*****

Benny found Pike napping when he walked in around 11:45 p.m. Pike had curled in on himself in his nest of tangled sheets, and he contentedly sucked his thumb, something he didn't do often. Benny wanted to climb into bed and join this sweet picture, but it would ruin his whole objective in coming here straight from work, still in uniform and stinking of grease. The sacrifices he made...

Benny crouched beside the bed and resisted the urge to stroke the longish brown hair that skewed crazily on that sleeping head. "Piiiiiiiike, wakey-wakey."

"Mmm?" Brown eyes softened from slumber opened, and the thumb came out. The look of trust made Benny feel so warm, especially since it had taken months to truly get there. When they'd first met, Pike had shown the instincts and gestures of an abused stray accustomed to fighting for its life.

"That must be really good. Let me try it." Benny grabbed Pike by the wrist and put the thumb in his mouth so he could suck on it. He'd never thought of spit having a scent or taste before, but Pike's did, this time sweet with a hint of malt. Must have had a 40 earlier. "Yummy."

"You're a nut," Pike said dreamily, still elsewhere. He had the ability to reach an altered state of consciousness just by falling asleep or passing out, no drugs required. Benny sometimes wished he could crawl inside that skull and explore a bit. "Hey, Benny, you stink."

"It's Thursday."

Pike wakened a little more. "Oh, right." He leaned over the bed and took a loving whiff of the bag Benny held. "Free food," he said reverently.

"You're easy to impress."

"And they had you working the register a little again today. Good thing they don't know how much money you lift from your mom's wallet."

"How did you-- I washed my hands!"

"Money has its own lingering fragrance." Pike yawned and stretched widely, briefly revealing ribs and an expanse of slightly rounded belly. Then he started to bustle around his shabby apartment to get the table ready.

Benny understood the whole scent thing though. Working as a mechanic six days a week left Pike smelling faintly of various engine oils and fluids no matter how much he washed. You had to be really close to detect it, but it was there. It had gotten to the point where Ben got horny just being near an open car engine.

And that was a big problem.

Pike handed Benny a joint and lifted his silver plated flask--what he claimed to be the only good thing he'd ever gotten from his parents, and he had to steal it--in a toast. "To you, Ben, for making the ultimate sacrifice so I can have free food Thursday nights."

Benny lit up and let the spicy smoke flow through him. "And don't you forget it. There's the uniform."

"No doubt designed by blind Himalayan monks."

"Stinking of grease all day."

"Waterproofing?"

"That damned visor."

"I like the crimp it puts in your hair."

//Really?// "Actually *working*."

"A horror I understand well."

"For very little money."

"I feel your pain."

"And the number one reason why working sucks: I have to stay sober for seven hours at a stretch."

"Oh, the humanity!" Pike took out a drumstick and dug in. "Good chicken, though."

"Not when you're over it all day."

"I bitch about the shop, but it's still better than fast food."

Normally, Ben would have spent the summer vacation lazing around, but he'd gotten to the point where he didn't enjoy getting drunk or stoned without Pike, and Pike had a steady job. Benny had requested hours that synchronized with Pike's, but his bosses had given him one till-closing shift anyway. Fortunately, it had a perk: the employees there when the place closed for the night got to take home whatever food was left over, as long as the manager didn't catch them *making* food specifically as leftovers. Benny teased the line by preparing a sundae and hiding it in the ice bin till he left but had never been caught. He just felt that Pike should have dessert with his chicken and biscuits.

And Pike did love getting the food, which he said just tasted better when it was free. It was amazing how quickly and easily he could demolish a bucket of chicken all by himself. He often went hungry during the school year, when he couldn't work as many hours.

Or at least he had until Benny started to quietly supplement his income. Ben saw himself as Robin Hood, taking from his parents to surreptitiously distribute through Pike's apartment. Now some of it came from his paycheck.

If Pike noticed that he was finding more "lost" money around lately, he just smiled and said that maybe someone was finally looking out for him. Benny knew Pike would do the same if he had the means.

