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3 MONTHS AGO.

It was hot. Even the coarse fabric of your jean shorts kept sticking to your skin, and when you thought nobody was looking you would awkwardly readjust everything. Moo’s house had air conditioning—a little white box sticking out his living room window with a flimsy piece of cardboard wedged beside it—but the machine wasn’t on. He liked the heat, moving through the house in beige, baggy shorts armed with numerous pockets, a cargo t-shirt, and a tacky vest that a fisherman might wear if it wasn’t so clearly nibbled at by moths. You watched from your place on the sofa as Moo flopped down into a plaid green armchair and cracked open a sizzley beer can.

He proceeded to make a very loud slurping noise, his eyes skipping around the bright living room, finding you. “Want one?”

You dug out the water bottle that had slipped between a gap in the sofa. The springs dug at you from underneath the cushion. “I have this.”

Suddenly, you heard the house’s rickety front door shutter. In walked Vernon and Moo’s roommate, Snozz, who had gone outside to light for a brief moment, trailing in with them the scent of stale smoke from cheap, old cigarettes. Vernon sunk into place beside you on the sofa. Snozz leaned against the sliding glass door. You wondered if they were feeling the heat. Maybe you wanted Vernon to yell at Moo to use his damn AC unit.

Moo started rocking in his green armchair. “Okay, Vern. Tell us.”

Your boyfriend scoffed, jerked his thumb at you. “She can tell you.”

And your forehead creased. “I can?”

Vernon shrugged. “You were in the club. Not me.”

Moo cackled, pointed his finger. “He can’t get in the club!”

“Shut up,” Vernon coughed back. “Nice gear you fuckin’ loser.”

“Hey! I’m going dock-fishing later! I have worms in the fridge.”

You sucked on your lower lip. “What am I saying?”

Vernon nudged your shoulder, raised his sharp, clean eyebrows. His t-shirt was sticking to your bare arm. “Who did you chat to at Prerogative?”

“Woah, woah!” Moo hollered, sitting up straight in his chair, the flashy tackles on his vest twinkling. “Prerogative? You do insider trading?”

“Uh, no?”

“Dude, shut up so she can talk!” Vernon grunted.

Finally, the roaring waves that had crashed through the living room were now calmly ebbing away. You felt nervous, pinched along the seam of your jean shorts while all the boys stared at you from every angle, and the heat turned heavier. But then Vernon squeezed your shoulder, his fingers resting on your skin like cool stones.

So you spoke up. “Well… last week, I went to Prerogative with my friends. I didn’t get in ‘cause I’m secretly loaded, or doing… insider trading…” you eyed Moo from across the small room, “but I used, erm, someone else’s name. Anyways. Yeah, I talked to Jeonghan—”

Moo squealed, “El Timador?!” while slapping a splotchy hand to his mouth, and you nearly thought there was a ten-year-old girl in the room.

“Yes,” you continued, clearing your throat. “I know that Vernon has an issue with some territories that you guys lost, or something? That were taken over by Jeonghan. So… well… I got Jeonghan to agree… he told me he’s going to arrange some sort of meeting with Vernon, essentially. I’m assuming to work something out. And I know that it wasn’t my business to intervene. Trust me, I already got an ear,” you glanced sideways at your boyfriend. “But Vernon was really bent about it. Anyway, that’s the story.”

The patched armchair sounded a rusty squeak. Moo was leaning forward, nodding at you, his lips pursed with sympathy… gratitude... reverence… you had no idea, really. “Wow, you are so brave,” he said.

“Um… thanks?”

Snozz had been so still and silent by the sliding glass door that you somewhat jumped when he used his voice, much lower and scratchier in cadence, like there were barbs in his throat. “Heard anything, Vernon?”

He shook his head. “Nope.”

“Wait, so, what the fuck does this mean?” Moo questioned, lowering his beer can to the matted carpet. “You want them… back?”

Vernon scoffed. “Yes. What the fuck do you think?”

“But are we sure that’s a good idea?”

And Vernon shrugged. “Dunno. You want more money?”

“Well, always. But—”

Vernon leaned forward, the tattoos along his sunkissed skin flexing, prowling. “Me too. I mean, we don’t have Hylands anymore—Minghao fucked that for us—not to mention we lost Starlight, the whole underground scene at Smog, and that fuckin’ washed up Russian idiot popstar who had us on speed dial for all his celebrity parties. Dude, we were makin’ fuckin’ bank back then. Carryin’ it in duffle bags bustin’ at the zippers.”

Moo didn’t seem to flourish with his usual glow. “I know, but—”

“But, but, but,” Vernon interrupted, teasing him. “But what, man?”

Silence then permeated itself into the slippery folds of heat in the sweltering air, and you wished, for the love of all things holy, that someone would just whack that damn AC and turn it on—even just to hear a rattling hum that could somehow succeed in squashing the nauseating silence.

You watched Moo collapse back into the chair with dejection.

“But that’s when we had Dots…” he added listlessly.

And no one spoke. No one moved. Some drifting clouds had streamed their way over the blurry orange ball in the summer sky and the living room was washed in mournful, hurt dimness. Even you glanced down at your lap, bit the inside of your cheek, and refused to disrupt the atmosphere bleeding over everything in the room. It made you acknowledge how powerful another person’s impact could be, to the point where time visibly slowed at the mere summoning of their name, like the world was suddenly dipped into a clear molasses. You wondered if you were an intruder, spoiling the stillness of their memories to someone you hardly, transiently knew.

Vernon scratched his nose. The gesture was faint, simple, but it was a pair of scissors that sheared the conversation apart from the exhumed hurt. “We can get them back…” he spoke softly. “I know it. Jeonghan isn’t bulletproof.”

“You trust him?” Snozz croaked, his hands now pulled out from his pockets, arms folded stoutly across his chest. “You trust fucking Jeonghan?”

“Dude, this may be as far as we ever fuckin’ get with him. That man’s a ghost, okay? You can’t find him if he doesn’t wanna be found. I think he’s got a penthouse in the fuckin’ Shadow Realm or some shit.”

But Snozz didn’t twitch. “He fucked over Dots,” he said, vitriolic, his nose crinkling and lips peeling. “He fucked over all of us.”

“Yeah, I know,” Vernon bit back. “I was fuckin’ there.”

The cool water bottle was pressing against your thigh and you terribly craved a sip from it, but you didn’t want it to crinkle and pop.

Moo’s long fingers were pulling at threads on the armchair as he stepped back into his voice, a calmer shade of blue. “Vern, shit was different then, y’know? We were so much more structured with Dotsy. We had more distributors selling. More people to move product. I mean, yeah, shit was tough when we had to compete with Jeonghan. But we never fell off the rails, right?” He paused, lips rubbing together, contemplating. “Nothing’s been the same since he died. We don’t have the horsepower. Not like we did.”

Vernon sighed. He leaned over, the heels of his palms rubbing into his eyes, and you wanted to stroke his back, but sometimes Vernon’s emotions were thorny and he needed to feel everything first, as it came through him in slices. You wondered if he knew that Jeonghan had submitted that leaf for Dots at Sherwood. Perhaps that was why he seemed to believe so much that Jeonghan might yield. You touched the edge of your face and felt a sticky moisture.

“Then it’s a respect thing,” Vernon suddenly barked. “It’s a fuckin’ respect thing that he gives those territories back. He wouldn’t have them without Dots. He wouldn’t have half the shit he has without Dots.”

You saw Moo frown and your heart ached. “What’s the point—"

“I’m sick of him bein’ gone, and everyone fuckin’ mopin’ around, actin’ like they can’t do shit anymore!” Vernon crackled with electric emotions, his language stabs of thunderbolts. “We can be what we were, how the fuck do you guys not see that? We’re just complacent now, y’know? It’s like we don’t give a fuck. All the hard work. All the sweat and blood.” He collapsed back into the sofa, spreading out his legs and turning up his palms, two roughed surfaces calloused over with hard grit. “It’s just… I don’t wanna be that. I don’t wanna go back to havin’ fuckin’ nothin’ at all…”

And you tensed, realizing that you were hearing a part of him that you had never heard before. The fear of having nothing. Believing he was nothing. Just a spot rubbed away until there was only glaring bareness, falling back into a bubbling pit of black that would swallow him. You saw into him a little more. He was scared.

You thought that was impossible.

Sighing out tenderly through your nose, you reached for his hand, slotting your fingers in between his. “You won’t have nothing.”

He smiled at you, but it was somewhat empty and crestfallen, in a way that might communicate—you don’t understand, you never will, but I do get what you’re saying—and he leaned forward to sweetly kiss your cheek.

Moo sniffled, his bare knees tapping together, the hollow thudding of bone echoing around the room. “What do you think Danny?” He asked.

It was strange to hear. They always used nicknames. Sometimes you forgot they had actual names, actual lives beyond your dwindled snapshots into the brunt of their suspect business. Snozz, Danny, Daniel—he didn’t speak for a moment—looking out the smudged glass door, until he deeply sighed, “let’s just wait and see what happens with this meeting. If it happens.” Then he smacked the shoddy conditioning unit.

It spluttered, squeaked, rattled to life, and you almost threw yourself at his feet in prostration. He walked out the room, leaving behind the mild scent of smoke, his eyes skimming yours lithely, and disappeared.

“Well, that’s freakin’ that,” Moo mumbled. You all sat in silence for a few seconds, staring blankly. “Time for worms!” Moo suddenly shouted, scrambling into the kitchen, pulling open the fridge. “Don’t vanish yet, Snoodles! We can fish!”

Vernon rolled his eyes. “He hates fishing.”

“But he’s good at untangling lines and hooking worms!”

With the living room emptied out, you looked to Vernon. “I know it’s difficult. But you really won’t have nothing,” you murmured, admiring the perfect ferns of his eyelashes, dark and earthy. “I must count for something, right?”

“You count for everything,” he answered, pecking your mouth.

Later in the day, when it was a bit cooler, everyone gradually moved outside. You hadn’t realized it the first time you came by Moo’s house, but he lived on a rather sizeable lake, and his backyard had a dock that stuck out onto the water as well as a firepit surrounded by frayed and faded-looking lawn chairs. Trees beaming with all their full, healthy leaves swayed above your head as you sat upon a beach towel laid out in the uncut grass.

A few other people came to the house, seeming friendly. You were nervous, but the lapping feeling subsided when you realized that at least none of them were Kitty.

There was one girl you spoke to more than the others.

She was Moo’s younger sister, around your age, and she came outside in an orange bikini top decorated by hot pink flowers, wearing jean shorts similar to yours. Her hair was woven back in neat, thin cornrows that coiled down the back of her neck. She smelled like sweet sunscreen. She had stopped by your beach towel.

“I’ve never seen you here before.”

“Oh, I’m new, I guess.”

“A friend? Sibling?”

Your face held onto the heat tightly as you said, “Vernon’s girlfriend.”

Her eyes had widened, and you saw the surrounding leaves of the property's elms and maples reflected in their creaseless brown. “That Vernon?” She gawked, pointing her finger toward the dock, where Moo and Vernon were fooling around with the fishing rods. “I hope my surprise doesn’t offend you! That’s great.”

You had nodded back. “It’s okay. I get that reaction a lot.”

Jade, that was her name. She was pleasant to speak with, and she was surprisingly open about her experiences with the other boys. You didn’t want to interrupt her as she rambled, occasionally pulling at a piece of her dark, coiled hair or grabbing onto her small hand to inspect her plain but well-groomed nails. She told you about getting rides home from Dots. About the time she was yanked into an upstairs closet at their old group house and told to stay put, hearing a few terrifying pops from a gun while she hid. She talked to you about school—a more relatable topic—and you saw some pieces that were reminiscent of Diana in her.

“I didn’t really get along with Vernon initially,” she explained. “I don’t know. He didn’t have much interest in speaking to me. He kinda scared me.”

And you laughed, tossing your head back. “Tell me about it.”

“Auggie is a good brother. He always makes me laugh. And he tries really hard to keep me uninvolved in his stuff. So, y’know, I don’t get hurt. But it’s hard. I don’t always understand it. I want to protect him, too. So it gets frustrating.”

God—you had nearly shaken her hand—“I know right!”

She asked if you wanted to swim with her. But you didn’t have the right clothes, so she nodded and got ready to excuse herself from the corner of your Clifford: The Big Red Dog towel that Moo had tossed you earlier. While she was dusting herself off, Snozz came outside, smiled at her with closed, curled lips as he wandered down flat stones to the dock, the breeze fluffing through his overgrown locks. She watched him for a moment, then looked back to you, her eyes a bit weighted, cloudy, as she whispered, “we used to date. Not anymore. Auggie didn’t like it. But Danny’s so sweet. Honestly, they all are. But there's a lot of stuff there that hurts.”

And then she started running toward the bank. You watched her jump onto her brother’s shoulders, and he swung her around playfully, threatening to dip her in the water cold against the dock.

Naturally, your gaze floated in Vernon’s direction, bent down over a fishing rod laid out on wood, his hands clasped around a black-spotted pike that he managed to unhook and sink gently back into the dark, glittering blue.

“But there's a lot of stuff there that hurts.” You heard Jade in your ear, and your insides stirred with dread that you might lose him.

Vernon might be too much for you, after all.

But you hated to think about it. Hated it like a raw blister.

Inside Mr. York’s kitchen, you, Tara, and Lara were standing around a bare counter space beside two oil vats, picking away at a square tin of sweet potato fries that Costello had hidden in one of the sleek convection ovens. The restaurant was officially closed for the night, the kitchen sanitized, wiped down, mopped, and everything glinted in starry silver.

He had always been a kinder cook, often hiding food for the waitstaff to eat, especially for Lara, whom he had a silly little crush on. But she was on a strict no-dating policy, citing things like: I need to work on myself, I should get back into dance, relationships are so distracting, I know how to please myself better than anyone, I’ve been neglecting a lot, while she came into work with the same patented scowl and sloppy attitude completely untouched. You wouldn’t recognize her otherwise. There were bumpy nicks still visible through her thin eyebrow, the discolouration hidden by makeup. She said it kept getting her attention from masculinely dressed woman with windswept-looking hair and Tara was snickering, grinning.

“Oh! Oh! Guys!” Tara yelped. “Guess what just opened?”

Lara dipped a golden, crispy fry into a tiny plastic cup of garlic sauce. “Your brain?” she muttered, sticking the fry into her mouth.

“Ugh—no—shut up.”

You raised an eyebrow. “That new nail place? On Fifth?”

“No,” Tara said, “but that would be amazing, too. Catherine Love’s assistant position is finally open! They started accepting applications this morning. I’m totally sending mine in the second I get home.”

“Wow, awesome,” you acknowledged.

“I know! It is awesome. It’s the definition of awesome.”

Continuing to nod, you pushed over a floppier fry for a dark, flaky one hiding underneath. Its sweetness squished delectably between your teeth. You had helped Tara practice her interviewing skills so much that you betted you could recite almost all her answers just from memory alone. She was more polished than a pearl.

“Maybe I’ll apply, too,” Lara mumbled around a thick, salted fry.

And you laughed. “Me three.”

Tara licked her lips, removing some orange crumbs. “You guys can apply all you want,” she invited confidently. “But I was born to do this.”

Lara grunted. “You were born to be someone’s assistant?”

“Not just someone! She’s an icon.”

“I’ve been looking through her website,” you admitted, deciding to try the garlic sauce that Lara was hogging. “And her exhibits are really gorgeous. I don’t know, but they feel super light. She seems to enjoy art that feels like sunshine on your skin, or a breeze in your hair. Does that make any sense?” The aromatic flavour of the garlic melted buttery on your tongue.

“Can I use that line?” Tara suddenly queried.

You sipped some water from a mason jar. “Uh, sure?” There was a thrumming vibration against your back pocket, so you pulled out your phone to read a text message from Vernon. Quickly gulping the rest of the mild tap water, you swirled out the jar into the large, deep sink. “Okay, chatty time is over for me,” you announced. “Vernon’s here. I’m gonna grab my stuff.”

“Ou la la,” Tara trilled. “Your Dark Knight.”

“To take you away on his impressive, black stallion,” Lara goaded.

After throwing the cinnamon bag over your shoulder, you made sure to poke your head back into the kitchen to blow a raspberry at them, still picking their way through the orange fries. “Goodnight, losers.”

As usual, Vernon was leaned against the edge of his car, so casual, wrapped in the humid gauze of a late summer night. He smiled when he saw you trotting up—still dressed in your work clothes—a hand raking through his dust-black hair while his eyes immediately warmed. Before he could speak, your hands had settled politely on his shoulders, massaging the breezy fabric of his white t-shirt splattered with a band logo. You kissed him, short and sweet, tasting a lingering mintiness from the gum he kept in his driver’s console.

“Hello, there,” you crooned. “How was that for timing, hm?”

He fingered a loose, bulbed button on your shirt, and the way his gaze travelled your body was a delicious longing. “Can’t complain.”

Once you were both settled inside the car, he asked about work.

You shrugged. “Fine. Not a drag. We were eating fries…” and you contemplated whether or not to bring up Catherine Love. Upon cranking the window down slightly, a city breeze flittered in, touching along your temples and baby hairs. “Do you think it would be weird if I applied for something I’m completely unqualified for and have no chance of attaining?”

Vernon’s eyes skipped to yours in the rear-view mirror. “People do shit like that all the time. They were gonna make Moo a project manager for a hotel construction rig. Don’t think he even knows how to use a drill.” He glanced at you for a moment, red light flushing in. “What’ch’ya thinkin’?”

Teeth scraped the inside of your cheek. “It’s stupid.”

“Nah,” Vernon hummed. “What’s the gig, PJ’s?”

“Well, Tara is obsessed with this artist lady. Catherine Love. She sets up exhibits and stuff. Worldwide. Have you seen her stuff before?”

The car smoothly rolled across the intersection. “Uh, dunno.”

You figured he wouldn’t know. “Anyways, it doesn’t matter. But she’s opened up a position to be her assistant. I’ve done some research on the building she works from—it’s Skyline—and it’s totally gorgeous. Right along the coastline. The more Tara gabs about it, and the more I look into everything…” you trailed off, unsure. “Would it hurt to apply?”

Vernon shrugged, leafy shadows tumbling in through the street lamps and running over him in flickers. “Why don’t you just do whatever the hell you want.” He tapped the steering wheel. “Who cares what happens?”

“Yeah, but—what if I get an interview?”

“Then you go do the interview.”

“But I’m unqualified.”

“Not that unqualified if you got an interview.”

“Well, I suppose so, but—”

“Dude, why’d you even ask what I thought if you were just gonna shoot yourself down the entire time?” He laughed. “I can’t control you with puppet strings or whatever the fuck. No one can. Only person who can make you do or not do things is yourself. So just shut up and pick one.”

Typical Vernon advice. Straight to the point.

Shuffling up in the chair, you huffed. More wind fluttered inside and you could feel the cool tendrils slipping through little gaps between the buttons on your fresh-ironed shirt. You talked a little more, asked him if he heard anything from Jeonghan, and he said no.

Your street was quiet. Vernon helped you out from the car.

“Staying over?” You asked.

He shook his head. “Can’t. Business. I’ll be gone for a few days.”

“What?!” You cried. “Why wouldn’t you tell me?”

“It was recent stuff. An order never got dropped off. I’m gonna go investigate with Snozz. Nothin’ too major. It’s happened before.”

But you still got unusually quiet, your stinging eyes scanning the pavement, panging reverberations aching from deep inside your chest. Your different lines of work already separated you enough.

Vernon stepped closer to you. He cupped your soft face, burning over with hot emotions, in his calloused hands. You met his eyes lined in the ivory moonlight and immediately wanted to cry, shifting your hand over his and strumming at his rough knuckles. “I wanted to spend time with you…”

“I know, beautiful,” he murmured, stroking your cheek.

“Why do you have to leave tonight?”

“Need to be there at a certain time.”

You sighed, bit your lip, choked back a stupid whine. “Okay, fine.”

He chuckled. “I have your approval, is that it?”

“You shouldn’t have it, but you do. Unforch.”

And he clicked his teeth, repeated your colloquialism, “unforch,” in a way that mimicked your tone and made you laugh, smile. He suddenly fastened his arms around your waist, his muscles digging into your plump skin, setting you on the edge of the car’s hood. You giggled, shoved at his chest, could hardly breathe, as he smothered you with kisses—some left tingling on your warm lips, others ticklish down your neck—each pouring more and more reassurance inside you until you were slaked.

