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I retreated to the warmth of the diner. I had enough after filling the car for a cup of coffee, and I sipped the bitter liquid slowly. It had probably been stewing in its pot for the last three hours and had finally reached the point where the bitter principles were the only thing left. Still it felt warm inside, and it gave me a kick I needed. The fatigue from several days without meaningful sleep was harsh, and I wanted to be at least vaguely conscious.

It didn't take long before my post-it note had the right effect. A gruff looking tiger about 50 in faded jeans came and sat beside me, with the blue square of paper in his paws. He had a coffee too, and sat in silence while he sipped it and eyed me up out of the corner.

"You're brave kid."

I just smiled.

"I'll have the Trucker's special thanks. And orange juice."

He gave a chuckle and rubbed my mane, and headed off to get the food.

His name was Zoltan, a Hungarian. His father came over for the Olympics in '56 and stayed when the Russian tanks rolled into Budapest. He told me all this while he wolfed down bacon and eggs like the last hen alive had just croaked. He drove a truck for a living, charting the endless course up and down the Hume that was familiar to most truckies some time during their life. He liked it though, even though it was lonely.

Lonely. I grunted an acknowledgement. I knew lonely all right. Most times I had done this, or something like it, it wasn't the money really. It was feeling another, and watching them look at me with a hunger that flowed through me like the most delicious booze there was, warming and seducing. I mattered in that look, I was something and not a total waste of oxygen, at least for them and for a brief moment while they took what they wanted. And if I was lucky, the cuddle and the closeness afterwards gave me enough to sustain me till the next time.

I had to blame Clay for that, in a roundabout way. He showed me at least as much as either of us could understand when we were both as damaged as each other.

Eventually Zoltan finished wolfing down his food and I felt less weak and almost awake. I didn't really want to be awake for what was next, but after a bad experience I knew I had to be. So I followed him to his rig out the back with my hooves scraping on the gravel, while the tiger whistled and almost sauntered he was so happy.

I got to make someone happy. I almost never managed that, except with my body.

He had a nice cubby in a sort of box behind the cab. It was cramped but homely, with nice fabric wall hangings to cover up the metal, a little light, some books. The bed was firm but comfortable, and I sat down with my hooves crossed while he fussed about in a bag. I saw him pull out lube and condoms, and he looked at me sort of apologetically.

"Um...just in case we need them. I mean..."

"It's ok. What do you want?"

"I want to see you."

I nodded and stripped, while he watched every move and I saw his eyes shining and his tongue slightly extend until I was naked and he was licking his lips like I was one of the eggs he had inhaled back in the diner.

"Oh Fuck Danny...you are so beautiful."

I turned away so he wouldn't see me looking sad. Clay had used the exact same line when we first got naked together, and then it made my heart sing. Now it just made me angry, though I took the compliment as my due. A tall and well muscled equine, I was used to the reaction, though I never believed it inside. To me I was unspeakably ugly, but in the moment when I heard their appreciation and saw their look, I could almost believe I was something. Just as Mr Stone had said.

I felt his paws on me, and I realised straight away that this one would be gentle. It was the way he touched, hesitating until he knew I didn't mind, then again but always waiting until I showed him it was alright. My feathering seemed to fascinate him, and spent a long time playing with it, then my tail, then my mane, before he finally cupped my scrotum and I obligingly dropped for him and he ran a clawtip over my flare.

"Such a pretty pony my lovely."

He went down on me, hungrily, slurping and working my length hard and efficiently while he fondled my sack. I felt a sort of something building, but it didn't go beyond an agonising halfway point and I knew the pills were still fucking with me. Eventually I pulled his muzzle off and moved him into an embrace. I stilled his questions with a kiss, and that seemed to do the trick for him, because he moaned and purred and his tail twitched as our kiss got hotter. He started frotting me wildly, rubbing his barbed cock against mine and it felt good, though I was nowhere near cumming.

Then he pulled off panting and looked at me. I just watched him, taking in the slightly bulky body, the grey fur amongst the white orange and black, but also the hunger and the sense of kindness in his eyes. For some reason I didn't want that, the kindness. It made it harder.

"Um...do you want..."

"Mate, I'm a top. We don't have to, if you don't want to, but if you do..."

I just nodded. I was a top too, for a lot of reasons. One of which was that bottoming hurt horribly. Ever since Him...I hadn't healed properly and it hurt like a motherfucker. Even when I accepted who I was and could enjoy sex with guys as much as girls and be touched without a full on PTSD brainsnap I struggled to offer this even to the ones I loved, though part of me wanted it. When I finally did with a boy I loved more than anyone in my life because I wanted him to have that part of me, I almost fainted and made him cry because he had hurt me, but I wanted it anyway. Now at least, I was better at taking pain, and a lot stronger. And tonight, I just didn't give a fuck any more.

