Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

PART ONE

Parents always figure shit out, don’t they? You can keep the guilt off your face and have the truth buried deep inside yourself, but they can always take one look and know you’re hiding something- something they wouldn’t like. Every time they look at you, it is like they are watching every memory no one knows you have. Your privacy and own thoughts are now theirs for the taking,

I only thought I would fuck Marc once. It was the night of our high school’s homecoming game. During the last three minutes of the last quarter, he made the suggestion, muttering into my ear and pretending the collar of my shirt needed to be straightened. We both had recently broken up with our girlfriends due to personal differences or whatever caused dumb and horny eighteen year olds to think their feeble relationship was worthy of a huge one week blow-out fight. We were both single and there was no reason why we couldn’t; I always thought he had a particular charm that always kept me curious.

He only lived a few blocks from the school. We both walked side by side down the sidewalk, his shoulder brushing against mine. As we approached his house, I noticed that all the lights were off inside and all the cars that should have been in the driveway were absent. Marc unlocked his front door and walked me inside and up the stairs. We fucked in his room; door locked, even though no one was home. We kept the lights as dim as we could without putting ourselves in pitch black. Marc missed a few times, tried to rush things and I’d end up wincing and he’d end up apologizing. Our rhythm was terrible, we got tired fast, or we would keep shifting to find an angle that was right for ourselves, but then mess up the attempts of the other. We both fell off the bed at one point. We stayed on the floor. He called me ‘Brandon’ four times. The other times he just called me ‘Babe’. We both came; I thought it was successful.

Marc walked me home afterwards, distance growing between our shoulders. No one in my house was awake, much to my surprise and suspicion, and I was able to slip into my room and under my sheets undetected; allowing sleep to disguise my disheveled appearance. When I woke up the next day, reminders came in the way of horribly timed winces whenever my sisters playfully tackled me or taking confident strides about a foot too long. The guilt came as heavy, unwavering stares from my parents, but oblivious ones from my brothers and sisters. They didn’t figure it out that morning, but as my mother grasped my hand to say grace over breakfast, I swore she could feel Marc’s skin on my fingers, and hear his name pass my lips as I led the prayer.

My mother was more observant than anyone ever gave her credit for and eventually was the one to find my first hickey. Well, ‘first’ since it was the first she knew about. Matt and Kara had a youth group dance they were helping chaperone, Kyla was allowed to sleep over at a friend’s house, and Mason was on his way to work, so the entire second floor was quiet as I sat up in my room reading. My mother had given me Medusa-comparable stares during dinner earlier that night, but I thought it was because I had accidentally let slip that I had gotten a C on my chemistry project on Agent Orange; Whitney had been sick all week so the entire partner project fell to me. The front door had just closed behind Mason as my mother stormed into my room, dragging me down the steps. I was wincing for more than one reason.

Downstairs, my father was sitting in his recliner, Bible open on his lap and lamp lit by his side. She pulled my collar aside and put my hickeys on display for my father- and the Holy Spirit lifting from the Bible’s open pages. She pointed at them with a shaking hand and asked what it was. She didn’t want an answer- a skill I had learned through horrible experimentation. My father kept the Bible open as he leaned forward, gazing through me to the secrets I was trying to swallow. Mom kept shaking her head, her hand now lowered, but Dad never looked away from me. The first thing he asked, breaking his silence, was if it was worth it. Mom asked for her name.

They assumed I had asked for some girl’s virginity. I still had one more secret; they hadn’t perfected the art of soul scouring, even with four other children. I remained silent, not knowing how to deny something that was incorrect. But the silence caused by the shouting in my head only confirmed the accusations in theirs. I was sent to my room, and locked inside until school Monday morning. I obeyed the punishment. Why wouldn’t I? I was getting away with it. Or, so I thought.

I was on my way to Marc’s house. To fuck of course. We were friends- he was in my US history class our sophomore year- but we didn’t have the relationship where either of us had to keep in constant contact with the other. Well, constant communication with each other. He would call my house, but wouldn’t hang up if my parents answered. He still called me ‘Brandon’. I ignored it in favor of the nights I could spend in his room, seemingly miles away from everything and everyone, lying in the clouds and rolling over onto the stars. But I was still always just in Summerlin. I would go over regardless.

That day, he called to tell me that he had the car that night and could come pick me up; he meant that his parents were both home and he wanted to park the car by the abandoned development towards the edge of town and fuck me while I wondered what kind of families would be living in the shells of houses beyond the gates hiding the car. Not to say that I was able to keep a continuous train of thought for the entire evening. That only lasted for the drive over.

I was sitting downstairs in the living room, sitting between Matt and Dad. Matt was watching some episode of M*A*S*H and Dad was watching the TV screen curiously over his glasses. Marc’s headlights shone through our windows as he pulled up to the house. I stood quickly, waving to Mom in the other room before patting my Dad on the shoulder.

“It’s late.” He said. He liked to make obvious statements that doubled as guilt trips.

“We’ll be back soon. Just going to hang out for a little. This was the only time he was free- he has a hectic work schedule.” Maybe if I made Marc look respectable, our nine o’clock outing would look less like a suspicious sexual meet up and more of a sincere meeting between two friends, who still didn’t confidently know each other’s last names.

“I want you back before eleven.”

“Of course.” Marc never liked foreplay anyway, so I knew that I would be back then, even at our slowest. I wasn’t lying.

I waved to the house again before walking out the door. I made sure not to make eye contact with the crucifixions hanging by the door. He didn’t need to know why I’d be saying his or his Father’s name so often within the next two hours. I ducked my head and jogged over to Marc’s car. In the dark, the mustard yellow paint of the family car looked like a dull gray- thank God. I climbed inside quickly and told him we had an hour, hour and a half tops- Dad said eleven, but the sooner I came back, the less suspicion would follow us.

He drove right to our typical spot, going down side streets and avoiding all the timely stop lights that would typically give us time to slip our hands down each other’s pants, all in favor of getting to our place faster. Told you, not a foreplay kinda guy. Well, he says he was one with any girl he fucked, but with guys he liked to have things be hastier. I didn’t have enough experience to have preference; only what Marc wanted.

We toppled to the back of the car and I started undressing, placing my clothes on the passenger seat, while Marc placed his on the driver’s seat; foolproof way of never accidentally going home with each other’s shirts or having them becoming wrinkled. Or getting cum on them. Don’t ask why we so desperately needed this system. I don’t enjoy handing out second hand embarrassment.

I was wrestling with my belt in the dim lighting when Marc began digging around his car, more frantic than impatient. “Fuck.” He muttered, lifting off his seat to look under him.

“What’s wrong?” I asked, already feeling a flush creep up my chest.

“I don’t think I have any more condoms, man.”

I stopped. “So, what do we do?” We both would laugh at us using condoms, since we really didn’t need them, but this was 1982. Health class told us about some scary shit showing up on people’s dicks.

“Nothing.” He replied matter-of-factly. “I’m still gonna fuck you.”

“But-”

“You’ll be fine.” Marc said, throwing his jeans onto the front seat.

“Marc.” I felt uncertainty bubble in my stomach and change the heat on my face from a blush to one of embarrassment.

“What?” Marc sighed and looked at me with a set jaw and pursed lips.

“Nothing.” I shook my head and shifted closer to Marc, kissing him and trying to loosen the tense annoyance from his face. It would be fine.

I wasn’t going to argue with Marc. I was a still-confused, newly deflowered Mormon, and he was one of the hottest boys in our graduating class that could get anything he wanted. Anytime, anywhere. As proven by me cramming myself into the back of his family’s ’78 Dodge Monaco, legs spread, swears on my lips, and thirty minutes left in my shortened curfew.

With fifteen minutes left, I was going down on Marc, the two of us trying to still fit horizontally on the back seats. I was staring up at his silhouette, trying to decode his expression when a blinding light came through the back window and illuminated his blown pupils and open mouth.

“Was that another car?” He asked, trying to push me back by my forehead. “That was a car I think.”

“Does it matter?” I hummed, ignoring the concern in his voice. If it was really important, he would have told me to finish while he was driving so we could make it home earlier. But we stayed right where we were, shifting and sliding in the darkness, the stars still around us.

I finished dressing as Marc drove back to my house. My shoelaces hadn’t been tied a full thirty seconds before I was out of the car, walking to the front steps. Ten thirty-six. The front door was unlocked and the house felt like one of the empty shells I had been staring at earlier.

“Dad?” He never went to bed until all seven Uries were under the same roof and accounted for. “Mom?” A light flicked on in the kitchen. My steps were muted by the hallway rug as I headed towards the light.

My father was leaning against the counter, his arms crossed over his chest and my mother was sitting at the dining table with her head in her hands. My father continued to stand beside her, his hand resting on her back. I stepped through the archway quickly, my presence not startling them.

“What’s wrong?”

“How long did you think you could keep this up?” Mom spoke first, her shaking hands lowering to her lap.

“What?” I asked, stepping back. Neither of my parents looked at me. They didn’t have to search me for my secrets. They already knew. “What are you talking about?”

“At first, I thought that boy was getting you into…. Into marijuana.” The word burned her and she quickly covered her mouth 

“Marc doesn’t smoke weed, Mom.” I wanted to laugh at her worry, but knew better than to show humor at this moment. “We don’t bother with that stuff.”

“We know.” My father said shortly.

“If you know then what-”

“We followed you, Brendon.” My mother cut me off with her sharp stare. She was seeing everything. “We thought you were off just doing drugs- God forbid- but I never thought-”

“You followed me?” I had never heard of my parents following Kyla or Mason. They always had at least a sliver of faith in us. Apparently, I was different. “I can’t believe-”

“You can’t!” My mother’s voice was shrill as she stood, shouting at me suddenly. “I thought we raised you differently. You used to be such a good boy. But… But now-” She only looked at my body, grimacing as I’m sure she refused to acknowledge what I did with it- with bodies like mine. “Now I don’t know who you are.”

I blinked at my mother slowly, her words sinking in; every time she had been staring at me since homecoming, she wasn’t trying to see what I was hiding. She was trying to recognize me. Had I really become a different person? Marc said fucking guys wasn’t a big deal as long as you didn’t hold hands with them or call them to wish them a good night. And I didn’t. Where was my mistake? Where did I go wrong? Besides lying with man the way man lies with woman, where? I knew that was a sin, but even the worst sinners were given a chance at redemption. But my sin immediately branded me a stranger and cast me down from the clouds.

“I didn’t raise my son to be a… a…” My father was so disgusted he couldn’t even say it. He struggled to speak and even hold his gaze with me. Dad never liked unwelcomed guests in his home.

“I’m still the same son!” I countered, holding my arms out, showing all ten fingers and ten toes, my arms and legs and entire body were just as they had made them. “I have been the same. I haven’t been any different since October!” I felt the first nail go into my coffin.

“October.” My father echoed me, his face curling into a grimace as he seemed to recall how many times I had seen Marc since then- how many times I had told them him I was seeing Marc. I accidentally allowed every night with Marc to play across my face as they stared at me.

“You have been doing this for seven months?” My mother was mortified. “You mean that- that was from…?” Somehow a hickey from a consenting man was worse than one from a poor, manipulated girl.

“It’s not a big deal, Mom!” I cried, stepping forward to try and comfort her. The hammer came down and sank the second nail in.

“Don’t touch me!” She retracted like I was going to burn her again, her eyes wide and frightened. I truly was a stranger to her.

“Mom, it’s not that big of a deal- it was nothing. I’ll stop seeing him. It just happened, okay?” Nail number three came down quickly, I almost missed the hammer shaking the coffin around me. “You raised me fine."

“How do things like that just happen?” My father didn’t really want to know. No question asked by my parents required an answer. “The devil must have seen something in you.”

“Why does it have to be about the devil?” I was sick of having deviant behavior being linked to something intangible. People made decisions themselves. It was all me. The devil didn’t possess me. I didn’t felt guilt at any time that I was with Marc, and I wasn’t about to start feeling it now. “Maybe I wanted to do it, huh? Maybe I wanted to be with Marc. Maybe I wanted it- did you ever think of that, Dad?” I had started yelling and I couldn’t stop. I didn’t want to. I felt months of silence and forced compliance bubbling up. “Your youngest son won’t live up to the carbon copy clones you have created before me. Maybe your baby boy is the biggest f-”

The word was never allowed to enter the universe’s space. My father restrained it. He had me by the throat, both hands squeezing my neck tightly, his thumbs pressing into my wind pipe. My vision included mostly the wrong kind of stars as I tried to swat him away from me. I was sputtering and gasping for breath. One of his thumbs shifted as his grip tightened his hands, and for a moment I could catch my breath. The world sharpened and then suspended in time as his grip settled back over me.

My father’s eyes were wide and red. He was scared; frightened by the man emerging inside me- one he didn’t recognize. One he didn’t know how to control or relate to. Even more so, he was afraid of the hands around my neck- they couldn’t possibly be his. Apparently, we both knew each other far less than we thought.

“D-Da- Dad!” I gasped, trying to let myself fall backwards and break away from his grip. I went limp, but I stayed levitating in his fists. “S-Stop!” My legs kicked helplessly and I saw black circles surrounding my vision. “Hel… Help.” I coughed, waving a hand out to where I knew my mother was still standing, watching.

Suddenly, I collapsed to the floor, my head smacked against the linoleum and my legs bent uncomfortably under me. My chest heaved as my lungs caught their first full breath. I rolled onto my side and began coughing, my throat stinging and still feeling like it was about to collapse on itself. It felt like it was swelling shut. I was still horribly aware that my parents were there, watching me struggle to sit up and writhing as I tried to breathe. The shame of a third pair of eyes staring down at me made my entire body tremble and grow weak. My arms shuddered as I tried to push myself up- tried to crawl away. My knees buckled as I tried to stand and I fell back down. My gaze couldn’t go above the tile floor.

I waited for my parents to leave the kitchen. They walked around my shaking form and left me alone. Dad always said ‘men never cry’, but he had already established that I was anything but, so what did it matter if I did?

In the Faith, you are taught God is always with you. The sentiment was meant to supply comfort those who felt alone, but it only made me feel vulnerable. It made me try and shrink into a size small enough that God’s judging gaze could over look me. I never seemed to be small enough, no matter how much I curled into myself and hid from the eyes watching me.

 Typically, Wednesdays as a senior in high school were dreadful; the middle day in a week full of useless lectures, and tests made only to give the teachers something to grade and hand to their higher ups. But that Wednesday, I was awake before my alarm, barely even falling asleep the night before. I didn’t bother waking the rest of my house with a shower and immediately got out of bed and began digging through my closet. I neglected most of my morning routine in favor of digging around and trying to find something that would hide the bruises forming on my neck the best. Matt’s old basketball sweatshirt that was still too big for me, stained band t-shirts of bands my parents would never let me listen to, and even one of Audrey’s forgotten sweatshirts littered the floor; nothing wanted to help me forget the accusatory bruises tracking all over my neck. I chose my senior class crewneck and a worn pair of jeans before grabbing my bag and sneaking out the front door. Nobody else in my house went to high school so I was on my own schedule. I was tempted to slam the door as I left, shake the crucifix off the wall.

The walk to school was always solemn and long, I would shuffle along the side of the road, waving at people from the church that would pass by in their cars. At the town’s fork in the road, I always went left going towards the school- going right lead you to a more (can you believe it) rural area of town; you’d cross a quaint little bridge and see a completely different Summerlin. I passed Audrey’s group of friends going for the front door of the school, I braced myself for the demeaning stares they would give me for being a disgrace to the Church- and shitty boyfriend. But they only waved meekly, letting me pass by unquestioned.

That’s right. The only person who really knew what I had done was me. No one could read my memories off my tense face. If I didn’t act like any thing was wrong, it could go completely unnoticed. Marc wouldn’t even be able to tell. I could keep everyone else in the dark if I just kept walking and smiling,

Getting out of the house less than twelve hours after almost being strangled to death wasn’t helping me from disconnecting from the event; being in school was like being on a different planet, in a different time zone. Nothing you did at home mattered. You walked into school the person the student body thought you were- and I was the quiet, completely heterosexual, favored Church boy from the Mormon community no one at my public high school really understood. I let the lie carry me through the day. The lie’s costume was so extravagant, hardly anyone noticed the purple fingerprints on my neck. It’s like it hadn’t happened. All night, thinking about the fight was like trying to reimagine a dream just as you saw it while you were asleep. And now, with ignorance all around me, that’s what it became: a dream. Only a bad vision of what could have been. But what good was a dream if there wasn’t reality to come back to.

Typically, I ate lunch alone or with Whitney, the girl from my Chemistry class that always was my partner and needed help on lab work; I couldn’t tell if she was trying to hit on me or was just completely lost. Whitney had come down with the flu again and wasn’t in class third period, so I sat down outside the gymnasium, ready to waste the next forty minutes counting ceiling tiles. I wasn’t hungry, my heavy heart filling my stomach instead.

“You won’t make it through gym running on empty.” An apple hit me on the top of the head as I looked up at the voice. It was Marc.

“I’m not really hungry.” I handed the apple back. I had a big breakfast; swallowing my pride was enough to last the next few days.

“Suit yourself.” He took the apple back and bit into it harshly. My own personal forbidden fruit.

We sat in silence as Marc ate most of his apple. Each bite revealed a little bit more of the core- I felt the same way. The more I sat near Marc, the more I wanted to talk about the night before, make a joke about it, laugh about it: So my Dad totally flipped at finding out I suck your dick casually. Tried to strangle me. Not my favorite thing to choke on, right?!

“I wanted to… talk to you about last night.” Marc sounded like he was replying to a question I hadn’t had the courage to ask. I nodded, trying to act casual. I pulled my legs to my chest and rested my elbows on my knees. “That was the last time.” There were many things we did the night prior; he had to be more specific. “I am trying to get with that girl, Chelsea, in my gym class so we obviously are done.” I stared on, looking at his apple. “But, it’s cool, right? I mean we were just both single at the same time- convenience, right?”

“Yeah. It’s totally fine.” I lied.

I was a convenience. I had become a stranger to my family, while becoming more familiar to myself, as a convenience. I sinned in convenience. I knew Marc and I weren’t in love or anything profound like that, but I figured our last time would be decided on, that I would be a part of it too. I wasn’t just a body he could use to masturbate with. I thought he looked at me differently. Somehow, suddenly everything I had been arguing for and convincing myself was less of a sin was tainted and vulgar. My parents had a reason to be disgusted. The fear in my father’s eyes hadn’t been unwarranted; who had I become? I was the throwaway, disposable fag of Summerlin. My own self discovery and curiosity was being poisoned by someone unwilling to consider my feelings- what I was risking. Now I was sitting there, looking like I willingly tossed it aside and spit on my family name.

“Wait,” Marc said, pointing at me with a finger, the rest of his hand gripping the apple core. “Are those, hickeys, man?”

I had ten mirroring bruises and he assumed they were hickeys. The one person I hoped to possibly approach with the subject had jealousy in his eyes. He was the only string tying me to Summerlin, and I could cut it with only one word. He was tossing me aside, and I planned to do the same.

“Yeah.” I muttered.

It was the first lie.

“And I was afraid you wouldn’t take my news well.” He scoffed, getting to his feet and tossing his apple core into a nearby trash can. “Not surprised, Brandon.” Marc marched away and I let him.

Marc was unsurprised, but why wasn’t I? What did he know about me that I didn’t? What did everyone know? What information did my parents gain watching my mistakes through their broken lenses? Was it me who was looking at myself wrong? I had been with a guy- and it didn’t repulse me. Sex wasn’t as blasphemous as the Church made it out to be. I know I shouldn’t have done it before I was married- or with Marc, another man. But I did. And in the hours I spent lying in my bed the night of, I couldn’t find a single bone in my body that weighed heavily at my decision. It wasn’t like I was committing my entire life to men- I still liked women- I just couldn’t ignore the lack of resistance in my body and mind to the same sex. Instead, resistance was coming from the ones around me, pushing down, wanting me to collapse like a tin can- weak, hollowed core able to completely compress into a flat, useless nothing. I hadn’t noticed, but I had been pushing back for months: My refusal to feel guilt. My continuation to see Marc- and love seeing him. My announcement of homosexuality in my own home’s kitchen. My refusal to stop taking every last breath I could from my father. Allowing myself to become a stranger to my parents, spiritually. And my plans to do so literally.

Chapter Text

My walk home was shorter than usual; I ran. The more time I had in the house, the better. On Wednesdays my sisters had work, Matt would be volunteering at the soup kitchen, my parents always went to church early to prep for the mid-week mass, and on that specific Wednesday, Mason said he would be out at a movie. The entire house would be mine.

I bust in the front door and went straight up to my room, throwing my bag down and not caring how the books spilled onto the floor. I stepped on a few of them as I grabbed the mason jar I kept on my nightstand that was filled with earnings from the past years- my attempts at trying to buy a car, even though I had no real license. I emptied it onto my bed and quickly counted the bills: $335. The wad of assorted bills was less than I thought three summers would reap, but it was better than an empty pocket. I tucked the money deep into my pocket as I walked across the hall from my room to the bathroom. Under the sink was mostly half-filled shampoo bottles and soaps we never cared to smell like, but in the very back held the remains of Kara’s senior year trend; a box of peroxide and bleaching instructions.

I quickly pulled my shirt off, tossing it on the floor as I ripped the box open, tearing it down the middle. The smell was horrifically strong as I hastily poured the weird, creamy liquid into the white power. I coughed and forced myself to sit down on the side of the tub. It was the only moment I took to consider what I was doing.

Once I dyed my hair, there was no going back. Yes, I didn’t have to run, but it meant I couldn’t deny it. The minute I changed a hair on my head, my parents wouldn’t have to look very hard or long to know what I was hiding. There was no going back. There was no coming back.

I ended up burning my hands a little bit, as well as the top of my ears, as I globbed the mixture onto my head. The directions said to let it sit for fifteen to twenty minutes, so I assumed the stinging meant it was working correctly. I had never dyed my hair before. I was completely clueless and just trying not to get anything in my eyes (or my contacts for that matter) for the next half an hour. While I waited, I went into Kyla’s room and dug around for her sewing kit; I had seen it once before in a movie somewhere and figured it could be replicated in real life. It didn’t look that painful.

I ran my ear under cold water from the faucet. The girl I had seen do it had horribly mis-dyed cotton candy hair; I had to have been a better cosmetologist than her. I pressed the pin against the lobe of my ear and felt like the pin-point was the size of my finger, trying to push through my ear instead. The pressure was blunt, and the pain was fast; white hot, cringing pain shot through my arms and curled my fingers into my hands. My hands let go of the pin quickly as I gasped, shaking my arms to try and stop the heat tingling my arms. I looked on the ground for the pin only to look up into the mirror and see it sticking through my ear lobe.

So, I was wrong. It hurt a lot more than that Beauty School Flunk-Out let on. I had to bribe myself to do the other one, and prevented them from healing over- and me from ever having to do that again- with a pair of old plastic black studs from Kyla’s room.

The room was still spinning as I washed the paste out of my hair. I stood up from leaning over the bathtub and met my reflection in the mirror; it all began to look right. But even without its brown pigment, my hair still looked unmistakably Mormon. It was all one length, hanging low around my ears and wrapping around my head. I tried shaping it differently- pulling it, trying to tease it, which only effectively pulled my hair out- before remembering the shaver Matt kept in his drawer under the sink. Now there was definitely no going back. Bleached hair was something I’m sure I could blabber myself out of by saying I was curious; I wanted to get my rebellious energy out elsewhere- since that’s all this homosexuality business was to my parents. It’s not that they hadn’t been paying attention to me as I grew; I had just been distancing myself from their vision of me on purpose. I wanted to embarrass them behind closed doors. And if I bleached my hair, cut it, and didn’t leave them behind I would just be showing our family’s turmoil off to the neighborhood. The longer I stared at myself, and the new stranger greeting me and only growing more familiar, the more I convinced myself that this was the best option.

I stood in the empty tub and began shaving the sides of my hair down. The shaver smoothed over my temples and around to the nape of my neck. It was the shortest I had had it in years; freshman year I trimmed it shorter to try and emulate my father’s appearance. Now, I was doing it to try and skew our resemblance.

Once I had blindly finished shaving, trimming, and chopping my hair, I ran the faucet to get rid of every last strand of hair from the tub- they had to think they’d been to be on the lookout for a thin brunet, not a white-hot blond that resembled a man I recently saw in a rock magazine that had a very lonely dancing record. It was a look I could go for. As the last of the water drained, I returned every last bottle, comb, and open draw back to its original state before leaving, and closing the door over behind me.

Before I could leave, I needed a wardrobe change. I rummaged through all my draws to find a plain white t-shirt from gym class and my favorite David Bowie shirt- my parents never let me listen to his stuff, but the shirt always gathered a lot of compliments from my classmates. The white shirt was pulled over my chest as I shoved the Bowie shirt behind my bed. One of my siblings would go through my belongings, find my Bowie shirt missing, and add it to the description on my worry filled Missing Persons flyer or official APB: Male, 18, 5’10”, dark brunet, brown eyes, blue David Bowie shirt. Any concerned Samaritan that approached me could be shrugged off, no problem.

Audrey’s lilac sweatshirt went on next, covering me up and adding an odd femininity to my figure- even better. I changed my jeans to a similarly worn pair that I forgot that I even owned, finding them stuffed in the very back of a drawer, and made sure to transfer the money into the new pair. I grabbed my wallet from my discarded jeans, removed any ID or card with my name on it and rolled it up in my Bowie shirt. I couldn’t be known as Brendon; people would hear my name and see right through my disguise. I had to adopt a new persona to complete the mirage.

Brandon? No, there were plenty of people who already thought that was my real name; I’d fool no one. Brian? There was some kid in my history class named Brian- actually Bryan- and I hated that guy. No thank you. Berlin? I considered letting my new identity lend itself as an homage to the biggest divider and separator of human beings of the time, but I had never been that poetic before. It would be obvious if I showed up anywhere with no real ID in my pocket and a name like Berlin. I scanned my bookshelf and came to a new name: Brent. It was weird enough that I sounded like I had a real parent name me, but real enough to sound like I didn’t make those parents up.

Brent was alive and well.

As I left the house locking the back door behind me, I said a quiet prayer for Brendon Urie. May he rest in peace.

Once you get every ounce of freedom you’ve ever wanted, what is the first thing you do? Cry? Think of everything you won’t miss? Think every thought you were afraid to have in your mind with your parents in the room? Enjoy those first blissful seconds where the conversation in your head is with the only person you’d have to answer to from then on: yourself? My short walk to the town’s split intersection involved all of these options.

I was all by myself, completely alone and unskilled and clueless. I knew that moment was exactly what I wanted- everything went off without a hitch- but this impending fear of destruction hung over me; I wasn’t just walking to school anymore. I was leaving. I was walking and wasn’t going to ever turn back. An endless forward path. I had already forgotten my address. I had a new name, I was a new person. I could validate my sexuality and my feelings in any way that I pleased. The possibilities were endlessly terrifying.

Who was I without the people around me resisting? Who was I when I never had a ‘no’ to argue against? Who was Brent? Did he tip over fifteen percent? Did he let his eyes wander over the lips of men, and trail down to their zippers without guilt? Did he even bother to remember anything his parents taught him about strangers and hitchhiking? Did he look both ways before crossing a street?

I decided he didn’t, and abruptly changed sides of the street, not caring that it wasn’t only the sun lighting up the street under my feet. I had no clue where I was going, but the less I recognized, the faster I walked. The town was small and mostly suburban; it was hard to not constantly be passing another person who could easily spot Brendon’s eyes under my new hanging blond bangs. I hung my head and watched my shoes as I walked. They were the black high top sneakers I wore everyday; no one could write ‘black sneakers’ on a Missing Persons Report. No one even looked at shoes anyway. I was in the clear. No one could be able to read the thousands of steps I had taken in those shoes, the hallways I rushed down, the football games I escaped from, the familiar streets to Marc’s house I paced, the aisles I walked down, and pews I walked around. Nobody could tell all of those miles from just my sneakers.

I glanced up at a street sign quickly at one point- Cinnamon or Crimson Road or something. I didn’t know it, and they didn’t know me.

A few cars passed me and honked. They weren’t alerting me of friendly well-wishes. One whistled too. All of them went by without hesitation though. It wasn’t until it looked like it was about to rain that a car slowed beside me.

“You headed somewhere, handsome?” The man’s voice was low and gritty. I didn’t even know which way I was facing to create an honest lie. I looked up to see a grown man in a beat up Vanagon. The paint was chipped and a hubcap was missing, but his grin didn’t seem to convey the fact he cared at all. He smiled as if he had pulled up in a limousine. His shirt’s top three buttons were open and he had a loosened tie around his neck. I jammed my hands into my pockets, keeping my hands from his imagination as his eyes raked over me. ‘Summerlin’ almost came from my lips, but I bit my lower lip instead.

I hadn’t answered him, but he continued to look at me, sizing me up and already getting fantasies in front of his eyes. I knew if I agreed to him, I could go far, far away. But something also told me I might not come back.

“I’m okay.” I pitched my voice higher, shaking my head and letting my hair fall in front of my face.

“Aw, come on. You can’t hitchhike like you used to; I might be the only person who will stop for you.” He gave me a pitying look as he shrugged. “People are very suspicious nowadays.”

“They are.” I agreed, myself included. This wasn’t the first act of defiance I wanted to commit. Then again, where else was I going to go? Who else was going to pick my homeless ass up without calling the police first? I could be brought back home within the hour if I wasn’t careful. “But I think the fuss is overrated.” I pulled my hands from my pockets and let them run through my hair. I let one hand tug on the hair at the nape of my neck, reminding myself I was still awake; the dream had ended.

I crossed in front of the van and got in the passenger seat. The driver’s name was Alexander. I introduced Brent.

We weren’t alone in his car; behind me were two men around Alexander’s age, mid-40s, asleep in the second row of seats. They also had ties and button downs on, covering their oddly sweaty bodies. One of the men, a short red head, had an undone zipper. They both smelled like Mr. Bellman who sat behind me in church- I always thought it was paint thinner, but Matt informed me it was liquor. Mr. Bellman also slept a lot.

