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"A Study in Contrasts"

Title: A Study In Contrasts
Rating: PG-13 (mainly because of the used of the "c" word)
Pairing: Torksmith
Author: Rinny
Summary: Peter's day job has aroused the suspicions ... and something else ... of his bandmates. One in particular.
Disclaimer: Never happened. Never, ever happened.
Author's Notes: This is a set up for another story I have in the hopper. I think I just like doing a really introspective Mike. :)


Mike quickly locked the door and threw himself onto his bed almost in the same motion. Micky and Davy were out swimming, but he knew they could come back to the pad at any time. And if they saw the Monkeemobile out in its usual place, they'd know he was home and would seek him out. The only person he was sure wouldn't interrupt him was the unwitting cause of all this ... all this that he was feeling. Whatever this was. But he couldn't be introspective right then. He had a pressing need. It was pressing out the front of his pants, in fact. And he'd ignored it long enough.

Mike yanked his zipper down and thrust his hand in, groaning as he curved his fingers around his already leaking cock. It wouldn't be long, he could tell. Though he hadn't had this feeling in a while, it was familiar. A few glides, some short strokes, a squeeze and -

"Oh - oh god ... Peter ..."

Minutes later, dry, tucked in and breathing somewhat normally, Mike sat up shakily, adjusting his wool hat, which had gone askew during some of the ... festivities. A minute later, he jumped when he heard the handle of the door being tried.

"Mike, you in here?"

"Uh, yeah, just a minnit."

He did a quick survey, silently deemed himself as about presentable as a person who'd just been whacking the wally a few minutes before was going to get, and opened the door to a confused-looking Micky and Davy.

"Why'd ya have the door locked?"

"Er, just was, um ..." His eyes pinballed around the room and lit on a book that was by his bed. "... readin'. Musta dozed off a little."

Davy nodded. Micky looked a bit uncertain, but shrugged. "Well, whadja find out?"

"Find ... out?" Mike gulped a mouthful of humid air. Exhaled. "'Bout what?"

"About Petah!" Davy said, his eyebrows rising until they nearly disappeared behind his fringe of hair. "Where's 'ee going? What's this day job 'ee won't talk about? Didn't you follow 'im today?"

Mike paused, remembering how it all started nearly a month ago. Gigs had dried up like a prune in the Sahara and, after another ... dispiriting conversation with Mr. Babbitt about the rent situation - namely that they didn't have the cash to pay it ... again - they'd put their heads together and decided there was nothing for it but to try to get day jobs. None of them had been successful, save Peter, who when pressed, said he'd gotten a job helping out at a school. Which was all fine and dandy, except he didn't seem so happy about it. In fact, when asked about his job, he'd become quite un-Peter-like.

Quite un-Peter-like. Snappish, a little defensive, embarrassed, even. All this from Peter, who was so open-handed that he'd give a play by play of a routine trip to the grocery store. But there was nothing at all embarrassing about the wads of cash Peter started handing over every week. Enough to catch up on the rent, enough to gas up the car to see about slightly-out-of-town gigs, enough to buy Davy a new tambourine after his old one had been smashed to smithereens by an overzealous, and now ex-irlfriend.

The change from a cash trickle to a cash flow should have made them all happy. But it didn't, for Peter still wouldn't come clean as to what it was he was actually doing to earn such a windfall. And that maybe wouldn't have mattered, except that whatever the job was seemed to be affecting his usual sunny, sweet disposition and his playing. He was off-key, off-beat, and even his songwriting had become flat and uninspired.

The money was wonderful, but after a conference in which Davy, Micky and Mike were in complete agreement, it wasn't worth Peter's well being. Since he was not volunteering where this wonderful "school where he was helping out" actually was, it was quickly decided that he should be followed. It was also quickly decided that all three of them tailing him would arouse suspicion. And it was also somehow quickly decided that Mike - towered above just about everyone in creation, who, in the bargain, wore an unmistakable, very green, very stand-outtish wool hat, and was, in general, never inconspicuous anywhere, should be the one to do it.

"'Ees not in trouble, is 'ee?"

"Or doing anything, er ... illegal?"

Mike pulled out his best incredulous look. Aimed. Fired. Two sets of eyes lowered in shame.

"C'mon, it's Peter we're talkin' bout here."

