Five Boys One Band

Now for something completely self-indulgent and just kinda silly. A standalone story about a fictional gay boy band. Why not.

(The song they are promoting is based on a real song by a real group. No copyright infringement intended pls don't sue me.)

Five Boys One Band: MOTIV8TION

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Part I.

The year was 2024. The place was the studio where they filmed The Tonight Show in New York City. The people involved were, naturally, Jimmy Fallon and the studio audience but more importantly: America's latest pop curiosity. A boy band--and me, the guy who had just joined on to help save said band's reputation as they stumbled their way out of a forced hiatus.

Going back to the year 2022, which was the year the TV survival show aired which would result in said boy band: The Next American Boy Band. A really obvious title, and an unoriginal concept. But me at sixteen years old, at first just a regular viewer, was tuned in. As were millions of others worldwide. A year later, the final product: MOTIV8TION. Spelled in all caps, with an 8 instead of an 'A'. America's next boy band.

Their lineup lasted a paltry eight months and two songs before two of their members suddenly left, in a massive upset that rocked their fans and viewers. Management scrambled, and, oddly enough, instead of grabbing someone who had been on the show, they decided on a completely unknown person.

"A wild card with that X factor," is what their smarmy, three-dollar Jay Leno-ass manager told me over a Zoom call. "We think that that's you, Ren." And with absolutely no insight into how any of this worked, I was just over the moon they'd chosen me.

Me, Ren Aonuma, a minimally recognisable online person, with a sizeable following. Seventeen thousand-some subscribers across all my platforms wasn't shabby at all. Not that that meant anything against the 2.4 GPA that led me to dropping out of college when it came to my disappointed Asian parents. But it no longer mattered. I was no longer just some guy. I was seventeen and my life was changed anew.

For their end, Motivation had been put on hiatus since their lineup was forcibly shrunk. It'd been crickets for months. I was one of their fans; was so worried they were over. They had a lot to prove. And shit, so did I. My small league of subscribers knew me, but that was a drop in the pond compared to, say, the entire world. But I had the talent to stand next to them, I knew that. I knew I could sing and dance my way out of a paper bag, even if I hadn't been on TV alongside them to prove it.

Now I had to prove it to the viewers of The Tonight Show. The Tonight Show! Part of me wondered if I wasn't in over my head. Now I was eighteen and I had only one chance at this.

Soundcheck had been hours ago, and the carefully media-trained interview had already happened. All the rest of them had been here before, and they were bantering easily with Jimmy goddamn Fallon like they were old friends. It boggled the mind, realising just how little I knew about this industry, this life.

They tossed me a couple of obvious questions like, "how does it feel being the new guy? Is it hard?" and I practically read the answers off my hand like a grade school exam. All smiles and pleasant, polite nods. It was all so trite, but part of the job. I don't know if the audience knew what to make of me yet.

I sure as shit knew my new bandmates didn't. Through the months of practice, recording, and content creation, I felt like I had barely actually gotten to know them. Reactions to my existence ranged from cautious enthusiasm to curt, tacit professionalism. Turns out, it didn't matter what the job was. A coworker was a coworker. And I was the new guy that wandered in, with everything to prove and everything to lose.

Now, we awaited the performance. The other four of them were already so used to this, so they didn't seem nearly as agitated as I was. And I definitely was; I felt about ready to throw up. With all the stars in my eyes at the time of signing, I didn't realise so much of Motivation's comeback was hinged on this performance. Their first day back on the job. If I fucked it up, I was cooked, and so was their reputation.

Untethered, I milled about behind the stage while the rest of them lounged easily, sipping complimentary Evian water like birds. Fucking Evian. I exclusively drank tap water before all this.

"Newbie," called one of them, and I immediately recognised the commanding, smooth voice of Motivation's leader, Teddy. (Not his real name. We all had stage names.) "Chill, dude! You're gonna tire yourself out." I caught his eyes; green and glimmering in the lights.

"Sorry," I replied, stopping dead in my tracks. "Nerves." He smiled at me, offering an outstretched arm to pull me in. He was touchy like that, I'd learned--with everyone, not just me. And they all seemed to be okay with it, so I figured I had to be as well. Work culture and all that. I sidled over to Teddy, practically disappearing next to his long, imposing frame. I accepted his little semi-side hug, taking in the smell of antiperspirant.

"You'll do great," he said, looking down at me with a friendly but curt nod. "You've been killing it so far. Don't choke now." It was a command, veiled in a gentle tone. I suppose that's why he was the leader.

