by John Inman
Still, Ned saw nothing to really frighten him as he stared at the empty window. What had been dusk outside only minutes earlier was now a soul-killing, fathomless black. Only far in the distance where fires in the center of the city still burned did a shimmer of light gleam across the horizon. Poor downtown. Ned knew those streets and buildings like he knew the back of his hand. He wondered if when this was all over, there would be anything left of the city he knew at all. That was assuming this mess would ever be over. At the moment, it looked doubtful.
Joe moved up behind him, and Ned sensed him gazing over his shoulder. He was staring through the window too. Ned directed his words to Joe’s ears alone, already relishing Joe’s nearness, Joe’s heat. Thankful for his presence. “Night fell early,” he said softly.
Joe pressed his chest to Ned’s back, closing the gap between them even more. “I’m not sure it’s really night. It might actually be….”
“No!” Ned pleaded. “Please. Don’t say it. It’s not the end. I know it isn’t.”
Gently, Joe relented. “All right. I won’t say it.”
Ned shook himself, seeking something a little less soul-crushing to think about. Anything to take his mind off the avalanche of inky darkness that had suddenly crashed down upon them. “Do you think we’re safe here?”
“No,” Joe said. “The light’s completely gone. Until the morning comes, I’m not sure we’re safe anywhere. That’s assuming the morning comes at all.”
A chill shot through Ned to hear such words from Joe, but he wasn’t surprised Joe had said them. Like Joe, Ned was pretty sure the danger had intensified too. With this sudden loss of light, even Mr. Wong seemed to think it had. But still, it couldn’t be as bad as Joe was implying. He wouldn’t believe it. Not yet.
Ned leaned back into Joe, who was holding his hands out to either side of Ned, waving them near the gas flames on the stove, trying to get them warm.
“What do you think?” Ned quietly asked. “What should we do?”
“I’m thinking,” Joe said, slipping sideways to stand beside Ned so they could both absorb a little of the heat. “I can’t believe the police still haven’t come about the dead guy in the freezer.”
“Me either,” Ned said. “I guess they really do have bigger fish to fry.” The heat felt good. Having Joe near felt even better. Not knowing what was going to happen next felt terrible. Ned’s throat was dry, and his stomach was a tight ball of misery. He had never known such fear. The total loss of light in the evening sky had rattled him severely.
A sputter of gunfire erupted outside. It sounded close, but not too close. Ned instinctively ducked, waiting for the deli’s front window to explode in a spray of glass. When it didn’t, he allowed himself a sigh of relief.
“Idiots still being idiots,” Mr. Wong carped. He and Bobby were sitting side by side on the floor in the corner, hugging their knees. They too were staring at the front window as if uneasy with the fact that little more than a quarter inch of plate glass separated them from the crazy people on the street. A siren wailed in the distance, but it was moving farther away, not closer. It didn’t sound like a police car anyway. It sounded like a fire truck. Again Ned worried about downtown, wondering if the people had escaped the buildings that were burning.
Joe took Ned’s hand and pulled him gently toward the opposite corner of the kitchen—in the back, far away from the flickering rings of flame on the stove—where the shadows lay deepest. He tugged him down to the floor so they could sit together with their backs to the wall. Joe wrapped his arm around Ned, and like Mr. Wong and his son, they tucked their knees up under their chins and settled in close to each other. Ned had never felt so loved and protected in his life. It was colder in this dark corner, farther away from the heat and light of the stove, but Ned didn’t mind. He was with Joe. That was all that mattered.
While Mr. Wong and Bobby talked softly in their own little well of shadow across the room, Joe leaned in, pulled Ned’s hand to his lips, and whispered for Ned alone to hear.
“Are you okay?” he asked. His voice was soft. His warm lips were even softer, moving like folds of satin over Ned’s knuckles.
Ned had to smile. “Oddly enough, even scared to death, I’ve never been better.”
Joe’s lips twisted into an answering smile. Ned could feel it on his hand.
Another explosion of gunfire echoed down the street. Once again, a scream rang out, then silence.
