Sex in C Major

So against his own instincts, against everything he knew about the people who were putting the pressure on Dean, he crossed the road.

Asked for another bag.

Offered to pay.

"Yeah," Dean said, shifting from foot to foot. "Yeah, yeah. You can-you can pay like last time, yeah?"

"Yeah," Stefan said, even as his stomach clenched up tight at the thought of it.

"Only-only you know, you know, it's not...not mine, like. Not mine. Like."

Stefan glanced at the stranger.

"I don't do weed," the stranger grunted. His eyes raked Stefan, then he smirked. "Do other stuff, though. What you need?"

He was bad news. Stefan knew it. Knew it.

But he said, "Something to relax,"

anyway.

"Can help you do that. Can smoke it, too."

"Not that."

"Got some K, too."

Stefan swallowed. He'd never done more than weed. Never wanted to. He couldn't get into this sort of thing, couldn't get into what Dean was into. It was fucking Dean up. Stefan could see that. And how was he supposed to transition if he was just permanently high? What would it do to his T shots-did they even work with harder drugs?

But his skin was crawling. His guts were dissolving.

And there was a huge hole-in his chest, his cunt, his arse, his head.

There was a hole in his soul.

"Okay," he whispered. "Yeah. Yeah, okay."

"It'll cost you."

"How much?"

"Heard you don't pay with cash. You know?"

Dean mumbled something. Stefan hesitated. The man was smirking.

"I can get cash."

"I don't want your cash. Call it a one-time offer."

He shouldn't. Daz had said he wasn't to sl-

Stefan balled his hands into fists. Checkmate. He wasn't a slave. He was-he was a man. A man. And men didn't do whatever their masters told them to do.

"You want a hand job, or..."

"Get you spaced for a sucking," the man said. He grinned. Three teeth were missing. "If you want more, we can negotiate then. C'mon. I got a place."

Dean was vibrating, almost, as they followed the man back into the estate. He didn't say much, almost twitching as they were led round the back of a couple of run-down shops and up a fire escape to a flat. It was dingy inside. Another man, skinny and pale, was asleep on a battered sofa. The open door to a bedroom showed a healthy cannabis crop, almost ready to go.

Then the door was closed. Stefan was pushed against it. Shoved to his knees.

He was face-fucked by a fat cock, with two meaty hands in his hair, and a stranger's voice calling him a stupid bitch. And when it was over, cum staining his cheek, he was given another bag of weed and some of the promised K.

Payment.

Stefan wanted to throw up again.

"It'll take more than the edge off," the man promised, then slapped Stefan's arse and caught at his belt as he headed for the door. "Don't fuck off, now. Take it here."

"Need the bathroom."

"Sure. Then come back and we can have a bit more fun. Bet you're pretty with your clothes off."

Stefan ducked into the bathroom and closed the door. It had no lock, and the bath was filthy. The inside of the toilet was a solid brown, and the tiles stank of piss. The cabinet had no door, and was filled with methadone bottles and rusty

razors.

Stefan took one.

And scratched it along his scalp again and again, until clumps of hair began to litter his clothes and the cracked sink-until there was nothing left to hold onto.

"Stupid bitch," he mumbled, dropping the razor into the abandoned tufts. "See if he thinks you're pretty now. Stupid bitch."

His whole body was shaking. He didn't want the K. He just wanted the weed, the alcohol, and everything to stop hurting. Just-just for a minute.

And if...if the K could do that....

He took it.

Then, before it could take effect and wipe away the last bit of judgement that he had, Stefan prised open the bathroom window, and jumped. The landing-second storey window onto a muddy bank-jarred his knees and made his stomach roll unpleasantly. He staggered. Sat for a moment in the mud, stunned.

Then ran a hand over his bare scalp, fingered his swollen lips from blowing a stranger for a drug he'd never had before and walked away.

A master and strange men had been too much.

But suddenly, Stefan wasn't sure he'd done the right thing. 32

When someone started banging on the door, Stefan fully expected the neighbours. Dean. The stranger from two days ago.

He had spent two days being sick in his flat after that day. Two days of shaking, sweating, throwing up, and picking open the scabbed wounds on his leg and breasts. Two days of crying and knowing he'd fucked up. Irreparably fucked up.