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For all intents and purposes, Benson is fully aware that he is a hypocrite.
He is a drifter that sticks too close to home, an obsessive who keeps his distance, and an absentee father who cares too much about his son.
Every day just before his shift, he sits outside an unspectacular house on the opposite side of the street and watches the kid get ready for school. It’s been a part of his daily routine since the kid was old enough to walk, when Benson found out about him from a friend of a friend—“that old bag you fucked a couple years back has a kid now, think it’s yours?”
He’s getting into the car and turning on the engine, and like every other morning, he doesn’t see Benson across the street. It’s just another fixture in his environment, something he sees so often that he no longer questions it. Benson’s invisible to him, and so long as he stays invisible, the kid’s safe. He sits outside the Bradley home until the kid pulls out of the driveway, the engine properly warmed up, and drives off to school. Then Benson’s off to work, and he won’t see the kid again until the next morning.
He smokes a cigarette before work, and he dwells on how shitty of a father he’s been. His son doesn’t know he exists, god only knows what story Leann told him—Benson thinks that she must have invented a man who she knew for only one night, older and dashing, not a skinny fifteen-year-old with self-applied cigarette burns on the insides of his arms. He’s seen the kid every day since he was about three years old, and yet he’s never said a word to him. He’s saved up cash in the back of his sock drawer, envisioning some romantic ideal that he’ll introduce himself to his son and take him on a road trip, paying for each shitty motel they stay in with the crumpled bills accumulating in the back of his drawer. So far, they have no purpose other than to collect dust, and it makes him feel like some useless rich fuck with no life goals other than to hoard wealth. He should just spend it, use it to fix up his car, but he can’t shake that he might get to use it on his son one day.
He hasn’t told his ma that she has a grandson yet; if she ever left the house and saw him on the street, he’d just be another stranger, and Benson planned to keep it that way. She knows he heads off to work earlier than he needs to, but he’s sure that she doesn’t suspect he’s secretly watching his son.
Once the car’s clear at the other end of the street, waiting to turn right, Benson pulls a u-ey out of the neighbor’s driveway and goes left, towards the construction site clear on the other side of town. It won’t look much different than his kid’s neighborhood—the power station an industrial jungle looming just past the edge of suburbia, all pipes assembled at sharp, 90° angles. To think that Benson grew up with a better view, seeing the guy across the street go out guns-ablazing in his front yard when he was only six. The house across the street, sunfaded and currently occupied by an elderly man, still brings Benson back; he can still see the arterial spray shooting out against the front door in an arch if he stares too long. The guy's wife and son were both in the house, weeks dead when the cops got through the bloody door, and he watched Arlene and Ricky Stapleton get carted out under white sheets, the blood too dried to soak through the fabric. Two weeks prior, he watched Ricky walk through that sunfaded door, and then Benson never saw his best friend again except as a grainy, black-and-white photo in the newspaper.
He's sure the kid hasn't been through that—he's sure that his son has had the privilege of an overly-sheltered childhood, and in turn he's had to suffer an ugly fucking view, an exchange for an otherwise picturesque lower-middle class life.
—
Benson hasn’t had sex since he hooked up with Leann. She was working as the receptionist at the nursing home, and he briefly took a job in the cafeteria the summer before his sophomore year. He wouldn’t even last a week at that job, not when he ended up cursing out an old fuck for calling him white trash while he was serving up his creamed corn, but he did last long enough to meet Leann out back on his smoke break, just long enough for her to ask if he wanted to go with her to her car.
They’d spoken a few times before, and he was pretty sure now that she must have grown up sheltered, too—the idea of fucking a practically feral teen excited her, like bestiality but with fewer moral objections. There was some kind of look in her eyes, almost wild, that put the idea in Benson’s head that she saw him as some kind of animal. She hesitated following him into the car, standing against the open door like she was reconsidering doing it. But he knew she wasn’t reconsidering fucking him—she’d been hesitating all week, and she couldn’t go back on it now, not when Benson could report her.
She didn’t know he wasn’t a snitch.
No, she was hesitating like she was catching a spider she found in her bathtub. Benson was lying across the backseat, his jeans undone, his heart thudding hard in the back of his throat, waiting. Leann hesitated what felt like half an hour, standing in the open door and triangulating her approach. Benson couldn’t wait anymore, but he couldn’t sit up, either, not if he wanted to remain unseen.
She soon crawled into the back, opening her shirt and hiking her skirt up her thighs until she was sitting pretty in Benson’s lap. Well, pretty enough, Benson didn’t get what other guys saw in girls, especially with her tits toppling out of her bra, her tacky lipstick sticking to the side of his face as she got adjusted on top of him. The other guys at school were also jealous of boys their age who got with their teachers, older women in general, but Benson wasn’t seeking their approval by doing this; he liked their ire just fine.
Benson still thinks about the lack of fulfillment he got, having sex with Leann. It was easier to dismiss sex as a whole when he hadn’t gotten anything out of it besides a son that he still hasn’t met. It should be his kid’s high school graduation today, and he sits just outside the high school parking lot, waiting for the seniors to flood from the football field and into their cars with their families. He ashes his cigarette and turns his music up, filling the cabin with frenetic drumming and equally frenetic vocals.
He sits by the curb, watches the kids pour out, and doesn't find his son and Leann among the bunch. Benson was certain they'd be here, and he waits until dusk before he finally gives up, stopping off at the gas station to buy another pack for his ma—he went through all of hers waiting to see his kid in his cap and gown. In the paper the next day, Benson scans through the list of graduates but finds no one named Bradley in the list; he didn’t make it onto the dedication.
Not like Benson would have made it, either; he just thought his kid would have the benefit of moving through life with an ease that he never got. He takes the pack to his ma once he gets home, dropping it on her lap and starting to strip his shirt off as he moves towards his room. She grunts in his direction, the sound melting into the squeak of his door opening, and Benson hears her start to talk as he strips out of his sweaty work uniform—got Al to cover his shift for nothing.
Benson doesn't drive out to Leann’s house again; he doesn't think he can handle seeing his son become a mini version of himself, repeating a cycle he never even knew he was a part of. He finishes off a flat beer from the previous night and shoves his hand into his boxers, working himself to completion in near-total silence, swallowing down guttural grunts as his mind wanders from the backseat of Leann's car to the front seat of his own, the blurry, unclear image of his boy sitting at his side, smiling at him. He has Leann’s hair, her same angular profile, though he hasn’t seen the kid close enough to know what he really looks like.
He wipes his hand off on his undershirt and sets it on the curve of his stomach, his heart pounding in his chest as he decides whether or not he wants to grapple with the fact that he just came to the thought of his own son. This late in the night, his mind rolling and adrenaline pumping thick through his veins, he thinks it’ll just be a waste.
—
A few years later, Benson is established at a shitty burger joint across town. He cleans and he occasionally handles customers, but he’s mostly there to do the shit jobs that nobody else wants. Most importantly, Benson isn’t breaking his fucking back for a union-busting prick, but that’s only because no one at Burgers Burgers Burgers has ever said one word about unionizing. It’s a good idea, but it’s not one that he’s going to take the reins on—Carla can do it, and of all of them, she’d be the one to get off her ass and demand it from Hardy. He’s happy to do the shit job he signed up for if he doesn’t go home with aches and pains like a fucking 90-year-old.
