SCAM : The Ugly Game

**Aron Sterling.** The glossy green skin didn’t burst; it gave way under my thumb, the nail sinking into the crisp, wet flesh with a sickening, sucking squelch. I watched as the perfect chemical green turned black, oxygen reacting with the juice, transforming the wound into a brown, rotting pulp that looked like an old bruise. The oxidation happened fast, like blood poisoning. Inside my head, it was too quiet—that specific, cotton-wool silence that smells of pharmaceuticals and expensive furniture polish. The smell of a house where no one screams because screaming is useless. My mother used to slice apples so thin you could look at the sun through them, but her hands shook with that fine, narcotic tremor that made silver chime against porcelain. Once, the knife slipped. I didn’t remember a scream—there wasn’t one—but I remembered the color: on the bright green peel, the blood looked black, thick as oil. She just stuck her finger in her mouth, looking through me with pupils dilated by Vicodin, and there was no pain in that gaze, only a glass-eyed, dead emptiness. *“Sour things help with the nausea, Aron.”* I pressed my finger deeper, feeling the cold juice run down my cuticle, sticky and viscous. I wasn’t nauseous from food. I was nauseous from the very fact of existing in this body, which felt too transparent, too receptive, as if I’d been flayed alive. “...and then Baxter just totally lost his shit, can you imagine?” Chase’s voice worked like a jackhammer, drilling into my temple. He sat opposite me, vibrating with his whole body, and that tremor transmitted through the table, through the floor, making my teeth ache. *Tap-tap-tap.* His knee hit the table leg in a rhythm that made me want to slit my wrists just to hear silence. “Are you going to eat that or fuck it?” Chase nodded at the apple, chewing with his mouth open; chunks of bread roll churned on his tongue. I flicked the mutilated fruit away. It rolled, leaving a wet trail on the plastic, and crashed into the barricade of wrappers Chase had erected around himself. “Shut up,” I exhaled, jaw clenched. There was a hum all around us—hundreds of voices, the clatter of cutlery, Chloe’s laugh somewhere to the side smelling of cloying vanilla—but suddenly, the air changed. The atmospheric density in the cafeteria spiked, as if someone had siphoned out the oxygen and pumped in a heavy, damp gas. Chase froze. His face, which had just expressed nothing but the desire to stuff his stomach, spread into a wide, predatory grin. “Oh. He’s here.” The shadow fell across the table before I heard the steps. Leo didn’t approach—he invaded. He kicked out the chair next to Chase, dragging the legs across the floor with a screech, and sat down, spreading his legs so wide it looked like a territorial claim. He reeked of the street—wet concrete, cheap tobacco, sweat, and something metallic and sharp that cut through the smell of cafeteria food. It was the smell of dirt tracked into an operating room. He said nothing. His gaze—heavy, dark, stripped of any social gloss—slid over Chloe, erasing her from reality, ignored Chase, and stopped on the mountain of food. His hands were busted up. The knuckles were scabbed over, ingrained soot blackening the space under his nails. He reached for the tray, but he didn’t take a sandwich. He didn’t take a clean package. His fingers closed around my apple. The very one I had just killed. Leo lifted it, turning it slowly, examining the brown, indented pulp where my fingerprint remained. It was disgusting. It was garbage, a remnant of my neurosis, a spoiled product. “Who tortured this?” his voice was like gravel in a cement mixer, low and scratching. “Aron was having fun,” Chase snorted, but tension slipped into his tone. “Grab a good one, that one’s rotting.” Leo didn’t listen. He looked up and stared straight at me. There was no bottom to that gaze. There was something dark, hungry, and twisted in it. He wasn’t repulsed. He looked at the dent from my finger as if it were the most interesting thing in the room, and then, without breaking eye contact, he brought the apple to his mouth. And bit into it. Right into the spot where the flesh had blackened from my touch. The sound was wet, loud, obscenely physiological. The crunch of breaking structure, the slurp of juice. He chewed, looking me in the eye, and a drop ran down his chin; he licked it off with a quick, animalistic movement, swallowing what I had ruined. A shiver raked through me, as if I’d been electrocuted. My stomach twisted