Ned let his head drop to Joe’s shoulder. He spoke as quietly as he could so he wouldn’t be overheard by Bobby or Mr. Wong. “Can I talk about us for a minute?” Ned asked. In his imagination he saw his breathless words sliding through the darkness to Joe’s ears, like birds, winging home.
Joe hadn’t shaved before they left the apartment, and now, as Joe used the back of Ned’s hand to stroke his own cheek, Ned shivered with sexual energy at the bristly, masculine feel of it.
“My favorite topic. Us,” Joe cooed, snuggling closer, exciting Ned even more.
Ned let the shadows and the cold settle around them while he tried to forget about the rising bulge in his pants. He cast about for the words he wanted to say. Then, unplanned, the words simply spilled out in a fevered rush. “I always thought the world hated me, Joe. I mean, the world the way it used to be. I even understood the hatred, because I hated myself too. Ashamed of who I was, what I was. Disgusted being me, being queer. I realize now it was the people who put this scar on my head, and other people like them, who made me feel that way.” In the dark, the fingers of his free hand navigated toward the welt of scar tissue under his hair. He stroked it idly, absentmindedly, like a child twiddling the corner of a favorite pillow. “Because of you, Joe, I’m not ashamed anymore. I don’t care what people think. Being gay is a blessing now. It’s a blessing that brought me to you. And you to me.”
Joe pressed a kiss to Ned’s brow. “It’s a blessing for both of us. I wasn’t ashamed of who I was, but I think I used my gayness like a shield. To push people away. To seclude myself. I think maybe if you hadn’t come along, I could have spent the rest of my life alone and not even minded much, not even regretting I had no one in my life.”
“And now?” Ned quietly asked.
Again, Joe’s smile brushed warm across the back of Ned’s hand. Joe’s breath bristled the little blond hairs there, sending a jolt of happiness through him.
“And now,” Joe said, “the very thought of being alone, being without you, scares me to death. I promise you I’ll do everything I can not to let anything happen to you. I can’t promise I can protect us if the world decides to blow up in our faces. But I do know if the world survives all this, then we’ll survive with it. If there’s even a semblance of the old planet left to live on, I fully intend to live on it with you. Trust me, Ned. I won’t let anything but death or the end of the world tear us apart.”
“I believe you,” Ned whispered, the burn of tears in his eyes.
He twisted around to tuck his head under Joe’s chin and nestled his cheek into the warm softness of Joe’s jacket. He slid a hand under the hem of it, then burrowed under Joe’s shirt too, so he could feel Joe’s warm belly against the palm of his hand. The soft pelt of hair sprinkling Joe’s stomach and chest tickled his fingertips. He ached for sex, but at the moment, simply touching was enough. And knowing he was loved was more than enough. It was everything.
“We’re on the same side now, Joe. We’re allies. A team. We’re both fighting the same battle. The battle to stay together. I’m sorry about the city, about all the poor people out there. Not for those assholes on the street, maybe, but for everybody else. They’re just like us. Fighting to hold on to what they love. I don’t know what’s happening with the planet, but I think if we all pull through this, we’ll be better people for it. We’ll have caught a glimpse of what it means to lose everything. That has to change us for the better, Joe. It’s changed me already. I know it has.”
Joe brushed Ned’s forehead with his lips. “It’s changed
me too. Loving somebody does that, I guess. Even with all this crap going on, I feel blessed having you here in my arms. Feeling blessed is a new feeling for me.”
Ned’s heart felt like a balloon pumped full of too much air. “Joe….”
He burrowed deeper into Joe’s embrace, his fingers sliding over the warm wales of Joe’s rib cage now. Again, his body almost bucked with his need for Joe. To feel Joe’s iron cock buried inside him, maybe, or taste Joe’s juices spilling across his tongue while Joe’s back arched beneath him in release. To know he had pleased Joe in some way. To know he had pleased Joe in the same way Joe could please him, with nothing more than a look, a touch, a caress. A really fantastic fuck.
Ned squeezed his eyes shut and curled himself into a fetal position with his head in Joe’s lap. When Joe’s arms folded around him, Ned felt protected from whatever might come. He breathed his answer into Joe’s belly. “Love does change us,” he whispered back. “It changes everything.”
