by Alexa Land
“I’m still forming sentences, and I haven’t puked or passed out.”
Duke knit his brows. “That’s your definition of fine?”
“It is when I’ve been drinking.”
He turned and headed for the door. Even though he was clearly less than thrilled with me, he said, “Text me if you need anything, and be careful please, especially on the stairs. I’m going back to work.”
“Thanks, Duke.” The door closed behind him.
I took off my shoes and jeans before curling up in a ball with my stuffed Totoro. I needed a nap, but climbing all those stairs to my room seemed far too ambitious. Fortunately, I was drunk enough to fall asleep pretty much anywhere, even the torture couch.
*****
My neck and shoulders ached when I awoke a few hours later. No surprise, given where I’d been sleeping. I sat up and looked around as I stretched my arms. I didn’t know what time it was, but it was dark out, and I’d transitioned nicely into the hangover portion of my impromptu booze fest.
I slumped against the totally unyielding couch and scowled. What was it stuffed with, bricks? Curiosity got the best of me, and I picked up one of the surprisingly heavy, square seat cushions and unzipped it. It took some effort to wrestle off the light green fabric cover, and I was swearing under my breath by the time I tossed it aside. When I unzipped the plastic inner liner, nothing happened at first. But the moment I parted the seam to look inside, hundreds of feathers burst from it.
I jumped up and exclaimed, “What the hell?” They’d been packed in tightly and apparently were under tremendous pressure, so when the upended cushion bounced on the floor, a huge cloud of feathers shot into the air.
I blinked in disbelief. The living room looked like dozens of chickens had exploded in it. How had the manufacturer gotten so many feathers in there? And why? I’d heard of down stuffing, and some of them were small and airy like you’d expect, but most of them were actual, full-size white feathers. They were accompanied by a strong, gamey smell, just to make them worse. I had to wonder what kind of seedy, bargain basement, cheapo emporium had sold Duke his chicken coffin of a couch.
There was absolutely no way I was going to get all those feathers back into the cushion. I knew that for a fact. So basically, I’d just murdered Duke’s sofa. I also knew I had to clean up the mess I’d made, which was going to suck. I doubled over with a big sneeze, which kicked up a cloud of feathers, and scratched my left arm.
When I sneezed three more times in quick succession, it became obvious I was allergic to the damn things. My eyes started to itch and water, and I upgraded the diagnosis to severely allergic. I decided the best course of action was to put some distance between myself and the source of my allergy, so I rushed out the front door in a swirl of feathers. I was vaguely aware of the fact that I was dressed in nothing but a skimpy, red jockstrap, socks, and an ankle brace, but I didn’t really care. After all, I wore little more than that when I worked at the nightclub.
I went around to the side of the house, turned on the hose, and splashed some cold water on my face, which soothed my eyes a bit. I had a pounding headache, thanks to my earlier one-man Long Island iced tea party, and every time I sneezed, it made my head throb. Plus, I was breaking out all over in itchy hives, so basically, I was a total mess. I turned off the hose and ended up stretching out on the cold cement walkway leading to the side gate, just because it felt good on my bumpy, red skin.
After a few minutes though, I started to shiver, so I got up and went around to the front of the house. I stopped and smiled at the sight of a tabby cat running up the steps, and I called, “Hey kitty, where are you going?”
I got my answer a moment later, when I reached the foot of the stairs and peered through the front door, which was in the process of swinging shut. The living room was filled with at least a dozen cats. I could only assume the smell had attracted them, and they were going batshit crazy with the feathers. I murmured, “Oh no,” and ran up the stairs, but the door clicked shut a split second before I reached it. When I jiggled the handle, it was locked.
I knocked, which was stupid. Like the cats were going to answer? Next, I tried knocking on Xavier’s door, but the guy who rented the other half of the duplex wasn’t home.