“Okay, okay!” You fought to articulate through the breathlessness and contagious laughter. “I-I g-get it!” When your head spilt back, and you saw the black quilt of a night sky with stars speckled across it like salt granules, and breathed in the foggy wind, and Vernon’s thick amber, and felt his hands squeeze into the back pockets on your work slacks, his hair brush your bare skin, his lips pulling bruises to the surface of your pulsing neck, you thought you could be someplace next to heaven. As long as he was there.

“You do, huh? You get it?” He purred.

Draping fingers through his hair to make the locks even messier, you nodded. “I guess you’ll miss me. Maybe. Is that it? The point?”

Then he pulled you off the hood. “Okay, smartass. Go to bed.”

As you stumbled onto the sidewalk, his palm thwacked your bum hard, enough to feel a jarring ripple that made you stagger, gasp.

“Hey!”

“Night!” He called, standing by his door.

You waved him off, smiling lopsidedly, limping up to the building despite trying your best not to. You said goodnight, too, but it was crinkled in the middle as your lower bum positively stung with the weight of his hand.

When Vernon called you, it was midday, Saturday. The summer air was weighted with a greasy humidity. Two whirring fans sat on the coffee table, one pointed at Ruby and another angled at you, while you watched a reality competition show. Neither of you really spoke or moved. The heat had made you drowsy. Some guy tumbled off a log dangling in the air, splashed into the flat, cold lake underneath, and you both groaned, jealous.

You picked up the vibrating phone, yawned, “hello?”

“PJ’s? What’chya up to?”

“Um, nothing, really. Watching people fumbling obstacle courses.”

“Well, grab a bag, pack some water. I’m gonna come get you.”

And you sat up from the indent you’d been making in the sofa, feeling the fan’s breeze tickle at your knees. “Huh? Why? What’s the matter?”

The sound of a car door slamming echoed across the line. “Dude, I got a note. Came outside from the store and it was tucked under my windshield wiper. Only got coordinates on it. Nothin’ else. Now, who the fuck do you think that is?”

You swallowed, touched your lips. “What? Really?”

“Really. Pack your shit. I’ll be there in twenty.” The phone beeped as the call collapsed. You glanced over at Ruby, the tanned glow of her olive skin, to see she was already looking back. “I’m going somewhere with Vernon.”

“If you’re going swimming, you have to invite me,” she huffed.

“Uh, I doubt it’s swimming.”

The heat had made her too lethargic to argue and pester. She was fanning herself with a cork coaster as you scrambled around the apartment, stuffing items into a tiny backpack—two bottles of water, a hydration drink, some sunblock, a change of clothes in case you sweated through your first outfit, apartment keys, and a little switchblade that you bought at a street market sale.

Vernon honked the horn when he arrived.

You said goodbye to your roommate and hurried outdoors, feeling the immediate scorch of the afternoon sun prickle you while the moisture made the air muggy. Escaping inside the car, you were relieved to get blasted by icy air conditioning.

“Here,” you offered Vernon a water bottle.

“Oh—fuck—thanks.”

The bottles crinkled as you each took lustily long sips.

“So—” you exhaled, breathless, “—you check the coordinates?”

“Mm. That’s why I know it’s him.”

“Oh. They go where?”

Vernon sighed, puffing out his chest. “Our old group house…” and there was a faint underbelly of sadness staining his words.

You nodded. “Jade told me about it. Briefly.” Your gaze wandered outside, to the woman trotting clumsily down the sidewalk with a newspaper clasped over her head, to the birds flapping their wings together along a shady tree branch. “Are you okay? Going there?”

He shrugged, running his thumb around the loose cap of the water bottle, a gleam on his forehead. “Dunno. It’ll sting. No two ways about it.”

“Yeah… but I’ll be there, if you need me.”

Vernon smiled.

While he drove to the location, you examined the note that he pulled from underneath his wipers. The paper was lined and margined, with hole punches, and a clear tear running down the side. The coordinates were written in dark purple, with the flakiness of a pencil crayon. Very neat handwriting. You wondered if Jeonghan tore the paper from his daughter’s notebook, used one of her crayons, though you couldn’t imagine he was the one to slide it under Vernon’s windshield wiper. He had people watching.

People watching.

And that made you feel mucky, thick fear in your gut.

The drive was longer than you expected. You passed landmarks you had never seen before, travelled across overpasses that revealed jagged neighbourhoods unfamiliar to your memory. Sometimes the streets were very thin, with the houses in between hardly houses, but scrappy shingles and skeletal structures and tarps that covered windows, doors, and garage openings. Sometimes the streets were wide and sunnily amicable, sprinklers chittering rainbows of spray across lush grass as children tossed beach balls at each other, splashing in their beautiful outdoor pools.

Sometimes there was nothing. Just road and dull, dull land. The liminal stretch that could not be avoided, linking unknowns together.

“We’re almost there,” Vernon said in a heavy, knotted tone.

The car bumped along a gravelly road. Each house was relatively spread apart. Some nicer than others—none well-groomed—but glittering in tiny charms that showed behind smudgy windows and aged patios. You hadn’t realized Vernon was pushing down a driveway until you saw something flicker through the dense trees.

The beginnings of a house.

The car settled. Vernon pulled out his keys. It was quiet.

“So…” you managed to croak. “This is the place?”

He nodded, let his eyes drift loosely. “Once upon a time.”

Your stomach writhed, getting out of the car. It wriggled and crawled and twisted. Swinging the backpack over your shoulder, you followed after Vernon toward the front door. But there was no door, just a bare threshold. Items littered the sprouting, wild grass. Some were mere decomposing lumps of brownish-black-rotting colour that were impossible to identify. Then there were plates, cups, metal rods, bottles, pieces of tile, brass knobs. You saw a broken alarm clock shattered into chunks, and a damn microwave sticking out from the earth at a strange angle, as though it had been thrown from above. When you glanced skyward, you noticed the upstairs windows were broken, embracing the full hail of seasons.

Suddenly, Vernon clutched your hand. “There’s glass,” he warned, nudging you to look at a splatter of hard edges close to your foot.

The humidity followed you inside. Dewiness and tangy, sour odours were hanging everywhere, cloaking you, and you wondered what kind of fever had soaked through the house, sucking things in and then spitting them out in pieces. Everything was positively ransacked.

It was total upturn.

Vernon was quiet, with a buried expression. He glanced into the kitchen but wouldn’t enter, his hand pressing into the peeling, graffitied wall.

You stood back and read the black letters.

G3M1N1 WAZ H3R3

TE EXTRAÑAMOS

More graffiti dried dripping in the rummaged living room.

761-8223 4 CANDY

COME HOME

EL TIMADOR DID IT

Emotions lingered. Certain spaces you walked past, and you could sense the immediate, blustery howl. The emotions were never going to leave. Even without people, the house was still full.

Vernon came up beside you. Together, you stood at the base of a staircase that extended toward a dark rectangle. Something was up there. It held the strongest emotion. Prowling in the decay and moldy blackness.

You swallowed. Hated to breathe the air. “Up there, right?”

He nodded. “Yeah. Up there.”

When you looked to Vernon, he was not himself. In the dimness and glossy heat, surrounded by fragile memories, he came to mirror a boy as opposed to the rugged, steely man you knew. It was in his blushing cheeks, his uncertain frown, and the vulnerable softness that stirred his eyes like a honey wand. His shoulders were not firm, and his forehead worried.

You touched his back, hoping the sensation was grounding. “I don’t think Jeonghan’s here yet. Should we wait in the car? What do you think?”

Instead, Vernon turned his back to the stairway, sat on one of the sturdier-looking steps, letting his elbows point into his knees. As he mused there in silence, you breathed out the dampness, and decided to gingerly fit beside him after brushing some grit off the step. It wasn’t comfortable at all.

At least not to you.

He clutched onto his hands, wringing them together. “Y’know, it wasn’t me who found him, Dots… it was Moo and Snozz. They went up to his room… saw him in bed with the covers pulled up to his waist. He looked asleep, they said. Nothin’ was weird. But then he just wouldn’t move. And they found the vomit under him. I remember, like, I was at this stupid waitin’ room, sittin’ in there with a bunch of other sweaty, nervous folk. For an interview. A sales position. At a car dealership of all goddamn places. N’ just as I got called into the big ole’ office, my phone started ringin’ off the hook. It was Moo, and he never calls. First thing I hear is ‘he won’t wake up, man—he’s not even breathing—he’s not anything—his heart’s gone’ and I fuckin’ collapsed into this old woman’s lap as she read a magazine about fuckin’ mental health and addiction.”

You watched him bite the nail of his thumb as he laughed, the clogged emotions starchy in his throat. “So I had to go over there, obviously, ditch the whole interview shit,” he sighed. “All three of us were in his room, just, fuckin’ stunned to silence, lookin’ at him in bed, so peaceful. Nothin’ was out of place. But he had the window open. Never. We were never allowed to have windows open or curtains open. It was a whole thing and you’d get slapped silly for ignorin’ it. And, like, the brightest fuckin’ light I had ever seen was comin’ through this damn window while we all stood around his bed, fucked in our heads, couldn’t even cry or talk.

Moo always says it was him comin’ to see us for the last time, spiritual shit like that. But, y’know, I always liked to think it was actually him leavin’, flowin’ away from us. ‘Cause he never should have been there. We knew it was over. We knew once word got out, shit would get hot quick. So we took all our stuff out and flipped the whole fuckin’ house. Ransacked it before anyone else could. I mean, this wasn’t all us. Who knows how many have been here since. But once it was over, we all sat down on the couch together for the last time, knew we’d never be back. That we’d have to accept not bein’ okay with anything, walkin’ around with holes in us, just empty sandbags, y’know? I can’t believe I’m here. It’s just numbness.”

You smiled, appreciating his honesty and openness. Interlocking your fingers through his, you grasped his hand tightly in the humid stairwell of the disembowelled house. “I know you’ll fill up. Drop by drop. Maybe drain a little, too. But that’s balance. I don’t think it ever truly goes away.”

Vernon squeezed your hand in return. “You fill me up well.” And his eyes were brighter, smiling in their own way, pleasant and uncoiling.

“Might I say, that is very, very touching.”

The unsuspecting, velvety voice made you crush together the bones in Vernon’s inked hand. Through the kitchen doorway, you saw Jeonghan, leaned against a dented countertop beside the bare outline of the wall where the fridge once stood. His hair was tied back, though a few loose strands tickled the pale edges of his smirking face. At your side, Vernon stiffened.

“Did you just get here?” You squeaked.

Jeonghan shook his head, and then slid his hands into the pockets of the black slacks he was wearing. “I’ve been here a while. Just wandering the property and that. Sorting through memories. No different than you two.”

Vernon stood up. “You picked a shitty day to do this.”

Upon drifting his way, unburdened, to the doorframe, Jeonghan shook his head. “Your manners are just as refined as I remember them. I think you should speak to the person you desire to negotiate with a bit more wise-mindedly.” Jeonghan flattened out a wrinkle in his glaring white shirt, a breezy button-up of tightly-woven lace, as he continued smiling. “Is that too much to ask, Hansol?”

You saw Vernon’s fingers twitch, his jaw flex.

Jeonghan sighed. “I know this house, too.” His stretched out his arms, clutched the doorway, squeezed the spongey wood in his fingers. “I helped with his body. I took the last look at him. Nothing but skin and bones, by then. Absent was his breath of life.”

And Vernon muttered something particularly guttural to himself that you failed to hear properly. So you let your hand sit on the boy’s shoulder, gave him a squeeze to smooth down his bristles.

“I knew you would bring her,” Jeonghan said, nodding at you. “I am glad to see you again, Clever Girl,” he called you. “I think Hansol must hold you very close to his heart if he’s showing you this place.”

Suddenly, Vernon jerked his head. “Let’s go talk.”

“Where would you like to talk?”

“Basement.”

“Ah, the old locker room. I used to count the money,” he remarked wistfully, letting his fingertip drag along a stain in the wallpaper. “You were never short, Hansol. Never. You were always so efficient.”

He rolled his eyes at Jeonghan, then strummed your arm into his warm fingers. “I think we should talk alone,” Vernon whispered. “I’m sorry, I can’t say how long this might take. He… he’s hard to deal with, always been that way, the cheeky fucker.” You felt something being pressed into your hand, and you noticed it was his bulky car keys attached to the carabiner. “If you need AC.” He kissed your cheek. “I owe you, ‘kay, baby? Thanks for comin’ with.”

“O-Okay,” you stuttered, clutching his keys.

Vernon waved at Jeonghan, and the man proceeded to follow him down the foyer into another room, where they disappeared from sight. You stood there for a moment, unsure, until you decided that the house was speaking too many things and you needed to be outside. But then you wondered where Jeonghan even came from. Upon walking into the kitchen, you noticed another doorway lacking a door. It led to a small porch, the wood stripped of its colour, a circular glass table tipped over and shattered.

Was anything in this house unwounded?

You slipped his keys into a pocket on your backpack.

The sun and heat were still singeing. Your feet moved carefully through the long blades of grass and matted weeds, finding a lighter, a spoon with a burnt underside, some tattered fabrics dried into lumps, and a molted book whose pages thunked lifelessly to the ground when you picked up the sleeveless hardcover. As you crouched down, pulled apart dried, wrinkly papers with faded script, one page was immediately yanked from your hand by a sudden breeze, bouncing and swirling back toward the porch. You stood up, turned around, noticed something astonishing.

A large mural painted to the back of the house, with heavy colours coated meticulously over the peeling boards, demonstrating prayer hands clasping a beaded, dangling rosary. The detail was bright and nimbus. Black font was sprayed under the shadow of the roofing, in a different language.

DIOS TE HA LIBERADO

VERNON.

His world started tilting the minute he got there and it wasn’t going to stop. The dizziness, the heat, the flashes of memories—voices, smells, laughter, and pain—all overwhelming him, like his head was dunked and held underwater. Right when he thought he might catch a breath, Jeonghan was there, with that tricky light in his eyes undimmed, pawing at Vernon’s raw hurt.

They hadn’t grown on each other immediately.

Jeonghan was older. He made rules and then broke them but no one else was allowed the same leisure. He rung aside stiffened curtains and busted open kitchen doors to the smell of burnt plastic and shifted through the downstairs deposits whenever he wanted.

He pickpocketed in elevators, subways, malls, cafés, movie theatres, markets, house parties—even in the line-up for the ATM—with his silkened fingers. He was also a slight lunatic. He reared his first car, a black corvette, into his old dealer’s Corolla for duping him with sugared-down coke, which sent the Corolla rolling into a boggy riverbank. He pulled out Basil’s tooth with pilers and kept it in one of those velvet charm pouches for bracelets after he caught him stealing from the depository.

He said he learned a magic trick and then proceeded to cough up an elusive, small key sticky in his saliva.

No, Jeonghan was fucking insane.

And after a while Vernon had no choice but to like him.

Jeonghan was gunpowder. He turned everyone into his sparks.

“I love you! I fucking love you Hansol Chwe!” He had started weeping uncontrollably into Vernon’s shoulder one night. “You understand me! You’re just like me! You don’t give a fucking fuck.” Then he took the can of compressed nitrous oxide and let the thin nozzle shoot a flushed stream up his nostril, and Vernon saw the glaze suffuse across Jeonghan’s eyes like a heated knife spreading butter.

He stared up into the starry night sky, his mouth hanging open in bliss. “Try it, try it! Holy fuck! Try it, Chwe! I’m fucking tingling everywhere. I’m floating!”

The next morning, with his head splintering into aching, stabbing pieces, teenage Vernon heard Dots yelling at Jeonghan from downstairs. He had never heard Dots yell.

“What the fuck is wrong with you?! You’re too wild sometimes, Jeonghan! He’s a fucking teenager. He shouldn’t be snorting fucking compressed air! Your faces are full of bruises! Were you punching the shit out of each other?”

It had trickled back to him slowly. Jeonghan leaning close, nothing in his eyes but twitching, sporadic blackness, entreating Vernon to punch him as hard as he could. So he did it. Right in the lip. The older boy knocked him back, bruising his jaw. And then they were grappling around in the soft beds of thick field grass, choking with laughter, with hoarse screams, with euphoria, as they punched and kicked and scratched and tore, midnight milky and clear overhead.

“Look, I fucking love Chwe. But you can’t save him, Paulo. You should fucking save yourself. He doesn’t want anything else. You can get out but he’ll still be here.”

Vernon looked around the basement. The windows were intact, placed high up the wall to be level with the overgrown grass consuming the outside. Although the light was sparse, it was adequate enough to see, and he observed in utmost intensity through the glowing green haze as Jeonghan grinned at the gaping hole busted into the concrete wall. The lockers were gone; had been for a while. Some people kept theirs. Others were destroyed.

“Do you still remember your number?” Jeonghan asked.

“Yeah.”

“I remember everyone’s. Snozz, Moo, Basil, Yo-Yo, Casper, 8-Ball, Tech, Froggy, Peppermint… when Peppermint kltch—” Jeonghan drew a line across his throat, “—and we had to replace him with Lipsy and we all hated Lipsy because he used to resell Snozz’s Provigil.” He sighed, hands bulging in his pants pockets. “And I remember yours, too.”

“Of all the places to fuckin’ meet, Jeonghan. Why this place?”

“I missed it.”

“You probably live in a fuckin’ castle by now. Hidden behind a waterfall or some majestic shit. Like hell you miss this place. Probably one of your fuckin’ weird mind games. Can’t ever do anything normal.”

“And you can? People look at you and they think a million things. I bet not one of those things is that you’re normal. But you know that. Who wants to be normal, anyway? Who doesn’t want to have a story that makes everyone stop and listen? You’re a walking storybook, Hansol. Everyone who lived in this house is or was a storybook. This house itself is a book.”

“Whatever, man.”

“I like to reread old books. That’s why I came here.”

“Are you gonna give me the territories back or not?”

“I don’t like that question. It’s very demanding. I always wonder how could you have spent so much time with Paulo and not adopt one ounce of his manners. No P’s and Q’s. You’re a man now, Hansol.”

“Oh, I have fuckin’ manners. Just not for you.”

“You know, what I did was not personal.”

“I really don’t care.”

“Then why are you so… angry? Impatient?”

“Maybe ‘cause you brought me to the fuckin’ house my friend died in on a hot-ass fuckin’ day after blue-ballin’ me for two weeks?”

 “That is your surface. But it’s not your insides.”

“What? You become a shrink?”

“No. But I know you Hansol. I know the ribs and the meat of your story. I know anger doesn’t come that easily to you unless it’s something very, very deep. You can be dismissive and cruel but not angry. The way I wanted to run things was different from Paulo. He held onto all of you too closely. He couldn’t get stern with you. He protected all your feelings.”

“S’not true. He just didn’t wanna pull out our fuckin’ teeth with pliers when we did somethin’ stupid, or burn off our fingerprints.”

“Basil never stole again, did he?”

“I don’t care what Basil did.”

“But when Moo lost Hylands? Mr. Shafaee? Prerogative?”

“So? Who gives a fuck! You just shuffle the cards!”

“He shouldn’t have any teeth at all.”

“Fuck off. Auggie doesn’t need this shit, anyway.”

“The only thing I’m pointing out is that while Dots did think strategically, he never put his foot all the way down. He couldn’t. He wouldn’t. And I didn’t agree. And now I have Hylands. Mr. Shaefaee exclusively tunnels our LSD, and I’ve got Prerogative in between my teeth, like a toothpick, Hansol. I’m not giving you anything. I’m done owing you.”

“Y’know what? Fuck you.”

“Once all this anger is out, maybe you could consider coming to work for me. I know what you’re capable of. I find impressiveness in you, things that no one else will, because—well—you’re a criminal.”

“You never gave a fuck about Dots. You twisted him up.”

“That is a whole other can of worms, Hansol. Don’t open it.”

“He did all the heavy-liftin’ for your sorry ass. Then you fuckin’ stabbed him in the back and took it all out from under him. You’re so damn corrupt. You owe us those fuckin’ territories, you ungrateful freak. I bet he would still be here, y’know? If you didn’t fuckin’ gut him like a fish.”

“Hansol, you don’t know anything about the conversation—”

“Don’t fuckin’ call me that! Vernon! Vernon! Not fuckin’ Hansol!”

“Well… Vernon… you weren’t there for our conversation.”

“You killed him.”

“Vernon—”

“You crushed him! And you took away the only fuckin’ person who actually fuckin’ cared about me! You just crushed him up and stole him from us like he was one of your bullshit drugs! He was the only person who thought I could do somethin’ other than this and then you pushed everything down and you fuckin’ ruined everybody’s life in this house!”

“Vernon, I never asked to leave.”

“You didn’t need to.”

“No. Paulo. He asked me to go. He didn’t want me there.”

“Bullshit.”

