Wolfsong (7 page)

But that’s okay because Gordo wasn’t intimidated, even when we both seemed to realize at the same time that I’d grown taller than him over the last few months. He had to look up at me now. “You need to get behind me, Ox. Let me deal with this.”

“With what? You didn’t tell me you knew them. What’s going on?”

He took a step back. His hands were fisted at his sides. His tattoos looked brighter than normal. “Old family drama,” he said through gritted teeth. “Long story.”

“I get this, okay?” I said, motioning between the two of us. “I get this. But you can’t tell me what to do. Not about this. I’m not doing anything wrong.”

“It’s not
about
you—”

“Sure as hell seems like it.”

He closed his eyes. Took a deep breath. Let it out slowly. “Ox. I need you safe.”

“Why wouldn’t I be?” I didn’t understand.

“Shit,” Mark muttered. “He’s your tether.” He chuckled darkly. “Oh, the fucking irony.”

Gordo’s eyes flashed open. He tried to step around me, but I wouldn’t let him. “Take a walk, man,” I told him. “Cool off.”

He snarled at me but turned and walked away.

I whirled on Mark. “What the hell was that?”

He was watching Gordo walk away. “Old family drama.”

“What?”

“It doesn’t matter, Ox,” he said. “Ancient history.”

I ASKED
Gordo to explain. I asked him how he knew Mark and the others. Why he had lied to me and acted like he didn’t know them at all.

He just scowled until I walked away.

I ASKED
Mark how he knew Gordo. Mark looked sad, and I couldn’t handle that so I told him I was sorry and never brought it up again.

IT WAS
the last Sunday dinner before school started. Joe and I sat on the porch watching the trees.

“I wish I could go with you,” he muttered.

“Next year, yeah?”

He shrugged. “I guess. It’s not the same. You won’t be around as much.”

I put my arm over his shoulder. “I’m not going anywhere.”

“I’m scared.”

“Of?”

“Things are changing,” he whispered.

I was too. More than he could ever know. “They will. They have to. But you and me? I promise that won’t ever change.”

“Okay.”

“Happy birthday, Joe.”

He laid his head on my shoulder and his nose brushed my neck. He breathed me in as we watched the sunset. It was pink and orange and red and I couldn’t think of a single place I’d rather be.

“FUCKING RETARD,”
Clint sneered at me the second day of school. Because that was his thing.

I ignored him, as I always did, shoving books into my locker. It was easier.

Apparently not for Carter, though. He grabbed Clint by the back of the head and threw him against the row of lockers, pressing his face against the cold metal. “You talk like that to him again and I’ll rip your fucking heart out,” he hissed. “Tell everyone that Ox is under Bennett protection and if anyone so much as
looks
at him funny, I’ll break their arms. Don’t fuck with Ox.”

“You didn’t have to do that,” I said quietly as Carter and Kelly pulled me away. Carter had his arm around my shoulders and Kelly held my elbow. “They go away eventually.”

“Fuck that,” Carter snarled.

“They don’t touch you,” Kelly growled. “Ever.”

THEY CAME
into the school with their fancy clothes and their perfect faces and their secrets and everyone talked about them. The Bennett boys.

High school is the same wherever you go.

It’s rumors and clichés and innuendo.

They’re in a gang
, people whispered.

They’re drug dealers.

They had to leave their other school because they killed a teacher.

They take turns fucking Ox.

Ox fucks them both.

I laughed and laughed.

We sat in the lunchroom and I had friends. Sometimes, I wanted to talk. Sometimes, I had nothing to say and opened my book. They always stayed.

They always sat on the same side of the table as me, crowding in close.

THEY WERE
physical. The whole family.

A hand in my hair.

A hug.

Elizabeth’s kiss on my cheek.

Joe on the dirt road as I walked in the sun. His hand would go into mine and he would lean up against me as we headed home.

Kelly bumped my shoulders as we passed each other in the hallway.

The weight of Carter’s arm on me as we walked to class.

Thomas’s hand shaking mine, the grip strong and callused.

Mark’s thumb against my ear.

At first it was just me.

But as winter approached, they started to include my mother.

