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The walls are greyish but whitewashed and smooth. The room is small but with a high ceiling and a long window with chicken wire in the glass just high enough that even the tallest boy couldn't reach it. There are no curtains or anything protruding from the ceiling, not even a light fixture. The two twin beds are pressed against opposite walls with a dresser between them. The floor is covered in that thick grey rug like material that all houses from the 90s seem to have. The beds are made of round wood and contain a blue plastic mattress with a thin sheet and and an electric blanket. The only decoration in the room is a heavy wooden cross complete with a tortured Jesus nailed firmly to the wall. As the door is shut behind him he feels a faint claustrophobia and stares at the laminated schedule taped to the back of the door. He throws his suitcase at the foot of his bed and sits down on his bed, staring vaguely upwards. The room, he notes, is sparse but also safe and clean. Nothing in here could ever harm him. The edges of the bed are even padded to prevent bruising one if they bumped into it. There are no pillows, maybe to stop someone from smothering their roommate or themselves. He feels slightly nauseous wondering how many have tried all the various now impossible ways. How many in his room alone?
Reaching into the pocket of his jeans he feels for the smooth wooden beads and pulls them out running them through his fingers. Holding them to his nose they smell like Ernst, mint and paint.
He'd slipped them into his hands the last time he'd seen him, standing outside Hans' house lip quivering. He'd signed quickly an explanation seeing Hans' confused expression.
"They'd never think to take a rosary away from you. They won't even question it."
There was more to say, of course, but by then his father's hand was on his shoulder and he was led into the van.
He wished he had more, despite the intimacy and irony of the gift. A photograph or a letter maybe. He isn't sure if he'll ever see Ernst again. Hell, if this works he won't want to and he genuinely can't tell if that's a good thing or not. He hates himself either way.
A few minutes later his reflection is interrupted by the sound of the door being opened. He doesn't bother to look up until he hears a slight grunt and then the slamming of the door harshly. A duffel bag flies across his line of sight and then collides with the wall making a thud. He turns to see its thrower, finding another boy leaning against the wall, breathing heavily. He is probably half a foot taller than Hans, maybe more, with broad shoulders and the build of an athlete. He has a large round face and sweaty brown hair that plasters to his forehead. His fists are balled and his eyes closed, his face clenched in concentration. He wears grey sweatpants that fray at the ends, a sports jersey, and a large dark green hoodie with the logo of a school on the left side near the zipper.
After a few seconds he opens his eyes and begins to rattle the door handle while Hans watches blankly. Eventually he stops, let's out a sharp "FUCK," kicks the door once more and turns abruptly to Hans.
"What are you staring for?" His voice is harsh and has a think deaf accent.
"You barge in here and start attacking the door. It's not bizarre for me to stare." Hans responds defensively.
"Yeah well, restrain yourself." He shoots back.
Hans sits on his bed speechless and then goes to unpacking as the other boy sits curled up on his bed facing the back wall. Hans stands up after he is done putting his clothes away and taps the boy on his back.
"I know ASL, you don't have to speak with me." He signs it and speaks at once, trying to make at least some attempt at a truce with the boy.
"I don't know it." He responds bitterly and pushes his hands away.
"What do you mean you don't know ASL you're deaf?" Hans is shocked and backs away.
"My grandmother didn't want me to learn it. I had speech therapy and I can lipread it's not impossible you know." He says it defensively.
"I know that, my mom is deaf and she can both speak and lipread but like she was also taught sign." There's an underlying tone in his voice of "what the fuck is wrong with you?"
"Can you stop fucking interrogating me?"
"We're living together, sorry for asking a few questions, Christ." Hans turns away a little, picking his book up.
"I'm not living here. I'm getting out. And I already know everything I need to know about you." The boy tells him swatting his hand in front of his face to get his attention.
"Like hell you do."
"Rosary beads tell it all you idiot."
"You don't know a thing about me or my rosary beads!" It sounds stupid coming out of his mouth but it's true. He would punch this kid if he could.
"Whatever."
"Can at least get your fucking name?" Hans spits.
"Max. Von Trenk."
"Hans Rilow." He replies, though he wasn't asked.
Max goes back to his bed and faces the wall closing his eyes, kicking his muddy sneakers off. Hans attempts to read for a while, eventually becoming too tired and slipping into his pajamas and into bed. He hates sleeping now. Every time he closes his eyes he sees that day again.
