That did not ease Jeremy’s mind at all though when he thought about the fact he’d been gone 48 hours and Mooncricket had a tendency to wander off. Not to mention, he had forgotten and left his car keys on the kitchen counter. The last thing he needed was to wake up and find his junkie boyfriend had rammed his car into a ditch or drove it off into a gravel pit.
He needn’t have worried about any of that though. He unlocked the barn doors and stepped out into the rising heat of early morning and found Mooncricket leaning against the side of the barn. Judging by the empty vodka bottle, overflowing ashtray and lone fruit cup that rolled around in the playful breeze, Mooncricket had camped out beside the barn for at least one night. He was staring off into the distance, head tipped back against the weathered boards and legs sprawled in a V. A needle dangled from his arm, which looked faintly bluish thanks to the tourniquet still wrapped around it. Jeremy’s heart lunged in his chest when he first saw Mooncricket; thoughts of him overdosing lighting up his mind like wildfire. Then he saw Mooncricket’s chest rise like a slowly inflating balloon and he made a soft muttering sound under his breath.
Jeremy went to him and knelt in the dew-wet grass beside Mooncricket to untie the tourniquet and pluck the needle from his vein. A thread-thin stream of blood squirted from the tiny hole when he did because of the hasty removal of the syringe. Mooncricket didn’t even stir as Jeremy massaged his arm to get the blood circulating once more. As the flesh began to pinken and warm beneath his hands, Jeremy sagged with relief. He didn’t know how long Mooncricket had been sitting there, but at least it hadn’t been long enough to permanently damage his arm due to lack of circulation.
“You moron,” he said with no heat to the words. He patted Mooncricket’s cheek, eliciting no response except a slow, dull blink. “You could’ve lost your arm if I had been an hour later coming out here.” He hit Mooncricket a little harder. “Wake up,” he snapped. “Come on.”
Mooncricket wasn’t overdosing, if he had been then he’d already be half dead, but he was way, way out somewhere Jeremy couldn’t reach him. He smelled of the cheap vodka he favored and his responses—what responses there were—were slow and more dulled reflex than anything actually conscious. Mooncricket was, in a word, wasted.
After another minute spent trying to rouse him even though he knew it was a fruitless effort, Jeremy took his wrists and started to drag him back to the house. Normally he would have carried Mooncricket, but he still wasn’t one hundred percent up to par, he felt too weak and a touch unsteady on his feet. Jeremy worried that if he tried to pick him up right then that they would both end up on the ground.
It took a while, but Jeremy got Mooncricket inside the house and into bed. He laid him on his side, covered him up then watched him another few minutes just to make sure he was going to make it. When he’d managed to convince himself that he would, Jeremy went to clean himself up. He crawled into bed beside Mooncricket who was completely knocked out and snoring softly by then. Jeremy sketched and kept an eye on him while he slept, only getting up to eat and use the bathroom when he needed to. In the late afternoon, he fixed himself a spike and shot up then slid down in bed beside Mooncricket, spooning against his back while he drifted.
When he woke again it was fully dark and Mooncricket was sitting up in bed beside him, eating a popsicle and flipping through Jeremy’s sketchbook.
“Hey,” Jeremy said when Mooncricket turned to look at him.
“You drew me,” Mooncricket said. He smiled, lips stained obscenely red from the cherry popsicle. “A lot. When’d you do these?”
“Earlier while you were passed out,” Jeremy said. He pushed himself up in bed then reached out and ran his hand over the back of Mooncricket’s head. “You scared the shit out of me.”
“Nuh-uh, no way, dude,” Mooncricket said. He put the sketchbook aside so he could curl up next to Jeremy and rest his head on his shoulder. “You scared the shit outta me. You don’t got the upper hand or whatever here. You were gone in there forever and I couldn’t get you to say nothing or anything. I was so freaked out.”
“So you waited by the door and got bombed?”
“I didn’t know what else to do,” Mooncricket said. “You told me not to call nobody and I was bugging out. So I thought… I dunno what I thought. I mean. Yeah.”
“It was very sweet of you.” Jeremy kissed him and smiled when he pulled back.
