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The moon was a sliver of gray in the indigo sky when Spot woke up. Half-asleep and comfortable, he shifted his legs and scrunched his pillow under his head to fluff it as he nestled back into peaceful sleepiness. A subtle sound of something made his brow furrow. Really, the boarding house was never fully asleep, what with hundreds of kids spread across several floors, so there was no immediate alarm. But the repetitive nature of it, too perfectly spaced out to be a random movement— he could admit it got to him.
Groggily, he lifted his head to search for the sound. He scanned the beds of sleeping children, squinting with only one eye open as he counted heads. The noise— a metronome of tap tap tap— turned his sight forward and across from his bunk to the window, where a lively Racetrack stood behind the glass.
At the sight of Spot’s wake, Racer’s eyes and smile blew wide, and he waved, big and boyish. Spot stifled a sigh as he watched the boy wildly gesture, a game of charades he was forced into playing. On the fourth round of Race pretending to shiver, making prayer hands, then gesturing with his thumbs pointed behind him, Spot groaned and stuffed his face into his pillow. He wanted to talk at this hour? Where did ‘e get off?
Spot raised his head to tell Race no, he was not coming out there, but was stopped in his tracks to find the blond pressing his face to the glass, squishing his nose sideways into a stupid face. He held the position and stared at Spot, patience oozing from the joker as his breath fogged the windowpane.
The boy in the bunk shook his head firmly, refusing to give in to the idiot, but after the other pouted his pretty lips from his place on the fire escape, Spot knew he’d lost. It was in moments like these that made Spot wonder if he’d bitten off more than he could chew dealin’ with Racer all these years.
Careful to make as little noise as possible, he shifted out of bed, his sheet still wrapped around his shoulders. He grabbed his pillow and dragged it to the window, sliding it open with little effort.
“Whaddaya want?” Spot sighed out quietly, rubbing the sleep from his eyes.
“What, you want me to act it all out again?” Race responded, snagging the pillow’s corner and tugging it. “C’mon!” With that, he started up the fire escape stairs to a higher level, pulling Spot up with him.
The older boy stumbled to keep up, tripping over his sheet and haphazardly closing the window on the way. Racer was relentless until they got to the highest level, where a window looking into the empty attic stood tall and dusty. The blond pried it open, snatching the pillow from Spot’s hands. He lined the windowsill with it and fell ungracefully into his new seat, patting the space next to him with a grin.
Spot rolled his eyes as he sat, but the annoyance he displayed was barely skin-deep. He was so used to Race’s antics nowadays, and he was finding them more endearing than irritating as of late. He tried not to think too deeply about it as the blond swung his legs and nearly vibrated in his place.
“See? Whadid I tell ya?” Race asked, gesturing around to the quiet collection of buildings surrounding them.
“You didn’t tell me nothin’,” replied Spot, sort of dumbfounded.
“I knew you was sleepin’ on me,” the blond whined out. He rubbed at his arms before stilling them in a loose crossed hold. “I told you to bring your big butt out ‘ere with yer blanket and pillow so we could shoot the shit, ‘cause t’night is a poyfect night for it.”
This kid—, Spot thought, pulling his threadbare sheet up and around to drape lightly over both of them. “D’ya know how late it is?” he asked with slight exasperation.
“Sure, it’s nearly two,” the blond shrugged, his bony hand pulling the corner of the sheet down further over his lanky frame. Their shoulders grazing under the sheet produced goosebumps along Spot’s arms. “You know, you really oughta learn how to read clocks soon. It’ll help ya sell.”
“Oh yeah? I think you could learn yourself a lesson about readin’ the room,” Spot shot back. A small smirk curled along the side of his mouth, any heat from the statement snuffed out before it could catch.
Race gasped dramatically, pulling a cigar from behind his ear and stabbing it into his chest as he fell into Spot. “Yer killin’ me! That really ‘urt, you know that? It’s like you don’t even want me ‘ere.” The boy used that sad little puppy pout again, craning his neck to look back at Spot upside down, the aqua blue sparkling behind his top lashes, and Spot was beginning to think this weakness of his was a real problem.
