Jericho's Wall - 8. Chapter 8

It was July fifteenth, the exact midpoint of my summer on Jericho’s farm and in his constant company. A Thursday, hot and breathtaking; I still remember the sense of tension in the air. The Weather Channel had been advising of an explosive end to the heatwave blanketing the South, storms had started moving in from the Midwest early in the week, some of them severe and leaving thankfully mild destruction in their wake, and the clouds were due to hit Chisaw County around late afternoon. Ron called early, asking Jericho and me to come by at one-thirty and help unload and cover the wood for the outhouse/storage shed; the location having been decided and his calculations complete, he was eager to get his project underway. We spent the morning in the garden, preparing for the prophesied storm by staking some plants more firmly, covering others with black plastic bags. After lunch (and doing our thing down by the elderberry shrubs and winding stream) Jericho and I jumped into Truck and headed over. The sun was still bright and high in the sky, the breeze almost non-existent. No storm clouds as yet but I felt them lurking just over the horizon. As Jericho tossed me Truck’s keys he said Ron should’ve waited to buy the wood until after the storm but he understood the urgency as Ron wanted to get the outhouse built in the break during summer quarter; males are sympatico to each other’s pet projects that way.

Our visit started pleasantly enough. I parked behind Ron’s sagging (and nameless, so far as I knew) pickup truck and we went around and knocked on the back door since they weren’t on the porch. The front door, Bud insisted, was for guests but we were family. They weren’t in the kitchen apparently as it took a couple minutes for Bud to answer, his hair mussed and face sweaty. As we stepped inside I noticed the air was heavily laced with patchouli and marijuana and as Ron stumbled in buttoning his shirt he muttered something about being all hot and sweaty from loading the wood and he’d just wanted to rest in the AC for a few minutes before unloading. Bud laughed and said tact was overrated, obviously Jericho and I knew they’d just had wild monkey sex (we hadn’t, really, but we figured it out pretty quick). Ron countered he’d been going for innuendo and not blatant in-our-faces gloating and both of them laughed. Bud said they’d been celebrating their anniversary, Ron said their anniversary was last week and Bud said he wasn’t done celebrating as yet. Jericho asked which anniversary they’d been celebrating and Bud said the twenty-third anniversary of their first, and I quote, “mutual bone-jumping” and he personally was of the opinion they should celebrate the entire month instead of just the day. Ron said he was in complete and total agreement but first he needed to get the damn wood unloaded and then they’d see about celebrating by unloading a different kind of wood. We laughed and unloaded the wood. As we carried the first of the planks around the side of the house Jericho commented on the weather, how it seemed so still and hot yet somehow menacing. Bud said it was another curious, electric sense of waiting much like the one marking the storm at the end of the heatwave of ’69 but nowhere near as intense. Ron said nothing would ever be as intense, in waiting or otherwise, as the end of the heatwave of ’69 and Bud kissed him once, very softly and lightly, on the lips.

We arranged the wood where Ron wanted it and secured the tarp to keep it dry. The first few dark clouds had begun to roll in and the breeze to pick up but the sun still shone brightly in the sky, signaling a few free hours before the storm swept in and Ron decided to use the time to assemble and tap down the frame for the foundation as he couldn’t see the wind picking up or destroying it but if it did oh well. He and Jericho got to work, muttering between themselves and sawing and hammering while Bud and I talked books on the back porch. After awhile Bud wandered over to the worksite, checking up on how far they’d gotten, and suddenly said to wait. Ron asked why. Bud asked if this was going to be the length of the shed. Ron said it was going to be both the length and the width, six feet by six feet, remember? Bud said the size had sounded good when they were discussing but now he actually saw it laid out he didn’t think it would be big enough and could they expand some, maybe ten by ten? Ron said it didn’t work that way, he’d calculated the amount and sizes of the wood he’d need down to the last nail. Bud said he understood but surely it wouldn’t be too much trouble to buy some more wood, would it? Ron said again it didn’t work like that, he’d have to stop and refigure and he was pretty sure six-by-six would be fine for their needs anyway. Bud pointed to the tiny but ramshackle metal shed in the back corner of the yard and asked how they were supposed to get all the garden implements from there plus everything else in a six-by-six area. Ron said he had no plans to move the tools from their current residence. Bud said the metal shed was falling down, they’d have to put the tools in the new one, and really, how hard could it be to change a few numbers here and there? Ron said for the third time it didn’t work like that, Bud had been watching him work with wood (in a decidedly unpunny manner, considering his rising voice) for the last twenty-three years at least and he should have picked up something in all this time. And they were off, hollering at each other at the top of their lungs while Jericho and I stood frozen, unsure what to say or do. They yelled and screamed for a few minutes, louder than the twins at their most annoying, before Bud abruptly shut up and marched inside, slamming the door behind him. Ron massaged the bridge of his nose and, in a tense but straining-to-be-polite-voice, said perhaps it would be best if Jericho and I go, he for damn sure appreciated our assistance but he needed to talk to the person he loved more than life itself but sometimes pissed him right the fuck off. We left.