The one thing he can’t stand is the majority of his coworkers. Carla and Donnie are alright, though Carla’s a bit too uptight, but the rest of them are either conformists with no personality, get off on being pricks, or have so little presence that they blend into the wallpaper. That’s the case for the new hire, Bradley.
When he’s brought around, introduced to his new coworkers, he gives them all the same nervous, impersonal smile, wave, “hi,” before being carted off to the next. Benson doesn’t think he’s ever seen a guy shake like a leaf just from being around a handful of strangers, but he manages to be pathetic in a way that Benson would find admirable if it wasn’t so fucking sad. He gives Bradley a little grunt when he says goodbye at the end of his shift, his gaze lingering for a second before he walks out into the parking lot, out of Benson’s sight from the opposite end of the dining area.
It continues everyday Benson and Bradley share a shift: no matter if Benson has already clocked in before the kid showed up or if he’s coming in for a late night, Bradley always says “hi” to him, giving him an increasingly familiar smile as the days go by. Maybe he takes Benson’s indifference as a show of understanding, like ignoring a cat to earn its trust, but if that’s the case he has to wonder what the fuck happened to him that he thinks a grunt or two constitutes any kind of bond at all. “Hi, Benson,” becomes a routine that he never asked for, but one that he isn’t going to break, because if this is what the kid needs to feel like he has any allies at work, so be it.
Benson only becomes aware that Bradley’s getting harassed when Chris does it outright in the dining area, cornering him from behind up against the counter and asking him if he knocked his jacket off the coat rack in the back.
“No,” he said simply, his voice shaking a little, and Benson stopped mopping up a dried ketchup smear on the tabletop.
“You know it’ll be worse for you if I catch you lying, so do you wanna tell me the truth now?”
He claps his hand onto Bradley’s shoulder, and Benson’s eyes narrow as he sees Chris pressing his fingers into his flesh until his knuckles turn white. Bradley stays still, he looks calm enough from here, but he just barely flinches when Chris twists his clasped hand around his shoulder.
Benson stands up, exhaling before he cracks his neck—the popping’s nice, makes him feel like his blood pressure’s dropping. He tucks the rag into the waist of his work pants and crosses the room, waiting until he’s at the counter to turn and say something to Chris.
“You know, I think I might’ve bumped the coat rack when I came from my little pep talk with Hardy this morning. Don’t think Bradley was even here then.”
Bradley definitely was at work then, and he was pretty sure he saw him accidentally knock Chris’ jacket over when he was scrambling to grab cups from the shelf, but Chris was a dick and Bradley didn’t deserve that kind of heat for something as stupid as knocking a jacket off a hook.
Chris looks up from Bradley, who is fixing Benson with wide, nervous eyes, and hardens his expression. He looks back down at Bradley as quickly as he turned away, and he almost nuzzles his face into the side of his neck. Benson’s stomach turns, and Bradley looks just as nauseous as he feels. Jess must be fucking oblivious, she has a clear view into the dining area from the drive-thru window and yet she can’t seem to see her boyfriend groping another man like he’s doing him in a truck stop stall. Benson might not mind seeing Bradley in that kind of situation, actually—pretty little blond thing, nervous, shivering, he’d probably cry if he was going to take a cock—he’d just rather not see Chris giving it to him.
“I know you’re just covering for him. Are you hot for rednecks, Bradley? You can tell me,” his voice is venomous, like deep down he’s somehow jealous of their perceived relationship, and Benson frowns.
“Leave him out of it, Chris—kid’s too fucking nervous to knock your jacket over on purpose.”
Chris’ eyes flare and he descends on Bradley, getting what almost sounds like a squeak out of him. He tries to curl up on himself but Chris holds him in place, his eyes fixed on Benson as he continues to interrogate the kid over a minor fucking mistake. Bradley stops trying to move or squirm, no matter how much Benson wishes that he’d kick Chris in the shin just to shut him up. While he looks at Benson, the expression in his eyes isn’t a pleading one—it’s one of resignation, and that’s what really turns his stomach.
“I won’t be mad if your boyfriend set you up to it, he’s a bad influence.” He laughs, and Bradley looks at Benson, his eyes glossy like some miserable animal begging for its life.
Benson was going to get him out of the snare.
He stepped forward, standing up straight even if that did nothing to tip the scales in his favor—he was a few inches shy of meeting Chris’ height—and staring at him coldly. “You made your point, I don’t think pinning Bradley here like you’re doing him is going to prove it any more.”
Chris glances between them both, his expression unreadable for what felt like minutes on end. Benson and Bradley share a look, albeit a brief one, before a shit-eating grin smears across Chris’ face.
“Okay, faggot. Point taken.” He slaps his hand onto Bradley’s back, nearly sending him careening forward into the condiment station as he does so. “Bradley, if he ever hits you or starts putting his smokes out on you, you know where to find me.”
He laughs his way into the back, leaving Benson and Bradley alone in the dining area, standing awkwardly close. While Benson wants to move along, get back to mopping tables, Bradley is staring at him with awe—and tears—in his eyes.
“Thank you, Benson,” he says quietly, shakily, and fuck if Benson doesn’t feel bad for the kid.
He’s still stuck in place, trembling a little, and he wonders if he should go out to his car and grab a smoke for Bradley—it might calm him down before Hardy can see him panicking, before Chris can bring Jess in to admire his handiwork. Benson can only wonder what she thinks about him grabbing another man like that, practically grinding against him in public. Maybe it gets her hot, seeing Chris close to fucking someone else right in front of her; maybe that would explain Jess flirting with Benson on his first day when he was bringing in patties from the walk-in. Whatever little agreement they might have with each other, he wants no part in it.
Now there’s about half an hour to open and Bradley looks like he’s going to implode on himself. Benson grabs his shoulder and rubs it, harder than he needs to, while Bradley continues to stare at him with wet eyes.
“I’ll cover the counter.” He gestures towards the door, trying to tell him that he can go on break, scheduled or not. “Go eat or something, you look like you’re gonna pass out.”
Bradley nods, pale and quiet, and steps cautiously towards the front door, watching Benson all the way. It’s like he’s trying to suss out an ulterior motive, confused why Benson would opt to take orders when he’s best suited to cleaning and cooking—anything that keeps him from talking to the customers. Hardy doesn’t even give him counter or drive-thru unless they’re working with a skeleton crew.
Benson watches him walk to his car, paying closer attention to Bradley’s movement than to the car he’s approaching, and hunger growls deep inside him. Ever since Leann, he’s always wanted to fuck things smaller, weaker, more pathetic than him. Bradley’s pathetic, he’s a cute little thing, but there's some piece missing. He messed up on the job, Benson purposefully gave him bad instructions just to see how he'd react, and Bradley reacted like he knew the information was wrong but he still went through with it—he listened to Benson, like he trusted him despite it all.
Bradley isn't stupid, he's just quiet, and worst of all, he's non-confrontational. No one should be a doormat, no one should get pushed around by someone who peaked in high school, for god sake.
