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“Oh, you idiot!” Petey gasps when Jimmy coughs out a hearty puff of grey smoke that spreads and curls in the air. “Don’t waste it when you’re not gonna even inhale properly, dude.”
Jimmy’s face contorts into something that can only be described as a half-grimace… or maybe he’s baring his teeth? “Shut up, kid, you got nothing on me.”
Petey shoots him a hateful glare and brings the cylinder to his lips, sucking on the ends and sharply inhaling. Lazy curls of smoke drift from the opposite side, glowing like an orange sunset as Petey turns away to exhale in a stream that can only be described as graceful and airborne. “Like this. Suck it in and hold it ‘till it burns, baby!”
He passes the joint back to Jimmy. The room is all warm and earthy-smelling when Jimmy brings it up to his lips and inhales with a frown, his breath drawn out and all belly-deep before his eye twitches and he coughs it out with a wheeze. Petey winces. The burn must be insane.
“So this is what you’re all holed up doing all day?”
“I do nails, schoolwork, and fun stuff?” Petey offers, shrugging. “I’ve really just sunk into my Femme Boy role. If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em.”
“This— what? That, I would never,” Jimmy laughs. He takes another drag (successfully coughing this time) before he gives the joint back to Petey. “You smoke up your room and paint all day and I can’t tell if I want to call you a loser or a legend.”
“How ‘bout both?” Petey giggles, before he takes another hit that burns his throat and lungs delightfully well. His mouth is starting to feel all cottony and his head tingles with what’s to come. “Think about it this way. You fight and do all these hopeless things all day and I can’t tell if I want to call you a loser or a legend. Well, maybe not now, because you’re slacking and getting high.”
“Fuck you,” Jimmy laughs. He looks around and blinks a bit before he shakes his head and looks around again. Petey’s starting to feel delightfully tingly at this point. There’s just a matter of time before he’s trapped in his own little slow world. “You’re not on the runway right now,” he points out. “So you must be slacking and getting high.”
Petey gives a scoff, sitting on Jimmy’s bed. “Did you just come up with that now?”
Jimmy nods shamefully, but it’s tinged with an all-loving sense of pride he can’t shake. “I think it’s great.”
“You’re playing my words. I would be the one to get credit for the phrase, respectfully.” The joint burns between his fingers and he feels like such a girl. “Shakespeare worked hard to make his own words, however there’s many others that were overshadowed by him.”
“Uh-huh,” Jimmy hums. His lips don’t match up with his words. Petey can feel his brain ripping itself apart to reach depths of thought you can only get slivers of when intoxicated. High. “Speaking of which…”
“What?”
“Never mind.” Jimmy dismisses Petey with a slight wave of his short fingers. Petey wonders if his mom gave birth to Jimmy to solely bully and cause trouble, because he sure looks like he’s built for it. “I can’t remember it. And before you say anything—”
“Put the Bully demeanour down and chill out first,” Petey hisses (reprimands) sharply. He really feels like a real diva in Moulin Rouge! now, pressing the joint against the bedframe to put it out. The ash spreads everywhere. “You’re killin’ me, man.”
The patterns of the ceiling wave appreciatively in front of his eyes. An old song he’d heard a long time ago repeats in his head again and again.
“If I was killing you, you’d end up with skin missing from your arms, flatlining on a gurney. But think about it, you can’t try on dresses in the bathroom anymore.” Jimmy says, quite matter-of-factly. Petey shudders at the true graphicness of his words.
“C’mon, Jimmy, you’re always all moody and angsty. Just fuckin’ relax, girl!” Petey tries. Jimmy gives Petey a lazy death stare. His eyes droop and Petey internally giggles and high-fives himself. Get Hopkins all high to the point of break! Petey’s a guy that always strives for fun and parties—his personality is eighty degree weather, cake for lunch and six shots of vodka at night topped off with half a joint, and Jimmy’s just getting the start at the Kowalaski Treatment.
Fun. And bar fistfights.
Yeah, this might not be a good idea. Petey’s ears are ringing faintly and there’s an appreciative tingle in his legs. He’s gotten too high before, of course, when the only thing to do everyday is to smoke, why wouldn’t you get too high?
“Ugh, is everything supposed to be this slow?” Jimmy’s eyes are darting around his room, taking in his new perspective. There’s a slight pink rimming to his eyes. It’s quite funny, Petey can imagine the newsletters: Jimmy Hopkins, Bullworth’s Greatest Saviour: Spotted Crying?
“Try not to pay attention to it,” Petey leans in to give a dramatic whisper. “That’s how you go from casual user to junkie.”
“Gimme a break.” Jimmy groans, rubbing a hand over his face before his fingers delicately wrap around his throat. “Is it s’pposed to feel like my throat is falling down?”
Petey shrugs. “Go figure.”
“My ass.” Jimmy whines. His voice has an American drawl to it that sounds like music to Petey’s ears. He would be the perfect face for a drag show. Did he say My ass or Eat my ass? Petey sits idly, letting his thoughts drift. His mouth feels milky in a way. It’s a short time that passes before he realizes he misses this and always gives himself more. Diva or junkie?
Everything’s moving in half-speed and Petey doesn’t know a word he’s saying, but it must be, in some sort, coherent. He laughs with Jimmy and Jimmy laughs with him.
“An’ when I first saw you, I fuckin’ hated you. Total bully to the people I’m trying to turn gay. Like, ‘s like, Make America Gay Again. Hey, that’s… what?” Petey pointlessly mutters. Jimmy cackles and Petey has satisfaction curl through his limbs.
“What are you even talking about?” Jimmy’s voice is raspy and there’s a certain slump his body is in that screams that fact that he is baked off his ass to everyone around him.
“I dunno. ‘M hungry.” Petey replies.
“C’mon, Buster. Let’s go get something.”