by Lolly Walter
Joe traced the edges of a scrape on Devin’s knee. “And then you came here.”
“Not at first. I thought I’d stay up in the hills. I didn’t know anything else. I hadn’t been outside our house in twelve years.”
“You must have been so scared.”
“The only world I knew was inside that house or in my mom’s books. I knew the real world was completely different, but I didn’t know how to live in it. Holing up, pretending none of it existed, that Tanner hadn’t died, sounded so much better. But—”
“You had to eat.”
“At the end, all I had left was tomato paste. Red and sticky like his blood. A stain of it, of his blood, ran through the house where I dragged him after he got shot. I couldn’t stand to look at it.” Devin shivered, remembering the way it streaked and soaked the carpet. It had smelled. “It started to feel like the whole house was covered in blood. I had nightmares where I was drowning in blood. I spilled the tomato paste one day. It dribbled over the counter, and I lost it. I ran out of the house and didn’t go back.”
Joe nodded like Devin had been rational. “How did you end up at Flights of Fantasy?”
“Tanner had told me about the city. He had said people still lived down there. People might mean food, and I was so alone, Joe. I…” Devin laid his hand over Joe’s. “I slept right next to him, talked to him every day, laughed with him. Being alone like that, I couldn’t do it. So anyway, he said people, and people meant food—”
“And warm bodies.”
“Right. Warm bodies. So I came down toward the tall buildings, hoping I’d find someone and we could, I don’t know, live together, anything to survive and have the closeness I had with Tanner. A scavenger found me. Tom.” Devin scoffed. “He was my hero for about sixty seconds.”
“What happened?”
“He told me I was beautiful. He called me a rare gem, I guess because I was white. I didn’t know there weren’t white people here. Didn’t know I was different. Tanner had always complained about black people and brown people, but he’d never said he was the only white person. Anyway, Tom turned out to be not so much a hero as a captor. He pulled a gun, told me I could choose: he’d sell me or he’d keep me as his ‘toy.’”
The shivering hadn’t fully gone away, and it turned into violent shaking. Joe pressed into Devin’s side and put his hand between Devin’s knees. He squeezed, and the firmness of his grip, his assurance, eased Devin’s anxiety.
“You don’t have to talk about this stuff,” Joe said.
“I don’t want to, but I think I need to. I’m tired of carrying it around.” Devin stretched out his legs.
Joe’s hand slid from his knee and up his thigh before pulling away.
If that hand had slid another few inches, Devin wouldn’t have stopped it. He wondered how he could be aroused and devastated at once. “I have to give it to Tom. He was honest about what he wanted, and he did give me a choice. He walked me to Flights of Fantasy, told me what it was about on the way. Then we met Boggs. He looked at me like I was a steak dinner, but he promised food and safety. Seemed a better bet than wandering around with Tom.”
“And he promised you girls.” Joe picked up a rock and threw it toward the stream that trickled through the trough left by the lake. “But you got me instead.”
“You were this living, breathing — I don’t know — manifestation of everything I didn’t want to be. Everything Tanner hated. All those books I read, they were clear. Boy meets girl. Falls in love. Never anything different. Tanner said men fucking men was unnatural. He said my dad would have hated me if I was a… If I was gay. I didn’t want my dad to hate me, crazy as it sounds. I sure as hell didn’t want Tanner to hate me.”
“Why would he even bring that up? The gender of the person you’re interested in matters a lot these days, at least if you want to go to America, but you two were so isolated. Why—”
“He wasn’t isolated. Just me. He went out every day to find us stuff to live off of. I mean, my parents were rich and, obviously, they stayed down here when everyone else left. Thought themselves survivalists, I guess. They had a shit-ton of stored food. But by the time I was twelve or so, we’d pretty much run out of it, except for the goddamned tomato paste. Tanner started leaving to find food, and he changed. Whatever happened out there, it made him harder, less forgiving. My sister Mattie died when she was a teenager, and she had art on her walls of naked guys. Tanner came home one day and caught me jacking it in her room.”
