Carver laughed. “And yet, here we are.”
“Yeah.”
They were quiet for a moment.
“So, you missed me at Duke?” Scott said, still smiling.
“Yeah. I kept listening to that mix CD you gave me right before we broke up. I told myself it was fine because they weren’t your songs, or anything.”
“No shit?”
“Yeah.”
“I assumed you threw that away, or something.”
“No, I listened to it ‘til it broke.”
Scott looked pleased. “Really?”
“Yeah,” Carver said with a tinge of embarrassment.
“Was this in between listening to Slipknot?”
“Fuck you,” he said, laughing, and Scott grinned. “I said myroommatewas into Slipknot.”
“Right, sorry. What were you into?”
“System of a Down, Slayer, Lamb of God, plus some random shit I found on Napster. I never really got good at finding new music, I always felt out of place when I went in a record store.”
Scott glanced away with a wistful expression and said, “I wish I could have helped you out.”
“I mean, you did a little, with the CD. Like, it helped to have this list of good bands you’d put together. I got credit from people for knowing who The Band was.”
“What of theirs did I put on there?”
“Atlantic City.”
“I remember that, actually,” Scott said, nodding. “Great cover. Um… this is kind of a fucked up story, but years ago I wasplaying a show at a casino in Atlantic City, and we were doing a cover of that song, and a guy in the audience keeled over. Some paramedics got there fast and took him away, but apparently he was already gone when they got there.”
“Jesus.”
“Yeah. It kind of fucked me up to think about. Like, my voice was probably the last thing he heard. Or one of the last things.”
“There are worse ways to go,” Carver said with a smile.
“But it wasn’t even that good a show, is what fucked me up. I was getting over a cold. I felt guilty, afterwards, like this guy fucking died and I wasn’t even giving it my all. If I’d known, I would have, you know?”
“No shit. If only we all knew everything ahead of time.”
“Yeah.”
They were quiet for a moment, looking at each other, and the magnetism of their bodies began to pull them together in the darkness. Carver reached up to stroke Scott’s bearded cheek, ruffling the short coarse hair with his thumb, and Scott turned to nuzzle his lips against Carver’s palm.
“You’re going home tomorrow morning, you said?” Carver said.
“Yeah,” Scott murmured, reaching up to take him by the wrist and press a kiss to the location of his pulse. “Van’s loaded up, tow truck comes at nine-thirty, and then I’ll head out on the bike.”
“All the way back?”