in an icy spasm, bile rising to my throat. It was too much. It was a violation of boundaries, a dirty penetration, as if he were eating my sickness, tasting my fear and finding it nutritious. The air turned viscous; I couldn’t breathe. I stood up abruptly, hips slamming into the edge of the table. The crash of the chair sounded like a gunshot. “I’m leaving.” I didn’t wait for an answer. I turned and walked away, feeling my spine burn under the crosshairs of his gaze, hearing the wet crunch of the next bite behind my back. *** The air in the locker room was thick as soup. It smelled of male sweat, camphor heating balm, and a damp humidity that settled as condensation on the cold tiles. Guys were dispersing, slamming locker doors; the sound of metal on metal echoed in my skull with a dull pulsation. I sat on the bench, elbows on my knees, trying not to breathe too deeply. Every inhale was a mistake. My ribs on the left side burned as if someone had shoved a hot coal under my skin. A shadow loomed over me. Brock. Huge, dumb as a post, but useful on defense. He stood shifting from foot to foot, looking guilty. “Cap, hey... sorry about that,” he rumbled, rubbing his neck. “Didn’t mean to hit you that hard. Misjudged the inertia.” I slowly raised my head. The movement sent a spike of pain through my side. Brock had slammed into me at full speed, shoulder driving right into the spot where an old bruise was already blooming. Now it was a pulp. “Forget it,” my voice sounded even, dry. I knew how to turn off the pain when people were watching. “It’s the game. You did your job.” “Brock, you have the grace of a drunk bulldozer,” Chase’s voice drifted over. He was already dressed, standing by the mirror fixing hair that looked like a bird’s nest anyway. “Seriously, dude, your braking distance is like a freight train. You don’t stop until you see a corpse.” Someone chuckled. The tension broke. Brock exhaled in relief, nodded to me once more, and lumbered toward the exit. “Thursday,” I said louder, cutting through the noise of the showers. “Tape study. Right after classes. We’re reviewing the Jackals' defense. No lateness.” “You got it, Cap,” someone called from the corner. The guys started to filter out. Chase slung his backpack over his shoulder, winking at me in the mirror. “Tell your new friend,” he nodded at Leo’s empty locker. “Since he’s stuck with the Coach again. I’m out of here. Cultural events await me.” “Movies?” I asked without interest. “Something like that. Back row seats, make-out spots, you know the drill. Later.” The door slammed. Silence fell instantly. The heavy, cotton-wool silence of an empty locker room. I was alone. Now I didn’t have to hold the mask. I grimaced, hissing air through clenched teeth. The pain rolled over me in a wave, hot and sticky. I slowly peeled off the sweat-soaked jersey. The fabric clung to my damp skin, and every movement had to be calculated like a move on a chessboard. Lifting an arm—pain. Turning my torso—unbearable. I went to the showers. The hot water beat down on my shoulders, but I couldn’t relax. I stood with my forehead pressed against the cold tile, watching the water, pink with serum from a scraped elbow, swirl down the drain. By the time I got back to my locker, twenty minutes had passed. I moved slowly, like an old man. Pulling on jeans was torture. Buttoning a shirt was a heroic feat. The door crashed open. Leo flew into the locker room. He was dirty—dirt smeared on his cheek, grass stains on his knees, t-shirt sticking to his body in dark patches. He reeked of the outside and a vicious energy that filled the space, displacing the air. He stopped when he saw me. His gaze swept over my half-bent posture. “You still alive, Cap?” he smirked, dropping his bag on the floor. “You look like you won’t make it to tomorrow. Did a steamroller run you over?” “Tape study Thursday,” I ignored his tone, struggling to fasten a button without hissing in pain. “After classes. Scouting the opponent. Don’t be late.” “Got it,” Leo threw back. He didn’t stand on ceremony. In one motion, he yanked his t-shirt over his head and tossed it into the corner. Then the jeans. Boxer briefs. He stripped naked, not shy, not turning away. His body was wiry, hard, covered in a map of old scars and fresh abrasions. He was a solid knot of muscle, ready to strike. I averted my eyes, feeling a strange awkwardness mixed with irritation. He walked past me into the shower, hitting me with a wave of sweat smell, and a second later, the sound of water started. I was left