Benson isn't going to babysit the kid, but he isn't going to tolerate Bradley shrinking up on himself like he's any other fucking loser in this town. He takes his time cleaning the front counter after the lunch rush and when Bradley comes back in, a little color returned to his face, he gives Benson a lingering glance before picking up where he left off—he takes over the register again and Benson checks the condiment station, lingering close enough to Bradley that it might deter Chris from coming back for seconds.
Maybe he is babysitting the kid a little bit. He puts off his smoke break until Chris clocks out for the day and Donnie comes in, meaning Bradley no longer needs monitoring like a prisoner on suicide watch. Benson avoids Bradley the rest of his shift, all two hours of it, but his avoidance is made moot when he and Bradley end up clocking out at the same time.
“Thanks again, Benson.” He slips his time card into its pocket, and Benson doesn't look in his direction.
“No need,” he says, clocking out and filing his time card in the slot above Bradley's.
They share a quick glance when Benson turns, and there's almost a kind of familiarity in his face—not that he knows him, but that he looks like someone Benson has known before. His eyes especially, sad and sickly-colored, stir up something in the back of Benson's mind. He's never seen this kid before in his life, he's sure of it, and yet with the day he's had he's prepared to doubt himself.
Benson leaves the backroom, his skin crawling and his fingers trembling, aching to wrap themselves around a cigarette. He missed his smoke break for Bradley and now he's honest to god jonesing—the kid owes him, he just isn't sure what. When he gets back into his car, lights up, and takes a few hungry puffs off his cig, the jumbled sickness in his gut starts to recede. His heart settles in his chest and his eyes slide shut like he's accenting one of his pleasureless masturbation sessions with a smoke. Weed was a better after-dinner mint, his head warm and fuzzy and less likely to dwell on the pathetic fucking loneliness he's subjected himself to, but Donnie's been out for weeks and his supplier's in jail—caught sleeping in a car he didn't even steal. So, the nicotine will have to work in a pinch.
Benson is parked two spots down from a battered little sedan, the paint so sun-faded it looks powdery, and he feels another flash of recognition in him. Not like that's a surprise, though—in a town of 10,000 he's bound to vaguely recognize most every car around. For all he knows it's Hardy's and he's managed to not get a good look at it until now. But Hardy wouldn't drive something so dumpy and modest, he would hit up the dealership in the next town over and get something shiny and disgustingly middle class.
Now he's interested, but only mildly—where the fuck does he recognize this car from? He turns his music up, something to thrash his understimulated mind back into working order, and pulls out of the parking lot. When he checks in his rearview mirror, the sun-faded sedan still sitting three spots down from where he’d parked—no owner coming out to claim it. Benson’s curiosity dies as he turns out onto the road and starts the drive back home, drums and guitar riffs pounding in his head.
—
A couple of days pass and Benson is mopping up the dining area when Bradley comes in and stops at the front door, his arms tucked in front of himself and into the baggy sleeves of his jacket—must have been his dad’s, unless his mom really thought he was going to break six feet. He stands there, lingering, and stares down at the ground, like he’s too nervous to look in Benson’s direction.
He waits, keeps pushing the mop around just to see if Bradley’s gonna take the initiative. It’s almost like the kid’s scared of him now, like a mildly dismissive comment was enough to scald him. Fuck, and he was starting to think he liked the kid. Benson dips the mop back into the bucket, sloshing it around to see if that’ll invite Bradley to talk, to not stand there like he’s freezing in the middle of July. All of this waiting, this awkward fucking silence, and nothing.
So, Benson looks up at him, gives him the attention he’s obviously fishing for, and Bradley stares, still in front of the door. He pulls his arms tighter across his chest, and Benson narrowly resists the urge to roll his eyes at Bradley’s battered wife act.
“Do your legs not fucking work?”
Bradley narrows his eyes and glances over at the door, sidestepping until he’s up against the booth closest to the door; there’s a healthy amount of space between the two of them. But even with Benson giving him room like Bradley’s a deer caught in his crosshair, he still keeps his eyes averted.
“I just wanted to thank you again for the other day.” He meets Benson’s gaze briefly, seeming to decide that was a bad idea just as suddenly and turning his attention back down to the floor—his rubber-soled shoes remind Benson of something they make psychos at the looney bin wear. “No one’s ever really stood up for me like that.”
“Wasn’t trying to stand up for you—I just don’t like when guys like Chris think they can get away with that shit.” In a better world, Benson would have killed Chris for pulling that shit with Bradley, but you can’t always get what you want, can you?
Bradley nods, and the faint light behind his eyes dampens. “Still, I appreciate it.”
Benson can reflect sometimes, especially when he really doesn’t want to, and as Bradley trudges off to the back to clock in, he wonders if he’s just a dick with no point. It makes him feel like a high school bully watching Bradley shy away like that, even if it seems to just be his natural state of being, and he doesn’t like that shit; he doesn’t want to be on the same level as the jocks who called him all forms of inbred white trash. Besides Donnie, Bradley’s been the only other motherfucker at this job to treat him like a person and not a ticking time bomb, and this is how he repays him? Having a conscience doesn’t seem like all it’s cracked up to be.
It’s a half day, though no one’s sure exactly why they’re getting a half day, and Benson goes on break just before noon, in the middle of the lunch rush, and finds Bradley sitting in the sedan with his phone held up to his ear—that solves his burning question, now doesn’t it? Benson doesn’t intervene, all he wants is a smoke and some peace and fucking quiet away from the lifeless bastards inside. He reaches through the open window and pulls his pack off the dash, popping a half-smoked cigarette from the carton and pushing it between his lips while he fails to tune out Bradley’s phone conversation.
He can hear one half of it, and only just barely with Bradley’s whimper of a voice, but it sounds like he’s groveling to whoever’s on the other end—girlfriend, wife, mom, he doesn’t know.
“I know, I don’t know what they’re thinking. But…” He trails off, going silent as Benson lights his half a smoke and inhales. “Hardy says my work’s slipping, and he thinks it’s because I’m not part of the team. I’m trying.”
He shouldn’t be hearing this. Bradley looks like he’s about to start crying, he even rubs his eyes and looks out the cracked window as another car pulls into the parking lot. “I know I can’t quit because they don’t like me, I’m not saying…no, yeah, I’m sorry.”
Benson nearly feels a tug in his heart when Bradley sniffles—not like he actually feels bad for the kid, he sounds like a fucking pussy right now, he just didn’t think he had that level of emotion in him. He pinches his cigarette between his finger and thumb and blows out a puff of smoke, his eyes following the car pulling in; it’s Carla, here to help with closing on her day off.
“What time are you coming back from Aunt Shelby’s? Okay. Love you, bye.”
He hangs up, and Benson stares past Bradley as he gets out of the car, closing the door and locking it behind him. He averts his gaze at first, but then he gets bold—he decides to look Benson in the face.
“Are you on lunch?” Bradley asks, his voice as flat and small as ever, and Benson shakes his head.
”We close up before then. You?”
“Yeah, I just don’t feel hungry.” He takes a quick glance at the restaurant before looking back at Benson. There’s something behind his sad fucking eyes, but he can’t tell just what it is.
