V. H. King's Ink

“You ever think it’s weird?” Izzy asked, raking his pick over the palm of his hand. “I dunnno man, maybe it’s just me. People are always talking about how we got options, but when I look around? Where are they? I don’t see any.”

Caegan glanced at Izzy, lighting another cigarette and running through the rest of the evening. Stocking shelves at Gerald’s. Getting food from…somewhere. Walking the blocks until a few hours after midnight. 

Teresa wouldn’t be back until 3, maybe 4 in the morning. Enough time for her to piss, pass out, and be up again at 6. She’d be out the door by 7, but not before waking up the whole block with her yelling.  

Izzy slid off the iron bars that made up the porch railing and held out his palm. Caegan passed him the cigarette, listening through the traffic and kids on their bikes for the sound of something going wrong.

“I mean, you got Spy’s parents who are doctors and shit.” Izzy leaned against the railing next to Caegan, their shoulders almost touching. “You got the Halls from Hell, making devil-knows how much money as lawyers. And then what? Do the rest of us just all have to live like this?”

Izzy gestured to the blocks with the cigarette between his fingers. Cars that didn’t run because you couldn’t fix the brakes and pay for insurance in the same month. Fake flowers because it was something nice to look at even if it was a lie. Izzy dropped his arms with a sigh, his shoulder touching Caegan’s on purpose this time. 

As he took a long drawl, feeling Caegan’s sleeves just barely brushing his own skin, Izzy realized he couldn’t tell if Caegan was breathing or not.  Caegan had to be breathing, but Izzy’s arms tingled anyway. Growing up on streets like these, you learned to watch out before you made it to kindergarten. But no one watched like Caegan did.

Caegan knew the secret hopes buried deep in people’s hearts, like shipwrecked dreams at the bottom of the sea. Like he saw the difference people were making, even though nobody else in the world out there gave a shit. Even if they did, what could they do about someone else’s life falling apart when they could barely get through their own hell?

“If you’re not six-figure rich, you’re living in the ditch and it’s like you don’t exist.” Izzy exhaled slowly, letting his knuckles touch Caegan’s when he handed the cigarette back. “I bet you half the people on this block got into college but couldn’t make it out because life is just one bad thing after another while most people look the other way. Nothing in this world was built for us. Nobody gives a shit, and ain’t a damn thing we can do to change it.” 

Their shoulders overlapped now, more than just touching. Izzy swallowed a knot in his throat. On these streets, nobody would say anything if they saw him with Caegan.  Anywhere else, with anyone else…

“Build our own.”

Izzy shifted to catch Caegan’s face in his peripheral vision, just for a moment.  He couldn’t see Caegan move, but Izzy thought he could almost feel Caegan lean into his shoulder.  Casually, comfortably—because of course Caegan could. No one would look at Caegan sideways because no one looked too closely at him in the first place.

“Say that again?” Izzy asked.

Caegan breathed slow and even, blowing smoke on the desert wind. Izzy thought of the way everyone called Caegan Ghost, and his arms prickled again.

“We build our own,” Caegan said, stubbing the cigarette out on the railing before tucking it into his pocket. “Nobody’s going to make a world for us. Like you said, you do all the right things and still end up here. So fuck all that bullshit—we build our own people and make our own place.”

“For what?” Izzy asked, his hands curling around the railing as he stared at the scarred gravel lot on the corner. “So someone can burn it down or buy us out?”

“They can’t,” Caegan said. “Not when it’s a state of mind.”

“What, you’re going to think-happy-thoughts your way to a better life?”

Izzy wished Caegan hadn’t put out the cigarette. Nothing changes. Nothing ever fucking changes.  It was that kind of harsh reality that made people do all the things Father Rocci preached against.

God didn’t give a shit about past-due hospital bills and overdrawing your account trying to get a few days’ groceries. God just forced the world to keep turning against you—except there was something about Caegan that made it feel like you could survive it.  

“I stay easy.” Caegan stretched and slid off the railing, rolling his shoulders. “Being rich doesn’t save you from life going to shit.”

Caegan lived like nothing mattered except for what you chose for yourself. He made living on the blocks work, and not just for himself. Caegan did more for people on the blocks than any mayor or president ever would. He didn’t make promises.  He didn’t try to change people’s minds. He was just…

The Great White.

