Lovely Bastards (BxB) (MxM)

Chapter 7 - Being Bad

Kit checked through the cabinets for booze.

As he expected, there was nothing. Alcoholics couldn't keep spirits at home - they would just drink it all.

So he went on social media. He found several of his new classmates, who responded quickly, inviting him into a couple of different groups connected to the school.

And then he called Tyson.

"Who's this?"

"Forgotten me already? I'm hurt."

"What the fuck do you want?!"

"Just one number. For the guy who buys for you. Booze, not weed."

"Why should I?"

"Oh, c'mon. You know I'll find out in school in like...two seconds. Bet there's a number on every other bathroom stall."

"Urgh. Fine, fine. Just don't ever call me again."

He dialled the number, took the buss a few stops away, and walked up five flights of worn concrete stairs to an apartment where a guy with a toddler on his hip handed him two bottles of cheap vodka in exchange for cash.

In his old hometown, it would have been even easier. He knew people there - one call, how much do you want, what, when, this is the price, this is the place. 

Knew which stores didn't check ID:s too closely - that was the cheapest option, unless you counted moonshine. 

And then there were always the house parties. Someone was always having one, and you found free booze there, and other things for sale - usually weed or pills. Sometimes hard drugs. 

He could have easily sold them himself - he had been buying for his mother for years, both the 'outright illegal' and the 'just shady' stuff.

They'll give you better prices, darling, they can see you're not hooked yet.

Could always go on the internet - didn't even have to be the dark web, as long as you knew where to go and what to ask for.

The internet had the best prices for drugs, but you knew even less what you were getting. There were some tests one you could do at home, and Kit knew them all, but no test for everything, and each one destroyed a bit of the stuff you were testing.

Could buy prescriptions from some doctors, but that was expensive. 

He had always drawn the line at dealing or turning tricks.

The sex industry all looked the same from the outside, but there was a big difference between the students and immigrants who gave hand jobs in massage parlours to make extra cash, to the popular strippers who filled trash bags with money on a good night, and the victims of human trafficking, paperless and brutalised, pimped out and more or less enslaved.

Then there were the junkies who'd do anything for cash, and the runaways, offered a place to stay, only to find out the extended hand belonged to a pimp, and you can stay here, sure, but you gotta pay your way, sweetheart. And countless others. 

Kit knew several runaways like that from foster care.

His mother had been one of the junkies, after she got too sick to dance. Kit knew most of her dealers, and had picked up odd jobs for them, let them send deliveries to his and Kitty's latest temporary place, dropped of stuff. 

He put four eggcups in a row on the kitchen counter and filled them with vodka. One by one he threw them back, barely registering the bitter taste or the way it burned going down, making him grimace.