(no subject)
Title: So You Think You Can Tell (Pt. 6)
Pairing: Casey/OMC, C/Z (past)
Rating: R
Disclaimer: Don't own!
Synopsis: When the truth comes out, the truth comes out.
“OW! Oh geez…”
“What was that?”
Casey chuckled into the phone. “Just Dad, of course.” He held the phone away from his face and turned to yell, “YOU OKAY?” toward the back of the house.
“He’s fine! Now, hurry-please, we’ve gotta meet up with Jen…”
Casey shook his head, hearing his mother’s fussing and blustering-about the kitchen, all in the name of a surprise rummage sale being held at the First Congregational in downtown. He returned to Jeremy, who was chuckling on the other end. “Sorry-anyway, you were saying something about stealing my friend?” Casey said.
“Oh, stop! C’mon, like I said-Delilah called me, not the other way around,” Jeremy replied. “She said she was heading to the mall, asked if I wanted to meet her there. ‘Said yes, of course.”
“Of course. Oh well, tell her I said ‘hi’… if she remembers who I am…”
Jeremy laughed and began asking if he needed anything for his camera-getting, “You should know the answer to that by now…” as a reply when Mr. Connor came into the room. He motioned for Casey to put the phone down a moment.
“Hold on, Jer… yeah?”
“Your mom’s gonna need my help with this ‘surprise sale’ going on. I just unloaded her last trip from the van, to make room for whatever she lugs home tonight.” The man rolled his eyes, shook his head then sighed out the next few words, “Mind mikeing-up leftovers for yourself tonight? Looks likes this is gonna take a while.”
“Yeah, I’m good. Have fun.”
“Pfft, between her and work calling me every ten minutes, I’m in for a GREAT time…”
Casey smiled as his father left; he returned to the phone. “Sorry. Mom’s going apeshit over some big rummage sale she and my aunt just found out about, like, an hour ago,” Casey said, just as his mother cried, “Frank, PLEASE put the phone down and get me out from under this desk!”
“Did I… just hear that?” Jeremy asked through puffing chortles.
“What, you’ve never heard YOUR mom holler out that kinda weird-assed shit?” Casey said.
“Well, maybe-not that weird, though. What’s she doing under a desk?”
“It’s probably the one on the porch, getting moved around to make room for… fuck knows.”
“Casey, can you just come out for a minute, help your father with the last few boxes??”
It was no use. He could barely hear Jeremy over the phone when he’d be damned-near shouting, not with all the rushing and panicking in the household. “One sec!” he called, then said, “Sorry, I gotta go. Maybe I’ll call you later.”
“Okay. And yeah, I promise…” Jeremy paused and brought his voice down to a hiss, saying, “…I won’t let Del get to any of our ‘secret photo session’ in the pile.”
Casey blushed and bit his lip. “Ye-e-eah, lock and key, like you promised me,” he said.
“Hope to die! Bye!”
“Bye,” Casey said then hung up the phone. It was brought back to the kitchen to charge, leaving Casey’s hands empty to help. He joined his parents at the car in the drive; he’d make things as quick as he could, his not bothering to throw on a coat. “Here, Dad,” he said, taking the other side of the box the man had just extracted.
“Ugh, thanks, Son,” he said before diving in for the last box.
Casey was glad for the sand and rock salt his mom had thrown down, as the small amount of melting from the day’s sunshine was starting to refreeze, creating slick, dangerous spots on the pavement. He crunched his way up the stairs and brought the box to the middle of the porch where there was just enough room left for his and his father’s haul. Mr. Connor edged his way by and dropped the box down; the bent over position he’d taken doing so looked hard to climb out of as he groaned and jerked his way to a stand again. “That woman’s gonna kill me, one of these days,” he said.
“Aw, Dad…”
“Okay! We’re done, hurry, honey!” Mrs. Connor called from the van as she climbed in. Looking like he was off to enjoy a funeral, Mr. Connor sighed, gave Casey a lazy salute then went back out to the drive. Casey waved them off, bursting into laughter over the woman backing-out at a dangerous speed.
The surprise evening by himself was welcome; he’d figured he’d be sorting through the pictures in his room with a chair shoved under the knob. It’d been dangerous enough, coming home and finding his mother heading to the stairs, her first question being, “Oh, are those the pictures?” with excitement. Casey had faked the need for the bathroom, telling her he’d bring them out to show her when he was ‘done’. Thankfully, she’d stayed downstairs to get them both some tea instead of following him, letting him hop into his room quick, dig the ‘top secret’ pack of pictures out and stuff them behind his secret-spot behind old schoolbooks on his shelf.
Oddly enough, the comments she’d made throughout their tea and viewing of the winter-fun had been expected. From, “Aw, Zeke’s bobble-head hat is adorable!” to “who won the saucer-race?”, she kept more than half of her focus on Casey’s ex. It’d never been a secret, her having the innocent, girlhood-crush aimed straight on the ‘dark, tall and handsome’ type she gravitated to. Her husband, one of Herrington’s star basketball players, had the height and smooth, masculine features, leaving him with the only ‘flaw’ of lighter hair. The story of his once having dyed his hair black to please her still made Casey guffaw, especially with how his mother described him as looking more like he’d broken a few black-ink pens on his hair, instead of attaining the Elvis look she’d drooled over. But she loved him all the same.
That didn’t mean she wouldn’t let her eyes wander over to wherever Zeke was sitting, standing or-perhaps especially, bending over. Her unapologetic, blunt replies never failed to make Casey blush. “I’m an ASS-girl, sue me!” she’d once said after Casey caught her staring at Zeke’s position, that being his kneeling on the floor and trying to help free a busted fork from the insides of the dishwasher. Even worse was that it’d been said right the fuck there, making Zeke blush right along with Casey.
Jeremy was only a few inches taller than Casey, light blonde hair and the only real ‘dark’ quality he had was a brown-colored blob as a birthmark on his ankle. But Casey knew enough about his mother to know she wasn’t going to judge someone solely by their looks. As long as they possessed some intelligence-which Jeremy did; a good-hearted nature-again, Jeremy did; had plenty of faults to prove that the best of people could be imperfect, something Casey was well-aware Jeremy didn’t just have, but was skilled at exhibiting…
So it was a mystery to Casey as to just why she didn’t like him… which he knew she didn’t. The incoherent grunts as replies from his father, along with his stoic, suspicious look any time Jeremy wandered by was something Casey had expected. But even if Jeremy hoarded talk-time, or was sometimes tripping himself up in dropping too many mentions about what kind of cash he’d come from, he was nice, generous, even. Sometimes TOO generous, making Casey feel a little uncomfortable whenever they’d go out shopping together. Just the offers Jeremy made involving ‘leftovers’ from his closets were worthy of making a few grand on eBay.
As Casey fixed up the plate of leftover ribs, rice pilaf and green beans from the fridge, he was brought back to Monday. The soda-buying and cracker-sharing with Zeke had been followed by something Casey had dearly hoped the young man hadn’t noticed, as Jeremy’s bringing up Casey as a project didn’t go down well with Casey, either. If HE had a problem with it, Zeke-the live-by-your-own-rules, rebellious young man that he was, had been bound to not just be irked by it, but bring it up to give a ‘don’t you dare fall for that shit’ warning to Casey. That was one of the things Casey had loved, still loved about the boy; not once had he felt the need to change anything about himself in order to ‘please’ Zeke as a boyfriend. There’d never been a ‘formal dress required’ rule for any of their dates, no criticism over what Casey wore altogether and always let Casey know that Casey was just fine the way Casey was. That was something he’d have to work on with Jeremy, unfortunately.
The microwave beeped, interrupting his thoughts. Another beep followed when he opened it, making him wonder if the old thing was finally starting to die. He checked the inside, the buttons-nothing. Sighing, he ignored possible appliance problems in favor of filling a glass with juice then taking it and his plate over to the kitchen table to eat.
He’d gotten three bites in of the pork when the strange noise came again; Casey looked to the microwave, but the next beep! seemed to come more from the left, by the counter near the back door. ‘Toaster?’ he thought then immediately rolled his eyes at himself. He interrupted his meal to go over and find the source of the noise, just in time to hear two… no, three, beeps in quick succession. He felt like an idiot, as he’d heard his dad’s text notification noise go off before and should have recognized it. “Forgot it again,” he said aloud. Seeing as his dad complained about work bugging him over important changes going down in the office, Casey figured a quick check wouldn’t hurt. His mother didn’t have a cell phone, but Aunt Jen did. If anything, he could call and let his dad know of anything important that he was missing.
The text icon in the menu had a number five in parentheses, so Casey highlighted the option and clicked. ‘I know this num…’ he immediately thought in seeing the unread messages at the top. “Zeke’s texting…?” he said aloud and before giving it any thought, he scrolled down to the get to the first message. It took some time, more than expected, and when he finally reached the end, his eyes widened at the dates and times. According to the cell, Zeke hadn’t started texting out-of-the-blue five minutes ago, but just before three on Sunday. Casey sped back to his chair, sat in a jerk and clicked to bring that very first message up.
With every one of Zeke’s texts including his father’s replies, Casey was getting some serious insight as to just what the hell had been going on, right under his nose. His teeth were clenched and extremities shaking more and more with every word he read; what exactly had brought this on? As far as Casey knew, Zeke had never shared his number with Mr. Connor, and vice versa. His dad hadn’t even gotten the goddamned cell until three weeks before, and only because it was through work.
“O-Oh my god,” Casey said in a shuddering groan as he realized that the times listed coincided with the few times Zeke had been supposedly texting ‘Dad’. ‘You sneaky fuck!’ Casey thought toward Zeke’s executing such a ruse, right the hell there with everyone in the Connor’s living room. Though he discovered that his mother, however she still ran Zeke’s fan-club, was NOT involved in the scheming, Casey still shook his head from side-to-side, coming close to growling under his breath. When he realized that Zeke had met up with him later in the night under the cover of Casey’s uncle supposedly needing help with his kitchen rebuilding project, he had to put the phone down and take a few deep breaths. The shake in his chest had tightened every muscle, right down to the bone.
‘You… fucking… assholes.’ His inner-thoughts had a deep, dark voice Casey barely recognized. There weren’t many times he felt the rage as he did right now, however. One thing was for sure; he got up and carried his plate over to the counter, re-wrapped it in plastic wrap and tossed it back into the fridge. He’d gone from hungry to sick-to-his-stomach in a shot. He looked back to the table at the phone, steaming up enough to want to know more-this anger wanted to feed.
Though a few more texts before tonight had a questionable feel to them, from Zeke’s end anyway, he couldn’t erase just how underhanded this felt. He was dying to know who’d started what with who, and why. A shared hate of the new boyfriend was evident, clear-as-fucking-day… but why, what the hell was either one of them going to gain by ruining Casey’s relationship? Did either one of these idiots consider how it was going to be if-no, WHEN, as everyone’s reality was going to have to accept-Casey found out? As tears pricked at Casey’s eyes, the anger turning to hurt, he finally reached the first newest message sent tonight. If he clicked it, his dad would know it’d been read… so damned-fucking-right, click…
hey, texting to say that the plans off. Cant do this. Its starting to rly weigh too much to the point where I FEEL it, and im getting uncomfortable. Youre his dad so I cant get into it all the way but im sorry. K? its getting too complicated for me to handle. After stuff I had to deal w/ today and finding out things that rly just HURT, ive gotta bail.
