Up Against the Wall
by Kaneko

~..~

Standin' next to strobe lights
Dancing hot, looking tight

~..~

It was JC's idea to go clubbing. "Celebration!" he said to Chris. "Fuck-you-Lou and-your-little-dog-too celebration!"

JC instigating anything was novel enough that Chris agreed to go, even though they'd found out about TransCon back in August, and it felt like they'd been having 'Fuck you Lou' parties for months.

It wasn't until Tiny cleared a path for them, revealing an honest-to-God disco ball in the middle of the ceiling, that Chris remembered JC had the taste of an 80s teenager.

"How cool is this!" JC said. He turned his face up towards the disco ball like he was sunning himself.

Chris sighed. For JC it was a novelty. For him it was a second taste, like a bad hot dog. And he didn't even like hot dogs. He watched light flicker over JC's hair to the beat of some weird Cyndi Lauper remix, and wished hard that he'd gone over to Justin's place, or stayed at home, or, really, done anything that didn't involve dancing to Cyndi Lauper. He looked around for the bar. He had a feeling he was going to need beer. Lots of beer. Or wine coolers if he were really going to get into the spirit of the thing.

JC grabbed his shoulder before he'd taken a step. "Hey check it." He pointed over Chris's shoulder to the dance floor. "Lance is here."

Chris turned, surprised, but sure enough, Lance was by the strobe lights, dancing with a bunch of girls. The dorkiness of his moves matched the dorkiness of the music.

Two step

~..~

The first time Chris ever saw Lance, he said, "I'm not sure about this one."

They'd all taken turns peeking around the open door of Lou's office. Chris had only looked for a second, but it was enough to see a glimpse of buttoned-down shirt. Even if Lance's mom hadn't been in there with him, it would have been painfully clear that Lance was going to need taking care of.

"I think he looks okay," Joey said. But that didn't mean anything. Joey always thought the best of people, and he'd argued that Jason was committed to the band right up until the day Jason quit.

"I think he looks like a fucking lot of work," Chris said.

Inside the office, something smashed. Justin ducked his head back from the door. "Shit, he knocked Lou's coffee over!" he whispered. He stuffed his sleeve into his mouth to muffle his giggles.

It's time to make my move

Chris wasn't one to fuck around when something needed to be said, so he decided to corner Lance in the bathroom half an hour after the meeting. He turned on the hand dryer while he was waiting; he and JC hadn't been able to afford heating for a while.

"Hey," he said as soon as Lance came out of the cubicle. "Lou thinks you have the sound we need."

"Yeah? He likes me?" Lance said. He flushed, the whole back of his neck going pink. "Cool." He smiled at Chris in the mirror - friendly and stupid as a puppy.

Chris twisted his hands underneath the dryer, wanting to feel warm everywhere at once. He thought about how much work the band was going to be, how little they could afford someone fragile in it.

"Look," he said. "You don't-" he stopped. "Look. We had to dump the last guy, so I want you to know upfront. This is going to be a lot of hard work. And if you're not tough enough to do it day after day after day, then we don't want you here."

Lance's smile crumbled a little, and Chris had a sudden, horrific image of Lance breaking down and crying like a girl, and Chris having to dry his tears with toilet paper.

His nerve deserted him, and he stepped back. "I just want to be honest with you," he said uncomfortably.

Lance didn't reply. He had strange eyes, Chris thought - pale and green like a lizard's. They flickered away from Chris's in the mirror. Chris sighed and moved his hands away from the dryer reluctantly. He was terrible at this, he thought. He wished he'd gotten JC to do it, or Joey.

"Lance," he said. "Don't- Don't cry." Lance looked back at him and Chris patted his shoulder awkwardly. "I'm sure you'll do fine."

The after-hours spot Is where I'm going to

Chris wouldn't have thought it possible to look a hundred per cent gay surrounded by hoochies at a nightclub, but Lance somehow pulled it off.

"It's good to see him out," JC said. His words were a little slurred, and Chris wondered exactly how much JC had had to drink before they'd arrived. He looked at JC's quiet face and couldn't bring himself to ask.

"Yeah," he said instead. Because it *was* good to see Lance going out - doing anything but staring at contracts and talking to lawyers.

"So J and I were talking," JC said. He smiled at Chris, and his eyes were glassy. "Do you think Lance seems different?"

Chris sighed. "Different how?" he said. If any of them were different, it was bound to be Chris's fault: Chris had been the one who told them they could trust Lou, Chris had been the one who told them to sign, Chris had been the one who thought he knew what he was doing. He wondered sometimes if he'd ever trust anyone but the four of them and his family again. He closed his eyes.

