Blood Sports (27 page)

He stopped at The Raging Insomniac, a twenty-four-hour Internet café. He bought some pot off a guy, and then played
Doom
on-line until his wrists hurt. He squinted against the early morning light as he smoked up in the alley.

Jeremy had passed out on the couch, sitting with his head thrown back, mouth open. His slacks had a tear on the bottom. His jacket hung over the coffee table. The subwoofers on the surround sound for the
TV
rattled with distortion as zombies cornered a buxom, vocal victim. Tom decided he’d put on headphones or dig up some earplugs. Jer was like a ninety-year-old. He’d wake up the second the
TV
was shut off or made even a degree quieter.

“Howdy, stranger,” Jeremy said, opening one eye.

Tom paused, hesitating at the hallway entrance.

“Watch this part,” Jer said, sitting forward and pumping the volume even louder.

The zombies attacked in a frenzy of cheesy effects, wet smacks of flesh being chomped and torn.

“This is all pre-
CGI
,” Jer said. “All the gigs are homemade. Pig guts and chicken skin. Cool, huh?”

“Yeah,” Tom said.

Jeremy sucked in a loud breath. “I smell cheap hooch. How’s your mom?”

He could feel a hot flush burning up from his neck and knew his face was going bright red.

Jeremy grinned. “Did Tommy miss his mommy?”

“Shut up.”

“She ditched you, huh?”

“I’m going to bed.”

“Grab yourself some dignity!” Jeremy yelled cheerfully after him. “You don’t have to go running after her like some dumb dog.”

With September coming up fast, Tom found a school six blocks from the condo. Even better, they had self-paced classes where he could come and go as he pleased. He took assessment tests and
passed Grade Ten in a matter of weeks. Grade Eleven was more of the same. He discovered that when he was in school or studying, he dropped off Jer’s radar. Ironically, now that he had the freedom to skip as many classes as he wanted and blow off homework any time, his attendance and grades had never been better.

The self-paced classes were held in a maze of portables, exiled from the nearby main high school. The tables inside looked like they’d been filched from church basements, and the plastic chairs were duct-taped where they’d cracked. The computers were a mish-mash of donations, some of them as new as last year, some of them still using punch cards.

From his corner table, he would watch the other self-paced students. The only thing he missed about his old school was goofing around with Mike – endless hours of playing
Doom
or
Quake
or
Streetfighter
, getting stoned, watching dumb movies, and discussing why they were dumb. Complaining about school. Avoiding Mike’s aunt, Patricia, and Tom’s mom.

But he’d decided on no civilians. No more Willy Bakers. Mike might want to help and end up steamrolled if Jeremy blew his top.

Which was all good and noble, but when he admitted it to himself, he didn’t want anyone to know how agonizingly strange his life had become. It was one thing to live it, and another thing to deal with people knowing about it.

As the months passed, no matter how drunk his mother was, no matter how high Jeremy got, they wouldn’t get tanked together. They would feel free to drink or snort in front of him, but they could never bring themselves to do it in front of each other. Sometimes, they would cross paths in the living room or in the kitchen, and they would play sober. Both of them would be swaying and
eyeball-rolling high, seriously discussing the weather or the outrageous price of winter produce.

Paulie stomped back from anger management. She broke out the cleaning supplies without saying hello. She slammed the pail into the sink and filled it and dropped it so it sloshed. She scoured the floor, frowning.

“You okay?” Tom said.

“Perfect,” Paulie said.

“You didn’t have to do that,” Tom said. “Your floor’s pretty spotless.”

Paulie ignored him. When she was finished, she closed her eyes and breathed deeply three times.

“You want to get something to eat?” she said.

“Sure.”

They caught the bus to the Granville Island Market and ate a late lunch on the dock. Tom threw crusts from his sandwich to the seagulls hovering hopefully around their bench. Paulie laughed when two fat seagulls bumped heads going for the same crust.

“Kits Beach has a great view of the fireworks,” Tom said.

Paulie rolled her eyes.

“It’s free,” Tom said.

Paulie turned shy when he held her hand, and they didn’t talk as they strolled out of Granville Market and followed the sidewalk past the marina, past the bridge to Kitsilano Beach. A group of seniors in matching T-shirts rested on the benches. Little kids screamed away from the waves and then ran back into the water for more. Sailboats tilted away from the wind. The beach volleyball courts were noisy with the shouting from the bronzed bikini-and-Speedo crowd while the basketball courts were all
teenage boys with their baseball caps backward, skinny kids in satin shorts.

Tom bought a Rainbow Rocket Pop for himself and a Creamsicle Dream for Paulie from a shirtless bicycle vendor wearing a white sombrero trimmed with fuzzy red balls. Paulie’s tongue went radioactive orange. He asked what colour his was and then stuck his tongue out.

“Could you grow up, please?” Paulie said, her face screwing up in annoyance. “This is why I don’t want to be seen in public with you.”

“Hey, Paulie,” Tom said. “Guess what?”

“What?”

“I love you.”

Paulie glared at him. “Sometimes I want to strangle you.”

Tom laughed.

“I’m serious,” she said. “I want you to take me serious.”

“I do,” Tom said.

“Don’t patronize me.”

“I’m not,” Tom said.

She punched his arm, hard, but she didn’t let go of his hand.

As Tom brushed his teeth, one of Jeremy’s friends opened the bathroom door and stared at him. The man was pale with eyes so pinned you couldn’t tell he had pupils. He swayed out of rhythm to the music. Tom hated being sober when everyone else was tripping.

“There’s another bathroom beside the kitchen,” Tom said. He rinsed and spat, wiped the toothpaste from the corner of his mouth with his T-shirt.

“Are you a narc?” Pinned said.

Tom laughed.

The man’s eyes went big. “Are you wired? Are you recording this?”

“I’m Jeremy’s cousin. Jeremy. Your host. I live here.”

Tom pushed past him and started down the hallway. The man followed close behind.

“I know you’re following me,” Pinned said.

“No one’s following you, you freak.” Tom didn’t see Jeremy, and everyone else ignored him and Pinned. Jeremy had a rotating series of friends in their mid- to late-twenties who had sprung from another species altogether, one with no sags or bumps or wrinkles or inappropriate body or facial hair. Unless they were going for the Goth or Betty Paige look, they were glowingly tanned, like someone had taken oil and a rag and buffed them to a high gloss. Tonight, Jeremy sat on the couch surrounded by people. The coffee table in front of him was littered with pizza boxes, empty beer bottles, and hand mirrors dusted with coke and snot-covered straws and rolled-up bills. The party was too loud and crowded to fight through. Tom decided to retreat to the Insomniac.

His bedroom was technically off-limits for Jeremy’s friends. But Tom wasn’t surprised to find a man and two women in his bed. The man was naked and bent over, a striped, orange McDonald’s straw sticking out of his anus. One of the women was literally blowing coke up his ass and the other was hysterical about the whole thing.

“Do you mind?” the guy said as Tom walked in and grabbed his knapsack.

“It’s my room,” Tom said, slinging his knapsack across his shoulder. “You’re on my bed.”

“Get us a refill, luvvie,” said the blow-woman, holding up a bowl.

Things to do tomorrow: buy better lock for door, burn sheets and mattress, Tom thought, turning and leaving.

Kids screamed instructions or trash talk at each other as they played on-line games, the espresso maker hissed, and the skull-pounding Industrial
CD
thudded in the background at The Raging Insomniac. Teenagers coming off the party circuit screamed with delight as they savoured details of their latest outing. The staff argued about who was going to clean the bathrooms and then about who was going to change the toner in the copy machine by the door.