A/N: I love Richard. -giggles- Also, I have the nastiest porn-bug bite. So excuse all the sex that'll be coming your way. I'd explain it to you, but you'd all straight judge me. For real. This story is disconnected from my other Ben-shots. Which are being archived in my writing journal as the "Anthuriums Found" series. This is the beginning of another Ben-centric exploration series that has more stories from other POV's called "Sweet Breads." More details on my profile and my writing journal!!

Summary: He hadn't meant to see them, but it would haunt him for the rest of his life.

If I Had Known Not To Look

He didn't mean to see them. Wandering near the DHARMA barracks was not something he did, but he was sure he'd find Benjamin there. Waiting, maybe. He sat by the fence a few times a week, waiting for him. They would talk. Ben was young and nervous. He worried about the future. About his father. About what had happened to him five years ago. He was twelve. Now he was seventeen and becoming a man. It's been a long time since Richard saw a boy become a man. Even longer since he had a hand in it.

Ben's innocence: the first of many sacrifices the wide-eyed boy would have to give the island.

But maybe...just maybe he had managed to hold onto some of it.

He knew her name was Annie. Knew that they were young and in love and that she was the most important person to Ben. He saw the look in his eyes when he talked about her. She was his light. His everything. Ben never had to say it, but Richard knew. He always knew.

Had he known everything though, he would have known not to look toward the trees just inside the sonic fence. He would have known not the peer into those shadows from his safety spot in the woods. He would have known that Ben and Annie would be fumbling nervously with buttons and whispering hoarsely to one another. He would have known that if he listened, he'd have heard her moan his name quietly. Heard her sharp cry as he entered her for the first time. Heard Ben's shaky breath and soft whimpers.

He didn't mean to, but he had seen them. Seen Ben weak. Seen the girl try and possess him. Seen him give in. It all happened in a few moments. And for one of the first times in a long time, he was embarrassed. Quietly, he slipped away from them. He had trespassed and could never do so again. He would give Ben this night. God knew he deserved it. And as he walked in the light of the moon, the moon that had always watched over first-time lovers he felt, he remembered his own first. And a warm smile crossed over his lips.

It had been lovely.

She was smooth and dark. Rich in voice and body. They were nineteen and knew nothing. But instinct was strong enough to know that she wanted him to touch her. To kiss her and probe her mouth with his tongue. To explore her body with his hands and palms and mouth. She urged him on with her hips and those little noises. And when it came time, she gasped and held him tight, tears falling at the feeling of him and then relaxing.

In the woods, he could not get the sound and sight of two teenagers, younger than he had been in their position, making love in the secret of the dark and the trees. He could still feel red from embarrassment. And he would always blush when Ben mentioned her name, every time after that.

Jacob noticed his distraction, saw his eyes dart here and there with memories. "Women are complex creatures," he mused. Richard nodded. "How long has it been?"

"Too long," the dark man replied, knowing how to play these words games with the man he'd served for decades. "Too long to do anything about it."

"You should travel off island more."

"And pick up women? Don't be tasteless, Jacob." The other man shrugged.

"I see little harm in it." Richard shook his head and briefly remember the children under the trees. "What are you thinking about?"

"About how children will always be children, no matter what they do."

"Benjamin Linus is no longer a child," Jacob noted.

"Innocence has little to do with that." And he thought of Annie. "He still has that connection. He will always have that connection."

.

It was five years later that they stood over her body in the rain and Richard remembered that day. Ben's hands ghosted over her body, his mouth working, but no words coming out. Richard saw two children exploring one another under the trees. And her blood was on his shirt. The gun Ben had shot her killer with rested in Richard's palm. He worked forcefully to spin a lie, but it came out like cotton on his tongue and he couldn't speak. Ben mad a noise that frightened him. The young man shivered and then stood, the pain erased from his face. And that was when Richard knew: the last of Benjamin Linus' innocence was gone. Sucked dry.

He turned to Richard and spun a lie like silk about what had happened. They'd been walking on the edge of the fence when a DHARMA security guard was overcome by heat and began acting delirious near them. He shot at them both, injuring Ben and killing Annie. Ben wrestled the gun from him, but the other man was shot and killed.

"But you've haven't been shot," Richard said.

"I know."

In the years from now, Richard would see the scars on Ben's shoulder and arm and remember the day he shot him. Remember him fall to the ground from the pain, but then pick himself up and carry Annie home in the downpour that had started moments after she had whispered, "I love you," and Richard had tried to not to remember the night he heard her say those words with such feeling beneath the trees.

It is five years later when he follows Jacob's advice. Finds a woman in a bar. A beautiful lonely woman who does not tell him her name for a long time. She never even asks for his. By midnight, he has her in his hotel bed, stripping her clothes off and biting, licking, kissing. She writhes and moans and tries to take control, but he is forceful. She does not when. He pulls at her with his hands and dry, dry palms. Forces himself inside her. Is harsh and angry almost. He has forgotten her whispered name. He will never tell her his. In the morning, he sends her on her way, wondering when he became like this. When sex made him a monster. When he forgot how to make love.

"It wasn't supposed to be like that," Jacob admonished.

"It wasn't supposed to happen at all."

"I meant for you to love again."

"There was no love." Richard takes his leave. No, there was no love. Just sweat and sex and the worry that he would never get to touch another human being this way again.

He thinks briefly about Ben and Annie, under the trees, exploring one another. And he wants to cry for reasons he can't really explain. Because Ben is alone and angry. Because he himself is alone and angry. Perhaps in that way they can lead. They can move forward.

Her name is Alex. And she is small and fragile in Ben's shaking hands. He has longed for human contact for so long, Richard knows that this child may be the last thing to save him. Save him from the bitterness that grows in his heart every day. Ben is a bitter and lonely man.

"She's just a child," he murmurs.

"She is," Richard says, sitting next to him. "It's time for you to go home now, Benjamin." The young man nods. "I'll take care of her."

"I know you will."

Richard holds the squirming bundle in his hands and watches Ben's sad eyes move away. Watches his retreating form.

He looks down at the little girl in his arms. Ben has taken her mother. She will live a lie.

But the important thing is that she will live.