Disclaimer: You know the drill. If I owned them things would be a lot more interesting.

Rooftops

Chapter 2

Hotshot

Vic had noticed that Michael lacked his usual vigor and enthusiasm when he got off the bus. When it was just as bad in the morning he knew there was something going on.

Michael had gotten up late, which Vic had expected. He'd grabbed a granola bar and barely said 'good morning' to Vic before disappearing out of the apartment. He was headed to the gym three blocks away. He and Brian had gone every day over the past few summers, getting into the gym regimen that so many gay men were attracted to.

"Good workout?" he asked when Michael returned. His nephew was still drenched in sweat.

"Yeah," Michael nodded.

"You don't look too tired. You and Brian must be going on a pretty regular basis in Pittsburgh."

Michael shrugged. Brian spent his money on clothes for his job and a gym membership. Michael could barely afford that.

"When we can," he replied.

"Well, that's good. It's a good habit to get into now. What does your mom say about it?"

He was approaching a topic that he knew Michael didn't want to talk about and it showed. He shifted uneasily from foot to foot.

"We can't afford it," he said with a shrug, "but I use my money from work."

"So, in other words, she doesn't know?"

"No, I tell her that I'm going to Brian's."

"Which is probably the same excuse you give her when you and Brian go out and try to sneak into Babylon," Vic said, giving his unspoken support.

Michael finally cracked a smile, "Yeah."

"Go take a shower," Vic told him, glancing at the clock. "I'll go grab us a late lunch from that bistro downtown, and then you and I can talk about what's going on at home."

Michael nodded reluctantly. He knew that it all had to come out sooner or later, so he might as well just tell his uncle about the issues going on at home with his mother.

"Good," Vic nodded, reaching for his jacket, "I'll be back in about half an hour."

As he headed for the door Michael walked in the opposite direction, back toward the guest room.

Once his uncle was gone he sat down on his bed and put his head in his hands. This was going to be a long vacation.

And he knew his uncle just as well as he knew his mother. He might keep his mouth shut for a week or two but by the time he went home Deb would know all about his complaints.

He picked up the phone and dialed the number for Brian's summer job.

"I'll have the final shots up to you in five minutes," Brian's voice answered. He sounded cranky.

Michael sighed, "Hello to you too."

"Hey Mikey," he could almost hear the grin creeping into Brian's voice, "How's the city without me?"

"Not quite as boring as I'd expected."

"Really? Who is he?"

Michael sighed, "Now why do you assume that means I met someone?"

"Spill," Brian insisted.

"It's a long story," Michael replied with a grin, "and not what I was calling about."

"What's up?" Brian sounded distracted, but Michael knew that he was paying attention while he worked on his current project.

"Uncle Vic wants to talk about Mom."

"What about her?"

"He wants me to tell him about all the issues from around the end of school. You know my grades, my future, my personal life."

"I wasn't aware that you had one of those," Brian replied, shuffling papers.

"Yes, thank you so much for the reminder." Michael rolled his eyes. He had all but convinced himself that whatever had happened with Ben the night before had been a mistake, a fluke. "I don't know what to tell him."

"Tell him that your mother needs to learn to keep her nose out of other peoples' business and let you live your own life."

Those were Brian's words, and if he was here with Michael that was exactly what he would say to Vic's face, but Michael could never put his situation with his mother so bluntly, especially not with she and Vic being so close.

"I can't say that."

"Then I don't know what to tell you Mikey. Listen, I've got to get these boards upstairs, but I'll talk to you later."

"Do me a favor?" Michael requested before Brian could just hang up on him.

Brian's was reply was that the dial tone didn't immediately sound in his ear.

"Go check in on her for me, make sure she's not, like, depressed because she's alone."

Brian was quiet for a moment. When he did reply Michael could hear a strange tone creeping into his voice.

"Sure Mikey, I'll go to the diner before I go out tonight."

"Thanks Brian."

This time he was rewarded with a click of the dial-tone.

He hung up Vic's phone and grabbed a set of clean clothes.

-

"Benjamin!" His father's voice echoed up the stairs and down the length of the hall, "Come down here please!"

Ben sighed. Brandon had dropped him off a few hours ago, and he'd slipped by them without so much as a word about his not coming home the night before, or a comment that he reeked of alcohol and cigarettes.

