A Charm of Finches

by Suanne Laqueur

  “Let us help you,” Ben said.

  “You don’t have to go in,” Jason said. “Just step back from the railing, okay? Can you do that much?”

  “Come on, Mo,” Ben said. “I won’t hurt you. I want to help. Will you let me help?”

  He stepped behind Mos and slid hands down his arms to his wrists. “Come on, let go now. That’s it. Just step back with me. I’m right here.”

  The boys lurched backward, like Quasimodo in reverse. Ben bumped against the side of the building and Mos bumped into him. His shoulders to Ben’s chest.

  Well, look what we got here.

  Mos shook hard. Ben held him tighter and the shaking stopped.

  The night shifted into a different normal.

  We’re just two normal straight dudes who want to go home.

  Jason stood in front of him now, both hands on Mos’s shoulders. “Mo, it’s okay.”

  “No, it’s not,” Mos said. “I’m not him.”

  “Not who?”

  “I’m not Mo.” He fumbled his wallet out of his pocket, shaking fingers digging in the folds for the twin licenses he carried. “See. That’s Mo. Geronimo. My twin brother. I’m Carlos. My brother was taken. The porn ring that got busted in New Jersey last summer. My brother knew him. The ringleader. He groomed Mo to trust him and then he took him. They found Mo in the basement, drugged up and handcuffed to a bed. They were selling him. Selling his pictures and then selling him. Mo was trapped there a day and a half and they about raped him to death.”

  “Jesus,” Ben said in a hiss of air, the circle of his arms pressing harder.

  “Nobody believed him,” Mos said, the story jumping the leash and getting away, all the roles mixed up, but it kept spilling. Piling up, lie on top of lie. Bricks to build a wall around Geno and keep him safe.

  “Everyone brushed it off,” Mos said. “Everyone said guys couldn’t get raped. They said Mo was gay. They said he must’ve brought it on or been asking for it. He even called a rape hotline once. The woman who answered hung up on him. She yelled at him for being a twisted pervert, calling up a hotline to jerk off to a made-up story. Then she hung up. Nobody believed him and he killed himself.”

  He was fading out, no longer sure who was who, where his truth stopped and the lie began or who was in control here.

  “Nobody believes it,” Mos said. “Not even the law. Who knows how many guys are out there in the world, afraid to say what happened to them…”

  “Hey,” Ben said at his shoulder. “You told me once you weren’t afraid of anything. Remember?”

  “I’m fucking afraid of everything,” Mos said.

  “You afraid of me?”

  Mos shook his head.

  Ben’s arms were so strong. “Not everything, then.”

  “Help me,” Mos said.

  “Come inside.”

  Inside, Seth was white and stunned. Natasha was pale and pink, like a bar of soap. She sat on one side of Mos on the couch. Ben sat on the other, warm and strong.

  “I’m sorry,” they all said.

  “I’m so sorry.”

  “Dude, that’s crazy.”

  “I’m so fucking sorry.”

  Jason knelt on the floor between Mos’s feet, hands on his thighs. “It made what you did tonight even more beautiful. You kind of saved your brother this time. You know?”

  “I bet he was watching,” Seth said. “I bet he was so fucking proud of you.”

  No, I’m dead to him.

  “You’re so brave,” Natasha said. “You’re amazing.”

  No, I was a coward. I sold out my own brother. I watched as they raped him. Anthony cuffed me to the bed and made me watch.

  I watched.

  He remembered the shape of a man’s arms behind his back. His shoulders to Anthony’s chest.

  “Nuh,” Geno said, head lolling like his neck was broken. All his body soft and slack except for one part that was rock hard.

  “Look what we got here,” Anthony said. “Somebody’s enjoying this.”

  Mos remembered. Mo remembered. Geno remembered.

  The land of Nos was abandoned now, its laws regarding feeling were suspended and its stars gone dark.

  So he went on remembering.

  He woke up.

