by Lee Mandelo
“Finish that,” Halse said as he pushed past him to rejoin his unruly guests.
Andrew ashed the blunt on the ground. The sunset hid behind the trees, grey light seeping around their edges. Milling groups broke into the occasional shoving scuffle or cackle of hyena-laughter. At the center, four boys and one young woman were breaking pieces of particle board and sticks with their heels to toss on the haphazard pile of material that Andrew assumed would soon be lit. The girl’s hair was in a tight bun and her buff, thin silhouette reminded him of Del. Del wouldn’t have been caught dead at one of these get-togethers. Sam approached the group and patted her on the ass; she smacked his with a piece of wood, which he danced away from with a laugh.
He checked his phone—no messages. No one had a clue where he was, or who he was with, or if he was coming home. Had Eddie been standing here three weeks before, talking to someone who ended up doing him harm? Maybe so. Andrew rolled the tension from his shoulders and put his phone in his pocket.
“Sorry, sorry,” Riley said, stumbling up to him. “I shouldn’t abandon you so quick, dude. I just hadn’t seen Ethan in like a month and a half, he went to his parents’ for break.”
“It’s fine,” Andrew said.
Riley’s hair was going flat already, dripping sweat and product down his temples. The pink scar stood out sharply on his cheek. He tugged Andrew’s arm, saying, “Come inside, let me make you another drink.”
The kitchen countertops were strewn with bottles and cups, and the sink was full of bags of ice. Riley popped the plastic safe-pourer out of a handle of whiskey and offered it over. Andrew swigged straight from the bottle. The burn scoured his throat from the inside, cheap and medicinal. They passed it back and forth until Riley choked a little and spit into the sink.
Andrew snorted. “Sanitary, spitting on the ice.”
“Next to it,” Riley corrected him. “You feeling good?”
Andrew’s head swam pleasantly. He hadn’t had much to eat before coming out. He’d dropped the finished roach somewhere outside, and he wondered if people often set the yard alight by accident during drought weeks.
“Maybe I am,” he allowed. “Where’s your, uh, your girlfriend?”
Riley wrinkled his nose and said, “Did you check the scene outside? I think Ethan is the only person at this party who isn’t white, and Irene is the lone chick. Luca doesn’t want to deal with that, and I don’t blame her. Sam’s parties are kind of … their own thing, you know? He mixes business with pleasure.”
Andrew rewound his memory to check against Riley’s explanation. He hadn’t noticed the party’s makeup, but on second thought, he guessed it was true. Most of the faces he’d passed were variations on his own—or, more accurately, Sam’s. Scruff on square jaws, farmer’s tans, high-top sneakers and blue jeans. West’s initial warning took on a different significance in hindsight, with Riley’s comment that his girlfriend wouldn’t be caught in this white, rowdy crowd ringing in his ears.
“Hey,” Halse bellowed from the deck. “Stop hogging the guest of honor!”
“Get fucked, Sam!” Riley hollered back, voice cracking.
Andrew glanced at his own shaking hands. He kept expecting to hear Eddie’s voice in the cacophony outside, sliding between the gaps of the music when the track changed. Riley’s palm slapped onto the back of his neck and squeezed. Andrew blinked down at him as Riley searched his face with drawn-together brows.
“Quit that pussy shit,” Halse said from the doorway.
Andrew jerked free and Riley huffed, “Shut up, Sam.”
Halse shoved aside a stack of cups and said, “Go grab me a book, oh cousin of mine.”
“I don’t think—”
“He doesn’t have to, but I’m going to,” Halse said.
Andrew sat at the kitchen table while Riley disappeared into the bowels of the house. Halse leaned against the counter. His black jeans rode low on his hips, baring inches of an electric green pair of boxer briefs. The muscle tank he wore had a grease stain on the side in the shape of a palm, smeared and faded. He expected Halse to speak, but the silence settled. The weight of the ticking clock dragged them both toward sunset.
“Here,” Riley said as he returned, offering a large hardcover labeled Algebra II.
Halse fished a plastic baggie out of his hip pocket and tapped a snowdrift of cocaine onto the textbook. Riley handed him a credit card and he grunted his approval, cutting out three lines.
