*****

"Could that fucking ball *be* any pinker? I think not. And the damned thing's so neon you could play in the dark."

Pike spun the ball in his hand. "Ben, it doesn't matter. I'm comfortable in my masculinity." He smiled as a cool night breeze ruffled his hair. After a hot day of sweating over even hotter car engines, this was paradise.

"Old man hates us," Benny said. He had his mini-golf club balanced atop his shoulders behind his head with his arms hooked over it to keep it in place. For some reason, seeing that pose always made Pike horny. Hell, seeing Ben with a club alone made him want to jump his friend. He hoped it had nothing to do with the way Ben's aura of barely contained violence intensified when holding something that could be used as a weapon in his hand, but Pike was afraid that might be it.

//Thanks, Dad.//

In Pike's hands a mini-golf club was just a burden to be carried, but in Benny's it had *potential*.

"I thought you like to go here because you know that, and you want to mess with him," Pike said. "We could go places where the owner doesn't hope something awful will happen to us once we leave the parking lot." Pike had introduced Benny to mini-golf not long after they'd met. Of course, that night he'd been stoned past the point of being embarrassed at his white trash roots showing. Pike had been shocked as hell when Benny took to it.

"Why just after the parking lot?"

"He wouldn't want us to sue him."

"He could look at us and think we have the money for that?"

"Your parents do."

"Well, yeah, but *I* don't look like it." Benny spun catwalk-style to show off his secondhand Army gear with ratty T-shirt. Pike had to laugh at the perfect, faux serious, "intense" model's facial expression Benny had on.

"While I wear the same stuff, and it's completely accurate. Ben, you watch TV during the day. Tons of law firms are looking for people exactly like me who have injuries they can use," Pike changed his voice to an announcer's, "to *get me money*. And themselves money."

"Uh, how did we get on this topic?" Benny twirled his club, making Pike's knees go weak.

"The old fart wants us dead."

"Oh, yeah. It just pisses me off when he takes it out on you. I'm the one he should hate."

"I'm an accessory."

"You shine so pretty, Pike."

"You know what I mean. I'm always with you."

"Of course. Nowhere else you should be."

"He has some reason to be pissed at us. Last time we came here stoned, you went Don Quixote on the windmill." Then Pike looked at Ben. "I mean--"

"I never *hit* it. But we do dream the impossible dream." Benny grinned at the look on Pike's face. "Surprised? Mom took me to see _The Man of La Mancha_ when she was on one of her culture kicks. Don't get too worried, though. I'm not going to reveal some kind of love for musicals."

"No secret mad passion for Barbra Streisand?"

"Gag me!"

"Well, I never saw the play; just read the novel." Pike shook his head. "That remark got out before I thought about it. Most folks our age think Don Quixote is a Mr. Rogers character. Stop me when I'm being a snob, okay?"

"You're *my* snob."

"Shit."

"Hey, I don't want you to edit yourself. I like it that you're so relaxed around me that you're losing the training your family gave you. If I don't get the ref now, I'll pick it up later." Ben got a funny look on his face.

"What?"

"Just thinking that our parents would have been happier if we'd been switched at birth. They still would have been bastards, but maybe they wouldn't have been *such* fucking bastards."

"That's scary."

"You want scary? The codger's lucky I never got so stoned near here that I decided to fulfill my lifelong dream of playing strip mini-golf with you."

Pike nearly choked. "You're assuming I'd also be so stoned that I would agree to play along."

"I'm a miracle worker. Besides, it would be fun if I could get you to strip *along* with me, but if I just started alone I know I wouldn't finish that way."

"You think highly of yourself."

"Justified. I know you. Anyway, I'm not so high on myself I'm delusional. You're about to beat my ass again."

"Your aim is great, but you always hit the ball too hard."

Benny shrugged and grinned. "I have too much fun letting you try to teach me."

"Telling me to stand behind you and guide you, then wiggling your ass against me just isn't fair in a public place."

"Fair? What's that?"

At that moment, Pike realized that Benny had something planned or a secret to tell. His eyes always glittered, but now they gleamed, and energy spiked from him. He looked at Pike in a more intent, speculative way than usual. //Like I'm his one and only sex object.// As Pike wondered what it could be, his lust increased. Benny would make him wait, but he liked what the anticipation did for him.

"Let's just hit the loop-de-loop," Pike said, then laughed as Benny posed his club in a threatening manner. "*Not* like that."

