When the World Changed

Here is the latest chapter of this story. My thanks as always to Flip for his proofreading assistance (you should check out his work here), and to those who've been kind enough to write and share their thoughts on the story so far with me. My thanks, also, of course, to Nifty itself for hosting this service in a little corner of the online world. You (and that includes me) should all consider a donation to support the site. Without sounding too much like a public radio pledge drive, but we obviously use Nifty - we should help it out.

I'll add my usual plug for Seal Rocks, my other Nifty story, also in the HS section here, with the final chapter posted way back in April 2011 (time flies!). I hope you enjoy this chapter, and look forward to hearing feedback, critiques, plaudits, gratuitous insults, or complete non sequiturs from you all. Enjoy!

When the World Changed, Part 16

The ride back to Summerton was glum and silent. Brady's mother was visibly upset that he was going back, and the boys had little desire to return either - their weekend of freedom had been too enjoyable. A rainstorm was blowing up, making the prospect of that afternoon's practice a grim one as well. They hurried their bags up into their rooms upon arrival, hoping to finish before the downpour, and Brady said an awkward goodbye to his mother behind Linsley. The hallways were oddly quiet - the boys not on fall sports teams didn't need to be back until after dinner, so most of the rooms were still empty. David, of course, wasn't there yet.

As Brady and Doug trudged toward Geiger for lunch, the skies opened. Doug had shown the foresight to bring along an umbrella just in case, so the two of them huddled together, clutching the tube and running clumsily for cover.

Seating was optional, and limited given the small number of boys back. Brady and Doug sat with some soccer guys they didn't really know. The conversation was nice enough, but stilted. It wasn't helped when Mr. Taber sat at the head of the table, gracious as always, but with that cold appraising look he always seemed to have on his face. "I trust the open weekend was a good one for you all?" The boys murmured their assent. " Mr. Poliakoff, did you visit your parents in South Island?" Poliakoff, a short wiry junior who played goalie for the varsity, nodded. Mr. Taber returned the nod courteously. "And I take it your father is well?" Another nod. Mr. Taber's smile became slightly fixed. "Mr, Poiakoff, it is customary in most circles to respond audibly to polite questions. May I at least have that courtesy?" His tone was politely acid.

Poliakoff looked up from his plate of what was alleged to be meat loaf. "I'm sorry, sir, I - I was - I was thinking, I suppose, not really paying attention . . . "

"I'm sure you have a great deal on your mind, Mr. Poliakoff, but that's no excuse for discourtesy." He scanned the rest of the table, the boys all resolutely looking down and appearing to concentrate on their food. "Mr. Conover?" Brady stiffened. "I presume you had a pleasant weekend in Cullingstown?"

Brady looked up and did his best to fix a steady and confident gaze on Mr. Taber. "Yes, sir, Doug and I had a good time. It's, um, it's good to get back, though." He could feel Doug, seated next to him, chuckle slightly at that last line.

Mr. Taber smiled slightly. His smile always somehow seemed just a bit condescending. "I'm sure you did. Mr. Taggart, did you enjoy Cullingstown?"

Doug swallowed hard before answering. "Um, yes, sir, it was nice. We, um, we did a lot of, sort of wandering around."

Mr. Taber regarded Doug for a long moment. "Good to hear. Now, Mr. Vegosan, what was your weekend like?" Mr. Taber moved smoothly on to other boys at the table, and Brady and Doug both let out soft sighs of relief.

"Why does that guy give me the creeps?" Doug muttered as they walked out of the dining hall. "That voice, and the welded hair. It - it's like he's royalty or something, and we're just shit that he's tolerating on his shoes ."

"I know," Brady smiled, remembering his own encounters with Taber. "He is willing to give it to the McShanes, though, I'll give him that."

Doug nodded. "Speaking of them, I didn't see Ian at lunch, did you?"

Brady shook his heads. "I didn't see a lot of people. I think practice is gonna be kinda sparse today."

Doug snorted. "Practice is gonna be kinda wet, that's what it's gonna be."

It was, miserably so. More boys were there than Brady had expected from the dining hall - apparently many families had elected to feed their sons real food for one more meal before consigning hem back to the mercies of Wilson dining hall fare. Ian was the only notable absence. Mr. Glendon, who was as comfortable as anyone could be in that weather, wearing a thick hooded poncho, pushed them through a fairly awful conditioning workout, including a long bout pushing the varsity's seven man sled up the hill behind the gym again and again. Their footing quickly vanished into mud, and it took frantic effort to keep the sled from sliding down the hill and into the lake. They were soon filthy and exhausted. Mr., Glendon gave them a break, and most, including Brady, simply dropped where they were, pulling off their helmets and letting the rain wash the mud off their reddened faces.

