disclaimer: none of these characters are mine.

There was a time when Davidson had friends.

There'd been quite a lot of them. He was funny, he was on the football team, honestly, why wouldn't he have friends was the real question? He'd never had a girlfriend, but that didn't really matter, he'd made out with almost every girl in the school.

But now he didn't have all of that, and sometimes he'd tell himself that he didn't really miss it, but that'd be a huge fucking lie.

Because god, there was nothing Davidson wouldn't give to be that person again. It'd been a huge fucking lie in itself but it was fun and he didn't have to care about anything.

Who fucking cared if his mother was...he couldn't find a professional sounding term for it. Prostitution wasn't professional work, but honestly, couldn't there be some nice term for it? Every other dirty job had some sugarcoated nice word to call it around kids. But not this.

Davidson didn't know who'd had spilled the secret, but somehow he couldn't avoid it now. Getting beaten up occasionally had gotten to be normal for him. Hell, it just showed how fucked up school was anyways. Moment you've got something you haven't told anyone, it'll just grow and grow and eventually somebody'll tell it and then things will just go downhill from there. He'd learned that the hard way.

So everyday at lunch, he ate on a bench just outside of school. It was cold as fuck, but Davidson had grown accustomed to it after awhile. Both the cold and being alone.

"Mind if I join you out here?"

He looked up. The kid in front of him looked like he hadn't eaten anything for about six years and had light grey bags under his eyes. His pants-which were a startling shade of purple-looked way too big for him and he gave off an overall air of being the type of person that if you pushed them, they'd just lay down and die.

And shit, was the guy colorblind or something? A large purple scarf was wrapped around his neck and his sweater was a bright lime green. "Yeah, sure," Davidson muttered, not really caring that much.

The other boy started unwrapping a jelly sandwich. "A bit of an odd place to eat, don't you think?" A smile played on his slightly feminine features.

Davidson shrugged. "Been eating here for awhile, you know? It's quiet, I guess."

"I like silence quite a lot, don't you?"

"I got used to it." Davidson had to wonder whether the strange boy even knew who he was, and why the fuck he'd chosen to sit out here with him. "Who the hell are you, anyways?"

"Stebbins. I've got a first name but it doesn't matter."

"I'm Davidson, then, I guess. You've probably heard of me." He almost laughed, he sounded like some narcissist celebrity trying to get himself more known.

Stebbins cocked his head sideways, having to blow a bit of blond hair out of his eyes. His hair didn't look like he brushed it a lot. "Why would I have heard of you?"

Davidson blinked in surprise. "Uh...well...you haven't heard..."

Stebbins gave a slightly bitter laugh. "Ah, I see, I'm such an outcast that I've been excluded from the latest gossip as well. Pray tell, why would I have heard of you?"

"Well..." Davidson hesitated a bit. Honestly, he didn't really care whether Stebbins would be completely disgusted by him or not. He'd only known the guy for a bit, after all. "My mom has a sorta...unprofessional...job, if you know what I mean."

It took Stebbins a few minutes to get it, but once he did he didn't seem to be terribly phased. "Oh, I see. Well, disliking someone for that is frankly unfair." He sounded slightly sad, really.

"You think?"

"Yes, I do in fact think so." He scooted closer to Davidson on the bench. "Piss on them if they'd hate you for something as ridiculous as that."

In all honesty, Davidson wasn't even sure how to respond. Stebbins wasn't treating him like his old friends, they weren't joking about anything and Stebbins spoke like a college professor.

"You know, they hate me too."

Davidson was brought out of his internal monologue by Stebbins. "Yeah?"

"Yes. They hate me because I dress strangely and carry around a copy of Alice in Wonderland in my bag like a security object." Stebbins lowered his voice. "But that's not the real reason. Can you keep a secret, Davidson?"

"Sure."

Stebbins leaned in to the point where he was whispering in Davidson's ear. "They hate me because I'm poor as shit and lacking of a father, and somehow I'm happier than they are."

"How do you do that, Stebbins? How do you not have a father and how are you just able to forget about it?"

Stebbins winced, as though remembering a bad memory. "Because my father isn't someone I'd...like to be around. He comes around sometimes, and..." The blond didn't seem to be quite sure what to say, so he rolled up one of his sleeves to show a slowly fading bruise.

Davidson felt a twinge of pity for Stebbins. "Oh...I...I'm sorry. I haven't got a dad either. It's shitty sometimes but I guess I've gotten used to it."

"It's not as bad after awhile," Stebbins said in agreement. "Do you...do the others attack you? It used to happen to me. Now they just rip up my books when I'm not around to see."

"Shit, it happens every couple of days and I still haven't gotten used to it." Davidson couldn't help it, having Stebbins next to him was bringing back the desire for human contact that he'd gotten from his mother. Not even sexual contact, just...touching. Because no one wanted to even be near him and now that, at least momentarily, someone did, he just wanted some sort of tangible evidence.

"Collie Parker ripped all the pages out of my copy of Through the Looking Glass, and then burned the rest of it later."

"I'm not the bookish type, but that's just wrong." Unable to resist the temptation anymore, Davidson wrapped an arm around Stebbins' shoulders. The other boy was so lanky that Davidson could pull him quite close while still letting him have some space for comfort.

"A lot of things are wrong, and yet everyone does them anyways. It's gotten to the point where some horrible things have been done so much that no one even cares about whether they're right or not."

Davidson laughed softly. "You should really major in philosophy. That's a compliment, by the way."

"In that case, thank you."

"But you're right. Some fucked-up things happen and nobody even bats an eye." He sighed and stared off into space. The fact that the other boy even cared just made him want to pour all his repressed emotions out onto Stebbins. "Hey, uh, this is sort of a stupid question, but..."

"I'm listening. Stupid questions are the best kind."

"Could I...uh...kiss you? I just...haven't done it in awhile and I..." Shit, this was coming out wrong. Stebbins was going to think he was some sort of prostitute freak who wanted that sort of thing from everybody.

"If you want to, then yes, by all means go ahead."

"Do you mean that?"

"I don't say things I don't mean, Davidson." So Davidson leaned towards Stebbins and kissed him. Not in a sexual way at all, it was more of a kiss out of mutual need. And somehow it felt better than all the girls he'd kissed because he was drunk and they wanted to say that they'd done it.

"U-uh, thanks, Stebbins."

Stebbins let his head fall against Davidson's shoulder. "You're welcome. Mind if I join you here again tomorrow?"

"Not at all."

sobs