"I'll be down in a minute," he called back.

He began piling the papers on his desk and stuffed them into a folder. This summer he had been working on a portfolio of his best writing work to send out to grad schools, and doing some historical research on literature.

He found his father in the kitchen, nursing his third cup of coffee of the day. He was sitting at the table with the mail in front of him.

"Hey Dad," he greeted, taking a seat as though nothing were wrong.

"I thought we discussed your going out," Mr. Bruckner said, raising an eyebrow at his son, "that you were going to call."

Ben nodded, "I'm sorry about last night. By the time I decided it would be best that I stay it was too late to call."

"Your mother was worried this morning."

"I don't see why the two of you worry so much. You know I'm responsible when it comes to that stuff."

"When it comes to you going out maybe," his father agreed.

He picked up a paper that had been mixed in with the mail, "But this. I thought we had come to an agreement about this."

Ben took the paper from his father. It was his grades; he'd been waiting for them for weeks now. A's mostly, and a high B in one of his upper level classes.

"Ben," he sighed, "We're paying a lot of money to send you to this school. This is ivy league son. I just hate to see you throw your life and our money away on this writing thing. You're a smart kid Ben. You've done so well in your politics and history classes. You could go into law like your uncle Jim. There's a real future in that field."

Ben sighed himself, folding the paper in his hands. He didn't know how to explain to his father that this was all he could see himself doing.

"Dad, I'm not interested in going into law. I think I might want to teach."

"Ben," he held up his hands, stopping him from talking anymore. "Ben, how do you know what you want? You're twenty years old."

"I've got to go," Ben said, standing up.

He couldn't do this right now. He didn't have the energy or the words and evidence to explain this to his father. Now that they knew the talk was going to happen he could spend a few days trying to build up his argument. If he swung his work and social schedules right he could avoid the conversation altogether.

"Benjamin," his father started to stop him.

Ben ignored him, heading toward the front door. "Sorry, I'm supposed to meet a friend this afternoon. If I don't hurry I'm going to be late."

"Benjamin," his father repeated, walking after him.

"Sorry Dad. We'll talk again later." He opened the door to find his mother coming up the front steps with groceries and flashed her a smile as he edged past her. "See you later Mom."

"Be good Ben," she told him, turning back to the house and nearly colliding with her husband. Mr. Bruckner just stared after him for a moment before walking down to the car to help his wife with the remaining groceries.

Where the hell was he supposed to go? It was one of Ben's days off for the week and as far as he knew most of his friends were either working or already getting a head start on their partying. So where could he go to escape from his parents for a little while?

His feet directed him toward Brandon's apartment, though inwardly he knew that Brandon wouldn't be home from work until nearly ten.

Christ, for all the time he spent escaping from his parents there he really should have had a key.

He caught the front door of the apartment building as someone was coming out and made his way up to Brandon's apartment just in case. There was no answer.

Great, the middle of the day and he had nowhere to go. He started climbing the stairs to higher floors. Smoking a cigarette always helped to calm his nerves a little, and made it much easier to figure things out.

As he reached the door to the roof he stopped, his thoughts jumping back to the previous night. Michael. That was someone who would be around.

Even more than that he had kissed Michael last night, and probably freaked the hell out of him. He started down the stairs, not quite sure what he was looking for with Michael but needing to try something to distract himself.

He walked slowly down the hall on the fourth floor, all the way second-guessing himself and questioning why he was doing this.

And then he was there, in front of room 401. Without even really thinking about it he raised his hand and knocked.

-

"Can we just stop talking about this?" Michael pleaded. He leaned his elbows on the table and put his head in his hands. He really couldn't sit here and talk about his mother all day.

"Michael, it's okay," Vic said, "we both know your mother can be a little much but you can't just let her walk all over you. You should call and her and talk to her this afternoon. But you had better do it soon. She's working the night shift."

"I don't want to talk to her," Michael said firmly.

"You need to-" Vic was interrupted by a knock at the door. He sighed and stood, pointing a finger at Michael, "Don't you go anywhere."

Vic opened the door to see a young blond man on the other side. He was familiar, but he didn't live in the building, and he was a bit too young for Vic to have picked up out at a club but…

"Hi, uhh…" he shifted his feet slightly, "Maybe I have the wrong apartment. I'm looking for Michael."