“He did, Hans—Vernon. I knew the ways we did things were different, but that didn’t mean I wanted to leave. I felt the same community you did. I know I’m fucking strange and a mess and I know I did things that were unfair but I was a free spirit, you see? When we were sucking air up our noses and punching each other to pieces, I never wanted it to end. You remember that night. How we had to hold each other. All the blood we leaked over that gas station sink. Then we ate those hot dogs, spilling mustard and ketchup and relish all over our shirts, before we started feeling the pain in our mouths and we swore we were angels. You knocked out three of my teeth and I had them filled with gold caps. I busted the eyebrow you wanted to get your piercing in so you had to pierce the other.

I still think about that night. But Paulo was furious. I didn’t understand how he could be so ginger and protective of you, but then I was getting reamed by the boy I fucking saved from another halfway house and tarps under bridges and picking scraps out of dumpsters. But it was because he was getting you steady. He was giving you responsibility and confidence and trust and all the fancy little dressings that parents are supposed to do, except you never got that. And I was bulldozing through his work. It got too much. I was too much. I had no place there anymore. I told him if I left, everything between us would change, and he said it already had.

You see, I saved him, but I never saved myself. And then the same thing happened to Paulo. He tried to save you. Get you steady. But then he’s a corpse lying beneath his own vomit in the upstairs bedroom of a trap house. So I ask this of you Chwe: if you see yourself staying in this scummy little world we have for ourselves, then you are still my competitor, and I cannot simply hand you anything. But if you want to leave, get away from all this, then I can help you. I will help get you out for Paulo’s sake. I will wire you money earned from your old territories. Not just some little lump. It’ll give you quite the boost. And you can cut it up with Auggie and Danny. But I understand if you don’t want the charity. That’s as far as I’m willing to go, alright? It’s a hefty choice. So think on it. Think about you.”

You returned to sitting on the stairs. It was too hot to stay outside, directly under the sun. The knapsack was creating a line of dampness down your back so you removed it, now flipping through Vernon’s stacked carabiner to keep yourself entertained. You only recognized two: one for his car and the other for his bachelor. There was a tiny silver key with an engrained number, 623, looking a bit scuffed, worn, as your thumb brushed across it.

Maybe for unlocking a suitcase. You weren’t sure.

From around the corner, there was a shuttering sound, and Vernon was suddenly striding up to you with a very blank expression.

“C’mon.” He gestured, limply raising his hand. “Let’s go. I’m gonna fuckin’ melt.”

“Okay—” you stood back up, flung the bag on, “—how did it go?”

“Tell you later.”

“Did you get to see the mural? It’s painted against the house.”

“No. Let’s go, okay?”

There was no room for patience in his stone-flat tone. You assumed the conversation hadn’t gone the way he wanted it to. As you followed him toward the empty front door, studying the rigidness in his sharp shoulders, you heard calm, sweeping footsteps from behind you. Jeonghan.

He placed his hand against the wall, missing chunks of plaster and running in dried paint. A wave. “Goodbye Clever Girl, Vernon.”

You didn’t say anything back, and Vernon certainly didn’t, either. It wasn’t that you didn’t want to. But in that moment, as Jeonghan’s palm embraced the fragile wall and his smile touched both sides of his cheeks, left in the house’s dust, rot, and sadness, he looked so perfectly at home. As though he weren’t standing in a boneyard.

You couldn’t say anything.

It was sticky inside the car. You opened the pink hydration drink and took several sips, huffing to Vernon if he wanted any, but he shook his head. The drive back to his apartment was long and silent. Cool air revving through the filters gradually stifled the heat. You unpeeled your bare thighs from the leather seat. Let the air hit them.

Closed your eyes and breathed.

When they opened again, you were rolling into the parking lot behind his building. Vernon didn’t shut the car off, the vibrations continuing to gently shake the vehicle. “Go inside, alright?” He slipped the appropriate key off the carabiner and handed it to you. “I’m gonna hang back a few minutes.”

You knew he wanted space, so you didn’t question him, instead accepting the key wordlessly and pulling up the knapsack from its hiding place at your feet.

“My clothes are full of sweat. Is it okay if I shower?”

“Do whatever the hell you want, PJ’s,” he sighed.

Vernon had the same white box as Moo sticking out his window, with a few brown dials and buttons that you squinted between. You couldn’t imagine him caring that much about the heat in his apartment considering how little time he spent there, and you wondered if he pulled this out from some cobwebby closet just for your comfort. After turning the unit on, you entered his washroom, plopping the knapsack down on the closed toilet lid before craning your neck over your shoulder, examining the rivulet of sweat travelling down the back of your old t-shirt.

You immediately peeled the fabric off, twisted the tight knobs in the shower, let the water spray.

Oh, to be a fly on the wall for that conversation, you couldn’t stop thinking, fingers brushing at your arms and tangling through your sopping hair. What kind of things had they discussed? What had made Vernon so crusted and folded-in? You were worried, but he never liked the suffocation.

Turning around, you let the cool water thrum like trenchant needles against your face, eyes squeezed shut and lips tucked in, sinking fully into the sensation of liquid rinsing the sun’s sweaty film away. Your fingers slid everywhere, swirling and rubbing, until the water began turning colder and colder and you knew it was time to get out. Fuck—you stood there, dripping all over the tiles—without a towel. When you cracked the washroom door open no more than a tentative sliver, about to shout Vernon’s name and pray he had finally come inside, you noticed a towel hung from the doorknob.

You quickly tugged it inside to pat yourself dry, then searched through the knapsack for a palm-sized tube of white lotion with a pleasant lactonic smell. Dressed in a fresh tank-top and airy shorts, you then flung the moistured towel over the shower bar and quietly padded out into the living room, where you found Vernon slumped deeply into the swallowing futon, arms crossed and legs spread desultorily. You stood behind him, eased your fingers into his knotted shoulders and squeezed. “How are you feeling?”

“He made it impossible for me,” Vernon hummed, tired. “I’m supposed to choose. ‘Course it’s a fuckin’ choice. It’s always a choice.”

“How do you mean?” Coming to sit across from him on the coffee table, you let him see the softness in your eyes. “What’s the choice?”

But he didn’t speak again. His gaze was an absent line drifting toward the windows and the grey industrial spots of city. It was taking everything inside you not to press him like he was dough underneath your kneading palms, and every beat of your heart was heavy. Please, you wanted to entreat, please tell me, let me in, let me help you, let me understand. What kind of choice? It felt scary. But you sat there quietly as the air conditioning purred, scraping at the underside of the coffee table, knowing that Vernon’s words always came to him and that he was so uniquely eloquent when it mattered.

You sighed, “can I help you right now? At all?”

His eyes flickered to you, and there was a sudden opening in their cloudiness to the true copper beneath. Then his lips twitched, gentle, leaning into a smile with dizzying prettiness.

“C’mere,” he rumbled, gesturing for you.

So you straddled his lap, sunk down, hands massaging his shoulders to realize their usual looseness. You missed his body so badly. You missed tracing his corded veins and letting your fingers glide along his sharp jaw and feeling the bulb of metal in his lip dig at your mouth. You missed touching his sooty hair, squeezing your arms around his elbow, nuzzling into his black tattoos, intoxicating yourself with his smell. Smoke and amber. He had been so distracted and you had been distracted with his distractedness.

His hands smoothed to your waist, gripped you hard.

You shivered.

And then he pulled your face in close to his. “You know I need you, baby,” he whispered, and every word tingled on your lips like a hundred blended spices. He kissed you, nudging his warm, soft mouth against yours. The heat was still there. Once lingering, now unfurling, as you pushed back, falling into the slippery lulls of tongue, teeth, breath, and rhythm. His hands scooped underneath your bum. You were wrapped around him in threads as he carried you over to his untouched bed, threw you down such that you bounced against the sheets tinged in old detergent.

“That wasn’t nice!” You pouted.

“Whoever said I was nice, Miss?” He replied, proceeding to crawl toward you like a sleek panther, his muscles lean and rolling. There were pulses in your abdomen upon watching and feeling him rub his lips against your ankle, up your shin to your knee, the dampness of a silk tongue licking slowly along your thigh as your hands shaped into fists and you forgot how to act human. He sat back, bracketing your waist. “Look a little fuzzy, don’t you?”

“Shut up,” you mewled, beginning to open your chest with air and pull the sheets into your nervous fingers. “What the heck was that?”

Vernon leaned over you, imposing, obstructing the sunny light with the edges of his body, his favourite gold chain dangling down, feathering in cold strokes along your collarbone the closer he hovered. “You don’t like when I taste you?” He was practically humming the sensual words into your hovering lips. Then the boy gripped your boiling face, pushed his thumbs into your mouth where they pressed against your ribbed teeth. “Taste yourself from me,” he whispered throatily, replacing his thumbs with his tongue, and your chest bloomed up, rubbing against his, as you welcomed the sudden slipperiness that filled your mouth. 

You were jelly. Liquid. Holding form on the bed. His hair was wrapped in between your fingers, and then your arms were hanging around his neck. Anything to keep his mouth on yours, his tongue thickly coating your tongue, tweaking cords in your body like a trained musician. You noticed his palm drifting, and then it engulfed your right breast over the tank-top, no sort of bra to blur the intimate, squeezing feeling. Suddenly, you were back in Kitty’s pale bedroom as the night turned everything deep blue, with Vernon licking your neck and rubbing circles to your nipples.

But this was different.

You needed more. It was terrifying, unfamiliar, but if you were going to make this moment with anyone then you would only allow him.

“Vernon,” came the shaky whisper as his clever tongue receded. He leaned back, allowing you to sit up, your eyes tracing the room.

“You okay?” Vernon asked, brushing some saliva off your chin, the edge of your flushed lips. “Wanna stop? It’s fine with me, yeah?”

If you spoke, it would break everything you built up. Taking in a long breath, you suddenly pinched your eyes shut and gripped the hem of the thin tank-top, beginning to peel it, inch after inch of skin exposing, burning, thrumming, but you kept going until the top was off your body and now a fabric lump discarded to the side. You were tingling, couldn’t open your eyes because what if Vernon was scowling or angry or disappointed or regretting everything—“I’m sorry,” you panicked, reaching for your top, trying to unfold it as your hands shook. “I screwed this up. I’m sorry.”

But then you blinked, and the shirt was fucking gone.

Vernon had thrown it away, somewhere unknown.

Fingers clasped your bare shoulders and you were being pressed back into the bed, the pillow plumping around your head. You tried to find the air. Instead, Vernon’s lips, your cheeks in his hands, a kiss that drew stars to the slates of your eyelids like chalk to a blackboard. He let you breathe while his kisses sunk lower. Something stupid and probably incoherent was on the tip of your tongue, but then you felt his mouth—that fucking delinquent mouth—drape itself onto one of your bare breasts and you hollered. The feeling was completely wet and smooth and comfortingly warm. Suction. As he squeezed his lips and slurped your nipple deep into his feverish mouth, you grasped at his hair like long grass sprigs. “Vernon! Oh my g-god!”

His hand curled around your other breast, kneaded it, then let your swollen nipple slip out from his mouth, dressed in silver threads of connecting, sordid spit. He sat back, gripped each breast, let his fingers dig as harshly as they needed while you squirmed and keened under him. “I waited so goddamn long to see these perfect tits of yours,” Vernon growled. “So don’t you dare fuckin’ tease me, you insufferable fuckin' girl.” He leaned down toward the breast untainted with his saliva. Your mind faded, surging between white vignettes and startling consciousness. Vernon pursed spit from his mouth, watched with leery eyes as it fell to your pert nipple, unable to contain himself from suddenly flicking and laving his tongue.

You squealed again, wrangled at his hair, panted. “I-I just, I didn’t think you would—I thoughttt—” he let his teeth run over your erect nipple, and a spike of sensitivity melted throughout your abdomen like warmed honey. “I always thought you wouldn’t like me.”

Your breasts remained secured and massaged underneath his calloused hands. Another hot kiss smudged your mouth, the feeling of fresh embers. “I would fuckin’ kill someone with my bare hands for you, lovely girl. What the fuck do you mean? You’re so beautiful.” He nudged you with a second kiss, reassurance and light. “N’ your tits fit so fuckin’ perfectly in my hands, baby. So, so soft in my mouth.”

“Don’t,” you giggled, losing your breath.

Your wet nipple was slipped between his fingers and suddenly there was a careful, sweet pinch that made your entire body delightfully careen.

“Hm? Don’t what?” Vernon murmured into your ear, the tune of his husky voice causing you to shiver, grasp onto him. “Don’t like when I play with your gorgeous tits, baby?” He pinched again, a little harder, and it stung. “Then what should I play with? Hm?” The ceiling began to swirl and wobble like a still pool of water after a rock breaks its surface. The tender backs of his fingers swept down your ribs, your tummy, reaching the drawstring on your cloth shorts. “Any suggestions?” And then his hand started to sink, slowly, sliding between your legs. But Vernon stopped for a moment to look into your eyes, which you could only imagine were embarrassingly glazed in pleasure. “What do you think?” He smiled, and it alighted your heart. “You don’t have to let me, okay? You can stop me. Yeah?”

This is real, you thought, your chest drilling, I can ask him to touch me, I can really fucking ask him to touch me. It’s not like that time. I trust him. So you swallowed, nodded, speaking in a runny, scared whisper. “I want to.”

He nodded back. “You want to, baby?”

“Yes. Please.”

“Okay. Fuck. C’mere then.”

Vernon sat against the wall, gestured for you to come between his legs. You crawled over, timid, thrilled, afraid, eager, and proceeded to get comfortable leaning back into his chest. He stiffened a little. You were right against his erection. Gosh—don’t think about that—don’t think about how big he is and how he might feel and how much he’s going to stretch you apart.

The way his hands moved were delicate, pulling apart the drawstring on your shorts, getting the hem nice and loose. He rubbed up and down the sensitive, shivering insides of your thighs, the grit on his fingertips threatening to make you a puddle. All those little imperfections you thought would disappoint him, turn him away from you—thick downy hairs and razor bumps and translucent creases in your skin—he didn’t seem to give a fuck about.

He nuzzled your ear. “You touch yourself?”

“What?”

Then he laughed, and it rumbled against your back. “With your fingers. Inside. Just so I know what you’re used to. That’s all.”

“Oh… um…” you didn’t want to answer, so you sat coyly for a minute, fishing the sheets into your hands, thinking. “Sometimes… I mean, only a few times with my fingers. If that means anything to you.”

Vernon nodded. “M’kay, that’s fine.” His inked arms suddenly wove around your waist, his muscles tightening and pressing into you. “I just wanna make sure you’re comfortable, PJ’s,” he murmured.

“I am,” you smiled. “A little nervous.”

“That’s normal. I don’t fault you. Just breathe. You don’t gotta worry much. I’ll make you feel really good. Really fuckin’ good. Okay?” He placed a lingering, soft kiss to the pounding vein in your neck.

Rolling out your shoulders, you went limp as best you could, letting your boyfriend take control. The sunlight outside was dimming. Clouds were pouring in. Large, fuzzy, dark clouds, like smeared ashes in the sky. Vernon was gentle with every movement, his large hand sliding underneath your shorts, dipping down over your pastel underwear. You fisted the cool bedsheets. Let him rub you with the rough flat of his textured palm. Bit your lip because you hadn’t realized how damn slippery and sensitive and aroused you were. The heat from his skin was a pressure. It made your head tingle.

“How’s that, princess?” Vernon murmured. “Feel alright?”

You didn’t want to speak. Just feel. Soak. Instead, you nodded.

Then his fingers started to prod. They curled and pushed gently, moving up and down the damp blotches on your underwear, figuring you out, getting a grasp for your anatomy without being too abruptly invasive.

His thumb pushed against you in just the right spot and you rolled against him, grabbing onto his knees without thought. Vernon smiled at your ear. “Does that feel good, baby?” He exercised the spot in thick, sweeping circles, drawing and drawing, letting you twitch, wriggle, and buck your hips the more he dug. “That’s your favourite spot, isn’t it?” He continued teasing into your burning ear, his voice rubbing through you, invoking desires you had always kept hidden. “I bet you always touch your clit, don’t you, princess? That feels the best, right? So sensitive.” Then two of his fingers slipped your sticky, uncomfortable panties to the side, softly poked at you, stroked the slimy wetness until it was wrapped between the digits. You turned immediately into his neck and huffed a big, deep breath.

Vernon laughed. “Fuckin’ feels good, yeah?” His fingers slid easily between your folds, made silky with arousal. The cold touch of his silver rings quickly warmed, and he nuzzled around your clit, squeezed a little. “Can feel you gettin’ fuckin’ wetter by the second. Hm? Gonna soak through your shorts, baby?”

You shook your head. Still didn’t want to use your voice.

He nibbled at the cartilage cusp of your ear; his words raspy as they slithered off his tongue. “Don’t wanna talk to me?” His entire hand shifted underneath the panties. A finger rubbed carefully at the slit where you leaked from like a broken faucet while his thumb tended to your overwhelmed clit, pushing, circling. “Afraid you’re gonna moan?” He dipped his finger inside you, shallow, just feeling, and you tensed, breathed hot, frustrated, needy air against his amber-scented neck. You felt his finger sink in a little deeper, closer to the knuckle. Your thighs somehow tilted further apart without you realizing. He was holding your throat, now.

Wouldn’t let your head squirm around as he groaned, “slutty fuckin’ girl, wants my fingers in her desperate, virgin cunt.” Pressure pushed through his warm, gripping hand to your beating throat, and your eyelids fluttered, the world ebbing with haze. Little by little, his index finger slid into your slit with a slight, creeping stretch, past his knuckle, stopping at his ring. You whined against his scarred palm, breathed in ragged, untrimmed pieces that were hot and damp. “You like that, baby girl?” The finger stroked you from the inside, hithering. His thumb pushed back on your clit. “Or is this too much for you? Just my fingers?” Vernon began to submerge in another, and the skin of your slit stung dully. “Jesus Christ. How are you gonna take my dick, then? Hm? I can’t split you in half, can I? Or are you such a brainless, dumb girl that you’ll let me? Huh? You gonna let me ruin your pussy, baby?”

The pressure lifted from your throat. Air surged in as you gasped, moaned, scraped down his hard, carved thighs. “Yes!” You gritted into sharp fragments. “I want you t-to—ff-fuck—it’s gonna c-come. I-I think—“ without a damn clue what you were babbling, you braced for the inevitable ripple, building like a shockwave.

But there was no ripple.

Vernon’s hand was gone from your shorts. A second later, he was pulling you back by the hair, then sliding his slimy fingers coated in your tasteful musk inside your own mouth. You couldn’t help but swallow, losing every thought you ever had, as his digits pushed deeper, making you choke.

“My face,” he breathed hotly against your ear, his voice tight and twisted in need. “You’ll cum on my face like a good fuckin’ girl, hm?” The fingers proceeded to pop out your mouth, but not without thick webs of your glistening spit following, your eyes widening at how erotic it was. “Take your shorts off, your panties,” Vernon ordered while nudging you off him, coming to his feet at the bedside, staring at you with an electrical heat. When you were moving too slowly, fingers too shaky, Vernon grabbed your tattooed shin in blatant impatience and roughly dragged you down the bed toward him.

You yelped, could do nothing but observe in a stupefying sense of shock and arousal as he grasped the shorts and panties in his deft, inked hands, peeled them off you with hunger until they were another lump on the floor alongside your discarded top. There you were, stripped to bareness of which there was nowhere to hide, sweating in his dishevelled bed, soiling his sheets with tangy liquids dripping down your thighs. Vernon’s fingers skimmed up to your knee. He wouldn’t stop staring, and his dark eyes seemed like gaping mouths that were drinking you in complete headiness.

Both your knees were in his hands.

Slowly, he began to spread your bent legs open, and you winced, chewed your lip to bruises, as the unfamiliar sensation of intimate exposure tendered you in its powerful grip. His gaze slipped down. You writhed a bit, looked but then didn’t look, looked again, as Vernon’s fingers brushed down the tops of your tremouring thighs. He pulled you a little more, had your soaking, bare centre gingerly meeting the bulge of his clothed erection.

Your forehead creased. The friction was slight yet delicious.

But he wouldn’t say anything. Vernon studied you wordlessly, perhaps confined in his own overlapping musings, much like you.

Still, you felt that flutter of emerging fear. “V-Vernon? Are—”

He dropped to his knees, and your mouth buttoned shut. Then his soft, nimble lips were dusting the interior of your right thigh with the kind of kisses that left invisible burn marks. Your head dropped into the sheets and his name slipped out in a wispy, quiet moan, meanwhile the room darkened into shadows from the swathing rain clouds collecting outside, in the heat.

