“So, when you’re offered bacon for breakfast, do you refuse because you’re worried about what’s going to happen when it’s gone?”
“No.”
“No!” Audrey smacked me in the chest. “You eat that bacon and you love it because it’s delicious. You don’t fret over whether you’ll ever have bacon again. You just eat the bacon.” Audrey stood in front of me and held my face between her hands. Her expression was so solemn that it was difficult not to laugh. “Eat the bacon, Henry.”
A roar erupted from Charlie and his friends. Audrey and I turned in time to watch a plume of fire and sparks shoot into the air and explode like a supernova. Diego winked at me from across the lawn.
“I’m assuming Diego is the bacon in that analogy.”
“I need another drink.”
? ? ?
Diego and I stood in my bedroom, the lights off, our arms wrapped around each other. The TV blared in the living room. It was still ten minutes to midnight, but it could have been ten seconds, and I wouldn’t have cared.
The bright moon shone through my window, and I froze Diego’s face in my mind, committing to memory the curves of his cheeks and the scar on his temple and the way he shivered when I touched him.
Diego’s skin pressed against mine as he kissed my lips and my neck, lingering only long enough in one spot to make me want more. This was prolonged euphoria, better than the carrot the sluggers used to turn me into their trained monkey.
“It was my mom.”
I stopped kissing Diego. “Is this really the best time to talk about your mom?”
“She’s the reason I came to live with Viv instead of going home when I got out of juvie.” He spoke so softly that I felt his words vibrate against my skin. I stroked Diego’s hair but didn’t move otherwise. “It was self-defense—even my lawyer said so—but my mom refused to testify against my dad. It was my word against his, and my father had a silver tongue when he wasn’t tweaking. I needed my mom to back me up, but she refused. He’s going to kill her one day, and she chose him over her own son.” His voice broke.
“You don’t have to talk about it.” I tried to imagine being betrayed by my own mother, but I couldn’t. Despite her flaws, my mom was always there for me.
Diego rested his forehead against mine. “I wanted you to know.” He pulled me to him and kissed me as if that might erase his memories of the past. He slid his hands under my shirt and pulled it over my head. I couldn’t unbutton his shirt fast enough. I lost track of time. We were arms and legs and lips, fearless and frenzied.
“Is this all right?” he asked as if I wasn’t the one who’d wrestled him out of his black dress pants. “You’ve had a lot to drink.”
“It’s good,” I murmured, tipsy but not drunk. “Is it okay for you?” I looked into Diego’s eyes, feeling self--conscious now. I’d been poked and prodded by aliens, wandered Calypso without a stitch, but standing in front of Diego was the most naked I’d ever felt.
“Better than okay.”
“Have you ever done it with a guy?” I asked. Diego shook his head. “Not even in juvie?”
“It’s not like that,” he said with a chuckle.
“I have . . . with Jesse. And Marcus.”
Diego laughed. “So much for just being friends.”
“We can stop.”
“I don’t want to. Unless you do.”
“I don’t.”
I led Diego to the bed, and we eased under my sheets, letting instinct and hormones take control. I thought it must’ve been midnight because I heard shouting, but I ignored it. Only Diego and I existed.
My bedroom door burst open. “Henry! Henry, you gotta come quick!”
I scrambled to cover Diego and myself with the sheets. “Jesus Christ, Charlie, we’re fucking busy in here!”
Charlie was crying. I didn’t notice that at first because I was freaking out about my brother walking in while Diego and I were naked and about to have sex. But when I did, I knew something was wrong. “Henry, please. It’s Zooey.”
1 January 2016
I watched my brother chew his fingernails down to the quick, and then keep biting. He gnawed on the ends until they bled, and I finally had to pull his hands away from his mouth. He looked at his fingers and shook his head.
“How long are they going to be in there?” he asked.
“I’m sure someone will be out soon.” The hospital waiting room was far from comforting, and our coffee cups sat forgotten on the small plastic side tables. We’d been waiting for more than an hour, starving for even the smallest scrap of news. Diego had been the only one of us sober enough to drive, and we’d rushed Zooey—moaning in pain and clutching her belly—to the nearest hospital in Audrey’s car. I wanted to call an ambulance, but Charlie refused to wait.
“Do you think I should call her parents again?”
“You left them a message, right?”
Charlie nodded. “I don’t think they get reception on their boat.”
Diego held my hand and smiled when I glanced his way. It was difficult to think of anything other than what we’d been about to do when I looked at him, but Charlie needed me, so I tried to pretend Diego wasn’t there.