In Another’s Eyes

 

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In another’s eyes

I’m someone who

Loves her enough

To walk away from you

I’d never cheat

And I would never lie

In another’s eyes…yeah

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

“Do you ever just wish the world would go away?”

 

The words, though softly spoken, crash into my mind. Like a fiend ripping away the shroud of innocence, they bring to mind the reality that I am not yet ready to face. The reality of her and him and my growing desperation to be with the one I truly love.

 

I sigh lightly into the warm chest underneath my cheek. If I had a choice I would stay here forever with Lance running his fingers through my hair and the sweet scent of our love making heavy in the air. These stolen moments are my only true peace. When I’m in Lance’s arms all is right with the world, a heavenly choir sings softly in the background, and all the lies and deceit of this world are washed away. Everything is possible yet nothing is important except him.

 

“Justin?”

 

I can feel his words rumble from deep within his chest. I don’t think he knows just how much I love to snuggle close to him. To let his words wash over me while the vibrations travel along my nerve endings and lodge themselves deep within my core. I laugh lightly to myself. Sometimes I wonder if his voice is the reason I fell in love with him. I know it’s not, but his voice does have the power to bring me to my knees or make me walk on air. It’s funny people say I have the voice of an angel because they haven’t experienced heaven until they’ve heard the three most coveted words pass Lance’s lips.

 

“Baby, do you?”

 

He wants an answer, but I’m not sure of the question anymore. Do I what, Lance? Do I wish I never had to leave this bed? Do I wish you’d scream to the world that you love me? Do I wish I could do the same for you? Do I wish there was no need for secrecy? Do I wish all the walls would come tumbling down? Do I wish JC and Britney would move on with their lives and leave us behind to love each other? Oh yeah, do I wish the world would just go away? “Sometimes.”

 

Sometimes like right now. When you’re gently running your fingers through my hair. When your other hand is stroking up and down the arm I have thrown across your waist. When I can still feel the physical proof of our love. When the covers lay in a tangled heap and our clothes are strewn across the room. When you ask me if I want it to go away.

 

Yeah, baby, that’s when I want the world to go away. But there is a time when I wish it would go away even more. It’s when I have to look into Britney’s eyes, and I feel like a traitor. When I look into her eyes I see everything a man could want. A friend. A lover. A confidant. I can see her love for me shining in her eyes. I see the trust. The longing. The understanding. The passion. I see it all…and it’s not what I want. Because what I want is in another’s eyes.

 

I hug you tighter. It’s always the same. I never want to go back. I want to stay here with you and sing cheesy love songs. Maybe make you breakfast in bed. Or read a book. Go to the mall. Anything, as long as I’m with you. I sigh again. I don’t want to go back to the real world.

 

“Thinking about Britney?”

 

He always knows what’s bothering me because it’s always the same thing. “Yeah.” Suddenly I feel the urge to let it all pour out. All these pent up frustrations and fears, they need an outlet. “I’m just so tired of all of this. I love Britney but I’m in love with you.” I feel tears prick my eyes as I rise up to look into my love’s eyes. “When’s it going to be over? How long before this charade ends? When can we stop pretending we’re just friends?” I see the sorrow in his eyes. I know it’s mirrored in my own. We’ve been through this before.

 

I can’t seem to stop myself, though. This is old, familiar ground. We’ve been here so many times before, and it hurts just as much, if not more, than the first time. I keep hoping that one day…one sweet day, there will be a different ending.

 

I can’t look at him anymore. Right now it’s just too painful to see the love and sorrow and longing in his eyes. I sit up and swing my legs over the side of the bed. My back is to him and my elbows are resting on my knees. I stare at the wall for a moment before lowering my head to my hands.

 

My words come out slightly muffled but I know he can hear them. “I never wanted to hurt anybody. I just wanted to fall in love and have that person love me back.” A harsh laugh rips from deep inside me and then he is there pulling me back into that warm chest I love so much. “I guess I got my wish.” My eyes droop closed and I rest my head against his shoulder. “Why does it have to be so complicated? I thought boy was supposed to meet girl, they fell in love, boy proposed, and they lived happily ever after. Why is our fairy tale so screwed up?”

