Fic: Lines On Palms (2/4)
Title: Lines On Palms (2/4)
Rating: R
Fandom: FOB (Patrick/Pete)
“I wish I could actually speak Italian,” Anna says and she’s eyeing the menu sceptically, “I mean, how am I supposed to know what anything is? They could be feeding me eye of newt or like, walrus balls.”
Patrick laughs a little, quirks a brow and cocks his head. “I really don’t think they’ll be feeding you walrus balls.”
“It could be like, a delicacy or something, jeez, Patrick, way to be close-minded.” But she’s laughing and Patrick, he grins back at her, is about to reply but the fist it comes out of left-field.
His head hasn’t caught up, but he’s on the floor and Anna’s screaming above him, waiter after waiter scurrying about and Patrick can hear the scrape of chairs against tiles as people are thrusting up to get a better look.
A waiter has leapt forward and grabbed the…the assailant? Attacker? Around the waist, is clutching at this tiny person who screeches out obscenities and vile words, is clawing at the waiters arms.
“Get this guy outta here!” and Anna, she’s damn near crying as they drag the guy out of the restaurant.
Another waiter, a tall, lean thing helps Patrick up and mumbles a, “Fucking trash,” beneath his breath at the guy being dragged out. Patrick has no idea why he decks the waiter, this guy in the penguin suit, but he’s out of the restaurant and after the boy before he can stop himself.
“Hey!” He yells out and the guy is out on the sidewalk, flustered and angry and he kicks over a garbage can, clutches his head in his hands and just, he screams.
Patrick is quick on his feet, moves ever closer before gripping the guy around the shoulder, turning him around and he knew, knew that it would be the hooker.
The hooker pulls away, shoves at Patrick’s torso and yells out a, “Fuck you.”
The kid staggers away, trips over his undone shoelaces and Jesus, Patrick thinks, coz this is maybe the first time he’s seen the guy this close, this clearly and he’s, he’s gorgeous the way sculptures are. He’s been cut out of clay, moulded, is soft and curvy in all the right places, sharp and pointed in the perfect ways and his face, fuck, his face. People will write music about this guy one day and all Patrick can hear right now are chords in his ears, notes against his eyelids.
“I’m sorry,” Patrick says, and he is. Mikey, the boyfriend, he hadn’t known about the hooker’s…career, had no fucking clue and-
“Yeah,” the hooker says, and he stares with blisteringly dark eyes, beautiful and angry and all these things Patrick has always tried to stay away from.
“I didn’t realize-“he tries again, but the hooker just says, “No, I don’t imagine you would have.”
Patrick’s not quite sure what to say to that, doesn’t want to pry or anything so when he says, “Did he break up with you?” he honestly doesn’t mean to.
The hooker quirks a brow, hands on his hips before screwing up his face and snarling, “What do you think?”
“Who’s looking after you now?”
The hooker glowers, “I don’t need looking after.”
The bus pulls up, and Jesus, Patrick hadn’t even realized they were at a stop, but the hooker gets on, ignores Patrick and fumbles through his pockets. It takes him a second to realise that this guy, he doesn’t have the money for a fucking ride home (where ever that is.)
The driver’s getting more and more impatient and Patrick’s moved forwards, pulled two dollars from his pocket and handed it over before anyone can get another word out. When he pulls off, steps back onto the sidewalk he can see the hooker fume, can see him glower at the steps. “Go back to your fucking girlfriend,” he says instead, and Patrick, he does.
*
It’s not that Patrick’s ever been good at looking after anything, but he figures that in these circumstances with this guy, well, Patrick figures that he kinda fucked up the only thing that the kid had going for him.
So maybe Patrick reached a conclusion.
Thirds is just as gritty, just as seedy as he remembers and he’s too paranoid about grazing himself, too scared of what he’ll get and he’s decked out in beanie and gloves and thick jacket and it’s not even that fucking cold yet.
There are hookers everywhere, girls and boys that lean and lure and these kids, they’re fucking sirens, out to seduce wayward sailors, businessmen, computer programmers, men with too much time and not enough at home waiting for them.
The hooker, Patrick’s one, he’s too easy to find on nights like this, too easily spotted in a field of mediocrity, an array of outrageous, rebellious conformity and Patrick‘s not going to complain, because he‘s made this fucking decision.
The hooker’s wrapped his body around a lamppost, arms reaching up and over and he’s a pole dancer here, some left over back-up dancer that was too provocative to remain behind the scenes, some pretty kid with sex falling from every open pore like water from a tap.
Patrick, he wonders if this guy, wonders if he can turn it on and off too.
“Hey, hey,” Patrick says, and he reaches out for the guy‘s arm, tries to pull him over and away from where the other boys, girls, where they all stand watching. “I need to talk to you.”
The hooker, he just shrugs him off, pulls his bird-bone wrist out of Patrick’s fly-catcher hand. “Are you going to pay me?” he asks, and it’s flippant, dismissive, and Patrick’s only used to that voice from teachers or some of the fuckhead customers at work.
He starts anyway, can feel question marks curling inside his ears, behind his eyes. “What?” and he’s still startled, fumbling at broken straws, torn threads. “I didn’t realise one had to pay for a conversation now.”
His eyes, the hookers, they’re blisteringly dark in this light, shadowed and coarse and they’re gritty in a way eyes shouldn’t be. Patrick can see sand, charcoal, broken glass.
“People aren’t paying for the sex,” he says and he’s backing up, starting back towards the other whores. “They’re paying for my time.”
Patrick, he’s reaching out again, clasping at the hooker’s bicep and pulling him back over by the fabric of his shirt, the thin cotton that clings like rain, like water, like a second-fucking skin.
