Beautiful Boys

by Francesca Lia Block

  They shot baskets in strangers’ driveways and swam in neighbors’ pools and picked flowers and fruits from gardens for Fifi. Sometimes they borrowed dogs from backyards and took them on walks for a while, bringing them home before their owners returned.

  It was not just Kaboodle—Pup loved all dogs and all dogs loved Pup. They came running up to him with worshipping eyes and licked his fingers, immediately flopping onto their backs like hot dogs to let him pet their bellies. He always had scraps of bread in his pockets for them.

  “What do you think dogs dream about?” Pup asked Dirk one day as Kaboodle lay stretched on top of his Vans, long eyelashes curling as if he had styled them that way.

  “I’ve never really thought about it.”

  “I think dogs dream about wind and light and leaves and squirrels and birds and when they cry they are dreaming about wolves and freeways. I wish I dreamed about those things.”

  “What do you dream about?”

  “I don’t know,” Pup said.

  Dirk was glad that Pup didn’t ask him what he dreamed.

  Dirk dreamed about Pup.

  He dreamed they were the superheroes Slam and Jam—skateboarding in the sky over the city, rescuing hurt children and animals. The clouds were the shape and color of giant flowers. In Dirk’s dream, he and Pup held each other in the center of a purple orchid cloud.

  In the summer Dirk and Pup took the bus to the beach with Pup’s two surfboards. Dirk never asked where he had gotten the boards but he thought Pup might have stolen them on one of his runs through the neighbors’ backyards. As they waxed the boards with Mr. Zogg’s Sex Wax to make them glide through the water, Pup told Dirk that surfing wasn’t much different from skateboarding.

  “You’ll be a pro.” He looked out at the horizon, measuring the swells.

  Dirk followed Pup into the water with the board under his arm. All around him the ocean was blindingly bright, the color of water on a map. Through the sparkles of wet light Dirk saw Pup’s smile before Pup paddled out on the surfboard, climbed onto it and was carried away like a part of the wave. Thinking about giving Pup his surfing like an embrace, Dirk plunged into the water with the board, steadying his body as the waves filled and fell beneath and around him.

  Afterward they raced up the hot sand and collapsed belly-first onto their towels. They lay there until their hair was dry and the sun and salt water made their skin feel taut against their bones. Then they used the outdoor showers, peeling their trunks away from their bodies, feeling the granules of scratchy sand rinse off from between their legs in the cold water. Pup wrapped his towel around his waist and pulled off his trunks from underneath. Dirk tried not to look. He wrapped his towel the same way and tried to get out of his trunks as smoothly as possible while Pup pulled up his jeans under the towel.

  Sometimes after they’d been surfing they sat at The Figtree Cafe on the Venice boardwalk drinking smoothies, eating blueberry muffins and watching the parade. There were velvet and tie-dye women who read tarot cards. Dirk never even wanted them to look at him, afraid they would guess his secret. There were kids break dancing and bulky bronze bodybuilders, a carnival of half-naked roller women, bicycle magician trickster boys, a clown who painted faces, a mocha-colored, electric blue-eyed man in a white turban who played electric guitar and warbled electric songs like a skating genie. There was an accordion-playing devil with a circus cart drawn by mangy stuffed animals on bicycles. More animals dangled from a miniature carousel, and there was a real stuffed taxidermy dog, rigid and nightmarish. Sometimes, to get away from all of it—especially that dog carcass—Dirk and Pup walked under the arcade of pastel Corinthian columns decaying in the salt air, past the vine-covered wood-frame houses and rose-jasmine gardens on the canals and the ducks flapping their feet through the streets like little surfers.

  One day after they’d been surfing Dirk started to get on the bus but Pup put his sun-warmed hand on Dirk’s surf-sore biceps.

  “I know a faster way.”

  Pup stuck out his thumb. With the freckles on his nose and his bare feet he reminded Dirk of Huckleberry Finn, his Huckleberry friend. Fifi had told Dirk never to hitchhike but Dirk didn’t want to be afraid of anything, and besides Pup looked so cute standing there with his thumb out, so defiant and twinkly holding his surfboard, one hip a little higher than the other, behind him the sky turning as pink as the skin on his shoulders where his tan was peeling.