I settled in my seat and stared forward, watching Alexander pull away from the curb and continue driving down the street I didn’t know. He made a conspicuous number of left and right turns- throwing off anyone who might have been following us. Or ruining my ability to find my way back. Someone behind me snored and muttered in his sleep. Alexander laughed, glancing in his rearview mirror. I expected fondness, but I saw only unrecognizable darkness.

“Sam can’t handle his liquor.” He said, shaking his head as he flicked on his blinker and changed lanes. The sun was setting. My family would be home soon. And Brendon’s ghost would be there to greet them. As his left hand returned to the steering wheel, his right released it and fell onto my knee. His thumb stroked back and forth meaninglessly. Both of our eyes never left the road. His hand didn’t wander or slide up my leg. It stayed on my knee, the way Marc would when we sat beside each other in class assemblies or during car rides to my house while I was trying to button my shirt correctly. When I didn’t respond to his touch, he patted my knee and lifted his hand back to the steering wheel. I crossed my legs and placed my laced fingers over my knee. It was still warm.

We drove for thirty minutes before he pulled up to a Motor Hotel. My palms began to sweat and I could feel bile rising in my throat.

“Home, sweet home.” Alexander turned the key and pulled it out of the ignition. “We’re room seven.” He pointed down at the row of door.

I opened my door and slipped out of the car, feet landing on the asphalt firmly. Maybe my shoes were enough to recognize me- identify me- if that’s all I left behind. I knew I wasn’t scared, but for whatever reason, uneasiness twisted my stomach up like the hem of my shirt in my hand. He wasn’t Marc. Marc and I weren’t anything meant to be or committed, but he wasn’t Marc. And that’s all I could think about.

But why should I care? He didn’t. He was probably throwing aside Chelsea’s panties as I marched towards my home for the evening, Alexander leaving the other two in the back of his van, still out cold.

“You from around here?” He asked, opening the door for me. “Just finish college or something?” So maybe he was completely oblivious to the fact that a month ago, him having me in his motel room would be illegal.

“Yeah. Finished early.” I rolled my shoulders and unzipped my sweatshirt. He watched me, his eyes heavy on my body. They weighed me down and glued me to the spot.

“What was a boy like you doing on the side of the road?” He mused, walking towards me after he slid the dead bolt over. “The world is too harsh for boys as beautiful as you.” His hand fell onto my shoulder and I could feel his breath on my neck.

I was newly eighteen years old and didn’t have a license or a car. I was on the run, starting over. I only had myself to my name. And even then, that was a sham. “Car broke down and I decided to just walk myself.”

The lie didn’t go unnoticed, but we both knew the real reasons for being on that road didn’t need to be spoken. His hand grabbed the hood of my sweatshirt and began to tug it down, sliding my jacket off.

“Get comfortable; my home is your home.” He placed the jacket over the back of a small armchair by the door. “If you need a shower, I can get you clean towels.” The sentiment was genuine, but lacked innocence. I felt conflicted by Alexander’s attitudes; my naïve upbringing tugged me in the direction of trusting him, while the way his eyes always seemed to be hooded and dark left me reserved and with many questions.

His motives oscillated between humanitarian and horny. Which was the front? I was good at lying thus far, but not at telling who was lying to me.

“I’m fine. I think I just need a nap- and then I should probably keep going.” Keep running. If I stayed stationary for too long, I’d become a fixture in someone’s life; someone could pinpoint me.

“We have a free bed.” He motioned towards a bed with crumpled sheets and a pillow near the foot of the bed. Marc’s bed had held the same wreckage before. But it wasn’t the bed of clouds and stars I knew.

“I’ll just use the armchair.” I said it nonchalantly and my discomfort slipped past him.

I sat down and pulled my legs to my chest, resting my forehead on my knees. My legs ached and I could feel a headache from the lingering smell of ‘definitely not chemicals, Bren. That’s liquor’ in the room and on every surface.

 I was shoved awake three hours later, the two other men falling into the room. One of them grabbed a fist full of my hair mindlessly as he passed by, the other whistling. I didn’t lift my head and pretended I was still asleep. I peaked through one eye to see it was completely dark out, night fully falling and covering my tracks. Night always made searches seem more hopeless.; maybe my family had given up already. I wondered if my father thought about his hands around my throat since he discovered my empty room. I wondered if he felt guilty. I didn’t- I was curious if we finally had that common.

“Who’s the kid, Alex?” One of them asked, yelling like he was calling down a hallway even though the farthest anyone could be was ten feet away.

“Twink I picked up.” Alex’s voice was low again. “Definitely from out of town. Nineteen tops.” I shrank in the chair, hoping to blend into the hopelessly ‘70s pattern. That time was gone and never coming back, please God, let me do the same.

“What are we gonna do with him?” The same voice as before asked. He sounded confused rather than curious; I exhaled a breath I accidentally began holding listening to them speak.

“If he’s new around here, we should show him a good time. Maybe that club a few miles that way?” So they planned to be my tour guides. I could pretend to be from Arizona.

“Might get a fuck out of him too if we play our cards right.”

So my first instincts were correct. But I noted the ‘might’ in his sentence and took in a steady breath. I would have advances to deny and chances to make things clear; I was only escaping. I wasn’t settling or leaving any lasting impressions. I was going to be a phantom of a memory. They’d only vaguely remember having me in their lives, but nothing concrete to ever pin me down to that room or that moment or that life. I still had every ounce of freedom.

If all else failed, that packed bar could become the perfect place to escape from my own escape. The crowd could engulf me. I would steal a jacket that someone left at their table, slip out the back door, and be gone. Again. I could become thin air and slip away from everyone, while remaining in plain sight.

“God. He looks like a real fag.” A new voice muttered. I realized then that Audrey’s sweatshirt was behind me, still blazingly lavender. I was fooling no one. I ran away looking more like a fag than my parents would ever bother to imagine. “Bet he’s a virgin.” The men laughed and I felt my skin crawl.

I was going to get out soon enough. I didn’t plan to stop running.

I forced myself to go back to sleep and avoid having to listen to anymore of their conversation.

When I woke again, my stomach was grumbling and my eyes were burning. I completely forgot I was wearing contacts- how fucking stupid. Then again, my glasses would be unmistakable; you put them on me and my entire calculated façade would become a Halloween costume; you’d see the changes but still be able to see me underneath it all. I rubbed my eyes and stretched my legs, sitting up straight. The red head was sprawled across the messy bed, no shirt on. He seemed to be the only one left with me. The moment my feet landed on the carpet firmly, he stirred awake.

“Going somewhere?” He asked, his voice thick and words slurred. He was the one who assumed my virginity.

“Just stretching my legs.” I replied. I sat myself back down and tried to avoid studying my shoes again, but also without having my eyes land on the red head too often.

“I’m here if you need anything.” He rolled over onto his back and revealed an embarrassingly visible hard-on. My eyes settled on my shoes, trying to find a defining feature on them; something to recognize.

I just had to get to the bar. Maybe bum a meal off of them to keep my budget untouched as I left the motel room in the same way. They could never report me or try to find me- they knew our time was limited- and if I got ‘lost’ at a bar, then they could rest easy knowing I was probably being a ‘real fag’ with another fag. I wouldn’t look suspicious. I was merely passing through- just like anyone else they might have picked up. I wasn’t special, and it was the most comforting thought; they wouldn’t never remember me anyway.

Even if my disappearance was spoken about, no one would connect their story with the one being told by a heartbroken Mormon community. Brent was living a completely different life than Brendon and could disappear into sleazy, smoke-filled bars if he wanted. He had no reason to stay. Why make one up?

Chapter Text

I learned the man watching me was Sam- the very same who couldn’t handle his liquor. He had recently been divorced form his third wife, drank vodka straight, smoke a pack of cigarettes effortlessly, and left me to jerk off in the bathroom four times in six hours. He made sure to walk directly in front of me as he walked to the back of the room. He lacked all subtlety and tack; he was repulsive.

It was maddening sitting beside the front door, so close to leaving, but knowing I had to wait to escape their confusing attempt at kidnapping- or seduction. I wasn’t sure which. Sam kept his distance but frequently made passes at me, mentioning how big my mouth was, how tiny I looked, how boyish I appeared. I had to pretend to be flattered, ducking my head and giggling. I had boyish charm; they’d understand if I was ‘picked up’ at the club. They would be disappointed, but happy for whatever guy got me ‘first’. Brent would be applauded.

My mother always complimented me on my cute, loveable, boyish charm. But God this was not how she intended it to be seen or used.

“Want something to drink?” He motioned towards a nightstand covered in beer and liquor bottles.

“No. No thanks.” I scrunched my nose up in a way that changed the connotation of my answer accidentally.

“Don’t drink?” He asked, face falling. It was an option he hadn’t considered.

“Only a little.” Marc and I had shared a bottle of red wine once on New Years. We were both so drunk he called me Brendon the entire evening, and I kept trying to drink from the bottle even though it was empty. “Haven’t been to a college party in a while since I was studying so hard for finals. Haven’t had any fun in such a long time.” I jutted my bottom lip out and seemed dejected by the missed imaginary opportunity.

“Oh! Well, then we should definitely take you out! The boys and I know a place not too far from here- you’ll love it. It’s really a fun time. Feels just like college.” Perfect. I planted the seed.

“Oh! Really? I’d love that!” I batted my eyelashes- he thought I was flirting, but I was mostly just trying to moisten my contacts.

It was almost four in the afternoon and I hadn’t stood from that chair except the moment I woke up- only to be possessively directed to sit back down. My stomach continued to grumble and I was sure the front desk had to have food of some kind. I reached into my pocket and slipped a five out of the wad of cash; I didn’t want them to know how much money I had. It would be far too suspicious to see a lost college kid, such as myself, with so much extra money stuffed in his pocket with no future purchase in sight. Instead, I gripped the bill in my fingers and slowly stood showing Sam Lincoln’s face.

“I’m gonna go see if the front lobby has any food.” My hand touched the door knob and I waited for him to answer. He sat up and furrowed his eyebrows at me. “I’ll be right back.” I promised, popping my hip and batting my doe eyes. Again, contacts. He continued to look concerned. “Promise.” I kicked off my sneakers and left them in front of the armchair. “Right back.”

My stocking feet crossed the wood paneling that led each door to the main building and lobby. I pushed the door open and a small bell rang, alerting a middle aged, heavy-set woman behind the desk that I had walked in. Her back was to me as she stared at a small television on a short filing drawer. The news was showing the very end of a weather report: a rain storm had avoided the area and it should be sunny skies for the next few days.

Down the hall, I could see the ice machine- as well as a vending machine. I shuffled down and tried to decide on whether it would be smarter to buy something to eat or drink considering my roommates were on a particular all liquid diet. I juggled between various potato snacks before deciding on pretzels; probably the best choice, only seventy-five cents, and my first meals since Tuesday. My change came out in only coins and I cursed the addition of seven quarters to my pockets.

The bag that fell to the bottom of the vending machine was mostly air and my first pretzel tasted stale. I dug my hand around for a non-fragmented piece as I walked back into the lobby. The woman was closer to the TV than before, her hand over her mouth. My curiosity peaked and I stopped to listen, pretending to browse the maps and pamphlets on the front desk; all shit about the casinos.

”Local Las Vegas boy officially declared missing after twenty-four hours.” I glanced at the screen to see me-well, Brendon- smiling in last year’s Thanksgiving photo. He was laughing while being nearly tackled by his father and two brothers; good picture, Mom and Dad. In the picture, Brendon was wearing his glasses and an old pair of black, hand-me-down loafers. I felt comfortable enough to stay and watch the rest of the segment. See what Brendon was up to.

“That is so terrible.” The woman muttered, her voice wavering. “That boy. Why that boy?” Whether she was asking God or me, we both had pretty good answers.

She looked up at the ceiling before pinching the bridge of her nose and ducking her head, her straight ironed hair falling around her full cheeks. She seemed inappropriately distraught over some Mormon punk who ran away for being a shameless fairy. What was I missing?

“What happened?” I asked, not needing to fake any confusion.

“Some boy in Summerlin. They think someone took him. Just, took him. Right out of his own house. The front door was wide open. They think… dear God,” she looked up at the ceiling again briefly. “They think someone followed him.”

The screen changed to a shot of my family home with my family standing out front, talking to police officers. Fuck. I left the front door open, didn’t I? But I left out the back and locked it, so it didn’t look like someone had made a foolish mistake trying to exit the house- it looked like a robbery where the only thing missing was their youngest son. Now people weren’t just looking for me, they were searching and praying. I hoped God couldn’t recognize me.

I turned around and left the moment I saw the location of the candle light vigil sponsored by my church. I was Summerlin’s taken angel now. Why couldn’t I have just disappeared? Why did it have to be an accident? Why couldn’t my parents accept that I didn’t want to be found? They didn’t recognize me and I planned to keep it that way. They wanted to place the blame everywhere else except their own hands- my father’s own firm, violent hands. Instead, they were creating some imaginary monster that was the reason I slipped through their fingers with only bruises; some pervert had to come and take me. A fag such as myself could never just leave over such mistreatment. I didn’t have the guts. My parents didn’t have the confidence in me.

None of my roommates had instilled me with a key, so as I walked back to room #7, I knocked casually. Not sure what the attitude should be for our situation. Mason always had a different rhythmic knock for the house when he would come home, but I figured picking up that trait for Brent would be slightly unbecoming for his current living situation.

“Go away.” Sam sounded panicked. “Pass on the housecleaning.”

What was I supposed to say? ‘Uh, excuse me, it’s Brent. That boy you think you can charm into sleeping with you before you thankfully drive me where I need to go: away’. I didn’t see that working.

I knocked again.

There was clanging behind the door and the curtains pulled over the window shifted. I pretended to look upset as I stared at the door, ignoring Sam’s peeking eye. I raised my arm to knock a third time, but before I could hit the door, it disappeared under my knuckles and a foreign third hand gripped my wrist and tugged me forward.

I tripped over my own shoes and nearly fell onto the floor. The room looked like it had been hurriedly cleaned; bottles were clumped together in a more organized fashion and Sam was buttoning his shirt. Either he was drunk or paranoid. Or both- I didn’t think they had to be mutually exclusive. He was staring at me, his eyes wide and breath heaving.

“Did you go out like that?” He asked quickly, pointing at me. I looked down at myself and didn’t find any flaws. I was only two days old; what mistakes could I make? “Who saw them?” He meant the bruises.

The woman at the desk hadn’t noticed; the Boy on the TV didn’t have bruises. None that you could see. “We can’t have anyone seeing these.” He stepped up to me and his hands slapped over them. They were unsteady, clammy, and cold. His fingers curled around my neck and I tensed up, feeling my throat already constricting. I stepped back and pulled my shoulders up, making my neck inaccessible.

I got them for being a man, but that same reason seemed to try and darken them.

“Hey- no. It’s okay.” Sam approached me again and placed a hand on the back of my neck, holding me still as he drunkenly tried to assure me of my safety. “I’m sure no one saw. They see hickeys all the time, anyway.”

The Boy on the TV had hickeys. I could show you the ones in the photo being broadcast all over the Valley. He wasn’t any better than me because I had traded them in for bruises. He would never have a life past eighteen, and I’d never have another childhood. We were perfectly matched, that boy and I.

Alexander and his still nameless sidekick arrived back at the room shortly after Sam assumed my bruises were oddly shaped hickeys, and then made various other assumptions about me. Mostly that he thought I would approve of his hand down my pants. They walked in on Sam’s third attempt.

“Sam! Not now!” Oh, this was apparently the incorrect time. There was a correct one scheduled later. “Get dressed; we are going out.”

“Out?” I felt I had the most authority to question the demand.

“Yes! To celebrate…”

“Your finals.” Sam supplied, nodding his head conspicuously at Alexander. Subtly at its finest; on four beers and a quarter of vodka.

I had to keep playing along. “Oh! You guys don’t have to do that!”

“Oh no- we must. All your hard work deserves some praise.” Alexander insisted, placing a hand on my shoulder and pulling me in closer.

My shoulder fit right underneath his arm as I bumped against his body. I didn’t realize how tall he was. How tall all of them were, upon frantic analysis. I was picked up by a small troop of giants. Hopefully, they weren’t tall enough to see over a crowd as their blond addition slipped away out the backdoor.

“Can I shower first?” I inquired fucking stupidly. It was a foolish choice, but I had to stop smelling like Mr. Bellman; I didn’t want to run away and be reminded of anyone- I had no past, only futures. That, and no one would drive me anywhere if I smelled like vodka and sweat. Well, at least I didn’t think anyone would.

I pushed the bathroom door closed behind me with my foot, the door made an unfamiliar bang instead of a click. I turned to see a hallowed doorknob. No lock. No privacy- except this was more physical than that I faced with my parents. It struck me then that I wasn’t the first hitchhiker they chose to spoil.

The faster I got to the club, the sooner I could go back to possessing my own secrets and controlling my own privacy. The faster I got to the club, the sooner I could meet Brent.

There were empty beer bottles on the sink and back of the toilet, clothes all over the floor, and a box of condoms knocked over in the sink basin. I waited until I was in the shower, curtain pulled over, before I began undressing. I threw my clothes over the curtain bar and tried to not get them wet as I turned on the faucet and showerhead. The water was cold, but I didn’t mind the way it made my skin tight- it limited the sensation it was crawling.

There wasn’t a lot of soap left but I made use of the half dollar-sized soap bar to try and clean the confusion and panic off of me. My first act of disappearing had been completed and the peeling Vanagon had safely taken me from runaway to mysterious, desirable teen. Now, I just had to act like my escape from this motel was back to a life I had had for all eighteen years that I was avoiding confronting. I faced away from the water and tried not to get soap in my only pair of contacts or catch my earrings by accident as I scrubbed my scalp. The armchair had transferred the undesirable stench of liquor and nicotine onto me, and the bar soap wasn’t willing to strip me of it, only my dignity as I grunted and gritted, trying to get myself clean. I gave up when blood began to show up under my fingernails.

I shut off the water without even thinking; the silence settled long enough for me to hear the door open. I grabbed the curtain and kept it closed as I tried to grab my clothes and slide into them.

“Everything okay in here?” the call was sweet, but still equal parts as insincere as curious.

“I’ll be right out.” I tugged my jeans up, buttoning them with one hand.

The door closed and I let go of the curtain, pulling my shirt over my head. I ignored the water dripping from my hair down the nape of my neck and spine, and the way it grabbed onto the shirt and stuck it to my skin. I pushed the curtain back, not expecting to see Alexander still by the door. His eyes clocked my appearance disappointedly. I popped my hip and ran a hand through my hair.

“All ready!” My fingers still had blood on them.

“Ready to celebrate?” His voice was quiet and soft; a second attempt at seduction.

I nodded while I hurriedly wiped my hands on my jeans. “Of course.”

“Good. Good.” Alexander took a step towards me, his hands going in his front pockets. “Tonight is going to be great but, I want you to know that it’s all about you- whatever you want, you need, we will make sure you have.” I had to applaud this guy’s humility. It was at least believable. “You won’t even have to ask twice.”

Do what I say? Well, then. “Can I have my shoes?” I asked coyly, shuffling my feet.

Alexander laughed quietly, letting his head drop as he took another step closer to me. “Shoes?” He didn’t seem to believe my genuine interest in being in the best shape to take off running.

“Don’t make me ask twice.” I moistened my contacts and went to step past Alexander. His hand immediately flew from his pocket and grabbed my hip. My hand flew up and landed in the middle of his chest, my entire body repulsed by the idea of him entering my personal space. His eyes narrowed and entire expression tensed as he let his hand fall to his side.

“You only have to ask once.” He repeated, leaving me in the bathroom. This time, though, it sounded like a threat.

The club had a one-word name that I didn’t catch as I was ushered from the van to the door. All three men had an arm either wrapped around me, linked with one another, or holding a door for me. The bouncer took one look at the four of us and didn’t bother to look me in the eyes, most likely to have deniability or just plead ignorance. Inside, the music was loud and upbeat. I could feel it pounding in my chest like a second heartbeat, except far less familiar. Many of the bodies moving and gyrating around me were clad in white. I unzipped my sweatshirt to fit in. For once, my disguise had Alexander and Sam looking like they were the ones out of place.

We crossed the crowded dance floor to the counter of the bar that ran perpendicular to the wall. I was sandwiched between Sam and the unnamed third man, who was against the wall, propping himself against it. I was forced onto a barstool by strong hands on my shoulders. They didn’t move as the bartender came over to us.

“Oh! Hello, boys! Celebrating a twenty-first birthday?” The tall young man ducked his head to try and see my face under my fallen bangs- see if I looked any older.

“Finals.” I replied, my voice even higher than intended; fear was pinching my throat closed with every breath.

“Oh! Congrats! Allow me to get you something on the house.” The young man reached over and touched my arm before strolling away, hands raised, ready to start creating.

Alexander didn’t release my shoulders as the bartender walked away; his grip only tightened as we waited, keeping me in place. Slowly, my eyes began to wander around the club: rainbow paraphernalia on every surface- including bodies- two men on the dance floor were undressing each other with their eyes, and two men in the corner were doing so literally.

“Is- Is this a… gay place?” I asked, the pieces finally falling into place. I never thought I would step foot in a gay bar. I only heard about them- never thought they were actually real.

“You know it, sweetheart.” The bartender had returned with four drinks. “You have been studying the wrong stuff for those tests.” He let out a beautiful, melodic laugh. He was totally hitting on me. I felt my body tingle as the flattery set in. “Welcome to the land of sexual freedom- and great music.”

He winked at me and left us at the counter as the song changed; a woman was singing about a fire in her soul, an uncontrollable love, and demanding to not to be left in ‘this way’. Whatever it was, I wanted to argue with her; being left alone sounded wonderful. I had six hands on my back and legs, urging me to pick up a glass from the counter. It was orange, but something told me it wasn’t going to taste like an orange. The minute I chose a glass, they all picked up the others, lifting three hands from me. I tried to remember what Marc’s wine tasted like and braced myself as I raised the glass to my lips.

It tasted like piss.

I almost spit it up all over the counter, heaving forward and grossly sputtering all over myself. Two more hands lifted.

“Here, try mine- it’s different.” Alexander handed a drink to me from over my shoulder. I shook my head, using the back of my hand to wipe my mouth of sticky liquor and spit. “Take the drink.”

“You’ll love it.” Sam promised, placing a hand on my stomach, trying to soothe my cough.

“This tastes like lemon.” Unnamed said, holding another hand in front of me.

“No… I don’t know.” I shook my head and continued to cough.

“Try it.”

Another drink came into my vision and I finally took one; it tasted like bathroom cleaner, but still at least a little lemon-like. He wasn’t completely wrong. I just had to get through the first round and I could get on the dance floor. They could leave me this way.

Sam’s drink was the next to be shoved into my grip. He rubbed my chest and rested his chin on my shoulder. He insisted that I at least sip it- even just the tiniest bit. I lifted the stout glass and tried to deduce what vile concoction was in my cup, but I had no idea where to start. It was red with an umbrella but smelled like Sam’s breath that was now puffing against my neck.

“Go on.” His hand slipped down and fell to my leg, his fingers drumming on the inside of my thigh. “Drink up.”

It was bitter at first, the splash of liquid burning my throat and drying my mouth, but then it twisted and became salty and gritty. I cringed and smacked my lips together, trying to get the taste out of my mouth. The minute my lips separated, Sam was forcing another sip into my mouth. The glass emptied half into my mouth and half down the front of me. The hands around me all lifted as they wiped my mouth and pet my hair down.

Later, when the bartender finally came back to refill the glasses I had emptied, my contacts began to act up; everything refused to stay in focus. The background of bright lights and rainbow signs wanted to be in the forefront for most of the bartender’s pickup lines and I missed his smile and kind brown eyes. After he left, my legs started to feel heavy and my arms hung at my sides- I must’ve really been sore from sleeping so cramped up. I hadn’t felt like this before.

“I wanna dance.” Exercise could only help me. I tried to stand, but as my feet touched the ground, there was heavy pounding in my ears. Either it was blood or the entirety of my head had become an ocean, sloshing in my ears. My face began to flush and I could feel myself sweating. “I wanna sit down. No- sit.” The rest of the room began to stretch away from me. The door seemed miles away.

“Okay, here you go.” The chair I was put into had no back, and I was forced to lean against someone. They kept poking me in the lower back with something. Sam’s hand was still on my leg and two others were siding over my chest, trying to take my sweatshirt off- trying to get me to stop sweating, I guessed.

“No- No that’s. That’s not mine.” I muttered, my tongue growing heavy. I reached over to grab a side and tug it back over my body, but grabbed a hand instead.

Now there were two unfamiliar heartbeats. One was steady and shaking my entire chest, the other was quick and pounding, only heard in my ears. My contacts wouldn’t refocus on Sam as he came closer to me, his breath even stronger. It was hot on my face and I began to sweat more as he began speaking near, and almost into, my mouth. I couldn’t hear what he was saying over the heartbeats.

“I feel really hot.” I mumbled back to him, our noses bumping together. Sam responded but his mouth was a slow blur of shapes. “I have to go soon.” I tugged on the hands snaking around my waist. “I need to-” The words got lost somewhere between my head and my mouth, becoming only a groan as someone pulled me against them, the room jolting and spinning.

“You want to go back to the room, wanna go to the car?” A voice was suddenly in my ear, trying to speak over the heartbeats- my heartbeat. “All you have to do is ask.”

“I wanna go home.” My entire body felt warm and liquefied. I was losing control and shape. I could no longer sit up. I fell into a set of strong, unmoving arms. I couldn’t get my mouth and brain to cooperate for a single moment. My tongue felt thick and swollen, like I could swallow it. “I wanna go.” I tried to stand, my arms pushing away the bodies around me. A chorus of voices cooed at me as I pushed at the shapes coming too close to me. I would bat at things that my hands seemed to go right through and stayed hovering in front of my eyes. I took one step and felt my knees buckle, my vision going bright white. Then I stared only into a black void.

 There was a chorus of shouting, every word sounding foreign and miles away, calling after me. There were eight hands.

Chapter Text

I had been run over by a truck- I was sure of it; every inch of me was aching and sore. My forehead was pounding and I wanted nothing more than to possess the ability to remove it; relieve some of the pressure building up behind it and by my temples. My eyes were still burning as I opened them, but I couldn’t tell if it was from my past-date contacts or from the sunshine pouring in from half drawn curtains. The light was warm and pleasant, but mother nature and I never had the same sleep schedule; I promptly used the pillow under my head to double as a blindfold. The pillow smelled fresh. It had been cleaned in the last week.

I wasn’t quartered up in a Motel Room. I was in someone’s home.

I immediately shot up and tried to gather clues from the past few hours; my shoes were missing and my sweatshirt had disappeared from my body. As I sat up, the room began to spin. The disorientation was familiar and I clutched my forehead and mouth, not sure if the headache or urge to vomit would get to me first. The bed under me was old and rickety, squeaking as I tried to crane my neck to see out the window. There was no one beside me, and I know I couldn’t have been completely alone, but the thought of moving to find out terrified me. Sam, even with an entire case of beer in his system, instilled that in me very quickly; I couldn’t be foolish running. I had to plan every step or the next one I took could be back through my front door.

I finally decided to swing my feet over the bed, testing the wooden floor boards, when I heard footsteps rushing the door. I only had time to feel my heart stop and entire body become paralyzed with fear as the door swung open.

The man in the doorway was young- maybe 20- and stood tall against the thin wooden frame, although he was anything but thin or frail. He looked strong- healthy actually- and had the beginnings of a beard coming over his grinning face. His manner was homey and genuine, keeping one hand on the frame as he leaned into the room, the other hand on the knob; he was asking permission to enter.

“You’re awake!” His eyes stayed on mine as he waited for a verbal response. I admittedly had none. This was the fourth stranger’s care I had fallen under, and waiting for his first red flag to shoot up proved difficult to have conversation around. “How do you feel?” He released the door knob and let it swing open farther. Light from the connecting room shone behind him. “You looked really terrible last night so I figured I would leave you to sleep- it seems to have done you good.”

Fuck. He took me from the bar and let me sleep in an empty bed, unbothered? He must’ve been a Mormon. Or at least something close to. They found me. I was home again.

“Who are you?”

“Oh shit!” He quickly stepped into the room and held a hand out to me. “I’m Spencer.” This man, a man not much older than me, whom had picked me up from a gay club at God knows what time, wanted to shake hands with me as a formal introduction. Still no response.

My instincts told me that I could trust him and his smile- eye crinkles and all- but there was a part of me that just didn’t believe people could be this nice. I certainly hadn’t met one before, even in Summerlin. We were in Las Vegas after all. Right?

“Who the fuck are you?” I asked again, disturbed by his disposition.

“Okay. Take two.” He stepped closer, his face still cheerful, but voice tense. “I’m Spencer James Smith- the guy that saved your ass from being taken by three pervs with a van.” I shrunk under the implication that they were hunting me down- not that they had brought me. That I hadn’t walked myself right into their car, motel, and plan. “Pleasure to meet your acquaintance.”

“I’m Brend- Brent.” I took his hand finally and shook it. “Thanks.”

It was absolutely idiotic to think even toeing with that situation was the best plan. My escape was supposed to get me to a better life, where I could shamelessly express all sides of myself, not one where I was boarded up in a motel room, scared for my safety. I was so desperate that I settled. This new life wasn’t for settling- I was going to honor the real, honest me. That was the whole point of running in the first place. What good was starting over if I just became the same person?

“Not a problem, just glad you look better. When I first found you, you honestly looked like fifty miles of bad road.” I had only walked around two, but he was still probably right. “Welcome back.”

“Thanks.” I repeated.

“I don’t have work this weekend so I’ll be here all day if you need me.” Spencer lifted his hands out to the room before letting them hit his thighs as he backed out of the door, leaving me alone.

“Wait- weekend?” It should have only been Friday.

“It’s Saturday.” He replied calmly, cracking a smile at my confusion. “And it’s still only 1982, don’t worry.”

I knew it was a joke, but the reassurance still comforted me. I was still where I should be- just a day behind. Somehow.

“Why was I out that long?” I muttered, rubbing my forehead. I have never felt this worn out and exhausted before. Not even after a night of splitting a bottle of red wine, yelling at fireworks, sloppy make outs, and stumbling around a house I was too drunk to remember the floor plan to. “What did I drink?”

