#wardrafe

Rafe’s sweat tastes like cedar wood and sugar. Addicts crave sugar, desperate for anything that lights up those tricky receptors. If they can’t get a fix, they get a bag of Nerds Gummy Clusters. JJ loved it as a kid, his home always stocked with teeth-rotting confections for those rare weeks Luke tried to kick his habit. It makes JJ sickeningly nostalgic as he mouths at Rafe’s flesh, breathing in the scent of him that’s both masculine and manufactured. He put on too much cologne before coming here, the acrid after taste sticking to JJ’s tongue.

Nobody’s perfect.

They don’t do it like this often, with JJ on his knees and Rafe laid back -- a beautiful sight all whimpering and squirmy -- but it’s not Rafe that’s in control. No matter what they do, whether he gives or receives, JJ’s always got the upper hand. He feels it as he devastates Rafe with just a few licks, turning the boy inside out with the power of his fist and mouth. He’s got his free hand on Rafe’s chest, feeling that hummingbird heart and the vibrations of his groans bash against his palm. JJ’s skin is on fire, sweaty and hot with need and aggravated by the brain-numbing hold Rafe’s got on his hair. No matter how many times they do this, JJ always gets so worked up he feels like he could burst from his own body and splatter the walls with gore Toxic Avenger style.

It’d be more colorful than the faded, torn posters and smoke stains that currently act as wall dressing in his dismal bedroom.

JJ fucking hates this room. Hates this house. It’s a shit box filled with junk, the epitome of the Cut. There’s no shame in being a Pogue, no shame in fighting tooth and nail against a system designed to ass-fuck you on the daily, but there is shame in the Maybank House. He wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t convenient. Word got back to JJ a few days ago that Luke had been arrested again and the Chateau was as prohibido for hookups as can get, so this house with its peeling paint and decayed wood finally has a purpose other than a cage to lock JJ in.

JJ likes keeping his eyes open when he gives head. The best part is seeing what he can do to Rafe, how overwhelmed and flushed he can get. Back arched and the flat, stretched out planes of his body on display, JJ wishes he could capture this moment forever. He knows Rafe has some complex about his looks, always fixing his hair and checking himself in every reflective surface he comes across, but the guy’s got no idea he’s a walking Venus. JJ wants to tell him, but he shows him instead.

He’s got Rafe right where he wants him, panting and shuddering and just on the verge of bliss when the front door slams shut.

JJ jerks back and smacks his hand over Rafe’s mouth as the Cameron boy’s come splatters across his own belly. JJ’s gaze snaps to his shut bedroom door, his eyes shifting left and right. He tries to think through the blind panic suddenly skyrocketing through his already fucked nervous system, but it doesn’t make sense. Dad’s supposed to be in jail. No Maybank ever got arrested without seeing iron bars for at least six months. It could be a burglar, but there was nothing here of value to take. Rafe is frozen beneath him; the walls hold their breath.

“JJ? You here?” Luke’s voice doesn’t so much as echo through the house but ricochet off the walls, making JJ flinch. It hits him like a bullet, settling in the meat of his heart. There’s a way out of this, an escape route somewhere, JJ just has to find it.

“Window,” Rafe says, and JJ finally looks at him. He’s flushed and panting for entirely different reasons than before and instead of terror, he’s got that blank look that’s all survival instinct. JJ’s relieved by it, anchors himself to that calculating stare.

Shaking his head, JJ swallows thickly, the taste of Rafe still heady on his tongue. “Nailed shut,” He says in a hushed voice. “My bike’s out front. He knows I’m here.”

A crash makes them both jump like surprised cats.

“JJ! Come the fuck out! Your dad’s a free man!” Luke calls down the hall, followed by a laugh like out of tune piano keys. JJ jolts back on his heels and stands. He knows better than to make his father wait. The longer they hide in here, the higher the likelihood of Luke coming to search for his son. Frantically grappling on the floor for fabric he recognizes, he finds his clothes and hurls Rafe’s at him. After throwing on his shirt, JJ runs his hands through his tousled hair. “I got a plan,” He says while Rafe dresses, his words as rapid as his breathing. He rubs at his chest to will his heart to calm the fuck down, but the damn thing ain’t listening. “The back door’s busted -- he’ll hear it. Just- Just let me go out there and distract him. If I get him into the kitchen, you can go out the front.” Rafe’s barely got his shirt on when JJ takes him by the shoulders and hauls him to his feet. “Tell me you’re listening, Cameron.”

Despite Rafe’s blank look, he’s trembling. JJ can smell his fear, as much as he’s trying to hide it, but the nod he gives him is response enough..

“Five minutes,” JJ assures him with a squeeze of his shoulders. He turns then and forces his features into a bored expression before opening his bedroom door. He’s lied to Luke before, pretended to be straight when he was blazed out of his mind, skirted around flunked classes and calls from school. He can do this. Easy peasy.

The hallway’s thankfully vacant. JJ hears movement from the living room and puts one foot before the other, following the noise. Luke must be on the couch, JJ can hear the springs whine under sturdy weight as he ventures closer to the living room. He passes dusty picture frames, askew where they hang on the wall from Luke’s hand shooting out to steady himself. JJ’s found him face down in this very hall more times than he can count. Turning the corner, JJ is face to face with his father.

Luke hasn’t shaved in a few days, his cheeks dusted with that greying bristle. He looks to be in a good mood, and history tells JJ to be on guard. The worst ideas Luke had ever had always came consequent to that rare excitement. He knows he should say something, but he can’t make the words out. It’s not about Rafe anymore, but the smile his father is wearing. Stretched thin, hungry.

Luke pats the seat next to him. “My boy! Get over here, spend some time with your old man. Need a bit of normalcy,” He says, and JJ’s chest starts buzzing again. Light is streaming through the thin yellow curtains, painting the living room the color of nicotine and highlighting the microscopic flurries in the air. Dust and dead skin float about like powdered sugar. “You would not believe what happened to me.”

JJ moves towards the kitchen, praying Luke gets his ass off the couch soon. He can’t look back down the hall to see if Rafe’s still in the bedroom, his eyes glued to his father out of habit. “Yeah, about that,” JJ says. He leans against the entryway to the kitchen, grips the chipped wood trim. His thumb nail scratches at the paint, digging in. “Heard you got picked up.” Luke laughs, but there’s a shadow in his eyes that makes JJ’s hackles rise. The urge to run is as innate as breathing, but JJ manages to shove it down. “Dumb fucks didn’t have a thing on me. They just held me for a few days while they tried to find something to pin on me. Your Dad’s as clean as a whistle,” Luke says as he stretches out on the couch, his arm resting on the back of it. He looks at his son, and JJ sees the moment that excitement veers straight into disappointment. “That’s why you’re here, huh? ‘Cause I’m not supposed to be? That hurts, kid. That hurts.”

JJ looks away, clenching his jaw against the wave of guilt that wraps itself around his chest. Why the fuck would he want to be here, surrounded by useless crap and a life unlived? But Dad’s been here alone, like he has all his life. A sad man in a sad house, both decomposing at the same rate. JJ chews on the inside of his cheek, bracing himself against warring emotions. He wants to beg Luke for forgiveness as much as he wants to leap across the cluttered coffee table and attack him. “I’ll make something to eat, yeah?” He manages to croak. “Come pop a seat at la mesa.”

Luke doesn’t move. He’s smiling again, and somehow that’s worse. “Nah, nothin’ in there anyway,” He says, and pats the space beside him again. “C’mere, JJ. Give your old man some time.”

JJ has to dig his nails into the skin of his palm to keep from looking back down the hallway. Dad’s on the side of the couch facing the hall, which means if JJ can just make sure Luke’s front stays turned towards him, he won’t see Rafe leaving out the front door. It’s an imperfect, risky plan more likely to fail than succeed, but he can tell Luke’s offer isn’t a request.

It’s a demand.

The walk to the sofa takes hours and seconds all at once. JJ blinks and he’s there, being pulled down onto his seat by Luke who puts his arm around his son’s shoulders. It should be nice, JJ knows it should, but his skin itches all over. Dad smells like cigarettes and heat and his hand is dry and calloused where he’s gripped JJ’s bicep. The couch is small and low, forcing them to sit hip-to-hip. No matter how much he tries to lean to the side and make space, his father’s hold is unforgiving.

“You’re still a kid, JJ. You’re still my kid.”

JJ’s staring at the bottle of pills on the table, toppled over on its side. He knows if he examined the label, it wouldn’t be Luke’s name he’d find. What a way to celebrate.

“I’ve been thinking about you. Not much else to do when you’re packed like sardines in a cell,” Luke says, turning inwardly to press his forehead to JJ’s temple. His hand raises to JJ’s head, rugged fingers threading through his wild thicket of hair. “When’s the day gonna come that you leave me for good, huh?