The tiger rolled a condom on his length and lubed up with all the sterile enthusiasm of a Young Pioneer dismantling his AK 47. I gave him a reassuring wink and rolled on my front, lifting my tail and spreading my hooves wide to give him access. I felt the heavy mass of the tiger behind me, then on me, his breath harsh in my ears, and then I felt the touch of his covered cock on my tailhole.

I gripped the bed hard and gritted my teeth as he entered, letting out the breath I had been holding in a long stuttering exhalation while he slid inside. He took it slow, at first, and I tried to give him a good time. My ass clenched whether I wanted to or not anyway, and it seemed to give him pleasure because he gasped when I did and kissed my mane.

In the end he sped up and slapped away like a jackrabbit, jabbing fast and shallow before letting out a deep guttural moan and laying still, breathing hard into my ear. He told me again how beautiful I was, and kissed my ears, and licked them, before pulling me onto my side as he spooned against me.

"You didn't cum."

"No...its ok. Did you enjoy?"

"Very much pony. Very much. I haven't been with anyone as hot as you in a long time. But I want to see you cum..."

His paw found my still hard horsehood, and he started jacking me slowly. It wasn't great, until he lubed his paw more and found a rhythm. He was still hard inside me, and I felt his maleness throbbing with heat, still for now. The pain was gone, and it felt good being full for once. I knew it wouldn't work though, as the familiar almost sensation took over. In desperation, I let my mind wander and thought of Clay.

As Zoltan began to hump inside me again, and nibble my neck, I pretended it was my Husky boy, just as we had that first magic time. It took a while, and many false starts mostly due to me before we did anything at all, but I knew in my heart he mattered to me, and what we were doing was a part of who I was that had nothing to do with the thing that shattered my life and everything to do with who I was all along. The paw slid faster over my length, and as my remembered boy took my length inside him, I felt the dam burst and I came, whinnying loudly in the cramped box while the tiger reached his own second climax inside me and lay against me licking my shoulder where his sharp teeth had drawn blood in his passion.

He was so apologetic, but he was also pleased.

"See pony, I told you I could make it good for you. Sorry about the bite..."

"It's ok. Really. Might have helped me cum."

His chuckle was back. A knowing chuckle, and a kind one.

"Well, you are hot when you lose it lovely. And you brought me along too. I normally am a one shot guy these days. Must be something about horses."

We cuddled, and I didn't feel like going. It felt good, just being held again. He pulled out and just lay beside me, and I ignored the pain in my hole as best I could, while the tiger's breathing became shallower and he started snoring slowly. I didn't want to go just yet, and I played with the graying tufts of his chestfur and watched his whiskers move as he breathed, then lay back with my head on my forearm and rested.

There was a small pile of books by the bed, and I flicked through them without really reading. I only had one book in my bag, and I didn't read it anyway, it was just there. It was the only thing that had made me cry in nine years, that book, and though I felt the urge building inside me while the tiger slept on, I managed to avoid losing it and let my mind wander instead.

*****

"Danny, you are going to be on your best behaviour, aren't you."

The badger didn't sound confident.

"Yes Ms Chew. Always."

"Good Danny. Now, Mrs Austin is an experienced carer, but you are a little unusual for her. I managed to persuade her to take you on for now, but you have to do your part."

I didn't get the coded messages, though I did get a sense of unease. Something didn't sound quite right, and my mane prickled.

We pulled up in front of a normal looking weatherboard in Preston. I had no idea where I was, as a kid from the deepest Eastern suburbs the North was complete foreign territory. Something else to learn, though I would stay in my current school for now.

"Well...here we are."

Yeah, so where is here?

The tall thin fox lady that greeted us looked up at me along a quivering nose through rather thick glasses. Her every movement radiated disapproval, and I tried to smile and held out my hand. She took it reluctantly and shook once before letting go.

"Madeleine, I told you I am not sure about this."

"Please Heather, we talked. You said you would give it a go."

I stood through this exchange hugging my bag with my ears drooping by the second. Lovely, just what I need.

I was sent to my room while the two of them had a long conversation in the lounge. It was pink, the room that is. Pink curtains, pink bedding, pink in the wallpaper. Pink everywhere. And roses. It was the most feminine room I had ever been in, nothing quite prepared me for it. Even in years after, when I spent a ridiculous amount of my time fucking women, I never found a more feminine room. Ever.