Spencer made an awkward expression and shrugged. “You never know with Gabe. He likes to think bartending is an art form. A lot of his ‘house drinks’ are just his imagination at work.” I began to remember the flirtatious bartender and his never ending arsenal of oddly colored drinks. “But I don’t think anything Gabe served you was what made you so out of it… I have never seen someone not be able to stand after three shots.”

I had only heard of this in the movies Marc would sneak me out to see. He always told me it never really happened. “You think they… drugged me.” I asked, holding my head and feeling my body shiver. I had gotten too close to the edge. I ran too far. There was a better way to get revenge, and it wasn’t forcing my parents to bury me. “Fuck… Thanks for uh, getting me.” Was ‘thank you’ even appropriate to say? It didn’t even begin to cover what I should have been saying to Spencer, a stranger that made my new life far less awful.

“Don’t mention it.” He nodded at me sharply before walking out, closing the door behind him.

I could hear doors opening and closing, but only one set of footsteps tracked around the house with no extra voices. It was only me and Spencer, and he chose to be in a completely different room. While I was unconscious for two days.

The room looked like no one lived in it. The floor was unnaturally clutter free and there were no frames hung on the walls. My purple sweatshirt was the only thing hung in the closet and my shoes were by the door. Spencer had given me my own space. A place to hide. A place to pretend.

In the other room, the phone rang and I heard Spencer’s calm footsteps walk to relieve the bell. The curtain fluttered from a gust of wind and revealed more of the desert beyond the glass. The apartment must’ve been on the third or fourth floor, the building itself surrounded by construction of another apartment building; an industrial garden being planted in sandy Las Vegas. At least, I still thought I was in Las Vegas. I didn’t actually have any proof besides the surrounding desert, but there were miles stretching in either direction that could look like Las Vegas. Didn’t seem like a shamed thought to ask.

I had to know if the boy on the TV would be making an appearance on any local news stations.

My socks drug along the carpeted floor and allowed my fatigued legs to settle into a labored stride as I left the room and entered the apartment’s center: an open living room with a large two-pane window overlooking the dining table that allowing the bright, undoubtedly scorching, desert sun to flood and light up the space. My feet slid far more easily along the wood floor as I stepped farther out of my room and into my new world. Spencer was by the small dining table and kitchen archway, phone between his ear and shoulder. He spotted me and held up a finger to tell me he’d be right with me.

“Yeah, Mom. I promise I’ll have him call you the moment he gets back. I- No, no I don’t know what I said. Sometimes he just needs a night to himself… No, I didn’t mention that damn piece of furniture, Mom. I’m not an idiot.” Spencer gave me a quick smile before turning closer to the wall and grabbing the phone and cupping the receiver to his mouth. “No, we didn’t have a fight- he just went out! I- Yes, Mom. I checked all the usual spots…. He’ll be back, Mom, okay? I’ve gotta go. Love you too.” He hung the phone back on the wall and turned back to me, smiling brightly again. “Sorry- my mom- what can I do for you?”

“Who’s missing?” I asked, feeling like I had walked into some sick joke. I looked casually curious and wandered over to the couch in front of me. I placed my hand on the back and nonchalantly looked over the living room décor. On the arm rest, closest to Spencer, there was a magazine.

“No one is missing.” He assured me, leaning against the wall and crossing his arms. The magazine was a Rolling Stone- two ordinary men were standing on the cover, both in monochromatic, black and white suits. It said one man’s name was Garfunkel. Poor bastard. “My roommate is just out at the moment. He should be back.” I read the address sticker: Spring Valley, Las Vegas.

“If you want to go find him, I can stay here… I guess.” I knew where I was, I had no intentions of finding myself under any other supervision or roof. “He’s more important than watching over me-”

“No no no.” Spencer hushed me and waved his hands. “I did look for him; it’s how I found you.”

I furrowed my eyebrows and sat down on the armrest. “You went looking for your roommate in the dark corners of a gay bar?” Spencer might have been an early twenties paternally fueled stranger, but his roommate must have been an interesting dichotomy. Although, I did feel myself waiting to hear Spencer’s reaction to the demographic of the club with shivering anxiousness.

“Yeah! Ry thinks I won’t look there because it’s a gay joint; you sometimes have to be smarter than the monster himself.” Spencer tapped his temple and laughed, pushing away from the wall. “Can I get you something to eat? It’s early enough to still be considered breakfast.” He rounded into the kitchen, his hand tapping the archway frame.

“I- No thank you.” I shook my head, even though he couldn’t see me.

This man goes into a gay club to locate a runaway roommate? Already not like anyone I had ever known. And the roommate assumed no one would find him there? Or was it that Spencer would never step foot in the place? Something was missing; I was waiting for the disgust.

“Wait. So you aren’t gay?” I was asking the question before I had given myself enough time to talk myself out of it. Apparently Brent was blunter than I had anticipated.

“God no.” Spencer laughed, spotting me as I stepped into the kitchen. His face fell as I went to step back out. “I mean- No, I’m not. Wasn’t a fan. Have a girlfriend, kinda- working on it. Ryan’s gay though. Definitely.” He pursed his lips together and intensified his expression as he nodded.

I didn’t bother trying to hide my relief. I even allowed myself to laugh at his joke. Seemed like Brent and Spencer were good friends already. I stood in the archway, arms crossed, watching as Spencer almost light the kitchen on fire trying to use the gas stove- One of these days, my honor roll GPA will help me with this damn thing. He cracked two eggs into a pan and put two slices of bread in his slot toaster. His hustle was meaningful and focused, but slightly confused. He kept opening his mouth to speak, but kept closing it the moment something bubbled, dinged, or popped. His marathon ended with a single chipped china plate of scrambled eggs and corner-burnt toast. He beamed with pride.

“Come, sit down.” He nodded over my shoulder at the small, round wooden table with only two chairs. Spencer placed the food down in front of a chair but sat down in the one across from it. That breakfast was for me.

“I said-”

“You haven’t eaten in a full day, and I’m guessing maybe a little bit longer than that. Eat the food.” Spencer thrust a fork into my hand and pointed at my plate. He looked angry, but had soft eyes- like when a father sees his child doing something dangerous on the park slide; he is worried and upset only because the focus of his universe is in danger, or because his youngest son does not relate to him on the most primal level. Actually, no. Nothing like that.

“Thanks.” I said again, pulling the plate closer to me. “You didn’t have to do this.”

“But I did.” Spencer shrugged and leaned back in his chair. “It’s the least I could do.” I wasn’t entirely sure what situation he was pitying me for, but if it meant I got a plate of dry eggs and heavy-handed buttered toast, I only made an unnoticeable face of confusion before continuing to remind my stomach that my throat hadn’t been cut. “So, where are you from?” He asked, standing to flip through his shelves of vinyl behind me, near the phone.

The eggs were harder to shallow that time. “Uh…rizona. A little town between Phoenix and Tucson.” They were the only two cities I knew there.

“Shit. Really?” He nodded with impressment. “Why come all the way to Nevada?”

“College.” I took a large bite from a piece of toast, willing to use the time I needed to chew for stalling.

 “Right on.” Spencer nodded again as he pulled a vinyl from its sleeve and placing it on the player. He put a lot of focus placing the needle perfectly at the beginning of the record. A quiet piano melody came from the speakers and a man began to sing about things being ‘a little bit funny’. He let the album play and didn’t ask another question. Not what college. Not a more specific town in Arizona. Nothing.

At first, I thought he was ticked off; here was some snot-nosed eighteen-year-old from a club he, himself, was barely old enough to stand near, and then said jerk proceeds to blatantly lie about himself. He should’ve been mad- you can’t build a friendship on lies- but instead his face was still pleasant as his head bobbed along to the music. He waited until I cleared my plate to take it from me, clapping me on the shoulder and thanking me. The faucet in the kitchen ran briefly before it stopped suddenly, and the plate quietly clacked against the counter top.

“I kind of told myself that I wouldn’t ask, but,” I prepared myself for the town name, my college mascot, my fake age, fake parents’ names, pretending I was an only child. “do you want to tell me about those bruises?” Spencer’s voice floated in from the kitchen and struck me still and silent.

I could see why lying was even less accepted by Spencer; he had been curious and worried, and I didn’t even have the courtesy to include them in the cover up. He waited long enough, though. I had already accepted his peace offering, I laughed at his joke- we were friends now. On same basic Maslow-level.

“I- they’re not- I mean.” I nervously slid my hands over my neck, as if I could feel the probably now yellowing bruises. They couldn’t be disguised as hickeys now, not with my invisible history. “Some guy at a college party. Things got really out of hand- he thought I was hitting on his girlfriend, Chelsea. We were both pretty…. Pretty w-wasted. It got out of hand pretty quick.” My nonchalance showed discomfort as I sputtered through the sentence. I looked over at Spencer, standing in the kitchen, watching me. His eyebrows were arched almost into his hairline.

“All that over a girl.” He asked. I nodded, letting my hands fall into my lap. “But you’re-”

“Into both.” I corrected. Brent was honest; it was the real reason for the bruises. I wasn’t just some way that my parents couldn’t understand. I was a particular way that could allow me to assimilate and live the model Mormon life, but there was also a whole other half that I didn’t want to bury inside of me. “I mean, I wasn’t flirting with her but- I can… Yeah.”

“Still doesn’t mean he should have choked you.” Spencer was right, and he knew it.

He validated me with a small smile before turning away.

If only my father could have seen me, openly discussing my preferences with a stranger, who themselves was unbothered by homosexuality. I was face-to-face with the real world, finally coming around to the idea of two men being together. I was on the brink of complete acceptance. I was on the edge, but I was safe.

Spencer had gone back to washing the plate again when the front door opened. The noise startled us both; the plate heard clattering against the sink and my entire body freezing up again. Spencer quickly turned off the sink and ran to the door. The dining table was in a sunken nook, and I couldn’t see the door, or the guest, only Spencer’s side directly behind the record player that was spinning with no more record to decipher into sound.

“Where have you been?” It was the first time Spencer sounded genuinely angry. “Ryan, tell me you didn’t go out drinking. Tell me, Ryan. Tell me that much.” Spencer was speaking through gritted teeth; I could hear him loud and clear through his attempts to silence himself.

“I didn’t.” An even, sweet yet monotone voice answered. His response was careful and calm, defusing Spencer. “I just had to clear my head for a little. I just, I just read the paper and just, I needed some time- I wandered around for most of the night. Watched the Strip’s lights until I got dizzy and tired. Just like we used to, Spence. Didn’t go out drinking.”

“Fuck- I was so worried, Ryan. Mom’s called me three times this morning.” Spencer continued, not letting the nostalgic answer deter him. “We thought your disappearing act days were coming to an end.”

“I’m still magic, Spence. And for my next trick, I will now make my best friend appear.”

“Ryan. I am not doing this to be an asshole. I just- I worry. You are twenty years old. You don’t get to run away and play Rebellious Kid. At least tell me so I don’t come home and think you just left.” I suddenly realized why Spencer was so kind to me; I didn’t have to tell him how I got to that bar or with those three guys, he just knew it wasn’t quite right. I wasn’t where I was supposed to be; I was shoving myself into some other narrative. And it definitely sounded like he knew what running looked like. Even if he thought it was from some possessive jerk at a college party.

“I don’t want to get into it right now, Spencer. Let me eat first or something. Fuck, just let me breathe for a minute-”

I wasn’t sure how to act even remotely casual when a thin man rounded the corner into the kitchen and into my eyesight. He was in a dark denim jacket, a maroon button down tucked into tight jeans that wrapped around his spindly, never-ending legs. He was strangely thin when compared to how average and healthy Spencer looked. His face was framed by loose curls that hung around his jaw line. His features were oddly delicate on a person that had made such a snarky and biting entrance. He pushed a lock of hair out of his eyes and broke into an amused grin as he looked at me, slowing turning to Spencer and thumbing over to me with also surprisingly thin and gentle-looking fingers.

“Who’s the cutie with the terrible dye job?” He smirked and glanced at me again. His smile faltered as his eyes looked over me, but returned as they landed back on my face. His eyes stayed on mine like he was studying them. He blinked quickly and looked away like he had seen something startling. What memory had he been able to gather from me so quickly? I sat still, staring at the two of them like an embarrassing cinema.

“This is Brent. A boy I found while looking for you.” Spencer said pointedly, standing right behind Ryan, speaking over his shoulder, and almost resting his chin on his shoulder. The proximity perplexed me and my furrowed eyebrows seemed to warrant more explanation. “Brent, this is my roommate, Ryan. See? Not missing.” Spencer put on a happy face and placed an arm around Ryan’s shoulders.

“And this is my roommate, Spencer.” Ryan returned, placing his hand on Spencer’s chest. He slapped it and Spencer jokingly winced, playfully slapping Ryan’s arm in return. Both were all smiles and giggles, and I wasn’t in on the joke.

I mean, they had to be a couple, right? But Spencer said he wasn’t- unless that was the joke; something they could always get a little laugh out about. I feared I had accidentally walked into the worst third wheeling experience created by the sick universe that contained the human life experience; two people in love with each other, but no one said it out loud, allowing every passerby to suffer with the obliviousness.

It would be the best place to hide, though; neither of them could pry their attention away from the other to even bother to notice me.

Apparently, though, the confusion and slight look of scheming showed on my face.

“We’re not.” Ryan answered my question even though it never made it to words. Like their declarations of love. “Spencer’s not gay- as I’m sure he told you.” Ryan looked at me and winked, enjoying watching the discomfort melt from my features. “Right, Spence?”

“Yes.” He sighed. “But it came up in natural conversation. He asked!”

“So you told him you weren’t. But did you tell him about-”

“Shut up.” Spencer said, nudging Ryan’s puckered lips away from his face. He had grown red and flustered. Ryan laughed at his sudden shift in demeanor and turned to wink at me again.

“I love fucking with him.” Ryan looked at Spencer as he walked back to the sink. “Literally, too, right, Spencer?”

The plate shattered in the sink. “Shove it, Ross.” He laughed, his face crimson. Spencer sounded frustrated, but he allowed Ryan to nudge him as he passed through the kitchen to the table. Ryan had an unforeseen ability to read people, knowing right where the line started- but also where it ended. As Ryan sat down at the table, I ducked my head, not willing Brendon’s story to show across my face. Ryan placed his feet up on the table and began looking at his nails instead of me.

“He been here all night?” Ryan asked. Spencer hummed back, clattering the plate pieces around. “Longer than most of our dates, huh? He might be a keeper then.” I could tell he was talking about me and not to me as an attempt to try and get my eyes to wander from the table top. Spencer made sounds of approval as he walked past me, bumping my back and smiling at me when I finally looked. I turned back and found Ryan watching me with curious and attentive eyes. I tried to look away again but he reached over and grabbed my arm, squeezing it tightly. “Welcome to apartment 3C, kid. We’re a bunch of wildcards here. You’re gonna fit right in.” He winked again and I had no response- no argument.

Chapter Text

First order of business now that Ryan and Spencer suddenly had a third person living in their home? Spencer’s first thought was a toothbrush, while Ryan’s went straight to my haircut. I continued to insist that no action needed to be taken, but the second I suggested that I should be on my way again, Spencer insisted that he wouldn’t allow me to just walk out that door if I didn’t at least have a plan or ‘point B’ to call home- he still thought my home was Arizona. Spencer even poked my chest defiantly as he spoke. Real anger was saved for Ryan apparently. True love, I suppose. 

It felt wrong, having a bed so soon after leaving my own- well, Brendon’s now- but this world, this calm, comforting apartment, was exactly what I was chasing. Spencer and Ryan recognized the same person I did. I might have literally been living a lie and living a double life, but it didn’t feel like it; I felt whole. Brent didn’t just have to be a shell of Brendon, he made friends and was offered a room, free of pity.

Spencer left for the corner pharmacy, his place of work, to get me a toothbrush and various living necessities at a worker’s discount. I hadn’t left the dining table and was stuck in the chair, afraid of moving and altering the life being built around me. As soon as Spencer left, saying he’d be right back, Ryan stood from his chair and walked to the bedroom across from the table, returning with a pair of scissors he snipped at me playfully.

“Please allow me to fix the weird… feathered look you have right now.” He waved a hand at my hair and made a tense face of disapproval. I immediately rolled my eyes, resenting the things I could imagine my father saying about Ryan’s focus going straight to my hair and appearance. “I know a home haircut when I see one. I’ve done enough of them to know. But also how to fix them.” He pulled my chair- and me- into the kitchen, onto the mustard colored tile floor in one quick motion. “What was the occasion? First rebellion as an adult? Saw your first real queer?” He laughed, placing a hand on my shoulder. The term startled me, having only heard it used to offend before. I pretended Ryan hadn’t felt my entire body jolt and settled in my chair.

“It just… got in my face.” I made no attempt to explain the most likely uneven bleaching or bruises he was trying to avoid as he looped a kitchen towel around my neck. “I just needed a change.”

“I know that feeling.” He chuckled. “Except for me, I stopped cutting my hair.” Behind my eyes, I could hear my father muttering, yet again, about the state of the nation: Men looking like girls, the whole world collapsing. But somehow, Ryan was the only person allowing my world not to crumble, but let keep spinning.

Ryan cut my hair for only ten minutes, snipping parts in the back and fixing the lopsided fringe I had hanging in my face. He clapped my shoulder suddenly and told me I no longer resembled a bird. I thanked him and stood from my chair, picking it up and placing it back near the table immediately, restoring the order of the home; no evidence I was there. I turned back and nearly missed bumping into Ryan as he walked back into the kitchen with a broom. He swept up the hair slowly, whistling as he went. He wasn’t in a rush. He wasn’t trying to hide me or cover anything up.

I know for the assimilation into their lives, I shouldn’t have asked any questions or stared for too long, but I was dying to know how someone who had been previously missing could return to his home and have a smile on his face- I guess it all depended who you came back to on what the reaction would be if you tried to explain yourself. Ryan was greeted with concern and almost-tears. I imagined I would be met with heavy glares, admissions of guilt (my part only), and coaxing me to see the wrong in my ways, all of them: How could you betray this family? Your mother was so worried! We all were! We assumed the worst! God knows who you were with this time. What an ungrateful cock-

I smiled to myself at the thought of Dad not being completely wrong- I was with a real gay person, in his home, letting him cut my hair, and get to know the persona I’ve created. I wasn’t a stranger to Ryan or Spencer.

I waited for Ryan to start asking questions about where I was from, who I was, but he just finished sweeping and went into the fridge, pulling back with an orange in his hands.

“Can I help you?” He asked. I was standing by the table, dumbly staring at him. “You can sit down if you want. You live here too, Brent.” I wasn’t just staying there, I lived there. A permanent fixture being allowed into their lives.

It was too easy; Brent wasn’t given the third degree before begrudgingly given a couch and scraps to eat. All I did was give my name and I was real. I was starting my new life, each breath further suffocating Brendon’s memory.

I sat down on the couch facing the door, copying Ryan as he put his feet up on the coffee table. He looked over at me and quirked an eyebrow. “Alright, not too homey.” He said, waving my feet off the table. My feet slid off and heat ran to my face; Brent was just as awkward as Brendon. “Oh my God.” His hand was suddenly on mine, his fingers slightly sticky from the orange peel. “I was kidding.” He squeezed my hand and leaned forward, a soft laugh escaping from his lips.

“Oh.” I replied, nervously laughing as Ryan continued to grip my hand.

“Out of the two of us, I am not the uptight one with the furniture; that’s Spencer. I get uptight about that-” He thumbed one hand over to the vinyl records that were meticulously organized in shelves by the kitchen archway. It looked like decades worth of music sitting on those shelves, and I was clueless to every year. “But since Spencer only listens to those two Elton albums, we really don’t fight over that- but two people putting their feet on tables? Oh, Brent. Get ready for it.” Ryan widened his eyes jokingly before going back to his orange.

I was nervously looking around the room, trying to find answers to questions I should not have been asking when Ryan tapped my thigh with his hand, pointing at the table. He stared and he raised his eyebrows, motioning to the table again. I placed my feet up beside his and he nodded in satisfaction. He muttered a quiet ‘excellent’ before peeling the rind off of the fruit and splitting it down the middle. He focused on one half, separating the segments and eating them slowly, one at a time. The record still hadn’t been flipped and the needle hadn’t been set back; the room was silent, but we were somehow able to exist in the silence together. Well, it made sense; I did live there too. We were roommates. Roommates also had secrets. They didn’t have to be completely translucent; mystery was half of the agreement. Roommates shared a common living space where their lives intersected. They didn’t live the same life. What I did outside of those four walls could stay my secret.

We heard Spencer before we saw him. He was stomping up the nearby flight of stairs and took two minutes for him to unlock the door. I made a motion to stand but Ryan shook his head, saying that Spencer was a big fan of doing things himself, said it was what drew him to Spencer in the first place. He laughed and I was left counting the times both had confirmed they weren’t romantically- or at least sexually- involved.

“I’m home!” Spencer called, kicking the door open. The door revealed us on the couch, both sets of feet perched on the coffee table. “Sorry I took so long! First, someone thought I was working and began asking too many damn questions.” He placed a full brown paper bag onto the coffee table, shushing our feet off the surface immediately. Ryan sat up and began helping Spencer unpack, handing the uneaten half of his orange to Spencer without asking or consulting him. “And then there was this crowd of people outside when I tried to leave, asking about this poor kid that went missing.” The Boy on the TV couldn’t have made it onto flyers already. It must’ve been someone else; Spencer didn’t even seem to notice the same Cupid’s bow or scar in their eyebrow. We went undetected. We remained separate.

“Fuck. That’s a shame.” Ryan noted somberly, to no one in particular. The topic passed as they worked to empty the bag, the coffee table being filled quickly.

“So.” Spencer said, putting an orange segment in his mouth. “I bought you a toothbrush, toothpaste, deodorant, razors,” Spencer threw each item into my lap as he named them.

“And condoms.” Ryan laughed, tossing them at my chest. I tried not to look mortified; I was never the one that brought them over to Marc’s. The thought of having them in or around my house seemed like a recipe for absolute disaster.

Spencer was far less childish than Ryan in his response. “You’ve read the papers, Ryan. Use ‘em and don’t be stupid.” He was smiling but his voice was stern. “I want you around to bother me for a long time.”

Marc always used a condom because in health class, for about a week straight, they mentioned something where these weird sores could show up on your dick, and he refused to run that chance even with ‘easy virigins’ like me. The last time we were together was the first time Marc went without one.

“Read what?” I asked, placing the box of condoms on the table. “What’s the big idea?”

Ryan looked over at me quickly, hair falling in his face. Spencer choked on his orange. “GRID.” Ryan replied slowly, like at any moment, I would come to my senses and take back the question.

But I didn’t though; I pressed on. “What’s that?” I omitted the fact my sexual experience and knowledge involved only one boy and what my ‘progressive’ health curriculum leant me: it was mostly embarrassment.

“Gay Related Immune Disease- do you really not know this?” Ryan wasn’t laughing or rolling his eyes as Spencer answered.

“Please don’t tell me those fucking boys at college-”

“I-no. They didn’t.” I responded quickly. I was lying about numbers and apparently safety now.  “I guess this explains why.” I didn’t think Marc knew about this. He couldn’t have. He wouldn’t have.

I had never heard of something affecting gay people only. Was I in the running since I also liked girls? Was this what Dad was scared of? I was completely in the dark, feeling around and trying to find the door out. It was impossible to run in the dark; everything was the same.

“Oh thank God you are here then.” Spencer muttered, shaking his head. “Don’t need another poor dying kid.”

“What is it?”

“Just, cover your dick- or theirs- okay?” Ryan said, placing a hand on my knee. “Just, do it, okay?”

“Oh-Okay. Yeah. Can do.” I nodded.

For the first time in my life, I felt completely clueless- or was at least aware of it. My household never spoke about sex- or listened to any music that discussed it. It was so taboo, I was a freshman in high school before I really knew how women got pregnant. But that was just mechanics. All the other sex- related topics I had to learn from Marc. But he really wasn’t about the education, just showing off what he knew. And even if he did, he never talked about anything that could be passed around through sex being dangerous. He just didn’t want his dick to get those weird sores; harder to impress girls he said, and they could sometimes show up on your face. I trusted Marc every time we were together, I didn’t want to start second guessing myself, but really, at that point, what did I know? I had been sheltered and now I was living in a world that could kill me just for being gay.

Sam and Alexander could have killed me. I was clueless and vulnerable; I could have been killed or diseased or however it happened. Why didn’t anyone tell me?

I came back to reality and heard Spencer talking again. Talking to me.

“I’m sorry, what?” I asked, blinking slowly, refocusing. Ryan was up from the couch and by the record player. Spencer was walking to the room I came from, carrying his purchases in his hands.

“This room is yours.” He repeated. “Whatever is yours, can just go right in here.” He pointed to the door to the right of my room. “There’s the bathroom.” He pointed to the room across the living room, facing the kitchen. “And that’s our room, if you need us.”

“You share?” I was asking myself more than either of them, but Ryan answered me with a laugh.

“Yup.” He winked. “Every night, right next to this guy.” He thumbed over his shoulder to Spencer who was still shuffling things back and forth.

“Why?” They had a spare room. I was staying in it.

“I work part time at a Laundromat four blocks away.” Ryan replied shortly. “I hate washing sheets.”

“So you just, share a bed?” This was unbelievable.

“Would you rather sleep next to Spencer? He’s a warm sleeper.” Ryan noted, scrunching up his nose.

“And Ryan’s feet are always freezing.” Spencer added, walking out of the room- my room.

I stared between them with a face of disbelief and confusion for a minute before Ryan waved a hand in front of my face, tisking. “You hold that face too long and you’ll get wrinkles.”

“Ryan, he is barely out of college, he doesn’t care about wrinkles.” Spencer laughed, picking up the box of condoms- the only thing left on the table- and walking them to my room.

“You’re right.” Ryan nodded, his face making a mock-expression of interest. “What do college kids think about? Neither of us would know.” Ryan was mocking Spencer with every ounce of energy he had, but his face conveyed the idea that he actually wanted me to respond. Did he want me to join in yanking Spencer’s chain? We already teamed up in putting our feet on the table, maybe this was a Part Two?

“Uh,” I lifted my shoulders and shrugged, not clever enough to answer. “I mostly just focused on not failing.” It was true for high school; some subjects just weren’t my favorite. And every time Marc would offer to do homework with me, we would most definitely would end up not studying anything other than each other’s skin. I assumed in college, the struggle could only continue.

“That’s good.” Ryan laughed, crouching down and flipping through the shelf packed with paper slipcovers. “Someone actually studying in college.” My nervous laughter didn’t mix well with his. He looked over his shoulder at me. “Fuck, you’re serious? You actually study. Jesus. What’s next? You’re gonna tell me your teenage years in the ‘70s were spent in the library, nose-deep in some chick’s poetry book and not just to get laid?” It was actually spent in a church choir, but his guess wasn’t that far off either. My silence said more than any words could. His eyebrows shot up and he nodded his head slowly, taking this new me in. “I can respect that. You look like a smart kid. What are you studying?”

“Uh… Theology.” Apparently, all I knew was the church; I was going to use it to my advantage. “Specifically a focus on Mormonism.”

“No shit.” Ryan muttered. “Good thing you go to school in Nevada, right? Fuckton of Mormons around here. Actually, I think there’s a church the next town over or something.” He muttered various mispronunciations of my hometown under his breath. “Sum-Sumlin something?”

“Never heard of it.” I shrugged.

Ryan shook his head as the name escaped him, continuing his search for his particular record. I wasn’t lying. I didn’t really know it; I merely passed through. The Boy on the TV lived there. His candle light vigils were held in the churchyard and picture pasted in every window. I could walk right through and I’d just be another tourist. I didn’t know that town. I apparently never did. I was destined to just pass on through.

Spencer apparently cooked regularly. I thought since his focus was far more intense than I’d ever seen towards pots and pans, that maybe it was a skill he was still acquiring. But, I was proven wrong was six o’clock rolled around and Ryan asked Spencer if he needed any help with dinner, even though Spencer had only placed one foot in the kitchen. Spencer declined the help instantly. Ryan’s question was sincere but Spencer’s answer was rehearsed.

“See? He’s a very independent man. He’ll do it himself and then do it for you.” Ryan said. He was whispering since he hadn’t been able to find a record to suffice his need and claimed silence was better. In the silence, Spencer was able to hear him though.

“Would you stop talking about me to him like that- fuck.” He called, the stove ticking. His voice tensed as he finished his sentence with eloquent swearing. “I don’t appreciate the constant innuendos, Ry.”

“I didn’t say anything.” Ryan responded innocently, waiting for Spencer’s face to peer out from the kitchen before breaking into a bright smile. Spencer rolled his eyes and waved a hand at him.

“If you must, you can tell him the story. I can see you are just dying to.” Spencer sighed, disappearing into the kitchen, slightly defeated. The stove lighter ticked again before finally igniting.

Ryan grinned at me, but held a finger up to me as his expression twisted into one of mischief. “Hmmm, I don’t know. Might wait until dinner. It’s a great conversation starter-”

“No. You will not discuss this over dinner. Get it out of your system now. Brent doesn’t deserve that with the first home-cooked, sit-down dinner he’s probably had since the semester started.” Spencer’s head reappeared only to give Ryan a stern look.

“Okay… Okay.” Ryan laughed, turning towards me and throwing one arm over the back of the couch. He seemed to enjoy the pause before the great reveal; I wasn’t sure if he was eager to tell the story, or to get under Spencer’s skin again. “Spencer and I,” He paused, alone with the movement in the kitchen. “we’ve had sex before.” I sat still, waiting for the surprise. I thought that was the most obvious fact at any given time.

I apparently was supposed to say something. “Uh-huh.” I nodded.

“He’s not even surprised, Spence.” Ryan laughed, calling over his shoulder.

“You’ve brought it up how many times?” Spencer answered.

“The late ‘70s were crazy- everyone was fucking everyone else.” Ryan said to me. “We tried a lot of things the summer before junior year. Namely boys. I knew I’d be into it- knew since I hit puberty- but Spencer wasn’t. But at least he tried, right?” Ryan shrugged, recalling the events with ease and fondness.

Summer before my junior year, I was teaching Sunday School and protecting kids from the dangers of the devil; idle hands made the devil’s play things. But apparently anyone’s hands could be used for evil. My hands were tainted, so were Ryan’s and Spencer’s. So were my father’s.

