by T. J. Klune
“Like hell,” I snarled. “If the Kid takes me out, you’re going to be alone forever. Nobody can put up with your bullshit like me.”
“Is that right?”
“Yes.”
“Oh?”
“Only me,” I insisted. He stopped moving and I bumped into him, looking up into his eyes. He smiled down at me, causing my breath to catch in my throat. I still hadn’t gotten used to the way he sometimes looked at me, that regard that threatened to flatten me.
He brought up a hand and cupped my cheek before kissing the tip of my nose, a spot he knows I hate but still allow him to do it. I’m not so very good when it comes to saying no to Otter Thompson. He hadn’t shaved for a couple of days, and his stubble was wonderfully rough as he rubbed his cheek against mine, like he was trying to embed his scent onto me to mark me as his own. My dick began to fly at half-mast, and it was almost enough to make me forget about the threats on my life by a nine-year-old.
“Only you,” Otter said before kissing me deeply.
Mushy bastard.
I WAS on my guard for the next day or so until I said something that caused the Kid to laugh hysterically, and he jumped in my lap and started babbling as he always did. After that, I figured we were in the free and clear. It was hard to imagine that someone like him could be so diabolical as to consider psychological warfare.
But that’s exactly what he did.
It started out with a simple observation. I had just gotten home from work at the grocery store, a ten-hour shift that exhausted me. I collapsed onto the couch as the Kid wandered in, smiling as he sat down next to me. We talked for a bit about our days while Otter cooked dinner in the kitchen. Then, as if distracted, the Kid stopped midsentence and reached up to brush off my shoulders.
“What?” I asked, looking down where his hands had been.
“Just a few hairs or something on your shoulder,” he replied with a shrug before continuing on about how he’d just finished watching some program on the effects of radiation poisoning. I tried to keep a straight face, but then he started talking about fingernails melting, and I had to gag.
“I can’t believe that shit doesn’t bug you,” I told him.
“Why would it?”
The next day, we were eating breakfast when he passed by me and gave me a hug. I was used to these little attacks from him, growing more and more frequent, much to my pleasure. His head rested on my shoulder for a moment before he looked up at me and smiled. Then I watched as the smile slid from his face. “What’s wrong?” I asked, trying to keep the worry from my voice.
He reached over and brushed my shoulder again. “You keep shedding,” he muttered. Then his eyes rose to my head, and he frowned slightly before beckoning me to lean closer. I did, keeping my eyes on him. “Well that explains it,” he said quietly, almost somber.
“What?”
“The hairs I keep seeing on your shoulders.”
“What about them?”
The Kid looked slightly sad before he spoke. “You’re losing your hair, Papa Bear.”
Silence.
Then, “Excuse me?”
“Your hairline,” he explained carefully. “It’s starting to recede a bit. Was your dad or grandpa bald?”
I laughed uncomfortably. “Shut up, Kid. You’re just trying to freak me out.”
“Okay,” he said, sounding dubious. “Maybe look in a mirror or something. You’re still pretty young for that to be happening. Wow, can you imagine if that were true, though? Bald by the time you’re thirty? Gosh, that would just suck.”
He walked out of the kitchen.
I stared after him.
Once I was sure he was gone, I leapt up from the chair and ran the opposite way, past boxes not yet unpacked, down the hall, until I reached the master bedroom and shoved my way into the bathroom, steam spreading across the mirror since Otter was in the shower. I could see him through the curtain, and for a moment, my mouth went dry at the thought of naked Otter all soapy and wet, those long legs, those big arms. Water falling in tiny rivers down his chest and stomach, leaving trails just begging to be licked. I adjusted myself, the front of my pajama shorts suddenly uncomfortably tight.
But then I caught my reflection. My hair.
I wiped away the fog from the glass and stared at my hairline, pushing it forward and back, trying to see if the Kid was right. My black hair looked like it always had, loose and floppy, in need of yet another haircut. But… didn’t it look like it had receded a little bit? Didn’t it look like I was losing my hair? I stared in horror at the mirror, the brown eyes of my reflection getting wider and wider, my hands trembling.
“Motherfucker!” I grumbled.
“Bear?” Otter called out over the water. “That you?”
I couldn’t answer.
He pulled back the curtain and stuck out his head, giving me an evil grin. “What’re you doing?” he said in that low voice of his, that voice that tells me he wouldn’t mind one bit if I got in the shower and got on my knees and proceeded to blow the fuck out of him.
“You’re going to leave me,” I whimpered as a hair fell off my head and onto the white countertop.
He laughed. “What? What are you looking at, Bear?”
“White sheets,” I blurted out, refusing to look at him looking at me.
“What?”
“I want white sheets for the bed.” I thought hard for a moment. “And white pillow cases!” I didn’t dare say aloud that it would be so I could see any of the traitorous hairs that would flee my head during the night.
“Uh… you okay?” he asked me as he turned off the water, pulling the curtain completely to the side. I snuck a look over and saw all six foot one of glorious, tan, naked Otter. His dick swung out in front of him, begging to be grabbed. He looked like he had just stepped off a porno set, all wet and slick and raring to go. Something shorted in my head.
