Barry Benson/Relationships

## Relationships

Although Hubcaps time as a hangaround did not work out and he eventually went on to join Lost MC, he and his son remain close and enjoy meeting up for a chat occasionally. Barry and his dad were temporarily separated for 5 years when Barry was deported but they luckily ran into each other nearly immediately upon Barrys return to the city and have reconnected.

Barry and TJ met during a long police chase back when TJ was still a cop. They ended up developing a friendly rivalry as a result of this. Their interactions after this were usually fun and had a lot of mutual respect. Shortly after meeting Barry, TJ lost a lot of his memories and thus forgot how he met/knew Barry and contacted him to find out. In a phone call Barry jokingly said that he was TJ's dad as he had slept with his mum. TJ was surprised by this answer but played along with it and they ended up referring to each other as father and son from this point onwards and started to develop a familial bond. There was a few hiccups at the start due to their very different lifestyles, as TJ was someone who valued the truth deeply, and Barry was wary about saying anything that could hurt his club or could be used against him. Despite this they learned to work around it for the most part and developed a strong relationship, their main hurdle being TJs difficult relationship with Dundee, the former leader of the club.
In December, 2021, TJ was kidnapped and shot by several members of Barrys club, as well as X, on the order of Dundee. TJ actually lost his pulse during this incident and was technically dead for several minutes before being revived at the hospital. Barrys club hid this detail from him for a week, Barry only finding out as a result of his friend Chatterbox. In the aftermath of this incident TJ was deeply traumatized and required psychical therapy to help him walk again properly, He became cold and angry and held a lot of resentment towards the BBMC and wanted to destroy them. TJ was cold towards his dad thinking he had been part of it and condoned what happened, and told him in their first interaction post shooting that he would give Barry one last chance to talk to him after this and if the conversation didn't go well they would never speak again. He urged Barry to step up as a leader in the club and make changes. Barry struggled greatly in the aftermath of the shooting and felt incredibly disrespected and hurt by his club and wondered if they valued him as their VP at all. Barry continued to try and show his son he was there for him and things gradually got less cold between them.
As TJs anger simmered down he turned more to sadness and a feeling of loss. He longer felt like he belonged in the PD and missed the family he had thought he had in BBMC. Barry, desperate to give his son the family he needed and help him find purpose again, proposed the idea of TJ joining BBMC. TJ was not entirely opposed to the idea but didn't know if it would be possible. Barry vowed he would make it happen. After several 1 on 1 talks with a lot of club members and with some conversations between TJ and other members, a deal was struck. TJ was allowed to join the club as a blooded in prospect, on the condition that should he ever fuck up Barry would the one to shoot him. Barry agreed to this and TJ officially was blooded into the club. Over the next few months TJ adjusted to gang life and became a shoulder for his dad to lean on, always there with advice and an alternative perspective when Barry needed it. Barry and TJ started a business together, Benson's Backalley Motors with Barry as the owner/CEO and TJ as the CFO. They went to have great success with it. TJ eventually went on to become a patched member and was even in talks about officially becoming the clubs Treasurer some day. Unfortunately, there was some rough patches over the next few months that ultimately culminated in TJ needing to leave the city for a break, much to his dads sorrow as he had come to rely on him and confide in him a lot. Barry drove TJ to the airport and let his son know he loved him and he was always there.
TJ eventually returned to the city in a limited capacity. TJ was the first person that Barry admitted his real opinion of Dundee to shortly before he was removed from the club and one of the first people he confided in once the dust settled. Barry and his son went on to lead the BBMC together with TJ stepping up to HC a few months after his return and they worked together to build a strong group before the RICO happened and they were separated for 5 years when Barry was deported back to Australia. Upon returning to LS, Barry and TJ quickly reconnected within the first week. Barry went on to ask TJ to be a HC member of his new club and help him build it, an offer TJ accepted.

