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JJ’s neck was all fucked up.
He tilted his head and craned so he could run his finger down all the purple splotches. He snorted when he realized most of them were evenly spaced from each other. Maybe Pope had it more under control than he had thought he did last night. No matter if he did, the blotches went all the way to his collarbones and he wondered if wearing a scarf in June would raise too many questions.
When he decided it would, an odd kind of panic stirred in his stomach. It wasn’t the kind he was used to, no, it was different. This panic didn’t come dripped in cold that ran down his arms and chest all the way to his belly on the inside, chilling him to the bone. This made him feel completely hollow with only a thrum of something missing—the illusion of something that was to come if he didn’t have an explanation for the discoloration of his neck that satisfied whoever asked.
It was only there for a minute, but it was terrifying. He banished with a shrug when he decided he didn’t care, and no one else should. His throat was a different color. Who cared? His chest and stomach had spots of purple, too, but if JJ’s memory served correctly, it was about when Pope reached his stomach when he told him—begged him, actually, if he wanted to be honest. He didn’t—to hurry up. God, he was sore.
Much like the minute of dread he had felt, this sore was new to him. It didn’t come packaged with bruises colored yellow and green on his stomach, hips, or face. His hips were still sore, the upper part of his thighs, too, in this good kind of way that JJ hadn’t ever felt before. It was hard for him to comprehend, he had never liked being sore before, but if he woke up the next morning, and he didn’t feel like this, he was sure life would lose all meaning.
JJ felt like he should shower, but he couldn’t bring himself to move from where he stood in front of Pope’s bathroom mirror. He couldn’t tear his eyes away from his own neck. Or what used to be his neck. Now it looked like a paint pallet. As soon as he craned his head the other way to look at the opposite side of his throat, Pope appeared in the doorway. JJ had left the door to the bathroom open.
Pope didn’t say anything at first. He walked into the bathroom, turned on the water to the sink and washed his hands, splashed cold water onto his face, then dried himself. JJ stopped looking at his neck and suddenly became very interested in his broken nails and torn-up cuticles. He brought his thumbnail to his mouth and bit off what he thought to be useless, extra nail. That made Pope talk finally. “That’s not good for you, you know. Nails keep a whole bunch of grime and gunk and bacteria under them that go into your mouth when you bite them. I have nail clippers.” He reached into a drawer built into the bathroom counter and pulled out the nail clippers. He set them down next to the sink.
“Suck me, this is efficient.” He hadn’t meant to say that, but at the same time, he had no idea what he had wanted to say. He spit the part of his nail he bit off into Pope’s trashcan. What remained of his thumbnail was now jagged and borderline dangerous. “You know where my shirt is?”
“No idea.” Pope reached into that same drawer and pulled out a nail file. Gently he grabbed JJ’s wrist while he leaned against the bathroom counter. Then, he started to file down and shape the thumbnail.
“Okay, the hell are you doing, man?” But JJ didn’t pull his wrist away.
“Bite your nails all you want and get diseases, but your nails should already be considered military-grade weapons by the government,” JJ thought about Pope groaning into his shoulder when he had scraped his fingernails down his back, and his arms. “And I think you may actually cut someone deep enough to need stitches if this is left unkempt.”
“You’re so fucking weird,” JJ told him. Pope hummed in agreement. “Why do you know how to do this?”
“I have a mom that I spend time with.” He said. JJ tried to make fun of him for that. Really, he searched his brain high and low for a comeback, but he was so distracted by the fact that Pope’s fingers could wrap all the way around his wrist with little effort. That probably would have freaked him out a while ago—that being up until late yesterday afternoon—but it didn’t now. At least not when it was Pope.
He was satisfied with his work after a few seconds and set the nail file down again. “Let’s find your shirt.” JJ liked that idea. They went back to Pope’s room, and JJ fell back down onto the bed. The mattress squeaked. “You gonna help?” Pope was looking by the foot of the bed. JJ shook his head.
“You make my neck look like a kindergarteners finger painting, you get to find my shirt.” He proclaimed.
Pope winced. “Sorry.”
“Don’t worry about it, bro.” He mumbled. JJ looked up at Pope’s ceiling. It was completely ordinary. Nothing special about it. It was almost disappointing.