I trudged out to the sidewalk and looked up at the house. A gray cat came to a stop beside me and stared at it, too. I told him, “Sorry, you’re too late. The cat rave is happening inside, but we can’t get in. I hope they’re not destroying everything. My roommate is already going to be mad at me for killing his couch, and now this.” The gray cat just blinked at me.
I hopped the fence and checked the back door, followed by each window on the ground floor, but everything was locked. When I returned to the front of the house and peered through one of the living room windows, it seemed the cat party was kicking into high gear. I had no idea what it was about the feathers that got them so worked up, but the cats were racing around and jumping all over the furniture.
When one of them knocked over a lamp, I knew I had to get in there and control the situation. The only open window was on the second floor at the front of the house, but it would have to do. After thinking through my options, I returned to the backyard and heaved the patio chairs over the locked gate. Then I stacked them on top of each other to build a rickety scaffold in front of the living room’s picture window. A couple of cats stopped frolicking to watch what I was doing.
It was easy to climb the chair ladder. The window opened from the bottom, and I pushed it up as far as it would go, which was only about ten inches. That would have to be enough. I pulled myself up onto the windowsill and stuffed my head and shoulders through the opening. In the process, I knocked over the chair tower. To my relief, it fell onto the tiny front yard, instead of crashing through the picture window.
My entry point was at the end of the hallway that led to the stairs and my room. I put my hands on the wood floor and walked them forward as I shimmied through the window. My torso slid through fairly easily, but when I tried to fit my butt through the opening, I ground to a halt.
Damn it, really? I kicked my legs and tried to wiggle through, but it absolutely wasn’t happening. I sighed and slumped in the window, draped over the sill like a rag doll with my hands on the floor and my ass and legs dangling outside.
I was just about to give up and extract myself from the window when a single, piercing blast from a police siren made me jump. Red and blue lights reflected on the white walls to either side of me. I was torn between hoping it was Duke and praying it wasn’t.
A moment later, he yelled, “Quinn? Is that you?” I sighed and waved to him with my foot. He called, “Wait there, I’ll come upstairs and help you.”
I sighed and murmured, “Wait for it.”
It was obvious when he opened the front door, because it was accompanied by a booming, “What the hell is happening in this living room?”
Some kind of cat mayhem ensued. It sounded like Duke was trying to shoo them out, but they weren’t going without a fight. There was a crashing sound and a muffled yell. A cat screeched, and soon after, two of them ran up the stairs and into my room. Oh man.
Duke came up the stairs a minute later with a few feathers sticking to his hair and uniform. He did something to the window so it would slide open all the way, then grabbed my arms and hauled me inside. I expected him to yell, but instead he asked, “Are you okay?”
I nodded, and then I started rambling, like I always did when I knew I’d fucked up. “Sorry about all of this. I got locked out. Oh, and I’m breaking out in hives. That’s why I’m polka-dotted. I have some antihistamine in my bathroom, which should fix me right up. I don’t know why the cats went so crazy for the feathers. I came outside when I started having an allergy attack, and next thing I knew, every cat on the block had taken over our living room.”
Duke didn’t say anything for a long moment, as a little muscle worked in his jaw. Finally, he took my hand and led me to the bathroom. I sat on the toilet lid as
he opened the medicine cabinet and popped a couple antihistamines from their packaging, then filled a cup. When he handed me the tablets and water, I looked up at him and asked, “Aren’t you mad at me?”
He crouched down beside me and brushed my hair from my eyes. “I know you didn’t do any of that on purpose.”
I swallowed the pills and returned the cup to the shelf above the sink. When we both stood up, Duke wrapped his arms around me, and I sank into his embrace. After a few moments, I asked, “Do you have to go back to work?”
“Yeah. I had half an hour between shifts, so I thought I’d check on you.”
“Is Finn downstairs?”
“No, he went home when his shift ended. I was the only one dumb enough to volunteer to work a double.”
“Is the house still full of cats, and if so, are you freaking out about what they’re doing down there?”
“I scared most of them out the door when I fell over the coffee table,” he said, “but there might be a few stragglers.”
