Sloth

by James, Ella

  Guilty.

  I don’t let the first sob loose until I turn onto the highway.

  Part III

  “Unless you love someone, nothing else makes

  any sense.” -e.e. cummings

  ONE

  Kellan

  November 13, 2010

  When Ly and I were little kids and Barrett was in junior high, our family lived in this cottage overlooking the cliffs near Malibu. My Mom would set her easel up on the porch, and Ly and I would ride our tricycles on the rough grass beside the house. We would dare each other to walk closer to the cliffs’ edge, and Ly would always make up some excuse not to. I was always sticking one foot off. It drove Mom crazy. I guess it probably scared her.

  There was so much wind there—all the time. I loved that wind. I loved the salty smell of it. I thought if I ever fell, I might just spread my arms and fly. I used to dream of it, at night when we would leave our windows open for the warm, wet air: flying over the water like an albatross.

  I don’t know why I remember that right now. Tonight. I guess because I’m standing at the front of Daniel Harmon’s father’s yacht, looking out over the choppy waters off the coast of Santa Monica.

  Tonight was our last game of the season, so Daniel had almost the whole team here to celebrate. He’s our captain, and he’s generous as shit. I don’t think he asked any of the guys to help with food or liquor, not to mention gas for this big bitch.

  I know most guys couldn’t shovel over the money. Lyon gave Dan a handful of Benjis yesterday, once Dan had gotten confirmation from his family’s captain.

  The two of them are pretty friendly: Ly and Dan. I heard them talking a couple weeks ago in the locker room, and I’m pretty sure it was about Ly becoming team captain in a few more years. Dan is a lineman, and Ly is a tight end—second string right now—and neither of them is consumed with playing, like I am.

  Not that I would be team captain anyway. I’m not cut out for that shit. Lyon has always been. And that’s a good thing, that one of us likes being the life of the party, because I’d rather take a knee to the nuts than spend a bunch of time with other people—most days, anyway.

  Nights like tonight, it’s cool. The bar is bleeding freely, there’s a bunch of not-quite-strippers in the cinema room, and I heard Murray’s making Mississippi hunch punch in the master bathroom.

  I get a buzz on my phone and pull it out and yep, my boy Murray—our superstar wide receiver—is asking me do I know how to sink a honeydew melon. I laugh smoke into the humid air and turn around from my spot at the bow of the yacht. I flick my blunt over the rail and take the port side back toward the stern, to avoid where all the girls are, on the starboard deck. I’m kind of sick of Gillian and her mind games. If she wants me, she can come and find me inside.

  I take my time going down the stairs and through the living area. It’s big—way bigger than the one on Robert’s yacht—and flashy as shit, with gold fixtures, a swank ass chandelier, and a bunch of leather furniture, all centered around the biggest flatscreen I’ve ever seen.

  As I start down the rear hallway, I bump into McQueen and his girl, Fiona, with her hand in Mc’s jeans. I give him a grin and he slaps my shoulder.

  I pass a couple of staterooms before I get to a wide-ass door that’s propped open with a fifth of tequila.

  There’s a party in the bedroom: a bunch of the D and a harem of girls who could either be strippers or their girlfriends. Since I’m not sure which, I don’t say much either way.

  I tip my chin at them, then bang on the bathroom door and yell, “It’s Kellan, dumbass. Open up!”

  Murray slaps the door open. I catch it right before it hits me in the face, then give his cheek a hard swipe. He steps back and shakes his head.

  “Man, this shit looked easy when my older brother did it.”

  “Us little bros gotta stick together,” I say. He laughs at that, because Murray is six-foot-five and three hundred pounds of lethal muscle—and some long, fast legs—so he doesn’t seem like anybody’s little anything. He told me once his brother, an accountant, is five-foot-eight with a fro and wire-rimmed glasses.

  I follow him deeper into the bathroom, which has a flowery, funeral parlor smell, and Murray points to the melon floating in a giant Tupperware box in the shower. “I tried to cut that shit with this knife—” he passes me a fillet knife from one of the sinks—“but that motherfucker will not budge.”