“Dad, don’t-”

“That’s what you do, kid. You’re a leaver, a runner. All my effort raisin’ you for nothin’.”

JJ grimaces and feels his heart lurch. He can’t do this, can’t breathe. Every word his father speaks settles on his skin like coarse wool in the middle of summer. He wants to wipe at his face, lift the accusations from his skin, but he can’t move.

“I’m not going anywhere, Dad,” JJ says, staring at his hands in his lap. He toys with the ratty strings that hang from his woven bracelets, twisting them around his finger until the bone aches and his skin turns purple. “I’ve just been with-”

“I know who you’ve been with.”

JJ seizes up, but his trepidation melts into noxious consolidation as his father continues.

“Those friends of yours,” Luke grumbles, digging his forehead into JJ’s temple. His nose is against JJ’s cheek, making JJ break a sweat. Can he smell Rafe’s cologne on his skin, sniff out the acts that had been so unfairly interrupted? “Useless little street rats, just like you.” It’s an old argument, one that JJ really isn’t in the mood to revisit. “Dad, I-”

Luke tightens his hold in JJ’s hair and yanks his head back. JJ can just barely shift his gaze to look at his father and sees a blur of fury. “Don’t talk back to me, JJ,” Luke warns, his voice low. “You’re ruining my good time.”

It takes a beat, but Luke finally releases his grip. JJ’s head falls forward with a wince, a pounding ache already forming behind his eyes. His skin feels tight, suffocating. There’s no air in the room, just Luke’s breath and his free hand, all over JJ now like he’s trying to rub life back into him. It makes sense when Luke takes hold of JJ’s wrist and moves the boy’s hand to his crotch. JJ goes limp and tense all at once as he calculates the risk in resisting. He hasn’t moved his hand and Luke’s grip tightens, dirty nails boring into his skin. His father must be tired of their foreplay.

“Make it up to me, kid. Show me why I haven’t kicked you to the curb yet.”

“I can’t,” JJ wheezes and attempts to jerk away, but Luke’s got his hand in a vice grip. In a flash the hand in JJ’s hair is now an arm around his throat, cutting off air.

“Do it, boy,” Luke orders through grit teeth. The headlock’s got JJ’s head swimming as he tries to suck in air. His cheeks feel as hot as an iron, the rest of his body numb. “I won’t ask twice.”

Tears leak from the corner of JJ’s eyes as he blinks, his jaw clenched tight. It’s nothing he hasn’t done before and nothing he won’t do again. His hands are shaking as he reaches for his father’s belt, clumsily unbuckling it. The zipper is easier, but it still feels like he’s moving in slow motion, like he’s swimming through honey.

Breathe in. Out. In. Out.

Dad’s arm relaxes just a fraction as JJ pulls out his dick. Half hard and swelling quick, the prick is massive in his hand and slightly purple in hue. It pulses against his palm with Luke’s heartbeat, giving the illusion that it’s some disconnected organ with its own sentience, a naked critter JJ had found in the backyard and brought inside for inspection.

It doesn’t take effort to move his hand how his father likes it, twisting his wrists on the upstroke. The motion is practiced, hardwired. He could do this blind. Luke leans back against the couch, his head turned towards his son and rewards the boy with groans of approval. It’s the closest thing to appreciation JJ will ever get.

JJ’s got his bottom lip between his teeth, ripping away skin as he keeps his attention on his hand, up and twist and down, up and twist and down. Luke’s breathing is fast and hot, trembling beside him and gripping his hand. JJ’s not good at much, but he’s good at this.

Luke’s arm around his neck relaxes a fraction more, and JJ heaves great gasping breaths through his teeth as air whooshes down his windpipe. The blur clears from his eyes, and in trying to focus he raises his gaze. The front door’s still shut. The living room is still in clunky disarray. Rafe is standing at the mouth of the hallway.

Rafe.

JJ doesn’t know how long he’s been standing there, staring at them, and he doesn’t want to. Bile rises up his throat, making him choke around his father’s headlock. He keeps moving his hand, squeezing and stroking the way he’s been trained. And Rafe keeps staring. He looks like a mannequin, stiff and expressionless, but even from across the room JJ can see his eyes.

Dead.

JJ searches for rage or disgust in that handsome face, but all he’s met with is Rafe’s unfeeling gaze. It rips JJ open more than anything, more than the knowledge that Rafe has been given front row tickets to JJ’s deepest shame. Everyone knows about the beatings and broken bones, but no one knows about this. Now Rafe has the reason for JJ’s interest, the missing piece that has been hanging over their hookups since the beginning.

JJ could smell Ward on him, and now Rafe will forever smell Luke on JJ.

Luke is close, JJ can tell by the way his father’s got his face buried in JJ’s hair and gasping. He sounds pained and JJ moves his hand faster, harder, praying his heart gives out and this can be over with. JJ tries to motion to the front door with his eyes, urging Rafe to get the fuck out while he can, but Rafe isn’t moving.

When he finally does step out from the shadows, JJ sees the crowbar in his hand. He must have picked it up in the hall, left by Luke at some point along with everything else. Step by step, Rafe nears the couch, those porcelain doll eyes of his never once wavering from the scene before him. Panic and need surge through JJ like rolling lightning, making him pant from the intensity of it. It would be so easy to let Rafe smash in his father’s skull. JJ can already feel the blood splatter across his face, taste brain matter. One swing and none of this will matter anymore. One swing and JJ will never have to do this again.

But this is his father. Luke had raised him, taught him to walk and ride a bike, saved him from closet monsters and left candy under his pillow after every lost tooth. He’s not some inhuman thing to exterminate, but a sad, angry man. He is JJ’s blood, his only blood. Rafe’s got family and money and a future, but all JJ has is this house of flies and regret.

Shaking his head as subtly as he can, JJ blinks back tears as he mouths the word No, and finally an emotion cracks through Rafe’s mask. JJ watches as he stops in the middle of the living room, his brow furrowed in confusion. He watches as that confusion shifts, transforms into a rage far more chilling than the numb void he had first encountered.

Luke’s moaning now, gripping JJ as hard as he can as his hips buck up against his son’s hand, and for a split second JJ knows Rafe won’t listen. He’s expecting the crowbar to come slicing through the air, for his father’s pleasure to be his final memory of him, but then Rafe turns. He’s out the door as quickly and silently as possible, the click of the latch silenced by the sound of Luke’s orgasm.

In a splash of white, it’s over.

JJ wipes his hand on the stained upholstery and yanks himself out of his father’s grip. He’s bolting as fast as he can; now that his duty is done, Luke doesn’t try to stop him. Skull pounding with every step, JJ’s out the door before he can blink. He needs to get away, make as much space between him and Dad as fast as he can. He starts walking without direction, figuring he’ll end up at the Chateau eventually. He’s too fucked in the head to turn back for his bike, but John B can pick it up later. Every inch of JJ is on fire and he tugs at his hair, still chewing on his lip like a teething infant. It feels like he’s at the top of a rollercoaster and any second he’ll come barreling down.

But the drop doesn’t come, just that horrible anticipation of being suspended in air.

*

Rafe starts running the second he shuts the door behind him, throwing the crowbar in the dead grass. He can’t get the images out of his head no matter how fast he sprints away from the Maybank house. All he sees is JJ, crying as he jerks off Luke, his red, puffy face trapped in Luke’s arm. The need to turn back and kill the fucker is still present and Rafe has to bash the impulse away with every step. He doesn’t get why JJ stopped him. He doesn’t get why he listened.

He doesn’t get how Luke can do that to his own son.

It wasn’t like Ward, who Rafe came to first, who had to be convinced. It wasn’t careful and quiet and consoling. It was forced. Brutal.

After two or so blocks, Rafe stops to vomit into someone’s weed-infested lawn, uncaring if the homeowner comes out to scold him. He doesn’t have a handle on himself, can’t make sense of his own thoughts. In his left ear is Luke’s revolting groans of pleasure, in his right is endless screaming.

It isn’t until his retching stops that Rafe realizes the screaming was him. Spitting one last time into the grass, Rafe straightens and wipes his mouth, his eyes. He didn’t think about the consequences when he saw JJ like that. He didn’t think about a dead body he would have to get rid of or blood he would have to clean. He hadn’t thought anything at all, except that JJ was being hurt and he had to stop it.

The realization hits Rafe like a brick to the face and he rubs at his brow, desperate to calm his erratic emotions. Man up, his father would say. It doesn’t matter that you nearly killed a man in his own home. It doesn’t matter that JJ’s been his dad’s bitch for who knows how long. Just get to the car and go home, forget it ever happened. Forget it ever happened. Forget it ever happened. Forget it ever happened.

Rafe spots JJ and all that bullshit goes out the window.