Casey stared at the word ‘hurt’. Something had hurt Zeke, today-but what? Was dealing with his mother’s bank issues bad enough that he had to drop THIS stupid ‘project’ in order to tend to that? Casey clicked to the next texts, no more stops in between, reading on:
thing is, I went into this on the impulse of ‘maybe I can get him back’ as part of my reasons, but in the end I wanted to make sure he wasn’t getting with someone that’s no good. Whether we ended up together again was a perk, and its clear to me that he wants jer, NOT me. And I or rly WE have to be ok with that.
Still don’t think jer’s ‘the one’ for case, but he’s the one case chose. They fit somehow and I don’t get it but it aint my decision. Maybe they’ll see it soon and you can be happy over it, but at this point, it wont matter to me. Im letting it go. No offense, but I was already hurt by what he did and don’t feel like weaseling my way around some ‘new guy’ to see if I got some kinda shot.
If casey had wanted me we never woulda broken up, cos in the end, he broke it off with me and seems to have done aright for himself. So cool. And who knows, maybe jer will get some sense and stop acting like a spoiled rich kid, realize the shit he says and does can be taken stupid-wrong. But again, not my problem.
After all this, I dunno if I could even be *friends* with casey. I did this, he did that, done. Maybe after some time, well see. But yeah… sorry. Hope shit works out. Maybe when it blows over, ill be by for some of mom-connors kickass cooking, or sneak over when he aint home for a plate, if im still welcome to it. Whatever. U don’t gotta text back. No bigs.
“Wha…” Casey muttered as he stared at the words Zeke had sent-to his father, not him. Why was Zeke telling him this stuff, instead of Casey himself? As far as he’d known, their breakup had been as tumultuous as most go, but ended up okay. Thinking back to the day they’d severed the ‘boyfriend ties’, Casey tried recalling what Zeke had said. Yet all he could remember was him standing there, staring at Casey with a blank expression. He had shaken his head a few times and tried making strong replies to Casey’s understandable ranting of frustration, but… ‘He sucks at communicating on a GOOD day,’ Casey thought. That had been clear, barely getting three words out with what felt like hour-long pauses in between. That itself had been a part of Casey’s annoyance that had built up and up, until finally… boom.
But in these texts? He seemed able to ‘get it out’, only to the wrong person. The VERY wrong person. The scheming, plotting, planning… Casey felt a rush of anger and daring spirit, as he began typing back:
well look at that, dad leaves his f’in phone home and I get to see just WHAT the FUCK you and him got up to, huh???? GUESS WHO you jackhammer, I
Casey stopped and frowned. Goddamned spellcheck. He hit the back button, typed the original insult of jackhole then stopped again. This time, all he could do was stare at his own words, so far unsent.
No. Texting was so damned crass. This needed to be a face-to-face-perhaps with a little of his own scheming involved. He erased what he’d written, thought a moment as to what sounded like his jerk of a dad then returned to the keyboard:
you ok? I thought everything was going fine but you sound messed up. Casey smiled, hit send and sat back in his chair. Seconds felt like hours, waiting to see if Zeke took the bait. Sure enough, the reply came only a little more than a minute later.
ill be fine. Just sitting on the couch zoning to stupid sitcoms and gorging on chips. Sorry like I said.
“Damned right you’re sorry,” Casey said. He sent his next text, his grin growing more devious in replying, no its ok. Need me to come by to talk or something? Im out cruising town, nothing to do, so if u want ill come by with some KFC or sumthin.
The second Casey hit send, he winced and hissed. ‘Sumthin’ wasn’t in his dad’s vernacular; it was too ‘teenager’, making him worry that Zeke was going to catch on as to just who had the phone right now. The next wait for a reply was longer, making Casey worry at his lip with anxiety. Shit. Shit, shit, shit…
The second the phone beeped, he grabbed it and looked. A heavy sigh of relief flooded out of his chest as he read, sounds good actually. Planned on being alone, but… yeah come by. Just as long as u aint gonna convince me to stick with your ‘plan’ there lol… front doors open, not getting off this damn couch.
“Perfect,” Casey said aloud. After typing a quick, be there in about 15-20 or so, he got up from the table and went to the front hall for his shoes. Winter wear was thrown on, his messenger bag slung over his shoulder, and the keys to his dad’s sedan snatched from the hanger on the wall. He had a general open invitation to it, so long as his dad didn’t have plans. It almost made him scowl; plans. His only comforts had to do with how Zeke HAD smartened-up, and that he indeed would be stopping by the KFC with the money he’d taken out that afternoon at the bank. He’d started feeling his appetite return-the extra energy to get through tonight, with its more-than-likely craziness ahead, was going to be needed.
~*~
It was too dark outside for Zeke to see anything past the porch; Casey took a deep breath as he saw the curtains of the front window sway back into place. ‘Yup, I’m here, you prick,’ he thought as he’d seen Zeke move the fabric aside to look out at the street, where Casey had parked the car. Gathering as much courage as he could, his bag and the fried chicken basket with sides was gathered up and he left the car.
His hopes that Zeke would, in fact, stay cemented to the couch were answered. After stomping snow and ice from his boots on the battered, old welcome mat provided, Casey steeled himself for what he was about to do and opened the door.
“Hey,” Zeke called from the nearby living room. “Kinda lied. I DID get up to make a pot of coffee, fixed you up some.”
Hidden by the foyer wall, Casey quickly got his heavy coat, gloves and hat off, leaving his boots on. Before he could rethink things, Casey made his stride slow and easy as he entered the room. He turned to the couch, finding Zeke lighting a cigarette. For one beautiful second, the young man hadn’t noticed who his real guest was, until he grumbled, “damned lighter’s dyin’,” tossed the shiny, expensive looking tool on the table and looked up just as Casey dumped the KFC bag on the coffee table in front of him. All he did was stare at Casey, as if he was trying to contemplate the most perplexing, puzzling mystery known to mankind.
“Hey there,” Casey said.
“Uh…” Zeke uttered. He darted his eyes from Casey to their dinner a few passes, before clearing his throat and sitting back slowly. “What’s… this… about?”
“What, the chicken? You said you’d go for some, remember?” Casey slipped his father’s cell from his pocket, held it up and tapped it in the air a few times. “That’s what you texted, anyway.”
Zeke was completely unreadable now. Instead of going either ghost-pale or red as a beet, his face stayed even, unchanged. He made an indistinguishable, light grunt and turned his gaze from Casey back to the TV. “I take it your dad’s out,” he said in a gruff mutter.
“Yup.” Casey sat down on the other side of the couch in a shot and began going through the dinner items. “So I got two small sides of potatoes, tub of corn… original recipe. Fuck the ‘extra crispy’ shit no one likes.”
“I like extra-crispy,” Zeke said. There was almost a note of defiance in his voice, as if everything Casey said was going to be met with a strange counterpoint. It made Casey’s lips twitch into a smirk before it disappeared with a sigh.
“You’re a rare breed, then-“
“So now you know. Feel good?”
Casey paused in his uncapping the corn to look over. Still still, unmoved, cigarette getting a heavy suck in Zeke’s lips. A twinge of anger-how DARE he be so flat-affect and moody, already-heated Casey’s face enough for him to say, “OH yeah. Real good, Tyler. Knowing what sneaky fucks you and Dad have been, behind my back? Behind Jeremy’s back? Yeah, it’s just fantastic.”
“It was your dad’s idea, one I wasn’t that huge on,” Zeke spat back.
“But you went for it anyway.”
“’Wish I hadn’t. I already lost my investment in the ‘Bank of Casey’ more than a month ago. Throwing any energy back into that pit was gonna end up a waste whether this crazy shit panned out or not.” Zeke suddenly stood, grabbed his empty mug from the table and stormed off to the kitchen.
‘Oh, no. That’s not how this is gonna play out,’ Casey thought with a violence, making him get up as well to follow the boy. Now in the kitchen, he watched as Zeke poured a new coffee for himself, his back to Casey. “So Dad started it… how? He suddenly ring you up outta the blue, drop by? What?”
“He’s the sneakier-fuckier of the two of us, so you know. He tracked me down at my uncle’s bar, there. Remembered my going there for… whatever,” Zeke answered. He turned, sipping his coffee as he leaned on the counter. The fact that he hadn’t put on a look of shock, surprise and even fear was gnawing at Casey more and more. “I shoulda seen through his schmoozing little performance from the get-go, acting chummy with me, playing some pool. Kept dropping hints at what he was there for, but again, I didn’t fully catch-on. ‘Til he brought things back to the bar and… hah…”
“What?” Casey said, watching a wry, sarcastic smirk come on Zeke’s face.
“Bet he sunk the eight on purpose, to get us out of the game and have ‘talk-time’. Yeah…”
Everything was getting even more cryptic, when all Casey wanted were honest, cut-and-dry answers. “So he actually asked you if you’d-go in on some stupid ‘quest’ to break me and Jer off?”
“Yup,” Zeke said.
“That’s… fucking sick.”
“It’s what he did. If you couldn’t tell, your dad can’t stand the guy. And even if he went about this whole-thing, like this, I can’t fucking blame him,” Zeke replied. His stare on Casey had grown more solid, enough for Casey’s whole body to stiffen. This was all one big act, with Zeke’s actions and replies asking Casey, ”And what the fuck are you gonna DO about it, boy?” instead of cried-out apologies and feeling regret over his and Casey’s dad’s sneaking around. Zeke didn’t emote a shred of ‘sorry’, when he should have been begging for Casey not to hate him for what he-they-had done.
“Whose decision IS it, my dating Jeremy? Or ANY guy, huh? Whose??” Casey said In a louder, firmer voice. “Mine. Not yours, not my fucking dad, mine!”
“Am I saying it ain’t? No, I gave up on the idea. Gave up on it yesterday, really, for fuck’s sake.”
“A bit too late for that now. And, well, seeing as how you’d texted about me and you not even being friends anymore, maybe I DON’T need to get the ‘full story’ from you. I can just wait for Mom and Dad to get back and ream HIS ass out, instead.”
“You’ve got a talent in that. Ranting and raving, meaning,” Zeke said with the most obvious bitterness dripping from his voice. Casey had to be so red with the radiating heat growing in his face.
“You’ve got some fucking nerve, Zeke. Some. Fucking. Nerve,” he said, moving closer until he was only a foot or so away. “When I’ve got some pretty understandable reasons TO rant and rave? Yeah, I’ll step up and say something about it. You? Hah, you make people think everything’s just fine then stab them in the back-“
“I never made out like things were ‘just fine’, the fuck you say?” Zeke interrupted. His eyes narrowed as he continued, “You decided we were done, told me so then all but raced outta here, leaving me to wonder what the fuck had just happened. I never got a word in past your yelling and bitching.”
