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visceravalentines · 4 hours

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sugar stuck in your teeth

They're grimy and tired and Benson's neck is sore. Randy gives him a shoulder rub and thinks hard about the allure of being a biological organism.

2.5k words. canon divergence, boys on the run. established relationship. implied sexual content, nothing explicit. sweat and oil and general nasty. sharing of a toothbrush. so fluffy i'm spinning it up and putting it on a stick and selling it at a carnival. read on ao3 here if that's more your speed.

They spend a full day on the road. Seven hours across Texas through scrub and sand. Nothing to see. No end in sight. Randy falls asleep in the dead-eyed sun of mid-afternoon and wakes up in the dark, dry air whipping through the car from Benson's window rolled all the way down.

"Hey." Randy sits up, disoriented, mouth gummy and tasting of bygone Mountain Dew, bladder fit to burst. "Why didn't you wake me up? You've been driving for hours."

"Didn't want to stop." Benson's voice is rough. Randy can read the exhaustion in his posture, the way he grips the wheel with both hands. "Besides, you looked like you could use it."

Randy shifts in his seat. He hasn't slept well all week. "Well…it's my turn now. Let me take over."

"Nah." Benson rolls his neck slowly. "Town's up here in like ten minutes. Figure we stop for the night."

Randy peers through the bug-splattered windshield and sees lights in the near distance. "You wanna find a motel?"

"I'd fucking love a motel. Gimme that lukewarm shower and a box spring mattress. Fucking luxury."

As it turns out, they get none of that. The only place in town has a sign that says Closed and no lights on in the lobby. Doors all locked, despite Benson's best efforts to rattle them open.

He doesn't say a word, doesn't even curse, just slumps defeated back to the car with Randy in tow. "You want the backseat or the front?"

"Benson, I slept for hours, I can–"

"There's not another town for forty miles and if I spend one more second on that fucking highway I'm gonna peel the skin off my face."

Randy doesn't argue. "I'll take the front."

"You sure?" Benson tosses a weary look at him over his shoulder. He squeezes the back of his neck and winces.

Randy nods. "Yeah, I'm sure."

The front sucks. You either have to fold your legs to fit around the steering wheel, or risk nailing the thing with your arm or your head. One time he hit the horn with his knee and scared them both so bad they ended up packing up and driving through the night because neither one could fall back asleep.

He's had plenty of rest. Benson should get the back.

They leave the car parked in the rear lot of the motel and pick their way through the scrub in the dark to take a piss, elbow-to-elbow. Randy barely feels self-conscious anymore. At the start he used to walk ten paces away and make Benson turn around. But that seems silly now. Benson's seen and touched every inch of him. This is nothing.

Benson zips up and takes off down the sidewalk with a haphazard sense of purpose. Randy has to jog a little to catch up. Benson holds out his arm and he ducks beneath it, the weight comfortable across his shoulders. By now Randy feels like he belongs there, pinned against his side.

He reeks. They both do. It's been three, almost four days since they last had a shower, been making do with baby wipes and clean underwear since they left Tennessee. Randy almost can't stand it. Back home, he showered every day, sometimes twice a day if work was rough. Right now, he could scrape the grime off himself with a fingernail.

He's adjusting to this level of awareness of his own body, like he's just now cognizant of the way his skin fits. It makes him sort of anxious. But he's coping. He doesn't really have a choice.

And it's funny–Randy doesn't mind Benson's stench at all. He's uncomfortable with his own stink, but he actually thinks Benson smells kind of…good, maybe. In a gross kind of way. It's such a foreign concept that he keeps inhaling a little too deep at this distance just to prove it to himself.

"What're you doing later?" Benson asks, oblivious.

Randy clears his throat. "Um…not much."

"Oh. Huh." Benson squints down the road towards the distant light of a gas station, the only thing in town that looks alive besides the two of them. "Well, how about I take you to dinner?"

A smile steals its way onto Randy's lips. He hooks his pinkie into Benson's pocket. "That might be nice."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

Benson takes a deep, thoughtful breath. "There's this place…Seven-Eleven?" He casts a dramatic sidelong glance in Randy's direction. "You heard of it?"

"Yeah, I…I think so."

"It's just fantastic. The beer list? Unbelievable. And the atmosphere, well…there's really nothing like it." He's talking with his hands, throwing them off balance. Randy stumbles happily along with him.

