CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Chris
“I don’t know what you want, Chris,” Ky said as he flopped down on the bed, his back to me and his head automatically hung down.
It was hard not to look at how his defined shoulder muscles flexed around the armholes of his tank. As much as I wanted to touch him, I got the sense that it was best if I held back. This up and down, back and forth thing with him was starting to really give me whiplash, but for some reason, I couldn’t help but keep holding on.
“I’m not good at this talking shit,” he said with a sigh in his tone. It was almost as if he was regretful for that. “I can talk about cars and the weather no problem but all this shit that’s going on in my head is just stuck there.”
“Okay,” I replied with a shrug. I wasn’t going to force him to talk and I knew no matter what I said he wasn’t going to open up if he didn’t really want to. So I let him go through whatever process he was going through and stayed there to listen to it all.
“Did you hear any of that?” he asked and I got the feeling he wasn’t talking about what he’d just said.
“Yeah, I walked in sometime around the time she said she became pregnant again. I’m assuming that…”
“She got pregnant at fifteen and lost the baby.” He let out a forced breath and I could tell that all of this was hard for him.
I knew his struggle right then. He wanted to break down but at the same time, he felt like he needed to be strong for everyone around him, especially Ingram.
“I left her, Chris. Walked away and didn’t look back. I wasn’t there to protect her. Fuck! This is all my fault.”
His body was vibrating. I didn’t even think about how he’d react, I just moved, my body sliding across the bed and wrapping around his. I hugged him from behind. In all honesty, I didn’t expect anything out of it, but then his body sagged into me instantly. His hand was suddenly covering mine and he didn’t hesitate to slip his fingers into the spaces between mine.
“This is not on you, Ky. You can’t undo the past, but what you can do is try for the future,” I said into his ear in a soft, calming tone. “You can’t fix this but you can make it better. And I believe that you are, simply by being here for her.”
“It’s bad. I didn’t expect it to be that horrible,” he said, then he was opening up like a man starved for salvation.
He told me everything she’d told him. I understood his rage an anger because as calm as I normally was, I felt it too. I wanted to kill. I tried my hardest to not let it show because that wasn’t what Ky needed right now. And in truth, Ingram didn’t need it either.
His body fell limp as soon as he was done. It was as if I was holding him up. Maybe in some way, I’d helped to ease his burdens and suddenly I wanted nothing but to be that person for him.
“Come here,” I said as I moved to relax back on the bed. He came willingly, spreading out beside me and looking up at the ceiling. “Tell me what happened. What sent you running?”
I waited for him to deny it, to brush it off and walk out of the room. The air became too thick to breathe as the seconds ticked on in silence. We weren’t touching, but I could almost feel the tension pulling at his muscles. Without looking at me, his hand sought out mine and he tangled our fingers together again.
“I was seventeen. We weren’t encouraged to have friendships. We were supposed to be nice and respectful to everyone, but there was never time to, like, hang out. But I had a friend, he was a year younger than me. He—Brighton, was an outsider like me, brought in by his parents when he was eight. He knew how different it was there and though I couldn’t remember much from my life before, we kind of became friends because we both understood.”
I turned my head and watched him as he spoke. It maybe wasn’t the best thing to do because I got the sense that Ky couldn’t take my eyes on him as he told me his story. But I was at the point that I was ready and willing to push past his barriers. I was there for him and he needed to know that he had all of me right now.
“I saw him as a friend and he saw me as the same,” he said and I got the feeling like he felt like he needed to make that statement, like it might have had more meaning woven in between each word. “One night, Fathe—the leader called everyone out of their homes. We all gathered around in the town center area and waited for him to speak. It was when I saw two men holding Brighton down that I knew something horribly wrong was about to happen. He went on about how the outside filth had been brought in by Brighton. That it was threatening to taint all of us and that ‘something had to be done in order to stop the spread of this evil,’ if you can believe that.”
“Oh,” I said and it was like a light went off in my head. I had a feeling I knew where this was going and it suddenly clicked why Ky had made that statement.
