Redirection

by Gregory Ashe

  “Jesus Christ.” He got an arm up, fending off the next blow. “I’m trying to—”

  His dad shoved him, and North tripped over his own feet. He came down hard, reflexes too slow to catch himself, and caught the corner of the TV tray with his head on his way. He barely felt it.

  “Get the fuck out of here! You think I want you here? You think I need you? Where the fuck have you ever been when I needed you?”

  North scrambled backward. Wet heat was running down the side of his face. His ear was still ringing.

  “Get out! This is my house, so you get the fuck out!”

  Somehow, North got to his feet. His dad was standing. Fury had done what nothing else could, apparently, and David McKinney wavered as he braced himself on his walker. Even jaundiced and trembling, eaten from the inside out until he might as well have been a stick man, David McKinney looked ready to kill. North didn’t realize he was backpedaling until his shoulders hit the front door.

  “This is what Shaw’s talking about,” North said. The words poured out in a drunken slur. “This is what he’s always talking about.”

  “Get out!” The remote hit North in the chest.

  “This is why I’m so fucked up.”

  “Get the fuck out!” This time, it was a half-empty can of Bud Light, the beer splashing into North’s face, stinging as it dripped down the side of his head.

  “This is why everything is always so fucked up,” North said, more to himself than to his dad, yanking on the handle. The front door opened. The sticky summer night yawned. He stumbled down the front porch, fell when he was halfway across the lawn, and dragged himself up to keep running.

  Chapter 24

  NORTH SLEPT IN THE GTO. Morning caught him in a park he didn’t know. A pair of white women power walking in yoga pants and sports bras were giving him the evil eye through the windshield. He opened the door and was sick. After, he closed his eyes for a while. When he opened them again, he saw that the universe had thrown him a lifeline: the missed calls on his phone, a voicemail from Percy. He took the Eads Bridge to Illinois, and he swore and fumbled for his shades as he crossed; the sun cut virgules into the water, and the glare was a second hangover clanging against the first.

  The Mound City Motor Lodge was technically not in Mound City. It was in East St. Louis, the urban wart on this side of the river, all crumbling concrete walls and empty lots, titty bars and liquor stores with bars on the windows. The tourist attraction was Larry Flynt’s Hustler Club. Other places had the Louvre or the Getty.

  When North parked the GTO on the weed-choked asphalt lot, he had to open the door and throw up again, and his shades fell right into the puke. He swore, considered them, and swore some more. He couldn’t seem to do anything about the problem. He leaned against the door frame. The morning air was cool and sweet, a mixture of leaking antifreeze from an ancient Chevy and a summer day that hadn’t cooked itself out yet. He closed his eyes, and when he started to doze, his head slipped, and he jerked awake.

  But Shaw was standing there now, so maybe he was still asleep. Today, Shaw had chosen red knit shorts, XXL, held up with an extension cord that went around his waist three times, topped with a batik poplin shirt—blue-black and gold. It was unbuttoned at the top, exposing the flat plane of his chest, the smooth skin brown with summer. Retro checkerboard Vans completed the outfit—judging by the amount of dirt on the shoes, North clocked them at about fifteen years old.

  “I didn’t know you’d be here,” Shaw said. “Is this ok?”

  North nodded and leaned forward into a few minutes of dry heaves.

  When his stomach had calmed down, he realized Shaw was holding his shoulder and stroking his hair. He made a noise, and Shaw helped him sit up.

  “Be right back,” Shaw whispered.

  The sun hooked along the curve of the GTO’s hood. A mourning dove was calling. Not far off, a speaker blared something garbled and went silent. The tracks weren’t far from here; they were already running checks, getting ready for the day.

  When Shaw came back, he was carrying a neoprene bag, a bottle of water, and a foil-wrapped packet of what turned out to be ibuprofen. He pressed the water and the packet into North’s hands. North drank half the water shakily. Shaw looked at him, took the foil packet back, and opened it. He placed the two pills in North’s hand, and North swallowed them with the rest of the water.

