Tarnish
by MacKenzie Barr
Disclaimer: I just wish I owned these boys, the wonderful Steve & Ghost . A few of the back stories and towns also belong to the lovely and outrageously talented Poppy Z. Brite, along with a majority of the other named characters. The only thing I get credit for is the plot.
Kinsey frowned at Ghost's busted lip and slid him a Natty Boho over the counter. "You have fun?" Ghost smiled a little and nodded.
"Guess so," and before Kinsey could ask, "Steve's still asleep." He turned the bottle on the bar and took a small sip, turning back to look at the big gold letters he'd sprayed up a couple years back. We are not afraid. Don't you fucking wish. Kinsey cleaned a couple bowls thoughtfully. It was Japanese noodle soup night again. He wouldn't make a killing on it, but it was easy. The silence now, however, was not. A mind like Ghost's could live for eons on silence.
"Thanks for the postcards," he said politely, gesturing to the bulletin board full of them on the back wall leading down to the restroom. There was one or two from Jamaica, but Ghost would ask about those later. "Good to know you guys hadn't abandoned us."
Ghost chuckled a little. "Now what in the hell would Steve and I do without Missing Mile?" His tone was joking, but his question was honest. So many had told them that if they put everything down but the music and kept barrelling forward, they could make it. They weren't just a small town band, peole said. But Steve and Ghost, they knew better. The house down on Burnt Church Road, Whirling Disc, the Sacred Yew, that's where they had been their whole lives, save for the first ten years of Ghost's that had been spent holed up in the Carolina mountains. They'd stay here.
They'd driven in around noon and prompty fell back asleep in their own rooms. Ghost knew someone other than Missing Mile locals, Terry and his friends and maybe a few club kids, had been in the house. There was another smell, too. A lingering foreign aura that somehow felt like it wasn't alien at all. Nevertheless, he'd pulled down some finger paints and touched up the warding sign on the porch.
It was about four now and Kinsey was setting up for the night's show, proudly marketed on Xeroxed posters as "LOST SOULS? RETURNS! TONIGHT AT 9!" Ghost had come early with their sparce equipment and words in his head that weren't quite ready for talking. Kinsey thought he understood, or atleast, understood enough. He'd watched the two of them ever since they'd first met. Even as kids, there was something unfathomable between them. If there were any two souls closer than those, he'd like to meet them. For the first few years of their friendship, they had been inseparable, and even after Steve started dating nearly every decent looking, willing girl in Missing Mile, he never left Ghost behind. Ghost had never really dated, or atleast, not that Kinsey had seen. But then again, he didn't think Ghost had the slightest inkling of a sex drive, much less the will to date. After all, he had all the love he needed from Steve.
Ghost could feel Kinsey reminicing about him and it made him a little uncomfortable. He finished half the bottle in one go. "I kissed him," he said softly, staring down at the bar. It was an answer to a question Kinsey had asked almost a year ago, after they had come back without Ann and right before they left for San Francisco. Kinsey looked up, surprised as hell. He'd known something had happened down there, something that made Ghost happy and remorseful all at once, but a kiss had never been on his list of possibilities. Of course, hell, right now he couldn't remember what had been.
"On the mouth?" he asked a little dumbly, putting the bowl and dish towel down and leaning on the bar, regarding Ghost thoughtfully. Ghost nodded.
"Yeah, right on the mouth. I didn't mean to, it wasn't what I meant to do, not really. But I did." He was peeling the label off his beer now, stalling, trying not to remember how warm Steve's lips had been, how good they felt. "He kissed me back, too."
This one had Kinsey almost laughing. Ghost must be pulling his damn chain! Steve Finn, rough 'em, tough 'em, fuck 'em Steve Finn had kissed not only his best friend, but a man? It almost had him laughing, almost, until the blue of Ghost's eyes reminded Kinsey that Ghost didn't fuck around. "Did you--"
Ghost shook his head quickly. "No. We just kissed and fell asleep. I don't even think he remembers it." This last part put obvious sadness in Ghost's eyes. Kinsey didn't blame him. Sharing something like that with someone you care so much about, they'd better damn remember it. Of course, it wasn't only Ghost that had made Kinsey inquire all those months ago. Steve had been acting a little off, as well, paying closer attention to Ghost instead of just accepting him there. Now that Kinsey thought of it, it seemed Steve had been looking an awful lot at Ghost's mouth, watching the thin pink petals moved when he talked.