I itched at my neck. “So, that’s why you live together?” I tried to understand the running gag they seemed to enjoy having with every guest they had. I wondered if I wasn’t the first stranger they accepted. “You can’t let him go?”

“Oh, no!” Ryan shook his head. “Spence and I have been friends since we were five. I love the guy and it has nothing to do with whether or not he’ll fuck me.” His eyes were honest and his voice was gentle- almost nostalgic.

So they really were two men that were that close and strictly friends. I had never seen anything like it before. People became suspicious if Marc and I had conversations during lunch that lasted longer than ten minutes. My community would never accept two guys being genuine people, caring for the feelings of another. It made me think of all the friendships that had somehow gone to waste by not being free to express themselves genuinely. Everything was measured, and suddenly I was with two men who said and did only as they deemed fit to their own lives; they fucked because they were curious, they shared a bed to avoid extra laundry, they took a stranger in to stop another ‘kid’ from being infected by a disease he had never heard of, or going hungry without a home-cooked meal. They were kind to others, and themselves. It was a foreign sight and concept, but I enjoyed becoming familiar with it.

The real world was nothing like what existed in 3C, but it was my world. And I was safe. The edge was a safe distance away. I didn’t have to run to it, I could stay away and catch my breath.

“Did you tell him the part where you love me?” Spencer laughed, his voice being followed by the clattering of plates. 

“Of course I did.” Ryan responded, going for the kitchen. “It’s the most important part of the story.”

Ryan disappeared out of sight into the kitchen, stepping out a moment later with a grin on his face and plates in his hands. He began to set the table as Spencer argued that he could do it himself. Ryan argued back that a third plate was a big responsibility for someone as busy as him. Spencer never had the chance to respond to the patronizing tone- he thought his food was burning and left Ryan to win the argument.

Luckily though, dinner was saved without the fire department being called. While Spencer could be heard finishing dinner, Ryan pulled a royal-looking navy blue armchair from his and Spencer’s room and used it as the third chair. Spencer looked at the chair with surprise, furrowing his eyebrows as he placed a bowl of rice on the table. He gave Ryan a long, concerned look; continuing to speak to him without words. I remained awkwardly beside a wooden chair.

“You can sit here.” Ryan offered, patting the armchair. “Feel like a king for a meal.”

“No! You can sit there.” I shook my head and grabbed the back of the simple wooden chairs.

“Please.” Ryan repeated tensely. “Sit down. It’s the only other chair we have, and the new kid deserves it.” Spencer took in Ryan as he watched me sink into the chair. Spencer placed the last of the dinner on the table and took a hesitant seat across from me, Ryan between us at the small circular table. He had his head lowered, pretending to focus on the rice he was scooping onto his plate, but his eyes stayed on Ryan. Ryan was walking back from the kitchen, a small black mug in his hands. He slumped into his seat and took a long sip from his cup. The silence was suffocating. I couldn’t take it.

“The chair is nice.” I said. Rubbing my hands over the decorative gold arm rests. The right side had a small broken leaf blossom, the roughness scratching my palm.

“It’s from my house.” Ryan responded, just stating a fact. “Every bedtime story was read in that chair.”

“That’s nice. “ I smiled, looking down at it, trying to maybe spot some of the memories Ryan’s blank expression was trying to conceal.

“Yeah, all good memories.” Ryan took another sip and placed his mug down at the corner of his plate closest to me. He grinned at me, but his eyes nervously fell to the chair as his fingers slipped off the mug; he avoided eye contact with it as the conversation revived itself and he began feeding himself surprisingly well-cooked rice and beans.

“So, Brent, welcome to your first dinner with us!” Spencer reached over and grabbed Ryan’s hand, trying to shake a smile onto his face. Ryan raised his eyebrows, giving the most pleasant expression he could, before picking up his mug. He avoided speaking by holding the mug up, hovering over his lips, daring Spencer to request him to speak. “We’re glad you’re here.” Spencer nodded at me and kept his hand on Ryan’s. Spencer’s face knitted into that same look he had when Ryan walked in the door. I hoped not every dinner was going to follow this formula; I’d go back to hotel vending machine food.

Spencer continued to fail at starting conversations, repeating and rephrasing the same niceties. He was floundering, his food getting cold as he refused to allow the silence caused by his chewing to fill the room. Ryan was staring at his food and I was eating the rice to get my stomach to stop churning. Although I didn’t know if it was hunger or discomfort driven.

“Spencer,” Ryan said, cutting him off. “Why don’t you tell that story about that girl in the pharmacy… Lucy, Brenda… Whatever her name is.”

“Linda?” Ryan snapped his fingers as Spencer mentioned the correct name.

“Yes. Her. Tell Brent.”

“Why?” Spencer probed, eager but eyeing Ryan suspiciously.

“It’s a nice story. You get those eye wrinkles when you tell it. It makes you happy.” Ryan’s voice was quiet, barely loud enough for either of us to hear. Spencer narrowed his eyes and Ryan shook their linked hands before smiling kindly at him. 

Spencer spent the next half hour talking about a kind, intelligent, and beautiful blonde that worked behind the pharmacy counter at his work. I finished eating mid-way through Spencer’s story and rested my hands on the table near my plate. Spencer was speaking quickly, wide-eyed and I barely kept up; suddenly the girl was his friend and interested in him even though she hadn’t been the sentence before. Ryan was right; Spencer looked undeniably thrilled to be talking about Linda. His eyes crinkled at the sides as he grinned at his own memories and the prospect of new ones. Ryan paid close attention to Spencer’s story, taking his first bite of his food, but never taking his eyes of Spencer. He still refused to look at me. The dynamic was complicated and most of the night was spent with me in a dumbfounded silence, the two of them navigating the dead eyes and furrowed expressions casually and with skill. Friends since they were five. They loved each other. The happiness of one seemed to spread onto the other. My confusion turned to curiosity as I studied Spencer and Ryan. Maybe Spencer was suspiciously and psychotically kind for a reason. And maybe it was sitting between him and I, at my first ‘family dinner’.

After Spencer finished his story, dinner seemed to be over and I immediately stood from the armchair, taking my plate into the kitchen and placing it in the sink. The sink was an ugly pastel lemon yellow- much like the rest of the kitchen- and it reminded me of Marc’s family car. The last real place I saw him. I began to wonder where he was. What was he doing? It had been three days since I had seen him. What crossed his mind in those seventy-two hours? Was it the generic shock of thinking I’d never do ‘something like that’, or did he really miss me? Did he actually care enough to be curious? I wondered if he went to my parents, eager for answers, only to be given the confused, grieving cold shoulder. Did he feel shame? I hoped not. I didn’t want shame- I wanted acceptance; I was gone and I was moving on. I was trying to be happy and had a better chance of finding what that meant being Brent than I did just sticking around with Brendon. I did start to miss him though, staring down at my plate in their sink. Both Marc and Brendon. If the desire to reconnect ever got too strong through, I could always flick on the TV for one of them.

I left the sink in favor of getting ready for bed; it was the ending of the first real day as a new, free man and I couldn’t wait to finish it off on an apparently unused mattress in a room I didn’t deserve. I crossed the living room virtually unnoticed as Spencer spoke to Ryan, who had the mug covering half of his face again. I couldn’t hear Spencer’s voice, but his entire body was shifted toward Ryan, his head ducked to never leave his line of sight even as Ryan looked down into his mug. I didn’t want to eavesdrop, but as I walked into the bedroom designated for my things and sleeping body, I made sure to keep my door open a crack.

Ryan’s demeanor dropped and shifted into one of avoidance and shame in seconds; what could cause such a reaction. He seemed to be carefree and untouchable. He and Spencer were unbreakable soldiers against the world beyond their walls. Ryan exuded confidence and playful arrogance. And I couldn’t believe I saw even the tiniest break in it. If he couldn’t bare it, what luck did I have?

Chapter Text

As a kind and refreshing wakeup call, I was nearly shoved out of bed and onto the floor.

“Rise and shine, Brent.” Ryan’s smile was inappropriate at that time of day, but it was still comforting. “Spencer was called in for a surprise shift at work ten minutes ago and he won’t be back until five. We have all day.”

“All day for what?” I grumbled, sitting up and rubbing my eyes. My contacts were not appreciative of their extended stay on my eyes. Opening my eyes made them itch uncontrollably, so I pretended the dim ceiling fan lighting was horribly blinding as I squinted at Ryan. He was in old, worn bell bottom jeans and a cuffed button down floral shirt. The look was aged, but Ryan didn’t seem to mind.

“For whatever you want.” Ryan replied. “Every Sunday my dad and I always did something together- dinner out; long, loud… discussions; a movie- something! We were always up to something… All his favorite places just so happened to be closed on Sundays, so it was mostly my ideas.”

“Oh.” I pressed my thumb against my eyes as I struggled with Ryan’s proposed plan. I could feel my contacts drying on my eyes and barely noticed Ryan’s voice growing quiet. “I, uh, typically don’t leave the house on Sundays… at college, you know? In my major Sundays were for worship and…. And studying.”

“But you don’t have anything to study, Brent! Live a little! Let’s do something. Keep the Sunday tradition!” Ryan seemed forcefully ecstatic, and I wanted to join him, but in the last eighteen years of my life I hadn’t left my house on Sundays and done anything other than observe my religion. I knew it would be like any other day, going outside my house that Sunday, but it seemed like the last straw- or the first step; I couldn’t tell if it would mean the death of Brendon or the birth of Brent.

Ryan sat down on the side of my bed and I felt the mattress dip beside me. I could feel his silent eagerness. I could also feel my eyes losing every last ounce of moisture. I gave up and opened my eyes, using my thumb and forefinger on both hands to remove my contacts simultaneously. Ryan became horribly out of focus, but I could hold my eyes open long enough to slowly decipher the confusion growing on his face.

“Are you wearing contacts?” He asked. His voice sounded like he was clarifying more than anything else; what else could I be yanking from my eyes?

“Was wearing them.” My eyes were breathing for the first time since Tuesday, when I went to sleep after arguing with my parents, being so distracted and far gone I forgot to remove them- even forgot I wore them. “Fuck they were too old.”

“You have your glasses though, right?” Ryan suggested it like glasses were a solution I had completely forgotten.

There was no way I could lie through that one. I couldn’t will glasses into my possession. “Uh, no. I don’t.”

“Y-You don’t?” Ryan was taken aback by my answer. “You left college and just don’t have-” His words cut off as his mouth snapped closed. He then only made quiet sounds of confirmation. He shifted closer to me, his face coming more into focus, and placed a hand on my shoulder. “They sell reading glasses and minor prescriptions at the pharmacy; we can go down and get you a pair.”

The generosity was immediate and startling. “No, you really don’t have to do that.” I couldn’t go out in such an open public space, especially to buy glasses. I could accidentally buy a pair too similar to my old pair and blow my entire transformation. Someone could spot me, hear my real voice through its alteration, someone could recognize my prescription- “I couldn’t ask you to do that for me.”

“Brent, you have to see.” Ryan laughed at my modest refusal. “We’ll wait until Spence is on break and buy a pair, that way he won’t waste our whole day asking you questions.”

No questions asked? That might have been my only chance to slip out and blend in; people bought glasses all the time, Spencer wouldn’t cause a scene, and maybe no one would recognize me since it was Sunday. Everyone I was trying to avoid would be in the same convenient place: church. I could go out, just this once. This one Sunday.

“You okay with that? I mean- I would do it for you and just bring the glasses back, but I kind of need your eyes.”

“No, that’s okay. I’ll go.” I agreed. “T-Thank you.”

Ryan squeezed my shoulder before standing and leaving me alone in the room. I got out of bed soon after and shuffled to the bathroom. It was cleaner than the last one I’d seen. There was only one aftershave bottle on the sink counter and all the cabinets underneath it were closed without anything poking out of the drawers. The shower curtain was pulled back and I could see the different bottles and soaps sitting on the ledges. They lived here. It was an apartment, not a pit stop. I locked the door, and quickly unlocked it so I could enjoy hearing the lock turn over a second time. I could lock myself in a room; I had privacy again. People weren’t trying to walk in on me when I was indecent. And I had no parents prying and invading the life I was trying to lead.

“Towels are on the door, Brent.” Ryan called from the hall. “All of them are clean!” I waited for his footsteps to trail away from the bathroom.

Taking my clothes off took two attempts. Being naked was a new level of vulnerability I hadn’t anticipated; I had been naked in front of other people before and I had no problem. But now, completely alone, and no chance of being interrupted, the thought paralyzed me. I was no longer in disguise. Without those clothes, I was Brendon. I had to switch back over to the person I thought I had left behind. After success on the third try, I stood in front of the round, frameless mirror.

My neck was almost healed; the tracks on my neck fading and the ones I left to get to the apartment faded as well. My ears looked less swollen and red than I had thought. My hair was far less messy and uneven as I had left it. I squinted at myself, sharpening the image, and couldn’t help but cringe at how small I looked in the mirror. Maybe I had shrunken down small enough to be irrelevant to God; a creation he could look past. My frail arms, boney fingers, lanky torso with protruding ribs, and awkward short legs made me look like a shell of a once perfected creation. Why would He look over something that was going to slowly destroy itself and eventually disappear? God didn’t create Brent. I did.

I tried to make my shower as short as possible, not wanting to leave Brent for too long and grow accustomed to the way Brendon carried himself and missed home a little and made sure I was careful to not harm the raw spots on my scalp from the last time I washed my hair. One of their soaps reminded me of a kind Mason used and I found Brendon smiling as I turned off the water and pulled back the curtain. Door was still locked.

I began drying myself off when I realized I had left everything in my room., I couldn’t get fully dressed before stepping back out into the apartment’s common areas. I would have to cross that gauntlet, wearing only what God gave me- and a towel. On the other side of the door, I heard music begin to play; Ryan was fiddling with the record player and wouldn’t be facing me. I held the towel tight around my waist as I opened the bathroom door and ran to my room, kicking it closed. Everything Spencer bought me was still lined up on the dresser on the left side, against the wall, but all over the bed were various shirt and pant combinations. They didn’t belong to me, obviously, but I didn’t remember Spencer picking me up any clothes- only underwear since Spencer did seem to get the hint that I didn’t pack an overnight back when I was taken to a bar. I slipped a fresh pair of underwear on and let the towel stay on the ground as I ran my fingers through my wet hair.

“Brent, so I was thinking-” Suddenly, the knob on the door was turning; I had forgotten to lock it in my rush.

“Don’t come in!” The door stopped and the knob clicked as it snapped back to its closed position.

“I noticed you only have that one sweatshirt so, if you want, I left some of my clothes out. You can wear whatever you want.” Ryan must have caught on the tiniest bit if he correctly guessed that if I didn’t have glasses, I definitely didn’t have any change of clothes to call my own.

Ryan’s shirt selections varied from tour t-shirts of more bands I never listened to, to simple short-sleeves, and cotton button downs. He had a comfy-looking David Bowie shirt that I immediately rejected it. Too similar to what was buried under my bed.

“Uh, Ryan?” I called, not sure if he was still there.

“Yeah, man?”

“You have any like, florals that I could borrow?”

“Florals? You don’t look like you’ve ever worn floral a day in your life.” He laughed.

Exactly.

A moment later, the door opened a crack and only a beige and brown floral shirt hung through the opening. I took it and slipped it on, buttoning it with one hand while trying to slip my pants on with the other. I considered myself a master of hasty and distracted dressing- I forgot what it was like to get dressed in a relaxed and casual way. I was either hiding from strangers or trying to look presentable before arriving at my home again.

“Okay. You can come in.” I said once I had fixed myself back to a full Brent image.

Ryan peaked inside and grinned at me as I looked over nervously, squinting still. “Shit. You do look good in floral.” I pretended it didn’t flatter me. “Ready to see again?”

I nodded and he waved me out of my bedroom and into the living room. He picked up the record player’s needle and returned the record to its sleeve, and then back to the shelf quickly. The album cover was white with two people, a man and a woman, posing on the front. The man had his foot up on a little stool and the woman had her leg hanging over his, her cloth draped arm spread out behind her. I didn’t recognize it or the melodies playing before Ryan interrupted it. Ryan caught me squinting; it was hard to hide the fact that I was curious.

“Great album, right? I listened to it non-stop all sophomore year.”

“I don’t know it.” I replied honestly.

“You don’t know Rumours?” He asked incredulously. “Okay let’s get you to the pharmacy for some glasses. And a goddamn history book.”

He wrapped an arm around my shoulders and led me down the flights of stairs down to the lobby. There were mailboxes against the far left wall beside the large glass doors leading outside. There was an elderly woman walking through them that Ryan quickly ran to hold the door for without hesitation. He said a muted good morning and was promptly told to go to hell.

“Mrs. Warwick.” Ryan muttered, keeping the door open for me. “She hates me and Spencer for being such ‘Godless fags’.”

“That’s terrible.” I couldn’t imagine passing a woman like that everyday. I knew I lived in a homophobic community, but no one said anything like that out loud.

“I know. She shouldn’t insult Spencer like that, it’s not even true!” We walked out onto the sidewalk and were greeted by the shaking sounds of construction across the way. “Can’t complain too much though. She’s a decent landlady either way.”

I must’ve heard him wrong. “She’s your landlady?”

“Well, technically her husband is, but she sometimes likes to be the one to yell at us.” My furrowed expression of both confusion, and attempts to sharpen my vision to see if Ryan was messing with me, obviously hinted that he should keep going. “I mean, as long as we pay on time and no one has to see or hear mine and Spencer’s ‘atrocities’ we get a place to stay, so, I mean, I can’t really complain. Better than being homeless.” He had me there. Ryan shrugged and led me to a parking lot behind the building. I stumbled over a cement parking marker and Ryan reached out and grabbed my arm. He released it the moment I steadied, looking over his shoulder nonchalantly.

“They can’t actually kick you out, can they?” I asked. No one had the right to do that; they were just two friends with honest jobs- and a homeless teen in their spare bedroom.

“I signed on to rent that place August thirtieth of nineteen seventy-nine, the entire town was still half on blueprints, and it was my eighteenth birthday. Spencer was with me, but he was only seventeen; he graduated a year early because he skipped the third grade, because he’s a genius like that- you and him have that in common.” He nodded as he considered the comparison, smiling at me warmly. “We were still half convinced we would somehow end up fucking around again since it was the end of the ‘70s and we thought we’d always carry it with us, so we came in all happy and joyful and best-friend-looking. That landlord took one look at us and said ‘No fags in my building!’.” He imitated a deep and angry voice, slamming his fist into his hand.

“He said that?” Who could just call someone that, with no evidence or grounds to say such things? “What did you do?”

“I placed two month’s rent on the table and he compromised saying we had to have two rooms- like that would do something.” Ryan laughed and rolled his eyes. “I’m still as much of a Godless fag as when I first moved into the place.”

Ryan pointed me in the direction of a sky blue Ford Pinto, at least twelve years old with the dents to show for it. He unlocked my door and let me climb in the passenger seat before walking around and getting into the driver’s seat. I settled into the seat, buckling the seatbelt, but scooting closer to the door than the seat intended. Ryan slid into the other seat smoothly, shutting the door and jolting the car. He fumbled with the keys before putting them into the ignition, pressing the clutch, and turning the engine over.

“Wait.” I said, noticing that the car keys were separate from Ryan’s apartment keys; they were exchangeable. “Why do you have the keys? Didn’t Spencer go to work?”

Ryan shifted his rearview mirror and focused on the reflection as he shifted into reverse. “I asked him to leave them for me. A small favor.”

“How far away does he work?” I asked in disbelief. I didn’t care how much you loved someone, walking all over God’s green Earth when you had a car was a bit much to request as a ‘small favor’. Then again, I was always offered to walk to Marc’s house if he couldn’t drive over to get me; maybe it was a common sacrifice of affection.

“Under seven blocks.” Ryan replied, twisting the wheel and backing out of the spot marked with their apartment number skillfully. “It was a deal.”

Ryan's eyes didn’t shift from the road as he pulled out of the parking lot and onto the road. His fingers drummed against the stick shift as we drove. His hands never left the steering wheel; he focused on driving only. I settled back into the middle of my seat.

The road was empty and only a handful of people were walking on the sidewalk or out of stores. Sundays were quiet, I presumed. Everyone seemed relaxed and calm. Not a person was worried or rushed. Part of me wanted to exist in a world of Sundays.

“Alright, here we are. Let’s get you some eyes.” Ryan announced, throwing the car into park as he pulled up beside the curb by the pharmacy. “Spencer should be taking a break in about fifteen minutes.”

The two of us clambered out of the car and through the store’s front doors like friends of some sort. Ryan placed a light hand between my shoulders to direct me around endcaps I continued to narrowly miss. He stopped us in front of a small plastic rack of glasses, each with different colored tags on the lenses and arms.

“Here, tell me when.” Ryan said with a serious tone. He picked up a green, blue, yellow, and red stickered glasses. Green made Ryan look even more like the entire world had resorted to watercolors, blue was slightly better, red did absolutely nothing, but once the pair of yellow tagged glasses fell over my eyes, and Ryan’s genuinely focused grimace came into focus, I couldn’t help but smile. “So, these? Better?” Ryan’s face relaxed and smiled back as I thanked every deity listening for this mismatched couple family for finding me. “Do you want another style? They have square-”

“No. These are fine.” The ones on my face were perfectly circular with no frames around the lenses and clear plastic arms. “No squares.” Brendon always preferred square.

Ryan didn’t suggest any of the other styles of yellow on the rack. “Okay. These look great on you.” He nodded. “And you see okay?”

“Every freckle on your face.”

“Excuse me. I have flawless skin” Ryan scoffed, grabbing my arm and tugging me towards the front of the store, an open mouth grin lighting up his face.

He led us towards the registers, going through three aisles of shampoo, conditioners, and various lotions. Ryan ran his fingers along the labels as he strolled through them, his shoes thudding on the carpet. He stopped and studied a bottle of shampoo haphazardly before grabbing it and carrying it as he continued. The bottle was a bright yellow; for bleached hair. I trailed behind him as he took languid steps around the pharmacy he knew well. He stopped to check what issues of magazines where in stock on the shelves, what different candy they had, and grabbed a pack of combs before stopping and peeking at the registers. Spencer was standing behind the counter with a cheerful smile splitting his face. Ryan leaned against a display for a new line of glittery nail polish and looked over at me, squinting and studying my face.

“Round glasses are really your style.” He leaned his head back to better admire me. “Your old ones look like that?”

“Yep.” I nodded quickly, forgetting Brendon’s black, square pair he had sitting on his nightstand beside his initialized Bible and retainer. “Almost identical to these.”

“Great look, I have to admit.” Ryan nodded again, like he was agreeing with his own observations. “Definitely cute. Even with the yellow sticker.”

I went crimson as I realized how stupid I must have looked, walking around with unpaid glasses on my face under my awkwardly cut hair. I ripped them off my face and handed them to Ryan, who took them slowly. I didn’t bother to try and see his face.

“Wait, there he goes. Let’s go.” Ryan’s hand wrapped around mine and tugged me forward. “Celia, my dear, how are we today?”

“Great, Ryan. You?” Her voice was high-pitch and quiet. I squinted to see a mid-twenties, small black girl standing at the counter. Her smile was genuine, and it was directed at me. “Who’s this?” Ryan was still holding my hand.

“Friend for out of town. He’s staying with me and Spencer.” Ryan answered. Celia rang up Ryan’s items and dug under the counter for a bag, only her rounded curly bun sticking up above the counter as she spoke.

“Do you need any more condoms, Ry? I’ll give you them for free if you want.” She asked. I dropped Ryan’s hand immediately and tried to take a step away from him. Where did that come from? I was just standing near them. I was a friend from out of town, again. “Spencer has been keeping me updated with all the GRID news- if you need any, you just let me know-”

“I’m okay.” Ryan responded, his head turning to look over at me curiously. “Just here for a few housekeeping things.”

“Okay. You want me to put this on Spencer’s account?” She asked, thumbing over her shoulder to the doorway where Spencer was sitting, oblivious to our visit.

“No. That’s okay. I have money.” Ryan reached into his pocket and pulled out a crumpled bill and handed it to Celia. He grabbed the bag and handed it off to me as he accepted the change with the other. I waited until we were in the car before I began peeling the stickers off my glasses.

Ryan sat in the driver’s seat and pulled other bills out of his pocket, organizing and counting them. He seemed surprised by his final total and turned to me with a playfully curious face. I stared back at him and waited.

“You hungry?”

“Uh, yeah. I guess.”

“I’ll take that as a polite yes.” He said, starting the car up. “Let’s get you something to eat.”

Ryan drove us only ten more minutes further down the street from his apartment building before pulling into a small parking lot beside a pink building with rectangular windows cutting out the side of each wall. I could only see a few people at the tables. Not many eyes to see me. He held the door for me as we walked in, the two of us horribly out of place in the crowd of older people and families eating after church.

“How many?” The hostess of the diner asked, looking out the glass door behind Ryan to see if anyone was following.

“Just us.” He placed a hand on my back briefly before letting it drop. The woman looked at us for a second longer than we expected before grabbing two menus and leading us to our table. We sat at a small, crooked booth in the back of the small diner. Ryan sat down and placed his menu back at the end of the table as I slowly opened mine.

“Aren’t you eating” I asked, feeling embarrassment rising within me again.

“Yeah. I just get the same thing every time I come here. At every diner, really.”

“And, that is…” I wanted to gauge how casual Ryan was with his quick decision breakfasts. What did he order if Spencer didn’t have to make it?

“Oh. Oh no.” Ryan laughed and shook his head. “Order whatever you want. This is our Sunday excursion, remember?” I definitely didn’t need reminding. All the church goers around me made forgetting very difficult. I began to feel like I had made a mistake; I had a reason to feel guilty. I was out on God’s day, not practicing any religion. I was avoiding my responsibilities as a Mormon- well, old responsibilities. They weren’t Brent’s. I was Brent now, and I could go out on Sundays if I wanted.

I tried to continue looking at the menu, but couldn’t help but notice a middle aged mother staring at me. Watching me. Noticing me. Our waitress came by and I could barely ask for a coffee, my hands shaking as I tried to pick up the cup.

“You really think you need that caffeine?” Ryan teased, nudging my foot under the table. He laughed to the waitress asking for our order, but his eyes stayed on mine as he ordered. I didn’t even hear what he said, but I asked for the same. “Brent, are you okay?”

“I think that woman is watching us.” I didn’t recognize her. How could she know me? Was it the Missing Persons flyer? She must’ve noticed the similarities; my eyes, my shoes, my-

“She probably is.” Ryan said calmly, sipping his cup of coffee. “She probably thinks we are a couple. I mean, not many men come in for breakfast alone, looking the way that we do.” We motioned to our nearly mirroring styled outfits.

Oh.

“Oh. Oh, I didn’t think of that.” The thought never crossed my mind, but as long as she looked at me with homophobic disgust, the less I reminded her of the Mormon boy with the perfect smile and grieving family. I tried to even my breathing and steady my hands, placing my cup down on its saucer. Droplets got on the table and my placemat.

“How long have you been a Mormon?” Ryan asked, like it was the next practical thought that should spark new conversation.

“I-I’m not. I just study Mormonism.” I repeated the lie in hopes of getting the worried look off his face.

“Look,” Ryan said, leaning forward over the table. I was glad I had already dropped the coffee cup. “I noticed your hesitation to leave this morning- and I figured that with all that studying you must have picked some of it up, right? And I’m sorry for taking you out on a Sunday if you are really against that-”

“No, no.” I shook my head. “I’m not.”

“Brent, there’s no shame in it.” Ryan assured me. “I just want to know so I can be more careful. More respectful.”

Ryan was practically giving me an out; a different way to explain myself before I was caught in an unthoughtful lie. How could I not take it? Although, as I went ahead, I noted Ryan’s skill in observation.

“Since sophomore year.” I replied vaguely.

“Wow, so what? Going on two years? Wow.” Ryan whistled shortly and widened his eyes. I noted that I was now finishing my junior year of college. “Are you like, full on... ya know?”

“No.” I shook my head again, but now speaking honestly rather than avoiding the issue. “I’m not that intense with the traditions… Save that for the textbooks.”

“Huh.” Ryan mused, sipping his coffee. “And you chose to study Mormonism because…?”

“Uh, I- uh, it sounded interesting.” I stuck to the only lie that was coming to mind. “The whole Golden Plates thing.”

“Sounded interesting?” Ryan echoed. I waited for the suspicion to glaze over his eyes. “Same reason I did half the shit I did as a teenager. At least you are doing it academically and getting a higher education. Told you, fucking genius.”

I placed my hands on my knees and tried to get them both to stop shaking as the waitress came back with two sausage, egg, and cheese breakfast sandwiches on toasted everything bagels. I had never been more pleased with an anxious decision in my life; my stomach vocally agreed. I forgot that I should have been carrying on a conversation as I grabbed the sandwich, taking a bite to silence my grumbling stomach and fear still bubbling in my chest; that woman was still staring at me- and the way Ryan rested his elbows on the table, leaning closer to me. My chewing slowed as I noticed Ryan chuckling to himself. I put the bagel down quickly and let my hands rest in my lap.

“No no no- don’t stop. I totally understand.” He said, encouraging me by picking up his own sandwich. “Feels good to eat something that isn’t a favor.” Ryan bit into his sandwich and seemed to enjoy the lengthy process off chewing it.

“Yeah, I guess it is.”

“When I was a kid, and always having to eat at Spencer’s, I would only eat enough to quiet the grumbling and keep my head from spinning. If you leave feeling full you just feel guilty.” He spoke carefully, but honestly. He took another bite before shaking his head and muttering, “Although, ten years later and a Smith still cooks for me.”

We continued to eat in silence, our stomachs being filled with guilt free food. Mine, unattached from a face and family, and Ryan’s not another favor owed to his best friend. Ryan ate slowly, enjoying every bite, and even resisting taking too long a sip of coffee.

Spencer was his roommate; why would Ryan feel guilty? They had a system, a roommate agreement- or was it a debt system? And why did Ryan ‘have to’ eat at Spencer’s?

“How long have you been living with Spencer?” I asked after the waitress refilled our cups.

“Three years this August.” Ryan replied. “Well, that’s just in the apartment- since I could ride a bike I have been in Spencer’s house. In his hair.

