Golden Boy (3 page)

I shake my head. ‘No.’

‘I hear you’ve got with loads of people from your year.’

‘Where d’you hear that?’

‘Around. I’m supposed to keep tabs on you. You’re my little cousin. Sort of.’

‘Not really,’ I point out. ‘And I’m only a year younger than you.’

‘Whatever. Loads of people at college like you too.’

‘Seriously?’

‘Yeah.’ He snorts, kind of like a laugh, but not quite. ‘They think you’re pretty.’

‘Pretty?’ I frown.

‘Well, you know. Whatever. Fit.’

I shrug. ‘Well, I’ve never even been all the way. I stop before it gets that far.’

‘I know, I heard,’ says Hunter.

‘Huh? From who? Who’s telling you all this stuff?’ I ask, laughing. ‘Where are you getting your information, Gestapo?’

Hunter just smiles mysteriously. ‘Well—’ He chinks his bottle against mine as I pick up the second. ‘I get it, anyway. You can’t help it if sometimes you just don’t want to, right?’

‘Umm, well, it’s not really—’ I begin.

‘And sometimes you . . . just do,’ Hunter says quietly, studying the label of his bottle. He sips his beer and looks around my room. ‘Cool games,’ he mutters, staring at my consoles.

I frown. ‘Are you alright, Hunter?’

For a moment he looks really miserable. But instead of talking he leans back onto my shoulder.

‘Nothing,’ he says, after a minute. ‘Tired.’

And then he breathes in quickly, and I realise he’s crying.

‘What’s wrong?’ I exclaim, wrapping my arms around him. He buries his face into my neck and I feel his lips, open and wet on my skin. His throat makes a choking noise.

‘Hey, hey,’ I murmur softly, and, holding his cheeks with my hands, I gently push back his face so I can look at him. I stroke away his tears. ‘What’s the matter?’

Hunter manages to calm himself. He looks at me fiercely, almost angrily. His lip trembles. He presses both lips together as if considering something, as if he’s confused, then he leans forward and kisses me. The fingers of his right hand knit with the hair at the back of my head. I’m so used to letting Hunter have his way that for a moment I don’t react. I feel his tongue flick in between my lips.

‘Woah,’ I murmur, struggling to pull away from the considerably stronger force of Hunter.

His dark eyes are black now. They track over my face.

‘What are you doing?’

He looks sullen. ‘You’re supposed to like me.’

‘I’m
supposed
to like you?’ I say.

‘You’re more girl than boy,’ Hunter mumbles, and I realise he’s very drunk. How he drove here without crashing and is going to drive his parents back I have no idea. ‘When we were growing up I always thought . . . Max . . .’ he whispers. ‘Please, Max.’

‘You’re . . . Hunter, you’re drunk.’

‘I was just nervous,’ he mumbles. ‘Because I knew I was gonna see you. Please, Max.’

He leans in again but I turn away slightly, so his lips brush my cheek.

‘I’m not gay. I’m sorry,’ I say. I sound like I’m pleading with him. ‘It’s not a bad thing to be, it’s just . . . I’m not.’

‘You don’t have to be,’ he says, matter of factly.

I look to the side, trying to mull over this, my mouth forming the word ‘what’. ‘Um,’ I eventually say. ‘But . . . you are.’

‘No I’m not,’ he says. ‘I don’t like boys. Or girls. Just you.’

‘You shouldn’t drive home,’ I say nervously. ‘You don’t look good.’

Hunter withdraws his hand and his eyes mist up, but it’s a hard mist, like the frost on a car window in winter. They become opaque.

‘Hunter,’ I whisper softly. ‘I’m sorry.’

He looks at me, then reaches for my throat with his hands and grips my neck. It’s not really aggressive. It’s intimate, like we’re the best friends we used to be. His eyes are set on me – primal, feral. I watch Hunter like an animal, like prey gauging the intentions of a predator. He stares back at me. My eyes flicker down his chest. Taking in how much bigger than me he is.

‘I’m not the freak,’ he growls. ‘There’s nothing wrong with me. There’s something wrong with you and you’re making me feel this way.’

I look down and feel my bottom lip bump out, embarrassed to have him bring my condition up.

‘You’ve always made me feel this way,’ he says. ‘You’re a little cocktease. You’re the freak. I’m not . . . I’m not . . .’

‘Gay?’ I murmur.

‘No, I’m not that, because you’re not even . . . because you’re . . .’

His eyes roam over me. He looks like he’s trying to prevent himself from having a panic attack.