Joe shifted away, but Devin caught his arm and held on tight.
“He beat me up a bit and left again. When he came home, he smelled terrible and acted weird. He said that I couldn’t sleep next to him anymore if I was a fag. I didn’t even know what the word meant, but I promised it, swore I wasn’t one, said I hated fags. He started crying and told me he was sorry, that he loved me, but he said I couldn’t want to fuck men. I promised some more, and he let me sleep near him again.”
“Bad stuff was happening to him.” Joe gestured to the hills, then swept his arm back toward the east side of town. “You know how I told you our clients like the power they have over us?”
Devin nodded.
“It’s the same on the streets. Sex is for power and violence. It has nothing to do with love or attraction.”
“Is that what it was for you?”
Joe shrugged and fidgeted some more. “Sometimes, though I was on the receiving end. I never hurt anyone. But I used it.” He gave a half-smile that didn’t meet his eyes. “Sex was my currency, the way I got food or shelter, the way I got people bigger than me to protect me. Sometimes it was companionship, like with Bea. The only way I knew anything about love and attraction was because I know my dad loved my mom. I’d never felt it myself, not before you.”
He said it so easy this time, like Devin was supposed to have any idea what to do with it. The silence lingered between them while Devin tried to think of something to say.
“We should go soon,” Joe said. “We’re going to have to shower for days to get all this mud off us.”
He stood and offered Devin a hand.
Devin took it and levered himself up but didn’t let go. “You never had sex for love?”
Joe’s eyes lost focus. “I thought I did, at the time, but” — he steadied himself and met Devin’s eyes — “I was naive. Love and gratitude aren’t the same things. Which is why…”
He twisted his hand until Devin let go. Joe’s back bowed to the rain as he picked his way through the muck and grabbed his shirt. A few tree roots were exposed, and he used them to climb out of the lake bed. As he climbed, the taut muscles in his slim back flexed and released.
“Joe?” Devin said when his partner had reached the top of the bank.
Joe put his hands on his hips and waited.
“I’m not naive. I’m chickenshit.”
“You, papi, are no coward.” Joe offered his hand again, and even though Devin didn’t need to, he let Joe help him climb out of the mud.
Six
“Who’s our pretty girl?” Devin made a cooing sound. “That’s right, it’s you. It’s you, our little princess.”
Joe’s patience for Nina bordered on endless, but his patience for Devin and his baby-rearing skills was wearing thin. He rolled his eyes and tilted the bottle higher. Baby Nina, who was almost a month old now and learning new skills every day, gripped the bottle with her fist and sucked hard. The open room where the runners slept was empty except for them, so at least no one else was around to witness Devin’s baby talk.
“She has no idea what you’re saying. You know that, right?”
“It’s the tone, Joe. It matters. One of the books in my mom’s library had a newborn in it.” Devin dropped back into his baby voice and made a wide-eyed, dopey face at Nina, who watched him attentively. “Yes, it does. Yes, it does.”
On the pretense of lifting the bottle even higher, Joe elbowed Devin in the stomach. “It’s creeping me out. Plus, you
’re breathing my air.”
“Oh, grow up, you big baby,” Devin said, his face inches from Joe’s as he hovered over Nina. He dropped back onto his ass next to Joe on the couch. “Why are you so cranky? We have the day off.”
A late cancellation almost never happened. Today had been Joe and Devin’s lucky day, at least until they found out that Boggs wanted Ebony back on the job and whoever was left at the Flats to babysit.
“We don’t get paid if we don’t work. And we get to spend our day off watching a baby. You don’t think that sucks? We could be napping.”
“Aw, look at her.” Devin hummed and rubbed Nina’s belly. “She’s about asleep. We’ll take a nap then. Seriously, what’s got you cranky? I know it’s not that we’re missing out on sleep we weren’t expecting to get.”
Baby Nina’s belly gurgled. Joe handed off her now-empty bottle and rearranged her so her tummy pressed into his shoulder. He patted her back, hoping she’d burp soon and fall asleep. Of course, if she slept less during the day, maybe she’d sleep more at night. The trade-off might be worth it.