That was it, the guy he'd seen in the hall the night before.

"And you are?" he asked

"Ben?" Michael's voice echoed from the table.

Ben looked past the man in front of him to find Michael sitting at a kitchen table. His face was flushed and he looked confused at seeing Ben again. He probably hadn't expected it and to be honest Ben hadn't really expected to see him again either.

Under that, he noted, Michael looked upset over something.

"Hey Michael," he smiled pretending not to notice Michael's underlying look.

Michael didn't move so he continued on.

"And you must be his Uncle Vic. It's good to meet you. Michael told me all about you last night."

"Did he?" Vic raised an eyebrow, "Well, it's nice to meet you too Ben."

Ben nodded, "Did you forget that we had plans Michael?" he asked. Michael just looked like he needed to get out of this apartment, the same feeling Ben had felt maybe half an hour earlier when he'd left his own house.

He gave Michael a particularly meaningful look as Vic glanced back at him.

"Shit, yeah, I'm sorry. You're right I did." Michael stood up from the table. He headed toward the door, edging past his uncle. "I'll be back later Uncle Vic."

"When?"

Michael looked at Ben.

Don't worry," Ben grinned like only college-age boys could, "I'll have him home before it's late enough to cause any trouble."

Before Vic could speak again he was off, dragging Michael after him down the hall. Although he was pretty sure he'd been duped Vic stepped back and shut the door. That Michael would a have a friend in New York was a great step away from relying solely on one Brian A. Kinney. Vic wasn't going to mess with that, though in a few days he was going to call his sister about her son.

-

"So, where are we going exactly?" Michael finally asked as they exited the building. The descent of the stairs had been too full of thoughts about seeing Ben again that he hadn't thought to ask why exactly Ben was stealing him out of his uncle's care.

"I have no idea," Ben replied, "But you looked like you needed to get out of there so I thought it might be a good idea to get away from your uncle before we figured that out."

"Umm… yeah," Michael agreed, shoving his hands into his pockets, "Thanks for that."

"Don't mention it."

They walked for a moment in silence. Michael wanted to ask Ben about the night before, about the kiss, but if Ben wasn't going to bring it up he didn't want to either.

"What about you?"

"Huh?"

"Well, we didn't actually make plans," Michael said, "At least I don't remember that, so what are you doing here."

Ben grinned; Michael wasn't the sort of person who couldn't simply just let things go.

"Same as you I think," he said, staring down at his hands as he rubbed them together. "Started up the same old argument with my dad and just needed to get out of the house because I didn't know what to say to him. So I started walking, ended up here, even though Brandon's at work so I stopped by to see what you were up to."

"Yeah, that sounds about right," Michael agreed. It hadn't been an argument with Vic but it was the same old shit.

"What do you do for fun back home, wherever that is, I don't think you said?"

"Pittsburgh," Michael replied, "I don't know. I usually just hang out with my friend Brian. We go to the gym, sneak out to go clubbing at night. Brian's just good at getting into and out of trouble."

That's pretty much what we do around here," Ben said with a grin. He didn't know what the two of them could do on the middle of the day.

Michael nodded. He knew his way around pretty well, but only the placed Vic and Brian had picked were all that familiar to him. That didn't leave many options for him.

"There's a park," Ben said, "a little less than half a mile away. We could just go sit or walk around for a few hours. To be perfectly honest there's nothing much to do until after dark."

"Yeah, it's like that at home too."

"Want to go?"

"Yeah, I guess," Michael agreed.

When they reached the park Ben directed them to a shady spot under some trees. He sat down in the grass and lit a cigarette, taking a drag and offering it to Michael.

Michael shook his head, glancing around in silence. This place was nice, and it was so startlingly different from the parts of the city that his uncle usually steered him toward.

"Ben, what's it like to grow up in the city?"

"Kind of boring actually," Ben said. He knew where Michael's question was coming from, "You learn at an early age never to let anything phase you, and you know your way around before you're old enough to drive, not that there's a need to drive."

"I guess not," Michael agreed.

Ben looked over at Michael. The look in his eyes was kind of far away. He was thinking about something, thinking hard. He took another drag off his cigarette and offered it again. This time Michael accepted.

"It's funny how much the city seems to shrink as you grow up," he continued.