JJ passes him, but Rafe’s on his ass in two strides. He snatches JJ by the shoulder and yanks him back to face him. In an instant they’re nearly chest-to-chest and Rafe’s stomach drops to his knees. JJ’s is still red-faced and puffy, his eyes swollen from fighting tears. His mouth is pinched, his bottom lip bloody from how much skin he’s bitten off. And his neck. That soft neck that Rafe has kissed and bitten and buried his face in has become a graveyard of dark, irritated bruises.

The sight makes Rafe want to vomit all over again.

JJ jerks his shoulder in Rafe’s grip. “Get the fuck off me!” He barks, shoving Rafe away.

But Rafe doesn’t budge, unable to take his eyes off the mass of still-forming bruises that encircle JJ’s neck. “Why did you make me stop?” He snaps, his anger mounting all over again. Instead of hot he feels cold, like his whole body is numb. Like he’s capable of anything. “You have a problem and I could've fixed it! One fucking swing and you're a free man!”

JJ steps forward and shoves Rafe again, this time hard enough to make him stumble back. JJ’s not crying anymore, but he's still shaking. Even his words come out wobbly. Rafe feels dizzy from it, caught off balance. “How about I pay Big Daddy a visit instead?” JJ says, his tone mocking. “One swing and you're a free man, yeah?”

Rafe surges forward and grabs JJ by the jaw. JJ doesn’t even flinch, just stares him down, and Rafe hates him for it. “Shut your goddamn mouth,” Rafe threatens, his hold on JJ's mandible tightening. Finally the Pogue squirms, and Rafe releases him in turn.

“What's the difference, Rafe?” JJ asks as he rubs the ache from his face. Rafe backs up, not liking that look in JJ's eyes. It's too knowing, too intimate. He feels naked under that gaze, like JJ can see right through him. “What's the difference between what you saw back there and what Ward does to you?”

Rafe doesn’t have an answer for him.

Against his better judgement, Rafe drives JJ to John B's place. Other than giving directions, the ride is silent. He runs a red-light at some point, nearly swerves into a passing car. Everything still feels scattered and Rafe can't quite catch up. When he sneaks a glance at JJ, the kid looks … gone. He's always so annoyingly hyper, so goofy even when they fuck, that it's weird to see him subdued. It's irritating, like an itch Rafe can't reach.

It all feels like a bad acid trip by the time Rafe is pulling into the driveway of what JJ bizarrely referred to as The Chateau. He's vaguely worried about whomever might be inside spotting him, but not enough to throw JJ out the car and drive off. The human thing would be to apologize, Rafe's pretty sure, but he doesn't feel guilty for what he almost did. What he wanted very, very badly to do.

Rafe puts his car in park and tenses his fingers around the wheel, squeezes the leather until his knuckles turn white. “Don't go back there,” He says, and looks over at John B's house. “You could live here, couldn't you?”

JJ sighs and Rafe catches him rubbing at his neck in his periphery. “You're a lot of things, Cameron, but you're not dumb,” He says, his words heavy in a way that makes Rafe want to rip him apart and put him back together until he resembles the boy Rafe remembers. He sighs again, exaggerating this time. “Fine, how about we make a deal. I'll leave when you do.”

JJ gets out of the car then, slamming the door shut behind him. Against his better judgement, Rafe watches him go up the driveway and disappear into the Chateau before taking off for Tannyhill.

His jaw is hung open, frozen in the middle of a snore, and he feels scruff when he reaches up to scratch his cheek. Nothing he could ever grow himself. 

The silk sheets are empty on the other half. Moonlight seeps in through the thick shutters, the fan lazily spins around. He couldn’t possibly sleep in a room this fucking cold and goosebumps erupt down his hirsute arms. 

It isn’t the gilded frame of a family portrait on the nightstand that gives it away. It’s not the maroon curtains Rose picked out that caused the dumbest fucking argument some years ago. It’s not even the gleaming stack of tasteful rings and watches on the nightstand accrued over years of birthdays, Father’s Days; the echoing weight of guilt that nestles behind his sternum could have only come from Ward. And now it’s in his own chest. 

Getting out of bed is a labor he couldn’t have possibly expected; his father is an older man, but he’s not old. His lower back is tight, shoulders sore until he rolls them out. Rafe stretches into the folds of his father’s body, assuming every limb and corner years before he thought he’d have to. He ignores how natural it feels. 

He moves like the undead down the hall— one leg in front of the other, all cerebellum, guiding him to the door he retreated behind hours ago. He knows the knob will turn smoothly; he’s never been allowed to have a lock. 

Rafe stares down at his own body, in his own bed. Lithe, sculpted along the mattress and clinging a pillow to his chest. His face is pressed so hard into the sheets that it smushes his mouth into a funny position, each soft breath out catching his lip. Ward must have the opposite problem occupying his son’s bedroom— the duvet has been kicked off the bed entirely. Exposed. 

Revenge fantasies are old friends of Rafe’s. They’re just typically on the defense: running away, stealing as much as he can from the safe before he leaves, escaping the unwanted touch once and for all. Never reciprocation. The day he’d outgrow his father always felt further away than the day he’d forgive him. He was not weak, he was just weaker. Not anymore. 

His fingers slide through the auburn hair so easily, slotting into their rightful space. Ward stirs, unfamiliar with the claiming touch, at least after so long. He blinks twice, lids swollen with dreams, and is clearly horrified to be woken up by his own figure hovering over the bed. 

Ward tries to scramble away, digging for traction on the polyester sheets and getting nothing, especially with the grip on his scalp. 

“What the f—?” he squeaks, kicking up and landing a small blow on Rafe’s— Ward’s torso. It’s nothing to him. A bunny thump. 

“Hi, Dad.” It claws out, a phrase unpracticed by the older man’s throat and sand-smooth upon delivery. Realization ivy-creeps on Ward’s face— where he is, who he is. Who’s holding him by the follicles and bloodthirsty. 

A hand too used to holding the rod doesn’t remember how to hide from one. 

The first few blows are fucking ecstasy. He hardly knows where to start, opting for an open palm at first and striking his own face on each side until a surge of anger inspires him to use his knuckles. The sound is dense, flesh on flesh, carving holes in his stomach quickly replaced by rage until it’s all he can taste. His father can’t predict where the next hit will come from, and each lands at full power on his now-delicate face. Bone crunches against the soft of his nose cartilage, and Rafe allows Ward to tumble backwards onto the bed. Streams of blood leak from his nostrils, down his t-shirt and over his linens. 

That’s my fucking shirt! he thinks before remembering the obvious. That’s my body. If this— when this is fixed, when he lies down and closes his eyes again and reawakens in his own body, he will have to face the damage his ire creates. Temporary suffering for Ward, scarring for himself. How typical. 

Rafe stalks back over to the bed, grabs the soiled shirt by the collar and yanks Ward up. He smears the blood away with his thumb, wipes it on his father’s trousers. New plan. 

“Take your clothes off.” My clothes. Should be an order he’s used to. 

The color drains from his angular face, only remaining in the tip of his nose and his shiny lips where his tongue darts out. “You gonna fuck me?” Ward hisses, eyes dragging up and down his body. Chest heaving. It’s delicious to see him so afraid. 

“No,” Rafe growls, pulling at the string of the dark flannel pants he woke up in. Of course his father hasn’t picked up his drift yet. “You’re going to fuck me.”

There’s a beat of processing, an empty room cut only by the gentle hum of the AC. For a brief moment, Rafe fears he’s about to be laughed at, mocked out of the room for the demand. Ward’s got a better grasp of the situation. 

“What?” His voice hasn’t cracked like that since middle school. He must struggle with the new frame. 

“You heard me. You’re gonna feel what I feel. Tomorrow.”

The swapped roles meant they’d already made a departure from the typical song and dance. Fully undressing Rafe was another. His father values speed, efficiency, clandestinity more than exposure. Intimacy. A saving grace for his dignity normally, but his father deserves no such reprieve. The patterned blue boxers hit the carpet last. 

Maybe it’s the body itself that hemorrhages confidence. Ward refuses eye contact. His hands tremble. He gnaws on his lip when Rafe lies on his back and rucks his own trousers down, just enough to expose his lack of underwear and lift his legs. 

He looks so young. 

He’s lined up his near-flaccid cock and about to enter him when Rafe suddenly feels like he’s going to vomit. He can’t— he can’t do this—

“Stop. Stop!” he snaps before shoving his father off him and back onto the mattress. Something he’s always wanted to do but lacked the sinew. “Get off me!”

Ward is quiet, only landing with a soft oof and scowling, always so disappointed in his boy. The judgment is no less painful through his own face and ire surges through him; how dare he forget the pecking order?

