Graffiti Bridge
part one
note (please read): soooo. i started this fic 3 years ago and i never finished it for reasons unknown to all of mankind (including myself)! a couple weeks ago i finally opened this word doc (aptly named 'for ren and livvy,' both of whom have probably long forgotten about this) and got incredibly nostalgic. so here is the rewritten version of part one. i hope you enjoy! -han
At half-past eleven, I heard heaving kittens.
I babysat a kitten once, but something was wrong with his digestive tract so he churned out hairballs like his life depended on it. Fortunately, after we switched to wet foods with higher meat content and slicked his paws with Vaseline, he was just fine.
This noise was similar—abrasive breathing and croaking peals. It was unrelenting, buzzing vociferously from behind the front door, too grating to ignore. From somewhere within the kitchen, Mom jolted awake, and I craned my neck with a tight frown.
Gigi was already in the DVD player and I was moon-eyed for Gaston, but that didn't stop Mom from nagging me to open the door, for Christ's sake, Alicia. I shot her the most incensed evil-eye within the realms of possibility; I was reasonably at ease in my flannel sleep pants and Christmas sweater, but I drew myself off the couch anyway with a weighty sigh. I placed the bowl of sweet cereal on the coffee table and pulled the tarnished spoon out from between my lips.
As I inched towards the front door, I found myself hoping that maybe—just maybe—Dad had finally decided to return from his business trip (otherwise known as sexcapades with the golden-brown, hourglass-shaped women he always seemed to 'fortuitously encounter' in La Costa de Sol). Maybe he bought a kitten.
Even the notion of any kind of gesture from Dad pinched my heart and lodged it in my throat. I brushed my fingers through my hair, winded with anticipation, wide-eyed with pulsing veins. I took a delicate breath and wrenched open the door.
It wasn't my father. It wasn't even a heaving kitten.
.
Most girls would have bottled and corked Cam Fisher's vomit on the spot, thanked him for praying to the porcelain god, and then rushed home to sleep with it underneath her pillow.
I might have even done the same had every muscle, every joint in my body not gone slack.
Because there he was in all of his broad-shouldered, protruding collarboned, heterochromic glory: Cam Fisher, limply crouching over a pool of pastel upchuck that splattered my welcome mat.
.
"Cam?"
We probably weren't on first-name basis yet, but I was too staggered and too bewildered to care. He inclined his head meekly, a radiant, fractured smile splitting his face as he lifted his eyes to mine.
What the fuck?
He balled his fingers into the welcome mat for support, clinging to it, hunched over and flushed pink. His skin was slick with a strong echo of too much cheap vodka. I could smell it on his sweat, unpleasant and sour.
Cam jabbed a sloppy finger into the air. "I like your sweater," he slurred in a blend of indistinguishable syllables. "Th'reindeer." My thoughts were still stringently limited to 'what the fuck,' but I tried to smile.
The first and only time Cam and I ever spoke came to pass two years ago, when we dissected an eyeball in Biology together. He'd scowled and refused to be the one to cut through the sclera—that was unerringly the extent of our history.
"What…what exactly are you doing here?" I squawked. White wisps slipped past my shaky lips and unfurled into the inky sky; Cam watched, apparently entranced. After a buttery silence, I abandoned all hopes of an intelligible answer and crossed my arms. "Do you—do you want to come in?"
He hummed, thrusting out his hands—his pale dinner-plate hands, with thick fingers, warm and coarse. My pulse raced when he slotted our fingers together with a loose indifference. I drew him off from the welcome mat and he cast his eyes down at me, giggling. Swallowing the lump in my throat, I looked away.
We were halfway through the front hall with a foot on the first step when Mom bellowed, "Who is it?" My heart pummeled my ribs as I jumped, sweat beading along my hairline. She had zero tolerance for strange boys reeking of high school parties, and I was the same. Sometimes.
Cameron Fisher was…painfully charismatic. He had cranky tendencies, a superiority complex, and a scowl that felt like a punch to the face, but you didn't turn away a drunk and vulnerable Cam Fisher—you just didn't; I was pretty sure that was written somewhere in the Constitution.
"Alicia!" Mother snapped intolerantly from the kitchen. Any second now and she would march into the front hall; I might as well start digging my own grave.
But, being gifted with stellar ingenuity, I cried, "It was just a prank!" The hairs on my arms stood straight, taut like dry grass, until—
"Oh."
