Burly
by Shine

"Don't tell anyone what you hear in this room," Justin says
"Unless," adds Chris, "it gets me a date. Then you can tell them anything."
To which Joey adds, "He likes burly men." Then Joey elaborates on that. Once again, I can't print.

Written for Rhys, cause she's wonderful.

Chris sometimes thought Joey was the strongest guy he knew. Justin was ripped all to hell, and JC had tight, wiry muscles that you wouldn't expect on someone as skinny as he was, and Lance had bulked up considerably since they'd started out, but Joey was just big--big all over, built solid and powerful, like a football player. He wasn't fat, no matter how he might look--there was a softness to his waist that lent him a padded appearance, but beneath that layer was muscle, hard and solid, lots of it.

His hands were broad with long fingers, and his shoulders were wide and powerful and rippled smoothly under the skin when he carried his duffel into the hotel room at four in the morning, wearing nothing but sweatshorts and a wifebeater. His legs were long, with heavy calves and thighs that were thick and hairy, and when Justin had badgered him into working out on a free day during the tour, he could run on the treadmill for hours. His arms were huge, and he could lift even more than Justin on the rare occasions that he used the benches.

Chris could look at him forever.

Once, during the Strings tour, Chris had sprained his ankle onstage during the performance, and he'd been hobbling around backstage after Bye Bye Bye, wiping his neck with a towel and swearing like a sailor as he struggled out of his costume. He could barely stand, wincing in pain every time his foot brushed the ground, and by the time he was finished the rest of them had already run out to the buses.

Joey had just laughed and waited until he was changed, then scooped him up and carried him all the way out to the buses, one firm arm under his back, another behind his thighs. Chris had been tense, unable to relax into the soothing steamy heat of Joey's body, afraid he would fall. When Joey broke into a jog at Dre's urging, Lonnie pacing them and talking urgently into his walkie-talkie, Chris had yelped loudly, clutched at his neck and Joey had grinned at him, wordless and amused, soft brown eyes affectionate and still bright with adrenaline from the stage.

When he'd finally eased Chris onto the couch in his bus, taking extra care not to jar Chris's wounded ankle, he hadn't even been breathing particularly hard.

It wasn't obvious, he thought, but Joey really was one of the better dancers in the group. He picked things up slowly, although not as slowly as Lance, but once he had them he had them down cold, and years later could still do the choreography for Here We Go, or Giddy Up, or Riddle, without even thinking about it. He moved with a surprising grace for his size, and had an incredible presence onstage, a solid force of power dancing with all his heart, fire and thunder on the stage. His voice was strong, even during the most grueling choreography, and he braced them and pushed them all forward, projecting the music out into the crowd.

He knew all the cracks that were made about him--"FAT-one" just being the most inventive--and he honestly didn't care. He didn't eat any more than the rest of them, and a lot less than JC or Justin. Off-tour he worked out more or less daily, although not very diligently, and when they were rehersing and performing he could dance for hours at a time, five days out of six. As long as he could still fit through the door of the bus, he joked to Chris once, he wasn't fat.

JC, who had an insane metabolism and needed to eat six times a day or more just to maintain his weight, had looked glum when he said that. Joey had chuckled and dropped down next to him, wrapping an arm around JC's shoulders and and stealing some of JC's potato chips. Chris watched him eat, eyes narrow and intent.

Chris, who had fought halfheartedly against his weight since he was nineteen and realized that his waist was not his friend, envied him that placidity. And it meant that he could tease Joey about it to his heart's content, in a way Joey would never tease him about being short or having a squeaky voice, because he knew Joey wouldn't take offence.

And when they were relaxing after a show, Chris leaning back against Joey's dense, solid heat, what with having his shoulders kneaded into quivering submission by those strong hands, what with feeling expanses of muscle shift and flex easy and evocative under his body, and feeling gentle lips and careful teeth and a strong, probing tongue tracing the nape of his neck down to his collarbone...

Chris couldn't imagine Joey any other way. Big and burly and beautiful.

Fin