Last night Benny had slept over in Pike's bed and dreamed of his childhood teddy bear, Bullwinkle. It was something silly and short, with the toy smoking a joint and picking up chick bears, but it had reminded him of what had been, pathetically enough, the last constant companion he'd had before Pike.

Dad had said that "Bullwinkle" was a stupid name for a teddy bear. Benny remembered saying something to extent that it was stupid name for a moose too and feeling that his response settled the question. Not to Dad, who decided that the bear was named "Ted." Even at three, little Ben-Ben knew *that* was stupid and unoriginal. He knew Bullwinkle hated it to. But Dad always won and made a point of mentioning "Ted." So his bear just had a secret identity, like Batman did.

Anyway, Benny would lie awake in the dark with the monster under his bed and the door locked so he couldn't call his parents in case it tried to eat him. Even if he could have gotten out, they would have only called him a stupid baby anyway. Mom said the locked door protected him, but he knew better. If the monster was already inside, it just meant that, being unable to get out, it only had him to snack on. The door protected *them*.

He would be in the bed, afraid to move even his foot off for fear of getting it chomped off, and clutch Bullwinkle tightly to him. The only person who was always there, what a later Benny would think of as a talisman. He'd tell Bullwinkle that he'd always be there too, would always take care of and protect him.

One day, Bullwinkle disappeared. Mom had said that he must have lost him somewhere. Been careless. Benny ripped his room and the basement apart looking. When they moved a year later, he did the same. He never found Bullwinkle. The guilt had made him feel like someone had torn his heart from his chest, shredded it, and shoved it back in.

Mom didn't tell him until he was thirteen that she'd thrown the bear out herself because it "looked too ratty." Besides, he had to be a big boy.

It wasn't the first time he had felt homicidal towards her and his father. Wasn't the last either.

Pike's hair was the same color as Bullwinkle's fur. His eyes even matched the color of the plastic buttons Bullwinkle had.

Oh, God. Benny put the joint down and shook his head hard. He wouldn't even approach that one again until he wasn't so stoned. Maybe not even then.

He picked up the joint again. He could be sober later, the later the better.

But he woke up from the pleasant "Bullwinkle smoking and cruising" dream clutching Pike's thin body so tightly that he was stunned Pike didn't break, and he'd felt the urge to whisper the old litany. I'll always be there. I'll always protect you.

Like you do for me.

Thank God Pike hadn't been awake. He dealt with so many bullies who thought his almost delicate looks guaranteed that 1] he was a fag and 2] that he was an easy target to beat the shit out. Having his best friend seemingly put the moves on him might inspire him to cut himself off from other people again. Might make him wonder if the friendship had just been a means to get into his pants. The thought of losing him made Benny only slightly more sick than the thought of Pike going back to ghosting through life, not trusting anyone enough to even talk to anyone aside from the man who gave him a job.

When Benny had taken to stalking him to find out more, none of the students really knew much about him. The ones who did, well, they'd be just as happy to kick Benny's ass as Pike's. Benny had to talk to teachers to get any real information, and they all got that look of mingled anger and despair that only a teacher could get at the word "underachiever." Their information basically boiled down to this: Pike was so smart and could be an A student if he applied himself, but he was distracted, he worked for a living, there was something odd going on with his family...

Looking back, Benny had to admit that his behavior had been kind of creepy: asking everybody about Pike, studying him, following him from a distance... But what else could you do after you saw the missing piece of yourself standing alone across a crowded lunchroom? Well, what else after you got over your major wiggins.

Besides, if he hadn't spent so much time figuring Pike out, he wouldn't have gotten anywhere. It showed him how to coax Pike to him, the way you would carefully approach and entice something feral.

"Hey, Benny. Earth's calling," Pike said.

Benny looked up and found himself fascinated by the sheen of chicken grease on Pike's lips. //Do you have to be so damned tempting?//

"Benny? You okay?"

Benny put the joint down and rubbed his eyes. "Just tired. I'm going to take a shower." //As cold as I can get it, to protect you from me.//

Or maybe he'd just think of Pike as his teddy bear.

~end~