It's too vivid for him and too recent. The two of them in his bedroom him holding him and them laughing, but in the dream the laughter is always mottled and disturbed with an echo to it. Then the door is burst open and his father is yelling and Ernst screams grabs him closer. He feels him pulled from him and his father's slap across his face that sends him reeling against the wall. Ernst crying and shouting and clawing at his father's arm. The look in his father's eyes. He wakes up sweating.
Every night is like that, every night since it happened. Now his days have a uniformity too, making them blend one into the each. He gets up at 5 and puts on his work out clothes. Then run for an hour and forty minutes. They get back to the campus and clean themselves. Morning prayers for and hour. Then confession and at 8:30, breakfast. 10 is bible studies, 11 group therapy, 12 some form of therapy to make them like girls (unnecessary for him but no one listens), 1 is gym, 2 is lunch. They have forty five minutes of rec after lunch and then at 4 o clock the dreaded aversion therapy. 5 is for silent reflection and private reading of approved literature. Organized boxing matches at 6, private therapy with a priest assigned to them at 7. 8 is evening prayers and 9 is dinner. At 10 they have a group run and public confession, if they don't have evening activities which could last into the next day and range from services to more therapy to a game of capture the flag. At 11 they are sent to their rooms to wind down, wash up and have private prayers. Lights out at 11:30. Sundays are different with a longer service in the morning and more private time with their priest, making Hans' least favorite day by default. The whole schedule leaves him with barely any breaks and only a half an hour when he isn't constantly watched and observed. Eyes on the back of his neck are constant now.
He feels highly lethargic all the time, days blur into each other and he has no time to think. He always wants to sleep as he at most will get five and a half hours and only if there are not evening activities. He has no one to talk to and no time to read or even reflect. Nightmares are even more constant, he sees things from long before Ernst now and new nightmares derived from therapy sessions here. All the boys seem a bit like the walking dead. Even Max, who's anger had been fiery and uncontrollable and lessened to a simmer with exhaustion. He's still defiant and cold but he'd stopped trying to escape or actively fight the staff. He was still distant from everyone. In fact, in the course of two months all Hans had learned of Max was that he was from Texas, his mother was dead, his father out of the picture, and that he lived with his grandmother. Max was such a mystery that the other boys and even the priests would pester Hans for information on him. But even if he had been trying he'd have gotten none.
The closest Hans got to getting more than a one word answer from Max was during the second week. Hans had come back to his room in tears that he was just barely hiding late at night and was covering his face in his hands. Max had looked up.
"Are you alright? Did they hurt you?" He had asked softly but with a desperation in his voice. Hans sunk deeper into his hoodie and scratched his neck quickly.
"It's stupid..it's nothing, I'm being a child." Hans says, his voice shaking. Max either ignores him or can't see his lips but he walks over to where he sits on the bed and wraps a long arm around his shoulders.
"What did they do?" He asks again, calmer this time. Hans turns to him and pulls off his hood. His dark ponytail was gone, replaced with a closely shaven scalp.
"It's just hair, it's not like they hurt me, I know, just..." Maxs cuts him off by pulling him into his chest, wrapping him in his arms.
"They don't have the right to take anything from you. To tell you how to live or what to do. Even hair, it's not their right." He tells him and lets Hans cry into him until the lights turn off and they're forced to bed by the darkness.
From then on there is a softness towards him from Max, but nothing close to friendship. Until, one day, two months in, they're in the dining hall for dinner. Max is sitting by himself and staring at his lap. Hans sits with a few boys he is friendly with, talking, when one of the priests who patrols the dining hall comes up behind Max.
"What do you have there?' He says. Max doesn't look up not noticing the priest. "I said, what do you have in your hand?"
His voice raises and now all the boys are quiet, one taps Max's shoulder and he looks up, confused. "Allow me to repeat myself what is in your hand boy?"