He steps closer and leans on the hood of Bradley’s sedan, getting closer to him than they’ve ever purposefully been. Bradley reacts accordingly, almost stepping back like he thinks Benson is liable to snap. He wants to turn around and leave Bradley, he doesn’t tolerate that kind of treatment if he’s not getting paid, but he goes against his nature and gives him the benefit of the doubt.
“You wanna get out of here?”
Bradley furrows his brows, but despite that hesitation, he nods.
“Like, go to lunch?” His eyes flicker, and Benson can practically hear his stomach growling.
So he was lying about not being hungry. It wasn’t a great lie, he should have seen through it immediately, but it just confirms his suspicion that Bradley wants to be as far away from Chris as possible, that fucking shit stain.
“We could go to your place—the old lady’s not gonna be back for a while, is she?”
Bradley shakes his head quickly, and he wraps himself up in his arms like his chest is gonna burst open.
“No, we can’t. Maybe…there’s a park near here, there’s the diner, I don’t know, we just can’t go to my place.” He practically stammers over his words and Benson wants to tell him to slow down before he starts hyperventilating.
He turns and opens the door to his own car, unlocking the passenger side and smacking the roof. Bradley tenses and watches him with wide eyes, and Benson rolls his own.
“C’mon, let’s go.”
It doesn’t take long for Bradley to cave and follow him into the car, though there’s a tension in his jaw as he walks around the front of Benson’s car, refusing to take his eyes off of him—it makes him think of Leann, the backseat of her car, the hesitation just before he steps inside and joins Benson. There’s a twisting in his gut, comparing Bradley to that bitch, seeing her while he crawls into the passenger seat.
They drive for a while, no words shared between them, and Benson does all he can to keep his eyes on the road because every time he so much as glances at Bradley in the passenger seat, he sees Leann.
He knows that if he wanted, he could just drive away. He can take Bradley hostage and they can leave their shitty jobs behind, but what the fuck is he gonna do outside this town that’s so much better than his current hand? Benson isn’t getting a better deal just because he moved a town or two over with a wide-eyed twink in tow, he doesn’t even have his cash on him—it’s all in his sock drawer, collecting dust because there’s still a sad sack part of him that thinks he’ll meet his son one day. For all he knows, that kid he watched for nearly 15 years was someone else’s bastard, and he never knocked up Leann. There’s no bright side to it—he just wasted his time on a random kid who will never know he exists because Benson’s nothing more to him than a stranger on the street. Did he put too much of his hope for the future into the thought that Leann’s kid was his? That he’d fill his useless life by stepping up and connecting with his long-lost son?
The kid never could have been his, anyway; too blond compared to Benson, and her color came from a bottle.
He slaps his hand on the wheel and startles Bradley.
“We’re going to the fucking diner,” he says, grabbing the wheel tight and pulling the u-ey into the opposite lane, “and after that, we’re hitting up the bar.”
Bradley grabs the armrest and pulls his lips into a tight frown, fishing his phone out of his pocket. “I really should call my mom if we’re gonna—”
“FUCK your mom, Bradley!” Benson yelps, speeding towards the diner like he has nothing to lose. At least it’s all open road ahead of them, like no one else decided to leave their house today; maybe this won’t be a total shitshow of a day, all things considered.
Now that he thinks about it, Benson really should have guessed it earlier—the kid has all the telltale signs of an overbearing mother.
Jess, Carla, and Chris can handle close; at least, Carla can. They peel down the highway and Bradley shrinks in his seat, his face twisting up. Benson turns the music up, giving Bradley a long, blank look—if you don’t like it, too fucking bad. The kid doesn't hide how much he hates it, but what's he gonna do, jump?
Bradley endures, and Benson likes his endurance.
—
When they arrive at the diner, Bradley doesn’t order anything. The waitress tries to coax him into picking out something from the menu, seeming to think he’s unreasonably pale and needs to eat, but gets distracted when he gives up the ghost; that his name isn’t actually Bradley.
“Randy’s my first name,” he admits, like it’s something to be ashamed of, and Benson doesn’t disagree.
“Well that’s lucky, having two first names” the waitress, Marsha, says back to him. Benson doesn’t like how fucking chipper she is, but Bradley— Randy, pardon his fucking French, doesn’t seem to mind her. So, he bites his tongue and waits for his chicken fried steak.
“Why didn’t you tell me your name’s not Bradley?” He asks once Marsha leaves, and Randy seems unfazed.
“It never came up.”
Randy holds his glass of water between both hands, condensed droplets pouring down to his fingers, and he doesn’t get how he can tolerate it. He doesn’t want to believe the kid puts up with whatever shit just to avoid conflict. He pushes a napkin over to him, exhaling heavily.
“Jesus, kid, mop that up, your hand’s turning red.”
Randy frowns, confused, and does it, and Benson is going to be pissed if he gets fired over someone who may as well be wallpaper. Despite his doubts, though, he knows there’s something under there—something actually goddamn interesting. Randy sets the wet napkin, crumpled and practically fusing together into a ball of paper mush, off to the side and wraps his hands around his dry glass, leaning slightly closer to Benson and clearing his throat.
“Why are we here?” He purses his lips like he’s going to be sick and circles his straw around the bottom of the glass. The ice cubes clink against the glass and Benson wants to tell him to knock that shit off, but he sucks it up—Randy’s less of an irritating prick than the average Burgers Burgers Burgers customer, he can tolerate it a little longer.
“Why do you think? I’m fucking hungry.” He pulls the pepper over to his side and tucks another napkin into the collar of his shirt. “Pretty sure you are too but you’re too chickenshit to order.”
Randy glares, and that gets Benson excited—maybe he’ll burst, he’ll get to see the real Randy Bradley, not the hollowed-out shell he puts forward at work. He rests his hand on the heel of his palm, and that’s when Benson sees the red ring around his wrist. Benson narrows his eyes but he doesn’t say anything about it, not just yet.
“I can make my own meals, I don’t need to bother a waitress for my food.” Smug little shit.
Benson jabs the toe of his work boot into Randy’s ankle with all the force he can manage. They touched once or twice when they slid into the booth, and Benson didn’t like the feeling that came from touching Randy on accident; it was vulnerable, strange, and he can’t abide by the way those feelings are fucking with his brain. Randy’s brow furrows tight and he curls up on himself, his pained eyes looking up and into Benson’s.
“Don’t fucking talk down to me like that,” he warns under his breath, but the fire inside him is both licking at his brain stem and burning out all in one.
He leans back against the booth bench and sighs, but Randy’s gaze doesn’t stray away. While he grabs his ankle underneath the table, he watches Benson with teary, dark eyes. He sees something in them, something curious and hungry in a way that nibbling on a green bean or two from Benson’s side dish won’t fix. It swirls, it colors Randy’s cheeks a bashful pink, and he pulls his lips together tightly like he’s trying to keep something in. Benson feels a grin spread across his face—Randy isn’t just submissive at work, now is he? Might even be a fucking pain freak, and that is what sets Benson over the edge.
“Where’d you get that bruise?” He asks, wondering if Randy has some secret kinky sex life he doesn’t know about—he might just lose his mind if Randy says he already has someone who ties him up and whips him, didn’t he even take a second to consider that Benson might want to fill that role for him?
He looks away shyly and Benson thinks he might confirm his worries.