Another thing people called Caegan, but never to his face. It was the only way people talked about the way he looked, but they didn’t mean disrespect by it. Caegan was as Black as the rest of them, but Izzy thought Caegan was something else, too. No one knew what, exactly, but they knew not to fuck around and find out. 

“Besides, I keep busy,” Caegan said. “Someone’s gotta fuck with Regis, right? Can’t have him busting up your little operation.”

If you knew how to listen for it, there was a smirk in Caegan’s dry tone. Izzy flipped up a finger, raising his voice to be heard through the screen door as Caegan went inside.

“I’m smart enough not to get picked up like that. My Moms would kill me before Regis even had the chance to shove me in the back of his squad car. I should get gone, before she thinks that’s where I’ve been.”

“Lucky you,” Caegan yelled from the kitchen. “Tell her I dragged your ass down to Bet’s Parlor because I saw a dress I thought she’d like.”

“Fuck you, Ghost.”

The front door slammed shut and Caegan locked it, shoving his keys somewhere beneath his hoodie.  Izzy realized he was smiling and he shook his head.  He slung his backpack over his shoulders, hopping his bike down the front steps and turning a half-circle in the street.

“Hop a ride, if you’re working at Geezer’s tonight.  At least that way I’ll only be halfway lying.”

Caegan snickered, a dry sound in his throat. He swiped his thumb over his phone screen, checking for messages from Scott before standing on the bar that went between the spokes of the back wheel. 

“Bullshit.”

“You’re always doing the charitable thing,” Izzy said, pushing them off and trying not to think about Caegan’s hand on his shoulder. “This is just me returning the favor.”

Gerald’s was only a few blocks away, but Caegan didn’t say anything when Izzy decided to take a detour.  It wasn’t a long one—not even ten minutes at most. Izzy made it home just late enough to get by with a casual apology to his mom and promising his sister he’d help with her homework.

Life went back to what it always was—chores, schoolwork, more chores for Miss Edith next door. Miss Edith asked him, like she always did, when he was going to ask out the pretty girl who came around with that hoodlum. Izzy charmed his way out of an answer like he always did.  If he was dating Skylar, he teased, then what would Miss Edith have left to nag him about?

When he finally crashed on the couch, Izzy let his mind drift. Skylar was all cute curves and cuss words, but everyone knew she was with Caegan. Not that Izzy was jealous, because it was nothing, really. His parents used to make comments sometimes, like they suspected.  And they pretty much knew for sure, by now.

They didn’t talk about it around his sister. His parents thought she was too young to worry about what could happen to him.  And they were convinced it would ruin his chances of getting into A Good School, as if having to transfer back to public schools hadn’t already done that.

One burst appendix and a bad infection had drained any would-be tuition money for Brighton Academy, and there went his chances of extra-curricular activities that would land him a good scholarship. If he managed to squirrel away enough cash on his own, he might be lucky enough to pay his way through a few college credits before he dropped out to work full-time.

Izzy had decided he could deal with that, if it meant he could pay his sister’s way through school. And his parents were probably right, about the waiting. He just hoped it didn’t turn into looking over his shoulder his entire life.  

For a long time, Izzy watched television light play on the ceiling, remembering how it felt to wrap his arms around a ghost. And what would Miss Edith have to say about that? Funny how the moments he felt the most hope were the ones when he was hiding between dumpsters in a back alley.

The impossibility of the world could bring Izzy close enough to feel Caegan’s lips on his own, the air around them silent of other people’s lies long enough for Izzy to hush his dread and choose to hope. Someday, it wouldn’t matter. It wouldn’t cost him scholarships and interviews and promotions. It would just be a life, his life, when he wouldn’t have to worry about his sister or parents feeling punished because of him.

Everyone knew Caegan’s life was the streets, bringing goodness out of a situation no one else wanted to be in. Izzy wouldn’t be on the blocks forever. He would find a way to a better part of the city, but he knew Caegan would be the reason he’d made it. So maybe it was an alright thing, those moments between the two of them. Maybe it could build something the world wouldn’t destroy.