I felt like I should pretend to shift in my sleep, roll over to give him some privacy. But I couldn’t quite do it. Some of it was fear that he’d know I was awake and he’d get embarrassed. And yeah, some of it was that I couldn’t take my eyes off him.

I started getting hard, too. Not surprising. With everything that had happened, I’d gone something like three days without jacking off, and that had to be some kind of record for me.

And I think about guys sometimes. I talked about that in some of my other journals, even if I haven’t mentioned it in this one yet. Make no mistake—girls are a big part of my life, and I’ve had two sort-of girlfriends (both in Book 7, and I really don’t need to talk about them anymore). Naked women dance in my head when my dick dances in my hand.

But every once in a while, I find myself thinking about what it’d be like to do it with a guy. Not those shit-eating fuckers Myron brought home, but . . . a guy like me. I wonder how it would feel to kiss a guy and feel his hand in mine—and on my body. The girls fade away and a bunch of boys parade through my head. I stop sneaking peeks at regular porn on Uncle Zack’s computer and shift into gay sites. I worry about sprouting wood in the locker room.

In a few days, the phase passes and the girls come bouncing back.

The whole thing is fucking confusing, to tell the truth. It’s like my body can’t decide what it likes. After each boy phase ends, I think it’ll be the last and I settle back to enjoy the girls my brain sends me. Then a few months later—wham! Here comes the boy brigade.

But it’s not just hard-ons and slapping one-eyed Woody. For a few days, I imagine bringing a guy—okay, a boyfriend—to Lake Trick and sitting on the dock for hours without needing to talk, or skating together and knowing he’s showing off for me, or sneaking out together on sultry summer nights to slide through silky shadows and steal romance from the moon.

I suffer through these phases, just wait them out. They make me sad and confused because I want something I can’t have, it’s something I don’t want to want. I want to fall in love with a girl one day for real and get married and maybe have kids. Boys don’t enter the picture. Most of the time. It’s that rest of the time which fucks me up.

Eryx bit his lip and turned on his side, rolling away from me. His arm worked harder, and his whole body stiffened, then shuddered. My own dick throbbed in sympathy, and I adjusted myself quick and quiet. Eryx shuddered one more time, then sighed hard and lay still. Eventually, he rolled onto his back again, zipped his dick back into his pants, and curled toward me with his head resting on his arm. He was looking at me. My eyes were slitted, open only the tiniest crack, and I was forcing myself to keep my breathing in sleep mode. My heart was beating fast, though. Did Eryx know I was awake? My dick was still hard, and I began to worry he might notice, despite the darkness and my loose jeans.

Eryx stared at me for a long time, just looking. No expression on his face. I didn’t know what to make of it. Finally his eyes slid shut and his breathing deepened. When I was sure he was asleep, I got up and carefully moved away from him. The graveyard was completely still. Even the bugs had quieted for the night. I stepped softly away and slipped several yards off among the tombstones. My mind overflowed with images of Eryx, of him laughing on his bed next to me, of the way his body moved when he vaulted the fence, of the expression on his face while he brought himself close to orgasm. I found a tall gravestone and sat behind it—not on the grave—and tried to think, but my head was filled with a swirling soup of pictures and weird emotions and tight tensions. My dick was still hard, and that was a constant distraction. I unzipped, leaned back, and let my mind wander.

Golden hair. Blue eyes. Lithe body. He stared at me in my mind.

It didn’t take long. My own body pulsed sweetly under the single eye of the moon. I let everything spill onto the graveyard grass, bits of my life touching a stranger’s death.

I felt strangely cleansed when I was done. More relaxed—that always happens—but also more in control. Yeah, some serious shit had happened, but I’d gotten myself away from it. I was strong. I was smart. I had gotten this far. I could get a lot further. Uncle Zack would be proud of me.

I crept back to Eryx, lay down next to him, and fell straight to sleep.

0o0

I’m writing all this on the beach, by the way. The whole world is sunny and warm. Eryx and Irene are jumping around in the water and laughing and splashing each other like seals. I like watching them. Irene’s new. I’ll get to her. I think I’ll go swim with her and Eryx for a while. Okay, I’m back.

