A time comes in a man’s professional life when he knows he’s done some of his best work. Looking back later, much later, Stef knew he’d surpassed his finest hour. In the thick of it, though, he felt he barely got both of them out alive.
He was prepared for one single bombshell revelation. Instead it was a firestorm. Geno opened the coffee can and spilled pieces of hardware onto the table. At the same time, he opened the bomb bay doors and unleashed his private hells. It all spilled out in a mess, sloshing and dripping over the table and onto the floor.
Geno talked about his attachment to his little nephew. Then something about pizza dough, the feel of it in his hands. A call to a rape crisis hotline that went badly. Needing to leave his sister’s house because it wasn’t safe. He recited parts of the Model Penal Code. He talked about his roommate Ben. Someone named Jason, whose boyfriend was Seth. He talked about the girls he slept with in school and never being able to come. A night at a bar and seeing a girl come close to being drugged.
“They asked if it happened to a girl I knew,” he said, the color up high in his face like he was running a fever. “A girl. It’s always a girl. Even the law says it’s a girl.”
“Well, now, wait a—”
Stef couldn’t even correct the erroneous statement. The sky was burning now, Geno’s babble strafing the air. Something about a girl named Natasha and Craigslist ads. “Straight dude seeks same,” he said over and over. The desperate decision to become Carlos because the alternative was jumping off Jason’s balcony. One more lie in the tangled web. Finding the Vicodin and getting into bed with his friends. Lying in Jason’s arms, holding Ben’s hand and waiting to die.
When Geno finally stopped talking, nuts and bolts and screws and washers were sorted in neat piles. He breathed hard over them, but not with the exertion of a mission accomplished. He looked like the sole survivor of war.
Slowly Stef picked through what the strainer of his instincts had kept back. “The dough felt really good in your hands.”
“Yeah.”
“It’s similar to human flesh. You know from working with Micah that because of the yeast, dough is technically alive. It’s an extremely tactile thing to hold and it can evoke deep emotions and deep sense memories. The same thing happens with sand. You put your hands in the sand table and you go somewhere else. It’s why we work with it, and other things like clay. Because it allows survivors to be touched without being touched.”
But that’s not the thing.
He turned over another piece. “You got aroused working with dough at the same time your nephew was hanging onto your leg. You were attached to him. It sounds like he trusted and adored you, and he was the one thing that made you feel good.”
Face in his hands, Geno nodded.
“Matthew may have even triggered extremely deep memories of being young with Carlos, but let that go a minute. You said you left your sister’s house because it wasn’t safe.”
“Yes.”
“Not because it wasn’t safe for you, but because it wasn’t safe for Matthew.”
Another nod, eyes squeezed shut.
“The woman on the hotline said you were the threat. You were the reason we needed rape hotlines in the first place.”
“Yeah.”
A stab of anger for this insensitive stranger, which Stef quickly parried. It’s something to address later. Not now.
“You thought you were a threat to Matthew,” he said.
“Yeah.”
“Why is that?”
“Because I got hard for him.” The last word got gulped into the back of Geno’s throat and his skin went grey-green.
“What just happened?” Stef said, already halfway out of his seat.
Now the ghostly face was slick with sweat. “I feel so sick.”
“Come sit by the window.”
Stef cracked it open, then wet a hand towel at the sink, getting it as cold as he could. “Put it on the back of your neck. Right up against the bump there.” He wet another towel and had Geno hold it between his wrists. “Deep breaths, okay? I’m right here.”
Geno’s teeth chattered as he pulled a breath through his nose. “I’m so dizzy. I feel like I’m…not even here.”
“It’s your vagus nerve reacting under stress. Remember I explained it to you? Sudden drop in blood pressure. It feels horrible and surreal, like you’re losing your mind. You’re not. It has a name. Vasovagal syncope. This is temporary. It will pass.”
“Promise?”
“I promise. You’re doing great. We’ll get through it.” Stef filled a paper cup with water and brought it back to the window sill. “Do you know what it is that triggered you just now? Say yes or no.”
Geno pulled his knees to his forehead, shaking as he wrapped arms around his shins. “Yes.”
“It’s in your head, you know what it is.”
“Yes.”
“All right. Take a drink. Nice and easy.”
Geno took a wobbling sip, then put his head down on his knees again. “You’re the only person I trust right now,” he said, muffled.
“I won’t fuck around with it. But I don’t want to put words in your mouth. Only you can tell the story.”
Geno nodded but didn’t speak.
After a minute, Stef said, “You lost all your color when you said you got hard for him.”
“Yeah.”
“Got hard for Matthew?”
“Yeah.”
Be careful here, Stef thought, then asked, “Or was it someone else?”
“Fuck…” Geno yanked the hand towel open and buried his mouth in it.
Stef ran to wet another towel at the sink. “It’s okay,” he said. “Let it come up. Heave it up. Get it out of you.”