Devin reached his arm around Joe’s shoulders and rubbed Nina’s head. He turned a bit sideways on the couch and laid his other hand on Joe’s thigh. “Talk to me.”
Hoping to disguise the heat that coursed through his body at Devin’s touch, Joe laid his head against Nina’s. She smelled like sour milk and vanilla. He scrunched his nose and turned back to Devin, who was watching him, waiting for an answer.
No point in hiding the truth.
“It’s my dad’s birthday.”
Devin’s hand tightened on Joe’s thigh. Joe covered it for a moment, traced Devin’s bones, delicate things even in such a large man, before returning to the business of burping the baby.
“He’s still out there,” Devin said. His hand moved to Joe’s far hip while his other hand moved from Nina’s head to Joe’s arm.
The intimacy of being held was so foreign that it made Joe uncomfortable. He did the holding. He’d never been held, not that he could remember. “He is, and it shouldn’t bother me. He’s been gone a long time. Nine years.”
“Well—”
The door to the room flew open, thudding against the wall. Bea stormed in, red-faced and scowling, followed by Victor, whose hunched shoulders and furtive glances at Bea’s back made him appear less menacing. Bea was halfway to her bed when she caught sight of Joe and Devin sitting on the couch, Devin’s arms still around Joe. Her expression grew darker.
“Oh, my God, Joe, you’re turning into such a pussy. Holding a baby with your man-wife? Pathetic.”
“You’re jealous ’cause you’re not the one sitting here with him.” Devin’s voice came out languid and quiet, but his hand squeezed Joe’s hip like a vise.
“Fuck you, bitch. You don’t know shit.” Bea took off her earrings, required accessories for female runners, and threw them on her bed. She glanced at Victor, who was skulking to her right and eyeing the baby, then flipped her attention back to Devin. “Dumb fucker.”
“Don’t curse in front of the baby,” Devin said, and Joe would have covered his face with his hands if he wasn’t using them both to hold and burp the baby. He didn’t want Devin to fight, but he did want the guy to sound tough. Worrying about the baby’s delicate ears wasn’t going to convince anyone that Devin shouldn’t be messed with.
Bea barked out a laugh that Victor echoed, though his sounded distracted. The baby burped, and Joe moved her from his shoulder and cradled her in his arms.
“Unzip me, Victor. The baby doesn’t know it’s swearing, you stupid blond giant.”
Bea was wearing a tight blue dress today. Long, lean legs, finely muscled, were displayed with such careless grace. Victor unzipped her, exposing what Joe knew was soft, tender skin. He had never been attracted to Bea, not like the heated, desperate arousal Devin stoked in him, but he’d loved her, in a way. Like a friend.
Next to him, Devin shifted, turning his head to the side while Bea changed. “It’s not polite to look,” he whispered, “even if she is a first-class super-bitch.”
“She’s not, papi. I hurt her. She deserved better than what I did. She was good to me, kind, and I repaid her by dumping her when something better came along.”
“I know the whole time she was kind, you were, too.” Devin said it with such conviction. He was right, of course.
Joe had been kind and careful with Bea. He’d held her at night while she cried for a mother and little sister who’d been raped and killed by scavengers. The nightmares, God. When she’d first come to Flights of Fantasy, she’d awakened the whole A dorm with her screams. Joe hadn’t been her partner then, but he’d comforted her, promised her better, promised she was safe and her mother and sister were at peace. And then he’d ditched her. There hadn’t been one kind thing about what he’d done.
“Until I latched onto you and she got stuck with Victor.”
Devin’s lips stretched into a smile against Joe’s ear. His hot breath gave Joe chills. “You think I’m something better?”
Joe moved his hand off the baby’s diapered bottom and slipped his fingertips along the underside of Devin’s forearm. “I know you’re something better.”
The smile against Joe’s ear got bigger, and Devin’s hand slid from Joe’s shoulder to his hair, raking through it, pulling lightly. It took a mighty effort for Joe to keep his eyes from rolling back in his head in pleasure.