My bag found a spot on a chair by the bed, and my school backpack went on the small desk by the window. This was home now, for good or ill.

That night I got enough background to know how much this was not going to work. Mrs Austin had had three previous kids, all girls, and the last one she had been in the process of moving to adoption with when the girl's mother suddenly pulled herself together and they reunited them. The pain was still fresh, and it rankled.

"The Department always take take take. Just like with you here; they knew I wanted another girl, but here they go giving me an overgrown lump of a teenage colt. Samantha, now she was wonderful, such a smart and polite girl, so loving. Boys are such a menace..."

And so it went on. For two weeks I tried, though everything I did was wrong. She couldn't stand to see me even moderately naked, and screamed at me the first time I went to the bathroom in my boxers and fleecy top. I ate wrong and too much, and I spoke with such a strong bogan accent. I watched the wrong TV, read the wrong books, and generally was a disappointment. Not like the sainted Samantha, apparently.

It came to a head when I had another nightmare, just before I was due to head on school camp for a week. The nightmare came, as it always did, in the early hours, and I didn't realise until I was woken by shaking. I lashed out before I realised where I was, and got a clip back over the head as I regrouped and a long screaming harangue. Then she sniffed.

"Have you wet the bed you disgusting horse?"

I had, of course, as I sometimes did when the nightmare took hold and I felt Him inside me like it was happening again. How could I tell that to this tall agitated fox?

She wouldn't speak to me that day as I prepared for camp. I wanted to ask her for a bag to take on camp, but couldn't bring myself to ask, so instead I just took my normal bag with most of my stuff still in it. Makes packing easier, if you just have everything you own with you. I left my school books with my backpack, and a few personal things by the bed.

The camp was an exercise in living hell. I was terrified of anyone knowing about me, and so I rugged up to cover my body at all times so nobody would see the scars. In the tent at night, my bag drew instant attention when my fellow campers realised I had all my stuff with me.

"Dude...why have you got your school uniform?"

"It's just what's in my bag, don't worry."

"Yeah, but, why did you pack it?"

I had to explain that this was my only bag, and all I had, and this caused immense amusement. I had a new nickname, Salvo. According to one bright Doberman, I got all my stuff from the Salvation Army charity bin. I couldn't begin to admit he was right, but he was pretty close.

The first day I came back from a hike to find some of my tentmates had got back early and hoisted my bag into a tree where they were taking turns throwing rocks at it. Things went downhill from there though, when I had my first nightmare in the company of 5 other guys in a tent.

One tried to wake me, and I had him on his back and I was choking him before he even got to cry out. After that, my new nickname was Psychopony, and though nobody messed with me again, I was not welcome in the tent. I didn't want to be there anyway, and I would wait until the teachers had gone to sleep before slipping out to sit by the remains of the open fire pit and watch the stars. The canoeing and rockclimbing went by without me really remembering, and I always seemed to end up paired with one of the teachers for the exercises. That suited me fine, and I found I liked talking to them anyway. At least they weren't idiots.

I was exhausted when the bus pulled up to school on Friday afternoon, and I just wanted to head to bed even in the pink monstrosity of my bedroom. It was destined not to be though, and instead of Mrs Austin, I found my caseworker looking harried and her old battered Honda parked by the gate.

"Danny...Mrs Austin and I felt that you would be better off somewhere else..."

"Find her a girl did you?"

"Danny, you know how hard it is finding places for teenage boys, and Mrs Austin has been generous..."

"Save it. Where to now?"

"We couldn't get you a place in your old group home so we have had to move you to a new one. Close to where you stayed with Mrs Austin though, so at least that will be familiar."

Coburg. It was anything but familiar, but that didn't matter.

When I got there, I found my room, complete with peeling plaster and rising damp. It was cold, and I turned on the ancient radiator to take the chill off while Mrs Chew talked to the Lead Resident, a short sleepy looking goat called Joel. On the bed was a green plastic garbage bag, and I opened it reluctantly.

In it was all the stuff I left behind, my backpack, school books, some clothes that I left in the laundry. I rifled through it, all the things left behind by the piece of garbage colt appropriately disposed of by Mrs Austin, looking for something, but it wasn't there. I ran out to the lounge.

"Ms Chew. We have to go to Mrs Austin, she forgot to pack a couple of my things."

The badger blinked a couple of times, her and the goat in mid conversation.

"Danny, cant this wait?"

"It's important!"

