Night Owls

by Jenn Bennett

  He didn’t respond, but I was too frustrated with myself to elaborate any further. Besides, he was an artist, right? He had to understand. So why did he look so damn grave? Or maybe it was disappointment. Not sure what he had to be—

  Oh.

  “I’m such an idiot,” I said. “I’m really sorry.”

  “Why?”

  I gestured toward the anatomy lab. “Because you ‘fixed’ this for me. I don’t know exactly what you did, but I’m thinking it couldn’t have been easy.”

  He shrugged with one shoulder and waved it away with the flick of a wrist. “I’m more worried that everything I try to do for you turns to shit.”

  “It really does, doesn’t it?” I was only joking, but he groaned, so I whapped him on the shin with the water bottle. “If you think a few tears and some upchucked pretzels are going to stop me from coming here twice a week, you don’t know me.”

  He didn’t smile, but his shoulders relaxed, and a few moments later he templed his fingers together, looking cheerfully devious. “Know what you need?”

  “A stronger stomach?”

  “Next best thing. Mint.”

  “Umm . . .”

  He dug out his phone and tapped the screen a few times. “An inbound N train is ten blocks away. You feel okay to walk to the stop?”

  “With you?”

  “That was sort of the idea, yeah.”

  “How do I know you won’t lead me into some creeptastic CSI situation?”

  “Damn. There goes my plan to harvest your kidneys.”

  “Please, don’t mention kidneys right now,” I said, pressing the heel of my hand against my stomach.

  He shuddered. “Now you’re making me queasy. Look, it’s a busy spot in the Castro. We only have to make one transfer. Fifteen minutes to get there, tops. Just text someone,” he suggested. “Make sure someone knows where you are.”

  I thought for a moment. “Give me your wallet.”

  “Excuse me?”

  I held out my hand. “If you want to take me somewhere, give me your wallet.”

  He didn’t even hesitate, just dug it out of his back pocket and handed it over.

  The black leather was warm and worn around the edges. “I thought you were vegetarian,” I said as I cracked it open.

  “A bad one, remember? Please don’t dig around too much in there.”

  I wiggled out his driver’s license. “Afraid I’ll find condoms or your My Little Pony club card?”

  “It’s called a Brony card, thankyouverymuch. Oh, Jesus—don’t look at the photo.”

  How could I not? It was ten times worse than the one on my state ID, and I wasn’t sure, but he seemed to have a ton of acne, which made me feel a lot better about his stunning good looks now. “Let’s see, Jackson Vincent is your real name, and not some fanfic Fast and Furious character you made up—surprise, surprise. And your birthday is in December, so that makes me, what, five months older than you?”

  “Told you I liked older women.”

  I held back a smile. “Five eleven? You seem taller.” And closer. His cheek was only a few inches away from mine.

  “Six one. I got the card a year and a half ago.”

  “Where’s this address?”

  “Ashbury Heights.”

  “Huh. Do you go to Urban Academy?”

  “Checking up on me?” He puffed up, more than a little pleased about this.

  “Well, do you?”

  “Would that magically make me safer in your eyes?” he asked.

  “Probably not.”

  “Good, because plenty of asshats go to that school, believe me.”

  “If your family’s rich, I’m not impressed.”

  “That makes two of us. What are you doing?”

  Mom thought I was working, and since she was just starting a twelve-hour shift a few buildings away, I figured I’d flown under the radar. But Heath expected me home. I snapped a photo of Jack’s license with my phone and sent it to Heath with a text: Going out to the Castro. If I’m not home by midnight, this guy kidnapped me. Then I replaced the ID—seriously, was that the edge of a condom wrapper?—and stuck the wallet in my jacket pocket, along with my phone. “I’ll give it back to you when you deliver me home with both kidneys intact.”

  If I hadn’t been sitting down already, his grin would’ve knocked me flat on my ass. “Any more arguments? Because we need to leave if we’re going to catch that train.” He held out an upturned palm.

  Most people who offer to help you stand just end up giving you a weak hand, but Jack tugged me off the ground with a surprising amount of force. This earned him a few extra points in my mind. I like people who follow through on promises.