They moved on to working on plays after that, thankfully. Evan and Brady worked more on the quick slant-in pattern . "That's how we attack linebacker blitzes," Mr. Glendon explained. "You both have to recognize it coming to the line, and agree on a word signal between you to call it right then and there. The blitz is what clears the space just behind the line for the pass, if you're quick enough. If there's no blitz, Conover gets his rib cage caved in by the linebacker standing right there, OK? Conover, one step and in diagonal to the middle, After you get it, angle as fast as you can directly downfield. Usually the defensive backs split out wide on blitzes to cover the receivers one on one, so if you're fast you can split the whole defense and run forever." He swept his arm oward the goal line to emphasize the point. " Creed, just rise up from under center and throw. You'll have the backers coming at you fast, so you better throw it quick and get ready to get knocked on your can."

Practicing passcatching in such wet conditions was frustrating - the ball was wet, slippery, and often coated with a thin sheen of mud. Brady felt like he was trying to grab an eel. "Concentrate!" Mr. Glendon shouted at them both (Evan's control over his passes was as shaky as Brady's ability to catch them).

After about half an hour, the two of them began to connect more consistently. Brady suddenly felt like he could catch anything, run anywhere. The hard rain had soaked him through, but he felt fresh as he seldom did so far into a practice. They moved to delayed out patterns, with Evan running a bootleg. Alan Black played cornerback against Brady, but he wasn't tall enough to prevent the passes from connecting time and time again. All he could do was hit Brady as hard as he could as soon as the ball arrived, in the hope of knocking it free.

At probably 3:30 or so, a cheerful voice called out from behind them. "Hello, sir, sorry I'm late." Brady, having never heard Ian McShane say much of anything in a cheerful voice, took a moment to realize who it was. Ian was grinning obsequiously. "My father had an important meeting, so we were delayed coming back. He asked me to tell you to call him to verify that."

Mr. Glendon looked at McShane evenly. "I'll do that, Ian, thank you. Now, take ten laps."

McShane's grin faded. "Sir?"

"I don't care what your excuse, or reason, or anything else, was, you're late. Your teammates have been working hard for an hour and a half now. Time for you to work, too. Ten laps."

"Sir, if you -"

"I don't care, Ian. Now."

Mc Shane stared at Mr. Glendon for a long moment, his face bright red beneath his face mask. Brady saw him scan the line of his teammates angrily. He snapped his chinstrap on and tuned to start running. "Come back muddy, McShane!" Mr. Glendon shouted after him. "Real, real muddy."

The rest of the team seemed buoyed by the punishment meted out to Ian, and the practice suddenly picked up pace. The plays were crisp now, the hitting hard and clean. Doug and Leonard DeNault ,a stocky Italian kid who played on the defensive line, were working each other over mercilessly, but laughing after each play.

McShane returned some time later, muddy as ordered and looking very winded. Mr. Glendon nodded to acknowledge his presence, and halted the drill after the following play. It was another quick slant, and Brady noticed that Ian watched the pattern with intense interest and a slight smile on his face. "All right, good job. Five forties and get into the showers. Get warm, dry off, and have Jimmy wash all your uniforms for tomorrow." The team trudged toward the line to start their wind sprints. McShane lagged behind. "You too, McShane."

"Sir, I just finished -"

"You just finished about half of what everyone else had to do this afternoon. Your team is lining up for wind sprints. Get in line."

McShane did, but muttered inaudibly under his breath the whole time. Brady noted that he dogged the wind sprints, which pissed him off a little, but he was in no mood to let it get to him.

They had lots of time before dinner, so most of the boys lingered in the hot shower room, soaking in the steam and warmth. It felt so good after being out in the driving rain for so long. The freshman soccer players joined them soon after, a group notably smaller and more wiry. The shower room grew crowded. Brady was surprised to see Prescott Hills among the soccer group. "Hey Pres, I didn't; realize you played soccer."

"Played? He's a fucking machine," Mike Niels, a friend of Dunc and Doug's from the third floor, said. "He's scoring like a goal a game easy."

Pres was blushing - he was very pale, and the blush seemed to cover nearly his entire body. Brady thought it was cute. "I'm OK," he said, his head down.

"Fuckin' pussy sport," muttered Ian in a stage whisper from the corner where he was standing beneath a stream of teaming water. "All you soccer pansies, you oughta try playing a man's sport sometime."

"Fuck you too, Ian," Niels retorted. "I didn't know anybody gave a shit what you thought." He was visibly yearning to break Ian's face.

McShane was up for the challenge as well. "What'd you say to me, faggot? You and your fucking cunt doctor father, you're so up to you neck in pussy you turned into one when you were like 3. Try something, ya fuckin' fairy."

