guys -- again, not the weirdest thing that had ever happened to him, and yet another reason to be glad he lived in a gated community with roving security patrols -- he couldn't come up with any explanation for this. So he went downstairs to look for his host.
Chris Kirkpatrick came out of the kitchen. "Hey, Joe, I couldn't find the... whoa. AJ. Hello. When did you get here? Joey didn't tell me he was. Okay, so he didn't tell me he was having guests, much less that he knew you so well that you'd be coming out of his bedroom at eight a.m. wearing his clothes. You want some coffeee?"
AJ nodded. "Yeah. Black. I think I could use something strong right now."
"Bad night?" Chris asked, walking away.
AJ followed him. "You wouldn't believe me if I told you. So this is Fatone's house?"
Chris whistled. "Man, you must have been plastered last night. Er. Um. Don't take that the wrong way or anything. I mean, I know you're trying to. Oh, fuck it. You got so wasted you don't even know who you went home with?"
"Like you haven't done it." AJ reached for the mug as soon as Chris poured the coffee into it. He needed it badly.
"Well, yeah. But you." AJ glared at him, his best 'I'm an ogre in the morning before I've had my coffee so leave me alone' glare. "And this is me shutting up now."
AJ drank the coffee as fast as he could stand it, and held the mug out for a refill. Drank that too, and sighed. Everything was still strange, but at least he was caffeinated. If he could just get a cigarette, life would be tolerable. "No, I didn't get drunk last night. Or anything else. I went to sleep in my own bed, and I woke up here."
Chris looked at him thoughtfully. "You know, I think I'm hurt."
"What?"
"Well, I'm not sure I'm right, but if Joey's where I think he is, someone in both our bands just pulled a great practical joke, and they didn't let me in on it. And this is a classic."
AJ's eyes widened. Sarah! "You don't think..."
"We, not being on the straight and narrow, did get wasted last night, so Joey's probably still asleep. In your bed."
"Fuck. Where's the phone?"
"What's wrong? Can't have the fabulous men of NSYNC fouling your precious sheets?"
"No, you asshole. I have a fiancee. Who went to bed with me last night."
"Dude, she's probably in on it."
AJ thought about it, then groaned. Okay, so the guys maybe didn't like her all that much, but when it came right down to it, she was a lot like AJ. She had the same wild side. She was definitely the kind of person who would do something like.
There was a giggle, and a cordless phone was shoved into his hands. "Dial, man. I want to talk to Joey. This is going to be so funny."
AJ dialed and waited. Sarah answered. "Yeah?"
"Um, it's me," AJ said.
"AJ, you fucking asshole. What the fuck were you thinking..." AJ pulled the phone away from his ear and winced. He could hear the screaming still coming from the other end. He covered the receiver. "She isn't in on it."
"Sound sleeper," Chris commented.
He shrugged and waited for the screaming to stop. When it seemed to be dying down, he put the phone back to his ear. "Baby, it wasn't my idea. I don't know what's going on. I'm here at Fatone's house."
"Fucking Nick."
That was the conclusion AJ had come to as well. "Yeah. Can you give the phone to Fatone? One of his guys is here and wants to talk to him."
He handed the phone to Chris, and waited. Chris laughed at Joey, made fun of him for being so drunk that he didn't know he was being moved halfway across Orlando, and hung up. Twenty minutes later, he was on his way back to his house.
An hour later, after having spent the time calming Sarah down, AJ was determined to hunt Nick down and find some way to make him pay for this. Sarah was upset, and that wasn't very funny.
Nick, however, was nowhere to be found. AJ figured he'd made himself scarce. No matter. Nick would have to surface again eventually, and when he did, AJ would make sure Nick never did anything like this again.
****
Two weeks later, the joke has gone way past funny. AJ has woken up in Joey's bed three more times. Nick, once tracked down to his boat, swore he had nothing to do with it. Kevin and Brian were verifiably out-of-state, and AJ can't imagine Howie or his mother having anything to do with something like this, especially when it's beginning to make him more than a little nuts. And no one else would be able to get into his house. Aside from Sarah, and she left after the second time, telling him to call her when he got his act together. AJ understood why she left. He'd nearly broken his hand on Joey's jaw when he'd found out that Fatone had had the nerve to grope her. The NSYNCer had not made it any better by saying, "Well, what the fuck else do you do when you wake up in bed with a hot chick?"
