don't eat the dove

When it came to what his punishment would be, the judge said he would be serving six months in a state prison. Benson, at his public defender's behest (because, like hell you had money for a lawyer, or even knew where to find a lawyer), had confessed to it, confessed his motives, owned up to it. Six months was the maximum sentence for battery, and, as you sat in the courtroom and listened to the sentence be handed down, you felt sick to your stomach. You weren't certain that you weren't going to vomit in that hot courtroom. Six months. A short time in the grand scheme of things, but it made you feel weak.

You visited him once. The prison he was being kept in was about an hour out of town, a straight shot down the interstate, but it turned into an all-day affair, by the time the security checks and signing forms and waivers and all that bullshit was said and done. You had done your makeup to look nice for him, to give him something he'd like to see, and he had liked it. He had smiled all tired at you, and it broke your heart. "It's not so bad," he shrugged, cradling the black plastic telephone to his cheek. "I get three meals a day, get a shower once a day… Don't have to deal with anyone from back home, y'know? I promise I'm not doing too bad. Just… The hardest part is that I sleep like shit now. I got so used to waking up with your hair in my face, or your cold-ass hands on my back to warm up… Even just the smell of the laundry soap for the bedsheets, I took it for granted… I took everything for granted…" He frowned, and you had too, and he cracked his neck, jerking his head in a circle to make it pop. "How're you? Anything fun or special happening?"

You clutched the phone so hard you felt like you could feel the plastic shifting. "Well, um, I lost my job," you mumbled, and you watched Benson, on the other side of the glass, deflate. "Yeah, um, bar manager doesn't really enjoy when one of their bartender's boyfriends beats up a patron. He fired me, like, the day after you got arrested. B-But I found a new job! Some sorta desk job at some real estate office. It's pretty boring, but, umm… Y'know. Better than nothing."

"Jesus Christ," Benson mumbled. "Sweetheart, I'm sorry—"

"It's fine—"

"Fuck, no, it's not," Benson snapped, his brows furrowed hard enough to make wrinkles on his forehead jump out. "It's not fine, none of this is fine. I made one bad fuckin' decision, and now it's fucked up your life too. You should be mad at me. You should want to never see me again, you should—"

"Don't tell me what I should and shouldn't be doing," you told him. "Look, I'm not, like… We both know you did something bad. I'm never going to defend you for it because that's insane, but I love you, and I'm going to stand by you for all of this. I just… I am mad at you. I am pissed at you every single day, leaving me all alone like this, for such a stupid, idiotic reason; some nights, I get so angry that I…" You trailed off, clenching your fist and digging your nails into your palm to keep your confession at bay: Some nights, I get so angry that I think about breaking up with you. "Even if I don't show it, I am mad at you, but I want to see you because I love you. As much as I'm mad at you, I'm also that fucking in love with you. Okay?"

Benson had nodded and chewed on his bottom lip. Then, as quiet as a mouse, almost like he was afraid of anyone hearing him say it, he whispered, "I love you too."

After that, you stuck to writing him letters. You couldn't see him. You couldn't afford to drag yourself that low. They were good letters, ones that would take you all day to craft and write, and he always responded in kind, but it was obvious that, after your visit, something had shifted. You wondered if he thought you would be one of those girls who fawned all over the criminal boyfriend and said that he had never done anything wrong, but that didn't make sense; Benson knew the type of woman you were and, even if it was a foolhardy and far-fetched idea for him, you wondered if him thinking that you considered him infallible had been a saving grace for him.

Then, one day, the first truly cold day of the year, about halfway through his sentence, something else shifted entirely. You woke up with an uneasy feeling in your gut, like you somehow knew that there was an impending cloud over the entire day. It felt silly to even speak it, but you almost felt like you were being constantly watched in the small ramshackle house that had fallen into your hands after Benson had left. But that was impossible— you always kept the curtains drawn, and the other people on your street weren't the snooping type. Despite that, the entire morning felt rocky and wrong. You almost expected to turn around and see Benson in the doorway, all big-shouldered with his Kubrick lecture-face that you missed so bad.