By the time we got home the dark clouds were thicker in the sky and the breeze almost constant. June and the girls hadn’t made it back from the stand yet so, at loose ends, we did our dry-hump thing again, this time in the hayloft as it felt too icky outside. After we finished we went ahead and brought Cow and Mule into the barn, both of them eager and willing, and changed into our off-duty shorts and tees then carried our books onto the back porch, where he put his feet in my lap and I rubbed them while we read. June and the girls arrived seconds before the rain started, running for the porch even as the first fat drops fell from the sky. Jericho said Bud and Ron had gotten into an argument while we were there and he felt bad although it wasn’t our fault. June assured him that no, it wasn’t our fault, sometimes couples blew up into spats for no apparent rhyme or reason, sometimes not even understanding why themselves, and they were likely only unconsciously responding to the stormy tension in the air. Jericho said he’d never seen our friends so angry; they’d bicker, sure, they’d pick at and annoy each other, but this was a fight. June said honey, people fight, even those who love each other, and sometimes they fight harder because they love each other, that it was difficult to explain but they trusted enough to show each other their worst and come out fine on the other end, secure in their connection. Jericho said fighting led to divorce. He was upset over the incident, more upset than I’d figured and truly more than I felt the situation warranted, pretty much agreeing with June. Sensing Jericho’s distress, his mother’s manner gentled down even further and she said unhealthy fighting leads to divorce, healthy fighting leads to a clearing of the air and rededication to the relationship and Bud and Ron would be just fine, they weren’t going to break up over an outhouse-slash-storage shed. She also said Jericho would understand someday, he’d be in a relationship with someone (June didn’t specify who) and they’d love each other to pieces but they’d still fight, sometimes loud and stridently. Jericho said he’d never fight with someone he loved. As it turns out he was wrong but our big fight was a few days away yet.

By the time Janey called us for dinner (thankfully at a reasonable auditory level) the rain had thickened and the wind grown into short, angry blasts, dampening and ruffling the pages of our books, and though there was no thunder or lightning yet they could be heard and spotted off to the west. After eating we repaired to the den, where we watched The Weather Channel, discovering the roughest, most dangerous cells of the storm, which had already produced several tornados though luckily none on the ground, were starting to move across the state line from Mississippi and according to the timeline prediction they’d be hitting Chisaw County just after midnight, although the area was already under a severe storm/tornado/flash flood watch and would be until morning. Around seven o’clock the thunder and lightning which had been threatening us from afar joined the local party, shaking the house with every clap, flickering the tv with every flash until the picture finally went to bluescreen, the storm thick enough no signal could be picked up from the satellite. Minutes later the power went out and June said it would probably be daylight before it was restored. Well-prepared for every emergency, she pulled out some oil lanterns and we played Uno until bedtime, and while we laughed and teased each other as if this were just another normal night our voices were hushed, the fingers clutching our cards tight and tense, and all of us jumped at the occasional big boom of thunder. When we did our new thing later it was awesome as usual, Jericho holding me down as he fucked hard and mercilessly, his filth washing over my ears and into my blood but I kept listening to the wind shriek around the eaves and corners of the house and the rain pounding the slit windows high in the walls of our bedroom. The storm was so noisy that afterward I couldn’t hear him mumbling in his bed across the darkness from me and the replacement of my usual fall-asleep soundtrack was jarring, sparking an unease profound enough even the elderberry wine in my dreams failed to soothe me.

I awoke to an urgent hand on my shoulder. “Mateo. Mateo!” My full first name and the tension in Jericho’s voice snapped me into full wakefulness, and the second thing I noticed was the utter stillness outside, no wind, no thunder, no rain, but I could hear a siren wailing far in the distance. “Mateo, wake up!”

“I’m awake. What time is it?”

“Just after one. Look, we need to get up and go to the shelter, there’s—”

“What? Why?”