Max turns red and attempts to shove the offensive item up his sleeve, but the priest grabs his wrist and pulls his hand up despite his protests. Hans is able to see the object as it is held in the air. It is a small school picture, the kind grandfathers keep in their wallet, of a boy with honey colored hair and a sloppy smile wearing a dark blue shit. Max's other hand reaches up to grab it but the priest slaps him across his face and his head falls backwards into his spaghetti, staining his hair red with sauce making it look bloody. The priest pockets the picture and pulls Max up by his arm. Hans feels an urge to run towards him but is too scared. Max is yelling something indistinguishable and is kicking and spinning about till other staff members have to grab him in order to get him out of the room. Hans can't help but notice that the whole time he'd been trying to get the picture and nothing more. Fighting like some animal for a little piece of paper.
He doesn't come back to the room till almost midnight but Hans had stayed awake. He runs up to him immediately, grabbing his shoulder tightly. He looks downwards and stands stiffly in front of him.
"Max, Max look at me! It's over. What ever they did it's over. I'm here, look at me, please, God!" Hans tells him, saying it like a prayer. Max looks up to meet the boy's eyes and it's like all the fire has gone out of them, the blue is lifeless and dull. His face is slack like a corpse and his shoulders shake for a second, as if he will weakly try to get out of Hans' grip but then his knees give in and he sinks to the floor, Hans going with him quickly. Max, for the first time since they got there, erupts into moaning sobs that wrack his body. He's beating the floor with his hands and Hans is sitting on his knees unsure of what to do. He doesn't work well with sadness. Eventually Max calms down and begins to wipe the snot from his nose and the tears from his eyes.
"I want to go home. I just want to go home. And I don't even know what that means anymore." He admits once he has calmed enough to speak. "I mean I can't go back to her. She doesn't care about me unless I'm everything she wants but I can't be here. I need him."
"I know how you feel." Hans tells him candidly, understanding Max maybe more than he ever understood anyone in his life. "Do you mind if I ask what the photograph was?"
"It's okay, I need to talk. Do you notice that they don't let us talk? Keeping this inside is like acid, it's festering." Max spits his words at the floor. "It was of my boyfriend, or ex-boyfriend or whatever. Bobby. My grandmother caught us together that's why I'm here."
"What's he like?" Max seems to calm down when he talks about him so Hans thinks it's a good idea to keep him talking.
"He's sweet, and so funny. And he'll say the things no one else wants to and he's also goddamn anxious that you just want to protect him from everything. And sometimes he'll smile in this way that makes you feel, like Christ, I can't explain it. I can't explain it all." Max smiles a little and closes his eyes faintly. "His parents were cool with it, he gave me the picture as a way to remember him, to see him when he's not near me. And I was gonna use it so that I could be strong and get out and go back to him. Because he needs me right now. But I was an idiot and I let them take it and now I have nothing."
Hans reaches into his pockets and pulls out what lie buried in them. "Here."
"Your rosary beads? Are you serious?" Max raises an eyebrow.
"You have your picture and I have my rosary beads. My boyfriend, Ernst, gave them to me. For the same reason Bobby gave your's to you. He's really catholic, it meant a lot to him. He always had it with him. And they won't take it away." Hans breathes, thinking of what Ernst would say or do right now. "You need it more."
"It means nothing to me...I don't know him. Please keep it." Max protests.
"It might mean nothing to you but it means something to me. To give it you. Please." That shouldn't convince him, Hans thinks. He's nothing to Max. Just a boy who cried over having his head shaved a few weeks ago.
Max takes it out of his outstretched palm and begins threading the beads between his fingers. "I was raised Jewish till I was twelve. My grandmother converted later in life, I didn't even convert with her. I don't really even know what to do with..." He trails off for a moment staring down at his hands. Finally he looks up and meets Hans' dark eyes. "Thank you."
"We're friends now. You and I?" Hans asks it, unsure of even why. It feels so middle school to say. But Max nods gratefully.
"Yes, friends." He takes his hand and squeezes, inching a bit closer.
"Can I teach you sign?" It just comes out before he can stop it.
"What? I don't get it?"
"Look you said they always watch us talk but if I taught you ASL they wouldn't know what we were saying. We could sign under the tables. Please, at best it'll keep us a little more sane. We can't talk too much at night we get too little sleep already." Hans tells him passionately, eyes lighting up.
"I mean, isn't it a really hard language? I don't intend to be here that long." Max is wary.
"Just like, finger spelling and I'll teach you basic words." Max stands up to get to his bed but Hans touches his arm once more to attempt to convince him. "We need something for just us. Something they have no capacity to take from us no matter what. Like seeking sanctuary. We'll die without it."
