Mary was the crowning glory in a long list of reasons why Tino’s life was totally dysfunctional, and he was starting to suspect that somewhere along the way, he had become highly and irreversibly fucked-up. Like the fact that seeing pills in a bottle made his dick hard, and seeing naked women made him think about being high.
If he went too long without seeing Mary or getting a job, he started to get itchy. He didn’t know if he was itchy for the drugs or itchy for the sex. He supposed he could solve it by taking the drugs when he wasn’t fucking, but that seemed wrong for some reason, and he could never bring himself to do it.
Drugs were for survival.
At least to Tino they were.
Others had different reasons for them.
“Why do you like the weekends so much?” Tino asked Nova as he followed him down the stairs. It was dark out, past nine, which was about the right time for Lost Boys to head out and play.
“It’s a break. A few days off. I don’t owe anyone anything,” Nova explained very reasonably.
How nice for Nova. It wasn’t Tino’s day off.
Tino didn’t really have a day off.
He was always doing something for someone.
School.
Karate.
Dance team.
Dealing.
Fucking.
Crew work.
What the hell would he do if he had a day off? Probably exactly what Nova did.
“That’s not what I meant,” Tino argued, still following after Nova, who was motivated to get the hell out of Dyker Heights for the night. “Is it the E or the girls?”
Drugs.
Or sex.
Which one was it that made him sweat for more?
“It’s both.” Nova walked past his Porsche in the driveway. “They sorta go hand in hand.”
Instead of catching the bus, Nova called a car service to get to the subway. The lack of stops in Dyker Heights never stopped being annoying. Nova carried Tino’s backpack, but Tino was still packing heat, so chances were they were both going down if they got stopped.
They never did.
The Borgata had most of Brooklyn in their pocket, but they could never be too careful.
When they got on the train, Nova dropped his head back against the seat and looked up. Tino tugged at his leather bracelet again, still worrying about Romeo and wishing today was a Monday instead of a Saturday so he could work off some of the nerves.
Tino fucked on weekdays, when men went to work.
Nova fucked on weekends when party girls came out to play.
“What the fuck are we gonna do about Romeo?” Nova sighed, still staring at the roof of the subway car. “Cazzo, Tino, we are screwed.”
That pretty much summed it up.
There was nothing to be done about Romeo.
They were just fucked. Romeo was going to find out they’d been playing in Neverland instead of staying on the straight and narrow like they had led him to believe.
“Can I ask you something?” Nova asked in Italian, which meant it was private.
“Sure.”
“Are you gay?”
Tino frowned and turned to his brother. “What?”
“I don’t care.” Nova sat up straight again and looked at Tino earnestly. “I just need to know. I need to plan. Gay doesn’t fly in Cosa Nostra. They will fucking kill your ass. Badly. Then I’ll have to eat a fucking bullet, so can you just tell me and help me avoid a disaster?”
“You’ve been thinking about this,” Tino whispered in awe. “You’ve put actual thought into it.”
“It’s the dance-team thing,” Nova said in exasperation. “Why are you so obsessed with it?”
’Cause it made him feel normal.
’Cause it made Brianna happy.
’Cause he liked the way her ass looked in spandex.
“And it’s more than that,” Nova said before Tino could answer. “There’s something weird about you. I don’t know what it is, but you got that club-band thing going, and you never take it off.”
“You’re giving me shit about club culture?” Tino laughed in his face, even though the band had nothing to do with clubbing. Nova just assumed it did because so many Lost Girls and Boys wore them. “You are the rave-boy poster child. And you do poppers now. You have no room to be giving me shit about dance team.”
“Poppers make the roll more intense,” Nova said defensively. “There’s a specific reason I use them.”
“Poppers are gay.” Tino held up his hands. “Everyone knows they’re gay. They relax your muscles. There’s only one reason a guy would want that, especially since they can make your dick soft.”
“How do you know that? Where do you learn all this shit?” Nova pressed suspiciously. “They don’t make my dick soft, by the way. I have the exact opposite problem, if you’re wondering.”
“I wasn’t wondering,” Tino assured him.
“Are you gay?” Nova asked him again. “Please just tell me.”
“I’m not answering that,” Tino said in response. “If you’ve used your big brain to figure out the reason I’m fucked-up is because I’m gay, then whatever.”
“Last week Sara said she tried with you, and you weren’t interested.”
“So because I won’t let one of your party girls suck my dick on the D train, I’m gay?” Tino barked at him, and since they were speaking Italian, he didn’t bother to keep his voice down. “You’re an idiot, Casanova.”
“I have never seen more girls come on to a guy in my life, Valentino,” Nova said slowly. “And you don’t fuck them. Why?”