There weren't that many places that Sam could think to go for this. The house he'd just built, like the treehouse, was off limits, but he still had room in the compound so...well that was that wasn't it?

"C'mon," he said and walked with Ian up to the compound and down to the very bottom basement floor to the only bit of privacy he could come up with.


continued from here

Alcuin wasn't the only one feeling a little uneasy. Sam was...well he didn't know the guy from Adam for one, and for two...well, he didn't know the guy from Adam. That was a pretty dumb expression now that it had entered his mind.

He spun on his heel and walked backwards down the stairs to the very last basement. He'd done this enough times before that he knew he wasn't going to fall (unless he got pushed, but really when pushing happened anyone would fall down stairs), and he wanted to get a good look at the guy he was going to be having anonymous sex with.

And if he found out later that this guy had slept with House too, he might just slam his dick in a drawer.

"You've got a gorgeous voice. Where're you from?"

Parties. Sam fuckin' hated the things. Oh sure, it was a great excuse to get drunk providing that the bartender of the evening didn't bother to ask how old you were. Tonight, unfortunately, was one of those fucking nights. Whoever let House bartend was on Sam's shitlist, that was for damn sure.

He danced for awhile when that Lilly chick decided that he needed some public humiliation. And then Maureen decided to join in on the fun. It took at least an hour for Sam to pull himself free from the claws of too much estrogen. Too. Fucking. Much. As soon as he was off the "dance floor" (really just a clearing, but whatever), he felt a cool breeze on his face. He moseyed backwards, just enjoying the time to relax and not feel like he was going to get groped to death.

And then...he found a rabbit hole.

The hard way.

Sam was actually doing pretty well for a guy who'd just flushed half of what remained of his boyfriend's roommate's stash of cocaine down the toilet and survived to tell the tale. Hell, he was actually feeling pretty good. Sure his back was a little scraped up, but that just came with the territory when these things happened. Besides, he was too high to give a damn.

A cable ran from the electric box on the outside of the compound, buried in a small dug trench so that no one tripped over it, to the beginnings of a home he had going there. It attached to the aux power on his CD player and was blasting some CD called "Model Prisoner" by some guy named Adam Pascal at top volume. It wasn't his normal shit (Manson really didn't suit him anymore these days and he was sick of Fall Out Boy and Panic!) but it didn't suck too badly. Besides, if he cranked up the volume of his headphones enough he didn't have to wear them to listen to music while he worked.

The would be home wasn't much yet. It had taken Sam two days of post holing just to get the main pillars sunk about three feet into the ground, and another two to set up the foundation and build up enough to be above the ground. It was lookin' damn good if you asked him though. Dad would've been proud. That hit him in the gut like a sucker punch. Dad. Right. He was gone wasn't he. Fuckin Island. He pulled out a joint from his pocket and lit up, annoyed with the memory and it's opportune time to surface. He took a deep drag and sat on the edge of his platform. May as well work on the stairs while he was sitting, right? Right. Besides, he was always better at knots when he was stoned.

So that's what Sam was doing. Getting high and making stairs. They wouldn't need to be very high stairs, fuck...three or four at most, but definitely neccesary as the floor itself came up to his knee. That might prove to be problematic later, but what the fuck ever.

God, this music kinda blew.

[continued from: here]

There were moments when Sam forgot exactly how strong Josh actually was. This happened to be one of those moments. Even drugged out of his mind...well partially drugged out of his mind...he was aware of two things. Josh's muscles and the fact that Josh had him pinned.

Shortly after came the fact that he couldn't fuckin reach Josh's lips and that sure as fuck wasn't buddies.

But he had a general idea what the fuck was going on here.

Punishment.

He whimpered and writhed and fought, but knew it wouldn't matter. Josh was stronger and for one of the few times in his life, actually had fuckin leverage.

Sam couldn't help but groan at that. He was good. Fuck. He was really good. So good that he'd forgotten almost entirely about that Josh fucker.

"My place or yours?" came his response. He really didn't fucking care which it turned out to be though.