“Listen, you hear the siren? Means a tornado’s been spotted. We don’t know where yet.” I jumped out of bed and pulled on some clothes, grabbing the first shirt came into my hand. We hurried upstairs to find the rest of the family at the back door waiting and June herded us across the silent but soaked yard towards a wooden covering atop a small rise I’d assumed was an old well. It wasn’t. As Jericho lifted the lid and urged the girls to scoot down the ladder inside a strong and sudden gust of wind staggered us all and before we could regain our balance the sky opened and hail dropped down like the wrath of God, stinging cold on my skin and bouncing so loud off the vehicles in the turnaround I worried nonsensically about dents in Caddy. Janey, Juanita and June went down the shelter ladder first, June saying something along the lines of thank heavens for the hail but I figured I heard her wrong and didn’t have time to think about it anyway as Jericho had hold of my shirt, tugging to get me to hurry. I was hurrying, dammit! As soon as I was clear Jericho followed, slamming the lid and sliding a metal latch into place to keep it closed and cutting the sudden and howling wind into distant wails, no less menacing for the softening. By the time I reached the bottom of the ladder, maybe ten feet or so, Juanita had lighted an oil lantern and I looked around as I moved aside to make room for Jericho and catch my breath. We were in a long and narrow room with a shut door at the other end. The ceiling was maybe eight feet high but seemed lower. Metal shelves with more canned food than a family of five could eat in a year lined one wall, cast off but still serviceable furniture the other. The lamp Juanita had lit flickered on the shelves and she struck another to place on the scarred card table in one corner while Janey shook an ancient-looking portable radio/eight-track player similar to Bud’s and muttered under her breath.

Noticing how badly I was shaking, Jericho put his hand on my shoulder, squeezed. “Hey. Mat my brother, everything is fine, I promise.” His faded blue eyes warm and sincere in the dimness. “Ninety-nine percent of the time tornados through this area run the same path up by Humbert, clear on the other side of the county, and we’ve never had one come through here. We’re only taking reasonable precautions, that’s all.”

“I, I’m not, not sca-scared,” I stammered. “I’m co-cold.” I had no reason to be cold but I was. Jericho didn’t question, just stepped in to wrap his arms around me, warming me up some. But not enough. To distract myself I asked June, “What, what did you mean about thank, thank heavens for, for the hail?”

She came over to join us, adding her heat to Jericho’s. “Generally hail means the conditions for a tornado in the immediate area aren’t favorable anymore.” I had no idea if she were telling the truth; I still don’t. But her words warmed just as much if not more than her and her son’s arms.

“You were supposed to check the batteries last week, Janey,” Juanita said, her voice severe. I glanced over and saw she’d lit another lamp and was watching her twin shake the radio with a disgusted expression on her face.

“I did, I swear! It was wor—there it goes. See?”

The radio was already tuned to the correct station, the weatherman’s voice low and tense but not panicked. Sure enough, there’d been a tornado on the ground but over near Humbert, as Jericho had predicted. We all started to relax and then he broke in with a new report: not one but two suspected cells over Tanners Hill, and my slowly warming body plunged back to ice. Tanners Hill was right up the road, maybe fifteen minutes. Jericho and June moved me over to the couch and we sat, them to either side of me, still holding me close. Jericho began whispering in my ear, telling me this shelter was older than the house and as secure and well-taken care of now as it was when it was built, had always been secure and well-taken care of, they’d had the structure and walls inspected not even two years ago. His voice was soothing, as if he were talking to a frightened animal, and I started to get pissed because I wasn’t frightened, I was cold but then I realized I was cold because I was frightened. Rather than give in to the fear I instead asked what was behind the door at the other end of the room.

“A tunnel leading to the barn, it comes up in the corner by where we store Mower and Bush Hog.”

Oddly enough, hearing the generic but proper names for the machines calmed me some. “I, I haven’t seen a huh-hatch over there.”

“It’s there, I promise. And even if something does happen, if something blocks both exits, we’ve got enough food in here to last a long time, longer than we’d ever need because if no one heard from us some of our neighbors would come looking.” I hadn’t been worrying about being trapped and I found I wasn’t worried about it now, Jericho relieving those fears before they might take root, and I started warming up enough to become slightly embarrassed but not enough to push him and June away. I could and would apologize later, and when I did both of them said no worries, they completely understood I was suffering a new and stressful situation and while I didn’t get completely over my embarrassment I felt some better.

“I still say we should widen the tunnel enough to get Cow and Mule inside,” Janey muttered, but even she seemed to realize how unworkable such an alteration would be so she lapsed into silence and we listened to the low, tense but not panicked voice of the weatherman talk about places I’d never heard of while I waited on pins and needles to hear Tanners Hill Road or Milk’n’Honey Lane. Jericho stopped talking and just kept rubbing his hand across my back, his touch as gentle and loving as it had not been only a few hours previous. At last the weatherman gave the all-clear for our area, saying the greatest threats had passed and the storm should be gone completely from Chisaw County no later than six a.m. We climbed out of the shelter with relief; I still consider those forty-five or so minutes the most terrifying of my life. Rain yet fell in sheets but the only thunder I heard as we hurried back toward the house was distant, non-threatening, and the hail had moved on too. Inside we split up again after June yawned and said we should sleep until seven, there was no point getting up any earlier. Once back in our bedroom I was surprised but pleased when Jericho slid into my bed with me, he and his elderberry wine comfort curling up behind and throwing one arm and one leg over me. I’d calmed considerably since the all-clear had been given but I still felt raw somewhere inside, nervous and itchy in a way I couldn’t figure out, and I nestled into his warmth. I felt him begin to harden against my hip but hoped he wouldn’t ask; not only was I still stinging from our previous session I wasn’t in the mood. He wasn’t either and whispered I should get some rest, everything was fine, he was here with me and everything was gonna be just fine. Sometime later he began mumbling in my ear and pulling me tighter against him, rubbing his fully hard cock into my hip but as I pushed back against him I at last fell into sleep.