"Yeah, babe, we know, it's just he's been acting so ... different. I really don't know what to think anymore," said Micky, looking up.

Mike bit down on a sardonic grin. Yeah, you and me both, buddy.

"Well, didja find out anything?"

The Texan paused. Did he? Find out ... anything? Yes, to that question. He did. He'd found out many things. Many, many things, some he didn't feel strong enough or sure enough to contemplate. But he knew he would at sometime, probably in the nearish future. Because if he knew anything, whatever this ... this he was feeling, it wasn't going to go away. And he could either tame it or let it consume him, or ...

Or ...?

"He does work at a school." Mike bit on his lower lip. "He, uh, I went in. He helps out the teacher. You know, handing out supplies, and collecting 'em at the end, uh ..."

"Supplies?" Davy looked puzzled. "Wha' do you mean? Like books and all?"

"Um. Not exactly." Mike looked away from the puzzled stares. "It's an art school. He hands out, y'know, brushes, paints, that sorta thing. Runs little errands for the teacher. Little bitty woman, glasses the size'a dinner plates ..."

"An art school?" Micky frowned. "Pete's acting all twitchy over that?"

"Well, the little biddy runs him pretty hard. He's probably just outta sorts because he's tired."

Mike shrugged in nonchalance, trying to clear his mind's eye of the other images. Peter's other duties. For when the class - jam packed full of salivating housewives, Mike had noticed from his hidden perch behind a convenient partition - was situated, and everyone had their little easels and colored pencils and erasers and all, then Peter took his place in the center of their little circle, his eyes down, sandy hair falling forward, covering his face as if in modesty.

And it was only then that he, with a deep breath, unbelted the silken robe that served as his only covering and let it fall to the floor. The old bat would guide him into whatever position she wished - the "figure study for the day," she called. Eyes unfocused, back straight, Peter held the pose, the slim, golden body exposed to cataloging, hungry gazes.

And Mike knew his had been among them, that day. It was strange - it wasn't like he'd never seen Peter naked before. He had. The logistics of the Pad - namely, four guys, one bathroom - sort of made that inevitable. He'd seen Micky and Davy in the altogether, too, as far as that went.

But that afternoon, Mike felt that he was seeing Peter, truly seeing him, as his eyes traveled over a landscape of smooth skin, sandy hair that was improbably dark in other places, such as his chest and - and ... yeah. Freckles that spread out over a subtly muscled back, fanning out and spiraling down along the base of his spine.

Mike could hear his breath rasping just above the skritching sounds of pencil against paper. In the moments that stretched forward, Mike didn't stop to consider that he was ogling someone who had the same basic 'parts' that he had. Nor did he even think of it as ogling someone in the group, and therefore off-limits. And not even the fact that this was Peter - about as innocent as a doe with eyes to match - was able to stop the flash of heat that engulfed him, damn-near singeing his hat.

In fact, that little tidbit seemed to titillate him more, thrust him back in his memory of small touches on the way up or down the spiral staircase, little brushes on the bandstand, a lopsided sweet grin swing his way like a search light. Things that seemed insignificant at the time, but as he gazed at Peter, seemed to all add up to something big. Something Mike had never really considered until faced with Peter's naked back and long legs.

In the end, he was forced to flee. He couldn't get certain thoughts out his mind, and images of Peter played behind his eyelids like a movie. He was barely cognizant of having gotten in the Monkeemobile and driven back to the Pad, but he knew he must have done so. To take care of a pressing need that had arisen too quickly for him to trip out over it. And now that was taken care of and Micky and Davy were expecting answers, and Mike realized he had none to give - none he wanted to volunteer, anyway. Yet.

Except ...

"It's groovy," Mike said through a dry mouth. "He's got a legitimate job and I guess his own reasons for not talkin' about it. Don't get uptight about it. Nothin's wrong. Pete's all right."

Making it clear with a grimace that this particular conversation was now over, Mike shut the door on the skeptical faces of his band mates and threw himself back onto his bed. He wasn't sure why he felt so jittery. He'd done it - he'd been able to preserve Peter's privacy while also telling the truth.

But he knew that there was a bigger question at hand, one that filtered through his mind as he felt a familiar stirring below his belt buckle. It was true. Peter was all right.

But was he?