Tranquility

by Ava O'Shay

  “Hey baby.” Ren came out of her room rubbing her eyes. “What are you doing here?” Quill smacked Jolin in the arm. “I told you to be quiet.”

  Jolin gave him another eye roll and walked over to wrap Ren in his arms. “Hey. Quill needed a ride so… “

  Ren ran her hands up Jolin’s back. “He’s messed up?” “Yep.” Jolin buried his nose in her hair and inhaled.

  Quill suppressed the jealousy he usually felt when he watched his sister and Jolin. She was lucky to find someone who cared so much for her. She didn’t need him looking out for her anymore. She had Jolin and his family.

  “And you were going to just disappear like you were never here?” Ren smiled.

  “No. I was going to crawl into your bed and surprise you. Then let Quill tell you how he fucked up tonight.” He planted a kiss on her forehead. “He wants to talk. Maybe you could give us a little bit?”

  “Some bro time.” Quill chuckled to himself.

  Ren looked from Jolin back to Quill. “Sure. Let me know before you leave.” “I will. I have an early class tomorrow. I won’t be staying long.”

  Ren held his hand until the last second, letting it go to return to her room. Jolin parked himself on the couch and waited for Quill to sit down.

  Quill looked like he wanted to take back his request. “What’s up man?” Jolin asked.

  “Do you think I’m gay?”

  “What?” Jolin laughed. “You have chased and caught more tail than anyone I have ever known, and now you’re asking me if you’re gay? Why all of a sudden do you think you’re gay? You aren’t trying to tell me something are you?”

  Quill shook his head, running his fingers through his short hair, pulling it tight. He came over and sat down in a chair across from Jolin. “Never mind. You can go… “ He waved his hand toward where Ren had headed.

  Jolin took a deep breath. “Why do you think you’re gay?” “You know the shit that went down with Ren and I, right?” “Some.”

  “Did she tell you what happened to me?” “I know you guys were abused.”

  Quill leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. “When I was eight. I guess eight.” He tried to get his mind to push through the drunken haze. He needed to talk to someone, and Jolin was his only friend. And he wasn’t sure he was actually his friend or just had to be since he was dating his sister.

  “When I was eight, it was the first time a man… you know, touched me to get himself off. When I was eleven. He showed me… you know… how… he had me jack off in front of him while he was wacking off too.” Quill shrugged.

  “Maybe you should talk to Ren about this.” Jolin shifted uncomfortably.

  Quill leaned back and moaned. “You want me to talk to my sister about jacking off?” “No. I guess not. But why does any of this make you gay?”

  “Never mind. Just forget I said anything, okay.”

  “I’m not really good at this stuff. Akeo is my go to guy, but I can give it a shot. Talk to me.”

  “I don’t know. It’s just. You can’t tell Ren.” “You and me bro. Dude code.”

  “Dude code?” Quill smirked.

  Jolin raised an eyebrow. “I can go.”

  Quill grabbed the brim of his baseball hat and pulled it down over his face. “I can’t seem to have a relationship with a girl like a normal person.”

  “You want a relationship like a normal person?” Jolin asked surprised. “I want what you and Ren have.”

  “Oh,” Jolin said. “I’m not sure normal is the word I’d use to describe what we have.”

  “I screw girls, and then say fuck you. I don’t even feel like I want to spend longer than it takes to get off. It would almost be easier to grab some lotion, some porn and a corner than to deal with them after.” He buried his head in his hands. “Sometimes I can’t get off. You know, I’m pounding, and they are all, ‘yeah baby, yeah’ and I’m like oh I forgot I need to stop at the store.”

  Jolin frowned. “Yeah I’ve had that experience.”

  Quill covered his ears. “Dude, I do not want to know about you and my sister.”

  Jolin leaned across to smack him in the head. “I’m not talking about Ren. I’m talking about Elizabeth. My ex.”

  “She looks like she’d be good.”

  “She probably is, but not with me. Look, my point is bad sex, not getting off… doesn’t mean you’re gay. It means it’s just sex.”

  “As opposed to…?”

