I didn’t expect Justin to be at our house, but I should have.

He has become like a mole on my brother’s face:

I’m having trouble remembering what David

looks like without Justin

slumped by his side, always the same smell

coming off him in waves:

Weed and cats

Weed and cats

Weed and cats

I don’t think my brother’s gay—

he called me a carpet muncher

when I told him I had a crush

on a girl in ninth grade—but I guess

David being gay doesn’t mean

David can’t also be cruel.

But I can’t explain why else Justin

would have turned my brother into Velcro.

They’re standing there in the kitchen

when I walk in, and the smell of cigarettes

tells me my mother is in the garage, smoking

and probably/definitely crying.

I stare at my brother and he stares back,

nods at the bag.

“Is that for us?”

“No,” I say.

“It’s for you.”

“Same thing” says Justin

and he doesn’t say it the way a boyfriend would

not flirty or funny.

He says it the way kudzu would speak

of the car it has swallowed:

We’re the same thing. This is mine now.