Ned heard the squeak of a cooler door, then the rustle of cellophane and the rattle of knives. He realized suddenly that Mr. Wong, true to form, was stirring about making sandwiches. When in doubt, eat. That was the Wong philosophy. Ned knew this because he’d been working for the man for two years.
As if Mr. Wong could read Ned’s thoughts, he started mumbling while he worked. “Have to keep up strength. And this pastrami too good to waste. Bobby, fetch pickles. The fat ones.”
Joe snorted softly. “After all, what’s Armageddon without a pastrami sandwich and a pickle?” To Mr. Wong, he said, “Ned and I have to go soon. We have to get to the zoo. We’ll be safer there, and the animals need our help.”
“No,” Mr. Wong said. “You not taking my Neddie anywhere. Not yet. First you eat. Maybe when street calms down. Then you go.”
Reluctantly, Ned said, “I guess we can wait for a while.”
“Good!” Mr. Wong barked happily. “You like horseradish, yes?”
JOE PATTED his stomach. Mr. Wong had given him and Ned two sandwiches each. And chips, a pickle, a little tub of yogurt, and a Coke. He was stuffed. He glanced at his wristwatch. It was getting late. Almost eleven. It would be midnight soon. He was already hours late for work, and he knew he couldn’t cower here much longer. He thought Ned seemed antsy to get moving too. It wasn’t for fear of being fired that Joe worried about being late for work. He suspected there wouldn’t be many zoo employees showing up tonight anyway. They had more important things to worry about than keeping their jobs. Survival for one. Protecting their loved ones for another.
Like he was protecting Ned.
He glanced at Ned now, sitting next to him in the shadows. He was concentrating hard, using a plastic spoon to dig out the last of his yogurt. Farther away, Bobby had finished eating and was now curled up in the corner, snoring softly. He had fallen asleep. Mr. Wong had thrown his coat over the boy to keep him warm. Joe watched now as Mr. Wong stared at his son for the longest time before finally turning to Ned and Joe. Moving closer, Mr. Wong slid his back down the wall next to Joe until he was sitting on the floor beside them.
“My heart hurt,” Mr. Wong said quietly, his voice barely stirring the darkness. “Bobby right to worry about body in freezer. I worry too. I never murder anybody before.”
“You had no choice,” Joe said. “It was kill or be killed. That’s not murder. It’s self-defense.” Ned leaned in, listening to what they said. He had sat up and was resting his head on Joe’s shoulder again, peering across Joe’s chest at Mr. Wong on the other side. Joe laid his hand over Ned’s knee, still glad to have him close.
Mr. Wong heaved a leaden sigh. He was staring at his hands, flexing his fingers as if mesmerized by the way they moved. “I always good to that man. I feed him. I let him sleep in the alley. Not run him off. Gave him big box in the winter for a house. Life not easy for someone like that. I try to help. But still….”
“Still he tried to hurt you,” Joe said.
“Yes. He try to hurt me. I don’t understand.”
While Bobby softly snored in the corner, the eyes of the other three drifted toward the door of the walk-in freezer, where the homeless man lay, getting colder and stiffer and deader by the minute.
To Joe’s surprise, Mr. Wong turned back to him and said, “I have to go. Take Bobby. My family need protection too. You and Ned welcome to come with us. Or stay here if you want. There’s food and a little heat. You might be okay.”
“No,” Joe said. “We have to go too. But how will you get to your family? Where are they? Where do you live?”
“Not far. Maybe fifteen, twenty blocks. We might take car. What you think?”
“It would be safer to walk,” Joe suggested. “You might get trapped in a car. The street could be blocked. There are a lot of people out there with guns. Anything could happen.”
Mr. Wong nodded. “I think you right. We walk. Slip through dark like Chinese cats. Little and sneaky.”
Joe and Ned laughed. Mr. Wong didn’t. He merely sat there in the shadows, staring across the kitchen at his sleeping son. “I wish you come too,” Mr. Wong fervently added.
Ned responded before Joe could. “I’m sorry. Like Joe said, we have another route to take. You’ll be safer without us anyway. Less noticeable.” Joe watched as Ned offered Mr. Wong a lovely, gentle smile. A twinkle of mischief lit his eyes. “You’ll be littler and sneakier on your own.”
