It was nearly noon when Jon had finally arisen, intent on doing something nice for Correy for a change, since he was always doing nice things for him. He made a fresh pot of coffee, cooked up a warm breakfast, and set it all on a tray, along with a single red rose he'd managed to procure from a vendor.

When he was finished, Jon gently woke Correy and the two of them sat down to breakfast to discuss the Gala events of the previous evening.

"So, I've been thinking..." Correy lifted a brow as he bit into the biscuit.

It was Jon's turn to be surprised, arching a brow at Correy's statement. "About what?" "Well, we had a disagreement last night, and it was about something that we'd already fought about and worked through." Correy wasn't one who beat around the bush. His emotions were worn on his sleeve for all to see. "So I thought we'd talk about things, outside of the heat of the moment. Talk while we're both calm and actually listening to each other." Jon felt a small twinge of pain in his chest, knowing that disagreement had been mostly his fault, his insecurities getting the best of him again. He knew in his heart that Correy loved him, but he'd heard it all before. He took a sip of coffee to try and hide what he was feeling. "Okay..." he started, unsure where to go from there. "I want to know what I can do to take away that small part of you that questions how I feel." Correy reached across the table and gently put his hand upon Jon's. "It's important to me, babe. I don't want there to be any doubts between us." Jon set the coffee cup down and linked his fingers with Correy's. "It's not you, Corr. It's me. I've never been able to hang onto anyone, not even Nikki." Correy canted his head and gazed into Jon's eyes. "Tell me everything that happened with her. I want to understand. You're not with her now, so mistakes were made. We can learn from that." He gave Jon's hand a gentle squeeze. "Please, babe?" Jon sighed softly. He didn't really want to think about Nikki much less talk about her. He still harbored some feelings for her, but they weren't like what he was feeling for Correy. "I met her when I was a boy. I was cast as Romeo to her Juliet. We were so young then." "You're not that old," Correy squeezed his hand again. "Tell me about the bad stuff. I know it must have been great at the beginning. Tell me what went wrong." Jon shrugged his shoulders. "I went away to pursue a career. She stayed here. We tried to keep in touch. It worked for a while. I'd come back now and then to see her, and it was like old times. I tried to convince her to come with me, but she didn't want to. She said her life was here. Maybe I should have stayed. I don't know. My mother..." He paused, his voice catching on the word. "I know it's hard," he leaned forwards and gave another squeeze to Jon's hand. "But you can do this. It's important." "My mother had high hopes for me," Jon continued. "It was her dream to be an actress. A dream she let go when she married my father. She always encouraged me, you know" She believed in me." Correy nodded, listening intently. He hung upon every word. He didn't interrupt this time, only showing a true compassion in his furrowed brow. What was unsaid was almost if not more important than what was said. Jon's mother had believed in him, while his father had not, but he didn't say that, not yet.

"I met Max when I was sixteen, seventeen" She...he...took my breath away. Everything was different after that. If I really truly loved Nikki, what was I doing with Max" I didn't understand what was happening. I was too young to understand that....that maybe I wasn't like everyone else. Nikki and I....we never made love. Not even once. She wanted to wait for marriage, and I guess I couldn't wait." "Whoa," Correy picked up the other half of the biscuit and began to nibble on it. "Did she know about Max?" "I tried, I did. I respected her wishes, but there were so many temptations. She knew there was someone, but she didn't know who. I fell in love with Max and lost Nikki, and then I lost Max. Work took me away from Max and when I got back, he'd replaced me with someone else." "I'm seeing a pattern here," Correy took another bite, chewed and swallowed before continuing. "And that pattern's being broken. Because your work is here. I'm here. You're not going away to work anymore. And if you do, I'll go with you." "Nikki didn't wait either. We reconciled for a while, but we couldn't make it work. I was there, she was here." "Exactly. I won't wait because I don't have to. Where you go, I go." Correy had heard enough about Nikki and Max. "I couldn't stand the loneliness and the guilt and then Mother died." He heard Correy's words, but he was deep into the story now. It was all or nothing; he couldn't stop in the middle. "She died and I just fell apart. My father didn't have to hold back anymore. He didn't have to make her happy. He told me what he thought of me and my dreams." "Baby," Correy whispered and lowered his chin to his knee.