  Am I here?

  I’m the only one around here.

  Is it still happening?

  Wherever here was, it was dark. And quiet.

  Am I all right?

  He was lying down.

  Am I home?

  I have no home.

  He opened his eyes. Lifted his head.

  He was on a couch.

  I’m at Jason’s place. I stayed here.

  He sat up. Parched, nauseous, his head clanging. He felt worn out and raw. He ached all over.

  Am I sick?

  He got up, breathed through the nausea and stumbled toward the bathroom, digging a shoulder into the wall for support.

  He threw up forever. Bringing up food he hadn’t even eaten yet.

  He’d never catch up to his life.

  I told them I was Carlos.

  Now I have to be him…or explain why I said I was him.

  His head bulged and ached within the web of lies he wove. He couldn’t remember what he told to who and why.

  I’m too tired.

  No one believes. Not even the law.

  I told them I was Carlito.

  I’m not him.

  I’m no one.

  He was tired. He hurt all over. He needed something for the pain. Something strong.

  He found Vicodin in the medicine cabinet and took two. He dumped the rest of the pills into his palm, pocketed them and put the bottle back in the cabinet.

  The apartment was stiller than death. The bedroom door was partly open. Boxes stacked against the walls. A king-sized mattress on the floor. On one side, Seth curled around Jason’s back, the clump of their joined hands under Jason’s chin.

  On the other side, Ben had his arms around Natasha, fingers buried in her fairyland hair.

  The spooning couples curved like brackets toward each other. From the door, the odd man stared at the space between.

  I want to go home.

  He took two more Vicodin.

  Say you want it.

  He crawled onto the mattress. Eased himself between bodies, like a side thought put in parenthesis.

  Say it, you little bitch.

  “I want it,” he mouthed.

  Carlos knew what he was doing when he set the trap. He had an easy target.

  I said I was him.

  Maybe I am him.

  Maybe they were right all along. I’m a whore just like my brother.

  Another two Vicodin.

  Geno rolled on his side and put his back against Jason.

  Can’t have one twin be gay without the other. You love it.

  Jason made a little sound. A shift of weight, then his hand moved against Geno’s arm. Up. Down. It felt good.

  Of course it does. And you want it.

  He loved it. He got hard for it. He came during it.

  But it was all right.

  It would be over soon and he wouldn’t have to be anyone.

  Two by two, he swallowed pills until his pocket was empty. He moved further back against Jason and reached to take Ben’s free hand. Then he lay still and waited to die.

  The gates of Nos would open and he’d go home. For good.

  Ben’s fingers curled, squeezed and went still.

  Jason’s palm slid and rested on Geno’s head.

  Brother mine.

  He could see the little red henhouse, golden light streaming from its tiny windows. His mother would be there. Waiting for him and his common sense.

  H
e smiled.

  He was the only one around here.

  The boy woke up in Mount Sinai hospital again.

  No Vern this time.

  No Zoe.

  No Mos.

  Just a cop, an ER nurse and Dr. Frankenstein.

  “How do you feel?” Stein asked.

  I don’t feel.

  “Quite a stunt you pulled there,” the nurse said, inclining the bed up a little.

  But it didn’t work.

  “Think you can help us figure out who you are?” the cop said. “Because doc here said he knows you, while the buddies who called nine-one-one think you’re someone else.”

  He had a wallet in his hands, which he opened. He drew out two driver licenses and laid them on the sheets.

  Two identical boys gazed out from each card.

  Same date of birth. Same height. Same weight. Same hair and eye color. Same face.

  CAAN, GERONIMO G.

  CAAN, CARLOS N.

  “Who are you?” Stein said. “Can you tell me?”

  The boy in the hospital bed reached. As his hand touched the license named Carlos, a single tear tracked down his face.

  “No,” Stein said.

  “It didn’t happen to me,” the boy said. “I just watched it happen.”

  “Geno.”