Joey had apologized, but it didn't change the fact that AJ was sleeping alone these days. He wasn't sleeping very well either. Being alone made it harder, and knowing that he might wake up at Joey's house didn't make him any more eager to go to sleep.
AJ had changed the alarm codes after each incident. At the moment, he was the only one who knew the current codes, and he was reprogramming them every morning. He had additional security watching the house, but they'd seen nothing. He wouldn't let anyone come over, especially not Fatone, who'd suggested that they leave some of their clothes at each other's houses to make it easier for them when they inevitably traded places again.
AJ told him to go fuck himself. He was sleeping in his clothes, in a different room each night. He was seriously considering leaving Florida altogether, but he didn't see how he could be any safer elsewhere if he wasn't safe in his own home.
He was sleeping on the folding cot in the studio the next night he swapped.
AJ woke up in the big bed, sprawled out like his body was making up for the cramped space of the cot. Sighed, and got up and went to the bathroom. He could find it with his eyes stuck shut, and that was disturbing. There was an extra toothbrush laid aside for him, and that was disturbing, too. AJ hadn't changed anything around at his house for Joey; he didn't want to think that this would be happening often enough for him to need to.
He went downstairs, and headed straight for the coffee. The Jamaican blend he favored was in the cupboard, and he made a pot. He didn't want to think about why Fatone had his favorite kind of coffee. He didn't really want to think, period.
The car keys were on the kitchen counter. AJ scooped them up. He usually woke up earlier than Joey, so he was the one who got to make the drive over. The only part of this he enjoyed was waking Fatone up and throwing him out of his bed.
Of course, the other man was sleeping on the cot today. AJ dropped the keys back on the counter and went into the living room to watch TV. Maybe he'd let Joey come to him today. Get some petty revenge.
The phone rang, and AJ answered it, smirking. Couldn't sleep in very well on that torture device. "How's your back, Fatone?"
"It happened again?" a familiar voice asked.
"Yeah, it did."
"And you're all fucked up about it."
"No shit, Kirkpatrick."
"Have you at least had your coffee yet? Or am I interrupting you before that profound religious experience?"
"I had coffee."
"Well, then, I have a theory about why this is happening."
"Because some sick fuck is getting off on it?"
"Er, no. This isn't any of Joey's friends doing this, and even though he isn't as freaked out as you are about it, he isn't any more happy about the idea of somebody getting into his house unawares than you are. Brianna, dude. He's had the locks changed, and it's still happening. So, my theory is, it's a cosmic convergence."
"A what?"
"Cosmic convergence. See, you're both Aquarians, and the resonance between your signs..."
"I'm not an Aquarius."
"You're not? I thought your birthday was in January."
"It is. The 9th. I'm a Capricorn."
"Oh. Well, never mind then. Have some more coffee. It's the good stuff. I found it at this little place down off Oakes."
"You got the Jamaican stuff?"
"What? You didn't like it?"
"No. It's good."
"Cool. I figured that if you had good coffee you might be less likely to set fire to Joey's house one morning. It works on Justin. One box of Captain Crunch in the morning, and he's your boy."
AJ thought about telling Chris that he wasn't anyone's boy, but he didn't think Chris meant to say that, and, in any case, it was good coffee. "Thanks."
"You're welcome. So you're not making the drive over this morning?"
"No. I slept on a cot last night. Figured it'd do Fatone good to wake up on that."
Chris snickered. "He probably rolled off and slept on the floor. Hey, you want some company? I could come over."
AJ considered it. He was a bear to be with lately, and Chris at least understood what was going on. "Yeah, sure. Why not?"
"Be there in ten."
****
The next day, AJ went to the bank, withdrew cash, and left town without his cell. He shaved his beard, put in contacts, and wore a long-sleeved shirt despite the muggy weather. His mother might recognize him, but his fans probably wouldn't. He hardly recognized himself when he wasn't projecting the bad-ass image. He didn't tell anyone he was leaving, much less where he was going. In Tampa, he bought a used car for cash from the local paper and drove off. He had no idea where he was going, except that he was going to keep moving and stay anonymous until whoever was doing this to him lost him.