  “Love. Emotion. You tend to have a lot of sex, but I’m guessing since you never see them again that it isn’t a mutually satisfying experience. One of you didn’t get what they needed. Maybe you’re bored. Or worn out.”

  Quill shook his head. “When mom’s boyfriends were around?” He leaned back and covered his face. “At first, it scared the shit out of me. I was confused. Why was my body doing what I didn’t want it to? But it… it felt good. I felt like someone cared. I thought when they went to Ren… Jesus. I thought they didn’t love me anymore. That they loved Ren more.”

  “It wasn’t love,” Jolin shot back. “It was abuse. Sick mother fucker abuse.”

  “I thought Ren took away someone caring about me. I didn’t realize she wasn’t competing for them, she was trying to save me from them. She was trying to protect me, and I’d go sneaking off to get the only kind of affection I knew. God damn the first time I blew. Jesus it was the… I felt so bad for feeling so good. It was wrong. Everything about it was wrong but… shit… I was playing a high stakes game for a moment of pleasure. I should have told her.

  We both didn’t need to be screwed over. I’ve never told her that. She thought she saved me, and I thought she was stealing them from me.” Quill leaned back, running his hands over his head, knocking his hat off in the process. “I am so fucked up.”

  Jolin ran his hands over the five o’clock shadow he was sporting. “Although I want to punch you right now for letting her think she was doing the right thing by taking your abuse, I understand that none of this is either of your fault. You were kids.” Jolin leaned forward. “Okay I’m just going by some stuff I’ve heard watching Law and Order SVU, so take it or leave it.”

  Quill raised an eyebrow. “Advice from a television show?”

  “Bear with me. What you experienced when you were little was just your body reacting. It is a natural reaction when someone touched your junk. It isn’t something you can help. I’ve heard rape victim sometimes have an orgasm, and they certainly aren’t enjoying that experience. And you were eight. Jesus, Quill, your mom wasn’t around. She didn’t give you what you needed emotionally. You were confused and took what you could get. It’s what you’re still doing. It’s what Ren tries to do.”

  Quill looked at Jolin with red eyes. “But could I be gay? You know, since it was guys who got me off… you know… before.” Quill swallowed back the lump in his throat. He knew he was more wasted than he thought when the next words came out of his mouth. “He told me I was a fag. That I got off when he touched me, so I had to be gay. Then told me if I told anyone, they would find out I was gay and my mom would hate me.”

  “Jesus Christ,” Jolin muttered.

  Quill shifted on the couch and tried to laugh off the tension. “Maybe I should watch more television. You seemed to have learned something.”

  “No. Not really. I get some from the counselor Ren is seeing.” Jolin leveled his gaze at Quill. “Being abused did not make you gay. It doesn’t matter to me if you are, but I think you’re confused, and I think you need to talk to someone that’s more knowledgeable than me.

  Ren has a lady she’s seeing. I’ve gone a couple of times to understand why she does what she does.” Jolin shrugged. “It might be a good idea for you to do the same.”

  “I don’t need a fucking shrink.” A counselor would try to get him to reveal the secret he had locked deep inside. The one he’d never tell. He couldn’t risk anyone knowing he’d allowed things go too far. That his sacrifices hadn’t kept Ren safe. If he said the words ou
t loud, they would become a reality that was too heavy to deal with, and he’d drown. He didn’t have it in him to swim to the surface if his secret got out.

  “Maybe you don’t. But what Ren and I have is anything but a normal relationship, and Ren and I won’t be able to have one until we sift through her shit. I’m sure yours is equally deep. She uses sex… or sexual acts… to feel in control. To control people. As a way to feel without actually having to feel. I’m guessing you may be doing the same. Sex, or blowing a guy, use to take her pain away. Give her a quick high. But making love isn’t supposed to be like that. That, my friend, is an emotion. Sex is a physical act. All you have ever had is sex. And if what you said is true, it isn’t working anymore.”

  “I’m so fucked up I don’t think a shrink could even straighten me out,” Quill whispered before closing his eyes. The last thing he saw before he passed out was the disappointed look on rocker chick’s face when she caught him with the other girl.

  .three

  Quill Diaz

  September 10

  6:30 a.m.