"Um. Just..." JC was quiet for a moment, and Chris opened his eyes again to look at him. JC had ordered a wheatgrass and vodka or something equally revolting, and he was playing with the green umbrella in the glass, twirling it between his fingers, around and around until Chris was dizzy from it. "Just. I don't know. Different."

Chris looked at Lance. He used to pride himself on reading people, but he hadn't read Lou - not at all. "I don't see it," he said.

'Cause I've got to have some more I'm looking for somebody to hit the dance floor

Lance needed a lot of taking care of when he first arrived. At the very start, he couldn't even dance - not even normal, club-type dancing. He spent long afternoons learning steps with JC, and even longer evenings practising them by himself in the attic.

In May, they went to a bar owned by one of Joey's friends. It was old, but the beer was cheap and the girls were mostly pretty. Chris set Justin and Lance up by the pool table, and told them they weren't allowed to play for money with anyone, and he really fucking meant it - especially you, Timberlake. With Chris's luck, Justin would beat everyone, then get beaten up.

They'd only been there an hour when Chris looked up, and saw Lance backed up against a wall, one hand raised placatingly. A huge guy towered over him. Justin was nowhere to be seen.

"Oh *hell* no," Chris said. Everything seemed to slow down for a second, while Chris pictured Lance's mom kicking his ass for letting her son get hurt, and kicking his ass again for taking her son to a bar. Then Justin's mom kicking his ass too, for good measure. Any way he looked at it, there was going to be pain in his near future. It seemed to take hours to get from his end of the room to Lance's.

"-looking at me," the guy was saying when Chris got there.

"Hey!" Chris said. He caught a glimpse of Lance's frightened face as he shoved himself between them. "C'mon man, this is stupid. He's like 15." Lance started to protest, and Chris felt kind of bad for making him out to be a baby. It was for his own good, though.

The guy didn't seem to care. The tiny, tight lines around his eyes said that he wasn't fucking around at all. When he shifted his weight, Chris went alert. He watched the guy bring his hands down into punching position. Behind him, he could hear the scared hiss-suck of Lance's breath. He braced himself. He wasn't big or anything, but he was fast, and he hadn't come off worse in a fight since he was Lance's age.

The punch never came, though. Joey was suddenly next to them, looking furious, and then JC was there, and Justin, and the guy was backing off.

Chris grinned at them when he'd gone. He struck a Bruce Lee pose. "You don't mess with vocal groups, baby."

"You okay?" he said to Lance later. He'd bought him two drinks: a beer in apology for the almost-fight and a soda in deference to his mom.

Lance dipped his fingertip in the soda. "Fine," he said. He didn't look scared exactly, but he looked resigned - like a kid who'd had the shit beaten out of them one too many times after school.

A couple of nights later, Chris leaned on the doorjamb of the attic. Lance was running through their newest routine. He mostly had the steps down, but he stumbled when he saw Chris watching. "Hey, Chris," he said. He wiped his face with a towel. "What's up?"

Chris pursed his lips in a kiss. "I'm gonna make a man out of you, baby."

Lance rolled his eyes, and Chris grinned. "C'mon I'm just kidding. I'm going to teach you how to fight."

"Chris, I don't have time."

"Yeah, you do," Chris said firmly. He crossed to the end of the room and flicked the tape recorder off.

And lucky for me

"I don't see it," Chris said again.

"Hey, oh hey." JC touched his arm gently. "It's okay, man." He kept his hand on Chris's arm, and articulated the words carefully, as though he were talking to a blind person. "Hey, why don't-" He squeezed Chris's arm. "Why don't you go talk to him. I'm going to get another drink."

Chris watched JC walk to the bar. Then he took a breath and headed over to Lance.

Lance saw him before Chris had gotten half way. He didn't stop dancing, but Chris could feel him watching.

"Hey," Chris said when he was close enough for Lance to hear him over the music. He tugged the fur-lined collar of Lance's coat gently. "You kill a chimp or what?"

Lance raised an eyebrow for a long second, and Chris's face went hot, even though it was Lance wearing the stupid clothes, and Chris calling him on it was totally, totally normal.

Lance was wearing some kind of black mesh thing under the coat. It should have looked wrong - it *did* look wrong, Chris told himself firmly - but underneath it, he could see the faint outline of Lance's abs. Maybe that was what JC had meant by changed, he thought. Because since when did Lance have abs?

"Hey." Chris said again. He felt suddenly and strangely off balance, as though he'd lost the place in a book he was reading. His hands were damp. He wiped them off on his pants. "Um. You want a drink?"