Max meets his eyes and nods. "Okay, teach me."
It doesn't take him long to learn the alphabet and basic words. In their free time Hans helps with grammar and more complex phrases. He's far from fluent, but it's a start. More than his grandmother gave him. And while learning the language they learn things about each other. Hans tells him about his Dad's homophobia and how he always felt like he wasn't living up to his lofty expectations as a kid. About how Ernst was the first person to ever believe in him. About how when his parents divorced his Mom took his beloved sisters and that he was left with his father. Max tells him about having cancer when he was younger and how he can't even remember his mother anymore. He talks about how Bobby was the only constant in his life, the only person he could ever count on. They spend any free time together, talking and learning. Joking sometimes even. When things get hard they comfort each other and stay up all night talking. Max feels more and more tired as does Hans but he says nothing. In private therapy the priests began pestering Hans about their new found closeness. Asking if he can tell them more about Max, promising it's all for the best, that it'll make things easier for him, that Max is refusing their help, etc. etc. Hans was tempted a little at first. Just telling them Bobby's name could make him one step closer to Ernst but he keeps his mouth shut. Accepting the punishment that went along with this. He'd always hated private therapy but now it became even more unbearable.
He came back to the room one Sunday night after therapy, that same shaking feeling he always had coming out of it. Max had gotten off his bed and walked up to him, but he'd shaken his hand off his shoulder.
"Hey, Hans, what's up?" He'd asked it kind of innocently, confused at the coldness of the greeting.
"I'm really tired I don't want to talk right now." He sat on his bed facing up towards the window blankly.
"Why do you always get like this when you come back from private therapy?" Max asks. Hans doesn't turn around so he taps his shoulder roughly, a with a groan Hans turns to face him.
"I don't know. Because they ask me a million questions and say that if I don't stop I'm going to hell what about you?"
"It doesn't get to me like this. I don't get this worked up. It's more than that." Max says.
"Well, I'm not you okay? I'm not strong like you. I don't have your, internal will or whatever." He feels that old anger rise up.
"Hans it's more than that. What's really going on? Please just tell me." He stops talking for a minute and attempts to sign the next phrase with wobbly hands. "You said sanctuary, you and I."
Hans follows his hands carefully and sighs. Max has told him all his shit and the door should go both ways. But he's used to keeping things boxed in.
"OKay...but you need to understand this is hard to say okay? Please just don't say anything till I'm done."
"I can do that."
"Well, I was a really early bloomer. I had my first wet dream in like the end of fifth grade. And before I turned twelve I had figured out I liked boys as well as girls. I didn't have a word for it then but I knew that I didn't look at them the way the other guys did. And I was really innocent. I mean like, I still believe all my dad's religious bullshit and I believed in the church and God and whatever. So I went to confession one day and told the priest what I felt for boys. And you'd think he would you know say something about how I was confused or I needed to follow God's plan or what they say to us now. But instead he told me, breaking a shitton of rules in doing so but I didn't know that then, to meet him after services the next day. To come alone after I was done. I was an altar boy at the time and I think they had been watching me for a while. So I went and...well essentially he told me to do everything he said from that point on or he would tell my dad what I'd said. And I was a little kid and I don't even think I knew what was happening. And I mean I couldn't tell anyone because I was so damn scared he was going to tell on me. And this lasted till I was like almost fifteen and convinced my dad that being an altar boy was getting in the way of school and that I didn't have time anymore. I still saw him in church sometimes or in town and it just would make me sweat and my whole body shake and feel sick. I mean every time I think about him it's like my skin is being ripped off. And when I'm alone with them, with the priests, it's stupid but it reminds me of him. I feel like they're just going to spring on me and-" He can't finish, choking on his words. Max rushes over to him and kneels at his feet grabbing his hands.
"Hans! It's okay I'm here!" He tells him squeezing his hands.
"I know, I know I just can never get that feeling of his hands just..." He's crying and Max has leaned up and kissed him hard. Closing off the tense space between them in an instant. Hans is pushing him off immediately. "Stop this is wrong! Max stop!"
"Why is this wrong? Because they said it is? The people who did that to you? You trust them?"
"No...no but we'll get in trouble. My dad will die, please stop." Hans is saying pushing the other boy away but he won't relent.