  10

  TRUE TO HIS WORD, AFTER A TRAIN RIDE THROUGH Sunset Tunnel and a painless bus transfer, Jack led me across a street lined with parked cars to a corner shop nestled on the border between Castro and Mission. He was taking me to a tea lounge that served (wait for it) tea and small plates of food. It was one of those casual-swank places that probably charged an arm and a leg and attracted a weird mix of theatergoers and hipsters. Heath would love it; Mom would turn up her nose. And my heart was racing too fast to have an opinion.

  Warm light glowed from soaring windows. It wasn’t superbusy—probably because it was eight thirty on a weeknight. We left the chilly air and stepped inside a warm and steamy room that smelled intoxicating, all spicy and herbal and citrus. Despite the high ceiling, the lounge felt cozy and had a sort of eclectic Eastern exotic vibe, with lots of cinnamony orange paint, expensive wood, and bonsai trees.

  In other words, it was everything the anatomy lab was not, and I couldn’t have been more grateful.

  A tea bar stretched along one wall, tables to the left, but instead of taking a seat, Jack asked for someone—a cheerful girl named Star, who looked to be a few years older than us. They hugged. When Jack introduced me as “my friend Beatrix,” she shook my hand and winked.

  “Can we get the table in the tatami alcove?” Jack pleaded. “It’s empty.”

  “You’re lucky it’s late and I’m in a good mood. Come on.”

  Along the back wall, the table in question sat on a raised platform covered with a bamboo mat. It seated ten people on floor cushions—some kind of Japanese deal. A sheer gold curtain divided us from the rest of the room and provided the illusion of privacy, but we could still hear and see everyone.

  “You feel like eating?” Jack asked.

  “Not sure if I want to tempt fate.” I really wasn’t sure, and there were no menus anywhere in sight, but that didn’t stop Jack. He ordered “Moorish tea service with extra dates” and an additional pot of some kind of Japanese-sounding tea. I set my red bag down and took off my jacket while he shrugged out of his. Beneath it, he wore a heathery plaid shirt with short sleeves rolled up several inches above his elbows. And if I’d thought his hands were beautiful, his arms were stunning. Nothing but muscle. Not beefy varsity football player mass, but lean and ropey. And covering that muscle was brightly colored ink that started right above his elbows and disappeared under his shirtsleeves.

  The handful of tattoos I’d spotted on seniors in my school were boring or dumb—fake tribal crap and band logos. Or hand-me-down flash art they’d picked from grimy sheets in tattoo shops ten minutes before they got inked. But just below Jack’s sleeves, a graceful vermilion fishtail swam in a sea of teal water on one arm, and a richly textured Japanese-style flower wrapped around the other. They looked like paintings come to life, vibrant and detailed and beautiful.

  Do not stare. . . .

  He was listening to Star call out a question about the order, so I gestured toward the door across the hall and darted inside the ladies’ room to wash my hands and rinse my mouth out again. After wishing I’d brought along lip gloss, I took a deep breath and rejoined him. He was standing, waiting for me, and seemed to be relieved when I came back, like he expected me to bolt or something. Too late for that.

  We sat cross-leg
ged on the floor cushions and leaned back on pillows against the wall. For a few moments, it was awkward and silent. In my defense, I was out of my element, but I wasn’t sure what his excuse was—or why he was wiping his hands on his jeans. He seemed too cocky to be nervous. But one of us had to say something, so I took the short straw.

  “This is crazy,” I said, looking out over the lounge through the gauzy curtain. “Sort of puts most coffee houses to shame.”

  “Right? I love it here. The Zen Center has better matcha, but I’m there all the time, so it’s not as special.”

  I had no idea what matcha was, but I’d heard of the Zen Center. “What do you do there? I mean, I’m guessing you don’t sing hymns and listen to sermons.”

  He shook his head. “I usually go to a weekly zazen session—that’s seated meditation.”

  “The breathing thing.”

  “Well, it’s more than just that, but yes. And they offer a lot of classes, so sometimes I sign up for ones that interest me. Oh, and I volunteer at the City Center Bookstore a couple of days a week.”

  “Volunteer? As in no paycheck?”