Brady stepped between them before thinking anything through. "Come on, guys, cool it. This is bullshit here."

Ian shoved Brady by the shoulder, sending him off balance slightly. "Get away from me, Jethro. I may have to come back here but I don't have to listen to your shit. He wants me, let him go."

"Nobody wants anybody, Ian. Just try to not be such an asshole for once, willya?"

Ian raised his right fist for a moment. Brady tensed. He could feel Doug step next to him. Niels was on his other side, spoiling for a fight. Ian looked at them and smiled contemptuously. "God, what a bunch of losers," he sneered, stepping back into the water.

When he turned slightly, Brady saw a cluster of purplish welts on his right side and back. Ian caught him looking, turned to put his back toward the wall, and eyed him angrily. "Yer lucky I wasn't at practice, Conover," he said. "I'd've kicked your ass good."

Brady shook his head. "Sure Ian." He grabbed his towel and walked away.

Brady and Doug walked back to Linsley with Niels (each this time under their own umbrella). "Is he always like that?"

Doug laughed. "That was kind of extreme, even for him. Sorry, Mike. You know the other guys on the team don't think about soccer like that."

"I know that," Niels answered. "I maybe should've just ignored him."

Brady snorted. "Ian isn't easy to ignore. He'll stay on it until you react. I think he enjoys just, like, goading people."

"I dunno." Niels said, stepping gingerly around a large puddle. "Somebody's gonna really fuck him up someday."

Brady took a long breath. "I think maybe somebody already did."

Doug glanced at him, puzzled. "Huh?'"

Brady stepped closer to them, though no one else was nearby. "Didn't you see his back? It was all bruised and stuff, like he got hit with, I dunno, a belt or something." He glanced away. "He - he saw that I noticed. That really pissed him off, I think."

"Jesus," Doug breathed. "D'you think it was Stud Douggie? Like what you told me about them going into the bathroom in Geiger after dinner the night of our first game, when Ian got kicked out and stuff?"

"Maybe," Brady said. He regretted saying anything now, because it cut too closely to the things David had told him about what else Stud Douggie did to his brother. God, those pictures . . . "Maybe he just, you know, had some kind of accident."

"Yeah, right." Doug clearly didn't buy that theory.

Brady looked at him. His dark hair was still damp from the shower, plastered close to his skull. His cheeks were ruddy from the practice and the hot water. Brady started to smile. God, he thought. He's fucking gorgeous. "Well, it was just an idea," he protested. He felt suddenly giddy.

Doug started laughing too. "Yeah, a really dumb idea." They started to lose it, doubling over, laughing for no real reason.

Niels stood watching. "You guys are weird, you know that?"

David still wasn't back, so Brady flopped on his bed after putting "Fresh Cream" on David's turntable. He sang along to the start of "I Feel Free" and let his mind wander. I need to towel my hair off more, he thought. And stuff the shoes again with newspaper. I wonder if I can get away with wearing sneakers to dinner tonight so I can let 'em dry. Not if Taber's there. . . H drifted off for a bit.

Hey Brady?" Vic Stenkowski was peeking around the door, looking nervously.

"Hey Vic," Brady said, sitting up a bit bleary. "What's goin' on?"

Vic's entire face was red. "I. um, I - I wanted to, like, thank you. For helping out, when Ian hit me and stuff. David too. Is he here?" Brady shook his head. "OK, well, um, maybe I should come back later -"

"You don't have to leave, Vic. Grab a chair, hang out, man. We live next to each other and this is the first time you been over here."

Vic flushed even deeper red, if that was possible, and sat. He had a paper bag in his left hand, Brady noticed. "Thanks, I, uh - well, anyway, I was up in the city this weekend with my parents, and, um, I got you guys something"

Brady grinned. "Vic, that's so cool, thanks. You didn't have to -"

"No, I did. I mean, I'm always the goofy kid that guys like Ian pick on, and - and you guys stood up for me. That was really cool, to me, y'know? Nobody ever did that for me, before . . ." He reached into the bag. "So I got you guys each a set."

He pulled out three paperback books bound together with twine. "I, um, I didn't have any like paper, sorry." He shrugged with a sheepish grin, and they both giggled a bit. "You'll love it, believe me."

He handed the package to Brady. "The Fellowship of the Ring" was on top, with the odd blue cover and a tree that seemed to be growing some kind of big eggplant or something.

Brady held the books reverently. "Vic, this - I dunno what to say, man. Thanks." He felt himself blushing now.

Vic noticed it, and the sight seemed to relax him. ":Cool, so I got a copy of all three for David, too. It's not like anything major. I mean Christ, they're paperbacks, right?" he grinned sheepishly. "D'you think David'll like it?"

