Don't Read in the Closet volume one

by Various Authors

  “Darling.” She gave me a long hug and I could feel the splash of tears on my neck. “You know I love you. This isn’t ever going to be about me leaving you. I’ll have a home for you to come to at Christmas. I’m not going to get a place without a room for you, okay?” That helped.

  “Okay. Just... just let me know when you get in. I’ll be up.” I tried to sound so mature but it sucked.

  The reality hadn’t hit me until I saw her mountain of bags packed, zipped, and ready to go all in a matter of minutes. I helped her carry them to her car. I didn’t ask what happened at the meeting. Figured I probably didn’t want to know what was said. It had to be pretty awful for her to be taking off like she was. We got her car loaded, piled with remnants of her life with my dad and I, a life that was ending after nearly twenty years, and I waved as she pulled away. It was so surreal. I didn’t realize I hadn’t moved until I felt a hand on my shoulder.

  “C’mon. Let’s go inside.” Brooklyn’s voice was gentle. I followed him mindlessly until we were back out of the sun and in the relative cool of my downstairs TV room. He pulled me into a hug, and unlike my mom, who was smaller than me, I felt enveloped by his big strong arms, comfortable, safe even. “It’ll be okay eventually. It just sucks a lot right now,” he whispered into my hair.

  The hug lasted for another minute or so before we did the awkward bro back pat and separated to sit on the couch. Lost was still playing, and I stared, unseeing, at the screen for a few minutes. Eventually, Brooklyn nudged me with his knee.

  “You’ll be okay. Really.”

  I thought about it for a second before I nodded.

  “I know.”

  * * * *

  It was hot. One of those nights where it never cools off, even when it’s almost morning. The heat from the day had been rising out of the baked ground for hours, turning the stockroom into an unbearable sauna. Brooklyn and I had been taking turns going and standing in the refrigerators to cool off. I guessed that since they had nice freezers and fridges for the perishables they didn’t much care if the boxes of pasta and crates of Gatorade melted. It sure as hell felt like we were going to.

  Finally, Jesus took pity on us and had us come up to the front of the store and stack items onto the shelves. Brooklyn got the lucky job of loading ice cream into the freezer, but even shelving in the regular aisles was better than being stuck back in the oven of the stock room.

  About two hours into our shift, after the store closed, Jesus announced that he was starving and he was going to drive to Sonic for burgers. The closest Sonic was at least twenty minutes down the highway, but he bribed us with offers of takeout to keep quiet about his long break. There weren’t going to be any customers anyway and I knew we could handle shelf stocking on our own. I asked for a milk shake and tater tots but Brooklyn got a deluxe burger and all the sides. I grinned at him and poked his hard stomach.

  “You better keep playing soccer next year. I’ve never seen anyone who loves to eat as much as you do.”

  He chuckled. “I will if they take me. I’m going to try out for the JV team.” Then he poked me back, hard, and jumped out of the way. I punched at him, but ended up swiping air. Jesus rolled his eyes and headed for the glass door. He opened it and then locked it behind him. Brooklyn managed to pinch me and slip out of my reach again. He laughed and I lunged at him again. Jesus knocked on the glass.

  “Don’t be assholes. I’ll be back in an hour.” He called through the window.

  We nodded. I put on my most angelic face. As soon as his car pulled away though, it was on. The weird part was that it was so much like how we used to be but nothing like it at the same time. We pinched and poked and even punched at each other just like always, but we were laughing our asses off the whole time and running up and down the aisles of the deserted store. I managed to get Brooklyn good, pinching him hard on the side before taking off down the snack aisle, bags of chips and bottles of soda blurring past me as I tried to run and laugh at the same time without wiping out. Too bad Brooklyn’s midfielder legs could take me in a heartbeat. Within a third of the aisle, he had me pinned against the Fritos and was poking at my clavicle as hard as he could. I could barely catch my breath from laughing, and I choked a little. He stopped and looked at me.

  “Okay?”

  I panted a little and nodded. “Yeah, okay.”