I waited for her to stride in, or for Cam to blow our cover, but finally I exhaled in relief.
Cam pressed himself against my shoulder, struggling to remain erect. His breath was heavy and bitter and it targeted my cheek, but he was grinning, his lips too right over both tiers of bone-white teeth. "M'thanks."
He smeared the words but I heard him loud and clear.
.
Sneaking Cam past Mom was easier than I expected.
She was blaring one of her Pink Floyd albums through a connection cable that attached the radio to her iPhone. She skirted her hands along the island in the kitchen with her eyes closed, humming gently.
Dad introduced her to their Animals album years ago, and I think it consoled her when she felt frazzled. I thought it was awful stuff, though; all pessimistic and unfeeling, with mind-numbing synthesizers and generic rock voices.
"Have a good drown," Mom crooned into her wooden spoon as Cam and I inched towards the staircase. "Have a good drown as you go down all alone."
On any other occasion, I would have been mortified—yes, Cameron Fisher, this is how my mother occupies herself on Friday nights—but Cam was dipping into unconsciousness, too focused on placing one foot in front of the other to do much of anything else.
I held my breath behind fiercely pursed lips, towing him up the stairs. Like a sack of rice, he weighed me down. Sweat slipped down the slope of my nose, and for a fleeting second, I considered throwing up my hands in defeat and dumping him outside to sleep with the malevolent night-squirrels. But I cleared my head with a firm shake and pushed ahead.
When we finally hit the top step, I sagged against the wall, out of breath. Cam was quiet, his head lolling and his parted lips wavering with every supple exhale.
I was sure he was asleep until I heard him mumble, "Hey," his voice thin and reedy like pebbles dropping through a gutter. My breath caught in my throat and I waited with voracious anticipation. "Hey, I—"
But nothing. No "thank you." No drunken confessions. No kitten sounds.
He was asleep. I looked down at Cam's long face, his eyelids tinted snowflake-blue and drawn shut. His lips were parted, dry and white from flaking lesions. A silvery sheen of sweat clung to his bold jaw.
I shook any improbably thoughts from my head. Calm the hell down. Having this gorgeous male sampling passed-out in my arms was hardly anything to get worked up over. I drew his arm over my shoulder, and together we shuffled down the hall. Asleep, Cam was flaccid and limp like a noodle. When I managed to kick open the door to my room, I was so worn out that I let him fall to the floor.
I felt a bit reckless. It wasn't like me to sneak cataleptic boys into my house. The last time I did anything even remotely irresponsible, I was sixteen, and I avoided the shower for five straight days during final exams. Mom nearly had an aneurysm when she found out.
Mom. Shit. If she walked in and saw Cam, hypovolemic shock was entirely possible. Likely, even.
I was weighing the pros and cons of sneaking some Estazolam into her water glass when Cam's eyelids snapped open. In a flash, he was curled into the fetal position, one hand bowed and cupping his face. With a final sweeping shudder, he puked on my carpet.
For a moment, I saw a colossal amount of red. Then the stench hit me like an elephant on rollerblades.
Maybe this wasn't such a great idea after all.
.
The final arrangement was Cam on the bed and me on the floor—now puke-free.
I snuck into my mother's room after she fell asleep and took off with the first can of air freshener I could get my shaking hands on. Now, the whole room smelled like Hawaiian Breeze instead of his putridly sour vomit.
Haphazardly, I piled two blankets on the carpet and slotted myself inside its warm aperture. Folding my arms, I strained to keep my eyes open. I could only imagine what would happen if I fell asleep.
Scenario One involved Cam waking up alone with a blistering hangover. He would groan brashly or slump downstairs—regardless, Mom would find him, lose her mind, and ground me for life.
Scenario Two went along the lines of Cam coming to his senses, glancing down at me (did I mention I drool in my sleep?) and then fleeing through the window.
He couldn't just leave. As inane and embarrassing as it was to admit, I wanted a thank you. I wanted appreciation and his unadulterated gratefulness. I wanted him to like me. I dug the heels of my hands into my brow, flushed and aggravated. He was Cameron Fisher—crème de la crème in our school, our town, and possibly the entirety of the state of New York. Had it been any other boy puking on my welcome mat, I would have slammed the door in his face. I hated admitting it.
You're an idiot, I thought to myself with a pinched frown.