They’re collectively half-dressed when Rafe drags him across the room, fingers ripping through hair again and lifting until his body is forced to obey the direction. Ward’s frail hips meet the edge of his dresser, stained oak digging into his bones, and Rafe bends him forward. He holds his skull in place, nose close enough to the mirror that his father fogs up the glass. He tries to squeeze his eyes shut, but finally relents when Rafe threatens to hold his lips open. 

“Look at me. LOOK! How could you do this to me? I’m your son!” he roars in his father’s voice, and he can’t help but spit. 

His fingers are nowhere near Ward’s mouth— the stiff jaw is his own choice. 

There are tears in his pretty blue eyes. Not that that’s ever stopped Ward before. He pulls him back from the mirror and quickly nestles his palm against his Adam’s apple, crushing down on the windpipe and silencing any protests before they start. Rafe squeezes, easily ignoring the way his father claws at his hand, and he’d bet money his feet are barely touching the ground. So much for not hurting his own body. 

“If I kill you like this, and go back to sleep…” Rafe asks, feeling the corded tendons and muscles warp under his grip, “who do you think will wake up in this body?”

If his eyes weren’t already wide as saucers from the pressure on his brain, they are now. Ward’s mouth falls open, mouths out something close to a please, and Rafe relents. He drops him to the floor, crumpled like a worn shirt. Ward coughs and wheezes, struggling to pull in air again. Once he can pull in a single gasp without hacking, he scurries back, never turning away but dragging himself to the sheets he’s marred so many times before. Now he finds comfort in them. 

Rafe turns to the mirror and rolls his shoulders back once more. Admires his new physique, new prowess. He’s never held such a command over a room before, likes the way he wears it so well already.

It’s late enough that Ward’s eyes are crossing as he fiddles at his desk, combing through papers and writing notes to himself for his meetings the next morning. He always preferred writing with a pen over keyboard, needing the tactile sensation of ink against paper to better commit things to memory. His office is mostly dark save for the warm yellow glow of his desk lamp, illuminating just enough for him to see across his desk. Rose is likely already asleep in bed, two Klonopin and a glass of wine escorting her to dreamland. Soon, Ward would follow his wife and crawl into their Merino wool and silk sheets, dyed a color he could never remember the name of that Rose just had to have. It is the feeling of his memory foam pillow beneath his ear that Ward is craving as he jots down a few more memos.

The creek of the door creeping open breaks the silence of the room. Ward doesn’t look up from his notes, seeing a flash of baby pink in his periphery and filling in the image of Rose’s satin robe. “I know, I know. I’ll be up to bed soon,” Ward says with a wave of his hand, imagining his wife’s chastising grin. Chardonnay always made her clingy if the pills didn’t knock her out first. Ward has a smile on his face as he looks up, that handsome grin of his that said he was a man that had it all together.

What greets him instead of his wife is Rafe.

Wearing a dress Ward almost certainly bought his daughter last year for her birthday party.

Ward’s son stands six-foot-two with long limbs that always reminded him of a lemur, his skin tan from being out doing God knows what every day. He’s pressed up against the back of the door with his hands folded behind his back, staring at his father with an expression Ward can only make out as maudlin in the dim light. The thin straps of Sarah’s dress are biting into the meat of his shoulders and the damn bodice barely stretches over his ribcage. The skirt is a pale pink gossamer, tulle maybe, and cuts off just above Rafe’s knees. The sight of him ignites disgust within Ward’s chest, but beyond that is searing disappointment. The kid had been a failure since birth and with age had only gotten more unpredictable. Cross-dressing in his sister’s clothes was par for the course, apparently.

“What the hell are you doing?” Ward asks with a grimace, pushing back from his desk before sighing heavily. He checks his clock before rubbing his brow. “I don’t have time for this, Rafe. Get the fuck out and go to bed.”

He casts a glance at Rafe that turns into a stare when he sees his son hasn’t moved an inch. Leaning onto his desk, he counters Rafe with a look that means business. But Rafe doesn’t move. He’s just standing there with that puppy-look that makes Ward sick to his stomach. “Sarah’ll kill you if you rip that dress,” Ward says with a low warning, giving the boy one last chance to get in line or suffer the consequences.

Like a gunshot Rafe pushes from the door, crossing the room in two unsteady strides before he’s around the desk and landing on his knees with heavy thunks that undoubtedly penetrate through the floor to the level below. He grabs at Ward’s knee and uses the leverage to turn Ward in his desk chair to face him. Bathed in yellow, Ward can see that Rafe’s eyes are all pupil, two black orbs staring up at him like dolls’ eyes. The effect is heightened by the long lashes that circle his eyes, thickened with mascara. There is rouge on his cheeks too, some kind of shimmery blush he no doubt stole from Sarah as well. Most obscene is the lipstick, a bright red smeared across Rafe’s lips.

“Jesus Christ, son.” Ward winces as he grabs Rafe by the jaw, turning his face into the light to examine the damage done. His lips curl in disgust as he looks away, blinking past the humiliation bubbling in his gut. He prays that this is just some bad trip, that Rafe mixed coke with something he shouldn’t and would forget all of this like a bad hangover, but then he feels hands running up his calves. Ward looks down, his eyes meeting Rafe’s, and past the high he sees ugly determination.

“Please, Dad. Just let me,” Rafe begs, his voice quiet and trembling as badly as his hands as they work their way up his father’s legs. Ward freezes, confusion and shock turning him rigid until finally his hands catch up with his brain. The urge to kick the kid like a hyper dog is ever present, but Ward opts to seize Rafe by his biceps and haul him up instead.

“The hell are you doing?” He asks through his teeth, his eyes nearly bulging as he tries to see his son past the haze of whatever he took and that goddamn makeup. Abomination. The word cuts like a blade through his mind, carving itself into whatever gland was meant to produce affection. “This isn’t funny, Rafe. Say something!” Ward shakes his son, recalling all the nights he had held the boy as a baby and sang to him until his squealing finally subsided and he could get back to sleep. All that effort, wasted on an ungrateful, thoughtless child.

But Rafe doesn’t stop. His hands are on Ward’s thighs now, grasping at the meat of his legs like he wishes to claw out chunks of his flesh through the fabric of his pants. The boy is shaking, his wide eyes wet with tears that smear the clumps of black stuck to his lashes. “Please, Daddy,” He gasps, and Ward flinches at the word. Only Sarah calls him that still. Rafe had grown out of it by the time his mother died. “I’ll be good. I promise to be good for you.”

The words shock Ward to his core and his breath hitches, escaping his lungs in a stuttering exhale. Slowly he releases his grip on Rafe’s arms, trying and failing to make sense of this. The kid’s sweating, he realizes, the scent of spun sugar heavy in the air. And crying. Rafe is crying as he looks up at his father, his hands now on Ward’s belt. The full grain leather slips from the buckle with ease, accompanied by the tinkling sound of metal. It’s not his son he sees before him, but for a moment it's her. Rafe always shared his mother’s coloring, that dark honey hair and eyes the color of sea glass. After it happened, during that short while Ward was alone, he had barely been able to look at his son. All he saw was what he had lost. That resentment had never been scrubbed away, even after Rose swept into his life and made Ward whole again. Why did Rafe get to live when he squandered every chance he was given? When he was nothing but a pitiful fuck-up, destined for prison or worse?

The thoughts send Ward grasping Rafe by the hair and bending forward to get in his face as he wrenches Rafe’s head back. “You disgust me.” Ward spits the words like venom. He smells vodka on Rafe’s breath, heady enough for Ward to feel buzzed as he shoves his son away. Rafe isn’t deterred, going now for the button and zip of his father’s pants. It’s happening. There’s no denying what Rafe intends to do as he slides down the pull of the zipper with a shaking hand.

“Good. I’ll be good,” Rafe whispers to himself, and Ward can’t tell if the boy is psyching himself up or still trying to convince his father not to intervene.

Rafe is all hands, running his fingers over Ward’s legs in massage-like circles. Ward’s curiosity is beginning to outweigh his shock as his own hands find the arms of the chair, gripping the cushioned rests until his own trembling subsides. How much is Rafe really like his mother? How far is he willing to go? Rafe was a coward as much as a fuck up, and Ward intended to win this game of chicken like he won at everything in life. “You want it? Take it,” Ward orders, waiting for his son to turn tail and run.

Ward isn’t aware that he’s half hard until Rafe pulls him out. The kid bends forward between Ward’s spread legs and licks him from root to tip, one long stripe on the underside that makes Ward hiss. He grows against Rafe’s tongue and forces his breathing to remain even as Rafe circles his hand around the base of him. Rafe's mouth is hot and wet as he pops the head into his mouth. Ward can feel every bump and groove of Rafe’s tongue and his stomach lurches, every logical neuron in his brain shooting sparks of pure terror.