I raise my arm and put a hand on his shoulder to calm him, and he takes advantage of this to move his arm below mine, wrap it around my waist and pull me, with one quick, easy move, from a sitting position to flat on my back, on the mattress below him. He moves forward and kisses me again briefly, before mumbling, ‘You’ll like it. I swear.’

He looks towards the door, rises slightly, unbuckles his belt and hops up onto the bed, leaning on my right leg so it’s pressed down and pushing the other leg down with his arms. It happens so quickly I’m still feeling sorry for him as he does it. The tone of my voice flips from consoling and soft, to sudden panic.

‘Hey! Wait, wait! What are you doing?’

‘Shhh.’ He hisses a warning. ‘Your brother.’

He is referring to Daniel, who is almost ten, and asleep in the next room. No, I don’t want Daniel to wake up and hear us and walk in right now. While I think about this, Hunter has cleared the duvet away from me in one quick swipe. It lands between my body and the wall to the right of me, pressing against my leg. He kneels painfully, right on my thighs, holding me down with his weight.

‘Shit!’ I cry out and cover myself with my hands. ‘What the fuck? Hunter! Get off me!’

‘Shut up.’ Hunter comes forward, puts one hand on my mouth and one hand on my neck and shakes me hard, my brain feeling like it’s thudding up against my skull, until I’m quiet and my head is aching. He leans low to my face and his lips brush against my skin. ‘Shut up,’ he says again, looking, even as he says it, unsure.

He takes his hands away and I lie there, unmoving, my hands still up by my face where I tried to break his hold on my neck. I cough gently, the air coming back into my lungs. I’m not scared. This is Hunter. I can remember what he looked like when he was five. In my head, he’s five.

I lie still. I feel like my physical self, my ability to move, is floating above my body. I feel dizzy and light. Inside my head, my brain-self yells at me to come back.

Then the sensation of being within my own body returns. I breathe it in with two short breaths and realise I have been staring at the ceiling; hands up like a convict in front of the police, not breathing, for about thirty seconds. Some fumbling is going on further down the bed. I look down to my waist.

‘Jesus,’ I murmur in complete disbelief, as if I’m watching something awful on
CSI
. Hunter’s penis is pointing at me. He takes his hands and rubs around my crotch roughly.

‘Is this your pussy?’ he whispers, shocked. ‘Fuck.’

‘No!’ I regain my voice. ‘Stop it!’ I try to sit up but he leans forward and pushes me back, easily, with a hand on my chest.

‘Don’t move, OK? Please,’ he mumbles. ‘Just don’t move.’

This is when the shock dissipates, and I get what’s coming. It seems a long time to take to comprehend the situation. I mean, things like this never happen. They happen to other people, but not to you, not to me. Not with moody-but-harmless Hunter. Not with the son of your parents’ best friends. Not with your best, true, forever friend when you were a kid. Not in sleepy, small town Hemingway. This happens to people in dark alleyways, at night, with strangers. This happens when you’re lost in a city. More to the point, this happens to girls. So I’ve been thinking so far,
This isn’t happening
. This is a situation I can control.

Now I’m lying on my back silently, while Hunter feels around my naked skin, and I can feel him, so heavy, his strong footballer’s legs pressing down my thighs, and I realise what he’s going to do. I realise I’m not going to be able to stop him. I realise too late.

‘Ow! Get off me! Get the fuck off me!’ I struggle but he’s already pushing at it, me, it, pulling at the sides with his fingers. ‘No! OW!’

I feel something roughly forced – shoved – inside me. A pain worse than anything I’ve ever felt shoots through me. It’s too big.

My eyes and mouth open wide, I almost shriek in panic. ‘No! Oh god! NO! Please! Hunter! Please!’

‘Oi!’ He hisses at me. ‘Shh! Just shut up!’

‘It hurts! No!’ Tears are falling down my face and I feel ashamed of myself for being such a wimp that I’m crying already. I’m gasping and squirming and pleading with him with my eyes, and panicking and whining on one constant note like a dog that’s been kicked. ‘Please! Please, Hunter! PLEASE!’

‘It’ll get better!’ he hisses, and pushes himself further in.

I hear a roar of laughter from downstairs. I hear the explosions of a video game and realise Daniel isn’t asleep. He’s awake, playing
World of War
, and I’m in the next room, with Hunter. Hunter grunts and I feel the skin pulling painfully and call out.

‘NO! Please, please, please! Stop, please stop! Please!’

‘Oi! Listen to me! Stop it! Listen!’ He grabs my shoulders and shakes me again so my head is bouncing around on the pillow and I feel like an object, a thing, unable to move, pinned down, plugged and useless, and then he holds me so I’m looking straight at him. His dark eyes stare coldly into mine. I watch him struggle to keep them cold.

