Chapter 6. Endgame
Chapter 6. Endgame
“Oh, Bruno, you shouldn't do that!” I cried. “Don't you know that's revenge? And revenge is a wicked, cruel, dangerous thing!”
--Lewis Carroll
Excerpt from Kyle's Diary, Friday, Feb 6, 10:00pm
Just got home from Tommy's. Tommy seemed pretty much his usual self when I left, so I guess he'll be OK. I think making those guys eat some of their own dog food helped a lot. But I guess I should pick up where I left off. The phone call was Ron, not Tommy, and he was worried because Tommy hadn't checked in when he promised, and when he called Tommy, his cell phone was turned off, which Tommy had promised he wouldn't do, after that last time he sort of went missing when he was seeing a girl. Ron asked me if I knew where he was; I told him he was at Tasha's, but that he had told me he'd be sure to be finished by now. We decided to give him another fifteen minutes, and I'd call as soon as I heard anything. Ron sounded really annoyed with Tommy, and he reminded me that he needed to be on campus by six thirty, and that if we weren't ready, we'd be on our own.
That was all he said; but the second he had said Tommy's cell was off, I knew something was wrong. I thought of my bad dreams of course; but all the other stuff sort of came into it: Tasha's boyfriend Mouse, Mouse and Simon watching us at lunch on Monday, Simon smirking at me, and Cassie being so worried about Tommy. Something very bad was going on. I just knew it somehow.
Tommy lay on his back on the floor, breathing deeply in a sound sleep, disturbed neither by the pain in his right hand nor the loud conversation going on around him.
“Look, Tasha, just go home and wait for me. We should be all finished here by, what, about six thirty at the latest?” He looked at Simon, who nodded. Tasha looked down at Tommy's sleeping body, reminded somehow of pictures of angels, and hesitated.
“Is he going to be all right?” she asked Mouse, a with an expression that might have represented compassion, in someone capable of that emotion. “He's really just sort of a sweet kid, you know?”
Mouse choked back his urge to tell Tasha what he really thought of this miserable queerboy; it had taken all of his self control just to keep himself from kicking the kid's face in after he had gone under. “Yeah, he'll be all right, he's just sleeping. I just couldn't stand to see him playing with you like that, you know? I kind of lost it, I guess. We're just going to play a little joke on him, then I'll come over. You stay in that dress tonight, we'll go over to the Taboo, OK?” He gave her rump a little slap, held her face in his usual rough fashion, and added, “C'mon, who's your big man?”
Tasha's eyes locked on his and she sighed. “You know you are,” she smiled, and gave him a little kiss. She went to the door, and looked back. “Call me soon, OK?” and left when Mouse nodded in reply.
Simon watched patiently. He was immensely pleased with the success of his plan, though Mouse had nearly spoiled it, and realized that everyone was now waiting for him to tell them what to do next. He took a moment to savor the sensation of controlling these brutish dolts like so many cattle. “OK, now.” he began, and handed out a couple of pairs of scissors from his bag. “You can start by giving our friend a haircut.” He smiled at their puzzled expressions. “Don't worry; it doesn't have to be a good haircut.” Then, as they still looked blank, he added, “In fact, it's better if it's a very bad one.” Simon almost literally saw three dim light bulbs above their heads glow with a feeble glimmer of understanding, as they went to work. He went back into his bag and pulled out the applicator and dye, and a second pair of handcuffs. Almost as an afterthought, he looked up, tossed Rocky a key, and said, “Oh. And strip him, of course.”
It didn't take long for the guys to reduce the sleeping Tommy's haircut to a rough and uneven pattern of nearly bald spots and randomly placed tufts of blond hair. As Chuck and Mouse worked with their scissors, Rocky removed Tommy's shoes and socks, opened the cuffs, and pulled off his jeans. The haircutting finished just as Rocky, with a moment's hesitation, pulled the sleeper's white silk boxers down his powerful legs. Everyone was suddenly quiet, except for Simon's sudden intake of breath. Chuck broke the silence with a chuckle. “It's a good thing you sent Tasha home, Mouse,” he said. “If she'd seen this equipment, she just might decide she likes the Boyd kid better after all!”
“Just shut the fuck up, Chuck!” Mouse growled, but his voice betrayed his envy. He turned to Simon, who was staring at Tommy's naked form. “Hey, smart boy! Now what happens?”