"We're already in trouble! We're already in hell! Just let me do this! It'll keep us sane please!" He's leaning up at him trying to get at his lips.
"What about Bobby? Don't you love him? You love him don't do this." Hans isn't sure who he's trying to convince.
"If I don't do this I lose myself and can never get back to him." It's a lame justification and they both know it but neither says a word. "Please Hans this is right. This is the only thing right in this whole fucking place."
"Okay." Hans says softly and lets the other boy kiss him again and lets him lead him onto the mattress. As they cling to each other and tear at each other's clothes he thinks he sees Ernst for a minute, his soft face and sweet eyes. This is for you, Hans wants to tell him, this is you in another body, you come to save me, this isn't cheating it's desperate. I need this, it's not wrong. Bullshit, he knows it's pure bullshit to make him feel better. He wants Max in his own right, wants Max for nothing to do with Ernst and everything to do with himself. He's probably wanted Max this whole time and is only now admitting it. But he repeats the mantra over and over in his head nearly the whole time. Trying to find a way to justify every orgasm, every kiss and every touch.
When it's over Max falls asleep quickly, holding onto him and lying across his smaller body. Hans stares upwards crying. He isn't sure why. He's such a cliche, "closeted boy cries his way through sex" it even sounds like an onion headline. Yet it's his life. And he knows with total certainty that Max has changed everything with that kiss. That from now on they can never go back to the way things were. And that scares him to death.
They never sleep alone from that point forward. Whether they decide to be intimate that night or not the two boys are constantly clutching each other despite the risks. They hold hands under the table and during runs when they think no one can see them. They sneak out of classes and therapy and meet in hallways for just the chance to touch each other, to touch something real and soft. Max even convinces Hans to skip church one day. They break into one of the priest's libraries and at first Hans is shaking from anxiety out of both being caught and missing church in general but Max is able to calm him down and he ends up reading to him from Othello while he sits with his head in his lap. It's the first book either of them have read from in months that wasn't a religious text. They weren't even sure why he had it but were eternally grateful.
One evening Hans is sitting on his bed legs curled into his chest after private therapy when Max walks darts into the room holding something under his jacket. He closes the door behind him quickly and smiles at him brightly.
"You'll never guess what I got! I can't believe I even did it I can hardly breathe!" Max gushes his shoulders rising and falling as he catches his breath. He sits cross legged on the floor and Hans slides down after him sits on his knees.
"Are you okay? What did you do?" He says anxiety coloring his tone.
"I stole this from my priest's office." He says it with a grin that fills his whole face as he removes a bottle of red wine which he places on the floor between them. "Check it!"
"Max! This is holy wine you'll get in so much trouble if they find out!" Hans tell him eyes darting about as if the whole clergy is in the corners of their dorm.
"More trouble than when I do this?" He asks and kisses his collar bone lightly. Hans smiles and looks upwards, squirming playfully.
"Put it back you idiot." He laughs.
"I'd only get in more trouble that way. C'mon it's too late to feel guilty I already opened it when he wasn't looking and everything!" Max says extending the bottle to Hans.
"I can't believe we're doing this." Hans takes a swig of the bottle the liquor tasting tart and dry. He passes it to Max who leans his back and gulps it down.
"I wish we could like play strip poker right now or something." Max l says between chugs.
"You don't need cards for me to get naked. I do that quite frequently." Hans snarks.
"I know that, but it feels apropos right now. Stolen wine, stolen kisses all that jazz." Max argues and then smiles, putting down the bottle. "But I will take you up on that offer of easily getting your clothes off." He reaches for Hans' shirt who shirks from him grinning, snatching the bottle, and then hops up to his feet.
"Catch me!" He says jumping onto the bed and holding the bottle above Max's reach.
It doesn't take long for Max to win being the stronger of the two and by midnight the two are entangled in each other's arms the now empty wine bottle lying discarded across the floor to be stashed away in the dresser later. Max ruffles Hans' hair that is just beginning to grow back, sticking up oddly here and there.
"You're beautiful Hanschen." Max murmurs. Hans looks at him in shock.
"What did you just call me?" He says, unsure if he heard it right.
"That's what your nickname would be right?" Max asks confused.