“I want-” and the hooker, he’s more forceful this time, but maybe less successful, is twisting awkwardly beneath Patrick’s desperate fingers, twitching in his grasp. He pulls away and Patrick, his nails dig, latch, catch, and the hooker’s getting that much more strained before finally yanking away.
“Wait-” and the hooker glares backwards, and hits away Patrick’s reaching hand.
“Paying customer,” he says, and nods in the direction of a grey Honda.
Fuck.
*
“I called like, eight times last night, Patrick,” Anna’s biting her lip and the contrast is an artist’s wet dream, snowy white on blood red, chapped, coarse and Patrick stares at the ceiling instead. “Why didn’t you return any of my calls?”
Patrick sighs, scratches at his sideburns and casts Anna a sorry look. “I just, I’ve got a bit on my mind, I dunno, with work and family and university coming up and I just…I, I don‘t have an excuse, Anna.”
“Of course you don’t,” she leans back in her seat, soaks into the foam car seat and Patrick can see her imprint there, can see it lasting. “Because you’re stupidly honest and can’t just, can’t just give me something to hold on to.”
“That’s,” Patrick says, and he furrows his brow, pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose. “That’s pretty fucking nostalgic, depressing, I don’t know. Is that the right word?”
Anna just smiles, something that doesn’t reach her eyes, is rough around the edges and just sad enough to make Patrick uncomfortable, sad enough to be noticeable. “I don’t know,” she says and they ride the rest of the bus trip out in silence.
Anna will find him later in the day between work and home and will hold onto his arm like it’s life support, like it’s the final straw. “Patrick,” she‘ll say, arms shaking and voice quivering and she’s never been clingy before, not like this. “Sometimes I just need you to answer the phone.”
*
“Table four wants two lemon tarts and a mocha latte,” Patrick says and Vicky nods somewhere from behind the counter, writes it down and hands it to where Alex stands in the back room making coffees; lattes, cappuccinos.
“It‘ll be ten minutes,” Alex calls out. “I’ve got a queue.”
Patrick nods and scribbles on his notepad, makes his way over to where Vicky stands popping gum behind the till. “Busy today,” and Vicky smiles, nods, shrugs.
“Always is on a Friday,” and she leans over brushes something off Patrick’s shoulders. “Joys of café work.”
Patrick grins at her and Vicky shoots back half-lidded eyes and an amused grin, teeth still chomping hard on sticks of strawberry gum. “Getting paid tonight,” she says, and Patrick, he smiles harder. “Thank fuck.”
“What are you spending your weekly on?” and she leans closer, makes to whisper. “Tell me your secrets, Patrick Stumph.”
He laughs at that, kisses her on the cheek and says, “I’ll tell you mine if you tell me yours.”
Vicky won’t, never does, what she does with her cash is her best kept secret and Patrick respects that enough not to push and Vicky, she replies in kind.
*
Patrick, he ends up on Thirds again, feet turning too quickly to auto-pilot before the sirens go off, before Patrick makes a conscious decision to submit to it. He weaves between the backdrop, the lips and cocks and finds the hooker, his hooker too easily, wandering over to some Saturn Hilux.
Patrick moves faster than he thought he could, gripping the hooker’s arm, his bicep, too tight in his fingers. The hooker, he flushes fuscia, this colour that sprawls across his face like spilt paint and he almost rips his arm away, chokes out a, “Fuck off,” through gritted teeth.
“Paying customer,” Patrick replies and he starts as the hooker’s arm slips out of his grasp. He’s quick though, Patrick, the track teacher at school didn’t think so, but right now Patrick’s hand, wrist, arm, it darts out, wraps around the hooker’s tiny waist and he drags the guy away bodily, heaving at ninety pounds of bitter rage, blatant indignation.
“How dare you-“ But Patrick, he just pushes the kid against the wall, hard enough to bruise but Patrick, he reckons this guy doesn’t know any other language.
“How much for a night?” and the words tumble from his mouth like this is natural, like he does this every night, hits on kids, hookers down dark alleys.
The boy‘s eyes are sceptical and he rocks back, leans against the wall and he‘s all seduction again, all bedroom movements and promises that Patrick, that he‘s sure the guy will follow through on if he shoves enough notes down the back of his jeans. “$250.”
“Done,” and Patrick shoves two fifty dollar notes at him. “You get the rest in the morning.”
The hooker’s eyes bulge, as if this hasn’t happened before and maybe he doesn’t always follow through, doesn’t always take the moral high ground when it comes to husbands, fathers with sweaty thighs and desperate fingers. The hooker looks ready to deck him and Patrick, his hands are still tight against his waist and he lets go, pushes off and he reaches to shove the hooker towards the backseat of his car. Patrick, he gets in the front, behind the wheel.
There’s heat there, where the hooker stares at Patrick through the car mirror and Patrick, he avoids it, stares out the front, stares at the street with his fingers clenched too tightly over the wheel. The hooker’s hands reach for the handle, jerks uselessly at it and yeah, child’s lock.
“Real fucking mature,” and he says it through clenched teeth, through stiff limbs and bitter tongue and Patrick, this loosens him somehow.
“Dude, I’m eighteen, what did you expect.”
They drive to some sleazy motel and the receptionist knows the hooker so well that Patrick has to click his tongue and shove the hooker up the stairs. The guy collapses back onto the bed, bounces slightly on the mattress before propping his body up on his elbows, balancing hopelessly, perfectly.
