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.
Ghost could feel his body practically breathing through its pores. Steve reached over and pushed the straw hat down over his eyes playfully before pulling the night's first chord out of the guitar. He leaned back into Ghost's shoulder, who was growling out the words. The kids were swaying and singing back, watching their barely elder homegrowns rip songs out of their souls, shove them through the wiring and out the big speakers. Terry and R.J. were playing tonight, but lagged back and let the two soak up the crowd glory, playing their parts with easy smiles.
Ghost's voice slid smooth and slick over the music, catching a little here, drawing out a little there. He clapped his hands and drummed his thighs to the beat, tried a few chords of air guitar that got a good laugh out of Steve. He could feel everybody in the place, even the older men sitting at the bar, there for the loud comfort and warm drink rather than the music, but he felt them, alright. He sang for all of them.
Ghost could hear Kinsey all the way from the bar, hooting and hollering with gusto. By the end of World, the swaying, closed-eyed children were singing it louder than Ghost and he leaned out over them, opened his arms and tossed back his head, breathed back by the whispering defiance of their fear.
Steve slid through the crowd to the bar as soon as it was over, a few kids slapping him on the back or ruffling his hair. Ghost was practically swarmed. All of them watched to touch him for just a moment. He stopped and talked with a few, but finally made it back to the bar, slipping in beside Steve, who was already chugging down a Natty Boho with R.J. and Terry.
Kinsey gave them a sly smile and pulled out two shot glasses, placing them before Steve and Ghost. "Just for you," he drawled, producing a bottle of Night Train. "Welcome home."
- - - -
Ghost had both hands wrapped around the bottle neck, sagging into Steve with a slow, stupid grin on as Kinsey gave last call. Half the liquor was gone. Steve was looking through the shot glasses like binoculars. There were only a few kids left, really. Only a few still drinking, at least. The others were talking and getting ready to head home or wherever at the tables strewn outward from the bar. Bordering on being crushing in his pocket, Steve had two joints of what Terry had claimed was good greenhouse stuff from the midlands of South Carolina. He planned to drive home and share one with Ghost, and save the other for the inevitable hangover tomorrow morning. Well, he thought blearily, gazing at the clock, later this morning.
Ghost slid off the barstool, stumbled out into the place and headed in the general direction of the door. He didn't get much weirder, but it didn't mean he could walk straight and easy. Night Train weighted his stomach nice and clean, a solid lead burn that tinted his veins orange and amber.
Steve followed and caught him by the elbow, helping him into the T-Bird, dragging his feet back around to the driver's side and dropping himself in. Ghost took another little sip and let it roll around on his tongue. Steve contemplated his keys in one hand and one of the joints in the other, still shoved into his linty pockets, shrugging off the urge to light up, god forbid he find a match anyway, and turned the monstrous engine. Ghost cranked down the window and let his head loll out, golden, moonstreaked hair whipping like a halo around his head, voice gone rougher with Night Train, carrying out over Missing Mile and the surrounding sparsity as he wailed a song so old to him he couldn't remember where he had heard it. What words he forgot, he made up.
The house near the dead end of Burnt Church Road was surrounded by an uncut but charmingly overgrown yard that barely differentiated between Ghost's meager herb garden and the imposing forest, ready to reclaim the land with its twisting vines, aching pines, and hungry kudzu. Ghost stumbled out of the old T-Bird as Steve cut the engine, up the side porch steps and nearly falling over a moved rocking chair, sagging against the door as he opened it. Steve followed close behind, locking the door with a little rattle to make sure it had caught. The windows stayed locked, and would until summer when the stew-thick humidity smothered the South all the way from the mountains down to the coast. Ghost swayed a little in the middle of the living room, head tilted and eyes half closed. It felt damn good to be home.
Steve slung his boots off by the door and peeled off his socks, dropping them into the hamper in the bathroom on his way to his room. Midlands Maryjane all but forgotten, he gave Ghost a little wave and teetered off to bed. "G'Night," he called with a slur. "Don't wake me up or I swear to God I'll kill you."