  Two girls in a white convertible Mustang stopped. Dirk recognized them—it was Tracey Stace and Nancy Nance, two of the most popular girls from their school.

  “Don’t you know it’s dangerous to pick up hitchhikers?” Pup teased.

  “You guys aren’t dangerous. You’re too cute,” Tracey Stace said. “Besides, you go to Fairfax.”

  She had dimples and her hair was almost white in the sun, her breasts straining her crocheted bikini top. She was wearing cutoffs ripped the whole way up the sides to show her sleek tan thighs. Nancy Nance was a smaller, less dimpled, less cleavaged version of Tracey Stace. She flopped over into the backseat, and Dirk sat next to her. Pup sat in front with Tracey Stace.

  “Want to come over?” she asked. “My mom’s out of town.”

  Tracey Stace lived in a modern house in the hills, all wood and glass. There was a Jacuzzi in the backyard. She told Pup and Dirk to test the water while she and Nancy got what she called “refreshments.” Pup slipped in. Dirk followed him, feeling big and awkward. The blasts of hot water massaged deep into the muscles of his lower back. Tracey and Nancy came out in their bikinis, carrying cold beers and a joint. Their bodies hardly made a ripple as they slid into the Jacuzzi. The moon was full, reflecting the whole of the sun. Lit up with it, the flowers in the garden looked like aliens with glowing skins. The palm trees shook in the Santa Ana winds like the hips of Hawaiian hula girls. Dirk thought about how Fifi called them palmistrees. She said she wondered if you could read their fortunes from above in the sky. He was glad that no one here could read his fortune.

  Dirk watched how Pup held the joint and sucked in, narrowing his eyes. He did it too. The smoke burned sweetly in his throat and chest, releasing the place in his shoulders that was always tight, ready to react, to fight back, if someone found out his secret.

  Tracey smacked some pink bubblegum-scented gloss from a fat stick onto her lips and moved closer to Pup. Then Dirk watched Pup lean over, just like that, not even thinking, not even trying, and kiss Tracey Stace’s mouth. Seeing Pup like that, kissing the most beautiful girl in school, made Dirk want to weep—not just because it was Tracey Stace and not Dirk who Pup was kissing but because of the beauty of it, the way Pup’s hand looked against Tracey Stace’s back and the way his eyes closed, the long lashes clumping together, the moonlight washing over everything like the waves that Dirk still felt pulling his body and seething beneath him although they were now miles and hours away.

  Dirk turned to Nancy Nance, who looked very delicate, like a little girl. He was afraid he might crush her. Her lashes were like flickers of moonlight on her cheek.

  “You’re so pretty,” Dirk said. He wanted her to know that if something went wrong it wasn’t because of that. She smiled shyly at him and he reached out for her, eyes closed, pressing his lips against hers.

  Nancy did all the work after that. Dirk’s beauty was all he had to give her although he would have given her more if he could. When he felt as if she would guess his secret he looked over at Pup and Tracey Stace. Pup had his legs around her and their bodies were moving up and down in the water.

  Then Pup looked at Dirk. When Dirk saw what was in Pup’s eyes his heart contracted with tiny pulses, the way Nancy Nance’s body was trembling near his. Dirk knew then that Pup loved him too. But mixed with Pup’s love was fear and soon it was just fear sucking the love away. Pup closed his eyes and there wasn’t even fear anymore. There was just a beautiful boy with pointed ears kissing a girl in a Jacuzzi, a boy who hardly knew that Dirk existed.

  After what had
happened with Tracey Stace and Nancy Nance, Dirk knew that everything had changed. Before Dirk and Pup had kissed the girls they were still safe in their innocence, little Peter Pans never growing old, never having to explain. Now Dirk’s love for Pup raged through him bitterly. It burned his shoulders like the sun, blistering as if it could peel off layers of skin. It stung like shards of glass embedded in a wound. It jolted him awake like an electric shock.

  Tracey Stace and Nancy Nance picked Pup and Dirk up at Fifi’s cottage. The girls were wearing tight white jeans that laced up front and back and lace-up T-shirts.

  “Where we going?” Pup asked, kissing Tracey Stace’s cheek.

  “A dance club in the valley,” Tracey said.