battling my sneakers. This was the final boss. The hardest part. To put them on, I had to lean over. Bend in half. I sat on the bench. Took a breath. Tried to lean. A grenade detonated in my side. Black spots swam before my eyes. I froze, breathing shallowly, waiting out the spasm. The sneaker sat on the floor, laces mocking me. I couldn’t reach it. Physically couldn’t. The water stopped. Leo walked out of the shower five minutes later. Wet, a towel around his hips dripping water onto the concrete floor. He was drying his hair with another towel, roughing it up with aggressive movements. He saw me. Sitting there, staring at my feet, one bare foot and a sneaker in my hand that I couldn’t put on. Leo froze. He stopped drying his head. His gaze slid over my face, over the beads of sweat on my forehead—sweat from pain, not heat—and dropped to the sneakers. He didn’t say anything. Didn’t make a joke. He just walked over, tossed the towel onto the bench, and dropped to one knee in front of me. I flinched, instinctively trying to pull my foot back. “What are you…” “Sit still,” he grunted. His fingers, damp and hot, grabbed my ankle. The grip was firm, stabilizing. He unceremoniously shoved my foot into the sneaker, pulling up the heel. Then he grabbed the laces. I stared at the top of his head. Water dripped from his dark hair, landing on my jeans. He was too close. I could feel the heat radiating from his body, the smell of cheap soap, and his breath. It was strange. Humiliating and... necessary. He pulled the knot tight. Sharp, strong, locking the foot in dead tight. Then he reached for the second sneaker. “Thanks,” I forced out. The word tasted like ash. Leo tied the second knot, slapped my knee with his palm—a gesture that nearly made me jump—and stood up, towering over me. “Give me a ride to my district?” he asked, looking down at me. It wasn’t a request; it was a demand for payment. I frowned. “Which district?” “My old one,” he jerked his head toward the exit. “Need to grab some stuff. Uncle said to wait for him, but he’s buried in paperwork for another three hours. I’m not hanging around here.” I wanted to refuse. I wanted to drive home, pop a painkiller, and lie flat in the dark. I didn’t need trips to the ghetto. I didn’t need Leo in my car. But I looked at my sneakers. At the tight, perfect knots. He had seen my weakness. And he had helped. In our world, that created a debt. “Fine,” I exhaled, standing up. Pain shot through my side again, but now I was shod. “I’ll drop you off.” Leo smirked—short, predatory, as if he’d won a bet. “I’ll get changed fast. Let’s roll.” *** Inside the Range Rover, the world ceased to exist. Here, there was only sterile climate control, the smell of expensive, treated leather that tickled the throat, and silence—dense, cotton-like, pressing on the temples harder than the roar of a stadium. Aron gripped the steering wheel as if trying to strangle it; his knuckles were white, and the pain in his bruised side throbbed in time with the engine’s RPMs, reminding him that his body was still made of meat and bone, not steel like this machine. Leo sat next to him, and his presence was a breach of the seal. He crossed his legs, the dirty sole of his sneaker hovering over the dashboard, threatening to leave a grey smear on the flawless plastic. He didn’t touch it, no, he just kept a millimeter of distance, mocking Aron’s need for purity. “Left,” Leo’s voice sounded not like a request, but like stone scraping against glass. Aron jerked the wheel. The car obeyed, leaning into the turn, tires whispering over the asphalt, carrying them away from manicured lawns into the grey gut of the sleeping districts. The streetlights here worked intermittently, and shadows from the houses stretched toward the road like long, crooked fingers. The silence was becoming unbearable. It filled the cabin like water filling a sinking ship, rising to the throat. Aron needed to break this glass before it crushed him. “Why did you get expelled?” the question came out dry, without intonation, as if reading a news report. Leo didn’t turn immediately. He stared out the window where barred windows and shuttered bodegas flashed by, his profile in the gloom seeming hewn from granite—sharp, rough, alien to the soft seat. “We had a certain... specimen,” he began slowly, dragging out the words as if tasting them. “Walked the halls like the earth owed him money. Looked over everyone’s heads like we were trash they forgot to sweep up. Thought he was a god, and the rest were just a herd meant