 

“I don’t know, baby. I don’t know.”

 

I know he doesn’t know. How could he? He’s not God. He’s just a man. No, not just a man. He’s the man I love. “Lance, when you look at JC do you ever see me?” I don’t wait for an answer. I already know it. “Because every time I look at Britney I see you.” I know he must see my sad smile because he kisses me on the forehead and leans his head against mine. “And all she really sees is a hollow projection. She doesn’t see-“

 

“She doesn’t see the light I see in your eyes. She doesn’t see the way you glow when I touch you or kiss you or hold you or even just look in your direction.”

 

 No, she doesn’t see that. That light is only for you, my love. “I…she…” Why is this so hard to put into words? “I care about her. I always have, and I always will. I love her.” Shouldn’t the fairy tale end with that statement? But this one doesn’t. “I love her but she’s not you. She doesn’t make my heart soar. She doesn’t make me burn with a mere smile. She doesn’t consume me. She’s…comfortable.” Did that make any sense to you? God knows it’s the only explanation I have.

 

How do you tell someone that’s been your girlfriend for so long and your friend since you were twelve that you’re in love with someone else? “She trusts me. I’m her forever. In her eyes I can see the belief that I’m the perfect man. Loving. Caring. Incapable of doing wrong. So much in love that another person would never cross my mind.” That’s what she sees but that’s not who I am. I’ll never be that person to her.

 

I wish I could be.

 

“She means so much to me, and I never want to break her heart. I never want her to know about all the times I’ve lied. I don’t want to disappoint her.”

 

I feel defeated. If Lance weren’t supporting me I’d fall. Just…fall and never stop. “I never want her to know I don’t love her enough to walk away from you.” So, yeah, sometimes I wish the world would just go away.

 

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In another’s eyes

I can do no wrong

And he believes in me

And his faith is strong

I’d never fall

Or even compromise

In another’s eyes…um

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This is real.

 

I am really here. Justin is really here. We’re here, and we’re together. God, it seems like it was only yesterday we were little more than friends. So much has changed. Some days I can’t believe the man I’ve become.

 

Justin’s shifting. I pull him closer and he drapes his arm over my stomach. I smile to myself. This is when I love him the most. Holding him. Touching him. They are the small pleasures in my life. When we’re like this nothing else in the world exists. Not Britney. Not…JC.

 

At least for a few minutes they didn’t exist. For a few minutes it was just us and our love. We touched, and we kissed. We lived our whole lives in those few minutes between realities.

 

I sigh. Now the past and present have caught up with me again. No matter how much I love Justin I can’t forget JC. He’s always there waiting for me. I can picture the warm smile on his face as he holds his arms out to me. We were made for each other. That’s what he says. I don’t argue the point. At one time, it seems so long ago, I used to laugh and kiss him on the nose telling him that we were, indeed, made for each other.

 

Now…now I just smile and hug him. I hug him so tight, and I close my eyes, and I pray with everything in me that when I open my eyes I’ll be hugging Justin. I know it’s wrong but for as much as I love JC, I love Justin a thousand times more.

 

I can tell he’s still caught up in the afterglow of our passion. He’s tracing patterns over my chest with his fingers and occasionally dropping small kisses on my skin. If my body wasn’t already on a slow burn, I’d go up in flames. Flames, that’s a good way to describe it. He crawls inside, sets me aflame, and then fills my heart until it’s so full of love for him that it may burst. And because of that…because his love has that affect on me, I am living a lie.

 

I don’t even really know how this all began. I was happy with JC. Well, I thought I was happy. He was always there for me. Right from the beginning. It was always Lance and JC. I feel a twinge in my heart. Sometimes I wish I could go back to those days. We did everything together. Lord, JC was my first male kiss. He was my first lover. He was my everything. We could tell each other anything. But not anymore. Somewhere along the way I changed. I left behind the boy from Mississippi that had stars in his eyes.