“Doesn’t seem like he really minds.” I noted, trying to soothe away the worry twisting his mouth at the corners.

“God no. Spencer’s too nice for that. His mom raised him right.” There was unrecognizable contempt that dripped from his chin as he took a sip from his mug. “He would save dinner for me, bring me lunches at school- hell, the kid knew how to clean cuts and perform minimal first aid before the third grade. His mom even had a spare room ready for me at all times.”

“Like you and Spencer do.”

“Yeah. Exactly like we do.” He hid a smile behind his coffee mug, his eyes remaining fixed on me. I wanted to be afraid, stop the secrets that could be creeping through the cracks in my disguise, but whatever Ryan was seeing, he didn’t mind. So I let him look- might as well let someone. He always seemed unimpressed; nothing he could see would startle him or scare him away. He anticipated every crash and explosion. I had thought that maybe Spencer had a history fueling his kindness, but really it might have been the film constantly playing behind those brown eyes that left Ryan so prepared and unfazed.

After two more cups of coffee, Ryan left more folded bills on the table before standing and motioning for the two of us to leave. Ryan turned the radio on in the car, our silence comfortable enough to be filled with the voice of a stranger. He sang along to a rock song particularly interested in the pugnacious nature of Saturday Nights. He turned the music up loud enough to be heard clearly with the windows down, but not loud enough to cover up the aggressive way he was singing about the drunken state of the singer’s father and passive parenting of his mother- this singer was oddly optimistic about the entire thing though. I caught on to the chorus by the end and muttered along with the words. The music was playful and energetic but had a level of anger that I typically didn’t hear in music; Christian rock was never really the same rock and roll that shook down walls and tried to stop wars.

“You like that song?” Ryan asked, pulling into the parking lot.

“Yeah, I guess I do.” I nodded. I knew nothing about the singer or what the song was really talking about, but it made a small fire in me flare up. It was another world my parents would never find me in.

“Well, I remember you said you didn’t know Rumours; trying to figure out where to start you out music wise. How to bring you to the twentieth century and modern pop culture.” He put the car into park and leaned against the door, looking at me. “Spencer and I love that song. When I was twelve years old, I wanted to be Elton John. Still do.”

“Elton John?” The name sounded familiar; Matt might have had a record of him- if our parents didn’t take it.

“Big glasses always colored to match his outfit. Gay as can be?”

“Oh! The piano guy!”

“No. That’s Billy Joel.”

“What?”

“Nevermind.” He waved away his comment and chuckled at my furrowed expression.

I enjoyed adjusting my glasses as we walked back to the front doors. Ryan walked beside me, our shoulders brushing in a strangely nostalgic fashion, him showing me directions on how to get back to my own home. On the light post across from the doors, a man was taping a paper up, a stack of copies under his arm. I quickly pretended to be studying my cuff buttons in case Brendon appeared on one of the pages.

“Excuse me, sir?” Fuck fuck fuck fuck.

“What?” Ryan already seemed short with the stranger. He was clean cut, maybe thirty years old, dressed professionally.

“Have you read the news lately?”

“It’s not even noon and I am mildly hungover. No.” Ryan kept walking, wrapping an arm around my shoulders as the man tried to loop me into the conversation.

“God has sent a cure.” He continued. “The fags are dying and He is curing them! He would rather they die than live in sin!”

“Thank you. I’ll be sure to thank the guy later.” Ryan pushed me toward the door, yanking it open for me.

Outside, the man continued to cheer and bubble with deranged excitement. I stared at him through the glass doors as Ryan fiddled with his keys to his mailbox. He dropped it twice.

“Ryan. You do know there won’t be any mail anyway, right? It’s Sunday.” I realized, watching him about to drop them a third.

“Fuck. You’re right. I-” He rubbed a hand over his face and stuffed his keys into his pockets. “You’re right. Let’s go.”

Ryan waited until the man looked at us through the door before he flipped him off and began walking towards the stairs. Ryan held the apartment door open for me and let me walk in first, loitering in the foyer; I still didn’t know what I could do in the house. Everything felt like it had a dust cover on it and was only meant to be looked at, not touched. Nothing was really mine. I felt comfortable enough to belong next to Ryan, eat breakfast with him, eat food from Spencer, but not enough to belong in a house where my toothbrush came back to my room with me every night and refused to stay on the sink ledge.

“Want some?” Ryan had walked past me and was standing by the vinyl, leaning down and studying the titles. His arm was stretched outward, trying to hand me a small silver container. Mr. Bellman had one just like it.

“Is that… alcohol?” I asked, taken aback by the hidden accessory he was holding out to me. I never knew a regular person to have one. I never knew a regular person who drank; I had terrible role models previously, and before that, Marc was the only person who even spoke about the topic. Why would Ryan even own one?

“Yeah.” Ryan peered over his shoulder, eyes furrowing at my unshortening distance toward the flask.

“It’s not even noon.” I repeated his argument with the man outside. I didn’t know what exactly I was fighting, but I had never seen a drink in the light of day besides Mr. Bellman, and he wasn’t someone I would set my life after.

“You sound like Spencer.” He muttered, retracting his offer. “Gotta make 3C a dry house.” He spoke in a mocking tone as he walked away from the record player, dissatisfied, and turned into the kitchen. He kicked the armchair as he passed it. I felt like a stranger again. But this time, it was because I wasn’t the one with the secrets. We were all on the run from something; I wasn’t special. But I had walked right into Ryan and Spencer’s, willing to stay with them. They didn’t know I was sweeping anything under the rug. But technically, in all fairness, they didn’t have to.

But even in their own home, they had things they wanted to hide and forget. They were always on the run even if they always had a home to come back to.

Ryan walked back from the kitchen, sitting on the couch with the same black mug from dinner the previous night. His flask was concealed again and I tried to see where he could be hiding it; on his face there was already blankness veiling the secrets kept there. His eyes were glued to the mug- or more accurately, something that wasn’t me.

I felt invisible as he began to drink from his cup. What had I done?

“Ryan?” I hadn’t moved from the front door.

“What-” He looked up suddenly- sharply- but seemed to look around, trying to find me. His eyes furrowed the minute he found me a foot from the door. “I-I’m sorry. Come in. Sit down. You live here too.” He had said the sentiment before but it still didn’t sound true. I was keeping up with so many lies, everything sounded like one. “I had a nice breakfast today. It was a nice morning.” He wasn’t speaking to me.

“Well, I couldn’t tell.” I responded like I had seen Brendon do to Kara many times before. Ryan stopped mid-sip from his mug and looked over at me, raising his eyebrows as I sank down into a seat on the other couch. I didn’t want to back down from the comment and defiantly placed my feet up on the coffee table. He quirked an eyebrow at my feet before continuing his sip and breaking into a quick grin.

“I like you.” He muttered. “I like you a lot.”

Ryan eventually put Rumours on again, urging me to listen to its beauty while he made a phone call to Mrs. Smith. Silence was suddenly unwelcome in the apartment. We flipped and replayed the album for most of the afternoon. He sang most of the record out loud, wandering around and collecting laundry; he had a late shift at work and was bringing in things from the apartment that were ‘due for their return to the laundromat’. The album was quiet but alluring, the guitar pulling you in and the female singer’s voice practically crying into you and making your heart understand her before you even understood her words. It was like nothing I had ever heard before.

Ryan had filled and placed a bag by the door. He had also emptied the black mug, hiding it back in the kitchen sink. He sank back down the minute before Spencer came in the door, just as chipper as the last time we saw him.

“Honey, I’m home.” Spencer smiled. He waved to me and strolled over to Ryan as he pocketed his keys, meeting him halfway for the chaste kiss on the cheek Ryan was sitting up for. “How was your day?”

“Good. Went to the diner today.” Ryan answered, taking the newspaper Spencer had placed in his lap and placing it on the coffee table. He rested his head in Spencer’s lap and stared up at the ceiling. Spencer immediately placed a hand on his chest and let him settle into the couch.

“You did? Get the usual?” Spencer asked, petting his hair soothingly.

“Yup. Bren did too.” Ryan lifted a limp hand toward me. Spencer’s eyes fixed on me as he followed Ryan’s hand. His eyes narrowed but relaxed as I fiddled with my glasses. He nodded and seemed to accept in a second the sudden addition to the appearance he was still getting to know.

“So you had a good time?” His voice hung on to the end of his sentence, knowing there was something missing; Ryan wasn’t just sprawled out on the couch to passively list two things about his day. Not with Spencer. There was always more.

“Yup. Almost got cured on the way home.” Ryan crossed his arms over his chest and closed his eyes as he sighed heavily, his entire chest rising and caving under the weight of his arms and the entire world. Spencer’s eyes furrowed as he stared down at Ryan; the worry was familiar on his face and set in before Ryan even finished his sentence. “He was right in front of the damn door. I couldn’t even avoid him.”

“I didn’t even see him! That’s disgusting.”

“He was a second from trapping Brent.” Ryan continued. “Giving us a bunch of bullshit about God. Rather we all be dead than sin. Better dead than make another mistake…” Ryan didn’t seem to be quoting the man outside anymore. I wasn’t sure what the source was, but it sure wasn’t anyone of God. God allowed mistakes- maybe not ones that involved homosexuality, but he wasn’t that critical. At least, not the God that had raised me.

“Uh, Ryan… He, uh, He doesn’t think like that. Just so you know.” I muttered, pleased that Ryan’s eyes opened and he looked over at me.

“Oh really.” Ryan asked, sighing again. “Is this the roommate talking or the Mormon?”

“Both.” I replied, trying to copy the tone Spencer used whenever talking to Ryan. “I mean, they say that He isn’t a fan of any other combo besides man and woman, but there isn’t any Cure. Just banishment.” Or sneaking out the backdoor and escaping at your own accord from your home and the watchful eye of God.

Ryan hummed in understanding before rolling over, laying on his stomach. Spencer blinked slowly at the awkward position but continued to rub Ryan’s back regardless. Spencer looked down at him and studied his lax form, his hand stopping as he saw a metal flask peeping out from his back pocket. I tried to avoid eye contact with Spencer as he froze, his head snapping up to stare at me. He pointed at it and watched me.

“Today?” He mouthed. I bit my lip and refused to respond verbally; I had seen secrets that weren’t mine to hand over.

Spencer placed his hand back on Ryan’s head and pried his eyes away from the flask to glance over his shoulder at the dining table. He shook his head as he looked back down at Ryan. “Love you, Ryan.” He muttered. “Always going to, no matter what.”

“I know.” Ryan sighed against Spencer’s leg.

“Well, just thought I should remind you.” Spencer replied keeping his hand on Ryan’s back. “Makes me feel like a good roommate.”

Ryan laughed at the joke, but the sound wasn’t as infectious as I had grown to know it could be. It was low and sad, his shoulders shaking- but I wasn’t confident if it was with laughter or hysterics.

Spencer and I didn’t make another sound as Ryan laid across the couch. We allowed time to pass in silence again, occupied by our own inner conversations. Ryan neck deep in whatever fog was keeping him in, and Spencer and I out; Spencer running through every emotion between concern and rage; and myself, unsure how to feel, stuck in the middle of someone else’s story, someone else’s fear and upset and comfort and secrecy. I wasn’t the only one. I was running. But so was everyone else.

Chapter Text

It wasn’t until Tuesday that the Ryan I had met midway through an argument with Spencer after suddenly disappearing decided to reappear again, witty wisecracks and all. And it wasn’t until Thursday that I ran into the Boy on the TV again, but this time, he found himself into the newspaper Spencer was reading at the dining table. Ryan had already left for work that morning, so I was left alone with the two boys.

Spencer had put on his typical Elton John record and I was washing dishes from breakfast in the sink.  Spencer was paging through the sections calmly, allowing the natural silence between us; we could have conversations, but unless prompted (typically by Ryan) Spencer didn’t pry. Ryan had told him my major and religion and Spencer smiled and nodded, and then told me to have a second serving of dinner. He seemed to know where the line was without even having to nudge around for it. How did one acquire such a skill?

Spencer was muttering about an article written about the plans for construction around town while I kept to myself, wrist deep in soapy water and eyes lost in the familiarity brought on by their horribly yellow sink. Guilt washed over me as my thoughts drug me back to home, to that day in Summerlin, to Marc; he was just trying to move on with his life and I probably landed every ounce of blame on him. The entire town probably had him under a microscope, ripping him apart and looking closely at the secrets sewn into him. I should have written him something, told him he should turn and run too. Maybe they’d think we ran off together, but really we’d be able to slip through their fingers and sew our disguises closed, unnoticed. But at least this way, I did know where to find him.

“Hey, Spencer?” I turned the faucet off and wiped my hands on the pair of Ryan’s jeans lent to me that morning.

“Uh-huh?” He didn’t look up from the paper. “What?”

“Can I use your phone?”

“Sure, yeah. Of course, Brent.” He waved me over to it, eyes still transfixed on a page.

My fingers dialed his phone number before I had even put the receiver up to my ear. I leaned my back against the wall as the phone rang, rang, rang. We always waited three rings to not seem too eager to each other or to any suspicious parent. It rang five times.

“Hello?” Marc’s voice wasn’t as smooth and calculated as I knew it could be. I almost didn’t recognize him.

“Marc?”

“Yeah, who’s this.” Apparently, he did either. He didn’t even bother to sound interested; his voice was tired and each breath was a sigh. I felt like I was only making things worse. 

“Marc.” I took a breath, hoping in some way he would recognize my hesitance and never need me to tell him the truth. My grip tightened around the receiver as I tried to lower my voice, preparing for my first bought of honesty to the person I could only pray actually cared to listen. Across from me, at the table, Spencer was running his hands through his hair, shaking his head as he placed the paper down. “Marc. It’s me.” I was speaking to both my current conversation and the face and story printed across two pages.

“What?” The voice responded distantly, the receiver falling from my hand.

I had made it to the paper; they had mass manufactured my face and my story to be seen by thousands, all in hopes of one person knowing something. I wondered if Sam or Alex regularly read the paper.

I hung the phone up as Spencer sat back in his chair, devastated by something he read. Brendon’s search had extended to strangers, towns over; they really were desperate. Talking to Marc in a sudden, vague conversation would only make the search hungrier and him look guiltier. It would confirm everyone’s worst fears.

“What happened?” I asked, staggering over to the table. I pushed the armchair to the side to get to Spencer’s side and see the article for its full face value.

“Jesus Christ.” Spencer muttered. “Jesus fucking Christ.” He continued to shake his head and run his hands through his hair. “Who takes an eighteen-year-old.? He’s just some kid! He doesn’t deserve this… Jesus Christ.” Brendon’s senior portrait was the center piece to the block paragraphs of the article, beside a picture of the entire Urie family two Christmases ago. His smile was awkward but genuine.

“Boy Missing: Man Hunt for Kidnappers.” I read, scanning the article.

“Apparently this kid in another town got kidnapped out of his own home. They think they targeted him because of his sexuality- this poor fucking kid- and they said he’s been spotted in the Strip, they think. This whole town is looking for this damn kid. He must be so scared.”

“The Strip?” I echoed, leaning over Spencer’s shoulder to try to find the information. Underneath Brendon’s senior picture was his description: 18. 5’10”. Brown hair. Brown eyes. Black Palo Verde Class of ’82 sweatshirt and jeans.

Last Wednesday, I never ran into a single member of my family; how could they know what I had on at school? I only really spoke to, and was noticed by, one person: Marc. Marc had helped them. He wanted to find me just as badly as my parents did. He had revived his good name with small attention to detail that aided the ‘manhunt’. He was tired for completely different reasons that I had originally thought. He was exhausted from hours of accounting our last conversation, probably stretching the truth the tiniest bit, handing out flyers, and waiting by the phone. The phone I had so stupidly thought to call in order to clear my own conscience.

“What the hell is he doing in the Strip?” My parents would be stricken to death with fear, thinking of their youngest son among the debauchery and excess. Why was my family so willing to accept where Brendon was being taken, but not the life I was living voluntarily?

“Apparently that’s where they took him- those damn kidnappers looking for ‘justice’.” Spencer was speaking through gritted teeth.

“Justice?”

“’Summerlin officials suspect the boy’s misleading curiosity with homosexuality to be the focus of this attack; the growing agenda of the Gay community, in light of the GRID outbreak, has left the community with a slight disgust for those who try to leave’.” Spencer read, his words short and coming out as aggravated huffs. “I can’t believe they are blaming the Gay community for this. Just because they suspect the kid might have been gay and might have gotten kidnapped by another homosexual does not mean that deranged GRID patients took this young boy out of rage and betrayal of heterosexuals.”

Brendon was the victim. The entire town of Summerlin wasn’t searching for the rebellious teen that left after being found-out by his parents in the act. They were looking for a poor mislead Mormon boy, taken from his own sacred home and drug to the abominable Las Vegas Strip. Brendon’s name had been cleared and had become the poster boy for validation of homophobia. They Gay community had become a scapegoat for years of identity struggles and one final expulsion of independence and disappearance. If they found Brendon, there would be a celebration and overwhelming relief throughout the town. No one knew the truth, if he showed up, everything would just go away.

“Can I see that?” I asked, waiting for Spencer to nod before taking the page from the section. The article stretched out across the two pages, each line crammed with cries for assistance, bargains with the kidnappers, and tear soaked remarks on Brendon’s behalf. It was a tragedy.

How could he just be gone… Especially like this…

He is such a nice boy. Who would hurt him?

I always sat next to him in Chemistry class. He’s so smart. I’m sure he’ll be fine. He’ll find a way back to us. I know it.

He was my closest friend… I miss him every day. Brendon, I hope you are safe.

And just like that, thinking of Marc, struggling every day to search and be useful in a futile search for a dead body was the worst thing I ever did. I punished him for something he had nothing to do with. How could I?

I could just call him and tell him I was safe and not in the Strip. If he asked where I was I could tell him, but then ask him to tell everyone Arizona. He’d do that for me; he missed me. I could give him peace of mind. It’s the least I could do 

I folded the paper up and tucked it under my arm, taking steps toward the phone. I could just call him. But Brendon wouldn’t be calling him. Brent would. Brent was the man who lived in this body; Brendon didn’t have this freedom and liberation, he couldn’t. Brent would have to call him. And that would push me too close to the edge. They could find me. My father could look Brent in the eye and think he saw reform- a familiar face. I didn’t deserve that. Brendon was dead. And I didn’t want to revive him. DNR. Sorry Marc.

The article ripped in half easily, Brendon’s face becoming unrecognizable lips and set of dark eyes. The Urie family split down the middle just as easy, the paper crumpling in my fists. One less person would see them. I strolled into the kitchen, trying casually to throw the shreds into the trashcan without Spencer noticing; he was too busy muttering to himself and folding the rest of the paper up in disgust. Brendon had come into the apartment, but I had to show him out. He couldn’t stay. I had said my last prayer for him. He should stay dead.

“Are you finished with the phone, Brent?” Spencer asked, pushing his chair back harshly. “She is not going to believe this.” I assumed he meant his mother; I was just glad he wasn’t calling Ryan. The thought of him meeting or seeing Brendon seemed terrifying and finite. Seemed like the end. Ryan could always see too much.

“Yeah- phone’s all yours.” I nodded, walking back to the living room and restarting the record, trying to block out the half conversation coming from Spencer’s line of the phone. He sat himself down on a pulled up chair, his mouth in a tight line as he listened. He had barely been on the phone for a few minutes, exchanged only four words, but the other line was busy. Most of the conversation was short-hand, Spencer muttering two words right before the line cluttered up, Spencer nodding with an affirmative ‘Oh, yeah. I remember that!’ and plenty of scoffing on both ends, I was sure. Spencer might have only been a year older than me- and still an adult- but his immediate need to call his mother struck me as unusual; he was independent. He didn’t need to refer to her for any help or advice. It was like the article was written about him and not some damn foolish boy no one should have ever gotten close to.

“I almost hope he never hears about this… He will not take it well. He’ll see right through the sugar coating- better than me. You and I both know he will, Mom.” Spencer said finally, a full sentence winding down their conversation. “Ryan always sees through crap. He will not put up with it.”

Spencer also wanted to keep Ryan in the dark; we both had the same mission. Without having to pry, Spencer and I were more alike than either of us thought.

He hung up the phone after five more minutes of agreeing how much of a bad idea having Brendon and Ryan collide was. I sat on the couch, agreeing as well. Spencer sat back down on the couch and glanced at the door; Ryan’s shift was over and it would only be a matter of time before Ryan would come home.

While we pretended not to be waiting for Ryan, we listened to the B side of some record with two quiet and soft-spoken male voices and beautiful melodies; I was so encroached in the music I almost didn’t hear the footstep pounding up the stairs.

“Why don’t you go to my room- watch TV or something.” Spencer muttered.

“What?” I asked, turning towards him. “Are you trying to send me to my room?”

“No- just.” He stood quickly and lifted the needle from the record. “I think MTV is better than the Ryan you are going to meet.”

“What are you-”

The door flew open and Ryan stomped inside, kicking it closed behind him. He threw the laundry down on the coffee table. His work polo was untucked from his jeans and shoulders hung down, just like the fabric.

“Did you fucking hear?” He shouted, I expected a billow of smoke- a vengeful fire put out by frustration- but there were only flames within Ryan. His eyes flickered and his chest heaved, feeding the fire. “Misleading curiosity! Slight disgust? Are you fucking joking!”

“I was hoping you didn’t read that article.” Spencer sighed, stepping toward Ryan.

“Oh, I read every. last. word.” Ryan was still yelling, but I sank further into the couch as I couldn’t figure out why. “That fucking kid doesn’t need vigils and prayers and memorials.” Ryan pointed a finger at Spencer, who stayed silent, knowing he wasn’t done. “He needs to be left alone. That kid fucking ran away. He ran and no one wants to face that. He ran away from all of this shit that is chasing him and trying to track him down.”

“I know.” Spencer nodded. So maybe I wasn’t fooling Spencer.

“I can’t fucking believe it.” Ryan ran his hands through his hair, mirroring Spencer earlier. He began pacing in the foyer; he hadn’t noticed me.

“At least people are looking for him-” Spencer spoke carefully, and I was surprised by his hesitance; Ryan wasn’t shouting at him.

“Don’t you fucking dare, Spencer.” Ryan’s heels dug into the floor and he spun on Spencer in seconds. “Don’t go there.” Now he was.

“I’m just saying. He may have run, but at least he has a support system calling him home.” Spencer’s voice was trying to throw water on the flames.

“Yeah? And? I had a support system leading me away. Support systems don’t mean dick if they aren’t supporting something you like about yourself. Otherwise it’s just oppression, Spence.” Ryan refused to be extinguished and advanced towards Spencer slowly, finger raised again. Spencer was silent again. “You and Ginger were great and I feel guilty every day because why the fuck would the universe put someone as nice and kind and loving as you in the same neighborhood? Why was I so lucky when so many are not? Not everyone can do odd jobs to get the money for two months’ rent upfront and leave cleanly. Not everyone has a second, well really first, mom who will cook them meals when their father is too drunk to remember he has an eight-year-old son who is too young and scared to work a damn can-opener. Not everyone is lucky, and sometimes their only glimpse of luck comes as taking off and never looking back. Sometimes, even if they are lucky, it’s all they can do.”

“But Ryan, you have to admit, leaving so abruptly… you are a little…” Spencer stopped to ponder the thought and pick a correct term.

“Fucked up?” Ryan laughed, his face tense and voice ice cold even as the flames blossomed in his eyes. Spencer definitely wasn’t going to pick that word, but he didn’t cut Ryan off. “I am not fucked up because I moved out and became a man at eighteen. I am fucked up because I couldn’t get out sooner. You of all people saw what that house did to me. And for you to say that someone looking for this kid is a good thing? All that means is that those folks are sober enough to find the front door and start looking. Other than that, they are no different.” Ryan spoke very confidentially about my parents, and I knew he was on my side, but I didn’t think it was fair to Ryan to compare them to the fuel to his fire. “Let the kid let go.” I wasn’t sure who Ryan was talking about, me or Brendon.

“But you didn’t, Ryan.” Spencer countered, still trying to toss a blanket on his fire. “Sometimes it isn’t as simple as you think it is. You are yet to fully leave home.”

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?” Ryan’s next step forward was shaky and he faltered. He began to smoke.

“I know you’ve been drinking.” Spencer responded, watching Ryan’s arm fall and cross over his chest. “And the way you’ve been acting around that damn chair? Ryan, I love you, but come on. That isn’t because you left home in a way that has left you completely fine.”

“I took that chair so my fucking father could sit on his fat ass on that cold, hard floor and realize just who the hell he fucked with.” Ryan gritted, his shoulders hunching, trying to appear bold and confident, but only appearing to be collapsing on himself. “I took that chair and I refuse to get rid of it. I want to burn it on his fucking grave.”

“Ryan, you can’t sit with this kind of hate-”

“Don’t tell me how to live, Spencer.” They were in a full shouting match by then, it didn’t matter if I had gone to the other room; I would have been hearing everything crystal clear by then. “Don’t you dare get on me for this again.” Ryan sounded exhausted, like he knew every word Spencer was about to say. Or worse, he knew Spencer was right.

“You hate that chair! Every time you see it, you relive it. I know you do. You haven’t mastered hiding that from me.” Spencer’s voice bordered on parental and I could see the tips of Ryan’s ears glowing red as he rubbed a spot of his head just above his left temple.

“Of course I relive it, Spencer. I had never fought with my father like that before! It was the first of many. For the longest time we just ignored each other and I assumed our lives would just go right by each other, neutral on both ends, but then he revealed our entire relationship was built on resentment. My father called me useless, told me to kill myself; told me to jump in front of a bus, a train that ran through another part of town, his car when he drove to work. Told me he wouldn’t stop; he’d kill his mistake of a son. He threw bottles at me, told me I was the reason my mom left. He put that all on me. He did. And then- And then he decided to go too far. He did. He decided to-” Ryan’s chest was heaving and his face was flushed. “That lush motherfucker wanted me dead, but guess what, asshole?”

“Ryan.”

“I am still kicking. And I took your fucking chair so the next time you decide to hit your kid, you can’t use that instead-”

“Ryan, I-”

“Screw you, Dad. You don’t get to be the only thief of the family. I can take things from you too-”

“George!” Spencer shouted over Ryan, silencing him immediately. Ryan’s face turned to stone and all the oxygen was sucked out of the room. The fire was extinguished.

“You did not.” Ryan muttered, murder still in his eyes, but now directed at Spencer.

I was on my feet and in between them before I even saw Ryan take a step forward. I placed my hands on their chests and tried to push them apart. Ryan staggered back, but Spencer remained steady.

“How could you?” Ryan practically in tears and Spencer had guilt carving his features into his face. “You know I am trying to let things die here, Spencer. You know that- like that chair. And that name. Let it die, Spencer. Stop trying to push me. Both of you.” Ryan shoved my hand away.

“But, Ryan, it just tears you up- look at yourself.”

“Glad you remember my name, asshole.” Ryan sneered, wiping his eyes. He was an entire building on fire, collapsing and engulfing himself in the flames right before my eyes. I didn’t know I was staring. “Not so pretty now, huh, kid?”

“I- No. That’s not.” I shook my head; there was a minefield ahead of me and Ryan just dared me to take a step.

His left hand reached up and pulled his long curls back. There was an odd, zig-zagged scar that stretched back above his temple. “Twenty-nine stitches over coming home ‘too late’. It was three in the afternoon, but he was so wasted, me simply coming in the front door allowed in so much sunlight and fresh air I nearly killed him.” I followed Spencer’s lead and stayed silent, letting Ryan speak only. Don’t pry, don’t make it worse. “He slapped me and when I didn’t cave, he shoved me. He pushed me down right on that chair.” He pointed his finger at the armchair instead of either of us. “Split my damn head on one of these damn leaves- broke it right off the chair.”

“And you biked to my house a complete mess- blood everywhere, you could barely speak. Ryan, you can’t want to go back to that.”

“No.” Ryan closed his eyes and let out a shaking breath. “I just- I need to get rid of it when I’m ready. When running no longer feels like it led to so much regret.” His chest heaved and he exhaled the last of his extinguished smoke. “Sure that kid’s got a search party and a whole family that he fucking escaped and maybe that’s foolish, and maybe I’m a little fucking jealous.”

The door slammed behind him and left Spencer and I still completely silent, dumbfounded by the inferno that had self- ignited, destroyed, and self-extinguished before us. An out-of-control, controlled burn. Spencer hadn’t seemed the tiniest bit terrified at first, but Ryan sure was.

“I can’t believe I said that.”

I can’t believe they had inadvertently fought over me- well, Brendon.

“Fourteen years of friendship and I have never called him ‘George’.” Spencer was pacing through the foyer into the kitchen, out into the living room, then back around. “Why did I do that?”

What did Ryan mean by running away left him with only regret. He seemed so independent and free- and aspiration for self-made homeless kids everywhere- but it was all a mirage to hide the inextinguishable smoldering ashes inside him.

“Oh God, I really fucked up this time.” Spencer stopped in the living room, turned around, and then walked counter-clockwise.

Would I become like Ryan because I ran, and was running? No. I couldn’t. They didn’t want to know me. I was a stranger to them then and now this was what everyone wanted. I was doing everyone a favor. Even if I was leading countless people to dead ends with false hope.

“Shit. Why did I even try to talk him out of it? What was I gonna do? Send him home?” Spencer was laughing at himself, his tone bordering on hysterical.

I wasn’t like Ryan. He took himself and his identity with him when he left. I skewed my parallels with those I left behind me. I wasn’t holding on to anything. They were gone. Good riddance.

“I should go look for him.” Spencer’s tone was suddenly somber and tense. “Grab your coat, we’re going.”

“Me?”

“Yes, you. More eyes, the better.” Spencer didn’t bother to look at me as he ran to his room.

“Are you sure he wants to see either of us?” I muttered, half keeping to myself, half asking the real question Spencer wasn’t considering.

“I know he doesn’t.” Spencer nodded, pulling his coat on. “But I just want to know where he is. Make sure he is safe.”

Spencer took the house and car keys off of the table and I realized that one pair wasn’t with Ryan; he was walking around. He was, quite literally, running again.

“You coming?” Spencer held the door open and wasn’t about to wait for my hesitance.

I nodded and closed the door behind me.