“So now you’re gonna bring ALL of that up into this, make out like because I broke up with you, you were somehow justified in pulling this shit?” Casey held back the urge to shove at Zeke’s front; feeling the urge to move this along into anything but Zeke’s cool and insulting retorts, even if it came to blows, was almost scary. It made Casey shake, hard enough to curl his arms tight over his chest and sniff a few times before saying, “If you’d ever actually cared for me, you wouldn’t have done this. You would’ve been happy for our friendship we had after breaking-up. I thought, at least, us being able to do that was valuable. But I guess you didn’t.”
Zeke stared back at Casey, this time with something flaring in the deep brown of his eyes. He cocked his head to the side a little, regarding Casey much like a hungry lion to an injured gazelle. “It’s funny… how you’ve inflated your ego so much that you think you can dole out how someone should or shouldn’t feel about whatever crap you pull,” he said.
The shaking in Casey’s body seemed to freeze and hold him very, very still. “Wha…?”
“Does it make you feel better, thinking I really didn’t care? Whether the whole time we dated or the last week when you started throwing everything we had into the shitter? Cos’ it wasn’t me, switching shit up on you, making demands. I liked things the way they’d been, thought you did too. Thought I was enough. But I wasn’t, was I?”
“Wasn’t… Zeke…”
Zeke let a heavy breath out through his nose and he straightened. The even expression returned as he watched Casey try to work through the confusion he felt. “You really don’t get it. Do you,” he stated.
“What… IS there to get? People break-up all the fuckin’ TIME, it happens! God, you’d dated how many people before me? You were my first, if anyone was gonna be an amateur, it was me!”
“Bingo.”
Frustration was turning to a rage that was in danger of making Casey pass out. “Bingo WHAT?”
“You were the amateur. The ‘newbie’ to relationships. Can’t count ninety-nine percent of anything I ever did with anyone else as actual relationship stuff. Flings, that was all, really. So really, you were technically MY first, too,” Zeke explained. “You were the first person I ended up with who I cared about. Hard. More than even my own parents.”
The shake returned. The switch in moods Casey felt, following the clues Zeke was giving him to whatever mystery there was between them started making him feel dizzy. He let out a tremulous breath and shook his head. “You said nothing. You stood there, saying nothing… and I’m expected to… god, this is fucking ridiculous…”
“Babe.” An odd smirk came on Zeke’s face and he shook his head. “You didn’t let me say a damned thing. Our breakup was your show, starring you. Only you. I was just a prop for you to yell at.”
“No! That’s not-that’s bullshit!” Casey outright yelled, flustered and confused.
“I wasn’t the one you wanted, in the end. I mean, look at Jeremy. Really?” Zeke said with a scoff as he took a hearty sip from his mug. “Me an’ him, we’re total opposites. You went for a whole new breed after you shut our shit down. It’s telling.”
“Okay. I’m serious, stop-with this-confusing shit,” Casey haltingly said, even waved his hands out over the floor as if physically trying to clear the air, to see things better. “Nothing… I had with you has anything to do with Jeremy, what I have with him. Why are you saying this… stuff?”
“Dunno.” Zeke stared into his drink, as if hypnotized. It was his turn to look bereft of answers, full of doubt. The pause that stretched between them was almost excruciating, the kind that made Casey start talking, or blurting things out really, to fill the void. Something deep inside of him told him to wait through it, however; no matter how hard it was. Finally, when Casey was fit to burst, Zeke’s lips parted to say, “’Did something else sneaky. When you went into the bank, I went to look at the pics. But I grabbed the wrong folder. The one you probably hid in some complicated secret room not even your parents know exist in the house.”
Casey’s lashes were more like hummingbirds now, fluttering at a rapid pace. “My… pics… with… you saw them?”
“It was like… gutted. I kept telling myself to ‘put them the fuck back’, but kept looking through them. Like I was torturing myself, seeing you, him, on film. After dropping you off…” Zeke cocked his head to the side, his brow furrowing as he continued gazing into his mug. Casey noticed how bright Zeke’s eyes had become, making him realize that for the first time, ever, he could see what Zeke looked like when he cried. That alone sobered him and made a hot, uncomfortable pit grow in his stomach. “…All I could think was, ‘how come we never did that together?’ You’re a photographer. The idea would’ve come up, if you wanted that, with me. Right? But it didn’t. You’re with Jer a few weeks and bam, sexy photo-shoot time.”
“I’d… Zeke, no. No, no, I…” Casey swallowed, the pain it caused to his throat making him wince a little. “…I never thought of it when we’d dated, cos’-I’d never thought of it. Me and Jer, we… DID it, because he brought it up.”
“But you did it.”
“Yeah, because he swore up and fucking down he’d keep HIS under wraps, never to be seen by anyone but him,” Casey said. He began shaking his head a little; it was a mix of frustration at yet MORE of Zeke’s being sneaky and seeing those goddamned pictures and feeling sad for the young man having seen them altogether. It wasn’t as if he suspected there was anything but pictures of their day out together. That had been what he’d dug around in those folders for, not blackmail-material. “I wish… you hadn’t seen them. Not just because OF them, but… really, Zeke, that had to be…”
“Gutting. Like I said.” Zeke lifted his face but didn’t look at Casey, choosing to turn his head quick to the window above the sink. His nose twitched and let out a series of sharp, quick hisses. Casey’s breathing faltered as he spotted a tear making its escape, leaving a trail down to the side of Zeke’s nose. Zeke turned on his heels toward the sink, slugged back the rest of his drink then turned toward the doorway. As he walked off, he said, “But yeah, scheming with your fuckin’ dad… not cool. I’m sorry for that.”
Casey swallowed hard then followed, finding Zeke going to the stairs. “Zeke, what’s… going on with you…”
“Nothing. You should probably get goin’, I’m tired. Going to bed.” Zeke kept rubbing the side of his nose as he stared up at the second floor. In a distant voice, he said, “Don’t be too hard on your dad. ‘K? He’s a good guy, just-wants to run your life, like most dads do with their kids.”
“Never mind that, you’ve… been telling me how you’ve been ‘gutted’ by things, whatever else. That’s more important.”
“It’s not, I’ll get over it.”
“Zeke, seriously-“
“I don’t FEEL like talking about it!” Zeke’s bellowing the words made Casey jump, his eyes snapping wide open. Zeke had finally turned to face him again; though more tears had streamed down, ones he’d been doing his best to hide, Casey noticed how pink his face had gotten. After a few moments of staring hard at Casey, Zeke groaned and shook his head. “I just got past my ‘life sucks’ breakdown from this afternoon, and don’t feel like fucking revisiting it. Especially with you right the hell here.”
“I thought we were okay,” Casey said, his own eyes starting to sting. “You hadn’t said much of anything. You didn’t even seem angry, or upset. So… s-so I thought it hadn’t mattered to you.”
“You were okay with it all, Casey. That’s what let you move on so quick…” Zeke rubbed his face with both hands and groaned. “I’m serious, I don’t wanna go over this shit right now. ‘K? Please?”
“When, then? Cos’… we gotta. Or really, you gotta,” Casey said. Zeke didn’t reply-but he wasn’t yelling, either. Casey waited through the pause before letting out a sigh. “Maybe you’re right. Thinking back… I hadn’t come up for air, ranting and yelling and stuff. So… I wanna fix that. Cos’ we can’t be friends if any ‘left unsaid’ stuff is… or if you don’t want to be friends, whatever…”
Zeke groaned and looked back to Casey. “I was just being mopey and emotional when I typed that, ‘k? But I dunno how to work this shit out to BE friends-you’re right, after this? Being the sneaky fuck I was, holding shit back that might’ve been good to let out a WHOLE lot earlier, I mean…”
“Whatever, doesn’t matter. Please, just…” Casey motioned to the couch, looked over and blinked fast. “Plus, there’s dinner.”
“Oh. Yeah,” Zeke said, looking over as well.
“So let’s just… eat. We don’t even gotta talk first, whatever. I dunno about you, but I’m starving,” Casey said.
Zeke kept silent now, but he nodded, turned toward the living room and joined Casey on the couch. Sporks, napkins and containers were divvied-up between them before diving into the miraculously still-warm chicken. All the words Casey wanted to say kept trying to push out through his mouth, so he did his best to shove spoonful after spoonful of corn and potato down, squashing out the danger. Zeke more nibbled at his food, but he wasn’t angry, or worse, bursting into tears. Just the small, barely-there visions of tears on his face that Casey had seen were enough to make HIM cry.
‘I made them,’ Casey thought to himself. As frustrated over this weird situation his dad and Zeke had brought everyone into, he’d said enough. Zeke knew Casey knew. He’d already bailed from the ‘project’ before Casey knew. Casey had to do his best to give him some points for that.
“Not that hungry,” Zeke finally said after about ten minutes of moving food around aimlessly. Some corn was gone, along with a bit of potato, though he hadn’t bothered getting his fingers greasy with the main course. Casey wasn’t going to push it; he shrugged and put his emptied containers and napkins into the take-out bag.
“Yeah, I’m good,” he said.
“You really hurt me, Casey.”
Casey turned to look at the young man, who sat in a relaxed pose of one arm outstretched along the back of the couch, the other bent with its fingers tracing Zeke’s lips. The only sign of tension was his propped-up foot on his knee, tapping quickly in the air. When Zeke sighed, the foot dropped down and he relaxed against the couch, eyes staring at the ceiling. While Casey was dying to press the issue, it was clear that Zeke was about to let some things go. However awkward the pauses and stammering, it didn’t matter. Casey relaxed his posture as well, turning himself completely with his knees bent up to his chest. His eyes stayed on Zeke, who inhaled deeply before saying, “Being with you, the way we were? ‘Felt like everything I’d ever wanted for myself but never knew what that everything would end up being. ‘Til… you.”
Casey’s arms tensed and closed in tight against his sides and chest. Zeke had always had those sweet moments, whether through the whispered, “love you,”s before they fell asleep in bed together; buying him candy when they’d have a spat, an apologetic smile on his face; even those times he’d say, “C’mon, I’m too cute for you to stay mad at me,” would break through Casey’s hard-headed, grumpy side. But right now, more than a month after they split-up, the things he said carried weight. A weight he’d carried around without telling anyone…
“I thought we were fine. I know I felt damned good. Then it was like… you decided ‘we’ weren’t enough; the whole world needed to know. That was something I was not ready for, full-stop. I kept trying to compromise, saying we could go outta town to some club, makeout in the middle of the dance floor-but that hadn’t been enough, for you. And…” Zeke paused with a groan, sat up and grabbed his cigarettes from the table. Once he’d lit up, he grunted back down to his slouching state and went on, “…I’d almost chased after you that night you left. The LAST night you left. I was gonna say ‘fuck it’ and tell you that yeah, let’s just come-out to everyone, cos’ fuck, Casey, I didn’t wanna lose you. If I had to get shit from the jock-holes at school over what we were doing, didn’t matter, cos’ I was gonna be with you. But on my way to the door, I was hit with this… vision, I guess. You, in a hospital room, after a crowd of football-fucks cornered you in the locker room. So I traded being with you with you not going back to that.”