GORDO TOLD
me about Joe. Part of it, anyway.

And I hated him for it.

“You have to be careful with him,” he said. We were on a smoke break, even though I didn’t smoke anymore.

“I know,” I said.

“You don’t. You don’t know the first thing.” He touched the raven on his arm. Smoke curled up around his fingers.

“Gordo—”

“He was taken, Ox.”

I stilled.

“They took him. In the middle of the night. To get back at his father. His family. They hurt him for weeks. He came back and he was broken. He didn’t even know his
name
—”

“Shut up,” I said hoarsely. “You shut your fucking mouth.”

He must have realized he’d gone too far. He closed his eyes. “Shit.”

“I love you,” I told him. “But I hate you right now. I’ve never hated you before, Gordo. But I hate you so fucking bad and I don’t know how to stop.”

We didn’t say anything for a very long time.

AND THEN
everything changed.

or never/eight weeks

CHRIS’S MOM
died and it was bad.

He cried in the middle of the shop, and I put my head on his shoulder. Rico touched his neck. Tanner laid his head on Chris’s back. Gordo ran his fingers over his buzzed hair.

He went away for a while.

He came back with Jessie. His little sister. She’d just turned seventeen and was going to live in Green Creek with him.

She looked like her brother. Brown hair and pretty green eyes. Fair skin with little freckles on her nose and cheeks and one on her ear that fascinated me. He brought her to the shop and she smiled quietly as he introduced her.

“And that’s Ox,” he said, and I walked into a wall.

The guys all stared at me.

“Did he just…?” Gordo asked.

“This is awesome,” Tanner said.

“Hi,” I said. My voice was much deeper than it’d ever been before. “I’m Ox. Oxnard. Call me Ox.” I tried to pose against a 2007 Chevy Tahoe but I slipped and skinned my elbow. I pulled myself back up. “Or Oxnard. Whatever.”

“Oh boy,” Rico said. “This is so awkward to witness. We should save him. Or leave.”

No one saved me. Or left.

“Hi, Ox,” Jessie said. “It’s nice to meet you.” She grinned and it was a mischievous thing with a hint of teeth. My mouth went dry because her lips were pretty and so were her eyes, and I thought,
Well, that’s just fine
.

“You… ah. You too?”

“Maybe Ox can show you around school next week when you start,” Chris said.

I dropped a socket wrench on my foot.

JESSIE STARTED
school on a Tuesday in the spring. I was awkward, unsure, even when she laughed after I told a joke I didn’t mean to tell. It was low and throaty and I thought it was one of the nicest sounds I’d ever heard.

Carter and Kelly seemed to like her well enough, but they refused to leave my side between classes and crowded me more than usual at lunch. I suppose it must have looked odd to anyone else, seeing three big guys on one small bench while a girl sat opposite them with all the room in the world. She cocked her eyebrow at us, but Carter and Kelly refused to move and I explained to her later that’s just how they were.

“Protective?” she asked, eyeing the two of them.

“You could say that. Guys, come on.”

They glared at me before glaring at her.

She laughed at them.

Later, she walked with me to the shop after school and I turned red when her arm brushed mine. I held the door open for her, and she called me a gentleman. I tripped over my feet at that and almost knocked her to the ground. Rico said in a very loud voice that it must be love.

THE SUN
was setting when I walked home, thoughts of pretty girls and brown hair swirling around in my head.

Joe was waiting for me, a smile on his face. The smile faded as I got closer.

“What is that?” he asked as I reached him.

“What?”

“That smell.”

I sniffed the air around me. It smelled the same. The forest and leaves and grass and blooming flowers, all sharp and heady. I told him so.

He shook his head. “Never mind.” The smile came back and he took my hand and we walked toward home. He told me about all he’d learned, how he couldn’t wait until he got to go to school with me and Carter and Kelly, and didn’t that tree look like a lady dancing? Did I see that rock with the crystal strip running down its side? Had I seen the commercial for that new superhero movie that we just
had
to go see this summer? Did I want to stay for dinner? Did I want to read comic books tonight?

“Yes, Joe,” I said.