to shut up and chew grass.” Aron felt his back muscles calcify. Every word wasn't a story about the past, but a mirror Leo was holding up to his face. “And?” Aron forced out, looking strictly ahead into the pool of headlights catching potholes in the road. “You decided to serve justice?” “I just wanted to smear his perfect face across a desk,” Leo chuckled, and there was so much dark pleasure in the sound that the air in the cabin grew heavier. “So he’d stop looking at us like dirt under his fingernails.” “And?” Aron asked, feeling a sticky chill crawl down his spine. “Did it work?” Leo finally turned. In the dark, his eyes flashed with a wet, predatory glint. “Maybe,” he leaned forward, and the smell of tobacco and the street grew thicker, overpowering the scent of leather. “Maybe here, they’ll knock you off your throne too, Your Majesty.” “You’re not like them,” Leo said suddenly, changing his tone. The mockery vanished from his voice, leaving only heavy, concrete certainty. “You’re not part of the herd. You’re just as fucked up as I am, you just hide it behind expensive clothes.” “Right back at you,” Aron grunted, feeling a strange, painful satisfaction at the words. “Stop here. Five minutes.” Leo got out, not closing the door all the way, letting the cold, damp street air into the cabin. Aron was left alone in the dark, locked in his expensive cage in the middle of a neighborhood that looked like a horror movie set. Minutes stretched like rubber. Aron drummed his fingers on the wheel, listening to every rustle outside. Why was he here? Why was he waiting? A knock on the glass sounded like a gunshot. Aron jerked, turning his head. Behind the glass, face pressed against the tint, stood a creature. Grey skin, sunken cheeks, eyes clouded with a milky film of madness. A man in a dirty jacket was muttering something, leaving a greasy smear of breath on the window. Aron rolled the window down. An inch. Just a crack. “Commander... got a cig?” a raspy voice, soaked in cheap spirits and rot. “I don’t smoke,” Aron cut him off, trying not to breathe. “Spare change then? Fifty cents... pipes are burning, no relief...” Dirty fingers with black, broken nails reached into the crack, trying to hook the edge of the glass. Aron shuddered with revulsion. He fumbled in the cup holder, finding a heavy two-dollar coin. Cold metal. Payoff. He extended the coin, trying not to touch the drifter’s hand, but the man grabbed his wrist—a sticky, hot touch that made him want to flay his own skin off. “GET THE FUCK AWAY FROM THERE!” Leo’s roar tore through the darkness. He appeared out of nowhere, furious, fast. The man at the car recoiled, recognized him, shrank into a ball, and muttering curses, dissolved into the shadows of a doorway. Leo yanked the door open, falling into the seat, bringing the smell of adrenaline with him. “Drive,” he threw out, breathing heavily. “And never... you hear me, never give them anything.” “It was just a coin,” Aron steered onto the road, feeling his heart hammering somewhere in his throat. “Today a coin,” Leo watched the rearview mirror, tracking the empty street. “Tomorrow they see your watch and decide it’s easier to cut off your hand than ask. These animals have no brakes.” “Friend of yours?” Aron asked, looking at Leo’s profile. Leo turned, a crooked, mean grin playing on his lips. “Yeah. My homie from the gang. On Thursdays, we rob rich boys in Jeeps.” Aron tensed. A cold knot coiled in his stomach. He looked at Leo, trying to read the truth in the darkness of his eyes. “You’re not serious?” “Of course not,” Leo snorted, leaning back against the seat and closing his eyes. “Do I look like a bum?” Aron exhaled. The corner of his mouth twitched, cracking the ice mask. “Fuck off,” Leo threw out lazily, noticing the microscopic smile. “Change course. Need to stop by a friend’s. Pay a debt.” His hand covered the pocket of his hoodie, and something clinked inside. Glass? Metal? “No,” Aron shook his head. “I need to get home. My father is coming back this evening.” “Cap, don’t be a bitch,” Leo’s voice became insinuating, viscous like molasses. “It won’t take long. Just one turn. We’re already here. We’re already in the shit, so let’s dive deeper.” Aron wanted to say no. But he was already an accomplice. He had crossed the line the moment he let this guy tie his shoelaces, the moment he let him into his car. He silently flicked the turn signal. *** The car glided through the twilight, headlights cutting through the thick, slate-grey air of the outskirts. Aron thought