~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Intro: HMC's Dorm Room.

(A white ball of sickeningly cute fluff jumps up onto HMC's desk)
HMC: What do you want?
BUNNY: Guess! (Wiggles its tail and winks)
HMC: No, fuck you; get off my desk right now. (Points to the door)
BUNNY: But it's a reeeeeally good one! (It starts bouncing)
HMC: You said the same thing about "Crazy Baby" and that was the most 
recycled piece of smut-less junk I've ever inflicted on other people. 
I have work to do. An essay, reading, lots of boring shit but it 
needs to be done.
BUNNY: But it has angst, sex and violence and a sad Jay, and you like 
those things!
HMC: NO! Don't tell me, I need to work.
BUNNY: (stares at me)
HMC: (stares back)
BUNNY: (Sniffles, single tear) Oh, I get it, you don't love my 
anymore. You know, once there was a time when everything you wrote 
was NC-17 and full of angsty goodness! Now, you don't listen to me 
anymore! I feel alone! You know what? I'm just gonna run away and 
join an animal testing facility, and they'll do experiments on me, and 
burn my fur off, and mess with my guts and I'll cry and I'll cry cuz 
once I had a writer who loved me and listened to my ideas, but the 
scientists won't care. They'll just do nasty stuff to my 
brainmeats---
HMC: ALRIGHT! *Jesus*.... Start talking you goddamned little....
BUNNY: YAY!!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Title: Needing a Hit
Author: HMC
Email: hmcgirl@earthlink.net
Pairing: Jay/Bob
Rated: R, cuz of language and maybe drugs.... oh yeah, and ssssssexual 
shtuff. Not really hardcore though (listen, you can hear the 
collective gasp of all the J/SB smut junkies out there). I'm too shy 
to write the really dirty stuff.
Disclaimer: Yeah, yeah, yeah. They're not mine. Plus, I shamelessly 
lifted the phrase "Bugfuck" from Kel. I'm only assuming that I used 
the word correctly. I'm evil.
Summary: Lotsa flashbacks.
***


"Fucking CHRIST, Jay!!" Bob bellowed at the top of his lungs, his 
statement directed at the lump on the couch, once recognizable as Jay. 
His voice was so earsplitting.... or maybe it just seemed that way 
thanks to his headache; Jay wasn't sure. He was sure that Bob had 
good reason to be mad at him, though.

"What did we agree?!" Bob demanded. Now, it seemed there was a 
slightly desperate tone to his voice. It sounded a bit sad, but 
mostly just righteously pissed off. When Jay hesitated, trying to 
think of the answer Bob wanted to hear, the larger man bent over and 
took him by the shoulders, shaking him firmly. "*What did we agree?*" 
He forced his words through clenched teeth. "No needles! No hard 
stuff!! What's the matter with you??" His eyes seemed to burn right 
through Jay, he was so angry....

~~~~
Jay had been at a party without Bob for the first time in what seemed 
like forever. Bob had refused to go thanks to a strong dislike for 
the host of said party, but he'd let Jay go alone, making him promise 
to stick to alcohol and pot and to call when he needed to get home. 
But they had drugs there, hard drugs. And Jay, in a drunken haze, 
suddenly reverted back to his teenage addictions. Before his life 
started working out for the better.... before he'd met Bob, he was a 
teen heroin addict. Out on the streets, a runaway. When he couldn't 
steal cash or food he'd whore himself out to any John on the street so 
he could buy heroin to get him through the night. But that was 
before. He'd been off that stuff since then. Yet somehow the urge 
came back. Somehow the very idea of it being available and him being 
alone.... the craving came back. In a moment of weakness, he'd 
succumbed. 

He'd thrown up four times after he'd gotten home, his body screaming 
at him all the while, trembling and blacking out more than once. At 
one point, he was certain he had a nosebleed, but it was impossible 
for him to tell. His body hadn't taken kindly to the sudden intrusion 
after so many years of going straight, and had gone completely bugfuck 
on him. Some kind stranger at the party had called Bob up and 
explained in so many words that Jay could barely breathe, let alone 
call for a ride home.
~~~~

Now it was the next morning and Bob was practically convulsing with 
anger. He still gripped Jay by the shoulders, staring him dead in the 
eye, his anger evident in every feature, in every tiny mannerism. And 
Jay was petrified. His fear overshadowed the effects of the last 
hectic night: the headache, the grogginess, the bruises, and the 
stinging in his throat. He could feel Bob's strong fingers pressing 
so hard that bruises were going to be there later. He'd seen Bob like 
this before. "Are.... are you gonna hit me?" He asked, his voice dry 
and strained. Part of him hated to ask, part of him insisted that Bob 
would never hurt him, but there was still that part of him that held 
the insecurities. It was the part of him that held all his fears.