  I laugh my way out of a smirk. “You know where the kitchen is, man?”

  Murray nods.

  “Go ask someone in there for a chopping block and a Kuhn Rikon melon knife, or something like that.”

  “Kuhn Rikon, you say?”

  I nod. “Whoever’s in there, they should know.”

  I think about telling him what to look for if the kitchen is unmanned, but no way it will be. Not with this many people on board.

  Murray takes a fuck while to come back, so after I use the fillet knife to finish slicing the three watermelons he busted open on the counter’s edge, I pour another bottle of Everclear into the box and stand at the door, listening to the boom of music from the bedroom.

  I look around the bathroom.... at the giant whirlpool. Then I start the water, lock the door, pull my shoes and clothes off. Nothing like a good soak. I slide into the water with a bottle of Cristal.

  I lean my head against one of the shell-shaped pillows on the tub’s side and let my breath out. I’m pretty fucking tired from this morning’s game, but very fucking happy. We went 7-3 this season, which is damn good for a team with me as quarterback.

  I curl my right hand into a fist. Then I take a long pull of Cristal.

  Now all I have to worry about is Gill. And Thanksgiving. My father will probably work the break away, and Barrett won’t come home—he’s down in Georgia, training with the Rangers—but even being in that fucking house makes it hard for me to breathe.

  Dad’s expectations stalk me through every echoing corridor, and my mom is still all over. The place is like a fucking shrine to her. Her art, her murals. Even a tapestry she wove. I guess I never noticed how much I hated it in high school. How I tried not to go downstairs for much, or even be home at all. Who can blame me? I don’t think Dad has spent more than six or seven hours in a row at home since Mom’s death. Sometimes I think he’s trying to follow her, the way he always works and never sleeps. I know, I know—he re-wires tiny little baby hearts. Does things no one else knows how to do. But still...

  I rub my forehead. My dad is a fucking prick.

  The times we do see him, he makes Lyon get all stiff and quiet. Ly has got this low, serious voice he uses with Robert, like to show him he’s a real man or some shit. It doesn’t matter how much he trips over himself, trying to impress our father. Robert never bats an eye. He never has any praise to spare. At the end of every day we’re there, Ly goes to his room and shuts the door. He doesn’t even rant about what a dick Robert is—not anymore. He doesn’t say a word to me about our bastard Dad. He hasn’t in at least a year.

  My strategy for being home is different. I get drunk, try to leave a bag of powder lying around, and see how rattled I can get him: dear old Dad—the esteemed pediatric cardiothoracic surgeon Dr. Robert Drake. He tells me what a prick I am, and I crack the knuckles on my right hand. I don’t care what Robert thinks. Not anymore. My name’s on TV every week. I’ve got my own damn fan page.

  Maybe we should take Gillian and Whitney to Veil or someplace for TG. Whitney doesn’t like Gill, but so the fuck what? I’ll keep Gill in bed, stuffed full of my dick, and Ly and Whit can stroll the happy mountains holding hands like the old folks they are.

  “Open up motherfucker!”

  Murray knocks so hard the door vibrates. He yanks it open and steps in. I stand up and laugh as Murray whirls away from me.

  “What the fuck are you doing, son? Damn!”

  He tosses a towel over his shoulder, and I catch it before it hits the water.

  “Put yo clothes on.”


  I towel off and reach for my boxers. “You get the knife?”

  “I got somethin’.” I laugh at Murray’s Mississippi drawl.

  We spend the next half hour finishing the punch, and then I hear Gill coming through the bedroom, making a big fuss as she tries to locate me.

  I shut her up as fast as I can, bending her over the side of a chair in one of the lesser staterooms and fingering her tight hole while my other hand delves into her warm pussy. I wait until she’s dripping wet and begging for it. Then I slide my dick inside her pussy for the moisture, draw out slowly, and take her asshole inch by blissful inch.

  When we’re finished, she’s quiet for once.

  I grin.

  She huffs. “I don’t know why you like my ass so much.”