Brady laughed. "Course he will. Hang onto it, give 'em to him yourself."

Vic beamed. "I will thanks. So, Cream, huh? You like 'em?"

Brady was the one smiling sheepishly now. "I don't know a lot about 'em. Davey kind of turned me on to them. He listens to this really wild stuff a lot."

"Yeah, I heard the Electric Prunes coming from there last week, cool stuff. Y'know, I heard Cream's got another record coming out next month. It's called 'Disraeli Gears'."

"Cool, how'd you find that out?"

"WOR FM. Don't you listen to it?"

Brady ducked his head a little. "Um, my clock radio, it only gets AM."

Vic grinned again. "I got a spare one, you want it? You gotta listen to WOR, it's like a world better than WABC and stuff. It's been getting a littlemore like AM lately, but it's still got so much good stuff. And it looks like a lot of the guys from WOR - Scott Muni and all - are moving to WNEW, so that'll probably be really good, too." Brady nodded along with Vic as he talked, pretending to know what these stations and who these people were. Of course, he didn't have a clue.

"WOR is dead," said a voice in the doorway. David was leaning there, overcoat dripping, hair plastered down, but smiling. "It's all gonna be WNEW now for the good stuff, and WABC for the Top 40 crap."

David!!!" Brady had expected to be happy to see him, but the surge of real emotion he felt was somehow deeper. He sprang from his bed togive David a hug.

David smiled, but held out a warning hand. "Cool it, my Dad's on his way up in a sec. He's in his 'I love Wilson' mood like he always gets, so be prepared."

"OK," Brady said, stepping back a respectable distance and allowing David to slip out of his trenchcoat and hang it up. "Did your mom come too?"

David paused a long second, staring into his closet. "No. Not - not this time."

Brady thought that a bit odd, but the next moment David's father swept into the room like a hurricane. "Hey, Brady, how ya doin'? Davey, is this one of your school friends? Glad to meet you, I'm Dave Tanner - well, the older Dave Tanner. Actually, the middle one, still, right Davey, long as Grandpa holds out!" He thought that was pretty funny, and turned from David to Brady and Vic in turn for verification. David looked pained in an Oh-my-God-my father-is-a-goon sort of way, while Vic, never the most gregarious kid even under the best of circumstances, was utterly at a loss.

Brady felt the sudden gap in the conversation, and realized he needed to fill it somehow. He opted for a polite chuckle. "Great to see you again sir. This is Vic Stenkowski, he ;lives next door."

Mr. Tanner grinned widely and pumped Vic's hand so hard it appeared for a second that Vic might lose the arm completely. "Great to meet ya, there, Vic! Great to meet any friend of Davey's!"

"Yeah, any friend at all," David muttered, turning back to his closet.

His father didn't hear that line, or if he did he chose to ignore it. Instead, he started intensely questioning Brady and Vic on their year to date at Wilson - their classes, their activities, the food, the other boys in the dorm. Brady found he had to do most of the- talking. Vic was overwhelmed.

Mercifully, it was approaching dinnertime. David noted this pointedly, reminding his father that he and Brady had to dress for dinner. His father nodded and clapped David on the back. "So you all set, there, sport? Don't you, ah, worry about anything. Not a thing, now, hear me? I - we - we'll be back here to see you again real soon. Brady, you look after your roommate - I know he's looking after you. I owe you a couple of those dinners out, Brady, just like I told you at the start of the semester. You count on it, now, OK? Great to meet you, there, Rick." Brady and David stifled a giggle; Vic was still too dazed to respond. He swept out of the room, booming a hearty hello to Mr. Billips, who had apparently appeared at the other end of the hall.

"God, now he'll talk to Billips for like an hour or something," David moaned.

Vic rose slowly to return to his room before remembering his original errand. "Um, David? I, um, I wanted to give you these." He handed the Lords of the Rings books to David, who was openly surprised. "I just - I was, y'know, glad, that you an' Brady helped me out. With McShane, and all. Grateful, I mean. I mean - well, anyway, I, um, I got a set for you and for Brady, too. Hope you like 'em." He lifted his arms for a moment as if to make a gesture, but either decided against it or realized he didn't have a clue what sort of gesture to make. He dropped his arms limply, and, head down, slipped out of the room before David could reply.

Brady grinned at the rare sight of David taken unawares. "Pretty cool, huh? You're a hero and stuff to him."

David was turning the books over in his hands. "Yeah, right," he said softly, with an affected air of casual contempt for the contempt, but smiling just a little. "So now we're gonna get sucked into this shit, huh?"

"What shit?"