Four weeks went by without anything happening, and AJ was beginning to feel safe again, even though he hadn't stopped moving, charting an erratic course through the U.S. There was a drought in Texas, and he'd taken a back road through the baked hard land so deserted that he hadn't seen another car for hours. When he stopped for the night, he slept in the backseat, doors locked and windows rolled up.
He woke up in a bed.
"Fuck," he said when he realized where he was. "Fuck."
And gave up and stumbled into the bathroom for a shower, because he needed one. The grit of Texas felt sandblasted into his skin.
After the shower, he went downstairs for coffee. That was something else he missed -- good coffee. There was plenty of coffee available in his new, nomadic lifestyle, but diner coffee was uniformly strong and generic. It kept him awake on the road, and not much else. He could have sought out places that would have the kind of expensive coffee he preferred, but that would have meant standing still too long.
It felt wrong to not be moving. He wanted to get in a car and drive, but there really was nowhere to run if whoever was doing this had tracked him down in the middle of Texas.
Arms grabbed him and held tight. "AJ!"
AJ snarled and shoved. The body on him went flying. He flung himself after it, ready to beat the shit out of his attacker, then recognized him.
"Chris."
"Yeah, it's me. Who'd you think it was?" Chris picked himself off the floor.
AJ scrubbed at his head. "I just... it's been a while. I feel like I've been on the run. I thought you were."
"Oh." Chris stepped up, and held his arms open again. "Can I, man? It's just so good to see you. We didn't know what happened to you. I thought -- we all thought maybe there really was a stalker all along and they'd taken you. You -- you really need to call your mom, by the way, and Kevin. And Sarah. They. The police have been looking for you."
"Fuck." AJ felt very tired. "I didn't think anyone would think I'd been kidnapped. I just thought that if I left, maybe I could lose whoever's doing this."
Chris wrapped his arms around him and squeezed hard before letting go. "You need coffee first. Then you're going to make some calls, okay? I'm serious. People think you're dead."
AJ followed him into the kitchen. "I'm not dead."
"Clearly." Chris got the coffee out, and started making a pot. "They figured out you were gone after a couple of days. It took them a while to connect you leaving with the mysterious switching houses in the middle of the night thing, and for a while there, I thought Kevin and Lance were going to kill each other."
"Why was Kevin going to kill Lance?" AJ watched the coffee brew.
"He thought we'd done something with you. Another prank, or something worse. It took us a while to convince him that we didn't know anything about you leaving. But that just left everyone wondering what really happened. They started thinking you were dead a week ago. I've been here ever since I heard you were gone, hoping you'd just show up. And now you did, and I still don't know what's going on, but you're not dead, just an insensitive asshole who doesn't know his friends care that he might be dead, and I'm really happy to see you, so don't you ever fucking do that again, okay?"
"Yeah. It didn't do any good anyway."
"You're here and you're safe, that's all I care about."
Chris was staring at him disturbingly hard, and AJ thought maybe there was something here he should have noticed a long time ago, but he hadn't, and he was noticing now. He didn't know what to do about it though, and he was glad when the coffee maker beeped.
Chris pulled the pot off, poured a mug of coffee, and shoved into AJ's hands. "Drink that. I'm going to make some calls, and when I get back, you're going to talk to all the nice people who've been worrying about you."
AJ raised the mug to his lips, but didn't take a sip. "Chris, look, for what it's worth, I'm sorry. If I could've told someone, I would have. But I didn't trust anyone."
Chris' eyes were bright. "Trust the people who love you, McLean. There are worse things than waking up in some guy's bed."
He drank the coffee as Chris left the kitchen. It was fresh; the beans that had made this had not been sitting there for a month. He wondered how Sarah felt about him now, thought maybe she might not be too happy with him, and that it was unlikely even she had any idea what kind of coffee he liked. He thought about Joey, stuck somewhere in Texas, miles from a phone or an airport, and grinned.
AJ didn't know where he was going from here, but he thought maybe he would put some of his clothes in the closet upstairs. Just in case.
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