With the next pause, Casey felt more at ease-more like the ‘floor was open’ to him, if he wanted it. With a tentative, soft voice, he said, “I didn’t wanna lie anymore, Zeke. That’s all.”
“It’s not lying, it’s staying alive. Believe me, Casey, I know first-hand.”
Casey frowned. “Know… what?”
Zeke groaned again. “I never got into it. You always told me how fuckin’ cool I was, how you’d crushed on me all the way back to your freshman year. That shit. My telling you some of my ‘background’… would’ve been embarrassing, I guess,” he explained. “We went to different schools ‘til Herrington High, so you didn’t know me back in the fifth grade. Yeah, I’m taller than everyone now, but back then? I was a head shorter than all the boys, a scrawny, geeky kid with glasses who got the crap kicked outta ‘im by his own dad; the bigger guys at school, it was like they could smell that on me. It made ‘em all take a shot. I was a stepping stone for anyone who wanted to climb up the ‘school status’ ladder, really. You got a little cooler with everyone if they knew you’d slapped me around.”
It didn’t make sense, at all. Not one bit. Zeke-Herrington High’s resident cool loner, the kind most eighties movies were based on? Zeke must have noticed Casey’s awestruck look; he made a small smile and raised his eyebrows. “It’s all true. I was just as much a loner back then, only it was cos’ I… I dunno, gave people AIDS when they got too close to me, whatever other juvenile bullshit they could come up with to keep me sitting by myself at lunch and recess. It wasn’t until I finally snapped that it stopped. And by ‘snapped’, I mean ‘terrify the living fuck outta every kid in school’.”
“How… so?” Casey hesitantly asked.
Zeke still wore his smirk, but the rest of him looked uncomfortable. He shifted in his seat, grunting before answering, “It was the last week of school. Me, I was all for it-get me the fuck away from those fucks for a few months, I’m good. But it got worse every day leading up to vaca, ‘til two days before school ended, three of the biggest bullies decided to drag me behind the school, near the walkway to the baseball field and rec-shit out back. No teachers ever bothered going back there, so I was thinking that this was it-I was gonna end up in a coma or coffin. HUGE crowd followed, of course, everyone hollering and whooping ‘em on. So they tossed me in between the dumpsters and laughed-broke my glasses. But even when shit got blurry, I DID see this Snapple bottle behind the dumpster closest to me. So, I grabbed it, smashed it against the brick wall of the building… got up and went at ‘em.”
“Went…” Casey registered every bit of this awful, scary life-story, growing more and more anxious. “You like, cut them up?”
“Two of ‘em, yeah. The third guy, Jack Bailey, he ran away terrified, screaming for the teacher. Everyone watching just stood there, shocked to shit as I slashed at John Gilford, then threw myself at Micah-can’t remember his last name, all of a sudden…” Zeke paused as if trying to think, but gave up with a shake of his head and scratching the back of his neck. “Anyway, no one died. But there were stitches involved. And when the lazy-assed teachers finally arrived and pulled me off of him, I stared down at both the guys, yelling, ‘Try me another time, motherfuckers, see what I cut off next!’ After that…”
“I never heard this… when it should be fucking legend,” Casey said with a note of awe.
“Oh, it was, for a long, lo-o-ong time. It got embellished to hell, of course. Instead of three guys it was a dozen and I had a switchblade… one story even involved Chinese throwing stars.” Zeke paused to roll his eyes and scoff, but Casey surprised himself in chuckling. Zeke looked to him, relaxed a little to smile back then turned away again to continue, “After a few years, the story died down-but not my status. Instead of, ‘hey, let’s pick on the little nerd’ it turned into, ‘don’t even LOOK at that guy wrong, he’ll cripple your ass.’”
“I really, really wish you’d told me. First off, it’s just… kinda cool. Nothing I’ve never fantasized about during MY time as the geeky, default punching bag for the jocks, but… it would’ve explained why you wouldn’t have wanted to invite anything in that takes you back to that place,” Casey said.
“Would it honestly have changed anything for you, Casey?”
Casey thought a moment, then shrugged. “Maybe? I dunno… but I would’ve understood.”
“I dunno, either. Sometimes… and I ain’t saying this to bitch at you, but sometimes you just wouldn’t, didn’t listen. I’d learned early on to just shut up and wait for the storm to pass. If we got mad at each other, I’d just sit back and let you go off; if you got upset over something not related to me that I felt was a waste of energy, I didn’t dare tell you to calm down. I just let you yell ‘til you got tired,” Zeke said. “But the times when it was good? None of the bad shit mattered. Not a bit. It was all a part of being with you, so I took the bad with that good. It was worth it. ‘Til the last week.”
“I know. I just-“
“You called me a chicken-shit, every damned day,” Zeke interrupted, making Casey clam-up immediately. “Yeah, it started off more teasy, but it got worse and worse. You added ‘fucking’ to it, ‘you’re just a fucking chicken-shit’, all pissed-off. Honestly? As nasty as you may get, the shit I wanted to reply with?” Zeke gave him a heavy, pointed look. “Your parents would’ve taken me to court to cover your psych bills. I can be one evil, venomous fucker with just words, Case.”
“Yeah. I know,” Casey meekly replied, looking down into his lap. He’d seen-or really, heard, with his own two ears a few times over their high school career, in the halls, parking lot, classes even.
“And no, I ain’t breathing a word of what went on in my head. I never will. Cos’ it hurt to just think about saying, and why? Cos’ I was better than that. I was better cos’ you’d made me better,” Zeke said. “Then you just left. Smack-bam-boom, goodbye. I didn’t get a say in it, at all.”
“You said enough… in the box you dropped off, full of stuff,” Casey said, his voice even smaller now. He remembered that pang of sadness, the bite of regret in unpacking all of those special things he’d given Zeke over their five-months together. “I made out like I didn’t care when Dad told me you’d left it all on the porch, but actually seeing it, going through it?”
“Yeah, that…” Zeke took the last drag from his dying cigarette, leaned forward to stamp it out and sighed. “…That was just my way of saying ‘fine, fuck you then’. But it wasn’t completely honest.”
“What-wasn’t?”
“I’d gotten out the door with the box, but before I could lock-up, I stopped… went back in and made a copy of that mix-tape.”
Casey parted his lips. “The… ‘our songs’?”
Zeke nodded slowly. “I pretended I didn’t care, too. If ‘not caring’ means that whenever I’m depressed to hell, I pop that in to either depress myself more or cheer me up… and I never know what it’ll do, when I do it. But I do it.”
The flood of information, the many secrets Zeke had held onto now being released, was daunting. It was in a good way, but it made Casey’s brain go into DUH-mode all the same. “We’re… we’re a real pair of douchebags, huh?” he said, a small, embarrassed smile tickling his lips.
“No. We’re overdramatic teenagers. Or just teenagers, nothing else needed,” Zeke said.
“Yeah.” Casey busied himself with a loose thread of his jeans, the simple actions of curling and twisting at it soothing. It allowed him to say, “I’m sorry, Zeke. I never meant to hurt you… even if what I did meant that you were gonna be hurt, no matter what.”
“I know. But-that’s another thing that’s bugging me.” Zeke went serious in expression as he looked to Casey, his head resting on the back of the couch. “You broke shit off with me cos’ I wouldn’t join you in the ‘Gay Pride Parade’ you wanted to put on at school. Yet you’re still in that closet. No one knows about you, you being with the ‘new guy’ from another town. What am I supposed to think about that?”
“What are you… isn’t it obvious?”
“Wouldn’t ask about it, if it was.”
“Yeah, but…” Casey couldn’t help a wry chuckle, coming out in a puffing scoff. “Zeke. Okay, yes, I wanna be ‘out and proud’. I wanna make a statement, to not hide like I’m ashamed of who the fuck I really am. But-okay, you really don’t know?”
“Case…”
“I’d get all these chicks coming at me, knowing you and I were ‘best friends’. They don’t know we’re MORE than that, so if they wanted a shot at you? Guess who they’d try to get to you through first,” Casey said. “This one girl, fuck, it was disgusting…”
“Yeah. Delilah told me about that one, the other night,” Zeke said.
“When?”
“She came back after you guys all left, just to… hang,” Zeke said, adding a shrug. “We got on you as a subject; she told me about the whole note thing you were supposed to give me-“
“Yeah, and like fuck I was gonna pass it along, or even tell you what she told me to tell YOU, and… I wanted that to stop. Plus, just the fact that girls would do that, at least two a week if not more, and…” Casey couldn’t help another lone chuckle as he ran his fingers through his hair, frustrated and embarrassed at the same time. “…In a way, I wanted to let everyone know, all so I could brag about you choosing me… instead of them. I wanted to just-walk into school, holding hands to tell everyone, ‘don’t even THINK you’ve got a shot, cos’ he’s my man. Not yours.’ Wanted that so bad. It’d… started hurting, cos’ when I want it so bad and you absolutely do NOT… what’s that say to me, really?”
“What? You thought I was-embarrassed, being with you?” Zeke asked with a deep frown. “Why the fuck would you think that?”
“Why the fuck would you think I’d never take sexy-time pics with you if you’d asked-or that I wanted to use us being together as some activist action?”
“Because…” Zeke started but drifted off. He shook his head, a heavy hum thrumming in his chest and throat. “’Wish we’d gone over this a lo-o-ong time before now.”
Casey swallowed and nodded. “Might’ve been a good idea,” he said.
“Yeah.” Zeke scratched his chin then dropped his hand into his lap. “It would’ve been.”
“Woulda, coulda, shoulda…” Casey said, his voice tired and sing-song. Zeke made a drowsy-sounding moan, shook his head and sat up.
“I’m sorry, too-for the whole scheming mess me and your dad got up to. ‘Wasn’t right.”
“Do you… really, really not like Jeremy that much? Honestly asking, cos’… okay, he brags a lot, comes from money and lets everyone KNOW it-“
“He’s not an irredeemable asshole. But… still stand by my stance that he just doesn’t fit you. I dunno. But that ain’t my business, not anymore, anyway.”
Casey watched as Zeke groaned to a stand, stretched then-Christ, the neck thing. He had to look away as Zeke cracked bones into place. Even just the sound of light pops and his satisfied hums… “I should probably get back,” Casey said.
“Yeah. And-you were right.”
“About what?” Casey asked as he too fought himself off of the comfortable couch.
“I would’ve spent the time either pounding pillows or crying into ‘em. Wouldn’t have bothered getting back to the shit we really did have to go over. Just would’ve avoided you and your calls,” Zeke said. “So, I’m glad you pushed it. Carefully enough, anyway.”
“I saw that-you needed it. While I shut up and let you have the time,” Casey said.
“You did. Thanks.” Zeke looked unsure for a moment before rolling his eyes, stepping forward with an arm outstretched and put it over Casey’s shoulders for a quick but sweet hug. “You ain’t as bad as they all say.”
“Hey, he-e-y… waitaminnit…”
“Take a joke, ya geek,” Zeke said, pulling away with a grin-THE grin, the one Casey had always adored seeing on his face and hadn’t realized he’d longed to see again. Having created it for the young man to wear made it even brighter, in Casey’s eyes.
