Title: Smoke
Author: soulmatejunkee 
Fandom: Queer as Folk US
Pairing: Brian/Ted
Timeline: Somewhere between 5.09 and 5.10
Word Count: 860
Disclaimer: I don’t own anything. It’s all CowLip and Showtime.
Beta: My lovely mander3_swish - thank you :)

As always: Every comment is welcome. I Love to read what you think. Thanks!

Brian's POV

The good stuff always costs me a fortune, but it’s always worth it. I needed to clear my head, to unwind, to relax. The last few days… the last few weeks have been horrible.

But as good as smoking the good stuff is, it’s completely wasted on Ted. I’m not even sure if he’s ever smoked before? He almost puked after the first hit.

But then… it was better than being alone. Anything was better than being alone, even hanging out with Ted. It felt weird, strange, and somehow wrong; normally it was Michael who brought tons of food for when we got the munchies, but Michael wasn’t interested in hanging out with me anymore.

Just because we’ve been friends our whole lives doesn’t mean we have to stay friends.

“I don’t think I’ve ever been here just to hang out,” Ted said while eating the Pad Thai. “Thanks for inviting me.”

I leaned back against the sofa and passed him the joint. “A man should never smoke alone.”

He coughed again and I think I could see tears in his eyes.

“Uh, this is… really… good stuff.”

I laughed and took the joint back. “Yeah, it is and… I think you’ve had enough.”

“I think so, too,” he agreed while coughing again. “So, no Babylon tonight?”

“Not in the mood.” And it was the truth. I haven’t really been in the mood to go to Babylon all week. I can’t explain it, something was different. There were still hundreds of young, beautiful guys out there, and even though I would love to ignore it, truth is I wasn’t one of them anymore. Going out alone every night wasn’t as fun as having someone by your side, someone waiting for you.

“Yeah, sometimes I don’t feel like it, either,” Ted nodded.

“Guess we’re not so different, after all.”

He laughed. “We’re totally different. You love that kind of life. I just have to endure it because… there’s no one waiting for me at home. God, that’s so depressing, and it can’t change when I’m sitting at home waiting for it to change. So I go out. I would give a lot to get what you had.”

“Beauty?” I say, teasingly.

“Someone who loves me. Someone who wants to be with me, and who loves me so much that he wants to spend his entire life with me. That’s such a big thing, it’s… so wonderful. I mean, how much does someone have to love you to plan his entire life with you, his future? It’s been a long time since I’ve felt that way, but I want that again, I really do. It’s all I’ve ever wanted, and I really hope it’s still out there for me. If I had it, I would hold onto it and never let go. I would fight for it. I would make sure that he never leaves me.”

I was waiting for my natural instinct to roll my eyes kick in, but it didn’t come. I took another hit and tried to keep the smoke in my lungs as long as possible. I wanted to tell him how pathetic he sounded and that something like that doesn’t exist in reality. Instead, I just breathed out: “How?”

“I would try to make him happy. Whatever he needed, whatever he wanted…”

“That’s not love Theodore, that’s sacrifice. It’s pathetic.” Thank God, I was still alive.

He looked at me, somehow satisfied. “It’s what you do, when you love someone. Sacrificing your own needs to make him happy. Ask Justin.”

My movements, my breath, my heartbeat, everything just stopped when I heard Michael’s words in my head again: He was never perfectly happy! He’s been waiting for years to hear you to say ‘I love you’ and ‘you’re the only one I want’!

I cleared my throat. “Well, Justin’s the best proof that it doesn’t work that way, isn’t he?”

“Worked wonderfully for you, didn’t it?”

I turned my head towards him and just nodded slightly. “I never asked him to sacrifice anything to be with me.”

“But you didn’t mind that he did. He made you happy.”

I swallowed. Fuck! I really couldn’t win in these stupid conversations about love lately; first Michael, then Lindsay, and now Ted.

I looked down. “Yeah, maybe.” That was pathetic -I was pathetic. There was no maybe. I had been happy, Justin had made me happy, which is probably the reason why I couldn’t or wouldn’t see that he wasn’t as perfectly happy as I was.

“See, we’re totally different. I would do anything to get what you had, while you … just let it go, maybe even gave it a push. It’s just that I don’t care why you did what you did and you don’t care that I want something different than you. That’s why this… thing between us somehow works.”

He ate some more noodles and I smoked some more. I came to the conclusion that I needed a time-out. I needed to get out of here, far away! Europe or Australia. Somewhere no one would keep reminding me that it's true, Justin had left because of me.