Despite existing in the city together for over a year and even having brief conversations once or twice, Barry and Andi never properly acknowledged their familial relationship until reintroduced by their father Hubcap Jones outside the Billabong shortly after Dundees death in August 2022. Upon the realization that they were brother and sister, Barry and Andi immediately fell quickly into a sibling dynamic, Andi excitedly texting Barry after their first proper talk to find out if she was the little sister or big sister and seemed happy to find out she was the little sister. Andi and Barry bickered a lot at first over who was their dads favorite kid, and during their first threeway hang out with their dad while they got to know each other they were very competitive (albeit in a childish manner) with Andi accusing Barry of not wanting a sister. Andi was very nervous upon first realizing she had a brother but she made a lot of effort to reach out first and call Barry and ask him to hang out as she knew he was also terrible at this kind of stuff, much like herself. When Barry first started hanging out with Andi he was very guarded as he doesn't open up easily, and used to put on a lot of bravado when talking to her, usually talking himself up in a comical manner and always saying he was fine even if he wasn't. Andi saw through this as she is very intuitive but tried to not force him to open up and slowly his walls started to come down a little over time. Upon learning about Barrys issues with saying the 'L' word, Andi proposed that Barry could say 'Ditto' in response to her saying telling him she loved him, a compromise he agreed to. It quickly became their thing and Andi would even go on to buy him a keychain of the pokemon 'Ditto' for Christmas later that year.
In the time while Dundee was gone Andi could sense Barry was struggling alot at various times and often encouraged him to speak up, not letting him hide his feelings from her. On one occasion during a long talk Andi pressed hard and Barry snapped and finally admitted that Dundee had ruined his ability to trust another person fully ever again and thats why he was struggling to open up with her emotionally. Andi asked him if he'd like to have a person he could fully trust and when he replied that he would she asked if he'd be open to her being that person. Barry agreed that he would try and work towards that with her and from that point on they seemed to have an easier time communicating. There was a few little bumps in the road during those months due to both parties tendency to close off from people and hide their feelings away, but they always came back together and Barry started opening up to Andi in ways he had never opened up to anyone, even seeking comfort in her straight away when he fell out with his longterm friend Chatterbox. In the weeks before Dundees return Barry became to suffer from dissociative amnesia due to the stress and trauma surrounding Dundees return and began waking up in random places. Upon learning of this through a third party, Andi was extremely worried. Andi pushed Barry a little and eventually got him to crack and admit what was happened. Andi made him promise to tell her the next time it happened and she created a care package of food and medical supplies for him to keep on him in case it happened again. Upon her brothers confession that he was having trouble sleeping at night as he feared Dundee killing him in his sleep and his confession that he was looked for a second house as a result of this, Andi bought a family house for her Barry, Hubcap and Barrys son TJ for Christmas. The house in a question was a private and quiet farm house that Barry had been repeatedly drawn to during his search for a new home and Barry was extremely happy when she presented it to him, Barry even going out of his way to hug her which isn't something he does often to anyone. The family celebrated Christmas there together, Barry presenting Andi with a golfcart, a vehicle she had wanted for a long time.
The day of Dundees return Barry slept in and Andi stayed up all night with a shotgun in hand to protect her brother and her family in case he tried anything. In the weeks after Dundees return Barry and Andi started to see each other less and less and their relationship became a little strained for a while. Shortly before Dundees removal from the club, Andi and Barry met up to talk and she expressed frustration that Dundee would ring up during their meetings looking for help and cutting their time short, a fact Barry acknowledged to be true. She told him she missed him and he seemed genuinely guilty when she mentioned that she and her dad missed him. When Dundee has left the club Barry and Andi started hanging out and talking a lot more and Barry started opening up to her a lot again, even admitting he hadn't had time for her and the rest of the family when he was so dedicated to fixing the mess of his club.
Barry and Andi were sadly separated when Andi took a trip out of town to visit her mother for a few months. During that time Barry was deported back to Australia and they didn't see each other for 5 years. Shortly after his return to the city Barry received an anonymous text from someone asking him to meet them at the train station. To Barrys surprise and happiness - it was Andi. The two had a long talk about the past and caught up and seem to be on the way to rebuilding that strong relationship currently.