  I shrug. “It’s symbiotic, baby. That ass likes me just as much as I like it. Don’t try to lie.”

  I step into the en suite and turn on the bath, then throw Gillian over my shoulder and lower her into the warm water.

  “What is it with you and baths tonight?”

  I shrug. “Cleanliness is Godliness or some shit. That’s what Murray says.”

  Her lip curls. “Stupid Southerner.”

  “Portlander.”

  Gill makes a face at me.

  My phone buzzes, and I step out without even checking who it is.

  Murray. ‘Get your ass in here. I got something for your bro Ly.’

  I tell Gillian I’ll be back in a few and elbow my way through the crowded hallway. I find Murray spooning hunch punch into some crystal we probably shouldn’t be using. He hands me a glittering glass that’s filled with red liquid and chunks of melon.

  He grins. “Give this to Ly. I want to see him drunk off real hunch punch, the way we do it down in Jackson.”

  “You want to what?” The door cracks open, and my blond brother steps in. He looks from me to Murray and grins. “You making fun of me, Murray? That hurts.” He puts a hand over his heart. “You think I can’t handle some of your fruity punch?”

  Lyon drains the glass in two long gulps and chews a chunk of melon. He smacks his lips together, then smiles his dimpled smile. A few minutes later, Whit pokes her head in.

  “What up?”

  Murray sends them off with two more glasses of the good stuff.

  Lyon holds his glass up to me as the door shuts, asking me in twinspeak what the fuck is in it. I wink.

  An hour later, when we’re dicking around on the promenade deck and Lyon slips on some sea foam, I remember that moment. The way I winked and let my brother eat the fruit.

  As Ly sails across the damp deck, Whitney grabs for him and so do I, because we both know Lyon is shit-faced. The two of us collide and send him sailing toward the guardrail, and at that moment, a big wave rocks the boat toward the starboard side. Lyon hits the railing with his middle, and flips over it like a gymnast on the bars.

  My heart stops.

  But he’s got the rail. Holy fuck, he’s got the rail! His hands are wrapped around the braided wire. His loafered foot is propped against the deck.

  I lunge for him, grab his forearms. “Fuck!”

  Whitney’s shrieking draws a crowd, and seconds later, Lyon is hauled onto the deck by six strong hands—two of them my own.

  He gives Whit a long, weird look before his eyes roll back into his head. He crumples to the slick deck like a blow-up doll deflating. When I drop down by him and shove my fingers to his neck, I find his pulse pounding too fast.

  A second later, blood starts pouring from his nose.

  My heart pounds too as Whitney screams again.

  TWO

  Cleo

  September 18, 2014

  How long am I going to sit here? Like a lunatic. I’ve got my phone in my hand, and my car parked on top of the library parking deck. I’ve made myself a beacon for Kellan—and yet he hasn’t sought me out. Not even a text to explain the lie about his uncle and the pretty girl with different colored eyes.

  So I have nothing to assuage the awful feeling in my stomach. The one that tells me I messed up, wearing my heart outside myself. Letting him brush up against it. Letting him grab hold of it.

  How many lies did he tell me?

  He’s an addict. Probably. I don’t want him to be, but I’m not an idiot. Who has that many pill bottles and injection-type supplies for any other reason?

  As I’ve sat here these last few hours, I’ve wondered if that’s why his uncle and the girl were there: to stage an intervention or something. Was that what happened the other night, when Pace wouldn’t deliver the plants? Manning was involved—as he would be if Kellan had a drug problem. And Kellan said something about how his dad was putting pressure on Pace. Wouldn’t any father try to intervene if they knew their child had a problem?

  Kellan.

  Addict.

  I saw that cabinet with my own two eyes, and still... I just can’t picture it. He always seems so... capable.

  And moody.

  Okay, he is definitely moody.

  Moody like an addict?

  How the hell would I know?

  He lied about the pot. I know that much for sure. Telling me he doesn’t smoke, as if I’d even care, but then he smokes. He clearly does.

  Maybe he lies instinctively. He would do it to protect himself. The longer I’ve known him, the more I’ve sensed something like that: an outer shell around the softer Kellan.