  I tried not to notice that Brooklyn hadn’t moved. At all. He was still right on me, pushing me back against the crinkly bags of chips, hand poised over my chest. His fingers touched me, and I swear to God I could feel them, warm and a little tingly, through my shirt. Was he leaning closer? I licked my lips and watched him.

  We were silent, the piped in muzak in the background was all of a sudden excruciatingly loud. I looked at Brooklyn, couldn’t stop looking at Brooklyn. His eyes were dark and kinda slanty, hooded like he was thinking of kissing me. Was he going to kiss me?

  I’m sure he could feel my heart pound in my chest where his fingers were still touching it.

  Kerthunk, kerthunk, kerthunk….

  More silence.

  Thunk… Thunk….

  He leaned closer, his lips were right against my cheek, I could feel his breath go down the side of my neck and I cleared my throat trying to hide a deep shiver that had nothing to do with cold and everything to do with being suddenly more turned on than I’d ever been before.

  There was no one in the store. No one coming….

  The phone rang, shrill in the quiet only broken by instrumental Matchbox 20 playing in the background, back to being barely loud enough to hear. Brooklyn sighed and pushed back from the shelf. He gave me a small smile that left me reeling.

  What the hell just happened?

  “Uh, I better get back to the ice cream before it melts.” His voice sounded hoarse and uncertain.

  Didn’t he already put it all away? I let him walk away, quickly escaping our weird moment and all that it may or may not have implied. It’s not like I knew what to say anyway.

  The rest of the night was kind of weird. Less awkward than I’d have thought it would be after that miss kiss, and yeah, after a little bit of thinking I knew that’s what it had been. It wasn’t a mistake, he sure as hell wasn’t inspecting the Fritos behind my head. We’d almost kissed and I had no idea what to do about it.

  No idea.

  I had even less idea what to do about the fact that maybe, just maybe, Brooklyn Thorn wanted to kiss me... and I really, really wanted to kiss him back. He tossed my bike in the back of his truck like he always did, and we rode home in the predawn heat, tired and still a bit electrified. I could feel it between us, different than it had been—not uncomfortable exactly, but not the same ease that had grown in the past weeks. I tried to ignore it. It seemed to be what Brooklyn was the most comfortable doing.

  Maybe that kiss just wasn’t meant to be. Yet. Or ever.

  * * * *

  “Shit! I thought that pole went across like that. Here, try it from your side.”

  Brooklyn’s face was frustrated to say the least. He was holding a pole from his tent, which we were setting up on top of my trampoline. It was a nice night, coolish outside but still stuffy in our houses. He’d suggested camping on my trampoline, which kinda surprised me, but of course I’d agreed.

  My house had been bleak since my mom had left. It was nice to have someone around other than my father, who I didn’t know how to talk to. He wasn’t really there all that often anyway, especially since I was usually only home when he was at work. That way was fine with me. We’d never been close.

  So, yeah, both the idea of company, and of course because it was Brooklyn, had me jumping at the prospect of having him over. He showed up with his tent, a camp light, a ton of comics, and enough junk food to have us spinning for hours on a sugar high. I added some homemade macaroni and cheese, strawberry lemonade (spiked with some of my dad’s rum), and marshmallows for us to roast over our little outdoor fire grill. We’d set everything else up, but were struggling to
put his tent together. I’d have scrapped the tent part all together but getting eaten alive by bugs wasn’t my idea of a good time.

  “Oooh, wait. I remember how it goes now. Here, give me your pole.”

  Brooklyn held his hand out expectantly. I couldn’t help it. I started laughing. It was dumb and I knew it, but the giggles, once they started couldn’t be stopped until I was rolling around on the surface of the trampoline saying ‘pole’ every time I could take a breath. Brooklyn shook his head at me, but he laughed too. “What are you? Twelve?”

  “Must be.” I handed the tent pole to him and lay there on my back, looking at the deepening purples and blues of twilight with a chuckle bubbling out every few seconds until I calmed all the way down. “It’s a nice night.”

  “Yeah it is. Thanks for having me over, by the way. I’m glad you thought this was a good idea.”

