Hideous Beauty

by William Hussey

  Pulling my bike from the fence, I angle it so I can rest my bum on the seat. This is ridiculous. I can’t keep staring at the thing like it might be a home-made bomb or a phial of anthrax about to go off in my face. I tear open the flap and pull out the sheet inside.

  And my stomach flips.

  Jesus, that’s my first stomach somersault in weeks. Because this is from you. I know it as soon as I see the distinctive yellow paper, torn from the journal you carried about everywhere. Your “Moodles and Doodles” book. I once asked if I could take a proper look inside and you shook your head: “Everyone needs a secret corner all to themselves, Frecks.” I remember frowning at that: “Even from me?” A pause, a moment to collect your thoughts, then: “Even from you, sweetheart. You’ll have that corner too. It might not be a book, but there’s some place you keep all to yourself and I won’t be there.”

  Oh, I have that place now, El. It’s called the world.

  I unfold the page like it’s a sacred object. It is. The sun glitters in your pencil strokes, ebony in a yellow sea, and for the first time since I lost you, I feel silent tears. I hold the drawing up so they don’t spoil this beauty. Is that arrogant? Because this picture is me. Dylan McKee, shy and prettier than I could ever really be, peeping out from behind a book. Carefully, oh so carefully, I place a trembling finger along the pencil line of my arm. My skin tingles like I’ve bridged some strange psychic connection across time and space. I’m both there, hiding away in Hug-A-Book, and I’m with you later when you take out your journal and recapture me. With you when you write these words in a circle around me:

  Frecks. Dream-haunter. Frecks of the EXTRAORDINARY green eyes and the LOVELIEST smile. Do I haunt your dreams too?

  I wipe my eyes ferociously, making sure there are no more tears, then hold the page to my chest. What an idiot I was. I wasted so much time because I thought time didn’t matter. I’m so sorry, El.

  After a while I manage to stop looking at the drawing of me and check out the reverse side. Maybe there are more sketches to warm and hurt my heart. There is a drawing here, but it has none of the sweetness of mine. I frown at the page, and all at once I know it wasn’t you who sent this treasure. Of course it wasn’t. Even if you posted it the day you died, it wouldn’t have taken three weeks to arrive.

  Gemma Argyle stares back at me. You’ve captured her perfectly, the pouting, preening princess and her other face creeping beneath. She’s dressed in a cloak and hood, something like the Evil Queen’s from Disney’s Snow White. Crooked talons are emerging from her hooped sleeves, twisting in the air as she conjures some dark spell.

  Straight away a memory clicks: it’s the Hug-A-Book day, and suddenly I’m thinking about what happened after you left her in the cafe. And I think I know why you might have drawn her like this…

  Questions burn inside my head: who sent this and why? A friend, an enemy? How did they even get hold of the drawing? All I know is that we now have something concrete to go on. We were looking for someone who might hate you, El, and with this we could have our first clue. I slide the page carefully back into its envelope, mount my bike, and set off towards Mike’s.

  “I wasn’t hiding,” I tell him.

  El gives me a wink. “I believe you.”

  He hands back my book, and immediately I drop it. Course I do. Shooting to my feet just as he’s bending down to help, I smash my head into his and all at once seven kinds of crap fall out of my pockets and scatter across the floor of the Hug-A-Book bookshop. El snorts with laughter and scoots down onto his haunches. We squat there like little kids fishing in a rock pool, and he’s talking but all I can do is look at his thighs. I thought they were impressive at the bonfire, but tensed up like this? Sheesh.

  “What? Pardon?” I fluster.

  He grins and hands me a well-gnawed biro.

  “I said, freckles and a complete klutz. Is this an act, Dylan?”

  “Dylan? I thought my name was Frecks?”

  “Frecks so soon after ‘freckles’ in that sentence would’ve sounded weird, no? Hey, maybe I should call you Prof! Your hand is never down in history and your hair’s always a bit Einsteiny. Yeeeeee…” He seesaws his hand. “It’s all right, but I prefer Frecks. And anyway, you’ve not answered my question. Have you worked out this entire routine?”

  “I’m sorry?”