This guy, he pulls off bedroom eyes too perfectly, has them even when he’s not talking sex, not seducing coz Patrick, he saw them even when the guy punched him in the restaurant. These dark things, they’re rooms with the lights out, deep and Patrick, he can’t see the end to them, can’t see the outline of lamp or person or bed, can only see, smell, feel the sex and he leans forwards unconsciously, without thought or direction.
Patrick, he’s not a virgin, has had Anna and Vicky and that fucking thing with Gabe, it’s just, this, the way the hooker looks right now, this put upon sex, it’s all high-brand porn, all prostitution and Patrick’s not sure he wants this, not sure he’s comfortable.
“So what do you want?” the guy asks, and he’s staring at the ceiling, has leant over to switch on the lamp beside the bed and the light is poor quality, makes his skin look sallow, old, washed-out. “Blow? Fuck?”
He moves over to the edge of the bed, stares up at Patrick and fuck, those eyes. “How do you want me?” he asks. “Against the wall, on my knees, back, belly? Ass up’s always popular.”
And this, Patrick thinks, flushes, and Jesus, that in itself must be his answer, sprawled over his face like a biological lie detector. “I want a name,” he says, and the hooker just quirks a brow, looks about as fucking condescending as Brandon Flowers does every second of his fucking life.
“Charlie,” the hooker says though, it‘s a joke, haha, but neither of them are smiling. “Rob, Chris, Ryan, Jon.”
Patrick grimaces, frowns too deep. “Seriously.”
The hooker stares with a questioning glance and Patrick can see that slow downward tug of his lips, the crinkle of his eyelids as he says, “Paul.”
Dishonesty is written all over this guys face like he’s the monk who writes the gospel of Luke, like he’s the entire fucking Bible and Patrick, he can’t control the bubble in his chest that crawls up his spine, throat, head. “You’re a dick,” he snarls, and the hooker’s on his feet before either of them can react, has Patrick by the throat, fingers clenching and he’s staring too hard, too coarse and even now his irises are promises, pupils threats.
“I’m a whore,” he growls, chokes down into Patrick’s ear. “Start treating me like one.”
Patrick grips at the hooker’s wrist, pries it away from his throat, says, “I want to know who you are.”
Someone’s flicked a switch because the hooker’s back to lazy seduction, has flopped back down onto the bed, pulling Patrick down on top of him. “Call me what you want.” And Patrick, he won’t, can’t, so he kisses him, presses his lips hard and tight and bitter onto the hooker’s, presses down like this, like it means something, like this guy is anyone he’s ever felt anything for, but the hooker pulls away, latches hot lips onto Patrick’s neck instead.
“People don’t pay $250 for a fucking name,” he murmurs into his neck, in between sucks and moans and the slurp and pop of cold, hard foreplay. “This isn’t fucking Pretty Woman.”
“Yeah,” Patrick replies, chokes out as he reaches for the hooker’s sides, grabs for his t-shirt. “You’re not a woman.”
“No,” the hooker says and he stops, stares up for the briefest of moments to whisper, “I’m not pretty.”
Patrick, he’s not the most ethical guy, doesn’t believe in pulling the troubles of others onto himself but really, this, this whole fucking thing is too wrong, too unfair and this hooker, this guy that Patrick is too fucking involved with, he doesn’t deserve this. Doesn’t deserve Patrick’s wayward attempts at being bad, at being good.
They just sleep in the end, and when Patrick wakes up there alone, his wallets empty and written on the room-service menu is the name Pete.
*
Patrick goes to Thirds after work, drives over and Pete‘s there already, hips thrust out and hands at his waist. He doesn’t even flinch when Patrick wanders over, when he stands beside him and just looks up at the sky, at the grey clouds that roll together like rotting fairy floss.
“It’s gonna rain,” Patrick says, and Pete nods, rolls his eyes up.
“Slow night then,” he replies. “Kids are scared of storms, dad’s stay home to look after them. To be decent fucking parents.”
Patrick nods, “You could come out with me again.”
Pete looks over, quirks his brow and leans back against the wall. “I don’t think so.”
“Wasn’t that bad at making out was I?” Patrick jokes, laughs, but it falls flat, drops somewhere into the two feet between them. Pete doesn’t answer, doesn’t so much as glance up and instead, just stares at the cracks in the pavement, counts the ants, stains, condom wrappers.
“You under sell yourself,” Patrick mumbles, because it feels right, because it’s true.
Pete‘s head darts up, eyes wide and lips parted. “What?”
“$250.” Patrick repeats, “You under sell yourself.”
Pete doesn’t answer, so Patrick turns around to go home.
*
Patrick hates white noise, would much rather motown, r’n’b, Aretha, Lupe, Smokey fucking Robinson. Then again, it’s oddly appropriate here, with Anna staring with half-lidded eyes and some unflattering grimace that sprawls across the space below her nose, above her chin.
“Jesus,” she says, and she crinkles up her eyes, clenches the lids shut and Patrick nods. “Are you even listening?”
“What?” and Patrick, he feels his pupils dart around the iris, is forced to lean forward in his seat and reach around a hand to touch Anna’s fingers.
“Patrick,” Anna leans backwards, pulls her arm out of Patrick’s grip and Patrick, he thinks the hooker started a trend. “Patrick, what’s up with you at the moment?”
“What do you mean?”
“Jesus,” she says, “It’s like you don’t even want me around. When we’re together your head is somewhere else and when we’re not--” she sighs, inhales too deep, too heavy from somewhere in the depths of her narrow chest and Patrick, he wants to reach over again, but he can’t bring himself to cross that divide, that gully, valley, cliff. Anna recollects herself, stares Patrick down. “I mean, you’re never home when I ring, never on MSN, never even fucking like, answering my crap e-mail chain letters to tell me how lame I am for believing them.”