  Shaw watched him for a second. Then he opened the neoprene bag and took out antiseptic wipes.

  North shook his head, which mostly consisted of rolling it back and forth on the seat since sitting up seemed like too much work.

  Shaw nodded. “You’ll scare him out of his mind if he sees you like this. Close your eyes. I’ll be gentle.” His lips quirked, but he didn’t make the joke, and neither did North. North thought about telling him he knew Shaw would always be gentle, and that was one of the reasons he loved him, after all the asshole men in his life who confused gentleness with weakness. But first he needed to rest his eyes for a minute, and the cool wet of the wipe and the faint sting of alcohol in his nose were surprisingly pleasant.

  When he opened his eyes again, the sun had crawled halfway up the GTO’s hood, turning Springmist Green into white fire. He moved his jaw, and his tongue made a dry, sticking noise inside his mouth. When he turned his head, Shaw was sitting in the passenger seat, holding the sunglasses—now washed free of puke.

  “Thanks,” North said. And then, “I’m sorry. I hate myself, and I’m so fucking sorry.”

  “It’s your 72-hour kit. The one you gave me, I mean.”

  Traffic whispered just out of sight. A cat prowled around the corner of the motel, froze, and then darted under a parked station wagon.

  “I’m sorry too,” Shaw said quietly. “I was out of line, saying what I did.”

  “I hit you, Shaw. I fucking hit you.”

  “North McKinney, please. I know you, and you didn’t come anywhere close to hurting me. You didn’t even try.”

  North shook his head. He got out of the car, avoiding his mess, and went around to the GTO’s trunk. Shaw joined him there as North pawed through the assorted clothing. He settled on an orange tee that said WATER DEPARTMENT in blocky black letters. He swore a few times getting free of the blood-soaked shirt he was currently wearing, and then he swore a little more pulling on the clean one. When his head popped through the collar, he was surprised to see that Shaw had averted his gaze, which might have been the first time in recorded history that Shaw hadn’t tried to ogle him. Well, North thought, chalk it up on the board. The one good thing in his life, and he’d ruined it. A heartfelt apology to all you dumbshits who placed the long bets.

  “I guess Percy called you too.”

  “He said you weren’t answering. I thought—I don’t know what I thought, but I figured I’d better come talk to him.”

  “Then let’s go talk to him.”

  The Mound City Motor Lodge was a yellow-brick horseshoe. Inside the horseshoe was the parking lot and, at the center of the parking lot, a patch of grass in need of watering. A white poly tarp had been set up on the grass, obviously meant to be a teepee, but the plastic had shredded, and the grommets had ripped free along one side, and now one side of the structure flapped like a ship’s sail. Inside, beer cans, cigarette butts, and used condoms told the story of Good Time Central. They found Percy’s room near the office, knocked, and waited.

  “I don’t think the Mississippians used teepees,” Shaw said.

  “I don’t think they used polyethylene tarps either.”

  “I’m not sure about that, actually. One time I was on a school visit to Cahokia Mounds, and we got to do some archaeology, and they had it all gridded out and everything, and I dug down just a few inches and found a prehistoric ZX cup, and it still smelled like cherry Coke, and that was basically the archaeological find of the century but nobody would print my discovery because they were all jealous and Big Archaeology got to them and made the
m not print it, but—”

  “Jesus Christ, wrap this up before I have to walk into oncoming traffic.”

  “—if they had ZX stores and foam cups, I bet they could have had polyethylmerman tarps.”

  It was an offering, and North took it. He squeezed Shaw’s nape. Then he slid an arm around Shaw’s shoulders, pulling Shaw against him in a sidelong hug. Shaw reached up to grip North’s wrist. Along the base of the building, a hardscape of river stones provided drainage, and a few wilted petunias and a lone, drooping snapdragon provided color. A bee was already exploring the snapdragon, and that moment, standing like that, North felt the ferocious need to wish that bee luck, to wish one creature in the universe the same impossible luck that he had.

  “That,” North said, cleared his throat, and continued, “is the stupidest fucking thing I’ve ever heard. There’s no such fucking thing, for starters.”