Mooncricket shrugged. “I guess. I was thinking, like, if you didn’t come outta there soon, I was totally gonna bust the door down or something and come get you ‘cause… ‘cause…”
“You were scared.”
“Yeah, Jeremy, I was. I’ve been scared since you came in here looking like fucking roadkill. That was so bad.”
“I’m all right now.” That wasn’t entirely true; his hearing still wasn’t as good as it used to be and there were still faint aches and pains, but it was mostly true.
“Really? You mean it?”
“Uh-huh,” Jeremy said. He kissed Mooncricket again, crowding him back until they both slid down in the bed and Jeremy loomed over him. “Want me to show you?”
“Like in a porno way?” Mooncricket started to grin as he set his popsicle aside to melt in the ashtray on the nightstand.
“Triple X guaranteed,” Jeremy said.
Mooncricket laughed as he leaned up to kiss Jeremy. His mouth tasted like sugared cherries and citric acid and Jeremy swallowed it down until Mooncricket’s laughter became moans and soft cries.
Later, Jeremy watched Mooncricket scratch his arms while he contemplated the egg roll on his plate. They were still naked, sitting at the kitchen table; goosebumps prickled Mooncricket’s skin and his long hair hung over his shoulders and in his face, loops and snarls of black vines tangled around him. Jeremy picked up a pen on the table and began to sketch Mooncricket on the back of an envelope that’s front promised him term life insurance at the lowest rates imaginable.
As he sketched, Jeremy said, “Eat the damn egg roll, Mooncricket.”
“Yeah, but like, I’m not that hungry,” he said.
“I don’t care,” Jeremy said. “Just because you’re not hungry doesn’t mean you shouldn’t eat. So do it.”
“Fuck, dude, whatever.” Mooncricket wasn’t happy about it, but he picked up the egg roll and took a bite anyway.
Jeremy went back to sketching, mind churning away, worrying at the biggest problem at hand. He stopped worrying when he realized the solution was a very simple one and he was over-thinking it in the extreme.
“We’ve been incommunicado with everyone for a few days,” Jeremy said as he shaded the hollow of Mooncricket’s cheek with black ink.
“Uh… Yes?” Mooncricket ventured.
“I mean, we haven’t been able to communicate with anyone lately.”
“Oh, yeah,” Mooncricket said with a nod. “We haven’t done that.”
“Right,” Jeremy said as he began to define the curves of Mooncricket’s lips. “So I was thinking. Why don’t you call Dawn Marie and see if she wants to hang out tonight? She’s cool and we should socialize.”
“But… um… you don’t like socializing,” Mooncricket said.
“I like it sometimes,” Jeremy said. “You trying to tell me you don’t want to hang out with your buddy?”
“No, no way, it’s not like that,” Mooncricket said hastily. “I’ll call her. I just… I meant that it was kinda… Ya know, never mind. It’s cool.”
Jeremy smiled to himself; Mooncricket was a highly sociable guy and he’d been cooped up and fretting for days on end. Of course he’d want to see his bestest pal, Dawn Marie Schuler.
“Then go call her,” Jeremy said. “We’ll drink some booze and do some drugs and it’ll be a good time.”
“Nice,” Mooncricket said. “I will do that right now.”
He didn’t waste any time getting up to call Dawn Marie after that and Jeremy smiled to himself as he listened to Mooncricket running his mouth. From what he gathered, Da
wn Marie was hungover and bored and some friend of hers was being a total weirdo.
“Then like, don’t invite him,” Mooncricket said. There was a pause and then he laughed. “So, you wanna party then, right?” Another pause. “Hell yeah. See ya in a little while then.”
He came back into the kitchen while Jeremy was filling in the loops of his hair. Mooncricket looked over his shoulder at what he was drawing and Jeremy leaned out of the way enough for him to see better.
“You drew me again,” Mooncricket said. Jeremy smiled at the pleased way he sounded. “But dude. You made the egg roll into a heart.”
“I know,” Jeremy said.
“I’m eating a heart.”
“Yes,” Jeremy said.
“Why?”
Jeremy shrugged and scratched his bare chest. “I don’t know. It just felt right.”