“Chris grabbed me in the freezer. He thought you and I were… together, I guess, and he said that you shouldn’t fight my battles for me.” Randy puts his hand on the bench, hiding his arm behind the table, and Benson scowls.
Of fucking course it was Chris. He leans forward on his arms, his eyebrows narrowed. “You can’t take that shit from him, Randy. Worthless motherfucker like him doesn’t get the right to treat you like you’re his own personal punching bag, stop letting him do that shit to you.”
He doesn’t acknowledge the fact that he’s getting hard over Randy’s bruise, over the thought of him getting hit and whimpering like it’s his first time getting dicked down, being his punching bag. Benson would find it hard to believe if Randy never has been fucked by another guy, just one look at him and he feels confident in asserting that he’s gay. Or, maybe, that’s just what he hopes to be the truth.
Randy’s other arm moves, like he’s cradling his injured wrist under the table, and he shrugs. “It’s just easier like this—taking shit if it means that I can’t ruin someone’s life because of my bad decisions.”
“Now what the fuck does that mean?” Benson balances his temple on his fist, still staring into Randy like he’s trying to solve a puzzle; one that he’s sure he’s already solved at this point. “Chris gets a free pass because you don’t wanna rock the boat? Jesus, how the fuck have you lived this long thinking you deserve to be the world’s doormat?”
He looks away from Benson, down at his knees, and it looks like the kid’s shutting down. He didn’t want to break Randy, not like this, and it doesn’t feel good seeing him clam up. Benson doesn’t want to be the dick that made Randy never trust anyone again, especially when he was being weirdly cute earlier, standing around waiting to say thank you again.
Fuck, he thinks, is that how the kid flirts?
Randy might have been trying to put some unsettling, pathetic moves on him, and Benson’s all but pushed him away just because he can’t keep his dumb fucking mouth shut.
Fuck the chicken fried steak, fuck the diner, and fuck the bar, too; the plan’s out the window and all he wants to do now is make Randy feel less shitty, and in turn make himself feel less like a dick. Now, his mission is to make Randy smile.
Benson takes his arm and pulls him up onto his feet, staring at him full in the face as he winces; he swears that Randy’s trying to put him over the edge when his front teeth just barely pull over the wet rim of his bottom lip. He looks forward, turning his attention far away from the unknowingly seductive little minx in his grip, and leads them away from the booth, pushing through the front door.
“You’re not hungry anymore?” Randy asks as the bell dings behind them, and Benson laughs.
“I’m hungry for something else now,” Benson says, practically dragging the kid back to his car, “you’ve got beer at your place, right?”
Randy winces and looks nervous again when Benson gestures over to the passenger side door—a wordless “get in.” He shakes his head, opening his mouth to start saying something, but he holds off until he’s in the car.
“No, Benson, really, my mom—”
“When is she gonna be back from Aunt Shelby’s?” He asks, and Randy gives him a confused look. “I heard you in the car—you shouldn’t roll down the window if you don’t wanna be eavesdropped on.”
He shakes his head, his shoulders tense, but they’ve been tense since this morning.
“She said 6:30 at the latest. But she could be back earlier, Benson, and she’s gonna flip if she finds beer around the house.”
“I’m not a fucking animal, Randy, I’ll take the evidence with me. She’ll never even know I was there.” That actually seems to reassure Randy, and Benson pulls out of the parking space, rolling up to exit. “Which way’s your house?”
Randy only gives him a tight-throated “left,” and Benson works out the nearest convenience store in his head—he’s gonna drink, he’s gonna try to be nicer to Randy, and he’s gonna make good on the weird fucking feelings roiling in his gut.
—
They park on the street over from Randy’s house and sneak in through the sliding back door like Benson’s a secret he needs to hide from the neighbors. He doesn’t mind, though it makes him think a little of Leann, the way she hid Benson when she fucked him—but that was different, she should have been arrested for sneaking around with him, but he isn’t sure she’d be convicted even if it happened today. She’s not the worst thing to happen to him, not by a longshot, it’s not like he’d go after her first if he had a lawyer on his side; someone else is higher on his list.
Randy gives a strange, small laugh as he pulls the back door open, slides it in its tracks, and steps inside the house. It’s dark inside, not pitch black but just dark enough that Benson can’t make much of anything out on the walls. There has to be pictures in a house this painfully suburban, and he sees the vague rectangular shapes in the darkness, but they’re just flat washes of gray, gray, and more gray.
Everything in this house is pretty gray, actually. Benson briefly looks into the living room while he’s following Randy past the kitchen and dining room, and all the furniture in there is gray—gray couch, gray curtains, gray coffee table on top of a gray rug. It’s a sad fucking existence, halfway between a black void and a padded cell, no wonder Randy’s outlook is so fucking bleak.
The house smells so clean that it makes Benson think of what a hospital must smell like, and he wonders how Randy can stand it, living in a decorated asylum. He grabs one of the cans from the six pack dangling in his hand and pops it open, taking a sip as they turn down a short hallway, three doors standing before them.
Randy gestures at the door on their left. “That’s my mom’s room,” he says before pointing to the door on the right, “that’s the bathroom, and straight down the hall is my room.”
Benson probably could have figured out the bathroom situation on his own, though: even in the dark, he can see the black, swirly lettering spelling out BATHROOM.
“Well, let’s go to your room, then.”
Randy glances back at him, his expression muddled in the dark, but Benson can tell he’s nervous. He guides them to the door at the end of the hallway and opens it, stepping in without any additional fanfare.
Randy’s room is bigger than Benson’s, or maybe it just looks that way because it isn’t crammed full of shit, and it’s without a shadow of a doubt cleaner. If it wasn’t for the almost-made bed, Benson would think nobody lives in here—that it’s like a set from a movie made to look lived in. There’s records on top of his dresser, there’s shelves with knick knacky shit on them, and there’s a guitar propped up in the corner of the room between his closet and the curtain, tucked away like it’s something shameful. Benson never would have placed Randy as the type that could play guitar, and he wonders if he takes all that shit at Burgers Burgers Burgers for a reason; maybe the kid actually has a life or some drive to live after all.
But there’s no pictures of friends, at least none that he can see before Randy turns the light on and blinds Benson for half a second. As his eyes adjust, he still doesn’t see any evidence that Randy does anything but go to work and go home—in the light, he can see that the guitar’s gathered a layer of dust on top of it. Maybe the kid can play, but he certainly hasn’t done so recently.
Randy leaves the door open while Benson looks around, like he’s considering leaving, and Benson laughs. He holds the six pack out to him, jostling it until the cans start to click together. “You could afford to loosen up.”
Randy comes closer, entering Benson’s personal space, and he tenses again seeing just how close they are. He grabs the plastic and pulls on the next can over from Benson’s, tugging until it pops free. Benson watches him pop the tab and sniff it, his eyes flicking back up as he decides whether or not he wants to drink it.
“If you don’t drink it now,” Benson says as he plops down on Randy’s bed, “I’ll just finish it for you later.”
Randy nods and tips his beer back, grimacing at the taste but still swallowing down a full swig before he moves to stand at the side of the bed next to Benson.