“You two are disgusting.” Bea snorted in what was probably meant to be derision, but her wet eyes gave her away. “You make me sick.”
She hitched up too-large gray sweatpants that had belonged to Joe and flopped onto her bed.
“See, underneath the anger, she’s hiding a lot of hurt,” Joe whispered. Guilt gnawed at him, but he wasn’t going to — couldn’t — change the arrangement he’d made with Boggs. Bea would heal in time.
Devin nodded. He stood and walked over to Bea. She warily watched his approach but didn’t protest when he sat at the foot of her mattress.
“I’m sorry.”
The words were barely audible, but they sounded sincere. Bea swiped at her eyes and kicked Devin in the ribs. She hadn’t kicked hard, and he didn’t flinch.
“You’re right, you know,” Devin continued. “I took Joe from you and it wasn’t fair.”
“Yeah, well, life isn’t fair.” Bea pivoted to the side, reached into her blue suitcase, and extracted a tiny army of stuffed animals. Bears, penguins, puppies, tigers — one by one, she threw them at Devin.
“Fun times at the Flats, Efraín.”
Joe jumped at the voice behind him. He’d been so focused on Devin and Bea that he’d lost track of Victor.
“You’d better not let anyone hear you call me that. Boggs’ll string you up by the balls if word gets back to him.”
Bea hit Devin with a stuffed koala bear.
“Ain’t nobody here, baby.” Victor kept his voice low. “We’re safe.”
Joe shuddered. Victor had said those words to him almost every day when they’d been together on the streets. “We’re safe.” He’d pat Joe on the shoulder, have sex with him, tell him he loved him, then pimp him out for food or supplies.
“I’m not a child anymore, Victor. Leave me alone.”
When Victor didn’t answer, Joe chanced diverting his attention from Devin and Bea and the flying stuffed animals and glanced at Victor.
Victor pushed his silky black hair away from his face and leaned over Joe’s shoulder, his eyes fixed on the baby. When he reached out, his hand skipped any contact with Joe and instead cupped Nina’s bare brown foot. He stroked her chubby toes.
“Ours was lighter-skinned, remember, Efraín? More my color than Ebony’s. She was so beautiful. I thought…” Victor trailed off and traced the lines of Nina’s fat folds.
“We thought we’d be a family.” The words slipped out before Joe could stop them. That lost baby had been their everything. She’d been their hope and promise of something better, some
thing more than whoring in east Austin. Ebony seemed to have recovered. When Zeke had shown up at Flights of Fantasy, he’d been a godsend, rugged and strong, quiet and kind. He and Ebony connected so quickly that it took the group by surprise. Joe moved on, too, given up that idea of safety and hope and family. It hadn’t been hard after Victor beat him half to death when the baby died. All his illusions about what they could be were knotted and severed in a whirl of blood and broken bones.
But Victor… Joe hadn’t stuck around to find out what happened to a grieving fifteen-year-old father with a propensity for violence. As soon as Victor left the next day, Joe and Ebony ran. They fled under the big highway that cleaved Austin in two and wandered downtown until they saw the sign for Flights of Fantasy. They didn’t know what it was. All they wanted was help. Well, they’d gotten it, in a sense.
“Let me hold her,” Victor said. He’d moved onto the couch next to Joe.
Joe squeezed Nina a little closer. “I’m not sure—”
“You’re a horrible fucking bastard.” Bea’s voice, ragged and choked with tears, recaptured Joe’s attention. She must have run out of stuffed animals, because she lunged forward and slapped Devin’s face. “I hate you.”
Devin nodded like he deserved it, and Bea slapped him again. And again. And again.
“You took everything from me. You ruined it all.” Slap. Slap. “I hate you. I hate you.” Bea put her weight into it and shoved Devin off her mattress.
“I’m really sorry we hurt you.” Devin gestured behind him toward Joe. “He’s sorry.”
Bea paused, hands on Devin’s shoulder, braced for another shove. “I know.” Her hands slid down Devin’s arm and into her lap. “I know he is. But that doesn’t make it fair or right.”
