Chapter 26 #2
‘I could tell, man. You lit up all around the house. You’re usually moody, you know. But once you started seeing Mason you had a spring in your step.’
‘I really like him,’ I tell my car’s wing mirror. ‘In a way that feels like it could wreck me.’
‘Text him, chickenshit.’
‘Fucksakes!’ I snap. ‘Okay! Fine!’
I’ve already drafted what I want to say to Mason in my Notes app. I’ve laboured over that text so much it’s overcooked and I can’t be arsed trying to make it better. I copy and paste it and send the whole neurotic crapload to Mason: a motherlode of insecurity.
‘He’s gonna leave me on read,’ I say at once. ‘Goddammit.’
‘Hammer’s seen my DM but he hasn’t replied yet either,’ Zeke says, looking at his phone all forlorn.
We stare at the mute skyscrapers of Perth lording over us and the rest of the city.
‘Well, we tried,’ I offer.
Zeke snorts. ‘Our lives are just massive tyre fires, aren’t they?’
I chuckle. ‘No shit.’
‘This isn’t where I thought we’d be by now, when we came down to Perth. Like, this is what our lives panned out like? Really?’
‘The gays need to change the slogan,’ I say. ‘No more IT GETS BETTER. Just a big neon billboard of WELL, IT COULD BE WORSE, FAGGOTS.’
Zeke cracks up, like full belly laughter, and I join him.
My phone vibrates. My heart jumps that it’s Mason replying – but it’s a phone call from Vince again.
‘Um, something kinda fucked and/or awesome just happened,’ Vince begins.
Vince posted on the Tool Shed’s Insta that we were closed, which, given Xander’s boycott, made it seem like the bar had caved in and shut down.
The bar’s detractors started dancing on our grave in the comments and in their own stories – including our nemesis, Xander Sullivan, who shared the post to his followers with a comment of: That’s what you get for being exclusionary!
Bye bye! Couldn’t have happened to a nicer bloke. xo
Vince, noticing the pile-on and the incorrect assumption, phoned Ahmed, who pointed out local news outlets were already running the story of Curtis’ death, so it would be wiser to mention it, pending further details.
Vince edited the text of the post to say the bar was closed due to the shock passing of its owner.
The tone of the comments immediately changed. Tributes began to flood in for Curtis, expressing shock and upset that he was gone.
But we weren’t the only ones affected: Xander didn’t know the post was edited. His caption was still up, now referring to a post that announced Curtis’ death: That’s what you get for being exclusionary! Bye bye! Couldn’t have happened to a nicer bloke. xo
The backlash is biblical. Zeke and I open Insta on our phones while Vince is still on the line, watching Xander’s followers turn on him in real time.
They slam him for disrespecting the dead, for being cold-blooded and sadistic, for celebrating the death of a community hero.
He’s called a grub, he’s called amoral, he’s called putrid.
There’s already a headline about him on a tabloid news site: Bad Taste: Influencer’s Vile Comment Goes Viral.
Xander’s Insta shows he hasn’t been online for an hour: he hasn’t even realised this is happening or taken his post down.
Must be sleeping off a hangover in his mansion or something.
‘Like, what do I do?’ Vince asks down the phone line. ‘It’s his own fault for being a dick, right?’
Me and Zeke exchange a look. ‘Xander’s favourite saying is, “You reap what you sow”,’ I point out, smirking with supreme satisfaction. ‘I think he just did.’
‘Does it make me a bad person if I say it’s the most beautiful karma I’ve ever seen?’ Vince asks.
We assure Vince it doesn’t, because we think it is, too. It’s like Curtis bitch-slapped Xander from the grave.
We scroll Xander’s destruction with glee until one of our phones vibrates with a new notification.
‘Yours or mine?’ I ask, hoping it’s Mason. ‘I can’t look.’
Zeke winces. ‘Mine. Hammer replied to me.’
‘What’d he say?’
‘He just got home from the stadium. He asked me to come over to his house.’
‘Booty call?’
‘Maybe? I don’t know what to make of him right now. I’ll tell him I’m with you.’
‘Dude, no. Don’t blow off a hookup to keep me company. I’ll be fine on my own.’
‘No, you won’t,’ Zeke says matter-of-factly.
I don’t reply.
A phone vibrates again. I’m sure it’s mine this time, so I check my phone excitedly, but there’s nothing. Mason’s seen my message now, but no reply. He did leave me on read.
‘Hammer says you can come, too,’ Zeke says, reading his latest message.
‘Ew. Gross. Tell him threeways are more your thing. And jocks aren’t my type.’
‘It’s not a hookup,’ Zeke shushes me. ‘I think he just wants to see us.’
Hammer’s penthouse apartment in South Perth is simultaneously swish as fuck and barren like a desert. There’s no fixtures or posters on the walls and the furniture is plush and expensive but also generic and colourless.