Barry met Collin very early into his time in the city, and was the one who taught Collin how to sell oxy. Collin was Barrys first hangaround in the club and they quickly got close, spending a lot of time together during the formation of the club in the early months. Collin demonstrated an incredible amount of loyalty and protectiveness towards Barry and two created a strong friendship, Collin often enjoying ruffling Barrys feathers by teasing him, flirting with him and poking a little fun at him in an affectionate way. Following the shooting of Barrys son by several club members, Collin included, their friendship became very strained for a while and Barry became distant and closed off from Collin for quite some time. This caused Collin a lot of sadness and he began to drink heavily from the guilt of hurting his best friend. Barry eventually proved his point to Collin when he helped create a similar situation around Collins (now estranged) daughter Cleo that ended in her being shot. Now understanding what it was like to be in his best friends shoes, Collin and Barry finally confronted their issues head on and apologized to each other for their respective parts in each incident, vowing they'd never do anything like that to each other again. After this their friendship got back on track and they became very close again like before. The bonds of their friendship were proven a 100 times over a few months later when they made the decision to shoot their former PM, Irwin Dundee, in the wake of his kidnap of Barry and his ongoing deal with Norman Bones. The two of them deemed him too great of a risk to their club and club members and decided together to take him out, both shooting at the same time. Barry and Collin leaned on each other heavily through this traumatic event and were there for each other and the club in the difficult aftermath.
When Barry made the decision to step up to PM a month later he asked for Collins opinion and Collin assured him that Barry was the PM the club needed and deserved. He told Barry that while Dundee ruled with fear, Barry lead with respect and let him know he'd support him every step of the way. During this difficult time Barry struggled with his mental heath, a fact Collin noticed. Barry actually opened to Collin quite a bit during this period, admitting to Collin about his trust issues in the wake of Dundees betrayal, his fears of Dundee killing him when he returned and even his dissociative amnesia. Barry even rang Collin a few times in the wake of these episodes and Collin came to pick him up and check in on him. During this period, while drunk, Collin went looking for Barrys sister Andi Jones with an AK due to thinking she had something to do with his girlfriend going missing. Although nothing happened, Barry was extremely upset for a while and it did temporarily shake his trust in Collin, a fact he was very aware of. Collin vowed to stop drinking because of this and eventually made amends Andi and won back Barrys trust, Collin being the only person outside of his family to be shown the location of Barrys secret safe house, a gesture that touched Collin and let him know things were fixed between them. Upon Dundees return Collin and Barry agreed to be a united front once more, Barry making Collin his VP so they could take care of the club together and block any attempts from Dundee to make poor decisions as a returning HC member. The final straw in Barry and Dundees relationship was when Dundee revealed to Barry that he had nearly ocean dumped and killed Collin while he was injured and unconscious. Barry was not able to overlook this and went to Collin about it, both of them deciding they were done and were going to let him burn himself out of the club. The day Dundee was voted out, Barry trusted Collin with the news that his son was back in the city, making him the only person Barry shared this knowledge with, a secret Collin has kept. Collin still maintains that Barry will always be Soft boy Bawwy to him no matter how much he changes.
Collin and Barry have unfortunately not seen each other in 5 years due to Barrys deportation, but Barry is hopeful he will see him again one day soon.

Despite the short amount of time they have had as friends, their chemistry complements each other. To the point where people would joke about Barry and Ziggy being in a relationship, even to Ziggy's husband. It didn't help the fact that Barry would sometimes jokingly make sexual innuendos about Ziggy and Ziggy would jokingly claim Barry as his boyfriend. They would make fun of each other a lot, one of the running jokes being Barry making fun of Ziggy's blunder of transferring money to a wrong number. And later a blunder where Ziggy posted a selfie of the Big Rock in their house ~~that happened to reveal more than that~~. These 2 blunders became the running joke for the two. After several talks where Barry made it clear he'd like Ziggy to join, Barry finally made the official offer to Ziggy on the 10th of January 2024 to become a patched member of ADMC, an offer Ziggy accepted.

Barry and Solomon have gone on to become a bit of a powerhouse together with Solomon being quick to offer Barry good advice, criticism and a lot of needed support through the hard early days of setting up a new club.