FALL - "All thieves and lovers are faithful admirers of sin."
Drama/Romance
[Jonathan Crane x OC]
T for Teen: Violence, Mild Suggestive Themes, Mild Use of Coarse Language.
Summary: High School. Society's bright idea: put all their aggressive, naive youth into one terrarium to torment and emotionally scar each other for life. How anyone can come through that well-adjusted on any level is an absolute miracle.
Chapter Three: A – fternoons/ffections
Summer vacation was something Jonathan never liked ever since he turned ten. The word vacation may as well have been a sin itself in the Keeny home. He toiled away in the small cornfield, root crop plots, and the few orchard trees they owned by himself from just before dawn until just after dusk. Pulling weeds, harvesting anything that seemed ripe enough, and being a literal scarecrow by scaring off the crows. So, it was a shock and ill omen to hear his grandmother calling loudly out to him from the house.
He could see the battered pickup truck parked near their porch long before he walked up, there was no one inside the vehicle. Did they have company? His answer came in the form of bumping into a brick-built man when the door opened as he was about to walk inside, "Pardon," An entirely thick Cajun French accent was followed up by deeply accented English, "my mistake, you must be Jonathan." The man was well into his aging years with strands of silver hair only shining brightly when the sun caught his short golden hair. Clean cut as a five o'clock shadow would allow him to be, he dressed in tan trousers, suspenders, and a plain white shirt. The man did not smile like his voice suggested he should have been, instead, he shuffled around allowing Jonathan inside before placing his fingers to his lips and whistling out a sharp short note, "Garçon!" It was yelled out in a pejorative manner.
As if ritually summoned from the opposite direction Jonathan had come, Leonard came nearly sprinting out of the cornfield. He ran right up to the porch, his chest laboring to catch his breath, "Oui, daddy?" He was wearing a similar outfit to his father and with his hair combed back his visage looked like it belonged in a church.
"Nous l'avons trouvé," Jonathan stood in the hall watching them interact with one another. He spied the blond nod at the words spoken, "… wipe that saleté de vous." Mister Broussard turned away from his son giving Jonathan a curt nod in passing before going down his hallway towards their kitchen.
Jonathan had watched the older man vanish through the doorway and could hear muffled speaking from within, he turned to see Leonard vigorously wiping the dirt from his clothes and trying to kick off any lingering dust on his shoes. His smile was a mile wide when he caught Jonathan staring at him but before the blond could open his mouth Jonathan stalked down the hallway into the kitchen. His grandmother was sitting at the wooden table with Leonard's father and whom he assumed was Leonard's mother.
"We have company, as you can see." He was weary whenever his grandmother sounded sweet, as it often turned venomous later on, "Go wash that dirt off." Her gaze told him she'd not tell him to do something twice right now, he turned without a word to wash up.
When he came back Leonard was standing behind his mother with a hand on her shoulder, she looked almost smaller than Jonathan did. In a fragile sort of way, her hair was much greyer nearly all silver tied back into a loose braid that disappeared down her back. She wore a simple white blouse that covered her arms and neck along with a plain dark brown skirt that covered her feet when sitting. They were a picture-perfect-looking church family, no wonder his granny let them inside. They likely had appealed to her religious nature – or maybe they were just that religious too. He recalled Leonard nearly swearing when he fixed his own busted finger but yelling out 'holy hell' seemed just as bad now. As much as he hated company perhaps this could be a blessing, maybe his grandmother would make friends and she'd stop harassing him so much. If there was a god he'd pray to that effect – or a devil he could sell his soul to for it.
As Jonathan came to stand next to the table – there was only enough seating for three as they'd used a chair last winter to heat their home – his grandmother spoke up gesturing out, "Jonathan. This is Mr. and Mrs. Broussard and their eldest son, was it Leonard?" She butchered the way he said his own name, pronouncing the N and D sounds too heavily.