Indeed, moments like this, when their pointed back-and-forths would spiral into silliness, when the touches would linger and the gazes would hold, were some of Spot’s favorites. The warmth he felt, a small flame kindling in his ribs, always seemed to soothe his muscles and smooth his mind like nothing else.
“Well, I’d rather be sleepin’,” Spot started coolly, “but if ‘m gonna be awake now anyway, ‘m glad to have the company.” The blond perked up instantly, sitting upright as he dug for his matches and hummed out a rumbling laugh.
“Look, guy, I’s not sayin’ I wanna be awake.” Race took a drag from his cigar, puffing smoke rings out; the sight alone made Spot almost feel wobbly, this boy who could make him fall to his knees. Racer continued, “...but I couldn’t sleep, so now I’s yer problem!”
Racer offered the cigar to Spot, who took it readily. “What, Jack too busy to tuck ya in t’night?” Spot prodded, the joke a veil for the vulnerability they usually hid. His head tingled as he smoked, searching in the flavor for something distinctly Race.
“Pfft, ya kiddin’ me? He kissed my fore’ead and everythin’!” Race laughed, taking the cigar back from the older boy. He hesitated awkwardly before continuing, “I dunno, today’s just been weird ’s all.”
The boy shifted in his place. Spot could see a slight tension itching his shoulders as he fidgeted with his corner of the sheet absentmindedly.
Like a hummingbird, Racer could be there and gone in an instant, so Spot thought hard about what he could say to that. The kid could have a short fuse, sure— he was a spitfire after all. But really, Spot didn’t worry about that. Spot knew that if he pushed too far, Race would slink back into his games, jokey and flirtatious with no real substance. It’s what he’d always done when things got hard.
One wrong move here, and Race would fall from the window to the pitch black streets below without another real thought. But before Spot decided his next best course of action, Race spoke up again.
“Look,” Racer started, his eyes pointedly trained on the streetlamps below, “I know ‘m a pain in yer ass.”
Confusion knit Spot’s brow.
Race went on, “But I don’t really got no one else. Not like this, anyhow.” He gestured with his cigar hand, waving between them.
Spot wanted to pretend he didn’t know what he meant. It would’ve been easier if he did, maybe. Instead, he was frozen to his seat, waiting with baited breath.
“And you know… If I could go back ‘n redo things, I dunno if I would. I think I’d stay the same.” The cigar sat, unsmoked and burning between Race’s fingers. “I think I’d do it all again.”
The vagueness felt pointed, like Race was walking on a tightrope at the circus. Spot could see it, the way he was wobbling to one side and then the other, standing between not enough and too much. The Brooklyner understood the balancing act all too well, yet he didn’t know what to make of any of it, left behind to watch from the stands as the blond walked through fire.
A huff of vapor dispersed from Race’s lips as he laughed dryly, turning to look at Spot. His eyes pierced somewhere deep, and Spot couldn’t look away.
“You know, I think yer my best friend, Spotty.”
Their gazes were locked, sheet and breath and warmth shared between them. Spot’s eyes dipped lower to Race’s freckles, purple constellations in the dark, then lower to his perfect cupid’s bow. It was like he was magnetized, drawn to close the distance, pulled to make it real.
“Where’s all this comin’ from, huh?” Spot asked instead, aiming for lighthearted but landing too softly. It took real effort to stay still.
He shrugged. “Not sure,” and his eyes flicked down to Spot’s own lips, “but if it’s makin’ ya stare at me like that, I oughta say stupid shit like this more often.”
There he went again, a joke to break the tension. The kid was too quick for his own good. But something about it felt different this time. This wasn’t Race running away, wasn’t an escape like usual— no, this felt like the blond was coming home.
It made Spot feel a twist in his head, a rush in his veins.
The conversation lapsed, the two sharing the cigar and the view in an easy quiet. It was simple, sitting with Racer, where the rest of New York fell away and nothing but the stars could see them. Nothing else, not even time could seem to find them here. They could be young forever, alive and smoking on the roof, away from the feel of ink on their fingers and the smell of pennies in their nails and the bruising grasp of labor on their shoulders. No deadlines. No morning bell. None of that could ever find them here.