 

A groan escapes me. Justin is kissing my chest lightly. I love it when he does that. The little kisses are almost unconscious acts on his part. He told me once, after I brought them to his attention, that he didn’t really realize he did it. We decided it was his way of staying close. His way of feeling the connection when the afterglow had passed.

 

I wish he could kiss me forever.

 

Forever. So I won’t have to go back and pretend to be that shy boy from Mississippi. JC always said that was what attracted him to me in the first place. And for a time I felt that attraction too. But as more and more time passed I realized something was missing. It wasn’t the sex. God, but the sex was good. But it was just that. Sex. I didn’t make love to JC after the first year. We fucked. And I feel so ashamed to admit it.

 

He deserves better than that. Better than me, but he tells me I’m what he wants so I stay. I stay because I love him. And because I don’t want to hurt him. But someday I’m going to hurt him because I love Justin too much to be without him for much longer.

 

A warm feeling courses through my veins as I run my fingers through my angel’s hair. I never meant to fall in love with him. It just happened. We had always been close. He was the first person I told I was gay. When I told him he looked at me for a few nerve wracking seconds and then pulled me into his arms. I could hear him whispering through my tears. He told me that no matter what he would always love me for me not for how people would look at me. Never in my life had I been so happy to have him as a friend.

 

We’ve shared a lot through the years. Fame. Fortune. Friends… Heartache.  I guess the heartache is where we began our journey together. I feel pressure behind my eyelids. I don’t want to remember. I want to pretend JC and Britney don’t exist. But how am I supposed to forget them when they’re the ones that brought us together and keep us apart.

 

The memory is so clear, almost as if it happened yesterday instead of three years ago. Chris, JC, and Joey were going out to celebrate. Joey had just turned twenty-one and JC had finished a song he had been having a lot of trouble writing. They wanted to go to a club and Justin and I were too young to get in. Relief coursed through me when the door had shut behind them. I was so tired of pretending. I just didn’t love JC anymore. At least not the way he wanted me to.

 

Justin had come in and plopped down on the bed beside me and laid his head on my stomach. The sigh that escaped him sounded as dejected as I felt. He had turned his head and the pain I saw in those beautiful blue eyes was almost more than I could stand. He blinked rapidly to stop the tears from forming and had asked if we could talk.

 

The rest of the night was spent wrapped in each other’s arms crying over the fact that we both felt like frauds because the love we thought we had went away. That was the beginning…and the end. We resolved to commit more to our relationships. Nothing would stop us. We would get back what we had lost.

 

Life went back to a semblance of normality. I was happy with JC again. Justin was happy with Britney. We supported each other. When one of us was feeling down the other was right there to give a lift up.

 

But ultimately we stopped ourselves from regaining the joy we had once known. We came to depend on each other so much. I didn’t realize how much my feelings for him had changed until one night when JC and I had been having sex. It was the closest thing to love we had made in a long time. As JC had been nearing climax I looked into his eyes and Justin stared back out at me. It was Justin’s blue eyes and curly hair and hard body I was making love to. It was him I wanted underneath me as I cried out in completion.

 

It was a pleasure and a pain when a few weeks later I found out he wanted the same thing. That night, on a blanket underneath the stars with cicadas singing on the breeze and the scent of sweet grass heavy in the air, I truly fell in love for the first and last time. Nothing I had ever experienced with JC came close to the feelings Justin aroused in me. And with Justin it wasn’t just about the sex. Although JC’s loving paled in comparison. Justin and I were...are happy to simply be together and at peace.

 

A sigh escapes me and I hug Justin tighter to me. The only times I’ve been happy since then are when we’re in each other’s arms. Right now. Right this minute I wish JC and Britney would go away. Hell, the whole world could cease to exist as long as I can stay right here with the man I love.