He bobbed his head anyhow, "Ou— Yes ma'am." The teen was just as tense as Jonathan was, and language was betraying him. His smile like sunshine was not present, it was something awfully small and nearly forced, "An' thank you kindly Mrs. Keeny for allowin' us in your home on such a parching Saturday afternoon." Kiss-ass, Jonathan thought. It was nearly hotter inside than it was outside as they had no air conditioner nor proper insulation.
"You're welcome, what a well-mannered son you have Mrs. Broussard. They go to the same school as my Johnny, maybe he can learn a thing or two from him." The insult did not go over his head.
Leonard leaned over to whisper to his mother and she beamed weakly at his grandmother, "Merci," her voice was tired sounding but full of unbridled kindness and love, "c'est un fils merveilleux." He understood not a word beyond 'Thank you.'
"Ma mère doesn't speak English, she said: Thank you." Leonard's excellent bi-lingual ability made more sense to Jonathan now, "I hope to be good friends with ya Jonathan." His smile grew.
Good friends? Jonathan resisted the urge to roll his eyes. The young man hung out with his bullies on a daily basis and they never spoke to one another unless it was an off-chance Leonard found Jonathan shoved into his locker.
"Speakin' of," Mister Broussard motioned to Jonathan, "You mentioned your boy was out doing chores? Would it be appropriate to loan you Leonard, for the summer as a godly an' good neighbor should? Boy's fit as an ox an' we've already finished our harvesting for the season." He spoke slower, obviously trying to only use English words.
His grandmother looked like she was about to scowl, he knew deep down she had him doing the chores alone for some kind of sick pleasure. Even so, her face turned upward into a soft smile, "That sounds like a lovely idea."
The two boys did not protest, getting right to work that same afternoon when the Broussard's left. Leonard's mother had begun coughing and his father had to take her home after explaining her health was in fact frail most of the year. However, she insisted on meeting the neighbors as soon as she had improved.
With Leonard's assistance, they had finished all his chores just before dusk. It was a daily routine that Leonard started showing up at Jonathan's porch before the crack of dawn, yet, every day his grandmother was simply adding more tasks to perform after they finished. The Keeny family had no tools beyond a broken set of gardening tools meant for flowerpots or something less arduous; they'd been doing everything all summer by hand otherwise. On the last evening of summer vacation right before dusk came Leonard had convinced Jonathan to sit down in the cornfield and just not go back to the house. They both knew there was still enough daylight for his grandmother to assign more chores, and it had been a sweltering humid day. Both teens were drenched in sweat just from standing outside let alone working. They were sitting in the cornfield across the road in the only spot that offered enough shade, where an old tractor was permanently parked like an unmovable boulder in the field and gaining rust.
"Ya know, ya do kinda look like a scarecrow out here." He was giving Jonathan a wry grin and a side glance, "Oh come on now, don't be givin' me that mean ol' scowl of yours."
Jonathan had not realized he was scowling so deeply; he felt his lips turn down into a frown but that was all.
Leonard continued speaking, "Gonna get them crow's feet to go with that scarecrow look you are." His laughter was hearty, nearly soul warming to anyone else. He was teasing and meant not a word of it, "Ya know I used ta have a nickname in middle school too, Lunky Leo."
Jonathan's reply dripped with sarcasm, "I can't imagine why."
"I ain't dumb," Leonard defended quickly but let out a sigh, "Je suis intelligente… it's too much effort ta be speakin' an' thinkin' in English all the time. But no one out here in these cornfields understands."
"Uh-huh." Jonathan could not sympathize with that nor did he quite feel any empathy towards the young man.
"Ya already know, seein' how I got them better test scores than you." Leonard gave him a wide grin recalling how upset-looking Jonathan had been to have gotten knocked down from best in class for the first time after achieving it. Of course, there were a few bright bulbs in the school that had always struggled with each other for that honor – they'd been blindsided by the hick from the backwoods before reclaiming their places at the end of the year.
"You failed Chemistry." Jonathan jabbed at him annoyed by the context of why the grin was on the blond's face.