 “God…” his breath tickled you. “Look at you, PJ’s…” his hands swept up your thighs, pushing them further apart with care, curiosity, eagerness. “Soakin’ my fuckin’ bed with your pretty cunt.” You felt his thumbs, settling down onto your slickened folds, and then he spread you open right there, right in front of his goddamn face that was and always had been way too beautiful for you to compute or handle.

You squirmed, toes curling in embarrassment because your body was gleefully responding in coursing thrums that turned you swollen, sticky, ready for him. “Gosh.” Your teeth grinded, and you started to laugh. “Why do you have to look so freaking intensely?” In a timid gesture, your legs began to close.

But Vernon peeled them back open in a heartbeat, almost flattening them to the bed, his scary strength never quite evaporating. “Fuck off, PJ’s,” he warned. His thumbs opened you again. “So, so fuckin’ pretty, sweetheart. You're fuckin' gorgeous. Look at how ready you are for me to taste you. To be inside you.”

The sheets dampened in your perspiring hands as Vernon used the pointed, strong tip of his tongue to lick at a glossy trail along the crease of your inner thigh. Suddenly, the spellbound boy nuzzled into you without hesitation, his nose pressed deep against your clit and his mouth opened, tongue dragging at you, letting everything slowly melt. You turned the sheets in circles around your fists, keened at the ceiling. What was that fucking feeling? What was it doing to you? Why was everything slipping away and numbing apart from the hot, oozing sensation of his heavy tongue tasting you? Again and again, his wet tongue swept, his hands unwavering in their grip.

“Oh, baby, you taste so fuckin’ good,” he slurred into your buttery folds, speaking against skin. “M’gonna fuckin’ die in this cunt.” His lips finally secured around your clit that his nose had kept nudging. Immediate suction overwhelmed you. Sloppy, vibrating with his throaty groans. You almost screamed at the feeling, squeezed your thighs around his head, but then worried you might possibly be suffocating him and let them shakily flutter back open. Vernon laughed against you. “Go ahead, beautiful. You can fuckin’ drown me, alright?” He spoke between thorough, flat licks to your needy clit that plastered you in his bubbly spit. “Let me die with your pussy in my mouth, won’t you?” The boy chuckled again, dug his blunt nails into the tissue of your thigh. “Or give me a new pair of your cute panties so I have somethin’ to jack myself off with when you’re not around.”

Your hips jerked up to his pierced mouth. “D-Don’t talk anymore, holy hell,” you gasped, floating between the coherency for proper words and the pleasure from his skilled tongue working your clit. “Y-You shouldn’t be in jail for drugs. It’s—yy-your—d-damn—” you succumbed, forgot everything, when he pressed his mouth firmly against you, let his tongue flick, faster, faster, until he settled into a pace that was solid and consistent, relentless in the stimulation. The pleasure was causing your back to bend off the mattress, dampness flush to the wrinkly sheets below. Glistering thighs gripped around his head, fingers scraping, while his tongue knew nothing but fast, euphoric taps to your clit that made your eyes reel backward.

And then you burst, screaming his name with the volume of splintering wood because you fucking doubted this was the first time his neighbours had heard it and it certainly wouldn’t be the last. In sensitive twitches, you started to relax, unfurl, thighs collapsing wide open. For a brief moment, you were worried about Vernon.

But then he popped up, grinning, chin and lips and nose wet.

“Your mouth,” you finally completed the lost thought circling your buzzing mind. “You should be in jail for your damn mouth…”

“You should come with me,” he breathed laboriously.

“No…” your eyelids were limp, weighted by unseen fingers pulling them down, “never...” However, something slippery started gentle laps that maneuvered your clit and dipped between your folds. You shuddered, wanted to curl up. “Vernon, I can’t.”

“Mmm…” he ignored you, spread you open once more, suckled lazily on your sore clit that still pulsed under his lips. Again, your body jerked, twitched, overrun with fire. “A little longer, baby,” Vernon mumbled. “Be good for me, okay? Relax for a few minutes.” He was being much slower, much slighter, his warm hand pressing into your gut while his thumb comfortingly stroked a fold in your tummy. Another lick. Another suckle. Another kiss. You felt the climb start over, but softer, while you breathed out his name, your chest reaching for more, more, more. “That’s it,” he whispered scratchily. “I’ve got you, baby, okay?” More kisses. More tender suckling. More lentamente licks. “M’gonna take care of you.” A finger pressing in, wriggling deep, squelching. “You can cum for me again, yeah? Can’t you, pretty girl? Let me feel your cunt around my fingers. Get your clit right on my tongue. Wanna feel you, baby. Taste you. Forever.”

Another ripple. The intensity wasn’t as sharp, but strong and clanging, rolling through you like summer thunder. You throbbed hotly against his tongue and clamped onto his thick finger. After a minute—spent faded, loosened, drifting—Vernon had kissed his way back up your body, and now his scuffed knuckles were stroking against your cheek in a tenderness meant only for you.

“I wish I didn’t know why you’re so unfairly good at that,” you huffed, letting a hand pull some dewy sweat off your forehead.

He grinned. “I only care about you.”

It was quiet for a moment. Amongst the humid stillness of your breaths, you heard a sudden spattering noise, and when you both looked toward the windows, rain had started washed the glass. Not an inch of sky was visible. Just very ruffled, grey valleys of clouds.

“Nature’s gotta run its course, huh?” Vernon sighed.

You nodded.

The boy looked back at you, his gaze lightened with sweetness, and brushed your chin. “If you don’t want to continue,” he whispered, “that’s okay. I’m not in a rush. And I don’t want you to feel like it’s a rush. As long as I can be around you. That’s all I need.”

While the rain pattered at the windows, you thought. Fingers then settled at the back of his neck, and you pulled him down, sinking into a kiss that tasted of your star-speckled orgasm.

Your hand brushed past his belt buckle to reach the popping tent in his pants. Gently, you squeezed him, ran your tongue along his bottom lip and nibbled his metal piercing. “I want to.”

Vernon twitched as you continued groping his pants. “Yeah?”

“I think we've both waited enough.”

He chuckled. You proceeded to watch him steadily as he stood on his knees, grasped the hem of his white t-shirt, removed it from his body that always passed by in flitters whenever you dreamt. Oddly enough, you had never wondered if Vernon was tattooed in places other than his arms. But there was a winding vine tattooed at his waist, and it split in different directions, coiling in delicately needled loops of ink that wound from his chest to patterns unknown down his back. You reached up, placing your palm flat to his pronounced clavicle, and then slowly dragged it down his sturdy, lean body, along the definitions in his abdomen. He let the shirt drop.

“Who gave you that?” You asked.

Vernon took off the fragile gold chain, let it spool onto his nightstand. “Snozz,” he said. “A long time ago. In a desert.”

“Hm. Why a vine?”

“Why not?” He smirked. “Start growin’ and don’t seem to stop.”

“Creeping vines used to grow all over the side of our house.”

“Lucky you,” Vernon said.

He started kissing you again, and your hands explored his torso, the smoothness of his back, where your fingertips occasionally bumped over logged scars or dried scratches. His body held so much—you felt it underneath the skin and muscle—and when you started tinkering with his belt you hoped he understood that your touch could be healing. He helped you unwind the belt from his waist, and unbutton his pants, and push the fabric down and off. It was difficult to stop kissing him and breathe. But you were under a spell, you were in love, and as he stood up to kick the boxers from his ankles, your dizzy head spun like a twinkling carousel.

You held your lip in your teeth at his exposure. There were some elder scars on his hard thighs, a few more tattoos that you couldn’t possibly pick apart because gravity was focused someplace else. Vernon crawled back over you. His lips found yours, two opposing magnets, and he kissed you with powerful depth.

You hand reached down to brush him. He was nothing but heat and firmness, so heavy in your clammy fingers, twitching, straining. Trying to remember what you had practiced before, you stroked him, still finding the motion awkward but noticing more rhythm and less nerves. “Am I doing okay?” You asked, hushed. He was getting slipperier in your grip.

“Mmm, yes, baby,” Vernon’s words flushed in a hot breath against your neck as he continued throbbing in your hand. “Such a good job.” You applied more pressure, and your thumb came to circle his sensitive, reddened tip that was beading out premature ejaculate. “Fuck,” he hissed, at last nudging your hand away and swallowing audibly. “M’too fuckin’ hard for that. I’ll bust.”

“Sorry.”

“No, it’s okay.” He grabbed a pillow from his headboard, folded it in half, stuffed it politely behind your head. “Want me to show you somethin’ fuckin’ goddamn magical, sweetheart?” Vernon hummed.

“Okay,” you agreed, your smile loopy and crooked.

His arm braced beside your head. In between your bent, spread legs, he settled, and you felt yourself begin to wriggle and warm with anticipation as he grasped around the middle of his heavy erection. Suddenly, his smooth tip was rubbing against you, slippery in the gloss, and your cheeks pooled with so much heat that you swore they might sluice off your bones. Your arms fastened around his neck for support and closeness. He was biting his lip.

“What the fuck…” you whispered, watching, entranced. Vernon smirked, letting his tip catch your slit ever so slightly before it smeared up through your folds and nudged at your puffy clit. “That should be freaking illegal,” you whined, breathless. “It feels so good.” Going loose, your head pressed into the folded pillow, letting him continue to tease you, rub you, give you small slaps with the flat, hard base of his girth that tingled in a euphoric way you could not admit.

 “I fuckin’ love this,” Vernon said hoarsely. “Don’t even need to fuck you—can just tease you like this, yeah?” He chuckled, tapped his head against your clit again to make you pulse and writhe. “But you need to take it, don’t you?” He leaned closer to your face, rubbed circles into you with his tip until you were dizzy and flickering. “Tell me,” Vernon groaned across your parted mouth, hinged open and desperate. “Tell me you want my dick. Tell me how deep you want it inside your cunt. Tell me it’s the only thing you’ve ever wanted.”

Your heart slammed. “I want it.”

“No.” He shook his head. “Use your big girl words.”

“I-I can’t say what you said…” your eyes stung with water.

“Why?” Vernon murmured. “You never shut up half the time.”

“Y’know… it’s too… dirty.”

He grinned, and his honey-brown eyes were sharp. “But I wanna hear you be dirty,” the boy urged. “What’s wrong with that?” His lips hovered over yours, and there was his tip again, pressing shallowly into your slit, just breaching. “I know how much you like to be good, but I want you to be bad for me, Pyjamas. Just for me.”

“I-I can’t,” you whined, sweltering under him as he turned blurrier.

“Yes, you can, baby.”

“Vernon.”

His mouth was damp against your ear. “You’re gonna fuckin’ say it to me. You can cry if you want to. But you’re gonna say it. Say you want my dick deep in your cunt, that all you want is for me to fuck you.”

You tucked back your tears. “I-I want your dick…” you swallowed, bit your cheek, huffed out, “deep inside my… cunt… and all I want is for you to…” a helpless, desperate, aching sniffle, “is for you to fuck me.”

He stroked the edge of your cheek. “Good girl.” Then Vernon was leaning over to his nightstand, a drawer pulled out, and he rifled around inside until a golden-coloured foil in a square shape was revealed. He tore a strip off the top with his teeth, spat it out, and removed a clear, limp condom. Your fingertips rubbed together as he rolled it on, stretched over his erection, knowing that this was really going to fucking happen. Then he was back over you, his eyes much softer. “I’ll be slow,” he said, brushing a small tear from your cheek. “It’ll sting and stretch the more I push in, but it shouldn’t hurt, and if it does, you need to tell me, baby, hm?” You nodded; butterflies alive in your gut. “I care about you so fuckin’ much, okay? I want this to feel good. It’ll always feel good for me but it’s different for you, so you need to communicate with me, yeah? I’m gonna be real gentle, baby.”

“Yes,” you squeaked, “I know. I know.”

He steadied over you. With your thighs spread open, legs hanging loose as possible, Vernon had enough room to operate. Your eyes closed, and you listened for the constant thrumming of raindrops dappling the windows, the distant thunder that followed forked, glittery lightning. But you were inside. Safe. With a man you loved. A man that cared. A man that was not used to being gentle, or slow, or delicate, when it came to sex, but understood how important you were and how little he mattered in this moment that was about pleasing you. Vernon began to push inside, opening you up inch by inch, his eyes creasing as he fought against his typical antics of rough, lusty, heavy slaps from his hips that broke bedposts and rendered him enough noise complaints to fill a book. You squeezed his arms.

“Okay?” Vernon asked.

“Yes,” you whined. “I’m stretching. It’s stinging.”

He nuzzled your cheek. “I know, baby. Breathe.”

A moment after the pause, and he resumed, pressing deeper into your insides. Your thighs started to tremble; the muscles ached. Vernon was pulsing inside you, to which you felt every vein and groove rubbing. Further, further, the sensation foreign, a bit uncomfortable. He was so hard. You sucked in your bottom lip and tried not to cry, but Vernon told you to communicate, so you scratched his shoulders and sniffled. “It’s a lot. It’s really a lot.” Pressure spread between your hips. “Are you there?”

Vernon kissed your forehead; let you burn his arms with your prickling nails. “Almost, okay? I know it’s a lot. But you’re takin’ it so, so fuckin’ well, baby. It’s gonna settle. It’ll start to feel good. I won’t hurt you.” A few minutes later, Vernon’s hips were clicking against yours. No more room was possible. You were stuffed and weeping, your head full of teased fuzz, while he kissed across your face over and over, his whispers like warm, tickling feathers. “Good girl, breathe. I’m there. No more.” And your tears started to dry up, revealing his sweet, flushed cheeks and foggy golden eyes. “Hey,” he chuckled, kissing your mouth. “You okay? Nothin’ hurts?”

“Okay,” you answered. “It feels weird.”

“I know.”

“But not to you. What’s it like?”

He shook his head. “Dude, I can’t be thinkin’ about that shit too much, or I’ll have you flat under me, poundin' you through the bed.”

“O-Oh,” you stuttered, licking your lips.

Vernon smiled, the edges dreamy and faint. “Don’t wanna break you just yet, huh? Later, maybe.” Ever so slightly, you felt his hips stir, grind, buck against you, and each time, little shockwaves echoed under your skin, more and more pleasurable. “Just wanna love you,” he whispered against the side of your mouth, cracked open, as his grinding developed more depth and groove, soft moans building in the seamy air. You heard him. The tears that had dried up were dampened over with new tears. Vernon had his knees bent on either side of you, his hips jutting in tender and deep, the angle allowing you to feel something unbeknownst, sensitive. “How’s that?” He rumbled into your ear. “Do you like it, sweetheart? How buried I am inside you?” More rutting. It felt desperate. Passionate. His tip was sinking into a cushy spot that took your voice away, filled your mouth with stones.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck…” Vernon groaned. “This pretty cunt wraps around me so fuckin’ well.” He started to squeeze your chest, pinch and pluck at your sore nipples. When you touched the corner of your mouth, you realized it was runny in sappy drool, and you promptly decided to not give a fuck, curling your arms around him, urging him closer. “If you ever let anyone else inside you, I’ll fuckin' rip them apart. I’ll make sure there's nothin' left of them.” A little harder, he was fucking you a little harder, slippery, sunctiony, smacking noises filling the room, breaking between the raindrops. His bed was squeaking in tandem with every thrust, its legs scarring the floor, practically sanding it down.

Finally, you untangled the words in your throat. “Feels so fucking good,” you choked out, face stinging with tears. “I fucking love you.”

He slotted his mouth onto yours. “Tell me again.”

Another slow, thick, hard rut from his hips. You scratched his toned back, tearing at the skin. “I fucking love you, Vernon.” He was reaching that spot, pressing into it so deeply, over and over, kissing it.

“No,” he grunted. “Hansol. Tell me again. Fuck. Please.”

You swallowed, then fastened your fingers into his hair. “I fucking love you, Hansol.” He reared you especially deep at that moment, the veins of his erection pulsing inside you, pumping, pumping. “I’m so fucking in love with you. I need you. I fucking need you. Give it to me. Please.”

Everything happened so quickly. Your shoulder was digging into the wall, elbow cramped against the mattress, your leg stretched up, ankle resting off his shoulder. He held your waist, fingertips moulding at the skin, fucking you, fucking you, forcing himself deeper, sweat glimmering on his pronounced collarbone, leaking down his chest, his tattoos seemingly crawling. You were a whining, whimpering, gushing mess, hardly able to keep your head up or the drool from tipping over the lip of your mouth like a spout.

“O-Oh, ff-fuck—” Vernon’s throat was dewy, tight, his jaw hinging open. “O-Oh, fuck this sloppy fuckin’ cunt. You pretty slut. Take me. Take this fuckin’ big dick deep in your pussy.” Tears piped down your face. Your hand clawed at the wall you were being crushed into. “Wanted t’fuck you for so goddamn long. Feel your guts around me.” Your leg started slipping off his hard shoulder from the sweat. He grabbed you by the shin, hoisted it back, licked his tongue along your tattoo of bundled rye tied up with ribbon. “If I didn’t have this fuckin’ dumbass condom, I’d fill you up so much, PJ’s. I’d stuff this pretty womb of yours. N’ you’d take it so well, baby, wouldn’t you?” He was bulging up into the base of your gut whenever he thrusted, and you were going weak, losing senses. “Tell me you’d take it.”

“I-I’d take it!” You cried, head thumping the wall.

He shook his head. “I’d take it, Hansol.”

You spluttered out, “I’d take it, Hansol.”

There was finality in it. Vernon kept thrusting, and the pulses you felt from the inside were ringing through you. Another snap. Another hoarse scream, as you clenched, wept, buckled. Where were you? What was happening? Why was there so much dampness underneath your body? How did you suddenly come to feel overwhelmingly empty and cold? Was that a cloth? A warm, wet cloth rubbing over your skin? That felt solacing. Oh—that place was fucking sore and raw—but the cloth was so gentle and there were sweet kisses against your thighs. You were still tremoring. There was a fabric being slipped over your dizzy head. It smelled like fresh, crisp laundry after hanging outside all day on a peg line. Gosh—you loved that—it was a big sweatshirt, you thought. Swallowed you. Now there were arms, lovely arms with storybooks of tattoos wrapping around you. There were lips on your forehead, then some sweet juice being tilted into your dry mouth.

Wherever you were, whoever you were with, you weren’t afraid.

You were safe, adored, and cared for.

The rain continued to pour all throughout the evening and late into the night. You woke up once, unsure of the time, to black in the windows and stormy rumbling echoing outside. Vernon was sat on the futon in the darkness, a small square of white light positioned on his lap, illuminating his face and the photographs he was passing between, and you remembered his furrowed brow, pushed down. You wanted him beside you, but you were too tired and confused. Instead, your eyes fluttered once, twice, perhaps three or four times more, before everything faded away and you were asleep again, your boyfriend’s haloed face the last thing outlined in your mind.

By morning, you were brittle and dry. A line of paste had crusted down your chin. The bright air made your eyes stinging and tender. A bone somewhere in your left shoulder popped when you shifted a little ways up the bed. Your mouth was dehydrated. For a moment, you sat up, rubbing away at your eye and smearing around the tears, until your hand reached backward in search of your phone, only to feel something human.

“Fuck!” You jumped, gasping. “What the fuck, Vernon?”

He was sitting criss-crossed, a pillow propped behind his back. You began noticing the scent of cinnamon and stewed apples. There was a bowl in his hand. A plastic spoon in the other, lumped in sticky oatmeal. “You’re in my bed, dumbass,” he mumbled around the utensil.

You sighed, scraping a line of white substance off your bottom lip, rubbing it away between your fingers. Glancing back, you stared at his bare upper body, decorated in that beautiful creeping vine, a few bruises around his neck, like splashes of red wine. Some thin scratches. You suddenly stroked at the dark green sweatshirt stitched with yellow letters, saw your clothes folded at the very edge of the bed, moved your legs and felt a raw, lingering soreness between the hips. “We had sex… I had sex…” you turned around, stared at Vernon. “I’m not… wait—” peaking underneath the covers, you realized just how damn naked you were. “Oh, shit.” Then back at Vernon. Shyness spread throughout your body, hot and tingling.

“Somethin’ like that,” he muttered, beginning to spoon up more oatmeal, though he put the bowl onto his nightstand when you looked frozen in ice. “Feel okay, PJ’s?” Vernon asked, scooting closer to you. His hand brushed along your cheek, which was warm and lined with imprints of wrinkled bedsheets, before he rubbed the dried drool off your chin.

“I’m okay,” you breathed unsteadily, shifting away from his touch.

He frowned, his eyebrows sloping. “What’s wrong?”

“Um…” you tucked the sweatshirt under your bum, surrounded your lap with the puffed covers. “I just can’t believe that happened.”

Vernon kept frowning, eyes a bit shiny. “Why?”