“Anna-”
She holds up a hand, laughs a little, but it’s choked and coarse and Patrick can hear where it’s shoved out from behind her vocal chords. “Is it something to do with that guy at the restaurant a few weeks ago?”
“What? No,” only yeah, it is.
Problem with Anna, problem with dating this chick on and off for three years is that she can see right through him. “I won’t hate you for it,” she says, “if you’re bored of this.”
“Fuck, I’m, Anna, I’m not,” and this time he does reach around, grabs at her skinny arm with bruising fingertips because this, Anna, he can’t let her go, can’t lose this and she’s staring with wide and desperate eyes and Patrick, he feels like such an asshole.
“Patrick, I…” she sighs again, moves to loosen his fingers around her arm. “Patrick, you know I love you, right?”
“Yeah,” he says, but he doesn’t really, especially when she’s looking at him with too much colliding in her pretty headspace.
“Patrick, I‘ve…I’ve been seeing someone else.”
Maybe he hears something break, shatter in the distance, but he can’t take his eyes, ears, thoughts off of Anna’s porcelain skin and long fingers, off her eyelashes that are catching tears and her lips that are quivering.
“I’m sorry.”
*
Patrick doesn’t go see Pete for the rest of the week and when Vicky calls to tell him that Anna, that she isn’t worth it, he thinks no.
I’m the one who’s not.
*
“So the rumour mill called me today,” she says, and she’s drinking tea, blowing over it and the steam, it billows around her face, erupts across her hair. “And of course, by the rumour mill I do mean Dana Perkins, that lovely woman who just started work at the hairdresser. Beautiful, you know, twenty-two and just had her first kid, I can’t imagine having a kid that young, let alone already being married and in a steady job.”
She laughs a little, leans back in her chair. “When I was twenty-two I was only just dating your father, listening to ACDC, Nirvana, I was pretty up with the times, y’know?”
Patrick quirks a brow, a grin and she just giggles again, shoves at his arm with a fistful of tired fingers. “Quiet, you,” she says, “I was a rocker.”
Patrick, he does laugh at that, at the image of her at concerts, as someone’s fucking groupie.
“So,” she says, “the point is Dana, she was telling me that you and Anna broke up.”
Patrick, his laughter draws short, strains, pulls against the edges of his lips. This is old news, week old Patrick, he’s a guy so this shouldn’t hurt anymore, shouldn’t make him want to curl up in bed until the world goes by and forgets it with him.
Patrick, he hears his mum sigh out, put her tea down on the table and clench her fingers on top of his. “I don’t mind,” she said, “I just wish you’d told me. It’s not a lot of fun hearing from Dana, even if she is lovely.”
“I didn’t mean for you to find out like that,” he says, head stumbling over reasons (excuses). “It just isn’t a big deal.”
She only sighs in response, her lips falling open, gaping at words she can’t quite get her tongue around, finally settling on, “If it wasn’t a big deal, you would’ve told me.”
Patrick pauses, thinks and yeah, he probably would have and yeah, it sorta was a big deal, sorta did hurt more than it should have, but he couldn’t be angry, couldn’t bring himself to be mad at her because, “We were cheating on each other.”
His mum, she clenches her eyes shut, opens them again with furrowed brow and eyes that don’t so much accuse as they do hurt. “I’m listening,” she says instead, and she doesn’t deny or judge and Patrick, he’s had all week to think this out, to need to say it.
“I mean, she was seeing someone else, and I guess I was too.”
She stares still, moves a hand to hover over his before pulling back, sighing. “Who?” she says, whispers and Patrick, he can’t not reply.
“Remember the boy from the train, the smaller one.”
“Oh,” she says.
The silence is stifling and she’s staring down at her tea cup, wringing her fingers in her lap before she moves a fist up to open over Patrick’s fingers, to intertwine with his. “I love you,” she says, “and I’m not saying that because you just broke up with your girlfriend, and I’m not saying it because you’re suddenly batting for the other team, or y’know, left and right handed, I’m saying it because you’re my kid and I do and maybe you need to hear that right now.”
“Right,” he says. “Thanks.”
*
“Anna’s clearly a bitch-faced slut,” Vicky says, and she’s on counter today, cashing up take-away orders and laughing at Alex behind the coffee machines. It’s a slow day and the customers are little more than a trickle through the doorway.
“No,” Patrick says, and he’s got his head in his hands, is leaning over the counter. “She’s really, really not.”
“Uh, yeah,” and Vicky’s doodling on one of the spare napkins, spiralling patterns and penning random words. “She cheated on you, you are therefore no longer required to defend her. That’s in like, the big book of relationships. I’m pretty sure the Bible has penned it too, somewhere between Genesis and Epistles.”
Patrick tries to laugh, and Vicky runs her fingers through his hair, toys with his sideburns. “I can’t be mad at her,” he says, and Vicky puts two hands over his cheeks, drags his face up to hers and casts him a disbelieving look. “Why the fuck not?”
Patrick glowers, pulls his face away, “Jesus, Vicky, do you remember Gabe’s party or was us fucking that forgettable?”
Vicky stares him down, lips set in a straight line, “One drunken fuck is a lot different than seeing someone else, Patrick, ours is sex, hers implies a whole other relationship.”
“Whatever,” he says, and he rips off his apron, throws it onto the front counter and tries to ignore the way Alex is peaking out around the coffee machine. “There’s virtually no one here, I’m sure you can handle it the rest of the day.”
He storms out of the café and puts in an extra effort to slam the door behind him.