******************************************************

Pike stared at the final hole, the clown face. Benny had already fired his ball at such velocity that it had loudly ricocheted off the chicken wire covering a few times before plunging down the bottom slot. At least he hadn't shot it all the way across the lot, as he often did. Pike wanted to finesse his ball into the clown nose. Not the eyes or mouth, though those would still be better than the bottom slot. No. He wanted the nose. Free game.

He didn't need this shot to win their match; Ben would never come close to even tying him at a game. He simply *wanted* this shot.

Perfect stance, perfect peace, perfect aim. That was all he wanted here.

Benny stayed silent. If he thought that Pike's Zen warrior approach to mini-golf was hilarious, he never said so. He often claimed he loved to watch Pike concentrate.

Pike fired and watched the ball arc... right into the nose. A siren went off, and lights flashed. He let out the breath he'd been holding.

In seconds he had Benny plastered, quivering, to his back, breathing hotly on the back of his neck. "That was *beautiful*, Pike! Fucking beautiful. And now the old fart has to give you a fucking *free game*. Oh, God, I love you."

The "old fart" looked less than happy as he handed over the game coupon. Pike thanked him as he handed the clubs over and smiled at the silent gloating he felt Benny doing behind him. For some reason Benny tended to let Pike do the talking for him when they were around other people. Right now, that was probably for the best.

"I'll be back for my game another night," Pike told the old man.

"Remember, you'll need your coupon." The old guy's expression begged Pike not to bring Benny when he returned for the free game.

Pike smiled. "Thanks. Good night."

Pike felt Benny's heat at his back all the way to the van. The anticipation just about made his skin itch. Benny wasn't always known for his patience. He might pounce once they were inside the van or maybe a little later. Sometimes stopping at a red light gave Pike a van shifted into park and a lap full of Benny. Not that Pike would complain, especially not since the steering wheel always forced them into such close proximity that moving became a bump and grind by default.

But Benny did nothing during the whole ride home except look at Pike in a way that made *Pike* want to shift the van into park and pounce. He could feel his heart pounding in his hard cock and had to resist the urge to unzip his jeans to get more comfortable. It was insane to want someone so much that his brain lost all ability to function, but he didn't seem to have a choice. He squirmed under the charged silence and probably broke a few speeding laws on his way home.

As soon as he had the apartment door closed behind him, Pike's world became a blur of motion. He came to lying on the bed with Ben draped between his spread legs. "Hi, there," Benny said, low and breathy.

"Hi, yourself."

Benny slow slide up to put them face to face rubbed torturously against Pike's erection. "Damn, that was hot to watch, Pike. That poor, old bastard."

"You're a sadist."

Pike opened his lips for Ben's kiss and shivered at the tongue stroking the roof of his mouth. "You're just figuring that out?" Benny whispered when they broke apart for air.

"You want something."

"You. Now. Any way I can get you." Ben unzipped Pike's jeans as he kissed his friend's neck. Talented Benny could multi-task.

"You wanted something even before I hit the clown nose. I could feel it. Tell me?"

Benny stiffened and pulled away a little, his slick lips parted in surprise. "You--"

Not the reaction Pike had expected. "You're not in trouble, are you?"

"Fuck, no! I just... Damn. I wanted to be smooth about it, find some way to bring it up so it would sound casual."

Pike stroked Benny's erection through the camo pants. "You're smooth. Tell me, Ben. Just tell me right out."

"I can't."

"Yeah, you can."

"But I--"

"Please tell me? Now I'm starting to worry."

"Okay. You asked for it." Ben took a deep breath and closed his eyes. "I'd like you to fuck me."

Oh. "That... really wasn't what I thought you were going for." Pike's panic grew by the second.

"Shit. You don't *have* to. I mean, I like the sucking and stroking and everything, really, really like it. In fact, if you don't want to... do the other thing, we could stay with the sucking and stroking and everything, and I'll be happy. Completely happy."

"But you're curious."

"You know me, I'll try anything. Sometimes I use my fingers on myself, and it's so good. I want you inside me. I want you to be my first." At the look on Pike's face, Ben said, "Shit, I'm doing exactly what I didn't want to do. I don't want to pressure you, Pike." Yet his eyes gleamed with unspoken pleading.

//This is serious. I've never done this. With anyone. Meanwhile, I'm so damned turned on by what he's saying I could just about come now. Do I want to do this? With everything it means?// "I don't.... Shit."

Benny closed his eyes. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have asked."

//This is so bad.// "Wouldn't I hurt you?"