I awoke first Friday morning. I still felt raw and nervous inside but figured it was just because I woke up alone, Jericho having at some point transferred to his own bed. The clock blinked a red one-twenty-seven a.m., meaning the power had been back on for eighty-seven minutes. Checking Jericho’s wristwatch on the nightstand I found the correct time to be just after six, meaning I had another almost whole hour to sleep. I lay there for a few minutes, trying to drop back off, but the itchy feeling wouldn’t go away and I needed to use the toilet anyway; eating and working and living a healthy country lifestyle tends to keep one regular. Sighing, I slipped into the bathroom, taking my time, and dressed, leaving our quiet bedroom in Jericho’s capable and mumbling care. No one had made it down to the kitchen yet so I started some coffee and pulled out the fixings for breakfast, attempting to soothe myself with the banal actions and with occasional gazes out the window, where the mid-risen sun sparkled over the countryside, as clear and bright as if the storms last night had never happened. When everyone else filtered in around fifteen minutes after seven they were pleased and grateful to find biscuits in the oven and the bacon just starting to sizzle in the skillet. But the raw, nervous, itchy feeling wouldn’t go away.

After our meal we went outside to check the damage. The temperature was hot but still cooler than any early morning over the past month and the sky was bright and cheerful, for all the world like a baby who’d screamed its head off all night and was peaceful and innocent now while everyone else was tired and aggravated from dealing with its tantrums. Celica and Truck looked okay, they had so many dings already a few more wouldn’t hurt, and Caddy appeared as pristine and smug as ever. Jericho and I walked the gravel drive, checking the fields on either side to find the garden had weathered the storm remarkably well, the only obvious signs of damage being a few leaning plants that would need to be pressed back into the ground and several flattened areas Jericho said would spring back up good as new over the next few days. We didn’t discover our major problem until we reached the woods between the fields and the road. “Dang it,” Jericho swore softly. We walked back to the house, kicking off our shoes and going inside to tell June one of the older trees had been blown down across the driveway just inside the woods. June was perhaps more succinct in her verdict of the situation, using a word I’d not yet heard from her. “Shit.” She got on the phone as Jericho and I went back outside, intending to wade into the muddy, waterlogged garden to right the downed plants and pull the plastic bags from the ones we’d covered.

“Who’s she calling?”

“Neighbors. Country people live for stuff like this. We’ll have that tree cut up by sundown.” And, under his breath, “I hope.”

Sure enough, by the time Jericho was satisfied he’d done all he could for his precious plants people I’d never seen before began pulling into the driveway on the other side of the downed tree, all of them with axes and chainsaws. We found out a tornado had indeed touched down in Humbert but hadn’t done much damage, only tearing from a gas station a metal awning everyone agreed should have been removed years ago and knocking over a few business signs on the main drag. One of the suspicious cells over Tanners Hill might have been a tornado but if so it never hit the ground. There’d been a few more trees uprooted in the area but more contingents of neighbors had set out to clean them up, not trusting the county to get off their asses before next week sometime. News exchanged, we got to work.

I believe I’ve mentioned once or twice how much I enjoyed outside tasks. This Friday (and half of Saturday) I found out this was not a blanket statement. I worked my ass off and I hated every fucking minute. Even Mule was pulled into the act and he hated it as much as me. The men with chainsaws would cut the tree into more manageable pieces and I’d help carry the logs through the heat and the humidity and the mud and the sawdust to load into Truck’s bed, drive up to the side of the barn and unload the logs for Jericho and another ninteenish-year-old man (cute, but nowhere close to my cousin) to split and which Janey and Juanita would then stack along the wall. I’d stand for a few minutes, catching my breath and admiring the way Jericho’s meaty rump twitched and his bare chest and arms flexed as he swung the axe, then get back into Truck and do it all over again. Lunch was a few minutes standing around drinking the coffee and inhaling the sandwiches June brought out, and there was no time for Jericho and me to slip away for a nap or even a quick dry-hump after. We worked steadily throughout the day, not stopping until the last light was fading from the sky. I stood under the shower for a long time, letting the hot water pound my sore muscles and sweat out the sawdust seemingly infused into my skin, and I only shut the water off when I realized Jericho was awaiting his turn; if he wasn’t so damn stingy with views of his dick we could’ve taken one together. After a quick supper we fell into bed and I was unsurprised when Jericho asked if I minded if we just jerked off instead of screwing, he was too tired. I was tired too, tired enough I almost told him not to worry about lovemaking (as I’d begun calling our sessions, in my head at least) at all tonight. Almost told, I say. But that raw, nervous, itchy feeling wouldn’t go away.