  “It was a good idea.” I leaned over and snagged the bag of marshmallows, ripped it open, and popped one in my mouth.

  “Hey! You can’t eat those until we get this thing set up.”

  “Maybe some of my lemonade will help.” I’d already told him that it was a bit stronger than the usual stuff.

  He chuckled. “I’m thinking we’d definitely better save the lemonade for later. Here, hold the pole and I’ll finish sliding the fabric over it. Then we’ll be good to go.”

  I snickered.

  The tent was set up and we were lying on our stomachs with half our bodies in the tent and our arms hanging over the edge of the trampoline roasting marshmallows on the grill that we’d rolled right up close so we could be lazy and not get down. It was probably good we didn’t have to do too much hopping up and down anyway, since we’d already drunk about half of the lemonade. I’d poured a bit more rum into it than I originally thought. Either that or both of us were pathetic lightweights.

  Brooklyn rolled onto his back, flaming marshmallow held up over his face.

  “Hey,” I laughed. “You’d better be careful with that thing or it’ll end up falling on you.” He blew it out and popped it in his mouth. “No, no, no... that’s not how you do it. You have to take the crunchy part off and eat that then roast the next layer, like this.” I demonstrated, pulling off the charred layer of sugar and licking it off my fingers. Brooklyn watched me intently with a slightly wavering gaze.

  “Dal? Can I ask you something?” He’d been calling me Dal for a few weeks. I kinda liked it.

  “Sure. ‘Sup?” I tried not to slur. He sounded serious all of a sudden.

  “Are you gay?”

  Oh, shit. Suddenly I was completely sober. My stomach clenched and I squeezed my eyes shut trying to stop the wild spin my head had just started to do. I didn’t want to lie but I didn’t want him to hate me either, not when we’d gotten so close. I cared what Brooklyn thought of me more than anyone else. I didn’t know when it had happened but there it was.

  “Hey, I just want to know. Don’t freak out.”

  I turned over and looked at him. The truth, then. Damn it. “Yeah, I am.” And there it was. He was the first person I’d ever told.

  Brooklyn reached over and took the marshmallow stick from my hand. Then he slowly laced his fingers through mine, watching our hands intently the whole time.

  “Uh, Brook, what are you doing?”

  “This…” He pulled on the hand he was holding until I toppled over, halfway sprawling on his chest. Then he used his other hand to thread into my hair, cupping the back of my head and pulling gently. “I wanted to kiss you so bad the other night in the store.” His nose rubbed against mine.

  My heart, my poor little heart, couldn’t take much more. It was trying to beat its way out of my chest. “Me too.”

  His hand rubbed its way through the hair along my neck, until he was tipping my chin up so my lips could meet his. And then right there, in a tent on the trampoline I’d had since I was ten years old, Brooklyn Thorn kissed me. He was tender and sweet, hands touching my face, tongue barely tasting my bottom lip. It felt wonderful and perfect, not too much, left me wanting so much more. He sighed.

  “What?” I asked quietly, all of a sudden worried.

  “Nothing. It’s just... it’s exactly how I thought it would be.”

  “Okay?” I needed more information before I started panicking.

  He let go of the hand he’d been holding the whole time and wrapped his arm around me. “Not okay. Amazing.”

  I was still kind of freaking out. “Brook, you just kissed me. You said you wanted to kiss me. Are you gay too? What’s happening here?”

  Brooklyn gathered me closer and scooted us further into the tent and onto our pillows. He nuzzled another small kiss on my lips.

  “I don’t know. I’m not completely straight. I’ve known that for years.”

  “Years?”

  “Yeah.” He smiled. “Sixth grade at least—when I looked over at this boy who I used to hate and realized that he had the prettiest lips I’d ever seen and more than anything I wanted to kiss him.”

  I choked. How was I supposed to react to that? Me? I was reeling. “Sixth grade?” It was the only thing I could think of to say.

  Brooklyn nodded. “It scared the hell out of me. I mean, you’ve gotta understand that.”

  “I do. This isn’t the best place to be gay.”

  Brooklyn shuddered. “And my Dad. He’d skin me alive if he knew.”

