Chapter Nineteen

The Sacred Yew was already crowded when Trevor and Zach arrived. A warm rain had begun misting down, but kids were still milling about on the sidewalk, basking in the humid summer night. Zach saw lots of black and ragged denim, buzz cuts and long braids and hair dyed all colors. Most of the faces were young, pale, and rapt. Sick with joy, Zach thought, watching their lives unfurl before them, a myriad of roads.

The doorman on duty was a slight, reedy teenage boy with a facial bone structure as sharp and delicate as a bird's. His long dyed-black hair straggled into his face, lightly beaded with rain, and for a moment Zach wanted to swoop the poor starved-looking thing into his arms and give him a jolt of the energy and love crackling through his body. He managed to restrain himself.

The boy stopped them as they entered the club, and Zach spoke the four talismanic words as easily as if he had been saying them all his life.

“I'm with the band. ”

“What's your name? ”

“Dario. ”

The kid found the name on his list and scratched it off, then nodded at Trevor. “What about him? ”

“He's with me. ”

” 'Kay. ” The kid picked up a rubber stamp and pressed it into a red inkpad, then against the backs of their left hands. The design was a scary-looking tree with many spreading branches, rather like the mythic Yggdrasil with its roots in hell.

They moved from the warm night into the heat and half-suppressed excitement of the club. “Dario? ” Trevor inquired.

“It's my stage name. After Dario Argento. ”

Then they were in the thick of the crowd and talk became impossible. Zach grabbed Trevor's hand and led him toward the tiny graffiti-covered room at the back of the stage. Terry and R. J. were lounging on a broken-down sofa. A cooler full of the ubiquitous Natty Bohos sat atop a blown-out, gutted amp, and Zach took one.

“So Ghost gets on the phone, ” Terry was telling R. J., “and says 'What's going on? Did you get a new singer? ' ”

“No shit! ”

“Yeah! And he goes, 'Well, watch out. Somebody's after him. ' And then Steve gets back on, and he says, 'Ghost dreamed the FBI or something was looking for your singer. '”

“Huh. . . Hey, Zach. Hey, Trevor. ”

Terry got up and greeted them with a hug. “Zach, our psychic friend dreamed the FBI was after you. Say it ain't so. ”

Zach tried to laugh. “Not unless they know about all those cattle mutilations. ” Trevor squeezed his hand.

“So, ” Terry said, “you ready to go? ”

“Hell, yes! ”

“I thought we'd play two sets. Everyone will buy beer during the break and Kinsey will make more money! ”

“And we can get stoned backstage, ” said Calvin, coming in. Zach wondered if he had been listening at the door. Calvin was wearing a pair of black cotton leggings and a skimpy rag that might once have been a T-shirt: nearly the same outfit Zach had on, but tighter and rattier. Zach saw that one of his nipples was pierced with a silver ring. Calvin beamed at Zach and offered him a slender black object. An eyeliner pencil.

“Want some? ”

Slinking about the stage, his eyes smeared with wanton kohl. . . “May I? ”

Calvin pressed the pencil into Zach's hand and turned away, flexing his fingers. He seemed to have toned his act down a little. In fact the whole atmosphere backstage had suddenly become brisk, excited but efficient; these guys were ready to have fun, but they also had a job to do. Terry and R. J. were standing, stretching. Zach felt the first flicker of nervousness like a wing brushing the inside of his stomach. He peered into the tiny lightless mirror Kinsey had thoughtfully provided and began outlining his eyes in black.

Trevor watched him strangely. “What are you doing? ”

“Putting on makeup. ” Zach finished, smudged the corners a bit, then looked up at Trevor. “Do you like it? ”

“I think I better go back into the club. ”

“Okay. Why? ”

Trevor leaned in close. “Because if I stay here, ” he whispered in Zach's ear, “I'm going to fuck you right in front of the band. ”

Great: now he was going on stage with a boner. “Wait till after the show, ” he whispered back. “I'll ruin you for life. ”

“Promise? ”

“Mmmmm. ” Trevor's lips covered his, Trevor's arms slid around him and hugged him tight. Then Trevor looked back at the other musicians. “I hope you have a good show, ” he said. They all realized they had been staring, smiled a little too widely and offered a ragged chorus of thanks.

The backstage door swung shut and Trevor was gone into the crowd. Terry glanced at the others. “Ready? ”

A round of nods. A moment of silence. Then Terry spoke three more of rock and roll's talismanic words:

“Let's do it. ”

Trevor was standing at the very center of the dance floor when Gumbo hit the stage. He felt the crowd pushing him forward, let himself surge closer to Zach.

Zach was already smiling at the audience as if he wanted to eat it alive. Calvin and R. J. picked up their guitars, slung the brightly colored hippie-weave straps over their shoulders. Terry sat down, leaned forward, and spoke hoarsely into the small mike mounted on his drum set.