“Well… it’s always seemed so far-fetched in my mind, I guess. I always thought you would… recoil, or get grossed out, or—”

“Grossed out?” He scoffed. “Am I fuckin’ thirteen?”

“No! I mean, like, you wouldn’t find me… attractive. I’m sorry, okay? I didn’t mean it that way. I just—I’ve never had the greatest self-esteem or confidence in my body—so it’s strange to me, still, that you could… feel that way about me. That’s it. That’s what I meant.”

Vernon’s tight shoulders relaxed, caving in. He scooted closer to you, and the knee of his black sweats brushed yours underneath the comforter. His eyes were filled with sweetness in the morning light, ashy curls of hair tickling his forehead. “Last night was the fuckin’ happiest moment of my life. Not ‘cause we fucked—I mean, that’s a great bonus, don’t get me wrong—but ‘cause you trusted me. Enough to let me see all a’ you, touch you, get close to you.” His mouth smoothed into a smile, a perfect line. “That’s what made me so fuckin’ happy, PJ’s. Your trust.” His fingers stroked playfully under your chin and you giggled. “My beautiful girl. N’ don’t turn away from me like that, okay? Scared me a little. Thought you regretted it.”

You nodded, tying knots into the sheets. “Sorry.”

He shrugged. “It’s okay.” Then his gaze flitted toward your clothes stacked a few feet away, and he leaned forward to pull them closer. “Need these? Probably make you feel a little comfier.”

Grabbing the shorts from the folded pile, you quickly yanked them under the bed and wrestled them on, meanwhile Vernon fell backward onto his pillow with his hands cupped over his eyes. You proceeded to squirm on top of him, wrap yourself around his warm body like a koala hugging a tree, breathe in deeply the scent of his skin, his hair. He squeezed you back, pressing his thick arms around you so tightly that you felt flattened. Laugher caught in your squished lungs, beating like giddy wings.

“O-Okay!” You squeaked. “Y’re crushing me!”

So he let go, and you puffed back up, an ear cozied against the warm spot of his bare chest where you could clearly hear and feel his beating heart. With a fingertip, you traced a tattooed vine along his pectoral muscle, breathed in, wanted to stay against him forever.

Time slipped by. Hunger reached you. There was an empty cup on his nightstand holding a small tinge of juice, and his emptied bowl of oatmeal. He must have noticed you staring. Vernon set his phone down, tilted his head. “Need food?”

“Yes,” you answered. “I think I slept through dinner.”

He laughed. “Kinda, yeah. I’ll fix you breakfast. Think I have some sesame bagels and cream cheese. You good with that? Maybe a yogurt.”

“I’ll take anything.”

While he sliced the bagel in half at the kitchen countertop, you glanced around the apartment. “Have you seen my knapsack?”

“In the washroom.”

“Too far,” you sighed, collapsing back into his bed.

Vernon made himself a bagel, too. “Okay, you gotta move to the futon or some shit,” he said. “Can’t stand crumbs in my bed.”

“I’m not a messy eater!”

“That’s what every fuckin’ messy eater says.” He snapped his fingers, gestured toward the coffee table. “Move your ass, beautiful.”

Your bare feet planted on the cool, scuffed floor, but when you tried standing up, a sore quiver ran down your thighs and fluttered between your hips, similar to overworking a muscle. You were like a mermaid learning to use their jellied land legs. Vernon smiled at you while setting down the plates at the coffee table, laughed, enjoyed your wobbling. “Gonna get over here today?”

“Shut up!” You barked. “I’m trying.”

“I see that,” he sighed, crossing his arms. “You’re lucky you can even stand. But, as it was your first n’ all, had to dial back a little.”

You huffed. “You’re doing a lot of talking and not a lot of helping.”

He raised his dark eyebrow notched with a piercing, lipped sarcastically, “oh, you want help? Hard to tell ‘cause you didn’t—”

“Okay, okay. Blah, blah. Yes, I would like help.”

Vernon smirked. Before you were ready, he had you swept up in his arms, and you clung to the fabric of the zombie t-shirt he’d slipped on. But he set you down very gingerly on the futon.

“There you go, Miss.”

Together, you ate breakfast, albeit the bagel tasted a bit stale, though you would have noticed it more if you weren’t so hungry and it wasn’t so deliciously slathered in cream cheese. You shovelled the cold vanilla yogurt into your mouth, then threw back some tangy pineapple juice, finished eating long before Vernon. After making him take your knapsack out from the washroom to update Ruby on your whereabouts with a text, you wondered if he would be willing to discuss what had happened last night.

“Hey,” you murmured, petting down the back of his head after he finished eating. “Maybe you don’t wanna talk about it lots, and I get that, but I just gotta know even a little about what happened with Jeonghan.”

Vernon sighed, scraping his spoon around the empty cup of yogurt, tonguing against his inner cheek. “He didn’t give me what I asked for,” he announced in a large breath, shrugging. “Made it some stupid choice.”

Your hand settled atop his wrist, thumb drawing circles to his skin, and he finally stopped dragging the spoon. “What’s the choice?” The air was very still as your question drifted apart into pieces.

Whatever the choice was, it seemed to make Vernon stiff and reproachful, his eyes steadied on the coffee table, hardened. You didn’t push. Just waited in the stillness.

He then leaned forward, putting down the empty yogurt, leaving the plastic spoon sticking out. Vernon faced you, but his gaze didn’t connect, and it cut somewhere distant and unreachable to you. “It’s some moral bullshit, Pyjamas. Either I’m his charity case that got away off his money, or I’m his freakin’ competition and it’ll always stay that way. He told me to choose, think about it. Like he’s so high n’ mighty and not some stupid, fucked up kid at heart, like the rest of us. Smug asshole.”

Your lips pressed together. “He’s going to pay you off?”

“He said he would, if I leave this all behind.”

“Dealing? He doesn’t want you to deal?”

His words hit a wall and Vernon was within another one of his silent, internal conversations, leaving you to study the faint contortions and colours that passed along his face. You had grabbed his wrist tighter, thinking about something he had mentioned before—not wanting to be nothing, slipping back into nothingness, having nothing—and you realized he didn’t know how to place himself inside your trivial society. The things you dealt with were not familiar to him, and vice versa. Maybe you were the outstretched branch reaching between the worlds, a place to cross over, but you didn’t know if Vernon knew that, if he wanted that. It stoked conflict in your belly. But damn it—it wasn’t about you—and that was hard to swallow.

Your tight grip softened. “It’s a big choice.”

He nodded. “Yeah.”

“But not one you have to make right now. Right?”

“Yeah,” he repeated himself.

“So don’t make it,” you whispered, wrapping your arms around his elbow, curling close beside him, cheek nudging his shoulder. “Let’s just sit.”

Around evening, Vernon drove you home. The rain had cooled away much of the slick heat, and small street puddles still reflected the cloudy sky in potholes and dips. It was Sunday and tomorrow was another work week and greedy hours away from Vernon. After last night, you felt more tethered to him than ever before, but you threw back the emotions like a tart shot of alcohol and put on a flaky, thin smile. He had enough to think about. Vernon helped you out the car by offering a hand, which you held onto carefully yet firmly, not wanting to let go, feel him slip away into the pastel summer, but understanding your paths couldn’t always overlap.

“Alright,” you sighed. “Text me tomorrow?”

He nodded. “Sure.”

Before you drifted away, your fingers brushing down the scars of his warm palm, a feathery sensation tickled your throat. Should you say it? You hadn’t talked about it at all. Had it been something momentous? Or was it forever? You hesitated at first, but the tickle got stronger, and Vernon had his index finger wrapped around yours.

“Um… okay. Later. I love you.”

The words made your throat hot and you wanted to fling around, disappear inside the building before he could say anything—or not say anything—and you felt your body already begin to pull away.

Stamp up the cobbled walkway in heavy steps. Breaths getting tangled in your chest. He hadn’t said it back.

Fuck. He hadn’t said it back.

It was momentous, wasn’t it?

He wasn’t going to cross the branch.

Even though you weren’t in the mood to go, you decided to suck it up and attend Soonyoung’s going-away party. He was leaving, after all. And he had been excitedly mentioning it during your shifts together. You weren’t sure if anyone else was bringing gifts—you didn’t really know anybody else there—but you bought one, anyway: a new ballcap in his favourite colourway, purple and red, with the tag still freshly hanging off. It would have been nice to have someone else there with you. Ruby was on another excursion for work. Tara heard that they were going to start releasing call-backs for Catherine Love interviews, and she was too anxious to leave her house. Lara had gotten mono and was out sick for an entire week.

You waited patiently at the doorstep to Soonyoung’s building, staring through the glass door at the tiny lobby area; a wall with silver mailboxes and a dresser scattered in abandoned pamphlets, until you noticed someone inside swagger jauntily down a staircase.

“Damn. Finally here, huh?” Soonyoung said, opening the door.

“Sorry! Didn’t mean to be so late. I took the bus.” Inside, the building air felt somewhat damp, smelled like old paper, the walls faded, everything wooden or carpeted. “I brought you something, by the way,” you added, raising up the unassuming brown bag.

“Aw, you didn’t have to do that!” Soonyoung smiled, throwing an arm around your shoulders for a moment, creating a wind of his spicy, vanilla-noted cologne as he squeezed you. “Thanks, though.”

You followed after him up a winding staircase.

“The bus, you said?” Soonyoung questioned, tossing you a look. “I thought maybe you would get a drive from Mr. Bad Boy?” He stopped on the top floor, where you continued down a long hallway with robust, dark wooden doors on either side.

Different doormats passed by you. We Have Cats! Check Your Vibe Before You Come Inside. Stop Throwing My Packages at The Door. Welcome Home! If You Find Yourself Standing Here, You Should Probably Go Away.

“Uh, no, not today,” you answered, smiling smally. For once, Soonyoung seemed like he wanted to ask instead of blathering about his own issues, but you wouldn’t allow it. “Let’s go inside. I’m excited!”

His apartment was much nicer than you were expecting. It was an open-concept, somewhat rustic, with a ceiling that sloped upward and had beautiful, smooth logs of maple from which he draped soft yellow lights. His kitchen was spacious. Wide countertops organized in drink stations and snack bowls, stainless steel appliances, a glass cabinet just for wine bottles.

Numerous people mingled in the heart of the living room. The music was noticeable but not particularly loud. Maybe this would be okay.

“This is really nice, Soonyoung!” You complimented, setting your brown bag in between bowls of sourdough pretzels and cheese puffs, while he filled a blue glass with tap water that he handed off to you.

“Everyone says that. And with a lot of surprise, too. I think they expect me to live in a cardboard box or something.” He shrugged.

“Maybe you give off a cardboard box vibe.”

“Can’t fight it, right?”

A shallow set of steps slightly elevated the kitchen above the living room. Soonyoung had always blabbered names, and somehow, you were able to put some of those names to faces just by inspecting the crowd and their innate descriptors.

You sipped from the water. “Want to see your gift?”

“Fuck yeah I do,” Soonyoung chuckled. He pulled the brown bag toward him, carefully removed the ballcap that was concealed in an opaque fibre cover. You squeezed the glass tighter as Soonyoung slid the fibre off the hat, his slanted eyes alight, mouth softly gasping. “Woah! Nice pick!” He reached over to punch your shoulder, but it was gentle. Soonyoung brushed through his ashy blonde hair a few times, smoothing it backward. It was longer now, enough to curl at his ears. “Does it look good?” The boy asked while fitting the ballcap on backward, the tag dangling behind his head.

“Yeah, it looks great. Fits you really well, too.”

“I’ll have to go look in a mirror. Hit some poses. Uh—” he gestured around before walking off, “—make yourself at home. Fashion up a drank or get some snacks on a plate, there. Whatevs. Thanks for the gift!”

Once Soonyoung was gone, you were alone in the polished kitchen, holding the glass of water snuggly to your chest and watching the collected groups in the living room shift. Everyone seemed to know each other. You wanted to move, to involve yourself, to be that person who effortlessly sews their way into a group and becomes part of the seam. But you had never been good at doing that. It made you long for Vernon, who could talk to just about anybody like he knew them for years, because he didn’t care what they might think.

As you glanced between the snacks, unfocused, someone suddenly emerged at the kitchen countertop, standing across from you. He paused, perusing his options, and then ladled some red punch into a plastic cup.

“Hey,” you said, forced.

He went back into the bowl to ladle in a lemon slice and more ice cubes, which rattled inside his drink. “Hey,” he responded. His smile was warm, curled at the edges, and you thought he was a good place to start.

“Uh, I just got here. What’s the punch?”

“It’s Jungle Juice. Got some vodka, white rum, pink lemonade, and I think there might be another juice in there. Can’t remember.” He brought the cup to his mouth, tilted in some liquid. “Tasty, though!”

You nodded. “I’ll try some.” Not wanting him to walk away and leave you lonesome in the kitchen, you pinned him down with another question while mixing the concoction with the ladle. “What’s your name?”

“Josh.” He watched you for a moment, his eyes large and dewy, like melted, black jewels. “Are you chasing it with water?” He then laughed.

“Oh, no! Soonyoung handed this to me. Guess I looked super thirsty or something? Or he thinks I’m an alcoholic. Who knows.”

As you filled a plastic cup with a full ladle of punch, making sure to avoid the citrus slices, Josh laughed. It was delicate. A man could have a delicate laugh? Who knew.  “Soons might be the alcoholic.” “How do you know him?”

“I play recreational volleyball at Cumberland. He was part of our team for a few months, and he was actually pretty good. Saved us from a few losing streaks. A couple of us here are from the team, actually,” Josh said, turning around to glean the room briefly. “There’s Maddy, down there, with the braid. And Olive is here, too. She’s always going to the damn washroom so we tease her. There’s Seungkwan. Yeah. Anyway. It's a lot of fun.” He turned back to you, adjusted the cup to his other hand. “You like volleyball?”

You hadn’t tasted your drink yet, and the condensation from the ice was chilly but welcomed against your palm. “Well, I’m not sure. I played in high school. Because of the gym curriculum. I wasn’t great but I wasn’t awful.” Finally, you sipped from it, and tried not to make a bitter face.

Josh nodded. “Well, we’re always looking for new players ‘cause sometimes things shuffle around a lot. It’s fun. Really. And ‘cause it’s recreational, it’s not all that stressful. Cumberland. If you’re interested.”

“Cumberland. Got it,” you replied, trying to mirror his perfect curly smile that was so friendly but immediately gave up. “Is it all year ‘round?”

“Our team specifically plays in the summer and fall. But there’s multiple teams, so your options are wide. But—obviously—I would prefer it if you wanted to play with us.” Josh laughed again, tracing back a loose frond of chocolate hair that slipped down into his eyes. “No pressure. How do you know Soonyoung? Can’t say that I’ve seen you around before.”

“Co-workers,” you said, “at Common Cents.”

“Oh, shoot! That’s you? Okay, I think Soonyoung might have dropped your name a few times.” Josh placed his drink down, let his hands rest on the reflective countertop. “Said you were dating this mysterious, dreamy bad boy with coarse manners. I think he was a little jealous.”

You didn’t say anything.

He tapped the counter with a fingertip. “Gosh… what was his name... something with… Vernon, right? Weird but I actually know of him in a roundabout way, ‘cause Maddy used to buy weed off his frienddd…” he paused, reaching into the corners of his memory, eyes searching. “Dots? I think? This was a while ago, though. Yeah. Dots. Wonder why he was called that. I don’t really have a nickname. Just Josh, Joshy. Nothing cool.”

“Right,” you answered breathlessly, noticing a tightness pulling your chest into a confined box. The drink was trembling a bit in your hand, so you placed it down, pushed it away. “Where’s the washroom?”

Josh pointed to a corridor beside the flatscreen television. “Down there. Door on the right is Soonyoung’s bedroom, though.”

“Thanks,” you nodded, excusing yourself.

In a hurry, you were slipping down the dark corridor, immediately pressing into the washroom, not bothering to check if it was in use. But the door gave way and you quickly closed, locked it, taking a moment to pace in confused circles, passing back and forth across the sink mirror. The truth was, Vernon hadn’t texted you like he said he would. And you didn’t text him because you were so afraid that you biffed it all up by telling the boy you loved him. It probably made his choice easy. He probably told Jeonghan what he wanted to do already. You were on the curb with your bags. A week had passed. Nothing. Worry made you sick, but then realism grounded you, and you had been fighting between the two each day, unsure, afraid.

To calm down, you washed your hands. Let the cool, surging water gush between your fingers and create pools in your overheated palms. The liquid soap had a sweet melon scent. It was inside a fancy, stone bottle.

You were not going to be the anxious girl who hid inside a damn washroom, fretting, letting the time slowly bleed into wasted, uncollectable whorls. So you dried your hands off, brushed down your shirt, and walked back into the buzzing living room with a false sense of stillness, attempting to spot Josh with his volleyball crew or Soonyoung in his flashy hat.

But they were together, standing by a window housing a neat storage system of what you assumed were vinyls. One was rested flat against the window. You approached them, and were quickly acquainted with Maddy, Olive, and Seungkwan. Mostly, you listened to them talk, because their words flowed and bounced off each other so smoothly that your intervention felt unnecessary. They spoke of such normal things. Maddy was going to a bridal shower. Olive said she was taking a summer course on Ancient Greece, the Myceneans. Seungkwan wanted to go bowling but everyone in the group groaned, grumbling about how terrible they were at the game.

Sometimes you added a comment, laughed along with their jokes that weren’t particularly funny to an outsider but made them squawk, shriek, and slap each other’s arms. At times, they were curious about you, listening to your awkward anecdotes that seemed fitting in the moment, but rushing messily through the details in case they turned bored. It felt right. This was what people did and this was how friends were made and how you got involved. But, somehow, a wall was there, an invisible wall that you might not be able to press against or breathe on to see the spreading warmth, but still noticed. Perhaps it was pessimism, the thought that you were just a passing face through a glaring window, but these weren’t your people.

It could be that Josh, Maddy, Olive, and Seungkwan were supposed to be fleeting. You were never meant to understand their jokes, or tell the perfect story that they related to, or collect all their numbers and keep them close, hoping you had made enough of an impact for them to text you—wanna get a drink? Wanna get breakfast? Wanna come to a movie? Wanna join our next game?

That was okay.

Breathe. It was all okay.

Soonyoung’s party ended right before midnight. Everyone trickled out in groups, and he saw each down the staircase, through the front door.

You were amongst the last to leave. Alongside another girl, you stayed behind to help Soonyoung clean up, trashing plastic cups into a garbage bag, locking unemptied snacks inside fresh containers, throwing beer and soda cans into his recycling under the kitchen sink. Through mild conversation, you realized the girl helping was his cousin, staying over to help him pack up his things and make the move. “So he doesn’t forget anything,” she sighed heavily, shoving a sushi tray into her glimmery garbage bag.

Soonyoung hugged you before you left. He was a little drunk off the flavourful punch and it lingered faintly on his breath. “M’gonna miss you, kiddo,” he mumbled, leaning on you. “Y’re a freakin’ kick ass co-worker.”

Your fingers pushed into his shoulder blades. “So you are.”

“I’ll come visit. All my pals are here.” He pulled back. His hands were thick and warm, grabbing you by the arms, shaking you once, his eyes seeming blurry but focused. “N’listen. Don’t take shit from Patsy, okay? Or from anybody.” His hat was just about slanting off his blonde head. “You can get a little rough with the regulars. They always come back. Huh?”

A stone sat in your throat. The air was suddenly dry, stinging.

You nodded, promised him, “I won’t,” in a quivery voice.

Gosh, you were gonna miss Soonyoung. Why did things have to change just when they felt settled? He said goodnight, waved you off.

Outside in the dull heat of late July, you thought about calling a ride service. The trip to Soonyoung’s building was long and the specific bus you needed to get back home didn’t come frequently. You stood on the final step of the brick building, in between luscious, plump bushes, staring at the map on your phone. From somewhere down the street, you heard laughter.

You stepped onto the sidewalk.

The Camry was parked under a street lamp. Vernon was there, leaned against its side as usual, speaking to a girl with a braided ponytail that resembled the friend from Josh’s volleyball team, Maddy.

Anxiety and anger and confusion fizzled in your body, hot then cool, and back to hot again. Was he supposed to be her ride? Why didn’t she go home with Josh and the others? Did he know you were here? You were tempted to slink away down the shadows of the street, staying close to the frilly bushes until you got around the corner. But the longer you stood and watched them converse so cordially, Soonyoung’s pink, round face placed together in your mind like pieces of a tiled mosaic. No. Go forward.

You got closer, passing under the yellow orbs lighting up the sidewalk, watched Maddy reach out and squeeze Vernon’s shoulder.