  “Oh no, Ethel Merman is very real. She was the First Lady of the musical comedy stage.”

  “That sounds like being the First Lady of a chlamydia convention.”

  “Do they have those? Because I know you’re joking, but I honestly think she would have—”

  Someone moved inside the room, and Shaw drew a pepper gel canister from the pocket of the oversized mesh shorts.

  “Who is it?” Percy asked from inside.

  “Use the peephole, dumbass,” North said.

  “How do I know you’re—how do I know it’s really you?”

  “This is not some Mission Impossible-style shit with face masks and voice modulators, but since you’re being cautious, and that’s generally a good thing, I’ll make you a deal: you open the door in the next five seconds, and I won’t kick it in, put you over my knee, and beat your ass with a belt the way your daddy should have done when you were twelve years old and crashed his McLaren.”

  After a silent moment, the chain rattled on the other side of the door.

  “Your voice is extra gravelly today,” Shaw said.

  “Be quiet.”

  “Probably from all that throwing up.”

  “Dear Lord.”

  “And it added something. To the delivery, I mean. I believed you.”

  North rubbed the uninjured side of his head.

  “And the phrasing was super butch, and you padded it out with some local color. That detail about the McLaren was nice.”

  The bolt shot back.

  “So I’m going to give you a 9.2. No, a 9.3. No, I’m sorry, a 9.2. I really can’t go any higher than that.”

  The door swung open. Percy stood there in stretched-out mocs, cut-off sweats, and a Chouteau Crew tee. He looked like someone had worked him over pretty well: bruises everywhere, a split lip, the skin across the bridge of his nose lacerated. That, combined with the obvious fact that he had gone on the lam without an exfoliating cream or his hair wax, was probably the Percy Herbert equivalent of developing-world refugee status.

  “Move,” North said, shoving Percy out of the way.

  “Ok, 9.3, but I feel like the judging period had closed.”

  Inside, the room was barely big enough for the two double beds. Three of the walls were white that showed scuffs and dirt along the baseboard; one of the walls had been painted in a shade that was probably called sunflower, but in an unpleasant way. Flat-screen TV bolted to the wall, sink and mirror in the main area, a staved-in door to the tiny toilet and shower, and instead of a closet, a hang rod. The hangers were all the anti-theft kind, and North felt faintly insulted on Percy’s behalf.

  Percy was locking the door behind Shaw. When he’d finished, he twitched aside the curtains and asked, “Did anyone follow you?”

  “Did anyone follow us? What the fuck is going on, Percy?”

  “Did anyone follow you here? Jeez. I picked the worst possible place, didn’t I? There’s only one way in and out.”

  “Percy, let’s sit down,” Shaw said, tugging him away from the window. After a weak struggle, Percy let Shaw lead him to one of the beds. Shaw pressed him down. Then he sat next to him. North leaned against the dresser; the cherry veneer had holes burned into it from a hundred cigarettes. “Ok.” Shaw smiled and patted Percy’s leg. “What’s going on?”

  “I can’t tell you.”

  North sighed, but when Shaw shot him a look, North zipped his lips.

  “Why can’t you tell us?”

  “Because I can’t. Because—because there are legal complications. Because I’m in deep shit.”

  “But you called us,” Shaw said.

  “Because Rufus told me to.”

  “Is this about—” North began.

  “North,” Shaw said firmly, “don’t you need to pee or lift weights or use a band saw or something?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “A band saw. It’s—”

  “I know perfectly fucking well what a band saw is.”

  “Well?” Shaw said.

  Grumbling, North pushed his way into the bathroom. He did, as a matter of fact, need to pee.

  Through the staved-in door came Shaw’s voice: “You’re carrying a lot of tension. And a lot of stress. And maybe some trauma. Did you know you have nice hands?”

  Percy’s answer was too low for North to make out.