“Artists are so weird,” Mooncricket said as he leaned down to put his arms around Jeremy’s shoulders and kiss his jaw.
“We are all freaks, no doubt,” Jeremy said. He finished the last loop of Mooncricket’s hair then laid the drawing aside. He turned to Mooncricket and kissed his smiling mouth. When he pulled back again, he whispered against his lips, “You should probably put on pants if your friend is coming over.”
“Dude.” Mooncricket’s eyes got big and he started to laugh.
“What?” Jeremy asked.
“I totally forgot about that,” Mooncricket said.
“Come on then,” Jeremy said. “We’ll get dressed together. Can’t entertain company sans trousers.”
“I dunno, we could, but it’d be weird,” Mooncricket said as he followed him out of the kitchen. “Dawn Marie might like it though.”
“Oh, I’m sure she would,” Jeremy said. “She’s a very peculiar girl, Miss Dawn Marie.”
“Peculiar? She’s not that short,” Mooncricket said.
Jeremy sighed and didn’t bother correcting him.
They were dressed and ready within ten minutes and Mooncricket got a head start on the party by cracking open a new bottle of vodka. Jeremy drank a beer, tapping his finger against the side of the bottle while he waited.
An hour later, he heard the crunch of tires on the gravel driveway and headlights cut through a gap in the living room curtains.
“Party on,” Jeremy murmured as he rose to go meet their guest at the door.
He opened it before she even knocked and his smile when he saw Dawn Marie was genuine.
“Hey, Germy,” Dawn Marie said as she slipped past him into the foyer.
“Hello, Dawn Marie,” Jeremy said as he followed her toward the living room. “It’s so good to see you again.”
Dawn Marie shot him a look over her shoulder, one part suspicion, one part bemusement. “And a pleasure to see you, too, freak potato,” Dawn Marie said.
“Dawn!” Mooncricket stood at the mouth of the hallway, bottle of vodka in one hand and a joint in the other. “Come do shots with me.”
“Damn straight,” Dawn Marie said as she went to greet him.
Jeremy trailed along behind her, taking his time because this was a party and he was in no rush. Tonight was going to be a beautiful night.
27
When in doubt, take a long, hot soak in the tub and try to forget your worries. That was Tobias’s philosophy on life. Dawn Marie often joked that the only thing standing between Tobias and a vagina of his very own was an aromatherapy candle.
Since the incident at Old Home Week, Tobias had skulked around the house and the funeral parlor in a black mood. He was snappish and quick to get annoyed with anyone and everyone in his path. When he wasn’t snarling like a sleepy old bear, he was brooding and quiet; troubled. A feeling of profound anxiousness followed him everywhere he went, even down into sleep where he dreamed of faces he was sure he recognized, but could give no names to. Dawn Marie finally got well and truly annoyed with him and told him he could have the house to himself and be a bitch to the walls if that was what he wanted to do; she didn’t care because she was going out.
Tobias roused himself from his sullen funk long enough to tell her to be careful, then he resumed his staring contest with Lenore. He assured himself that because he had foreseen her death at Keith’s hands, she would be all right for a little while. He could only hope so because he could not keep her glued to his side or locked inside Gallagher House until the end times no matter how much an overprotective part of his nature insisted he do exactly that.
She had been gone about fifteen minutes before Tobias rose from the sofa in the great room to go run himself a bath. It certainly wouldn’t cure his ills, but it might soothe the ache in his back that almost never let up anymore and perhaps a warm washcloth laid across his burning eyes would help them because eye drops didn’t do a thing.
He lowered himself into the deep old claw-footed bathtub with a groan and sat there, letting the hot water unknot his tense muscles. Steam drifted in lazy curls and left a fine sheen of moisture over the parts of himself he had not submerged. For all of five seconds, Tobias entertained the idea of masturbating; it was a nice, quick way to relieve tension though not something he often found himself feeling he just had to do. He sank down in the tub even more and tilted his head back against the lip of enamel-coated steel behind him and laughed as he thought of the many terms used to describe it. His favorite was strangle ye olde crotch fowle, courtesy of a long ago email from Hylas. I’ll stop blathering at you now because I have the urge to go strangle ye olde crotch fowle, the exact line had been. It had taken Tobias a couple of minutes to realize he meant he was going to choke the chicken. Then he’d found the whole thing highly inappropriate, but funny.