Pairing: Casey/OMC, C/Z (past)
Rating: R
Disclaimer: Don't own!
Synopsis: When the truth comes out, the truth comes out.
“OW! Oh geez…”
“What was that?”
Casey chuckled into the phone. “Just Dad, of course.” He held the phone away from his face and turned to yell, “YOU OKAY?” toward the back of the house.
“He’s fine! Now, hurry-please, we’ve gotta meet up with Jen…”
Casey shook his head, hearing his mother’s fussing and blustering-about the kitchen, all in the name of a surprise rummage sale being held at the First Congregational in downtown. He returned to Jeremy, who was chuckling on the other end. “Sorry-anyway, you were saying something about stealing my friend?” Casey said.
“Oh, stop! C’mon, like I said-Delilah called me, not the other way around,” Jeremy replied. “She said she was heading to the mall, asked if I wanted to meet her there. ‘Said yes, of course.”
“Of course. Oh well, tell her I said ‘hi’… if she remembers who I am…”
Jeremy laughed and began asking if he needed anything for his camera-getting, “You should know the answer to that by now…” as a reply when Mr. Connor came into the room. He motioned for Casey to put the phone down a moment.
“Hold on, Jer… yeah?”
“Your mom’s gonna need my help with this ‘surprise sale’ going on. I just unloaded her last trip from the van, to make room for whatever she lugs home tonight.” The man rolled his eyes, shook his head then sighed out the next few words, “Mind mikeing-up leftovers for yourself tonight? Looks likes this is gonna take a while.”
“Yeah, I’m good. Have fun.”
“Pfft, between her and work calling me every ten minutes, I’m in for a GREAT time…”
Casey smiled as his father left; he returned to the phone. “Sorry. Mom’s going apeshit over some big rummage sale she and my aunt just found out about, like, an hour ago,” Casey said, just as his mother cried, “Frank, PLEASE put the phone down and get me out from under this desk!”
“Did I… just hear that?” Jeremy asked through puffing chortles.
“What, you’ve never heard YOUR mom holler out that kinda weird-assed shit?” Casey said.
“Well, maybe-not that weird, though. What’s she doing under a desk?”
“It’s probably the one on the porch, getting moved around to make room for… fuck knows.”
“Casey, can you just come out for a minute, help your father with the last few boxes??”
It was no use. He could barely hear Jeremy over the phone when he’d be damned-near shouting, not with all the rushing and panicking in the household. “One sec!” he called, then said, “Sorry, I gotta go. Maybe I’ll call you later.”
“Okay. And yeah, I promise…” Jeremy paused and brought his voice down to a hiss, saying, “…I won’t let Del get to any of our ‘secret photo session’ in the pile.”
Casey blushed and bit his lip. “Ye-e-eah, lock and key, like you promised me,” he said.
“Hope to die! Bye!”
“Bye,” Casey said then hung up the phone. It was brought back to the kitchen to charge, leaving Casey’s hands empty to help. He joined his parents at the car in the drive; he’d make things as quick as he could, his not bothering to throw on a coat. “Here, Dad,” he said, taking the other side of the box the man had just extracted.
“Ugh, thanks, Son,” he said before diving in for the last box.
Casey was glad for the sand and rock salt his mom had thrown down, as the small amount of melting from the day’s sunshine was starting to refreeze, creating slick, dangerous spots on the pavement. He crunched his way up the stairs and brought the box to the middle of the porch where there was just enough room left for his and his father’s haul. Mr. Connor edged his way by and dropped the box down; the bent over position he’d taken doing so looked hard to climb out of as he groaned and jerked his way to a stand again. “That woman’s gonna kill me, one of these days,” he said.
“Aw, Dad…”
“Okay! We’re done, hurry, honey!” Mrs. Connor called from the van as she climbed in. Looking like he was off to enjoy a funeral, Mr. Connor sighed, gave Casey a lazy salute then went back out to the drive. Casey waved them off, bursting into laughter over the woman backing-out at a dangerous speed.
The surprise evening by himself was welcome; he’d figured he’d be sorting through the pictures in his room with a chair shoved under the knob. It’d been dangerous enough, coming home and finding his mother heading to the stairs, her first question being, “Oh, are those the pictures?” with excitement. Casey had faked the need for the bathroom, telling her he’d bring them out to show her when he was ‘done’. Thankfully, she’d stayed downstairs to get them both some tea instead of following him, letting him hop into his room quick, dig the ‘top secret’ pack of pictures out and stuff them behind his secret-spot behind old schoolbooks on his shelf.
Oddly enough, the comments she’d made throughout their tea and viewing of the winter-fun had been expected. From, “Aw, Zeke’s bobble-head hat is adorable!” to “who won the saucer-race?”, she kept more than half of her focus on Casey’s ex. It’d never been a secret, her having the innocent, girlhood-crush aimed straight on the ‘dark, tall and handsome’ type she gravitated to. Her husband, one of Herrington’s star basketball players, had the height and smooth, masculine features, leaving him with the only ‘flaw’ of lighter hair. The story of his once having dyed his hair black to please her still made Casey guffaw, especially with how his mother described him as looking more like he’d broken a few black-ink pens on his hair, instead of attaining the Elvis look she’d drooled over. But she loved him all the same.
That didn’t mean she wouldn’t let her eyes wander over to wherever Zeke was sitting, standing or-perhaps especially, bending over. Her unapologetic, blunt replies never failed to make Casey blush. “I’m an ASS-girl, sue me!” she’d once said after Casey caught her staring at Zeke’s position, that being his kneeling on the floor and trying to help free a busted fork from the insides of the dishwasher. Even worse was that it’d been said right the fuck there, making Zeke blush right along with Casey.
Jeremy was only a few inches taller than Casey, light blonde hair and the only real ‘dark’ quality he had was a brown-colored blob as a birthmark on his ankle. But Casey knew enough about his mother to know she wasn’t going to judge someone solely by their looks. As long as they possessed some intelligence-which Jeremy did; a good-hearted nature-again, Jeremy did; had plenty of faults to prove that the best of people could be imperfect, something Casey was well-aware Jeremy didn’t just have, but was skilled at exhibiting…
So it was a mystery to Casey as to just why she didn’t like him… which he knew she didn’t. The incoherent grunts as replies from his father, along with his stoic, suspicious look any time Jeremy wandered by was something Casey had expected. But even if Jeremy hoarded talk-time, or was sometimes tripping himself up in dropping too many mentions about what kind of cash he’d come from, he was nice, generous, even. Sometimes TOO generous, making Casey feel a little uncomfortable whenever they’d go out shopping together. Just the offers Jeremy made involving ‘leftovers’ from his closets were worthy of making a few grand on eBay.
As Casey fixed up the plate of leftover ribs, rice pilaf and green beans from the fridge, he was brought back to Monday. The soda-buying and cracker-sharing with Zeke had been followed by something Casey had dearly hoped the young man hadn’t noticed, as Jeremy’s bringing up Casey as a project didn’t go down well with Casey, either. If HE had a problem with it, Zeke-the live-by-your-own-rules, rebellious young man that he was, had been bound to not just be irked by it, but bring it up to give a ‘don’t you dare fall for that shit’ warning to Casey. That was one of the things Casey had loved, still loved about the boy; not once had he felt the need to change anything about himself in order to ‘please’ Zeke as a boyfriend. There’d never been a ‘formal dress required’ rule for any of their dates, no criticism over what Casey wore altogether and always let Casey know that Casey was just fine the way Casey was. That was something he’d have to work on with Jeremy, unfortunately.
The microwave beeped, interrupting his thoughts. Another beep followed when he opened it, making him wonder if the old thing was finally starting to die. He checked the inside, the buttons-nothing. Sighing, he ignored possible appliance problems in favor of filling a glass with juice then taking it and his plate over to the kitchen table to eat.
He’d gotten three bites in of the pork when the strange noise came again; Casey looked to the microwave, but the next beep! seemed to come more from the left, by the counter near the back door. ‘Toaster?’ he thought then immediately rolled his eyes at himself. He interrupted his meal to go over and find the source of the noise, just in time to hear two… no, three, beeps in quick succession. He felt like an idiot, as he’d heard his dad’s text notification noise go off before and should have recognized it. “Forgot it again,” he said aloud. Seeing as his dad complained about work bugging him over important changes going down in the office, Casey figured a quick check wouldn’t hurt. His mother didn’t have a cell phone, but Aunt Jen did. If anything, he could call and let his dad know of anything important that he was missing.
The text icon in the menu had a number five in parentheses, so Casey highlighted the option and clicked. ‘I know this num…’ he immediately thought in seeing the unread messages at the top. “Zeke’s texting…?” he said aloud and before giving it any thought, he scrolled down to the get to the first message. It took some time, more than expected, and when he finally reached the end, his eyes widened at the dates and times. According to the cell, Zeke hadn’t started texting out-of-the-blue five minutes ago, but just before three on Sunday. Casey sped back to his chair, sat in a jerk and clicked to bring that very first message up.
With every one of Zeke’s texts including his father’s replies, Casey was getting some serious insight as to just what the hell had been going on, right under his nose. His teeth were clenched and extremities shaking more and more with every word he read; what exactly had brought this on? As far as Casey knew, Zeke had never shared his number with Mr. Connor, and vice versa. His dad hadn’t even gotten the goddamned cell until three weeks before, and only because it was through work.
“O-Oh my god,” Casey said in a shuddering groan as he realized that the times listed coincided with the few times Zeke had been supposedly texting ‘Dad’. ‘You sneaky fuck!’ Casey thought toward Zeke’s executing such a ruse, right the hell there with everyone in the Connor’s living room. Though he discovered that his mother, however she still ran Zeke’s fan-club, was NOT involved in the scheming, Casey still shook his head from side-to-side, coming close to growling under his breath. When he realized that Zeke had met up with him later in the night under the cover of Casey’s uncle supposedly needing help with his kitchen rebuilding project, he had to put the phone down and take a few deep breaths. The shake in his chest had tightened every muscle, right down to the bone.
‘You… fucking… assholes.’ His inner-thoughts had a deep, dark voice Casey barely recognized. There weren’t many times he felt the rage as he did right now, however. One thing was for sure; he got up and carried his plate over to the counter, re-wrapped it in plastic wrap and tossed it back into the fridge. He’d gone from hungry to sick-to-his-stomach in a shot. He looked back to the table at the phone, steaming up enough to want to know more-this anger wanted to feed.
Though a few more texts before tonight had a questionable feel to them, from Zeke’s end anyway, he couldn’t erase just how underhanded this felt. He was dying to know who’d started what with who, and why. A shared hate of the new boyfriend was evident, clear-as-fucking-day… but why, what the hell was either one of them going to gain by ruining Casey’s relationship? Did either one of these idiots consider how it was going to be if-no, WHEN, as everyone’s reality was going to have to accept-Casey found out? As tears pricked at Casey’s eyes, the anger turning to hurt, he finally reached the first newest message sent tonight. If he clicked it, his dad would know it’d been read… so damned-fucking-right, click…
hey, texting to say that the plans off. Cant do this. Its starting to rly weigh too much to the point where I FEEL it, and im getting uncomfortable. Youre his dad so I cant get into it all the way but im sorry. K? its getting too complicated for me to handle. After stuff I had to deal w/ today and finding out things that rly just HURT, ive gotta bail.