  Maybe his entire life is a lie. Some people are like that. They can’t commit to being just one person.

  I think about how he joined SGA for his brother. How he doesn’t even like it. And on top of that—the lie of posing as the type of person you aren’t—he has an even more flamboyant double-life because he’s an SGA president who deals.

  So Kellan is a liar.

  I don’t care...

  All I feel right now is desperate. Foolish. Why did I storm off like that? It was stupid to run off without talking to him. Especially after I saw his secret cabinet. Tears shimmer in my eyes.

  R.

  I couldn’t help him! Why not, God?

  I can’t believe he’s dead.

  The more I think about my Kellan, swallowing a bunch of painkillers so he doesn’t have to face whatever haunts him, the more restless—the more helpless—I feel. I want to go to his house, but I’m too scared. What if he hasn’t texted me because he doesn’t want me to come back?

  He likes the affection—yeah. The holding hands, the non-stop touching. So he needs the contact to assuage some beast. But maybe I freaked him out when I told him I liked him. If he’s an addict, he may think he needs to shut me out. Spare me some pain or some such martyr shit.

  I feel the weight of his warm hand on my back as I stood by Olive’s grave. I can see him, pale and stricken, in the passenger’s seat, playing me that song.

  Hey, wait... The hospital!

  My hand drifts to my throat. Of course. I think back to the way he was on the drive to Emory—so listless. At one point, he was begging me to hurry. And before that, up in the windowed room at his house... I don’t think we had sex. Wasn’t that the time I woke up with that egg inside my pussy? And Kellan seemed so pale. So haunted. Was he going through withdrawal or something?

  It would make sense. The way he seemed when we first met: a tiger, always on the prowl, demanding things. And how he seemed to grow more... quiet as the days passed. I wonder if the girl could be his AA partner. Or maybe he was going to—what’s it called?—a Methadone clinic? And the girl knew the clinic hours, so she tried to intercept him there.

  I get out of the car and start to pace. Back and forth, along the row where I’m parked. Moonlight glints off hoods and bumpers. A warm, magnolia-scented breeze tickles my skin. When headlights spill out of the lower level, signaling the arrival of another car, I step behind this big, green Ford F-250 and pray that it’s an Escalade.

  That’s what I’m doing when my phone rings: hiding from the glow of unfamiliar headlights. I look for his name on the s
creen, but it’s not Kellan. Not the 1-800 hundred number of Be The Match. This number is a local one that I don’t know. Of course.

  “Hello?” I say with trepidation.

  “Cleo?”

  My stomach somersaults. “Manning?”

  “It’s ole Manning.”

  I lean against the green truck’s hood. “God, I’m glad you called. I was going to talk to you about something. Something with Kellan. I’m kind of worried about something with him.”

  “Why you worried?” he drawls.

  “I... I’m sort of hesitant to say. But Manning, do you know what’s going on right now? I was over at his house and his uncle and this girl showed up. He told me—”

  “Cleo?” he says. “Why don’t ya hold your horses for a second?”

  “Why?”

  “I need to tell you something. Kellan told me to...”

  Fear scoops through me. “Okay, what?”

  “He wanted you to know that you can get... that thing from Matt or me, at the prices y’all had talked about. You know that thing?”

  “From Matt or you?” My heart is pounding, but my brain is running a step behind my body. I rub my head and frown. Is Kellan going—”

  Manning cuts in on me, saying, “And he wanted me to tell you that I’ve got a check. I can bring it to you... whenever. Tomorrow. It’s for twenty K. You know what I’m talking about?”

  My blood pumps so hard I feel faint.

  “Honey? Are ya there?”

  I slide down the truck’s grill, crouching on the cement deck. “So... ? He’s...” My head throbs, referring pain behind my eyes, where tears are building.

  “He’s going back to California, with his uncle and that girl you saw. I’m real sorry, Cleo. That’s his high school girlfriend. He was hoping to get back with her for the last couple of months. Since she got pregnant back in May.”

  THREE

  Kellan