  “Mine probably would too.”

  We both sighed, heavy with the knowledge of what it was like to hide.

  But it had been necessary. Still was. With that in mind, I covered the grill up and zipped up the tent. We had Brooklyn’s camping lantern turned on low, so there was a glow in the tent, barely bright enough to see by. It was warm and intimate and the light looked gorgeous against Brooklyn’s skin, shining off the halo of tiny hairs on his arms too fine to see in the day, and burnishing his golden brown curls until he looked like Apollo or some other bronzed god reclining in his bower. He arched his back and pulled his tank top off. I gulped.

  “This okay?”

  “Uh, yeah. If you don’t mind me looking.”

  He took my hand and put it on his chest, covering it with his own then kissing me lightly. “I definitely don’t mind.” I was nervous all of a sudden.

  “Uh, Brook?”

  “Don’t worry. I’m not gonna try anything.”

  I was relieved and achingly disappointed. “It’s just that I’ve never really done much with anyone before, closet door screwed shut and all.”

  “Me neither. The girls at our school really didn’t do anything for me and the guys... well, you know that story. What exactly do you mean by not much?” I just looked at him. I was sure my pathetic inexperience shone bright and clear. “Was that your first kiss?”

  “Yeah.”

  His forehead wrinkled up. “I’m sorry.”

  “Why are you apologizing?”

  “I would’ve made it better, more special or something.”

  I smiled and boldly reached up to touch his caramely curls. “It was perfect.” A quick tug and my shirt was off too and I cuddled my bare chest against Brooklyn’s, sighing at how damn good it felt.

  Perfect was exactly the right word.

  ****

  My dad was gone like he always was. I couldn’t even say when I had seen him last. This time, he was on a trip to California for some food expo. He’d left the night before and was supposedly going to be gone for a week. It was a relief to tell you the truth. We’d never really gotten along and I guessed that once I left for college there wasn’t going to be much contact between the two of us. I talked to my mom most days on the phone. She’d urged me to come spend my last weeks of summer in Houston at my grandparents’ house, and even told me I could bring Brooklyn if I wanted.

  I’d finally told my mom—in an awkward stilted phone conversation with a lot of crying (her), and a lot of trying to spit out what I needed to say (me). At the end, she told me that she’d love me no matter what, and she’
d work on my somewhat conservative grandparents. She also cautioned me not to tell my father. I hadn’t been planning on it. I had the same instinct about how he’d take it.

  Brooklyn and I were driving home from work in the usual dark of predawn. I was sitting close to him on the bench seat. It was safe to be close when there was no one out on the roads. He had his hand on my thigh and I was laying my head on his shoulder. He’d cut his hair a few days before, caramel curls snipped close to his head. I missed his halo, but he said he’d grow it back when we got to school. His dad had told him he looked like a homo and rather than stir up any trouble he’d just cut it off. Brooklyn lifted his hand from my thigh and draped his arm across the back of my shoulders. I scooted even closer and scrubbed my face against his neck tiredly. He trailed his fingers along my arm and up into hair that had turned kinda bleached out and surfer cool after half a summer of me not bothering to deal with it.

  “You wanna just come to my house and crash? My dad’s gone till the weekend.” I should’ve been nervous just asking that out of nowhere. It wasn’t a small thing. It felt easy though, like the way it should be.

  “Yeah?” Brooklyn sounded a little surprised, buy pleasantly so. I nodded against his shoulder. “Well, sure then. Why not? My dad’s already left for work anyway. He starts the ovens up first thing.”

  We pulled up to my house and Brooklyn parked. I didn’t want to even move, but I managed to drag my bike to the shed then walked with Brooklyn, hands loosely linked, to the front door. We had a few moments of staring awkwardly at each other before I gestured him towards the stairs down to my room. He’d been in the TV area a few times by then but never all the way back to the end of the hall where I slept. I took his hand again and pulled him behind me until I could close the door of my bedroom and lock it... just in case.

  I closed my blinds and curtains so we wouldn’t get woken up when the sun rose right outside my window in less than an hour, then kicked off my shoes tiredly.