Dreamland City. Larina Lavergne
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dreamy dark eyes and basically looks nothing like Skelly. He probably isn’t, seeing how Tommy’s mother used to turn tricks on the side.
Tommy’s yawning, and he stretches his arms over his head like a cat. Neil’s in the kitchen opening cabinets and drawers, most likely looking for liquor.
“If there’s any, it’s in the cabinet under the sink,” I call out to him, and he nods, finding an almost-full bottle of whisky. He brings it over, settles into an armchair before unscrewing the cap, tipping the bottle back and taking a long swig.
I go and sit by Tommy on the couch. He looks at me with his special warm look that’s only for me, and I smile back. He’s mostly like a brother to me, but we have a special relationship that involves lots of extra non-brotherly kissing and touching when we want it, and I kinda want it now after our extended separation.
“So what’s it like in caawlege?” He draws out the word ‘college’ almost mockingly, but I know he doesn’t mean anything by it.
“It’s OK.”
Tommy waits for me to say more, and when I don’t, he asks, “What should we do?” He accepts the bottle from his silent brother and takes a long swallow before handing it over to me. I mimic his action and repeat it again for good measure. The burn of the whisky is addictive, and I’m reaching for the bottle again.
“So, what should we do?” he asks again, wiping his glistening lips with the back of his hand.
I shrug. I don’t really care what we do, but I do want to get laid at some point.
“TV?” I suggest, turning it on with the remote. Tommy flips through the channels and finds a repeat telecast of the recent football game between NC State and Clemson. Watching the padded giants running around the field reminds me of David in our faraway land of Duke University, and how for the first time, Duke looks like it has a fighting chance in the conference, albeit a small one. As I look over at Tommy, I realize that with his athletic build and brute strength, he would probably have made a good football player if he hadn’t dropped out of high school a couple of years ago. But when Skelly’s back gave out and Neil a fresh cadet in the academy, poor Tommy didn’t really have a choice but to quit school and start working. Tommy loves his family—he’s trying his best. But when I look at Neil and his dead, cold eyes, I feel bad for Tommy, who’s trying so hard, for nothing.
We sit in silence, passing the bottle around and watching the game on TV. Soon enough, I’m feeling a pleasant buzz. I snuggle up against Tommy on the ratty brown couch. He smells of pine and elbow grease.
“Working on your bike again?”
He looks down at me. “Yep.”
Skelly has an old army buddy in the nearby town of Garner who runs a junkyard, and he gave Tommy a broken Suzuki motorcycle for his eighteenth birthday late last year. Tommy’s been working on it for months between jobs, scavenging parts from other junkyards. At first, I was skeptical: it looked like a real piece of shit. But he cleaned it up pretty good, and aside from the fact that it still can’t run, it’s now as shiny and pretty as any of them in a showroom.
“I can smell the grease on you.” I whack him lightly on the arm. It’s not a bad smell, though; it’s a Tommy smell.
“It’s almost done. I’ll take you for a ride when it’s all fixed up.” He has a warm grin on his face, then he pulls me in close and nuzzles my neck.
“Great,” I say, though I couldn’t care less whether the bike runs or not. I shift back a little bit to give him better access to my body.
“Hey, what’s this?” Tommy asks suddenly, his lips leaving my body, and the air turns the moisture cold on my skin. He’s picked up some of my homework that I had thrown on the floor by the side of the couch. He’s squinting adorably at the equations on an Econ problem set I hammered out before falling asleep.
“School stuff,” I say. “Their idea of break is to give you work.”
“Wow. Neat.” I know he doesn’t understand any of what I’ve written, and that he’s impressed.
“You’re so smart, Lily,” he says seriously, reaching out again for the whisky.
I wish he would shut up and start kissing me again, but I settle for burrowing into his warmth.
“You shouldn’t have wasted yer time comin’ home,” he adds. “There ain’t no one here you can talk with about stuff like that.”
I snort. “Where should I be then, Tommy? At college with the fucking dickheads who just wanna get laid? Or the sorority girls with their make-up and parties and church on Sundays where they diddle their boyfriends?”
“Don’t know nuthin’ ‘bout that, but you’re sure better than any of us. Then any of this.”
I look around. There’s smoke wafting up from the ashtray on the coffee table. Old coffee and whisky stains on the surface. Piles of dirty dishes with scraps of food still stuck on them in the sink. The otherworldly sound of the football game in the background.
And I smile at this beautiful boy, whom I love with all my heart.
“There’s nothing better than this, Tommy.”
Tommy laughs, but I’m not joking.
+++
The bottle’s empty, Neil has passed out snoring on the armchair, and Tommy is lying on top of me. My blouse is half open—we didn’t quite make it to the bedroom—and we’re trying to be quiet so Neil doesn’t wake up.
It’s hard to keep silent though, as Tommy’s magic fingers skirt lightly around my body, just enough to make me want their elusive touch even more. The sound of a car starting outside makes me flinch, and Tommy darts a quick glance at Neil to make sure he’s still asleep before he lowers himself completely on top of me and nips gently, then more insistently at my mouth.
“Shhh…quiet….” he says in between bites on my neck as my breath quickens and I let out a little yelp. I nod and push his head harder against me, and he shifts and flips me a little to my side. When I twist my head and look over, I freeze because Neil is awake, staring straight at me with his dead eyes. I stare back at him without saying a word, and I can see his nostrils flaring slightly.
And then right at that moment, I hear the door of the trailer fly open. And like an avenging angel sent by God, Beau walks in.
2
Beau’s my Texan stepfather. Born and raised in El Paso before settling in North Carolina, he moved into our trailer when I was six or seven. Lord only knows why or how he and my mother decided to get married in the first place—they sure don’t act like it.
I can smell the liquor in his breath from where I’m lying, and his gait is unsteady as he barrels toward us. I can only imagine how everything looks, with me lying on the couch with my blouse half unbuttoned and Tommy on top of me.
Tommy jumps up as suddenly as a flash of lightning. I sit up as well and nimbly begin to button my blouse, inwardly embracing that delicious, addictive and oppressive moment of silence that surrounds us just before it teeters over into an explosion of rage.
We’re falling over ourselves in that eternal moment. Tommy is grabbing his jacket and running out the door, pulling on his shirt over his head; Neil follows closely behind, stumbling over in Tommy’s wake. It might actually be funny watching them scramble like that, but I’m too busy scrambling myself: Beau is about to blow, and I don’t want to be close when that happens.
I leap off the couch and dart past him, running into my mother’s bedroom and slamming the door shut, wedging the chair underneath. And there the moment breaks like a snow globe released from the top of a building hitting the ground beneath. Beau is throwing furniture and things around, yelling, all punctuated by the sound of glass breaking. He hollers for his shotgun.
I sit in the middle of the bed. I hear the front