By Any Other Name by Tia Fielding

had been a metal one that had left the line in the first place. After that he had figured it was easier not to jerk against his restraints when they were made of something sharp and heavy.
     
    Skye turned around and looked at his back over his shoulder. The scars crisscrossing his body were ugly. There were welts, some wide, some narrow. Cuts and cigarette burns. Turning around again, he concentrated on his front. Less scarring there, a few cuts and a line of cigarette burns under his left nipple, but that was it. His arms were a different deal, because they were almost fully free of scars that weren’t self-inflicted. Reminders of his own weakness, of not being able to escape this life for good, were annoying.
     
    And he had wanted that, to be finally over his miserable existence. It had been good for a few years when he had had Dru in his life, but then he had slid deeper into the pits of hell than ever before. Truthfully, it had been the thought of Dru that had kept him from killing himself. It hadn’t been Dru who had kept him from going completely insane while being held by that man, because he hadn’t wanted to think about Dru at all. Not when he was drugged, chained to a wall, beaten, raped, cut…. No, Dru would not be used against fighting those things. So for years he had tried not to think about his boyhood friend at all. What had kept him clinging to his sanity was his well-honed ability to block everything from his mind. Some things you just pick up as a little kid, when you have to deal with parents who fight, even violently, all the time.
     
    It was the times when he felt safer, like being stuffed in the back of the man’s van while they were moving to a new place, when he had pulled out the memories of his friend. While driving, the man couldn’t hurt him, and he was safe for a moment. That was when Skye went into the secret place in his mind. There was sunshine and lying on the grass in the backyard of the Beckett house. Seeing Dru grinning at him when he did something silly or, better yet, hearing the echoes of Dru’s laughter, laughter that Skye had made happen. He had never felt so loved before, not like when he was around Dru. The blond represented everything good in his life, and he couldn’t taint that by thinking of him outside of those car rides.
     
    Skye shook himself a bit, turning away from his image in the mirror, and went to pull on some of Thom’s old sleep pants. They fit him and weren’t that long, and he liked that they were soft against his skin from previous use and washing. He pulled on a T-shirt and looked at the clock on the table. Eight. He had slept a lot, then. That was a good sign; he was getting more sleep even if he woke up from nightmares. And what did he expect? He had only been here two weeks.
     
    Thom would be at work already, and Dru would still be in bed. Maybe he should go to the gym for awhile before making them some breakfast. With a sigh, he changed into some shorts now that he had changed his plan and walked out of the room. It was convenient to have the gym inside the house, especially on a rainy day like this one. It seemed like it was pouring; the steady hum against the roof soothed him somehow. Maybe that had helped him with the sleep too. Skye made his way to the kitchen and grabbed a bottle of water before going to the gym.
     
    It had everything for a basic workout. He clicked on the TV on the wall and went onto the treadmill to warm up a little. While watching the morning news, he moved from a walk to a jog, and when another morning talk show began, he went to the front of the room and began to do push-ups and sit-ups. It was easy, routine from the Institute, and something he found joy in: pushing his limits and making his body feel alive instead of abused or something that disgusted him.
     
    He half-listened to the conversation on TV and let his mind wander a bit. He had met Dru and Skye’s friend Kara a couple of times now. She seemed to pop up