"This Tolkien stuff, it's like a sick cult, Bray," David laughed. "It hit campus last year, and all the upperclassmen were reading it like mad and arguing over it. The writer's this prof at Oxford or something, and he does this stuff in his spare time, if you can imagine what a sick fuck he must be to do shit like that in his spare time! I heard he used to be in this like group of other writers - good ones, too, like C.S. Lewis and stuff? - and he'd read this stuff with magic and elves and dwarves and shit to them every week, until one week he started reading his newest one, and somebody said, 'Oh God, another fucking Elf.'" This line amused David no end, and he laughed openly for the first time since his arrival. "Doncha love that?"

Brady joined in his laughter, even though he still didn't really understand what the hell David was talking about. He decided to change the subject. "So how was the weekend? Sorry your Mom couldn't come down."

David's laughter faded. "Yeah. Funny about that, huh?" He bent over to heave a suitcase onto his bed. "You better change, we only got like fifteen minutes and it's raining like shit out there."

They changed, and sloshed their way over to Geiger for dinner. Seating was still optional, but a lot more boys were back, and they sat with Doug, Dunc, and Evan and swapped weekend stories. All except David, who was falling into one of his morose moods Brady recognized it, and tried to pull him into the conversation to draw him out, but David would have none of it.

Bill Fieldstone wandered by. His face was puffy and discolored, especially around his left eye. "Jesus, Bill," Brady exclaimed. "What the hell happened?"

Fieldstone was uncharacteristically terse. "Got mugged in the city on Saturday night," he said, shrugging. "No big deal, OK?"

David looked at him sharply. "Where in the city?"

"Um, lower Manhattan. It was my fault, out late in a bad area and all."

David persisted. "Where?"

Bill was flustered. "O - over by the East River and 14th" Brady had never seen him even remotely disconcerted before.

David and he locked eyes for a second or two. "OK," David said evenly, looking back down at his plate. "Just curious. Tough area around there, huh?"

Bill blushed. "Yeah." He blinked, which appeared to hurt a little. "So Conover, have a good weekend?"

Brady answered evenly, wondering what the hell had just happened. He could see Ian and Stud Douggie looking at them from across the room behind Fieldstone, pointing and smirking. It took him a moment to tear his eyes from that and concentrate on answering Bill.

Mr. Taber paused on his way to a table to examine Fieldstone's face. "How did this happen, Mr. Fieldstone?" He also seemed interested in the specific part of the city where he'd been mugged, and when Fieldstone told him, Mr. Taber's eyes flared for a moment. "Not an area to frequent alone. Unfortunately, you learned that the hard way. I'm glad you're otherwise unhurt, correct?"

"Yes, sir, thank you, I'm fine," Bill replied evenly. Bill moved on, and for a moment Mr. Taber's eyes seemed to meet David's, and some understanding passed between them.

Brady waited until they were back in the room, wadding newspaper into their dress shoes, to ask. "OK, what was the deal with Fieldstone?"

David snorted. "He was in the meat packing district, man, don't you know that? Are you that dumb?"

Brady was at once embarrassed (he really was that dumb, of course - he had no idea what the meat packing district was) and angry. "What the hell do I know about New York City, Davey, I've been there like twice to go to the World's Fair with my brothers."

David shook his head and sat on his bed. "OK. The meat packing district is this industrial area on the East Side, just north of Greenwich Village. Guys - queers - they go up there and meet up with other queers. They go into these empty truck trailers and, you know, fuck and all. And other guys go looking for them to beat the shit outta them for being queer."

Brady swallowed. "You think that's what Fieldstone was doing?"

David curled his lip a bit. "He sure knew why I was asking, didn't he? Taber got it, too! You notice?"

Brady nodded. David picked up a glass from his desk. Brady realized with a start that he hadn't washed it. It had residue of the Southern Comfort and Coke that Fieldstone had brought by. "Shit!" he exclaimed, a bit too agitatedly, as he leapt up and grabbed the glass from David.

David was surprised. "The hell, what's that about?"

Brady felt the color rise in his cheeks. "I, uh - last week, after you left, I - I had a , um, a Coke, and - and I used that glass. I forgot to like wash it. That's all." He tried to avoid David's searching gaze. "Sorry to be such a spazz about it."

"No problem,' David answered, still eying Brady curiously. "I can wash it."

"No! It - I mean, like, I got it dirty. I -I'll wash it. Hang on, OK?"

Brady could feel David's appraising eyes on him as he scuttled to the bathroom.

Study hall that night, again, was fairly low key. There were few assignments due from over the long weekend, so the boys just hung out in their rooms. David closed their door and put some Miles Davis on at a low volume. "I see you were playing the Cream record," he said to Brady. "Did you clean it before you started? I wanna keep these things as free from pops and shit as I can."