Irene’s here. She’s trying to look over my shoulder, but I’m not letting her. It’s taking a long time to write this because she keeps trying to grab my notebook, and I keep having to hold it away from her. Once she managed to snatch it away from me and I had to chase her across the sand. She runs like a laughing antelope. I don’t know how Eryx and I caught her the first time.

But none of that happened yet in my notebook, and I guess it’s cheating to jump ahead, so I’ll quit it.

0o0

The sun was high when I woke, and the air was already heating up. My muscles felt stiff, I had a crick in my neck, and my clothes were damp with dew. I felt grungy, and I wanted clean clothes. The mausoleum cast cool shade, though, and I saw that Eryx had been smart choosing this as a place to sleep—no one could see the spot from the road. I wondered what time it was, then realized it didn’t matter. I had no place to be.

Eryx woke up when I did. He looked around like he didn’t know where he was, then rubbed his eyes. His gold hair was tousled, but on him it looked good.

Shit. I’m really in a boy phase right now. Not a good time for this, since the person I’m spending all my time with is a good-looking guy who’d accidentally shown me a very personal side of himself last night. And he’s my step-brother. Sort of. Mom and Myron never got married, so technically, to me, Eryx is nothing.

When does nothing turn into everything?

“Now what?” I asked.

“Now,” Eryx said, “we look for breakfast.”

“I want a shower,” I said. “It’s been days, and I can smell myself.”

“At least the stink keeps the zombies away,” Eryx said, and I slugged him on the arm.

We wandered around Aquapura for a while, exploring. It was easier in daylight—I didn’t feel like a vampire, and there were other people around. Cars drove by on the pavement, making the streets seem alive after our night spent among the dead. I felt weird, though. My clothes were wrinkled and dirty, my hair was a mess, and I really did smell. I had the hundred-dollar bill in my pocket, but that didn’t help. I wondered how a store or restaurant would react to two messy, smelly street kids handing over a hundred bucks for a couple of bagels. The clerk might think it was odd, like we were drug dealers or thieves or something and call the cops, and then we’d have to explain too much. And it was Sunday, so the banks were closed—no way to break the bill into something smaller. Besides, banks meant cameras and easy communication with the police, worse than a store.

It was close to noon now, and the sun poured liquid heat over us. I was so hungry, I was dizzy. We were in a shopping district, with lots of little shops that were actually open. I felt like people were staring at us on the street. A guy walking with his little daughter turned to blink at me as he passed by. A car drove too slowly, the driver peering out the window.

Now that it was light out, I caught glimpses of the ocean in the distance between buildings. Lots of the streets ended in palm-tree beaches that swept right out to the wide water. Part of me wanted to run straight to it, but right now, I was too hungry to care.

Eryx spotted a small grocery store. A bakery section was visible through the front window.

“Score!” he said, grabbing my arm. “Come on!”

We went around back to the Dumpsters. Piles of crushed cardboard lay in the alley beside huge trash bins.

“Why is this better than anywhere else?” I asked as Eryx hoisted himself into one of the dumpsters.

“Bakery section means they toss out the day-old stuff when the fresh stuff arrives, and it looks like we’re the first ones here.” His voice echoed a little inside the green metal cave. Suddenly he yelped and jumped straight back out. I swear he didn’t even touch the sides of the dumpster.

“What?” I said, not sure if I should back away or offer to help. “What’s wrong?”

He just pointed through dumpster’s trash hole. I carefully peeked inside. At first I didn’t see anything but trash. Then I saw them. Roaches. Each one the size of my hand. More than a dozen of them scurried around on the metal walls, looking for god knows what. I could hear the skritchy noise their feet made.

“Holy shit!” I said. “Those are—holy shit!”

“Yeah,” Eryx said.

“Now what?” I said. “No way am I going in there.”

Eryx looked at me, then looked at the dumpster, then looked at me again. He had an odd look on his face. “Well,” he said slowly, “they’ll probably be everywhere, no matter where we try. And roaches don’t bite.”

With that, he hoisted himself back inside. I was impressed. You couldn’t have gotten me in there with a gun to my neck. I waited for another yelp, but none came.