This is happening. And it feels good.

Rafe is swirling his tongue around the head, flicking his tongue against the slit in a way that has Ward’s back arching as he braces himself with his iron grip on the arm rests. He lowers his head, taking Ward into his mouth inch by inch until Ward can see that Sarah’s dress is open in the back. Rafe hadn’t been able to do up the zipper and the fabric flaps like wings as his bird-like shoulder blades jut out. With every inch Rafe takes, he’s sucking harder, his hand twisting around the base like he wants to rip Ward from the root. The boy’s got a mouth like a hoover and Ward shuts his eyes, seeing her and smelling Sarah’s perfume. Rafe’s tongue is too much, too hot, and Ward releases one of the arm rests. He opens his eyes to stare down at his son as he takes him by the jaw, feeling his mouth work as he begins to bob back and forth, sucking Ward’s cock like he had been trained for it. He wipes away the drool that escapes Rafe’s plush lips before slipping his thumb inside, stretching his mouth to the side until he sees teeth.

Rafe opens his eyes and meets his father’s gaze, his lipstick smeared across his face. He looks filthy, like some back alley whore Ward found in the Cut. He expects to see hatred or fear in Rafe’s eyes, but all he sees is a half-lidded look of desire. Humiliation returns with a vengeance and Ward leans back in his seat, unable to meet the boy’s eyes any longer.

He wants to shove Rafe away, but he’s harder than he’s ever been for Rose inside that slick mouth. It would be one thing if Rafe wasn’t enjoying it, if this was just a punishment like all the other times Ward had cut him with words or taken away privileges that Ward had worked hard day and night tirelessly for. But this wasn’t a punishment; this was desperation.

“So fucking needy,” Ward groans, his thumb slipping out of Rafe’s mouth before snatching his hair again. He pushes Rafe forward, forces him to take it all until he feels himself smacking the back of Rafe’s throat. Rafe begins to gag, choking and sputtering against Ward’s crotch. His hands scatter to grip Ward’s legs again, tugging on his pants and digging his nails into the muscle. “You like this, don’t you? So, take it.” Ward bucks his hips into Rafe’s mouth, his breath heavy as his body warms, tightens. “Fucking take it.”

Rafe resists a moment longer before he breathes through his nose and his throat relaxes. He swallows down the head, allowing Ward to penetrate his throat to the hilt. Naturally, it takes a dick in his mouth for the boy to follow orders. Ward doesn’t have the ability to feel pride, too busy fucking up into that ruined mouth. It lasts for hours or seconds, Ward can’t tell, but then he’s shooting off and Rafe is drinking every thick drop that exploded against his tongue.

Ward’s orgasm rolls through him in waves, leaving him trembling and gasping for air. No sooner does he release his hold on Rafe’s hair than his son is pushing himself away, his chest heaving like he had been drowning. Ward looks down at him and is overtaken with the sense that he has spoiled the boy, that this is just one more mistake in a sea of regret. Reaching out, Ward wipes a smear of lipstick and cum from Rafe’s bottom lip before shoving hard at his shoulder.

“Get yourself cleaned up.”

~

Semen gets cold so quickly. Rafe’s lamenting the change as he stares at the pearlescent splatter across his freckled chest and drags a spasming finger through the muck. It’s like schoolhouse glue at this point, smells like moldy icing. The guy, Rick or whatever, needs a better diet, but Rafe’s smart enough to keep his mouth shut. There’s rings around his wrists from where the handcuffs have bitten his skin red and papery, thin as blown-up bubblegum. It’s an ache like any other, less of an annoyance and more like a song stuck in his head, background noise he tries to tune out.

Sitting up, Rafe sucks in a wince, the fucking batton that Ranger Rick’s currently washing in the en-suite sink having left a phantom impression through his colon. It’s routine at this point, but that doesn’t clean the blood off the sheets. Twisting his arm back, he feels for the welts slashed between the nubs of his spine like the bastard was aiming. He can’t quite reach, but the twinge is there, sharp and throbbing. It’s enough to leave him dizzy, but most things do.

Rafe’s gotten very good at seeing double.

Shaking the noise out his ears, Rafe moves his shoulders one muscle at a time, acclimating to the sting licking up his back and blooming from his backside. Bend. Twist. Bend. Twist. Rick’s getting braver, eager to test the limits of anatomy. If Rafe didn’t find it so fascinating himself, he might mind. Reaching the moth-bitten and smelly scrap of fabric that was once considered a t-shirt, but now could be legally defined as a biohazard, he tugs it overhead. Be a man, you’ve swallowed worse. Dad’s voice in his head, that whiskey-slick purr that slides past his ear all syrupy. You’ll heal, son. Bones grow back twice as strong. Stretching his arms feels like acupuncture with knives, so Rafe has to bite back a whine as that nasty anger of his slugs up his throat like bile.

Rick comes into view and he’s laughing. Rafe can’t hear it, but he feels it, watches as the man’s expression contorts in a howl. It’s only a second, a flash that doesn’t match what comes after, but he can’t shake it, can’t help but feel like Rick the trick is trying to take what he didn’t earn.

“You owe me an extra twenty,” He croaks, sounding weaker than he expected. Breathless, like someone else is speaking for him. Rafe’s always like this for a while after, still hanging around on the ceiling somewhere. Only the pain lancing his joints and flaying his skin has any hope of lassoing around his ankle and yanking him back down to the world of the living.

The guy, Rick the slick, Rick the sick, Rick with his heavy black leather broomstick, is slipping his belt through the loops of his uniform. His thick fingers are like pale sausages and Rafe’s stomach turns at the taste of spoiled meat coating his tongue. “We’re already square, kid,” He says, and Rafe’s moving, throwing on his flannel and jeans. It’s everywhere, that anger, like someone had burst the veins behind his eyes. You don’t mishandle merchandise, it’s bad for business.

“The fuck we are,” Rafe snaps, rising to his full height. He’s wiry, spindly, and Rick’s got at least a buck-fifty on him, but there must be something in his face that makes the guy take him seriously, because Rick isn’t hitting him or laughing. Rafe had expected laughter. “My shirt’s sticking to my fucking skin. You went off menu.”

The slovenly face staring back at him is all butter, his bald head the only taut part of him. Rafe feels the urge to mush around the features, try and find something human in those black eyes like twin riverstones. Rick tuts before patting down his uniform, reaching into his right pants pocket. Rafe can’t help but salivate at the sight of the leather wallet presented like charity, some Pavlov instinct turning his tongue into a hungry proboscis intent on seeking sugar.

There’s a crisp twenty dollar bill and a small Ziplock with a couple lines worth of white powder pressed into Rafe’s palm. It’s like taking the Eucharist, like Saint Rick’s giving his blessing. Rafe nearly sticks out his tongue.

“For your trouble,” The satisfied customer says with a wink, like they’re old friends. In a way, they are. Ranger Rick was one of the first. An early bird that caught the worm.

Rafe’s already headed out the door, the smell of mildew and cigarettes clinging to piss-yellow wallpaper. He’s been to this motel so many times that he knows the layout by feel alone, doesn’t need to open his eyes as his hand grasps the knob. “And also with you,” He calls back, chipper as only a boy with cum stains on his briefs can be.

It’s easy to swallow anything when you’ve got nothing to lose.

Quick pit stop in the parking lot, Rafe pops open the baggie. The coke goes down smooth as he snorts a couple bumps off the side of his hand, his septum long-since-deviated making his nose run. Sniffling like a pup, Rafe’s thoughts burn a little clearer as the high turns his heart into a hammer, shooting his blood through every vein until his skin pulses. He imagines the layout, the hidden rivers that power his body spread out down his limbs, as he gets on his bike. It’s a piece of shit, thrown together with spare parts, but it beats walking.

It takes two tries for the engine to turn over, but then Rafe’s gone, narrowly avoiding smacking into the side of Rick’s cruiser before turning out the lot. It’s still early, so Rafe heads in the direction of where he goes whenever he’s got loose change or Dad’s allowance burning a hole in his pocket. It’s rare he gets extra, even if he knows the twenty won’t get him far, so he’s giddy. Excitement hums behind his ribs and maybe it’s the coke or the fact that it’s cloudy today, the air swollen with rain to come and the sun hidden behind a bluey-grey curtain that’s got him all riled up, but Rafe rides the wave. He leans into the vibration of his bike, cranks the accelerator until the wind whips his face.

He’s not alive yet, just undead. The living’ll come later.

The girl Barry plops in Rafe’s lap tastes sweet, like lead and lithium. She’s kind of eating his face, but he’s kind of too busy thinking about the party favors Barry said he’d throw in for showing her a good time to give too much of a shit. It’s weirder with girls, their hunger different. Rafe’s been digested plenty, but he still feels like he’s all hands whenever something with breasts and hips tries him on for size. They’re on the couch, surrounded by smoke and baseheads, and Rafe didn’t catch her name, wouldn’t remember it anyway.