You needed to get out of the house. That was the only thing that would fix you, you decided. As you dressed and showered, you tried to pinpoint exactly what was giving you such pause about everything, and you landed on the fact that, with the chill in the air, you missed his big arms around you, his hot chest against your back as he snuggled you in bed. In the heat of the summer, you had hated it, and sometimes pushed him away when he would cling to you with sweaty, sticky skin, but now, the absence of your living heater made you want to cry. God, you missed him badly.

But, as soon as you stepped out of the house, bound for God-knows-where, you realized the exact reason the day felt weird: you were, in fact, being watched. Laying on the brown coir welcome mat in front of the door was a collection of cherry suckers, three in total. Unfortunately for you, you didn't notice them in time, and the heel of your sneaker crushed one before you could try to reposition your weight to land differently. Candy. Who the fuck would leave candy on your doorstep? It was gonna attract ants, or bugs, or—

Your heart stopped. Cherry suckers. The memory felt hazy, from months and months ago, leaving a lounge in town to go home and stealing a lollipop from a little dish they had at the stand in the front where they checked memberships cards. You had sucked on it for most of the car ride home, until Burgers Burgers Burgers. Until Benson. Benson was the only person who knew about the cherry-flavored suckers. Unless Chris had overheard that conversation? But it seemed unlikely Chris would try to fuck with you like this, and, honestly, he was probably so absorbed in his phone at that moment that he never even knew you and Benson had been sharing the candy in the first place.

You instantly lifted your gaze upwards, to the street. Whoever had done this surely had a reason for it, so they would want to stay and see a reaction, right? But who the fuck would have done it? It sent a shiver down your spine. Nobody else knew about this in-joke except for Benson, but Benson did not place them there… Right? You frowned instantly; impossible. He was in jail, and you were pretty sure you would know if he had escaped somehow. Feels like someone would have told you. That sounded like something that happened in movies, a convict escaping jail just to go visit his sweetheart. Maybe he had put someone up to it?

But Benson didn't really know anyone else— no other friends, no family that he was close to. Even his own mother hadn't visited him in jail; hell, she hadn't even bothered to show up to his court hearings. You had only met her once as well, when Benson was moving out of her house and into the one you were currently in front of. She had seemed all but disinterested in you, only speaking to you when Benson had disappeared into the back and asking if you had any cigarettes she could bum. But otherwise, her son's girlfriend didn't seem to mean all that much to her— and by extension, from what Benson had told you about his upbringing, it seemed her son himself didn't mean all that much to her.

The street was empty. The usual cars were parked on the road in front of their houses, nobody even outside for you to consider a suspect. Your mouth was dry, and you forced a swallow down as you picked up the two remaining suckers. The one you had accidentally crushed had busted and torn the paper wrapping around it, leaving little shards of hard, red sugar on the welcome mat, and you sighed. "What the fuck…" you mumbled, and, as you stood up to go back inside, you looked at the mess of wrapper and candy in your palm.

And, shit, were you glad you actually looked at it, because you found something on the inside. It was hard to make it out entirely with the tears in the paper, but you were pretty easily able to figure out that someone, whoever had left them for you, had written MIDNITE in big, block letters. You would recognize Benson's handwriting anywhere. It was written in thick, red permanent marker, like the marker you had written your address on Benson's hand with that night. That certainly was not something anyone else would know.

"Benny?" you called out to the street. Silence met you, and, as you put two and two together, you quickly tugged the wrappers off the other two. They were loose, obviously having been unwrapped and then done back up as tightly as possible— the first one had BBB written in the same marker on the inside, and the second had a big heart drawn on it, colored in in a zig-zag pattern. Somehow, however he was managing it, Benson was beckoning you to his old job, where you had fallen in love with him. At midnight. Would he be there? Surely so. You called his name again, hoping to see any evidence that he was still there— or whoever he had set up to do it— but, again, you got no response.