 

Emotion clogs my throat making my voice deeper than normal. I wonder is he ever feels the same. “Do you ever just wish the world would go away?” I feel him tense slightly. I hate the pain I know I just caused him. I can almost feel it vibrate through his body. He’s like me. During our time together he forgets for a while too. I wish there was nothing to forget.

 

His warm breath caresses my skin as he lets out a sigh. I run my fingers through his hair and I feel him relax against me. I know he’s lost in thought. This is the hardest time for both of us. The anguish of the real world returning tears at both our hearts.

 

“Justin?” He’s not answering. I wonder what’s going through his mind. Is he beginning to regret the love we share? I don’t know if I could live if he didn’t love me anymore.

 

“Baby, do you?” He’s worrying me now. Every thought racing through my mind is tinged with fear. He’s my world. My anchor. Without him I couldn’t play this charade every day. I couldn’t wake up beside JC every morning and pretend everything is all right. He’s my strength, and he gives me the power to keep my promise to JC. He gives me the power to not break the heart I once loved.

 

“Sometimes.”

 

Oh, God. That’s defeat I hear in his voice. My eyes are beginning to sting. We’ve brought this misery on ourselves but I can’t help but embrace it. Embrace it and pray for the day it will end. How can we go on like this? JC means the world to me and I can’t hurt him. I just can’t. I love him even if I’m not in love with him anymore. I can feel my heart break all over again. Justin and I have discussed this. We would destroy everything if we gave up the pretense of love toward JC and Britney.

 

Britney. The resentment is welling up inside me. I know it’s ridiculous to feel this way toward her but she has what I want…need.

 

Still, she may have Justin’s body, but I content myself knowing I have his heart and soul. And someday…some day not too far away. I’ll have his body forever too. Nothing will keep us apart.

 

I pray for that day. For the day when I know it’s me he’s thinking about instead of Britney. His arms are tightening around me. A soft sigh wells up deep inside. He’s thinking of Britney. He’s thinking about how he’s betrayed her and how he can’t be the man she needs. I know that’s what he’s thinking about still I ask, “Thinking about Britney?”

 

“Yeah.” And that one word says it all. In his voice I can hear the pain and defeat and my heart breaks all over again for the agony of our love. “I’m just so tired of all of this. I love Britney but I’m in love with you.” And my heart sings. I want to crush him to me and confess with every breath in me that I love him too, but before I can, he’s rising up and looking me in the eye. As I look into the watery depths I curse Britney and JC and the whole world, but most of all I curse myself for putting him through this.

 

“When’s it going to be over? How long before this charade ends? When can we stop pretending we’re just friends?” And, God, but I want to tell him ‘right now’. I want to kiss him and hold him and promise we’ll never be apart again, but in the back of my mind a soft smile and excited eyes remind me I would only be lying to the one person in my life I’m completely truthful with.

 

JC. His face blazes across my mind. I can see his many faces. The bright, excited smile and eyes when he comes up with a new idea for a song. The pleading eyes and innocent grin when he’s begging for something. His eyes, lust filled and turbulent, as he urges me on to greater heights during sex. And the face that haunts me most. His face of devotion and uncompromising love.

 

He trusts me implicitly and if the thought of me straying ever crossed his mind, I would be surprised. Inwardly I shake. He’s not naïve. He’s in love.

 

With me.

 

The jarring motion of Justin swinging away from me to sit on the edge of the bed brings me back to the present. The slump of his shoulders as he cradles his head in his hands calls to me. Before his muffled words are completely out of his mouth, I’m on my knees behind him pulling him against me.

 

“I never wanted to hurt anybody. I just wanted to fall in love and have that person love me back.” His harsh laughter cuts at me deep inside. We can’t survive this much longer.

“I guess I got my wish.” His eyes close and he rests his head against my shoulder. I want to cry.

 

“Why does it have to be so complicated? I thought boy was supposed to meet girl, they fell in love, boy proposed, and they lived happily ever after. Why is our fairy tale so screwed up?”

