Hijacking Jayson James Blog #2 – Derrick and Justin Talk About T.E.D.

Derrick

“What the fuck is Ted?”  Justin asked me as I opened the door to walk in.

“Ted?”  I had no idea what Justin was talking about.  

Justin spelled it out for me, “T (dot) E (dot) D (dot).  Oh, wait a minute.  Tim Eric Delsin.”  

He held up his Kindle so I could see the cover, but I was still not sure what he was talking about. “Is it a book?  The title seems weird.”  I pulled off my coat, but before I could drop it on the floor, Justin gave me the look, so I hung it up.

“What’s weird is who wrote it.”

“Who wrote it?”  Now he had my interest.

“Jayson  James.”  He shoved his Kindle inches away from my face.

I frowned, “Our Jayson James?”

“Is there any other?” Justin snapped back as he started pacing the room.

I frowned, “No need to be snide.”

He stopped mid pace, flopped his Kindle down and came over to me, putting his arms around me, “Sorry.   This pisses me off.”

I gave Justin a squeeze and an idea came to me.   I pulled away from him and went over to my laptop.  Before Justin could ask, I said, “I want to see what T.E.D. is all about.”

“It’s about us getting fucked!”

I peered over at him.  “Don’t you think your being a little melodramatic?”

He sighed and started pacing the room.  “Doesn’t it bother you that Jayson wrote a book without us in it?  I mean why would he do that?”

Honestly, I could get why Jayson would do that.  Now I needed to figure out how to get Justin to understand it.  I knew putting out three books in a row with the same characters, could pigeon hole an author.  Sure, there were short stories with other characters, but they were no books.  Thankfully, he was winding down, being he came over and sat down beside me.

“It just does not make any sense.  We provided him with storylines for not one, not two, but three books.”  Justin was going off and I was finding it hard to remember why I had sat down at the computer.    I found it better to let him continue to spout off for a little while longer, being I found it sexy when he would do this.  Not that I would never admit that to him, because he would be all sweet, lovey and charming afterwards, like he had to make it up to me.  As I did a search on T.E.D., Justin continued to rant.  “The reviews have been good.  Hell!  He’s gained more readers with every new book.   Sure he’s grown with each new book, but without us, he would have nothing.”

I’d become absorbed in what I was looking at online, that I hadn’t noticed Justin was no longer going off until he was sitting beside me with his head on my shoulder.  Here comes the sweet, lovey and charming.  I turned and kissed him on the forehead.  Now he was ready to listen.  “You know how you get in the mood to draw different things?”

“You mean like guys?   Or flowers?  Still life?  That kind of things?”

“Yes.  That is how it works for writing.  Sometimes you might have several great ideas involving the same characters, setting and such, but then you get an idea for something else and you write it.” 

Justin lifted his head off my shoulder, “I get the writing it.  It’s the publishing it where I have the problem.”

“Come on Justin.  We knew there were going to be books without us.”  I bit my lip.

Justin thought for a moment, “I suppose you are right.  I just thought we were going to be in them.  Even if it was for a little bit.”

“I think we should not let it bother us.  We still have each other.”

Justin smiled, “We’ll have another book.”

I grinned, “We’ll be in a few more.  I’m sure.”

 

 

Justin

My older brother, James called me the next day and asked me if I’d read this book he was reading called T.E.D.  Seeing what the book was about, I was surprised to hear that James was reading it.  Then he told me that he was in it.  Delsin, of course I knew I’d heard that name before.

It was clear to me that these guys in this book were older than Derrick and I.   I was more curious about reading the book and no longer upset about it.  Derrick was getting in the shower when James called and I could not recall how much time I’d been on the phone, but I imagined it was long enough that Derrick was done or near to being done.

I was curious and thought I would check out T.E.D.   A few clicks later, I came across something that thoroughly pissed me off.  As I scrolled up and down the page, the anger in me came to a boil.

Derrick walked in and looked concerned, “What is it?”

“He’s having a release party for the new book.”  I spoke through gritted teeth.

“Who?” He was confused.

“Fucking Jayson James for that T.E.D. book.”  I squeeze my fingers tight into fists and tensed my neck  to release some pressure.

“No way!”  I could tell Derrick was trying not to smirk, as he always did when I did this.  As silly as I knew it looked, it worked.  We’d established this unspoken rule, which basically was letting it go.

He’s attempting not to smirk, prompted my own poorly disguising of my own grin, “Way!  It says right here on Facebook, Release Party Weekend for T.E.D. by Jayson James.  He never gave us any damn release party.”

Derrick’s jaw dropped, “That’s such B.S.” 

He walked over and pulled up a chair next to me at the computer.  It was then that I noticed he was only wearing a bath towel.  He must have caught me eying him over, because he subtly bit his lower lip.  That’s all it took for me.  “I… “

“Did you see this?”  Derrick pointed at the computer screen, “Most of these prizes are about us and our books.”

“What?”  I snapped out of the sexual trans I was going into and took a look.  There were books, what I’d learned from Derrick was various author swag, autographed covers.  I had a thought, “I think we are going to be fine.”

“You do?”  Derrick seemed surprised.

“I do.”  The more I thought about it, the more confident I felt.  “We are always going to be how it all started.  Nothing is ever going to change that.   I mean think of all the stories, books, poems and other pieces of writing, many never read, let alone finished.”

Derrick nodded, “Very true.”  He smiled and looking into his eyes it became clear to me that I had just figured out something he already had.  I smiled back and nodded, letting him know I got it.  We both laughed.

I proceeded to eye Derrick up and down.  He took me by the hand and led the way.  Suddenly he stopped, looked me in the eye and stated, “Our next book, we are getting a release party.”

“Damn straight.  Bigger and better.”