“I’ll round them up, I promise. I’ll also fix the living room.”
“Should I ask where all the feathers came from?”
“One of the seat cushions on the couch. I had to know why they were so rock-hard, and I got my answer. The manufacturer somehow managed to pack a metric ton of chicken feathers in there.” I plucked a short feather from his shoulder. “At least, I assume this came from a chicken, but what do I know?”
He dusted himself off as he said, “I’ll clean them up when I get home from my second shift. You should stay in your room with the door shut, so these allergies don’t get any worse.”
Duke lightly tapped the end of my nose with his index finger, and I asked, “Did you just do that because I have a red bump there?” He nodded, and I tucked my face into his shoulder. “Ugh, I must look disgusting right now.”
“You couldn’t look disgusting if you tried, Quinn.”
I raised an eyebrow as I scratched my thigh. “Dude, I’m polka-dotted.”
“Even so.” He kissed my (probably blotchy) forehead and said, “I have to go back to work. Promise me you’ll stay upstairs, and call me if your allergies get worse, okay?”
“I will, even though I feel terrible about making you clean up my mess.”
“Actually, I like to clean. It’s soothing.” I pulled him down to my height and brushed my lips to his. He kissed me gently and ran his fingertips over my cheek before leaving the bathroom. I was grinning as I turned on the shower.
*****
“Duke? Is that you?” I sat up in bed and blinked at my surroundings. I’d fallen asleep with the lights on and a comic book draped over my chest and had been awakened by a creaking sound out in the hall.
He stuck his head through the gap in the door and said, “I’m sorry to wake you. I saw your light on, so I came upstairs to see how you were.”
I pushed down my Wonder Woman comforter, stuck my arms out, and examined them top and bottom. “I’m still blotchy, but the bumps are gone and I don’t itch anymore.”
“That’s good. Well, I should let you get some rest.”
He started to leave, but I tossed my comic book aside and said, “Don’t go yet. Come sit down and tell me how your shift went.”
Duke came into the room and perched on the edge of my new mattress. He smelled like soap and was dressed in a white tank top and a pair of cotton shorts. My eyes started to wander down his big, sexy body, but then I checked myself and met his gaze as he said, “It was extremely long, but uneventful.”
“Uneventful has to be a good thing in your line of work.” He nodded at that, and I asked, “Did you find any more cats when you got home?”
“Yup. There were two under the sofa, so I escorted them out.”
“I wonder if they were the two that ran from my room when I went to bed.”
“Maybe. I got rid of the feathers, too. I tried to stuff a few back into the cushion, but it wasn’t particularly successful.” I was idly rubbing my ribcage, and Duke asked, “Does your tattoo hurt?”
“Not a lot. It kind of feels like a sunburn, but just over a three-inch area.” I pulled up the hem of my T-shirt, glanced at the squiggle, and sighed. It was basically an elongated, upside-down U, with a little flare at just the right place to make it look like a cock. I wondered what Yoshi had actually been drawing when my unannounced flail sent his tattoo gun skittering across my skin. “Damn it, I need to have this fixed. I spend a hell of a lot of time half-naked, and this looks too stupid to just leave it like that. Do you suppose laser tattoo removal hurts in the same way that getting a tattoo does?”
“I really don’t know.”
“I’d ask Yoshi to tattoo over it, but I don’t think I can face another minute of that needle on my skin.” I wrapped my arms around myself as a little shudder ran through me.
“Was it really that painful?”
“No. I mean, it didn’t feel great, but it wasn’t unbearable, either.” I studied my blanket, and after a pause, I admitted, “The problem is…it was familiar.”
“What do you mean?”
“I guess it almost triggered a memory, something from a long time ago, before my mom and dad adopted me. Maybe I’d been scratched, or burned. Who knows? Most of the scars on my body have totally faded out, so I can’t really tell what was done to me. I only remember pain, and being afraid, and when that needle touched my skin this afternoon, that fear came rushing back to me.”