The Big Dog is freshly showered, wearing a Mad Hueys tank top and a fresh pair of Eagles training footy shorts and foam Billabong thongs. He’s hobbling a bit – maybe he hurt his leg during today’s game.
‘Lads,’ he booms at me and Zeke as he opens his front door, like we’re a couple of footy mates. ‘Come in. Wanna drink?’
We hold up our sweating bounty from Thirsty Camel.
‘Way ahead of ya, dude,’ I say.
Hammer’s got the evening footy game on his big-arse TV screen – I couldn’t give a rat’s who’s playing – but he leads us past the living area to his kitchen.
We grab a new drink each and refrigerate the rest while Hammer pours himself a fresh glass of whiskey.
He leads us out onto a balcony with a spectacular view of the city and the river, the twilight sky darkening enough that the first stars have begun to demand attention.
‘Beautiful,’ Zeke says, cracking a fresh vodka can. ‘How the other half live, ay?’
Hammer looks bashful, which is like seeing Kanye West look humble. He puts on a Dom Dolla song on low volume on his phone for ambience.
My nostrils curl. ‘Jeez, what’s that smell? It smells like cum out here.’
Hammer’s face goes even redder suddenly. ‘Uh. Must be them cum trees.’
‘The what trees?’ I blurt out.
Zeke smirks. ‘I know the ones. Some kind of pear trees. The smell is definitely … cum-adjacent. But I thought they usually flower in summer?’
Hammer yanks a patio chair out from the table with unwarranted aggression. ‘How the fuck am I meant to know when plants are in season? I’m not a bloody botanicalist.’
Zeke doesn’t correct him that the profession is botanist. I always liked that about Zeke, post-high school. He’s smart enough to know more than most of us, but he’ll almost always hold his tongue rather than correct someone in front of other people.
Once we’re all seated around the glass patio table, I light a dart and Zeke says to Hammer, ‘So? What happened?’
Hammer spills the beans. The DMs were from his own brother, Doug. They had a blue over it and it’s sorted. Doug’s not gonna out him. He got through the footy game with his heterosexual facade intact.
‘I got a lot to think about,’ Hammer mutters into his whiskey. ‘Not sure what I wanna do next.’
‘Right,’ Zeke says, his fingers tapping the side of his vodka can. I know he probably wants me out of here so he can have Hammer to himself. His restraint is impressive.
‘How are youse?’ Hammer prods. He glances at me – like a friend, for once, not a punk he’s calling a goth. ‘I’m sorry about Curtis, Charlie. It’s hell sad.’
‘Appreciated, dude.’
‘Is your Arab mate okay? His boyfriend?’
‘Husband,’ I correct. ‘They were married. And his name’s Ahmed. And no, he’s not okay. His family’s with him now so we’ve given them space today. I’d rather not talk about Curtis right now. I’ve been thinking about him all day.’
‘Roger that,’ Hammer says efficiently. He shifts his gaze to Zeke. ‘You got the all-clear, out of hospital all good, mate?’
‘Good as new,’ Zeke assures him. ‘They gave me some brochure about substance use, but. For amyl. How embarrassing. I feel so stupid.’
‘You’re not stupid, mate, you’re the smartest bloke I ever met,’ Hammer says quickly.
Zeke smiles coyly back at him. The charged energy between them is palpable. I shouldn’t stay here too long.
I push my chair out and lie down on the balcony tiles, staring up at the sky while I puff on my smoke.
‘That can’t be comfortable,’ Zeke mutters.
I hunt for my favourite constellation, but Orion’s Belt is nowhere to be seen tonight.
We’re too close to the light pollution of the CBD – only a handful of the brightest stars are struggling through, and the rest get swallowed whole.
Maybe Orion was a human who made it to the heavens, but now I wonder if he even wanted that.
I always imagined being a mortal among gods would make you feel chosen and superior, but what if it just made you suffocatingly lonely to never be around your own kind?
‘Poofs on a roof,’ I say. ‘Only three of us, this time.’
Both the other boys say nothing. The Dom Dolla song finishes at the same moment, leaving a pulsing beat of silence over us as thick as a blanket.
‘Sorry,’ I add. ‘Mood killer.’
Hammer clears his throat. ‘Never got a chance to say it, but I’m sorry about Matt. He was nice to me, that night after the Summer Dance. He seemed like a top bloke.’
I am too numb from Curtis’ death to feel any sadder than I already do.
‘He was nice to me, too,’ Zeke adds. ‘That night we jumped the fence to get into the school, I was too fat to get over it. Hammer, you just kept going, but Matt stopped and helped me over the fence, and he didn’t make me feel shit about it.’
I nod. That’s Matty.
We don’t say anything. A Pendulum song takes the space left by Dom Dolla. Nature abhors a vacuum.