about the man at the window. About his empty, dead-fish eyes. About how easily a person turns into a shell, an empty container where life used to be. “When I was twelve, my mother died,” Leo’s voice sliced the silence suddenly, without warning. Aron didn’t turn, but his fingers gripped the wheel so hard the leather creaked. “That guy begging for change...” Leo continued, staring out the window at the sparse lights flashing by. “He lived next door. Worked at a factory, used to buy me sodas on weekends. Was a decent guy. Then his wife left, and he... crumbled. First the bottle, then the needle. Now he’s just a piece of rotting meat wandering the hood looking for a fix.” Aron stayed silent. The information scratched his throat like sandpaper. They had something in common—death, emptiness, parents who broke. “I’m sorry,” the words slipped out, heavy, clumsy. Leo grimaced, as if from a toothache. “What for? He chose his road and fucked up. Weakling.” “I meant your mother,” Aron said quietly. The pause hung in the air, thick and viscous. “I’m sorry.” Leo jerked his shoulder, blocking the pity like a punch. “Let’s not do the past,” he shook his head. “Over there, where the light is flickering. Stop. Kill the lights. Lock the doors. Don’t open for anyone. Stay low, Cap.” Leo slipped into the darkness, dissolving into it. Aron watched his figure disappear into the doorway of a leaning trailer. *What am I doing?* The thought beat inside his head like a trapped bird. He, the Captain, the school’s hope, sitting in the ghetto in a hundred-thousand-dollar car waiting for a dealer. Two minutes later, the door flew open. Leo dove back in, breathless, eyes burning wild. “Fuck you!” he yelled at someone in the dark, slamming the door. “Floor it, Cap! We’re free!” Aron stomped the pedal into the floor. The engine roared, jerking the car forward. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Leo shoving a wad of crumpled bills and a foil bundle into his pocket. “Did you just…” Aron started. “Slow down, Schumacher,” Leo interrupted, leaning back and spreading his arms as if to embrace the entire cabin. “Don’t attract the cops.” They hit the highway. The city lights grew closer, brighter. The tension that had held them by the throat for the last half hour began to loosen, replaced by a strange, vibrating euphoria. They did it. They got out. Leo shifted, pulling something thin and white from his pocket. “Can I smoke?” “No,” Aron cut him off. “No smoking in the car. It’s leather.” “Fine,” Leo accepted it too easily, with frightening calm. “Then pull over here. On the shoulder.” “Why?” “I want to smoke. I’m stressed, Cap. I need to exhale.” “You know I need to get home,” Aron felt himself boiling over, but it wasn’t anger, more like fatigue mixed with curiosity. “I don’t know,” Leo turned his whole body toward him, his face close, too close. “I only know that you are the most tedious, stifling, boring person I have ever met. You’re like a robot. Do you even have a ‘life’ button?” Aron gritted his teeth. Leo was acting like a petulant child testing boundaries. But stopping was stupid. Aron smirked at his own thoughts. “Smoke,” he tossed out. “But open the window. All the way.” Leo gave a triumphant huff. The glass slid down, letting in the whistle of the wind. *Click* of the lighter. Spark. A sweet, heavy, herbal smell instantly filled the car, hitting the nose, overpowering the sterility of leather and expensive cologne. It was the smell of freedom and lawlessness. Leo took a deep, greedy drag, held his breath, closing his eyes, and slowly exhaled a thick, milky cloud of smoke out the window. His shoulders dropped. He seemed to melt into the seat, turning liquid. “Fuck, that’s good...” he whispered, his voice vibrating with pleasure. Aron wrinkled his nose, feeling the scent penetrate his lungs too, intoxicating him, loosening the knots of tension. “Want some?” Leo held out the smoking joint. The burning tip glowed like a red eye in the dark. Aron glanced sideways at the joint, then at Leo. “It smells weird,” he said seriously, with the same fastidiousness he used for dirty vegetables. “Did you check the expiration date?” Silence lasted a second. A cotton-thick, dense silence. And then Leo exploded. He coughed, choked on smoke, and a braying, cawing, uncontrollable sound erupted from his throat. He laughed, doubling over, banging his forehead on the dashboard, wiping away tears. “Expiration... holy shit... date!” he squeezed out through hysterical laughter, gasping for air. “Cap, you... you are