The Less-Dead (10 page)

“But, Will?” I look around the campsite. “How long can you stay here? I mean, I understand about disappearing, but this place doesn’t look safe to me.”

“I won’t be here much longer,” he says. “Turns out my social worker found me a home. She says it’s a good one. When things blow over, I’ll move in. Plus, Hawk’s been helping me out. Even lined me up with a job, waiting tables at Kerbey Lane. If everything goes well, I’ll make it to L.A. right after I graduate.”

I look at Hawk, wondering what kind of trouble he’s in and whether he’s here in the woods with Will because he’s hiding out from the police. It’s highly possible. “Eh, you give me too much credit, Will,” Hawk says. He takes a long drag and blows a smoke ring.

“So, enough of this morbid stuff,” Will says. “You guys got my note. Are you ready for Saturday night?”

“We’re ready,” Carson says. “Thanks for setting up the gig, Will. Really, we owe you one.”

“No problem. Turned out the Red Room had an opening and the owner took my word for it that you guys were good.” Will looks at me. “And now, I get to keep my promise to Noah. Remember? I’m going to help you write that song for Aubrey.”

“Tonight?” I say.

“Of course. You’ll need to sing it for her on Saturday. Come on.” He stands up. “Do you have the book I gave you?”

“Oh … no. I didn’t bring it.”

“That’s all right, I’ll get mine. Hey, Hawk, keep Carson company for a while, okay? Noah and I are going to write a song.”

Hawk eyes Carson and blows another smoke ring. “Sure thing.”

Will leads me several yards away to a big limestone rock. We take seats atop, and Will pulls out his notebook. “Now, tell me ten things you hate about Aubrey.”

“What? Ten things I
hate
? I thought this was supposed to be a love song.”

“Well, in your case an
anti
-love song might work best. Especially if Aubrey needs some persuading. Words can be more powerful if you write the opposite of how you feel.”

“Sorry, Will, but that doesn’t make sense.”

“Oh, it does. Come on, give it a try.”

Will and I brainstorm, and when we’re done, I have the bare bones of the strangest song I’ve ever written. A few lines of the chorus, too. “So if Aubrey never speaks to me again, I can blame you, right?” I say.

“After Aubrey hears the song, she’ll be begging for more.”

“Now,
that
I highly doubt.”

“Trust me, Noah. I know what I’m talking about. I’ve had my heart broken a few times.” Will looks at me and smiles sadly. “And I know what unrequited love is like.” There’s a tense silence between us. I feel my face growing hot. Suddenly I realize that my knee is touching Will’s. I pull it away. “Listen, Will, I can’t—”

“I know.” He hangs his head. “Sorry, I shouldn’t have said that. It was really stupid.”

“Yeah, it was.”

I’m about to hop off the rock, but Will stops me. “Noah, wait, please. God, this is so awkward. Let me explain. You see, when I first saw you on the Drag, playing guitar and singing, you reminded me of the guy I told you about—the one I was seeing. The guitarist. We were together about eight months. Our breakup was pretty rough, and I’m not even sure I’m over it yet. Anyway, the day I met you I took a chance, and when I figured out you were straight, which didn’t take long, I still wanted to be your friend. I just like you. That’s all.”

I’m sitting on the edge of the rock. My whole body is tense. “Okay, whatever. I … I really need to go now.”

“Yeah, sure, I understand.”

Will rips the pages from the book and hands them to me. I shove them into my pocket, jump off the rock, and walk back to the campfire. Will trails behind.

“Hey, you’re back,” Carson says. “Hawk and I were just discussing my recipe for apricot-hash jelly. He thinks I need to add a little cayenne pepper. Give it a Cajun flavor.”

When I don’t laugh, Carson gives me a strange look. He peers behind me and sees Will. “So … did you guys write the song?”

“Yeah, some of it,” I say. “Carson, it’s getting late. We need to head home before it’s pitch black.”

Carson looks back and forth between me and Will. “Is everything … okay?”

“Everything’s fine,” I say.

Will doesn’t answer. He just stands there with his hands in his pockets.

“Will? You’ll be there Saturday night to hear us play, right?” Carson says.

“Um, I should be.”

“You’d
better
be. Come on, dude. It’s our
debut.”

Will shuffles his feet. “Yeah, well, Noah’s right. You guys should head home.”

Carson watches us. “Okay. Well, you be careful out here. And keep in touch.” He bumps fists with Hawk, then Will, and the two of us head for the clearing.