Lance cocked his head curiously and held up his beer. "Got one," he said. He took a sip, his eyes wide and shining over the rim of the glass.

I see a fine young lady's eyeing me

One of the first things Chris learnt about Lance was that he liked to play practical jokes, and not even smart ones. Sometimes he'd eat all the cereal and then laugh when Chris stared at the empty box.

Chris was better at that kind of thing. He'd once told JC that Orlando spiders were attracted to wool, and JC had slept shivering under a plastic tarp for two nights, until Chris decided he felt more guilty than amused.

It had been JC's idea that Lance and Chris share a room in Orlando.

"All the annoying people should be in one room," he said. And Chris didn't think he was even half joking: Lance had filled JC's shampoo bottle with toothpaste the night before, and you fucked with JC's hair at your peril.

So when Chris woke up already bored out of his skull, as though even his dreams had been dull, it was the simplest thing in the world to drag Lance's sleepy ass out of bed, press him up against the wall, and demand that he sing the Poofu song.

"Sing it!" he said.

Lance shook his head. He breathed in sharply, and Chris hurriedly slid a palm over his mouth. In the next room, the shower gushed and Chris could hear Joey singing faintly over Lance's muffled protest. Chris grinned and leaned his forehead on the back of Lance's neck, feeling the hot, damp flush of his skin. "Sing the Poofu song?" he said hopefully.

Lance shook his head again, his breath warm and wet against Chris's skin.

Chris poked him with his free hand. "Sing it. C'mon. C'mon, c'mon, c'mon, c'mon, c'mon, c'mon, c'mon, c'mon, c- *ow*." He snatched his hand from Lance's mouth, and glared at the neat set of teeth marks under his thumb. "Fuck."

The lights were low And her friends were all around

Joey cursed for three hours straight when they found out about TransCon, screaming "Asshole! Asshole! Fucking asshole!" until his voice was hoarse and he had to whisper it. Chris thought maybe he'd fucked his throat up on purpose so that their next concert would suck.

Someone turned the lights down around the time Justin started crying. Chris was grateful because it let him wipe his own face without anyone seeing. When the lights came back on, it was clear that Joey and JC had been crying too in the darkness. Lance, though, was resolutely dry-eyed. He was staring at nothing much, and looking much older than 20.

"What are we going to do now?" Justin asked. He sounded as numb as Chris felt. When Chris looked at him, he was curled up in the corner of the couch, his face pressed against JC's shoulder.

"We're going to get out," Lance said, firmly.

I walked up to her slow And you know what happens now

"So," said Chris awkwardly. "It's good to see you out, man."

Lance nodded, and took another sip of his drink. "I'm done with the contracts. I just wanted to go through all the words for myself, you know."

"Sure," Chris said, even though he didn't really. He'd always trusted tone of voice and the look on people's faces more than anything in print. Until Lou.

"Yeah," Lance said. There was a strange note in his voice, and Chris realised abruptly that he was staring at the pale skin underneath the web of Lance's shirt. When he looked up, Lance was looking back at him. Chris flushed.

"Hey," Lance said softly.

"Hey," Chris said. "So JC said." Chris couldn't keep the guilt out of his voice. He bit his lip. "JC said you seemed kind of different."

Lance raised an eyebrow. "Different how?"

Chris shrugged.

After a moment, Lance sighed. "Well, what do you think?" He cocked his head, and for a split second, he didn't seem to be dancing so much as prowling around the other dancers, around Chris. He was moving to the beat, but in a way that reminded Chris of a lion camouflaging itself in the long grass.

Then the strobe light flashed, and it was just Lance again, dancing like a fucking idiot.

When it flashed again, Lance was smiling a little.

Chris swallowed. His throat felt dry. "What?" he said.

Lance took his hand. "C'mon."

She took my hand We never said a word at all

"Where are we going?" Chris said. Lance had led him to a quiet VIP corridor that Chris hadn't even known existed, and they were still walking. Lance tightened his grip, but he didn't answer. Chris flushed for what felt like the millionth time that evening. He felt hot and damp all over; even his mouth tasted like salt.

"Where are we going?" he said again. Silence always made Chris uneasy; he didn't like the way his thoughts scrambled to fill the void. Right now, Lance's silence was making him think about things like contracts that should never have been signed, and the way Lance's smile had been uncomplicated and innocent when they first met. "Lance where are we going? Where are we going, where are we going, where are we going, where are we going?"

Lance glanced at him and rolled his eyes, but he stopped walking. Chris swallowed. He wondered how Lance had known about this place. Lance had always had an uncanny knack for finding places they were entitled to be in. Chris used to imagine him ordering blueprints for the places they went to. Or maybe he just knew people.