They sit in edgy silence for a few minutes, drinking, and Benson turns to look at the records on his dresser. He wants to ask him just what shit he listens to that makes him think he's above punk rock. The kid's a soft rock infomercial down to his wimpy little voice, though Benson might be kind and acknowledge the hint of irony biting the edges of his words and simmering just underneath his fucking pathetic exterior.
Randy swirls his beer can in his hand, procrastinating taking another sip like he's waiting for Benson to say “drink.” God, he could cry, he can tell Randy wants to make his own choices but he just refuses to. Might as well open his arms and tell Randy to do whatever he wants to him, see if that loosens the cinder blocks tied to his feet.
He turns his attention to Randy and he smiles at him, wondering if it’ll calm him down or make him that much more uneasy.
“Have you ever brought a girl back here? A guy?”
Randy shakes his head, but Benson can see him blushing—the tips of his ears are turning pinker by the second. “Not like this.”
He laughs and tips his beer can back, swallowing down another mouthful of the cheap shit. If Randy doesn’t like it, he’s holding back the urge to say anything about his distaste. Benson wonders just how much he can hold back before he finally lets loose.
“Don’t tell me I’m your first, Randy.” He watches him through half-lidded eyes, his head leaned forward and his other hand gripping the edge of the bed. “You know how much pressure that puts on me?”
He gives the slightest smile, an incredulous one, as he finally throws his can back and swallows down more beer. Benson almost feels proud of him, though he’s certain the kid’s gonna be flat on his face in ten minutes if he downs the whole thing in one go. Randy drinks for a few more moments, long and drawn out, and Benson’s fixated on the way his Adam’s apple bobs, the dip in his throat sinking with each swallow—he wants to spit in that divot and lick it up, lubricate it like he’s gonna fuck it. Benson should hate him, he should think Randy’s the lowest of the fucking low, and to some extent he is, but goddamn if he isn’t effortlessly hot.
Blood is rushing to his cock, but he doesn’t feel himself getting hard; Randy might just have to make do with hand stuff if he even wants Benson to make him scream like a whore. He draws one leg up and perches his foot on the edge of the bed, trying to hide the weak tenting in his pants from Randy.
“You have kissed someone before, right? Someone besides your mom?”
Randy rolls his eyes, swallowing down the last drops of beer and putting the can down, extending his hand out as a wordless demand for another.
“You’re gonna be on your ass, Randy—just answer the question.”
He drops his hand to his side and gives one small shake of his head. “Nope. I had a girlfriend but we never kissed. We kind of didn’t like each other like that, but her parents liked that she had a boyfriend and my mom liked her, so we kind of went out for three months. Then we broke up because her cat died.”
Benson raises an eyebrow and snickers into his fist, balancing his elbow on his knee. What kind of fucking excuse, he wants to start, but he ends up cackling, unable to get the words out. Who the fuck breaks up with someone over a cat? It might be Benson’s new favorite joke of all time. When he manages to stop the tears brimming in his eyes, he smiles at Randy, dropping his leg down just slightly.
“You’re twenty, and your girlfriend who broke up with you over her dead cat never even kissed you? Randy, get over here, right now.”
Randy hesitates for a moment, licking his lips, before he moves closer. He scoots an inch or two closer to Benson, leaving enough space for both of their beer cans to sit in between them, and his face has gone pale like he’s about to have a heart attack. Benson balances his beer can against his thigh and turns, grabbing Randy’s face and pulling him in before either of them can back out.
He doesn’t want to think he’s been wanting to do this since Randy started working at Burgers Burgers Burgers, but there’s some part of him deep down that really likes scrawny, pathetic twinks. Maybe some psychologist could pick at his brain, figure out how a kid goes from getting molested by his fatass shop teacher to pursuing any older woman who’d look at him twice to becoming obsessed with the only guy at work that he can overpower, but Benson doesn’t think that kind of shit holds any water. It’s all just coincidences, and it’s coincidence that led him to giving Randy Bradley his first kiss.
He doesn’t move against Benson, he doesn’t try to kiss him back—he sits still and lets Benson take control, and his pulse throbs like a jackhammer underneath his cupped palms. Randy gives the smallest moan when Benson breaks their lips apart and pulls away, like he’s disappointed, and Benson drops his hands, giving him one last lingering look before he finishes off his beer.
“There, congratulations, you’re a man now.” Benson keeps one hand wrapped around the empty can, the other rests in the no man’s land between their thighs, and he silently wishes that he’d kept going. It was like kissing a dead fish, but goddamn, he didn’t want to let Randy go.
Silence stretches out between them again, so long that Benson starts and is halfway to finishing a second beer before he thinks that maybe he should run out. If they’re not gonna talk, not gonna check off any more of Randy’s firsts, then why bother hanging around?
He doesn’t actually like sitting in silence with Randy, does he?
Just as Benson’s about to get up and excuse himself to the bathroom to flee, he feels Randy shifting beside him. He turns, sees the kid inching even closer, and plants himself; what does he think he’s doing?
Randy leans across the gap and presses his lips to Benson’s, kissing him just as softly and shyly as he thought he would. His hands stay wrapped around the empty beer can and Benson can feel him smile against his mouth, like he’s fulfilling some deep seated desire. He’s not particularly good at kissing—like he knows what makes a good kiss—but Benson is frozen in place as Randy pulls away, looking up at him with glimmering, dizzy eyes.
“Sorry, I just…I’ve been thinking about that for months.” He sets the beer can aside and folds his hands in his lap, fidgeting a little. “I kind of thought you were taking me out on a date, sorry if I completely misread it—I can be so stupid sometimes.”
Benson licks his lips, tastes Randy and beer clinging to the skin, and he doesn’t care if he’s not hard anymore—he’s horny and he wants to make Randy scream.
He knocks him down onto the bed, plowing into him like a linebacker, and pins him down by his wrists, taking special care to squeeze the one that Chris grabbed earlier. Randy gasps and tries to move, but he can’t do much more than struggle underneath Benson’s weight. He’s not much bigger than him, the only advantage he has over Randy is a bit more muscle, but after a few weak moves, Randy settles and stares up at Benson with his lips parted.
He leans down and kisses Randy again, much rougher than the kiss he instigated, and he moves down his face, kissing his chin, his jaw, down his neck, all while Randy finally starts giving him the noises he’s been craving: the choked little moans and sighs, the shuddering exhales when Benson finds a place he really fucking likes, and the winces and whimpers when he nips at his throat—everyone who fucks him wants a feral dog, might as well give it to them.
Randy’s shy at first, but he doesn’t hide just how much he likes what Benson’s doing to him: “don’t stop, don’t stop, Benson,” he moans like a fucking pornstar, solidifying to him that all of his experience has been visual, not physical.
His pulse is throbbing and he’s almost getting hard, but he’s not gonna jam his cock straight into Randy, no matter how much he’d love to see him wail and writhe. Benson reaches down in between their bodies and grabs Randy through his work pants, groping him desperately, tightly, and makes Randy whine and arch his back. Never been touched, how special is Benson?