“Thanks, buddy,” Riley said.
“I don’t—” Andrew started.
Halse barreled over his objection with a smile: “Think it over before you say no. It’s free, and you need to get out of your fucking skin tonight, don’t you?”
All three men paused while Andrew drummed his fingertips on his knee. The ache of his missing half chewed at him. Eddie had left him this.
“Here’s the plan,” Halse said. He snagged a straw and flipped his pocketknife out, snipping it short with a fluid twitch of the wrist. “I’m going to do this line. Y’all are going to do yours. I’m going to go outside, fill a beer bottle full of gas, stuff a rag in it, and we’re going to light that. And then you,” he pointed at Andrew, “are going to start our bonfire in the most spectacular way possible.”
Riley said, “And then we’ll all be friends.”
“If nobody goes to the hospital tonight, then we’ll be friends,” Halse corrected, prompting the thrill of impending risk.
Andrew scrubbed his hands over his face. His head pounded along with the music. He stood and took the two steps to put his hip against the countertop next to Halse, who punched his arm hard enough to jar his shoulder. He watched Halse bend down to the line, pressing one nostril shut, and thought, Did someone here fuck Eddie up?
The sweat on Halse’s scalp glistened through his stubble. He snorted loud then reared back, nose scrunched and eyes squinted. He made a soft hissing sound as he passed the straw to Andrew.
“The last time I did coke, it was ’cause Eddie kept putting it in my drink,” Andrew said.
“The bastard,” Halse said with a fond edge.
“Yeah,” he choked out as he bent to the textbook.
The straw edge cut into his nostril. He lined it up and tilted his chin, inhaling in one long burning go. Fire poured through his sinuses and dripped a liquid astringent rush down the back of his throat. He tipped his head up with a gagging swallow. His eyes watered. Riley stole the straw and muscled him aside, the lines of their legs pressed together. He finished his fast.
Andrew stared at him while he blinked and snuffled. Riley occupied two worlds but neither matched the other, and Eddie had straddled that same impossible divide without effort or concern. The blistering noise of the crowd outside battered his screaming nerves as the leash around Andrew’s neck slipped another notch looser.
“Let’s light something on fire,” Halse said.
“Fuck yeah,” Riley growled back.
The pair hustled him outside with broad hands and toothy smiles. He found himself standing with Riley in front of the unlit bonfire, the thirty or so boys spread out in the yard around them hollering and carrying on.
“Ready?” Halse said from behind him, so close to his ear he felt the gust of hot breath.
“Give it,” he said, sticking his hand out.
“Back up.” Halse jerked him by the belt loop, and he staggered back a few more feet from the pit.
The sun set like a tether snapping. He felt the change, night coming in like a stinging slap on the soles of his feet. The woods loomed on the outskirts of the property, blacker than any city night. Eddie had been here too, without him. A lighter flicked. The soft whoosh of the rag catching set him ablaze inside, threatening raw orange glow kicking his heart against his ribs. The blur of chemicals and liquor and heat on his wrist all stung as drops of sizzling gas speckled him. He heard himself laugh, and then Halse said, “Throw it.”
He pitched the bottle into the pile of wood and scraps so hard it shattered wit
h a burst of flame and glass. The crowd roared. He staggered through a laugh that kept on going into wheezing giggles, and Riley jostled him with an elbow in turn. He tripped. Halse caught him around the waist to buffer his fall, his cackle closer to a snarl of delight in the flickering hot glow.
“You’re totally fucked, good, awesome,” he said.
“Halse,” Andrew slurred.
“Call me Sam, bitch.” He patted Andrew’s cheek, almost a smack, then grabbed his chin in a squeeze that puckered his mouth. “I gotta go make friends and host and shit. Riley, keep him busy.”
The support of his muscled arm and bony hand disappeared at once as he withdrew into the crowd. Andrew wavered in place, spat a mouthful of bitter saliva on the ground. The roar and glow of the bonfire cast jumping shadows over anonymous faces and bodies. The lines of strong fingers haunted his stinging cheek. His eager pulse raced, teetering on the edge of nausea.
“Come on, let’s go find Ethan,” Riley said.
