He went to the bookcase and started handling the family photos. “Wonder if he ever sucked a cock,” he said, picking up a portrait of my father.
“Don’t be a butt plug.”
He smiled. “I love you,” he said, raising his T-shirt, pulling it off over his head.
Dark hair rose in a fishbone up and out of his jeans.
I turned off the television.
“We need something,” he said as I led him down the hall toward my room.
“Something what?”
“Slippery.”
I ducked into the bathroom, opened the cabinet, and grabbed a tube of Neosporin.
“Brilliant,” he said. “An antibiotic lube job, fights infection while you’re having fun.”
Piece by piece I undressed with him, after him. He peeled off his socks, I peeled off mine. He unzipped his jeans and I undid mine. He slipped his fingers into the band of his underwear, snapped the elastic, and grinned. I pulled mine down. He slipped the tube of ointment into my ass, pinched my nipples, and sank his teeth deep into the muscle above my collarbone.
My parents got back just after midnight. “It was so nice of you to spend the evening,” my mother said. “I just hate to leave you-know-who home alone. I think he gets depressed.”
“Whatever,” he said, shrugging. He left with my father, who was giving him a ride home.
“You don’t have to come with us,” my father said to me. “It’s late. Go to bed.”
“See you in school tomorrow,” I said.
“Whatever.”
A week later he sat in my room at home, jerking off, with the door open.
“Stop,” I said. “Or close the door.”
“Danger excites me.”
“My mother isn’t dangerous,” I said, getting up and closing the door myself.
“What we’ve got here,” he said, still jerking, “is virgin sperm. People will pay a load for this shit.” He laughed at himself. “Get it—pay a load.” Come shot into the air and landed on the glass of my fish tank.
“Very funny,” I said. I was working out an algebra problem on my bed. He came over to me, dropped his pants, and put his butt in my face. “Your luck, I haven’t used it for anything except a couple of farts all day. Lick it,” he said, bending over, holding his cheeks apart. It was smelly and permanently stained. His testicles hung loose and low, and I took them in my hand, rolling them like Bogart’s Caine Mutiny balls. “Get in,” he said. I buried my face there, tickled his asshole with the tip of my tongue, and made him laugh.
Saturday, on her way to the grocery store, my mother dropped us off at the park. “Shall I come back for you when I’m finished?” she asked.
“No,” he said flatly.
“No, thanks,” I said. “We’ll find our way.”
“Ever fuck a girl?” he asked as we cut across the grass, past the playground, past the baseball fields and toward the woods.
“No.”
“Ever want to?”
“No.”
“Wanna watch?” he said, taking me to a picnic table where a girl I recognized from school was standing, arms crossed in front of her chest. “It’s twelve-thirty, you’re late,” she said. The girl looked at me and blinked. “Oh, hi. We’re in history together, right?”
I nodded and looked at my shoes.
“Miss me?” he asked, kissing the girl’s neck, hard.
My eyes hyperfocused and zeroed in on his lips, on her skin, on the feathery blond hair at the base of her skull. When he pulled away, the hair was wet, the skin was purple and red. There were teeth marks.
She stood in the clearing, eyes closed. He reached for her hand and led her into the woods. I followed, keeping a certain distance between them and me.
In the trees, he pulled his T-shirt off over his head. She ran her fingernails slowly up and down the fishbone of fur sticking out of his Levi’s. He tugged at the top of her jeans.
“Take ’em off,” he said in a familiar and desperate voice.
“Who do you think you’re kidding,” she said.
“Show me yours,” he said, rubbing the front of his Levi’s with an open palm, “and I’ll show you mine.”
“That’s okay, thanks,” she said, backing away.
He went toward her, she stepped back again. He stuck his leg behind her, tripping her. She fell to the ground. He stepped on her open palms, holding her down with his Nikes.
“This isn’t funny,” she said.
He laughed.
He unzipped his pants and peed on her. She screamed, and he aimed the river at her mouth. Her lips sealed and her head turned away. Torrent released, he shook it off on her, put it away, and stepped from her hands.