So, you silently went back inside, and you began to fret. Pacing around, jumping at any noise outside, biting your fingernails down to the stinging quick. Should you go? Benny would be there. Or maybe someone who had managed to get a message from him to pass onto you that his letters weren't enough to convey. Either way, you were still hesitant to jump feet-first into going. What if Benson did show up? He would be a felon now, escaping from prison and going on the lam. You didn't know if you wanted to support that or not. But it was Benson, your Benny-bunny. You would probably follow him to the ends of the earth if he so asked. You didn't know if you liked that about yourself, but, you had to consider, you didn't even know what he wanted from you, or if it even was him that was doing it. Your mind kept circling around to it being a big prank, or that it wasn't going to be Benson, but, long after night had fallen, as the clock on the microwave was blinking twenty minutes until midnight, you snatched up your car keys and left the house.

The route to the burger joint was short and familiar. The streetlights were buzzy and blinking in and out, and the midnight breeze sent a chill down your spine. You smoked as you drove, something you rarely did— you hated the sour taste they left in your mouth, and, after Benson was sent away, the smell of it made your heart hurt— but your hands were shaking as you drove the beat-up beige piece of shit. You needed to calm down. You were certain you were working yourself up over what would amount to be nothing.

You wrinkled your nose when you stepped into the place. For as long as Benson had worked there, you had only ever been inside twice: the first night, and then another night a few weeks later to bring Benson a working lighter during his break. It smelled like fry oil, the air damp with the sticky scent of it. You felt physically heavier under the yellow fluorescents, and you drew your sweater tighter around you. The bell chimed as you entered, and the little blond head at the register peeked over the counter. You had met that guy before. You recognized him. The little pipe cleaner come to life that had asked if you were Benson's girlfriend. Bradley? What the fuck was that dude's name?

"Oh," he chirped as you approached the register. His voice was heavy, though, obviously confused at your presence. Shit, you were confused at your own presence, so you didn't blame him one bit. "Um, hey."

"Hi," you said softly. Your eyes floated down to his name tag, proudly declaring Bradley, but you frowned. "Your name isn't Bradley, right? I remember it's something else…"

"Randy," he nodded.

"Right, right," you mumbled. "Umm… You remember me?"

Randy nodded again. "You're Benson's…" he started and trailed off. "I don't know what you call it. Not his girlfriend, but—"

"Oh, no, I am," you said. "Um, back when I met you, I wasn't his girlfriend, but, um… Things changed."

"Oh," Randy said shortly. "Uh-huh. Sure… Were you dating back when he jumped Chris?"

You swallowed thickly. "Yeah," you whispered. You averted your eyes from his, down to the plastic countertop, cracked with age and stained with uncountable years of soda spills. You played at it with what little fingernail you hadn't chewed off earlier, and you added, "He's been in jail for the past few months."

"I know," Randy said. "We've been writing each other."

Your head shot up. "What?" you asked, your eyebrows furrowing. "You've been writing him? Like, letters?"

"I mean, not, like, all the time," Randy shrugged. "Just one or two. Mostly, he just was asking me if I knew how you were doing. He said he didn't believe you when you wrote that you were doing okay, and just wanted to see if you were lying or not."

"And?" you gulped. "What did you say?"

"I didn't know," Randy replied. "This is our… What? Second time ever speaking to each other? I didn't know how you were doing or what you were up to, I hadn't seen you in months. After I told him that, he stopped sending me stuff…"

You knew better than to assume that was the end of it. Randy's energy had changed, his fingers tapping against the side of the register and his eyes darting around everywhere to avoid yours. He was lying; or, at least, not telling the whole truth. "Randy," you said slowly. "Benson sent you a letter. Recently. Didn't he?"

Randy sighed, his shoulders heaving, and he leaned forward to mess with the roll of receipt paper. Like the night you met him. He was nervous. "I don't know what you're talking about," he said simply.

"Yes, you do," you pressed. "Benson sent you a letter within the past few days. He told you to do something for him, didn't he? Did you plant those suckers at my door?"

"The what?" Randy asked, his own face screwing up in confusion. "That wasn't me."

"Randy—"

"I promise I'm telling the truth," Randy said, his eyes going all big now. "He asked me to do some stuff for him, but suckers or whatever wasn't part of it."

"What sorta stuff?" you asked, and you nearly jumped out of your skin when Randy's wristwatch started to beep, tinny and loud and annoying. He instantly went to silence it, and, as his hand pulled away, you saw, clear as day, the numbers displayed: 12:00. Midnight. "Randy, is Benson here?"