Randy reaches up and grabs at the back of Benson's greasy hair, knotting his fingers into it and exhaling sharply with each desperate grasp between his legs. His legs arch and bracket Benson's, and he rolls his hips up into his hand, a smile spreading across his face. Benson stares down at him, his cheeks burning red and his eyes glimmering, and he wants to sink his teeth into his throat and pull out as much meat as he can hold in his mouth. He wants the flesh, the tendons, the blood and sinew dribbling down his chin while the light leaves Randy's eyes. He wants Randy dead and he wants to ruin him for any other motherfucker out there.
“Benson, can you…” Randy trails off, his Adam’s apple bobbing in his throat with a hard swallow—Benson wants to bite it. He twists his fingertips into Benson’s scalp and presses their hips flush until he can feel Randy’s cock fighting against his, fighting against the weird, slippery material of his work pants.
“What?” He asks bluntly, his lips moving against the delicate skin of his throat. “Use your words.”
He pulls Benson’s head back, and he wants to kick him, hit him, do something to him for thinking he can make him move like that, but when he sees Randy looking up at him like he’s something good, the fire in him fades. He doesn’t agree, he thinks Randy might be a bit stupid if he doesn’t see Benson for what he is, but he likes this better than the hungry, disgusted stares he’s used to; he likes Randy’s open admiration, even if it feels fucking weird to be on the receiving end of it.
“Can you grind against me?” His voice is weak and shaky, like he’s already been racked with just a little groping and grinding. “I don’t have condoms or anything, so we can’t…do that, unless you don’t mind—”
“I’m not fucking you, Randy.”
It’s a dismissal, but not a permanent one, because he’d be lying if he said he didn’t want to fuck Randy within an inch of his life. He looks a little disappointed underneath Benson, there’s even something a little bitchy in his expression as he glances to the side, looking at the scant light coming through underneath his curtains—it’s not orangey yet, they still have time.
Randy pulls off his work shirt, the undershirt beneath that, and leaves himself half-naked in front of Benson, breathing like he’s done more than expose his chest. He’s not as skinny as Benson would have guessed, there’s some muscle to him, but it’s wiry and slight, and Benson’s more interested in the thin layers of fat on his chest, his hips, and his lower stomach. Randy’s softness is different than his own, it sends him into a frenzy seeing where his body has stored what little fat he has, the survival reserves that Benson used to be much more familiar with back before he got old.
Benson grabs Randy’s hips and kneels over him—he’s glad they’re on a mattress, his knees will be thanking him in the morning—before he lowers himself entirely on top of Randy, catching his lips with his own and kissing him hard. He feels like he’s sucking the breath out of his lungs when he manages to pry Randy’s mouth open, trying to suffocate him, but he doesn’t try to fight back against Benson; to his utter delight, Randy moans into his mouth.
He grabs onto Benson’s shoulders and tries to hold him in place while they kiss, while he slips his tongue into Randy’s mouth and tries to taste him underneath the beer, and the most he can give are small, eager pants. Benson digs his fingers into his hips, grinding the meat against the bone until he’s sure he’s bruised Randy, and he breaks their mouths apart, kissing down the side of his face until he can latch his mouth onto the side of his throat and hear his little bitch whine.
“Benson,” Randy says between halted breaths, starting to move his body upward. His skin is hot underneath Benson’s hands, he feels like a fucking wildfire.
“Randy,” he says back before he starts suckling at the skin underneath Randy’s jaw. “Is this why you never kissed your girlfriend?”
He exhales sharply as Benson sucks a hickey into the skin just beneath his jawline. “She likes girls, and I don’t.”
Benson grabs his jaw with one hand and cranes his head up, making Randy whine as he holds him in place, the column of his throat left exposed for Benson to kiss, lick, and bite. His body rolls, moves like a wave as Benson leaves hickies down the side of his throat, nibbling at the bruised skin, holding himself back so he doesn’t bite straight through and rip out his jugular; it pumps thickly against the thin skin, calling to him like Randy’s body itself is asking for death.
“You know, when you stood up to Chris for me, I went home that night and…got off thinking about you.” Even with a whole beer in his virginal system, Randy still manages to play coy. Benson moves to the other side of his neck and kisses it, bites at it, tongues along the two moles just underneath his jaw.
“You fucking pervert, Randy!” Benson slurs, biting down on the side of his throat again and making Randy moan; bold words coming from him. Each sound that he makes is like bad music—a little choked and awkward, but it’s more authentic than the polished crap. If anything, the kid’s an outsider artist specializing in moaning like a fucking whore. “Tell me alllllll about it.”
He crawls down his chest, exposed to the cool air around them, and gropes his pecs with both hands, trying to mash them around like they’re tits. Randy gasps and grips at the sheets, arching his back up into Benson’s grip. He exhales a shuddering breath and moves himself up into Benson again, their erections grazing together like he was trying to acquaint them. Like Benson’s going to fully put out on the first date—not a chance in hell.
“You really wanna know?”
He brings his thumbs down on Randy’s nipples and grinds, almost immediately seeing the skin darken and the flesh swell underneath his touch.
“Don’t play cute with me.” He presses harder as Randy struggles to swallow down a loud, high moan, and he rolls up into Benson once again.
Randy doesn’t know how to be sexy, not in the way that someone trying to be desirable does, but Benson fucking loves how one beer and a little kissing managed to bring out the animal in him—not like Benson has much experience himself, but this feels better than it did with her. There was no preamble with Leann aside from some kissing: Benson was inside her before he really understood what was happening, and after a few quick, eager bounces in his lap, they were both finished. It’s good with Randy, and he feels like a fucking pussy for thinking that.
Benson’s tongue rolls in the divot of Randy’s collarbone, starts to trail up the top of his throat to his Adam’s apple, and he moves up the bed, scrambling back until he’s up against his headboard. Randy’s eyes are almost pitch black, his pupils blown as wide as his eyes as he stares at Benson; anticipatory, so excited that Benson can almost feel him vibrating from here.
“I was laying right here,” he says, spreading his freed legs, “and I waited until my mom went to bed to hide under my covers. I was thinking about you all day, thinking about how I wanted you to pin me down to my bed and dry hump me with your hand around my neck. I got off thinking about your muscles flexing as you choked me.”
Benson raises his eyebrows—Randy’s a fucking freak and he didn’t even know it. He looks like the type to not even know how two guys get it on, and he fantasized about Benson choking him. He’d rather tear his throat out, but he’ll keep that choking idea in mind for later.
“Get the fuck over here,” he laughs, leaning forward and grabbing Randy’s thigh, hoisting it up to his side, “let’s try this.”
Benson rolls his hips lazily against the kid’s, and he throws his head back and whimpers, biting his lower lip. He tightens his grasp and thrusts his hips forward, like a jab at Randy’s barely-contained erection fighting against the zipper of his work pants. Randy moves up into him and holds tight onto his sleeves, grinding his hips up into Benson’s with a better rhythm than he anticipated from a drunk virgin. He matches Benson well, just slightly out of time, and Randy shudders every time their hard-ons rub together.
“When did you come?” He asks, panting with each graze of their cocks against each other.
Randy shrugs, or it looks like he shrugs, and he thrusts his hips hard into Benson’s; it’s enough to make him tear up, but fuck if it doesn’t feel good. “I think it was when I stopped breathing.”
Benson severely underestimated Randy, he almost feels the need to apologize to him for assuming he was sexless.
