"Watch Your Back"
By Viridian5
March 26, 2001

RATING: NC-17; Billy/Joe. If m/m interaction bothers you, pass on by.
SUMMARY: Joe pushes things until they snap.
DISTRIBUTION: Ten Buck Fucks. Anywhere else too, as long as you ask me first.
FEEDBACK: Hell, yes. Feedback can be sent to Viridian5@aol.com.
DISCLAIMERS: The band members in Hard Core Logo belong to Ed Festus, much as they might wish otherwise. Terminal City Pictures, Shadow Shows, Michael Turner, Bruce McDonald, and Noel S. Baker also have a marker on these folks. (My, but the Hard Cores’ asses are owned by many, many people.) I am none of the above. No infringement intended.
NOTES: Sequel to "Following," and it’s still 1978.
Thanks to Audra for the beta.

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"Watch Your Back"
By Viridian5
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John slid bad and came close to falling on his ass, almost tossing the amp he was carrying. Did I have to do everything myself? "Shit, be careful with that! I can replace you easier," I said.

John looked at me, sighed, and muttered something about us all being better off once we were dead. Hey, how are those meds working for you, man? He hadn’t been the same since I switched to ABBA mid-song on him during a show last week, but it’s not like it was my job to keep the Hard Cores sane. Way too much fucking work there.

But he didn’t slide on any more ice on his way into the club.

Billy stood in the back of the van with my guitar case in his hand. "Maybe you should stop... managing and start bringing stuff in yourself. Since we all know you can do it better than we can. And since the handle on your case is so slippery." The little bastard started to toss my case from hand to hand, catching it at the last second every time. Made it look easy too, like it weighed nothing.

It could just be him being his usual asshole self or him starting to get back at me for groping him last week. We hadn’t said a word about it and nothing obvious had changed, but Billy never forgot anything anybody ever did to him. He’d make only a little fuss at the time--some yelling or a thrown chair--but he liked to nail you for real much later, serving his vengeance dead cold, like those wives who took the beating at the time but ended up shooting or cutting a piece off their husbands while the guy slept.

Gave sleeping in the same room with him an extra bit of spice.

Billy did all that shit later. Best I could figure was that he wanted people to think he was the nice one, the reasonable one, in the band. Like we’re the fucking Beatles. Guess I was the smart one. And the cute one.

Why the fuck he cared, I didn’t know.

Not that we didn’t play people with that. Good bandmember/bad diva. I got my way, then soft-voiced, long-suffering Billy swept through to smooth things out.

Only I got the super deluxe delayed vengeance treatment from him though, instead of the standard delayed vengeance. It said a lot that I was the only person who could piss him off that badly.

"I’m watching the van," I said.

"Suuuuure."

"You drop that, and I’m taking it out of your ass."

"Not on the best day of your life." Then Billy shrieked and almost dropped the case. He elbowed Pipe, who was standing behind him, hands under his coat, tickling him. "You fuckhead!"

As he tried to dodge, Pipe kept giving me these challenging looks. Fucking with my Billy and my guitar because he thought he could be top dog. Fuckhead kept crying for attention since he resented what he called "the Joe and Billy show." I was going to have him crying for other reasons if he didn’t cut that shit out.

When I thought about it, I realized that he’d been putting his hands on Billy a lot lately, touching him, getting him drinks. I didn’t get the right vibes from him for that--he could just be doing it to mess with me--but why take chances?

Yeah, I was going to have to take him down hard soon. Hard, since he was too stupid to learn from anything less.

Fucking drummers.

Right now Billy and Pipe were doing a battle to the death thing, and Billy looked pissed. Maybe Pipe’s hands hadn’t stopped at his ribs. As pissed off as I was, I still couldn’t help wondering if Pipe had managed to get under the sweater and two shirts Billy wore. Billy dodged a headlock, then bashed Pipe’s head down against the other amp, Billy’s lips pulled back from his clenched teeth as he snarled. Oh, baby. So much for being the reasonable one.

