Kens

by Raziel Reid

  “Bump?” he asks, offering Tommy the powdered tip of a key.

  “No thanks,” Tommy says. His head is already pounding.

  Ken Hilton overhears Tommy’s refusal. “Don’t be rude,” he says, leaning over and taking the bump himself.

  “Ken, I’m not feeling so hot.” Tommy fans himself with a cocktail napkin. “I think I’m going to be sick.”

  “Stick a dick in your mouth.” Ken Hilton goes back to making out with Pink Tank Top.

  “I might be able to help you with that,” Purple Tank Top offers. He pulls Tommy close to his rock-hard chest and chokes him with his tongue.

  Tommy squirms. He isn’t able to pull away fast enough. He feels a burning in his stomach. Before he can stop it, puke spews out of his mouth and lands all over Purple Tank Top.

  Ken Roberts starts dry heaving at the sight of the puke. He’s worked his gag reflex into submission; all he has to do is think of vomit and it starts coming up. He runs off to the bathroom.

  The tank top boys quickly ditch the VIP section. Ken Hilton tries to stop them from going but ends up slipping on Tommy’s puke and collapsing on the floor. The vom on his Moschino flashes under the strobe light.

  As the club spins around him, Tommy asks for water.

  “What did you just say?” Ken Hilton asks.

  “Water,” Tommy croaks.

  He can’t focus his eyes, but he can feel Ken Hilton’s glare slicing through him. And then he remembers, the only water the Kens drink is during water sports…

  The entire club is looking over at them, taking in the image of the Kens surrounded by vomit and not a single cute guy. Ken Hilton grabs Tommy and drags him so hard through the club his arm almost pops out of its socket. Tommy stumbles through the backdoor of Dreamhouse out into the alley.

  He pukes the rest of his stomach contents out behind the Dumpster. He stands up straight and focuses his eyes. Ken Hilton is recording him with his iPhone.

  “That’s it,” Ken Hilton hisses. “You are so over. I don’t know why I thought I could be friends with the fat poor kid. You’re hopeless! I’m taking you out of the display window and putting you back in the box where you’re going to rot, thot.”

  Ken Hilton goes close-up on Tommy’s smudged eyeliner.

  “The swan goes back to being an ugly duckling. I can’t take back your surgeries, but I’ll have your new nose broken if you so much as look at me again.”

  “What?” Tommy can barely register what’s happening.

  “I really wanted you to be something,” Ken Hilton says. “But it has become painfully clear that you are beyond help.” He shakes his head. “I was so wrong about you! I just can’t help but take pity on a basic bitch every now and then. I always regret being nice. Will I never learn?”

  “Ken, I’m sorry! I just don’t feel well…I don’t really drink.”

  “Or gossip or do coke or know how to accessorize for shit,” Ken Hilton adds. “I bet if that guy in there had asked you for a blow job you would have given him the number of your cheap fucking hairstylist!”

  “Why are you being such a cunt?” Tommy asks. “I need to go home. I drank too much. I should sleep it off.”

  “Do you even hear yourself?” Ken Hilton rattles. “We haven’t even gone to the after-party yet!”

  “Please don’t do this again.” Tommy holds on to himself. “I thought we were friends.”

  “You are, like, so obsessed with me,” Ken Hilton says. “Since you need another reading lesson, allow me to give you one, Thomas. You’re such a loser, all the followers I bought you unfollowed.”

  “Yeah, well…,” Tommy stammers. “Your mom is her own season of Botched!”

  “For your information, she likes it when people stare!” Ken Hilton holds up his iPhone. “Just wait for your eulogy post,” he says.

  Ken Hilton yanks the stud out of Tommy’s left ear. Tommy gasps in shock.

  “Diamonds are forever”—Ken Hilton tosses the earring in the air and catches it in his palm—“but your time is up.”

  DECONSTRUCTION

  The magic bleeds out of him.

  Tommy steadies himself by holding on to the Dumpster. He brings his hand to his ear to see if his lobe is split. It throbs, but still seems to be in one piece.

  The bass from the music inside Dreamhouse pounds through the backdoor. Some dream!

  He limps to the end of the alley in Ken Hilton’s platforms. At the street, he stops and looks both ways. He doesn’t know where he’s going, but he has to move. He wants to get as far away from Ken Hilton and his insanity as possible. Off-screen, evil isn’t so glamorous.