Benny regained a little of his usual smirk. "Wow, don't we think highly of ourselves?"

Pike smiled weakly. "It's just that I'm so huge, Ben. I don't know if anyone could survive it."

"I want you. I've wanted you forever."

Oh. "I..." //Yes? No? Throw him off and run screaming from the room to put it off?// "...want you too. I don't think I'd last long, though."

Benny took a strip of leather with snaps on it out of his pocket. The cockring Benny had bought a month back. Frustrated with how fast they shot off during some of their sessions, they'd wondered about ways of slowing it down that wouldn't necessarily involve getting stoned. Not that getting stoned was bad, just that they wanted to be able to remember more of their sex. Benny had figured out a solution and dragged him to a sextoy shop to get it. Benny had misbehaved in there even more than Pike had feared he would. At least Pike had discovered that extreme embarrassment, in the store and later on their first trial run of the strap, really wasn't lethal. He found the damned thing uncomfortable, but it did give them more time as well as making the final release more mind-shattering.

Putting it on Benny was fun, though.

Pike couldn't help smiling. "You have an answer for everything, don't you?"

"Not yet."

"Yes. Yeah, I'll do it. *What* do I have to do?"

All smiles, Benny gave him a deep kiss. "Nothing yet. Let me do everything first."

Nervousness had deflated Pike's erection a bit, and Benny took advantage of the opportunity to snap the cockring on the base of his cock, then kissed the tip. Ben grinned at his gasp.

Benny took some items out of his pocket, then did the fastest strip Pike had ever seen. Boots, camo pants, ratty skull T-shirt all whipped off faster than he could have suspected was possible. Benny unlaced and removed Pike's battered combat boots with more care, stroking his calves and ankles in what might have been meant as a soothing manner. He indulged in so much fondling as he took off Pike's jeans and boxers that only the cockring held Pike's orgasm back.

Watching Ben made Pike too crazy too quickly, so he took a break from it by wiggling out of his T-shirt. Once he had the shirt over his head and off, he could see Ben looking at him with a combination of affection, lust, and mischief. Ben put the condom on him with such long, deep strokes that he would have come if he hadn't been bound.

"Now watch," Benny said, and Pike propped his pillows up to give himself a better view. Ben slicked his fingers with the lube he'd left on the nightstand, stroked some on Pike's cock, then deliberately fell backwards onto the bed, legs spread, leaving himself exposed.

Ben tantalizingly circled the opening with his finger before sliding it in. It seemed strangely like a magic act to Pike, and he moved closer, sitting between Ben's knees to watch. Another finger went in, and Benny started to thrust with them. Pale skin lightly sheened with sweat, he writhed and let out small whimpering sounds that made Pike's cock throb harder.

Pike's whole body knew exactly what it wanted to do even if his mind still struggled. Fortunately for him, Ben slid his fingers out and pushed Pike down before settling on top. They stared at one another, breathily heavily, before Benny started to impale himself on Pike's cock. Pike seemed to hear his friend's grunt from a distance as tight heat sheathed him. He groaned at how good it felt and how amazed he was at the way he'd been able to just slide in, accepted, part of Benny. His hips started to move, thrusting up instinctively, making Benny moan.

"Are you okay?" Pike gasped.

"Hell, yes."

Pike's hips achieved a fast rhythm that left him drowning in wonderful friction and heat. His hands stroked every inch of gleaming pale skin they could reach. Ben had his eyes closed and a look of rapture on his face as he whimpered Pike's name. The feel, sight, and sound of it all made Pike want to come, but he couldn't, not bound as he was.

"Ben, let me loose," Pike panted.

"Fuck me, Pike. Please, fuck me."

Even with everything going on, Pike understood the difference immediately. //It's one thing for Benny to screw himself on me like I'm some kind of sex toy, another for me to fuck him into the mattress. It's me being acted on versus acting, about taking responsibility. Do I want to do this?

//Yes.// "We'll have to flip over," Pike panted as he stopped moving, which was surprisingly hard. His hips knew what they wanted to do, and they wanted to keep thrusting. As incredible as it all felt, it scared him to be so out of control, so enslaved to what his body demanded.

Benny smiled so blindingly that it almost killed Pike to see it. "Count of three?"

"Yeah."

"One. Two. Three..." They rolled at the same time, putting Benny on his back, with Pike accidentally doing a deep, hard jab in as they settled. "Oh, God..." Ben moaned.

"I'm not hurt--"

Benny locked his legs around Pike. "No! Go!"