“Brighton had a crush on a guy and I guess he’d tried to tell him but it didn’t go over so well. The guy ran and told Father.” He said the word through gritted teeth. “I stood there frozen in shock because I just didn’t understand why he would do this to his ‘people’ and how he could have been so cold to a kid. A fucking kid, Chris. I knew deep inside of me that this was all wrong but I felt like I couldn’t do anything about it. Brighton was my friend, and I didn’t give a shit about what anyone had to say about him. He was funny and smart. He made me laugh. Hell, he made that place bearable. Do you get me?”
“Yeah. I think I get it. So, you were taught that it was wrong?”
“Yes. One of Father’s things was you couldn’t be homosexual because then you couldn’t grow the following. That was what we were called, ‘the following,’ or his following at times. In his mind, there it was all about adding and growing his word. He said it was the evils of the outside world that weren’t supposed to happen inside of those gates. It was so messed up.”
His head turned and he looked into my eyes. There was a deep sadness there and I wanted more than anything to take that away for him.
“Being gay, giving into those thoughts and urges, he saw it as a direct attack against him and his word. He blamed it on the fact that Brighton had been out there too long before coming to be ‘saved’ and that his impressionable mind had already been tainted before he’d reached the front gates. He said there was nothing he could do for him.”
“Wait. But I’m confused. He took his parents in and yours too, right? They weren’t born there and had been so-called tainted for much longer, right?” I asked trying to put all the pieces of the puzzle together. I wasn’t sure why, the man sounded crazy and I knew that there was probably no good explanation to any of his ways.
“Adults came to him to be saved,” Ky said then let out a long sigh as—I assumed—he tried to think of the words to explain it. “It was their choice to seek out the light and therefore they were open to receiving the change. Children born on the outside and brought in were seen as people he had to break-in, if you will. They didn’t have the choice, and though he welcomed them in because of their parents, he never fully accepted them.”
His fingers twitched in mine and then his grip became almost crushing. I didn’t say anything and I didn’t even try to ease the pain. I held him firmly, my thumb stroking back and forth over his warm skin.
I could sense it in my bones that this story was about to get worse. My stomach turned and a sour taste flooded my mouth. I tried my hardest to hold strong for Ky. I knew he needed to get this out. He needed to be free.
“They beat him, Chris. A defenseless sixteen-year-old. Right there in the middle of the town center for everyone to see. They stripped him down and continued to pummel him with anything they could get their hands on as he lay there lifeless in the dirt. I tried to help him. I ran through the crowd not even thinking about what I was doing, but they held me back. When it was all over they left him there and I received a punishment for what I tried to do. They chained me to a tree not twenty feet from him and left me there for three days. He wasn’t dead, Chris. You know how long it took for his body to finally give out? Nearly two days. I will never forget watching his body rise and fall with his last breath, and the feeling of waiting for him to breathe again. But it didn’t happen.”
I had no words. I don’t think he really expected me to, but I still wished that I could have comforted him in some way. I understood why he’d left and I couldn’t blame him, not even a little bit. That was some fucked up shit. I couldn’t believe how people could treat other people sometimes—how cruel they could be.
My lips found his shoulder and I placed a light kiss on his soft skin, thankful that he was wearing a tank under his cut. I didn’t mind the shop smell that still clung to him. In fact, I found comfort in it. My lips lingered against his skin as the minutes ticked on.
“I couldn’t stay there. I knew that much. I had this card that my grandma had made me way before my parents moved us to that place. It was a simple index card that she had laminated so that it wouldn’t get ruined. It had her address on it because she said that my parents moved too much to put theirs on there. She told me to keep it in my pocket at all times. I was a kid, you know, so I tried my hardest to remember to put it in the pocket of my pants every morning. It helped that she scared the shit out of me by saying that if I didn’t have it and I got lost, then no one would be able to help me find my way back home. That is scary to hear when you’re little.”
His lips tipped up for a second and I let out a short laugh. Then like the magic had disappeared and he remembered what he was talking about, his face went hard again. This time, I knew it didn’t have anything to do with me and so I didn’t move away.
“That card ended up saving my life, I think. I still would have left without it, but I can only imagine what might have happened to me. It killed me to leave Ingram behind, but you know all of that.”