"I did just like you showed me, relax," Brady said with a grin.

"Good. After that glass, I had to wonder."

Brady had no snappy comeback to that dig, so he just turned back to his desk and buried his face in his Penguin edition of "Julius Caesar."

Doug and Dunc pushed into the room just as study hall was formally ending (though the boys had been quietly ignoring it for some time). Dunc had a T shirt on with odd blotchy patterns of several gaudy intermixed colors. "It's tie-dyed," he explained. "It's big with all the hippie types out in San Francisco and stuff."

"Looks like somebody puked paint," David responded. He laughed at Dunc's crestfallen look. "C'mon, I'm just shittin' you. "

Dunc smiled and cocked his head. "Is that Davis? Which album?"

David nodded. "The first quintet one. You gotta recognize Coltrane there."

"Yeah, I thought so," Dunc replied. He and David started into a long discussion about Davis, Coltrane, Herbie Hancock, and various other people Brady had never heard of. He glanced, feeling a bit uncomfortable, at Doug, who had a rueful smile. He shrugged, and they both started giggling.

"Relax," Doug whispered as he flopped down on Brady's bed to sit next to him, "I don't know who the fuck they're talking about either."

Brady felt himself blushing a bit. "So how was study hall?" he asked, glancing away to hide the color in his cheeks.

"Totally stupid," Doug answered. "I got nothing for tomorrow, so Dunc and I just sat around and bullshitted." He leaned in. "Dunc told me he smoked grass this weekend with his older brother."

"He did? Wow!!!" Brady was surprised and a bit scandalized by this. He glanced over at Dunc, who remained in an animated conversation with David about Miles Davis' various session players, with a worried look. "Is - is he OK?"

Doug started giggling again, leaning back against the wall. "Course he is. You don't like lose your mind because you smoke a little dope, man."

"B- but is he, like addicted now? Or in danger of that? I just -"

"You don't get addicted to grass. That's like heroin and shit. Dope isn't like that."

Brady grinned. ""Big expert, huh?"

Doug laughed. "Yeah, I smoke it all the time, right? I just read, that's all. The like science is pretty easy to find, and all the bullshit they put on the news about it is just - well, it's bullshit, you know?"

Brady nodded. "Like all the stuff about having sex," he said without thinking. The color rose again in his cheeks. "I - I mean, how, you know, knocking up a girl, it's so bad, and that it'll like happen if you do anything - grab a tit or whatever." The boys had been subjected to a particularly execrable "health" movie the week before open weekend, called "Phoebe," in which the perils of heavy petting and sex with girls were stressed in frankly laughable fashion.

Doug started laughing loudly. "'Oh, Phoebe, fuck my eyes out!!!'" he squealed in a loud falsetto. He lunged at Brady and started tickling him. Brady fell back, trying to protect himself with little apparent success, and David and Dunc joined in, adding their own pleading obscene requests for Phoebe to the din.

Cureton and Luce came in to upbraid them for the noise. "If Billips can hear it in his apartment bad enough for him to tell us to come down on you guys, it's too damn loud," Bart said calmly. Cureton looked like he wanted to say more, but contented himself with standing disapprovingly in the doorway, arms folded in a manner that reminded Brady of Billips - or, for that matter, McShane. The boys apologized profusely, not wanting to get stung first night back, and tried to compose themselves. No sooner had the Prefects left, however, than the giggles resumed, this time muffled (albeit poorly).

After lights out, Brady felt ready to slip into peaceful dreams, until David's calm voice broke the silence. "So who brought you what to drink last Thursday night?"

"Huh?" Brady's stomach lurched. "Wh - whaddya mean, I -"

"Can it, Conover, you're a shitty liar. Just tell me what the hell's going on, OK?"

Brady swallowed audibly in the darkness. David persisted. "Did you and Taggart -"

"No!!! God, no! It - it was Fieldstone, OK? He just came by and - "

"And he brought what, - a fifth of Southern Comfort, right? Jesus . . . "

"How did you know that?"

David snorted. "How the hell do you think?" he sighed. "So what else happened?"

"Nothing! Really! I mean, well I was really drunk, and I passed out and all - "

"Yeah?"

Brady paused a long moment, feeling the shame e wash over him. "Nothing happened, OK? He - he like got a little, you know, friendly, and - and I stopped him. That's all."

"How did he 'get friendly'?"

Brady was starting to get angry. "Come on, Davey, that's enough, man. It wasn't any big deal, OK?"

"If it's Fieldstone it's a big deal. I keep telling you, he's a big shot around here. Christ, you oughtta know that by now." His voice lowered, "And - and I told you about him, and what he tried with me." He paused a second or two, then snarled angrily, "Show some common fuckin' sense!"