something else! Seriously? Expiration date on weed? You’re killing me!” Aron frowned, not understanding the reaction. He had just asked. It was a logical question for consumable products. But watching Leo laugh like a horse, slapping his knee, shaking with mirth, Aron felt something inside him break. The ice wall cracked. The knot in his chest came undone. Warmth spread through his veins. It was absurd. They were driving in a car worth a house, drugs in their pocket, fresh from a visit to hell, and Leo was laughing at his propriety so genuinely that it became contagious. Leo wiped his tears with the back of his hand, took another drag, calmer now, and looked at Aron. His eyes were shining—from laughter, from the high, and from something else, warm and real. “We could have been good friends,” he said quietly, and the words hung in the smoky air, demanding no answer. Aron watched the road, where city lights blurred into long, glowing streaks. He smelled the smoke, heard Leo’s breathing next to him, felt their shoulders almost touching in the confined space. He wanted to say: *“I thought so too.”* Or: *“Maybe.”* But he stayed silent. He just drove, letting the smoke and this strange, intoxicating comfort fill the space between them, binding them tighter than any words, tighter than any vows. *** The Range Rover’s engine ticked as it cooled, metallic sounds like a weapon powering down. Aron sat in the darkness of the garage, gripping the wheel until the skin on his knuckles stretched white. The ghostly, sweetish smell of weed still hung in the cabin—an invisible piece of evidence that could cost him his life. Fear was cold jelly in his stomach. He had to get out. He had to go inside. Face *Him*. Aron sucked in air that smelled of leather and his own sweat, and opened the door. The house met him with silence. Not calm, but dead—the silence of a crypt where any sound is punished. He walked into the living room. His father sat in the armchair. Richard Sterling wasn’t reading a newspaper, wasn’t watching TV. He was simply sitting, staring at the wall, and in his stillness lay the threat of a dormant volcano. “Where were you?” father’s voice expressed no interest. It was a perimeter check. Aron froze. His head felt empty and resonant, like a bell. The script he had rehearsed with Chase surfaced on its own. “At Chase’s,” his tongue felt too big and clumsy. “Watched game tapes of the Jackals. Analyzed defensive strategy.” A second of silence stretched into eternity. Richard slowly shifted his gaze to his son. His eyes were scanners searching for lies, weakness, the smell of smoke. But Aron stood straight, his face a frozen mask he had worn since childhood. “Food’s in the fridge,” his father finally said, losing interest. “Yes, sir.” Aron exhaled only when he reached the kitchen. The fridge light hit his eyes with a blue, artificial glare. He took out a container of cold pasta. The first forkful was a revelation. Flavor exploded on his tongue. Cold sauce, dough, spices—it all seemed divine, incredible, saturated to the limit. He ate without feeling full, shoving food into himself as if he hadn’t eaten in a week. *What the hell?* a sluggish thought drifted by. Food had never tasted this good. The world around him seemed a little brighter, a little more... vibrating. The smoke in the car. Leo smoked with the windows up. Contact high. Euphoria hit his head in a warm wave. The fear of his father suddenly seemed distant and small, like an insect under glass. Aron returned to the living room. The words flew out of his mouth before he could stop them. “I need to go out. To see friends.” Richard slowly turned his head. For the first time in years, genuine bewilderment appeared on his face. Aron Sterling didn’t go “to see friends.” Aron Sterling trained, studied, and slept. Especially at ten PM. “It is ten o'clock,” his father’s voice was quiet, dangerous. “Where do you think you’re going?” Aron shocked himself. He stood in the middle of the living room, feeling his heart hammer in his throat, but instead of apologizing and running to his room, he just stood there. His body vibrated with someone else’s smoke and his own audacity. Richard looked at him for a long time. Then, as if deciding this was some new game he didn’t understand, he waved a hand. “Be home by twelve.” Aron blinked. He turned and walked out. *** He didn’t remember walking to the car. Didn’t remember starting the engine. Reality spliced together. One second he was standing before his father, the next—the Range Rover was flying