I was missing a couple of things, though my football magazines could wait. But what couldn't was a battered copy of Wind in the Willows. My Dad had read it to me, sitting up in bed before I turned out the light. It was the one thing that I managed to salvage from my stuff that reminded me of him, and it had been his before. My only remaining touchstone of my Dad. It had his name in it, scrawled in his unsteady hand. Mike Lawrence, grade 4 C. Every night I would touch that name with a finger and talk to him, and often fall asleep with it in bed. It had become even more battered, losing pages rapidly but it was still mine. I thought it was safer in Preston than it would be on camp.

Ms Chew finally relented and let me call Mrs Austin, but the crotchety old bird didn't really want to speak. She had a five year old girl to look after now, and couldn't leave her.

"Oh that old thing. It was all damaged Daniel, and those magazines were old. I threw them out. Everything that matters is in the bag I sent ahead with Ms Chew. Now, I really must go...goodbye now Daniel."

The click when she hung up was final, and I handed the mobile back to Ms Chew still stunned.

"Danny. Plenty of people are doing the best they can for you. Its best not to make a fuss. Joel here and I have had a good talk, and he is looking forward to getting to know you. Aren't you Joe?"

The goat smiled his best fake smile. "Sure. You like footy I hear Danny?"

I nodded and headed back to my room and closed the door, just curling up on the bed and shaking.

It was then I finally cried. I hadn't cried when I woke in hospital, and found my Mum wasn't coming. Somehow I couldn't find how to do it then, but a stupid paperback copy of Wind in the Willows managed it and I bawled, kicking the green garbage bag with a hoof to try and hurt it as much as I was hurting.

The door opened, and one of my fellow inmates peeked through. A tall bulky equine, at least I wouldn't be alone here.

"What a fucking pussy," and then he slammed the door. Ok, maybe I would be.

*****

After a while things settled down, though there was a real sense of menace in the house. All of us were damaged, the group homes tended to be a dumping ground for the ones everyone else rejected. Which meant there was a disproportionate number of teenage males with behavioural problems and history of abuse to house out of sight of the community and away from the foster parents who mostly wanted girls under 4 who they could move to adoption with. A caseworker for one of the guys had candidly said that we would be better off disabled, and female.

It generated a kind of city of the damned feel, and I found the other equine, a chestnut quarterhorse called Nick, was the leader of our merry band. The Lead Resident was completely ineffectual, retreating to his study most nights to play videogames. And one night Nick decided to call for a raid.

"You had better be useful Danny. Show you aren't a complete pussy."

There was general amusement at that, as word of my crying fit had passed around. I haven't cried since. Through innumerable pains over the years, even holding people I loved as they died, I never cried. I don't think I can any more, those pathways no longer work. Crying is for people who can feel.

We all managed to sneak out of our rooms, through windows caked with dirt, to meet in the street before we headed for a drive in bottle shop about twenty minutes walk away. Far enough that they wouldn't know where we came from.

The eldest guys distracted the shop assistants near the till, while the rest of us had the job of stealing and running off with the gear. We managed to get two slabs of UDL rum and cola, a bottle of Jack Daniels, and a bottle of Bundy before they twigged and we all legged it in different directions. We met up in the park nearest to our home, sitting on the various pieces of play equipment to divvy up the spoils. I took a spot on a swing, and downed my first rum and cola. It tasted sweet, and I reached for a second and let the burning take hold and warm me inside and numb my mind and everything else.

Before too long I was completely drunk, and barely able to stand upright. I just lazily swung back and forward, while one of the guys, a Labrador, handed out smokes. I knew I needed to piss, but I didn't know how I was going to make it to the toilets across the park. Nick sensed my problem, and offered to help. I leaned on him all the way to the block.

Once we were inside though, it was a different Nick who took over.

"Now, you owe me mate. Pussy like you shouldn't have any problems..."

"Wha..."

I felt his hands on me, and suddenly he twisted my mane hard and I fell forward with a yell. I was so pissed I couldn't get up, just swayed drunkenly on my hands and knees, hooves scraping the floor. Then I felt a stinging blow as he backhanded my muzzle and pulled me into his crotch.

"Fucking do it you weak as piss pony..."

There was something warm, something heavy against my muzzle. He had pulled out his cock, lolling in the air and he pressed my muzzle against it and yanked my mane again. I couldn't breathe, couldn't coordinate my limbs, and instead I opened my lips and felt it inside me, rasping over my throat.

"That's it...such a good cocksucker..."

I tried to pull off but he yanked harder, pulling me down his length while he bucked his hips into me and I choked, but he did it again. I gripped his fetlocks, trying to lift off the ground, dazed and horrified, and then I heard him grunt and felt his tail swishing and then I felt a hot gush in my throat that tasted claggy and I coughed and choked on it until he pulled off with a nicker of disgust.

