Endless
by Shine

The afternoon was sliding gently into twilight behind the bus, the soft *shush* of wheels a steady rumble in the background that by now was unnoticed, was the sound of silence. The pavement was sparkling with long skidding rays of light glancing across droplets of water and scattering, and the warm humid air rising from the sun-heated road was creating a thin mist across the highway, indefinite and unearthly.

Joey stared out the window, absorbed in watching it happen, watching the mist rise and swirl around the cars nearby. He found himself fully able to believe that at moments like this, they weren't anywhere real--an endless highway, a road that never stopped, caught forever between...something.

Heaven and hell, maybe.

He caught sight of one of the other buses out of the corner of his eye, and turned to study it for a minute. Nondescript, heavily tinted windows, utterly unremarkable. They'd shed the last of the fans a few miles ago, so the buses drove steadily now, a whole convoy of them carrying their crew of wardrobe and hairstylists and dancers and riggers and managers and technicians. The people who followed them from city to city, setting up and tearing down and basically creating the show.

The support staff traveled in buses more like Greyhounds than the rolling apartments that the guys lived in, but the seats were large and comfortable, and there was room to move around and bathrooms and even a small food area. The five of them had made sure of that. If there was one lesson you learned in this business, it was to take care of your people.

Ahead of them was the bus Chris and JC and Justin shared, looking alone and stark as it headed the long column of buses, and Joey wondered idly where his cellphone was, suddenly wanting to hear what was happening over there. Wanting to hear a familiar voice, make sure they were real. But he didn't get up, because he already knew, and that was enough. He'd known them for so long, and he leaned his head against the glass and left the heat of his breath frost the scenery outside into obscurity, drawing up memories and images.

JC was probably sleeping, crashed in a complicated tangle of limbs and blankets, the simple act of living draining all his energy. He lived so hard, so fast, so completely, that he couldn't keep it up. His sheer joy in life and wild enthusiasm for what they did, who they were, was like a bonfire, brilliant and gorgeous and hot, but it couldn't be sustained for long. He could only go on so long before he would crash, and no one begrudged him the time. JC was someone Joey thought might not quite be of this earth, and that was enough reason to love him.

Chris and Justin would be together, the oldest and the youngest sharing a moment that the rest of them would never understand, and seldom see. They often did, though, on the long rides between venues, with JC asleep and Joey and Lance on the other bus. No one ever talked about it, but everyone knew, when Justin and Chris emerged at the hotel or the venue so close the lines of their bodies were blurred into each other, peace and calm laying over them like sunshine.

Kodak moments, and it was at moments like that Joey had the most hope that this would all work out. Hope that Chris would lose the bitterness he tried so hard to hide, at being dismissed at the same game he had created. Hope that Justin would somehow come out of this stronger, wiser, and whole--not a man who did too much, too young, too fast, and never recovered from it.

They would be curled up together on the couch, Joey knew, or maybe Justin's bunk, sharing the same pillow. They might not even talk, and Chris would pretend not to notice Justin's hand sliding up his shirt, and Justin would wordlessly press into Chris's mouth on his neck. It was sexual, but it wasn't--that was the only way Joey could think of it. It was lovers, and brothers, and best friends, and they seemed to be able to move back and forth between the roles with ease.

Behind him Lance was sitting on the other couch, his feet propped up on Joey's thigh. He was reading something that made him laugh every now and then, and Joey closed his eyes, shutting out the outside world, to concentrate on it. Lance's laugh was like the rest of him--deep and uncomplicated, geniune, and rarely shared with those he didn't know, didn't trust.

Joey loved to hear him laugh, the honest, elusive laughter few but the guys in the group heard--chuckles that rumbled subterranean-low, giggles that jumped up an octave, the helpless squeaks of laughter when something was so funny he couldn't even breathe, when he rolled helplessly in his chair, crying, and laughing like he'd die if he didn't get some of the pleasure he was feeling out.

"What are you reading?" he asked, opening his eyes again and discovering that while he'd been looking away twilight had taken over the world, impossibly blue skies deepening to indigo and yellow slashes of headlights turning the mundane roadside into a realm of mystery.

Lance glanced up, grinning, and held up the book--a scruffy used paperback with "Nick Carter: Killmaster!" blazoned across the front. It looked old, like from the seventies, and dog-eared. There was a bright pink happy-face sticker on the front, and an illustration of a tall blond man with a gun and a grim look. A busty blonde falling out of her dress was sprawled at his feet. Joey blinked, stared, and then grinned back.

"Oh my god."

"Oh yeah," Lance said cheerfully. "One of the roadies gave it to me back in Tulsa. I may actually send this to Nick. He'll get a kick out of it." Joey nodded. Their two bands had been drawing together more of late, due in no small part to Lance getting over his grudge against Kevin for the anti-N'Sync things he'd said when they started, and Justin making a determined effort to get closer to Nick Carter, possibly the only other person on the planet who could understand some of the shit he went through in the public eye.

"You okay?" Lance didn't sound worried, but his voice was soft and gentle. Joey nodded again, turning around to face Lance across the bus. Lance shifted his feet so they were in Joey's lap, and Joey rubbed the arches idly for a minute, digging his thumbs in while Lance made a rumbling pleased sound, stretching his ankles and flexing his toes in bliss as Joey concentrated on the knots and cords of muscle and tendon.

Their feet always hurt when they were in heavy rehersal or on tour. Most sneakers weren't designed for hours of high-impact dancing, and Lance and Justin escaped the worst of it due to their age, but sometimes after shows Joey or Chris or JC would be limping out to the bus, the adrenaline high that kept them going while on stage vanishing as soon as they left it. Sore feet and joints and muscles and bodies, the price to pay for the job they did.

That was how they'd really bonded, back in Germany, over backrubs and bad music and jokes and hugs. When Lance was still scared to speak, and Justin was growing almost as fast as his teenage-male ego, and Chris and Joey missed home desperately and tried to hide it with jokes in order to keep everyone else upbeat, and JC had slept fifteen hours a day when they let him. They'd coalesced as a group back then, over late nights in ugly depressing hotel rooms, clumped together backstage at any of a thousand anonymous clubs and festivals, after rehersals where Lance never smiled and JC almost broke his back doing the backflip and missing the ground, the first time they tried it. That was when they'd learned about the comfort of a familiar touch on a blue day, in a blue time.

"I'm okay," he said finally, studying Lance's face in the gloom. He'd been reading without a light on, and now that it was getting dark his face was shrouded in shadows, twilight-blue highlights glittering in the blond tips of his hair, falling across his cheekbones, the sharp angle of his jaw, his wrist. "Just...thinking, you know?"

"Yeah," and Lance smiled at him, the small sunny grin so different from his wide, showy Business Smile. The one only they saw.

"Come here," Lance said, and Joey pushed Lance's feet out of his lap and stood, flipping on the lights so that Lance could read and dropping to sit by Lance, who pulled him close, one strong arm wrapping around his shoulders and guiding him down. Joey leaned against him, pulled his legs up onto the couch, and rested his head back against Lance's shoulder, hard and broad and perfect.

Lance's scent reached him, warm and soft and comforting, the smell of sweat and washed cotton and shampoo and heat, and he breathed deeply. Lance was back to reading again, and Joey could feel him moving underneath him as he laughed. One hand was in his hair, absently carding through the strands, playing with the length of it, slipping down to stroke the nape of his neck, and he went to sleep and dreamed of mist, and Lance's eyes, and an endless highway.

Fin