through the night streets, tearing apart the silence of the suburbs. Leo’s uncle’s house was ordinary. Neat lawn, white walls, middle class, boredom. Aron stopped at the curb. Inside him, energy boiled, demanding an exit. He laid on the horn. And didn’t let go. The long, piercing wail of the signal sliced through the sleeping street. Lights flicked on in neighboring houses. Someone opened a window and yelled, “Shut up, asshole!” Aron didn’t move his hand. He was having fun. It was madness. The front door flew open. Leo stormed onto the porch in just sweatpants, barefoot, disheveled, and angry. He ran to the car, yanking the passenger door open. “Are you fucking nuts, Cap?!” he hissed, falling into the seat. “You’re gonna call every cop in the district!” Aron stopped honking. The silence that followed rang in his ears. He turned to Leo. His eyes shone with a feverish glint. “Let’s be friends?” he blurted out. It didn’t sound like an offer, but like an ultimatum. Or a plea for rescue. Leo froze. He looked at Aron, at his dilated pupils, at his hands gripping the wheel. Then he exhaled, and the anger drained away, replaced by something resembling understanding. “I get it,” he said shortly. “Drive. I’ll show you a place.” *** They stood on the edge of the cliff. The city spread out below like a giant, glowing computer motherboard. Yellow, white, and red lights pulsed, flowing through the veins of the streets. The wind here was strong, cold; it whipped their hair and crawled under their jackets, but Aron felt hot. He felt... alive. His skin hummed. Sounds were crisp. The view of the city evoked not boredom, but awe. He stood leaning against the warm hood of the car, smiling. Stupidly, widely, uncontrollably. “Why are you grinning like a moron?” Leo’s voice came from the side. He was sitting on the hood, swinging his legs. Aron looked at him. The smile didn’t leave his face. “It’s the first time I asked my father to go see friends,” he admitted. The words felt light, like soap bubbles. “So?” Leo snorted, pulling out a pack. “Didn’t let you? Daddy said, ‘No, son, better hang out with Williams, he’ll teach you bad things’?” “Yes,” Aron nodded, then frowned, trying to catch a thought by the tail. “I mean no. He said be back by twelve.” Leo huffed, flicked the lighter. The flame illuminated his sharp cheekbones and mocking eyes. “Why I like being here...” Aron began, looking at the lights, but didn’t finish. He didn’t need to. “Here, smoke,” Leo held out the joint. Aron stared at the smoldering tip with horror. Euphoria was momentarily replaced by the paranoia of an honor student. “What’s the comedown like?” he babbled, not taking the cigarette. “Is there a risk of overdose? I read synthetics can cause cardiac arrest. I saw on the news, people dying, foam at the mouth, convulsions... Maybe I shouldn’t? I have a regimen, I have a liver...” Leo started laughing. Loudly, rolling, tilting his head back to the stars. “Are you serious?” he wiped away tears. “‘Foam at the mouth’? Cap, it’s weed, not heroin.” “I’m serious, stop laughing at me!” Aron pouted, but it looked pathetic. “You can take two drags,” Leo made a serious face, but his eyes were laughing. “The third will be fatal. Your head will explode like a watermelon.” He laughed again. Aron, feeling like an idiot, snatched the joint from his fingers. First drag. The smoke burned his throat. Aron doubled over, coughing as if spitting up a lung. “Weakling,” Leo stated, taking the joint back. “Watch. Don’t swallow the smoke right away. Let it in, hold it, let it cool down.” He inhaled, deep, beautifully, and slowly released a stream of smoke toward the city. “Now you. Try to hold your breath.” Aron tried again. This time was easier. The smoke filled his lungs, heavy, sweet. He held his breath, feeling his head become light as a balloon. Exhaled. Coughed, but less. The wind at the summit was cold; it tore at their clothes, trying to throw them down to the pulsing vein of the city, but the hood of the Range Rover held the warmth of the dying engine. The metal warmed their thighs through denim, creating the illusion of a living creature beneath them. Aron sat gripping the edge of the hood so as not to slide off—not off the car, but out of reality, which was melting and flowing like hot wax. Leo was close. Too close. His knee almost touched Aron’s, and that centimeter of void between them was charged with such electricity that the air seemed to crackle. Leo took a drag. Deep. Greedy. The red cherry of the joint flared in the dark like an