"I don't know, um…I've heard they don't have Pringles. Like, the big can. Just the little ones."

Benson scoffs. "Well, now, don't you worry your pretty little head about that. You can get two of the little ones if you want. It's on me."

"Wow."

"I know."

"That's–that's really generous."

"Well, you're gonna have to put out."

Randy coughs out a laugh, looks at his shoes to hide the heat in his face. "Sounds, um…sounds fair."

"Randy, come on." Benson laughs, gives his shoulder a shake. "You're giving it up for two cans of Pringles? You gotta know your worth, man."

He'd give it up for less, but that's beside the point. "Maybe toss in some peach rings and we have a deal."

Benson gives him a squeeze. "Fuck yeah, alright. Now we're talkin'."

They pick their way through the snack aisles of the gas station, select a few staples they aren't sick of yet. Benson salutes the clerk behind the counter like he's an American hero. They make their way back down the road to the motel in silence save for the crunching of chips and cellophane.

It's a beautiful night, still warm from the sun, everything orange beneath the sodium streetlights. Not a soul in sight save for them. This town looks like every other one and Randy likes that, likes that it's starting to feel like coming home when they stop for the night in a new place with a single stoplight.

They lean against the trunk of the Chrysler and pass the Big Gulp back and forth. It's too late for caffeine so they got root beer, extra ice, because Benson likes to fish it out and chew on it. There's too many streetlights to really see the stars, but that doesn't stop Randy from trying. He sucks the sour off a peach ring and feels a little bit nauseous and a lot filthy and an overall, bone-deep sense of contentment.

Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Benson twist his head, trying to roll out his neck again. It's not the sharp jerk of his familiar tic, not quite, but it makes Randy nervous. He's been doing it all night. He wonders if it was something he said, something he did. He still doesn't know what exactly he's trying to shrug off every time, but he knows enough to tread that ground lightly.

"You okay?" he asks, tries to make it casual. He swallows the peach ring whole and has to fight it all the way down his esophagus.

"Yeah." Benson nods, winces slightly. "Yeah. Just sore." He grips the back of his neck and stretches, lips hitched in a grimace.

Randy can imagine. Slumped in a car days on end, cracking the damn thing all the time. He sets the Big Gulp on the trunk, thinks, hesitates. Commits.

"Would you, um…would you want me to rub it out for you?"

Benson looks at him warily as he considers the offer. He's slow to answer, but Randy is patient. Doesn't push it. Lets him think about it.

Finally he nods. "Sure. Why not."

Randy clambers up on the trunk and sits behind him. Benson leans back between his legs, rests his elbows on Randy's knees, hangs his head forward. The space between them is awkward all of the sudden. Too close, not close enough. Too many clothes on. Too much skin exposed.

Randy is nervous and he's not sure why. He thinks fleetingly of their first time, his first time, and the way Benson's hands hovered an inch over his skin and shook a little bit. This isn't that, but it feels kind of the same. "You can…tell me to stop if you want. Whatever you want. It's okay."

"How about you start and then we'll see."

Randy brushes the curls at the base of Benson's neck hesitantly with his thumb before he wraps his hand around the muscle of his shoulder, gives an experimental squeeze. "Right…there?"

"Higher."

He moves his hand up and tries again. "There?"

Benson hisses through his teeth, cringes. "Yeah. Fuck."

Randy sets his hands on either side of his neck and squeezes gently.

"Yeah. Right there."

Benson's all tension beneath the skin, stiff and warm under his cold fingers. Randy thinks about the color of his muscles, the white of bone underneath them. He's pretty sure he's never touched anyone like this before, not even Benson, not like this. Not friendly or sexual, just…intimate.

"If you want me to stop, just–just say so, okay?"

Benson grunts an affirmative. His skin is oily and his muscles are taut as bowstrings, so riddled with knots it feels like buckshot lodged in his flesh. Randy presses his thumbs in deep and pushes up along his spine, again and again, feels a flush of satisfaction as Benson melts back against the car.

"Fuck," he moans.

"Hurts?"

"Yeah. Don't stop."

Randy's nothing if not good at taking orders. He falls into a rhythm, slow and steady, works over his neck and shoulders and back again. Benson swears up a storm and lets out a low whimper whenever he hits a sore spot.

"Sorry," Randy murmurs every time.

Benson never replies, but that's okay. He doesn't tell him to stop either.