  The Kens may be plastic, but inside they’re pure acid.

  A wave of regret suddenly washes over Tommy as he keeps walking. Has he really been kicked out of Ken World already? He feels defective. Was this Ken Hilton’s plan the entire time? To give Tommy everything only for the amusement of taking it away? It all feels so familiar.

  The cold makes him shiver. Maybe it was the booze, or the Percocet, or the way he could tell that Purple Tank Top was uncircumcised under his jeans…but it was just too much for him.

  All the horrible things Ken Hilton said swirl in Tommy’s mind. He’d been completely degraded, and didn’t even have red ass cheeks to show for it!

  Tommy had always known the Kens were a void—that was part of their appeal. They didn’t feel, or think, or worry like everyone else. They were so empty that they floated above all the mundanities of life. They didn’t need to eat, shit or even breathe. They were fueled by a lack of substance. And once Tommy had entered the void, he felt like a mannequin who came to life after closing but was never able to leave the store.

  It’s a wonder he’d made it out alive. Being a Ken wasn’t nearly as fun as reading about them on Tumblr. You can only replace food with bitchiness for so long. Unless you’re as depraved as Ken Hilton, it simply isn’t sustainable.

  A gas station is up the street. Tommy turns into the parking lot and walks up to his reflection in the glass window. He doesn’t look at himself in the same obsessive way he has ever since his transformation. This time, he stares at his reflection in the glossed gas station window, trying to see if somewhere beyond the plastic he still exists.

  Tommy doesn’t hear the bells on the gas station door ringing, or footsteps coming up beside him.

  “Looking a little worse for wear, Ken.” Blaine sucks on the straw of a slushy.

  Tommy had been so consumed with his sudden fall from Ken that he hadn’t noticed the Harley in the parking lot.

  “I’m not a Ken anymore,” he says.

  “Has your soul reentered your body?”

  “I feel like shit, so I guess so.”

  Blaine takes a loud slurp of his slushy. He motions for Tommy to sit next to him on the curb and offers him a sip from the straw. It soothes Tommy’s raw throat.

  “Not as seen in commercials?” Blaine asks.

  “It literally made me vomit.”

  “You hurled?”

  “And Ken Hilton filmed it.” Tommy buries his face in his hands. “It wasn’t even fun! I think that’s what I’m the most disappointed about. There were moments where I felt as carefree as the Kens. It was horrible, but wonderful, being so selfish. Loving yourself so much. But I couldn’t make it last. I just couldn’t stop feeling. Except when…” Tommy blinks. “Except when I was wearing the Kens’ contacts. Isn’t that weird? When they were in I felt invincible. They were irritating my eyes so I took them out while we were getting ready for Dreamhouse, and I forgot to put them back in before we left. Maybe that’s why I was such a mess. With the contacts, I saw everything from above it all. Without them, I was just…me.”

  Tommy wipes the dust off the knees of his leggings. “I gave up myself to walk the hallway like a catwalk with the Kens, only to realize that the catwalk doesn’t lead where I thought it did. And if you dare lose step, the drop is steep.”

  “Sounds like they need to be tripped,” Blaine says.r />
  “The Kens are impenetrable.”

  “I bet if everyone stopped kissing Ken Hilton’s Brazilian butt lift he’d land on it.” Blaine jumps to a stand and gives Tommy his hand. “Let’s get that ear cleaned up,” he says.

  At the end of a cul-de-sac in The Hills sits Blaine’s traditional house with powder-blue shutters. They park the bike in the driveway and go around back. The first glow of sunrise behind the hills gives the sky a metallic sheen that reflects off the surface of a pool.

  Blaine takes off his leather jacket and drops it to the grass. He starts pulling off his shirt.

  “What are you doing?” Tommy asks.

  “I told you we’d get that ear cleaned up.” Blaine kicks off his boots. When he pulls down his jeans and stars-and-stripes boxers, Tommy doesn’t know where to look. His eyes land on a tattoo on Blaine’s thigh—the grim reaper carrying a scythe and standing beside a girl with her arm around his cloak. A speech balloon says, “I’ve always been a sucker for a man in uniform!”