It was still there Saturday morning, but by now I’d decided I was reacting to the stress of the last twenty-odd hours. We trudged back out into the fray and resumed our forced labor. By noon the last of the main tree plus another, smaller one it had pushed over in its collapse had been reduced to logs and transported to beside the barn to be split at Jericho’s leisure and all the neighbors I’d never seen before vanished within the space of fifteen minutes, never to be seen by me again. We’d planned to hit the garden after lunch but June vetoed us, saying we’d worked hard enough for the time being, the garden could wait until Monday. We protested but not too much and, using the pretense he wanted to check a few things in the barn (“No, not work, Mom, I just want to check a few things.” “What things?” “Just . . . things.” She raised her eyebrows, studied Jericho and then me for an unnerving moment before agreeing.) we dry-humped in the hay-loft. We considered going back into the house to nap in our own beds but as we argued about who’d pull the other to their feet we fell asleep.

The feeling was still there when we awoke two hours later, though it had subsided some and I figured my stress was dropping too. We prepared for our usual Saturday night excursion though neither of us were sure we’d be able to skate, as sore as we were from clearing up that damn tree, but we found to our surprise the exercise stretched our muscles and some of the aches and pains began to subside. Even the raw, nervous, itchy feeling dropped to a barely perceptible purr, finally fading altogether as we circled round and round the floor, not holding hands but fingers brushing occasionally as the DJ spun what I had to come to think of as our song despite the weeping guitars and melancholy, loss-struck lyrics. But later, after Jericho held me down and fucked me silly and I lay curled up facing him and listening to him mumble the feeling came back. And it seemed even stronger.

The feeling was still there when I woke up Sunday. By the time Jericho and I walked the fence I was in full blown what-the-fuck mode, not even feeling better after we did our dry-hump thing in the trees, and I liquidated a black racer I knew was non-venomous just because I didn’t like the way it was coiled on a rock in the sun. Jericho had been treating me gently all morning, so gently I don’t think he was fully aware, but when I laughed after killing the snake he tilted his head to study my face. He’d been so tired and dispirited himself the last couple days he hadn’t realized the depths of my funk but he realized it now alright. He didn’t say anything but his manner gentled even more, pissing me off further, and when I moved away from him on the pew at church he was clearly hurt though again didn’t say anything. I felt bad, he wasn’t what had me so on edge but then again he was. I wasn’t making sense even to myself and a phrase Bud had used a few times came back to haunt me. Couldn’t see the water for the well. Couldn’t see the water for the well. I saw neither water nor well, forest nor trees. I saw everything and nothing. I tried to pay attention to Sister Sarah but I couldn’t, I had no idea what simple and logical truth she was trying to impart in her crisp white server’s shirt and black pants. June lay her hand on my knee; I hadn’t realized I’d been jiggling it hard and fast enough to shake the entire pew. I ate heartily at fellowship, trying to smother the feeling and ending up with nothing but a stomachache and a case of gas I was dangerously close to not suppressing. Back at home, Jericho asked if I wanted to forego our usual Sunday trip to Bud and Ron’s shotgun house but I shook my head before he’d even finished the question, if I had to hang around the farm all day and listen to Janey and Juanita bitch I thought I might pop out of my skin. So we jumped into Truck (him driving, which was probably a good idea) and headed over.

