Belonging (41 page)

“Wow Chance, that’s huge,” I said. “Is
anyone going with you?”

“I asked my friend Zachary, but he
doesn’t want to go. He doesn’t see why I’d want to do any of this,
both because he knows my mom and I have a lot of issues and because
he doesn’t think that man would be worth finding, even if I somehow
managed it.” Chance took a sip of the drink Dare had given him and
added, “Actually, I’m glad my friend turned me down. This really is
something I should do on my own.”

“I hope that goes well for you. If you
need anything while you’re on the road, be sure to call us,” I told
him. My friend thanked me and squeezed my hand.

A little while later when I went into
the kitchen for a glass of water, Christian followed me and said,
“Can I talk to you a minute, Gianni?”

“Of course.”

He fidgeted a bit, leaning against the
edge of the black granite countertop as he said, “I have to admit,
I was pretty thrown off when you and my dad first got together. All
I saw was your age difference, so I really didn’t get it. But I’ve
watched you two together, and it’s so obvious that you really love
each other. I’ve also seen such an amazing transformation in Zan
and it’s wonderful to see him so happy. It means the world to me
that he’s here, in my home, and that he was at my side when I
married Shea. All of that’s because of you. That’s why I wanted to
say thank you. I’m so glad my dad has you now.”

I gave him a hug as I said, “Thank you
too, Christian. I never would have met Zan if it wasn’t for you,
and your support means a lot.”

When we let go of each other, he
grinned embarrassedly and changed the subject by saying, “I’m
having more cake. Do you want another piece?”

“Why not?” I said, and took the plate
he handed me.

*****

It was almost three a.m. by the time
Zan and I got home. He draped his jacket over the back of the couch
in the living room, then dropped down onto it and slid off his
dress shoes with a sigh of relief. “I should have convinced
Christian and Shea to get married on the beach, so I could go
barefoot.”

I tossed my suit jacket beside his and
rolled back my sleeves as I came around the couch. “You looked so
sexy all dressed up,” I told him as I knelt down in front of him.
“Now you just need me to fix you up again.”

I stripped off his socks, lifted his
right foot into my lap and began massaging it. Zan groaned with
pleasure, but then he said, “You don’t have to do that, love. You
must be tired.”

“Please let me. I really want to make
you feel good.” I carefully pushed my thumbs into the ball of his
foot and drew them in a circle.

Zan let his head fall back against the
couch and murmured, “That feels too amazing to stop
you.”

I massaged his feet for several
minutes, and when he seemed completely relaxed I slid my hands up
his thighs. He raised a lid and grinned at me as I stroked his cock
through his clothes. It responded instantly.

I unfastened his belt and his pants,
then started sucking him. His low moan made me happy. I’d been
wanting to do this all day and took my time, enjoying the velvety
texture against my lips and the slightly salty taste of his precum.
I slid my hands around his waist as I deep-throated him and he ran
his fingers into my hair and muttered, “Oh God.” He let me keep
going for a couple more minutes before he whispered, “I need to be
inside you, Gianni.”

He removed my tie, then fumbled with
the buttons on my shirt. In just a minute I was stripped naked, and
Zan pulled me onto his lap and kissed me. I wrapped my arms around
his neck and whispered in his ear, “Please Alexzander, tie me
up.”

“Sure, love,” he said, then stood up,
taking me with him. I laughed in surprise as he dropped me over his
shoulder in a fireman’s carry and headed for the stairs.

When we got to our bedroom he laid me
on the mattress and climbed on top of me. Then he just paused for a
moment and stared at me. I chuckled and said, “What?”

“You’re just so extraordinarily
beautiful. It takes my breath away.” I grinned at him and he began
kissing his way down my body. When he reached my cock, he sucked me
until I was hard, then rolled over to my nightstand and pulled out
a length of soft cotton cord. He used it to quickly bind my wrists
together, then tied them to one of the posts at the foot of the
bed. I sighed contentedly.

