Disclaimers: They belong to Alliance, and while I can do some impressions, large corporate entity isn't one of them.

Spoilers: None, really. Vague references to Eclipse, Strange Bedfellows, Ladies' Man.

Summary: Fraser does some thinking.

Ratings Note: R for implied m/m interaction.

Author's Note: This started as an extremely short apology snippet, but Max wrote such a nice note about it that I decided to see where it would go.

Acknowledgments: To Rae for fine audiencing.

Feedback: Loved and appreciated at Daddy793@aol.com.

*

The Ray who lives in Benton Fraser's mind is a portrait of motion, and only as clear as such. No painter -- however talented -- can truly capture the phenomenon of movement, and Fraser fears his mind is just as limited. There is only a flash of bare midriff here, the shine of sunlight on teeth there. The essence of desire is available to him -- but only through the most blurred of glyphs.

It is a hurtful thing, but a punishment dearly loved. And eagerly returned to.

Some days Fraser wishes he could find some logical, practical reason to get his own apartment, if only to see if this Ray would pick him up every morning --

No, he cannot allow himself that lie. Whenever he thinks of having his own apartment he pictures nothing but a space containing Ray and whatever Ray is touching at a given moment. A lean defines part of a wall, impatient feet tap out the floor.

Square, beautiful hands, smaller than his own, grip the sides of a window frame as Fraser holds him.

Ray's body is lean, spare. The hardness of it is always a surprise, though perhaps not as much as it was on his first Ray. There was an elegance to Ray Vecchio that is blunted on Ray Kowalski, an ambiguity of form that is now conspicuously absent.

Ray, his new Ray, is small and very sparsely furred, but emphatically male just the same. Fraser wants to know what that feels like, and while his imagination continues to serve him it is no longer strong enough. His mind can't quite provide the images and sensations of a Ray in motion over Fraser's body.

His fantasies feature a Ray that smiles, but does not move. It's wrong, it's almost an obscenity, but it's one that Fraser cannot help but crave. In his fantasies he always winds up covering the still form with his own and taking his pleasure.

A brief, businesslike sort that leaves his body cold with sweat and his mind...

The showers clear most of the sticky haze away but never all, and sometimes he feels the expanding layers of it on his skin. An itching, dark layer that is slowly obscuring him from the rest of the world, leaving him needful.

It is at times like these when his father feels most like a delusion, for he never comes when his thoughts are here. Surely he'd have something to say about the slow ruin of his son?

No, right now Fraser knows the only solutions are the ones he provides for himself. There is no solution here; therefore there is nothing to be dressed in his father's clothes and trotted out before his conscious mind.

The trick works and the man himself appears, scowling, in the closet door Fraser has purposefully left open.

"You would disgust yourself if you would just let yourself *see*."

The rough, aged voice has just the right edge of indignant surety -- he can almost hear his father thinking 'my son is a fool, but maybe if I beat him across the head a few times he'll get it.'

"I have you for such vision, Dad."

"You know, other children don't take their dead parents for granted."

"I'm not a child."

Silence, and silence, and when Fraser finally looks up again there is nothing there but his clothing. A shorter, more frustrating visit than usual. It's disturbing to think the man could grow even more terse after death...

Though he smiles a little at the image of his father eventually showing up just to glare meaningfully and disappear again... it would certainly make for fewer embarrassing moments with Ray --

Fraser winces. He can't avoid thoughts of the man at all tonight.

//He needs me.//

Something squeezes him inside at the thought, tugs him to sudden useless hardness. Welter of images, fast and vivid: Ray worn and strangely calm on top of a coffin, Ray weeping beside him, Ray bristling with unspent energy, smelling of Chanel and arousal and Fraser slips his hand into his boxers and the sudden movement is perfect, just perfect.

For a heartbeat it was Ray's motion, too fast, too unpredictable to be anything else. Ray's hand, Ray's body close enough to touch for brief shocking moments of intimacy before he'd try to get away...

When he can, Fraser squeezes himself roughly and pulls his hand back. So far, he has managed to avoid slaking himself with Ray's pain and his own greed.

It used to be... easier.

He grits his teeth and listens for Diefenbaker's breathing. Steady, even. Sleeping. He has noticed no difference in Fraser, or is perhaps merely polite enough not to mention it.

Fraser stares up into the darkness and tries not to corrupt his memories any further. It will be a long wait until morning.


End.

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