  “Freckles meets klutz? It’s an irresistible combo.” His eyes suddenly light up and he snatches a packet from the floor. “Hey, Starburst!”

  Does he know his fingers smell of Starburst? Will he deduce that this is why I’ve been carrying around multipacks of them ever since the bonfire? He pops an orange one into his mouth and rolls it around. His tongue is very red and wet, I notice. Oh God, I’m such a perv.

  “Did you know these are my absolute favourite sweets of all time?”

  “No,” I say quickly, “I had no idea.”

  He gives me a hooded look. I feel like a convict under a floodlight.

  “Um, I think your friend needs you,” I tell him.

  Gemma Argyle is throwing us both the stink-eye and beckoning to Ellis like he’s a primary-school kid who’s lost his buddy on an outing.

  “The only thing that young lady needs is a sense of perspective, and perhaps a more stereotypical gay BFF. I think I’ve been a disappointment to her. I tend to disappoint people, Frecks, this is something you will learn in time. To be fair, I was kind of lonely when I first got here and walked right into the GBFF role without understanding what I was getting myself into. She adores my wardrobe but hates that I play footie and that I’ve been known to crack a sly beer with the boys after a match. I also hate her little dog. It craps in her handbag and she calls the turds ‘chocolate treasure drops’.”

  “Okay.” I nod. “So can I ask? Why are you even friends with her?”

  El’s grin falters and he looks away. “I think because she doesn’t have any.”

  “What?” I almost laugh. “But Gemma Argyle’s the most popular girl in school.”

  “Being popular and having friends aren’t always the same thing.” He shakes his head and his smile returns. “But I’ve done my duty for today. Rescue me, Frecks!”

  “Oh, I…no,” I say, edging around him. “I have to be somewhere.”

  He falls to one knee, hands clasped together. “Somewhere sounds wonderful.”

  “Yeah. Okay, but… Sorry, I, uh, really can’t. I… You see, it’s this restricted, um, place and I just couldn’t…”

  DYLAN! my brain screams. HE WANTS TO BE WITH YOU! SAY YES! GRAB HIS HAND AND JUST GO!

  Yeah, but what if he doesn’t? What if I’m misreading this?

  HE’S ON HIS KNEES, NUMBNUTS!

  “Right,” I fumble. “So, I’m sorry about the head-bump thing… Okay. Bye.”

  Still kneeling, he gives me this stunned sort of wave as I crash out of the shop.

  Crap crap crap. I try to keep my brain out of my head as I walk. I know that sounds mad, but you get what I mean. I walk fast, thumbs pulling at my backpack straps until they cut into my armpits. I haven’t been this bad since puberty, but hey, it seems that old anxieties never die.

  Head down all the way, I end up at Ferrivale Library. My own personal Fortress of Solitude. Mrs Jackson says “hi” as I pass the issues desk. She’s around fifty, just about the nicest person you could meet, and has this titanic bosom that holds a particular fascination for Mike. I don’t think he actually fancies Mrs J, it’s more a sort of scientific aerodynamic interest. Anyway, I’m pretty sure my favourite librarian knows I’m gay. She’s like the most discreet person ever, but every so often her book suggestions give her away. Don’t get me wrong, Adam Silvera is an amazing writer, but Mrs J needs to subtle up her hints. Once she gave me the Tom Daley autobiography, the one with Daley on the cover, snug in his budgie smugglers, because, and I quote, “I know you like diving, dear.” Honestly, I have never once discussed diving with her.

  I start in the history section, subconsciously hunting for somet
hing that might annoy Mr Morris by confirming he’s right about me being unfocused. We’re not studying anything about nineteenth century American inventors, so I grab a biography of Thomas Edison. Next, I head into Graphic Novels. I still call them “comics”, because it’s a grown-up word in its own right, goddamn it. I’m just taking down a bound omnibus edition of The Walking Dead when a hand snakes through the shelf and grabs my wrist. Because I’m already thinking zombies, I yelp, and someone on the other side of the shelf giggles.

  My stomach flips. It’s a weird, fluttery, fairground kind of sensation.

  “Sorry, Frecks, I couldn’t resist.”

  Immediately, my mouth’s back building sandcastles on planet Mars. El saunters around the corner and plants his elbow on the bookshelf, chin in his hand.