"Yeah," grunted another, Raye, his arms folded. "Don't fumble the crossing step in the last chorus like you've been doing in practice and we'll be golden." Arms crossed, his sharp, amber glint levelled into me like a scalpel. He was all angles, all business. I didn't let my eyes meet his directly. I didn't want to get pierced.

"Be nice, Raye," came the voice of our main singer Dino, his somewhat amused smirk taking up his smooth, made-up face. "We're a team. And we'll do this thing together." Reaching over Teddy, he offered me a fist bump, his hand practically dwarfing mine. When I looked up, his smile and eyes were both sparkling even in the low light. I smiled back, I couldn't help it around him.

The last one, Kaleo, leaning against the wall, the farthest away, just nodded in agreement and sipped his fancy French water. His moon-shaped face was bathed in a low light, illuminating the faint glitter on his dark almond eyes. Distant, unattainable, but beautiful. That was his entire schtick.

Ringleader Teddy, smooth Dino, icy Raye, and resident eye-candy for the girls Kaleo--that was Motivation. And now me: Aren. It really didn't help my nerves that they were additionally all hot as hell, and I hadn't jacked off in weeks. No privacy, no time.

But of course all the boys in the boy band were hot. Pop music was even more so about modelling than it was really about music. Shit, I had a single line in our song, and the rest of my duties were "look hot and dance well". The other guys had that down to a T already.

I could hardly believe it, even though my body wore the bruises of seemingly endless practice like badges of honour. At least they were hidden in this stupid-ass outfit. God, this outfit: a black top that was practically vacuum-sealed onto me, and oversized pants were halfway hanging off my hips. Like I said--modelling.

I was racing through all the steps of rehearsal again in my mind. It was burned into my memory; I just had to focus on getting through this. The song was less than three minutes--and it threatened to be an eternity. I just had to get through it. Tonight Show today, Good Morning America tomorrow. This was my life now.

We all drifted onto the stage, not yet revealed by the spotlights. When I heard the host utter the signal ("everyone please give it up...for Motivation!") I took a deep breath and reached deep inside. I was no longer Ren, the dropout kid posting dance covers to Tiktok. I was Aren, Motivation's dance machine, and I stood in the centre of these guys, about to show America what the fuck I was made of.

The lights flooded my face. A crunchy, catchy bassline filled the studio. The audience was cheering, and they were cheering for me.

Our performance slunk by me, my blood coursing with adrenaline as I danced. I danced and danced, my body merging in the middle with my memories of rehearsal. 'Dying in your arms / Feeling like a cloud / Wishing I could get another taste...' At one point in the choreography, I had a solo dance break, and the lights raced across my body like they couldn't pin me down.

My very few piecemeal words flitted out of me, and I tried to catch my breath as I sang my only actual line towards the end. 'Got your taste in my mouth, let it go / So alive and I'm dying for more...' I still wasn't used to my own voice coming through the in-ear monitor, patchy with effort and waning energy. But we did it. We closed the song in the same position as we were in when we started, and I had the final line.

"Venom."

Fervent cheering erupted around me, and I tightened my muscles so as not to fall over, utterly and thoroughly exhausted. I felt Dino's broad hand on my back, steadying me. I wanted to close my eyes and just collapse into him.

"Wow!" I heard distantly from the host. "Wow! Ladies and gentlemen, they've still got it--that was Motivation! ..." More cheers. Lights danced in my eyes, the motes blurry around the edges. Delirium crept in, threatening to topple me over. I nearly did. My eyes fluttered closed as a contented smile spread across my face.

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Part II.

What happened between us getting off stage and getting back in the company-owned cars was genuinely a blur. One minute, I was saying thank you to Jimmy Fallon. The next, I was on my back in bed. It was in a New York City hotel, somewhere towards the top floor, and I could hear a talk show going in the background.

No, not a random talk show--it was a repeat of our performance. I'd woken up just towards the end of it, in time to catch the camera zoomed in on my face, pasting my goofy, tired smile across the TV.

"Oh, no," I said aloud, cringing visibly. "Did I really look like that?"

"What's wrong with it? You looked cute as hell, bro."

I eased myself onto an elbow, to find my usual roommate Dino on the opposite bed, stripped down to just a pair of sweatpants. He had washed off the makeup and now his normal, shiny oak-brown skin peeked through. When he saw my movement, he peered at me through his short, floppy locs.