“Howdy! We're Gumbo! ” A spatter of whistles and applause. “Thanks. You'll notice that tonight we're four instead of three. Say hello to DARIO, our special guest vocalist appearing in a limited engagement of one. . . night. . . only! ” A drumstick kissed the edge of a cymbal. “DARIO! A genu-wine Cajun maniac straight from New OrLEEENS! ”

Over the forest of waving, fluttering hands thrust up by the crowd, Trevor distinctly saw Zach mouth the word Shit. But he recovered fast and ripped the microphone off its stand as Terry gave the three-beat intro to the first song. Calvin unleashed a fast-and-dirty flood of guitar noise, and R. J. backed him with a bass line that made Trevor think of wheels blasting down an open highway. Zach stood with the mike clutched to his chest, arched his back and speared the audience with his glittering eyes.

Trevor thought Zach was looking straight at him as he began to sing.

In fact, Zach had left his glasses in the dressing room and couldn't see much beyond the first four rows of people. But he could feel Trevor in the crowd, could feel a long invisible strand of electricity flowing between them, tapping into the web that connected Zach with Terry, R. J., and Calvin, sending tendrils through the audience and infecting them as well. It was a silver-blue energy, as galvanizing as a slug of moonshine, as effervescent as a champagne chaser.

He opened his mouth and felt the energy come blazing up his spine as he let the words fly. He barely knew what he was singing; his photographic memory gave him back the lyrics and his reptile brain translated them into pure emotion without ever processing their meaning. He twisted the syllables, stretched the long sounds, pushed his voice way down deep to match the bass, then sang with the guitar, high and hoarse and clear.

The crowd pushed right up to the stage. A few kids up front were already dancing. Zach let their movements tug at him, flow over him. Soon he was dancing harder than any of them, remembering to breathe, keeping his voice strong, letting the music control him.

The young upturned faces were sweaty, eyes half-closed, lips parted as if in ecstasy. This was like making love to an enormous roomful of people all at once, like taking control of all their pleasure centers and squeezing hard. It was his best fantasy gone one better. No one was jealous. Everyone was getting off, and getting him off. And somewhere right in the middle of it was his one true love.

“I gotta bad reaaaaction, ” he moaned, lips brushing the mike, letting his voice crack a little, thinking of Billie Holiday. “Gotta bad reaction to yoooou. . . gotta suck your poison every night, gotta swallow too. . . ” He was improvising on the lyrics now as the song ended. Calvin caught his eye and gave him a very dark smile.

The next number on the set list read simply “FUNKY BLUESJAM. ” Terry had told him to vamp around, make up his own lyrics if he wanted. His shirt was already soaked. He peeled it off as the band eased into a slow, sexy groove. The crowd whistled and hooted. Zach closed his eyes and tilted his head back and just stood swaying at center stage for a long moment, leggings riding low on his hips, lights playing over the sweat on his face and chest and rib cage. Me felt them looking at him and he let them look.

Slowly he brought the mike up and started singing again, letting his voice skitter and scat over the music, only gradually beginning to form whole words and lines. “Where the bars never close. . . And the neon screams. . . And the smell of whiskey gets in your dreams. . . ”

A boy was dancing front and center, head thrown back in abandon, red-gold hair shaved close on the sides and spiked with sweat, pale skin flushed. His eyes met Zach's and held them, almost defiant. Zach knew that look, had seen it plenty of times in the Quarter. It said, I am as beautiful as you, and I know it. The boy wore a thin white T-shirt and loose, low-slung faded jeans. The edge of the shirt pulled up as he danced, revealing a maddening stretch of flat hairless belly, a heartbreaking curve of hipbone.

“Where the gutters run red by the break of dawn. . . And the boys get paler as the night wears on. . . ”

Suddenly he saw Trevor in the crowd, not dancing, just standing still in the sea of bodies, letting himself be jostled, gazing up at Zach. His face was intent, but calm; he was taking all this in now to be remembered and maybe drawn later. Zach lost the thread of his lyrics, wailed and sobbed wordlessly for a while. He felt like a torch singer in some smoky little dive in 1929, high on Prohibition liquor and the reefers they were rolling backstage.

He gave Trevor his most smoldering smile, put the mike back on the stand and ran his hands over his face, through his hair. Trevor smiled back a little uneasily, as if afraid people would notice where Zach was looking. But his gaze never wavered. He had to take everything in. The artist as eyeball, thought Zach: lidless, as raw to the touch as an exposed nerve, but seeing and processing all.

The next couple of songs were Gumbo standards with a country-Cajun flavor. Zach whined his way through them thinking of Hank and Patsy and Clifton Chenier, wishing he had a bottle of bourbon, a pair of black steel-toed cowboy boots, and a bushel of tabasco peppers. Terry whaled his skins without mercy, and R. J. moved his feet for the first time that evening. Zach could tell this was the stuff they really loved. They played the blues fine, but they were country boys.

