Chapter 2 – Age 13
Jule hopped off his bicycle and wheeled it around the side of Tor’s house and into his backyard.
Despite their parents being in an off stage of their lifetime on-and-off relationship, seven years after they met, Jule and Tor remained best friends.
Jule was old enough to ride his bike over to the Dunworthy house, so nobody was in their way.
Jule’s mom was always working, like usual, and his father was busy with his job and his plan to run for attorney general and probably some mistress.
Tor’s mother Vickie had fallen hard into her drug use again and nobody had heard from her in almost a year.
Tor’s father John Jones had never lived there, and he only came by occasionally and always when Vickie was around.
Nobody said much about him, but they made it clear that he was bad news and it was better not to cross his path, so much so that, if he was visiting, Tor’s brothers disappeared and Jule was told to stay far away. Thankfully, those times were rare.
He and Tor were inseparable. They hung out every day after school.
They got their homework done, which always went quickly with Tor because he read faster than anyone Jule knew, remembered every word, and was great at teaching Jule things he didn’t understand.
When their work was done, they’d find something fun to do until Jule had to leave so he’d beat his mother home from work.
That evening, she had rushed in, packed a bag, and rushed out, explaining that there was an emergency at her firm’s Tucson office, and because she was now the managing partner, she had to deal with it.
She’d be gone for days so Jule stuffed some things into his backpack and rode back to Tor’s house.
There were even more cars there than earlier that afternoon.
Travis and Titan had started a business flipping them.
They stole them, stripped some for parts and updated others, and then sold them.
Usually, things moved quickly but either they’d found a way to grab extra inventory, or they were having trouble unloading them.
He hoped it was the first one, because if the cars weren’t selling, they’d have to come up with another way to make money.
The last time things had been desperate, they’d gotten sloppy.
Tyson was still locked up because of it, but hopefully he’d be out soon.
“Tor!” he shouted as he dropped his bike by the back door. “Tori!” He walked inside expecting to find Tor on the couch, but Titan was there instead. “Hey, Tan,” he said. “Tor in the bedroom?” He started toward the hallway.
“Nah, he’s out.”
He frowned. “Out where?” Tor didn’t go out without him.
“He’s at that dude’s house.” Titan picked up a paper and sprinkled some weed on it. “He never takes long so he’ll be back soon.” He spread the weed across it and then pressed the ends of the paper together, rolled it, and licked the edge.
“What dude?” Jule walked to the living room and took off his backpack.
“You know the one who moved into that yellow house down the street.” He lit the joint and inhaled. “Billy or Cody or something,” he said on an exhale.
Neither name was familiar. “Who? Does he go to our school?”
“Nah, man. He’s older than me. His wife went to school with Ty, I think. Short guy. Brown hair. Cody.” He took another drag and nodded. “That’s his name. Pretty sure.”
Titan was eighteen. Tyson was twenty-three. “Why does Tor go there? Is he doing work at their house?” And why hadn’t he mentioned that to Jule?
“From what I understand that dude’s doing all the work.” Titan chuckled, picked up his beer, and took a swig, joint still between his fingers. “Sit down, man. You’re blocking the TV.”
“What are you talking about? What kind of work?”
“Sucking Tor’s dick mostly, I think.” He leaned to the side. “Seriously, move out of the way.”
“What the fuck did you say?” Jule shouted.
“Whoa.” Titan stood up. “Chill out, man. What the fuck?”
“What did you say?” Jule got in his face.
“Step back, Jule!”
“What happened?” Travis came running in from the bedroom, pulling up his boxers. “Why are you guys yelling?”
“Jule’s freaking out again.”
“Did you say Tor is”—he gulped—“with a grown man?”
“It’s a blow job, Jule. Why are you freaking out?”
“Did you know about this?” He flipped around and faced Travis.
“Yeah?” Travis said, looking confused. “Are you okay? You’re bright red.”
“And you’re letting it happen?”
“He’s getting his dick sucked. Of course we’re letting it happen.” Travis shrugged. “Hell, I wish it’d happen for me more often but I’m not into dudes, and chicks are harder to get. I tried to talk that guy’s wife into sucking me off but she’s only into watching her husband go down.”
“Same.” Titan nodded. “Kinky bitch. Tor’s lucky.”
“You’re both fucking crazy,” he yelled.
“Jule, chill out.”
“Where’s your gun?” He jerked his gaze around the room, and when he didn’t see anything, he marched toward the bedroom.