  “I brought the fox a chick,” the boy said. “He was a whore just like me. He loved it.”

  “You are not Carlos Caan,” Dr. Stein said. “Carlos Caan was your twin brother. He died. You are Geronimo Caan. You survived.”

  The boy stared at his lap.

  “You are not your brother.”

  Tears splashed onto Carlos’ face, beading up and sliding along the laminated surface of the card.

  “But I can understand how it feels easier to be him,” Stein said. “It has to be so hard to be you right now, Geno.”

  The boy looked up. “I don’t want to be anyone anymore.”

  I just want to go home.

  He didn’t care. They could lock him up, put him away or send him back to the basement. It didn’t matter anymore. He watched his own hand reach again, extend an index finger and flick Carlos’ license off the bed, between the bars of the railing.

  “I think I’m going crazy,” he said to the boy who remained in his lap.

  “No,” Stein said. “No, you aren’t. You were brutalized and tortured. It’s no wonder you switched places with someone. You’re not crazy. You’re trying to survive an intolerable situation.”

  The boy’s shoulders gave a tiny shiver as he poured back into himself. Goosebumps like needles swept across his body and his teeth chattered. As he filled back up with Geno, he filled with illegal feeling. His hand curled around his driver’s license, the edges digging into his palm.

  “I just wanted it to stop,” he whispered.

  “I know, Geno. You’re hurting so bad.”

  “I wanted to see my mother.”

  Stein nodded. “You must miss her so much, Geno.”

  His name finally sticking to him, Geno nodded.

  “And your father, too.”

  “I want to go home. And I don’t know where that is.”

  “I know.”

  All of Geno chattered now, shaking and twitching and trembling. “I want to die,” he said. “And I’m afraid I won’t.”

  Vern came.

  The kvater always came.

  A meeting was held and decisions made. Geno would be kept in the hospital a week on a suicide watch, then it was recommended he be released to a supervised environment.

  “There’s an excellent center in Chelsea called the Exodus Project,” Dr. Stein said. “I made some calls for him and they have the space.”

  “For how long?” Vern said.

  “Their rehab program is six months.”

  Vern’s jaw was tight, his eyes flat as the details were hammered out. Geno sensed this was the last time the kvater would take him from one set of arms and hand him to another.

  When Stein left the room, Vern walked over to the window. Arms crossed over his impeccable shirt front, he stared out at Central Park. Beneath the cross of his suspenders, his back quivered.

  Geno swallowed hard. “I’m sorry.”

  Vern’s head turned a bit. “I miss him too, you know,” he said tightly.

  “I know,” Geno said, and again wished he were dead.

  Vern came over to him. He smelled strong and piney, like money and power and aftershave and pipe smoke. His fingers reached for the gold chain at Geno’s neck and picked up the star of David. “My parents gave this chain to your father for his bar mitzvah. I loved him like a brother and I mourn him every single day.”

  “Do you want it?” Geno asked.

  “I want you to live.” With a tiny thud, the star fell back on Geno’s chest. “Look at me,” Vern said.

  Through blurred wet eyes, Geno looked up.

  “I’m not going to let you die,” Vern said. “I’ll be damned if I stand here and watch Nathan Caan’s only son die.”

  This time, when he put his arms around Geno, Geno let him.

  Ronnie Danvers texted Stef early in the morning: Need to see you as soon as you get in.

  Hoping it wasn’t about Max, Stef headed to her office. In one of the chairs across from her desk sat Franklin Stein, head of Mount Sinai’s adolescent health center and a frequent consultant with the Coalition for Creative Therapy. If you looked up “mensch” in the dictionary, you’d find Frank Stein. He was one of Stef’s favorite people on the planet.

  “Dr. Frankenstein,” Stef said, laughing as Frank hugged him hard.

  “Gee, I haven’t heard that joke in an hour.” Frank slapped Stef’s shoulders a few more times as they took seats again.