Next came another jam, R. J. and Calvin getting into a riff that was like something out of an old spy movie, sinister and slinky, octopussy; Terry laughing behind the drums, striking up a strip-club beat. Zach hung on the microphone, tilted his face to the lights and closed his eyes. The world was red and gold, sweat and smoke, pain and joyThe first set was over too soon. Zach stared over at the crowd, unwilling to turn them loose even for twenty minutes. Trevor caught his eye and pointed toward the bar. Zach held up his open hand-Be there in five-and reluctantly left the stage.

Entering the backstage room was like walking into a sauna. The other three musicians were as sweaty as Zach, and as buzzed. The little cubicle was saturated with their energy. The smell was like an electrical storm in a locker room.

Terry slung an arm around him. “Good show. Man, you really know how to work a crowd. ”

“It feels great. ”

“You're a natural, ” R. J. told him. “Terry could sing 'Bad Reaction' for the rest of his life and never get 'em riled up like that. ”

“Aw, fuck you, ” said Terry. “I'm just a drummer working overtime. Zach's a singer. ”

Basking in the praise, Zach started to grab a Natty Boho, then realized he had finished his first one onstage and his bladder was full. “Is there anywhere I can take a piss back here or do I have to fight my way to the rest room? ”

“Yeah, if you go way back behind the stage, there's a little bitty John in the far corner. Nobody's supposed to know about it because it doesn't have a sink, but you can piss there. ”

Zach took off in the direction Terry had pointed him. A narrow L-shaped hall hooked away into the bowels of the backstage area, virtually lightless. Zach trailed his hand along the wall to keep his bearings. The cinder blocks felt cool and moist beneath his fingers, as if he were descending into an underground cave. Eventually he came to an open door, felt around until he found a light switch, and beheld the dankest, saddest little water closet he had ever laid eyes on. It was clean, and that almost made it worse: a bathroom this desolate needed roaches and mildew to liven it up. He hated to imagine Kinsey back here scrubbing the toilet.

Zach peeled his leggings down. The stream of pee sounded very loud going into the rusty water, and he realized his ears were ringing. As he readjusted himself, a knock sounded at the door. I bet I know who that is, Zach thought.

“Yeah? ”

“It's Calvin. ”

Bing! You win the trip to Acapulco and the set of steak knives too. He opened the door a crack and saw a sparkling eye, a shock of bleached hair, half of a grinning mouth.

“Just wanted to see if you were done. I gotta go too. ”

Zach let Calvin in and turned to leave. Calvin stepped right up to the toilet, tugged his pants down, and let fly. Huh, Zach thought, so he really did have to piss.

But as Zach was halfway out the door, Calvin said, “Hey, Dario? ”

“Yeah? ”

“That was a fuckin' brilliant set. You look great onstage. ”

“Aw hell, I just like to sing. You guys are the musicians. ”

“Yeah, right. You're about as humble as me. ” Calvin flushed the toilet, pulled his leggings up to a point just above the line of his pubic hair, then turned and in one smooth motion grabbed Zach and pinned him against the wall. His chest pressed against Zach's, slick with sweat. His hands slid up Zach's rib cage and his thumbs grazed Zach's bare nipples, then tweaked them gently. Zach found himself instantly, crazily aroused.

Calvin's lips brushed Zach's. “Do you want this as bad as I do? ” he whispered.

“Well-yeah, but—”

Calvin's mouth closed over his, hot and lush, full of the golden taste of beer. His tongue slid, searched, teased its way into Zach's mouth. For several seconds they kissed with sloppy abandon. Calvin's unshaven face scoured him, abraded him. It would leave scratches. Zach didn't care.

He felt Calvin's hips nudging against his own, Calvin's dick getting hard against him, pushing into his bare stomach. Almost automatically, Zach moved his hips so that their hardons were pressed together, separated only by two thin layers of cotton. The concrete wall was rough and cool against his back. The noise of the club was a dull subliminal roar far away.

He suddenly wondered why in hell he was doing this.

The question was jarring. It made him realize that since the moment he'd said yeah, but and Calvin had stopped his mouth with a kiss, he hadn't had a single thought in his head. Not for Trevor, not for himself, not for anything but his own damned mindless pleasure. Zach knew he had often used sex like a drug. But until now, he'd never consciously known that he used it to make himself stop thinking.

The shame of that knowledge washed over him like a caustic wave. But on its crest came a second realization. Being with Trevor didn't make him feel that way, didn't short-circuit his thought processes or cut off his emotions. When they made love Zach's perceptions intensified and his consciousness seemed to expand. Before, fucking had always been like slamming a door on the world. With Trevor it was like opening a thousand doors.

