10.“Ryan, I thought I had peaches on the list.” my mom said, searching through the paper bags. I stared at her and hoped that she didn’t see the peach juice stains on my shirt and the way that my hair stuck up oddly, an after-effect of Jay mussing with my hair. All I could smell was the bittersweet tinge of exoticism that peaches represented. And my mom was oblivious.
“Well, they were all squishy, so I didn’t want to risk it.” I told her, smiling innocently.
“Yeah, they do tend to be awfully ripe at this time of year.” she said, not really paying attention as I inched my way to the bathroom and the shower. I was so fucking sticky, mostly from peaches, but some of it from him. Shuddered thinking about how long I might have to stay in there to wash it all away.
Water spilled over my scalp, over my pores, through my eyelashes and down my body. The peach juice, or at least most of it, went with it. I just stayed there and let the warmth fill me, even though it was late April and sort of warm anyway. Jay... It was such a mystery why he even kept up with me... I was younger than he was, certainly not anything special, and he had Bobby. But he took every opportunity to nip out and embarrass me in public. I sighed and resolved to visit him tomorrow, even if I had to sell my soul to Amir to do it. Amir...I wondered if Jay and he had ever done anything together. It might fit some pieces of the puzzle together...but then I doubted it. Maybe theirs was a relationship of continued antagonization and they really had a great friendship. Somehow I doubted it.
I met Amir as I walked into the dorm. He looked at me for a moment, smiling a bit, and then shook his head. “Ryan, isn’t it? Just couldn’t stay away, huh?” he asked. I stared at him and sighed.“Could I ask you a question?”
“Yeah, you can always ask, it’s just I might not be able to answer.”
“That’s fine. Um...do you still go to college?”
“Nah, I graduated. But I sort of wanted to stay on as a Resident Advisor and help out the other kids. Not being able to find a job sort of helped.”
“What did you major in?”
“Art History.” He laughed. “I was idealistic.” He looked at me for a bit and sighed. “But you probably don’t want to know about me. What did you really want to ask?”
“Well, it’s really an opinion question. You have been in a romantic relationship more than just kissing, right?” I asked.
“Um..yeah.” Red crept up his face, warmth crept up mine. Why had I just spontaneously decided to ask him about this? “Why, do you need advice? About Jay?”
“Yeah.” I squeaked out.
He smiled weakly. “You’d probably be better off asking Bobby.”
“No, I really feel more comfortable asking you.” Not exactly true, but it was better than asking the guy that I’d seen naked and could conceivably be fucking me in the near future.
He shrugged, “Okay, go ahead then.”
“Um...do you think a relationship based on sex can last?” Blank stare for a few minutes. “Like...um...public sex?” Intense stare, like he was imagining it all. Sort of creepy, but at least he was listening.
“It can last, if both parties involved make it last, but I don’t know how deep you’d actually be capable of getting. And if you’re talking about Jay, I really don’t think he’s capable of that.” He watched me as my face fell. “But don’t listen to me, I mean, he might be able to... I really only know him on a superficial level.”
“Well, thanks for listening anyway. I guess I’ll have to go ask Jay then.” I said, making for the stairs. He grabbed my shoulder and shook his head.
“I don’t know if you want to do that. He’s not having a really great day.” I shrugged. I had lived through my mom’s bad days, this was probably similar.
“WHAT’S YOUR FUCKING PROBLEM!!! HAVEN’T YOU EVER SEEN A GUY IN A NIGHTGOWN BEFORE!!!” Jay’s screams reached me in the stairwell. I resisted the urge to run back down and out the door. If I wanted to have anything lasting with him, which my somewhat addled teenage mind wanted with all its being, I had to know what he was like in pretty much every circumstance.“....gay...” I heard whispered as I opened the door and stepped out. Jay was standing in the hallway, the veins in his neck stark and defined, almost popping out with anger. What he was wearing was just a little odd, a sheer peach mesh nightie that showed off his boxers, and, of course, my favorite titillation points, the nipples. Bobby had his arm around Jay’s waist and was trying to get him to go back into their room.
“YEAH FUCKER, I’M FUCKING GAY!!!”
“Ssh, you’re not feeling well, come back to bed.” Bobby said soothingly, tugging gently on Jay’s stomach. Then he saw me. “Ryan, come on, help me get him back inside.” I was amazed that he even wanted me involved. Instantly I ran up and started dragging a kicking and screaming Jay back into their room. “His ulcer’s acting up. That and a few other things, but it’s mostly the ulcer.”
Finally we had him in bed and quiet, mostly by me putting my hand over his mouth and Bobby putting his hand up Jay’s boxers. Jay slid his eyes halfway closed and sighed, gently leaning back against both of us. “Is he always like this when...” I began, trying to keep quiet so that he wouldn’t start yelling at me.
Bobby sighed and shook his head. “Most of the time he’s alright, but if someone starts messing with him he’ll totally go off on them for no reason at all. He’s got everyone in the hall trained, almost... Well, except for this one guy down the hall who keeps on fucking with him for being gay, but that’s it.”