At first his hands are balled into fists against Randy's knees, but after a while they go slack. He relaxes, finally, allows Randy and the car to support his weight. It's a selfish thought, but Randy hopes he's the first person to do this for him, or at least the first in a long, long time. Benson doesn't have a lot of firsts left. He wants this one.

Before long, his hands are cramping and he worries he's going to rub his neck raw but doesn't want to stop touching him, doesn't want to forfeit this new familiarity with his body. So he eases up, cheats a little bit, combs his fingers through his greasy hair and scratches at his scalp. It makes his chest feel tight, the way Benson leans into his touch with his eyes closed and groans under his breath.

When he finally pulls away, Randy tries to subdue his disappointment, until he turns around and reaches up to hook a hand behind Randy's head.

"C'mere," Benson mumbles, tugging him close and meeting him halfway for a kiss that tastes like peach rings and root beer. Randy grips his forearm and for a second, in his mind's eye, everything drops out and disappears into the void, save for them and the car and the stars.

When he breaks the kiss Benson doesn't let him go, holds him in place with their foreheads pressed together. Neither of them speak. Randy focuses so hard on Benson's breathing he forgets to breathe himself. There are words, but they creep by in silence like animals in the dark.

"We still got water in the back?" Benson says at last.

"Mmhm."

"I'm gonna brush my teeth. Change into my jammies." His jammies are a pair of basketball shorts made of more holes than fabric.

"Okay," Randy says.

Neither one of them moves. The crickets chat amongst themselves in the brush.

"You still want the front?" Benson asks.

"Sure."

"Thanks."

"No problem."

Benson sighs softly through his nose. He lets go of him and steps back, shuffles from one foot to the other and stares at Randy for a long time, hair sticking up in all directions. Finally he goes to dig through the backseat for the water jug.

"Looks like a bunch of fuckin' raccoons live in here," he mutters.

Randy chuckles, looks at his hands palm-up on his lap. He's got Benson's skin beneath his nails, his sweat and oil worked into the whorls of his fingerprints. He's never been so close to another person. Spent his whole life maintaining a safe distance from everyone around him, treating his body like a blast zone. Now the idea of distance is laughable. They share everything but toothbrushes. Hell, he's been inside him. Randy always figured he would never reach that level of connection with anybody.

He brings his hand to his face and hesitates for just a second before he sticks his thumb in his mouth. The salt of Benson's sweat is familiar on his tongue. He tastes his skin on his skin. He knows him. He knows him. And Benson knows him right back.

He's craved this sort of intimacy his whole life. Laid awake alone countless nights and ached for it, mourned bitterly for what he never had and assumed he never would. But now he lies awake with Benson beside him and basks in how wrong he was. In how real he feels in his arms, wearing a second skin of grit and spit and whatever else.

He doesn't want to sleep in the front.

Randy twists to call over his shoulder. "Hey…um, Benson?"

"Yeah?" he says around his toothbrush.

"You think we could…both fit in the back?"

Benson spits on the asphalt. "No."

"Well…could we try?"

Benson snorts. "Fuckin' clingy, huh?" he says, but he sounds amused. Randy feels those dark eyes appraising him like a pair of hands fumbling at his clothes. He tugs absentmindedly at the collar of his shirt. Well, Benson's shirt. "Yeah. We can try."

Randy hops off the trunk and joins him in the evening routine, bumping shoulders, bumping elbows, their voices small and close in the night.

"Gonna sweat to death together back there," Benson says.

"That's okay."

"If you say so. Think I might skip the jammies. That cool?"

"That's–that's fine, yeah. That's good. Hey…is that my toothbrush?"

"No, yours is green."

"That is green."

"No it's not."

"Yes it is, the light makes it look weird."

Benson looks at the thing again. "Oh. Whoops. Does it really matter?"

Randy gives this serious consideration, thinks about his mouth and everywhere it's been. Thinks about the state of the rest of him. Thinks about pressing his body to Benson's in the backseat, sticky with sweat, breath on his neck.

He wants to say yes, it matters, but he doesn't feel it. He tastes salt on his tongue instead.

"I guess not," he shrugs.

Benson hands it to him.

"Your turn, then."

#i really do be dunking my barbies in mud and then playing house w them #and then posting at such odd hours #oh well. try and stop me. you can't #stockroom syndrome #the passenger #the passenger 2023 #the passenger fanfiction #ranson #randy bradley #benson the passenger #the passenger 2023 fanfiction

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