Simon looked at Mouse with a startled expression. He had not forgotten what Tommy looked like naked, but somehow had not quite been prepared for the reality. “Huh? Oh. Right. OK, I'll get this stuff into the applicator, it'll just be a couple of minutes. Then you can have some fun!”
Excerpt from Kyle's Diary, Friday, Feb 6, 10:00pm (continued)
Fortunately, I remembered what Brian told us about his sister knowing Cassie's sister, so I called Brian up to try to get her number. When I could only reach his voice mail, I got kind of frantic, and maybe Brian picked up on that when he got the message, because he called me back in only about ten minutes. But waiting out those ten minutes was terrible because I couldn't do anything except pace around waiting for him to call back. He thought I was worrying over nothing — aren't I the one who's always telling him how invincible Tommy is? — but he said he'd ask his sister to get Cassie's number. That took another fifteen minutes! I was going crazy, it was already almost 5:30, and I wasn't even sure if Cassie knew anything!
Cassie was shy, and rarely spoke to anyone but her few close friends, so it is no wonder that so many people underestimated her. And in this case, she had done her research Thursday night, once she heard that something was up. She at least wanted to know where Mouse lived, since the ‘joke’ on Tommy was going to be happening there. Her sister knew a girl from her class who had dated him last year; they had broken up because she didn't like the ‘rough play’ he enjoyed. It had taken a bit of work, but her sister talked to her friend and got the street where he lived and a description of the house; unfortunately, she had never really noticed the house number.
When Kyle called, Cassie knew at once that her worst fears had been realized. She quickly told Kyle everything she had learned, then apologized for not telling Tommy what she had overheard that day at lunch. “I'll feel terrible if something happens to him,” she told Kyle, “but I'll feel even worse not knowing! Please call me when you find out what's happened.”.
“Yes, of course I will. We will both so owe you a lot for this, thank you so much.”
“I just hope it isn't too late,” she said. There was a pause. “You and Tommy are in love, aren't you?”
Kyle nodded, then remembered that this was a phone call, and just said, “Yes, we are.”
“You're very lucky, you know?”
“Yes,” Kyle said. “I know I am. Every day. I'll call you, I promise. Goodbye.”
“Goodbye,” Cassie said; but Kyle had misunderstood. When she had said, “You're very lucky,” she hadn't been talking about just Kyle.
Tommy was still asleep, but Simon wasn't taking a chance on him waking up early; he had cuffed Tommy's ankles together once more, and cuffed his wrists as well, looping them around a support beam in the middle of the garage room, and left him sleeping on his side. The jocks had taken turns with the black henna after Simon had shown them how to apply it. “QUEER” was scrawled mostly legibly on his chest, and “FAG” in huge letters on his back. On his buttocks were the words, “ENTER HERE”. It had been the better part of an hour since they had finished ‘decorating’ Tommy's body. Chuck and Mouse had killed the time (and irritated Simon) by playing cacophonously on some of the old band equipment, but now they were growing impatient.
“How long do we have to wait?” asked Chuck for the fifth time. “Let's just drive him to the school and call it a night!”
“First of all,” Simon reminded him, “it's still too light outside; the sun is just setting. Second of all, if we don't give the henna another half hour at least, he'll be able to wash it out. If it sets long enough, it will dye his skin for two weeks.”
“Where do you learn this shit?” asked Mouse.
“Google is your friend!” smirked Simon with such an irritatingly smug expression that Chuck was about ready to punch his face flat. Seeing this, he hastily added, “Look, there's no point in waiting here. I can watch him. Go in the house and play video games or something, OK?”
Chuck and Mouse brightened up, and Mouse said, “Yeah, I just got the new Madden, you guys up for it?”
Chuck nodded enthusiastically, but Rocky, who had been very quiet since Tommy had been cuffed and left lying there, shook his head. “Look guys, this has worked out great, but, well, you know, I got in a lot of trouble back at Adams? Well, it was for beating up a couple of faggots. If someone sees me and I get connected with this, they'll like really hang me, you know? I hate to bail on you, but I really think I'd better go now. You don't need me any more anyhow, you can carry the little queer to the car yourselves.”
They argued about this for several minutes, but Rocky could not be talked into staying, so as Chuck and Mouse went into the house, Rocky walked slowly up the driveway to the street.
“You think it's OK leaving that faggot Simon alone with him?” asked Mouse as he pulled the game from the shelf.
“Yeah. He won't turn him loose, and if he wants to play with Sleeping Beauty, so much the better, right? OK. I get to be Oakland.”