Normally I’d sit back and enjoy this, but-- "Hey! You can rough him up after the show. Show first. And we’re getting 5% off the door." Besides, I had slush seeping in through the busted seam on my left boot.

Pipe grabbed parts of his drum kit, wobbled out of the van, and stuck his tongue out at Billy before he beat it into the club. He probably would’ve given Billy the finger if he hadn’t had his hands full. Yeah, there was a situation waiting to blow up here, and it was gonna blow up in my face if I didn’t stamp it out soon.

Billy thrust two mic stands at me and let go, knowing I’d have to grab them if I didn’t want them to drop into a snowbank. "The snow’s gonna affect turnout," he said.

"Pussies. What else does this loser town have to do on a Friday night?"

"I dunno. Maybe drink, fuck, score?"

"I’d smack you if I didn’t have my hands full."

"Yeah, yeah. Never stopped you before."

Billy smirked, took the mic stands from my hands, and walked off into the club, shooting, "You might want to get out of that puddle before you lose your toes to frostbite," over his shoulder.

Once the guys finished unloading, without any homicides getting in the way, I parked the van around the block and walked back. Inside, I managed not to slide down the wet, worn-out stairs to the downstairs part of the club. Too bad I missed out on watching Pipe carrying his drum set down these.

The club looked a lot like my dad’s rec room in the basement--exposed cement block walls, concrete floor, and those wooden chairs at the bar--but grungier, cheaper looking. Some of the couches were so wrecked they could probably swallow a person whole. Heat banged through exposed pipes on the ceiling, while steam gushed out of another pipe in one corner.

Perfect.

Billy had his guitar plugged in, so he noodled around on it a bit to check the levels, his tongue tip peeking out and touching his bottom lip in his concentration. He had his microphone set up, as if he didn’t always lean in to use mine anyway.

I didn’t have some kind of epiphany moment way back when I’d realized how I wanted him--no choirs of fucking angels or golden light or shit--just me recognizing something I’d wanted for a long time. I remember when it happened, though. We were writing music, with me moving his hands on his guitar strings once in a while and him slapping my hands away. He bent his spiky head to look down at his fingerwork, and I knew that I wanted everything I could get from him. Mind, soul, heart, body. All.

Billy saw me coming to the stage and started playing "God Save the Queen." I answered, "Don’t make me beat you when I come up there."

Billy gave me that "like you could" look before saying, "You don’t have far up to come. Stage is one step high." Then a wire duct-taped to an exposed pipe overhead fell and smacked him across the face. He muttered all the filthy words he knew, so it took him a while to finish.

"Hey, if Billy dies, I get his stash," Pipe said.

"Not if I kill you first," Billy answered.

"Nah, if Billy dies, I get all his worldly possessions," I said. "I take his shit in life, so I’m sure as hell gonna get it after his death."

Billy flipped me off. He loves me.

The bartender came over. "You can’t let your cases block the fire exit like that. Move them."

I’d tell him to move them himself, but who knew where the hell they’d end up? Fucker.

It really was like my father’s basement.

The fucking snow did affect the turnout--figures it would when we’re getting 5%--but the 30 people we had were invested, right there with us, which always stoked me up. The fucking losers who didn’t want to get their feet cold were missing us at our best.

Billy had stripped off the oversized dark blue commando sweater and flannel shirt, so the lights were streaking colors across his white undershirt. Some shitheads occasionally complained to me that Billy didn’t dress punk enough, like punk’s some kind of fashion thing with a uniform. Some of them were just smart enough to get what I meant when I answered that that was part of what made him more punk than they’d ever be.

Billy had stayed on his end of the tiny stage for most of the set and hadn’t leaned in as close as usual during his sing-a-long bits. Couldn’t let that keep going on.

I walked up and faced him, then put my forehead to his and started to push, still playing the whole way. The end of his cigarette flared as he took a deeper breath, then he pushed back, unwilling to give me a fucking inch. Billy was one of the few who didn’t back down from me, and that was part of why I wanted him like I did. His sweaty, spiky hair kept scratching my forehead as he tried to knock me away, but I wouldn’t budge, and with the pressure we had going our skulls should have dented. Shit, we could probably press coal into diamonds. His knuckles kept hitting mine as we played, and I could smell him.

