“Gee, I wonder why? It’s not like you’re always going out of your way to torment me whenever we’re in the same room together,” Jude snapped.
“Oh, here we go.” Jude’s mom shook her head at the ceiling like she was communing her troubles with the heavens. “You would think we could get throughorderingbefore you start telling us about all the ways we’ve failed you as parents.”
“You would think we could get through ordering before you start going on at me about what a fucking failure I am!” Jude countered, blood well and truly boiled.
“You are not a failure, Jude,” Al said softly, and it was such a quiet, earnest statement that Jude’s anger fizzled out. He stopped looking at his mother and looked instead at Al, who was observing him with visible concern.
Beneath the table, Al put a reassuring hand on Jude’s thigh and squeezed.
“And what do you study, Al?” Jude’s mom asked, her tone no less cutting than it had been when she had been speaking with Jude. “Assuming you attend college, that is?”
“I am studying to become an engineer,” Al said to her, but he didn’t take his eyes off of Jude.
“Ha,” she laughed humorlessly. “Well, that’s good. Jude needs someone with a real job to support him. Lord knows he’s not going to be making money with a degree infine arts.” She said “fine arts” like one would say “genital warts.”
Al finally broke his intense eye contact with Jude in order to look at her. His brow furrowed. “Jude does good artwork,” he said. “Why would he not study what he feels enjoyment for and has talent in?”
“Hey, I like that,” Lennon said, pointing at Al. “Standing up for your man. That’s what’s up.”
He leaned back in his chair, looking entertained by the bickering.
“I am seated, not standing, so I do not understand what you mean,” Al said, “but I do know that I do not feel appreciation for the way you and your mother speak to Jude. You are not acting kind.”
“Ah, he knows we’re just giving him a hard time, don’t you, Judy?”
“His name is Jude, not Judy,” Al interjected before Jude could even open his mouth. “Do you not know your brother’s name? And why would you want to give him a ‘hard time.’ You mean hard as in difficult, correct? Because English has many words that sound the same but mean different things, which is stupid. But even if that is that word’s correct meaning, that saying does not seem correct or kind, as I do not understand why you would want to make situations difficult for Jude.”
“Al, you don’t have to—” Jude started, but Al was apparently getting heated.
“I do not know many humans”—Jude cringed slightly—“but I do not need to meet more of them to know that Jude is the best one. He is nice and funny and generous. He does not have many things because he is ‘broke as all get out,’ or that is what Jude’s human roommate Ezra said to me. But even though he is broke as all get out, Jude shares all his things with me. He helped me when I needed help a lot, even though he did not have to. He is beautiful, very good at mating, and also my favorite in the whole universe, and I do not think I feel desire for you to say more mean things to him.” Seemingly without meaning to, Al had risen out of his chair and was looming over the lot of them. He glanced down at himself, as though unsure of how he’d gotten that way, and then asked Lennon, “Oh. Is this what you meant by ‘standing up for your man’?”
“Uh. Yeah, man. That definitely counts,” Lennon said, looking a little shell-shocked. They all did, actually, Jude likely included. And also the server, who had returned with a notepad and pen in his hand.
“I’ll just… give you a few more minutes,” he said with a tight smile, and scurried away.
“What does ‘few’ evenmean?” Al muttered angrily, mostly to himself.
“I think,” Jude began, slowly getting to his feet as well, “that maybe it’s time for Al and me to leave.”
His mother glared at both of them. “Perhaps that would be wise.”
“Aw, don’t leave,” said Lennon, throwing up his hands. “We never see each other anymore.”
Everyone looked at Lennon like he was insane, and he shrugged. “Just trying to keep the peace,” he said. “Go on, then. See you later, Judy.”
“His name is Jude,” Al said in the most menacing voice Jude had ever heard him use. Lennon’s eyebrows disappeared into his hairline.
“Right, sorry.” He cleared his throat. “See you later,Jude.”
A small smile crept onto Jude’s face.
“Damn straight,” he muttered. He took Al by the hand and headed to the exit. Not once did he look back.
* * *
“I believe I feel enjoyment for Mexican food,” Al announced, and proceeded to suck the rest of the sauce out of the Taco Bell sauce packet. It was his seventeenth.
Jude, who was lying on the windshield of his car, hands behind his head, stopped looking up at the stars and looked at Al instead. “This definitely does not count as Mexican food,” he said, wrinkling his nose as Al pinched the very last of the sauce out of the packet currently between his lips. He hadn’t felt like going home after the disaster at the restaurant, so he and Al had bought their weight in Taco Bell and driven out into the desert. Jude had made quick work out of the spicy potato tacos and Al…