Excerpt from Kyle's Diary, Friday, Feb 6, 10:00pm (continued)
I called Ron as I was walking towards Mouse's block, and let him know what I'd found out. I must have been out of my mind; I was going to go looking for the same guy who was bullying me at the beginning of the year. In retrospect, I guess I should have just had Ron come and join me right then, but I didn't know which house yet, so I told him I'd call him when I had scouted out which house it was. Ron was really upset and worried about his brother, and also was feeling under pressure, because it was getting late, and he was already dressed up and ready to head over to campus.
It was starting to get dark when I got to Mouse's street, and when I got there, I was almost ready to cry. I was looking for a white house with a front porch, and there were four houses on the block like that! I realized I'd have to check the garages of each house and hope that this wasn't all a wild goose chase after all. But just as I headed towards the first one, I saw someone.
Rocky walked along the street heading for home. His thoughts were a furious turmoil of conflicting feelings. Fuck, fuck, fuck! It's bad enough the stupid kid's a goddamn faggot, but he isn't even a little bit ashamed of it! And he does girls too! And on top of that, the goddamn queer's got to be so fucking strong, and look some kind of faggot Greek god or something! Like I'm supposed to just ignore that? I should have kicked his ribs in, he has no right to do that to me, to make me feel that way! Goddamn queer! He was shaking his head angrily: angry at himself; angry at his friends; angry at Tommy. Suddenly, right there in front of him, under the light of a lamppost, was the little queer boyfriend. He clenched his fists. Maybe bashing this faggot's face in will help.
Kyle looked up at Rocky, recognizing him as the one who had arm-wrestled Tommy on Monday. He knew he was probably about to get pounded into the ground, but he said simply, “Please. Which house? Please; I love him.”
Years later, Rocky would tell people that this was a turning point, the moment he got his first tiny clue that being gay wasn't just defined by who you have sex with, or where you stuck what, but could be more — much more. But at the moment, all he felt was confusion; he wanted to hit this little fag; he wanted to help him; he wanted to run away; he wanted to cry. With a calmness he didn't feel, he just said, “White house; ivy on the front fence. But don't go there. They'll just hurt you too.” And without waiting for Kyle to say anything that would just make it worse, he hurried away. Kyle forgot all about calling Ron, and went to Mouse's house at once, his mind summoning a thousand horrible images about what had been done to Tommy (hurt me too?). Quietly, he went up the driveway to the garage, and listened at the door. He didn't know who was in there — the whole football team? — but could guess what would happen if he were discovered. So at first, all he could hear was the pounding of his own heart.
Thirteen-year-old Tommy stands in a lunch line at his middle school, when another eighth-grader walks toward him. Tommy has seen him before but hasn't really noticed him. This has already happened, thinks Tommy. I'm dreaming it. I could change it, but it was perfect just as it was. Look at him. He's so cute, his clothes fit him so perfectly. How could I not have noticed him before?
Kyle is obviously scared; he doesn't know for sure if Tommy is gay. Haltingly, shyly, he stammers, “Hi, my name is Kyle. I was wondering … I mean, I thought maybe, um, do you think you'd like to go to a movie with me? Tonight?”
I cancelled a date with a girl that night to go with him, Tommy recalls as he watches this boy glancing anxiously into his face. He was so cute, I was curious to find out what he wanted. And it really took guts for him to come up to me like that.
Tommy spots Kyle at once outside the theatre; he is dressed in tight jeans and a V-necked shirt with the sleeves rolled up. He'd never dressed like that in school; I'm glad he dresses like that more often now. Kyle insists on buying the tickets. Tommy is impressed by the gesture from this shy boy.
The two young teens sit in the back of the theatre as the movie starts. Tommy senses that Kyle is still apprehensive; in a little while he puts his arm around Kyle's shoulder. Kyle tenses up, but Tommy whispers in his ear, “It's OK, Kyle,” and Kyle begins to relax as Tommy reassures him with a little squeeze on his shoulder. Kyle scarcely said a word the whole evening, Tommy now recalls. But I seemed always to understand how he was feeling. I think that's one of the reasons I found him so sexy.
They are in front of Tommy's house; Ron opens the door. He is shirtless, having just worked out. I was worried for a second that maybe that would scare Kyle away, but he seemed OK.