"No," Randy said. "He's in prison. Remember?"

"Fuck, don't get cute with me," you winced, leaning forward on the countertop. "Randy, if my boyfriend is here, I need you to tell me, okay? I-I need to know if he's here. I just need you to tell me, because if…" You trailed off, feeling your voice going weak, and, when you continued, your voice cracked and wobbled. "If my Benny is here, if he escaped prison and is now a fugitive and is on the run, that's the sorta shit I need to know. Okay? So just fucking tell me—"

"I don't know," Randy said firmly. "I haven't seen Benson in months. The only communication I've had with him was the letters. If he's here right now, I have no idea. Alright?"

"What did Benson ask you to do?" you tried next. "You said he asked you to do stuff for him, like what?"

Randy scratched at the back of his head, right where his hat ended and his hairline began. "Get some clothes," he started softly. "Some cigarettes. Stuff like that."

"Oh, fuck," you whimpered. Benson wasn't there, but he certainly was coming. That confirmed it. Benson was coming to collect you and take you on the run with him. You felt stupid for not seeing it before now. Your sweet boy was coming for you.

The door chime buzzed, and your breath caught in your throat. Your heart was racing so hard that you felt like it would jump right through your ribs to the floor. You clasped your wrists in opposite hands to keep from shaking too violently, but nothing could have prepared you for the way your knees would go weak when your eyes finally landed on him.

Considering the entire situation, Benson looked completely fucking normal. That might have thrown you more than if he looked super fucked up, covered in blood or obviously haggard or anything. But no— his hair was different than you remembered it, the ends curling around his ears and jaw, longer in the back than you knew he liked. He looked well-groomed, recently showered, his face shiny and fresh. He looked better than okay, better than 'surviving'; he looked good.

His eyes surveyed the room for a single second before landing on you, and his intense gaze made your knees actually buckle, and you fell sideways into the countertop. There was something in his eyes that made you feel small and scared, and you moved back as he tried to step forward. Even across the dining room, you felt trapped by his presence.

"You need to get outta here," you said with a weak voice. "You can't be seen here. I-I can't be seen with you—"

"Easy," Benson rumbled out, raising his hands in a 'settle down' type movement. "Nobody's seen us."

"Randy—!"

"— Did what I asked him to," Benson interrupted you. Then, his searing gaze flicked over to the man standing across the counter from you. "You did do what I asked you to, right?"

Randy nodded meekly, and he moved around the counter to go into the back room. In a flash, he was skittering back in with a battered backpack, and he tossed it towards Benson, who caught it with a deft hand.

"And the cameras are off?" Benson added. He nearly ripped the zipper off the bag in his haste to open it, and he found a crushed carton of cigarettes with the ease of a truffle pig.

Randy cleared his throat. "Yeah," he nodded. "Turned them off about twenty minutes ago… Fooled with it to make it look like a power outage."

"Good job," Benson said. He shredded the thin plastic wrapping off the cigarettes, and he gummed one of the paper sticks before replacing the box in the back, then slinging the bag on his shoulder. Then, he clicked his fingers at you, and beckoned you forward with a two-finger wave. "C'mon, doll, we gotta get going now."

"Going?" you repeated. "Going where?"

Benson shrugged. "Houston," he said. "Charleston. Fuck, we could go to fuckin' Omaha, who knows? We'll find a place together."

"How did you even…" you started, and you were forced to stop. You couldn't even force the words out of your mouth. It felt like they got caught on your teeth and your body wouldn't physically let you say it: How did you even escape prison? "I'm not going with you. I can't."

"Why not?" Benson asked. He raised his eyebrows at you, a genuine question, and he rolled the cigarette to the other corner of his mouth. "I thought you'd be happy to see me."

"Don't do that," you whimpered, your lip wobbling. "Don't twist this into that. I am happy, Benny, I—"

"Then what's the problem?" Benson chuffed out a laugh. "I know you hate this fucking place— Bumfuck, Louisiana, not New Orleans but so close we might as well be— I'm giving you a chance to leave with no strings attached and start all over. Start over with me. Don't you want that? I know you do."