Our friends had made up and made up exceeding well, Bud assured us after they’d apologized profusely for quarrelling in front of company. Jericho dropped into his usual spot on the top step and spread his legs, looked hurt again when I leaned against a nearby porch post instead of taking my accustomed spot. I pretended not to notice and also pretended not to notice Bud and Ron pretending not to notice our tension. The wood still sat under its tarp, Ron cheerfully informing us it had survived the storm without becoming absolutely soaked and was even now waiting on some fellow planks to join them for the expanded building. After arguing the other night for an hour or so and clearing the air of some minor things that had been building awhile Bud and Ron had settled in to decide exactly what each of them wanted in a storage shed. Bud wanted storage, and lots of it. Ron wanted a building that looked like an outhouse from the old days. After much hemming and hawing they finally settled on a ten-by-six structure with two doors and a removable support between them for big items. Bud was happy with the size, Ron was happy he’d be able to decorate the doors with stars and opposing crescent moons with a sign under each, one reading “His” and the other “The Other His”. Solution reached, they had wild make-up monkey sex all night while the rest of us huddled in fucking tornado shelters worried we were about to die and I decided the whole fake outhouse thing was stupid, had been stupid from the start. When we went inside to trade out the books I’d brought back Bud asked if I were okay. I said I was fine. He asked if I were sure. I said I was fine, I was sure. He didn’t appear to believe me and urged for me to call them anytime, he worked from home and Ron was off this week. I said I know. He looked for a second like he was about to say something sharp, looked for another second like he was about to pull me in for a hug and over the next second decided quite rightly to leave me be. I was ashamed of myself but I couldn’t seem to break free of this mood, this raw, nervous, itchy feeling so deep inside me I couldn’t decide where it was. First it seemed to be in my stomach, then my heart, then my balls, then anywhere and everywhere else. When we left Jericho turned for home but I insisted we find somewhere to do our dry-hump thing, I was horny. Unreasonably horny, I knew, considering that right now he was dancing me up the fucking wall for some reason I couldn’t define even to myself. He drove us to the electric plateau where the Satanists performed their full moon sabbats and when he pulled me up against his chest, grinding hard into my crack and giving me reacharound even though we weren’t fucking I came hard, yelling loud enough to quiet the cicadas. I felt better for a few minutes but as we crunched up the driveway towards the house the feeling came back again, like an itch you can’t scratch in the middle of your back so you hunt down a pencil or a fork or any goddam thing in the world to finally scratch away that annoying, raw, nervous itchy itch only not to be able to pinpoint exactly where to dig. June was more insistent than usual with her offers of weed and I grew increasingly impolite until she finally seemed to get the hint. MST3K wasn’t funny that night, not at all, even though everyone else seemed to enjoy it, albeit with softer laughs and the occasional side-eye at suddenly-gone-insane-Mateo sitting alone in a chair without Jericho, an act unheard of during my tenure in this house. I was doubly aggressive in bed later, pushing my hips back into him with every thrust, not letting him hold me down. As he was pulling up his drawers in the gloom I said I’m sorry, and I meant it. He said I know, I’m sorry too, I just don’t know what to do, and he meant it. I said I don’t know either.

On Monday morning the raw, nervous itchy feeling was still there. And on Monday afternoon I found the worst place to scratch.

In general Jericho and I got along well. No, delete the ‘in general’. Jericho and I got along well. There’d been a few minor flashes of annoyance, such as when I paid our ticket at Waffle House the first Saturday or he woke me up at five a.m. again, couldn’t we sleep ‘til five-thirty just freakin’ once? Normal stuff. You can’t be in someone’s constant company without the two of you rubbing up against each other wrong on occasion, you just can’t. But there’d been no cross words between us at all. Like none. Zero. Jericho was so easy to be with I sometimes forgot I was an autonomous person and I liked it that way. I was a sub who wasn’t actually a sub, no matter how much I enjoyed being arranged or held down and fucked, and Jericho wasn’t my master. I didn’t want to give him my power, I wanted to use my power to complement his, if this makes any sense, and I was perfectly content in his shadow, to be the one he chattered to about everything and nothing. He signified to me. But if he’d gotten on my nerves on Sunday, Monday morning was even worse. And again, I couldn’t pinpoint why. The itch was just below the skin and I couldn’t find the damn thing, no matter how hard I dug with the tines of my metaphorical fork. I loved Jericho, not only in a blood-kin way or a close friend way but in a romantic way. I was in love with Jericho, he could do absolutely no wrong in my eyes. His shit, as it were, didn’t stink. But he was dancing me up the goddam wall and halfway across the ceiling. And he knew it, but just like me he didn’t know how or why. He was extra gentle, even solicitous with me, but his concern clung to me like a heavy velvet drape. Seeing he was irritating me more he backed off, gave me my space, and that irritated me too. I didn’t want him to hover over me but I didn’t want him to go away. I wanted him to fix me. But I couldn’t figure out where I was broken and like a hurt animal I snapped at his fingers when he tried to find the wound. I didn’t blame him for the frustration I saw building on his gorgeous face, in his faded-blue eyes. I didn’t blame him because I was frustrated with me too.

Lunch was quiet; I had infected everyone around me with my mood. No one knew what to say, afraid they’d set me off even though I was doing my utmost to hold my frustration inside and not take it out on anyone. Not Janey, not Juanita, not June, especially not Jericho. The clean-up was quiet and even I saw that in my attempts not to take my frustration out on anyone I was taking it out on everyone. June and Jericho held some sort of silent conversation similar to the ones held by Bud and Ron (partnered people, lifelong best friends and mothers and their children all have this ability to one degree or another) and though I couldn’t read the exact words I caught the gist: Do you want me to stay home, not open the stand? No, Mom, I’ve got this. Are you sure? I’m sure, Mom, we’ll be okay. He’ll be okay, I promise. The silent exchange pissed me off even more, if such a thing were possible, and I said not a single word as we loaded Celica with the day’s veggies nor did I watch the car crunch down the drive. As soon as June shifted into first I spun on my heel, trudging across the damp fallow field towards the stream at the far end. I didn’t turn to look but I heard Jericho follow. Once on the bank I toed out of my boots, stepping into the mud in my stocking feet but not caring, and pushed off my pants and boxers, tossing them askew on the ground. I walked over to the tree beside the elderberry shrubs, my dick so hard I could cut glass, and bent over, spread my cheeks. Waited.