I managed to find the toilet and began heaving, hugging the bowl for support, as he watched me. He pushed a hoof into my rump, tilting me further into the bowl.

"Can't hold your booze either pony. What a pussy."

And then he turned and walked out.

*****

The tiger stirred beside me, and I held him close basking in the feel of a warm body for a bit longer. My ass still hurt, but I didn't mind. I was glad I hadn't had to go down on him either, after the memories of Nick that flooded back. Somehow it kept the tiger unpolluted for me, a vaguely good memory for the road.

As I dressed quietly, trying not to disturb him, I went over the tendrils of memory in my mind. It would be a few more weeks before I saw Clay again after that horror, and then only after a lot more pain and discovery, by which time I needed him more than I could even understand. When the time came, I couldn't do much except freeze, but what I felt for him was enough even with the memories. Though it helped that I conquered Nick in my own way, when I wasn't too drunk to fight.

The horse had tried it on another kid, a small pup, and this time I wasn't pissed drunk, I was pissed angry. I went at him, and when he came into my room, he tried to force me again. Then it happened, and I was back with Him in a flashback, like I did in the nightmares, and when I came back to myself I found the violence had come with the memory and Nick was against a wall with a bloodied muzzle and we were being separated by Joel and a couple of the others. Nick always feared me after that, and I told him if I ever found him doing anything with the others I would kill him. I think he believed me.

With all the weights I was getting bigger, and stronger, and with the madness that came with the flashbacks, I seemed to be able to take on even the older guys like Nick. Now Psychopony was my nickname at school and in the home, and I was avoided like a pariah. It suited me fine, though I missed my Husky more than I could manage to admit.

One thing I had managed to do something about, though it was pathetic. I stole the school library copy of Wind in the Willows, and took it back home. There I wrote my Dad's name in the cover just like he had, Mike Lawrence grade 4C. I would touch it like I had with the copy I had lost, pretending it was his, and tell him about my day, or make him promise to take me out to kick the footy.

He had promised to do that the day he died, and when the cops came to say he wouldn't be coming home from work, I was pissed off at first because I thought he had concocted some elaborate ruse to get out of his promise. Such is the level of an 8 year old, and I hated that the only memories I had of him were the misty incomplete ones seen through the filter of a little kid who didn't know anything. Of the man he was, I glimpsed just a fraction, and then it was all over.

I was about to slip out of the cab when the tiger sat upright.

"Hey!"

"Hey. Sorry, I'll let you sleep. Don't you have like a mandatory rest or something?"

"Yeah, but it just means I cant drive. Doesn't mean I cant talk to a beautiful pony. Are you ok hun?"

"I'm ok, don't worry..."

"...hun, if you're ok, I'm the Pope. I'm hungry after that, do you want to get some more food?"

I just shrugged, and he took it as a yes. In truth, I felt embarrassed and lost, but I knew I didn't want it to end just yet, a part of me still clinging on to life.

We headed for the diner again this time downing chips and dim sims fresh from the deep fryer. The tiger definitely hadn't heard about heart health. He seemed to catch my quizzical look and just grinned and stroked his ample belly.

"I'm in perfect shape for truck driving Danny. And snuggling. What could be better?"

I chuckled and then spied a bin by the checkout. Footballs, Sherrins no less, and only $15. I reached reflexively for my pocket and a wallet I knew was empty, but before I could stop myself, my fingers closed on something plastic.

There were two 50 dollar bills in there.

"Sorry...I know we didn't really say anything but...well, I wanted you to have something else, so you don't go hungry wherever you are going. Hun...are you sure you don't want to stick with me? You could keep me company, there's room in the truck..."

He looked so hopeful, and I hated having to disappoint him. Instead I bought one of the footballs, and headed out into the truck parking area with a bemused tiger.

"Come on mate. You need some exercise. See if you can kick it."

His eyes lit up, and he took up position by his cab while I went the usual 30 metres away. And at 5 am, in a dark truck stop off the Hume, I played kick to kick with a 50 year old tiger, and imagined my dad and me in the park the night he was supposed to come home but didn't, and he was proud of how much my kicking had improved. Back then when I was 8, I had spent the day with Timmy Wharton practicing so I could show off to him when he came home. Now, I spent the day doing very different things I knew wouldn't make him proud. But I could pretend anyway.

When it was time to go there was a small group of truckdrivers now involved, all laughing and joking as they enjoyed an impromptu kick in the semi dark. I had a long way to go still, and it was time. I waved at the tiger, who waved back holding my old stolen copy of Wind in the Willows. I think it has a good home now, somehow.