Hunter’s fingers pinch my upper arms. His breath is hot on my skin. He moves towards me and kisses me, licking my mouth when I won’t move my lips. He leans fully on me, his weight bearing down on my chest, and wraps his arms around my waist and neck. I can’t breathe. He continues to push into me. His lips press against my cheek. I open my mouth but can’t form any words. I moan. It’s too painful.

‘Hey,’ he lifts his head. ‘Do you really want your mum and dad to hear you?’ he whispers. ‘Do you want them to come in your room and see your little he-she dick?’

I shut up, shocked, and stare at him.

‘Do you?’ he asks, almost matter-of-factly. ‘Do you want your mum and dad to see your little he-she dick?’ His lips part, close. He swallows. He shakes his head minutely, still inside me. ‘I’m not gay,’ he murmurs. ‘You’re not a guy. You’re . . . you’re not anything.’

My lips tremble. Our eyes are locked on to each other’s. Hunter’s face grows more cold and angry as he convinces himself with his own words. I watch him disbelievingly.

‘You’re a freak,’ Hunter murmurs, breathing quickly. ‘You’re a he-she.’

This is the worst moment of my life.

I have never been spoken to like this.

Those words, the word, burn in my cheeks, uprooting shame from my nervous system, causing tears to prick suddenly, immediately, at the corners of my eyes.

We wait together, in silence, for me to come round. My mouth is open. My eyelids blink. I swallow. I sweat.

I look at my penis. I look towards the door. I look at him, above me, inside me.

‘Do you?’ he whispers. ‘Do you want them to see?’

I shake my head and close my lips and wait, watching him.

Hunter nods. ‘Of course you don’t. Nobody wants to see that, do they?’

I wait. He pinches the skin of my waist hard between his forefinger and thumb. ‘Do they, Max?’

I shake my head again and mouth, ‘
No
.’

We have reached a sort of impasse. We understand I’m not to move, and I’m not to call out. Or in any case, I don’t move. I don’t call out. We stare at each other, straight in the eye, as Hunter moves forward, on top of me. He bends my legs into V-shapes and presses the knees down so I’m flat on the bed, my legs far apart. It feels so strange to be so exposed. It’s the first time, I realise, in my entire life, I have lain in this way, utterly spread beneath someone.

He moves his hips forward quickly, and stuffs something hard and long further into me. His penis – I think, as if it could have been something else and the thought has just come to me. I feel a horrible stretching in my crotch and sick rises in my stomach and throat.

I let out a staggered cry, the breath escaping over my teeth. ‘Uh-oh-oh.’

‘Tight,’ Hunter mutters coldly, like a scientist. Then, almost apologetically: ‘Bit dry. Don’t suppose you get wet, do you?’ He’s trying to keep his cool. But his lips are trembling.

I speak without thinking. ‘I don’t know.’

‘It’ll get better.’

He shoves again, deeper, and I gasp in pain. The pain is . . . unbearable. Explicit. Nauseating. Constant. Rising and falling slightly with each thrust.

I’m not made for this. I’m not built wide enough. He’s too big. He’s too big. The stretching snaps, stops, and turns to splitting. I can feel skin tearing down there. He leans over me, his breath hot, smelling of breath mints and beer. I feel sicker.

Hunter closes his eyes, turns his face into my neck and moans. ‘Oh,’ he mutters, moving in and out of me. ‘Oh my god.’

I can’t close my eyes. I just don’t do anything. I lie there, a blank. I lie there as he kisses my neck, sucking at my skin. I lie there like a blow-up doll, my mouth open, moving up and down on the bedsheets while Hunter presses my legs down and moves back and forth into me. He raises his head and looks down to where he is entering me. I can’t see it. I’m lying back. I don’t want to see it, but I look where he’s looking instinctually. My dick is flopping lifelessly as he pounds at me. I think about how it must feel to be a big, strong guy with a big dick and the ability to walk into any room and know you could overpower and take anyone you wanted. I wonder if I’d want that, given the choice. It seems a weird thing to be. It seems alien.

Hunter’s watching our parts come together. He lets out another, ‘Oh my god’, rising in tone as he thrusts faster. He takes my arm and pushes it above my head, then holds it there. He seems to smell my shoulder. He puts both hands in my hair again, stroking it, tousling it, and moans, rocking back and forth. My hair’s really soft. He used to stroke it like that, when we were little. I didn’t think anything of it. Everyone strokes my hair.