  “We don’t dance,” Pup said. “We hate disco.”

  “It’s not a disco place. They play KROQ music.”

  “We still don’t dance,” said Pup.

  Dirk was glad he hadn’t told them about dancing with Fifi in the kitchen.

  “You can watch us,” Tracey said and Nancy giggled.

  Dirk and Pup sat behind the dj booth watching Tracey’s and Nancy’s blond hair change colors under the strobe lights as they danced to Adam and the Ants, Devo, and the Go-Gos. Pup lit up a cigarette. Dirk waited for Pup to hand it to him but instead Pup held out the pack. Dirk took his own cigarette. It was the first time they hadn’t shared.

  “I scored a whole pack this time,” Pup said, as if he were explaining it.

  Dirk looked at Pup, far away behind a cloud of blue smoke, moving farther and farther away. Tracey and Nancy were twisting, snaking, shaking and skanking all over the floor. When “Los Angeles” by X came on they butted heads and collided into each other, working their elbows and knees in all directions.

  “Punk rock,” Tracey shrilled.

  Punk rock, Dirk thought as a boy jumped off the carpeted bench along the mirrored wall and began slamming with invisible demons. With his stiff sunglass-black Mohawk, rows of earrings and black leather boots, the sweat and strength of his body, he made Tracey and Nancy’s version look like hopscotch.

  Dirk could almost feel Pup’s heart slamming inside of him as he watched the boy. Dirk knew, seeing that dancer, alone and proud, tormented and beautiful, that he had found something he wanted to be. The boy reminded Dirk of Wild Animal Park.

  When he was little Fifi had taken him on the wild animal safari. You had to keep the windows rolled up so the animals couldn’t get in. Dirk wanted to get out of the car and run around with them. They were fierce and wise and easy in their skins. That was what the dancing boy reminded Dirk of.

  “That dude has some hell of cool boots,” Pup said, flicking ashes.

  Tracey and Nancy danced over. “She told you this wasn’t a disco,” Nancy said.

  “I think punk is gross,” said Tracey.

  When they left the club that night Dirk saw Mohawk and three other boys with short hair and black clothes leaning against a turquoise-blue-and-white ’55 Pontiac in the parking lot, smoking.

  “My grandmother drives a car like that,” Dirk said. “A red-and-white one.”

  He looked back at the boys as Tracey Stace drove away.

  “Want to come over?” Tracey asked.

  “I’m feeling kind of burnt,” Dirk said. “You can just drop me off.”

  Pup didn’t come by Dirk’s house the next day. Dirk felt like his stomach was a roller coaster as he rode his skateboard to school. At lunchtime he looked for Pup. He was sitting with Tracey Stace and Nancy Nance.

  “What’s up?” Dirk asked.

  “Not much,” Pup said. “You should have hung with us last night. We drove up to Mulholland.”

  “Where were you this morning?” Dirk asked.

  He saw Pup’s upper lip curl slightly. “Tracey gave me a ride. We were out all night.”

  For three days Pup didn’t come by Dirk’s house. When Dirk finally called and asked him what he was doing that night Pup said, “I’m seeing Tracey.” That was all. He didn’t ask Dirk to join them.

  Dirk saw Pup and Tracey walking on campus with their hands in the back pockets of each other’s jeans and knew that he had to do something. If he didn’t tell Pup his feelings he thought he might go slamming through space, careening into everything until there was nothing left of him but bruises wilting on bone. He caught up with Pup in the hall after school.

  “Are you free today, man?” Dirk asked.

  Pup looked like a startled animal caught in the beam of headlights in the middle of a road.

  “I’m seeing Tracey,” he said. It didn’t sound mean, just sad, Dirk thought.

  “Just meet me at the tree this afternoon.” Dirk walked away.

  He didn’t really expect Pup to be at the tree where they had first met. It was a warm day but he kept his Wayfarer sunglasses on, kept his sweatshirt on. He practiced skateboard tricks on the sidewalk under the olive tree where Pup and he had put their footprints once when the cement was wet. He was skateboarding over the black stains of smashed olives and the footprints when he heard the thud of rubber Vans soles on cement, and there was Pup with leaves in his hair just like the first day.

  “Hey,” Pup said.