Zan lubed his cock before pushing it
into me, and I relaxed and parted my legs for him. He fucked me
slowly, watching my reactions, and murmured, “My sweet, amazing
Gianni. Do you have any idea how much I love you?”

I grinned and said, “I’m going to go
ahead and guess a lot?”

That made him smile. “Total
understatement, love.”

Chapter
Twenty-Three

Three months
later

“I’m nervous and excited at the same
time,” Nana said. “I don’t know if I want to cheer or
upchuck.”

“Go with cheering,” I said. “It’s less
messy.”

Nana stood up straight as a big
security guard walked past, holding up the V.I.P. badge that hung
around her neck. She pointed it at him, then spun and mirrored his
progress with it until he was out of range. We were backstage at
the L.A. Coliseum, and she was dressed head to toe in white
leather, including knee-high platform boots, pants, and a little
jacket that she wore over a demure pink blouse. I had to grin at
her ensemble.

Jessie rushed up to us with Nico and
Chance right behind him and exclaimed, “I’m so excited that I could
puke!”

“That seems to be popular right now,”
I told him.

“How are you so calm,
Gianni?”

“I’m faking it.”

He grabbed me in a hug and
said, “This is amazing.
Amazing!
I can’t believe I’m here, and I can’t believe
where I’m going tomorrow. I’ll never be able to thank you enough.
Never!”

When he let go of me, Nana patted my
cheek and said, “That’s my Johnnie. He’s a good boy, him and his
sweetie both.” We’d bought Nana a first-class trip to Italy, as a
way of thanking her for all she did for the family. She was
departing the next day. We’d decided to send Jessie with her for
company, along with my cousin Nico, who needed a vacation
desperately before he began another grueling semester of law
school. Jessie had never been out of the country before and had
been bubbling with excitement for weeks, ever since we told him
about the trip.

Vincent, Trevor and their son joined
us, followed by Dante and Charlie, then Mikey and Marie and the
kids. They’d been back in the green room and Josh was holding a
half-eaten cupcake. He told me, “I just met the lead singer of
Mayday. He was so cool! Wait until I tell the kids at school about
this! Yoshi met him, too. I think they like each other. They were,
like, all flirty and stuff.”

I glanced at Vincent, who said,
“That’s a pretty accurate summation.”

Christian and Shea were right beside
me, and Christian murmured, “Listen to that. It’s absolutely
surreal.”

The crowd of ninety-two thousand
people had begun chanting in unison. It started low and grew louder
and louder. “Zan, Zan, Zan, Zan!”

My boyfriend was the last act of the
night. When he released his first song-of the-week right after his
son’s wedding, he was asked to headline a concert raising money for
a national charity that helped LGBT runaways. Once he signed on,
the response by his fans was so overwhelming that the concert had
been moved to the largest venue available. It seemed fitting that
his return to performing would be here, as if he was finally
getting to finish what he started.

Zan had been doing a final check with
the sound crew, and he came up to me and spun me around, then
kissed me passionately. His eyes were alight, his smile wide and
genuine. “You doing okay?” I asked him.

“Right as rain, love,” he told me.
“This is as familiar to me as breathing.”

The radio DJ that had been MCing the
event walked up to us and asked, “Are you ready, Mr.
Tillane?”

“It’s just Zan,” my boyfriend told
him. “And I am, absolutely.”

The DJ jogged out onto the wide stage
and introduced him. The sound of thousands of people cheering was
utterly overwhelming, but Zan just winked at me as a technician
clicked on his earpiece, and then he walked out onto the stage. He
was dressed the way he always did at home, in a white button-down
shirt with the sleeves rolled back and old 501s, his feet bare.
He’d thought about dressing up, but ultimately decided to just be
himself.

Zan went to the microphone at center
stage and said, “I want to thank all of you for coming out tonight
and supporting a great cause. This first song is called Loved You
Forever. Go ahead and sing along if you know the words.”