“Ky,” I whispered and had all intentions of telling him that none of what had happened was his fault, but then his lips were on mine and I forgot everything I was going to say.
“Don’t,” he mumbled in between kisses. “Don’t tell me, because I don’t want to disappoint you when inside I know that I can’t believe your words, no matter how much I would want to.”
He rolled to half cover me, his body pressed tightly into the side of mine. I held him as our lips made lazy passes against each other’s. This wasn’t sexual, it was two lonely souls trying to hold onto one another's. It was beautiful and sad all at the same time.
Then he broke away and his head came to rest in the crook of my neck. I wrapped my arms around him, holding his body firmly to mine.
“I want to give Ingram a better life that we both had growing up. I want her to be proud to call me her family. But I have to be honest, I don’t have the first clue on how to be the man deserving of that title.”
“You already are,” I said after I cleared my throat. “You took her in. You didn’t ever make her feel like she was unwanted here. You never treated her like she was an idiot or weird. All the things you’ve done have been nothing short of being a good big brother.”
“Is it horrible that I want to lock her down in this house and never let anything bad happen to her?” he asked with a chuckle.
“No. I mean, you can’t do that—I won’t let you, but I get what you’re saying.”
“You’re amazing. You know that, Chris?” His head lifted and his eyes met mine.
I was suddenly choked up. I didn’t know what to say or how to respond.
“This is some heavy shit I’ve brought into your home, into your sanctuary. I bet you didn’t know it would be this fucked up.”
“No, but I didn’t care either. I didn’t offer because I felt like I had to. I did it because I care about you and well, Ingram looked terrified.”
“Oh, God, she did,” he said as he laughed at the memory and flopped back over onto the bed. “What was she thinking? What was my grandma thinking sending her this way? Oh, man.” He shook his head and it was good to see the smile on his face.
His hand found mine again and for a long time, we remained silent and still. It didn’t feel awkward or intense and I kind of loved the way we could just comfortably be around each other. Right then at least, who knew what was going to happen once the spell was broken beyond this room. I didn’t want to think about that, for right now, I just wanted to enjoy the closeness of Ky.
“If I stay here any longer I’m going to fall asleep. Today has been exhausting,” he said as he shifted to sit up.
“Okay,” I replied in a tone that said I didn’t mind if that happened.
His sad smile told me all I needed to know. He wasn’t ready and I wasn’t going to push it.
“Thank you, for listening and taking us in. For being amazing with Ingram. Just, for everything,” he said and his eyes looked down into mine.
I smiled up at him and gave a soft nod.
“I’ll see you in the morning,” I said letting him know that I understood his need to flee.
“Goodnight, Chris.”
He got to his feet and it seemed like he was having to push himself with each step. Like he wasn’t quite sure that he wanted to go.
“Night, Ky.”
He looked back at me once he hit the so-called doorway. Then he was gone, jogging down the stairs with heavy feet.
I hated the way he made me feel. No, wait, that wasn’t right. I loved the way he made me feel but I hated the fact that he clearly wasn’t ready to let go of whatever was holding him back. I wasn’t sure what that was, and I didn’t really have the first idea of what it could be. Part of me wanted to blame it on that place, that fucking cult—yes, I said it. But by the way he talked, it was clear that none of that negative stuff had stuck with him.
While listening to him explain his story, I learned a few things. One, Ky had a good heart despite the shit he’d gone through. Two, he was fucking smart and I don’t even think he realized it. Three, he was a man wise beyond his years. Four, in his heart he knew right from wrong and I imagined the struggle of having to hide that for years wasn’t easy. And five, he was soft. Yes, grunty and at times asshole-ish Ky had a warm gooey center.
I chuckled to myself at the thought. I’d never come out and say that to anyone, let alone him, but it didn’t mean it made it any less true. I smiled to the empty room, thinking how I was the lucky boy that got to be a part of it, to see him with his guard down.
That was what I kept my mind on as I crawled into bed. I wouldn’t doubt that the morning would bring back the Ky we’d all been used to and I wasn’t even going to say that I hated that.
Fucking baby steps.
I just needed to keep remembering that.