Claude is the high school running back, tall, muscled, yet lithe enough to elude opponents.
Falling into bed, Sebastian clutches his pillow and moans, admitting that man rouses sinful desires in him. Then Sebastian thinks of how Alois has been bullied into becoming a knife-wielding sadist, how Angelina moved away, how the Sutcliff boy— girl— took a razor and . . .
Sebastian can feel God damning him.
He sleeps, tossing and turning, then shoots upright as Claude strides into his dreams, chest bare, chiseled, gorgeous.
Sebastian tries fantasizing about Lizzie instead. He feels nauseous.
By dawn, he's rocking, crying for a six-year-old boy who kissed him in a park.