“I can’t…” Geno’s chest bucked again. He was only dry-heaving, but it was relentless. The kind of paralyzing nausea that dehumanized you.
Stef gave him the new, folded towel. “Get that under your collar. Put it right over your chest. I’m going to put my hands on you.” He waited two beats before he pressed one flat, neutral palm between Geno’s shoulder blades and the other over the cold, wet cloth on his sternum. Between his hands, the planes of Geno’s body quaked like tectonic plates. A rolling, cataclysmic event ready to break out of this boy.
“Focus on the cold,” Stef said. “I’m going to squeeze you a little. Tell me if it’s too much.” He pressed his hands in, equal force front and back. Sometimes pressure could break up anxiety. He made a quick mental note to get Geno a weighted blanket if this worked for him.
“Too much?” he asked.
“No, it’s helping.”
The spasms stopped. With a last shiver, Geno leaned his head back, breathing hard. Stef wet down the towels again for him. Brought more water to drink. Geno breathed slow behind closed eyes. His color was back and the inhales and exhales seemed calmer.
“You’re doing great,” Stef said.
Geno opened his eyes. “It happened with Anthony.”
“I know. I know now. You can tell me.”
“While I was… While he was…raping me, I… Jesus.” He was breaking apart.
Stef held perfectly still, face soft but his teeth closed around the tip of his tongue almost to the point of pain.
“He was behind me and…” Geno’s fists clenched and his face twisted into a contorted mask of shame. “He was holding up all my weight. I didn’t have anything left. No strength, no fight, no nothing. I… I caved in. I gave up. I couldn’t fight anymore so I just took it. And that’s when he… His hand reached around and…” Geno pressed his forehead into his palms, fingertips digging into his scalp. “He found it.”
“You had an erection.”
Geno was weeping too hard to answer but he nodded.
“It’s not unusual,” Stef said, keeping his voice controlled and firm. “Listen to me, it’s not. I’ve seen and heard this a hundred times. It happens.”
“He made it happen.” Geno’s voice was like melted tar under the sun, bubbling up and bursting open. “He saw and he fucking laughed, said I was a whore just like my brother. Said one twin couldn’t be gay without the other. He fucking broke me then. That’s when it happened. He told me to say shit to him and I said it. He told me to come in his hand and I did. He fucking made me come and he smeared it all over my face and in my mouth and said I loved it. It’s all I can hear. His voice in my ear saying, ‘Yeah, you love it, baby boy…’”
Geno’s shaking hand pointed over his right shoulder. “He’s right there. On my back, breathing on my neck, talking in my ear, reaching for my dick. Anytime I lie down with a girl or anytime I get friendly with a guy, it’s his fucking voice in my ear telling me what I really love, who I really am. That’s why Carlito brought me in there. He knew I was an easy target. He knew. They all knew.”
Stef let him cry it out hard and gradually come down, shuddering and sniffing.
Be careful, he thought. This isn’t over yet.
“We have a lot to talk about here,” he said. “I’ll start by saying what happened to you would drive anyone to the brink. But not everyone would come back from that kind of edge. It’s a goddamn miracle you’re sitting here telling me this stuff. Don’t dismiss how strong you are, Geno.”
“Strong, shit. I’m fucking weak.”
“You didn’t get hard for Anthony and you didn’t come from being raped. It was an involuntary response of ejaculation which had nothing to do with pleasure. It had nothing to do with you.”
“That’s fucking easy for you to say.”
“I am not talking shit to make you feel better. You were loaded up with enough Viagra to stop your heart—”
“So what,” Geno cried. “It shouldn’t have made a fucking difference.”
“You had no control over the situation. Not the circumstances and not your body’s reaction. I can pick up the phone and get eight doctors to confirm that some men get an erection when they’re under stress or even terrified. They’ll all tell you a penis does what it’s made to do regardless of context. It doesn’t know the difference. It has one job and sometimes it does it when the circumstances aren’t even close to sexual.”
“You don’t understand.” Geno twisted and writhed. His palm spread wide across one of the window panes, fingers digging into the smooth glass. “That fucking son of a bitch destroyed my family and I got hard for him. He upset my mother, he preyed on my brother and I came for it. He was raping the shit out of me, he made me come and it killed my father.”
The fist reared back and Stef lunged to grab Geno’s wrist before it could plunge toward and through the window. He hauled the energy in the other direction, but Geno was already uncurling off the window ledge and flinging himself toward Stef’s arms. The combined momentum was nearly enough to barrel Stef over and send them both sprawling. He managed to pivot and get his back against the wall as his arms closed around Geno.
“I got you,” he said.
“He killed him,” Geno cried.
“I know,” Stef said, holding him tight. “Stay here and tell me.”
“He took my brother and he broke him and he killed him.”
“Hold onto me. Keep telling me. I got you.”
“He killed my father.”
“I know. And it nearly killed you. Day after day it goes on. Almost killing you. But never finishing the job.”