  Blaine cannonballs into the water, splashing Tommy’s legs.

  “Get in!” he yells as he resurfaces.

  Tommy stretches Ken Hilton’s crop-top as he pulls it over his head, careful to avoid his ear. The leggings are stuck to his skin with sweat; it takes him forever to pull them off. He hops around and almost falls over. He can hear Blaine laughing at him.

  As soon as he’s naked, Tommy jumps straight into the pool. He’s suddenly self-conscious again. It had felt fine being naked in front of the Kens earlier, but he’s shy with Blaine.

  The water is warm. Tommy’s ear stings in the chlorine, but the pain is a relief. It’s the part of him that’s still real.

  Tommy swims around Blaine, their legs grazing under the surface. It’s so electric that it’s like the sunrise is lifting from directly beneath them. The surface of the water flashes like a silvery sheet of light, whiting out their faces as they swim over to the end of the infinity pool. They’re all wet lips and wet eyelashes and wet dreams.

  “So it ends.” Tommy leans his head against the edge of the pool. “Now that I’ve seen what goes on behind the shelf I feel like such an idiot. Ken Hilton should seriously be stopped. Ken Roberts wouldn’t be so insecure if he wasn’t always in Ken Hilton’s shadow. And I can tell Ken Carson isn’t really a bully. That’s why he always seems so relieved when he can escape on the football field. There’d be no Kens without Ken Hilton. Just think how different school would be.”

  “It’s not just school. This town is everything that’s wrong with the world. It’s like a never-ending E! special.” Blaine shudders. “I overheard these two moms pushing strollers on the street talking about taking their babies to get their first shot—of Botox.”

  Tommy swallows some pool water. He wonders how much Blaine knows about his dad and Ken Roberts.

  “Sometimes it’s even worse at home than on the streets…,” Tommy says.

  “Yeah.” Blaine snorts. “My dad’s swallowed the glitter pill. But I know my mom would have been able to see through this place.”

  “Where is she?”

  Blaine stares at Tommy as blankly as the Kens. It makes the heated pool suddenly feel freezing.

  “Force Quit,” Blaine finally says. He jumps out of the pool. “Is it true Ken Hilton lives nearby?” he asks. “My dad says Hilton House is a real work of art.”

  “It’s a few blocks away,” Tommy says. “Why?”

  “I’ve been meaning to ask if he wants to come out and play…”

  Blaine goes into the pool house and grabs two towels. He brings one to Tommy as he climbs out of the water.

  “It’s almost time for school.” Tommy looks at the sunrise as he dries his hair. “And I left my clothes at Ken Hilton’s house! He wanted to dress me up.”

  “No problem.” Blaine wraps his towel around his waist. “I’ll lend you something. But we should still swing by Ken Hilton’s house to pick up your stuff on the way to school.”

  “What for?”

  “We could be the ones to dismantle the pillar of blond. Of course, the whole town will probably end up smothered.”

  “I don’t know,” Tommy says. “I just want to avoid the Kens…”

  Blaine digs through the pocket of his leather jacket, still lying on the ground, and pulls out his phone.

  “You’re not going to let Ken Hilton discard you like a broken toy, are you?” he asks. Blaine shows Tommy his phone. “Just as I suspected. Ken Hilton sure didn’t waste any time.”

  The tab on the phone is open to SoFamous, where a headline reads: “Ken Rawlins’s Eulogy Post.” Blaine clicks Play and he and Tommy watch a wobbly Tommy retching in the alley behind Dreamhouse.

  “I’m taking you out of the display window and putting you back in the box where you’re going to rot, thot,” Ken Hilton hisses.

  Tommy hits Stop.

  “That bitch!”

  FACE OFF

  Tommy borrows a pair of gym shorts and a Supreme hoodie from Blaine for the ride to Ken Hilton’s house. Blaine also gives him a pair of sneakers so that he doesn’t have to wear Ken Hilton’s hooker heels. His club clothes are in a bag. Tommy is dressed before Blaine is ready; he says he has to gather the “supplies.” Tommy’s too distracted by the fact that he’s alone in Blaine’s room to question what he means. He sits on the edge of the bed, running his hands along the sheets. There’s a Charles Manson poster hanging on the closet door with his quote, “We’re not in Wonderland anymore, Alice.”