Your chest heaved as you tried to calm down. You did want that. You wanted that badly. All you had ever really wanted, ever since meeting Benson, was to have a life with him. You couldn't pretend for even a second that your immediate reaction was to agree with him. But there were too many complications. "Okay, what about when the police start looking for us?" you asked. "You escaped prison, and I just so happen to go missing the same day. They're gonna come looking for both of us, and want to punish both of us. That's a ridiculous thing for you to ask me to do, to become a fugitive with you. A-And all our shit at the house, you wanna just leave all that behind? I'm surprised the police hadn't come to see me yet, I don't think they're that far behind you. You can't seriously be asking me to join you in whatever fucking little life of crime you've got now."

"I am," Benson huffed. "Baby, I…" He clenched his hands into fists at his side, and he breathed shakily as he started to mumble out, "I thought I was a lost cause before you. I wasn't good for nothing, I had nobody in my life, I was just sorta… Floating around, I guess. Waiting for some big thing to happen that would change my perspective on everything, change my mind or whatever. And then you fell into my lap. S'like the universe heard me asking for a reason, and there you were. And you brought me back from the dead. I guess that's why I… I told you, the night I… Y'know. That I didn't know why I did it, that I just flew off the handle, and that's true, but I've had time to figure out why I did it. It's because you are the only good thing I have. I couldn't stand to see that walking dick with arms disrespecting you. And I knew, sitting in that fuckin' prison cell, that when I got out, both of us were gonna be tortured by what I did. I couldn't do that to you, so I was really plannin' on just keeping myself gone, but… Then I got to thinking. You brought me back from the dead once. I need you to do it again, and again, and again, a thousand more times— I just can't do this without you. I don't want to do this without you."

It almost hurt to breathe as you listened to him, and you sucked in a tight breath. "If I go with you…" you started softly. "And anything happens to us… I need you to promise me something."

"Anything," Benson said instantly. "Name it, I'll swear it."

"If we get caught," you whispered. You felt the weight of your words as you spoke, realizing exactly what you were sentencing yourself to, and there was no turning back. Not that you wanted to turn back. You wanted this. "You let me be in control. Okay? If we get caught, they're gonna listen to me more than you, so you need to let me handle it. Hopefully, that'll never have to happen, but… You gotta promise."

Benson nodded, his eyes cast down at the floor. "I promise," he mumbled, and he held his hand out to you. In an instant, you went to him, and, as soon as your palm touched his, his grip was strong, and he pulled you into his body. You felt weak in his embrace, and you finally let yourself break down and fall into him. Your Benson. His chest as the same firmness it always had been— you pushed your hands up his shirt to touch his chest, touch the scar he had running down his torso, the big, gnarled pink skin that he told you had come from a knife while being mugged when he was 16 (you weren't sure if you believed him, or if he even intended you to believe him when he said that, one of the first times you had made love and you were tracing the scar and asked what it was from)— the scent of his neck was the same, even the way he sighed and cradled your head was the same, like he had never stopped. You wept into his skin, and, softly, just for you, Benson whispered, "I was never in control anyway. S'always you. From the day you waltzed in here with your candy, you had me in the palm of your hand. Hook, line, fuckin' sinker."

"The suckers were a good touch," you whispered with a drowned little chuckle, and Benson barked out a laugh. "Was that something else you put Randy up to?"

"No, that was me," Benson whispered. "I was just gonna knock on the door and talk to you, but I got… Scared. Got nervous for some reason that you'd call the police, or one'a our neighbors would see us talking and call it in. So… Cherry-flavored suckers. With love notes."

You sniffled up your tears, and you cradled Benson's scruffy, unshaved jaw in your hand, and you pulled him into a kiss. Messy, hot breaths, his hands squeezing your hips so hard that you were sure they'd be tender with broken capillaries— just how Benson always kissed you. He put his whole body into it. "Well, c'mon, then," you chuckled. "Where're we going?"

"Somewhere fuckin' far away from here," Benson smiled. "Where nobody would ever think to look for us."

"New York?" you giggled, and Benson rolled his eyes.

"Doll, you gotta remember, I'm a small-town boy," he chuckled. "Was born here, figured I'd be dying here… New York might be a lot for me… But if that's what you want. Let's go to New York."