"Aren, my man," he said with a warm smile. "How are you?" I can't lie and say Dino isn't attractive: tall, beautifully dark, and a smile like a dental office ad. That we so often roomed together on the road only magnified whatever I thought was between us. The pleasant conversation, the errant touching. In the middle of all my delusions, I rather thought he was a little too nice to me, and hoped for something else.

Of course, that's fucking insane. We were coworkers, and I was continually starstruck. It was nothing more than that. But as I took in the sight of his soft, smiling face, I couldn't stop a flutter from rising in me. They were all hot, for sure, but Dino was different.

"Fuck, I'm beat," I confessed, my aching muscles confirming my state of being. "Did we do good or...?"

"Yeah...we killed it, dude," he said with a tight smile. Fuck. That didn't bode too well. "To celebrate, the rest of the guys are coming to our room tonight. Y'know...just to take the edge off."

"Oh, okay." Never mind that we didn't usually do that, but now the doubt was beginning to sink in. "Do you...think there was something I could improve on, or what?"

He just shook his head, sitting up against the pillows; the shadowed ridges of his abs moved with him. "Nah, don't worry about it. If anything, Teddy'll tell you. When he gets here."

I sighed when I pictured Teddy's chiselled, peach-white face; the tight smile he had when he gave me notes. Stuff about my performance or stage presence, stuff I could genuinely improve on. I think it helped, but his entire demeanour unseated me. Maybe it was his 'leader' role.

For some reason, he and Raye acted like good cop-bad cop when these things happened, though usually they were after rehearsal and not right at bedtime. Something about this was odd.

"Okay--" I began, and was quickly interrupted by four sharp raps on the door. Dino slunk off the bed, tossing me a knowing smile. I watched his hefty ass roll about in his sweats as he went. Then peeled my eyes away when I heard the other guys at the door.

Teddy, Raye, and Kaleo all sauntered into the room, trying not to make too much noise. They came bearing pizzas, pop--and to my surprise, Raye was hitting a dab pen.

"Motivation is back, boys!" crowed Teddy as he balanced two boxes of pizza in his hands. His smile was wide; his eyes were like searchlights in the room. He seemed to be in a good mood. "Well? What did you guys think? Fuckin' the Tonight Show, am I right?"

"I still hate the song," Raye muttered, setting down a six pack of pop. "Funky pop in 2024? What a shocker."

"It was a safe choice," retorted Teddy with a shrug; "but yeah, I'll give you that." He wheeled his piercing stare onto me, his grin wide. "Aren. Our new guy! How was it finally performing for a real audience?"

Leaning back on my bed, I wanted to sink into the shadows--I was so fucking tired. But they looked like they planned to be here for a while. "It was incredible," I said honestly. "I didn't feel like myself, I felt like...like a fuckin' machine." An enthusiastic "heeyyyyy!" came out of the guys, and they cheered and clapped me on the back. Most notably, Raye just nodded and hit his pen.

"You'll get more used to it," Dino offered, throwing his arm around my shoulders. He smelled like body wash. "Just stick with us. We need you. Right, guys?"

Teddy and Kaleo offered their enthusiastic agreement. Raye had opened one of the pizza boxes--pepperoni, my favourite--and sat on Dino's bed with the slice halfway to his downturned mouth. The silence weighed heavily; I could tell Dino and Teddy were staring at him. All the while, Kaleo fumbled with a bottle of Pepsi, busying himself with the lid, trying not to be so involved.

"What?" asked Raye. Slight annoyance crossed his gold-brown face, his angular features. "We needed Jin-young and Pablo, too. Where the fuck did they go?" The two lost members of Motivation, I knew; they were like ghosts in the group's history. "I'm just saying," Raye was saying after a bite; "that we'll see where we're at after a year. You have two pairs of shoes to fill. Big ones."

"I know that," I retorted. I had more to say to Raye's smug face, but Teddy swept in.

"And I believe you," he said, flashing a winning grin. "That's why we're celebrating, Aren. To our brand new addition, who just totally killed it for his first performance!" He took the pop from Kaleo, and handed it to me. "Come on. You're amazing. You deserve it."

I sipped, but kept an eye on Raye, across the bed from me. He was aggravating, in part because he was a dick, and in part because he was nearly a dead ringer of my first boyfriend, from when I was fifteen. A toned, smirk-faced Filipino with frustratingly kissable lips, and eyes I could swim in. Fuck him. He just hit his pen again, showing me the side of his cut jaw.