The two new friends sit on the bed in Tommy's room. They talk a bit. Kyle sees a pair of dumbbells and Tommy confirms that he does work out. “Kyle,” Tommy says, putting his arm around his shoulder again, “would you like to be … friends with me?” He does not want to make Kyle too nervous by using the word “boyfriend.”
Kyle's eyes gleam, and he smiles, still a bit shyly. “That'd be great, Tommy.” The two boys stand, and Tommy reaches out and gives Kyle a hug. Our first hug was maybe the best I'd ever had, Tommy remembers. He felt so yummy, and it was right.
Suddenly, Tommy is naked; he feels cold. His eyes are closed, and someone is kissing his chest. Wait, this is different; Dad drove Kyle home right after that hug. This isn't how it happened! Why does my hand hurt? And who's kissing me?
Alone with Tommy, Simon just stood over his sleeping form for a full minute, staring at him. “You know, you're the only person I've ever wanted this way. I spotted you almost the first day of school, and it didn't take long for me to find out all about you. You two probably thought you'd simply been careless in the boy's room, but I'd followed you in so quietly, there was no way you could have known I was there. And I wasn't asking all that much; I just wanted what you give away so easily to girls like Tasha or that wimpy little boyfriend of yours.” With some effort, he sat Tommy up, propping his back against the support beam, and gently, even affectionately, ran his hand through the wreck of his haircut. “You know, if you'd just given me a chance, we could have been friends. I could do so much for you, get you anything you like — girls; steroids; maybe even fix some grades, though your transcript doesn't look like you'd need that.” Simon knelt beside Tommy and his hands felt the weight of the relaxed, but still firm and solid, muscles of his arms and chest. “We'd have been so awesome as a team, Tommy! With my connections and brains, and your muscles for enforcement? Man, we could have owned the whole school!”
Simon's expression darkened. “But you made your choice. It's almost dark now. In a few minutes, we'll take you back to school, just as you are. You're going to spend the night cuffed to the fence, or if you manage to get loose, you'll have to walk home naked with those nice tattoos. You just might find your clothes and stuff waiting for you there. Those tattoos, though, will stay with you for a while, to remind you and your boyfriend and everyone in the locker room just how ‘invincible’ you really are.”
The skinny boy's hands slid down Tommy's almost impossibly chiseled abdominals, and down between his legs. “Such a pity,” Simon murmured, “but for now, anyway, I can have you to myself.” He smirked as his hands felt a stirring between Tommy's legs. He gave a little squeeze. “You seem to be having a nice dream; is your boyfriend in it? So much the better.” So saying, he leaned forward to kiss the sleeping boy's chest. Slowly, his tongue began to work its way down Tommy's abdomen, while his hands reached around the bottom of his back, and his finger began to probe the top of the buttocks.
“If your finger goes in there, you will die.”
Simon stood up and stepped back, startled to hear Tommy speak. His eyes were still closed, and his expression hadn't changed. “Are you awake?” he asked sharply.
Excerpt from Kyle's Diary, Friday, Feb 6, 10:00pm (continued)
There I was at the door, and finally remembered. Ron, of course! He would take care of these guys! Ron answered on the first ring, and I told him where I was and gave him the address. He told me he'd be there in ten minutes, and not to try to take these guys on by myself.
I paced in front of the door for a few minutes, but couldn't wait. I figured I could peek inside, then I'd be able to tell Ron how many there are, anyway, and maybe see how Tommy is. I tried the knob and turned it real slowly and gently. It was unlocked! So I pulled the door open, just a crack.
At first, I didn't see anyone in the room. Then, I spotted Tommy, and it was all I could do to keep from crying out. His face was bruised and his hair was all messed up, and he was naked, and the word “QUEER” had been painted on his chest, and he was slumped against an upright. His hands were tied back behind him. And crouched over him, with his back to me, was that miserable weasel Simon! I heard Tommy say something I couldn't catch, then Simon stood up and took a step back and asked him if he was awake. Tommy opened his eyes, and said to Simon, “what do you think?”
Simon started saying something about how it didn't matter, and having other ways to put Tommy out again, and how these were police handcuffs. Then I realized that there wasn't anyone else in the room but them! I stepped into the room quietly. Tommy saw me, but I put my fingers to my lips, and he didn't say anything. I don't think he quite believed it was me yet, he told me afterward he was still a little spaced out. I got right next to Simon, and he didn't hear me at all. I said his name, and he turned around. When he did, and I saw his face after seeing what he'd done to Tommy, I just couldn't help myself.