And that meant he wasn't getting anything here that he couldn't get a thousand times better at home.

Zach felt a pang of regret as he broke the kiss and pushed Calvin away. Calvin was what he used to think of as a sweet catch, a beautiful bad boy with a guitar, and in the old days Zach would have loved to take an all-night tour of Calvin's personal heavens and hells.

But whether he liked it or not, those days were gone for him. He couldn't do this to Trevor. Furthermore, he didn't even want to.

“Sorry, ” he said. “I can't. ”

“Sure you can. ” Calvin tried to push back against him. His eyes were wild, his breath coming fast. He was obviously horny to the point of pain, and Zach felt for him. But there were plenty of adorable boys out there, fairly stewing in their own juices. A handsome blond guitarist could take his pick.

“No. I can't. I'm with somebody, and you knew damn well I was. ”

“Hey-” Calvin twitched one shoulder in the most insouciant of shrugs, but his eyes were hurt. “Saw you lookin', was all. Just tryin' to show the new kid a little hometown hospitality. ”

“I know I was looking. 'Course I was. You're gorgeous. ” Calvin's eyes softened a little. “But I'm with Trevor, okay? We're solid. I love him. ”

Calvin sniffed. “You fall in love pretty fast, don't you? ”

“Not really. It took me nineteen years. ”

“Aren't you scared he'll freak out and murder you in your sleep? ”

Zach laughed. “No. If Trevor decides to kill me, he'll make sure I'm awake for it. ”

Calvin considered this dubiously. “Whatever, ” he said at last. “You wanna kiss me one more time? ”

“Yes, ” Zach told him honestly. “But I'm not gonna. ”

He ducked under Calvin's arm and left the guitarist staring after him. As he fumbled his way back along the hall, the noise and the energy of the club grew stronger with every step he took. He felt the invisible thread of his lover pulling him, drawing him.

Zach had done plenty of things he was proud of: survived on his own since he was fourteen, hacked his way into systems that no one else could crack, bailed his friends out of jail and wiped their records clean.

All of that was fine. But he couldn't remember the last time a decision not to do something had made him feel so good.

“I sold a story to Taboo! ” Trevor shouted over the din of the bar.

Kinsey's slightly harassed expression became an enormous grin. “That's great! Have a Coke! Hell, have two Cokes! ” He slapped them down on the bar in front of Trevor, then held up an apologetic hand and hurried away to serve the customers lining up for beer. Trevor pulled a five-dollar bill out of his pocket and dropped it into the tip jar while Kinsey's back was turned.

Zach had given him a wad of cash this morning. Just in case you need anything in town, he'd said, pressing it into Trevor's hand. When Trevor protested the amount-over a hundred dollars-Zach only looked disgusted. Money is just stuff you trade for things that you want, he had told Trevor with the air of a person explaining that two plus two equals four. When you need more, you get it. It may not grow on trees, but accessing a bank account is a hell of a lot easier than climbing a tree.

Trevor looked around the crowded bar, but saw no sign of Zach. Probably he was still backstage getting stoned with the band. Trevor didn't think Zach would mind if he joined them. To his own surprise, he was actually beginning to develop a taste for pot. Possibly because it was such a vital component of Zach's body chemistry. But maybe, Trevor thought, he was also ready to start altering his consciousness instead of just exaggerating it.

He grabbed his two Cokes and started making his way back toward the stage. Halfway “there, he passed Calvin going the other way. Trevor just nodded, but Calvin reached out and stopped him, put his hands on Trevor's shoulders and leaned in to speak loudly in Trevor's ear. “You've got a real sweet boyfriend. He sure does love you. Better hang on to him. ”

Then he was gone into the crowd. What was that all about? Trevor wondered. But Calvin had fucked with his head enough. He didn't care what the guitarist thought of him. Terry and R. J. were better musicians anyway. Calvin's playing had plenty of glitter and flash, but none of their Southern soul.

Trevor let himself into the dressing room and Zach was there, bare-chested, sleek as a seal, resplendent, taking a long toke on a fat, fragrant joint. The room was already crowded with friends of the band, but Zach saw Trevor right away. He held the smoke in his lungs as he passed the joint, crossed the room, put his lips against Trevor's, and exhaled a long, steady stream of smoke into Trevor's mouth. A shotgun.

Trevor abandoned his Cokes and ran his hands down the curve of Zach's spine. His fingertips came away slick with sweat. He touched them to his mouth, tasted salt.

“Do you want to go somewhere? ” Zach whispered in his ear. Trevor nodded. Zach pulled him through the door, along a dark passageway, into a tiny, ill-lit bathroom. They slammed the door and leaned against it, groping and squeezing and clawing at each other, kissing madly. Then Trevor was kneeling on the hard cement floor, licking Zach's stomach, using his teeth to pull down the leggings, gripping Zach's hipbones like handles.