He then began to sing
an
a Capella
version of one of his biggest hits. His beautiful voice
filled the stadium, clear and resonant. “Oh my God,” Christian
whispered, linking arms with me while his husband hugged him around
the waist. “I can’t believe he started with that. Dad wrote that
song for me.” Shea kissed his cheek and Christian murmured, “I
never thought I’d get to see this.”

Nana picked up my free hand. “Sweet
baby Jesus, what a voice,” she exclaimed.

Yosh jogged up to us just then. He
stood behind me, draping an arm over my shoulder. When I glanced at
him, he grinned happily before we both turned our attention back to
the stage.

It was an amazing sight to look out
over the massive, sold-out arena. We were just off-stage, behind a
heavy, black curtain, and could see about half the crowd from our
angle. The audience was on its feet, swaying like waves in the
ocean, and they were singing. More and more joined in, a chorus of
thousands filling the night. It was so beautiful and powerful that
it gave me goosebumps.

When the song ended, the applause was
absolutely deafening. Zan smiled at the crowd and said, “Cheers,
thanks a lot. It’s nice to know you remember the words. It’s nice
to know I do, too.” The crowd laughed appreciatively and broke into
another round of deafening applause as Zan went to the black grand
piano that was slightly stage right. He sat down facing me, in
profile to the audience, and started to play. At first he just idly
picked out a melody while he talked to the crowd. I was amazed by
how perfectly at home he was. Zan invited the audience to sing
along again and launched into another of his hits.

He performed for over two
and a half hours, either singing
a
Capella
or accompanying himself on the
piano. He’d thought about bringing in a band and staging a full
production, but had decided in the end to just make it about the
music. It was the right call and the crowd clearly loved the
intimacy of what he was doing. They remained on their feet, singing
along and swaying to the music throughout the concert.

I watched him out on the stage and in
close-up on the monitors beside me, which showed the three massive
screens that backed him. He looked happy and relaxed, and was
obviously enjoying himself. Zan was totally in his
element.

Finally he addressed the audience and
said, “I want to thank all of you again for being here tonight. I’m
going to do one more song for you before I bid you farewell, and
I’d like to ask my boyfriend Gianni to join me on stage for this
one.” He looked at me in the wings and said into the mic, “What do
you say, love? Will you come on out here?”

My heart pounded wildly as I walked
onto the stage. It was thrilling, but pretty overwhelming, too. The
crowd was cheering and the lights were incredibly bright. I
couldn’t look at the audience, it was just too much. I also
couldn’t look at the giant screen to my right at the back of the
stage, since a cameraman had focused on my face, and it appeared
fifteen feet high on the screen. Instead, I just kept my eyes on
Zan, and that made all the difference.

As I sat beside him on the bench, he
said, “I didn’t mean to embarrass you, love, but it seemed fitting
that you’d join me. You’re the reason I’m here, after all. You woke
me up and brought me back into the world.” He dropped his gaze as
his fingers picked out a tune on the keys. “I wrote a song for you.
Actually, you don’t know this but I’ve written twenty-six songs for
you since we met, in addition to the one I played for you on your
birthday. Some of them are a bit crap, I must admit. I’m so totally
head-over-heels in love with you that it’s difficult to write songs
that are anything more than, ‘I love you, I love you, I love you’,
a million times over. Nothing can convey how much you mean to me,
but this says a little. It’s called Belonging.”

He began to sing and I watched in awe
as his graceful hands danced over the keys. The melody was gorgeous
and the lyrics were sweet and sincere. Zan sang, “Please be my
forever, and let me be yours.” The song was a pledge and a promise.
My heart felt so full.

As the music washed over me, I looked
up at the huge screens. The biggest one in the center showed Zan
and me in close-up. A couple cameramen were panning over the crowd
and broadcasting people in the audience on the other two screens.
What I saw sent the tears I’d been trying to hold back tumbling
down my cheeks.