And, to my amazement, Jericho said firmly, clearly, “No.”

I growled, shifted on my feet, clenched my soaked socks into the mud, spread my cheeks wider.

And he said it again. “No, Mateo.” Not ‘Mat’ but ‘Mateo’. In full daylight.

“Why not?” I asked through clenched teeth and without turning around. “Why the fuck not?”

“Because I don’t want to,” he snapped back, and I heard his jaw clench closed, heard his slow breaths in and out. I smelled elderberries but I wasn’t sure if the scent came from him or the shrubs and that pissed me off too. When he had himself under control he continued in a softer but still firm voice, “Because you don’t want to.”

“Who says I don’t?” I stood up and turned around, my angry cock thumping like a club from my crotch, and Jericho’s eyes widened. “I believe I have a crystal clear tell right here, do I not?” I grabbed hold and pumped but the strokes felt like claws on my sensitive skin. I didn’t care and stroked harder. “I’ve got a big cock, don’t I?”

“Mateo, I—”

“Yeah, that’s right, I’m biracial, I get shit on all the fucking time from both fucking sides but at least I got the blessed BBC. It’s only fair, am I right?”

“What’s wrong with you, Mat my . . .” he hesitated, “. . . Mat my lover? Please, tell me what’s wrong so I can fix it!”

“What’s wrong with me? What’s wrong with me is you’ve held my BBC in your hand, you’ve stroked me off yourself, but today is the first time you’ve actually laid eyes on it! Even in our bedroom after a shower, not once have you glanced over when I dropped my towel, not once!”

His response was just as crazy and as logical as my statement. “I didn’t know you wanted me to glance over, I was trying to give you your privacy!”

“Bullshit!” I was onto something now, some niggling frustration that wasn’t the point at all but somehow stood for everything that mattered. “What is it with you and dicks?”

“What, what do you mean?” Honestly confused, honestly frustrated, but I saw anger building in his faded-blue eyes, and it satisfied the dark, primal, wicked part of me I hadn’t known existed until now, a part of me that only glimpsed made me never desire to make further acquaintance.

“What I mean is the very first night I arrived you described yours, three weeks after that you dry-humped me between my thighs or cheeks, two weeks after that you stuffed it up my ass—”

“Because you wanted me to!” he bit off.

“Yes, because I wanted you to, and I still want you to, I love your dick inside me!” It may not have sounded like I meant the words, the way I roared, but I was telling the truth.

Yup, must not have sounded like it if his “Doesn’t sound that way to me right now!” were any indication.

“No, I do! My point here is as much as I love it inside me and as much as you love putting it in—”

“I do love fucking you!” he yelled, and although he didn’t sound like he meant the words I knew he was telling the truth.

“Then why haven’t I seen it?” I advanced on him. “I’ve had it spunk all over my backside and balls, I’ve had your quote-unquote big dick shoved so far up my ass I thought I might die from how amazing it felt but not once have I fucking seen it, not once have I touched it with my fingers, stroked it in my hand!”

“Is that what this little . . . little . . . temper tantrum is about, Mateo? You’re upset because I have some common modesty?”

“Common modesty? What’s so fucking common about it?” I was in his face, so close my erection poked his blue jeans. Neither of us looked down though that wicked part of me that found all this so terribly, terribly droll whispered You learned in Boy’s Health what fills vascular tissue to create an erection, now you know for sure. Blood. “You’re so fucking modest you could change clothes in the nun’s locker room.”

His face screwed up into irritated confusion. “What?”

“Never mind, it sounded better in my head. What I mean is, why haven’t you let me see your dick?”

He was angry now, I’d taken my marching army and blowing horns and attacked a wall I’d barely known existed. “I don’t have to show you my cock, the fact I fuck you with it should be enough!” And it was. So why couldn’t I admit it?

“Show me your dick, Jericho.” Why had I never noticed how similar we were in size? Why had I thought he was somehow larger than me? He may, I say may have been two inches taller, maybe twenty pounds heavier. Not so very big at all. I reached up to poke his chest, “Show me your dick!” and he batted my finger away.

“I don’t want to show you my dick,” he seethed. “I don’t have to show you my dick!”

“Show me your dick.” Again I poked, again he batted my finger away. “Show me your dick, Jer.”

“No, Mat.”

I reached up to poke, using fingers on both hands this time. “Show. Me. Your. Dick.” He used both hands to bat me away.

“No, Mateo. Knock it off. Back the fuck away.”