“I really miss him,” Tobias told Lenore, who was perched on the side of the tub, breathing in steam that made her finer feathers frizz. He sighed and dunked his washcloth in the hot water, folded it then closed his eyes to drape it over them.
One hour and a lot of hot water later, Tobias finished his bath by washing his hair then climbed out. The bathroom was shrouded in steam so thick it was like fog, drifting and dipping on invisible currents of air. Tobias dried himself off then used the towel to wipe the fog from the mirror so he could see to comb his hair.
For a second, he stared at his water-smudged reflection, wondering why the light had gotten so dim. Tobias frowned and picked up the hand towel to dry the mirror better. When he pulled his hand away, his reflection smiled at him.
“There you are.”
Tobias loosed a startled curse and stumbled back from the mirror. It was not his reflection at all. It was his dead brother.
“Whoa, hey, chill out,” Hylas said. “I didn’t mean to startle you, but okay, I see the problem now. I probably should’ve announced myself a little better, huh?”
“This is not happening,” Tobias muttered as he squeezed his eyes closed.
“Go ahead and count to ten if you really have to,” Hylas said. “I’ll wait.”
Tobias opened his eyes again well before reaching ten and Hylas smiled at him.
“Yeah, it’s weird,” he said. “I’m really sorry, Tobias. I swear I didn’t mean to— Hey, so. You’re naked.”
“Fuck,” Tobias hissed as he snatched the towel off the counter and wrapped it around his waist.
“No need to hide your junk from me, but I get it,” Hylas said with a shrug. “You always have been kind of a prude.”
“You are not real,” Tobias said. “I’ve lost my mind. I have completely— No. I’m dreaming. I fell asleep in the tub and I’m dreaming. I just need to wake up.”
“Pinch yourself if you want,” Hylas said. “The offer stands: I will wait.”
Tobias pinched himself viciously, so hard the pain made him jump a bit. Still, he persisted, going so far as to twist his fingers into the flesh of his upper arm.
“Okay, I take it back,” Hylas said. “Quit it. You’re hurting me just watching that shit.”
“Oh, my God,” Tobias said.
“That’s what I nee
d to talk to you about,” Hylas said.
“You need to talk to me about God?” Tobias asked. That was it; he really had gone stark raving mad and it had happened so quickly; he really hadn’t seen it coming.
“What? No, not like that,” Hylas said. “But kind of.”
“Hylas…” Tobias trailed off as he raked his fingers through his hair.
“I know I’m freaking you out, but I swear, you’re not any crazier than you were two hours ago,” Hylas said. “Just hear me out, all right? I would love to hang out in your mirror and shoot the breeze all night because I miss you like hell, but now is not the time. When I said there’s something I really need to tell you, I meant it. I lost the thread for a while there or well, I don’t know if I ever really had it. This stuff is hard when you go a long time without doing it, especially after you totally forget it to begin with.”
Hylas waved his hands with a grumble and Tobias groaned, gritted his teeth and tried to look away, but could not because it was Hylas. Real or not, he was right there and talking to him again.
“I am getting way ahead of myself,” Hylas said. “Look, let me ask you something.”
“Fine,” Tobias said.
“Do you ever feel like you’re forgetting something? Something beyond important? Beyond, well, pretty much everything?”
“Yes,” Tobias said. “You know that.”
“Right, your dreams,” Hylas said. “But I mean more than that even. More like there’s something you should know or something you should do—or should be able to do—but for some reason you can’t? That instead of just forgetting something, you feel like you’re missing something? I know I felt like that lot, it didn’t bother me too much, but sometimes it’d creep up on me out of nowhere and it’d floor me and I don’t mean in an unexpected nap kind of way.”
“Always,” Tobias said after a moment. The feeling had haunted him his entire life, most of all when he felt powerless. He’d been impotent with rage during those times because he had been certain that he should not be powerless, not ever.
Falls the Shadow (Sparrow Falls Book 2) Page 37
