Thomas finally pushed to his feet with a barely concealed wince, a hand going to his side where the wolf monsters had bitten. He took a step closer to Andrew, then another, only light filling the aching space between them.
“I won’t let my monsters hurt you.” His hand reached out, tentative at first, and then he took hold of Andrew’s Wickwood sweater and twisted his fingers into the soft fabric so hard Andrew felt the shape of Thomas’s finger bones against his heartbeat. “If I lose control, you’d stop me, right? If I’m the true monster, you’d fight me.”
“You’re not the monster.” But all Andrew could think was ifhe could crack open Thomas’s ribs right then and fit his whole self inside him, he would.
“But if I am”—Thomas’s teeth clenched—“you have to swear you’d stop me.”
“I can’t,” Andrew whispered.
“Yes, you can.” Thomas’s eyes were on him then, wretched and dark and mossy. “Prove to me that you can. Hit me.”
Andrew stared.
“I need to know you can do it.” Thomas let go and took a step back. “That you can defend yourself from me.”
They stood an arm’s length apart, both breathing too fast as if they’d run a thousand miles and still not outpaced the dark. Between them the world crumbled into a cavernous black void.
“No,” Andrew said.
Thomas shoved him. Andrew’s shoulders hit the wall and air burst from his lungs with a gasp.
“Hit me.” Thomas’s eyes blazed. “Or I swear I will fucking leave you in case that’s the only way to save you. I will leave you and never, never come back. I’ll—”
Andrew hit him.
His fist met flesh with a thick and terrible sound, and he felt the moment blood slid across his knuckles like a crimson tithe to the woods.
His second punch made Thomas stumble backward, hand to his mouth as his fingers came away red.
Everything felt vicious and electric between them. Sweat ran down the back of Andrew’s neck and raw, red heat ravaged his eyes. He wanted to kiss Thomas. He wanted to press their bloody mouths together with a hunger he thought would kill him.
He hadn’t needed to hit Thomas twice.
But he had.
Thomas wiped his mouth. “Okay.” He sounded calmer. “Okay, good.”
This is all they were, at the end of it all, boys with stomachs empty and concave, waiting to be filled by Wickwood and forests and rot.
TWENTY-ONE
It was impossible he’d gotten away with it.
He kept waiting for Thomas to bring it up, or a teacher to pull him into a dark room where a detective would step out of the shadows, handcuffs ready, the accusation written cold in their eyes:Murderer.
Andrew couldn’t stop thinking about it as he slipped into one of the halls dedicated to independent study, textbooks crowded in his arms and a sweater on under his blazer because he was cold, always cold. His hair was swept back in a deep, honey wave, and he looked a shy and lovely boy, not one to sacrifice a teacher.
take Clemens as the tithe take him take him take him
He had to stop thinking about it. He should think, instead, of Thomas’s scabbed-over lip, how he kept worrying it in class until it split afresh and lined his chin with a perfect paint stroke of vermilion.
Yesterday’s violence felt like a fever dream, but a bruise ghosted Andrew’s knuckles in the soft shape of Thomas’s mouth.
He should stop thinking about Thomas’s mouth.
Finding a free table in the study hall proved harder than he anticipated, especially since most of the seniors had clustered in groups of two or three, their books and laptops taking overwhole tables. Tall mahogany bookshelves divided the room, desks and students sequestered between them, and with the dark wallpaper and ornate carved cornices and bronze chandeliers, the whole room felt oppressive and airless. But he couldn’t keep hovering, awkward and alone, while he waited for Thomas to be released from art class. Not to mention how much work he had to catch up on.
He was failing classes; they both were. Sleepless nights full of monsters weren’t conducive to Wickwood’s rigorous academic schedule, apparently.