Casey stared at the word ‘hurt’. Something had hurt Zeke, today-but what? Was dealing with his mother’s bank issues bad enough that he had to drop THIS stupid ‘project’ in order to tend to that? Casey clicked to the next texts, no more stops in between, reading on:
thing is, I went into this on the impulse of ‘maybe I can get him back’ as part of my reasons, but in the end I wanted to make sure he wasn’t getting with someone that’s no good. Whether we ended up together again was a perk, and its clear to me that he wants jer, NOT me. And I or rly WE have to be ok with that.
Still don’t think jer’s ‘the one’ for case, but he’s the one case chose. They fit somehow and I don’t get it but it aint my decision. Maybe they’ll see it soon and you can be happy over it, but at this point, it wont matter to me. Im letting it go. No offense, but I was already hurt by what he did and don’t feel like weaseling my way around some ‘new guy’ to see if I got some kinda shot.
If casey had wanted me we never woulda broken up, cos in the end, he broke it off with me and seems to have done aright for himself. So cool. And who knows, maybe jer will get some sense and stop acting like a spoiled rich kid, realize the shit he says and does can be taken stupid-wrong. But again, not my problem.
After all this, I dunno if I could even be *friends* with casey. I did this, he did that, done. Maybe after some time, well see. But yeah… sorry. Hope shit works out. Maybe when it blows over, ill be by for some of mom-connors kickass cooking, or sneak over when he aint home for a plate, if im still welcome to it. Whatever. U don’t gotta text back. No bigs.
“Wha…” Casey muttered as he stared at the words Zeke had sent-to his father, not him. Why was Zeke telling him this stuff, instead of Casey himself? As far as he’d known, their breakup had been as tumultuous as most go, but ended up okay. Thinking back to the day they’d severed the ‘boyfriend ties’, Casey tried recalling what Zeke had said. Yet all he could remember was him standing there, staring at Casey with a blank expression. He had shaken his head a few times and tried making strong replies to Casey’s understandable ranting of frustration, but… ‘He sucks at communicating on a GOOD day,’ Casey thought. That had been clear, barely getting three words out with what felt like hour-long pauses in between. That itself had been a part of Casey’s annoyance that had built up and up, until finally… boom.
But in these texts? He seemed able to ‘get it out’, only to the wrong person. The VERY wrong person. The scheming, plotting, planning… Casey felt a rush of anger and daring spirit, as he began typing back:
well look at that, dad leaves his f’in phone home and I get to see just WHAT the FUCK you and him got up to, huh???? GUESS WHO you jackhammer, I
Casey stopped and frowned. Goddamned spellcheck. He hit the back button, typed the original insult of jackhole then stopped again. This time, all he could do was stare at his own words, so far unsent.
No. Texting was so damned crass. This needed to be a face-to-face-perhaps with a little of his own scheming involved. He erased what he’d written, thought a moment as to what sounded like his jerk of a dad then returned to the keyboard:
you ok? I thought everything was going fine but you sound messed up. Casey smiled, hit send and sat back in his chair. Seconds felt like hours, waiting to see if Zeke took the bait. Sure enough, the reply came only a little more than a minute later.
ill be fine. Just sitting on the couch zoning to stupid sitcoms and gorging on chips. Sorry like I said.
“Damned right you’re sorry,” Casey said. He sent his next text, his grin growing more devious in replying, no its ok. Need me to come by to talk or something? Im out cruising town, nothing to do, so if u want ill come by with some KFC or sumthin.
The second Casey hit send, he winced and hissed. ‘Sumthin’ wasn’t in his dad’s vernacular; it was too ‘teenager’, making him worry that Zeke was going to catch on as to just who had the phone right now. The next wait for a reply was longer, making Casey worry at his lip with anxiety. Shit. Shit, shit, shit…
The second the phone beeped, he grabbed it and looked. A heavy sigh of relief flooded out of his chest as he read, sounds good actually. Planned on being alone, but… yeah come by. Just as long as u aint gonna convince me to stick with your ‘plan’ there lol… front doors open, not getting off this damn couch.
“Perfect,” Casey said aloud. After typing a quick, be there in about 15-20 or so, he got up from the table and went to the front hall for his shoes. Winter wear was thrown on, his messenger bag slung over his shoulder, and the keys to his dad’s sedan snatched from the hanger on the wall. He had a general open invitation to it, so long as his dad didn’t have plans. It almost made him scowl; plans. His only comforts had to do with how Zeke HAD smartened-up, and that he indeed would be stopping by the KFC with the money he’d taken out that afternoon at the bank. He’d started feeling his appetite return-the extra energy to get through tonight, with its more-than-likely craziness ahead, was going to be needed.
~*~
It was too dark outside for Zeke to see anything past the porch; Casey took a deep breath as he saw the curtains of the front window sway back into place. ‘Yup, I’m here, you prick,’ he thought as he’d seen Zeke move the fabric aside to look out at the street, where Casey had parked the car. Gathering as much courage as he could, his bag and the fried chicken basket with sides was gathered up and he left the car.
His hopes that Zeke would, in fact, stay cemented to the couch were answered. After stomping snow and ice from his boots on the battered, old welcome mat provided, Casey steeled himself for what he was about to do and opened the door.
“Hey,” Zeke called from the nearby living room. “Kinda lied. I DID get up to make a pot of coffee, fixed you up some.”
Hidden by the foyer wall, Casey quickly got his heavy coat, gloves and hat off, leaving his boots on. Before he could rethink things, Casey made his stride slow and easy as he entered the room. He turned to the couch, finding Zeke lighting a cigarette. For one beautiful second, the young man hadn’t noticed who his real guest was, until he grumbled, “damned lighter’s dyin’,” tossed the shiny, expensive looking tool on the table and looked up just as Casey dumped the KFC bag on the coffee table in front of him. All he did was stare at Casey, as if he was trying to contemplate the most perplexing, puzzling mystery known to mankind.
“Hey there,” Casey said.
“Uh…” Zeke uttered. He darted his eyes from Casey to their dinner a few passes, before clearing his throat and sitting back slowly. “What’s… this… about?”
“What, the chicken? You said you’d go for some, remember?” Casey slipped his father’s cell from his pocket, held it up and tapped it in the air a few times. “That’s what you texted, anyway.”
Zeke was completely unreadable now. Instead of going either ghost-pale or red as a beet, his face stayed even, unchanged. He made an indistinguishable, light grunt and turned his gaze from Casey back to the TV. “I take it your dad’s out,” he said in a gruff mutter.
“Yup.” Casey sat down on the other side of the couch in a shot and began going through the dinner items. “So I got two small sides of potatoes, tub of corn… original recipe. Fuck the ‘extra crispy’ shit no one likes.”
“I like extra-crispy,” Zeke said. There was almost a note of defiance in his voice, as if everything Casey said was going to be met with a strange counterpoint. It made Casey’s lips twitch into a smirk before it disappeared with a sigh.
“You’re a rare breed, then-“
“So now you know. Feel good?”
Casey paused in his uncapping the corn to look over. Still still, unmoved, cigarette getting a heavy suck in Zeke’s lips. A twinge of anger-how DARE he be so flat-affect and moody, already-heated Casey’s face enough for him to say, “OH yeah. Real good, Tyler. Knowing what sneaky fucks you and Dad have been, behind my back? Behind Jeremy’s back? Yeah, it’s just fantastic.”
“It was your dad’s idea, one I wasn’t that huge on,” Zeke spat back.
“But you went for it anyway.”
“’Wish I hadn’t. I already lost my investment in the ‘Bank of Casey’ more than a month ago. Throwing any energy back into that pit was gonna end up a waste whether this crazy shit panned out or not.” Zeke suddenly stood, grabbed his empty mug from the table and stormed off to the kitchen.
‘Oh, no. That’s not how this is gonna play out,’ Casey thought with a violence, making him get up as well to follow the boy. Now in the kitchen, he watched as Zeke poured a new coffee for himself, his back to Casey. “So Dad started it… how? He suddenly ring you up outta the blue, drop by? What?”
“He’s the sneakier-fuckier of the two of us, so you know. He tracked me down at my uncle’s bar, there. Remembered my going there for… whatever,” Zeke answered. He turned, sipping his coffee as he leaned on the counter. The fact that he hadn’t put on a look of shock, surprise and even fear was gnawing at Casey more and more. “I shoulda seen through his schmoozing little performance from the get-go, acting chummy with me, playing some pool. Kept dropping hints at what he was there for, but again, I didn’t fully catch-on. ‘Til he brought things back to the bar and… hah…”
“What?” Casey said, watching a wry, sarcastic smirk come on Zeke’s face.
“Bet he sunk the eight on purpose, to get us out of the game and have ‘talk-time’. Yeah…”
Everything was getting even more cryptic, when all Casey wanted were honest, cut-and-dry answers. “So he actually asked you if you’d-go in on some stupid ‘quest’ to break me and Jer off?”
“Yup,” Zeke said.
“That’s… fucking sick.”
“It’s what he did. If you couldn’t tell, your dad can’t stand the guy. And even if he went about this whole-thing, like this, I can’t fucking blame him,” Zeke replied. His stare on Casey had grown more solid, enough for Casey’s whole body to stiffen. This was all one big act, with Zeke’s actions and replies asking Casey, ”And what the fuck are you gonna DO about it, boy?” instead of cried-out apologies and feeling regret over his and Casey’s dad’s sneaking around. Zeke didn’t emote a shred of ‘sorry’, when he should have been begging for Casey not to hate him for what he-they-had done.
“Whose decision IS it, my dating Jeremy? Or ANY guy, huh? Whose??” Casey said In a louder, firmer voice. “Mine. Not yours, not my fucking dad, mine!”
“Am I saying it ain’t? No, I gave up on the idea. Gave up on it yesterday, really, for fuck’s sake.”
“A bit too late for that now. And, well, seeing as how you’d texted about me and you not even being friends anymore, maybe I DON’T need to get the ‘full story’ from you. I can just wait for Mom and Dad to get back and ream HIS ass out, instead.”
“You’ve got a talent in that. Ranting and raving, meaning,” Zeke said with the most obvious bitterness dripping from his voice. Casey had to be so red with the radiating heat growing in his face.
“You’ve got some fucking nerve, Zeke. Some. Fucking. Nerve,” he said, moving closer until he was only a foot or so away. “When I’ve got some pretty understandable reasons TO rant and rave? Yeah, I’ll step up and say something about it. You? Hah, you make people think everything’s just fine then stab them in the back-“
“I never made out like things were ‘just fine’, the fuck you say?” Zeke interrupted. His eyes narrowed as he continued, “You decided we were done, told me so then all but raced outta here, leaving me to wonder what the fuck had just happened. I never got a word in past your yelling and bitching.”