"All right, I get it, gimme a break!" Brady yelled, not much caring if Cureton heard him and stung him for it. He was embarrassed and felt put upon at the same time. I handled it, dammit, leave me alone, he thought. It's over.

David sighed. "Christ, I leave you alone for one fucking night and you're getting molested."

"I didn't get fucking molested, OK?" Brady shouted. "Just - just leave it alone. Please."

Several seconds passed. "OK," David said quietly. "Let me know when you want to talk about it."

"Nothing to talk about. I'm not gonna want to."

. "Yes you are. You will. You don't see it, but it's eating at you, and that's only gonna get worse, OK? Sooner or later, you're gonna want to talk about it. You - you'll need to. And that's fine. Just let me know."

Brady had to giggle. "Such a fucking shrink. I'm lying down and everything, too."

They both began to laugh. Brady heard David roll over. "What am I gonna do with you, Conover? Yer gonna get eaten alive at some point."

Brady sighed, starting to feel sleepy. "It's OK, Davey, it really is. He didn't like fuck me or anything, and he's not gonna." A pause. "Besides, I never wanna drink that shit again, it was awful."

David laughed. "Isn't it the worst? I don't know how he can stomach it. And Janis Joplin like guzzles it."

"Yeah, well look at her, she looks like shit."

More laughter. "No wonder she sings so like ragged."

David sighed again, and Brady heard him roll over and tuck in. "OK, talk more later. Gotta crash now."

Brady suddenly remembered he hadn't asked David about his weekend. "Hey, did you have a good weekend with your mom and dad?"

Brady heard more shuffling. "With my dad. My mom . . . " David sighed deeply. "My mom is out in LA. She's, um, rediscovering herself, or something.."

Brady swallowed hard, sorry he'd broached the subject "Oh. OK. Um, sorry, I -"

Forget it," David said curtly. "She does this sort of crap at least once a year. She decides she's 'being smothered in her domestic life' - her words - and she goes off to some place to 'allow herself to blossom' for a few weeks." Brady faintly saw him sit up in the dark. "It's such bullshit. She just doesn't want to be a mother. I heard her last year, when I was packing to come here for eighth grade, talking to my dad, and she was going on and on about how liberating shoving me off to boarding school was gonna be." He snorted. "Some maternal instinct, huh?"

Brady had no idea what to say. "I - but, but your dad, what about him?"

Another snort. "My dad's great. He's understanding," he added, his tone a bit disgusted. "He understands her, he understands me, he understands everybody. He just accepts it all and lets it happen. He like supports her, just like he did with me, no matter what's going on or what selfish crap she pulls. I know it's part of this whole shrink thing he does, to be sympathetic and withhold judgment on people and all that kind of stuff, he tells me that all the time. But sometimes - sometimes I just wish he'd care enough, about something, to put his Goddam foot down." He paused. "That's why I was so freaked when he swore, when he was talking about the doctors who think being queer is like sick and all. It was as, like, passionate, as I'd ever seen him, about anything." Brady heard him sniffle a bit. "He just accepts it all - the stuff with my mom. And - and he acts like it's all for the best and crap. It's not for the best, it's fucked up, y'know? I mean she's my mother, fer Chrissake. And - and she won't hang around long enough to see me for a three day weekend after not seeing me for a month? She'd rather like go to LA and see some fucking guru who looks like a bum and blabs about finding your chi or something. I'd like to shove his chi up his fuckin' froggy ass."

Brady felt the need to say something comforting. "Davey, I - I'm sure - I mean I know your mom must, like, love you and all. She's just, y'know, confused, and like uncertain -"

"I'm her fucking son! Is she uncertain about that?" Brady heard him roll angrily up in his covers. The wind whistled loudly through the gaps in the windowpane Brady hadn't been able to seal. "Fucking cold," David muttered.

Brady lay staring, unable to think of anything to say. "So," David resumed after a couple of uncomfortable minutes, "How was your weekend with Taggart?"

'It - it was fine, really. Quiet, mostly. Nothing, you know, major. Or anything." He had no intention of recounting any more than he had to.

David seemed to ponder this for a few seconds. "OK, so nothing happened with Doug. But something did. I can tell. You gonna tell me or do I just wait for the confessional some night?"

"It's nothing, really! It was just, you know, awkward. We, um, we met Kenny. Couple of times."

David rolled over again, Brady knew he was facing him now. "Did he say anything?"

"No, nothing, nothing like that. Um, he's kind of bugging me to come back home."

"To be with him?"

Brady swallowed. "Yeah, I guess."

David paused a bit. "I thought he was with those like greaser guys we saw him with when we biked over there."