“White sheets!” I half screamed at him as I ran out of the bathroom.
I BOUGHT white bed sheets that same day (“Make sure you get five-hundred thread count,” my super diva princess boyfriend said. “You know I can’t sleep on anything less.”). I hurried home, throwing them in the washing machine, pacing in front of it until it dinged and then launched them into the dryer.
During this interminable hour and a half, a dozen different scenarios played through my head, each more realistic than the last as to how my life would be as a balding man in his twenties: So, if this is true, if this is really happening to me, the first thing I’ve got to do is accept it. Acceptance is the key; it’s the only way I can get through this. First thing to decide: do I try and work with it or shave my head? Shaving my head would suck because I’m pretty sure my head is lumpy and shaped weird. Working with it would suck because every day my forehead would look like it’s getting a little bit bigger, like my head is growing. Okay, so say I work with it? Do I do a comb-over? Like, maybe let it grow out a little bit more so I have something extra to work with? Oh God! What if I get that little bald patch on the back of my head that looks like a helicopter landing pad? What if it falls off in clumps and creepy patches and I look like I have leprosy? Can people still get leprosy? For that matter, can people still get the plague? Didn’t I read something that someone got the plague or something recently? Maybe that was anthrax. Why do people send white powder in envelopes to government agencies? They must be really fucking bored. And crazy. Like, okay. Say you hate the IRS. You decide to be all devious and put laundry detergent into an envelope, and you mail it to them because you owe a bajillion dollars in back taxes. Panic ensues. The worst thing that happens is that people get a day off from work. Ooooh, so evil. You showed them. How neat are you? I bet those people that do that shit are bald too. Oh crap. I’m going to be bald and mail Tide to government buildings, and I’ll bitch and moan about how The Man is bringing us down, and I’ll live in a shack in the middle of the woods. That’s my future. I’m going to be a bald detergent terrorist. Damn you, genetics!
The Kid walked by the open door of the bedroom and stopped to watch me for a moment as I tore off the old sheets and spread on the new ones, muttering to myself. “New sheets?” he asked innocently. “And white even. How sterile.”
“Just needed new ones,” I told him.
He nodded and shrugged and walked away, whistling some song I didn’t recognize.
By then it was only four thirty in the afternoon, way too early to consider going to bed, even if I was going slightly crazy. I eyed the Benadryl in the bathroom for a moment, considering chugging it down and going to bed right then. But then Otter said he needed help putting together the entertainment center, and I groaned and turned off the bathroom light, shutting the door behind me.
“ARE you tired?” I asked Otter at eight that night. We were in front of the TV, the Kid in his new bedroom, plotting the downfall of carnivores everywhere. “I’m tired. Are you tired?”
He cocked his head at me. “You feel okay? You’ve been acting weird all day.” He reached up to rub the back of my head, and I knew he would feel the growing bald spot, so I ducked my head away from him.
“No, I haven’t.” I scowled. “You’re weird.”
He rolled his eyes. “Good one. Seriously. What’s up?”
I looked at him for a moment, trying to decide what my next words would be, but of course, my mouth opened before I could stop it: “Would you still love me if I sent detergent to the IRS?”
He burst out laughing. “Is this one of those little games that couples play?” he asked me while he chuckled. “Like would you still love me if I had twelve fingers?”
I gaped at him.
“Oh, or would you still love me if I turned out to be a notorious bank robber on the run from Interpol?”
“Otter—”
He was enjoying this stupid game he’d started way too much. “I know! Would you still love me if I wanted to get a sex change?”
I stared. “A sex change?”
He shrugged. “I’d still be the same person.”
“Yeah, but you’d be a chick.”
His eyes narrowed. “I would still be me,” he grumped. “And we all know you like chicks.”
This was weird. “Do you want to get a sex change?” I asked slowly.
“Apparently that can’t even be on the table because you’d dump me! I’d still love you if you turned out to be a laundry terrorist, but you wouldn’t be able to stay with me if I had a vagina? Uncool, Bear. So uncool. I thought you loved me. You won’t even let me be myself if I needed to be.”
“Are you fucking stupid?” I snapped at him.
He looked at me with that gold-green, and then his eyes flitted down to my shoulder. He reached up carefully and brushed it gently. “What?” I asked him, panic in my voice.
He shrugged. “Just a couple of hairs.”
Oh… my… God.
Getting ready for bed that night was a nightmare, the white sheets blinding in the overhead light that swung gently on the ceiling fan. They mocked me as I slid on my sleep shorts, telling me that when I woke up in the morning, it’d look like somebody had shaved a cat while we slept. Otter smiled quietly as he walked past me, pulling the toothbrush from his mouth to give me a Colgate kiss. How could he know the storm that brewed in me that night? How life as I knew it was so over, that I was so full of angst and despair that I just couldn’t possibly see how I could go on? Oh, how I wish he knew.
I got into bed, my heart thumping against my chest. Otter crawled in after me and pulled me tightly against him, his breath warm against my neck, his arms wrapping around me, forcing one of his big legs between my own.
“I love you, Bear,” he whispered sweetly as he reached up to switch off the light.