“So now you’re gonna bring ALL of that up into this, make out like because I broke up with you, you were somehow justified in pulling this shit?” Casey held back the urge to shove at Zeke’s front; feeling the urge to move this along into anything but Zeke’s cool and insulting retorts, even if it came to blows, was almost scary. It made Casey shake, hard enough to curl his arms tight over his chest and sniff a few times before saying, “If you’d ever actually cared for me, you wouldn’t have done this. You would’ve been happy for our friendship we had after breaking-up. I thought, at least, us being able to do that was valuable. But I guess you didn’t.”
Zeke stared back at Casey, this time with something flaring in the deep brown of his eyes. He cocked his head to the side a little, regarding Casey much like a hungry lion to an injured gazelle. “It’s funny… how you’ve inflated your ego so much that you think you can dole out how someone should or shouldn’t feel about whatever crap you pull,” he said.
The shaking in Casey’s body seemed to freeze and hold him very, very still. “Wha…?”
“Does it make you feel better, thinking I really didn’t care? Whether the whole time we dated or the last week when you started throwing everything we had into the shitter? Cos’ it wasn’t me, switching shit up on you, making demands. I liked things the way they’d been, thought you did too. Thought I was enough. But I wasn’t, was I?”
“Wasn’t… Zeke…”
Zeke let a heavy breath out through his nose and he straightened. The even expression returned as he watched Casey try to work through the confusion he felt. “You really don’t get it. Do you,” he stated.
“What… IS there to get? People break-up all the fuckin’ TIME, it happens! God, you’d dated how many people before me? You were my first, if anyone was gonna be an amateur, it was me!”
“Bingo.”
Frustration was turning to a rage that was in danger of making Casey pass out. “Bingo WHAT?”
“You were the amateur. The ‘newbie’ to relationships. Can’t count ninety-nine percent of anything I ever did with anyone else as actual relationship stuff. Flings, that was all, really. So really, you were technically MY first, too,” Zeke explained. “You were the first person I ended up with who I cared about. Hard. More than even my own parents.”
The shake returned. The switch in moods Casey felt, following the clues Zeke was giving him to whatever mystery there was between them started making him feel dizzy. He let out a tremulous breath and shook his head. “You said nothing. You stood there, saying nothing… and I’m expected to… god, this is fucking ridiculous…”
“Babe.” An odd smirk came on Zeke’s face and he shook his head. “You didn’t let me say a damned thing. Our breakup was your show, starring you. Only you. I was just a prop for you to yell at.”
“No! That’s not-that’s bullshit!” Casey outright yelled, flustered and confused.
“I wasn’t the one you wanted, in the end. I mean, look at Jeremy. Really?” Zeke said with a scoff as he took a hearty sip from his mug. “Me an’ him, we’re total opposites. You went for a whole new breed after you shut our shit down. It’s telling.”
“Okay. I’m serious, stop-with this-confusing shit,” Casey haltingly said, even waved his hands out over the floor as if physically trying to clear the air, to see things better. “Nothing… I had with you has anything to do with Jeremy, what I have with him. Why are you saying this… stuff?”
“Dunno.” Zeke stared into his drink, as if hypnotized. It was his turn to look bereft of answers, full of doubt. The pause that stretched between them was almost excruciating, the kind that made Casey start talking, or blurting things out really, to fill the void. Something deep inside of him told him to wait through it, however; no matter how hard it was. Finally, when Casey was fit to burst, Zeke’s lips parted to say, “’Did something else sneaky. When you went into the bank, I went to look at the pics. But I grabbed the wrong folder. The one you probably hid in some complicated secret room not even your parents know exist in the house.”
Casey’s lashes were more like hummingbirds now, fluttering at a rapid pace. “My… pics… with… you saw them?”
“It was like… gutted. I kept telling myself to ‘put them the fuck back’, but kept looking through them. Like I was torturing myself, seeing you, him, on film. After dropping you off…” Zeke cocked his head to the side, his brow furrowing as he continued gazing into his mug. Casey noticed how bright Zeke’s eyes had become, making him realize that for the first time, ever, he could see what Zeke looked like when he cried. That alone sobered him and made a hot, uncomfortable pit grow in his stomach. “…All I could think was, ‘how come we never did that together?’ You’re a photographer. The idea would’ve come up, if you wanted that, with me. Right? But it didn’t. You’re with Jer a few weeks and bam, sexy photo-shoot time.”
“I’d… Zeke, no. No, no, I…” Casey swallowed, the pain it caused to his throat making him wince a little. “…I never thought of it when we’d dated, cos’-I’d never thought of it. Me and Jer, we… DID it, because he brought it up.”
“But you did it.”
“Yeah, because he swore up and fucking down he’d keep HIS under wraps, never to be seen by anyone but him,” Casey said. He began shaking his head a little; it was a mix of frustration at yet MORE of Zeke’s being sneaky and seeing those goddamned pictures and feeling sad for the young man having seen them altogether. It wasn’t as if he suspected there was anything but pictures of their day out together. That had been what he’d dug around in those folders for, not blackmail-material. “I wish… you hadn’t seen them. Not just because OF them, but… really, Zeke, that had to be…”
“Gutting. Like I said.” Zeke lifted his face but didn’t look at Casey, choosing to turn his head quick to the window above the sink. His nose twitched and let out a series of sharp, quick hisses. Casey’s breathing faltered as he spotted a tear making its escape, leaving a trail down to the side of Zeke’s nose. Zeke turned on his heels toward the sink, slugged back the rest of his drink then turned toward the doorway. As he walked off, he said, “But yeah, scheming with your fuckin’ dad… not cool. I’m sorry for that.”
Casey swallowed hard then followed, finding Zeke going to the stairs. “Zeke, what’s… going on with you…”
“Nothing. You should probably get goin’, I’m tired. Going to bed.” Zeke kept rubbing the side of his nose as he stared up at the second floor. In a distant voice, he said, “Don’t be too hard on your dad. ‘K? He’s a good guy, just-wants to run your life, like most dads do with their kids.”
“Never mind that, you’ve… been telling me how you’ve been ‘gutted’ by things, whatever else. That’s more important.”
“It’s not, I’ll get over it.”
“Zeke, seriously-“
“I don’t FEEL like talking about it!” Zeke’s bellowing the words made Casey jump, his eyes snapping wide open. Zeke had finally turned to face him again; though more tears had streamed down, ones he’d been doing his best to hide, Casey noticed how pink his face had gotten. After a few moments of staring hard at Casey, Zeke groaned and shook his head. “I just got past my ‘life sucks’ breakdown from this afternoon, and don’t feel like fucking revisiting it. Especially with you right the hell here.”
“I thought we were okay,” Casey said, his own eyes starting to sting. “You hadn’t said much of anything. You didn’t even seem angry, or upset. So… s-so I thought it hadn’t mattered to you.”
“You were okay with it all, Casey. That’s what let you move on so quick…” Zeke rubbed his face with both hands and groaned. “I’m serious, I don’t wanna go over this shit right now. ‘K? Please?”
“When, then? Cos’… we gotta. Or really, you gotta,” Casey said. Zeke didn’t reply-but he wasn’t yelling, either. Casey waited through the pause before letting out a sigh. “Maybe you’re right. Thinking back… I hadn’t come up for air, ranting and yelling and stuff. So… I wanna fix that. Cos’ we can’t be friends if any ‘left unsaid’ stuff is… or if you don’t want to be friends, whatever…”
Zeke groaned and looked back to Casey. “I was just being mopey and emotional when I typed that, ‘k? But I dunno how to work this shit out to BE friends-you’re right, after this? Being the sneaky fuck I was, holding shit back that might’ve been good to let out a WHOLE lot earlier, I mean…”
“Whatever, doesn’t matter. Please, just…” Casey motioned to the couch, looked over and blinked fast. “Plus, there’s dinner.”
“Oh. Yeah,” Zeke said, looking over as well.
“So let’s just… eat. We don’t even gotta talk first, whatever. I dunno about you, but I’m starving,” Casey said.
Zeke kept silent now, but he nodded, turned toward the living room and joined Casey on the couch. Sporks, napkins and containers were divvied-up between them before diving into the miraculously still-warm chicken. All the words Casey wanted to say kept trying to push out through his mouth, so he did his best to shove spoonful after spoonful of corn and potato down, squashing out the danger. Zeke more nibbled at his food, but he wasn’t angry, or worse, bursting into tears. Just the small, barely-there visions of tears on his face that Casey had seen were enough to make HIM cry.
‘I made them,’ Casey thought to himself. As frustrated over this weird situation his dad and Zeke had brought everyone into, he’d said enough. Zeke knew Casey knew. He’d already bailed from the ‘project’ before Casey knew. Casey had to do his best to give him some points for that.
“Not that hungry,” Zeke finally said after about ten minutes of moving food around aimlessly. Some corn was gone, along with a bit of potato, though he hadn’t bothered getting his fingers greasy with the main course. Casey wasn’t going to push it; he shrugged and put his emptied containers and napkins into the take-out bag.
“Yeah, I’m good,” he said.
“You really hurt me, Casey.”
Casey turned to look at the young man, who sat in a relaxed pose of one arm outstretched along the back of the couch, the other bent with its fingers tracing Zeke’s lips. The only sign of tension was his propped-up foot on his knee, tapping quickly in the air. When Zeke sighed, the foot dropped down and he relaxed against the couch, eyes staring at the ceiling. While Casey was dying to press the issue, it was clear that Zeke was about to let some things go. However awkward the pauses and stammering, it didn’t matter. Casey relaxed his posture as well, turning himself completely with his knees bent up to his chest. His eyes stayed on Zeke, who inhaled deeply before saying, “Being with you, the way we were? ‘Felt like everything I’d ever wanted for myself but never knew what that everything would end up being. ‘Til… you.”
Casey’s arms tensed and closed in tight against his sides and chest. Zeke had always had those sweet moments, whether through the whispered, “love you,”s before they fell asleep in bed together; buying him candy when they’d have a spat, an apologetic smile on his face; even those times he’d say, “C’mon, I’m too cute for you to stay mad at me,” would break through Casey’s hard-headed, grumpy side. But right now, more than a month after they split-up, the things he said carried weight. A weight he’d carried around without telling anyone…
“I thought we were fine. I know I felt damned good. Then it was like… you decided ‘we’ weren’t enough; the whole world needed to know. That was something I was not ready for, full-stop. I kept trying to compromise, saying we could go outta town to some club, makeout in the middle of the dance floor-but that hadn’t been enough, for you. And…” Zeke paused with a groan, sat up and grabbed his cigarettes from the table. Once he’d lit up, he grunted back down to his slouching state and went on, “…I’d almost chased after you that night you left. The LAST night you left. I was gonna say ‘fuck it’ and tell you that yeah, let’s just come-out to everyone, cos’ fuck, Casey, I didn’t wanna lose you. If I had to get shit from the jock-holes at school over what we were doing, didn’t matter, cos’ I was gonna be with you. But on my way to the door, I was hit with this… vision, I guess. You, in a hospital room, after a crowd of football-fucks cornered you in the locker room. So I traded being with you with you not going back to that.”