Fuck, I probably couldn’t get any harder than this. We could charge clubs more if I started indulging my sex fantasies on stage. Punk rock and live porn, all in one. Proof that yes, folks, Billy does have an ass.

And it’s mine.

I realized that he was playing ahead to the end of "Son of a Bitch to the Core," and I’d already started to play it along with him without thinking. Sneaky bastard. No way I’d let him out of this so easily. I skipped back to the middle, and Billy, musical perfectionist that he was, went back with me. John must have had that "oh no, the voices are talking to me again" look on his face, and I wished I could see it, but I had my eyes glued to Billy and his frustration.

It had given me such a fucking warm feeling that when I started singing ABBA that one show, he picked up the tune and played it with me. My right hand man, watching my back.

I could hear the crowd going nuts; I don’t know what they thought we were up to, but they seemed to be loving it. John’s bass suddenly showed up at the part of "Son of a Bitch" that I’d forced Billy to. Fuck, yeah.

Then Billy somehow managed to headbutt me and knock me on my ass. After which he speed-thrashed his way to the end of the song, closing out with a high note that he held impossibly long, and breathlessly shouted "Thank you!" into the mic. His mic, the one he never used. The audience exploded into noise, which covered up John trailing off half a moment later, then hitting his head against his microphone over and over. At least that’s what the boom boom boom sound suggested to me from where I was sitting on my ass in the center of the stage.

When Billy turned around, grinning down at me, I grabbed his ankle and pulled him down with me.

Billy got two punches in before John pulled us apart too soon. I wanted to wrestle some more.

As I downed my third free drink and kept accepting praise as my rightful due, I saw Billy get back and take his coat off. Billy-boy always brought our guitars out to the van before he let himself enjoy the crowd. Anal Man. John did something similar with our gear, but John was a funny farm alumni.

Billy was getting frustrated looking for something onstage, so I went over. "Lose something?" I asked.

"I think someone stole my fucking undershirt. It was right here...." He wore just the sweater and flannel shirt above his jeans right now since he’d taken his sweaty undershirt off fifteen minutes ago and put it on top of the speakers.

"Fans, Billy-boy. We’re living the legend." He looked so disgusted that I had to laugh. "You should be proud. Your undershirt is going to be part of somebody’s jerk-off fantasies for a while. It means you’re a fucking star now."

"Fuck you."

Somebody behind me asked, "Are you Joe Dick?"

"What’s it to you?" I asked.

I just barely ducked the punch the fucker threw at me. Imagine how pleased I was when Billy turned feral and threw himself at the guy, taking him down. But the asshole’s friends started grabbing at us. Things got confusing after that. I ducked punches, threw punches, got hit with punches. From what little I could see in between all the moving bodies, it looked like we’d started a whole-bar brawl. Fuck yeah.

Billy grabbed one of the guys off me and smashed the guy’s head against the stage, giving me a chance to knock down most of the rest. Somebody’d split Billy’s bottom lip and ripped the bottom of his sweater’s right sleeve. "Let’s get the hell out of here," he hissed.

"Why? This is the most fucking fun I’ve had in a while." I had one of the world’s greatest adrenaline highs going, feeling no pain.

"Because the police are going to get called in with the way things are going, and I don’t want to be here for that."

He grabbed my arm and started to pull me through the crowd. I couldn’t help laughing as I accidentally kicked part of Pipefelcher’s drumset away. Guess it paid to be Anal Man after all. "Where are we going, genius?" I asked as I ducked someone’s swing.

"Fire exit."

Two brawlers knocked us into it. We pushed them back into the crush, then tried the door. It didn’t give. You had to love it. Billy hit it hard with his shoulder but just hurt his shoulder. I hit it hard, opening it with a loud cracking sound. We just about dropped through into an alley, the sudden cold hitting like a brick.

I pushed the door back in. If Billy had gone to this trouble for our getaway, I could make sure nobody followed us out.