Blessed be the boys time couldn’t capture.
It was Race who stood first, the sheet pulling off of Spot and hanging limply around the blond. He looked so small like that. Just a child.
Spot stood, too, and they were facing each other, the view forgotten and the nubby cigar stubbed. Race’s sharp eyes looked through Spot, deep, deeper, into his skull, his brains, the mush in the center of it all. What did he see?
It must’ve been something he liked, because before Spot knew up from down, Race had pulled him by his belt loops, closing their distance and pressing their hips together. Spot stumbled with a gasp, and their faces were inches apart, noses nearly brushing, and Spot couldn’t believe how tall Racer’d gotten, when had that happened? And Race’s eyes wouldn’t leave his mouth, and Spot felt it again— like magnets— and he couldn’t stop himself, like time, ticking but not, stuck but moving, and he fell up into Racer’s personal space and kissed him.
It was quick and featherlight, and it could’ve been played off as an idiotic joke or a stumble if either of them were willing to lie. They didn’t do that with each other, though. Not anymore. Not for a while. Maybe not ever.
Spot felt a burn on his neck, an inky warmth sinking down his scalp and around his head, and a ringing echoed in his ears. He couldn’t tell what Race was thinking; his face was impossibly blank, upsettingly steely.
Racer licked his lips.
Spot held his breath.
The blond dipped down again, his lips barely a breath away, and Spot could’ve just lifted up to close the distance, but he waited, like a second hand stuck between dashes on an old pocket watch. Now Spot was the one walking through fire, balancing on a tightrope, hanging on by a thread. Race’s blue eyes were so bright, so big and striking on his dollface, and they crinkled as he grinned and chuckled.
Race pulled away, taking a full step backward. Spot didn’t know when he’d let go of his belt loops, but now he felt like he’d fallen into the pit of fire, or maybe it was an ice bath— he was burned completely blue.
“I should prob’ly head back,” Race reasoned. He wiped his hands on his trousers and fixed his suspenders. He was so casual it would’ve been cruel— cruel if it wasn’t Racer. "Thanks fer lettin' me bother ya."
Spot hummed and nodded, and Race whipped the sheet around Spot’s shoulders, smoothing it down and lingering his skinny fingers on the boy’s bedsheet-lapels. His hands snaked up to hold Spot’s shoulders, and the Brooklyner was sure he’d kiss him again, would lean down and confirm the inevitable and do it.
Race patted him on the cheek once, twice, then turned and started down the stairs. Spot had to slog through water, his shoes heavy with lead as he hung himself over the railing to watch the blond go down the several flights back toward the street.
“Racer,” he called, louder than a whisper but quieter than a yell— like a plea, or a prayer.
The younger boy looked up, and the streetlights made his skin glow. “Yeah?”
Now that he had the kid’s attention, he wasn’t sure what to say. How did Spot tell him what it meant to have their lips meet, to feel his hip bones through his pants? Could he lie and say he was sorry for kissing him? Would Race believe him? Or would he be better off explaining just how much he wasn’t sorry, and how the kid was a coward for not doing it again, and how Spot would make him pay for it, would torture him with the possibility but never let it happen again, and wasn’t that a good lie they could both agree on, could both say, could both live with— that this would never happen again?
It was all too much, and Spot could feel time catching up to him, to both of them. So he said the only thing that made sense anymore.
“I think yer my best friend, too.”
Race’s smile nearly knocked Spot off the balcony.
“I know,” he replied softly. “I’m all yours.”
Spot didn’t know what that meant, but something about it felt like a promise. Race looked at him for a moment more, then he was gone, slinking down and jumping to the road. He dashed toward the bridge, looking back only once— a crack and strike, then silent and out of sight, quick as lightning, a whip, a stopwatch.
Spot sat back on the window, the sheet not nearly warm enough now. His fingers ghosted his chapped lips and his knee bounced.
He agreed with his best friend, he decided, as he leaned on the window frame and watched nighttime uncurl herself into day: given the chance, Spot wouldn’t change a thing— he’d do it all again.