  The stale smell of smoke and beer surrounded him. Quill waited for his eyes to adjust to the darkness of the small, metal shed haphazardly placed in the backyard of their rental. Mom’s current boyfriend had asked him to fetch a tool, but he couldn’t remember what it was he’d asked for. Not that it mattered. He learned a few weeks ago that there weren’t any tools in the shed, and all he’d find was the man waiting for him.

  “Hey boy.” The man’s words were slurred just like his mom’s always were. They had been drinking since he left for school. Quill had been hungry when he got home, but mom was already passed out on the couch, and the boyfriend told him he couldn’t have a snack until he got the tools for him.

  Quill walked toward him. The sun shone through the bent slats of the dilapidated shed, the dust floating in the rays of light as he moved closer. A couch was against one wall, and the man was sitting, legs wide open, pants unzipped, waiting for him.

  “Come here, I got something for you.” The man burped, setting a candy bar on his thigh.

  Quill walked toward him, kneeling in the dirt between his legs. The man ran his fingers through Quill’s unruly hair.

  “In a few years, you’ll be begging for this. Or some whore from your junior high.” The man let out a laugh that turned into a hacking cough.

  Quill hated the taste of the man. Hated the smell of him and the feel of his hair in his mouth. But the agonizing minutes it took for the liquid to fill his small mouth made it worth it when the man would pull him close to his side, run his hand softly up and down his back and tell Quill what good a boy he was.

  “Get up.” Ren kicked Quill’s leg.

  Quill rolled over; burying his head in the couch pillows, he groaned. The dream wasn’t supposed to have come. The pot, beer, and sex should have drowned it, but it didn’t.

  “Look, douche bag, I don’t care how fucked up you are. Get your ass up, you’re going to class.”

  Quill opened one eye, but didn’t move to get up. After Jolin left, Quill had apparently passed out on the couch.

  “Get up!” she yelled and punched him in the arm. “Fucking A, Ren.” Quill hated when she hit him. “Get. The. Fuck. Up.” She practically spit.

  Quill pulled himself up and shuffled into the bathroom. He hesitated before looking in the mirror. “Shit.” His eyes were bloodshot, dark circles marred his usual good looks. With a sigh, he grabbed his toothbrush, washed his face, and ran a damp towel over his hair before replacing his baseball hat. Then he dropped his clothes, running a towel under each arm pit and over his crotch. His clothes were wrinkled and smelled like stale beer and pot. Naked, he crossed into his small room to get a fresh shirt and jeans then sprayed a liberal amount of body spray over himself. By the time he returned to the kitchen, Ren had made coffee and two travel mugs sat on the counter.

  “Jesus Christ did you bathe in cologne?” Ren waved a hand in front of her face. “I don’t want to be late, c’mon.” She shoved a book into her backpack and walked out the door.

  “Give me a break,” Quill muttered under his breath before picking up his backpack from against the wall and snagging the coffee. Ren was waiting in her small car. A car he helped Jolin and his parents pick out for her as a graduation present. Jolin’s parents divorced a few years ago, but for the most part they were supportive of him. He’d suffered a concussion, and his fairytale of football stardom dissolved before he could reach his dream of a college scholarship. Jolin implied his dad had some issue with the loss of his son’s football prospects, but everything seemed to have calmed down lately. Quill didn’t spend a lot of time talking with Jolin, at least before last night’s bro-mance festivities, but when someone is at your house constantly, it’s hard not to know what’s going on.

  Closed in the car, Ren started to cough. “Crack a window or something. You smell like a Chippendale dancer.”

  “And that’s a bad thing?”

  “It is if you are a college freshman and not a stripper.” “You said you were in a hurry.”

  “Meaning move fast, not spray an entire bottle of Old Spice on yourself.” “I didn’t want to stink.”

  “Well now you stink in a different way.”

  “You are doing wonders for my self-esteem.” Quill leaned his head back against the seat. “Why?” The tone of Ren’s voice broke his heart.

  “Don’t.” Quill took a big drink of coffee, letting it scald the inside of his mouth. “Don’t be my mother.”

  “Months Quill. You’ve been sober for months. Why last night?” Ren wouldn’t look at him. Her knuckles were white as she gripped the steering wheel. “And why the fuck did you call Jolin?”