It had been almost a month and the world was getting colder than Sam had ever experienced before. Fuck, he was a California boy. How the hell was he supposed to be prepared for this shit?! He huddled closer, pulling the stolen blanket tightly around him. He was going to die here. He knew it. He was going to fucking freeze to death and nobody was going to give a damn.

He had fifty cents in his pocket and wondered if that would be enough to get ahold of at least Josh. But...well it wasn't like Josh would tell his Mom or his brothers that he loved them. Josh wasn't that kind of nice. Hell, Josh probably wouldn't even fucking remember him anymore. He'd do better to just call home, but he didn't think he could stand the sound of his Mom's heart breaking.

Fuck.

He just needed a hit of something just to keep warm at least.

He staggered to his feet and went to go find the dealer he'd turned down weeks before.

Sam had expected to wake up to the sound of waves crashing against the shore, just not quite so close and not quite so in the middle of the night.

He opened his eyes and looked ahead of him. This wasn't like any cliff face on the Island. He stood up and immediately caught sight of the wooden post in the ground and the half completed fence. It all registered in his mind as clearly as if it were the moment he left. Home. He was in California where he didn't have to deal with Doctors or Superheros or Island Politics. He was home. He could see his brothers, his mom his-

Swearing caught his attention where it wouldn't have earlier.

Josh.

"Fuck," Sam said to himself and went tearing up the hill he had come running down. He had one good thing to say about the Island, at least now he was in pretty damn good shape. The cop had just shoved Josh against the car and was about to handcuff him when Sam crested up the hill. Josh's bag wasn't anywhere in sight and Josh himself looked as if he had just come from the island.

Oh fuck this.

The blonde took the cop at a run and knocked the fat ass off his feet. "You owe me," he said as he palmed the pig's keys and took off at a run. Josh was smart enough to follow, Sam was sure of that much.

But he had to. He had to get away from Tony for awhile, if only to keep him safe for the time being until he worked out a plan. Johnny could help with that, but he was still...well he was still more than a little terrified of going near Johnny too soon.

He sat at the edge of the waterfall behind the entrance to the caves and just watched it run its course. It was cold and he was actually wearing Johnny's jacket. Funny thing was, it started smelling like him again. Maybe it was because Sam had stopped looking for it. Who knew?

There were footsteps.

He didn't notice them.

He was too wrapped up in being depressed over things he couldn't control and people he hated.

Sam had been almost entirely silent for going on three days now. It wasn't that he was depressed or anything. Well, he was on some level, but he was also more than a little aware that it was entirely his own doing.

No. No he wasn't depressed. He was scared. He was pulling back from everything he held dear because he couldn't stand the thought of losing it.

He was scared because...because he couldn't lose Tony like he'd lost everyone else. Granted when "everyone else" consisted of Wilson and the Island's Biggest Playboy (at least that's what Sam was now mentally referring to Johnny as), it probably wasn't saying much.

It was like this constant tightening in his chest. He just couldn't deal with it. He didn't like being this afraid.

Just then he was curled up in bed in just his boxers with the lights out.

He was shiverring, but it wasn't because he was cold.

He really hated this.

A lot.

Sam and Tony had been in a very good place in their relationship. Well, very good in Sam's terms included sleeping naked and a more than healthy sex life.

There wasn't a night that went by that he didn't fall asleep curled up next to Tony. Preferably, his head was on his shoulder, but so long as they ended up in a knot of limbs, Sam really didn't care.

Tonight was no exception.

There was something tugging at the back of his mind to wake up though. It was still pitch black in the room. The door was closed and Tony was breathing slowly next to him. There was something that felt like long hair on his shoulders that shifted when he moved, but he just brushed ot off as a trick of his half sleep.

He was awake...and horny. Tony should be too.

He kissed his neck. "Tony," he murmured. "Wake up." Odd, his voice felt tired...and he was wet between his legs.

Oh shit.

He tried to pull back, but Tony's arm wasn't moving.

I did not just piss the bed.

It was sunny and Sam was glad for that. He was on his way to go visit Johnny and to tell him what happened with Tony and how their relationship has changed and that he finally talked to his dad and that his dad is alright with him being gay and...