Spencer barely seemed to remember I was behind him, practically falling down the steps and trying to catch up to him. He marched down the stairs and through the glass doors, rounding the sidewalk and heading for the car.

“He couldn’t have gotten far. He’s only on foot.” Spencer muttered, nearly dropping the keys from the ignition as he rushed. “Unless he hitch-hiked out of town- fuck. Where do we look first?” Spencer tried to start the car, but stalled it twice. He kept missing the switch between clutch to gas as tried to go in reverse. “Shit. Ryan was always better at driving this thing than me.”

“Is that why he left you the car?” I asked the universe, and Spencer, again.

“No. Ryan isn’t manipulative like that. He’s just compulsive when he gets scared. When he needs to go, he goes. The quickest way possible. He leaves no time for you to think. A real magician. Here one second, gone the next.”

I wasn’t going to commit the thought to words, but Spencer was sweating and trembling with fear. He kept speaking about Ryan like he knew Ryan the best- read the manual, cover to cover- but he was the one who had sent him away. Last time, Ryan ran to him, now he was running from him.

I wondered if this was what my parents looked like after arriving home to an empty house; drumming, nervous fingers, pale complexions, shaking voices, and anxious perspiration.

We returned home with no luck of finding Ryan; we had gone to the pharmacy, Spencer asking his adoring ‘sweetheart’, Linda, if Ryan had come in or at least by the store. Spencer left me in the car to storm three different bars- two not entirely full of Spencer’s demographic- and every alleyway we passed on our way to the edge of town. Spencer was exhausted as he trudged up the stairs. His march was defeated and I had to push him onto the landing of the third floor. He was wiped out but completely restless. His body couldn’t carry him another foot forward, but his mind was eons away.

As we were sure Ryan was.

“You should go to sleep, Brent.” Spencer sighed, sinking into the couch.

“I could say the same to you.”

“I don’t have work tomorrow- I can wait for Ryan.” It didn’t sound like Spencer was predicting his reappearance in the next twenty-four hours.

I sat down beside him. “What’s the longest he’s been gone?”

“Two weeks. Way back when he was fifteen…” Spencer replied. “He came back weighing ninety-five pounds and no memory of the previous fourteen days.”

“Do you think he’ll be gone that long?” Being on the other side of abandonment was nothing like I expected; it was just as hallow and numb.

“Who knows.” Spencer covered his face with his hands. “We he gets scared, he runs. He just goes. He just- fuck.” I heard familiarity in Spencer’s fear- it was warranted. He had a history, a track record of going missing in the blink of an eye. I didn’t. Brendon didn’t; he had never left home for longer than a day at a time. I couldn’t image the horror running across my family’s faces when they realized I had expanded my horizons beyond the front yard, when I realized the same truths as Ryan.

“I’m sure he’ll be back soon.” I had no evidence, no confidence, not even the guts to try and convince Spencer further. I just reached over and touched Spencer’s shoulder lightly. “He loves you.”

“That’s not my worry.” Spencer muttered, biting his lower lip. “It’s if he knows I do too.”

Fear of unreciprocated love. I knew what that felt like; it was definitely enough fear to cause someone to leave. Leaving everything out for someone to see and pick apart at their own leisure, and possibly have them cast it all away in favor of something more favorable was enough reason to never trust another person again.

I suddenly began to wonder if Ryan would ever actually come back. I didn’t.

The windows were allowing the beginning glows from the sunrise into the living room, stretching over the dining table and three chairs onto us. We both involuntarily had dozed off somewhere between three and four in the morning. We had sat in complete silence, staring at the door and knowing it wouldn’t be opening under our goodwill. I sat up on the couch, reaching for my glasses and hoping that the redefined image would reveal Ryan, curled up on the couch across from us, having snuck in right under our noses. But the thought was unlikely and stirred me with false hope. We knew there was no way we had missed him; Spencer only slept in five minute increments. The moment he would doze off, he would be revived with the growing knowledge that he could wake up and have the truth and reality be far worse than when he went to sleep. It was better for your sense of sanity to have the situation dwindle in front of your eyes and the control slip through your fingers than have it torn from you while you were absolutely helpless.

“Spencer,” I said, my voice cracking as I tried to summon every bit of comfort I could.

“Don’t say it.” Spencer sighed, pushing himself up in his seat and running a hand through his hair. “Please. Just don’t-” Spencer took a deep breath, the tension on his face having only worsened through the long hours of the night. He put both feet on the ground, about to stand when we were both startled by the sound of keys in the door knob. Spencer moved to the edge of is seat, eyes wide, and entire body rigid with hesitation. “Please.”

Ryan stumbled inside, his hand gripping the doorknob as his only source of balance. His shirt was spotted with blood and his left eye was surrounded by browning, purple bruises. He cringed as he blinked, trying to cover his face with his right hand, which look like his knuckles had been rubbed raw, blood staining the top of his hand and running over his fingers. His hand drew more attention to the cut along his eyebrow and blood running down his cheek, as well as the two streams that had dried on his upper lip. Ryan’s long hair was matted and knotted and I barely recognized his stride as he limped into the foyer.

“Ryan! Oh my god!” Spencer gasped, standing and rushing up to him. “What the hell happened to you?” Spencer immediately grabbed Ryan’s face, studying his cuts and scrapes. Ryan let him.

The homecoming was beautiful, but only because both parties wanted to collide. They wanted their paths to cross and depend on the other. They had been living independently, but it didn’t compare to when they were together. I didn’t know the feeling.

“Nothing- look, I’m sorry, Spence.” Ryan’s usually confident and snarky tone was reduced to a whisper as he placed his hand over Spencer’s. “I really shouldn’t have-”

“No. No, I shouldn’t have been such a dick. I thought I was helping-”

“You were. I am just not ready-”

“I know. I’ll wait. I’ll let you do whatever you need-”

“-I didn’t mean to storm off. I won’t again.” Ryan fell into Spencer and hugged him, apologizing for his absence, but Spencer refusing to accept it under the pretense that Ryan was wrong. Spencer wasn’t going to blame Ryan for something he couldn’t understand; he was just glad he was home. We both were.

“I am so sorry, Ryan.”

“I’m sorry, Spence.”

Spencer kissed his cheek and held the back of his head as they closed their embrace again. As Spencer backed away, his attention was demanded by the blood suddenly on his hand.

“Ryan, what did you do?” He gasped, placing his hand back on his head to find the source of the bleeding. When his hand came back with more clotless blood, he rushed to the kitchen and returned with a dish rag, wiping up the blood. He pushed it against the back of Ryan’s head and lead him to the bathroom. I followed slowly, still in the habit of trailing Spencer.

Ryan was obediently pushed to sit on the edge of the tub, holding the rag as Spencer dug around behind the mirror. Ryan spotted me and waved me in, reminding me that I wasn’t just being a voyeur- this was also my business. I was a victim too. I wasn’t the one who had run. He motioned for me to sit down next to him, touching my knee reassuringly as I sat.

“I’m still waiting for that answer, Ryan.” Spencer prompted, returning with hydrogen peroxide and gauze.

“Nothing- I just got into a fight outside The Spot.” Ryan muttered, wincing as Spencer began assessing his wounds. “Some guy was running his mouth- I was running my mouth- and I lost.”

“Why would you pick a fight?” Spencer’s tone was soft and winced alongside of Ryan. They moved in a mesmerized and familiar way, knowing how this all went.

“This guy kept yammering about queers and homos and fags and The Cure. I just couldn’t take it. I kept thinking about that kid, ya know?” He looked at me as Spencer poured hydrogen peroxide on the gauze. “That kid is probably facing that side of the world for the first time and I wanted the hate to end there. A little vigilante justice, huh?”

“Maybe not your strong suit?” Spencer teased.

That side of the world? Had I not met it yet? Had I been blinded by their kindness? Was Ryan already protecting ‘that kid’ before his alley fight? How much had Ryan already invested in Brendon, without even knowing.

My curiosity ran my tongue. “What, uh, what did they say exactly?”

“The usual: Fags were sick. I was deranged. I needed help- fuck, that stings, Spence- I was unnatural, a real fuck up. Going to hell, never to be accepted in God’s perfect world. Fags had started the apocalypse with our disease. The usual.” Ryan was listing the insults with ease as he glared up at Spencer and missed my startled expression. “Oh- although, while he was trying to flatten my head on the sidewalk, he did tell me that he thought every fag should be put on a remote island and left to starve to death.” Ryan chuckled, rolling his eyes. “Can you believe that?”

I couldn’t.

There was a part of the world who desired isolation from people like me. What if my parents were like that? I had felt pride in running, thinking it was the best solution, but what if instead it was the best solution for my parents, never forcing them to see my sick, unnatural self again.

My hand fiddled with my shirt collar and echoed the grip around my neck from a week previous. At the time, he was scared, staring at a stranger deceiving him into thinking he was his son. I couldn’t imagine the situation if he was angry, if he had wished a fate worse than death on me. Would I have even been able to consider becoming Brent? Could he have killed both Brendon and Brent?

I was stuck in a loop of watching my argument with my parents, each viewing revealing a harsher reality just as my dad’s hands lunged for my throat. The words forever lodged in my throat rising as I struggled to keep my eyes focused on Ryan’s face.

“Whoa.” A hand was on my lap, grabbing my hands. “Easy, Brent. Not- Not all guys are like that. He’s just one douche bag.”

“Yeah! There are accepting people out there.” Spencer added, skillfully wiping blood from Ryan’s upper lip.

“Yeah.” Ryan nodded, tipping his head back so Spencer could get all around the bottom of his nose. “A whole world of them.” Yeah, but they lived in cheap apartments with homophobic landlords with their ignorant wives, and were nearly killed by the other whole world of people with opposing opinions.

I felt small again. This time, far too small for God to even bother to care if His creation lived, died, or completely disappeared.

“Brent?” Ryan was squeezing my hand. I could only manage to squeeze back as a response. “It’s okay, man. If you don’t start shit, they don’t start it with you.”

“Typically.”

“Spencer!"

“I am just trying to be realistic, so he isn’t surprised if someone starts talking shit.”

Spencer was right; I needed to be realistic. I needed to live up to my mistakes, know the repercussions in full effect.

Somewhere between Spencer taping up Ryan’s cuts and washing the clotted blood out of his hair, Brendon began to sit in on the conversation. He looked at Ryan the entire time, and Ryan looked back, trying to encourage him with soft smiles and nods- alerting him that Spencer was addressing him. Brendon began to wonder if it was all worth it?

Maybe shutting the hell up and not becoming a poster boy fag liberator was really the best option. Maybe changing the inside instead of the perception would be easier; only one person would have to know then.

But Brendon wasn’t the enemy, and I had made him one. I buried him to try and liven up my wilting self confidence with the birth of Brent. Brendon hadn’t done anything despicable except be the face of my mistakes; he was the recognizable one. But all those mistakes were now Brent’s mantras and mottos. Why did Brendon have to regret them and disintegrate into a quiet memory in order to be at peace. Why couldn’t Brendon be the one to experience peace and freedom? Brent was facing a world of homophobia and regret, but it was also Brendon’s to tackle. He was the one that deserved to see it beaten, not Brent.

“You okay, man? Hey… Brent. Come on. Brent! Man, c’mon.” Ryan was snapping a heavily wrapped hand in front of my eyes. “Brent.”

“Bren.” I said, blinking and meeting his eyes.  “My nickname at school, in my class of three other Brents, was Bren. Can you…”

“Bren?” They both repeated immediately. “Absolutely.” Name changing seemed to be a well accepted tradition for them.

“Thanks.” Brendon spoke and I allowed him to smile.

Ryan nodded and allowed me to sink back into myself quietly as Spencer finished. He ordered Ryan to take off his shirt, scanning his body for cuts and applying light pressure to Ryan’s protruding rubs. Ryan objected to the full examination and told Spencer he felt fine, until Spencer pressed on the lower right of his ribs and Ryan’s words twisted into a gasp, his mouth hanging open, and his hand gripping Spencer’s shoulder as he squirmed away from his hands.

“Don’t do that.” He mumbled, catching his breath.

“Shit. I think you bruised a rib.” Spencer didn’t sound panicked, just remorseful. Familiarity in its strangest form. “I’ll make sure work knows and get you a week off. Some ice, some heat, some rest and you’ll be fine.” Spencer reassured Ryan, who was still panting and pale.

“It’s been a while since you’ve made me do that, huh Spence?” He teased, trying to mask his pain. Spencer laughed and turned away, going back to the sink. Ryan’s face relaxed into one of shock and discomfort- I looked away as I realized I wasn’t truly privileged enough to see it.

“Maybe I can get a few days off too.” Spencer added quietly to himself.

“No- it’s fine. Bren will stay with me.” Apparently, I was privileged enough. “He’s got God’s home number, what could be better?” He winked at me and for the first time, Brendon intercepted the affection and my stomach fluttered. Brent was new and was trying to hastily build a life and be built, but Brendon? He was changing in only small additions, still slowly growing, but mostly finished and open to the world. He was less distracted by the lies he was constructing and knew flirting when he saw it.

Chapter Text

We slept until noon. I could have slept later, but the construction outside my window reminded me that the world was still turning, even though in the apartment it felt like it had come to a screeching halt. Ryan had come back from God knows where with enough bruises and blood to settle any argument he and Spencer had started, or could ever think of starting. But then, in that frozen moment, Ryan was in his room with Spencer, and they were asleep; a family recovering from a scare.

I rolled out of bed and shuffled to the door as I shoved my glasses on with one hand. My room was still unlively and blank. I had only my sweatshirt and two shirts Ryan had decided ‘looked better on me’ hanging in the closet. My shoes still sat patiently by the door. Spencer kept offering to try and get me more clothes, an attempt to properly move me in, but I insisted I didn’t need anything; I didn’t want to be made permanent, not yet. After every attempt, Ryan would wait until Spencer was onto his next sentence before leaning in to quietly assure me that it wasn’t a favor. But it sure felt like it. I had three hundred and thirty dollars they didn’t know I had on my person at all times, and using any of it to try and establish myself within their life, and try to make Brent real, felt like a favor. I know it’s what they deserved, what I deserved; a chance to live a full life as someone I wanted to present to the world. Whoever that was now, Brent or Brendon.

I opened my door and walked out into the living room, which held the only real evidence that I lived there; a third coaster on the coffee table, magazines on the table from Ryan and Spencer trying to catch me up on the entire last forty years of music, and a third dining chair pushed into the dining table. That reminder terrified me-  another favor I was making them extend to me: Ryan’s well being for another family dinner.

I circled around the coffee table and relived the inferno that shook the house and almost tore everything in two. Spencer was shaken to a form I had never seen. Without Ryan, he was just a vulnerable core. I knew what the felt like and nothing Spencer did surprised me. He kissed Ryan and held him and refused to let him disappear from his sight. Incompleteness was a terrifying possibility for everyone.

I was passing the record player, looking at the stack of albums meticulously organized, when I was scared by a sudden ringing beside me: the telephone. I ripped the phone off its holder to stop the noise, but forgot that there would be someone on the other line attempting to contact someone. And I was the one who wasn’t even supposed to be here, holding my only connection to the outside world.

“Hello?” I kept my voice pitched higher, but barely spoke above a whisper.

“Mr. Smith, this month’s payment is late and I am curious about-”

“This is Ryan. Let me get him.” I blurted, trying to keep my voice even and sound like the only other person who could actually be answering the phone.

I let the phone hang from the wall as I hurried over to Spencer’s room. I knocked lightly before turning the knob and poking in. The curtains were closed and the room was still as dark as it had been the entire evening we spent looking for Ryan.

“Spencer.” I whispered. “Spencer, there is someone on the phone for you.”

A hand bumped against furniture before a night table lamp flicked on. “What?” Spencer’s voice was scratchy and his eyes weren’t even open. Ryan was asleep on Spencer’s arm and he was trying to push himself up with his only one free hand. “What’s wrong?”

“There is someone on the phone that is talking about rent. They asked for Mr. Smith. And that’s not me.” I reported, nervously clutching the door.

“Fuck. I’ll get it.” He grumbled. “Watch him.” Spencer slowly pulled his arm out from under Ryan, careful not to disturb him. Ryan mumbled in his sleep but didn’t wake, allowing Spencer to slip out of bed and walk towards me. “Make sure he doesn’t get out of bed.”

I wasn’t sure what Spencer meant; Ryan was dead asleep. He was on his side, facing the left side of the bed- Spencer’s side- eyes closed peacefully and arms wrapped around his bare torso. His breathing was even and quiet. He was calm, allowing the world to spin around him. Outside of the room, I could hear Spencer speaking in short, chopped sentence; the other line obviously saying far more than him. The phone was slammed against the wall as he hung up, stomping back into the room. I was still standing awkwardly by the door as he hurried around the room, turning on the overhead light.

“The landlord is unbelievable!” He wasn’t whispering and Ryan slowly stirred awake as Spencer continued to grumble and stop around.

“What’s wrong, Spencer?” Ryan rubbed his eyes but winced as he touched his sore eye. “What did he do?”

“Lost our rent.” Spencer yelled, yanking a drawer open and pulling a shirt out, and his gray sleepshirt off. “Seven hundred dollars just disappeared.”

“What?” Ryan was awake in a moment, sitting up, but clutching his side and gasping as he leaned on his ribs. “They don’t have the payment? I paid on Monday!" 

“That’s what I said. But no record of it.” Spencer cried, marching around, trying to find jeans on the floor. He tugged them out from an abandoned clothing pile and quickly yanked them over his legs.

“What? What the fuck? How does that even happen?” Ryan was running his fingers through his hair, shaking his head. The world had kept spinning. It was never going to stop, was it?

“I don’t know. I am going down there to clear things up- hopefully.” Spencer slumped down to the foot of the bed and began lacing up his shoes.

“We don’t have money for another payment right now, Spencer.” Ryan muttered, scooting closer and placing a hand on his back.

“I know.”

“Let me help.” I remembered I wasn’t just watching this scene of distress; I was contributing to it. But I didn’t have to. “I have some money. From, uh, working on campus.”

“No.” Ryan said shortly. “This is not a debt you have to pay off, Bren.”

“I know that. But I still live here. And you won’t be able work for a while. Just let me help.” Ryan had defended me unknowingly to the point of throwing punches. He thought of me while he fought wits with an angry anti-gay bastard. Each cut and bruise was mine too. It could have been any of us; I owed him this much. Owed him permanence. “I have a little more than three hundred dollars. It won’t cover it, but it can help.”

“We aren’t accepting your money.” Spencer refused, shoving one heel into his shoe. “I won’t let you pay for some asshole’s mistake because of who we are.”

“Who I am.” Ryan corrected.

“Who I am too.” I reached into the pocket of my flannel pants and produced the money, holding it out to Spencer. Ryan eyed me with a furrowed expression, trying to figure me out. “Even if you don’t use it, just take it and let me think I helped.”

“Bren, no.”

“Take it.”

“Spencer, just take it.” Ryan nudged his side. Spencer looked at him incredulously, but he shot Spencer a look of unquestioning demand; it wasn’t for him. It was for me.

“If he finds the money, I’ll give it right back.” Spencer promised, leaning forward and taking the money from my hand carefully. “Thank you.”

Spencer stood and hesitated in front of me as he went for the door. He held a hand out awkwardly, barely letting the gesture process before dropping it and pulling me in for a hug. I patted his back awkwardly and he squeezed my shoulder tightly. He thanked me again quietly, in a voice only I could hear, before pulling away from me and going out the door.

The front door slammed shut and Ryan and I were left in its shaking silence. Ryan was still sitting up in the middle of the bed, looking at me.

“Why don’t you come sit down?” He wasn’t really asking as he shifted blankets and made a clear spot for me on his left. Before I could shake my head, he had begun patting the mattress again. I sat down slowly and let me legs stretch out in front of me. Ryan shifted to be directly beside me, his shoulder leaning against mine. “You want to tell me why you have three hundred plus dollars in your pajama pants?” He placed a gentle hand on my leg, but his voice was unwavering and patient; he expected an answer. But, what better way to forget an answer than with another question. 

“You want to tell me why still have that chair in your apartment?” I looked at Ryan with a blank expression, not letting the question become anything other than a search for the truth. Or invitation for silence. Considering the Earth’s refusal to stop moving, I thought a silence would follow. But Ryan wasn’t predictable, so I was learning.

“I’ve taught you too well.” Ryan noted, shifting his weight away from my shoulder. I looked at the space and regretted whatever redirected his motives. “But if you require answers, Spencer,” Ryan sighed and rolled his shoulders back. “I don’t know if I can see it go.” He continued truthfully, speaking stiffly, but with the softness only offered by the fear of vulnerability. “Don’t know if I can be the me I am now without the me I was back then. And that includes that ridiculous chair.” He shook his head and ran his fingers through his hair. His hand hovered over his scar. “But mostly? Fucking stupid as it sounds, part of me is hoping to make it into something positive again. Me and Spencer- and you- can turn it into something I don’t have to pretend never happened.” I didn’t expect Ryan to answer my question, but with his swollen eye and scarlet cuts across his face staring over at me, I realized he already had before; he just had to put it into words that I could finally understand.

Brendon was an entire lifetime of experiences and memories I was trying to pretend didn’t happen. But why bury Brendon, or burn the chair, when I could just as easily introduce him to a new audience that would look at him and not search for memories or mistakes, wouldn’t go looking for the flaws. But I was still mostly flaws, no matter who I was. I had flaws that warranted death threats. It was always going to be better to burn me than revive me.

“Your turn.” Ryan said, motioning to me. He looked eager to get off the subject.

“Something I learned at college,” I muttered, feeling myself wander again. “Never know when you’ll need to have your cash.” Like if you wanted or needed to get up and runaway in the blink of an eye, you wouldn’t have to worry about grabbing anything; at any time of day or night, I could just leave.

“Well, if I could extend my own advice,” Ryan leaned back against my shoulder and reached for my hand. I eyed him nervously as his fingers wrapped around my hand, trapping it. “You will never need your cash to pay for some invisible guilt or shame debt in this house.” I looked at him- eye purple, lip split, nose swollen- and had a hard time seeing that debt as invisible. “You aren’t a burden to us.”

I didn’t want the lecture. I knew what the world thought about Ryan and Spencer- and now me and Brendon. It was impossible to avoid, and if Ryan and Spencer didn’t get screwed by their landlord, it’d be by someone else. And without Ryan’s self-righteous need to protect the Boy in the Paper, he would be able to work- and I might have been the one to have been beaten into far worse shape than him. As far as I was concerned, I was paying to keep myself in the closet and in the consequences I deserved.

“Ryan, you don’t understand. I-”

“I don’t?” His tone was soft and he seemed genuinely taken aback by the possibility of his advice being a stone’s throw away from helpful. “What do you mean I don’t understand?"

Actually, Ryan was the only one who could understand. But I wasn’t going to tell him that. Not yet.

“Nothing.”

“Is it what I was saying yesterday? All those guys just talk complete shit.”

“Didn’t feel like that to me.” It wasn’t bullshit to me yet. My bruises may have healed but the fear ran far deeper. If I ran from a place that might have wanted to get rid of and isolate me anyway, was I really running anymore, or was I just lost?

“Bren, there is nothing wrong with you.” He was practically laughing, but it was only to keep the anguish from his voice.

“You aren’t sick or unnatural- none of us are. We are all human beings, and nothing some asshole says can change that. You don’t actually believe them, do you?” I wasn’t actually sure. I didn’t want to; Marc missed me and I missed him and we were openly feeling remorse for a split caused by powers greater than ourselves. I wasn’t the problem. But then I remember that the distant, wide-eyed look held by my father and landlord’s wife and man outside the building all had hope for the death of thousands, including me and Ryan. Who was I supposed to believe? Who was I supposed to let live?

I shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe.” Ryan’s grip on my hand tightened and it was only then I realized they were shaking.

“It took me a really long time to learn that I wasn’t an anomaly, Bren. To learn that those guys were wrong. You think I fought those guys to blow off a little bit of petty steam?” He waved at his injures and quirked an eyebrow at my slow nodding. “No. I fought those guys because they were just wrong. They were spewing complete, invalid garbage just to make themselves feel superior to a group of people not even in competition of with him- so I gave him a little competition for his trouble.”

“Do you always fight everyone you disagree with?” I asked, trying not to look at any one injury.

“No.” He was about to rethink his answer, rubbing his forehead again, but shrugged it off. “But sometimes it helps. Especially with that thing in the news. That kid turned and ran but I didn’t want to show them that. Because for him, it wasn’t cowardly; that kid is brave. But they didn’t know that, they’d think they’d won. So I picked a fight, told them they were wrong, scared them because I wasn’t different than them, and got beat up for it. Wouldn’t be the first time.” Ryan shrugged again and carded his hands through his hair. “But you don’t need to fight anyone- actually, I advise against that- you just have to remember that you are just like anyone else. Just a regular college kid, moving along in life.” He wanted Brent to be the strong one, but Brendon was the one who had never seen such milestones, and he possibly never could.

So far, Brent hid. Brendon had run, but Brent was all about hiding, about creating dead ends to sit flush against and never move forward from. Brendon made the mistakes, but he was also proud of them, and while sitting with Ryan, I realized he already did understand me. He understood Brendon. He believed that Brendon wasn’t anything but worthy of love and acceptance. He fought for Brendon. He risked his life for Brendon’s, the least he could do was live it.

“Just like everyone else.” I repeated, trying to convince myself to listen to my own words.

“Yes, you are.” Ryan placed his other hand on top of mine and shook our hand reassuringly. “You might have better hair though.” He tousled my untidy bedhead and nudged my side, breaking in a bright smile. “You still tired? Spencer should be with the landlord for a while, you can lay down. Get some sleep.” He leaned back slowly, and rolled back onto his side.

“It’s noon, I should probably-”

“Go back to sleep.” Ryan repeated, his eyes closing and body settling into his side of the mattress. “Being tuned up always makes me exhausted. I always sleep until at least one in the afternoon, so give me a little longer and I’ll be vertical.”

“That’s okay… You deserve some rest.” I offered, folding my legs in front of me and holding my ankles. “… Long day.”

His eyes cracked open to look at me. “Thanks, Spence.” He laughed. “The caregiver look is good on you. Cute.”

Luckily, Ryan closed his eyes and missed a blush creeping up my neck. God, Brendon was more easily flattered than Brent. Cute was such a pathetic compliment to get hung up on. Marc never had to call me cute. Well, actually, Marc never flattered me. I was never ‘cute’. Hell, I was never ‘Brendon’.

I sat beside Ryan until Spencer returned. I had no idea how long he had been gone, but the time passed easily with Ryan; he had a particular presence that made even boring silence a comforting moment. Even though I was on a side of a bed that wasn’t mine, I didn’t feel like a stranger. Brendon and Ryan seemed to get along in the silence, letting Ryan grab his hand in his sleep. I was taking in the homey décor of hung pictures of Ryan and Spencer in mortar boards, another of Ryan in front of their severely less dented Pinto with a set of keys- and a pair of hilariously large yellow sunglasses, and one of the two of them in homemade looking Christmas sweaters with Ryan also wearing a frown a mile long- but the corners lifting as it seemed Spencer leaned in to kiss his temple just as the photo was taken. Each picture was aged and showed decades of friendship, even if the picture was less than a year old. Their lives had been intertwining for years; they shared the same life. And were willing to welcome me into it. As the front door slammed shut, I sat up further; waiting for Spencer and feeling like the conversation was just as much my business as Ryan’s. I had settled somewhere. For now.

“How did it go?” I asked, squeezing Ryan’s hand and trying to wake him.

“Nothing.” Spencer sighed, not looking startled or even hesitating when my voice answered his arrival. “They have nothing from our last payment. We owe them in full.”

“In full?” Ryan echoed, stirring awake. “Fucking assholes.” It wasn’t a half bad observation, fully awake or not.

“I really don’t want to use your money, Bren, but we don’t have that kind of disposable income just lying around.” Spencer looked at me apologetically as he began kicking off his shoes. “I mean, Ry and I aren’t broke, but we don’t have seven hundred dollars just ready to be given away at a moment’s notice. And with Ryan being home and not being able to work, I just don’t see how-”

“Why don’t I get a job?” Honestly, I wasn’t sure how I could do that since I had no ID or any real identity of any kind, but the offer was extended none the less by my restless guilt.

“No.” Ryan responded firmly beside me. “You don’t have to do that.”

“Why not?” I asked, looking at him to avoid the surprise on Spencer’s face.

“Because.” Ryan replied, pressing his lips together before continuing. “There are no finals in April.” He pushed himself up slowly and Spencer immediately turned away from us and busied himself.

“Excuse me?”

“In college, there are no finals in April. You obviously needed a break for some reason. Whether it was your roommate, the campus, you know whatever it was, you needed to get away and that’s fine. We are here to support you. You are twenty years old, you have to figure yourself out- and don’t have to fix us either.” Ryan was so close to the truth, but I had no heart to tweak the imperfections and lead him to the truth; I was too scared to do anything but nod silently. I didn’t want to tell Ryan I was eighteen with an entire town looking for me, so I became a twenty-year-old college kid tired of being a free, parentless college kid. “Take your time, Bren.”

“Yeah, don’t try to fix our mistakes- or our landlord’s.” Spencer agreed, sitting on the edge of the bed beside me. “Figure yourself out- sometimes college isn’t for everyone."

“But, college is all I know.” I muttered. 

“Not everything in life is about being a Mormon, Bren.” Ryan laughed, shaking my shoulder.

I knew he was right, but it was the only life I knew. I wasn’t ready to let go; didn’t know if I could be the me I was then without the me I was back home... Were Brendon and Brent all that different after all? Had I really only changed the exterior this whole time?

Ryan had gotten the closest to Brendon than ever before. He had seemed to have spoken to him rather than Brent, and for a moment, I had forgotten he wasn’t in the room, but the voyeur in all of this. Technically, Brent’s name was going to be added to the residents list and mail address, even though Brendon was the one doing most of the speaking and listening.

The lies were more complicated than I had bargained for. I thought I would be easy to forget about Brendon and just be whoever I wanted- but that person didn’t differ very much from the boy who quietly said grace before Spencer’s meals every day because it felt odd to accept food without acknowledging God- or at least the Earth- who gave it to him. The boy was still very much me. That boy could just also slowly learn to love modern pop culture and the gay community he had been denied. I had given myself an either/or ultimatum, but the more I straddled the line between telling another lie or admitting the truth, I wanted to allow both to exist in union and unity.