Kaleo handed me a slice of pizza on a plate, his gentle smile lit up by the low hotel room light. "It's been a tough few months for everyone," he offered in his soft, sugary voice. It was the most, I think, he'd said today.

"Thanks." I took the plate from him, and his feathery touch lingered a second too long on my hand. That's how I knew the no-jerk stress was getting to me, because that tiny interaction made me want to kiss him deep and long. It didn't help that he was already so cute. Fuck this gay-ass job.

The mood in the room relaxed and slowed when we turned the TV away from the programs and onto late night scary movies. Shitty zombie movies from the '80s. We talked for the first time about stuff that wasn't work. My life, their lives. On the one bed, Raye and Kaleo had settled in; Raye curiously had Kaleo practically snuggled to him. Like a lover. Or maybe I was just warm with sexual frustration.

I found myself sandwiched between Teddy and Dino, and my head was swimming. Once in conversation together, they were now talking over me, while I sank between the chiselled masses of their bodies. Teddy's pearly white abs on one side of me, and the long shadows of Dino's body on the other. I was melting into the bed. I felt like I was drunk; when I raised my hand in front of my face, it felt slow, disharmonious.

Wait. Was I drunk?

When I tried to raise myself off the bed, my head swam in the air of the hotel room, now warm and stuffy, and suffused with shadow. The TV was now a buzzing blur in the background. On the opposite bed, Kaleo was closer than ever to Raye; their faces...touching. Raye met my bewildered stare with his hard, agate eyes, and rubbed Kaleo's back while he kissed down his older bandmate's chest. He traced a line down his golden body; his one hand fondling his package.

"There he is," I heard Teddy's voice from beside, beneath, and all around me, echoing. "There's our boy."

"You feel alright, dance machine?" came Dino's voice, breathy and sweet in my ears. I could feel hands on my ass and back; curious fingers tugging at my clothes. I felt hot, prickly. Dino and Teddy's bodies closed in around me, towers that circled my frame.

"What's...going on?" I slurred, my voice bleary. "What...?" But it was lost under a moan that escaped me as I felt Teddy snake his hand into my briefs. He gripped my cock, which slowly pulsed to attention.

"You know, when our manager brought you to the practice room for the first time," he was saying; his breath hot against my ear; "I thought...wow. I gotta have this fucking adorable kid."

"So goddamn cute," Dino confirmed, putting his thumb against my lips. "Can I kiss you, Aren?"

My voice was tumbling out of me before I could stop it: "I...I've always wanted you to." Dino's grinning face filled my view, and soon I felt his lips close against mine. All my wildest dreams.

"Fuck!" I heard Teddy exult to the guys on the other bed. "Kal, I don't even think we needed to give him anything. He's raring to go." Wait, what? But the question was lost against the soft, insistent texture of my favourite Motivation member's lips kissing me.

"Dino," I was muttering against his mouth; "please don't stop...."

"I won't, baby," he replied, and he took my forearms and draped them around himself. "There you go. Hold onto me. I got you." Another kiss. "I got you."

Meanwhile, I could feel Teddy's hands peeling my clothes off of me. Hot, sweaty skin met the air of the room, and it tickled my nerves. Footsteps shuffled; bedsprings creaked. Dino had flipped me over, to see the members of Motivation all positioned around me. Naked, gloriously naked, all of them, and they hefted, held or stroked their cocks. All varying sizes. All of them, I wanted in me. I was fucking delirious.

When I looked down, I saw I was naked too, and despite myself, I felt no shame. Only unprecedented lust. My six-and-a-half inches were pulsating, engorged; weeping precum, and wanting so badly to be touched. What was going on?

"Hope you can understand," Teddy was saying, leaning down to replace Dino. "It's like a...a little initiation we like to do." He placed his broad hand on my chest, close to cupping my neck. "Time to show us what you're really made of."

Initiation...? He shuffled over, lining up the head of his cock with my mouth. Just a beat, then I accepted him thirstily, arousal and curiosity getting the better of me. The tip sank in, then the inches just kept coming until with almost no effort, I had swallowed Teddy's long, skinny cock all the way down.

"Oh, fuck yeah, Aren," he groaned, a shudder overcoming his body. "Come on, use your hands. Take some dick." In my one hand, Dino's fat, weighty dick, slick with grease and precum. I could barely close my hand around it. In the other, Kaleo's; not as long, but girthy, and already violently slick.