  He shrugged. “I don’t mind. It was worse during school, because I had to work Saturday mornings. But for the summer, I’m only there a few hours in the afternoon on Wednesdays and Fridays. I usually work with my friend Andy. We’re doing a graphic novel together. He’s the artist. I write and do the lettering.”

  “Cool. You do it all by hand?”

  “Mostly, though some of the captions I do digitally, but I design all the fonts.”

  Ooh. Now all the Golden Apple graffiti words made more sense. I guess he saw the realization on my face, because he gave me a sheepish smile.

  “It’s what I do,” he said. “Just words. I’m good at layout and design, but unlike you, I’m total shit at drawing people.”

  He had an art thing. I had an art thing. I smiled, ridiculously happy about this.

  “Did you design your tattoos?”

  He ran his hand over the fish, pulling his sleeve up for a better view. The bright ink covered every inch of his biceps and stopped just above his shoulder. Half sleeves. Not a haphazard amalgamation of little tattoos inked one at a time, but an entire painting. “No. A local tattoo artist.”

  “It’s stunning work.” And had probably cost him a small fortune. Not to mention that he wasn’t eighteen yet, so it wasn’t exactly legal. “A koi?”

  “Siamese fighting fish,” he said with a shy smile. “That’s a fancy name for a betta. I love fish. Oh, and that’s a Buddhist prayer wheel turning the water. And here on the other arm is a lotus design.”

  He twisted to show me, and I leaned closer to smell him—I mean, to get a better look—okay, and to smell him, because holy cow. His scent and body and the pink lotus blooming in a spring-green spray of stalks were all . . . intoxicating.

  “It’s so beautiful,” I murmured. I heard his breathing change and suddenly realized I’d been leaning over him a little too long. I awkwardly withdrew and felt my cheeks heating.

  “I’m terrible at design,” I said quickly, fumbling to focus on anything but how embarrassed I was. “And I’m not creative—I mean, not in a cool way. I used to paint, but color overwhelms me now. Maybe my tastes have changed over the last couple of years—I don’t know. It’s easier when I leave emotion out of it and just focus on line and shadow. I like things to be . . .” I used my hands to make a box shape on the table.

  “Structured?”

  “Yeah. I guess I’m a color-inside-the-lines girl. Worse, really—I’d rather shade inside the lines with a nice, light 4H pencil. Something dark like a 5B or 6B? That’s me going nuts.”

  He laughed, stretching out his long legs beneath the squat table. When he did, his thigh bumped against my knee and then stayed there, sending a chain of warm chills through my nervous system that short-circuited my frontal lobe.

  “Zen would tell me to embrace the middle pencil,” he said.

  “Ah, the HB pencil,” I agreed, nodding.

  “So boring, that HB.”

  “You’re no HB. You’re like ten Prismacolors all at once.” Did I really just say that? Maybe if I just slid all the way under the table, no one would notice.

  “You’d be surprised how tame I really am.”

  I seriously doubted that. He tugged on the small black cord that hung from one side of the bracelet I’d noticed earlier. “Is that a religious thing?”

  “Mala beads,” he said, offering me a closer look. The strand of irregular dark beads wound around his wrist three times. “Bodhi seeds. I use it to count a mantra. I twist each bead as I count, like this.”

  I ran my fingertips over the smooth surface of one strand, just for a moment; it seemed too personal to be pawed. “Like a rosary? To count penance or sins or whatever?”

  “Sort of. Buddhists don’t believe in sin—at least, not in a punished-by-an-angry-god way.”

  “So you can do whatever you want?”

  “We follow a ‘do no harm’ moral code—basic stuff like don’t kill, don’t steal, don’t criticize others.”

  “Don’t destroy property?”

  One side of his mouth twitched. “I haven’t done anything that can’t be cleaned up. I’m not knocking the heads off statues or setting fire to anything.”

  “But—”

  “But I’m aware that what I’ve done affects others, and sometimes that might be in a negative way. And that’s not cool. But I do my best to keep the harm to a minimum.”

  A couple of girls passed by our table on their way to the rest-room, so I didn’t push Jack about the vandalism, just in case we might be overheard. “How long have you been a Buddhist?”