How in hell was I supposed to manage that? Who had both?

About a week later, lies still entangling me, Ryan needed me to help him carry laundry down to his work; he was still bruised up, but well enough to be relieved from bedrest. I had built literal walls around me by shutting myself in my room since Ryan’s almost run-in with all my truths and memories. The only reason I was facing the light of day was because Spencer was out at work, Ryan needed my help, and I couldn’t say no to him. He knocked on my door- as he always did- waiting for my answer before coming in with three bags of clothes and a hopeful smile. He never formally asked, but I had gotten out of bed before he could even get a word out.

Ryan’s cuts were healing quickly; he looked like he had still been in a fight, but like he had won his time around. His gait had straightened and regained its confidence and speed. He was healing, but Brendon never thanked him. 

He was carrying one bag in front of him, arms wrapped around it and clutching it to his body. I held the other two bags by my sides, walking beside him as we went to the laundromat. Ryan held the door for me and I stepped inside the chilled building first, the hum of the machines all greeting me at once. There were only three other people in the room, busy folding clothes, loading machines, or waiting for the spin cycle to finished: a short woman and her teenage daughter speaking quietly to each other in a language I didn’t understand, and a man who was easily double their height.

“Bren, will you go back there and use the machine to get me some quarters?” Ryan placed three dollars in my now empty hand and pointed to the back of the room. I nodded and did as I was told. “Thanks, Bren.” He placed a hand on my back as he took the last bag from me.

I walked away and left Ryan to take the machine next to the man, whom as I passed began humming quietly. The machine was old and the green paint was faded on the corners and on the cup where the quarters spilled out after inserting a dollar bill. I fed each dollar into the slot slowly, giving myself as much solitude as I could; Ryan kept using my name repeatedly- a sign of affection. He most likely was trying to get me in a place where I’d explain why I had migrated to only portion of the house, but using the nickname of the identity I was trying to abandon and bury wasn’t the way to do it.

I returned with twelve quarters to find Ryan sorting darks and lights, laughing coyly to the man beside him; they apparently had hit it off, or knew each other. The man was taller than both Ryan or I, my head falling back as I looked at him, folding shirts with great delicacy. He was dressed impeccably for a Saturday afternoon at a laundromat; he had long black slacks with shined black loafers, a light blue short-sleeve button-down shirt tucked into his pants, and short brunet hair carefully coiffed back. Everything about him was neat and calculated, but also horribly familiar.

“Oh! Bren!” Ryan cried, noticing me with a face splitting smile. “Guess who I just met?” I looked between the two of them, raising my eyebrows. “A real life, full-on Mormon.” Well, that explained it.

“Hi.”

“Bren is also a Mormon; studies it at college.” Ryan said to the man, motioning to me. He raised his eyebrows, impressed.

“Pleasure to meet you.” He held a hand out to me. “Always nice to meet someone else from the Church.” His smile was genuine and cheerful. I expected emptiness. 

“My name is Brent. I go by Bren.” I said it like I was setting the record straight. I was going to start this relationship off on the right foot, with the right lies.

“Nice to meet you, Bren. I’m Dallon.” His handshake was so firm and strong I was afraid he didn’t know to let go. It exuded both professionalism and complete humility. “I think studying your faith in higher education is very honorable.”

“It’s uh, not really, uh, my faith. I only really got interested through school…”

“That’s okay.” He assured me, placing a quick hand on my shoulder. “A brother is a brother. I still greatly admire you; twenty-six years of being a Mormon and I never went to college to study it.” He joked, his laugh somehow pure, never crossing the line into obnoxious or awkward.

“Twenty-six years?” Ryan echoed, eyeing Dallon. The commitment had startled me as well, although I was sure Ryan was more so caught up in how old Dallon might have been rather than the time he had spent being controlled.

“Since birth.” Dallon explained, not minding the interjecting. “It’s all I know.” At least we had something in common.

“And that is… okay? I mean, you don’t- I mean, it doesn’t ever like, get to you?” I phrased my question to sound as academic as I could make it. And somehow, without a high school diploma, I didn’t succeed. But Dallon didn’t seem to mind.

“Sometimes, yes. But most of the time, I love it. I love my church and my friends and my community. I could never see a life of mine without it.” He shrugged as he folded another shirt, making sure each crease was even and unwrinkled. “I love it.” I wanted to believe he was lying to me, but his warming smile didn’t seem to hold the ability.

“Oh. You do.” I nodded, trying to find the beginnings of a lie; I knew the signs by now.

“And you don’t believe me.” Dallon laughed, stopping his folding and looking at me with no surprise on his face.

“Well, that’s not what I meant." 

“You don’t believe that I’m happy.” He stated, repeating himself but taking no offense.

“It’s not that I don’t think- I just, I-” I sputtered, trying to avoid Dallon’s nonjudgmental look and Ryan’s confused stare as he loaded clothes into the machine. The truth was the only easy way out. “I know that you can be happy, but I… well, I…”

“Are not happy.” Dallon’s face lifted into one of comprehension. “That’s okay; I had my own phase of unhappiness with the Church. I wanted to leave- everyone does- but you can’t!”

“Can’t?” Ryan asked, the machine door closing a bit louder than it should have.

“No- you shouldn’t. It’s not all that bad. Everyone is a family. Everyone is God’s child- a couple billion brothers and sisters is pretty beautiful, don’t you think?” He grinned brightly, looking between us. Ryan smothered a laugh. “Sorry, I’m one of those guys, a painful optimistic, I know.”

“It’s refreshing.” Ryan said, shaking his head, trying to deny the mockery his laugh insinuated. “I think it’s nice.”

Dallon smiled and didn’t even flinch when Ryan touched his arm- an act of sincerity. His eyes focused on Ryan as he listened to him. Dallon directed every moment and piece of him to Ryan. It shouldn’t have done anything else, but it did rub part of me the wrong way; we were all God’s creations, but Ryan and I were the ones God couldn’t be bothered to supervise.

“Ryan’s gay.” I spoke over Ryan and stepped forward, standing equal to Dallon. “You know that, right? He’s gay." 

“Uh,” Dallon let his hands fall by his side, looking at Ryan, who was as inarticulate as Dallon, and then back at me. “Uh, yeah. I do. We only started talking because he was hitting on me.” Dallon smiled again, but didn’t look uncomfortable. The thought was funny to him- palatable and non-threatening.

“You- you don’t care?” I clarified, sure I had missed something.

“That Ryan is gay? Or the fact that a reasonably attractive man is flirting with me because I am tall? Because, honestly, I am pretty okay with both.” Dallon joked, both Ryan and him laughing in the way romantic acquaintances would, knowingly although aware that the two had little in common except the other.

I fidgeted with my glasses, seeing the way they blurred as my lenses lifted from my nose; it wasn’t a dream but completely real life. This wasn’t another lie or fabricated skit. Dallon was a real person who had practiced the Mormon faith, the same faith as me, for nearly three decades and found no use with having Ryan direct a few of his charming lines at him, or with me using the term ‘gay’ in his presence. There were people that could stomach the thought of me. I had just come face to face with the side of the world I didn’t have to fear. It hadn’t been a lie; they hadn’t lied to me the way I had to them.

“I’m guessing that wasn’t an answer he was expecting.” Ryan muttered, waving a hand in front of my eyes as I got distracted by my own hope.

“It typically never is.” Dallon admitted, packing his clothes into a bag carefully. “A bisexual Mormon is quite the lifestyle.”

“W-What?” Dallon didn’t just accept gay people, he included himself in the greater community. He was bi. And still a Mormon. “Doesn’t, I mean, doesn’t the Church mind?” The Church wouldn’t just let that slide.

“Yeah, but they deal with it for the most part. If you follow every other moral teaching and practice, they really can’t get on your case too badly. People can grow, I like to think.”

There was a possibility I was wrong; I had left the wrong people. I might have overreacted. No- no there was no way. I was threatened. People didn’t know my real name. I had become a stranger. They wanted me gone. I had performed a service. I wasn’t wrong. I couldn’t be. There was no way. No no no. Dallon was just a minority. A singular speck of false hope.

“I, uh, didn’t know that. I’ll note it- in my school notes, I mean.” I fumbled for my words just as my hands did trying to pick up the quarters on the dryer top to place into Ryan’s open palm. “For my degree.”

Ryan took the quarters and looked at me with a long, knowing look; letting me know that he was aware of my lie and that he could read the anxiety on my face like the books I was pretending to study.

“That’s right! A real professional Mormon.” Dallon smacked my arm lightly as he swung the bag over his shoulder. “Well, if you ever have another question, or just want to talk again, be sure to find me at church. I’m almost always there.” He bowed shortly to the two of us, his hand extended. “Absolute pleasure, Bren and Ryan. God bless you both and have a wonderful day.”

He left and continued on with his life, probably going back to his church to deliver the newly washed clothes to his community, accepted and loved unconditionally. He exited our lives in that moment, but I realized he had left enough room for Brendon to enter. I never thought I could have both, but Dallon did. He had both- fuck, he had everything.

I might have been wrong.

“Bren, you still in there?” Ryan snapped his fingers at me, leaning against the churning washer facing me.

“Yeah.” I nodded, shaking off the doubt encasing my stiffening muscles. “I’m okay.”

“You sure?” He laughed at my response; my voice was shaking, quiet, and unpitched. My regular tone was foreign to him, and sounded far more unsure than Brent ever did. I nodded at him, leaning back against the dryer. “Okay. If you insist.” Ryan shrugged, obviously repressing more of his own commentary on my lack of confidence in convincing him of the truth- well, technically, the lie. I couldn’t even keep it straight. Was I lying now if Brendon had learned his place: front and center. Who was I supposed to be lying to? Myself or Ryan?

I watched Ryan load and fold the laundry and avoided having much other conversation; I didn’t need my room to have walls. Ryan was folding towels with a steady side-eye accompanying each tuck. His hand rested on my shoulder as he paired socks. His hand squeezed my shoulder and assured me of his support- for what I didn’t know then. He didn’t remove it until functioning one-handedly was impossible and impractical. As he moved to repack the bags of clothes, I remained still, slowly feeling isolated. 

I couldn’t tell if Ryan had been kind to Brent or Brendon his whole time? Which would he like better? Which did he want as a roommate? Which one had he held hands with? He always went on about not pretending like a particular life event never happened, but I was erasing an entire lifetime I had made, and Dallon was telling me he was happy and accepted and lived long enough to see twenty-six. Dallon was telling me I might have been wrong and I was telling Ryan I was fine. The lies just kept coming. I couldn’t let them direct my life. Lies were supposed to help me escape, not trap me even further.

“Actually, no. I, uh, I’m not.” I muttered, running my hands through my hair. Ryan stopped and looked over at me quickly, both of us shocked by the response. I couldn’t have been wrong.

“What’s wrong?” He inched closer to me, his hand holding my forearm tightly. “You look pale all of a sudden.”

“Dallon was so cheerful. About everything.” I couldn’t forget how positive he appeared to be talking about the Church and its open mindedness. He was so sure, so pleased.

“I mean, he seems like a cheerful guy.” Ryan wasn’t in my headspace at all; my face was unreadable and blank as I struggled to know who to be honest to. Ryan was just trying to get me to keep talking.

“He said the Church could grow- they could understand. I have never… I am scared to believe him but horrified to deny it.”

“Things different at school I’m guessing.” He muttered, looking at me with worried eyes. “But I’m sure when you go home it will be different. Be better.”

“Home?” Not only did the sudden introduction of the topic startle me, but it occurred to me I wasn’t sure where ‘home’ was. Or at least not the home Ryan was saying I would go back to.

“Yeah, when you go home, I’m sure all that shit from college will stay at college.”

“Go home?” I repeated, clarifying what concept I wasn’t computing.

“Yeah.” Ryan nodded slowly, trying to find where in those two words he was losing me.

“Are you kicking me out?” There was a deadline I was unaware of. I was wrong, but about more than one thing. Ryan was under the impression my life would pack up and keep moving. I hadn’t become stationary after all. It didn’t matter if I was Brent or Brendon or some mix thereof. I was still going to be their temporary stranger who finally occupied their second bedroom. “You want me to leave.”

“What? No.” Ryan shook his head quickly, grabbing my hand and holding it between both of his own. “I just mean that when May rolls around and finals are really over, as well as college, and your family is expecting your return from Nevada, I thought you would leave. 

“But you expect me to leave.” I summarized, cutting through Ryan’s explanation.

“No.” Ryan said shortly. “I just thought-”

“That I would leave.” I pulled my hand from his grip. How could I be so stupid? Thinking I could fully start over, no questions asked? I had let myself grow into Ryan and Spencer’s self-made family tree, only to be uprooted a few weeks later. I thought Ryan and Spencer were my second chance, a place to hide Brendon’s body and let Brent live. But it was just as temporary as the motel I called home my first night without Brendon.

“Bren!” Ryan was yelling for some reason. I hadn’t even noticed I was walking away.

I was halfway down the block when I realized I had no idea where I could run to; I was stranded again. I put my thumb out as I stood on the edge of the sidewalk, hoping to be taken to a new place to pass through momentarily; I could live a life of starting over. Nothing would matter. I could be someone different each day. I could abandon Brent too, leave him to be the next missing face in Las Vegas. It would be easy, just had to get my hands on some dye and scissors and-

“Bren!” Ryan had caught up to me, grabbing my outstretched arm and shoving it against my side. A car had already pulled over. “He’s fine thank you. We don’t need a ride- move along, fucker.” Ryan ushered the car away before I could get a hand on the door handle. “What the hell are you doing?” His voice was hushed, but he wasn’t ashamed of the scene we were putting on for the sidewalk. He was shocked, his eyes searching me for some answers to the thousands of questions flashing over his face. “Are you going to leave, just like that?” He looked terrified by the idea; I was the boy who came into his home unexpectedly without a pair of glasses, only the clothes on my back, obvious escape money tucked into my pockets, and bruises framing my throat. I was the boy he defended.

“Well, you wanted me-”

“I want you to stay.” Ryan interrupted, holding the sides of my face so I would be forced to look him in the eye. The feeling of hands on my face was far more comforting than the pressure of them on my neck. “I was just trying to piece it all together… And with the whole Mormon thing and you’re gay- bi, sorry- and then just now with Dallon, I came to the conclusion of college but I just assumed…” He shook his head, taking a steady breath. “I thought it was college; having no clothes, no glasses, showing up out of nowhere, the weird money, the bruises. I thought you had just left college, but if I’m wrong, then I’m wrong. It’s something else and I don’t need to know what, but I do need you to know that our apartment is always a home for you as long as you need it.” He tightened his hold on my face and shook me lightly. “You hear me?” Ryan was pleading.

Brendon had never been so wanted before. Ryan was at least partially aware that college was a cover and the basis of Brent’s stay was a sham, but still wanted me to stay, to become a constant. Didn’t want me to start over. He was asking for Brendon.

“Hey. Answer me.”

“Yeah.” I nodded. “I hear you.”

“Are you going to stay?” Ryan prompted. Our conversation had dropped back to hushed tones and was attracting the attention of a few passersby, but none that forced an inch of separation between us. “I didn’t mean to make it sound like-”

“I will. I’ll stay.”

Ryan’s head ducked and his hands fell to my shoulders as he let out a heavy sigh- absolute relief. I wasn’t slipping through his fingers and collecting a new name and past to call my own. I was staying with them. As Ryan walked me back to the laundromat, my hand laced with his and pressed up against his chest, I knew who I was staying with: Brendon.

The Church could grow, but I refused to be the one to change. Millions of God’s creatures and every single one had to live the same way? Why couldn’t some of them live their happy, typical, structured lives and others live with two less-than-strangers in their own structured life of strategic lies? I didn’t have to be small and avoid the eyes of God. I wasn’t going to regret the past that caused me to leave it behind. I wasn’t going to erase it either by giving the same body a new name and renaming its mistakes.

Dallon might have been right; I didn’t have to erase anything to be happy. Maybe one day, Brendon could be friends with Ryan and Spencer, sharing himself and his past in the happy present they were building together. Maybe. Just maybe.

Chapter Text

I couldn’t stop thinking about Dallon. He was so open and unapologetic, carrying the repercussions of the Church with the comfort of knowing everyone will come around eventually and just accept his sins as part of his story. He had seen that side of the world Ryan had been warning me about and protecting the Boy in the Paper from, and walked boldly through it with his shoulders back, chin held high, and steps even and controlled. Dallon wasn’t scared. He was a proud sinning creature of God; he stood tall and met His watching gaze with grace and dignity. I couldn’t stop thinking about him. Could that have been me? In due time, could I have grown to be just like Dallon, invested in both my faith and myself?

No, drawing that line and severing those ties had been the best thing I had done. I freed myself. I didn’t have to wait for anyone to ‘come around’ or ‘grow’ to stomach my life choices. No waiting. No guilt. I didn’t have to regret my choices, but I didn’t have to pretend they didn’t happen either. I was ready to face any side of the world as unapologetically as Ryan- I didn’t need to emulate Dallon’s humility. Ryan had already survived with his own way of handling the world; he survived and had a safe home with his best friend. I had a lot to learn. And I wanted to know all his tricks just as badly as I wanted to know how Dallon managed to do it. Maybe while my tactic was fleeing, his was digging his feet into the ground and continuing to live in his own way, letting the Church grow around him. Maybe his tactic was just different, but our outcomes would be the same. He seemed pretty happy. I could only hope.

“Bren! We’re eating!”

After helping Ryan back from the laundromat, he was exhausted but denied a nap until I had the phone in my hand and was about to dial the pharmacy; I had learned something after all. I used the time Ryan slept to mull the morning’s events over, resuming my hiding act. I sat on my bed and stared at the wall across from me, mostly thinking of Dallon, of the Church, a little bit about Mom, and for a fleeting moment, Marc. He missed me. Maybe he would be the first to come around.

“Bren, you in there?” Ryan knocked on my door, waiting for a response.

“Here I come.” I stood from the bed and shuffled to the door, leaving my thoughts but taking Brendon with me.

“There he is!” Spencer called from the table as I appeared from the doorway.

“You hungry? You haven’t really eaten today.” Ryan asked, walking beside me as I crossed the room to the table. I shrugged.

“Glad you are joining us this evening.” Spencer’s tone had a bite to it and I realized how much of a horrible house guest I had been, hiding away in a room I couldn’t bother to truly move into.

“I like dinners this way.” Ryan gestured to the two of us by his side as he sat down; his small family. “Hope they stay this way.” I made the mistake of looking over at Ryan and locking eyes with him. He wanted me to stay; he wanted Brendon, and he was trying to convince me with a look. Finally, eyes that didn’t belong to God.

I shrugged again and let Spencer put pasta on my plate, deciding how much dinner I had left to eat before it could all still be considered a favor.

Spencer finished serving and settled in his chair, looking between me and Ryan with worried eyes. He began clacking his fork against his plate to try and fill silence strangling the three of us. I wasn’t hungry much and just fiddled with my fork on its napkin. My entire body felt numb, my bones feeling damp and cold to my core. I couldn’t stop thinking about what I had done. Had it all just been a streak of mistakes? Did I make any of the right choices? My God, what had I done.

A hand rested over mine and stopped it from playing with the silverware.

“Bren?” Ryan said quietly. All the charm had been torn from his voice as he leaned in to whisper only loud enough for me to hear. “Are you okay?”

I nodded.

“Bren. You can’t even look at me.”

He had a point; another set of eyes frightened me. I kept my eyes focused on my fork. “Just, Dallon… What he said… What…”

What was I supposed to believe?

“Dallon?” Spencer said, trying to re-engage us. “Who’s that?”

“A Mormon.” Ryan replied shortly, hoping to avoid his questions. Unfortunately, Ryan had answered instead of me. And Spencer had no aversion to asking Ryan follow-up questions.

“Oh! Does he go to school with you, Bren?”

“No. We met him at the laundromat today.” Ryan steered the conversation away from college quickly.

“Met at the laundromat? Since when do you ever talk- Oh. Oh, I see. You flirted with him at the laundromat.” Spencer pointed his fork at Ryan as he smugly decoded Ryan’s answers.

“I was just being nice.” Ryan sighed, glaring at Spencer before looking back at me. “I wasn’t really flirting with him.” He seemed to be promising to me, tightening his grip on my hand. “I wasn’t.” I wanted to tell Ryan that he didn’t have to despise and completely dissociate from Dallon, or the conversions we had hours before, but he seemed like it was life or death whether or not I believed his fidelity to the goodness of mankind. I shrugged it off and he looked guilty, dropping his gaze to our hands and then his plate.

“Well, what did he look like? Where is he from? Do I know him? What did you guys talk about?” He asked, trying to move the conversation long, seeing as though the silent one I was having with Ryan dropped off.

“Nothing really. Mostly him and Bren spoke.” Ryan handed the conversation over to me where Spencer suddenly let it die; the silence had gotten its last breath from him. “Is it bothering you that much?” Ryan asked quietly, excluding Spencer much more blatantly this time.

I shrugged again. “I just don’t feel that well.” Every inch of me ached as I felt my previously well disguised core take a seat at the table. I was that same core, that same fucking apple core- that same boy- I was when Marc left me, when I left him and that whole town, when I was told me own identity had been for convenience, when I thought I would die at the hands of my father and then my Heavenly Father. I was still that boy; change the outside, and the core is still the same. I couldn’t hide it. That core would always be with me- and it was the part of me Ryan kept trying to connect to. Each time he looked at me, I was sure he could see every second of my past, but he continued to look beyond it to the scared, lying teenage boy taking up space in his house. It was my core- Brendon- who had gotten a haircut from him within the first hour of us meeting; Brendon who was taken to breakfast and told to relinquish all guilt; Brendon who was saved, in some way, from those homophobes at the gay bar; Brendon who was let in on a microscopic truth about Ryan’s dad; and Brendon who was making an impression on them both.

Brent had never really lived there at all. I didn’t want him around anymore; Dallon left with my last self-convincing lie, neatly folded and took it far, far away. Only Brendon was left- I was left.

“You don’t? Is there anything I can do for you?” Ryan asked. His eyes were taking Brendon in, every inch of his forgotten form and hidden truths, and found it all familiar.

“No. I think I’m just going to go back to bed.” I thumbed over my shoulder to my room.

Ryan didn’t release my hand. “Bren, please. You should really eat something.” I tugged on Ryan’s grip. “Eat a little and then I will leave you to be in your room all night, if you want.” I didn’t recognize what was in Ryan’s eyes. His voice had a familiar tone of desperation that I had grown to know from Marc, but it was far different. Ryan was bargaining, pleading for something that would benefit only me; when Marc begged for things, his tone of voice typically invoked guilt in the listener. But Ryan didn’t make me feel guilt- there was no draining color or nervous hands, no derailing thoughts. I only felt cared for. And that was enough.

I sat back down at the table slowly, sinking into the armchair. Ryan watched me as I begrudgingly picked up my fork, using it to stab a noodle on my place. I put it in my mouth, chewing for far longer than necessary, and Ryan looked pleased.

“Thank you.” He said to me quietly. He placed a hand on my head and tussled my hair as he spoke up, opening the conversation. “Can’t let the pretty one starve to death.”

“Oh. So he’s the pretty one?” Spencer asked, trying to look insulted.

“Come on, Spence. Look at that face. Cute as a button.” Ryan’s hand slipped from my head and slid down to the back of my neck. His fingers closed around it, only lightly, my flesh tingling with the sudden shock of fear.

“Don’t.” My response was sudden, scaring all three of us as I shouted at my plate. I lurched forward and felt myself slip from his grip quickly. Ryan didn’t argue and held his hands up, where I could see them. I sat back up, clutching my shirt and tenderly feeling my throat. I was panting, my breath having been preemptively taken from me as my memory lit up all over my face. Both Ryan and Spencer were watching it, the image still unclear and foggy, but the moving shapes enough to reveal a clear enough picture.

“Bren, shit! I’m sorry, I didn’t even think-” Ryan said softly, placing his hands flat on the table top. He kept letting me see them, know where they were. Let me know I was safe. The only fingers pressing to my neck were my own, checking for damages. I could feel the old bruises resurfacing. They hadn’t gone away. I hadn’t gotten away. What had I done? “What do you need?”

“Do you- do you have a newspaper.” I knew now.

“Do you mean paper bag?”

“Don’t argue with the boy, Spencer. Get him the fucking paper.”

Spencer scrambled to grab the newspaper from the kitchen counter, placing the stack on the table and not reaching toward me at all, his hands always visible too.

I had to be in there somewhere. I was the Boy in the Paper and I couldn’t forget it, couldn’t lie to myself anymore. The boy falsely missed by an entire town was still me. I was still the boy who was scared. Scared of having to be myself, but also scared of having people deny it. I was the strangled boy, but that didn’t mean I always had to be. Brendon- I- could still be strong. I didn’t have to be scared. It was over. It was over and I wasn’t wrong.

I began muttering as I tore through the paper, my thoughts leaking into reality. I had abandoned Brendon so quickly, sure I had left him on the tile kitchen floor, but I knew there was something missing. There had to be. Something to cure my instability. Something to make Dallon make more sense.

I looked down at my senior picture, both Spencer and Ryan staring at the only Brendon they recognized. He was smiling back at me. We were the same person; we both had made the same mistakes. Both of us had fought our fathers- and lost. We were happy only in our own separate moments, and deep down we still were always. I didn’t lose it- I just needed a reminder; what I could take with me as I reinvented Brendon, leaving Brent at the laundromat and learning who could grow from town, even if I was the only one.

My eyes scanned the article, sure it had to be written somewhere. Finally, the name appeared. My finger pointed at it, bruising the page. “There.” I nodded at the lines, Ryan leaning closer slowly.

“Summerlin?” Ryan read.

“Yes. Take me.”

“Okay.” Ryan agreed, slowly. Uncomfortably. Spencer nodded with Ryan, unsure of my motives as well. “Sundays are our days for outings.”

March into town on a Sunday, go walk right back into my old life. I would have nothing to hide Brendon or his core. I was still running, but somehow it was leading me right back to my escaped destination. Less than a month and I was already running in circles, hoping to remain undiscovered.

I’d slip out just as unnoticed. I knew I could; once you do something once, repetition is the easy part. The proof was in my accidental lying, even when the truth was fighting to reach my lips.

Ryan spent the rest of the night sitting at the dining table, staring at his hands. I had left the table with Spencer after helping clear the dishes, leaving Ryan to stare at his long, frail fingers, completely unaware of their inability for evil. Spencer and I sat on the couch, staying with Ryan as he muttered and sighed a conversation we were not a part of. Eventually, as the evening went on, Spencer gave up trying to interpret Ryan’s conversation and left to take a shower. As he left me with Ryan, I stood to walk to the kitchen- for what, I didn’t really know. Maybe nothing. I wanted to be closer to him. Try and intercept his mutterings. Stop him from having fearful disbelief give distance to his eyes.

I opened the refrigerator and pretended to have a goal. “Ryan?”

“Huh?” He jumped and craned to look at me. “Bren.” He hadn’t expected it to be me. His eyes could barely focus on me, flitting between my neck and the floor. “I- I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to- I wasn’t thinking.” Ryan kept restarting his sentences, like every apology wasn’t expressing his guilt correctly. But, he didn’t even need to speak; his gutted expression said most of it.

“It’s okay.” I closed the refrigerator door with nothing in hand.

“No, it’s not.” He shook his head and fidgeted in his seat. “How could I do that? I am not that person.” He stared down at his hands, his fingers trembling. “I am not my father.”

“And you aren’t.” I said blindly. I knew very little as it was, and Ryan wasn’t giving me any other answers. “You didn’t do anything.” I wanted to reassure Ryan that he was not the cause of my silence and wasn’t a builder of walls, but also trying to convince myself to keep the truth buried. Just wash away the guilt.

“But I scared you. And as someone who has been the one on the receiving end of that for almost a decade and a half, I refuse to cause it in another person. I only share a name with my dad.” Ryan and I also had that in common; sharing names with those you wish to completely dissociate from. But for me, it took me a moment to remember I was hoping to lose touch with Boyd, not Brendon.

“Just a name.” I couldn’t contribute much to a history I knew very little about it; it was a past I was allowed a quick glimpse of before it was boarded up and painted over. “I don’t think you could ever become what you say he was like… You care too much.” Even from Ryan’s short outburst and vague stories, I figured the man that was his namesake wasn’t a kind human being.

“Probably not enough.” He muttered, letting his hands fall onto his knees.

“You care about Spencer.” That unto itself was denial of Ryan’s apathy. He even said it himself, he loved Spencer and always would. Not everyone can commit to someone at the age of five. “You care about me.” The secretive, awful Mormon abomination that was occupying the second bedroom the landlord forced onto him to try and change who he was. The kid he was letting run to the same place he did at eighteen. “I think that’s enough.”

He looked at me and smiled, shaking his head as he laughed quietly. “Thanks, Bren. You’ve really got the whole roommate thing down.”

“Maybe Spencer can be the one to move out.” I teased, sitting down next to him.

“Yeah, that’d go well.” Ryan laughed. “Two non-heterosexuals in the same apartment? Our landlord would hire an exorcist.”

“If that ever happens, I know a few priests that would love to help.” I said. “Or we could just get Dallon to bless the place.”

Ryan laughed wholeheartedly at the remark, slapping my arm as he leaned forward in his chair. I allowed myself to laugh too. We both knew it was more of a playful observation and stab at Dallon than an actual joke, but he didn’t seem to be able to stop laughing, wincing as he did- we didn’t want to. We were laughing at the tension that was trying to grow around us, laughing at the armchair I sat in, laughing at the fact that sometimes we felt like we wouldn’t ever do it again.

Ryan sighed, coming back to the conversation, his hand being able to rest on my forearm kindly. “I am excited to go out again tomorrow.”

“Me too…” I nodded, looking at Ryan without any façade to cover me. “With everything you said- and Dallon- I really want to make sure that boy is okay.” At that moment, he was the best he had been in weeks, but would that hold? It had been a while for Brendon.

“And you said I was the caring one.” Ryan said quietly, acting like the fading cut across his eyebrow and pinking scars on his knuckles weren’t there, like we didn’t care about the same boy. His hand slid down from my forearm and squeezed my hand. He smiled at me for a moment that seemed to extend beyond time before he let go and stood.