I should have backed the fuck away. I saw the warning clear as day in his faded blue eyes. And some part of me that was not finding all this so terribly, terribly droll cried out in protest as I raised my fingers for another pair of pokes. “Show.” My fingers aiming for his chest. “Me.” His hands coming up in front, not positioned to bat. “Your.” My fingers skimming close, closer still. “Di—”

And suddenly I was flying backwards, his outstretched hands losing touch after the push, and I stumbled and slipped on the squishy ground, his mouth opening, changing from an angry, voluptuous line to a wide-expression of shock and regret, and I lost my balance, his hands, the ones which had just shoved at my shoulders, reaching out to try grab me, and I fell straight backwards into the stream, my bare ass splashing into the shallow water and coming to painful rest on the muddy, pebbly bottom so hard I bit my tongue. I looked around myself, at the water either cleaving to roll around me or soaking and darkening my tee in liquid inevitability.

Abruptly, as if the cool, shallow water had been poured over my head, all the anger, all the frustration washed out of me, leaving me nothing but tired and sad. Jericho splashed into the stream, heedless of his boots and jeans, his hand held out to help me up, but I waved him away. “I’m sorry, Mat, I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to push you so hard, I was only trying to get you out of my face.” He sloshed backwards a couple steps, watched anxiously as I climbed to my feet, the water dripping from my soaked tee-shirt to run down my naked crotch and my naked ass and my naked flanks and I noticed with absolutely no surprise at all I wasn’t hard anymore. My dick was a coward.

All his anger was gone now too, his voice and face and faded-blue eyes suffused with concern. “What do you want, Mateo? Mat? Mat my friend, my lover, my brother? Please tell me what you want so I can give it to you! I hate seeing you like this!”

I wanted him. I wanted my mother. I wanted to have never come here. I wanted to never leave. I didn’t know what I wanted.

I slogged back up onto the bank and he followed. “Really, Mat, I didn’t mean to—”

“I know you didn’t.” My voice tired. My soul tired. “And I’m not mad. Really I’m not, I deserved it. I’m sorry is what I am, I’m so fucking sorry.”

“You don’t have to apologize, just please tell me what you need, what would make you feel better!”

I didn’t know what—wait, I did too. I knew what I needed. What would make me feel better. I bent over to scoop up my pants and boots, began the long, slow, waterlogged trip across the fallow field. Jericho followed me for a few steps but stopped and I walked on alone, bare-assed, not wanting. I paused on the back porch and pulled off my soaked tee, my soaked socks, not wanting to make a huge mess in June’s immaculate house. I carried my clothes to the laundry room, made sure to drop them in the hamper labeled with my name, not wanting them to be lost forever; trust Jericho, he said it had happened before. I hoped Darren had been the one to lose his shit, not wanting him to still have his favorite pair of jeans and most expensive shirt. I took a quick shower, not wanting one but also not wanting to make a mess where I needed to go. I walked bare-ass to the bedroom, tossed my towel on the floor between our twin beds and dressed, not wanting to be bare-assed anymore. Not wanting.

When I went back upstairs I found Jericho, barefoot and in his long, baggy shorts, mopping up the tracks I’d left on the floor. Not wanting to force him to clean up after me I said, “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to—” and reached for the mop but he shook his head. “I’ve got this. Please, Mateo, let me.” So I let him. As I lifted the keys from the hook beside the door I asked, “Do you mind if I use Truck? I’m not going far, I promise, and I won’t be long.” Not wanting to worry him.

“Are you okay to drive?”

“I’m fine.” And I was. I felt crystal clear, mainly because I felt empty. I knew the emptiness was a lie, I thought the crystal clarity would last long enough to get me where I needed to go.

“Go ahead,” Jericho said. “Be careful, okay?”

“I will.”

Truck didn’t start. I popped the hood, got out, jiggled the starter wire, not wanting to ask for help. Truck fired right up. As I crunched down the gravel Jericho came out to the turnaround, watched me drive away from him with his hand shielding his eyes and I remembered my first day, when he’d stood from a crouch in the garden to watch us arrive, when I hadn’t known who it was and couldn’t tell for the glare but I thought was male. I came off the clutch slow and easy as I pulled onto Milk’n’Honey Lane, not wanting to stall the engine. Not wanting.

I clicked on the tinny radio. A song was just going off and though I couldn’t be sure I thought it was “Tuesday’s Gone” and I was glad, not wanting to hear it. Another song started, something bright and chipper with guitars that laughed and screamed and didn’t fucking weep. I hummed along, not wanting my own eerie silence. As I crossed the disused railroad tracks I thought I really should have called first but then remembered Bud worked from home and Ron was off this week and look, there was Bud’s Grand Am with Ron’s truck right beside. I parked on the street, not wanting to be trapped if Bud’s sister stopped by and blocked the driveway. I got out and started trudging around back, not wanting to use the front door, I wasn’t a guest, I was family, but before I reached the side of the house the front door opened and my auntie stepped outside, calling into the living room behind him, “He’s here, tell Jericho he’s fine.” Bud stepped down off the porch opening his arms and, not wanting to disappoint him, I stepped into them. Needing.