“Noah, what happened back there?” Carson says. “Why are you acting so weird?”

“Nothing
happened
. Just leave me alone, all right?”

“You didn’t even say goodbye to Will.”

“Shut up. I don’t feel like talking right now.”

He sighs. “Fine. Whatever.”

We hike in silence. It’s getting darker by the second. Halfway to the entrance, we hear rustling in the trees. We both freeze, and suddenly Hawk appears in the bushes. He flips on a flashlight and hands it to me. “Thought you might need this.” The beam casts shadows on his face, making his freakish appearance even more ghastly.

I swallow. “Thanks.”

He nods solemnly. “Listen. Both of you. Don’t come back here. It could be dangerous. Someone might follow you.”

“Don’t worry. We’re not coming back,” I say.

“Good.” Slowly, he lifts one side of his shirt, revealing a holster. Tucked inside, a gun. “Believe me. Will’s safe.”

“DUDE, COME
on,
jump
!”

It’s Friday, and Carson is going to the movies with Kat and the King of Glory youth group tonight. He’s still grounded for stealing the DPCP’s Lexus Wednesday night, so the two of us are sneaking out of his second-story bedroom window. Carson has already taken the plunge. Now it’s my turn. I teeter on the ledge.

“Remind me again,” I say. “Why am I doing this?”

“Because you need to get out of the house, dude. You’ve been moping around for days, and honestly, you’ve been a real pain in the ass. Besides, I need a ride. Just aim for this bush. It’ll break your fall.”

“Break my leg’s more like it.”

I stare at the bush Carson is pointing to. It’s an over-grown holly with red berries and spiked leaves. Besides breaking my leg, I’m going to get impaled. I take a deep breath, jump, hit the bush, and roll into the grass. A painful
experience, but I’m alive, and that’s good enough for Carson.

“Come on, let’s go.” He pulls me to my feet. “Kat’s waiting for us. And you’d better not chicken out. You better ask Aubrey to our gig at the Red Room.”

“Yeah, right. If I can pry her away from Brandon.”

When we arrive at the theater, I see the usual zealots outside the box office, waiting to buy tickets. We’re about to see the new inspirational film
Spears in the Jungle
—a true story about three American missionaries martyred by some pissed-off aborigines. Just wait till the DPCP hears about this one.

At the front of the line is Brandon. Tonight he’s wearing a shirt that says
Satan Sucks
. Behind him are Aubrey and Kat. “Come on, there they are!” Carson runs to the front of the line. Like a sucker, I follow.

Brandon, Kat, and Aubrey stare at me like I have two heads. In fact, all the zealots are giving me strange looks. “Um, Noah?” Aubrey says. “You’re bleeding.” She taps her right cheek.

“What?” I touch my face. That damn holly bush. I turn to Carson. “Why didn’t you tell me I was bleeding, you idiot?”

He shrugs. “Sorry. I didn’t notice.”

“Here.” I shove some money into his hand. “Buy my ticket. I’m going to the bathroom.”

After rinsing the blood off my face and neck, I stare at myself in the mirror. Besides having been mauled by a shrub, I’m not a bad-looking guy. And I’ve got a decent personality.
At least, I
think
I do. Even
guys
are attracted to me. So what does Brandon have that I don’t?

Nothing.

Everything.

He’s got Aubrey.

Carson doesn’t even wait for me. Some friend. The guy at the door is holding my ticket. “Thanks.” I snatch it from his hand and walk into the theater. The lights are dim, and since it’s a low-budget Christian film, instead of previews, they’re flashing church advertisements on the screen. I look around and see the youth group sitting dead center. Brandon’s in the first row of zealots, looking all cozy sitting next to Aubrey. Beside Aubrey is Kat, and next to Kat is Carson. The loser didn’t even save me a seat. The rest of that row is filled with more zealots. To top it off, Marty is in the row behind them, waving me over.

“Noah, dude, come on, sit over here!” As usual, Marty is trying to be all hip and cool, all relevant, all down with the teen scene. But he can’t fool me. The biggest question on Marty’s mind is
So, Noah, how’s your walk with the Lord?

“How’ve you been?” he says. “I haven’t spoken to you in a while.”

“Fine.” I’m in no mood for Marty’s small talk. Especially when I see Aubrey laughing at one of Brandon’s jokes. I peer over and see their fingers loosely entwined. A knot twists in my stomach.