This seemed to catch Michael's attention.

"Yeah, how's that?"

Ben smiled. There was a way to distract Michael from focusing on whatever had made him so upset at his uncle, and that was to keep talking.

So that's what he did. He recounted his childhood in New York, and how strange it had been to settle in at school where it was so quiet and so much less crowded. He let Michael talk about Pittsburgh, noting that almost all of his stories started with 'Brian and I.' Before they knew it the sun was going down.

Neither of them had made any move to get up and head back toward Vic's apartment, but silence settled between the two of them. Undoubtedly there were more stories and more conversations to be had, but both of them were thinking.

Ben's thoughts were finally off of his father and their conversation earlier in the afternoon. He was thinking about Michael, who was three years his junior and yet had all of these stories and experiences that mirrored Ben's own. He glanced to his side to find Michael looking at him, the dark brown eyes flicking immediately away as he was caught.

"What's on your mind?"

Why'd you kiss me least night was what Michael wanted to ask but instead spilled out, "Why'd you track me down today?"

Ben shrugged, "Like I said before, you're the only person I could think of who wasn't probably at work, and you're pretty cool to hang out with Michael. Plus, you said Brian's staying in Pittsburgh this summer so I figured you could probably use a friend."

That last part was a little bit of a letdown. Michael shrugged, "I guess, but you might want to be careful."

"Why's that?"

"People will start making fun of you if they hear you're hanging out with a fag."

Ben could tell from the venom in Michael's voice that he didn't have it easy back home. He hadn't told Michael about himself yet and Michael hadn't brought up the night before so he figured Michael still assumed that he was a straight boy who had just been slightly intoxicated.

"I don't really care what people say. I've known the people around here for most of my life; they've got plenty of other ways to get under my skin."

Michael nodded.

"So this Brian guy…" Ben approached the question carefully, "You talk about him a lot. Is he your boyfriend or something?"

Michael smiled a little, "He'd kill us both if he heard you say that. No, he's just been my best friend as long as I can remember. I mean, we love each other sure, but nothing's ever happened and nothing ever will. He knows that and so do I."

He looked over at Ben and continued, "Why?"

"Dunno," Ben said with a shrug, "Well, since he's not here, what do you say you come with me to a party on Friday. Maybe you'll make some new friends for the summer."

"Okay," Michael nodded, "It'll be my first hetero social in a while but I'm sure I can stomach it."

That didn't sound anything like what Michael had said all afternoon. Ben figured someone had to have put those words in his mouth but he laughed and shook his head all the same.

"Come on," he said, standing up, "We'd better get you home before your uncle calls the cops to send out a search party."

He reached down a hand to help Michael up. Michael took hold of it, trying to ignore the tingle that shot up his arm as he pulled himself to his feet.

-

"So is this going to become a regular occurrence?" Vic asked as Michael closed the door behind him.

"What do you mean?" Michael asked.

"You avoiding your problems by sneaking out of here with Ben."

"It wasn't sneaking," Michael kicked off his shoes, looking at them as he spoke.

"I called your mother."

"I figured you would."

"You should talk to her. I'll give you a week or so to sort things out but you need to get this fixed."

"You've lived with her," Michael retorted, collapsing onto the couch, "How the hell do you tell my mother to butt out."

Vic took a seat on the arm of the couch looking down at his nephew. His own mother had been like Deb but she was certainly more protective of Michael. This wasn't going to be easy for him or her.

"So what about this Ben?" he changed the topic of conversation, raising an eyebrow, "Something I should know?"

"No," Michael shook his head, "Nothing's going on, he's straight."

"But you're going to spend time with him?"

Michael nodded, "He invited me to a party downstairs on Friday?"

Then he turned on his teenage sarcasm, "Can I go Uncle Vic? There won't be drinking or drugs or sex, I swear."

"I didn't believe that the first summer you and Brian came up here. I'm certainly not going to start now." Vic told him, "Just, don't cause too much trouble."

A/N: You know, it's funny when people add stuff to alerts, because they very rarely give feedback for it. Most of my feedback is on lj now anyway, but I'd love to hear something. Working to get a chapter or two of Call Me Hunter up before I hop back on this, but if I get stuck the next chapter is pretty much done.

Until next time,

Hotshot