*
Continue to Part 3..
Rating: R
Fandom: FOB (Patrick/Pete)
“I wish I could actually speak Italian,” Anna says and she’s eyeing the menu sceptically, “I mean, how am I supposed to know what anything is? They could be feeding me eye of newt or like, walrus balls.”
Patrick laughs a little, quirks a brow and cocks his head. “I really don’t think they’ll be feeding you walrus balls.”
“It could be like, a delicacy or something, jeez, Patrick, way to be close-minded.” But she’s laughing and Patrick, he grins back at her, is about to reply but the fist it comes out of left-field.
His head hasn’t caught up, but he’s on the floor and Anna’s screaming above him, waiter after waiter scurrying about and Patrick can hear the scrape of chairs against tiles as people are thrusting up to get a better look.
A waiter has leapt forward and grabbed the…the assailant? Attacker? Around the waist, is clutching at this tiny person who screeches out obscenities and vile words, is clawing at the waiters arms.
“Get this guy outta here!” and Anna, she’s damn near crying as they drag the guy out of the restaurant.
Another waiter, a tall, lean thing helps Patrick up and mumbles a, “Fucking trash,” beneath his breath at the guy being dragged out. Patrick has no idea why he decks the waiter, this guy in the penguin suit, but he’s out of the restaurant and after the boy before he can stop himself.
“Hey!” He yells out and the guy is out on the sidewalk, flustered and angry and he kicks over a garbage can, clutches his head in his hands and just, he screams.
Patrick is quick on his feet, moves ever closer before gripping the guy around the shoulder, turning him around and he knew, knew that it would be the hooker.
The hooker pulls away, shoves at Patrick’s torso and yells out a, “Fuck you.”
The kid staggers away, trips over his undone shoelaces and Jesus, Patrick thinks, coz this is maybe the first time he’s seen the guy this close, this clearly and he’s, he’s gorgeous the way sculptures are. He’s been cut out of clay, moulded, is soft and curvy in all the right places, sharp and pointed in the perfect ways and his face, fuck, his face. People will write music about this guy one day and all Patrick can hear right now are chords in his ears, notes against his eyelids.
“I’m sorry,” Patrick says, and he is. Mikey, the boyfriend, he hadn’t known about the hooker’s…career, had no fucking clue and-
“Yeah,” the hooker says, and he stares with blisteringly dark eyes, beautiful and angry and all these things Patrick has always tried to stay away from.
“I didn’t realize-“he tries again, but the hooker just says, “No, I don’t imagine you would have.”
Patrick’s not quite sure what to say to that, doesn’t want to pry or anything so when he says, “Did he break up with you?” he honestly doesn’t mean to.
The hooker quirks a brow, hands on his hips before screwing up his face and snarling, “What do you think?”
“Who’s looking after you now?”
The hooker glowers, “I don’t need looking after.”
The bus pulls up, and Jesus, Patrick hadn’t even realized they were at a stop, but the hooker gets on, ignores Patrick and fumbles through his pockets. It takes him a second to realise that this guy, he doesn’t have the money for a fucking ride home (where ever that is.)
The driver’s getting more and more impatient and Patrick’s moved forwards, pulled two dollars from his pocket and handed it over before anyone can get another word out. When he pulls off, steps back onto the sidewalk he can see the hooker fume, can see him glower at the steps. “Go back to your fucking girlfriend,” he says instead, and Patrick, he does.
*
It’s not that Patrick’s ever been good at looking after anything, but he figures that in these circumstances with this guy, well, Patrick figures that he kinda fucked up the only thing that the kid had going for him.
So maybe Patrick reached a conclusion.
Thirds is just as gritty, just as seedy as he remembers and he’s too paranoid about grazing himself, too scared of what he’ll get and he’s decked out in beanie and gloves and thick jacket and it’s not even that fucking cold yet.
There are hookers everywhere, girls and boys that lean and lure and these kids, they’re fucking sirens, out to seduce wayward sailors, businessmen, computer programmers, men with too much time and not enough at home waiting for them.
The hooker, Patrick’s one, he’s too easy to find on nights like this, too easily spotted in a field of mediocrity, an array of outrageous, rebellious conformity and Patrick‘s not going to complain, because he‘s made this fucking decision.
The hooker’s wrapped his body around a lamppost, arms reaching up and over and he’s a pole dancer here, some left over back-up dancer that was too provocative to remain behind the scenes, some pretty kid with sex falling from every open pore like water from a tap.
Patrick, he wonders if this guy, wonders if he can turn it on and off too.
“Hey, hey,” Patrick says, and he reaches out for the guy‘s arm, tries to pull him over and away from where the other boys, girls, where they all stand watching. “I need to talk to you.”
The hooker, he just shrugs him off, pulls his bird-bone wrist out of Patrick’s fly-catcher hand. “Are you going to pay me?” he asks, and it’s flippant, dismissive, and Patrick’s only used to that voice from teachers or some of the fuckhead customers at work.
He starts anyway, can feel question marks curling inside his ears, behind his eyes. “What?” and he’s still startled, fumbling at broken straws, torn threads. “I didn’t realise one had to pay for a conversation now.”
His eyes, the hookers, they’re blisteringly dark in this light, shadowed and coarse and they’re gritty in a way eyes shouldn’t be. Patrick can see sand, charcoal, broken glass.
“People aren’t paying for the sex,” he says and he’s backing up, starting back towards the other whores. “They’re paying for my time.”
Patrick, he’s reaching out again, clasping at the hooker’s bicep and pulling him back over by the fabric of his shirt, the thin cotton that clings like rain, like water, like a second-fucking skin.
