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“City hands,” he drawls, and it’s all right there in his eyes like he can see, he can tell—
Matt jerks away from him, a lightning quick bolt of shame crackling through his insides.
He’d be angrier if he wasn’t so fucking startled. Men like Quint—they sometimes look at him, look at Matt like they’re sizing him up, like something in his smallness makes them think they might put their hands on him and he might like it. And they’d be right, sometimes, wouldn’t they, Matt? As if he hadn’t already thought about Brody doing that very thing, him married for chrissakes, and with children!
Nevermind how brown his skin is, how it looks warm to the touch.
The ugliest part is that the ring on his finger wouldn’t stop Matt, hasn’t stopped him before. This need, this ugly yearning that tears him open like a mouth full of shark teeth, Matt belly up in the water and all his insides spilling out— city hands city boy yes sir no sir touch me touch me touch me.
They will and they won’t. He says “touch me,” because he can’t say “love me,” and he can’t admit that’s what he’s asking for anyway.
Quint smells like a fish market, like fresh blood. Even now, years later, Matt will think about how he felt sunburnt every time Quint looked at him. He will think about the water rolling out, rolling on, placid and cold. Amity in summer, endless summer, and all the empty docks, and the sail slapping against the mast like someone shaking out a table cloth. Quint touching his scar.
Here’s the truth: Matt can only love em’ old, mean, and dangerous.
Like a shark, he can’t stop moving. Maybe one day he’ll get lucky—outrun himself.
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