It went dark. He dropped off almost immediately.
I stayed awake long into the night.
“AHH!” I practically shouted when I opened my eyes the next morning.
There it was. Right next to my face. Mocking me.
A fucking hair. My life was over.
Otter grunted and rolled toward me, cracking open a blurry eye and sighing. “Bad dream?” he asked in a sleep-roughened voice. Normally, it was sexy when he sounded like that. Normally, it zinged straight to my dick. But now? Oh Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, now all I could do was stare in horror at the pillow, the single hair moving gently in the breeze from the ceiling fan, like it was waving good-bye, like it was saying so long.
“What is it?” he asked, coming more fully awake.
I raised a shaking hand and pointed at it.
His eyes followed my finger, and a look of confusion came over him until he became aware enough of what we were staring at. He reached over and picked it up, pinching it between his fingers, pulling it right in front of his face, his eyes thoughtful, the left side of his mouth struggling not to quirk. “Bear,” he said quietly, grinning. “It’s just a thread from your shirt. You’re really not letting the Kid get to you, are you?”
I was, but I couldn’t tell him that. I schooled my face and reigned in my breathing. “Of course not,” I scoffed. “I don’t even know what you’re talking about.”
“Uh-huh.”
“But….”
“But what?”
“Never mind,” I muttered, pulling the covers up and over my head, hiding so he couldn’t see the warm crawl of fire burning my face. He followed me down into the dark and cuddled up against me, scrunching up his body so he could spoon up against me. I tried to resist, but… well, you know. It’s Otter. I can’t resist him no matter how hard I try. I found myself giving in and moved to my side, facing him, our knees bumping, his morning breath on my face. If you knew what that smelled like, you’d know how much I really loved him to be able to face it head-on.
“The Kid’s a jerk,” I grumbled at him.
“Should’ve watched where you put his shirt, huh?” he said, reaching over to rub the back of his hand on my cheek. There was no admonition in his voice, just a gentle teasing, lightened by the grin that I knew so well. Even there, in the dark, I could see the gold-green, now awake and starting to shine. I started having uncouth thoughts toward his person.
“Whatever,” I said, trying to shove it away.
But Otter knew better, and he leaned forward and brushed his lips against mine, the lightest touch. I loved it, gross breath and all. “Even then,” he said before he kissed me again.
“What?” I breathed, noticing how hot it was getting buried in the blankets, how hot it was getting because his hands had found their way to my sides and were beginning to rub against my shirt, suddenly against my skin. I was finding it harder and harder to think as a digit slipped down the waistband and caressed my ass.
“Even if you’re bald,” he said seriously.
“Shut up,” I growled before he laughed and rolled on top of me, smothering any other retort I might have had. It was okay, though. I’d get him back later.
DID you know that you can change Wikipedia? That apparently it’s a “living” encyclopedia, that people can update it whenever they want?
I sure as hell didn’t know that.
So imagine my surprise, then, when the Kid showed me on a Wikipedia page headlined “Bald” that researchers in the UK had discovered that eating meat was directly linked to losing your hair. Imagine my surprise, then, seeing those words slashed across the screen, that a Dr. Edmund Paddington-Kingsleyshire at the University of British Hair Studies had conducted an exhaustive six-year study into the matter. The Kid looked at me solemnly as I read the words, that vein on my forehead as big as a garden hose.
Now, look. Let’s be honest. You know me. You’ve heard the first part of my story. If you don’t and you’re one of those weird people that likes to start a story in the middle, I bid you welcome and good day (but I still think you’re weird). But for those that know me? You know, and I can say this with complete sincerity, that I’m not the smartest person i
n the world. I’ve often wondered if God decided to pass on giving me brains ’cause he knew he had to save them all for my maniacal little brother. I can admit it freely. I can be a little dumb sometimes, (okay, okay: a lot of the time. Whatever). So of course I believed in Dr. Edmund Paddington-Kingsleyshire and his obviously tenured relationship with the impressive sounding University of British Hair Studies. Of course I believed it, because it was on Wikipedia. It looked so official! How was I to know that Wikipedia was full of lies? Why would you let people write whatever they want for an encyclopedia?
It wasn’t till Otter found me minutes later hiding in the pantry in our new kitchen (it seemed to be the only place to escape Wikipedia) under the guise of reading the ingredients to a can of peaches (had to look like I had a reason to be in there), that I realized that maybe the Internet could be a liar. Ingredients: water… sugar… peaches. Simple enough. But I’d read it at least five hundred times by the time he opened the pantry door and came in with me, shutting the door behind him.
“What are you doing?” he asked, the laughter in his voice evident.
“Reading about peaches.” I glared at him. It should have been obvious. The “duh” at the end of my sentence was, of course, implied.
“Why are you reading about peaches?” He cocked his head to the side.
“They’re interesting,” I retorted.
“Huh. You know, when people ask why we’re together, I tell them about stuff like this and they look at me weird.”
I snorted. “Please,” I scoffed. “This is me keeping the magic alive.”
He chuckled and took the peaches from my hand and put them back on the shelf. “Bear, do you know what Wikipedia is?” he asked me gently.