Tunnel vision. He placed his feet in the exact track of the other boy’s, eyes on his heels, chaos spilling off around them. He wasn’t certain if he followed for hours or minutes. When Riley abruptly whooped and leapt up onto another man, Andrew almost ran into them, staggering to a stop. Ethan’s shouted greeting slipped out of Andrew’s head in an instant, pushed loose by Ethan’s hands clutching Riley’s ass; Riley’s legs locked around Ethan’s waist. His dark eyes glinted in the ghost of firelight. Riley’s lips slanted over Ethan’s, sloppy, hungry, a flash of wet tongue—half on his mouth, half on his face. Andrew’s hands hung loose at his sides. He swayed a step backward, and another, head blank. Riley’s shirt rode up. He had dimples at the small of his back, divots for Ethan’s grip to settle onto. Riley braced his forearms on Ethan’s shoulders to lift his seat higher and press closer on his—friend. Ethan’s hands squeezed at his thighs. Spit glistened between their moving mouths.
Andrew fled, and the crowd swallowed him up. He clapped a stranger’s shoulder and took the bottle from his hand to pour half a lukewarm beer down his throat. The man shoved him good-naturedly and blustered about getting him another drink. Andrew floated like driftwood in a sea of crushing voices and unfamiliar faces. The bridge of his nose stung. A drip of heat rolled over his upper lip. He swiped his tongue out, tasting blood.
Behind him, a man said, “Can’t believe Halse lets those faggots come around here.”
Andrew bunched his shirt up and held it to his nose. Red spread across the fabric and behind his eyes.
Another man said, “I hear the last one he got all buddied up with cut his wrists. Guess that one’s boyfriend is hanging around too, now. Can’t get fucking rid of them.”
“Well, one of them’s his cousin—”
Andrew’s heel slipped on the damp grass as his knuckles slammed into cheekbone and eye socket with devastating accuracy. The shit-talker’s head whipped back. He dropped to the ground in a stone-still sprawl. One observer’s shocked yelp ripped through the raucous music. The second man grabbed Andrew’s shirt and cocked a fist, shouting “Fuck you—”
Andrew flipped his grip on the bottle in his hand and smashed it into the man’s ribs with a sick-hollow thud. He crumpled around the blow and his raised fist foundered to a bruising grip on Andrew’s arm. His stumbling weight took them both to the ground. Andrew saw nothing but flashes of color, air forced out of his lungs. He snarled and slammed his forehead into the bloodied face above him. The crunch of cartilage was unmistakable. He lost his bottle. An elbow glanced off his jaw and snapped his head into the ground. His skull bounced off the dirt. He jammed his fingers into the open mouth above him and yanked, so the man reared up with a yowl. He got on top without knowing how he did it, planting a knee in someone’s gut. A second pair of arms came around his shoulder and throat, trying to choke him out.
“Hey, hey, hey!” Halse’s voice rang out.
The pressure disappeared from his throat. Hands in his hair and shirt hauled him to his feet. His head lolled back onto Halse’s shoulder, eyes rolling; he caught sight of Riley standing offside with his mouth hanging open in surprise. Halse snorted and popped him casually on the jaw, a disciplinary slap that made his vision go patchy.
“Blur, is there a reason you’re trying to murder my fucking guests?” Halse asked.
Andrew considered the man on the ground, struggling to find his knees and sliding on the grass. The one standing, the one who’d been choking him, eye swollen ripe from Andrew’s initial punch, spat on the ground. For a second Andrew was impressed with himself; he wasn’t a big guy, and the one he’d knocked on his ass was built.
“Talking about Eddie,” he slurred through an aching mouth.
“Man, who the hell is that,” gasped the one whose ribs he’d tried to break.
“This young man is a good friend of mine,” Halse said. His jovial tone set Andrew’s survival instincts pinging. Halse lowered him in a controlled fall, and he sprawled on his ass while the other man paced over to the pair of strangers. The strangers drew together, sensing the same threat. “What kind of shit were you talking, and who invited you to my home?”
“Hey, you know us,” the standing man said uncertainly.
His friend, though, stared silent at Andrew’s face. His nose was crooked, a mask of blood painting him from hair to shirt collar. Andrew grinned. “Called Riley a fag,” he offered without breaking the glowering eye contact.