Duke pulled me into a hug, and I sank into his arms. After a moment, I asked, “Will you please sleep here tonight? I’m not talking about sex. I just really need you right now.”
He murmured, “Of course,” and we both shifted around and got under the covers.
I snuggled against Duke’s chest, and as he gathered me in an embrace, I whispered, “Thank you.”
“You don’t have to thank me,” he said softly. “I’m getting just as much out of this as you are. Your new bed is really comfortable, by the way. I can’t tell you how happy I am that the porn mattress never made it into the house.”
I grinned at that as I lightly traced his collarbone with a fingertip, but then I grew serious. After a while, I said, “I don’t want to be the weird guy who freaks out while getting a tattoo. Also, I could really do without the random panic attacks about stuff I can’t even remember. I try so hard to just be happy and enjoy my life, but every once in a while, something like this happens, and I’m reminded how damaged I am. I fucking hate it, Duke. I hate the fact that even though decades have gone by, the monsters who brought me into this world can still hurt me.”
His voice was so quiet when he said, “I totally understand.”
I held him tightly and whispered, “I know you do. I understand your pain too, Duke. Maybe better than anyone.”
After a long pause, he said, “I had a brother. He died before I was born.”
“That’s so sad. What was his name?”
“Ulrich.”
“Why do you have the same name?”
“I guess I was supposed to take his place, but I was doomed to fail, right from the start. To hear my parents tell it, he was the perfect son and could do no wrong. How could I live up to that? How could anyone?”
After another pause, Duke said, “It’s an odd thing, spending your entire life in the shadow of someone you’ve never even met. I often wonder what Rick was like. That’s what everyone called him. I wonder if he and I would have gotten along, or if we would have had anything in common. But that’s so stupid. I wouldn’t even exist if he hadn’t died, so there’s no point in wondering what he would have been like as a big brother.”
I whispered, “What happened to him?”
“He drowned. It was the night of his high school graduation. He was supposed to go on to the University of Arizona on a full baseball scholarship. Everyone expected him to have this bright, glorious future. But instead, he got so drunk at a party that he fell into a swimming pool and died, despite the fact that he’d worked as a lifeguard
every summer and was an excellent swimmer.”
“Oh God.”
“It’s terrible, I know. I guess you never get over a loss like that. My parents certainly didn’t. That part I understand. What I don’t get is the decision to have another child, give him the same name, and expect him to somehow step into the giant shoes left behind by a boy who’s remembered as perfect in every way. I know I’m a terrible person for resenting Rick, and for thinking things like, how perfect could he have been if he was out partying that hard? He was just a kid, and he died, and nothing that happened to me was his fault. He didn’t know our parents would try to replace him with a second-rate facsimile, or that our father’s frustration, grief, and disappointment would result in him beating me while our mother turned a blind eye.”
I whispered, “Oh no.”
Duke stroked my hair, as if I was the one who needed comforting, and said, “It’s in the past now. My father can’t hurt me anymore. I was seventeen the last time he tried. He went to hit me, and I lunged at him. I was as big as he was at that point, and it must have scared him to realize I was willing to fight back. I stopped myself before I did anything to him, but he got the message and the beatings stopped.”
I sat up and tried to meet his gaze. “I don’t understand why you allow your parents to be a part of your life now. They’re terrible people, and they don’t deserve you!”
He shrugged and studied the macaroni Elvis on the wall beside the bed. “They’re all I have. I don’t make friends easily, and I don’t have any other family aside from my grandmother, but she doesn’t want anything to do with me.”
“Fuck them! You have me, Duke, and you don’t need those people!”
“But I don’t have you. Not really. We’ve known each other a matter of days, and even though you agreed to go out with me and I’d love to be optimistic about that, it’s hard to imagine this developing into anything long-term.”
“How can you say that?”
“Because you’re you, and I’m me.”
I told him, “That’s not an explanation.”