Mr. Wong only nodded, as if expecting the refusal. He reached over Joe and took Ned’s hand. “You be careful.”
“Don’t worry,” Joe said. “I won’t let anything happen to him.”
“No,” Mr. Wong smiled. “I don’t suppose you will.”
Mr. Wong heaved a sigh, as if prodding himself to get started. “Best wake up number one son.”
Before Joe could respond, a horrendous crash jarred the darkness. The blinds were ripped from the window on the street. Shards of glass tore across the deli, strafing the place like bullets. Struck with debris, the display case by the cash register exploded as well, shattered by the flying glass. The brick that caused all the damage tumbled to a stop at Joe’s feet.
Wrenched from sleep, Bobby cried out and scuttled across the kitchen on his hands and knees, flinging himself into his father’s arms. What was once a front window was now a black hole opening into the night. Icy air poured through the wound. Joe realized they were suddenly unprotected and unhidden, laid bare to all the chaos outside. He rushed across the room to quickly turn off the flames on the stove so they wouldn’t be seen by anyone on the street.
“We have to go now!” Joe hissed. “All of us. It’s not safe here anymore. Out the back. Hurry!”
Ned dove toward the workstation and grabbed a fistful of kitchen knives. He handed one to each of them—Joe, Bobby, Mr. Wong—and kept the last one for himself. “Weapons,” he said, as if an explanation was necessary.
“I’d rather have a bazooka,” Bobby groused.
To which Joe replied, “Wouldn’t we all?”
Mr. Wong took a final look around his shop. He scooped the paper hat off his head and dropped it on the floor. “Don’t suppose deli be here when we come back.”
Ned laid a consoling hand on the little man’s shoulder. “It might, Mr. Wong. It might.”
Bobby stepped close and slid his arms around his father’s waist. “If it’s not, then we’ll open a Chinese restaurant.”
Mr. Wong gave a disgusted grunt. “Chinese restaurant more work.”
Bobby reached up and gently bopped his dad on the chin with his little fist. “You live for work.”
“No,” Mr. Wong whispered in the darkness. “I live for my children. From number one son on down.”
“And what about mom?” Bobby quietly asked.
“I live for her most of all.” He tousled his son’s hair. “If you’re ready, we go to her now.”
Bobby nodded bravely. “I’m ready.”
They stepped away from each other, and Mr. Wong moved to unbolt the back door. They stepped
into the pitch-black alley with Mr. Wong leading the way. When all four of them were outside, Mr. Wong firmly latched the door behind them and locked it with a key. “If anyone chasing us,” he said, “that slow them down.”
Clutching Ned by the collar of his jacket, afraid he would lose him in the darkness, Joe groped around in the shadows until he felt Mr. Wong’s arm. He grabbed it and tugged him close.
He spilled a tense whisper into the darkness. “You’re going west, I think. We’re headed east. Be careful. Stay in the park as long as you can. Avoid the streets.”
“Yes. You too.”
“We will.”
Mr. Wong bumped into Joe in the dark and, reaching around him, pulled Ned into a bone-crushing embrace. “You listen to Joe. He take care of you.”
“Yes,” Ned said. “And I’ll take care of him. You and Bobby stay safe.”
Mr. Wong gave a self-mocking snort. “I kill one man already. What’s a few more?”
Bobby gave a dry laugh from somewhere in the shadows. “Sheesh, Pop. You sound like Jackie Chan doing his Rambo impersonation.”
Totally unamused, Mr. Wong said, “Tonight, I think, being Rambo not a bad thing at all.”
Joe fumbled in the shadows until he found Mr. Wong’s hand. He squeezed it and pulled him into a hug. “Stay safe,” he hissed in Mr. Wong’s ear. “And thank you.”
Before Mr. Wong could answer, Joe tugged Ned away, leading him down the alley. Hand in hand, they slipped into the darkness.
“THEY’LL BE all right,” Joe whispered.
Ned swallowed his fear for Mr. Wong and the boy and said, “I hope.”