"He, uh, he is, mostly, I guess. B -but I don't think he really, like, wants to be. It's just sort of who he's fallen in with, you know?"

David chuckled. "So what'd he do, blow you in a janitor's closet or something?" Brady stiffened, he caught his breath instinctively "Bray? Br - holy shit, really???" He could hear David straighten up, giggling a bit. "Come on, man you gotta tell me this shit!"

Brady wanted to do anything but tell him what had happened, but he knew he was stuck. H described the entire weekend - the confrontation with Mr. Jocko,. the football game, slipping into the cleaning closet with Kenny, his guilt afterwards, and Kenny's visit that morning. He omitted his dreams, feeling they were too personal entirely to share even with David.

David let him talk. Brady saw his silhouette in the dark, seated on the edge of his bed, covers wrapped around him against the cold. When Brady at last fell silent, David sighed. "So I guess Doug doesn't know about any of this?"

"Jesus, no, Davey!!! I could never tell him stuff like that! He'd - he'd think I was some kind of pervert or something. I can't."

You can't tell him the truth?"

Brady shifted uncomfortably. "That's not what I meant," he protested. "It's just, I dunno, this - this is personal and all, and -"

"And it's not personal between you and him already?"

Brady sighed. "Not that personal. I mean it's not like he's confiding deep dark secrets and shit to me, either."

"Think he wants to? Or would be willing to, if you asked?"

Brady was at a loss. "I dunno, geez. How can I tell that? It - we're like friends, Davey, we're not doing the shrink thing with each other." "Like you do," he was tempted to add, but that seemed gratuitously cruel.

"Sorry," David said after a moment. "I get into the habit when I'm with my dad, he does this shit to me all the time. And he basically predicted you'd have some Goddam dumb thing like this happen to you - well, happen twice as it turns out. Fieldstone, then Kenny."

Brady nodded, acknowledging how stupid he'd been on both occasions, before the implications of what David had said sank in. "Wait a minute- did you like tell your dad? What I told you and all? He knows???"

"Conover, he's a shrink. You ever have somebody like that ask you stuff? I couldn't hide that from him if I tried."

"Oh Jesus." Brady felt like throwing up. Now everyone would know, they'd all know, he'd be pointed at and branded and driven out. His fear throttled the anger he felt over the betrayal.

"Bray," David's voice was soft and soothing now, "he's OK. My dad's cool with it all. It's his job to be, right? And to never tell anybody what he hears. Not even the cops or anything, OK? You gotta relax a little."

"I just – I mean Christ, that wasn't for you to tell, Davey. I trusted you and all. I don't want people knowing how fucked up I am -"

"You're not fucked up, OK? You got to get that shit out of your head. You think you're fucked up? Yeah, you are, but it's because you think that. Not because of what you feel, OK? "

"I'm sorry," Brady muttered. He disliked it when David became parental with him, and even more so when the point he was making seemed so right.

"There goes the 'sorry' shit again,' David said with an easy laugh. "God you're predictable, you say that so much."

Brady started to smile as well. "And you end every other sentence with 'OK.' OK?"

"OK," David answered, and they started giggling. Brady saw David lie back down and wrap himself back up in his bedclothes. A few minutes passed. "So, David piped up unexpectedly, "did you like it?"

"Huh? Like what?" Brady was far along enough toward sleeping that he was having trouble processing the question.

David chuckled. "Getting' your dick sucked. The blow job. Did you like it?"

"Oh. Oh, that." Brady felt his cheeks reddening. "Um, yeah, I mean sure, how – how could you, y'know, not like that?" He couldn't help giggling a bit, guiltily. "It was - I mean, how could you not, you know, like it? It was like - I, um, I kind of lost it really fast."

David laughed again. "Yeah ,that happens. Hope you weren't as loud as you are when you jerk off, you'd've gotten caught for sure."

"I'm not loud, Jesus," Brady protested. The memory of what Kenny had done had him thickening quickly.

"Like hell you're not." They fell back into silence, and Brady's hand strayed toward his crotch. "My dad thinks McShane's gonna pull something soon," David added. "He's been on Leeds about them both, and Leeds would love to get rid of them except he doesn't want to upset the gravy train. Their dad's money. He needs a reason, and they're so pissed off about anybody holding them to account and all that they're likely to something just out of spite. That, and to make their dad happy - show him how tough they are and all that shit. ." He took a deep breath "So you gotta like be careful, OK?"

"OK," Brady said, ignoring the use of the term he'd just teased David about. A vague rush of fear and adrenaline ran through him. What could they do to him, anyway? He fell silent, mulling the question over, and fell suddenly into an uneasy sleep, his hand still idly pushed part way into his underwear.