“Yay!” Eryx shouted from inside the bin. “Produce!”

Through the opening, he handed me some apples. They had bruises, like they’d been in a fight. Next came a head of lettuce with brown spots on it, a plastic bag of fruit Danishes, and two empty plastic bottles.

“Breakfast!” Eryx said, and hauled himself out. He showed me how to eat around the bruises in the apples, and he made me eat the green parts of the lettuce. “Vitamins,” he said. “You can’t skimp on that, dude. Not now.”

The Danishes were stale, but fine otherwise. No roaches in the bags, either, and don’t think I didn’t check. I felt a lot better with a full stomach.

“What are the bottles for?” I asked.

“Water. We can fill them somewhere and carry them with us. Now we find a place to wash.”

“I know a place,” I said, and Eryx looked at me, surprised. “You think I can’t figure some shit out, too?”

Eryx grinned. “Show me.”

I’d seen a sign pointing the way to a public library a couple blocks over. The low brown building was small, and the Sunday hours were really limited, but it was open now. We went in. It was cool inside and smelled like old paper. The librarian at the front desk didn’t even glance at us. The bathroom was at the back. It just had a toilet, sink, and paper towel dispenser. Eryx locked us inside.

“Paper towel bath,” I said.

“Perfect,” Eryx agreed. “We have to be quick, though—someone might try to come in.”

We both stripped down to our boxers. Eryx’s muscles are a lot better developed than mine—I’m way skinny. I kind of watched him out of the corner of my eye as we wet paper towels and added liquid soap. We also wet our heads under the sink. I rummaged for the old comb in the bottom of my backpack, and we both used it. It wasn’t a very good bath, but I felt a lot better, and I didn’t stink anymore.

We got new clothes out of our packs and even changed our underwear. I carefully didn’t look, but I couldn’t help seeing. We also washed out the bottles and filled them from the sink. And then we were dressed, our dirty clothes in our packs. I’d eaten, I was reasonably clean, and I felt a lot more confident as a result.

“Come on,” I said. “I want to see the ocean.”

A short walk, and we were there. The street we were on ended in a turnaround, and a bunch of old motels spread out with their backs to us, like they were trying to wall off the beach. I was getting excited now, and I started walking faster and faster until I was trotting, running, flying toward the water. The air smelled like salt and sun and sand. I dodged between the buildings and emerged in the sunlight with shifting sand beneath my shoes. Wooden signs shouted warnings at me: Private Beach. No Lifeguard On Duty. No Alcoholic Beverages. Caution: Rip currents. I ignored them all. I didn’t run all the way to Florida to be scared off by wooden words.

The beach was almost empty. A scattering of men in bathing suits and women in sun hats, a few kids in the shallows. Blue waves lapped pale sand, and bright, wide air stretched out in all directions. The water called to me. It had been so long.

Eryx grabbed my shoulder from behind. “Not here,” he said.

“Now what?” I sighed.

“It’s all open here, and there’s no place to put our stuff. What if someone steals everything?” He jerked his head toward a roped-off section of sand closer to the hotel. A Private Beach sign guarded it. “We aren’t staying at the hotel, so we can’t leave anything over there. If we go farther up the beach, we can find a place in those dunes to hide our backpacks while we swim, maybe even find a place to camp out, you know? Way better than a graveyard.”

He pointed left, and I saw the flat beach wrinkled up and became hilly dunes a ways down, past the hotels. Eryx made for them, and I followed without saying anything. We walked about a quarter mile. I got sand in my shoes and my back started to ache from walking on ground that shifted every time I took a step. I was sweating again. And just a few yards away, the ocean waves rolled in and out as if it were beckoning to me.

We reached the grassy dunes and climbed a ways into them. No one else was around. I think we were at the edge of town or something. Further up the coast, I saw houses. Maybe this place was public land or something. We found a place under a scrubby bush where we could stash our stuff, then decided to use our dirty boxers as swim suits in order to rinse them out. Seconds later, I was sprinting toward the ocean, shouting like a little kid. I hit the warm water and dove in.