  Whatever it was, it made Shaw laugh. “Yes, I’m serious. Turn your head. No, the other way. Oh, that doesn’t look good. Hold on.” Then came the unmistakable sound of someone rolling a sparkwheel, and Shaw coughed. “Here. It’s totally fine; it’s medicinal. Turn your head again. God, do you have any idea how much psychic pain you’re carrying in your neck?”

  Several racking coughs constituted Percy’s answer.

  “Have you ever tried acupuncture? Because with your job, and the amount of stress you’re under—” Shaw’s idiocy was swallowed up for a moment by the sound of the toilet flushing.

  “—North to get mad,” Percy was saying when North could hear again.

  “Don’t worry about him. He’s not nearly as tough as he thinks. Did you hear how weak his flow is?”

  “Excuse me?” North shouted through the door.

  “Hit it again, yeah, like that. No, hold your breath for a little. Remember what you were saying at Teddi’s party? How you like me, and you were jealous when you heard about me and North? That was so sweet of you. Go ahead, take another toke; you need to relax.”

  North let himself back out into the main room, took in Percy and Shaw and the freshly sparked joint, and shook his head as he washed his hands. When he turned around again, Percy was sitting in the vee of Shaw’s legs, and he was moaning—quietly, but unmistakably—as Shaw dug his thumb into a spot near the base of Percy’s neck.

  “Take another hit,” Shaw said.

  Percy obliged.

  “North, do you want one? Because Percy is bogarting it.”

  “’mnot,” Percy mumbled, his head bobbing on a wet-noodle neck as Shaw continued to work on him.

  “Pass.”

  “Percy’s been under a tremendous amount of strain. It’s been affecting him psychically. And astrally. Oh, and ethereally, I bet, but we’d need one of those candles, and they’re like two hundred dollars each. I’m going to pull your shirt up a little. Is that ok?”

  “No,” North said.

  But neither Percy nor Shaw seemed to hear him, and when Percy nodded, Shaw rucked up his shirt and held it with one hand. His other hand moved down Percy’s back—pressing, massaging. And the cut-offs were doing absolutely nothing to hide Percy’s boner.

  “All right,” North said. “Cut it out before this turns into a fucking daisy chain.”

  Shaw’s head came up. His hazel eyes glittered with a challenge, and North understood: last night, Dakota, the crack of his hand against Shaw’s chest, the satisfying sting in his palm balanced against the shock and pain in Shaw’s face. The night zoetroped. His dad. Shaw. Grabbing Shaw’s arm. Grabbing his dad’s arm.

  “I get it. You made your fucking poin
t, and I was wrong, now stop it.”

  “What about your shoulders?” Shaw asked.

  “Oh my God,” Percy whispered. “I haven’t smoked in two or three years, and this shit is good.”

  “Your shoulders?”

  “Yeah.” And then, blushing, Percy mumbled, “Should I lie down?”

  “Absolutely fucking not,” North said.

  “Not yet,” Shaw said, hazel eyes like glass as he met North’s gaze again.

  “I’m sorry. Is that what you want to hear? I am sorry for all of it, and I was wrong. I should have said it sooner. I was wrong the whole way through. I’ll make a list, and you can check it off and tell me if I missed anything, but cut this shit out right now.”

  “You get one more chance,” Shaw said.

  “One more chance at what?” Percy asked. “Could you do my neck again because—yeah, hell yeah. Like that.”

  He raised the joint, but Shaw plucked it away, letting the shirt fall. “Any more of that and you’re going to be drooling.” His eyes came up.

  North had gone to Lone Elk Park as a kid, hopped across a stream while his dad picked a fight with his mom, and been surprised that the water was clear but that the stones weren’t gray. They were blue and yellow and green and brown. The sunlight filtered through the canopy overhead, and the water gathered the light into ruffles on a thousand tiny crests and troughs. Shaw’s eyes were hazel, but hazel wasn’t even close.

  Launch across the room, grab Percy by the prong, and throw him through the wall. Then catch Shaw up by the scruff, drag him out to the GTO, and—

  Shaw was still watching.

  North bit the inside of his cheek until his eyes stung. Then he said, “Please?”

  “Holy shit.” Percy laughed. “I am really, really high.”