Used (5)

by Chris J

"So this is the place, is it?"

AJ leaned against the wall and crossed his arms over his chest and surveyed the room. The house was just about exactly what he would have expected from Justin. A little too organized, a little too fake, a lot too showy. He bet Justin had a room somewhere that was strewn with clothes and CDs and magazines, where he spent all his time. Like all of them, 90% of him was for appearances.

"What, something wrong with it?" said Justin defensively, flipping on lights as he led the way inside. Or thought he was leading the way anyway, except AJ wasn't following. Finally he turned around. "What, already?"

"Just getting a sense of the place," he said, looking it over again. It was too white, too. "Where's the piano?"

"You're in my house for the first time and all you can ask is 'where's the piano'? That's fucked up."

"I'm a musician," said AJ, pushing himself away from the wall. "Of course I want to see your piano. You do have one, right?" Though of course Justin had one.

"Of course I have one," said Justin, and AJ smirked, finally following him down the hallway. "What do you take me for? That's just weird. What, are you just going to look at it or something?"

"Or something," said AJ as Justin flipped on the lights in what was presumably his music room. It was spacious, and there was a grand piano -- white -- right in the middle. "You can tell a lot about a person from their piano." He walked up to it without hesitation and ran a finger along the top, studying it for a long time. "You don't play, do you," he said finally, and it wasn't a question.

"How did you ... ?" Justin blurted out before arranging his face into a neutral -- no, skeptical -- expression again. "There's no way to tell that from just looking at a piano."

"It looks like you bought it to match your house. And it's dusty. You might want to tell your housekeeper about that."

Justin scowled at him. "So what else does my piano tell you about me?" he snapped at him, but AJ noticed he ran his own finger along it to check for dust. "Besides. I play guitar."

"Right," said AJ. "Well ... it tells me you're not afraid to spend your money. And that at least you have good taste. Well, let's see the guitar then."

"Oh," said Justin, looking startled at the request. "Oh, well, it's up in my room. I was working on this thing, and ... "

AJ waved off the rest of the explanation. "Nevermind," he said with a grin. "That tells me everything I need to know."

"Does it," said Justin, no more a question than AJ's comment on his piano playing abilities had been. "What, you think I'm lying to you or something? That I don't even own a guitar?"

"Nah," said AJ, resisting the urge to roll his eyes at his defensiveness. Not the he could blame him really; he probably had people doubting that very fact every day. "Saw the look in your eyes when you said it. I know that look. That what you compose your stuff on?"

Justin stared at him and blinked a few times and AJ wondered when he was gonna get over it already and realize that AJ didn't cling to any media-constructed notions of him. That AJ hadn't really spent a lot of time thinking too hard about who Justin Timberlake was, until they met.

"So," AJ said finally. "What's a guy got to do to get something cold to drink around here? You must have iced tea somewhere, if nothing else."

"I don't," said Justin right away, snapping out of it just like that. "I dunno. I'll show you the kitchen. I'm sure I'll have something. I wasn't exactly expecting company, you know."

"Then you shouldn't have invited me over," said AJ, letting Justin lead the way back through the house. A guy could get lost in a place like this, if he didn't have a pretty palatial home of his own. "No matter how bored you were."

"Yeah, starting to realize that," said Justin, flipping the kitchen light on even though sunlight was streaming in through the large windows. "Just grab whatever you want." He pointed AJ toward the fridge and, like the good host he was, sat down in his breakfast nook and stared out the window into his backyard.

AJ stared at the contents of the fridge for a moment, then carefully avoided the rows of beer on the middle shelf and reached for a bottle of lemonade that had been shoved to the back behind the jug of water and the ketchup, probably long forgotten. He already had half of it drained before he kicked the fridge shut and sat down with Justin at the table.

"I don't usually play when I'm writing stuff," Justin said, out of the blue. "Me and Wade, we usually just mess around with lyrics and stuff, and I sing. And he tries to sing, but … " He made a face, and AJ laughed knowingly. "I mean, he's not bad, he's just … "

"Not you?"

"Something like that," muttered Justin, staring out the window again. He wasn't a small guy, but he looked almost too small for the house. The wide open spaces of it diminished him, and as he sprawled over the kitchen table looking out the window, he almost looked like a child playing at being a grown-up. "When I play, it's just usually for fun."

"Yeah, okay," he said easily. "I get that. When you make music for a living, it's nice to keep a piece of it that's just fun."

"I've thought about doing something else though," Justin went on, getting a bit more animated. "Like ... playing clubs or something where I can play my guitar and do a different kind of music and everything I did wouldn't have to be done by committee." AJ snickered. "What? I could do that."

"Oh, I know you could," said AJ, taking a sip of the lemonade to keep from making any other rude noises. "I know exactly how it would happen, as a matter of fact. And I don't think you'd like it as much as you think you would."

"Oh, you're so sure of that, are you?" said Justin, his voice a mixture of disbelief and sadness. AJ hated that the sadness was there, but he understood where it came from better than most. "It would be new. It would be different. It might get me some respect."

"And it might not," said AJ, draining the rest of his drink. "Look. Justin. I'm not trying to burst your bubble here ... but been there, done that. And it's not all it's cracked up to be." Justin just stared at him. "Sorry," he added. "Wish I had something better to tell you."

"It might be different for me," he protested. "I mean, no offense, but -- "

"But you're Justin Timberlake?" He didn't even wait for Justin to acknowledge that. "That'll probably just make it harder. I mean ... you've got to know that the kind of people who would go to a show like that are the kind of people who want to see you fail."

"That's a really shitty thing to say."

"It's a really shitty truth," countered AJ. "I'm not saying don't do it, Justin. I just saying I have some experience in the area, and that's probably how it'll go down. Right now, anyway. Who knows about ten years from now? You might be lead singer of some queer thrashpunk band."

Justin snickered and nodded his head a little at that, and tapped his fingers against the table.

"Here's the thing," AJ continued, "and I know you know this Justin, but sometimes it makes things clearer when someone says it out loud. If you're not ready for something about you or something you love to be trashed by people ... don't put it out there for them to have that chance."

Justin nodded again, and was obviously thinking about it. Or possibly just staring at the table, but AJ figured that "thinking about it" was the more likely of the two possibilities.

"Well," he said finally. "Whatever. It's just a thought right now anyway. But at least I can show you what I can do. If you're interested." He angled his head toward the staircase and was obviously waiting for a response.

AJ drained the last few drops out of his bottle of lemonade and got up from the table to slide the empty bottle onto the counter. "Well?" he said as he turned back. "Lead the way."

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