He leaned back and sighed heavily. This child thought too damn much, he could tell from the lines around his face, the crease in his pale brow. "Bother you much?" he asked lightly, trying to ease some of the worry out of Ghost's face. The pale eyed boy just shrugged a little.
"Guess it does. I didn't even mean to do it."
"Well, you know what Freud says about that."
"Fuck Freud."
Kinsey frowned, tucked some of his hippie long hair behind his ear. "Ghost," he started gently, "I hope you don't mind if I ask this, because you know you can trust me, but," why am I even asking? I already know the answer, it's as plain as day, "well," because he needs to know it, "do you love him?"
Ghost shot up off the bar stool and froze, made like he might dash out of the place and never come back, but the look in his eyes said why he hadn't run. Where would I go? He slid back up to the bar and gripped it with both hands, looked down at the toes of his scuffed Converse sneakers, kicked them against the bar. "Shit yeah," he confessed softly. "O'course I do." Kinsey was about to give himself a pat on the back when Terry came in, loud as ever, all smiles.
"Woohoo! Hell yeah! My favorite mind reader's back in town!" He hugged the littler man so tight his feet lifted up off the floor and he groaned helplessly as he was squeezed into the pine smelling embrace. Terry set him down and Ghost grinned up at him.
"Hey," he offered plainly. Terry slapped him on the back heavily, nearly made him fall over.
"Where's Steve?"
"At home."
"You boys have fun?"
"Yeah."
"Squeeze a lot o' girls?"
"I gotta get home..." Ghost picked up his beer and Terry blinked in confusion as Kinsey shot him a reproachful warning glance. "See ya tonight," Ghost called from the door and was gone into the bright sun. Terry gave Kinsey a begging look to be informed, but Kinsey just shrugged, gave a long glance at the golden words arching up to the ceiling, and began to whipe down the bar.
Steve was in the shower, thank god, when Ghost got home. He took off his straw hat and set it on the coffee table, stretching and taking a deep breath of the house. Being anywhere with Steve was home, but nothing felt quite as warm as this. He walked down the hall, trailed his hands along the walls, and slipped into his room. He felt Calvin in here, someone else, and Terry, of course. Thankfully, the displaced presence from before was free from his space. The window was still broken, covered with a thick black posterboard. The bat was still out in the over grown yard somewhere. Zillah's smear of blood on his wall had been turned into the bright fall of Ann's hair, the handprints colored over with bright blues and tacked over the blue were the two postcards from Nothing. There had been no more.
Ghost took off his shoes, shucked off the black and white striped knee socks, fought the dirty t-shirt over his head, and laid down. His sheets felt soft and cool against his skin and he burroughed down into them, falling sleep almost instantly.
Steve stepped out of the shower not long after, shook his long hair and wrapped a towel around his waist, padding oblong puddles of water down the hall runner, stopping at Ghost's door on his way to retrieve a beer. He leaned in the frame and watched Ghost sleep, little lips parted, lavender lids closed over those blue eyes, his sun golden lashes kissing his pale cheeks. Steve stepped into the room and over to Ghost, sighed as he knelt down carefully and crossed his arms on the edge of the bed. "What goes on in there, Ghost?" he asked quietly. "What are you seeing in that magic head?"
Ghost made no response but a long sleep sigh, eyelids fluttering and then easing, body subconsciously shifting a little towards the warmth of Steve's breath. Steve leaned forward and brushed blonde hair away from Ghosts' high, pale forward, kissing it before letting the hair fall back down.
"Dream those dreams, Ghost. I always wanna hear 'em." He stood and walked back to the door, continuing his original path to the kitchen. "Dream a couple for me."
TBC