“Holy shit.” Titan scrambled over the coffee table and darted for him just as Travis grabbed his shoulders. “What are you doing?”
“I’m going to kill that child molester.”
“He’s not that old and Tor’s into it. Calm down.”
“Into it? Do you hear yourself?”
“Are you mad that Tor’s into guys? Because that’s shitty, Jule.”
“I don’t care that he’s gay!” Not that he had known about that, which, honestly, did make him mad, but only because Tor had kept it from him and they told each other everything.
“I’m mad that a grown adult is having sex with a kid and his wife is getting off on it.
That’s sick.” Jule grabbed his hair, pulling. “Tor’s thirteen!”
“It’s a blow job, not sex. And I was having sex when I was thirteen,” Titan said.
“Same,” Travis agreed. “Actually, I was having sex until you started yelling and I’d like to get back to it. I know you don’t like smoking, Jule, so get a beer. You need to chill the fuck out. Tor’ll be back soon.”
“Angela?” Titan asked, looking at Travis and tilting this head toward the bedrooms.
“Yeah.”
“That’s getting to be a regular thing.”
Travis shrugged at Titan and then arched his eyebrows at Jule. “You good, man?”
Jule nodded, not because that was true but because he needed them to get out of his way. They let go of him, but they were blocking his access to the bedrooms, so he ran out the back door instead.
“Jule!” Travis called after him. “Where are you going?”
He was too enraged to say anything. His heart was racing, his skin on fire, he couldn’t get air into his lungs fast enough, and his vision was going dark around the edges.
He saw an exhaust pipe and picked it up.
It’d have to do. He must have run because, suddenly, he was at the yellow house, banging on the door.
A guy matching Titan’s description of Cody opened it.
Short. Brown hair. Way too old to be messing with Tor.
Jule swung the pipe and caught him in the stomach, knocking him to the ground.
“You pedo piece of shit.” He raised the pipe over his head and brought it down. “You sick fuck!” He did it again.
“Oh my God,” a woman shouted from inside the house. “What are you doing?”
“Stopping this freak!” The guy was curled into a ball, bloody and crying. Jule hit him again.
“You’re killing him!”
“Good.” He raised his arm, ready to land another blow.
“Jule?” Tor appeared behind the woman, his eyes wide. “Holy shit.” He jumped forward and grabbed the pipe mid-swing. “What are you doing?”
“Let go of me,” Jule screamed. “I’m going to kill him.”
“Fuck. Stop.” Tor tried pushing Jule away, but he fought back. Tor was stronger than him, but he was taller, wider, madder. “Stop! Jule, stop.”
“Fuck you.” He wiggled and shoved, trying to get out of Tor’s grasp. “He’s a sicko!”
“I’m calling the cops,” the woman said.
“No,” Tor shouted. “Jule, cut it out.” Tor was gripping his arms and using all his strength to keep him away from the freak on the ground, but Jule wasn’t going to let up. “Don’t make me hit you. I swear to God.”
“Let me go.” He shoved Tor.
“Damn it!” Tor swung and punched Jule square in the face, knocking him to the ground.
The pipe clattered out of his hand. “Fuck, Tori, that hurt.”
Tor squatted down and looked at the man. “Hey, you okay?” He touched his shoulder. “Cody?” He shook him.
“Is he dead?” the woman asked.
“No. He’s breathing, but he’s bleeding a lot and he’s unconscious. You should call for an ambulance probably.” Tor closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “Shit. We have to get out of here.” He grabbed Jule’s arm and yanked him up. “Let’s go.”
“I’m going to kill him.” He rubbed the back of his head and winced. Something warm dripped from his eyebrow along the side of his face. Tor always could land a punch. He was freakishly strong.
“No, you’re not,” Tor said.
“I need an ambulance,” the woman was speaking into her phone. She rattled off her address. “My husband was attacked.”
Tor flipped around, took the phone from her, and pressed it against his shirt. “If you tell anyone that he had anything to do with this, I’ll tell the cops why he did it. Explain that to Cody when he wakes up.”
Her eyes widened and her jaw dropped. “You can’t. We’ll both go to jail.”
“I don’t give a fuck. Make up a story. I don’t care what, but you leave him out of it completely.
” With that threat hanging in the air, he handed her the phone, then he ducked down, picked up the pipe, turned Jule around, and pushed him out the door.
“Let’s go, killer. We need to get you out of sight. ”
“What were you thinking?” Tor said angrily.
