Aaron asked the words, just as Lance was bracing himself for Aaron to freak out at him. The man was not the most approachable, friendly person in the world, and Lance had been staring at him. He hadn’t meant to, but it had happened anyway. His mind had been far away, but Aaron could be prickly.
Like Jamie. Jamie could be prickly, too, though he did it with sarcastic comments more than with sullen silences, like Aaron did. But it occurred to Lance, for the first time, that maybe there was more than reticence at play here. Maybe Aaron protected himself, just as Lance had come to see that Jamie did.
“Oh. Uh.” Lance considered that. There were limits to what he could even tell Aaron, who wasn’t in on the secret about the fake relationship between Ken and Lance. Aaron was being fed the same story as the rest of the world, and Lance sighed as he tried to figure out what he could say to his surprisingly perceptive bandmate.
“Is this about Ken?” Aaron actually turned the screen of his phone off and looked at Lance directly, which was definitely not something that Lance was used to. He’d known Aaron for over a year, and now that he thought about it, he was pretty sure this was his first real conversation with the guy.
“ … Sort of,” Lance admitted. “It’s sort of complicated …”
“Because you’re not really dating him,” Aaron spoke with a tone of certainty. He wasn’t asking a question, he was just stating a fact, and Lance bit his lower lip and dropped his gaze. Just for a moment, a knee-jerk guilty reaction. How the hell did Aaron know that?
“Lance, I’m not an idiot. I have eyes,” Aaron spoke again, and when Lance stole a look at him, he saw something that he would never have expected to see from the other man. Compassion. Not pity, but just sincere worry.
“Where’s Ken?” Lance asked because if they were going to get into this, he really didn’t need Ken walking in in the middle. Ken, who would surely report back to Lester that Lance wasn’t keeping his side of the deal. Things might still work out, but only if handled carefully.
“He went running,” Aaron told him, and Lance nodded. Silently, he rose to his feet and went to the coffee maker, not because he really wanted coffee but because he wanted an excuse to focus on something other than Aaron’s eyes, which seemed to know far too much.
“No. I guess you figured it out, but Ken and I aren’t really dating …” Lance started to speak, and as he did, the whole story came out. Every last bit of it, from the embarrassment of being caught on dates with women, women he didn’t even care about, and his agreement with Ken and Lester.
He even went into Ken’s irrational dislike of Jamie, how Ken wasn’t even willing to give the newcomer a chance. Though he felt intensely disloyal to his best friend, he said it all and took comfort in the fact that Aaron was a quiet man. If anyone could keep a secret, surely it was Aaron.
“And then there’s Jamie,” Aaron prompted, and Lance winced, but somehow it didn’t even surprise him that Aaron knew, or suspected, about that, too. In fact, he was starting to wonder what those odd violet eyes of his didn’t see.
“And then there’s Jamie,” Lance echoed, not bothering to deny it. Aaron had already figured it out, at least partially. There didn’t seem to be any point in trying to pretend that it wasn’t going on, not when Aaron already knew.
Only it was hard to know what to even say about Jamie. There were feelings, for sure, but how far did they go? Even he was just figuring that out. How could he explain it to anyone else?
Aaron just waited, his head cocked slightly to the side, a look of pure concentration on his face. It was strange, being the subject of Aaron’s attention. He’d noticed it before, how Aaron fixated completely on whatever he was doing, to a level that was almost terrifying, but he’d never had that turned on him before.
“I think I …” Lance frowned and shook his head. He wasn’t ready for that, so he turned onto a different track. “I think we’re together. It was just supposed to be sex, but it’s turned into more than that.”
Aaron nodded, his mouth relaxed, like he wasn’t exactly surprised by that, his expression thoughtful.
“I’ve seen it,” Aaron admitted. “He cares for you, and you for him. You’re just lucky Ken isn’t the most observant person, and Lester isn’t around much.”
“I don’t know if I should go for it,” Lance admitted in a soft whisper. “I think I could. I think that, further into the tour, if I went to Lester he would let me and Ken stage some sort of elaborate breakup. I don’t think he would care if I’m seen to be dating Ken or Jamie, as long as …”
His voice trailed off, and he shook his head. Aaron didn’t know about Amy. Aaron didn’t, couldn’t, understand just how damn terrifying this was to him. That he could let himself fall for Jamie, and then potentially lose him, no one could understand that.
“Well, what do you have to lose by trying?” Aaron asked, and just those few words, that one sentence, slapped things into focus for Lance quite a bit.
What did he have to lose? His peace of mind. The band. There was quite a lot, but what Aaron didn’t ask, which was perhaps more relevant, was what did Lance stand to gain if he went for this?
A small smile tugged at the corners of his mouth, a strange, reckless, but somehow very right feeling forming, growing, in the very core of his body. What did he have to lose? Plenty. What did he have to gain?
So much more, if it worked out and if Jamie was willing to go for it, if Lance could open himself up, and for the first time since Amy, Lance thought that was actually a possibility.
He opened his mouth but didn’t get the chance to say anything. The door to the suite opened, and Lance looked up, expecting to see Ken. He shot Aaron a brief, warning look, but the really good thing about Aaron was that Lance didn’t feel like he actually needed to warn him to keep his mouth shut. Keeping his mouth shut seemed to be pretty much Aaron’s natural state.
But it wasn’t Ken who walked in. It was Jamie, and his cheeks were pink, his eyes sparkling, a smug, highly pleased with himself, smirk on his lips as he held something behind his back.
“Hey,” Jamie said, the very soul of casualness, to the point where it was highly suspicious. Lance eyed him, trying to see whatever he was holding behind his back, because whatever it was, Jamie was doing his best to keep it from Lance.
“Jamie,” Lance finally said, frustrated by how Jamie kept shifting, kept Lance’s eyes from falling on what he was holding. All Lance saw was the corner of what looked like a cloth bag, maybe? And a little bit of mesh, he thought, but Jamie was being a brat, and he couldn’t see more.
“Jamie!” Aaron spoke sharply, and Jamie jumped, obviously startled. “Knock it off. You’re being a twit.”
Giving a sheepish little grin, Jamie shrugged and then slowly, with great pomp and drama, pulled what appeared to be a small cloth duffel bag from behind his back.
“I don’t see what …” Lance started, a little annoyed because why Jamie had made such a big deal about a stupid new piece of luggage, he didn’t know. And then he gasped, and his eyes went wide. “No. No, Jamie, you didn’t.”
But Jamie had. As the beautiful auburn haired man held up the bag, Lance caught the slightest hint of glowing silvery eyes and a soft, low mewing noise. He raised his gaze back to Jamie, who stared at him, seemingly confident but with uncertainty in his eyes.