“I want-” and the hooker, he’s more forceful this time, but maybe less successful, is twisting awkwardly beneath Patrick’s desperate fingers, twitching in his grasp. He pulls away and Patrick, his nails dig, latch, catch, and the hooker’s getting that much more strained before finally yanking away.
“Wait-” and the hooker glares backwards, and hits away Patrick’s reaching hand.
“Paying customer,” he says, and nods in the direction of a grey Honda.
Fuck.
*
“I called like, eight times last night, Patrick,” Anna’s biting her lip and the contrast is an artist’s wet dream, snowy white on blood red, chapped, coarse and Patrick stares at the ceiling instead. “Why didn’t you return any of my calls?”
Patrick sighs, scratches at his sideburns and casts Anna a sorry look. “I just, I’ve got a bit on my mind, I dunno, with work and family and university coming up and I just…I, I don‘t have an excuse, Anna.”
“Of course you don’t,” she leans back in her seat, soaks into the foam car seat and Patrick can see her imprint there, can see it lasting. “Because you’re stupidly honest and can’t just, can’t just give me something to hold on to.”
“That’s,” Patrick says, and he furrows his brow, pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose. “That’s pretty fucking nostalgic, depressing, I don’t know. Is that the right word?”
Anna just smiles, something that doesn’t reach her eyes, is rough around the edges and just sad enough to make Patrick uncomfortable, sad enough to be noticeable. “I don’t know,” she says and they ride the rest of the bus trip out in silence.
Anna will find him later in the day between work and home and will hold onto his arm like it’s life support, like it’s the final straw. “Patrick,” she‘ll say, arms shaking and voice quivering and she’s never been clingy before, not like this. “Sometimes I just need you to answer the phone.”
*
“Table four wants two lemon tarts and a mocha latte,” Patrick says and Vicky nods somewhere from behind the counter, writes it down and hands it to where Alex stands in the back room making coffees; lattes, cappuccinos.
“It‘ll be ten minutes,” Alex calls out. “I’ve got a queue.”
Patrick nods and scribbles on his notepad, makes his way over to where Vicky stands popping gum behind the till. “Busy today,” and Vicky smiles, nods, shrugs.
“Always is on a Friday,” and she leans over brushes something off Patrick’s shoulders. “Joys of café work.”
Patrick grins at her and Vicky shoots back half-lidded eyes and an amused grin, teeth still chomping hard on sticks of strawberry gum. “Getting paid tonight,” she says, and Patrick, he smiles harder. “Thank fuck.”
“What are you spending your weekly on?” and she leans closer, makes to whisper. “Tell me your secrets, Patrick Stumph.”
He laughs at that, kisses her on the cheek and says, “I’ll tell you mine if you tell me yours.”
Vicky won’t, never does, what she does with her cash is her best kept secret and Patrick respects that enough not to push and Vicky, she replies in kind.
*
Patrick, he ends up on Thirds again, feet turning too quickly to auto-pilot before the sirens go off, before Patrick makes a conscious decision to submit to it. He weaves between the backdrop, the lips and cocks and finds the hooker, his hooker too easily, wandering over to some Saturn Hilux.
Patrick moves faster than he thought he could, gripping the hooker’s arm, his bicep, too tight in his fingers. The hooker, he flushes fuscia, this colour that sprawls across his face like spilt paint and he almost rips his arm away, chokes out a, “Fuck off,” through gritted teeth.
“Paying customer,” Patrick replies and he starts as the hooker’s arm slips out of his grasp. He’s quick though, Patrick, the track teacher at school didn’t think so, but right now Patrick’s hand, wrist, arm, it darts out, wraps around the hooker’s tiny waist and he drags the guy away bodily, heaving at ninety pounds of bitter rage, blatant indignation.
“How dare you-“ But Patrick, he just pushes the kid against the wall, hard enough to bruise but Patrick, he reckons this guy doesn’t know any other language.
“How much for a night?” and the words tumble from his mouth like this is natural, like he does this every night, hits on kids, hookers down dark alleys.
The boy‘s eyes are sceptical and he rocks back, leans against the wall and he‘s all seduction again, all bedroom movements and promises that Patrick, that he‘s sure the guy will follow through on if he shoves enough notes down the back of his jeans. “$250.”
“Done,” and Patrick shoves two fifty dollar notes at him. “You get the rest in the morning.”
The hooker’s eyes bulge, as if this hasn’t happened before and maybe he doesn’t always follow through, doesn’t always take the moral high ground when it comes to husbands, fathers with sweaty thighs and desperate fingers. The hooker looks ready to deck him and Patrick, his hands are still tight against his waist and he lets go, pushes off and he reaches to shove the hooker towards the backseat of his car. Patrick, he gets in the front, behind the wheel.
There’s heat there, where the hooker stares at Patrick through the car mirror and Patrick, he avoids it, stares out the front, stares at the street with his fingers clenched too tightly over the wheel. The hooker’s hands reach for the handle, jerks uselessly at it and yeah, child’s lock.
“Real fucking mature,” and he says it through clenched teeth, through stiff limbs and bitter tongue and Patrick, this loosens him somehow.
“Dude, I’m eighteen, what did you expect.”
They drive to some sleazy motel and the receptionist knows the hooker so well that Patrick has to click his tongue and shove the hooker up the stairs. The guy collapses back onto the bed, bounces slightly on the mattress before propping his body up on his elbows, balancing hopelessly, perfectly.