 

I don’t know why it happened to us. Neither of us ever wanted to hurt anyone. We only wanted the childhood illusion of love. “I don’t know, baby. I don’t know.” But I’d go through it all again just to love him.

 

“Lance, when you look at JC do you ever see me?” His question catches me unprepared, but once again he continues before I can answer. “Because every time I look at Britney I see you.” A sad smile curves the lips I yearn to kiss. And how am I supposed to answer his question? His uncanny ability to pick up on my earlier thoughts renders me speechless and I kiss his forehead and then lean my head against his in answer. No words were really needed. I know he sees me in Britney. He told me once that my reflection was the only thing that carried him through their sham of a relationship. “And all she really sees is a hollow projection. She doesn’t see-“

 

“She doesn’t see the light I see in your eyes. She doesn’t see the way you glow when I touch you or kiss you or hold you or even just look in your direction.” No, she doesn’t see that. That light shines only for me and each time I see it, another memory is added to the rich treasures I have of you.

 

“I…she…I care about her. I always have, and I always will. I love her…I love her but she’s not you. She doesn’t make my heart soar. She doesn’t make me burn with a mere smile. She doesn’t consume me. She’s…comfortable.” And I know exactly what he’s saying. I feel the same toward JC. There’s no pressure in staying with him, but in return there is no pleasure either.

 

“She trusts me. I’m her forever. In her eyes I can see the belief that I’m the perfect man. Loving. Caring. Incapable of doing wrong. So much in love that another person would never cross my mind.”

 

And that’s something Britney and I have in common. We see Justin in the same light. The only difference being that I think Justin is perfect despite his flaws and she thinks he’s perfect because she doesn’t see his flaws.

 

“She means so much to me, and I never want to break her heart. I never want her to know about all the times I’ve lied. I don’t want to disappoint her.” And what more can I do than hold him tighter? I feel his pain and share his fears. “I never want her to know I don’t love her enough to walk away from you.”

 

Traitorously my mind wants to know why he doesn’t love me enough to walk away from her, but resolutely I push the thought away. Fear has held both of us prisoner far too long. With new resolve I climb off the bed and snatch up my phone. One of us has to be strong and none of us, Britney and JC included, deserve the secrecy and hiding. And besides, today I’m willing to prove to Justin that I love him enough to walk away from JC. As the phone rings I wonder what tomorrow will bring, but as I see the fear and hope in Justin’s bottomless blue eyes, I know we’ll be fine because we’ll be together.

 

He squeezes my hand, and I see the relief as a lone tear slides down his face. “I love you, Lance.” And that’s all the encouragement I need as I hear a voice on the other end of the line.

 

“JC, we need to talk…”

 

The day has come at long last.

 

~~~~~The End~~~~~

 

In Another’s Eyes

Written by: Bobby Wood, John Peppard  & Garth Brooks

Performed by: Garth Brooks and Trisha Yearwood

CD: Sevens available on Capitol Records

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In another’s eyes

I’m someone who

Loves her enough

To walk away from you

I’d never cheat

And I would never lie

In another’s eyes…yeah

 

In another’s eyes

I can do no wrong

And he believes in me

And his faith is strong

I’d never fall

Or even compromise

In another’s eyes…um

 

In another’s eyes

I’m afraid that I can’t see

This picture perfect portrait

That they paint of me

They don’t realize

And I pray they never do

‘Cause every time I look

I’m seein’ you

In another’s eyes

 

Oh…in another’s eyes

Starin’ back at me

I see a sinkin’ soul

Tryin’ desperately

To turn the tide

Before it dies

In another’s eyes…yeah

 

And what they don’t see

Lord, is killing me

It’s a blessing and a curse

That love is blind

‘Cause in another’s eyes

I’m afraid that I can’t see

This picture perfect portrait

That they paint of me

They don’t realize

And I pray to God they never do

‘Cause every time I look

I’m seein’ you

In another’s eyes

In another’s eyes

In another’s eyes

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