"Yeah, but no one's called me that since my mom moved out. And that was when I was in fourth grade. I don't go by that anymore it's a child's name how did you even..." He trails off.
"It just seemed right. It suits you. You're more of a Hanschen than a Hans." Max tells him stroking his back as if he is calming a child.
"Well, alright. But just in private okay?"
"Okay."
He turns around and lets the other boy spoon him as he faces the wall. Max places his lips on his neck and sleepily whispers into him.
"I love you Hanschen."
He doesn't reply but feels his face turn red. The response stuck in his throat but too close to coming out for comfort. Too natural a response for his liking. He isn't sure what this is to him. This forbidden thing that makes his heart speed up and his father's words reverberate in his ears. And then there's Ernst. Ernst who who will be beyond heartbroken when he finds out about this. Ernst who doesn't deserve his boyfriend to do this to him. Ernst who he's certain he still loves despite this. He decides on silence and wills himself back to sleep and his dreams of his father and priests and mottled laughter.
At first Hanschen doesn't notice much of a change in Max. They're all always tired and having a lack of energy isn't a surprise. When his nose starts running frequently and he begins to get have loud hacking coughs Max shoves it off.
"I've always had a shit immune system since chemo it's no big deal." He tells him upon questioning and Hanschen puts it out of his mind. Then he begins to seem more and more somnolent, his eyes often closing during conversations and classes, a glassy look ever present on his face. His lips are dry and Hanschen begins to suggest they sleep more instead of staying up but Max refuses to listen. Pushing himself to keep going. Hanschen thinks it's nothing, regarding him with detached concern until during an evening run he falls face first into the gravel.
Hanschen ran over to him instantly, helping him up and looking nervously at his scraped and bloody hands.
"Max! Oh my god!" He yells as if he can hear him, the other boys leaving them behind in the dirt.
"I'm fine I just slipped that's all." Max replies leaning up on his arms and breathing hard, wincing as he puts pressure on his stinging hands.
"You almost passed out, let me help you up." Hanschen tells him, letting the taller boy put his weight on his shoulders.
"I'm fine Hanschen! I'm fine I just fell!" He barks back but doesn't refuse his help. He leans on him the whole way back to the building. Their instructors eye them critically, physical contact a thing to be detested here. Hanschen tells them what happened and they barely respond. Just nodding their heads along. He asks for them to exempt Max from anymore physical activities that week but despite his protests is refused. There's no grounds they say. Max gets reprimanded for going to slow in gym.
He only gets worse, it's hard to wake him some days and he's always falling down in gym and getting punished. Max keeps claiming it's nothing refusing help. And when Hanschen finally goes and begs a priest to at least let him see a doctor or take him to the hospital he is refused swiftly.
"You aren't released until your guardians allow. And this is none of your business Hans. You aren't Mr.Von Trenk's keeper." There's an accusation in his tone, trying to will Hanschen to admit to what they both know he's been doing. Instead he bows his head and leaves his office.
It's on a Sunday during relaxation that Max can't even get out of bed. His face is ashen and his nose crusted with snot and red. When Hanschen touches his forehead he's burning up.
"You need to go to a doctor." He tells him. "Max you need to go to the hospital."
"They won't take me you know that." Max has stopped protesting to being sick at this point. He shakily attempts to sign his words as he speaks his head pounding. Hanschen grabs his hands when he is done speaking.
"I'll force them Max you're so sick please, you're not getting any better they have to take you out." Max says nothing just looks into Hanschen's anxious dark eyes and squeezes his hand tighter.
His fever gets worse throughout the day and he drifts in and out of sleep. Hanschen has tried to alert some of the staff multiple times but to no avail. After he is rebuked the third time that day Max starts crying quietly. When Hanschen notices he rushes to his side.
"They're not going to do anything. I'm going to die." Max tells him and cuts him off before he can protest. "Hanschen please, I need you to tell him what happened. Make sure he knows what happened. And know that I loved him and that I'm sorry and that I want him to move."
"Max you're being dramatic you're not gonna die this is stupid." Hanschen tells him tearfully, stroking his face.
"Everyone's gonna forget me. No one's gonna know I was ever here." Max says choking on his words.
"No, they won't I promise they won't. I promise I'll make sure they remember you." Hanschen tells him hands desperately trying to make him understand.