  “Tell me about it,” Tommy says to himself.

  When they pull up to Hilton House, the gate is closed. Blaine parks the bike and they climb over the hedges. The sun has fully risen in the sky, and rays of light are shining through the fountain at the center of the driveway.

  “You think anyone’s up?” Blaine asks.

  “Even if his mom’s home, she won’t notice us,” Tommy says. “She’s played by Tara Reid.”

  Blaine checks the door. It’s unlocked. Before opening it all the way, he gives Tommy a quick smirk. It’s totally his signature sculpt, with his eyebrows arching into triangles on his forehead.

  They step into the house. Tommy’s scared that if Ken Hilton catches them he’ll be the subject of another post on SoFamous, this time bumping Coach Summers as Ken Hilton’s stalker. (Coach Summers said good morning to Ken Hilton one day before Ken Hilton had acknowledged him.)

  “I’ll just leave the clothes here for the maid,” Tommy says, dropping the bag on a table next to a bouquet of pink roses with buds that look like the tips of Barbie’s shoes. “Forget revenge. Let’s just get out of here.” Tommy turns toward the door, but Blaine holds him back.

  “Don’t you want to give Ken Hilton some of his own medicine?” he asks.

  A loud snore comes from the living room. Blaine brings his index finger to his lips. They creep down the hall and find Ken Hilton’s mom passed out on the floor, drooling onto a Birkin pillow. At first Tommy panics, thinking that she’s awake—her eyes are partway open—but her face is just pulled so tight she can’t fully close them.

  “What’s she on?” Blaine asks.

  “Everything,” Tommy whispers. “Haven’t you seen Ken Hilton’s ‘Pill of the Day’ posts on SoFamous? I swear I learn more about chemistry from his mother’s medicine cabinet than in class.”

  Tommy leads Blaine to the kitchen. If he remembers correctly from his childhood, Barbie Hilton’s stash is in the cabinet above the sink. He and Blaine stand back in awe. Lined up are row after row of prescription pill bottles.

  “Vicodin, OxyContin, Roxycodone, Percocet…” Blaine reads the labels on the bottles. “Ooh, Flintstone vitamins!” He pops the lid and tosses one in his mouth.

  Blaine grabs another bottle, opening the lid and dumping the white pills into the trash.

  “We have to get Ken where it’ll really hurt,” he says. “His vanity.”

  “How?” Tommy asks.

  Blaine slides his backpack off his shoulders and starts pulling
out supplies.

  “I stocked up right after I saw you at Allan’s pool house,” Blaine says, taking off his leather jacket and rolling up the sleeves of his shirt. He reaches for the aluminum powder. “You can pass Ken the bottle, pretending you’re trying to make amends. New on the market. An unreal high.”

  “But Allan said you should detonate in an open field! We don’t want to kill him…”

  Tommy searches the side of Blaine’s face. Blaine keeps measuring the potassium perchlorate.

  “Don’t worry, it’ll just blow enough to singe Ken Hilton’s plastic.” He stops pouring and glances over at Tommy. “Kinda like what he did to you.”

  The spot on Tommy’s face where his scar used to be starts burning.

  “Well, as long as DeepFace can still recognize him,” Tommy says.

  Blaine had even packed a drill to make a hole in the lid. He sticks a safety fuse through it and pops the lid back on the bottle.

  “Which way to Her Royal Highness’s room?” he asks, hanging his jacket around his shoulders.

  When they enter Ken Hilton’s boudoir, the dogs jump off the bed and run over to them. The tiny barks don’t wake Ken Hilton. You have to switch him on to wake him up. He remains asleep, surrounded by dolls and teddy bears, looking immaculate despite last night’s wild antics. That’s just like Ken Hilton. When he should have a hangover from hell he jumps out of bed in the morning looking flawless and is all, “Bonjour, bitches!”

  Blaine walks around Ken Hilton’s bed to the nightstand. He picks up a key and a bag of cocaine next to the Hello Kitty alarm clock, scoops up a generous bump and puts it under Ken Hilton’s nose. Ken Hilton breathes it up with a gentle snore and his eyes instantly fling open. His eyeliner is perfect. Not even a little smudged. Like he reapplied it right before passing out.

  “What the actual fuck?” Ken Hilton shoots into a sitting position.