"One," he held up his finger which he then pointed at Jonathan with, "out of many subjects. Want-ta tutor me this year?"
A very curt "No." was spoken.
Leonard shrugged, "Worth a shot… Oh, what if I teach ya French?"
This time the curt "No." was a bit more dead sounding.
"Non," It was practically the same word when spoken and Leonard mimicked a female voice like their French I teacher had, "Uh good, but it could have been better."
Jonathan snorted covering his mouth with the back of his hand quickly. Leonard had gone silent, staring but then laughed heartily with a smile like sunshine. It was too infectious. Jonathan chortled loudly. They laughed for a long time mocking the teacher and a few others from the school while they were at it.
Dusk came and passed them by, the stars were out and they had simply been talking. They'd never spoken like this before and Jonathan was enjoying the company, it was strange for him. They spoke about religion a little until it became weird for them both, they spoke about girls and how they were still harassing Leonard with bad French romance lines, they spoke about Jonathan's interest in psychology, they spoke about Leonard's absurd gator wrestling sister. Long into the balmy night they spoke and not once did Leonard ever belittle Jonathan for his opinions nor did they speak on topics that he obviously did not wish to discuss.
Discussing school is what it had boiled down to as it was what they had in common the most.
Jonathan eventually opened up to Leonard about something that bothered him, "And to top it off, some stalker has been playing a prank on me all year. Stuffing love letters into my locker." Jonathan huffed and fell back onto the ground finally joining the blond lying down.
Leonard was silent for a long moment, "I… wrote those letters, in your locker." He had not meant them to cause Jonathan anguish. The blond had assumed he had gotten his point across when he handed Jonathan the first letter, but, without a word of reply he kept sending them. How had he been such an idiot? He wanted to bury his head in the dirt and had never been more thankful for the darkness of night hiding his burning red face.
Jonathan was quiet for a moment longer. He sat upright with a deep scowl on his face and began in an accusing tone, "Did Bo put you up to it? To get me out here alone so they could tie me to a post agai—"
Leonard huffed out in an annoyed way cutting Jonathan off, "It's because I think you're cute," the way he said cute was as if he had reserved the word for someone he found attractive, and the long pause afterward not only allowed Jonathan time to take this in but also look at Leonard's face. In the darkness he'd not see the shade of red it had turned. Leonard had turned his eyes away from Jonathan to the skyline, "I'm sorry. I was wantin' to spent time gettin' ta know ya an' you I. Before you decided I was just another devil spawn faggot if I asked ya outright. I get most people think it ain't right an' ya may never speak ta me again, but thanks for hanging around tonight. It's been the best time I've had since I got here." The cowardly lion did have some courage after all.
They did not speak after this the entire night. Leonard seemed very used to the silence and would occasionally look over to check if Jonathan was still there. It was the first time Jonathan had stayed out all night and he'd forgotten about the wrath that was to come when he got home. His mind had gone mostly blank as he tried to process an entire year of love letters that were not pranks. Only when dawn started creeping over the horizon did he realize how late it truly was. He would be locked in the shed for the weekend… no, probably the whole week… he might die this time.
He might actually die this time.
The fearful thought raced in his head over and over again spinning out of control and taking him into the darkest parts of his mind.
/ x / x / x / x / x / x / x / x / x / x / x / x / x / x / x /
Leonard stared at the stars being eaten by the dawn, slowly turning the blackness into deep blues. Waiting for Jonathan to get up and leave so that he could take his shame and stuff it away. Purple would come next in the skyline, soon it'd be fully light out. It was not the purple he saw. Jonathan had finally moved, not to leave. He was sitting on top of Leonard's waist, straddling him, leaning dangerously closer by the moment.
It was short, sweet, tender, and confused. A soft kiss followed by a cold gaze and harsh words, "Never speak to me again, and no more lover boy letters." Then Jonathan was gone. He stepped over Leonard vanishing from sight into the cornfield.