He scrunches up his face like a kid who just got caught in a lie. “Kinda, yeah.”
I can’t help but smile. I almost laugh. Almost. Apparently, we both think the other is trying to kill us at all times.
“You do remember that time, about two hours ago, when I held a gun on you, right? I could have killed you then.” Even though that’s a lie. He doesn’t know I couldn’t do it. Or that as long as I’ve had that gun on the other side of the room, I’ve never been able to pull the trigger when it’s facing a living creature. Paper targets are fine, but anything with a heartbeat... “I promise not to kill you if you promise not to kill me,” I offer.
Andrew picks up the glass of water. “Best deal I’ve made all apocalypse.” Then he downs the pills. I smile and head into the kitchen to clean the dishes.
When I get back to the living room, the sun has gone down. I light two candles and set them out on the side tables next to the couch and chair.
Andrew’s barely awake. When I ask if he’s okay, he gives me agrunt. Maybe the pain meds were a good idea. He’ll be knocked out long enough for me to sleep without worrying about him getting up to murder me. I think he’s being honest, but I can’t be complacent. Who knows if his promises are worth anything.
Andrew’s soft snores fill the silence. I call out to him quietly but he’s fully passed out now. I reach for the Virginia Woolf book and am flipping through it when something falls out onto my lap.
It’s a thin piece of paper ripped from what looks like a handwritten address book. It reads:Marc and Diane Foster. 4322 Leiper Street, Alexandria, VA, 22314. Their phone number’s listed as well, but that isn’t much use now.
I watch Andrew sleep, wondering why he would have something from an address book. My mother had one, but she never even used it. Most people used their phones to store that info.
I put the piece of paper on the table, closer to him, so he’ll see it when he wakes. I open the book one more time and begin to read.
Andrew
WHEN I WAKE, SUN IS FLOODING THEliving room. There’s a fire roaring in the fireplace. I stretch out on the couch and a burst of pain from my leg makes me gasp.
There’s a blanket on me.
Jamison gave me a blanket while I was passed out. My face warms, but I notice he isn’t in the living room with me.
I sit up and something on the coffee table catches my eye. The address I’ve been carrying around for weeks is there, next to my books. It must have fallen out when I was going through my bag. I grab it and stuff it quickly into the pockets of the sweatpants Jamison gave me last night.
“Jamison?” I call out.
“You can call me Jamie.”
I startle at his disembodied voice and wince again at the pain in my leg. I sit up a little more and see him sitting on the floor near the front door. There’s a new, bigger tub of what looks like medical supplies that was absolutely not here last night. Jamie is tying a large piece of foam rubber to the top of the branch I had been using as a crutch.
Seriously, where is he getting this shit? Is there a Joann Fabrics in his backyard? You know what? I’m not even going to ask. He’s got electricity, water, and a fridge—ofcoursehe has foam rubber, too. He probably got it from his neighbor, Tom Holland. At least his padding is better than a T-shirt. I want to make a drag queen joke about padding but I know it will go over his head.
All my good material is wasted on this kid.
“Why are youlurkingbehind the couch?”
He stops tying and turns his attention to me. “Oh, I’m sorry. You were saying you enjoyed having hard wood dig into your armpit?”
Does he not hear himself? Are straight boys immune to innuendo?
Like I said. Good material. Wasted.
“Looks great. As you were.”
Jamie goes back to the foam and I can’t help but smile as I watch him work. The muscles in my cheeks ache at being used so often for the first time in months.
Wake up, smile: the apocalypse has provided a cute boy to nurse us back to health.
Jamie has a look about him that just doesn’t match his personality. He’s big, both tall and wide. I watch his hands as they move; they’re large but somehow delicate. He doesn’t look up at me once while he works, so I stare at him freely. Even with his face turned down, I can see his handsome features.
He shouldn’t be helping me. He’s like so many guys I’ve known from school who pick on people like me.
But that isn’t him. There isn’t that defensiveness about him that there was with other guys our age. The ones who worry that if theyget too close they might catch the gay. One guy told me that once and I looked him up and down, pointed at myself, and said, “You couldn’t catch this gay if you had tickets toHamilton.”