When she pulls back, Rafe notices the murky green of her eyes. She doesn’t turn away as she reaches out to pick up her joint from where it’s been burning in the ashtray, her smile as slick as jellyfish. Instead of bringing it to her lips, she slips it between Rafe’s, letting him inhale like a suckling infant. She says something, but it's just whispering, constant whispering doubling and tripling over and over again until all Rafe hears is an uninterrupted buzz. It isn’t until she flicks him on the head that her question sinks in like a hammer to his skull.

“What sort of name is Whippet, anyway?”

Barry laughs, sorting through pills he’s got on the coffee table, piles all colors of the rainbow laid out like he’s moving into the confectionery business. Rafe tries to look over, but what’s-her-name pulls him back to her with a tug of his chin. He wants to correct her, his tongue loose and spongy behind his teeth, mouth hanging open with inhaled speech, but the Candyman cuts him off. “Dumbass here got caught huffing nitrous behind his elementary school, ain’t that right, Whip?” Barry says, the light glinting off his gold tooth. “Shit like that tends to stick.” Rafe tries to size him up, tries to decide whether to join in on the joke or feign embarrassment, but he’s all unglued, held together by the promise of payment and what’s-her-name’s claws currently digging into the meat of his arm.

She nips at Rafe’s bottom lip, the pop audible as it snaps back against his gums. “I like it,” She says, and Rafe figures that’s a compliment. Her greedy fingers spill under the hem of his shirt, tracing the bends of his ribs. She’s reaching back and back and back until Rafe gasps, nails scraping the hot, puffy wounds like tiger-stripes along his spine. Before he can tug himself away to safe harbor, what's-her-name snatches him by the shoulders and wrenches him forward like she's discovered cancer. Doubled over, Rafe’s got his face buried in her jean miniskirt as she pulls up the back of his shirt. She must see the damage, because he hears more mumbling he can’t decipher. There’s too much blood in his ears, like he’s underwater, but she doesn’t sound happy anymore.

“Christ, Whip.” Barry’s voice, slicing through the fog like lightning through thunderclouds. “You better not get blood on my damn couch. Here, get the fuck out.”

It’s either pity or the fact that Rafe’s gagging, but he feels a tied-off baggie hit his face. Rafe snatches it, shoves it in his pocket, shoves himself away from what’s-her-name’s milky sweetness and cloying perfume that's been giving him a headache the last half hour. She’s still calling after him as he stumbles towards the exit, past a group of lifers huddling together around a shared pipe.

A strong grip clamps down on Rafe's shoulder just before the carpet’s about to give under his feet, steadying him. Turning quick enough to make his stomach flip, he shrugs off the calloused hand that falls without fight and gapes at the startling handsome face before him. Tan and aged, flecked with grey stubble, they’ve never spoken, but their paths have crossed at Barry’s frequently enough that Rafe recognizes him.

“Get yourself cleaned up, kid,” Luke warns before turning back just in time for one of the walking corpses to pass him the pipe. Rafe watches with vague fascination as Luke takes a hit, the spinning glass catching his eye like a Fourth of July sparkler, before continuing on in his programmed direction, away from the stench of bleach and heat.

By the time Rafe makes it back to his bike, the blanket of clouds is beginning to crack open like fragile eggshells. He’s weaving down side streets and backroads in the hopes of beating the breaking light. The sun doesn’t like him, or he doesn’t like the sun, Rafe’s still not sure who started it. All he knows for certain is that he can’t trust the light, can’t stand the heat of it or look at what it reveals. It’s safer in the dark, hidden beneath shadows that obscure and blur away all the disagreeable details. Mom had died in the dark, and the shadows had been there to take her to wherever she needed to go. He’d been shielded from the blood all over everything and her limpid, slack face, hadn’t seen the gashes carved up her arms with the blade from Dad’s safety razor. All the moonlight coming in through the window had allowed him to make out was the inky water she lay in and the pale gold of her hair. If Rafe had just left it at that, maybe everything would have been okay. Maybe she wasn’t even dead until he flipped on the light.

The Cameron house is one of the larger shacks the Cut has to offer. Ward never made it past a year at UNC, but no one's forgotten his honor roll rank or SAT scores, the potential he drank away while managing, somehow, not to poison his intelligence. That could've-been-a-contender pride earned him a cushy gig supervising construction, and it had paid for the only home Rafe's ever known. From its flecking white exterior to the shudders Sarah had helped Mom paint green, the site of endless arguments and sleepless nights still filled Rafe with animal comfort. It was sort of like the beginnings of the flu and a little like the relief after the initial panic of a burn blends out into pleasure, but maybe that was the coke. Whatever the shit Rick gave him was cut with still has Rafe sniffling and breathing through his mouth as he dismounts his bike and wheels it around back.

He never uses the front door if he can help it. When Dad’s off, he’s always parked in the living room, a king supervising his domain from his brown leather La-Z-Boy throne, and Rafe doesn’t want to face him yet, doesn’t think he can take that look of his like staring down the barrel. Quiet as miasma, Rafe passes through the back door, skirting the house’s heart with his hand trailing along the wall. His clumsy feet are suddenly precise as he strays from every creaky floorboard, careful not to draw attention. There’s music coming from Dad’s stereo, George Strait’s croon leaking through the walls, and compulsively Rafe hums under his breath as he slips into Wheezie’s room.

They’ve got an agreement. Anything Rafe doesn’t want found, he hides here. He goes straight to her chest of drawers, kneels before the second-from-the-bottom tier. Riffling past Sarah’s old dolls, now missing limbs and most of their hair, school function t-shirts never worn, and various pre-teen baubles, he finds the metal box he’s looking for. The dinosaurs printed on the top yawn wide to show off their teeth and Rafe’s sure not to make eye-contact as he opens the tin and places the pills inside. Shoving it all away, he’s careful as he rises to his feet. His backside still aches from his neck to his thighs, while the front of him’s relatively numb. He needs a shower and probably some food, his stomach’s all knotted up, usually is.

Rafe can go days without eating, it’s a good trick.

He’s only a couple steps down the hall when Dad’s voice rings loud in clear, not in his head but in reality, the sharpness of it turning Rafe to stone for an instant. The music shuts off, an eerie silence in its wake.

“Rafe, don’t make me call for you twice.”

It’s something automatic, the way his feet move, like Dad twisted a crank or pulled a string. He follows the yellow glow of the living room light spilling into the dim hallway, steps into the room with unsure shoulders hunched. His fingers are restless, so he brings his thumb to his mouth, starts gnawing at the swollen skin around the nail. Sarah says it makes him look like a burn victim, like he dipped his fingertips in acid. Dad’s in his chair, chunky blue and white plastic cooler cup on the end table beside him. He’s gotta drink just to keep the shakes away, so by now he should be half a box deep in wine.

Rafe can smell it, that acrid tang hanging in the air like smoke.

Leaning forward, Ward waves his son over with one hand, runs the other down his beard. Always obedient, Rafe steps closer. He doesn’t wince as he gets down on his knees since his father can’t stand weakness, pokes at any fault till the blister pops. “Rick called me,” He says, some kind of feeling simmering beneath his surface that Rafe can’t quite make out. It’s not anger or disappointment, but something else all together. Envy, maybe. Shame? Rafe just stares up at him, fingers in his mouth like he’s teething. “Said he might have gotten a little out of hand. How out of hand?”

Looking away, Rafe shrugs, but the rawness around his wrist must give him away, because his father catches his arm and pulls him forward to examine the defects. Ward’s all furrowed brow, grumbling to himself before releasing the boy and motioning towards the couch. “Get over there.”

Rafe starts, his gaze flicking back and forth between his father and the sofa. “What about Wheezie and Sarah?”

Ward’s already gotten up, but he pauses to offer a confused look. “The girls are at school, you know that,” He says before turning away and slinking heavy-footed into the shadowed hall.

Shoving himself to his feet, Rafe blinks. He knows what’s going to happen, but it takes a moment to get his limbs to cooperate. Once his fleshy fingers get to moving, he starts to strip. Flannel, t-shirt, jeans, all of it gets peeled away until he’s in just his underwear. There’s a tremor in his hand as he folds it all neatly in a little pile on the coffee table, but that’s normal.

“On the couch,” Ward orders, carrying in his supplies, and the boy knows better than to be asked a third time.

It’s not Rafe that stretches out on the sofa, feet hanging off the armrest and stomach pressed to the cushions. It’s Whippet, blank eyed and agreeable, arms folded under his cheek. Ward sits on the edge next to Whippet’s thighs and opens the tub of Arnica, starts spreading the cold cream on the boy’s back. Whippet shivers, but the thick fingers making circles against his skin and smoothing out the sting puts him back at ease, especially when Ward places his free hand on the back of his neck, holding him steady. It’s nice, it really is.