  “Two years. And before you ask, my family isn’t religious. My mom’s family is Episcopalian, so my parents make appearances at Grace Cathedral. But it’s just for show. My dad sort of worships himself.”

  “My dad ran off with a strip-club owner a few years ago.” I was surprised the words came out of my mouth, because I only talked about Dad with Heath, never with my friends, and never, ever with Mom.

  “Yikes. Classy.”

  “Right? I have zero contact with him, so don’t ask me to get you free passes,” I joked. Of course, right after I said it, I realized that this wasn’t exactly true anymore—the zero-contact thing. That carved artist’s mannequin was currently stuffed in the bottom of my Ikea wardrobe under some shoeboxes. I hadn’t decided what I was going to do about it yet.

  “I’m sorry,” Jack said in a low voice that made me feel self-conscious.

  “About what? He’s an ass, but our lives went on without him. Half of all marriages end in divorce. Everyone expects me to be crying over the fact that I don’t have a father figure in my life, like I should be screwed up over it or something. But I never even really think about him.”

  I shrugged as Star and another server climbed the stairs to our platform carrying two pots of tea: one made of black ceramic, and the other glass. With those came a long tray overflowing with hummus and roasted eggplant and olives and plump dates filled with feta and garnished with flower blossoms—flowers!

  “I’m suddenly starving,” I murmured.

  “I could eat all this by my lonesome, so we’d better get something else. Cheese or sweets?”

  “Hmm, tough choice.”

  “Bring both,” he told Star.

  “Just so we’re clear, I’m not paying for any of this, rich boy.”

  “That might be a problem since you have my wallet,” he reminded me as he poured steaming cups of the most amazing-smelling mint tea I’d ever inhaled.

  “In that case, drinks are on me.”

  Everything tasted amazing, even the tea. And the flowers were edible. They tasted like nothing, but still. As we stuffed ourselves with finger food, I stretched out my legs beneath the table alongside Jack’s. It took only two bites of a honey-drizzled date stuffed with feta for me to end up pressed against him from hip to ankle. He was warm and thrillingly
solid, and maybe it was because I was small and he was tall, or maybe it was the fact that I had his wallet in my pocket, but I couldn’t remember ever feeling so . . . well, safe was the wrong word, because I was still nervous around him. I don’t know. Maybe I was content—who knows? Could’ve just been that I was relieved to have some food in my stomach after what had happened at the anatomy lab.

  We laughed at each other’s stupid jokes and discovered we had a few things in common: We were both born in the city; we both had been to Alcatraz on school field trips and hated it; and at Amoeba Music, we liked browsing the movies and retro rock posters more than the actual music.

  Once I was sure no one was listening to our conversation, I said in a low voice, “Since I’m the only one knows your secret identity, I think I need to know why.”

  “Why I haven’t told anyone else?” he asked.

  “Why you’re doing it.”

  His brows lowered, and for a moment his eyes were shadowed so deeply by his dark lashes that they disappeared, and he was a faceless ghoul with empty, dark sockets. Then he turned his head and pretended to smile. “It’s not important.”

  “Just something you do for kicks?”

  “No, not that.”

  “Daddy issues?”

  Jack snorted. “If he ever finds out, I’ll have some issues, all right, because he’ll disown me.” His upswept hair was wilting in the steam rising from our teacups. He pushed a lock of it out of his eyes. “My dad lives for work. Family comes—well, not even second. My mom’s pretty high up there, but I’m probably tenth. And if I ever publicly embarrassed him, he’d send me away somewhere before I could open my mouth to apologize. Military school or Russia, probably. Not even kidding.”

  “To be fair, the stuff you’re doing would probably land you in jail, so you wouldn’t have to worry about being sent away.”

  “Good point. If I get busted, will you smuggle a sharpened HB inside a cake for me?”

  “Maybe if you’d stop vandalizing, you wouldn’t have to shiv your way out of San Quentin with a pencil.”

  He rubbed his cheek against his shoulder, and his face came close enough to mine that I could smell his lemony hair wax and the mint of the tea on his breath. I barely heard his whispered reply beneath the sound of footsteps racing toward our table.