She must have heard your stamping footsteps, because she looked your way with a smile that dropped slightly, but recovered. To be fair, you weren’t really upset at her.

She didn’t know your history with Vernon. At least, you thought.

“What are you guys chatting about?” You interrupted, but kept the fiery line of your gaze nailed to Vernon as to avoid scalding Maddy. He didn’t say anything, but stared at you deeply, so damn deeply, that you felt a pulse ripple inside you. It was staggering, disorientating, and you almost touched the cold edge of his car for balance as the night dragged in dizziness.

Maddy stepped away from him, her hands tucked politely at her abdomen. “Oh, we kinda know each other. Long story. I think.” She then pointed down the street, toward another similar looking building. “I live right there, actually. We were just talking about how I moved.”

“Vernon?” You asked.

He shrugged. “What she said.”

God—he was so infuriating—you wanted to take his beautifully featured face that you had missed terribly throughout the week and shove it against the car window. You twitched in anger. “Okay. Night.”

No, you couldn’t handle seeing him.

Once you started to walk away, you hoped, prayed, to feel a hand on your hand, preferably a tattooed hand with tough scars, a hand that had rubbed patterns across your back just like it had tightened around your fragile throat and stroked you from the inside.

But you felt nothing.

And it only forced you to stalk faster and faster, fingers wound up into balls. You rounded the corner, marched up to the empty bus stop placed along the quiet, residential street, sat down on the bench and inhaled the sticky, sweet smell of lilacs shedding behind you.

The moon was thin, a crescent that looked easily breakable. You craned your neck to stare at its gentle glow until someone had slid onto the bench, right next to you.

Husky amber melanged with the lilac.

Neither of you spoke for a few minutes.

Vernon opened his mouth, took in a breath.

“Shut up,” you hissed. “Don’t freaking talk to me.” When you looked his way, he seemed calm and expectant of your anger. “I told you I loved you, you—you take my virginity—or whatever the fucking fuck you want to call it, and then you don’t contact me for a week. Now, you show up down the street of Soonyoung’s going-away party, and you don’t even fucking care that I was there. You’re impossible Vernon. You’re so impossible.” Your arms were folded, squeezing yourself for comfort. “That is so not boyfriend of you. I don’t know what do anymore. Most people don’t have fucking drug dealers for boyfriends. They have boring boyfriends. At least with sense.”

He stayed silent. Your foot bobbed up and down.

After another minute went by, you sighed. “Thanks for the talk.”

Vernon started to smile. “Well, you said don’t talk to you.”

You looked at him again, going stiff.

He raised his eyebrows. “So, can I talk to you, Miss? Officially?”

“Stop calling me Miss! I don’t like it!”

Again, he was quiet, his lips tightened but grinning.

You huffed, annoyed, sinking defeatedly down the bench with your legs sticking out. “Fine, fine, whatever. Talk. You can officially talk to me. I should freaking slap you.” Your finger lurched at him. “Don’t turn that into a dirty joke, either. Or I will really slap you. For real. And don’t turn that into a joke. Don’t turn anything I’m saying into a joke because I’m so—”

He stood up. Grasped you by the hand. In a swift tug, he pulled you up from your slouching, brooding seat, and you found your body tucked close to his, the late, fragrant heat warm around you, melting you both together. His hand was gentle, stroking carefully along the curve of your face as though he were touching something thin and fragile. Instinctually, you pushed into the affection, your eyes beginning to close just to feel him more.

“I’m no good for you,” Vernon murmured.

Your eyes shot back open. His closeness wasn’t a memory anymore, nor the tenderness faint but full in his gaze, and you wanted to stitch your body to his so he could never leave. “Well, it’s just that I’m mad, but…”

“I’ve given Jeonghan’s choice some more thought. I think I know what I might do. I think.” His hands gripped your waist, smoothed along the fabric of your shirt to grasp your lower back, push you closer against him.

“Oh… that’s good. Um, yeah.” You didn’t want to know. “Vernon, I know that I’m upset. I still am. But you are good for me. Just because something doesn’t always feel good doesn’t mean it’s not good. Maybe I scared you a bit when I said it. Maybe it was supposed to stay inside that moment at your place and not go anywhere else. I just—I want you to be ready to say it, and say it sincerely—not feel forced for my sake. So, I guess I’m glad you didn’t say it. But we should have talked about it.” Your hands were resting against his chest, flat and feeling his heartbeat.

“PJ’s…” he said, and the way it caught deeply in his throat made your knees stupidly weak, spaghetti-like. “Come with me, okay?”

So you followed behind him, fingers wrapped in his, returning around the corner to his car parked underneath the foggy lamp. He opened the backdoor. You climbed inside first, and he slid in after you, tugging the door shut.

Everything was so still and silent. The leather buckled and squeaked when you climbed onto his lap. Your breathing was layered in the minty air as his hands drifted up the tingling bareness of your thighs, squeezing. The small, slick, suctioning noises of your intimate kissing was like quiet water droplets. His fingers undid the buttons on your shorts. Then his warm hand was down your underwear, softly feeling around your sticky, flooding centre, massaging between your folds, and pressing into you. His fingers made you gasp and twitch, moan against his ear, burn for more, until your clothes were useless piles sitting abandoned on the leather or fallen to the carpet floors under the backseat. His hands were spread flat to your hips, guiding you to move along the thick shaft of his hard, aching length. Not inside. Just feeling the skin to skin. Anticipating. Knowing. You lubricated him more with every movement. Breathed hard and heavy into his ear. Listened to the wet noises of him slipping between you. Right before you started sinking down, he held your face as opposed to your hips, and his eyes were full of you like a golden, reflective lake.

“I love you,” Vernon said, his thumbs running across your fleshy, hot cheeks. “I fuckin’ love you, okay? N’ I’m sorry I wimped out and couldn’t say it back, even when I knew how much you wanted to hear it. But it fuckin' scares me. I never thought it would but it does.”

You rested your forehead against his. “It scares me, too.”

He chuckled. “Guess you’re not as wimpy as me, huh?”

You smiled, let your thighs fall wider apart so that his tip brushed along the side of your folds, hugged him close. “I just need you. That’s all.”

Vernon took his length back into his hand, began to gently coax himself inside your heat, open and warm and waiting. “I need you, too, baby.”

Together, you went back to your apartment. Vernon took a hot shower while you laid in bed, his maroon sweatshirt draped across your lap, your fingertips rubbing at some of its pilling. You checked emails on your phone, gazing between notifications for old, free subscriptions you no longer cared about—Learning to Budget! Are You Still Interested in Building a Stellar Website? Check Out These Unclaimed Scholarships!—until your thumb paused over something unfamiliar. You sat up, opened the professional email, hardly read an ounce of text until the very bottom, where an electronic signature was twinkling at you.

If you are interested in proceeding with an interview for this position, please contact [email protected] for confirmation and further inquiry.

Small, excited throbs filled your veins. You looked around the room for someone to share your energy with, but it was just you, shaking on the bed, as you processed what had happened. Suddenly, you heard a thumping noise inside the walls, and you knew Vernon had just turned off the knobs for the shower. He came inside your bedroom a few minutes later, rubbing a hand towel from the toiletries closet against his damp, springy hair, bringing in with him a very clean, pleasant smell. You had the phone screen turned into your chest, hidden. The syllables were on your lips but wouldn’t form.

Vernon looked back at you, glanced up and down. “You good?”

“Something just happened,” you managed to exhale.

He squished the hand towel in his lap. “ And what’s that?”

You peeled the phone away from your chest, stared at the email again just to make sure you weren’t hallucinatory and that the words hadn’t morphed, before you handed the device to Vernon. He took the phone, leaned forward with elbows on his knees, and threw the white towel over his shoulder. You tried not to squirm around as he read the tiny printed information which he zoomed in to see better. Once he got to the end, he sat up again, nodded satisfactorily, and gave the phone back to you.

“Well?” You engaged. “Isn’t that… I don’t know? Freaking crazy?”

“Is it? You’re a talented girl.”

“My resume was hardly anything special or stand-outish.” You looked at the email again, smiling. “Maybe it was my cover letter?”

“Who knows, baby. Good news, though.”

For a moment, you wanted to message Tara, but she hadn’t texted you and it didn’t seem appropriate to flaunt the email to her when you weren’t sure if she had received one herself. So you let the phone clatter onto your nightstand. Instead, you crawled over to Vernon and threw your arms around his shoulders, breathing in the mild soapiness of the washed shampoo lingering in his damp hair.

“I have to thank you, ‘cause you motivated me to do it,” you hummed, closing your eyes, hugging him hard.

He said nothing, but grabbed onto your wrist and squeezed.

TWO MONTHS AGO.

You were sitting in a loungeroom at the Skyline. Several people were dispersed throughout the space. Some occupied the leather L-shaped sofa and unwrapped complementary truffles from the potter’s bowl on the coffee table. Others hovered by the countertop, sipping at teas whose soothing fragrance, a bit of rosehip and lavender, remedied the nerves. You were sitting on a stool at the island. The surface was clean, white marble, reflecting the light fixture overhead like still cream. A very small part of you felt prepared. However, the bigger, much more prominent part wanted to hurl into the large palm plant potted in the corner.

Tara was called in ten minutes ago. She left behind a teacup painted with bluebells, still steaming, and you pulled it closer. The warmth soaked through the porcelain and into your palms.

Reminded you to be calm, be steady.

Different strings of quiet conversation zipped through one ear and out the other. No one in the room dressed or looked alike. Everyone seemed to have a unique story. You could see it in how they styled their hair, where they placed their jewelry, the colours draping their bodies, hear it in the particular linguistics that flavoured their sentences. What kind of story did you portray—if any story at all?

Hey Catherine, I’ve spent nearly a year of my life falling in love with a drug dealer, and before that, I was lost, drifting, and probably depressed because my degree wasn’t what I thought it would be and I was too chicken to make a change! Don’t I seem like the perfect candidate to be your assistant?

Really, you didn’t know who she was looking for.

Maybe that would make you more unique than anyone.

The lounge door pushed open.

In walked Tara, her cream pantsuit swaying around her like weightless water. She seemed to have more vibrance in her skin than when she left. The same man who escorted everyone from the building’s ground lobby to the twentieth-floor lounge room was keeping the door held open with his back. Using a thin, white stylus, he made a calculated swipe at the tablet held against his arm, then looked up placidly and called, “Mariam Kestle?”

A woman stood from the couch. She quickly cleaned her fingertips of chocolatey truffle, dabbed at her lipstick, and hurried toward the door.

“Good luck!” Everyone sang collectively, though it sounded thicker than when Tara had gone for her interview twenty minutes ago.

She wasn’t allowed to linger in the loungeroom. You continued grasping her teacup, much cooler now, as she picked up her purse from the stool beside yours. “Don’t stress,” she whispered, her pearl-powdered eyes quickly meeting yours. “It’s easy.” And then she was gone, leaving behind a cloud of elegant, flowery perfume she had been saving for the occasion.

Yes, easy because she was more practiced than a heart surgeon! But you clung onto her words regardless, daring to hope.

Over the hour, nearly everybody in the loungeroom had gone, person after person returning to collect their things. It got quieter, and somehow heavier, each time someone disappeared. You moved to the bare sofa, spoke a little with an older man in a very colourful dress shirt full of popping nineties-esque shapes, until the door opened for the umpteenth time and the attendant finally, finally said your name.

The woman you passed on your way out seemed crestfallen. You tried hard, scrubbing and scrubbing, to erase the imagery of her downturned lips, distracted eyes, and solemn expression on your way toward Catherine’s office. When the attendant knocked, waiting for his superior’s response, you caught the puzzled look he shot your way, and just as she called out, you nearly grabbed his presumptuous little tablet and broke it over your knee.

“Good luck,” he said in his tinny, snotty voice.

You couldn’t help it—your face twisted in annoyance. “Keep it.”

Her office was bright, like it was founded on biblical firmament, and sunlight stung through the windows, rendering you bleary-eyed.

She stood up, reached across her desk. “Hello, there.”

You squinted, pawed at a space in the air and prayed her hand would be there. “Bright in here, isn’t it?” Her cool fingers brushed yours.

“Oh! Right, right. I always forget how bright the sun gets around this time. I love it.” You fumbled and tripped your way into a chair as she proceeded to tug the curtains shut, one by one. “But I also sit behind with my back to the windows. So I forget how the light seems to flashbang everyone who walks in here.”

She tugged on a bulbed chain, and the final curtain unravelled like a gigantic parchment, dropping down over the window. A soft, comfortable dimness touched her office. At last, Catherine settled back into her chair. “Thanks for pointing it out.”

You expected her office to be tidy. The kind that looked seldom used because it was kept so spiffy and neat. But there was clutter. Boxes sat against the walls, stuffed with packed files, papers, canvases, fabrics, a coffee machine, a printer, books, manuals, DVDs, corners and shiny pieces to things you couldn’t identify. Paintings and picture frames were taken down, ordered against one another. She had a shelf, but it was emptied out, and clear circles and squares where knickknacks once stood were surrounded by a faint layer of dust. Her desk was cluttered, too. There was a file split open, assumed to be your file, sitting on top of several thick catalogues.

She clicked on her desk lamp, aimed it down at the file.

“Is that man with the tablet the assistant that’s leaving?”

As she adjusted the lamp, she laughed. “No, no. He’s a substitute for now, until I decide on an assistant who permanently fills the role.”

“Okay, I see.”

You didn’t speak again. Instead, in the quiet and soft light, you let her glance across your file, watched how her eyes, a dark grey, moved lower, lower, until she reached the bottom. Then, she looked up, and her thin mouth adapted a smile that was neither comforting nor cold.

“Your resume doesn’t seem to align with the experience I require in this position, although you do have some lovely qualities.”

Sharpness poked your throat. “I know...”

Again, she said nothing, but flipped a page in the file and continued to read—even started humming—and it was a blended, silky sound that made your focus drift in and out, like a camera lens tinged by salted sea water. She giggled at something she read, brushed her finger over the ink. “Your letter has a sort of charm to it. I can feel you in the words. Your honesty.”

You swallowed. “Thanks.”

Catherine clasped her pale hands together on the humble-sized desk, not one finger with a ring. But she wore a thin gold bracelet made of links. “So, you say you know art through a friend. A friend lost and then rekindled. You call that rekindling in itself art. Because art makes you feel, think, discover, and question. I find that interesting.” She aimed the desk lamp away from the file, slightly toward your face, as though she were a detective and you, her suspect. “How did this rekindling come to be?”

That was something you couldn’t explain.

Didn’t really expect to be questioned on.

“Uh… well, to save you from a very long story, our friendship hit a fizzle, as those things often do. She had slipped away from herself, and I guess I did a little bit, too. But we had a good talk at your Winter Wonderland show, actually. And that sort of started things up again. She got clean. And I…” you peered into the lamp’s golden rings emanating toward you, let your shoulders drop. “I had to change my perspective. Stop moping around, getting all passive. I want life to come from me, not happen to me.”

She nodded. “Invictus.”

“Yeah.”

“That’s a good thing to realize. And good on your friend.”

“I wanted her to apply.”

“She never did?”

“Well, I didn’t see her today. Plus, she never said anything.”

“If this round is not successful, we hold another. There could still be a chance for her, if she wishes.” Catherine sat back, bouncing her chair, and tucked some fraying, wispy brown curls behind her ear. “You know, my assistant comes with me when I travel. I support having a tethered life, actually. Because that’s where home is. But this job is not for people who have those tethered lives. Things that hold them to home. Home has to be no more than a place. How do you feel about travel? What tethers you?”

So many pictures fell through your mind like stones dropping out from a sack. But the one picture that kept reappearing more than any other was Vernon—and he was deciding his own tethers.

Your hands tightened, and then released, blood rushing through your fingers. “I don’t know. I’ve never been that adventurous. But that’s changed a lot this past year.”

“Well,” she gestured around her office, at the boxes and paintings and odd spaces of spilling emptiness, “I ask for a reason. Because I’m going to be leaving Skyline for some time. I’m going to Seoul for my next series of exhibitions. But I also have family ties there. I know a handful of applicants were excited to settle into Skyline, but this job is like a magic carpet. It flies you places. It’s fun, but you need to be ready to work.”

Very little of what she said stuck to you. “Leaving? When?”

“By the end of the month.”

“Jeez, that’s—that’s sudden.”

“It is. And I understand that. So I’ve been letting all interviewees know that they have the option to join me in October. I will take Henry with me for the first month instead.” She tilted her head, smiled a little. “I must admit, it’s a bit of a selfish choice. I stayed at Skyline longer than I really should have…” you noticed her grey eyes adrift, lingering on a picture frame turned toward her, the photograph hidden from your curiosity.

“Well, if you have family there…” you laughed, though it sounded awkward and breathy in an unnecessary attempt to be comforting.

Catherine sighed. “I love your story, about losing a friendship and then rekindling it. How rare is that? Don’t you think that when people leave, it’s for a reason? Even if we are not meant to fully understand that reason?” She gripped her chin, shook her head. “I think about it often. How do we know if someone isn’t supposed to come back?”

Your throat was dry. “Wow. I-I’m not sure—” and you started to cough, splatter spit into your elbow, stinging bleariness flooding your eyes, feathers in your throat. Catherine stood up, said something about fetching you some water, before leaving you alone in the tenebrosity of her packaged office. There was a tissue box somewhere on her desk, and your hand reached around cluelessly as the tears in your eyes turned the world disorganized. You grabbed something cold and heavy in your hand, held it up to your hot, flushed face as your vision gradually cleared. Not tissues.

The photograph.

An adolescent boy with braces and shaggy hair holding onto a baby girl wrapped up in a starry pink swaddle. You held the picture underneath the lamp to make sure you were interpreting every detail correctly. Trembling fingertips reached out to touch the glass, its hard but fragile surface, along the boy’s face, his crooked teeth, his eyes. You knew him. You knew him. Hansol.

Catherine returned to the office. From over your shoulder, she sat a mug of water onto the desk. Then she said, “pretty, aren’t they?”

You set the frame down, turned it away from you.

She plopped back in the chair and smiled. There was a glint in her cinder eyes, a lopsided curl in her smile, and it all painfully, vividly, overwhelmingly reminded you of him. “It’s a clean mug,” she said. “Just some water from our machine. Are you alright? Got a tickle?”

The interview came to stand in your way.

You wanted out. Wanted the curtains whipped open again, with the blistering sunlight to turn the room to fire. But you stayed in your seat. “I’m fine. Sorry about that.” You pulled the mug into your grip but didn’t sip anything. “I shouldn’t have looked at your photograph.”

“No, it’s alright. I can’t pack it away just yet. Something inside won’t let me.” She grabbed the frame, angled it in a way she preferred.

“That’s the family you’re going to see?”

“Just my daughter. As you said before, it would be a long story.”

You nodded, teeth aching as though they might fall out. She looked to you again, except you couldn’t meet her gaze.

“Right. Things happen,” you said, attempting to be soothing.

Things happen. Things happen. Things happen.

You became a ticking timebomb in that seat.

Vernon was picking you up after the interview.

As you left behind the miraculous building and its infinite glass capturing the coastline blue, you stared down at your phone, reading his text message. Then you stalked down several blocks to his location, your heels practically grating through the flimsy flats stuck on your feet, barrelling across walkways and shouldering around unhurried people. You found the diner where he was eating a late lunch. Just as he was about to stick a salted, yellow fry in his mouth, you marched up to his booth and slapped it away.

He sat back. “Uh—excuse you, asshole?”

When you said nothing, he grabbed another fry off his plate—stopped to give you an expectant, skeptic look—only to have you smack it from his hand again, where it landed under a table on the checkered floor.

His arm dropped. “What? Your interview suck?”

“Don’t play dumb,” you hissed.

“So, it didn’t suck?”

You dropped down into the seat across from him, feeling the aged, cracked pleats of dark green leather under your fingertips. He must have just gotten his food. The plate was messily surrounded by fries and a big buttery burger with a gleaming bun, a small red flag wrapped around a toothpick sticking out. The interview had ended earlier than you originally surmised.

Vernon sighed, dragging the tall glass of brown soda toward him, dripping in condensation. “Dude, I can’t understand if you don’t tell.”

And you laughed. “Says you!”

“What?”

“Your freaking goddamn mother is Catherine Love!”

The diner wasn’t very full. Just some older folk taking their time perusing newspapers or writing onto notepads. Behind the counter, you could see two cooks, busying themselves in the greasy, steamy air. The blinds at the table were angled shut, patterning the surface in white lines.

Surprisingly, Vernon’s face didn’t change. “Not really.”

You scoffed, “what the hell does that mean?”

He slurped up some soda, swallowed. “Technically, her name’s Catherine Melody. That’s how I know her. It’s different.”