Bob's expression turned from furious to horrified. "Wha.... *hit* 
you? Jay...." His eyes closed and he released Jay from his iron grip. 
Straightening, he rubbed his temples with his fingertips, using slow 
circles, as if willing the anger away. 

~~~~
It had happened once. Just once in the eight years they'd known each 
other, back when Jay had first moved in and was going cold turkey. 
He'd been seventeen to Bob's twenty-one at the time. Bob still 
cringed whenever he thought about it. He still regretted it to this 
day. Hell, he'd *always* regret it.

Jay had been trying his hardest to kick the habit, but it came with a 
price. In the first few heroin-free months, he was insufferable. If 
it weren't for the fact that he loved the little stoner, Bob would 
have given up and left, or kicked him out. He knew Jay tried to keep 
his temper under control, but when he jonesed, he really jonesed. The 
blond would talk constantly, smoke like a chimney, twitch like he was 
on fire, and insult Bob like there was no tomorrow.

He could get so angry, so quick. And the littlest thing would set him 
off into a rampage of sharp and hurtful words. One day, Bob had been 
reminding Jay why he was doing all this, so that he could live to see 
the age of 20, and Jay had lost it. He went off the deep end, 
dredging up the one thing in Bob's past that could ever get a truly 
strong reaction. 

"Why are you freaking out over this, Bob? I can do what I want! Oh, 
I know what it is, you tubby bitch! You're trying to make up for what 
your dad couldn't do! You want me off the stuff because it would make 
you feel better about not getting your dad off heroin! Well your 
father's dead Bob!"

And that's when Bob lost his famous iron self-control. It didn't 
register that Jay didn't know what he was saying. It didn't occur to 
him that Jay had a fever and was lost in a fit of hazy delirium that 
came from a frenzied need to shoot up. And he'd snapped, releasing 
his anger in one moment of blind fury. 

He'd whirled around and backhanded Jay across the face before he could 
stop himself, the sickening sound resonating throughout the apartment. 
The force of the powerful smack snapped Jay's head back and sent him 
stumbling into a wall. The stunned blond hit the wall and slid slowly 
to the ground, the pain of the hit not hurting so much as the fact 
that Bob had administered it. 

As soon as it had happened, Bob was on his knees next to Jay 
apologizing. Christ, he could have snapped the kid's neck, smacking 
him that hard. "Jesus, Jay, I'm so sorry, listen.... I'm sorry...." 
What had he done? Jay was just a kid, a seventeen-year-old kid.... 
how could he just smack him like that? Bob had always prided himself 
on his level-headedness. His ability to control his temper in 
volatile situations was known all over Jersey.... Yet one mention of 
his dad has stripped him of that.

Jay held up the hand that wasn't fastened on his cheek. His eyes 
never came in contact with Bob's. Instead they stayed fastened on the 
floor, watering up. His voice finally matched his age. He sounded 
like a kid. "No, just.... Just don't talk right now. Just lemme 
alone. Go away.... just.... go for a while." With the lifted hand, 
he feebly pushed on Bob's shoulder.

Much to his regret he realized that Jay would need some time to 
himself, so he let the blond have his space, and time to collect his 
thoughts.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Sighing at the wholly depressing memory, Bob fought away his anger and 
slid next to Jay on the couch. "I'm not going to hit you, Jay. I'll 
never hit you again."

Jay answered Bob's sigh with one of his own and leaned his head 
against Bob's shoulder.

"I just get scared, Jay. I love you too much to lose you to something 
as stupid as heroin. Fuck.... I just don't want to lose you to 
anything." He pulled a cigarette out of his pocket and with a few deft 
movements, it was lit and Bob was inhaling the smoke deep into his 
lungs. "I have this fear. One day, I won't be fast enough, or I 
won't be smart enough to.... to save you from whatever. And you'll be 
gone. I dreamt once.... I dreamt that I held you in my arms, and you 
were dying. There was so much blood, and I couldn't even tell where 
it was coming from. I tried to do something, but my body was frozen. 
And all I could see was you looking at me; pleading.... you were 
scared but you knew I could save you. But I couldn't. I tried. And 
I swear to Christ, I could *feel* the life just *leave* you." A tear 
rolled down his cheek. He noticed out of the corner of his eye that 
Jay was looking up at him, but he continued anyway.

"Yeah, I saw my dad die from this fuckin' heroin bullshit. I loved 
him then almost as much as I love you now. That's why I hit you that 
one time. Because to suggest that someday you might suffer the same 
fate he did.... it makes me crazy." He took a long drag off his 
cigarette.

Jay's hand on his face pulled him out of his heartrending reverie. 
Jay looked visibly shaken by Bob's speech; his hand trembled slightly 
against the soft skin. "I'm sorry, Silent Bob." 

Without so much as a word, he leaned in and touched lips with the 
larger man. The kiss was simple at first, but quickly escalated to 
deep and passionate. Soon Bob's hands were tangled in golden tresses, 
pulling Jay's head closer, deepening the kiss, wanting more. Jay 
threw one leg over his lap, encircling Bob's neck with his arms. Bob 
in turn tightened his grip around Jay's body, capturing him in an 
embrace that spoke volumes. 

Bob hazarded a quick peek to realize that Jay was kissing him with his 
eyes open again. Why did he always do that? Bob first noticed him 
doing it during that brief stint with Justice after her jail time. 
The blond would always keep them open just a little bit when they made 
out, lazily gazing through half lidded eyes. After he and Jay had 
hooked up, he noticed the thinner man doing it all the time. It was a 
little eerie at first, but Bob had since gotten used to it. When Jay 
noticed him peering back, he pulled back for a second, grinning 
somewhat bashfully. "I just like to look at you."

Bob smiled and pulled him back, attacking his mouth with a new 
ferocity, slipping his large hands under the thin t-shirt of his lover 
and running his hands up and down the smooth skin he found there. Jay 
gave a small moan, almost a purr really, of pleasure and reached down 
to start pulling Bob's sweatshirt off. 

Before he could do so, Bob wrapped his arms under Jay's butt, standing 
up at the same time, startling the blond into clinging to him with his 
arms and legs. Jay gasped at the sudden movement and the fear of 
being dropped, but he chuckled low in his throat as Bob walked towards 
his bedroom. "Why you gotta treat me like such a chick? Carrying 
me."

"Cuz you're my bitch." Bob smiled, pushing/dropping him onto the 
mattress. 


tbc....