That all sounded stupid, really. Hell, he felt stupid for being so excited.

He was still, mostly, in a good mood when he rapped on the glass of the Hummer.

Sam had been hanging out almost exclusively in his room since learning of his father's arrival on the island. Well, he'd warned Johnny and then hid himself away in his room unless he had to shower or pee. Tony was good for bringing food in.

Sam found that this was easier if he thought of himself as a spy, but right about then he realized that he didn't have much of an imagination without his brothers around.

He was laying back on the shoved together beds with the door open and his face in his hands.

Somehow knowing that his dad was there made him miss Adam and Ryan more.

Sam had been in a constant state of intoxication since finding out about his father's arrival.

Just then, he was laying in the sand within easy walking distance of Summerfell.

Not that he knew what Summerfell was or that it even existed, but Sansa was cute and Robb had a tight ass and Rickon was pretty awesome. That was really all Sam needed to feel okay about being near Starks...even if he wasn't aware of it.

He took a long drag off of his joint and closed his eyes.

When he opened them again, it was to the distinct smell of not pot, but something like dog breath.

[[ooc: backdated to this past thursday the 16th]]

Sam might've just died right then.

It was like every nerve was on fire when her hand brushed against him. He had to take a moment to recover from the thrill it sent down his spine.

His mind wasn't entirely his own then. Drugs and hormones blocked out everything but Maureen. His mouth found her ear. "I want you," he breathed. "Show me what to do."

Sam had never mastered the art of innuendo.

Sam was settling back into his own body nicely.

What was even nicer than that was being able to take a shower and not have to worry about looking down and seeing a horrid clump of hair on his chest.

Okay, so it wasn't so bad as all that, but still.

When he got up that morning, Tony was gone (presumably out for his morning swim).

And when he returned to the room, it was still empty. However, both beds were shoved and attached together to form one large bed and the desks and such had been moved to the wall where Sam's bed had been.

Barring the presence of Tony in the room, Sam did what any teenager would do.

He flopped diagonally across his bed and seriously considered masturbating.

Really, only a towel stood between his cock and his hand.

Mmmmm, temptation island, eh?

It was still raining when Sam knocked on the window to the Hummer. He was drenched to the core but didn't seem to notice.

He was so tired he was awake, so cold that he wasn't even aware of his body anymore.

He had one thing on his mind and one thing only. He needed to spend some time with Johnny today or he was going to go crazy.

This was what hell was like. This is what hell had to be like.

He knocked twice, small taps with the knuckle of his index finger.

It was more often than he cared to admit that Sam found himself smoking on the Ben-Rock these days. He'd gone every day since he left the letter. The bruise (because it really was just one) around his neck was fading and as he began another growth-spurt, Johnny's jacket was beginning to fit him better.

He was smoking. He did that a lot when he was stressed, really.

He was half hoping to see Johnny and half terrified of seeing Johnny.

Sam had painted himself into a corner, really.

He closed his eyes and hung his head. He missed Johnny more than he ever cared to admit to himself.

Sam hadn't actually moved into the room in the compound right away. He went back with Tony that night, sure, but he didn't grab his stuff until the next day. He was in a mood as he packed up his stuff, having had a rather...interesting encounter with Anakin just outside the Hummer.

He didn't think seeing his clone would be that big a deal. Sam was wrong more often than he cared to admit. In fact, Sam was wrong probably 75% of the time. He didn't want to think about the fight that ensued. His temper had been running hot lately and to have Anakin there looking for Johnny was just enough to push him over the edge.

"First Chase, then Anakin, Jesus Christ, who else don't I know about?" he muttered to himself. It hurt more than he cared to admit, and he wasn't just talking about the bruises around his throat. He put on Guster's collar to hide those. It didn't work particularly well, but if he stayed in the shade it was fine. He paused with his hand over Johnny's jacket. He could almost make out the slight indent in the padding where he slept at night. The same distinct curve of Johnny's body next to him. That was the hardest part. Sure, having a bed again was great, but it'd been nigh on impossible to sleep without Johnny's arm around him.