“You gotta learn to say no, son,” Dad says as his fingers sweep across his lower back, no longer caressing, but kneading. Whippet’s sore muscles whine and the sensation pushes an easy gasp past his lips. “You give them an inch, they’ll take a mile. I vet everyone as best I can, but there’s always a risk. What’ll happen to us if you end up in a wooden box?”

Whippet stares at the wall, remembers how Mom used to polish the oak laminate with dizzying oscillations, until his eyes lose focus. He’s already in a wooden box. He’ll never leave it.

Ward sighs and Whippet flinches, can’t stand the disappointment on his breath. He wants to be good, needs to be. It’s as urgent as air in his lungs, but he’s drowning and Dad’s got his hand on his ass, briefs shoved away.

“There you go,” Ward murmurs, his lips brushing the shell of Whippet’s ear as he pushes and pulls at the tortured glutes one handful at a time.. “Easy now. Easy … Just let me check.”

Whippet squeezes his eyes tight, mouth pulled open as his father begins to probe, two fingers jammed inside him. He’s feeling for fissures left behind from Ranger Ricky’s baton and Whippet’s shaking, back arched and hips raised to meet Ward’s hand.

It’s what he knows best; how to allow your own murder.

Ward keeps shifting his hand back and forth, his touch deepening with every thrust until Whippet’s shaking. Rafe’s somewhere up there, watching the boy writhe with the indifference of angels. There’s no way to stop it, no way to run from the hand swallowing him from the inside. Not when Ward’s pressing against the spot that makes the cock pinned under Whippet’s belly twitch like a neglected pet.

There’s warmth on Whippet’s cheek, soft as feathers and twice as gentle, that eases his eyes open. The trick reveals itself as the sun comes into view, rays bursting from behind the window. Blinding white rips at Rafe’s vision, slaps him across the face with the force of a sledgehammer. He can’t get away fast enough, can’t escape the burning whiteness as he begins to kick, clawing at the arm rest as he lunges for safety. It burns all over, his sensitive flesh on fire, and he scrambles to get behind the couch, to hide, to shove himself into the dark where he can breathe again. Rocking back and forth, Rafe’s smacking at his cheek, desperate to carve the betrayal from his skin.

As quick as Rafe disappeared, Dad comes after him, kneels beside the kid doubled over and pressed to the floor. “Rafe? Jesus, Rafe, stop it!” He grabs at Rafe’s arms, tries to wrench them away, but Rafe’s crying now, wet, ugly sobs bursting from his lungs.

“The sun. The fucking sun,” Rafe’s gasping, fighting against the strong arms wrapping around him. It’s suffocating, the embrace, the stench of sweat and fermented grapes. It’s too fucking much, but it’s all he has. “It- It hit me. You saw it! It hit me!”

“Shh, son. It’s alright,” Dad reassures, cupping the back of Rafe’s skull as he pulls the boy to his chest like a wailing child. “I’m here. I’m right here.”

Rafe’s fight begins to give, exhaustion settling in as he clings to the sturdy frame of his father, bitten fingers clutching at his shirt. He’s shaking so hard his teeth are rattling, his tears hot and heavy as they roll down his cheeks to soak into Ward’s shoulder. “Where’s Wheezie?” He asks through frantic pants. “I need Wheezie, Dad. She can’t be out in the sun!”

Ward only holds Rafe tighter, squeezing the tears out of him like puss from a wound. “Your sister’s at school. She’s safe,” He says, stroking the back of Rafe’s hair over and over again. The buzzing’s back, humming in Rafe’s ear. Maybe it wasn’t the sun, but a bee sting. Maybe there’s thousands of yellow-assed insects making a home in his skull and drilling holes in his brain. That would explain what’s wrong with him, the malfunction that makes a papercut feel like a missing limb and a stab wound feel like a skinned knee. “Everybody’s safe, son. I promise.”

Shaking his head, Rafe bites his lip, tries and fails to calm his breathing. He can’t get in enough air, can’t expand his lungs and that fucking buzzing won’t stop. “Why can’t it leave me alone?” He asks, begging the only god he knows for answers. “Why can’t I just be left alone?”

Eventually, Rafe manages to come back down to Earth. Ward holds him through it, rocking him back and forth. It nearly puts Rafe to sleep, and he’s barely conscious as his father helps him to stand, guides him like a fellow drunk out the living room and down the hall. Rafe trips over his own feet, but each time he’s caught and set upright. The end of all things comes when he’s laid in bed, covers pulled up around him, because it’s only then that Rafe’s eyes focus enough to catch the look his father’s giving him, that sickly-sweet pity that always follows disgust.

It hurts as much as the punch had, but Rafe’s too tired to keep crying.

“Rest a little,” Ward says like all the tenderness has been bled out of him. It’s Rafe’s fault, he’s sure. If his father is bleeding, Rafe had to have created the wound. “It’s Sarah’s turn to make dinner.”

Daddy, please hear this song that I sing In your heart, there’s a spark that just screams For a lover to bring A child to your chest that could lay as you sleep And love all you have left, like your boy used to be Long ago, wrapped in sheets warm and wet

Rafe flinches as the door shuts behind him, the sound bouncing off the walls of the foyer and reverberating through the entryway like yelling into the mouth of a cave. He turns, stops, loses his way. It’s home, but he can’t find the right path, can’t settle on how best to make his way upstairs. There’s too many steps, the staircase as daunting as climbing up a mountain without rope. When did home get so big? Rafe feels like a child lost in a supermarket, staring wide eyed at the fixtures he’s always known but now can’t parse. He’s dementia-possessed, some very significant lobe in his brain a loose gem in its setting. Reaching for Dad, his savior, his North Star, Rafe grabs the meat of his arm.

“Dad, wait-”

Ward spins to grab his mistake by the back of the neck, fragile vertebrae grinding together under the sudden compression of his grip. Burden. Fuck-up. Worthless. The urge to go limp drags Rafe’s feet into the foundation, but before he can turn liquid Dad’s guiding him forward, moving so fast and so firmly that his son has no choice but to follow the invisible path laid out before him.

“Don’t say a fucking word,” Orders his father as he sends the boy up the stairs, his voice a deep hiss in Rafe’s ear. There’s fear there, beneath the anger that’s made him all solid and mighty, so much anger that he’s vibrating Rafe’s spinal cord. Can’t wake Sarah and Wheezie. Can’t let them see you like this. Sarah already hates you. Dad’s fearsome expression is so striking as to dissolve Rafe into nothingness, so he can’t look at him straight. He’s been wearing that face since he pulled his son out of Barry’s trailer and shoved him into the truck, ignoring the dealer’s jeers.

He didn’t mean to get high.

Rafe tries to speak, to work his tongue along his teeth and carve out the words, but his jaw won’t stop grinding. The repeated motion hurts, but Rafe can’t stop it, like his body isn’t his but a too-tight plastic bag he’s stuck in. There’s no air, no room to move, just tight elasticity warping his bones. It didn’t used to feel like this. Coke used to spread out his thoughts and make him feel invincible, like he was a young god on the verge of immortality. It used to feel good, but now he’s just sick like his head’s screwed on wrong and nothing makes sense. Sarah’s perfect, that’s why Dad loves her more. You’re ruined. Ruinedruinedruinedruinedruined. Why can’t I feel my feet?

The hall rug turns slick and Rafe trips, but Dad’s arm swoops in and captures his waist, holds him steady against the tide that threatens to swallow him whole. He doesn’t deserve it, this endless mercy, but God, does he need it. It’s the only thing Rafe can cling to, that constant hope that Ward won’t give up on him.

“Th’nk you …” Rafe mumbles against his father as his feet settle and he finds the floor sturdy, no longer a rippling ribbon. Selfish. He used to be perfect, now he can’t even walk. Somehow along the way he turned into this useless thing, leaning on Ward so he doesn’t collapse. The shame of it makes him want to vomit apologies until his throat bleeds, until Dad stops looking like he regrets ever bringing Rafe into the world.

Better off dead after all you’ve put him through. You won’t get better, there’s no use in trying. You can’t function in the real world.

There’s more shuffling, forced to be quiet under the threat of the girls waking. Rafe is turned inside out, his guts hanging from his hands. Fuck, he’s cold. He’s so cold and Dad’s warm. Warm and unyielding, a rock Rafe can dig his fingers into.

“Off. Off. Rafe, Christ-” Dad untangles himself and Rafe loses his footing, falls like a pile of sticks onto his bed. The plush mattress is cool and his sheets stink of lavender detergent, the fragrance making his stomach turn. He groans as he tries to push himself up, but his elbows keep giving out. It’s like trying to pull himself out of quicksand, only his bones keep chattering and his skin itches. How can he sweat when he’s so fucking cold?

