OK. Yeahh, this may seem a bit repetitive. But I guess you can cope with a little more love fighting? Lol, d/w, things pick up pretty well in the next chap. REVIEW. X
The day news came,
My best friend died,
My knees went weak and you saw me cry,
Say I'm still the soldier in your eyes...
CHRIS
I woke up early, once again in my best friend's room with the guy butted against me. One of his hands lay on my chest, resting over my heart. I felt it speed in my ribcage as I embraced conciousness. Just like before, I was lying half naked with a BOY sprawled across me. A boy whose lips were red raw from my kisses, his collar and hip bones bruised from my teeth and my hands. Dang, I have to quit hurting him. Would I be so rough if he were a girl? Somehow I doubted it. But maybe the reason this kept happening was that only he – a boy, skinny but relatively strong – could handle the ferocity of my kisses.
I couldn't retain the reflex grimace that twisted my face as I recalled the events of the previous night. Some of our 'kisses' had been sweet. Soft. No punches... no bruises. Which kind did I prefer?
I felt another flare of automatic revulsion wash through me. It was deja vu, a repeat of yesterday's panic. The feeling that had sent me scurrying from Gordie's arms at five thirty in the morning. This time, I fought back weakly. I couldn't continue to do everything under the cover of darkness. This cycle would not, could not continue. Do or die.
The night of the party had been so fucked up. I remembered him saying "fuck you". It was at that moment that I'd grasped the full gravity of the situation. I had tried to hurt him, walk away. But some alien part of me had come back, not fighting him but fighting the knowledge that I was not who I'd thought I was. That nothing would ever be the same. I'd lashed out, pummelling him. Trying to damage him the way I was damaged. Damaged goods. That was me, for fuck's sake.
Every moment we grappled outside Kerri Brandon's house, I'd cursed myself. You can't! You do?! I do? But my fists had kept dancing. Hurting him, hurting us both. Because I never would be good enough for him. Looking past the gender thing (as hard as that was) I was just a retard Chambers lout. A loser. A waste of space and air. Probably knock up a bint like Becky Newton and be chained to this miserable town forever. Die an old, crabby man who beat his kids and hit the beer with the other nobodies in the pub - My father. But hey, at least I'd be comfortable in my sexuality, right?
But Gordie – sensitive, brainy Gordie – could get out. Get away. Away from his no good son-of-a-whore Father, away from Denny's shoes. Away from Denny's grave. Christ, he'd been stuck under it long enough.
I looked back at him, remembering the fateful night in more detail. His hands on my chest, his tongue in my mouth. When I woke up, I'd vehemently denied the ideas (all x-rated) that battered at my brain. Throwing them out, I'd decided I'd never speak to Gordon Lachance again. Like that was so fuckin' simple, right?
But when he'd cornered me by the cafeteria I had snapped. Seeing his impish, tired face had made me want to smash my head into a wall. I called him Pansie. Faggot. Bender. Punching him again with my words and my body. And as I had, I'd silently begged him with my eyes to see that I didn't mean it. But I guess I wasn't obvious enough, 'cuz he'd run off, making me hate myself that little bit more. I'd stayed boiling mad all day, glaring at him and grinding my teeth. I'd taken off home seconds after the bell.
That night however (last night) I had succumbed to whatever power he had over me. I'd run to his house in the sheeting rain at God know's what time. There, I skulked in the darkness. My eyes on the light at his window, and the shadows crawling up the wall. I battled with myself uselessly for what seemed like an eternity, before finally giving into whatever freak-ass thing drove me in my weak moments around Gordie.
And now, here I was. Lying next to my best friend, reminiscing and trying to fight the rational part of my brain. Would I leave again now? Repeat the cycle? I didn't want to, but part of me (the part that my Dad inhabited) wanted to hit Gordie as he lay sleeping. To beat his faggot ass senseless and trash his room. To run away and burn my clothes, to rip my skin off. To swear blind to everyone (including myself) that I'd been drunk every time our lips had touched, every time I'd held him.
My indecision was interrupted when Gordie woke up. His dark eyes fluttered open and we locked eyes immediately.
"Hey." He said gruffly after a little while. He sat up, rubbing a little sleep from one eye and stretching.
I knew then, that I had to stay. For a little while, at least. A little while. Whether that be half an hour or fifty fuckin' years. I cautiously stroked a hand across his face, allowing a tentative smile to crawl across my mouth.
"Ugh, we gotta go school," He whined, rolling his shoulders.
"Naw, we don't." I said, an idea forming, "Let's skive off. Go hang somewhere."
"Chris, are you nuts? Its the second day, man. Sincerely."