Pike started to thrust again. It took him a few moments to regain find the trajectory Benny had liked best in this new position, but once he did he had his friend whimpering under him. They were so intertwined that Pike didn't know if he'd ever be able to untangle himself from Benny, and he didn't know if he wanted to. As they moved together, the bed banged against the wall in time to Pike's thrusts, which pounded in time to his heartbeat. Which seemed to be very close in time to Benny's, which Pike could feel through every feverish kiss on slick skin.

Pike drowned under the sensual overload until he could only think that he needed to come *now*. "Benny--"

"Yeah. Do it," Benny gasped.

Once Pike's fumbling fingers finally undid the snap, orgasm hit him like a boulder. A boulder that kept running him over, then rolling backwards to crush him again. His whole body felt like one singing nerve, and all of it was rushing out his cock into Ben.

Benny had a look of total exaltation on his face, as if he soared on the most incredible high, as he screamed Pike's name and came hard with a deep shudder. //Beautiful.//

Spent, they melted together, gasping. Pike didn't think he could move. Hell, he could barely see. He really wanted to sleep, but that would have been completely rude, so he struggled to stay up for Ben's sake.

But also out of curiosity and terror over what his friend's reaction would be.

Ben started to recover and showered a frenzy of little kisses on Pike's skin. When that received no reaction beyond an exhausted smile, he said, "I'm going to have to bring you back from the dead again, huh?" When he took the condom off, he smirked at the pitiful twitch Pike's cock did in response. "Yeah?"

"Nnn."

"Gotcha."

After Ben struggled to get out of bed, then disappeared, Pike closed his eyes and drifted, smiling a little at the sound of running water. He opened them at the feel of warm circles being rubbed into his stomach. He'd always liked clean-up, taking care of Ben and being taken care of, though he'd die before he'd admit it. //Having your tummy rubbed like a big baby. Infantilism? Freak.//

//Now you say 'freak'? You just fucked your best friend. And loved it, I might add.//

//I don't want to deal with this right now....//

//Then when? Yeah, you were a cocksucker before, but now? You might as well put a ring on his finger, Bruce. He already has one on your cock. So... when do you start taking it up the ass? You know that comes next.//

Pike shoved that voice away. He hated hearing his father talk with his voice. To his relief, an affectionate slap to the side of his face brought him back.

"You okay?" Ben looked worried through his lingering afterglow. He sat close enough to touch but without touching. Giving space if Pike needed it.

"I'm fine. Just thinking. A lot to think about."

"That'll get you in trouble every time. That's why I avoid thinking. Umm."

//Now you're making Benny upset. Suck it in.// "That... was really incredible, Ben."

Benny grinned in a way that made him look like a six-year-old on Christmas morning. Pike had to fight so hard to throttle that bad thought down that he almost missed Benny's words. "Wasn't it? Fuck, you're a natural talent, Pike."

//He loved it, he wants to do it again sometime, but he doesn't want to pressure me. Damn, that's sweet, more than I deserve.// "What was it like for you?"

"I-- It was-- Fuck, you're the one with the words. I just feel stuff."

"Try? You sure as hell looked like you were enjoying yourself."

"I don't want you to feel like I'm pressuring you."

"You're not. Get over here."

"Pushy bastard." But Ben settled down next to Pike and burrowed against him anyway.

"Now talk."

"Okay, okay. It hurt a little at first, burned a bit, felt weird. But then it started to feel really, really good, and that really good started spreading out to my whole body, like. And we were connected, tight, you actually part-ways inside me, about as close as I think we can get body-wise in the real world... Fuck, I can't describe it. It sounds so small when I try to put it into words. And I sound totally mushy."

Which meant that if Pike wanted to know what it felt like, he'd have to be on the receiving end. He couldn't handle that. Yet? "No, I felt connected in too. And you felt so good...."

"You saying I'm one nice piece of ass?"

"Hey, if it fits. If you..." //Say it, fag.// //Oh, shut up.// "...ever want me to do that again, I'm up for it."

"Really?" Benny sounded surprised but happy. "That's so cool. You realize I'll take you up on that."

"Yeah. I wouldn't say so otherwise."

"All right then."

Nothing about reciprocation. Not only did Benny not expect him to take bottom himself, Benny hadn't even been sure if he'd ever want to do this again either. It made him feel selfish and rotten, which he knew Ben was trying very hard *not* to make him feel.

"I just need a little time."

Ben even seemed to hear the rest of it, the possibility of more. "That's more than fine with me."

***THE END***