This guy, he pulls off bedroom eyes too perfectly, has them even when he’s not talking sex, not seducing coz Patrick, he saw them even when the guy punched him in the restaurant. These dark things, they’re rooms with the lights out, deep and Patrick, he can’t see the end to them, can’t see the outline of lamp or person or bed, can only see, smell, feel the sex and he leans forwards unconsciously, without thought or direction.
Patrick, he’s not a virgin, has had Anna and Vicky and that fucking thing with Gabe, it’s just, this, the way the hooker looks right now, this put upon sex, it’s all high-brand porn, all prostitution and Patrick’s not sure he wants this, not sure he’s comfortable.
“So what do you want?” the guy asks, and he’s staring at the ceiling, has leant over to switch on the lamp beside the bed and the light is poor quality, makes his skin look sallow, old, washed-out. “Blow? Fuck?”
He moves over to the edge of the bed, stares up at Patrick and fuck, those eyes. “How do you want me?” he asks. “Against the wall, on my knees, back, belly? Ass up’s always popular.”
And this, Patrick thinks, flushes, and Jesus, that in itself must be his answer, sprawled over his face like a biological lie detector. “I want a name,” he says, and the hooker just quirks a brow, looks about as fucking condescending as Brandon Flowers does every second of his fucking life.
“Charlie,” the hooker says though, it‘s a joke, haha, but neither of them are smiling. “Rob, Chris, Ryan, Jon.”
Patrick grimaces, frowns too deep. “Seriously.”
The hooker stares with a questioning glance and Patrick can see that slow downward tug of his lips, the crinkle of his eyelids as he says, “Paul.”
Dishonesty is written all over this guys face like he’s the monk who writes the gospel of Luke, like he’s the entire fucking Bible and Patrick, he can’t control the bubble in his chest that crawls up his spine, throat, head. “You’re a dick,” he snarls, and the hooker’s on his feet before either of them can react, has Patrick by the throat, fingers clenching and he’s staring too hard, too coarse and even now his irises are promises, pupils threats.
“I’m a whore,” he growls, chokes down into Patrick’s ear. “Start treating me like one.”
Patrick grips at the hooker’s wrist, pries it away from his throat, says, “I want to know who you are.”
Someone’s flicked a switch because the hooker’s back to lazy seduction, has flopped back down onto the bed, pulling Patrick down on top of him. “Call me what you want.” And Patrick, he won’t, can’t, so he kisses him, presses his lips hard and tight and bitter onto the hooker’s, presses down like this, like it means something, like this guy is anyone he’s ever felt anything for, but the hooker pulls away, latches hot lips onto Patrick’s neck instead.
“People don’t pay $250 for a fucking name,” he murmurs into his neck, in between sucks and moans and the slurp and pop of cold, hard foreplay. “This isn’t fucking Pretty Woman.”
“Yeah,” Patrick replies, chokes out as he reaches for the hooker’s sides, grabs for his t-shirt. “You’re not a woman.”
“No,” the hooker says and he stops, stares up for the briefest of moments to whisper, “I’m not pretty.”
Patrick, he’s not the most ethical guy, doesn’t believe in pulling the troubles of others onto himself but really, this, this whole fucking thing is too wrong, too unfair and this hooker, this guy that Patrick is too fucking involved with, he doesn’t deserve this. Doesn’t deserve Patrick’s wayward attempts at being bad, at being good.
They just sleep in the end, and when Patrick wakes up there alone, his wallets empty and written on the room-service menu is the name Pete.
*
Patrick goes to Thirds after work, drives over and Pete‘s there already, hips thrust out and hands at his waist. He doesn’t even flinch when Patrick wanders over, when he stands beside him and just looks up at the sky, at the grey clouds that roll together like rotting fairy floss.
“It’s gonna rain,” Patrick says, and Pete nods, rolls his eyes up.
“Slow night then,” he replies. “Kids are scared of storms, dad’s stay home to look after them. To be decent fucking parents.”
Patrick nods, “You could come out with me again.”
Pete looks over, quirks his brow and leans back against the wall. “I don’t think so.”
“Wasn’t that bad at making out was I?” Patrick jokes, laughs, but it falls flat, drops somewhere into the two feet between them. Pete doesn’t answer, doesn’t so much as glance up and instead, just stares at the cracks in the pavement, counts the ants, stains, condom wrappers.
“You under sell yourself,” Patrick mumbles, because it feels right, because it’s true.
Pete‘s head darts up, eyes wide and lips parted. “What?”
“$250.” Patrick repeats, “You under sell yourself.”
Pete doesn’t answer, so Patrick turns around to go home.
*
Patrick hates white noise, would much rather motown, r’n’b, Aretha, Lupe, Smokey fucking Robinson. Then again, it’s oddly appropriate here, with Anna staring with half-lidded eyes and some unflattering grimace that sprawls across the space below her nose, above her chin.
“Jesus,” she says, and she crinkles up her eyes, clenches the lids shut and Patrick nods. “Are you even listening?”
“What?” and Patrick, he feels his pupils dart around the iris, is forced to lean forward in his seat and reach around a hand to touch Anna’s fingers.
“Patrick,” Anna leans backwards, pulls her arm out of Patrick’s grip and Patrick, he thinks the hooker started a trend. “Patrick, what’s up with you at the moment?”
“What do you mean?”
“Jesus,” she says, “It’s like you don’t even want me around. When we’re together your head is somewhere else and when we’re not--” she sighs, inhales too deep, too heavy from somewhere in the depths of her narrow chest and Patrick, he wants to reach over again, but he can’t bring himself to cross that divide, that gully, valley, cliff. Anna recollects herself, stares Patrick down. “I mean, you’re never home when I ring, never on MSN, never even fucking like, answering my crap e-mail chain letters to tell me how lame I am for believing them.”