It only took about ninety seconds. “Oh Trev, ” Zach gasped as he came, “oh god I needed that, thank you, thank you. . . ”

“Sure. ” Trevor wiped his mouth on the back of his hand. “Can't be a real rock star without a backstage blowjob. ”

Someone knocked.

Trevor felt Zach's body stiffen. He got to his feet. Zach tugged his leggings up and backed away from the door. “Who is it? ”

“Us, ” said a chorus of sheepish voices.

Zach opened the door. Terry, his girlfriend Victoria, R. J., and Calvin were standing just outside looking embarrassed. “Sorry, ” said Calvin, “but the break's almost over and we thought you might want some of these. ” He held out a plastic bag half full of mushrooms. They were pale brown streaked with iridescent blue-the psilocybin-and gave off a crumbling earthy smell.

Trevor saw Zach's hand start to reach forward; then he paused and looked uncertainly back at Trevor. “I like mushrooms a lot. Have you ever done 'em? ”

Trevor shook his head.

“Well. . . they'd give you plenty of ideas, that's for sure. ” Zach stared at Trevor, then back at the bag. “Can I have some for later? ” he asked.

Calvin pulled the bag back. “You can buy some. I'm not giving them away if you're not gonna do 'em with us. ”

Zach's eyes met Calvin's. Though these two probably were attracted to each other, Trevor realized, that wasn't exactly what was going on between them. It was rather that they understood each other as any creatures of the same species will, especially if it is a dangerous species.

“Okay. ” Zach pulled out a handful of twenties. “How much? ”

“Well... oh, fuck it. ” Terry, R. J., and Victoria had all started staring at Calvin reproachfully as soon as he mentioned money. “I don't care. Just take a handful. ”

Zach was nearly laughing as he reached into the bag. “Thanks, Calvin. That's real nice of you. ” Their eyes were shooting silver daggers at each other, but on another level they seemed to be positively enjoying the exchange. Trevor had spent the past two days diving into Zach's character like an unfamiliar river, eager to let it flow over him, to let its current carry him along. Now he was beginning to realize that it had secret tributaries and strange deep pools he might never fathom.

Zach wrapped his mushrooms in a twist of toilet paper and gave them to Trevor to hold. Trevor stowed the little bundle deep in his pocket, then wiped his fingers on his shirt. He wasn't at all sure he wanted to eat those nasty-looking things. Bobby had liked his hallucinogens, Trevor knew, but gave them up soon after he stopped drawing. And Crumb had done all sorts of drugs, though he claimed in a recent Comics Journal interview that they had affected his draftsmanship.

But what had Trevor thought earlier? Hyping his consciousness with caffeine had helped him prowl around the edges of his past, but he had not yet penetrated to the heart of it. Maybe it was time to start altering his brain, laying open his very cells. Maybe then he would know enough so that he could leave with Zach, if Zach had to go.

Gumbo kicked off the second set with a thrash-tempo version of the old Cajun song “Paper in My Shoe. ” Zach shouted what lyrics he knew over a pileup of guitar and drum noise and made up the rest, grinning between the rapid-fire lines. He had never been able to stand Cajun music when he lived in New Orleans. But singing this song here in this club was like going home again.

The crowd was dancing hard. From the stage they looked like nothing but a seething, bobbing mass of heads, waving hands, blissed-out faces. Zach noticed that the beautiful red-haired boy was still at front and center, but he had switched his attention to Calvin. The guitarist kept making eye contact with the boy, playing to him. The boy was dancing so hard that his white shirt had gone transparent with sweat. Zach could see the pink points of his nipples through the drenched cotton.

See, Zach felt like telling Calvin, you're a knockout, you have drugs, you play guitar in a hot band. You couldn't go home alone tonight if you wanted to.

They eased into another jam, this one slow, dark, and nasty. The V-neck of the boy's shirt had slipped down, exposing one pale shoulder. Several girls in front were wearing skimpy tank tops, and as they danced their slender arms swayed in the air like branches. Zach found himself thinking about skin. It could be a fabulously erotic substance, smooth under the hands, salty against the tongue. Its color could inspire hatred. It could be flayed and tanned.

He gripped the microphone, leaned forward until his lips were almost touching it. “Dressin' up at night in his suit of skin. . . Cured her ribs in the barn. . . Fried up her heart in a skillet. . . Put her ole hands in a jar. . . ”

He caught Trevor laughing in the audience, eyes squeezed shut, mouth wide open: a completely unself-conscious moment. Zach let his lips brush the mike. “Ooooh Ed, ” he moaned, “what'd you do with her head? ”

The kids loved it. Zach hung on the mike stand, threw in a few sultry bars of “Summertime. ” Gonna spread your wings, take to the sky. . .