Fuck, I felt good. I knew I had bruises rising, but right now that didn’t matter. I was hard as a rock and pacing, trying to work some of the adrenaline off, but it wouldn’t go. Meanwhile, I felt like I had to come or die.

"I think that was the band," Billy said out of nowhere.

"What?"

"The other band. You destroyed their instruments at our last gig, and they came back for revenge. I recognize their singer, if you can call him that."

"Got what they deserved. Whiny fuckers."

Billy nodded and just about vibrated as he sucked at his knuckles. Must have split them along with his lip. I could see a bruise coming in on his left cheekbone. His every rapid breath let out a cloud of fog. He had that bright, glad light in his eyes that he got when we fought. High on it. Feral. Billy’s jeans were tented.

I remembered the way he’d moved under my hand and tried to fight me as I stroked his dick through his jeans that last time.

"Joe! What the fuck--" he shouted as I grabbed him, pushed him against the wall, and pressed him there, my hands on his shoulders and my knee between his legs keeping him where I wanted him. He felt so damned good there. He took a deep breath and said, "You better stop this shit right now."

Shivering, lips blue, the hairs on his thin wrists standing up from goosebumps, Billy seemed to be suffering from the cold since he hadn’t snared his coat before we left. A sweater and flannel shirt weren’t enough protection for our Billy. Far be it from me to let my best buddy suffer when I could warm him up.

I brought my knee up higher, making him squirm as he tried to avoid riding it. His hands clawed at me, but I didn’t feel it through the high I had. Great fight, and Billy had been right in the middle of it as my right hand man.... I had him at enough distance from me that he couldn’t headbutt me either. He kept squirming, making it hard to hold onto him, but that just made me hornier.

"You want this," I said as I brought my knee up higher and rubbed him.

"Like hell. Get your fucking hands off me now," he gasped, a flood of fog steaming from his lips.

His mouth. I wanted.... Kissing him seemed like something a fag would do, but he had that blood on his split lip.... I moved in fast before he could take advantage of having me in close. Even his lips were cold, but his mouth was hot as I pushed my tongue in. It brought me in closer to him than I’d ever been, right in his face, skin to skin and nearly eyeball to eyeball. This wasn’t kissing, it was fucking feeding, me sucking down his breath and metallic-tasting blood like I could eat his soul. Billy kind of melted and surged all at once, his body screaming "yes." Funny the weird weaknesses people had.

Hell, I was humping mine into a brick wall right now.

But he was humping me right back. When he bit my ear, I came hard with a growl, just about crushing him into the bricks, which seemed to be what he needed to come.

Years of foreplay, all coming down to a perfect time and place. I felt great. Once I got my breath back, I laughed. "I think you ripped out one of my earrings."

Shaking, he pushed me away. "Fuck you, Joe," he said, his voice sounding like it had to struggle its way out of his throat.

"I don’t play that way, Billy-boy." Fuck, I needed a cigarette. "Don’t tell me you didn’t want it."

"This changes everything!" he said, just about on fire with how angry he was, but I could see the lust in there too. Beautiful. It always made him angry that he needed me as much as he did.

"Hell yeah! Makes it better. You kept dancing around it. Now it’s out in the open."

He stared at me like I was some kind of alien creature. I sped in on him so I could lick some of the blood off his chin and move away before he could hit me.

"I hate you!"

"Likewise."

Billy shook his head. "I have to change."

My jeans were fucking sticky and uncomfortable too, but I knew he didn’t mean that. "I thought you said this already changed everything. Make up your mind."

"Oh yeah." He walked up close--letting me smell the sweat, sex, and blood on him--but didn’t hit me. Instead he put his hand on my crotch, stroked... then gripped my dick hard and painfully through the worn, soaked denim. "Don’t fuck with me, Joe," he whispered.

"Baby," I managed to grunt. My smartass smile was part grimace of pain, but I meant it.

He snarled, then let go and started to walk away, shouting over his shoulder, "This isn’t over. I’d watch myself if I were you."

"I’m looking forward to it," I said, and walked a lot slower so I could enjoy the view

**********************THE END***********************