Geno convulsed with weeping. Stef kept the embrace as strong as he could while liquid mercury dribbled down from his head, filling in his pores.
I can be sympathetic to your pain, but I do not have to feel it for you.
“I miss him,” Geno said, like a knife slicing through the air. “Carlito served me up. He sold me. But he was mine and I miss him.”
“I know.”
“I miss him so bad.” The cry didn’t even sound human anymore.
“I know,” Stef said, a hand at the back of Geno’s head. “I know you do. Your heart is broken.”
A machine gun rattle of wet sobs against Stef’s chest and Geno’s hands clutched harder. “I want him back…”
Stef’s heart fractured into pieces. Slivers and shards that pierced clean through his protective armor. It was no use now. He was feeling all of it.
“He was your twin,” he said, rocking both of them. “You’re cut in half. You’ve been severed in two.”
Geno’s head nodded furiously against Stef’s collarbone. His weight was growing heavier, deader, starting to drag downward. Still holding tight, Stef helped both of them get to the floor, on their knees. They stayed there a long time, long after Geno stopped crying. Finally his white-knuckled grip on Stef’s shirt sleeves relaxed, and he rolled down to sit with his back up against the wall. Stef sat as well, both of them with knees drawn up and arms wrapped around. Geno’s head was pressed to his kneecaps while Stef’s was turned to the boy, only touching Geno with his eyes.
“I couldn’t get away from it,” Geno said. “It followed me everywhere. I tried to have sex with someone and all I could hear was Anthony telling me I loved it. Like he controlled everything. And only he could make me come.”
“On top of everything you endured, you feel sold out by your own body.”
“He told me I loved it.”
“He lied.”
Geno buried his head again, shoulders shaking.
“It’s hard not to equate your physical reaction with the emotional reaction,” Stef said. “But your body’s response during the rape had nothing, zero to do with arousal. Zero to do with your sexuality.”
“I feel so fucking ruined.”
“You’re not.”
“Shut up. You don’t know anything. You have no fucking idea what it’s like to be me. To be cuffed in a bed, getting a strange man’s dick shoved up your ass or down your throat. Lying there smelling your own blood and shit and jiz and being told you love it. You don’t know anything, so shut the fuck up.”
The words bounced harmlessly off Stef’s skin. Often the greatest display of trust a client showed his therapist was lashing out in anger. It took more confidence than allowing tears.
“Sorry,” Geno said.
“Don’t apologize,” Stef said, astounded by this boy’s heart. “Your job isn’t making me feel comfortable with your ordeal. Your job isn’t worrying if it’s too much for me to hear or worrying I’ll take your anger personally. Your job is to talk about whatever you need to talk about.”
Geno exhaled roughly and looked around the room. “How do you not bring all this home with you at the end of the day?”
“That’s my problem,” Stef said. “Not yours.”
“I’m asking you a fucking question. Come on.”
“I do bring it home with me. My last job of the day is peeling my job off my skin and leaving it outside my house.”
“Mm.”
“And I don’t always do that last job well.”
“Do you talk about your day with Jav?”
“Sometimes.”
“Do you talk about me?”
Stef hesitated. “I think what you’re really asking is do I forget about you when I leave here at night. The answer is no. I don’t.”
I can’t, he thought. You’re so like Jav. Your stories are so similar and your hearts have endured so much. Now that I see it, I don’t think I can un-see it. This won’t just peel off my skin. Not tonight.
Geno said nothing, but his chin gave the tiniest of nods and the last bit of tension sank out of his shoulders. He took another sip of water, looking like an athlete who’d played the game of his life. “I think I want to go lie down.”
“All right.”
Geno’s teeth worried at his bottom lip. His head half-turned to Stef and stopped. “I’m a little…afraid of being alone though.”
Afraid of being forgotten, Stef thought. “You want me to sit with you a while?”
“Just until I fall asleep. Is that allowed?”
“You’re the one who says if it’s allowed.”
The EP bedrooms had the same wide windowsills as the art room. Stef sat here, looking out on the street. Through the ocean waves of the white noise machine, he heard Geno’s breathing getting longer and softer. Once or twice, the boy twitched, moaning each time.
“I’m here,” Stef said, turning his muted phone over and over in his hands.
I’ll be back soon, he texted Jav. Everything’s fine. Don’t worry.
He wasn’t fine and Jav would worry. It was how things were supposed to be.
His eyes fell on the pastel drawing tacked to the bulletin board. The little red henhouse nestled in the hills. A bit of the background torn out, where a fox once prowled. A hole through which other horrors might come creeping.
Stef stared until he fell into the picture. He raised up the ramp of the henhouse, cutting off access to the door. He shouldered a rifle and put his back to the rough, red walls.
I’m on guard, little brother.
You fought hard and brave. Rest your heart now. Don’t be afraid.
I’m here.
They’ll have to come through me to get to you this time.