There’s a click as Ward shuts the door, the sound of his accompanying sigh like a strike to the face. He hates you and it’s all your fault. You’ve gone too far this time, or are you too stupid to figure it out? Rafe looks over at his father and sees it, that disgust that had Rafe chasing line after line tonight. Once he started, he had to keep going, had to outrun the reality he’s faced with now.

“Dad, I- I know I fucked up,” Rafe says, finally on his back and shoving himself upright like a toppled beatle. Dad’s still prone against the door, hands on his hips as he waits for the excuses to come. There’s so much Rafe could say, a million reasons for why he went to Barry’s tonight, why he let himself slip, but none of them matter right now, not when he can feel his father’s revulsion like poison in his stomach. All your fault. “But I got- I’ve got it under control.”

“How exactly is this under control?” Ward counters, his face turning to the ceiling like there’s an answer up there. He raises his hand to rub at his brow and Rafe curls into himself, hands in his hair because his father is too far away. He needs him close, needs him so badly it hurts.

Please. Pleasepleasepleasepleasepleasepleasepleaseplease.

“You don’t-” Rafe shakes his head because he can’t cry, he can’t fall apart like this. He knows better. Goddammit, he knows better. Why did he let this happen? Why did he ruin everything? Releasing his hair, Rafe holds out his hands as if steadying himself and takes a gulp of air, then another. “It’s just a backslide, okay?” He points to himself, to the heart that won’t stop hammering, ricocheting against his sternum and taking his breath away. “I’m good. I’m good, Dad. This doesn’t change anything.”

Dad just shakes his head and Rafe can’t stand it, can’t let him think his son is broken for good.

“We’ll talk in the morn-”

“No, no, no, no, it can’t wait,” Rafe insists, straining to speak past his shivering. He shakes his head again and again, his father blurring in the short distance. It’s not tears, it can’t be tears because Dad always hates that, can’t stand to see Rafe blubber like a little kid. “Don’t leave. Please don’t leave, Dad.”

Seconds tick and Ward stands like a judge deliberating his sentence. Rafe can’t breathe, too focused on holding himself steady beneath the weight of that all-knowing gaze. He’ll be good. He’ll be good if Dad just gives him the chance. It’s all Rafe wants, to carve himself open in the hope that there will be something pleasing there, something worth all the trouble.

Rafe doesn’t know when Dad moves, but he does. He’s sitting on the bed when he comes into focus. Come closer. He’s hunched, slightly, his hand on his beard as he regards his son like a stranger, like some bug found scuttling along the wall. Touch me, tell me I’m real. It’s worse than judgement and Rafe looks away, embarrassed to his core. He knows how he looks, how this looks.

Don’t look at me like that. Please, I can’t take this anymore. Why can’t you love me how I want?

“You can’t keep doing this, Rafe,” Dad says, that stern edge to his voice like chipped glass.

What do you want?

Rafe reaches for his father, takes that disappointed face between his trembling hands. He can’t listen to it anymore, can’t stand under that magnifying glass and get burned alive. “It’s under control,” He says with a nod, his words slow and deliberate but still his tongue catches on his teeth. He runs his fingers through Ward’s hair, marveling at the softness. The greys catch the moonlight filtering in through Rafe’s curtains, strands of silver gleaming like diamonds. Why can’t I look like him? I just look like Mom. What would Mom do? Rafe smoothes away the crease between Ward’s brows with his thumb, traces the outline of his restrained frown and gets a relieved sigh in return. When his eyes fall shut, Rafe tries not to weaken from the satisfaction. “It’s just a slip up. I can fix it.”

 I can be good. I can be good and make you love me again. You taught me how.

“You have to be an adult,” Dad says, his voice a low grumble, but Rafe’s not listening. He’s suspended in air, soaking up warmth as his hands venture lower and he drags his twitching fingers over his father’s shoulders, under the collar of his shirt. That steady pulse pulls Rafe in, somewhat calming his own erratic heartbeat. “I could look away from this when you were sixteen, but it’s time to man up. How else am I supposed to trust you?”

Rafe stills, his head falling to press his forehead to Ward’s shoulder because it’s not working. Do you want it to work? He digs in, shaking his head, and tries to swallow around the lump in his throat. His thoughts keep talking over each other, the fragments of intelligence too jumbled to digest. Dad has to forgive him, because Rafe won’t abide living as a discarded toy. Why won’t he touch me back?

Dropping his hand, Rafe cups his father through the fabric of his pants. “You trust me with this,” Rafe says as he pulls back just enough to see surprise seep into Ward’s gaze. He moves his hand down and back in a slow seduction that’s both teasing and vulgar until he feels his father begin to stiffen beneath the oscillation of his wrist. There’s Rafe’s purpose, his path to redemption. He knows what needs to be done, knows how to soothe his father’s worry and bleed away the shame lacerating his veins.

It’s never going to stop.

Ward kisses him and it’s like swallowing sunshine, like Rafe is a real, human boy when his father breathes life into his mouth. The noise ebbs away until it’s only his father’s tongue against his own and the sigh of buttons slipped through their holes. Rafe’s chest hurts, but it’s okay because he needs this. He needs this and Dad needs him. Nothing else matters. It's love. It's love and it burns. Oh, god, does it burn.

I don’t want it to stop.

Knowing better than to let this chance slip through his fingers, Rafe pulls himself closer to straddle Ward’s lap. He’s still quivering, his muscles strained from the taut trembling, so he’s gripping onto Ward like he’s afraid of falling off him. It hurts, his body one big cramp, but it becomes easier to bear when his father buries his face in Rafe’s neck to leave scorching kisses beneath his jaw. Rafe’s making himself busy by shoving away clothes as Ward’s fingers slip beneath the sweat-drenched t-shirt he’s wearing to trace the knots of his spine, the ridges of his shoulder blades that stick out like malformed wings trapped beneath his skin. Dizzying want sends Rafe’s head back as he grinds down against his father’s crotch, eyes squeezed tight against the desperate, aching need threatening to split him in two.

Aren’t you tired of this?

It’s a quiet ecstasy when Ward grabs Rafe by the waist and shoves him down on the mattress. That sickly lavender perfume fills his nose as his face meets his pillow and it makes his stomach lurch. Don’t throw up. Breathe through your nose. Keep swallowing. He can’t breathe, can’t find his balance, but there’s a hand on the back of his head. It’s just Dad, so he won’t let Rafe suffocate, but the lack of oxygen is turning his thoughts into jelly.

What choice do I have?

“We’ll get you through this,” Dad says as he begins to tug down Rafe’s shorts with one hand, his body draped over his son. This is what I want. He’s heavy, a weight Rafe wasn’t prepared for and his chest can’t expand beneath him. It’s like being buried alive, the pressure and heat a heavy fog pinning Rafe down. He clutches his pillow as a chill rolls over his skin once he’s naked from the waist down, his scrawny legs pried apart. “Just relax, Rafe. I’ll make it better, then we’ll go to bed. Good boy, that’s it.”

Rafe cries out against the sudden invasion and inhales a mouthful of cotton as the noise gets muffled by his pillow. Heat swells inside him, scalding and thick until he feels as raw as a wound, weeping with infection. He needs this, the bombardment of his senses, because he can’t stand to feel it. The more his father fucks him, the less pain there is and the quieter the voices get. It’s Rafe’s anchor, that starvation of understanding. Ward doesn’t touch him, except for the hand in his hair and the grip on his hip, and Rafe’s indebted to him for it. He doesn’t want to think about his dick, a limp specimen trapped beneath his pelvis.

He knows he won’t be able to come, too fucked from the coke still buzzing through his veins, but this isn’t about him anyway. It’s enough that Dad’s inside him, stretching him open until Rafe feels peeled apart, ripened to the point of rot. It’s enough to hear his name said like a prayer, like he’s the answer to every problem his father has ever had.

It’s enough. It’s enough. It’s enough. I’m enough.

By the time it’s over, Rafe has stopped shaking. He can’t remember how it ended, but the sun’s coming up and he’s alone in his bed. When did Dad leave? The sheets are wet beneath him, but Rafe can’t move to clean himself, his muscles throbbing and festering with exhaustion. Peroxide for blood. Cold water and detergent for semen. There’s a numbing clarity slowly overtaking his awareness as the coke seeps from his marrow and out his pores. Rafe sniffles through the congestion obstructing his abused nasal passages and crushes his palms to his ears, hopeless to suppress the swell of too many voices carving their opinions into his cerebral cortex. He just wants to sleep, but it’s too soon for that, the last dregs of his high still present enough to keep him treacherously alert.