Luke couldn’t pull the smile from his face: even in his most lubricated fantasies he could never have imagined a place as perfect as this. Mitchell wandered around the Bright Lands like it bored him, nodding at one boy, cupping another’s nuts with a brazen little smile that suggested more to come later. Luke, clutching his clothes in one hand, trailed naked behind him, doing his best to hold on to all that Mitchell was saying while his mind threatened to flit away into the sky, giddy as helium.
“If you need to tidy up we got the Water House there.” Mitchell pointed at a long blue trailer that sat at one end of the circle, opposite the massive elevated triple-wide that Luke had seen when the blindfold was removed.
He noticed a steady line of boys filing into a brilliant red trailer that rested up the circle from the Water House, all of the boys grinning and chugging from red Solo cups.
“We’ll get you into Glory Days over there later. You’ve stopped bleeding, yeah?”
Luke touched the wound on the back of his thigh. It would leave a scar. His smile wavered. “For now.”
“Let’s get you changed then.”
As they started across the circle, Luke heard two boys cackling at something. He glanced over his shoulder just in time to spot a man who looked an awful lot like Joel Whitley appear in the window of a black camper trailer that stood next to the tall triple-wide.
Luke felt his first pulse of misgiving. What was Whitley doing here? And why did he look so terrified? Luke recalled Garrett Mason, in the truck last night, saying of Joel, “He’s on the list for tomorrow.”
“Word of advice.” Mitchell put a hand on Luke’s shoulder. Joel’s face disappeared behind a black shutter. “That black one’s Mr. Boone’s special trailer. It’s the only one that locks. You steer clear of Boone, you hear? He’s short a favorite right now.”
Mitchell guided Luke toward a double-wide trailer painted Bison green and chuckled as he pointed out the tall words painted above the trailer’s door: HELLO DARLIN’.
“Don’t mind the names,” Mitchell said with a bemused little shake of his head. “The old guys have a boner for the faggy details.”
A handful of boys stood inside the trailer, sipping from more red plastic cups. They went silent the moment Luke stepped through the front door.
Mitchell led Luke into a large room where hideous wallpaper peeled around a bank of rusted green lockers. An old bed was buried beneath a mountain of jockstraps and socks and jerseys. Costumes.
“Don’t let them see you with a phone,” Mitchell said, heading into an attached bathroom.
Luke tossed his jeans and his dusty shirt into a locker, plucked a pair of shorts off the bed, told himself he felt no misgivings about leaving his keys and his phone out of reach. Mitchell emerged from the bathroom with a grimy first aid kit and handed Luke a roll of gauze and an alcohol wipe.
“You guys think of everything,” Luke said.
Mitchell shrugged. “If you see something you want around town you can just take it. Nobody’s gonna hassle you anymore.”
In a cramped kitchen, Mitchell showed Luke a counter full of orange Gatorade coolers labeled TRASHCAN PUNCH, VODKA MONSTER, RUM. A pair of glass cutting boards rested near a rusted sink. The boards were covered with lines of powder. Arrayed behind the cutting boards were foil pouches that Luke saw contained lube, candy dishes full of tablets, empty pill bottles like he’d find at a pharmacy. FEEL FREE 2 TAKE HOME—COMPLIMENTS OF THE BAG BOYS.
“Do those guys in the living room play for Spricksville High?” Luke murmured to Mitchell.
“Better don’t ask questions,” Mitchell said. He sidled up to the counter, ran a thin line of crystal up his nose and plucked a small glass vial from a candy dish; the shape of it alone looked illicit. “Do you like poppers?”
“Are they sour?”
Mitchell grimaced, rubbing his nose. “You don’t drink it. Take one of the big ones—Garrett refills all this shit later. You want some Oxy? You want—oh what’s up, bro, where you been?”
The most beautiful redhead Luke had ever seen appeared with a boy of his own in tow and twisted Mitchell’s nipple with a sneer. Mitchell popped his nuts. Luke studied the floor until the redhead and his boy stepped past him.
“You’re sort of shy, aren’t you?” Mitchell said, leading Luke back toward the living room.
Luke smiled, shrugged. “Dylan must have been popular here.”
The living room suddenly went silent. Mitchell grabbed Luke by the wrist and yanked him outside.
“Let’s pretend you never said that name,” he said with his father’s political smile. “Now, some guys spend their whole night in Glory Days—that’s where the cards and the titty porn is.” Mitchell pointed at the red trailer, then turned to nod at the tall triple-wide Luke had seen earlier, the one with the big porch. Tomas Hernandez was stepping out of its door and tucking something into his sock as he walked, a cigarette on his lips. His fingers were shaking. “If you’re ever short on cash you can go in that one there but, well—you’ll see.”
Luke saw the dark spots in the dirt where his blood had fallen earlier. He remembered the cop with all the tattoos who had cut his thigh. He glanced again at that little black camper with its dark windows. “Do you get to keep coming here after you graduate?”
“You’re all about the questions. But yes, you can come back to be a Hand, but you don’t want to. And you definitely don’t want to start dating one of the Hands off the clock.” Mitchell let out a funny, humorless laugh. A few more boys arrived, Luke saw, and now they milled around the doors of the trailers in twos and threes, drinking, smoking, talking without meeting each other’s eyes. It was strange, Luke thought: the way two dozen guys could feel like a wild party. If this was what a party felt like.
Mitchell stopped near a silver Airstream. The trailer was surrounded by a white picket fence and a bed of fake flowers. White foil packets of lube glinted among their stems like eggshells.
“Listen, man, it’s simple. Don’t think about this stuff. Let what you do at home stay at home. Let what you do here stay here. ’Cause what we’ve got here is just a few guys doing what we feel. It don’t mean we’re about that faggot shit, yeah?”
Over Mitchell’s shoulder, inside the dim silver trailer, Luke saw Garrett Mason throw his head back in a moan. Stevey Turner was braced on a couch.
Luke knew one thing and one thing only: he was definitely, definitely about that faggot shit.
He forced a smile. “Of course, bro.”
“Perfect. Now repeat after me.”
Mitchell fished an amber vial from his sock, shook it briskly, unscrewed the cap and pressed it to his nostril. He took a snort, switched sides. Let out a long quavering breath.
Luke did just as he was told. The liquid inside smelled of paint thinner. By the end of his first drag he felt a tingling in his face. By the end of his second he was flush all over with a warmth anchored somewhere inside his balls. He saw spots. He said, “Oh shit,” and it felt like the most profound thing to ever come out of his mouth.
Luke felt a finger run up his ass. He turned to see the stunning redhead from earlier regarding him. The boy jabbed the finger deeper. Luke winced—even with the poppers it hurt like a bitch—but smiled back and told himself this was exactly what he’d always wanted.