He was leaning over Jule, who was sitting on the closed toilet, and wiping balled up toilet paper dipped in water across his eyebrow.
“That hurts.” Jule pulled away.
“It’ll hurt more when I get the alcohol out, killer. Stay still.”
“Fuck you for punching me that hard.”
“Fuck you for losing your shit and being a dumbass.” Tor shook his head and tossed the bloody wad of paper into the trash.
“Why the fuck did you go over there, Jule? All these years we’ve been keeping you out of trouble at school and making sure you have straight A’s so your mom will stay out of your hair and then you do something like this?
Did you even think about what would happen if you got caught?
If your mother found out? Do you think you’ll ever be able to come here again if she knew?
She’d probably send you away to a boarding school or something. ”
“I was thinking that you were being raped by a pedo and nobody was doing anything to stop it.”
“I wasn’t being raped.” Tor rolled his eyes.
He reached for the bottle of alcohol on the shelf they’d built into the wall last year.
Tor had removed a piece of drywall and then cut it up and covered the studs in the wall with it.
Jule had helped him. Now there was space for the bottles and tubes and things that crowded the bathroom everyone in the house shared.
“I was getting really conveniently located head, and you fucked that up for me.”
Jule stayed quiet while Tor crumpled up more toilet paper, coated it in alcohol, and then gently patted it against his eyebrow. “He’s too old for you,” he finally said. “It’s illegal.”
“Yeah, well, so is a lot of shit I do, and it’s never bothered you before. Like I said, he’s close and willing so whatever.”
“I meant illegal for him to be doing. Not illegal for you. It’s wrong.”
Tor stood up straight, threw the paper into the trash, and rolled his neck from left to right. “Yeah, probably.” He shrugged and then smirked at Jule. “Felt pretty good though.” He got a Band-Aid from the box and peeled off the paper.
There was nothing funny about the situation so Jule shouldn’t have laughed but he did anyway. “You’re insane.”
“I’m horny.” He put the Band-Aid on Jule and then looked at him appraisingly. “You ever had someone suck you off?”
“You don’t think I’d have told you if I had?” Jule felt himself getting angry again. “Fuck you for that too, by the way. I can’t believe you kept that from me.”
Tor gripped his hand and pulled him up. “Wasn’t sure how you’d act if you found out.”
“I’d act like a sane person and tell you to stay away from predators.” Tor walked out of the bathroom and Jule followed him. “I can make a list of good advice like that if you need it. Don’t take candy from strangers. Don’t get into the back of a white windowless van.”
“Shut the fuck up,” Tor said, chuckling. He bumped his shoulder against Jule. “You never told me why you came back.”
“My mom went out of town.”
“Cool.” Tor walked into the bedroom and collapsed onto his bed. Jule lay beside him, both of them on their backs, crowded together on the twin mattress like usual. “How long?”
“Not sure. Few days. A week maybe. She’ll text at some point.”
Tor nodded.
“So,” Jule said.
Tor turned onto his side and looked at him.
Jule mirrored his position. “You’re gay?”
“Probably.”
He considered that. “How do you know?”
“Because I liked getting my dick sucked by Cody and I made sure not to look at Josie while he was doing it because that would have killed my boner.”
“Josie’s the wife?”
“Uh huh,” Tor said.
“I can’t believe you’ve been having some kind of weird three-way thing with a grown married couple.”
“I can’t believe you tried to kill a guy in front of a witness in an open door where anyone could have walked by.”
“He deserved it.” Jule grinned. “Hey, maybe I knocked some of his teeth out. That should help him give better blow jobs next time, right?”
Tor snorted. “I won’t get to find out because no way is he going to come anywhere near me after that stunt you pulled.”
“Good.” They lay together in silence, and Jule took in Tor’s face.
His round cheeks had thinned out over the years, and his jawline was more visible.
His eyelashes were fair but long, his eyebrows the same dusty color.
They framed his eyes, which were still that sparkling blue.
Tor was beautiful. He had buzzed off most of his hair so there was only a thin layer of the dirty blond showing.
Jule ran his palm over the soft strands. “Tori?”
“Yeah?”
“Did you do anything else with that guy?”
“No.”
“Did you kiss him?”
Tor shook his head.
“Have you kissed anyone?”
“No.”
“I haven’t either.”
Tor slowly raised his hand and traced his fingertips over the bandage and down the side of Jule’s face. “Do you want me to kiss you, Julie?”
Jule nodded.
Tor gazed into his eyes as he cradled his cheek and moved forward until their lips brushed together.