angry eye, illuminating hollow cheeks, sharp bones, and trembling lashes. Leo didn’t exhale. He held the smoke inside, letting it soak into his blood, and turned his whole body toward Aron. “There’s another way,” Leo’s voice was strained, muffled because his lungs were full of poison. “Economical.” He shifted. The rustle of fabric on metal sounded deafeningly loud. Leo loomed over him, blocking out the city lights, blocking out the stars, blocking out the oxygen. He smelled not just of weed. He smelled of a hot body, the damp night, and a danger that pulled stronger than gravity. Aron stopped breathing. His heart slammed against his ribs once, twice, then froze, skipping a beat. Leo leaned in. Slowly. Agonizingly slowly, giving Aron every second to push away, run, hit. But Aron didn’t move. He was paralyzed, hypnotized by the darkness in the eyes opposite him, which had no pupils—only black wells. Leo’s face was so close Aron felt the heat of his skin on his own. The world narrowed to the line of the other boy’s lips—dry, chapped, slightly parted. “Breathe,” Leo exhaled, barely parting his mouth. It was a command. And a plea. Aron parted his lips, obeying an instinct that was older than fear. Leo leaned forward, closing the distance to a millimeter, but not touching. That millimeter was torture. Leo began to exhale. A thick, milky-grey stream of smoke flowed from his mouth into Aron’s. It felt like the transfer of a soul. Or a curse. The smoke was warm, moist, heavy. It tasted of Leo’s lungs, tasted of his saliva, tasted of his life. Aron inhaled it greedily, swallowing that grey silk, feeling it fill his larynx, trachea, expanding his chest from the inside with soft, suffocating pressure. Eye to eye. They stared into each other while the smoke bound them like an umbilical cord. Time stopped. The city sounds vanished. Only the rush of blood in his ears remained—a hollow, rhythmic alarm. Aron felt his head spinning, the ground leaving his feet, but his anchor was Leo. His face. His breath, which had now become Aron’s breath. It was more intimate than a kiss. Dirtier. More honest. They were breathing one breath for two, mixing carbon dioxide and the high. When the air in Leo’s lungs ran out, he didn’t pull away immediately. He froze, looking at Aron’s lips, wet, half-open, escaping wisps of smoke curling from them. Aron was drunk. Not on the weed. On this proximity. On the fact that Leo was in his personal space, in his safety zone, and Aron didn’t want him to leave. He wanted to lean forward. Cross that last, pathetic millimeter. Erase the border. Taste not smoke, but flesh. His lips burned. Leo slowly, as if reluctantly, pulled back. An inch. Two. The cold wind immediately slapped his face, but his skin burned as if scalded with boiling water. Aron exhaled the remnants of smoke into the sky. His head was cotton, his body weightless, as if filled with lead and helium simultaneously. They sat on the hood, and the silence between them wasn’t empty. It was viscous, like syrup. It pressed on their shoulders, on their ears, on their groins. No one was laughing. The laughter had died. Only the heavy, sticky realization remained that something irreversible had just happened. Aron looked at Leo. He was staring at the city, but his chest heaved heavily, raggedly, as if he’d just run a marathon. His hand lay on the hood, a centimeter from Aron’s hand. Aron’s pinky twitched. He needed to touch. Just to check that this was real. That this heat was real. But he didn’t dare. The air trembled. It seemed that if either of them spoke now, the sky would crash to the earth. “We need to leave,” Aron’s voice sounded foreign, raspy, as if stripped raw. He didn’t understand why he said it. He didn’t want to leave. He wanted to stay here forever, in this smoky cocoon. Leo turned his head. His gaze was cloudy, unfocused, heavy. He licked his lips, and Aron tracked the movement, feeling everything inside him tighten into a taut, painful knot. “We need...” Leo stumbled. He was looking at Aron’s mouth. “We need to buy something.” It was a lie. They didn’t need to buy anything. They needed to either fight or fuck right here on the hood, under the freezing wind. But they chose the safe lie. “Yeah,” Aron exhaled, feeling his heart slowly, reluctantly start beating again. “Food.” They sat for another minute, not moving, allowing the moment to die slowly, allowing the cold to return, until the viscous magic of the smoke dissipated, leaving behind only the taste of ash and a mad, unslaked hunger on their lips