  “Hey,” said Dirk, flipping his skateboard into the air and catching it. He gestured with his head and started walking. Pup walked much more slowly than usual. Dirk could smell his scent—clean like salt water and honeysuckle and grass.

  “Want to stop by the house?” Dirk asked.

  Pup shrugged. They were silent the whole way to the cottage.

  Jimi Hendrix on the stereo. Pup slouched on the floor in Dirk’s room while Dirk unscrewed the bedpost and took out what he had hidden there. He shook the pot into the paper and rolled and licked the way the boy who had sold it to him had done. Then he lit the joint and handed it to Pup. Pup took a deep hit and handed it back. Dirk breathed in smoke like the green and golden afternoon light. Maybe it would make him brave.

  “Nancy really likes you,” Pup said after his second hit. “She’s a babe.”

  “She is,” said Dirk.

  “You should’ve gone with us up to Mulholland.”

  Dirk wanted a magical plant to grow inside of him, making him proud and at ease. He and Pup smoked some more. Jimi’s guitar burned with music.

  “I just wanted to tell you. I’ve been pretending my whole life. I’m so sick of it. You’re my best friend.” Dirk looked down, feeling the heat in his face.

  “Don’t even say it, Dirk,” said Pup.

  Dirk started to reach out his hand but drew it back. He started to open his mouth to explain but Pup whispered, “Please don’t. I can’t handle it, man.”

  He got up and pushed his hair out of his eyes. “I love you, Dirk,” Pup said. “But I can’t handle it.”

  And then before Dirk knew it, Pup was gone.

  That night Dirk stood in the bathroom looking at his reflection. He didn’t see the fine angles of his cheekbones, the delicate bridge of his nose, the tenderness of his lips. He didn’t see the sparkle of his dark eyes that seemed to shine up from the deepest, brightest place. He saw a scared boy who was in love with Pup Lambert and who hated himself.

  Dirk took a razor and began to shave the sides of his scalp. The buzz vibrated into his brain. How thin was the skin at his temples, Dirk thought. Just skin stretched over pulse. He thought about the punk rock boy at the dance club. There was something about that boy that no one could touch. Dirk took the hair that was left on his head and dyed it with black dye so that it was almost blue. Then he formed it into a spikey fan. He smoothed it with Fifi’s gel and sprayed it with her Aqua Net so it stood straight up like the hair on top of Kaboodle’s head.

  At school Dirk wore all black and his Mohawk. Everyone turned and stared. But no one had questions in their eyes about what it was all hiding underneath. The disguise worked. There was some fear, some admiration, some jealousy, but no one despised Dirk the way he knew they would if he revealed his secret.

  Also, no one questioned
why Dirk and Pup didn’t share a lunch on the same bench anymore, why they didn’t play basketball together. It all seemed because of the Mohawk, the big boots Dirk had started to wear, the Germs and X buttons on his collar. That seemed like enough. No one knew that it was because of a glance in a Jacuzzi, a joint shared like a kiss and then turned to ash, a shock of love.

  Dirk and the Tear Jerks

  Fifi watched Dirk and his Mohawk more closely now. Her blue eyes looked always ready to spill. Dirk wanted to tell her, how he wanted to tell her, but what if the tears spilled, blue onto her cheeks? What if he hurt the one person who had loved him his whole life? What if she said, “It’s just a phase,” and he had to tell her, “It’s not just a phase, Grandma Fifi. It’s who I am.”

  And why did he have to tell? Boys who loved girls didn’t have to sit their mothers down and say, “Mom, I love girls. I want to sleep with them.” It would be too embarrassing. Just because what he felt was different, did it have to be discussed?

  On Dirk’s sixteenth birthday Fifi called him into the kitchen.

  “Where’s Pup?” Fifi asked. “I thought you were going to invite him over.”

  “He’s busy,” Dirk said. “You know that. You ask me every day.”

  Kit came and sat on Dirk’s lap. Kaboodle covered his eyes with his paws. Pet and Mini did a tragic ballet in their cage.

  Fifi had baked Dirk a chocolate raspberry kiwi cake. The candles made her shine like the Christmas tree angel she put on her pink-flocked tree each year. Dirk closed his eyes and blew the candles out. He didn’t make a wish. There were no wishes inside of him anymore.