Chris looked at him sideways. "I knew this guy once," he said. When Lance didn't answer, he licked his lips nervously. "I knew this guy who told me he had the blueprints to Disneyland. And there was this whole underground city underneath all the-"

Lance interrupted him. "Chris," he said. And he was suddenly much closer. He smelled good - like soap and beer. Chris licked his own lips, and thought if he just moved an inch or two, he'd be licking Lance's mouth.

"I um-" Chris said, stupidly. Lance's lips were pink and wet, and Chris couldn't seem to stop staring at them. "So like-" Chris swallowed. "My friend thought Walt was making a city to rule over. He-"

"Chris." Lance said. "You're killing the mood."

Chris closed his mouth with a snap.

Lance leaned in slowly and brushed his lips over Chris's mouth. It was a whisper of a touch - almost nothing, but Chris's chest clenched painfully. He never wanted it to stop.

He was breathing unsteadily when Lance pulled back, Lance, though, looked as calm as if he did this every night. And maybe he did, Chris thought wildly. Maybe *that* was the change JC had talked about. Maybe he'd fucked JC last night, and was going to lead Justin by the hand and do him tomorrow.

"Are you going to fuck Justin?" Chris blurted.

"You know," Lance said. "I've heard a lot about the Kirkpatrick freak technique over the years, and I gotta say, so far, not living up to its hype."

Chris opened his mouth to protest that he got laid with that technique - he got laid all the time, but he couldn't get it out. "I'm sorry," he said instead. "Lance. About TransCon, I'm- All the things I-"

"Chris," Lance said. He sounded annoyed, but he tilted his head like he was listening.

"I'm the oldest," Chris said quietly. "I should have been teaching you to - I don't know - to be smart, to know who to trust."

"You know what you taught me?"

"What?" Chris said. He'd taught Lance so many things, he thought. That he had to like pussy, that the band always came first, even when Lance's heart was giving out. He should have stood up to Lou all those times, he thought. They should have left Lou the second he tried to fuck around with Lance's health.

"You don't know?" Lance said. shifted so he was tilting Chris's head up. He pressed a kiss to Chris's jaw, to his throat. "You don't know?" he said again. And Chris heard himself make a needy, breathy noise in response. He lifted his head more to give Lance better access. And Lance bit down. Hard.

Chris gasped. For a moment, it was just raw sensation. He remembered picking up snow with his bare hands as a kid. There had always been a second when his head knew it was snow, but his skin wasn't sure whether it was hot or cold. It was like that, he thought. Just like that.

"Fuck, Lance," he said.

Lance lifted his head. A lamb with wolf's teeth, Chris thought numbly. He flinched as Lance lifted his hand, but Lance just ran his thumb over the bite mark, proprietarily.

"Lance-"

Lance crowded him slowly back against the wall. "If someone catches us," he said. And his voice was a low rumble, a jungle purr. "Lou can just deal."

Chris looked at his teeth. "Okay," he said, and Lance's smile flashed like a knife.

It was hot and fast. Chris barely had time to fumble his pants open before Lance slid a solid thigh between his legs. Chris closed his eyes and grinded on him. Lance's jeans were soft, but the material burned against Chris's cock. He was going to hurt tomorrow, he thought. He didn't care. His shoulders thumped noisily against the wall - too noisily for just one person, he realised after a while.

"Oh fuck," he said into Lance's neck. It came out kind of as a groan. "I think someone's trying to get in."

"Fuck 'em," Lance said. He covered the bite mark on Chris's neck with his mouth - missing twice because Chris was moving. Chris grinned blindly at the ceiling. Lance had never had rhythm. By the time they came, the person trying to get in had left - maybe to find someone with a key.

Lance kept his arms wrapped around Chris while Chris's legs steadied. He was near enough that Chris could feel his breath puffing softly against his mouth. Chris closed his eyes, and wet his lips. He lifted his mouth to meet Lance's, and felt Lance draw back.

"Hey," Chris protested. He opened his eyes.

Lance grinned: a relaxed, happy grin. It made him look young and mischievous and vulnerable, and Chris's heart clenched again.

"I'm not a good catch, Bass," he said, roughly. "I'm broke. And sometimes I'm stupid."

Lance raised an eyebrow. "And bitter?"

Chris grinned reluctantly. "And bitter."

"It's going to be okay, Chris," Lance said. He leaned in and kissed him. "It's going to be fine."

And they were still in the corridor, with their dicks poking out under their shirts, and someone was probably going to come in and catch them, but Chris couldn't bring himself to care.