“I’ll see you tomorrow, Bren.”

“’night, Ryan.”

Ryan walked back to his bedroom, shutting the door behind him just as the bathroom door swung back open. Spencer stepped out towel drying his hair, the towel covering his face.

“So, Ryan, look, I had a quick question I wanted to ask, it’s from Mom so, just go with me on this,” he paused; a cue for complaints. I sat silently shifting in my seat and only clearing my throat. Spencer dropped the towel from his head and found me before looking around the room.

“Where’s Ryan?” He was confused, but also had the beginnings of concern spreading across his face.

“In your room.” I replied, pointing.

“Is he okay?” Spencer asked quietly, stepping toward me and away from the bedroom door. “Did he… say anything? To you, I mean. Did you talk to him?”

“Yeah.” I nodded, acting like Spencer was asking a stupid question. Of course Ryan talked to me; Ryan always talked to me.

“He did?” Spencer looked at me with genuine surprise. “And he’s okay?”

“Seemed fine when he left to sleep.” I replied honestly. “We had a good laugh.” And made sure to flatter each other accidentally.

Spencer nodded at me slowly, lifting the towel to his hair again and wandering to his room, looking over his shoulder at me before opening the door. He closed the door behind him and left me sitting in the armchair, alone with the rest of the house. I stood from the chair to go to bed myself, leaving Boyd with George, and taking Brendon with me to see the next day.

To see himself again.

I was sure I was dreaming the quiet, hushed muttering, but as I rolled over and tried to get comfortable again, I realized it was Spencer and Ryan outside my door. 

“Don’t just- knock, Spencer. Knock first."

“What? Why? Do you think he’s-”

“No- God Spencer, what the fuck.”

“Ow!”

“He isn’t us; you knock for him. Give him some privacy, some respect.”

“Fine. Fine.”

Spencer knocked three short and heavy-handed times. I grunted in response; Ryan would know it was safe to come in.

“Good morning, sunshine.” Sarcasm dripped from Ryan’s greeting.

“Hope you are excited for today!” Spencer’s was filled with pure sincerity.

“What time is it?” I muttered, rubbing my eyes and reaching for my glasses.

“Eight-thirty.” Ryan replied with forced cheerfulness. The bed dipped beside me and I opened my eyes to see Ryan sitting down and giving me a look that suggested that Spencer was behind the early wake-up call; Ryan’s hair was still messy, a stray curl hanging in his face. He wasn’t in jeans or civilian clothes, unlike Spencer, who was dressed and fully-awake.

“Why are we awake so early” I asked quietly, Spencer too busy opening the curtains to hear me.

“Spencer is excited you want to get out of the house.” He explained, looking at Spencer. “The first time I requested to leave the apartment after moving in, Spencer almost made me a cake. He was ecstatic.” We looked at Spencer, standing at the window with his arms at length, holding the curtains, and broke into smiles. Spencer turned around and found us admiring his disposition and returned the grin, stepping over to sit on the edge of the empty side of bed.

I might have suggested the visitation in the middle of an unexpected breakdown, but he was still excited for me. Eager that I was volunteering to leave the room I had quarantined myself in; it was like he was excited to meet Brendon. Spencer wanted to love him too.

“Who wants breakfast?” He asked, clapping his hands together, Ryan winced like it had been thunder.

“We do. Just, promise you won’t slip us any of what you are on.” Ryan laughed, dodging Spencer’s hand as he went to slap his arm.

Slip us anything. Like how I ended up in their apartment in the first place, trying to escape Brendon, making my first debt to Spencer my life. While today, I was rushing right back into Brendon’s arms. But this time, I was with Ryan and Spencer; I’d be safe. I’d return with Brendon. He would be able to come home.

“Bren, what do you want?” I hadn’t noticed Spencer’s voice until he spoke to Brent, even though I almost didn’t answer.

“Uh, nothing. I’ll just eat some cereal or something.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah, I’ll make something for myself.”

“He’s going to be upset if you don’t let him cook you something.” Ryan said under his breath, but giving me a hidden grin. “You better take his peace offering.” He placed a hand on my legs that were still under the blankets.

“Fine. Whatever you want to make, I’ll eat.” I agreed. Spencer’s face lit up as I accepted his offering. It was now assumed if Spencer was cooking for Ryan, I was to dine with them; breaking bread does make friendships. The Bible wasn’t a complete lie, that was at least true. I would be sure to make a note to Dallon later. He was right about something.

“Great! I’ll get started.” Spencer clapped my leg before standing and walking out the door. “Can’t send you out on an empty stomach.”

Ryan gave Spencer an encouraging nod and full-tooth grin before looking back at me and patting my leg. “You’re a good sport.”

“I am getting breakfast out of this.” I explained, sitting up in bed and pushing my hanging bang out of my eyes.

“I know, but free food or not, this is one of the few times Spencer just doesn’t get it- he hasn’t figured you out yet.” Ryan said softly, shrugging. Spencer was eager and wide-eyed, but Ryan seemed to take notice that mine derived from anxiety. He eyed me carefully, trying to read my expression; I was too tired to be guarded and quickly restrained the readability of my features. “How do you feel today? Ready?”

“Think so.” I honestly had no idea what going back to Summerlin would bring to the surface. Who would I see? Would they care if they recognized me even the tiniest bit? “Hope so.”

“It’s going to be one fucking sad and angry town, Bren, so if you don’t think you will be up for some of that shit we are bound to see today, don’t hesitate to drop out.”

“I’m going.” If Ryan gave me an excuse, Brent could give himself a thousand more to slip back into the apartment. There could be no discussion. “I am going.”

“Okay.” Ryan nodded and accepted my harsh response. “Then we will; I’ll leave you to get changed.” Ryan stood and wandered over to my dresser where my, well Ryan’s, newly washed shirts from yesterday were sitting out. He pulled a white-button up with blue paisleys out of the pile and threw it over to me. “You should wear that. The pattern flatters you.” He winked quickly shut the door behind him as he strolled out. Ryan had a habit of flirting with Brendon and after today, there would be no core to find or façade to search through- Brendon could flirt back.

I followed Ryan’s advice and switched out my sleepshirt for the paisley button down. I slipped on my own pair of jeans I brought from home and my worn high top sneakers; old, new, borrowed, blue. Had everything I needed for a proper union of souls. Go in two, return in one sound body. I would fix this uncertainty in my bones and learn how to be Brendon back at the apartment- in my new home- learn how to have both. How to be happy, not pretending half of my life never happened. I just had to collect my last pieces of mind before I could continue to live in this world with Ryan and Spencer. In the world Dallon promised.

My hair was on its way to becoming presentable as I left my room and made my way to the dining table where three plates were set, ready for the food narrowly being burnt in the kitchen.

“Ryan, don’t touch anything!” Spencer shouted, the sound of a hand slapping skin reaching me. “You’ll ruin it!”

“I’m just trying to help.”

“This is a Ginger Smith family skill. Only I can handle this.”

“You are making pancakes, Spencer. I know I never even stepped foot on a college campus, but I am confident you don’t need a damn degree to cook them.”

“Not a degree. The Smith gene.”

“Oh for the love of God.” I rounded the corner to see Ryan leaning against the refrigerator, arms crossed, watching Spencer grip a pan handle with both hands, waiting for the particular moment he should flip the pancake. He looked over at me quickly, noting my arrival, only to double take and crack a smile at my shirt. I leaned in the archway, one hip-popped and no shame in sight as I coyly questioned Spencer’s methods.

“What are you doing exactly?”

“My mom has this method to pancakes- it’s all about waiting- the exact moment will come.” He said nonchalantly, not taking his eyes off of the pan.

“Right.”

“You’ll have to meet Ginger sometime.” Ryan said, his eyes taking a moment to drag up to my eyes. I straightened my posture as I nodded. “She’s a wonderful lady- and makes a killer pancake. Both her and her son.” Ryan laughed, Spencer flipping his pancake and placing the pan back on the stove. “You’ll love her.”

“Everyone loves my mom.” Spencer countered, taking a large plate from the cabinets above him. “She is just one of those people: always cheerful, always smiling, always a song in her heart, you know?”

“No.” Ryan laughed.

“Yeah.” I did; my mother. It struck me then that I had no chance of seeing her that day. She’d be inside our family home, continuing to be a devout Mormon. Deep down, I knew seeing her would end in an undesirable and awful way, but part of me was secretly hoping to run into her. Just see how she was. But now the fact that I would literally have to go into my old home to see her made the day seem a lot less hopeful. I hoped she was safe and at least trying to be happy. I hoped she had moved on.

“Okay! Who’s hungry?” Spencer walked past me, plate full of perfect pancakes, ready for the three grumbling stomachs following him out of the kitchen.

I didn’t remember the time passing for Spencer’s plate to be filled, but Ryan’s nervous expression told me that it had passed while I was neck deep in my own thoughts, having completely dropped Ryan’s conversation about Spencer’s mother. I hadn’t meant to. Brendon- I- would be far less distracted when I came back. I wouldn’t have any stray thoughts to entertain. I could focus on this life, on this happiness.

“Thanks, Spence.” Ryan said, once we were all sitting down, smiles back on our faces and pancakes on our plates. “Appreciate the full-stomach sendoff.”

“Of course, Ry.” He leaned in and met Ryan halfway for a peck on the cheek. “You two ready for today?” His tone was slowly growing more appropriately solemn.

“Aren’t you coming?” I noticed how isolated the subjects of his sentences were. “You woke us up at eight-thirty, cheerful and horrifying to make pancakes… You’re coming, right?” It made sense to me.

“Me? Oh, no.” Spencer shook his head but kept a pleasant expression. “Ryan was talking to me last night and I think that maybe, this is just something I don’t understand.” Ryan was right, and Spencer could admit defeat. “It would be better if you two went and didn’t have to drag me along. I don’t mind. I completely understand. It’s not about me.” Spencer was sitting across from me and could only offer a supportive smile. “I’m sure Summerlin has a payphone or two if you need to call home- if not, I’ll be here when you get back.”

I was being encouraged to wander, to creep close to the edge again. I was being let free, but with a safety net and open arms to catch me if I fell off, or came stumbling back. Brendon was ready.

I ate breakfast slowly, not sure if my stomach twisting nausea would have been cured by food or only worsened; there would only be more to churn around- beside my thoughts. Ryan and Spencer spoke casually about their landlord, discussing if Spencer should go back and have come choice words with him. Ryan defused the tension growing on Spencer’s face with a well-timed joke and squeeze of the hand. They could read each other effortlessly; I could only be so blessed to be a part of their family where reading the other’s face was an act of care and concern, not malice. Although, yet again it startled me how well Ryan could observe and read people, all while he remained a mystery.

All forks and knives were placed on plates with grins and quiet laughter. The plates were collected and placed in the sink and I heard a set of keys jingling by the door. I was sitting at the table, watching them move around me, not processing the next step.

“You coming?” Ryan laughed, holding the front door open. I nodded, pushing the chair back and leaving every pang of fear at the foot of the table. Spencer’s Sunday cleaning would sweep it up and carry it out before I came home. I stepped toward the door, about to go into the hallway when Ryan grabbed my sleeve, keeping me in the doorway. “Ah, ah, ah- can’t just leave.” I looked at him expectantly and Ryan pointed over to the kitchen. “Bye, Spence.” Ryan called over the sound of clattering plates and running water.

“Bye, Spencer.” I echoed as Ryan nudged me.

“We’ll be back.” Ryan continued, nodding his head as the faucet turned off.

“Okay! I’ll be here. Be safe.” Spencer called to us. Ryan smiled at the sentiment before waving me out the door and to the stairs. The words sounded rehearsed, but not empty. Once down in the lobby, Ryan was ahead of me, walking to the door and humming quietly.

“Why did you do that?” I asked, catching up with Ryan as he held the door open.

“Do what?”

“Make me say that.”

“Did you want to leave without saying anything?” Ryan asked. I had done it before, why change the trend now? “I always say that to Spence. Started with his mom…” Ryan walked out onto the sidewalk behind me, mulling the next sentence over, only deciding to speak when the car was in sight. “I never lived at Spencer’s house but was always there, if that makes sense. I lived in their spare room, but sometimes I would have to leave and go back to my dad’s house, and I would always tell her I’d be back, and she’d tell me she’d be there and for me to be safe. Always like that, always will be.” Ryan shrugged and unlocked the passenger car door.

“You really like Spencer’s mom, don’t you?” I noted, more to myself than Ryan. I could be observant too.

“She’s the only mom I’ve ever had. So, yes. You could say that I have a particular soft spot for Ginger Smith.”

“What?” I stared at Ryan as he climbed into the driver’s seat. “Really?”

“Yeah.” Ryan nodded, adjusting his mirrors. “Never really had a mother- a biological one, I mean. She left me with my dad and, well,” He cleared his throat. “we all know that story.” I didn’t, but I wasn’t sure I wanted to.

“Oh.” Ryan never had the chance to grow up with one home and one family, and I had gone off and left one in favor of another. I left my mom and Ryan sounded like he wished every day that he could be so lucky, he could have decided his own future, decided what was the best for him. “I’m sorry.” Sorry I was going back and changing my life, making my own decisions. Picking up my own pieces.

“It’s okay. Sometimes people leave. She did, I did.” Ryan’s fingers drummed on the steering wheel. “Sometimes people leave.”

“Yeah, you’re right. Sometimes they do.” I was just as guilty as Ryan, and as he drove us through town, I had to remind myself that we weren’t leaving. We were staying; I was going home in order to stay.

Two world class escape artists, strategizing to stay.

I vaguely recognized all of the landmarks we passed, other schools that mostly played Palo Verde at football games, local stores, and homes on street names I could hear being read by my mother. We were close. Ryan pulled up to the fork in the road I had passed almost every day for eighteen years. Two paths but only one way to go.

“Which way?” Ryan asked, leaning forward to try and see farther down each road.

“Straight.” Ryan slowly turned to blink at my sudden answer. “Just picking one.”

“Okay… Straight it is then.” Ryan sounded like he was bracing me for the joking criticism that would be next if I was wrong. But I wasn’t. I couldn’t be.

The town was quiet, but not in any way I remembered. There was only one other car sharing the road with Ryan, but I recognized the truck immediately; we were the only strangers. We drove past the local supermarket, which had papers with a picture- my picture- pasted on the side; telephone poles with the same picture; and even my old church. The church had candles lining the windows by the side doors and trailing down the pathway to the sidewalk, they were still in mourning, in search, for me. They hadn’t forgotten me. I wasn’t just someone I could pick up and be able to leave with; everyone was still looking for me too. I was wanted, in more ways than one.

“Want to stop here?” Ryan was pointing to the church parking lot.

“Why?” I almost forgot that we would have to exit the car.

“Because we’re in a car.” Ryan stated, trying to get through to the logical part of my brain that had gone catatonic at the sight of home. “And we can’t pull up and pay our respects in a car.”

“He’s not dead.” I spat, trying to stop Ryan from treating it like a funeral. This was a visit; a pickup. “That boy is not dead.”

“You’re right.” Ryan agreed and lifted one hand from the wheel in surrender. “We can’t check up on him if we don’t park though, Bren. Unless you don’t want to be that close to it.” That close to the look of devastation and heavy-hearted loss. Ryan’s voice sounded like he would understand if I wanted distance. He had been a runaway himself and knew what to expect- but didn’t detect the tension on my face that showed I knew too.

“No. No. I want to go up.” I assured him, letting him pull into the parking lot. “I want to see him.” I wanted to get Brendon back.

We parked and were barely two steps away from the car when someone came marching up to us frantically, waving a paper in our faces. The orange flyer had a cropped photo of me and my supposed friends at a football game printed at its center.

“Here- have you seen him?” The boy didn’t believe in greetings. “Please, take one and call that number if you find this boy.” I grabbed the paper out of my vision half out of curiosity and half out of disbelief. I knew the face on the paper, but I also knew the face holding it. It was Marc. He looked tired and haggard and skinnier than I remembered. His boney frame was well hidden in the David Bowie shirt I also immediately recognized; it looked better on him than me, admittedly. Glad it came out of hiding. Unlike me.

“We haven’t seen him, we’re sorry.” Ryan apologized, taking the flyer. “But we’re here to see if there is something we can do.”

“You can take these and hand them out wherever you go- the more people that see my Brendon’s face, the better. We have been looking high and low for weeks. He has to be somewhere.” Yeah, right under your damn nose.

“Sure, we can do that. Maybe I can put some up around work.” Ryan took the stack of papers. He looked at me, trying to include me in the conversation, but I didn’t trust myself to speak in front of Marc; I would give everything away.

“Thank you. Thank you so much.” Marc seemed out of breath as Ryan accepted the flyers and agreed to help; pure relief from not being turned down for trying to locate a ‘curious’ gay kid from Las Vegas.

“No problem. We’ll help find him… Were you two close?” Ryan rolled the flyers up and tucked them in his back pocket without looking at them.

“Brendon’s my best friend. With him gone, god… It’s been absolutely awful.” Marc held his head, pinching the bridge of his nose before looking back at us. His eyes were red and glassy- I swear I saw a tear. But it couldn’t have been for me; it was for a mirage of me. Someone that never really existed, but was being carried around in heavy hearts. “I just can’t believe he’s gone. Who would do that?”

Marc was also under the impression that Brendon was taken and persecuted, not believing that he could have done it himself. Even though all the papers were pointing fingers and the Boy’s ‘curiosity’ with homosexuality, Marc was refusing to see any signs of the obvious scapegoat attempt. He also refused to take any of the responsibility. He knew his relationship with Brendon- with me- so did my parents, but he was going to stand in the parking lot of my church and lie to two strangers. Wouldn’t be the first time.

“I’m so sorry.” Ryan sighed, sounding genuine towards Marc’s mourning, but supporting a skeptical expression. “It must be really hard for everyone.”

“We just want to know he’s okay. His family is worried sick; he has four older siblings. I can’t imagine their faces when they learned their baby brother was missing. I know I thought it was some sick joke, you know? Someone thought it would be funny to pretend he was gone. And the day before they told me, that Wednesday, everything was fine. We were talking. We had lunch together and were just, hanging out.” He let his hands fall and both mine and Ryan’s jaws almost did the same; Ryan was hanging onto every word, but I just couldn’t believe the person standing in front of me. He was describing Brendon the day of his disappearance with a particular tone of guilt, and only I really knew it. “We were talking about girlfriends, making plans for the weekend, the usual- and he was so happy. He was smiling and laughing-”

“I can’t listen to this.” I muttered, turning away from Marc’s crumpling and teary-eyed face. “I can’t.”

Ryan’s hand immediately touched my back, stepping toward me. “Is this too much?” I nodded, but Ryan had no idea what I was talking about. Of course he didn’t; he might have been talking to Brendon this whole time, finding the real boy under all the lies, but he didn’t know that. He didn’t know. He was clueless. But I wasn’t. I knew more than Marc thought I did. I was the one who knew the whole story. Actually, the only one. “I’m so sorry- we should get going then.” Ryan’s hand pressed against my shoulders as he tried to guide me away from Marc. I dug my heels into the ground. I said it was too much, but I said nothing about wanting to leave Marc. I did that already.

“How long has Brandon been missing?” I asked, trying to mask my voice with a higher pitch.

“His name is Brendon.” Marc immediately corrected, holding his paper up to show the spelling. I tried not to laugh at the face smiling back at me- a face that had been called Brandon between messy kisses from the lips only spitting lies at me now. “Brendon Boyd Urie.” He learned my last name.

I couldn’t tell if Marc was being genuine and making up for lost time, or if he was trying to win the graces of the Mormon community he was not a part of. Either way, this was the most interested in me I had ever seen him. I thought telling him where I was running would ease his broken heart and save us, but leaving apparently only made it better. Me being absent brought us closer together. Marc forcing himself closer to my memory.

“I’m sorry. How long has Brendon been gone.” I repeated.

“Since the fourteenth. I saw in him school, but then after he was…” He looked at his hands and I swore I saw guilt. Not that I would’ve recognized it on his face, but it looked about right.

“Do you guys have any ideas on where he is? Who took him?” Ryan asked, still trying to collect information about the Boy in the Paper while also stopping my jaw from clenching shut and nearly shattering my teeth.

“It says it on the flyer; last he was seen was in the Strip, with three older guys.” I was about to be worried when I remembered the entire town was scanning high and low for someone who didn’t exist anymore.

Then again, who were they following?

“And do you really think Brandon got this treatment because he was a fag?” I asked, disguising my venom with curiosity. Marc nearly drown in the guilt washing over his face while Ryan’s neck nearly snapped as he turned to stare at me.

“Bren!” Ryan hissed, slapping my arm. I hadn’t expected Ryan to use my name. Why would I think he wouldn’t? He didn’t know who this boy was, who he was to me. To Ryan, Marc was just another deceived but still desperate townsperson that I was giving the third degree to for no good reason. “Be gentle.” He had an understanding expression as he muttered through closed lips, warning me to not seem too anti-heterosexual. Our arrival would be taken a lot less warmly.

“Bren?” Marc echoed, suddenly locking eyes on my face. His eyes stayed even with my eyes, and I was beyond thankful; the minute they sank to my lips I would be figured out.

“What?” I asked, pretending to itch my face and covering my mouth.

“I- nothing- I’m sorry. You just looked really familiar. Do you go to school here or something?”

“Spring Valley. Probably saw me at a football game.” I replied. I wasn’t lying; a football game was the first and last time Marc really saw me.

“Oh! Spring Valley? Maybe more people know Brendon there. Here, have some more flyers and hang them up in the hallways.” Marc shoved more paper into my hand. I tried not to let his hands touch mine.

“I will.” I promised, taking more pages with my picture and immediately holding them to my chest.

Marc looked at us both with a devastation I had never seen before as he thanked us and began walking on- walking home. I stood and watched him stagger home alone, no one shuffling along beside him, jittery or nervous. Maybe he did miss Brendon. Even the tiniest bit. Maybe he wasn’t lying. Unlike me.

“Why did you say you were in high school?” Ryan asked slowly, turning towards me with narrowed eyes.

“What?”

“You don’t go to school in Spring Valley. You’ve never seen him at a football game. You won’t be in any high school for you to hang those.” Ryan pointed out, his expression getting more removed and incredulous. “Why did you just lie to that poor kid?”

“Well, I-” Shit shit shit. “I couldn’t just leave Marc hanging.”

“You know his name?” Ryan was far too sharp for my lies; he was seeing too much.

“He introduced himself at the beginning- didn’t you hear him?” I acted like Ryan was the worse person out of the pair. What was one more lie?

“I guess not.”” Ryan muttered, considering his own mistake. “But that still doesn’t explain the false hope, Bren. Why didn’t you tell him you are from Arizona? Or at least name your college. Don’t act like you have been around, making friends with the kid who literally vanished. I know we think his escape method is different than this shit he’s talkin’, but that still isn’t reason.” He was right. I shouldn’t have acted like I was friends with Brendon; we were still getting to know each other. “Why not just tell him you live about four hundred miles away, in a state that probably doesn’t even know this kid’s fucking name if he showed up. Why lie?” Ryan unrolled his flyers and thrust the picture in my face. He was fighting for Brendon again. Fighting me for him.

I just wasn’t sure who deserved him.

“I just- I didn’t want to hurt him.” I admitted, being honest with Ryan for the first time since arriving at Brendon’s hometown. “I couldn’t lie.”

“But Spring Valley is the lie!” Ryan laughed, looking around like I was pulling his leg and talking in circles on purpose.

I opened my mouth to continue my fight for Brendon, for keeping him hidden, when Ryan’s face stilled. He stared up at me and for once, I was the one that could read him. He saw Brendon. But this time, he had the real one on a paper in his hands as well.

“Bren.” Ryan blinked slowly and repositioned his weight on his feet, his voice pinched with frustration. “Where in Arizona are you from?”

“Uh…” I only had two landmark cities, nothing smaller. Nothing believable.

“Bren. Where?” Ryan asked again, growing frantic. “Where in Arizona?”

“Ryan.” I sighed, hating the disbelief spreading over his face as he stepped away from me.

“No.” He hung his head and ran a hand through his hair. He refused to look at me, but ended up staring me in the eyes anyway. I saw the recognition flash across Ryan’s face. I could only watch as Ryan slowly lifted the paper up, next to my face. He looked between the two faces, but never left my eyes. “No. No no. No. No.” The papers scattered on the ground of the parking lot as they slipped through his fingers. “It’s you.”

“Ryan, let me explain.” I hushed, leaning down to gather the flyers. Gather the evidence. I didn’t expect to be linked to the Boy in the Paper so quickly. I was scrambling for my pictures and words.

“I can’t believe- you the whole time? Are you fucking kidding, Brendon?” He shouted my name at me and called to the boy he had always seen in me. I stepped up to him as I could hear my name rattling the silent sky, trying to silence him. “Don’t try to shut me up! Why did you lie to me- to both of us? You lived with us!”

“I know, but-”

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Ryan asked, pointing a heavy finger at himself. “Brendon, why didn’t you just tell me?” He took my name in and was only going to use it when speaking to me. He wasn’t letting the lie live anymore.

“I wasn’t going to tell anyone… I- I was going to start over. I- I don’t know.” I knew why. And he was sitting in his armchair, glasses on the tip of his nose, paging through his bookmarked Bible.

I knew why. I could put a finger on it. I could name it. I could say it. I didn’t have to keep lying. Ryan was standing in front of me, eyebrows knitted together and face crumpled with worry, asking why I didn’t tell him. Not demanding the truth, all in all, but why I was hiding. What I was afraid of. Ryan knew what it was like to smother secrets and try to keep them buried and he was still here. He was listening. I knew. And I could tell him. He already knew Brendon; I could tell him.

“Can you just, tell me something I do know about you. What is true?” Ryan asked, motioning to the paper and face he couldn’t stop comparing to the one staring back at him.

“I’m a Mormon. Raised in the community, actually.” It was the only complete truth I could think of. Who else was I; it was all I knew.

“Raised here?” Ryan looked around and took in the buildings I saw as common. “And you went to church here?” I nodded and he repeated the action, trying to be my eyes. “And you knew that boy?”

“I went to school with him.” Small truths. I could admit knowing Marc. He barely knew me.

“School. As in…”

“High school.”

“Jesus.” Ryan rubbed his hands over his face before going back and holding the sides of his face. He was shaking his head in complete disbelief and I was afraid I had crossed the line and revealed a part of Brendon that was undesirable. And it wasn’t even something I could control. “Jesus, Brendon. How old are you?”

“Eighteen. As of the twelfth.”

“Eight- are you serious? Brendon, fuck, I-” Ryan dropped his arms by his sides and rushed me, wrapping them around my waist. It took me a second of realization before I did the same, letting Brendon hug back. “Why didn’t you fucking say something?” Ryan sounded gutted. “Did you think I wasn’t going to believe you or something? Think I was going to kick you out? I was in your shoes; I know exactly what you are dealing with. I am not going to just kick you out. Oh my god, Brendon, why didn’t you say something?”

I was afraid Brendon wasn’t good enough. That he was a series of conveniences and wrong doings. That he was better off being left behind than shown a better life. That the me without lies wasn’t worth it. “I was scared.” I muttered into Ryan’s shoulder. He placed a hand on the back of my head and tried to calm the wavering in my voice.

“I was too. But we’ve got you now. Me and Spencer. You have a home that isn’t going to send you away or make you feel like leaving. We’re here. I’ve got you. You don’t have to be scared anymore.”

“I just didn’t want to be sent back. I didn’t want… I don’t want to be send back.” The guilt would be enough to weigh me down into my grave if God didn’t strike me down first. “I just didn’t want…” Not didn’t, couldn’t. There was no way I could go back and face my siblings, my parents, my dad. I couldn’t imagine the look in his eyes if I came crawling back to the home and identity I abandoned with nothing to show for myself but the frustrating lack of an apology. I was scared of him. I was scared of my father. And I ran. “My dad- he just- I-I don’t want to-” An unfamiliar tightness closed around my throat, trapping the truth and putting an anchor in my chest. I couldn’t give it all away yet; secrets kept me safe.

My voice could barely carry the weight of my words and continued to waver and break. I gripped Ryan’s back and tried not to let the imagination of my father’s fiery eyes flash before me and show on my face, even if Ryan couldn’t see it.

I tried to speak again but my throat had closed shut. I could only gasp. “I know. Your dad.” Ryan soothed my tensing with a calming voice. His hand slipped higher up on my head. Further from my neck. “I know what he did.”

Part of him knew the first moment he met me, his eye recognizing those bruises as ones he had met in a mirror. He let the conversation drift to my obvious dye job, another sign I was running; I was shifting into someone new. I was lying. He saw all of it, but he just didn’t know. Neither did I. Ryan and I had been honest with each other since the beginning. And he still shared his partial story about his father with me; offered me his only stolen reminder of his childhood; still defended that Boy, and the still scared boy inside of him, from the world that threatened them both.

“What do we do now?” I asked, backing away from Ryan and looking at the paper crumpling in my grip.

“We can go home.” He replied. “The apartment, I mean. Home. Unless you want to-”

“No.” I shook my head and didn’t let the idea even unfold; I couldn’t stay.

“Okay. So we’ll go.”

“Are we going to tell Spencer?” Spencer accepted me for all the unknowns about me. What would those truths do to him? Spencer had known Ryan for most of his life and was able to help and support Ryan in his time of need, but I was just the charity case he saved from self-destruction. How would someone react if I were to reveal I had been lying to them for weeks. Accepting his good will in exchange for a caricature of myself.

“No. No we don’t have to tell Spencer. We can keep it just between us.” And just like that, Ryan was going to cover my secrets with me. He was committed and wasn’t going to let me feel alone. He spoke my name with ferocity, refusing to let Brendon slip back into the shadows. He rested his hands on my shoulders and set the sun shining down on me. I was under close watch, but now, it was no longer the scrutinizing eyes of God. “Are you ready to go home?” Ryan asked, squeezing my shoulders. I nodded and I knew exactly where I would be going. Where home was. I just followed Ryan.

“Yeah. I don’t want to be here anymore.” Brendon didn’t live here; he wasn’t even buried here. Brendon was alive but wasn’t running. He was walking away.

Just try and stop me.

END OF PART 1