“Oh, did he,” Halse said.
The crowd had gone still around them, ripples of hushed conversation spreading through the circle. Andrew wiped his face again. His fingers bled sluggishly, split on someone’s teeth. When he put his hand on the ground, pain and something other pulsed up his forearm from the grass, the earth he was oozing onto, clinging to his bones with a tar-stickiness. The surrounding forest rustled in an eerie cacophony of wind and leaves. Halse popped his shoulders and sighed, then hauled his foot back and drove it into the prone man’s stomach. He gagged twice and balled up into a shaking huddle.
His friend stepped over him as if he were going to retaliate, but Halse pointed a finger in his face and said, “I’ll kill you. I will kill you if you look at me again. Get out. Take your friend with you.”
Andrew lay back, the starlit sky streaming and shifting above him. The damp grass on the side of his face let him know he’d collapsed. Music shrieked along without pause. A cold can slipped into his fist. He mumbled a thanks and pressed it to his forehead. Beer splashed on his skin. A boot skimmed over his ribs. He blinked up at Halse standing over him. Both his hands were tucked in his back pockets, drawing his jeans skin-tight over his crotch. Andrew dragged his stare up another couple feet to Halse’s chin, tipped at a considering angle. Andrew focused on the sensation of bony ankles and the heels of shoes digging in on both sides of his hips.
“Are you concussed?” Halse asked.
“Holy shit,” Riley said, and he appeared beside them, crouching. “I only lost you for like, ten minutes, dude.”
Andrew let him tilt his head and observe his pupils. Halse waited. Riley reached for the hem of his tank, stripped it over his head, and wadded it up. The long, angry red scars under his pectorals were unexpected. Andrew stopped his hand halfway while reaching out to touch, to trace them with his fingers like he had with his eyes.
“Hold still, fuckass,” Riley said and scrubbed at Andrew’s face with the sweat-damp shirt.
Andrew dropped his hand to the ground, struggling to prop himself up on his elbows. Halse loomed, staring out at the surrounding revelers with his hackles up. Riley said, “For the record, don’t defend my virtue, I don’t give a shit.”
“Eddie’s,” he corrected. The inside of his mouth was a wreck. He stuck his tongue into split skin along his molars on the left side. “They said Eddie…”
“Riley, take him home,” Halse said.
He swung his leg over Andrew’s torso and flicked a wave at them over his shoulder. The tall woman Andrew had noticed before fell in next to him and follo
wed him into the crowd, which sorted itself out again in Halse’s absence.
“I’m going to throw up,” he said.
Riley tipped him onto his side and he puked, which was agonizing in the extreme. Adrenaline leaked out with the wet tracks of reflexive tears. The cold shiver that ran across his skin presaged another heave. He spat bitterness and blood. The rest was a blur, a cotton shirt shoved under his oozing nose, bare skin supporting him. Then he was in the bench seat, his feet propped out the open window, the breeze nipping him as they drove.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
“Don’t be. I wouldn’t let someone talk shit about him either. And he was your—you know, he was yours, you were together.”
“No,” Andrew said. “It wasn’t like that. We weren’t like that.”
“What,” Riley said, twisting in his seat and glancing away from the road.
Andrew met his eyes for a split second before closing his own against the accusation he saw there, the hurt wedged like a splinter under a fingernail. “I’m not gay.”
“Oh my god,” Riley murmured. His laugh was forced and, Andrew thought, incredulous. “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me. You’re serious?”
“The scars you’ve got,” he said instead.
“Eddie helped me pay for it. Generous guy. We’re not having that conversation while you’re this fucked up,” Riley said.
Andrew subsided. The night whipped past in silence. His knuckles hurt. And he kept hearing Riley say he was your—on loop. What word should he put after? On paper, a sibling; in practice, something else. If Eddie had been Riley’s friend, he wasn’t that for Andrew. That friendship was a muted fraction of the real thing, the marrow-thing, that tied them together. Through the cavern and their hauntings since, through a life spent with Eddie keeping him leashed but cared for at the same time, he couldn’t find a label that fit where he needed it to go. Maybe instead, just a hard stop: he was yours.