Simon turned around. He didn't know Kyle well, but the look of livid fury on the younger boy's face would have been new even to Tommy. If his eyes lit up whenever they saw Tommy, now they shone with darkly blazing anger. He drew back his fist, and with more force than he had ever used in his gut-punching play with Tommy, drove it hard into Simon's belly. Simon folded up like a broken puppet and fell to the floor with a short cry, and lay there struggling to breathe. Kyle was too furious to be able to get any satisfaction from the moment, but when he turned to Tommy, he saw that his friend was smiling proudly at him.
“Get the key!” Tommy said, pulling for the first time at the cuffs on his wrists and ankles and feeling their sharp edges bite at his skin.
Kyle pulled Simon up roughly by the front of his shirt. “Key!” was all he said, but Simon needed no persuasion, for he was now every bit as afraid of Kyle as he would be of Tommy.
“Right pocket,” he gasped. Kyle found the key and pushed its owner back to the ground. He turned and knelt beside Tommy, unlocking the cuffs that bound his ankles.
“Are you all right?” he asked, as he walked around the support beam that held Tommy captive. “What happened?”
“I'm not quite sure,” Tommy said. “There were three football players, and Tasha. We had a fight; I think there was something in the drink. What time is it?”
As Kyle glanced at his watch, suddenly Simon got up, and ran out of the garage towards the house, yelling “He's loose! Help! Hurry!”
Kyle fumbled with the key and handcuffs, hurrying to free Tommy before reinforcements arrived. As the second ring opened with a satisfying click, Chuck and Mouse trotted into the room to see what the yelling was about. Tommy stood quickly, positioning himself betwen the two football players and Kyle. With an inarticulate growl, Mouse rushed at Tommy and aimed a punch at his face, but Tommy ducked the punch rather easily and, with his left hand, grabbed at Mouse's wrist. But then he realized his mistake; with Tommy occupied, Chuck started to edge around Tommy towards Kyle, who stood behind Tommy with his own back against the support pillar to which his friend had been cuffed a minute before.
Tommy twisted away from Mouse without releasing him. Although his right hand throbbed with pain, he grabbed Chuck and squeezed his forearm with all the force he could muster, crying out from the pain as he did so.
Chuck spun around and threw a hasty punch at Tommy's chest, as a new voice from the doorway cried out, “Jesus Christ, Tommy, what the Hell did they do to you?!”
The handsome young man in the tuxedo charging in the doorway was well known to the football players; they had thought they had seen the last of him after he had graduated last year.
“Boyd!” exclaimed Mouse.
“Ron Boyd,” clarified Chuck, managing to twist himself loose from Tommy's agonized hand.
Ron had taken in the situation in an instant, and when he saw his little brother's bruised face and fat lip, saw his ruined hair, saw the epithets scrawled on his naked body, and heard his cry of pain, he was consumed with a fury unlike any he had ever known. He rushed at Chuck and struck him repeatedly with unrestrained punches to his body and his face. Chuck made a couple of attempts to block the punches and then to back away, but it was to no avail. A punch to the jaw brought Chuck to the ground, and he lay there, unconscious. Ron, who at that moment was literally ready to kill these guys, lifted Chuck's limp form. He was about to hurl it with all his strength through the mirrored closet doors when the only force in the universe that could have stopped him intervened.
“Ron, stop! I'm OK! I'll be OK! Stop!”
Ron turned around. His brother stood there panting, with the unconscious Mouse lying at his feet. Tommy grinned at his big brother. “They go down pretty easy, really, don't they?”
Ron's head cleared as the berserk rage faded, then he went over and gave his brother a warm hug. “I was so worried, are you sure you're OK? God, your hair is a mess, and those tattoos …”
“I think my hand is bruised is all. Wait a minute — what tattoos?”
It took a while before Tommy realized what had been done. As Kyle told him how he looked, Ron looked around at the ‘garage band’ equipment and started to chuckle, then to laugh almost hysterically. Kyle and Tommy looked at him in bemusement. “I can't help it,” Ron gasped between laughs. “These guys are such losers! They can't play football worth a damn, they can't fight worth a damn, and … this equipment is … just … such … crap!” and laughed some more, releasing at last the worry and tension that had been building during the last hours. Finally, he took a deep breath, and spoke again.
“I suppose that skinny guy running away from the house was Simon?” Kyle nodded. “Well, if this was his idea, these guys will probably have a few words with him, I don't think you need to do anything about him,” Ron said thoughtfully. “But what should we do with these guys? Just leave them?”