“And if people talk about me like I’m not in the room.” Jay snarled, turning like he was going to bite me. Bobby gently moved his hand and Jay’s eyes flickered. “But if you keep that up I can ignore it.” he whispered.
Bobby looked at his watch and then kissed Jay on the forehead. “I’ve got class right now, but Ryan’ll stay with you, okay?” Jay looked like he was going to be sick. His whole face went pale and he shot up and ran to the garbage can. Bobby acted like it was normal as Jay started puking his guts out. I was unsure what I could do except watch the muscles in Jay’s back shudder and then listen to the delightful sounds coming from him.
Bobby was halfway out the door when Jay hissed “Fuck.” I went over and looked. It was mostly blood.
Hospital. I hated it, hated them with a passion. My stomach went into its fucked up mode when I so much as smelled them. And now I was sitting in the waiting room next to Bobby, who had decided that maybe his economics class wasn’t quite as important as finding out if Jay was going to die. Last time I had been here it was after my grandfather broke his hip, I think that was the last time I saw him alive before both me and my mom decided that perhaps I didn’t really want to remember him half- insensate and totally devoid of anything that made him human. Didn’t want to remember how I didn’t even cry when I heard he was dead, never had since. But that had nothing to do with what was happening now. Prayed fervently that this wasn’t going to be the last time I saw Jay.We had rushed Jay over here as quickly as possible, trying to keep him relatively calm even though he was totally freaked out by the thought that maybe he was being eaten alive by his stomach acids. Luckily the university had its own hospital and he had insurance, otherwise he might have ended up sitting in the emergency room waiting for hours and... I found myself leaning my head on Bobby’s shoulder. He just seemed like the kind of person who would mother someone to death. “Why did it flare up anyway?”
“His ex called last night...Jay started drinking and smoking again, the usual.”
“What’s his ex like?” Bobby sighed and rubbed at his eyes.
“Paige was...well, he was really nice and almost normal to everyone except Jay. I mean, he’d call Jay up all the time and get Jay all worried about little nothings, he’d obsess about what time they’d have to meet, whether or not unanswered e-mails meant that Jay was dead...stuff like that. And Jay was fine with that, as long as he got fucked. Except Paige was just...standoffish there too. He’d act like touching Jay was touching a plague victim. Eventually Jay got to the point where he thought he was so dirty that he sort of felt like he was diseased.” Bobby sighed and leaned his head back, I wondered how long ago this was... “And then Paige started getting really paranoid, wondering where Jay was just about every second of the day. Jay picked it up then, and he’d have fits if someone moved the things on his desk, if I was just a little bit late back from class. That’s about the time he found out that he had an ulcer.”
“Paige wasn’t abusive, was he?”
“Not the physical kind, just mentally and verbally. Finally Paige just dumped him, saying that if he couldn’t be sure where Jay was all the time he didn’t want to be involved. I tried really hard to get him back to normal, but he still calls Paige at least once a month and then he gets all fucked up again.”
“I’m so sorry.” I whispered, hugging him. He pushed me away. I sighed. “It seems like you really love Jay. I’ll just..go away if you want me to.” I said. It wasn’t my place to deal in matters that I couldn’t understand or control, and everything was working against me. I knew that I wouldn’t be able to handle most of the stresses that Bobby dealt with almost without thinking.
“No. Really, it’s fine. He talks about you all the time, I mean, nothing all that special, but he really only thinks of me as a friend who’ll fuck him when no one else will. And I’m okay with that.” I wondered if, when the time came, I would be that self-sacrificing.
They let us in to see him a little bit later. He was wearing one of those dinky hospital gowns, I longed for one of his over the top nightgowns, but obviously that wouldn’t work here and I started to feel guilty for even thinking it. His skin was pale as paper, perhaps even paler, and he could barely keep his eyes open. But there weren’t any machines whirring and buzzing around him yet, so it couldn’t have been that bad.
He smiled when he saw Bobby and me and sat up a bit. Bobby kissed his forehead, then whispered something in his ear. Jay looked at me slowly, a cautious look replacing the smile. I went over and hugged him, shocked at how clammy his skin had turned in the three hours since we had taken him in here. Tried to pretend that it was the air conditioning.
“They’re gonna keep me here overnight...” Jay said. Bobby nodded. “I guess they just want to see how bad it is and...The guy who can do the endoscopy went home or something like that. Can’t say that I’m all that disappointed.”
“Then you can’t be all that much at risk.” I ventured. Bobby and Jay both looked at me like I was crazy.
“Still might have to have surgery...”
“I told you not to drink last night. Especially after Paige called.”
“I know, I know.” Jay said, his voice growing more child-like by the second.
“Do you want me to stay with you overnight?” Bobby asked. Jay nodded almost immediately, perhaps they had done this before? I know that I would never have done it.
I felt like a total outsider. But Bobby had practically said that Jay would rather have me than him. What was the truth, what did Jay really think? Right now he was staring at Bobby like Bobby was the center of his world... I needed to think about this...Amir had raised some good points, Bobby had confused things, and now I had to worry about Jay and whether or not he’d pay any lasting attention to me or not.
And now all I could think about was fucking him. Stupid hormones.