Too soon they came to the last song. Zach threw himself into it hard, ended up on his knees clutching the mike, howling into it, forcing every bit of air from his lungs, reaching deep into his soul for those blues. Who knew when he would sing for an audience again? He had to make this time good enough to last.

Then it was over. He was backstage, listening to the roar of the crowd through the thin wall. Terry, R. J., and Calvin were slapping his back, congratulating him, assuring him of a gig if he decided to stick around town. After they got high again, the others went out to start packing up their equipment, and Zach found Trevor standing alone at the edge of the crowd.

They lingered in the bar for a while. Soon the other band members drifted in to bask in the post-performance attention. Friends milled around, hoping to be drawn into the circle. Kids approached them with compliments, smiles, hungry eyes.

Zach saw Calvin talking to the boy who had been dancing in front of the stage. The boy's face was as delicately shaded as a watercolor painting: eyelashes the same red-gold as his hair, pale pink lips, the faintest of lavender hollows above and below his eyes. He made a grand gesture with his hand, lowered his eyelids disdainfully. “I don't know, ” Zach heard him say. “Last time I did mushrooms they were old and made me sick. ”

“These are real fresh, ” Calvin assured him. “I grew 'em myself. ”

“Well. . . '” The boy's eyes tilted up to meet Calvin's. “I guess I will. ” He smiled.

“Come on backstage with me. We'll do you up real good. ”

Zach watched them leave the bar together. The thought of those two exquisite creatures having mad hallucinatory sex made him happy for some reason. He looked at Trevor sitting next to him and thought about having some mad hallucinatory sex of his own.

“You want to get out of here soon? ” he asked, and couldn't help laughing when Trevor looked absurdly grateful.

Chapter Twent y

Back at the house, Trevor and Zach sat at the kitchen table drinking tapwater from freshly washed glasses. Only a rusty trickle had come out of the faucet at first, but when they left it running for a few minutes it turned into a clear, steady stream. Zach couldn't help remembering the rotten blood and ropy sperm gushing from the bathroom tap, but the kitchen water looked and tasted fine.

The mushrooms lay on the table in front of them, next to the computer, still half-swathed in a twist of Sacred Yew toilet paper. Both boys kept glancing at them from time to time, Trevor with intrigued trepidation, Zach with a sort of patient lust.

As soon as they got home, they had gone through the house turning on lights in all the safe rooms-the kitchen, the big bedroom, Trevor's bedroom, the studio. Even the hall light was burning. Though it was well past midnight, the house felt almost cozy.

Zach couldn't stop talking about the show. “As soon as I hit that stage, ” he told Trevor, “I felt like I was born there. I haven't felt born to anything since the first time I touched a computer. What am I gonna do, Trev? Maybe I could disguise myself and become a famous rock star. Like the guy in that movie Angel Heart, but in reverse, without amnesia. It'd be the perfect cover! ”

“But the guy in Angel Heart sold his soul to the Devil. ”

“I don't have a problem with that. ” Zach fingered a mushroom cap, watched a few dark spores sift onto the tabletop. “You know, I really want to eat some of these. ”

“Eat 'em, then. ”

“Are you going to do any? ”

“Well. . . ” Trevor shifted in his chair. “What exactly happens? Is it like getting stoned? ”

“No, it's much more intense. Scarier, your first time. But you'll see all kinds of beautiful hallucinations and feel all kinds of weird physical sensations and have fucked-up thoughts and ideas. ”

“Sounds kind of like sex. ”

“We can do that too. ”

“Do you think it could make me see things that are always here, but that I can't see now? ”

“Like what? You mean here in the house? ”

Trevor nodded.

Zach took a deep breath. “Trev... I don't think we ought to stay in the house too long after we dose. I thought we could go over to Terry's. They ate theirs at the club, so they'll be up all night, and I bet Terry would let us use his spare room. I don't know if I'm into tripping here. ”

Trevor just looked at him.

“What? ” said Zach at last.

“This is a hallucinogen we're talking about, right? A mind-expanding, consciousness-altering drug? ”

Zach nodded.

“Okay then. Keeping in mind what I came here for, what I'm living in this house for, do you really think I'd consider doing it anywhere else? ”

“I guess not, ” Zach said quietly. “But, Trevor, I think it's a real bad idea. ”

“What do you mean? ”

“You know I'm going to have to leave soon. And I know you must have at least thought about going with me. ”

“So? ”

“So maybe it doesn't want you to leave. ”

“Maybe I don't want to. ”

The words stung like a slap. “If you stay here, ” Zach began, then had to stop and take a deep breath. His voice had nearly cracked. “If you stay here, it'll be hard to get back in touch with you. I might not be able to do it. ”

“You could leave a message for me at the club. ”

“If They find out I was ever in this town, They could tap the club's phone. They could make trouble for Kinsey. They could tap Terry's phone. They could harass the fuck out of you. A lot of real scary people are after me, Trev. I've already left too many traces here. I have to disappear for good now, and you might never be able to find me again. Is that what you want? ”

Trevor had been staring stubbornly at the table. Now he looked up at Zach. His eyes shimmered with tears about to spill over. “No. ”

“Neither do I. ” Is it true? thought Zach. Am I telling him this in good faith? If I'm going on the run forever, do I really want to take someone with me?