Pope must have searched for twenty minutes before he gave up. “It’s gone forever. Never to be seen again.”
“Like Jalapeño Cheez-Its and Shark energy drinks.” Pope raised an eyebrow. JJ pointed a finger gun at him. “The official energy drink of the UFC…in like, 2005.”
“I’ve never heard of Shark energy drinks before…”
JJ sat up in bed and threw his hands up. “No one has. Unless you’re Mike Goldberg.”
“Who the fuck is Mike Goldberg?” Pope was putting on a shirt of his own now and JJ was a little disappointed to see it happen.
He focused on the opening to talk about UFC to cheer himself up. “The co-announcer of the UFC with Joe Rogan, occasionally joined by fighters such as BJ Penn and Randy Couture.”
“BJ is an unfortunate name.” Pope put on shorts next.
“Yes, it is.” JJ agreed. Pope walked over to him and offered his hand, JJ grabbed it, and he was yanked up from the bed. Pope turned, then let go of his hand. They left his bedroom and lying on the floor in the hallway, was his shirt. Right. He’d been shoved up against his bedroom door, hands snaking up his shirt and running down his chest.
JJ snatched it from the floor and put it on again. “So, really, Jalapeño Cheez-Its?” Pope asked. It took JJ longer than he would ever admit to remember he had spoken about those just moments prior.
“Oh, uh, yeah. For a little, they had them in stores and sold them in boxes like the other kinds, but they stopped doing it, and for a while only sold them in those fucking combo packs, and now you don’t really see them at all.” JJ was handed a granola bar, and he tore open the wrapper and then shoved half of it in his mouth. “Really unfortunate. Kie had them one time. Wonderful creation.” Pope hummed again. JJ frowned. “Sorry. You don’t care at all.”
“No, I’m sorry, I do. I promise. I’m sorry they don’t make those anymore…” He trailed off. JJ looked at him funny. “Was uh…last night a one-time sort of deal?” He asked. He was staring off into the unlit burners of his stove like they were the most interesting things in the world. JJ swallowed the rest of the granola bar like cement.
“Well…how often are your parents not gonna be home at night?” He offered with a chuckle and hoped Pope laughed too. He didn’t. “Man, I dunno.” They had been sitting on Pope’s couch, talking about John B. and Sarah and how happy they seemed. Then they talked about both of their failed relationships with Kiara in great detail, because apparently she had told Sarah that Pope was a way better kisser than JJ, and then Sarah told John B for some reason, then of course, John B had told him.
JJ asked Pope what he did with Kiara. He tried explaining it, but JJ didn’t understand. At the end of the night, he was in agreement with Kiara: Pope was a much better kisser than he was.
Pope drummed his fingers against the stove. “I want it to be…not just a one-night thing.” He muttered and JJ’s entire body shuddered with warmth. Goosebumps rose on his arms and he folded the granola bar wrapper over and over. “I’ve wanted it to be for a while, actually uh…like a while.”
JJ leaned against the counter. “How long?”
Pope clicked his tongue. “Long enough that what happened last night is almost identical to one of the in-depth scenarios I’ve had built up in my head.” He said, with shame.
JJ smiled. “How long have you been jerking your shit to me, Pope?” He groaned loudly and JJ cackled then looked down at his shoes. He could feel his face gain and significant warmth it didn’t have before. “I uh… I think this not just being a one-night thing would be…great and very beneficial to my health, since you seem so worried about it.”
Pope turned to him. “You serious?”
JJ looked up at him. He’d always loved Pope’s eyes. They fit his face so well, all big and dark and deep. He felt like he could drown in them. “Well, my nose didn’t grow, so I guess.” Then, the same panic from the bathroom returned, and he hastily added, “But we can’t tell the others.” He was worried that Pope would frown and ask him why, and he’d have to try and explain something he wasn’t sure of himself, but he didn’t.
In fact, he nodded. “Okay. We don’t have to.”
His panic had been sated, he had returned to normal, and he nodded back at Pope, who turned back to mess with the dials on the stove. JJ went back to running his fingers along the marks on his neck.
Silence settled between them.