July 1953

"You oughta be more careful bud."

Jack turned, fingers stilling on the chicken wire. "Doin' what? I ain't gonna cut my fingers off, you know." The pliers clacked as he squeezed them in Ennis' direction.

Ennis deadpanned the pliers. The heat was getting to be miserable, and he was getting awful tired of pulling his brim down against that damned sun and sweat rolling from the band. Fancy huffed beneath him–seemed the heat didn't agree with her, either. He looked down at Jack sat back on his haunches, fiddling with the wire fence. He hadn't asked for Jack's help, but Jack saw fit to give it anyway.

Had for months now.

"You know Ennis, you're a damn hard nut to crack." Jack was squinting up at him now from the ground, scrunching up his brow and lip in that way only Jack Twist could. He shifted a hand atop the fencepost, fingers drumming.

Do you always fidget like you're sat on an anthill? "Sorry."

"Ain't a bad thing, friend. More confusing than anything, I'll be honest." Jack flicked his brim up as he stared Ennis down in earnest. "Cause you see, if I didn't know any better–and frankly I still don't know if I do–I'd think you was ignoring me and letting me talk to myself out here. Hell, every time I come out we sit here in silence."

Ennis' heart gave a curious skip at the lopsided grin Jack gave when he looked back at the brunette. "We being you, that is. You know, conversation with you's like throwing a ball against a brick wall. I ain't really playing with anybody, but I keep throwin' the ball back anyhow. You reckon?"

He shrugged.

Jack shook his head. "And see, that's what I don't get. How you can keep all those thoughts up there and never need to say one out loud. I think I'd be a lunatic if I didn't. And I know you have them, you wouldn't have told me to be careful if you didn't. I know you think 'em. You just don't say 'em."

It wasn't the first time anybody had ever told Ennis he was quiet. He hunched his shoulders against the word, because the truth was, he wasn't. He had lots of thoughts. Sometimes, though, it seemed that was all people could say about him; nobody ever looked at his silence long enough to see that his mind roared louder than the engine on a tractor.

But Jack wasn't calling him quiet, and he wasn't looking at Ennis like his head was empty simply because he didn't say much. He wasn't asking why, either. That was the thing about Jack, Ennis was coming to realize. Sometimes the boy could just be. Jack didn't talk like he wanted something of an answer from Ennis, not like K.E or Mama sometimes did. He thought Jack's words were as natural as the stream that ran between their two slices of land. Nobody asked the stream why it flowed where it did. It just was.

"Them bruises."

For once, Jack was the one to silently prod.

Ennis gestured vaguely to the skin laid out under Jack's rolled up sleeves. "That's why I said you oughta be more careful. Don't think I've ever seen you without them."

"Oh." Jack was staring down at his forearms as if noticing the bruises scattered up and around them for the first time, his eye twitching as a look of something rolled over his features. "One hell of a klutz, me." Quick as it came, it went, and he turned a cheek back to Ennis with a swooping smile. "Friend, I think that's the most words you've spoken to me since I known ya."

"Most I've spoken in a year."

That seemed to startle a laugh out of Jack, and if Ennis had thought the brunette's smile was captivating before, it sure paled in comparison to his laughter.

Ennis was an observer. That was why, as he cracked a thin-lipped smile in Jack's direction, he noticed how Jack's throat was about as long as the expanse of his fingers when his head was thrown back. Only because he was good at observing did he reckon Jack's whole body laughed with him. Only because Jack was the first one to really see him did he start laughing along.

"This the first time you've laughed in a year, too?"

Yes. "No. And just because I say in one word what you say in fifty don't mean I don't say a lot, you git."

Jack's head lolled to his right as he regarded Ennis with a sudden sincerity. "I know. Your eyes say what your mouth don't."

Ennis froze. He wanted to ask what the hell that was supposed to mean. He wanted to laugh, because someone saw something worth observing in kind. He wanted to offer his own observations in return, like how the only time he'd ever seen Jack be still was when he had mentioned Jack's bruised arms. Instead, he felt unease rear its ugly head within his gut. He didn't like not knowing what to do. "You ain't one of them faggots, are you Twist? Watching me like that?" Ennis didn't know exactly what that word meant or where it came from, but he wrinkled his nose in a sneer anyhow like his daddy did when he talked about the neighbors Earl and Rich.

Ennis watched as Jack's ankle ceased to bounce. Jack turned his attention from his fingers on the fencepost to Ennis with a slight slack-jaw, and Ennis' shoulders sagged under the weight of the hurt in that gaze. "No, I ain't. Just a friend."

Clipped. That was what Jack's tone was, and all of a sudden the ease of the stream bled out of his words and body as he turned on his heel and strode away.

Later, as Ennis rode back home with Jack's forgotten hat in hand, he realized why that mattered. His daddy sometimes clipped their chickens' wings to keep them in place.

Ennis had barely made it outside the stable before he wretched against the side of the house, waving off Jenny and blaming bad food. Truth was, he didn't think any food on earth could make him feel that bad, couldn't twist up his guts–just perfectly so–that each heave felt like it was tightening around his chest. Just him. Just him and the wretched words he'd let out.

"You know, if you keep that hat any longer, you're gonna have to give it a name. Make it pay rent too, while you're at it."

