Sprout

dead in his tracks to keep from running into the water, and I ran right into him. He fell forwards and I grabbed him, kept him from landing in the mud. I pulled him upright and against me and my arms fell naturally around his ribs. He was breathing heavily. Not gasping or anything, just taking in long deep drafts of air and letting them back out again. His body was warm, and I could feel the dampness beneath the hem of his too-small shirt.
    He dropped the bag of cell phones and adjusted something in his pants. I stiffened (I mean my arms stiffened, pervert) and only when I felt its handle press against my hipbone did I remember: the gun. I shifted slightly to the left so it was no longer touching me.
    Even though they’d lost most of their leaves, the trees were still so thick that only a thin ribbon of cloudless sky hung over the water, the latter reflecting the former perfectly. Shadows of crows swam in the shallow water like fish, and the whole impression was of some private rift in the Kansas landscape, which was usually one of endless vistas, the constant feeling of being exposed and vulnerable. I pulled Ty a little closer. Our curves lined up, fitted into each other. The handle of the gun nudged my hip again but I ignored it. I put my chin on his shoulder, pressed my cheek against his ear. Unlike the rest of his body, it was cold, and I rubbed my cheek against it until it was warm. It took a long time, but we had all day.
    A crow cawed. Ty giggled.
    The center of the river undulated with its dark fast current, but where it lapped the bank a grayish scum had accumulated, studded with twigs and leaves and bits of trash. The layer of flotsam was almost two feet wide and so thick and stagnant it looked like it would hold you up if you stepped on it, but every once in a while an air bubble popped through from underneath, though whether it was a fish or just the riverbed farting out some gas was a mystery to me.
    Ty reached for his pants again. I heard his zipper this time.
    I stiffened. Arms and legs this time, abs and chest. I couldn’t take a breath.
    A moment later, I heard a sound that all boys instinctively recognize: the piddle of liberated urine splashing against defenseless earth.
    I jumped back. “Are you taking a whiz ?”
    Ty giggled again, his shoulders and back shaking slightly. A few amber drops splashed off to either side of his legs.
    When he was finished he tucked himself away with exaggerated gestures, as though he were stuffing an elephant’s trunk in his Fruit of the Looms (or FTL as his waistband said, which is also the acronym for Faster Than Light, but, um, yeah, off the subject). Then he pulled out the gun, grabbed the bag of phones, and set off upstream. After a moment’s hesitation, I followed. A part of me was glad for the distraction of the gun, since without it I wasn’t sure what else we might do. But another part of me (I’ll let you guess which part) wanted to grab the gun and throw it in the river so that there wouldn’t be any more distractions. (Actually that part of me couldn’t grab the gun, because it didn’t have any fingers, but I think you know what I’m trying to say.)
    Up ahead the corpse of a cottonwood lay across the river’s breadth, and this, apparently, was Ty’s destination. “Wait here,” he said, and handed me the gun. He kept the phones with him, however, and, carefully—more nimbly than I could’ve done it, that’s for sure—he used the fallen tree to cross the river.
    I touched the gun barrel, which was still warm from where it’d been tucked into Ty’s pants, then shoved it in mine. Immediately I felt a sharp pain. There being no bang, however, and no blood, I was pretty sure I’d just rammed myself, and not actually shot off my privates. I shifted the gun to the right slightly, and it promptly fell down the leg of my pants. I suspected that the whole gun-in-waistband thing probly worked better with briefs than it did with boxers, or at least with a belt. I shook my right leg till the gun fell out of my pants and then just held it.
    On the other side of the river, Ty had broken off a good-sized branch of the fallen cottonwood and was driving the sharp end into the soft bank. When it was more or less firmly in place, he found another branch, long and on the thin side, placed one end on the top of the post he’d just set up, then rested the other on the fallen cottonwood, so that it formed a surprisingly level bar. I was pretty sure I