And the answer was a resounding yes. Because he not only wanted to, he had to. If he didn't take Trevor, he might as well leave his brain or his heart behind. It was that simple; that was how deeply people became grafted into you when you loved them like this.

A part of Zach still hated that.

A part of him was grateful that he had at least found the right Siamese twin.

And a part of him rejoiced that this was possible after all.

Their fingers intertwined on the tabletop. They gripped hands tightly for a moment, both fighting back tears. “You could stay here for a while, then go over to Terry's, ” Trevor said. “I wouldn't mind being alone. ”

“No way. You don't want to trip alone in this house. ”

“I don't mind. ”

“You would. ” Zach pulled back to look into Trevor's eyes. “Believe me. You would. You may be able to deal with the house, but I know psilocybin. I'm not letting you do that. ”

“Then stay. ”

“Okay. ” Zach let his head fall back onto Trevor's shoulder. I've just agreed to trip on mushrooms in a haunted house, he thought. The Grand Adventures of Zachary Bosch. . . reel three.

“So, ” said Trevor, “how do we do it? Do we just eat them? ”

“Yes. And I warn you, they taste fucking horrible. ”

Trevor picked up a blue-streaked stem and nibbled experimentally at it. “They don't seem to taste like much of anything. ”

“Just you wait. ”

Zach got up and refilled their water glasses, then began to portion out the mushrooms. There were seven caps and five stems. The caps were the most potent and shittiest-tasting part. He put three caps and three stems in one pile, four caps and two stems in the other.

“Now what? ” Trevor asked.

“Getting nervous? ”

“No. ”

“Then let's eat. ”

Each of them picked up a cap, put it in his mouth, and began to chew. Zach's cap splintered and grew soggy in his mouth. The dry dead flavor trickled between his teeth, over his tongue. He washed it down with a gulp of water.

“I see what you mean, ” said Trevor after a few seconds.

“You don't have to chew them all the way. Just soften 'em up a little and swallow the chunks. ”

“Now you tell me. ” Trevor drained his water glass and got up for more. “God, that's disgusting. It's like chewing on mummified flesh. ”

“Better lose that thought. You've got five more pieces to eat. ”

Crunching, grimacing, and swigging water, they choked down the rest of their mushrooms, then brushed their teeth at the sink. “How long does it take? ” Trevor asked.

“Twenty, thirty minutes. Shall we smoke a joint and get in bed? ”

“Are you sure we ought to be stoned? ”

“Yes. ” Zach nodded vigorously. “Under the circumstances, I'm very sure. ”

Trevor felt the first tickling tendrils of the drug twenty minutes later. Zach was lying half on top of him with his head on Trevor's chest. They had been talking in the darkened bedroom, a meandering conversation with pools of calm clear silence here and there. It was during one of these silences that the sensation seemed to begin in Trevor's stomach and spread, shivering through his guts, swirling slyly through his blood, up his spine, into his brain.

He felt Zach's lips move against his chest. “Do you feel it? ”

“Yes. ”

“Are you hallucinating? ”

“I don't think so. ” Trevor looked at the shadows cast on the ceiling. Veins of pink and purple light were pulsing through them, beginning to creep down the walls. “Well, maybe. ”

He pulled Zach up to him, cupped Zach's head between his hands, and kissed his closed eyelids. The smudges of shadow beneath Zach's eyes were dark with eyeliner and fatigue. Trevor brushed his lips across them, felt Zach shiver. He kissed Zach's forehead, the narrow bridge of his nose and its elegant pointed tip, his willing mouth.

Kissing soon became a hallucinatory experience in itself. The interplay of their tongues was like a dance. Zach's mouth tasted of mint toothpaste and pot smoke and what Trevor had come to think of as his lover's own flavor, peppery and faintly sweet. Zach's very skin seemed to undulate against him at every point of contact. Trevor imagined it becoming soft as warm caramel and flowing over him, surrounding him. Whether Zach's body was taking him in or being assimilated itself would not matter. Their flesh would mingle, their bones would merge into one complex cradle surrounding the stew of their viscera. What a drawing it would make!