"Know that I love you okay? And I'm so glad I met you." Max tells him tears spilling out of his eyes.
"I love you too." Hanschen signs back, not speaking this time, afraid his voice will betray him. Max grabs his hand pulls at him. Hanschen climbs onto the bed and wraps his arms around him. He closes his eyes. He wakes up a while later and finds Max still breathing but deep in sleep.
When it's time for dinner Hanschen is screaming at the staff come to fetch them.
"He won't wake up! I can't wake him up! Please take him to a hospital! Please call 911!" This time they listen and someone picks Max up and begins to carry him out of the room. Hanschen runs after trying to follow. "No, please let me come! Please don't let him go alone!"
He's held back roughly by his shoulder by one of the staff members and he's never fought against someone more in his life. Because he will not let them take Max. Ever inch of his body rebels against this. But will is always trumped by sheer force and he is flung against the floor and the door closed behind. Max taken from him without even a chance to say goodbye. He rattles the doorknob kicking fiercely, trying to break it down with all his might. Eventually he stops when his fingers feel raw and his foot aches and he collapses onto the carpet once more.
"Fuck you!" He shouts at the door as if it'll make things better. "Fuck you!"
He isn't sent to dinner but allowed to skip it. In fact no one comes to his room till the evening of the next day when the priest he goes to therapy with enters slowly. Hanschen hops to his feet upon seeing him, desperation in his face.
"Is he okay? Can I see him?" Hanschen asks not even bothering to say hello or go through the formalities.
"Hans," He begins and he already knows what is coming from the weight in the priest's voice. "By the time they got him to the hospital he was already gone. They lost him in the ambulance."
The words don't register immediately, he has to think for a second. "Gone" what does that even mean? His mind races a mile a minute, it doesn't make sense. Because Max can't be gone. It doesn't make sense. He can't even register that he will never see him again. Never touch him again, talk to him again. It hits him hard in a place deep within his gut. There aren't words, there isn't a way for him to describe the wave. It's a little bit like drowning and a little bit like falling off a cliff. Like when you're waking up in the morning but you're still under a layer of sleep. A bit beneath the veil.
"Is there going to be a funeral?" His voice begins to shake as he says it. "May I go?"
"His body was taken back to Texas his grandmother had him cremated." The priest replies.
"But he was Jewish! He wouldn't want to be cremated she should know that!" He shouts it unsure why he cares so much. Max is dead, it doesn't matter what happens but suddenly in the moment all he could think about was how he shouldn't have been cremated. How he wouldn't want that. How it was unfair. As if that would make things better.
"It was the wishes of the family Hans, and we respect that." The priest says severely. "Try to calm yourself down."
"You killed him! I told you to take him to a doctor and you wouldn't do it! Why didn't you take him to the hospital earlier?!" Hanschen screams at him, feeling the need to lunge at his throat. How dare he sit there so calmly.
"Get a hold of yourself. And has it ever occurred to you that you are the reason Mr.von Trenk is dead?" Hanschen blinks at him in disbelief. "Do you understand that maybe this was your punishment or your warning from God? He took Max and this is your sign to reform. To move on and be a better man. Listen Hans," his eyes glisten with, "this is your second chance take it."
Hanschen says nothing merely stares at his feet. The words resonate within him. He wants to ask why he got the second chance? Why not Max? Why was he deserving of life and redemption in God's eyes?
"Nevertheless I've come to tell you your mother is here to pick you up. We've decided, with her urging," the priest grimaces a bit at this line. "That our care will not be the best for you. Your father has said you cannot stay in his house anymore so you're back in your mother's custody. Pack your things and she'll be at the front desk. I hope we've done enough for you Hans. I truly have faith in you."
Hanschen nods. "Yes father."
After he leaves as Hanschen begins to load his things into a duffel bag he feels struck dumb. He almost wants to laugh at the vision of his mother, a 5'4" deaf woman who runs a farmer's market with her Gallaudet students in her free time, yelling "urging" a group of priests to let him out. He would laugh if he didn't feel so empty.
He finds her standing there at the door, his first look of the outside world in months. She looks at him, chewing her lip and saying nothing. He rushes to her almost immediately and flings his head into her chest, she wraps her arms around his head and rocks him back and forth.
