Clint checks his watch and sighs like he hates the world.
When Johnny takes my hand and weaves our fingers together, I groan, because I already know what’s coming. Ezra launches off the couch like a cartoon superhero, lunging forward, his arm high above his head as he readies himself to karate chop Johnny and me apart. He roars a battle cry that makes him sound like the king of the jungle, even though we don’t live anywhere near a jungle, and Ezzy’s more of a queen than a king.
“Ah, Christ. Here we go.” I say with a sigh, readying myself for the pain.
“Not this shit again,” Johnny groans, and the next thing I know, a dull thud spreads across my wrist, and judging by the hissing sounds Johnny is making, he must be feeling it too.
“God dammit, Ezra,” I cry out, letting go of Johnny’s wrist and grabbing my own, rubbing softly like it’ll somehow ease the pain. “I’ve asked you not to do that. We agreed to non-violence.”
“Yeah, well, we also agreed Johnny would keep his fucking hands off you, but there he goes, practically stroking your cock in front of the whole room.”
“He was holding my hand.”
“Aha!” he declares like he’s just cracked the case. “So, you admit it? He was stroking you to completion.”
“He was stroking the side of my hand.” I turn and give Austin and Clint a look. “Can we have the room?”
Austin blinks at me. “Just go to yours. It’s right fucking there, up those stairs and literally ten paces to your right. Lazy fuck.”
“Give us the fucking room!” Ezra shrieks like an emotionally unhinged banshee. “Get out, get out, get out!”
“Did you just fucking screech at me?” As Aussie stands and walks our way, looking like he’s out for blood, Ezra swallows and takes a step behind Johnny.
“If you’re going to kill someone,” Ezra pleads, “kill Johnny. He’s bald and nearly forty. He has nothing to live for.”
“The thought of framing you for murder gets me by,” Johnny mumbles under his breath. “And I’m only thirty-three.”
“Yes, well, you look seventy.” Ezra stops and shakes his head. “I mean, obviously you don’t, but that dig was designed to hurt, and I won’t apologize for it.” He flicks a dismissive hand in the air. “Besides, even if you managed to frame me and I got sent to jail, Bubba would just get himself arrested to keep me company. He’d kill Aussie dead just so he could spend twenty-to-life with me in Pretty Boy Prison.”
“Boys,” I attempt, but they just talk over me.
“Oh, yeah?” Johnny asks. He holds his hands in front of him, moving them mystically like he’s reading a crystal ball. “Is that what your psychic senses are telling you?”
Ezzy’s eyes narrow. “Don’t you ever attempt to discredit my psychic abilities. You know I don’t like it when you do that. It’s a gift, Johnny. I can’t explain it, I can only experience the visions as they come.”
“A gift,” Johnny scoffs. “You just spit words out random, swindling people out of their hard-earned money.”
Ezra shakes his head insistently. “I don’t swindle. I let the spirits speak through me. There’s a difference.”
“The spirits? Are those the same spirits who told you I was fucking Bubba in the ass in the upstairs bathroom, so you called the fire department to bust the door down, claiming an arsonist was hiding in the shower?”
“Her name is Barbara. You know that. I was just minding my own, and then she bares in, shouting about fire and brimstone. I assumed she meant someone was setting fires upstairs. She said what she said, so I did what I did. Besides, you were making a lot of really weird noises. How was I supposed to know you were simply suffering from Irritable Bowel Syndrome?”
“You put four chocolate laxatives in my milkshake! Ten grown men barged into the bathroom while I was battling for my goddamn life.”
“When the spirits are at play, one cannot silence what they say.”
I stare dreamily at my boy, because he’s over here quoting Walt Whitman to put a smile on my face. “That was stunning, Ezra. Was that fromO Captain! My Captain!?”
Ezra blushes. “It sure was, Bubs,”
“It was not,” Johnny says. “Half the shit you claim to be poetry is just stupid little rhymes you come up with on the fly. Do you think you’re the only one who knows how to rhyme? You think that’s how you’re going to take Bubba from me?”
“Ain’t nobody taking me from either of you.”
They both stare at me like I’m stupid. “This isn’t about you,” they say in unison.
“Roses are red, violets are blue,” Johnny says. “I’m gonna hang out with him all day. Sucks for you.”