Ghost chuckled and toed off his sneakers, pushing them into the little hall closet and padding off to his room, sliding out of his clothes and into a loose pair of gray wash pants. He stretched grandly and his bird-like shoulders winged out under his pale back. Again, his sheets received him with a cool, rose scented warmth, and the sound of Steve's loud breathing down the hall and rain rolling in lulled him into a dark, deep sleep.
- - - -
Steve rocked up uneasily onto his scrawny ass, chicken legs hanging over the edge of the bed as he chanced to push to his feet. He raked a hand back through his uncharacteristically clean hair and shuffled down the hall towards the kitchen. If he didn't shove at least half a bottle of Tylenol down his throat in the next five minutes, one of two very unpleasant sounding things would happen; his head would pop like a ripe melon, or he might just turn into a bottle of beer. While the second actually sounded a bit fitting and interesting, it wasn't enough to put him back in bed. Besides, he was already halfway down the hall and turning around would probably land him flat on his ass, and fuck if he was going to stand back up if that happened.
A light on at the end of the hall and a tiny sound sobered him quickly enough. He shuffled a little faster to the bathroom where Ghost stood slumped over the sink, crystalline tears fapping gently into the porcelain basin, sliding over his creamy skin, leaving shimmering diamond tracts over over his gentle rise of cheek. Steve braced himself in the door jam, his state and position letting a little memory slide into him, the jealousy and hurt of seeing Arkady touch Ghost, or watching him kiss him, the scared, guilty look painting Ghost's summer blue eyes when Steve announced his annoyed presence. He furrowed his dark brows over his dark eyes under his dark, unruly hair and made sure to soften his look enough to appear sympathetic and caring and not drunk and a little irritated, which was actually what he was, despite wanting to be the former. "Ghost?" he croaked gently, voice sore and loud against the tiles and the throbbing walls of his head. "Ghost, y'OK?"
Ghost took in a shivering breath, brittle and frail, like torn parchment. He squeezed his eyes shut and let two fat, hot drops smear down his face. "I... dunno. Not sure." He pursed his lips and straightened in an attempt to be strong, like Steve, Steve was always strong, but the taste of his tears only made him sob again, spraying saline mist against the mirror from his scarlet lips. Steve reached forward and rubbed a warm, broad hand down Ghost's bare arm, sending a wave of goosebumps rippling over his flesh. Steve watched it spread to a shiver down his spine, raising the little golden hairs along his arms and at the small of his back, baby-pink nipples shuddering erect at the touch. Ghost began to pull away but leaned into Steve's embrace, knew it was probably the only true safety he had. Skinny arms wrapped around a skinny waist and thin, bony hands wound themselves in a dark mass of debatable curls. Steve rested his cheek on Ghost's soft curtain of blonde hair and shushed him softly, rocking him back and forth and making small, warm circles over his back. Ghost swallowed the sobs and focused on Steve's calm to push away the inexplicable sadness that had wrenched him from sleep.
"Bad dream?" Steve inquired softly, leaning them both up against the counter. Ghost shook his head and drew back a little.
"Nuh uh. Can't even remember my dream. Just woke up and felt like somebody'd died or somethin'. Maybe it was the dream, but I'm pretty sure I'd remember what it was for it to make me ache like that. Goddamn, like I woke up to find you'd gone and left me over night." He pulled his shaking hands through Steve's hair and pressed his cheek into the warm chest, feeling Steve's heart beat radiate behind the ribs. Steve squeezed him a little subconsciously, Ghost catching the thought and smiling a little through the tears
I ain't goin' nowhere myself, hell naw. "Wan'me to lie down with you?" Steve sounded tired and a little grudging of the idea, but knew it was the least he could do, what they always did, and he'd do as many times as it might take to chase away all of Ghost's demons and nightmares.
Ghost nodded and Steve led him first into the kitchen for a drink of water and Tylenol for himself, then back into Ghost's room, curling around his bony figure under the blankets, his back against the cool, solid wall, Ghost's back pressed up against his chest. He buried his nose into the crook of Ghost's long, thin neck and wrapped a hand over his hip, slipping back into a drunk, but more stable sleep, warding off the rest of the night's ill from Ghost with his dark, protective presence.