He sits beside her in the car listening as she talks, and she never talks, at rapid fire speed spitting words at the window. Cursing his father and the system and priests and just about everything. Telling him how his sisters will be ecstatic to see him again. How much she's missed him. How that bastard had absolutely no right. Not even consulting her, his own mother. And how she knew it was a bad idea to give him custody in the first place but he'd been so insistent that it was what was best and she, the idiot she was believed him.
"I don't know how you will forgive me Hanschen I really don't." The old nickname pricks at his heart a little bit and tears he didn't think he was capable of shedding came into his eyes. "It's okay baby you can cry. It's all going to be okay from now on I promise. I'm not going to let them hurt you again. I'm going to make this all up to you the best that I can. I don't know how but I'm going to try sweetheart." He nods weakly as she speaks.
He goes home to the welcoming arms of his sisters who have a million questions but restrain themselves and let him trudge up to the guest bedroom in their small Virginia house. Thea asks him later if he wants to come down for dinner but he shakes his head and she tells him that Mom will bring it up to him. She looks like she has more to say but instead joins Melitta and his mother downstairs.
He thinks about Bobby suddenly in a wave. What it must be like for the boy with the sloppy smile to find out that his boyfriend was in ashes. He would write to him he decides. He doesn't know what to say. Maybe just an apology. For killing his boyfriend or something. He would like to meet him he thinks. Hanschen knows for a fact he would. He doubts Bobby would feel the same though.
Ernst comes over the next day. He rushes up the stairs to Hanschen's room and jumps into his arms saying nothing. The two fall to floor intertwined. They lie on his carpet for a bit Ernst clutching him and them both crying.
"Your hair." Ernst says smiling slightly.
"They cut it."
"You're still beautiful." He says smiling. Hanschen says and eventually gets the nerve to speak, raising his arms above them.
"I need to tell you something."
"Okay what is it?"
"I cheated on you."
Ernst pulls away, not in disgust but in shock. His face is marked with disbelief and hurt.
"With who?" He says not getting it fully. Hanschen supposes his mom didn't tell him.
"A boy at the facility. My roommate. His name was Max and I didn't mean to but I had no one there and now he's dead. He's dead and it's my fault and I broke your heart now too and I should be the one dead I know I should..." Ernst pulls him into him despite himself, letting him cry as long as he wants.
"I don't think you should be dead. I don't know what happened but it can't be your fault." He breathes heavily and sits up, his signs slow and with care. "But I think I should go right now Hans. Because I'm not ready to take care of you after this. I'll be back, I know I will I'm loyal as a dog, and I'm glad you were honest. And I know we'll work this out. But I really can't be here right now. It's not good for either of us." He stands up and walks out before Hanschen has time to protest.
He spends a good amount of what's left of the summer sitting in his room. Reading or watching tv. Sometimes he helps his mother with the garden or the market and will stay up late with her when she grades papers. His sisters tease him and talk to him about boys and girls. They help him with his hair as it grows back, and provide him with nice beanies on particularly awkward days. His mother signs him up for a support group that'll meet in the fall and he starts looking at colleges. He thinks of Max a lot and writes that awkward letter to Bobby so far he hasn't gotten a reply but he's hopeful.
It's at the end of August when Ernst comes back over. He begins with a long speech but is cut off with a kiss from Hanschen, the two of them back to their old ways. The next morning he climbs out of bed and looks at the boy lying there, his smiling face tangled in the sheets and the way the light hits him from his huge window.
He knows for a fact that he loves Ernst. Knows it as well as he knows his own name, knows that he wants to tell him everything. But not today. Today is for soft kisses and the lemonade his mom will bring up with a cheeky disapproving glance. Today is for his sisters teasing him and shit talking them beneath the table. Today is for getting tipsy at night and watching Star Wars in their pajamas. Today is good.
He thinks again of Max. Of how Max doesn't have today and tomorrow. Remembers his plea to be remembered. And he has an idea. The priest had even said he had been given a chance he just probably didn't mean it this way.
He sits down at his desk, morning light streaming into their sanctuary of a room like shards of heaven. He turns on his computer and pulls up Word, beginning to write. To find a way to get it all down.
There was once a boy who would take on the world to build himself something that counts. A boy who loved with every inch of his heart. And during the end of my Junior year of high school I met him when he came into my dorm room kicking and screaming.
That's a good start of a story.