“Vernon,” you urged, leaning forward, shoulders sticking up, “she’s still your mother! Why—I just don’t get why? Why didn’t you tell me? Don’t you think that’s a huge thing? That I’m going to get interviewed by your mom?” The air fell flat out of you. Grabbing a napkin off the table, you slapped it over your forehead, perspiring with stress, and heaved.

Silence sat between you. Heavier than the loungeroom.

You pulled the napkin off your forehead, stared into him.

He shrugged. “You were excited about this. Why would I tell you that she’s my mom? Wouldn’t you agree it would change things? I wanted you to have that moment without my personal shit gettin’ in the way.”

It had to marinate. You couldn’t just spew up all your conflicted, rash feelings without considering his perspective, too. The napkin was squeezed into a ball in your hand, and you kept massaging it until a sense of quiet unfurled inside you. Letting the napkin open itself on the table, you rubbed down your thighs, glanced at him. “I suppose… you’re right. But I figured it out anyway. I’m sure I biffed it. It was all I could think about for the rest of the interview. Not that I was a fitting candidate from the start.”

Vernon pushed the soda across the table. You sipped from it, closed your eyes, enjoyed the rush of cold sweetness and fizzing bubbles.

He cleared his throat. “I mean, I’m sorry, PJ’s. Maybe I should have told you to avoid all this blindsided bullshit.” You nudged the glass back and he sipped, too. “But I didn’t think you would put it together right fuckin’ there. Did she have my goddamn grade school picture collaged to the wall?”

“Not really,” you sighed. “I don’t think I would have figured it out, but I picked up a picture frame off her desk when she left the room, and it was the same picture on your nightstand—you and your little sister—that made it quite obvious.” You noticed that Vernon’s face had started to creep with something that felt dark. It charcoaled shadows underneath his eyes and along his cheekbones. “And now that I think about it, some of the things she said make a lot more sense with context… she’s… going to Seoul.”

Vernon cackled a bit. “Yeah, off to Sofia.”

Was it your place to say more? You were uncertain. He seemed to have lost his interest in eating, so you pulled some fries off his plate, let him brood for a few minutes, stare at the blinds with the filtered sunlight.

“She said something about—” you had his plate now, grabbed the tiny spritzer of vinegar and shook it over the fries, “—about staying here longer than she should have. I think she was hoping to see you.”

“Yeah, so she can judge what I’ve become, no doubt.”

“Well, maybe… maybe not. There was hurt. A lot of it.” Wiping the crumbs off your fingers, you let Vernon have his plate back. “Look, I know it’s a sensitive subject for you, so if I’m overstepping, let me know. But would you ever consider talking to her? You don’t have to forgive, or accept anything she says, but just… to like… hear her? Would you ever do that?”

He dug some fries away from the burger. “Man, I don’t know…”

“I know you have a lot to think about right now,” you said tenderly, twining each word with thought, “but she’s leaving at the end of the month.”

Vernon sighed, picking up his burger and sliding out a crisp pickle to eat. Then he finally took a bite, and you noticed some tension vacate him.

A man stopped by the table. He was dressed fairly casually, but wore a black waist apron stuffed with a crinkled-up notepad. “Can I get you anything?” He asked politely, his hands clasped. After you thought for a moment, eyes trailing the menu, you asked for the ice cream sundae.

Because, damn. You deserved it.

VERNON.

It was quite easy to hang out with Moo. He could entertain himself to no end, which let Vernon be more absented-minded than usual.

Moo used a cube of blue chalk to powder the tip of the lacquered cue. Vernon leaned against the wall, smelled the beer in the air, the fried food, stale smoke. He always liked this bar. The smells comforted him, the sounds of cans being cracked open and hard balls splashing around a felted table were unchanged. Moo finally leaned over, lined up his cue, slid the stick back and then knocked it forward, but the tap was a little too hard.

He stood up, ground down on his cheek. “That’s fucking stupid.”

Vernon reached for his beer on the small table beside him. The glass was cold on his lips, and the beer was frothy in his mouth. “Loser.”

“Shut up, tool. You do better then.”

Vernon shrugged. He grabbed his cue, walked around the table to find the white ball. Similar to his friend, he leaned over, let the cue slide across a groove in his hand, and then struck, pocketing a ball.

Moo swatted his hand through the air. “Easiest shot I’ve seen in my life,” he muttered while picking at his plate of nachos. “Baby could do that.”

“You know a baby?”

“I will. Sharla’s due in three months.”

“Guess we’ll have to wait.”

Vernon sunk another ball, and then another, until he decided he wanted a break and purposefully let his cue falter. Moo rubbed his hands together, delighted to try again, leaving behind his plate of chips, stringy cheese, salsa, and blackened chicken bits. Vernon got comfortable against the wall while Moo studied the table, rubbing his chin.

“Now that I’m thinking about it …” Moo hummed, “isn’t it so fucking weird that Sharla’s pregnant? I mean, I’m gonna be a freakin’ uncle, man, and Jade’s gonna be an aunt, and Sharla’s gonna be a mom. A goddamn mom. A mother. Time flies, man. Straight like an arrow.”

“Yeah… sure does.”

“I mean, it feels like yesterday she would sneak out and make me cover for her, then get me to come pick her up in our dad’s car.” Moo chose a spot, blew at the tip of his cue. “She’s well-rounded and all. But she had a crazy streak dad never knew about.” He bent down, went quiet for a moment as he settled the cue into position. “You guys had a little thing, didn’t you? At one point? Back in the day, as we say. I always knew. She’d smell like you some days.” Then he struck the white ball into another, a loud clacking noise echoing around the bar just as the ball swiftly pocketed. Moo stood back, clutched his fist. “Fuck yeah. You see that angle? Finesse, Vern.”

“And you’re how many balls behind?”

“Slow and steady wins the race. Mrs. Yee’s class type shit.”

Vernon crossed his arms and laughed.

“Anyway.” Moo grabbed his drink and sipped. “I’m looking forward to being an uncle. To be honest, though, I always thought the first kid in my life would be yours.” He rubbed his nose, laughed a little. “But you’re not as promiscuous now. Guess PJ straightened that out.” He approached the table again, quieted down as he focused on making a particularly tricky shot, the edge of his tongue sticking out. The colourful balls scattered and Moo cheered before walking back to his mixed drink for a necessary victory sip.

It was true. Vernon was surprised too that he never got a girl pregnant, although there had been a few scares in the past he still remembered in uncomfortable vividness. Sex had never been multifaceted to him until he met you—it was pleasure and escape, another drug—but the way you grated on him was impossible to ignore. You made him feel things that he thought weren’t for him. Strong things. Things he didn’t always understand. Things that scared him. But things he came to want just like any other human being once he realized how starved he was of it. And then you were the most important thing. But not a thing. You. And he thought of you every day. His body started to ache like a sore tooth.

He was missing you.

“Oh, damn. Just fucked it,” Moo scoffed. “Alright. You go.”

Vernon sighed. “Dude, I can’t lie. I don’t feel like playin’.”

“No—what?! Come on! At least do your turn! Danny’s gonna be here soon and he call fill in for you. At least finish your turn. Please.”

He sighed again and grabbed his cue. Vernon’s shots were aimless and rushed. One ball sank but the other bumped off the side and zoomed down the green felt with no direction at all. After another taste of his beer, beginning to gradually warm, Vernon said he needed a few minutes alone.

Outside, the evening was warm.

The sky was luminous compared to the dusky lighting inside the bar. Calm clouds looked like stirred cream in a baby blue coffee cup. He breathed in. Lost was the scent of foaming beer, cooking oil, and faded cigarette smoke. Instead, there was a weightless nothingness. Vernon took out his phone as well as a toothpick to play with in his teeth, saw you had texted him, and started to smile.

omg! a spider in my shoe!! JPG_387456 i shook it outside i just can’t bear to squish it D:

In his head, he could hear your scream, see the way you jumped, raced around, got all trembly with freight. He could picture you squatted at the edge of the walkway outside your apartment, shaking your shoe to coax the spider out while your face puckered up and your lips got tight.

what a good person u are up to anything? been missing u all day

He walked across the tiny parking lot to his car and leaned against the driver’s door, circling the toothpick around his mouth with a prodding tongue, tasting its wood flavour. You had your interview about two weeks ago. Since that day, you hadn’t mentioned anything about the position again, and Vernon suspected you just didn’t want to stir the pot when it came to his mother as a topic. Which he understood. He hadn’t exactly built her up with much kindness. Hearing you compliment her artwork and exhibitions—it hadn’t been easy to keep a straight face—but your enthusiasm was too flowering and he was too soft about you to uproot it.

Vernon’s phone vibrated in his hand. When he glanced down, he saw an unrecognized number labeled above a text message. Skeptical, he opened the conversation initiated by the strange number.

Ready to make a decision? 709 Dooley Dr. 8pm. Let’s talk.

And he looked up, glancing around the quiet parking lot, then into the dark bar windows obscured with neon signs and dusty shutters.

It wasn’t like Vernon didn’t know who it was. But he wished he didn’t.

Pulling the toothpick out from his mouth, Vernon rubbed it between his fingers while continuing to read the text over again. The group house. He didn’t want to go back there, among the rot, the graffiti, the staleness of memories succumbing to age and seasons. He didn’t want to see Jeonghan’s face. It was like getting belted into a rollercoaster, thrust up a drop, and then over the precipice, pelted by stinging air that was hard to breathe.

Suddenly, his phone whirred again.

Don’t wait too long. Time flies, right?

He shut his phone off, flicked the toothpick aside.

Vernon swung into the car and started its engine. Without knowing what he was going to decide, Vernon followed the familiar route back to a place he once considered home.

He arrived a few minutes before eight o’clock. The sky was a melting gradient. A big ball of gold, stretching into peach, and then a long, long stretch of lilac that convulsed akin to a thin bedsheet fluttering on a peg line. Vernon entered through the broken doorway, careful in his steps, was about to walk past the threshold to the kitchen when he noticed someone there already. Jeonghan was sitting at a table. It looked old, plucked from a curb. The chair left for him to sit on was a scrappy lawn chair that might just rip.

“You’re here.” Jeonghan gestured to the chair. “I brought seats.”

Vernon stayed in the doorframe. “From a dumpster?”

“It matches the house.”

He stepped into the kitchen. The floor was strewn in dirt, dead leaves, scuffs from furniture and equipment being dragged about. It always seemed to be the heart of the house. On good days, where everyone gathered, sharing barbecue and playing music. On bad days, where arguments happened and cupboards rattled when fists came slamming down. Sometimes, a place of mystery that Vernon wasn’t allowed to see, simply because he was too young, even though he knew what was happening,

Vernon hooked his ankle around the chair leg, pulled it further away from Jeonghan and more toward himself. Finally, he sat, and the chair creaked. “If this snaps, man…” he warned, gritting his teeth.

“Oh, mine is much worse,” Jeonghan laughed. “I feel as though I’m about to fall through the bottom any minute now! But I can’t deny there’s a little fun in not knowing. Russian Roulette in shitty lawn chair form.”

“Nice to know you’ve got little informants sprinkled everywhere.”

“You only go to so many places.”

Vernon wanted to roll his eyes. Jeonghan’s power was much bigger than it seemed, but that had always been his allure. Sort of like an iceberg, the top seeming eerie enough, but the unseen much scarier.

“Has it been difficult?” Jeonghan asked. “Choosing?”

His blunt nails scraped the hard plastic of the chair arms, scribbled with crayon. “No,” Vernon scoffed, “it was all cookies n’ cream.”

“I thought it was courteous to ask, Vernon.”

“Well, I don’t really want your fuckin’ courtesy. Did you drag me all the way out here to socialize? I get you told me the truth and all, but I’ve spent so long upset at you that it isn’t really gonna fly away all that quick.”

Jeonghan nodded. “I understand.”

“Not that you really care how I feel about you.”

“I do, Vernon.”

And the boy shivered a little despite the warmth seeped into the kitchen. Jeonghan always called him Hansol. He was never one to use the nicknames they all coined for each other. It was another one of his natural mannerisms that set him apart, above, a discreet way of telling everybody that he knew them inside, not just their surface. But Vernon had exploded at him for continuing to call him Hansol. Was it a mind game or an honest attempt at proving his compassion? Vernon never knew with Jeonghan.

“You know,” Jeonghan said, setting his elbow onto the scratched table and letting his chin sit in his palm, “if you’re really in that much of a rush, then why don’t you just come out with it? What are you going to do?” His eyes were large, black like soaked bark. “I won’t judge you. Safe space and all.”

“Yeah,” Vernon tutted, leaning back in the chair, hearing its metal hinges stretch crustily. “You’re the person I’m worried about judgin’ me.”

“To think you’d worry about anyone judging you is not in your character, is it? Unless you’re thinking something big, Vernon.” Jeonghan smiled, ducked his head a little, and there was a sudden sinisterness.

“Well,” he huffed, “maybe I am...”

The kitchen was silent for a moment. Outside, he could hear the tall grass rustling in the evening wind, and when Vernon looked out the doorway onto the porch, he remembered all those nights in one big rush of nostalgia. Moo always manned the barbecue. Dots always controlled the music. Snozz made the drinks and passed out mint Swishers. Vernon would keep the little bonfire going, and across from him—in the translucent areas of hot flames—Jeonghan would be staring up at the stars, smiling. Before he pushed all those thoughts away, Vernon heard all their different laughs blending together, hoarse with Swisher smoke and then velvety with alcohol.

He closed his eyes tightly. You see, I saved him, but I never saved myself. And then the same thing happened to Paulo. He tried to save you. Get you steady. But then he’s a corpse lying beneath his own vomit in the upstairs bedroom of a trap house.

Vernon opened his eyes again to see Jeonghan, except not through the dancing heat of an alive fire, but in the sunset fragility of a broken kitchen.

Jeonghan tapped his finger. “Did you think about you?”

“I tried to.”

“Good. That’s good. You can’t make a decision like that clearly with anyone else in mind but yourself. What will you do, Vernon?”

He held the answer on his tongue for a moment. “There’s some sort of mural outside, isn’t there? You’ve seen it, yeah?”

Jeonghan nodded. “Would you care to take a look?”

Together, they moved through the kitchen, down the rotten porch where Jade used to do her homework, and around tall heaps of untended grass well-stoked by the summer sun and rain. They each turned around to glance at the back of the house. Vernon admired the paint. The thickness of the colours. How brightly the mural stood against the golden sky. He felt his eyes prick. Little tears had gathered. Jeonghan’s hand was on his shoulder, squeezing, as Vernon felt more and more like that misguided teenager isolated into a world that had already decided things for him.

Vernon sighed, “I’ve got to leave. I’ve just gotta.”

The hand on his shoulder slipped off. “I’m glad you finally feel like you can do that now, Hansol,” Jeonghan said, his tone warmer than it ever had been. They studied the mural until the sun seeped into blackness and the yard filled with the intermittent glow of fireflies, carrying flickers of their own charged starlight.

You and Vernon returned to the art shop to finish your pictures. At first, you had overgrown with worry that they threw the paintings out after receiving an email from the business about hitting their deadline. But you emailed them back, and to your relief, they held both your pictures. It was nearing the end of summer and you wanted each other to have something as a memory. The art shop was quieter than usual. Only a few tables were occupied. The air smelled like dried watercolour, acrylic, and soap.

Much like the first time, Vernon was quiet as he painted. The little girl’s apron with the bubblegum pink and stitched butterflies was gone, so he chose a regular black apron that matched his hair. While you suspected the quietness, something about it was different. Vernon would at least swear when he made a mistake, or sigh a lot, set the canvas back onto the easel and glare at it every few minutes. But he was moving along fluidly. You didn’t want to disturb his rhythm so you stayed quiet, too, occasionally pausing to sip from your water bottle or put the brush down to rest your wrist.

He was done before you.

“I need maybe… twenty more minutes? I think?”

“That’s fine,” Vernon said, getting up from the table. “Feelin’ a little warm. Gonna sit outside on the step for a minute. Be right back.”

“Uh, okay,” you answered, unsure of how to respond while watching him push open the door to the art shop. It closed, and he was gone. Sighing, you had to trust he would tell you, and returned to your painting.

Then you were finished. You insisted on showing him the product, an intense labour of love, but Vernon shook his head, told you that it was better to wait until you were back home. The drive was quiet. Your paintings were dried under a lamp at the shop and tucked safely into a paper bag that sat in your lap. Ruby wasn’t there. Vernon wandered into your bedroom before you could offer if he wanted anything (even when you knew how capable he was of getting things himself), so you followed, strangely loathing that sticky quietness because conversation with him was one of your favourites. Laughter. He always made you laugh, get teary.

You plopped down on the end of your bed, bounced a few times.

Vernon leaned against the dresser across from you.

Setting the bag down to the floor, you reached for a stuffed toy behind you. It was filled with so much cotton that you could feel the cloudy lumps under your fingers. “Is everything okay?” You hummed.

He grasped the dresser’s edges. “Yeah, but no.”

“What’s that mean?”

Vernon looked down at his golden chain, shiny against his black t-shirt. He touched it for a moment, then looked to you and smiled, but he didn’t speak. Your fingers pushed harder into the stuffed toy, thumbs pressing the beaded eyes deep into its head until you felt bad.

“PJ’s,” he said, and his voice shook a little. “I’m leavin’.”

You blinked. Put the stuffed toy aside. “Huh? Leaving?”

He nodded, like it was too difficult to speak.

“Uh, okay. Leaving to where? For what?” You wanted to seem calm, levelled, even though you had just burst on the inside like an old pipe, emotions sputtering everywhere, stepping over each other, gripping and crawling, agony. “Is this related to Jeonghan?”

Vernon nodded again. He wiped a hand across his face, and his skin turned a little flushed from the pressure. “Yeah. I talked to him a few days ago.” The hand dropped, his fingers starting to curl in and out, flex their tendons. “I really didn’t know what I was gonna do ‘til I got there and started talkin’ to him. I feel like the answer came from my gut, y’know? It was practically singin’ to me.”

“Well, that’s good,” you said, smiling. “You can’t ignore that.”

“I have to go see my mom. My sister. In Seoul.”

Suddenly, you felt very cold. It was late summer but, in your body, it was a winter storm. Everything started to freeze over. Become hard. You couldn’t look at Vernon. Then you were shaking, wanted to reach around yourself for comfort but found that you were rusted.

“Oh…” you managed to squeeze out. “Yes. That’s important. That’s big. You should do it.”

“PJ’s…”

“No, you should go. This is your life.” You stood up, accidentally kicked the paper bag with your foot and it crinkled loudly, almost a cry. “It’s just really unexpected that’s all. But I want you to go. I do. I really do, and I was the one who made you consider it, and—”

He grabbed your arms and pulled you against him. The frigidness inside you twisted around into nothing but withering heat. For a second, you resisted, beginning to push back on him, push away, shake your head as the stinging sensation engendered water from your eyes. But you gave up the pushing the second you smelled him. It was all too familiar. It was that winter night in the front seat of his car with his bomber jacket pulled up to your chin. When his scent soothed you for the first time. Found its way to an open fold in your memory and slotted inside like a handwritten letter.

“PJ’s, you can be upset,” Vernon whispered, stroking the back of your head tenderly as you sniffled, cried, ached, into his neck. “I didn’t expect you to be okay. If you were, I might be a little fuckin’ miffed,” he laughed, and you pressed your hands hard against his chest to feel that deep, hearty vibration; let it run through his skin and into yours.

“For how long?” You mumbled, closing your eyes.

Vernon held your waist, sighed. “Dunno. As long as I need t’be.”

“And… and… you want to go… alone?”

Your face was gently lifted from the dampness of his shoulder. You saw the emotion in his eyes, full like a fat water droplet threatening to spill apart. His thumbs casted away the tears. “PJ’s, you have steadiness here. A great support circle. Maybe things aren’t always sweet but that doesn’t make it so. I want you to be here and continue leadin’ this beautiful life of yours.”

“But I want to be with you…” you sniffled, grabbing his tattooed wrists, hoping the touch of your soft fingers was a magic spell. “I know you have to go but I just can’t imagine my life if you’re not beside me.”

He nodded. Then Vernon leaned forward, and his lips were kissing the thin, fragile skin of your closed eyelids, still trembling as tears pooled underneath. “I just wanted to tell you. I didn’t want it to be another big secret, hm?” He kissed your forehead, made sure it lasted. “We can talk about it more later. Let’s try to relax.” His hands gripped your weak, sunken shoulders. “There’s some paint on your face,” he said with a tiny smile, “and some more on your arms. I think you need a shower. Want to shower?”

