Party
by Shine

As holiday parties went it wasn't half-bad.

Joey leaned back against a pillar, sipped his wine, and studied the crowd thoughtfully. For the moment he was alone. Justin had taken up with a cute brunette down at the bar--she looked every bit as underage as he was, and Joey wished them well getting drinks out of the bartender, who was noticeably unimpressed by tonight's famous clientele. He'd been there when Britney tried to get a rum and Coke and was turned down cold, and he approved. These kids today drank too much.

JC was off dancing with Michelle from Destiny's Child, with moves simultanously elegant and goofy--they both looked like they were determined to enjoy themselves and the evening's merrymaking. Both of them looked tired, though, and he wondered how long they'd stay. And whether they'd leave together.

Lance was on the other side of the club, half-hidden behind an enormous ficus plant and talking with Alicia Keyes--probably about her production company, although Alicia looked like she was flirting pretty hard. Lance was currently dating Scott, a law student back in Orlando, though, and Joey knew that Lance would be going back to the hotel alone tonight.

Lance had told Joey once that Scott had given Lance permission for him to sleep with other people when Scott couldn't be there, like at these industry shindigs. Lance had appreciated the gesture, but never taken advantage of it, he'd told Joey, and Joey was fairly certain that had been the point. Joey liked Scott a lot, and liked that he was apparently sneaky enough to short-circuit Lance's tendancy to get skittish when he felt tied down. Scott was the first person in the four years since Lance had come out that he'd dated more than two months. They were having their one-year anniversary in February.

Chris was nowhere to be seen, and Joey figured he'd left already. Chris was a fun-loving guy, but these staged promotional events starring the entertainment elite were anything but. Besides, his knees had been giving him trouble lately--he was probably back at the hotel with a couple of icepacks and catching up on his sleep.

The thing was, the party wasn't actually that horrible. Just horribly *bland*. The music was fairly tolerable, although half the songs were by people who were attending the event, so it wasn't particularly new or interesting or even very diverse. The sound quality was fairly good, though, and the volume was sufficient while not being excessive. Apart from the fact that All Or Nothing was apparently on repeat--and even O-Town was starting to look a bit green when it came on--he had no real complaints.

The decorations for this holiday soiree were another matter. They were tasteful and discreetly non-religiously-specific--which basically mean lots of snowflakes, icicles, snowmen, and silvery balls. With glitter. Tinsel also featured pretty highly. Joey was feeling just a tad conspicuous in his red and black ensemble.

"Hey," came a voice from behind him, pitched to carry through the indistinct rumble of a hundred voices, and he turned.

"Hey," he said, and watched as AJ appeared out of the crowd and approached, settling back against the pillar at his side. He had something clear and bubbling in his hand, with a twist of lime. Joey studied the glass thoughtfully, and almost reached out for it. It wasn't nosiness--he knew more than most people what it had meant for AJ to go to rehab, and he trusted him. But the enticing wetness of it *was* making him thirsty, and he took another sip of his wine, which didn't help. Wine wasn't exactly a good thirst-quencher of a drink. Besides, he was barely half-way through his first glass, and he'd been here almost two hours. The party was too bland to be even drink-worthy. He thought he was losing his taste for alcohol, and it didn't really bother him.

"Seven-Up," AJ informed him, with the long-suffering air of someone who'd had to say that too many times already, and Joey nodded.

"Actually, I wasn't wondering," he said, and AJ gave him an halfway-apologetic look.

"You'd be the first the entire fucking night, then," he said with a hint of bitterness. He gulped down the rest of his drink, and tossed the plastic cup towards the trash can several feet away.

Joey could understand the bitterness--it had to be hell watching everyone around him drink themselves into oblivion, and then turn around and give AJ a hard time about his drinking habits. There were more than a few people here who should probably be in rehab themselves, and Joey didn't doubt that it made them even more likely to comment, terrified that they couldn't match what AJ had done to turn things around.

"They're assholes," he said, and AJ smiled.

They spent the rest of the party together, leaning against the pillar and keeping up a running commentary of the party. Joey pointed out that Ashley and Erik seemed to have some weird bet over who could dress the worst--AJ thought Ashley won, but Joey argued that Erik did, based on the number and color of the feathers he was wearing. After a second look, AJ agreed.

Justin and his brunette disappeared for half an hour, and when they came back her lipstick was smeared and Justin's hair was ruffled. Lance came up to them at one point to say that he was getting a cab back to the hotel. Joey gave up on his wine and tossed it, and AJ went back to the bar to get them a couple of Seven-Ups.

When he came back to Joey's pillar, Joey slid a quick hand across his shoulder in thanks as he took his drink, trusting to the dim lighting and the drunk people around them to keep the gesture hidden. AJ smiled at him, small and private.

Joey turned back to the dancefloor. JC was still out there, dancing with himself while Michelle danced with Christina Aguilera, both of them looking far happier with their new partners. A hand slid between him and the wall, pressed gently low against his back, and for a brief moment there was the pressure of AJ's head on his shoulder.

"Wanna get out of here?" AJ asked.

Joey took a deep draft of his Seven-Up to wash away any residual alcohol in his mouth, then tossed the cup at the trash. "Hell, yeah," he said.

Fin