He grinds deep and low against Randy’s groin, and that’s when he milks what feels like a never-ending series of moans, sighs, and whimpers from Randy as he gets him closer to coming. He wonders if this is what being a normal teenager would have felt like, one that didn’t come with all of Benson’s baggage; dry humping in an empty house until the parents came home, leaving too many hickeys that couldn’t be hidden under shirt collars, only unable to do more because Randy didn’t come pre-lubed. He feels warm and fuzzy, he actually feels fucking nice as he pulls Randy’s leg further from his body and finds a good angle to grind their cocks together.
His other leg twists up against Benson’s side and he tucks his chin into his chest before tossing his head back, giving a long, shuddering moan as he comes. Randy throws his arms around Benson’s shoulders and breathes through it, his eyes opening after a brief moment of near-silence, and he locks on Benson’s face. His pupils are still blown, and Benson almost thinks he looks insane like this, but in a way that gets him hot. He feels himself dribbling precome into his boxers and latches his hand onto Randy’s throat—only hard enough for him to feel the pressure, not to block his windpipe—and ruts hard against his thigh until he’s finished off too, grunting like the feral fucking dog that he may as well be.
“Benson?” Randy moans as he starts coming down, the floating and the delicious sounds coming from his mouth making Benson feel better than he ever has.
“Yeah?” He keeps his hand wrapped around his neck, he likes the feeling of Randy’s blood pumping, the feeling of his pulse thudding regularly, firmly, through his major arteries.
He exhales before speaking again, and Benson starts to miss the silence.
“You didn’t even try to choke me.”
He grins wide and moves up, his hand cupping Randy’s cheek as he kisses him hard, hard enough to split his lip, and he’s proud when he looks down at his handiwork and finds blood smeared across Randy’s bottom lip.
“Does that make up for it?”
He licks the blood blooming from his lip and gives him a faint smile, suiting the dazed, far-out look in his eyes. “A little.”
Benson gets a little taste of Randy’s blood when they kiss again—he wants to fill his mouth with it, but a few drops are better than none.
—
Benson waits around a little while before getting up to go to the bathroom. He’s itching out of his skin, wanting a smoke to follow up actual, good sex, but Randy’ll be up his ass about smoking inside, he’s certain of it. Least he can do is piss before he heads out, leaves Randy with no fucking way to get to work. Fuck, he thinks as he crawls off of Randy, passed out and utterly placid, his car’s still at work.
Maybe he’ll be a good samaritan and come pick Randy up in the morning, if his mom doesn’t have some fucking conniption about Randy getting a ride from a coworker. He creaks the door open as gently as he can and steps out into the hallway, feeling his come drying and cooling in his boxers, it’s enough to make him feel genuinely uncomfortable. He’ll have to head to the laundromat tomorrow, maybe tonight if he can swing it, but if Ma needs another pack then he’s not gonna be able to afford that and the spin cycle until he gets paid on Friday.
Benson makes a b-line to the bathroom and steps in, locking himself in and pulling himself out of his underwear as quickly as he can. What is he gonna do tomorrow when they show up to work together, Randy smiling at him and acting like they’re buddies? What is Chris gonna do when he notices? Benson knows he won’t take it well, being proven right, and he doesn’t want to be the cause of Randy getting treated worse and worse at work.
When he gets back in there, he’s gonna tell Randy to be fucking discreet at work—Chris and Jess can fuck in the freezer, but if anyone catches the two of them staring at each other for longer than necessary, Hardy is more than liable to fire them both for inappropriate conduct, aka, being faggots on the job. Benson can brush it off, but Randy? He won’t last a fucking week through the taunting, the harassment, and Benson can easily see him splayed out on the concrete.
He’s not gonna let that shit happen to Randy.
Benson finishes pissing and flushes the toilet, turning his attention to mopping up the come in his boxers. Next time, he’s gonna choke Randy on his cock if he’s so gung-ho on suffocation—the kid’s gonna look pretty with his mouth wrapped around his shaft, he’s certain of it.
He wipes his hands on his work pants and closes the bathroom door behind him, coming back down the hall and stopping when he sees one of the pictures hanging on the wall. With the bedroom light pouring out onto it now, Benson can see the subjects now: Randy, maybe about eight years old with a stupid fucking haircut, frowning and sitting in the lap of a woman that Benson immediately recognizes.
Sticky lipstick, cold hands, sickly sweet perfume that clung to his clothes for days on end. Her hands were wrapped around him, wrapped around Randy, and Benson can feel her nails digging into his skin. His stomach turns, twists, and he steps backward until he falls against the opposite wall, fixated on the picture; fixated on Leann.
Her hair was the same, bottle blonde and teased into a helmet, and he realizes then why Randy’s eyes are so familiar. Benson swallows down a heavy wave of nausea, then another that hits him when he realizes that he can still taste Randy in his mouth.
That’s his son in the bedroom, resting off an orgasm that Benson gave him; the first real gift he’s ever given to his son, before any birthday or Christmas present, was an orgasm brought on by weak, noncommittal choking.
Benson can’t decide how to feel. He’s sick, he’s disgusted by what he’s done, but at the same time…Randy doesn’t know.
How the fuck could he know? He hasn’t known Leann in twenty years, but he knows that she wouldn’t tell Randy anything about his real dad—he probably thinks his real dad was someone brave, chivalric, everything that a scrawny teenager thrown into the back of a powder blue sedan wasn’t. He wishes he knew just what story Leann spun when Randy inevitably asked why he only has a mommy—he imagines it goes something like “he went out to buy milk but then he got swept out to sea, he’ll come home someday and we’ll be a normal family again!”
Too late for that now.
He clears his throat and pushes himself off the wall, only planning to go in and grab the beer—because no way in hell he’s leaving all that beer with Randy—when he’s stopped dead in his tracks at the sight of him, stripped down to just his underwear and pulling out pajamas from his dresser.
“Hey,” he says, taking a folded pair of pajama pants and putting them on his bed.
“Hey.” Benson lingers in the doorway, but Randy comes up to him, standing only a few inches away from him and crossing his arms over himself.
The bruises are already starting to develop; Benson isn’t going to be able to control himself at work tomorrow when he sees Randy adorned with his fucked-up love. He reaches across the gap and grabs his shoulder, massaging the muscle harder than he needs to. My son, he thinks, his eyes darting across Randy’s face, you’re my son.
“I’m gonna drive you to work tomorrow morning.”
“O-okay,” Randy stammers when Benson really works his fingers into his flesh, but he doesn’t shrink away. He stays where he is, and Benson’s hand snakes up his neck, the back of his head, until his fingers are working their way through his mussed hair.
My son, all mine.
Benson cards his fingers lazily through Randy’s hair and grabs it, pulling his head over to kiss him hungrily, violently; his stomach turns, but he’ll get used to it. He’s gonna take that cash from the back of his drawer and he’s gonna take Randy as far away from this shit as he can. His son, his own flesh and blood, the same kid he watched from a distance for nearly half his life, is finally here with him, and Benson’s not going to let anyone get between them ever again.
He leaves Randy with a simple goodbye and Benson is halfway across the lawn before he doubles over and vomits, giving up nothing more than trace amounts of beer and stomach acid.