  Quill rubbed his face. “Jesus, Ren, give it a rest. It’s been three months. It isn’t like I’m an alcoholic, and I called for a ride. You should be proud I didn’t drive.”

  “What happened?”

  He knew she was worried something pushed him over the edge. His fight with Mrs.

  Daniel had, but he didn’t want to get into it. “I’m eighteen. It’s what eighteen year olds do.” He didn’t want to get all emo on her, so he changed the subject. “So how’s it going with the shrink?”

  Her tongue darted out, playing with the thin ring pierced through her lower lip.

  Quill didn’t say anything. Ren sucked on the ring whenever she was thinking. He took a moment to look at the broken heart tattoo she had behind her ear. They had gotten tattoos together when they’d turned sixteen. He’d chosen the words ‘This too shall pass’ to be scribed down his ribs along with a pair of dice on his forearm. It hurt like a bitch, and he was still waiting for the shit to pass, but it was better than announcing to the world your mother broke your heart.

  Quill took another drink, proud of how he’d turned the table on her.

  “A counselor. I’m seeing a counselor.” Her voice lost its usual bitchy edge. He glanced her way. “What’s the difference?”

  “Look. I just want to make sure you’re okay. If you need to talk to someone, you can talk to me.” Ren glanced his way.

  “Apparently I need to talk to you because Jolin says you’re trying to slit your wrists.” “I’m not slitting my wrists, and I’m not talking about it with you.”

  He narrowed his eyes. “So you feel it’s fine to tell a complete stranger about our life?” She pulled the ring in her mouth again.

  “Why does he stay with you? What do we really have to offer someone like him? Why set yourself up for loss? Everyone else runs for the high road when they find out. Why not him?”

  “He knows everything,” she whispered. “He hasn’t left yet.”

  “I thought lying was our thing.” He snorted. “When did you decide to break the pact?” “Fuck you. I have a lot to offer Jolin, and no matter what shit I throw his way, he sticks by me. I’m trying to start over. Clean slate. The past is the past.”

  “The past has a way of coming back and biting you in the ass.” He glanced o
ver. “It’s just a matter of time before mom comes back and fucks us up again.”

  Ren snorted. “Which is why I’m talking to someone. I don’t want to give her that power again.” Their apartment wasn’t far from the University campus and Ren pulled the car into the lot.

  “Don’t cut anymore,” Quill said. “Don’t get wasted anymore.”

  Quill didn’t move to open door after she shut the engine off. If he didn’t talk to her now, she would track him down later. Eventually, she wouldn’t let him turn the conversation around on her. “Ren. I’m okay. I needed to blow off steam. My coping skills and nothing more.”

  She reached over and touched his arm. “Fucking girls you don’t know is not blowing off steam. It isn’t a coping skill. It’s trying to feel something. Just like I cut to try and feel. We’re trying to fill a hole mom left us with, and it won’t work. I want to be better for Jolin. I want to be better for me and you. I can ask my lady if you can talk to her.”

  Quill grabbed the back of her head and pulled into his chest. “I love you. But you and Jolin need to stop playing Dr. Phil with me. I’m good.”

  “Don’t get wasted again,” she whispered into his chest. “No promises.”

  Ren lightly punched him in the stomach. “I thought lying was our thing?” She laughed. “I don’t want to lie to you.” He held up his fist for her to bump. “Twin power?”

  She bumped his fist with hers. “Activated.” She smiled.

  “Form of a normal person,” Quill whispered, mimicking the Wonder Twins cartoon they used to watch as kids.

  .four

  Quill Diaz

  September 10

  7:30 a.m.

  After his morning with Ren, Quill knew his day was going to suck. And it only took his first class to confirm his prediction.

  He’d like to have blamed it on the pot and beer, but he should have recognized her when he saw her at the club. He’d been trying to avoid hooking up with girls in his classes for this exact reason. It was uncomfortable sitting in a room with a girl he’d had his dick in. However, last night he was so focused on rocker chick, he hadn’t really looked at her stand in. In his hazy mind, he had fucked the rocker chick… or the bass player, but he wasn’t letting his head go there.