"Jeez, where's your sense of adventure, ya pussy? What happened to the Gordo I used to know? C'mon, let's steal ourselves another holiday." I liked that idea, in the sun. Free and easy. Doing whatever we wanted...
"Aw, alright," He sighed, rolling back over on to his side and yawning, "Now go the fuck home for a bit, then. I need ma sleep, dumbass."
"And I don't?!" I laughed, lounging next to him and pulling the cover up over our heads. It was like we were seven again, playing hide and seek. 'Cept now there was this weird electricity fizzing away between us. I lay facing him. It was nice. Hiding under the thin shelter. I imagined we were invisible. Invincible. Untouchable. Just me and Gordie, as we should be. With this miserable excuse for a world turning away from us for a few seconds...
Gordie flicked my face with his fingers, "You are such a shit, Chambers."
"And you're a little fucker."
"Pussy."
"Freak."
"Ass."
"Dipshit."
"Fag."
I stared at him, wounded and dumbstruck. His eyes widened as he realised what had come out of his mouth. We had often had insult rallies like this, sometimes in exactly this order.
Gordie parted his lips to take it back, but it was far too late. Anger, hurt, self-loathing dawned in me - hot and searing and final. This lazy morning had turned ugly fast.
"Bender!" I spat, shoving the cover away and glaring down at him. He got up too, standing in front of me with his hands planted on his – most likely still bruised - hips. We both watched the floor. This rally would be ridden out like always.
"Queer."
"Ass-fucker." Please don't believe me, Gordie. Look at me...
"Pansie."
"Manwhore." Look at me...
"Sucker." This hurt, hitting me somewhere low.
"Liar!"
"Loser." This was said quietly. And it hurt worse than any of the swear words. I already knew it was true, but Gordie had always been the one to tell me it was a lie...
I threw myself at him, shoving him hard into the wall. This wasn't about bruised egos, it was merely a product of the inevitable. We were doomed. We couldn't be together, and by hurting the other we hoped to hurt the future. Me, fucking a bruised, faceless girl every night in a loveless relationship. Him, walking away with a suitcase under his arm... We wanted to break it. Make it disappear. Beat it into some quantifiable submission. Beat the feelings, the lies, away.
"Say that again!" I dared him, my insides boiling.
"LOSER!" The desperation was plain in his eyes. The longing...
I don't know who moved first, but suddenly our mouths were together again. I guess I didn't kiss him, I forced myself on him. Banging him into the wall repeatedly, I drew more blood from his mouth with my teeth as my tongue plunged past his lips. He tried to kiss back, to fight back, but I didn't let him move an inch as I grabbed his hips, yanking him forward roughly until there was no space between us.
We fell to the floor, grappling like dogs, our arms and lips and legs locked in a death struggle. People would have thought we were fucking if they'd seen us. Or I was raping Gordie. But really we were fighting. Fighting everything. Fighting ourselves.
I felt part of me - Gordie's best friend - drift away as he pushed my head back a few inches. Our foreheads were rammed together, eye to eye we panted. I kept my hands locked on the sides of his head, gripping him so he couldn't move closer or further away.
"Christ, why do we always have to fight when we make out? Fuck with me all you want, Chambers," He gasped, "But kiss me like that and you tell me everything I need to know."
"No I don't!" I started to cry. Jesus Christ, Second time in three fuckin' days. But I wasn't alone. Gordie was sobbing too. It was about fucking time, he was supposed to be the soppy one. But that just about summed him up, he could make me do things in three days than I had never done before in my whole life. And I think I know why the tears were gushing then.
This was the end of our friendship, as we knew it. It had been consumed by this thing. This vile, nasty thing that ate at us with an intensity that we couldn't fight effectively. There was no cure. Our old, comfy friendship was dead. Leaving only evil and fights and pain and swollen kisses that made no sense. Christ, it had only been three days.
Three days ago, I'd been Chris Chambers. A kid in Castle Rock, looking for a girl with tits and hips. Now I was Chris Chambers, a kid in Castle Rock, battered and kissed by a boy. A fucking boy! None other than Gordie fuckin' Chance. What a shitwad!
I stared numbly at my ex-best friend. He looked broken, too. Damaged as the tears dried up. I'd been right, this cycle couldn't start again.
"It's over, ain't it?"
We both new damn well what I meant. The innocence of our friendship... gone. Never again would we go fishing and joke about girls and homework, at least, not without falling over, beating each other up and then kissing with a wild passion that made my insides hurt.
"Yeah. It's over."
He wiped blood and tears from his face, and watched me move away from him again.