  “I like your ultra-secret, strictly-restricted special place,” he tells me. “I had to give the lady at the desk a weird handshake just to get in.”

  He looks me up and down, and I’m not sure if he’s amused or annoyed.

  “Where’s Gemma?” I ask.

  “Do you care?”

  “Um. No.”

  “Hey, Frecks?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Can I have another Starburst?”

  “Oh. Okay.”

  I drop my bag and fish in my jacket pocket. Then I realize it’s my old jacket with the hole in the pocket and the sweets have fallen into the lining.

  “Just a minute.”

  I dig my hand deeper, almost up to the elbow, but the bloody things keep slipping between my fingers and sliding further around the back, so now it looks like I’m a vet with my arm halfway up a cow’s anus. Ellis’s nonchalant expression cracks. Yeah, yeah, it’s freaking hilarious. In the end I drag out my hand and shrug.

  “No,” I tell him, “I’m sorry, but you can’t have a Starburst.”

  He’s now practically on the floor in hysterics. Between giggles, he holds out a hand to me, palm up, as if in surrender. I want to put my palm against his. I want to twine my fingers through his. I actually lift my hand, and I’m going to do it. My heart is raging. I can hear the blood pounding in my ears. I step forward and he grabs my sleeve and pulls me down to the floor with him.

  I don’t know how it happens, but suddenly I’m lying on my back and he’s on all fours, his arms planted either side of my head. His face is centimetres from mine and he’s hiccupping with laughter. I’m laughing too, but quietly, because it’s the library and I’m Dylan. It takes hours (seconds really, but time’s elastic in moments like this) for him to stop laughing and just settle into a smile. Down in the children’s section I can hear a librarian reading aloud to the little kids: “Will you, won’t you, will you, won’t you, will you join the dance?”

  Yes, I think. Yes, please. I’d like to join the dance now.

  El catches his bottom lip between his teeth and touches me. It’s like at the bonfire, but different too. Not the shock of electricity this time but a slow, wonderfully excruciating warmth. Three fingers, tracing my freckles and my jaw and my cheek. I take a shuddery breath. The whites of his eyes are so white, his skin so flawless, and yet he seems fascinated with my face, with my blemishes and imperfections. It’s crazy.

  “Do you mind?” he asks, his little finger edging closer to my mouth.

  I shake my head, though I have no idea what he means.

  Gently, very gently, he traces my lips with his fingertip.

  And I’m lost. The library, Ferrivale, all of it, falls away from me. And then suddenly an old man shouts something random and clumps towards our half-hidden section. Panicked, I snake my way between Ellis’s arms and drag myself onto a small reading couch. I can’t stand up. Not yet. El, still on all fours, gives me this wolfish grin and crawls over to the couch, sliding into the seat next to mine just as the Grinch rounds the bend. He glares at us for a second.

  Ellis, who’s picked up a volume of Hellboy, gives him the arched eyebrow treatment.

  “Do you mind, sir? This is an ultra-secret restricted area. Isn’t that right, Frecks?”

  “That’s correct.” I nod to the geezer. “Super-restricted.”

  The old guy looks at us like we might be deviants. If we are, I don’t care. Anyway, he grunts and trundles off. I laugh and bury my head in El’s shoulder. I don’t even think about how easy that feels until later.

  “I love your tattoos,” I say suddenly, emerging from his sweet, football-field scent.

  “Random.” He nods. “But thanks.” He spreads out his arms. His sleeves are rolled up and he flexes, making the jags and swirls of each intricate design appear like running ink.

  “Did you design them yourself?” I ask, and he nods again. “So what do they mean?”

  “They’re wards. Talismans. Protections against evil. They keep me safe.”

  “Do you run into much evil?” I laugh.

  He’s silent for a while, and I’m terrified I’ve said the wrong thing.

  “Every now and then. And if I’m right about you, Dylan, you’ll run into it too one day. Most of us do. So…” He sighs. “You like comics?”

  I’m so pleased he didn’t say “graphic novels” that I start giving him the full geek chorus: how I first fell in love with The Fantastic Four when my dad bought me a colouring book at an airport; my Avengers-themed fifth birthday party, back when nobody knew who the Avengers were; my and Mike’s invention of the candyfloss-themed supervillain Slaughter Master.