  “Is this an intervention?” Stef said.

  “I wish,” Ronnie said. She looked grim. Stef noticed the window was cracked. The ash tray on the desk was full of butts, which was against the rules.

  “I wanted to talk to you about a case,” Frank said.

  “What kind of case?” Stef said.

  “A horrible one.”

  Stef glanced at Ronnie. “Why do you always do this to me before breakfast?”

  The laugh he expected didn’t come. His eyes shifted between his colleagues’ unsmiling faces before he put out his palm, motioning for the file folder on Ronnie’s desk. Ronnie put her hand on top of it and shook her head. “Better Frank explains,” she said.

  “A young man is coming to the Exodus Project next week,” Frank said. “His name is Geronimo Caan. Goes by Geno. Eighteen years old, grew up in New Jersey. Had an identical twin brother, no other siblings. His mother died when he was fifteen. Father worked in international law.”

  Stef noted the past tense but said nothing.

  “He’s a survivor of the pornography ring busted in New Jersey last summer.”

  “Also known as the Mengele Ring,” Ronnie said.

  Stef closed his eyes. “Must we?” he said lowly, but nodded to indicate he was listening.

  “You recall the details of that bust?” Frank asked.

  “It was part of the larger ring the Austrians brought down,” Stef said. “But this particular cell targeted twins.”

  “That’s right. The Caan brothers were at the house when the police made the raid. They found Carlos Caan hanged from the shower head in a downstairs bathroom. Coroner ruled it a suicide. Allegedly, he had the established relationship with the ringleader, Anthony Fox. The theory is he was financially or emotionally blackmailed into delivering up his twin.”

  “The details are all in here,” Ronnie said, tapping the file folder with her cigarette lighter.

  From the top of his crown Stef imagined a smooth molten layer, cascading down like mercury, filling in his pores and making a semi-permeab
le barrier. A one-way emotional street. Compassion and empathy could go out. But nothing was allowed in.

  When confident he was untouchable, Stef opened his eyes. “From what I last read, this guy Fox is still on the run.”

  “Yes. As for Geno…” Frank lowered his glasses from his head to his nose, picked up the folder and flipped it open. “He suffered close to forty-eight hours of sexual assault. DNA analysis confirmed seven different men, including Fox.”

  Stef felt a faint vibration as the words bounced off his protective armor, wanting in. He refused them.

  I can be sympathetic to your pain. But I do not have to feel it for you.

  “Severe internal injuries. Anal fissure, torn perineum, perforated bowel. A close call with peritonitis. He lived on a transverse colostomy for five weeks.”

  “Lived where?” Stef asked. “With other family?”

  “A half-sister for about a month,” Ronnie said. “He moved out shortly before he left for his freshman year at Brooklyn College. Reasons unclear.”

  “I’d seen him regularly while in the hospital,” Frank said. “Intermittently in the weeks after he was released. Then not at all by August.”

  “Toughing it out alone,” Stef said.

  “I’m not sure it was entirely alone,” Frank said. “He was self-medicating with prescription drugs, but he also may have developed a dissociative disorder.”

  “Conscious depersonalization or a fugue state?”

  “I’m thinking conscious. He overdosed on Vicodin at a party on the Upper East Side. Paramedics took him to Mount Sinai and police found two driver’s licenses in his wallet, one his, one his brother’s. They called me down and of course I knew it was Geno, but the friends who called nine-one-one insisted his name was Carlos.”

  Stef tapped his teeth together. “So, he switched places?”

  “Possibly.”

  “God,” Stef said. He put his elbows on his knees, raked fingers through his hair and held on tight. “Ronnie, you ruined breakfast.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said, and sounded sincere.

  Stef pulled in another fortifying breath and let go his hair. “What’s his awareness now? I mean, does he know and accept who he is?”

  “He does,” Frank said. “I don’t know what else he’s accepted, though.”

  “All right.”