The lawn is very very green, even in the twilight.. That's the first thing that you notice when you get out of the car. Also, you're very glad that you've just got your carry on bag, because the thought of lugging suitcases is just almost too much to grasp at the moment. You're finally home, but it doesn't feel like home.

"Catch you later, C!"

Justin's waving goodbye to you, and you smile at him. It's good that he brought you home, because you're too... something to drive.

You're mostly tired, you think. Your house feels empty despite the fact that you've got people to come in and take care of it. It's the museum vibe, and you think of Justin shrieking out "It's like a museum. It's cold and you're not allowed to touch anything" when you first showed him around.

That's from Ferris Bueller's Day Off, you know that now. You didn't then, and you felt your brow crease and you crossed your arms, hoping you didn't actually look confused. Justin told everyone that you'd never seen the movie and Chris laughed at you for hours. It's not your fault, you watch what the others pick.

Your house is cold, and the bits of art that you bought, carefully and with an eye to their possible appreciation, seem too small to fill the empty corners. It's bizarre that you miss the bus, when everyone bitches about the limited amount of space and living out of two or three suitcases for months at a time. It's cramped, but full somehow in a way that this space just isn't.

The cordless phone taunts you with silence, even while you think about calling Lance or Joey. They're probably not even home yet, but already you miss them.

You remember telling the woman who was helping you furnish the place that you specifically wanted a cordless phone. She thought you'd be pleased to have the best, but it really just made you nervous around it. Anything that expensive should last for years, and you've got a way of dropping things. You just sort of forget about them and then they're on the floor broken in pieces.

There are books that you mean to read. You've been ordering them for months from amazon.com and tiny random sites you've found online, glad that you finally had a real address to ship them to. The same with the dvd's that are neatly alphabetized on the rack that you ordered. You think that the woman, whatever her name was, earned every penny, because things are ordered and organized the way you asked.

It takes a minute, but you finally realize what's making you feel restless. It's the air conditioning mixed with the smell of whatever potpourri or candles are scattered around. The air feels like hotel air, and the smell is absolutely generic. You think wistfully of Joey's house where sometimes it stinks like dirty laundry or smells wonderfully of tomato sauce. The point is, his house smells like a home. Yours doesn't.

The phone rings then, and you trip over a rug when you try to run to get it before your machine comes on. You don't quite make it, so you're talking over the mechanical voice that's way too loud.

"Please don't hang up." You sound almost desperate, but you're just so glad that something's broken the heavy silence.

There's silence until the beep and then you hear Lance's voice. He sounds bemused, you know all of them well enough to recognize moods just from a word or two. That sort of knowledge is important when you live with each other so closely. You're so busy thinking that you miss what Lance said and have to say "Huh? I missed that, dude."

You think about making excuses about the machine, but he's laughing and saying "I've been bitchin' about y'all for the last month, and now I'm bored. I've been in my fuckin' house for ten minutes and there's nothing to do."

You're nodding eagerly until you realize that yes, there are miles separating you, and you actually have to communicate in words now. It feels awkward, bulky and too cumbersome.

You try anyway. "Yeah. It feels like a hotel here. It's like, too quiet or something." You pause. "I think I miss Chris or something, even."

Lance laughs at that. "I've heard some sick shit in my day, but missing Chris. Dude." He trails off, and you think that maybe he misses the easy shorthand of looks and nudges too.

You look around your house and realize that you wish he was there. It makes sense, and it's not just because Lance kisses you sometimes or you miss the way he hugs you. The two of you are a tour thing, you've always thought. It's telling, though, that it's you that he called, and you feel warm and happy inside for the first time since you walked in the door.

When you start talking, your voice cracks and you realize that you're nervous. That's just insane, so you say "So, you wanna come over? Crazy or not?" and you want him to say yes so badly that you're holding your breath.

He laughs again, and says "Yeah, yeah, I think I'd like that. Better your house than mine, I think. Mine just smells musty."

You say "Well, mine smells like some damn flowery crap." and you sound so disgusted that you both crack up and he hangs up promising to be there soon.

Lance must have broken speed limits, you think, when you hear the knock on the door a full ten minutes before you'd expected him. You fling the door open and motion him in, closing the door before you spin around and hug him. Your nose is tucked into the space where his collarbone becomes his chest and you can't smell the stupid flowers anymore, just his cologne and maybe a little sweat. It's warm outside, you remember that.

"You want a drink? Or maybe I could make something to eat?"

Lance wanders around, poking at things. He checks out the books, leaving two out, and you know that he'll borrow them and never give them back. Lance hoards books, likes to pretend that he'll reread them and then give them back. He won't and you kind of wish that you could have read them first, but he's there to pick them up and its worth more than the price of a couple paperback books.

You follow him around, and you both end up in the television room. He thumbs through the new dvds and says, "Hey! You got it" and picks up 'The Princess Diaries'.

You blush then, you can feel the color staining your cheeks pink. Disney movies charm you sometimes, and you wanted to see this when it came out, but you knew that Chris would laugh for hours and Joey would call you 'Princess' for days. It wasn't worth the teasing.

The others will watch Beauty and The Beast or maybe The Little Mermaid sometimes, because they like to sing along. Hearing 'Poor Unfortunate Souls', the boyband way, with Chris doing Ariel and Lance imitating Ursula is something that still makes you laugh. They wouldn't like this movie, but Lance is smiling. You forgot that he likes those sorts of films too.

"You wanna?" and Lance is waving the dvd. The sheer ludicrousness of getting back home and immediately watching it, when you've all bitched that you're damn sick of movies, doesn't escape you, but Lance looks pleased and you can't think of anyplace else you'd rather be.

He sprawls out on the couch and pushes play, pats the couch beside him. You sit down, a sedate distance away, but before too much time passes, you're tangled up together, legs and arms everywhere. You're comfortable, and you think that Lance is too.

He kisses your forehead, and you're surprised and pleased and comforted without even thinking about it. You think that you missed him, or rather the thought of him, because the next tour is so far away. This time, though, you think that things are going to be different. You tug your fingers through his hair, scratching at his scalp the way he likes and close your eyes. You realize that your house suddenly feels like home, now that Lance is in it.

~end~