picture this. youβre sixteen, new to town, wide-eyed and stumble-footed. youβre still waiting for the penny to drop. you dream that your mum wakes you with a packed suitcase and a smile bigger than sheβs ever given you, a grinning and self-effacing never mind! april fools! get up, lazy bum, weβre going home!
it doesnβt come. days become weeks. at school, you were the shiny new toy long enough for the tiny year level of only twenty-six other kids to determine that youβre just as dull as everyone else in this town. youβre from a flyspeck nowhere just like here, but at least your nowhere had places you knew, faces you recognised, haunts you traced with bike tracks and footprints. your new pastor has a droning voice that is somehow impossible to let fade into background noise. your mum hangs desperately onto every word as if theyβre spoken to her directly. you canβt remember the last time she looked at you like that.
thereβs a boy at school called ryan. in class, he leans back in his chair until the front legs lift off the floor, balancing on two plastic points against ancient carpet. he throws ripped chunks of his rubber at his friends when theyβre not looking. he never brings books or a pencil case to class, snickers in the back when the teachers are talking, mocks the girl with braces like all the other boys. when he smiles, you count his perfect white teeth. when heβs concentrating, he traces them with his tongue. you imagine how it might feel to replace his tongue with yours. it frightens you. at lunchtime, you sit on the edge of the oval alone watching fluffy clouds drift away, leaving you behind. ryan plays footy no matter the weather and ends most school days with dirt and grass stains on his uniform. in the change-rooms before phys ed, you watch him undress from the corner of your eye and pretend to be focused on tying up your shoes. all of him is golden, even the creamy skin of his stomach and thighs. you imagine how it would feel under your hands. it frightens you. sometimes you look up and find him already watching. and he doesnβt look away or pretend he wasnβt staring. your gazes lock and you can feel him peeling something away to look at a piece of you youβve always worked to hide. it frightens you.
it happens almost by accident. your bike is next to his in the bike shed. you arrive at the same moment one afternoon. he sometimes has a milk crate lashed to the back for his schoolbag and the sight of it makes you smile. you can feel that searching gaze as you unlock your bike from the rack. he just looks at you, hands on the handlebars and both feet still firmly planted on the cement floor. come on, he eventually says, swinging a leg over the worn leather seat. i wanna show you something.
you ride behind him and watch sweat darken the back of his shirt under the empty blue sky. you imagine how it might taste and it frightens you. the bikes are abandoned beside a gumtree losing its bark and he leads you through yellow grass that gives his hair a golden cast. youβre watching him, entranced by the stiffness in his movement. that languid, cool confidence is replaced by a kind of mechanical swaggerβa boy playing at casualness and failing terribly. you canβt imagine why heβs trying so hard to seem tough. youβre so hypnotised by his performance that you nearly step on the snake with the frog in its mouth. when you rear back, yelling in shock and fear, ryanβs delight is cruel and his high, mocking laughter makes you feel hot and bristly. he prods the snake with a stick. his jibes land, the jab about a fear of heights, the rolling eyes. they all sting and you try not to let it show.
the floor in the abandoned mill is soaked in sunlight. motes of dust spin in the air, kicked up by your feet and the bits of refuse you throw around the space together. you snap into stillness at his warningβfunnel web, on your shoulderβand something ugly cracks inside you when it turns out to be another tease at your expense. youβre snarling fuck you, cunt before you can think and in another moment youβre both on that warm floor, twisting and wrestling and all you want is for him to cut to the fucking chase and tell you why youβre really here, and his body is hot on top of yours and his hands are tight around your wrists and that light-spun golden hair is falling in his eyes and heβs watching you glance at the place where heβs holding you down and your chest is tight and bursting and aching and his sudden kiss comes down so hard that you forget everything else that came before.
you wrench out of the kiss by instinct. his hands release your wrists. youβre panting now, staring up at him. heβs still. his face is open. you look at the softness of his parted lips and remember wanting to lick his perfect white teeth, wanting to taste his sweat, wanting to feel his body under your palms, and it puts a lightness in your belly that youβre convinced would have you floating away if not for his weight. you drag him down and try to kiss that lightness into his mouth.
the act melts away. he cups the back of your head as if youβre something fragile and runs his fingers through your hair. when you pull back to look at one another you find the lightness behind his eyes and something in you sings. he presses you down, all warmth and tenderness and a gentle hand moving low, a soft mouth against your neck. you turn your head to find yourselves reflected. you see the blurred shape of his hand moving over you, see how your head is tilted back in pleasure and your body presses up into his touch. you watch him peel it all away to reveal a piece of you youβve worked all your life to hide. it frightens you. you jerk away as if burned.
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