To keep my eyes off the lovebirds, I begin reading the church advertisements, and I see one for King of Glory.
A place where everyone is welcome
. Anger rises in my chest. I
turn to Marty and blurt out, “Actually, I recently joined another church.” I say this pretty loudly. It’s intentional. Aubrey spins around and gives me a strange look.

“Really?” Marty says. “That’s a surprise. Which one?”

“Westboro Baptist. Have you heard of it? It’s pretty cool. We have these awesome Bible studies, mostly from the book of Leviticus, and then we head out for some serious gay-bashing afterward. This guy I know from King of Glory, he used to go there, but he’s in jail now. Anyway, it’s very intense. You should try it sometime.” Heads are turning now. One of them is Brandon’s.

Brandon laughs nervously. “Hey, uh, Marty … don’t take Noah too seriously, okay? He’s got one wicked sense of humor.”

Carson narrows his eyes at me. “Yeah, Noah’s one funny guy.”

Honestly, I can’t tell whether I’m pissed off at them or at myself. Maybe it’s both.

I guess all the zealots have heard about their former Sunday school teacher’s double life, because they’re squirming in their seats. Lucky for them, the lights turn off and the movie begins. As the pagan aborigines slash their way through the jungle with huge machetes, Marty leans over and whispers in my ear, “I don’t think he did it.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Warren Banks. Yesterday I went to visit him in jail.”

“You
visited
him?”

“Yeah. That’s what pastors do, Noah. Visit people who need help. Anyway, Banks told me
his
version of what happened. He said he was with Kyle the night he was killed, but
they only had a drink together and talked. After that, Kyle went off with a guy who was asking for spare change. Kyle was going to take him to an all-night diner, get him something to eat. That’s the last Banks saw of Kyle Lester.”

“And you believe that?”

“Well, I can’t be one hundred percent sure, but he seems to be telling the truth. Plus, Banks didn’t even know the other boy who was murdered—the one found by Town Lake. And the medical examiners haven’t been able to determine yet if the boy was killed before or after Banks was arrested. Anyway, Banks is hiring a good lawyer. They’re going to fight it.”

“But what about the whole Westboro Baptist thing? Banks was a
member
of that place. Those people are
sick
. I saw them on the news.”

“I know. I asked Warren about that, too. He told me he’d made a huge mistake joining that church. He’d been fighting his sexual orientation for a long time. It seems he got bad advice from this radical online support group. Warren believed if he could be repulsed enough by homosexuals, it might cure him. Obviously it didn’t work.”

“Cure him?”
I shake my head. “This is unbelievable. Listen, Marty, I’m sorry, but I’m not buying that story. I think Banks is lying. I think he’s guilty.”

Marty shrugs. “You could be right.”

I lean back in my seat, and as I watch the movie, something nags at me. Banks claimed it was a guy in need of money who was last seen with Kyle. But who?

Twenty minutes into the movie, I reach the conclusion that
Spears in the Jungle
is one of the worst films of the year.
Not only is the acting atrocious, but there’s so much melodrama I want to barf. Worst of all, when the aborigines spear the missionaries, there’s no blood.

Anyway, I must be one sick dude, because when the camera flashes back to the United States and everyone is at the missionaries’ funeral, and the seven-year-old son one of the dead guys stands up and gives a tearful speech about how proud he is of his father because he risked his life to spread God’s Word to the aborigines, I lose it and start to laugh. And once I get going, I can’t stop. Carson turns around and gives me a dirty look, and that’s when I see that he’s been crying—which makes me crack up even more.

“Um, Noah, I think you’d better leave,” Marty says. “Now.”

“Yeah, I think you’re right.” I get up, and I notice that Aubrey is doubled over in her seat. One hand is cupped over her mouth, and her shoulders are shaking. She’s laughing. A wicked surge of pleasure rises inside me. As I walk up the aisle, one of the zealots begins to clap. I turn and take a bow.

Outside the theater, I hear someone running behind me. “Noah, wait!”

It’s Aubrey. “Oh … hey.”

She’s not laughing anymore. “Noah, I don’t know what to say. I just … well, how
are
you?”

Depressed. Angry. Guilty. Losing my mind. All of the above
. “I’m fine.” She’s not buying it. Aubrey’s always been able to read me like a book. “How about you?” I say.

“Okay, I guess. It’s been pretty crazy at home, though. The police have been at my house questioning my father
about Warren Banks. And after that second boy was murdered, they came back. They think my father should know something, since he’s the pastor of our church, but he doesn’t. The whole thing’s so strange. And scary.”