“Anna-”
She holds up a hand, laughs a little, but it’s choked and coarse and Patrick can hear where it’s shoved out from behind her vocal chords. “Is it something to do with that guy at the restaurant a few weeks ago?”
“What? No,” only yeah, it is.
Problem with Anna, problem with dating this chick on and off for three years is that she can see right through him. “I won’t hate you for it,” she says, “if you’re bored of this.”
“Fuck, I’m, Anna, I’m not,” and this time he does reach around, grabs at her skinny arm with bruising fingertips because this, Anna, he can’t let her go, can’t lose this and she’s staring with wide and desperate eyes and Patrick, he feels like such an asshole.
“Patrick, I…” she sighs again, moves to loosen his fingers around her arm. “Patrick, you know I love you, right?”
“Yeah,” he says, but he doesn’t really, especially when she’s looking at him with too much colliding in her pretty headspace.
“Patrick, I‘ve…I’ve been seeing someone else.”
Maybe he hears something break, shatter in the distance, but he can’t take his eyes, ears, thoughts off of Anna’s porcelain skin and long fingers, off her eyelashes that are catching tears and her lips that are quivering.
“I’m sorry.”
*
Patrick doesn’t go see Pete for the rest of the week and when Vicky calls to tell him that Anna, that she isn’t worth it, he thinks no.
I’m the one who’s not.
*
“So the rumour mill called me today,” she says, and she’s drinking tea, blowing over it and the steam, it billows around her face, erupts across her hair. “And of course, by the rumour mill I do mean Dana Perkins, that lovely woman who just started work at the hairdresser. Beautiful, you know, twenty-two and just had her first kid, I can’t imagine having a kid that young, let alone already being married and in a steady job.”
She laughs a little, leans back in her chair. “When I was twenty-two I was only just dating your father, listening to ACDC, Nirvana, I was pretty up with the times, y’know?”
Patrick quirks a brow, a grin and she just giggles again, shoves at his arm with a fistful of tired fingers. “Quiet, you,” she says, “I was a rocker.”
Patrick, he does laugh at that, at the image of her at concerts, as someone’s fucking groupie.
“So,” she says, “the point is Dana, she was telling me that you and Anna broke up.”
Patrick, his laughter draws short, strains, pulls against the edges of his lips. This is old news, week old Patrick, he’s a guy so this shouldn’t hurt anymore, shouldn’t make him want to curl up in bed until the world goes by and forgets it with him.
Patrick, he hears his mum sigh out, put her tea down on the table and clench her fingers on top of his. “I don’t mind,” she said, “I just wish you’d told me. It’s not a lot of fun hearing from Dana, even if she is lovely.”
“I didn’t mean for you to find out like that,” he says, head stumbling over reasons (excuses). “It just isn’t a big deal.”
She only sighs in response, her lips falling open, gaping at words she can’t quite get her tongue around, finally settling on, “If it wasn’t a big deal, you would’ve told me.”
Patrick pauses, thinks and yeah, he probably would have and yeah, it sorta was a big deal, sorta did hurt more than it should have, but he couldn’t be angry, couldn’t bring himself to be mad at her because, “We were cheating on each other.”
His mum, she clenches her eyes shut, opens them again with furrowed brow and eyes that don’t so much accuse as they do hurt. “I’m listening,” she says instead, and she doesn’t deny or judge and Patrick, he’s had all week to think this out, to need to say it.
“I mean, she was seeing someone else, and I guess I was too.”
She stares still, moves a hand to hover over his before pulling back, sighing. “Who?” she says, whispers and Patrick, he can’t not reply.
“Remember the boy from the train, the smaller one.”
“Oh,” she says.
The silence is stifling and she’s staring down at her tea cup, wringing her fingers in her lap before she moves a fist up to open over Patrick’s fingers, to intertwine with his. “I love you,” she says, “and I’m not saying that because you just broke up with your girlfriend, and I’m not saying it because you’re suddenly batting for the other team, or y’know, left and right handed, I’m saying it because you’re my kid and I do and maybe you need to hear that right now.”
“Right,” he says. “Thanks.”
*
“Anna’s clearly a bitch-faced slut,” Vicky says, and she’s on counter today, cashing up take-away orders and laughing at Alex behind the coffee machines. It’s a slow day and the customers are little more than a trickle through the doorway.
“No,” Patrick says, and he’s got his head in his hands, is leaning over the counter. “She’s really, really not.”
“Uh, yeah,” and Vicky’s doodling on one of the spare napkins, spiralling patterns and penning random words. “She cheated on you, you are therefore no longer required to defend her. That’s in like, the big book of relationships. I’m pretty sure the Bible has penned it too, somewhere between Genesis and Epistles.”
Patrick tries to laugh, and Vicky runs her fingers through his hair, toys with his sideburns. “I can’t be mad at her,” he says, and Vicky puts two hands over his cheeks, drags his face up to hers and casts him a disbelieving look. “Why the fuck not?”
Patrick glowers, pulls his face away, “Jesus, Vicky, do you remember Gabe’s party or was us fucking that forgettable?”
Vicky stares him down, lips set in a straight line, “One drunken fuck is a lot different than seeing someone else, Patrick, ours is sex, hers implies a whole other relationship.”
“Whatever,” he says, and he rips off his apron, throws it onto the front counter and tries to ignore the way Alex is peaking out around the coffee machine. “There’s virtually no one here, I’m sure you can handle it the rest of the day.”
He storms out of the café and puts in an extra effort to slam the door behind him.
*
Continue to Part 3..