I reached for my postage stamp of a phone, an unsettling ball of nerves undulating in the pit of my stomach. She picked up after two rings like I knew she would.
"It's fucking past midnight, Leesh," Massie snapped.
"As your best friend, I didn't realize my calling hours were limited to the PM," I mumbled faintly, glancing briefly up at the bed. Cam twisted in the sheets and then went still. "Guess what?"
"Was that a rhetorical question?"
I ignored her. "Cam Fisher is in my sleeping in my bed." I tried to sound nonchalant, as if the notion of having most attractive boy in school balled up on my mattress was as a tedious as Honors Latin I.
"Alicia Rivera, you minx!" She screeched with a manic laugh. I could practically see her varnished claws tightening mid-stroke around a fold of Bean's skin. "Get it!"
"It's not—I didn't mean like that," I admitted, picking halfheartedly at my cuticles.
"Then explain!"
"He was drunk. He vomited on my welcome mat, so I took him in out of…sheer kindheartedness."
I heard her snort. "Sheer kindheartedness, my ass," she scoffed. "Haven't you had a crush on him since, like, the eighth grade? You and I both know you only did it—"
I hung up. I could admit it to myself—albeit silently—but I wouldn't listen to her say it.
.
Eventually, I fell asleep.
I tried not to, I really did. For hours I avoided thinking about my enticing goose-feather pillow, occupying myself instead with virtual twenty-questions and braiding my hair. My efforts were fruitless. At some point I drifted off, only to encounter a magnified Cam Fisher raging about my uncomfortable mattress in a jarringly bizarre dream.
I woke up to light pouring through the window, the glare curling off the glass pane, beaming at me. Mumbling inarticulately, I squinted around the room to assimilate my surroundings.
As usual, the My Little Ponies puffed out their chests in one particularly dusty corner, rainbows and fruit on their identical flanks. Inside the closet, the contents of a board game were littered beyond the refuge of the box— thoroughly normal.
But when I stole a glance at the bed and found the disheveled sheets empty, my heart sank and I scrambled to my feet. He was gone. On impulse I began to panic, looking around riotously. The only indication that he had ever been in this room was the tousled blanket on the bed.
I flung myself around the corner, tripped down the stairs, and slid into the kitchen. I combed through each projection, each nook in the house, frustrated and unwilling to believe he had left.
"Cam?" My voice was wound tight and high, a shrill sound that only Mom acknowledged from her bedroom.
"Alicia? Was that you?" She barked assertively. I didn't reply.
Following another brief once-over in each room, the anticipation rapidly dimmed. He left without even a thank you. I felt stung, personally affronted. What an asshole.
I pursed my lips, casting a chaste glance at the front door. Maybe he was outside. It was warm indoors, I reasoned, and he might have wanted to get some fresh air. I knew I was just grasping at straws now, but I needed to be sure.
I shuffled outside, my toes curling into the unyielding soil and nubs of grass, slick from winter flurries. I jerked my head right and left, seeing nothing. My head sagged to my chest. Disappointment streamed through every vein, and I felt my face flush. "Fucking Cameron Fisher," I complained under my breath.
Frosty air nipped my skin. Teeth chattering, I balled the ends of my nightshirt in my fists and discharged a raggedy sigh. I was just about to turn and walk back inside when I heard someone call my name, the voice funneled through a sluggish bass intonation.
I stopped in my tracks.
It wasn't Mom, obviously; she was neither sluggish nor male.
I froze, hands numb, and looked over my shoulder. It was Saturday morning. None of my neighbors could even bring themselves to stir on Saturday morning.
"Alicia!" There it was again—rich, low tones distended like elastic candy into a sleepy drawl. It was then that I began to suspect Cam Fisher; not simply because it would be wholly ideal if it turned out he'd never left, but also because of the voice—the voice that more or less shrieked, 'I am a sex god, have babies with me.'
I didn't dare breathe his name aloud out of painstaking trepidation, afraid that I might be terribly, terribly wrong.
"Shit, Alicia, I'm up here."
My neck snapped up, and it wasn't until I piped "Cam" that I realized I'd been holding my breath. He sprawled with an addicting air of effortless nonchalance, a twisted, scornful expression on his face— his face, that should have been but wasn't insipid from a dreadful hangover.
And then I become conscious of the fact that—oh hell—he was on the roof.
note: it's a pretty silly and ridiculous concept, but i hope you enjoyed anyway. thanks for reading!
