Beast(60)

Bullshit, I want to scream.

Bullshit.

But of course I say nothing.

We stop walking and pause. The ground is thick with wet leaves glued to the edges of the sidewalk.

Operation Tattle Ye Not, Neighbors has begun.

Once out of the park, we land in a gully that steers the rain runoff into the sewers and walk along the drainage line until we hit the alley of unfinished road that runs directly behind my house. Mostly gravel and dirt with giant muddy potholes, which is good for us. No cars, not ever. We walk side by side, quiet again but with concentration, until we hit my backyard. I pick up Jamie, my massive bag full of glass bottles that I’ve been lugging like a pack mule, and help her and the beer over our chain-link fence and into the wet lump of turf we call a yard, then we split up for tactical reasons.

I go all the way around the block, pop out of the alley, turn right, and keep going until I cruise up my front walk, take out my key and open the door. No harm, no foul. Hi, Swanpoles. I’m home by six o’clock. Text that to my mom.

So funny, the last thing my mom said before she left for Pittsburgh was “It’s a school night. If you’re going to binge-watch something, keep it to only four episodes.” That and “Shave that thing off; it looks ridiculous.”

And now that Jamie and I got the beer, shaving my beard off is the only thing I can think about. Not that I have anything to compare it to, but it was the shittiest beer run I’ve ever been on. I go to the back door and let Jamie in. She’s just as cold, if not freezing. That skirt has to be drafty.

It’s weird: a month ago the only thing I would’ve focused on is what’s underneath the skirt and now I don’t care. I’m only worried about whether or not she’s warm enough.

I leave Jamie in the kitchen to unload the beer and aim for the bathroom. “Dylan?” she calls after me. “Little help here?”

“Be right back,” I say as I head straight for the box nailed underneath the mail slot. I pick through all the letters. Nothing but a bunch of junk mail. How long does it take to check some hormones in a blood test? Seriously. Takes forever apparently, it’s been five days. Five. I leave the mail in the box and shut myself inside the bathroom because I can’t stand my beard. I need it off my face. Time to get rid of this itchy, scratchy reminder of everything I don’t want to be. As soon as I close the door, I exhale at my reflection in the mirror.

I throw the glasses off. They hit the bathtub with a clunk and skid rattling into the drain. I turn on the water in the sink and lather up.

I’m fifteen years old. I want to be carded.

My face sheared, I breathe a little easier and pat dry with a towel. I slip off the sports coat and plunk it on an empty hook. Jamie wedges the door open with her toe, two bottles in each hand. “Oh no, your beard is gone.”

“So?”

She hands me the full bottle. It’s cold. Ice cold. Every ad I’ve seen since I was a baby has made beer in glass bottles out to be nectar of the gods. It’s amazing, the happy music and bikini girls won’t let you forget it. You will drink it and have a party. So, here we are, our plan executed to perfection, and I don’t want it. It’s unearned. I put it on the bathroom counter and leave it there.

She puts her unopened bottle next to mine.

The chill in my bones from walking through all that frigid slop makes me sink. Jamie glances about the room, but not in an “oh wow, I really like the tiles, they’re so beige” way. It’s more of a maybe-I-should-leave face. Perhaps she’s already mapping out her escape route and the mileage she’s going to put on her boots walking home.

I don’t want her to go. I never do. The thought that she might sucks.

Corroborating her observations might help. That always worked in biology lab last year. “I do know I’m hideous. I just don’t know what to do about it,” I say.

“Oh come on, Dylan, don’t make me feel worse, I know what I said was mean,” she says in a blur. “It’s a certain look and you make it work, I swear on a stack of…whatever’s not blasphemous.”

“It’s okay; I am aware.” I gesture to myself, trying to laugh and holding up my hands, furry side out. “What I want to know is what do I do with it all? My whole everything. I’m a throw rug. You might think it’s dumb, and maybe it is, but I hate being so hairy. It’s everywhere. The last time I saw my skin, it was screaming red and scaly from a bad wax. And that’s just one thing that bugs me.”

“You don’t like being hairy? That’s the big deal?”

“It’s mostly just gross. Feels like it’s endless.”

“It’s not a death sentence. If there’s something you don’t like, work it out.” She scans the room, thinking. “Let’s fix it right now.” Jamie grabs my electric razor and clicks it on with a bzzzz. “Shall we?”

My neck tightens. “I don’t want you to see my back. It’s disgusting and I hate it.”

“But this is such an easy tweak, it’s stupid.” She shakes her head. “Besides, confession time, I’m mildly curious what you’d look like without a pelt. We’re friends, right? So it’s no big deal.”

We’re friends, we’re friends. That word is starting to tick me off and it shouldn’t. Friends hang out, friends get beer when their mom is gone. Friends shave each other’s backs. Oh my god, what are we doing?