Kyle had been searching through the room, and had found the bundle containing Tommy's clothes, including his cell phone; he also had discovered the henna applicator. Now he grinned with an expression of mischief that Tommy recognized very well. “I have an idea,” he said, and withdrew a condom wrapper from the pocket of Tommy's jeans. “If Ron can wait a few more minutes, and if Tommy feels ‘up’ to it, I think we can leave these guys with a little memento.” He explained his idea.
Ron looked at his watch. “If we can do this in fifteen minutes, I can get you guys home and still make the concert OK. Tommy?”
“It'll be a pleasure.” He turned to Kyle, who was holding him by his left hand, and kissed him. “Especially if you help.”
Kyle's eyes gleamed. He glanced down and saw that Tommy was indeed ready. “The pleasure will be all mine.”
Excerpt from Kyle's Diary, Friday, Feb 6, 10:00pm
After we finished, Tommy got dressed and Ron drove us back to his house. I called Cassie on the way and told her everything was OK now, and Tommy and I both thanked her again for her help. After Ron dropped us off, he drove right to his concert, but only after we had reassured him about a hundred times that Tommy would be OK. He had examined Tommy's hand himself carefully, and had agreed that nothing was broken. Tommy showered, of course, but the tattoos wouldn't come out with regular soap. We got some bleach from the service porch, and managed to get a lot of the color out, but you can still sort of read them. I guess it will take time for them to go away completely. And of course, Tommy will have to get a haircut tomorrow. It'll have to be a Marine-type buzz cut, which he hates, but I think it'll look OK really, until his hair grows back. His poor hand! It really is just bruised, everyone agrees, but a really ugly color and a lot of swelling. We iced it and elevated it, and Tommy said that helped some, but it will probably hurt for a few days. Let's see, what else? Oh, we were going to cuff Chuck and Mouse, but Tommy wanted to keep the cuffs himself, he's wants to try to break them, which will be fun. And we might find fun games to play with the unbroken pair, who knows? Anyway, it's stuff like that that makes me think that Tommy's feeling OK after this whole mess.
When we were cuddling on his bed tonight, he got this real serious look on his face and said something that was just amazingly cool to hear from him. “You know,” he said, “sometimes people think I'm real brave to stand up to these bullies and fight with them. But it's easy for me. I don't even think about it. I know I'm stronger than they are. Being this strong, sometimes it feels like having the cheat codes for Doom or something like that; I know I can get out of any situation. It doesn't really take any courage to do what I do.” Then he looked at me and smiled a smile that could melt icebergs. “You're the courageous one, Kyle. The moment we met, it took real guts for you to ask me out, when you were afraid I might not be gay and might hurt you. And tonight! You came to that house, and went to the garage, and opened the door. You didn't know who would be there, or whether Chuck or a bunch of his friends might come out at any minute. You stuck with me in there when Simon went running for help. You're the bravest guy I know, Kyle! I love you so much!” OK, we kissed for a long time after that, but isn't that nice of him to say that? I certainly didn't feel brave!
Anyway, Ron came back with their parents a few hours later. He said he had gotten there OK, and his concert was all right, but it wasn't exactly his best performance either. Actually, though he didn't say so, I think he thought it was terrible. Their parents wanted to have a long talk with Tommy and Ron and so it wasn't really right for me to stay the night, and Tommy's dad took me home. Ron had filled him in on what had gone on, of course, and he thanked me (on behalf of both him and Tommy's mom) for being such a special friend for Tommy. It's pretty obvious how Tommy and Ron learned to be such caring people!
I'm pretty wound down now, and ready for bed. I can sleep well tonight I think — no nightmares for me this time, I bet! I'll bet those jock creeps and Simon can't sleep, though. I wonder if they'll believe the ‘note’ we left them?
About a mile away, Chuck shook Mouse. “Wake up! Wake up man! Ow, shit! I think that fucker broke one of my ribs or something. You've got something on your ass!”
Mouse opened his eyes and sat up. His head was throbbing. He and Chuck were naked. Between them was a used condom, still sticky. And on the buttocks of each guy was tattooed, in permanent black henna, “TOMMY WAS HERE”.
The authors of this story are very interested in your comments and criticisms. There is no way to know whether people are reading the story at all unless we hear from you. Kindly send any comments to Tommy.Boyd@comcast.net. If there is enough interest, a sequel is possible.