He didn't have to roll over and see Jenny to know she was smiling at him like she knew some grand secret he didn't. "Quit beamin' like a loon, Jen."

He heard footsteps coming closer to his bed, feeling Jenny's proximity along his back. "I ain't. But that wall's so damn interesting to you that you wouldn't know if I was, anyhow." Ennis sighed, rolling over and cracking an eye open. Jenny leaned against the wall, Jack's hat perched innocently on her palm. That's how bombs getcha, he thought, 'cause they don't look nothing like bombs at all.

Of course, this was a hat. "So, you gonna tell me what Mr. Hat's deal is? And before you try," she wagged a finger at his breath, "I know it ain't yours, so don't try stringing me along like that. I ain't stupid, Ennis."

That was the problem. "It ain't anything."

Jenny looked thoughtful. "No, it is, actually. Resistol, if the label's anything to go off of."

"No need to be smart about it."

"Then you'd better start shootin' straight."

She moved to sit down next to him on the bed, and Ennis drew his knees to his chest, feeling perhaps the smallest he'd ever felt in his life. "It's Jack's."

"The neighbor's?"

Ennis shook his head. "Their son. His name's Jack."

"I see." She trailed off, looking at Ennis with an upturned brow. It wasn't the same–nobody could make an expression like Jack Twist–but dammit if Ennis hadn't missed the familiarity. "That doesn't tell me why you've been making a prisoner out of his hat."

"He left it here, and I haven't gotten the chance to give it back yet." Yeah, I gathered, Jenny's eyebrow seemed to say. "We didn't…leave on the best of terms."

"So fix them."

"Jenny, it ain't that simple." He wanted to tell her how he had clipped Jack the same way daddy clipped a chicken, but he didn't think she'd understand. He didn't either, if he was honest.

"Listen. I know you're at the ripe age of ten and you know everything. But Ennis, sounds to me like Jack is your friend. And I won't even tease you about finally havin' one, cause I know what it takes to crack you. What I will say is when you hurt friends, you gotta fix it." She raised her hand again against Ennis' words. "Ain't no standing this one, 'cause you can full well apologize to him. You've been off for months now, brother, and your retchin' ain't quiet enough even when you think no one's awake."

She offered the hat to him then, extended like a peace offering that wasn't hers to give. That was right, he was ten now–he wondered how old Jack was. Had Jack celebrated a birthday since they'd last seen each other? The wavering hat he took into his hands seemed heavy with the weight of two months, like it was bogged down with the same heaviness Ennis felt in his chest. Maybe Jenny was right.

"Starin' at it won't give it back to him. Now go, I'm sure Jack would appreciate being spared any more of the sunburns he's probably been gettin' with his hat gone."

"Jenny," Thank you. I'm sorry. I don't know why you noticed but I sure am glad you did. "You're so nosy."

She waved him off. Ennis didn't think he'd hurt her, but he still kicked the back of his left foot on the way down the stairs anyhow. It wasn't that words failed Ennis so much as Ennis failed words, and he kicked himself for it all the way over on the walk to Jack's house.

His footsteps slowed as he got closer, seeds of leaded trepidation blooming in the soles of his feet. Jack's family had painted the house a stark white, which might have looked nice if the wind and dust hadn't beaten the wooden boards to threatening shreds. The Miller's house had always slanted a hair to the left, but the loneliness of the driveway and the harshness of the paint made the porch look almost like it was sneering at Ennis, creaky steps and all. It was too quiet. Jack's hat held to his heart, he started up the stairs.

It's a house, Ennis. He knocked, looking down at his toes and clacking the tips of his boots together while he waited. It didn't matter that he had heard the footsteps, Ennis still startled when the door cracked open, a small woman with dark hair and darker eyes peering back at him.

"Ma'am." He tipped his hat, running his fingers along Jack's dark brim tucked against his chest like a lifeline. "Is Jack home?"

A man with silver came up behind who he assumed was Jack's mother. He wasn't tall by any means, but his presence still seemed to suck up the surrounding air regardless. "He ain't home."

"Oh." Stupidly, the thought hadn't occurred to Ennis that Jack may not be here. "When will he be back?"

"I said, he. Ain't. Home, Son."

This man hadn't created Jack, Ennis decided. It simply wasn't possible. "Okay. Well, he left this, and I wanted to give it back. And," the words flowed out before he could think, "when he comes back, can you tell him I've been lookin' for him?"

The silver-haired man snatched Jack's hat from Ennis before disappearing behind the threshold of the door. In his absence, the air seemed to get some of its warmth back, and if Ennis' shoulders unfurled and he breathed just a little bit easier, well–no one had to know.

With a whispered "thank you," the woman shut the door, leaving Ennis and his mounting horror alone on the porch to wonder as to exactly what he had left Jack alone to. He turned. Walked down the steps, scuffing his boots in the dirt. Paused.

He hadn't known he was running until he was nearly to the fencepost where Jack always used to show up, waiting for him with a smile and the promise of hours passed in ease. Ennis slowed, breathing hard against his ribs and the effort it took to not sink into himself.

Jack wasn't there. Ennis held a hand to the top of his hat, looking across for any dashes of brunette amongst the green.

Jack, I swear.