Chapter 16. Liam #2
What follows is the most chaotic mud fight I've ever witnessed, and I once saw a group of eight-year-olds destroy a birthday party over a water balloon dispute.
Jack and Miles are slinging mud at each other.
I watch Miles take a mud ball to the chest and stagger back, and then he motherfucking laughs.
It's the first time I've heard Miles laugh since I met him. Maybe the first time anyone here has.
"Huh," Ethan says.
Jack tackles Miles into the mud, and they both go down in a heap.
For a terrifying second, I think Miles is going to shut down, the physical contact, the unpredictability, all of it hitting every trigger he has.
But Jack rolls off immediately, hands up, checking, and Miles just lies there in the mud, staring at the sky, chest heaving, that tiny almost-smile still on his face.
Jack offers his hand. Miles takes it. They stand up together, both absolutely filthy, and Jack claps him on the back, and Miles doesn't flinch.
The water fight winds down slowly with everyone too exhausted.
Kids collapse on the grass. Someone starts a half-hearted splash war by the drainage grate and it fizzles out in thirty seconds.
Griff coils the hose, whistling something that might be an old country song, and the guards start the slow process of herding everyone back inside.
The courtyard looks like a war zone. Mud everywhere. Grass torn up. A single shoe, nobody knows whose, sitting in the middle of a puddle.
I stand there, dripping, my shorts sagging with water weight, my skin covered in a fine layer of mud that's already drying in the sun, and I think: I want to remember this.
I often have these moments where I think this will be a core memory, so I need to hold onto it.
So I think very hard about it, trying to burn it into my memory.
This is one of those moments I hope stays with me forever.
Jack appears at my side, plastered in mud, grinning so wide his face might split. "Dude," he says.
"Dude," I say back.
We look at each other and just start laughing again, for no reason.
Griff blows his whistle, the metal one he keeps around his neck, and calls out: "EVERYONE INSIDE. SHOWERS. NOW. YOU HAVE TWENTY MINUTES AND THEN I WANT THIS YARD CLEANED UP."
There's a collective groan, but nobody argues.
We start filing in, a parade of soaked, filthy, grinning idiots, tracking mud through the corridors and not caring.
The guards pretend to be annoyed, but I catch Diaz taking a selfie with his ruined uniform, and Patterson is helping one of the younger kids wring out his shirt.
In the shower block, it's chaos. Fifty guys crammed, everyone jostling for a showerhead, steam rising, the sound of water and voices bouncing off tile.
Jack sings, badly, loudly, belting out "Bohemian Rhapsody" with the passion of a man who has never once hit a single note right in his life and doesn't seem to know or care, and three other guys join in, turning it into a full, terrible choir.
Someone throws a bar of soap and it skids across the floor like a hockey puck, which makes kids start a hockey game with broomsticks and mops.
I find a spot under a showerhead in the corner, let the hot water run over me, and close my eyes. The mud sluices off in brown rivers, swirling around the drain.
When I open my eyes, Ethan is at the showerhead next to mine.
He's facing the wall, water running down his back, and the muscles there are shifting and flexing as he scrubs mud from his hair.
I watch a drop of water trace the line of his spine, down over the ridge of his hip, disappearing into the steam, and my mouth goes dry. Fuck, if I could touch him…
He glances over his shoulder, catches me staring, and raises one eyebrow.
The corner of his mouth twitches. He doesn't say anything, just turns back to the wall and tilts his head under the spray, letting the water run down his face, his neck, his chest. He knows exactly what he's doing. He always does.
The shower block is too crowded for anything, and besides, Jack is two showerheads down, still going, and three kids are harmonizing on the "Galileo" part.
I scrub the last of the mud from behind my ears and turn off the water. Grab my towel from the hook, wrap it around my waist. The tile is slippery and warm, and the air is so thick with steam it's like breathing through a wet cloth.
Ethan finishes a minute after me. He wraps his towel low on his hips, deliberately low, the bastard, and walks past me toward the changing area.
His shoulder brushes mine as he passes, and his hand grazes the small of my back.
Just his fingertips. My skin burns where he touched me.
My cock stands at attention, absolutely humiliating.
I get dressed. Clean shorts, a fresh t-shirt that smells like industrial detergent. My hair is dripping onto my collar, but I don't care.
Back in the corridor, the mood is electric. Guys are talking over each other, replaying the highlights, arguing about who got the muddiest, who screamed the loudest, who managed to get Griff with that one lucky splash. The walls echo with it.
I find Jack waiting by our door, his hair sticking up in seven different directions. "I totally got Patterson better than you got Griff."
"In your dreams, Perry."
"In my reality, Marsal. I had that man drenched."
"You had that man in a headlock dragging you across the yard."
He laughs. We're still arguing when we get back to the room. Miles is already there, sitting on his bunk, changed into dry clothes. His hair is combed flat.
Harry is on his bed, writing something, looking thoroughly unbothered. He didn't participate in the water fight.
"Fun day at summer camp?" he says without looking up.
"You missed out," Jack says, flopping onto his bunk. "Griff went full Vietnam."
"I saw from the window. Looked undignified."
"It was glorious."
Harry huffs and keeps writing.
I climb onto my lower bunk and lie back. My body is heavy with the good kind of tired, the kind that comes from laughing too hard and running too fast.
Ethan comes in last. He closes the door behind him, checks the room with that quick, automatic sweep, everyone present, everything in order, and then sits on his bed.
"Lunch soon," he directs, authoritative as ever. I love it. Best day we’ve ever had here. I mean, with him, almost every day is the best day, even behind bars.