"Told me I was worthless, that I'd never amount to anything. It didn't matter what I'd achieved. I was a Granger. I was supposed to carry on the legacy, whatever that is. Nikki tried to console me, but I couldn't stay here. And then he died, too, and I..." Correy could feel the pain and anguish over the lack of paternal care or love. He slid out of his chair and walked around the table until he was behind Jon. He bent over and hugged Jon from behind and kissed his cheek. "I'm here, baby, I'm here." Jon lowered his head, closing his eyes, lost in the memories, only partly aware of Correy's reassuring presence. He hadn't broken down yet, maybe he wouldn't. Telling someone the truth was like lifting a heavy burden from his shoulders. "It's ok," Correy whispered and kissed the top of Jon's head. "I couldn't live with the guilt. I'd experimented with different drugs, found they eased the pain for a little while. It started out simply enough. A little pot now and then mixed with alcohol, but it wasn't enough. Tay and I did a little coke, and God, the high was incredible. But it didn't last. An hour or so, and you were back down. I found I had to do more and more of it to get high, to maintain that high. By that time, I'd left New York, went back to L.A. The coke was flowing like water out there. I'd lost track of friends, family. I hadn't written Nikki in God only knows how long." Correy knew all too well how good it felt to get high on nose candy, and how bad the crashes could be. He hugged Jon tightly from behind, his mouth buried into the wild curls of Jon's head. He knew something really bad must have happened for Jon to have quit and braced himself for that inevitability. "Nikki wrote and told me it was over, and I realized my whole life was a waste. I'd lost everyone and everything I'd ever cared about. I couldn't find work. No one would hire me. My manager urged me to get into rehab, but I....I kept going back to my mother and what a disappointment I must be. One night, I did a little too much, mixed it with alcohol and some other stuff. I don't even remember what all I took. Anything I could get my hands on. I didn't care what. There was nothing left to live for and no one gave a damn." "Jesus," he whispered and the first of the tear drops moistened the top of Jon's hair, darkening the already dark curls. "Someone must have found me. I don't know who. When I woke up, I was in the hospital and they had me on something to kill the pain of withdrawal. The papers were full of rumors and lies. They never get anything right. But they wouldn't let me see that. I wasn't even allowed to write a letter. I had to get my head on straight first, they said. I wrote so many letters that never got sent. Letters to Nikki mostly." He blew out a slow breath before continuing. "I was in rehab for about a year. All I could think about all that time was coming home, making up for lost time, settling down, finding work, asking Nikki to marry me." Correy closed his eyes, tears squeezing out between long, ashy lashes. He took Jon's pain as his own. So easily, he could have been the one telling this story. "But when I got home, I found out she'd moved on. She was with someone else. She was angry I hadn't written. She wouldn't listen to explanations. She forgave me finally. I proposed and she said yes, but then..." He lowered his voice. "You know the rest." "But then Kay, then me." He sighed softly and nodded. "You and Nikki weren't meant to be, baby. You have to believe that." He lifted his head and wiped his face before turning in a wide arc around Jon to settle onto the edge of the table, facing him. "She was in your life to help you get through Auntie and Uncle's deaths. But she wasn't strong enough to help you get through the drugs and rehab. That was something you had to do for yourself. And because she'd served the purpose in your life already, going back to her and trying to get her back was doomed to fail." "It wasn't Nikki's fault, Corr. Riley is right. I'm to blame for screwing it up. I screwed everything up, but..." Jon lifted his head, turning to look at Correy, tears filling his eyes. "I don't want to screw us up." "Then stop comparing us to what you had. Because we're different. You're different, I'm different. It's not the same and as long as you believe in me as much as I believe in you, we're going to make it." "What if I screw it up again?" Jon asked, brushing the tears from his face. "I love you so much. I don't want to hurt you. I never meant to hurt anyone. Not Nikki, not Kaylee, not you." "What if my face was blue and my eyes were beige?" Correy shrugged and sighed. "Can't live on what ifs baby. You live on what you do know, on what you do believe." "I just wanted someone to believe in me..." Correy brought his hands up to cradle Jon's face between them. "I believe in you, but it doesn't matter what I or anybody else believes. You've got to believe in you, first." His eyes were narrowed slightly and he gazed into Jon's eyes with that same fierce determination and passion. "You have to believe in you, first." "My mother believed in me," Jon said, his voice rough with emotion, blue eyes swimming with tears as they looked back at Correy. Correy slid forward, going to one knee so he could wrap Jon in a warm and comforting hug. "Let it out, let it all out." He had his eyes closed and his own face was buried in Jon's neck. "Let it out, I'm here, babe. I'm here." "I....I can't..." Jon's voice broke, afraid to let the damn break, to let loose the flood of pain and emotions he'd kept bottled up for so long. "Yes, you can. I'm here, to pick you back up. So let it all out, scream and cuss as loud as you want. There's just the two of us here to hear it. And when you're done, we won't speak of it." He picked his head up from Correy's shoulder, eyes shining with tears. "You won't leave me, will you?" "Not until you send me away," Correy had lifted his head at the same time and he gazed into Jon's watery eyes. "And you know how stubborn I can be." He smiled and used his thumb to wipe away tears from Jon's cheek. "So you can do and say what you like. You're not getting rid of me that easily." "I'm such a mess. I'm sorry." He was really trying to put his life back together, one small step at a time. "I don't deserve you, Corr." He sniffled and let the tears spill over and down his cheeks. "Jon, do you believe in yourself?" He ignored the apology and the self pity. It was time to get to the healing. "I don't know. I know I can act. I know I have talent. I know that I love you. I'm not just a pretty face." "That's a good start," Correy leaned forward and kissed him then, hard and thoroughly. "And you can believe in that." "I don't want people to think I'm just...." Jon broke off as he got kissed, that kiss taking his breath away. Correy pressed his forehead to Jon's, his hand behind his neck with a firm grip. "Throw away what other people think. What you know in your heart and in your mind is the only truth that matters." "I came back to start over, Corr, but....no one will let me. No one but you. I just want to be happy, like everyone else. Why is that so much to ask?" "Listen to me. Will you listen to me? Screw everybody else. Do what brings you the most happiness. Act your ass off, be in every play you can be in, love me as much as I love you and we're going to be just fine."