Wild Awake

want it to end. I think back to Lukas and the disaster with the wine, and it seems hilarious now, like I’ve traded in a jar full of pennies for a bar of gold. It’s amazing how quickly the things you thought would make you happy seem small once you stumble on something true.
    Beautiful , I think to myself as I float back into sleep, my whole body thrumming with a tender, exhausted state of exhilaration. Beside me, Skunk’s body is warm under his T-shirt. The last thing I see before falling asleep is the Kali painting on Skunk’s wall. Her blue-gold body is draped in equal parts flowers and severed heads—as if beauty and horror were interchangeable and what matters most is trusting in the dance. I gaze at her until I can almost hear the clink of bells, the thud of drums. My eyes droop shut, and then I’m gone.
    Sometime around noon on Saturday we both take showers in the tiny downstairs bathroom. Skunk gives me a soft old T-shirt to wear and a pair of his aunt’s sweatpants he finds in the dryer. They’re big in the butt and they make me look like an orangutan, but at least they’re clean. Oh, Skunk! Oh, Bicycle Boy! This afternoon’s omelet features Asiago and leeks. When did Lukas ever feed me? When did Lukas peel off my borrowed socks and do a weird and vaguely pleasant shiatsu thing to my feet?
    That evening when Skunk comes downstairs from checking in with his aunt and uncle, he does a silent victory dance in the middle of the floor.
    What’s going on? I say with my eyes.
    He just smiles and keeps dancing.
    No, tell me!
    I pound the bed with my fist in mock frustration. High heels click on the floor above our heads. Do Skunk’s aunt and uncle have company over? Are we about to get busted? Is Skunk getting some kind of sick pleasure out of almost getting caught?
    I’m about to bolt for the alley when Skunk slides onto the bed beside me and whispers in my ear, “They’re going to an engagement party in Surrey. They won’t be home until eleven.”
    When Skunk’s aunt and uncle leave for the party, we go upstairs and play house. We snuggle up on the couch and watch movies on the big-screen TV. We play with the cat. I climb onto Skunk’s aunt’s elliptical machine and swing my legs so hard I almost break it. When I discover the waterbed in Skunk’s aunt and uncle’s room when I’m walking through after using their bathroom, I shriek so loud, Skunk comes running in to save me.
    We stare at it, then at each other, both of us waiting for the other person to say what they’re thinking first.
    “We shouldn’t,” says Skunk.
    So we do.
    When the rain stops, just past ten, we’re lying on the floor of Skunk’s bedroom flushed and breathless, our teacups abandoned nearby. We both hear it at the same time: the sudden silence, where the patter of rain had sounded in the courtyard ever since we come in from our ride. I burrow my hand in the soft black tangle of his hair. “Time to go home.”
    I feel a pinprick of uncertainty when I say it. Maybe it was crazy to stay here. Maybe Skunk thinks I’m a big easy sloot, and all those sweet things we did were just games to him. If you’d only been responsible like I told you to be, you wouldn’t have to worry about those questions , says the version of myself that went home and practiced piano on Thursday night. For one perilous moment, my heart hangs in the air like a flipped coin. I know by the time I get home, that coin’s going to have landed either on drunken elation or crippling regret, and I don’t want to wait that long to find out which one it’s going to be. I decide to do a test.
    “There’s something I want to do before I go,” I say. “I need to whisper it, though.”
    Skunk tilts his head, and I murmur it in his ear. When I pull away, he grins.
    “Do you . . . want to?” I say.
    He nods and starts to unbutton his jeans. We undress quickly, dropping shirts and underwear, and I glimpse Skunk’s body, pale and lustrous as a pearl, his tattoos dark on his arms. When we’re both naked, I reach for Skunk’s hand.
    The glass door slides open easily. The wet concrete in the courtyard is cold and rough under our feet. I glance at the sky and let out a happy whoop.
    We gambol, star-clad, while the last few raindrops splash around us and the pear tree shakes its wet, white blossoms on our heads.

chapter twenty-five
    When I get home, I plug my dead cell phone into its charger and discover a million messages from Lukas, asking where I