With the next pause, Casey felt more at ease-more like the ‘floor was open’ to him, if he wanted it. With a tentative, soft voice, he said, “I didn’t wanna lie anymore, Zeke. That’s all.”
“It’s not lying, it’s staying alive. Believe me, Casey, I know first-hand.”
Casey frowned. “Know… what?”
Zeke groaned again. “I never got into it. You always told me how fuckin’ cool I was, how you’d crushed on me all the way back to your freshman year. That shit. My telling you some of my ‘background’… would’ve been embarrassing, I guess,” he explained. “We went to different schools ‘til Herrington High, so you didn’t know me back in the fifth grade. Yeah, I’m taller than everyone now, but back then? I was a head shorter than all the boys, a scrawny, geeky kid with glasses who got the crap kicked outta ‘im by his own dad; the bigger guys at school, it was like they could smell that on me. It made ‘em all take a shot. I was a stepping stone for anyone who wanted to climb up the ‘school status’ ladder, really. You got a little cooler with everyone if they knew you’d slapped me around.”
It didn’t make sense, at all. Not one bit. Zeke-Herrington High’s resident cool loner, the kind most eighties movies were based on? Zeke must have noticed Casey’s awestruck look; he made a small smile and raised his eyebrows. “It’s all true. I was just as much a loner back then, only it was cos’ I… I dunno, gave people AIDS when they got too close to me, whatever other juvenile bullshit they could come up with to keep me sitting by myself at lunch and recess. It wasn’t until I finally snapped that it stopped. And by ‘snapped’, I mean ‘terrify the living fuck outta every kid in school’.”
“How… so?” Casey hesitantly asked.
Zeke still wore his smirk, but the rest of him looked uncomfortable. He shifted in his seat, grunting before answering, “It was the last week of school. Me, I was all for it-get me the fuck away from those fucks for a few months, I’m good. But it got worse every day leading up to vaca, ‘til two days before school ended, three of the biggest bullies decided to drag me behind the school, near the walkway to the baseball field and rec-shit out back. No teachers ever bothered going back there, so I was thinking that this was it-I was gonna end up in a coma or coffin. HUGE crowd followed, of course, everyone hollering and whooping ‘em on. So they tossed me in between the dumpsters and laughed-broke my glasses. But even when shit got blurry, I DID see this Snapple bottle behind the dumpster closest to me. So, I grabbed it, smashed it against the brick wall of the building… got up and went at ‘em.”
“Went…” Casey registered every bit of this awful, scary life-story, growing more and more anxious. “You like, cut them up?”
“Two of ‘em, yeah. The third guy, Jack Bailey, he ran away terrified, screaming for the teacher. Everyone watching just stood there, shocked to shit as I slashed at John Gilford, then threw myself at Micah-can’t remember his last name, all of a sudden…” Zeke paused as if trying to think, but gave up with a shake of his head and scratching the back of his neck. “Anyway, no one died. But there were stitches involved. And when the lazy-assed teachers finally arrived and pulled me off of him, I stared down at both the guys, yelling, ‘Try me another time, motherfuckers, see what I cut off next!’ After that…”
“I never heard this… when it should be fucking legend,” Casey said with a note of awe.
“Oh, it was, for a long, lo-o-ong time. It got embellished to hell, of course. Instead of three guys it was a dozen and I had a switchblade… one story even involved Chinese throwing stars.” Zeke paused to roll his eyes and scoff, but Casey surprised himself in chuckling. Zeke looked to him, relaxed a little to smile back then turned away again to continue, “After a few years, the story died down-but not my status. Instead of, ‘hey, let’s pick on the little nerd’ it turned into, ‘don’t even LOOK at that guy wrong, he’ll cripple your ass.’”
“I really, really wish you’d told me. First off, it’s just… kinda cool. Nothing I’ve never fantasized about during MY time as the geeky, default punching bag for the jocks, but… it would’ve explained why you wouldn’t have wanted to invite anything in that takes you back to that place,” Casey said.
“Would it honestly have changed anything for you, Casey?”
Casey thought a moment, then shrugged. “Maybe? I dunno… but I would’ve understood.”
“I dunno, either. Sometimes… and I ain’t saying this to bitch at you, but sometimes you just wouldn’t, didn’t listen. I’d learned early on to just shut up and wait for the storm to pass. If we got mad at each other, I’d just sit back and let you go off; if you got upset over something not related to me that I felt was a waste of energy, I didn’t dare tell you to calm down. I just let you yell ‘til you got tired,” Zeke said. “But the times when it was good? None of the bad shit mattered. Not a bit. It was all a part of being with you, so I took the bad with that good. It was worth it. ‘Til the last week.”
“I know. I just-“
“You called me a chicken-shit, every damned day,” Zeke interrupted, making Casey clam-up immediately. “Yeah, it started off more teasy, but it got worse and worse. You added ‘fucking’ to it, ‘you’re just a fucking chicken-shit’, all pissed-off. Honestly? As nasty as you may get, the shit I wanted to reply with?” Zeke gave him a heavy, pointed look. “Your parents would’ve taken me to court to cover your psych bills. I can be one evil, venomous fucker with just words, Case.”
“Yeah. I know,” Casey meekly replied, looking down into his lap. He’d seen-or really, heard, with his own two ears a few times over their high school career, in the halls, parking lot, classes even.
“And no, I ain’t breathing a word of what went on in my head. I never will. Cos’ it hurt to just think about saying, and why? Cos’ I was better than that. I was better cos’ you’d made me better,” Zeke said. “Then you just left. Smack-bam-boom, goodbye. I didn’t get a say in it, at all.”
“You said enough… in the box you dropped off, full of stuff,” Casey said, his voice even smaller now. He remembered that pang of sadness, the bite of regret in unpacking all of those special things he’d given Zeke over their five-months together. “I made out like I didn’t care when Dad told me you’d left it all on the porch, but actually seeing it, going through it?”
“Yeah, that…” Zeke took the last drag from his dying cigarette, leaned forward to stamp it out and sighed. “…That was just my way of saying ‘fine, fuck you then’. But it wasn’t completely honest.”
“What-wasn’t?”
“I’d gotten out the door with the box, but before I could lock-up, I stopped… went back in and made a copy of that mix-tape.”
Casey parted his lips. “The… ‘our songs’?”
Zeke nodded slowly. “I pretended I didn’t care, too. If ‘not caring’ means that whenever I’m depressed to hell, I pop that in to either depress myself more or cheer me up… and I never know what it’ll do, when I do it. But I do it.”
The flood of information, the many secrets Zeke had held onto now being released, was daunting. It was in a good way, but it made Casey’s brain go into DUH-mode all the same. “We’re… we’re a real pair of douchebags, huh?” he said, a small, embarrassed smile tickling his lips.
“No. We’re overdramatic teenagers. Or just teenagers, nothing else needed,” Zeke said.
“Yeah.” Casey busied himself with a loose thread of his jeans, the simple actions of curling and twisting at it soothing. It allowed him to say, “I’m sorry, Zeke. I never meant to hurt you… even if what I did meant that you were gonna be hurt, no matter what.”
“I know. But-that’s another thing that’s bugging me.” Zeke went serious in expression as he looked to Casey, his head resting on the back of the couch. “You broke shit off with me cos’ I wouldn’t join you in the ‘Gay Pride Parade’ you wanted to put on at school. Yet you’re still in that closet. No one knows about you, you being with the ‘new guy’ from another town. What am I supposed to think about that?”
“What are you… isn’t it obvious?”
“Wouldn’t ask about it, if it was.”
“Yeah, but…” Casey couldn’t help a wry chuckle, coming out in a puffing scoff. “Zeke. Okay, yes, I wanna be ‘out and proud’. I wanna make a statement, to not hide like I’m ashamed of who the fuck I really am. But-okay, you really don’t know?”
“Case…”
“I’d get all these chicks coming at me, knowing you and I were ‘best friends’. They don’t know we’re MORE than that, so if they wanted a shot at you? Guess who they’d try to get to you through first,” Casey said. “This one girl, fuck, it was disgusting…”
“Yeah. Delilah told me about that one, the other night,” Zeke said.
“When?”
“She came back after you guys all left, just to… hang,” Zeke said, adding a shrug. “We got on you as a subject; she told me about the whole note thing you were supposed to give me-“
“Yeah, and like fuck I was gonna pass it along, or even tell you what she told me to tell YOU, and… I wanted that to stop. Plus, just the fact that girls would do that, at least two a week if not more, and…” Casey couldn’t help another lone chuckle as he ran his fingers through his hair, frustrated and embarrassed at the same time. “…In a way, I wanted to let everyone know, all so I could brag about you choosing me… instead of them. I wanted to just-walk into school, holding hands to tell everyone, ‘don’t even THINK you’ve got a shot, cos’ he’s my man. Not yours.’ Wanted that so bad. It’d… started hurting, cos’ when I want it so bad and you absolutely do NOT… what’s that say to me, really?”
“What? You thought I was-embarrassed, being with you?” Zeke asked with a deep frown. “Why the fuck would you think that?”
“Why the fuck would you think I’d never take sexy-time pics with you if you’d asked-or that I wanted to use us being together as some activist action?”
“Because…” Zeke started but drifted off. He shook his head, a heavy hum thrumming in his chest and throat. “’Wish we’d gone over this a lo-o-ong time before now.”
Casey swallowed and nodded. “Might’ve been a good idea,” he said.
“Yeah.” Zeke scratched his chin then dropped his hand into his lap. “It would’ve been.”
“Woulda, coulda, shoulda…” Casey said, his voice tired and sing-song. Zeke made a drowsy-sounding moan, shook his head and sat up.
“I’m sorry, too-for the whole scheming mess me and your dad got up to. ‘Wasn’t right.”
“Do you… really, really not like Jeremy that much? Honestly asking, cos’… okay, he brags a lot, comes from money and lets everyone KNOW it-“
“He’s not an irredeemable asshole. But… still stand by my stance that he just doesn’t fit you. I dunno. But that ain’t my business, not anymore, anyway.”
Casey watched as Zeke groaned to a stand, stretched then-Christ, the neck thing. He had to look away as Zeke cracked bones into place. Even just the sound of light pops and his satisfied hums… “I should probably get back,” Casey said.
“Yeah. And-you were right.”
“About what?” Casey asked as he too fought himself off of the comfortable couch.
“I would’ve spent the time either pounding pillows or crying into ‘em. Wouldn’t have bothered getting back to the shit we really did have to go over. Just would’ve avoided you and your calls,” Zeke said. “So, I’m glad you pushed it. Carefully enough, anyway.”
“I saw that-you needed it. While I shut up and let you have the time,” Casey said.
“You did. Thanks.” Zeke looked unsure for a moment before rolling his eyes, stepping forward with an arm outstretched and put it over Casey’s shoulders for a quick but sweet hug. “You ain’t as bad as they all say.”
“Hey, he-e-y… waitaminnit…”
“Take a joke, ya geek,” Zeke said, pulling away with a grin-THE grin, the one Casey had always adored seeing on his face and hadn’t realized he’d longed to see again. Having created it for the young man to wear made it even brighter, in Casey’s eyes.