For a moment, you stood and thought, looking off to the side feeling hurt, confused. You let the feelings exist, but took a deep, long breath, and willed them not to control you, such that you finally lost sight of that infinite, dark chasm, bearing a gravitational pull like no other. Vernon led you into the washroom. Water started spraying from the showerhead until there was hot steam dense in the air and fog slicking the mirror. In the misty heat, you both undressed. Vernon got under the water first while you huddled at the end of the tub, wincing at the temperature of the fiery droplets.

“C’mere—” he pulled at your arm.

And you wriggled him off. “It’s too hot you maniac.”

“Feels so good though.” He tugged you again.

You shrunk against his chest, hiding from the water, but it reached you anyway. Vernon gripped your shoulders and turned you around. There was a snapping noise, and then a soapy lathering noise. Before you could ask, his hands were beginning to glide along your body, dressing you in suds that smelled tropical and peachy. Even though his hands were slippery and wet, they maintained their textured roughness, and you couldn’t help but shiver, gasp, whenever they lingered around intimate areas.

His body was firm against yours. You bit your lip while watching his long, thick fingers drag slowly up the centre of your tummy, how they stroked underneath your breasts, gliding with water. He started to kiss along your shoulder, drag his tongue to your neck, press his gritty voice far inside your ear to feel your knees wobble. “I’ll always take care of you, my love.”

Everything was different in the shower. There was more echo, inescapable wetness, dizzying heat in your head and hot water stinging in your eyes and the sloppiest moans you had ever made finding their way up your throat. But he was right. Vernon always took care of you. The shower tiles lost their coolness the more he thrusted into you, pushing your body into the wall. That tattooed hand stayed hard but attentive around your neck.

It got messier and messier, the noises of skin slapping against skin getting louder, but at least you were in the shower. Vernon pulled your head back onto his shoulder, then clutched your hips tight in his fingers, and the fact you could already sense the dermal ache of bruises forming made you grin a little bit twisted.

He kept thrusting. The fullness intoxicated you.

“Good girl,” he grunted, rubbing your throat. “You take this big dick so well now, don’t you, yeah? Moan so loud whenever I get inside this gorgeous pussy.” He hugged you against him, squeezed you. “You don’t understand—” Vernon rasped, his hips intense and working, “—I fuckin’ love you so much, PJ’s. Make me think about crazy fuckin’ shit I never even considered. Gettin’ married n’ buyin’ a stupid house n’ havin’ babies. I love you. Just some shit I gotta do first, right?” Suddenly, he couldn’t manage to speak through the orgasm that throbbed at your insides, filling you deep with heat.

After showering, washing away the stress, you and Vernon spent some time in your bedroom. You thought about cooking or ordering food.

But then his phone started to rumble on your nightstand. He groaned, lifting his head from your stomach, where your fingers had been sweeping through his damp, black tresses. Vernon pulled the phone close to him, squinted at the screen, shoved himself up with a tired sigh.

You watched him stand and pull his t-shirt back on, hiding the hard, gilded lines of his back from your fond eyes that always wandered.

“Gotta take this.” He leaned down to kiss you. “Sorry. I’ll be back.”

Once you heard the echo of the front door closing, you decided to roll off the bed and check what groceries were available in the kitchen for you to cook with. Ruby had been quite busy with work, mostly eating pre-packaged meals she bought from their cafeteria, and you had been neglecting shopping for almost a week now. You touched the loose handle on the fridge, only to be grabbed by your shoulder a second later, and then yanked backward into Ruby’s bedroom that smelled like one of her fragrancy candles.

It happened so quickly you hadn’t time to scream.

“Ruby!” You exclaimed while she shut her bedroom door. “What the heck was that? When did you come home? Have you been here all day?”

“No.” She shook her head, still dressed in her black work pants and a fancy white button-up. But her hair was down, and she scraped her fingers through the molasses-brown strands. “I got home, like, twenty minutes ago.”

“Oh…” you said, your brow coming to furrow. “Oh.”

“Yeah,” Ruby gawked, rolling her eyes. “Oh.”

Embarrassment unsheathed itself from the base of your stomach and you found that words were running off toward your mind’s distant horizon. You watched them go, blinking into twinkles, gone.

Ruby sighed, walking over to her large candle that she had lit, in a bright fuchsia jar. She inhaled the hibiscus smoke, looked at you. “I mean, I’m not upset! I promise I’m not. It just took me by surprise.” Then your roommate started laughing, unbuttoning the bottom of her shirt. “I’m pleased you two have such a prosperous sex life. At least, it sounds like it.”

Finally, your senses regrew, and you collapsed onto her bed, hands covering your eyes. “You should have slammed the door extra loud!” You cried out, laughing, too, in hiccups. “Like, five times! So we knew!”

The mattress dipped at her weight beside you. “I thought about it, but I’m not sure Vernon would care, actually. And, I consider it proper to leave you uninterrupted after my, erm, experiences in the past.”

Pulling the hands off your face, you saw Ruby’s soft expression peering down at you as she tucked a lock of thick hair behind her ear.

And you puffed out a breath, smiling. “I guess so…”

Ruby was probably your closest friend now. Naturally, you told her just about everything, including your first night with Vernon. At first, you thought it might be somewhat strange to mention it considering she had her own sexual history with him, in a different time, but it wasn’t awkward or weird at all. She wasn’t too picky when it came to detail—she was merely happy to listen as you stumbled through it—and said she would never be shy to offer advice or answer questions. So, despite your embarrassment that she heard Vernon plowing you in the damn shower, you were just relieved it was your roommate that walked in, not anybody’s parents or a friend of hers.

She sat on her side, tucked her knees up. “Babe, I’m literally jealous, if anything. But my dating life has been ultra-dry ‘cause of work.”

You decided to sit up. “What? There’re no cuties there?”

“No,” Ruby pouted, blowing out a stream of air from her lips that made some hair dance off her nose. “I mean, there are a few attractive guys, but their personality is awful, like—I don’t know—tissues.” She peeled off her ankle socks, rubbed at the indents they left against her olive skin. “I hate when attractive people think they don’t need a personality just ‘cause they’re attractive! I mean, look at me, girl. I’m the walking talking truth!”

Together, you laughed. “Never lower your standards, Ruby.”

“Yeah,” she sighed, her smile faint but remaining, “I won’t.” A flash of something reluctant passed across her face, and you noticed the restraint in her expression as she pondered, chewing her lip. But then she seemed to decide there was no reason to avoid it. “Well… I guess it makes the most sense to tell you this…” she began, and the apples of her cheeks suffused with a pretty redness. “But I’m kinda talking to Moo… I mean, he told me to call him August—Auggie—but I guess you call him Moo?”

“Ruby!” You trilled. “Are you really?!”

She nodded, pulled out the phone from her back pocket to show you the proof of a text message conversation. You scrolled through some of it while she cared to explain. “At first, I wasn’t taking it that serious. We started chatting on IG and then he asked for my number. I let the message sit for a couple days, but then I gave in.” Ruby smiled. “He’s just really funny. I like that he can entertain himself, too. And I can get him to do just about anything for me,” she snickered. “I was texting him at work that I was really craving a yogurt parfait for lunch, and those Mediterranean chips we tried one time. Then, like, just as I was about to go on my lunch, I got a buzz from the lobby. He left the snacks there for me. Isn’t that so sweet?”

You handed the phone back. “No, that is really sweet.”

Ruby nodded, put the phone away. “I mean, we’re not serious or anything, still talking and feelings things out. But… I might like him,” she said with a giggle, her hazel eyes alight as she pinched her fingers together.

“I support it,” you said, encouraging her.

“Thanks. TBD, I guess. How’s Vern doing?”

You paused, glancing over her decorative bedspread and pulling at a small thread that was much tighter than you expected it to be. Vernon had mentioned that you were the first person he told, and even though you were surging to tell Ruby—to let your emotions flow and tangle with hers in search of empathy—it wasn’t your place. So you straightened up, brushed at your bare knee, smiled. “He’s well. Like usual. I was thinking of either making dinner or ordering in? What do you think?” You asked.

“Oh, ordering in,” Ruby insisted. “He’ll pay, anyway.”

And so for dinner, Vernon ordered Souvlaki bowls. He was surprised to come back inside and find that Ruby was there, but, unlike you, he hadn’t flickered in one ounce of shame. Together, you ate at the couch and played a movie. You nibbled from your golden boiled potatoes and shovelled creamy, flavourful rice into your hungry mouth alongside a garlicky salad and strips of grilled chicken, at times wondering if Vernon was going to mention anything about his departure to Ruby. But he never said a word.

Dessert was a deep-dish marble cake from the back of the fridge, and you all scraped it apart with forks until you could see the yellow, shiny tin underneath amongst the chocolate crumbs and cheap icing. You tried not to think about how horribly you would miss this, tried to focus on the memory you were in the midst of creating as opposed to how it would feel to leave it behind. Whenever your eyes felt particularly watery, you would bury the feelings with another large mouthful of cake, to which Vernon would remove the icing from your lips with a sweep of his thumb.

Ruby eventually excused herself to her bedroom when she got a phone call from her parents. Once you and Vernon cleaned up the coffee table and kitchen counters, you went to your bedroom, too.

“Oh!” You picked up the brown paper bag. “We still have to do our paintings. It’s been long enough, hasn’t it?” He sat down next to you on the bed while you held the bag closed. “Should I just reach in and pull one out?”

“Sure.” Vernon shrugged.

“Do you think it will be mine or yours?” You hummed, your fingers picking a random canvas, the dried paint rough and full of texture.

He thought for a moment. “Yours.”

Then you pulled the canvas out. “Oh! It is mine!” You flipped it toward Vernon so he could see, your heart beating anticipatorily.

Vernon raised his sharp eyebrows. “Woah, nice,” the boy complimented, reaching out to take the picture from you. He held the canvas in both his hands, continued staring, as you took pride in the pleased edges of his impressed smile. “The old Camry, huh?” Vernon laughed. “I sent you a pic, didn’t I? I can tell you added some shine on the bumper.”

You nodded. “It was my reference photo.”

“This is fuckin’ great, PJ’s,” he said, meeting your eyeline.

Heat rubbed underneath your cheeks. “Thank you… I’m glad you like it. I know how much it means to you and everything.”

Vernon hummed, agreeing. “Guess mine’s next.”

A smile was wide and bursting on your mouth.

He snatched the brown paper bag from you. “Alright. Don’t look so damn eager, over there. I know you’re ready to see a trainwreck.” Vernon reached inside the bag, then let it drop to the floor between his legs as he pulled the canvas out. “I didn’t get the artsy bone, yeah?”

“I’m smiling so much because I’m genuinely excited!” You countered, proceeding to roughly grasp the painting from Vernon’s hand in retaliation. “I know how hard you worked on it. I was freakin’ there.” And you flipped it over, a hand immediately shooting to your mouth. “Vernon!”

The boy leaned back on his hands, shrugged. “What?”

“What is this even from?!” You exclaimed.

“Can’t you tell?”

“Am I wearing… my pony t-shirt?”

“Yeah. It’s the day I saw you for the first time. When you came outta your room.” He sat up, reached over to tap the picture. “I even drew your juice.” And you saw the funnily outlined pink glass in your hand.

“Why are my eyes so big?”

“You looked surprised as hell. Which I get. It’s not too often you see a face like mine,” he said while winking at you, and you pushed his arm. “I know it’s not perfect n’ all that. But—it’s like—one of my favourite memories. It’s how I think to like of you. Just tryin’ to drink some juice one mornin’ and then your entire life gets turned upside down. Funny, huh?”

“No. It is perfect, Vernon,” you told him, admiring the hues of effort and the gingerly painted-over mistakes and how detailed everything was in a crude mixture. “I love it. Genuinely. It’s amazing.” Then you leaned over to kiss his cheek, which felt warm and soft underneath your lips, like the surface of a blushed peach. “It’s the start of everything. Of us.”

Vernon nodded, a little sigh huffing through his nose. The sound was small but sorrowful. He stared around your room. “Yeah, the start…”

ONE MONTH AGO.

In early September, you said goodbye.

Vernon came to your apartment in the morning. Everything was exceptionally still as the sun began to rise. Its light broke through the dawn like a blossoming flower. But you were already awake, waiting, unable to sleep. In fact, you hadn’t slept properly in about a week. Instead, you dreamt in bursts, with intricate stories crammed into mere minutes of mistiness and restless tossing. But your body didn’t feel the tiredness. It could only feel that something was about to happen, and so it stayed awake in preparation.

Ruby had already said her goodbye. For the past two weeks she had been away in Tuscany visiting her sick grandmother, alongside her parents and some other relatives. Family was paramount to them. She was coming back tomorrow tonight and you planned to surprise her at the airport.

As it turned out, you hadn’t gotten Catherine Love’s assistant position. Tara didn’t either, and she came into her shift crying, blowing her reddened nose with a tissue while Lara helped her into the locker room, taking the purse off her friend’s shoulder while you sat next to Tara on the little bench, rubbing her back. She calmed down with you and Lara squeezing her soft, slender hands, and you had to admit it felt strange to hold a hand that wasn’t rough and hardened with earned callouses.

“I’m so lucky to have friends like you guys,” Tara sniffled.

A letter eventually came to your mailbox. You were pulling out crumpled fliers, advertisements, and old subscriptions from unchanged addresses, and you nearly tossed a blank, white envelope addressed to you straight into the mail room’s recycling bin. But you noticed the name at the top left corner, written in neat black pen that looked like perfect computer font—Diana Basu—and you gripped the envelope so tightly that you left behind imprints of your sweaty fingertips. Back in your apartment, you stood at the kitchen counter while recovering a handwritten letter from Diana.

In the first few sentences, she explained her decision to apply for Catherine’s assistant position, and she got the job. Diana wrote about getting ready to leave for Seoul. She wrote about her new sense of freedom and lightness, how she broke up with Darian, how a friend from the Sherwood narcotic’s group had helped her journey into steadfast sobriety, and, finally, that so many positive changes had happened to her because of you. That you had never stopped caring.

She wrote that it was your best quality.

You read the sentence over and over again, feeling the penned words become ink in your eyes glossy with tears. Then you saw her updated phone number written along the bottom of the paper, a small smiley face beside it—the same face she would doodle onto the corner of your notebooks during boring, clock-watching lectures—and you suddenly hugged the letter to your chest like it was her.

Before you came outside the apartment to see Vernon, you quickly stepped into Ruby’s old slippers whose heels were thin and flatly worn. The early air was still holding onto summer’s languorous heat, but there was permeating coolness now, and it felt fresh against your arms and legs. There he was, leaned against the vanilla car, dressed in a prim jean jacket you had never seen before with a white t-shirt underneath. He smiled at you, raised his dark eyebrows, and it somehow felt like the very first time—your heart remembering itself, that it could beat that rapidly for another person.

The morning stillness blurred around you.

His golden eyes embraced you before anything else, his sun-kissed summer skin reflecting the morning light in radiance. “Nice to see the famous shirt before I go. Startin’ to think you burned it.”

“This shirt is literal history. This is its own Library of Alexandria.”

“I’m sure the shirt feels charmed.”

You smiled, and then stood on your toes, attempting to peer around him and into the backseat. “Uh, where’s all your luggage?”

“Didn’t have much. Just a suitcase in the trunk. Auggie and Danny took some old stuff from my pad. And then I sold some other shit.”

You nodded. “Did Jeonghan wire you the money?”

“I told him to wire the guys.”

“Oh.” You blinked. “That’s good. But you didn’t take any?”

Vernon shook his head. “Nah. I’ve got enough. Whatever. But there are some leftovers if you need it. Jeonghan said so. I know you didn’t take the money from Minghao so I doubt you’ll take this. But it’s there regardless”

Crossing your arms, you laughed. “I wouldn’t know how to get it.”

“Just ask Auggie or Danny. And I’m not sure that’s true. You’re a lot fuckin’ sneakier than you let on,” Vernon chuckled, tilting his head.

You approached him, flattened out the collar of his jacket, tried not to breathe in his amber musk but doing so anyway because you never wanted the sentimental smell and all the memories it harboured to dissipate. “I like to call it resourceful,” you answered, flicking your tongue along your teeth. “But sneaky works, too.”

It was hard to stomach that you were his last goodbye.

Vernon didn’t know how long he was going to be in Seoul. He often said he didn’t know if anything was going to work out. Maybe he would see his mother’s face, softened by age, for the first time in years and feel deep in his bones that he was not ready. Or maybe he would sense the relief casting over him like raindrops that he was letting the weight finally fall. Regardless, it was time for his own quest of sorts. One that would not support your relationship as the distance stretched and his world opened in difficult, painful ways.

If Vernon was meant to come back, if you were meant to be, then you trusted the universe to handle your rekindling. You had already cried enough repeating the thought to yourself when nights were especially sleepless. Sometimes it was solacing.

And if not solacing then tormenting.

Like most thoughts were.

“Well,” you hummed thoughtfully, tucking your hands behind your back so he wouldn’t notice how they quivered, “you should get going, considering how terrible you are with time. It would be kinda awkward if you missed your flight and had to reschedule everything and we needed to do this a second time.” You laughed together, his nose crinkled like a rabbit. “Is the Camry coming with you to Seoul?”

“That would be sweet, huh? But the Camry's gonna get signed over to Auggie. He'll pick it up from the airport with Danny. Hey—he said he'd sell it to you for a cheap price, once you get your licence, of course. How's that sound, PJ's? Think you can handle the Camry?”

“Maybe. With a good driving teacher.”

“Ask Danny about that. Moo just grips it and rips it,” Vernon said.

“Sounds no different from you,” you teased.

Vernon cupped your cheek. “You wouldn't like me as a teacher. We'd spend more time in the backseat than the front.”

And you pressed on his chest, leaning back to loudly laugh, only to feel him encase you in his arms, his lips skimming the sensitive skin of your throat. “Okay, okay!” You giggled. “You'll be late!”

“No chance,” Vernon hummed, and his tattooed hands moved to hold your cheeks. “I can be responsible sometimes, yeah?”

You nodded, spoke in a broken whisper, “I know.” Promptly, your hands settled overtop his, brushing your fingers over his fingers, feeling his scuffed knuckles, his scratched skin. Your eyes closed for a moment and you felt the burning embellishment of a new memory, bittersweet, sink deep into your brain. “I’m really going to miss you,” came the fragile confession of total obviousness, half-stuck in your congested throat that was beginning to close up.

“I know, lovely girl. I’ll miss you, too, yeah?” Vernon said.

But the tears stayed in place, sealed by your own will. “And you have to come back at some point. Out of principal. You still owe me molotes and a new canteen. Don’t you dare forget. Moocher.”

He chuckled with an emotional rasp, the edges of his eyes wrinkling, his smile full. “I won’t. Not with your threat hangin’ over me.”

“If you’re going to use my canteen, at least fill it with some quality soju or something. I’ll know if you don’t. I have good spidey senses.”

“Not better than mine.”

“That’s debatable.”

“Smartass.”

“Remember your manners, too.”

“You know I have manners.”

“Yes—optional manners—of which you never choose the option to have manners. You know that Diana will be down there.”

“Is she your informant now?”

“She could be.” You grasped the edges of his jacket and pulled him close, enough to press your forehead against his and spurn out the sunlight from dazzling between unnecessary spaces that were meant for your energies, instead. “So you best behave, Hansol.”

He kissed you, lips flush and sacred on yours. A part of you wanted to kick and scream, tear everything into slivers, crush the sun between your ferocious hands until the fire oozed out like magma and darkness fell like a stage curtain. But another part of you was tranquil, and it felt every second of the intimate kiss, every movement, every emotion that combined into singularity at the warmth of your soft mouths. Your fingers swept down the tattoos on his wrists, touching the ink for the last time, holding their enigmatic stories.

“Okay,” Vernon sighed. “I should hit the road, PJ’s.”

“Yes.” You nodded, beginning to let him go. “Drive safely.”

He opened the door to the car. It suddenly stung, and you struggled to compute that his body had drifted away with the faintness of fog. Then he lowered himself into the seat. The door was pulled shut, and its echo embraced the quietness in the early September air.

You listened to the engine start. Its rumble. One you hated to hear but then grew to love because it meant your person was just outside, waiting for you. Then the car was moving. It started to roll. Roll away. You took a few steps forward, slippers scuffing down the centre of the road, wanted to chase that damn car and the charming, silver-tongued boy inside who had unnegotiably changed your life.

But you didn’t.

Instead, you studied the Camry until it disappeared.

Outside, stillness of movement and sound returned. The summer's dulled heat flirted with the incoming autumn coolness in some sort of persuasion to stay longer. You returned indoors.

While Vernon was gone, you knew part of him would always linger.

Almost like a ghost.