He closed his eyes and grabbed his notebook. Sam's handwriting was frantic and almost completely illegible.

Johnny-

I’m not good at talking about my feelings if I’m not high. I have to have an excuse to feel stuff or to say I’m feeling stuff and maybe you get that. I don’t know. I...that doesn’t matter really. I’m not high.

I met him five minutes ago. Maybe a little more than that. It doesn’t matter. Not really. He looks just like me, did you know that? Blonde hair, blue eyes, blowjob lips...He even sounds like me. Except he’s not me. He’s tanned and muscled and beautiful where I’m skinny and pale and awkward. Hell, I bet he can give you exactly what you want too, exactly what I can’t. He’s not drugged up or occasionally suicidal. He doesn’t even love you. But he looks...fuck, he looks just like me. I bet even right down to the size and shape of his cock.

I can’t do this. I can’t be in love with you. I want to, but this isn’t how it’s supposed to be. It’s supposed to be happy and wonderful and not make me feel like...shit. When I’m with you, at first, I could forget about who else you might’ve been with that day. I could just be happy that you were paying attention to me. Then I found out about Chase and started thinking about who else you were kissing like that and who else you were calling beautiful and wonderful and whispering sweet nothings to. Now there's Anakin. I don't want to know who else. I’m falling apart. I love you. I love you, but I can’t take having the mere thought of you being that intimate with someone else have such an effect on me. It’s like someone shoved their hands inside my body and one fist clenched around my heart and the other one around my stomach and they both just twisted them into knots. I can’t be second best. I can’t share. I wish I could. I wish I could just be thankful for the time I have with you...just be happy with that, but I can’t. I'm starting to just feel like a notch in your bedpost.

Tony's offered me a bed in the compound. Not with him like that, but in the same room. I guess his roommate bailed on him or something. I've decided to take it. It's a bed and while it's going to be hard as fuck to sleep without you, it'll do us both some good. I can get over my jealousy and you can...I don't know. Do whatever it is you do...be free, maybe. I need you to be my best friend more than anything else and I can't...I can't do that if I'm this cripplingly in love with you. My first instinct is to cut you out of my life entirely and I don't want to do that. You can see me whenever you come up for a shower. I can't hide from you. I’m sorry. It has to be this way. I don’t know how I’m going to survive this, but I know you’re strong enough for the both of us. As much as I want to, I can’t hate you. I can only hate myself. Fuck, I’m so sorry. You deserve better than me.

I’m sorry for grinding my cigarette out on the Ben-Rock the first time we met. I’m sorry for glaring at you every time you called me “Sammy”. I’m sorry for making the Hummer smell like pot from time to time. I’m sorry for running off and coming back injured. I’m sorry for making you take care of me because I was stupid. I’m sorry for dragging you into the whole mess with me and James. I’m sorry for getting high in your car on shit that scares you. I’m not sorry for falling in love with you. It saved me as much as it ruined me. I’m not sorry for stealing your coat. It’s the fucking tropics. You aren’t going to need it and I don’t think I can sleep without a part of you with me.

I can’t not love you, so I have to exist someplace without you to keep it from tearing me apart.

I have to try this. It...it might just be good for me. I'd like to talk to you, but I'm afraid. I'm sorry I'm a coward. I'd ask you to come find me, but it's not my place to leave with a note and then just...yeah. I'm just...sorry.

Forgive me.

Samuel J. Monroe

Sam tore the page out of his note book. He hesitated for a moment and then dug into his bag. He grabbed the couple Blink 182 CD's he had and set them under the letter.

P.S. - I want you to have these.

With that, Sam closed his eyes tightly and tried not to cry. It was so much easier to put this whole situation out of his mind when someone else was around. What he wouldn't give for one last kiss...

He shook his head and pulled himself together. As he closed the door to the Hummer, he wiped his eyes on the back of his sleeve. There was no way he was going to be able to do this without breaking down even a little. He made it back to the compound unnoticed and slipped into the, thankfully, empty dorm room.