Yes to it all.

IT WAS
a Thursday that I finally worked up the nerve.

“She’s going to look at me weird and I won’t remember how to breathe!” I groaned to Carter and Kelly.

“You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to,” Kelly said.

“But I
want
to.”

“Are you sure?” Carter asked, sounding dubious. “You’re not acting like it. Maybe think on it a few more days?”

“Or weeks,” Kelly said.

“Or years,” Carter said.

“Or never,” Kelly said.

“She’s coming!” I said. I might have squeaked.

“Hey, guys.” Jessie flashed a smile as she sat down at the lunch table.

“Jessie.” Carter sounded bored out of his mind.

“How nice to see you again.” Kelly didn’t sound like he meant that at all.

They both crowded me closer. I could barely breathe.

“Hi,” I said. “You look… swell.”

Kelly snorted.

“Thanks,” Jessie said.

“So,” I said.

They all looked at me.

“There’s… stuff. Happening. This weekend.”

“Is there?” Carter asked like a jerk. “What
kind
of stuff is happening this weekend, Ox?”

“Things.” I kicked him under the table. He didn’t even flinch.

“Stuff and things?” Jessie asked. “Exciting.”

“Maybe….”

“Maybe what?”

“Maybe you’d want to… do? Stuff and things? With me.”

Kelly groaned.

Jessie grinned. “Why, Oxnard Matheson. You devil. I can’t Saturday because Chris and I have to go do some work on Mom’s estate. How about Sunday afternoon?”

“He can’t,” Carter said.

“I can’t?” I asked.

“Sunday dinner,” Kelly reminded me.

“Oh. Well. Maybe I can miss it? This once? It’s not like I can’t go next Sunday.”

Carter and Kelly stared at me.

“Sounds good,” Jessie said. She was blushing and I thought,
Wow
.

“You have to be the one to tell Joe,” Carter said.

“Seriously,” Kelly agreed. “I don’t even want to be in the same room.”

“Joe?” Jessie asked.

“Little brother,” Carter said, like it should have been obvious.

“Ox’s best friend,” Kelly said, like it was a challenge.

“He’s awesome,” I agreed, and I felt the first stirrings of guilt and didn’t know why.

“Where is he?” she asked.

“Homeschooled,” I said. “He’ll be here next year.” And I couldn’t wait.

“How old is he?” she asked. She sounded confused.

“Eleven.”

“Your best friend is an eleven-year-old?”

Carter and Kelly tensed on either side of me, coiling like spring-loaded traps.

“That’s so sweet,” Jessie said. She smiled at the three of us.

“Whatever,” Carter mumbled.

“Don’t forget to tell Joe,” Kelly said.

I FORGOT
to tell Joe.

I didn’t know why. Maybe it was work. And school. And the fact that I was going on my first date with a pretty girl. Maybe it was because I was distracted by the joyous ribbing the guys gave me at the shop when they found out (“Make sure you wrap it up, papi,” Rico said. “Chris will come after you with a shotgun if you don’t.” Chris had looked horrified and then threatened me with bodily harm if I even
thought
about sex in
any
way, shape, or form. Tanner and Gordo just laughed and laughed. Gordo seemed especially pleased by all of this).

(Chris came in on Saturday with a box of condoms and told me never to speak of it again. I threw them in the dumpster behind the shop so Mom wouldn’t find them at home. I was mortified.)

But I forgot to tell him.

Jessie smiled at me when I knocked on the apartment door. Chris did his best to scowl at me, but I knew him too well. He rolled his eyes and ruffled my hair and told us to be good.

And we were.

She told me stories over lasagna that was too dry, like how when she was seven, she was riding a horse that got spooked by a snake. It took off with her on its back and didn’t stop for almost an hour. She didn’t ride horses anymore, but she thought snakes were okay.

She took a drink of water that was in a wineglass, like we were adults. Like it was wine and we were adults and doing adult things. I thought her foot touched mine.

She said, “We knew she was going. We’d known it for a long time. But when she took her last breath, it was still such a surprise that I thought I would break. It got easier, though. Much quicker than I thought it would.”