  “Okay.” El nods. “But why ‘Slaughter Master’? Shouldn’t he be, like, the Pink Peril?”

  “Oh.” I consider. “Yeah. Maybe.”

  “Or do you think that’s a bit gay?”

  “No! It’s just, we were kids and probably didn’t work it out properly and—”

  “Frecks, I’m teasing.”

  “Oh.” I press my hands between my knees. I want to hold his hand, but I’ve retreated again. “So, do you like comics?”

  “Are you kidding? Steve Ditko’s my hero! Those original Spider-Man designs? Wow. You know I draw a bit, right?”

  “Yeah! I mean, I’d heard you do art A level.”

  Plus I’ve been sneaking into the school studios and looking at your portraits and sculptures every lunch break.

  “I’m going to draw you when I get home,” he says.

  “Right. Are you?”

  He shrugs. “I’ve got an idea. A hide-and-seek idea. We’ll see… But first, Mr Frecks, will you leave your super-restricted lair and walk me to my car?”

  I nod. It’s all I’m capable of.

  Mrs J is grinning like a loon when we pass the issues desk. I think she’s dying to give me a thumbs up as well but she manages to resist, so I throw her a quick smile.

  We walk side by side, out across the street and right through town. It’s busy, shoulders barge me, but I hardly notice. I’m now fixated on how close our hands can swing without actually touching. I think he knows this game and he’s teasing me, letting his little finger arch outwards then pulling it back, but I’ve discovered something about myself today. I like being teased. At least, I like being teased by Ellis Bell.

  El knows. He must. Anyway, I’ve decided that I’m going to tell him. And maybe I’m completely misreading things, because I really can’t see how he could ever be interested in me, but if he is then—

  “What the hell?!”

  We’ve turned down a side alley and El has broken into a run. I join him on the kerb in front of a rather beaten-up Nissan Micra. The driver’s window has been busted in and a whole heap of rubbish thrown onto the front seat. A couple of bluebottles drone around the gloopy contents of old takeaway boxes while a random shoe pokes out from between a mountain of crisp wrappers. El looks up and down the street but no one’s in sight.

  “We should call the police. Hey.” I click my fingers. “Do you think this could’ve been Alistair Pardue? Revenge for how you kicked his sorry arse at the bonfire?”

  He shakes his head. “No. No, I don’t think this was Alistair. He woul
dn’t have the balls. I think…” He pauses for a second, his gaze roaming back down the street. “Probably just some silly kid.” Ellis bends down and picks up something from under the front tyre. A shattered snow globe, a few specks of white still floating in the broken bowl. “Ah shit. My aunt gave me this as a moving-in present.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  He sighs. “I don’t know how I’m gonna get the window replaced. If I make a claim my insurance will skyrocket.”

  “I can pay,” I tell him.

  “Frecks.” He looks at me like I’ve just suggested handing over a spare kidney. “I couldn’t. This’ll cost eighty quid, easy.”

  “It’s no big deal,” I say. “You can pay me back later.”

  He looks all around, as if some other solution will appear out of thin air, before finally coming back to me.

  “I will pay you back.”

  I shrug and we head off to a cashpoint. When I hand over the money, he takes this big journal from his bag and tears out a yellow page. Then he unclips a fine-point pen, jots something in this beautiful swirly script, and hands the paper to me.

  I, Ellis Maximillian Bell, swear by all the most secret and solemn traditions of the ultra-secret restricted place (AKA The Library) that I will pay back Frecks, AKA Dylan Lemuel Jasper McKee, all his hard-earned moolah.

  Signed EMB xxxxxxxxxxxx

  “You should feel honoured,” he tells me. “I never tear out a page from my Moodles and Doodles.”

  “Moodles and Doodles?” I grin.

  “Don’t you dare laugh! It’s what I called my first ever sketchbook. I guess I’m superstitious and the name’s sort of stuck.”

  I smile and fold up the paper and put it in my wallet.

  “How do you know my middle names?” I ask.

  “Dylan.” He grins. “I’m your new gay BFF. I know everything about you.”