He kicked off his shoes and flopped down onto his back. He wrapped himself up in Johnny's coat, even though it didn't smell like Johnny anymore, put on his headphones and just let everything take him away. He was crying. He cried almost as often as he was wrong. Not that he'd admit to that either.

Sam was spending more and more time out of the Hummer these days. More specifically, he'd been spending that time on the Ben-Rock watching the water. He figured that if he wasn't in the Hummer, people couldn't find him to yell at him for the fight with House.

Not that he made himself particularly difficult to find, really.

He had stolen a pack of cigarettes from one of the dorms in the building, a late night run to see if there was any nicotine to be had while people slept. He was smoking one just then, savouring its flavour with every drag.

Tony didn't hate him. Johnny...had actually seemed proud of him and Anna...well..she was another story all together. He hadn't seen her at all.

He was starting to relax. If someone was going to kill him, they would've done it by now. Right?

Sam let Ray carry most of his weight on the way out of the room and down the hall. He was doing a very good job at keeping his injured right leg from bearing that load.

When they arrived at the office, Sam maneuvered his way into a chair. The gash in his calf was fine, but one of the splinters of the cane had lodged itself in his back when he fell.

He yelped when he attempted to sit back on it. Fucking fuck...fuck...FUCK. He leaned forward, needing to just sit. He blocked out the pain of the splinter moving and just focused on calming the fuck down.

He didn't say a word to Ray.

Sam was tired of wasting his batteries when he could just crank up the volume on the Hummer's stero system instead. He stuck in a mix CD Corey made for him. Music to toke up to, right? Sort of.

Johnny was gone for the time being, thank God, and Sam had the back to himself. Spoon? Check. Lighter? Check. Syringe? Check. Water? Check. Collar? Check. Heroin? Double Check. Sam had only done this a few times, but he knew what he was doing, for the most part.

He took the spoon, putting some of his hommade opiate inside. A few drops of water and Sam heated it up with the lighter. This was the easy part. The hard part was finding a vein. He loaded it into the syringe and set it down gently for a moment.

I like how it feels not to feel.

He grabbed Guster's collar and tightened it on his upper arm, holding it taught with his teeth. With two fingers, he tapped out a vein.

Surprisingly enough, one appeared rather easily. Good. He curled his hand into a fist, popping it out further. His free hand went to the syringe. It's so much easier to give yourself a shot than it is to let someone else do it. Giving it to yourself is nothing. It's the easiest thing in the world. Almost like breathing.

With the needle in his vein, he pushed down on the plunger. It wasn't a very good hit, just enough to mellow him out quite a bit. Not enough to have things melting around him. He removed it slowly, putting the cap back on the tip before he undid the dog collar.

And with that, he lay back and waited for the drugs to do their job.

Sam lay in only his cargo shorts on the rock next to the one that reminded Johnny of Ben. He hadn't stepped on that particular action figure, so Sam had nothing to base that on.

His eyes were closed and the sun was warm on his flesh.

He'd left Johnny with the Hummer and the cleaning of it. That didn't seem to matter too much.

His mind weighed heavilly on what happened with Chase. On the fact that almost the entire time, his mind was on Johnny. On...on the state of arousal the mere thought of Johnny stirred in him. Damnit, he was easilly aroused, but never quite so...quickly. This was annoying. Fuckin' hormones.

How he ended up in a bar, Sam will never know. How he ended up in a bar in what sounded like England, he wasn't sure he wanted to know. Words were being flung all around him, things he wasn't quite sure he understood, but sounded enough like English.

Must be some weird Brit-Slang.

He pushed through the crowd. Were cloaks in? In his distraction (was that a pint glass...floating?), Sam walked right into some guy at the bar. "Shit! Sorry, man."

Poor guy, didn't have a clue what he was getting himself into.

James had left.

James Wilson. The source of all Sam's emotional turmoil was gone. Walking away. Sam couldn't even look at him. He just let him walk. No, he'd slammed the door in his face and then let him walk.

Time passed, as it always does. And by the time there were footsteps approaching the Hummer once more, Sam's face was streaked with tears, burrowed in Johnny's jacket.

He didn't even hear the door open.