Now Zach was running his tongue along the arc of Trevor's collarbone, leaving a trail of warm wetness that quickly turned cold as it evaporated. He rubbed his face on Trevor's chest, pressed his lips into the hollow just below Trevor's ribs. Trevor felt that bright band of energy connecting them again, as elusive and yet as constant as the particles and waves that made up light, sound, matter.

The room was swarming around him. His drawings waved gently from the walls. The mattress felt insubstantial under his back, as if it were suspended above a great gaping hole that went through the floor and the foundation of the house, as if it could dissolve at any moment and leave him plunging forever, alone in a numb black void, a blank universe. Trevor gasped and clutched Zach tight. It was beginning in earnest.

“It's okay, ” Zach soothed him. “These are strong 'shrooms, that's all. Keep hanging on to me and you'll be fine. ”

“Do you. . . can you. . . ” Trevor had no idea what he wanted to ask. His teeth began to chatter.

“Trev, just relax and go with it. Look at the lights. Everything feels good. I love you. ”

“I love you too. . . but it's so strange. . . ”

“It's supposed to be strange. That's why we do drugs; they make us feel different. Don't fight it. ”

Zach stroked Trevor's hair, rubbed his arms and shoulders until the muscles began to unbunch. Trevor's hands had curled into loose fists. Zach coaxed them open, kissed the mirror-image maps of the palms, the pencil-calluses, the intricate whorls of the fingertips. He took a finger into his mouth and sucked softly, heard Trevor's breath catch.

“Your tongue feels like velvet. ”

“Your hands taste like seawater. ”

Zach kissed the fold of Trevor's left wrist, then ran his tongue along the forearm and into the soft hollow of the elbow. Trevor sighed. and relaxed a little, though his pulse still beat like a frightened bird against Zach's tongue. The veins of the inner elbow: the junkie veins, the veins to sever if you wanted to bleed to death.

Zach slid his mouth down Trevor's arm and kissed the raised white lines of his scars. He had hesitated to do this before, unsure if Trevor would mind. Now the scars' rippled texture was so appealing that he couldn't help himself. Zach imagined the razor going through Trevor's flesh smooth as butter, Trevor's icy eyes screaming out of his impassive face as he watched the blood well up.

Trevor made a soft moaning sound deep in his throat. Zach sucked harder at the tender flesh, and the scar he was kissing opened against his tongue like a torrid kiss. The coppery taste of fresh blood spilled into his mouth.

Trevor felt a silvery stinging sensation in his arm, then another and another, then three at once, a deep bone-shivering pain. He raised himself on his right elbow, saw the old cuts on his left arm opening, parting like little red mouths. Zach stared up at him in confusion, then in horror as he realized Trevor was seeing the blood too. Deep wet crimson ringed his mouth and streaked his face, shocking against the whiteness of his skin.

“Trev? What. . . ? ”

Trevor felt weirdly serene. The open wounds hurt no more than they had when he'd made them. It was, rather, a way of draining off pain. He remembered the feeling so well now. “It's nearly here, ” he said.

“What? ”

“Birdland. ”

Zach's pupils were enormous, guttering. His mouth hung slightly open. Trevor took his hands, pulled him up and held him, smearing Zach's body with blood. He kissed Zach's sticky lips. “Don't be scared. ”

“But. . . aren't you bleeding? ”

“Only for a little while. ”

“Trevor! Have your stigmata, then, goddammit, but don't pull this mystical shit on me! ” Zach pounded the mattress. “Don't you dare die-if you die, I swear to God I'll come after you-I'll hunt you down and haunt your damn ghost—”

“I'm not dying. Come here. Hold me. ” He wrapped his arms tighter around Zach, felt the blood flowing between them, trickling down Zach's spine. I have to go, he thought. You're the only thing that will bring me back. But that would just frighten Zach worse, so he didn't say it.

He didn't know where he was going, or even how. He knew it would be Birdland, the true Birdland that lay paradoxically far beyond the house and deep within it. But Trevor was realizing that Birdland wasn't just the place of his past, the place in his childhood where he had found his talent, his dreams. It was also the place where his dreams could find him, and some of them were very bad. It was a place of scars, and of wounds that had never healed.

“Just don't leave me here, ” Zach murmured against his chest.

“I promise. ”

Trevor remembered lying in bed this afternoon imagining Zach's body inextricably linked with his, remembered his fantasy of Zach's flesh flowing over him, surrounding him. He pressed his body up against Zach's, wrapped his legs around Zach's skinny hips. “I want you to fuck me, ” he said.

“Huh? Now? ”

“Yes. Now. ”

Emotions were warring in Zach's face: confusion, fear, sorrow, frustration, arousal. Trevor felt Zach's penis growing cautiously hard against the back of his thigh. He reached down and cupped Zach's balls, ran his hand up the silky shaft, streaking it with blood. Zach shuddered, took a deep breath. “Are you sure? ”

But apparently he could see the answer in Trevor's face. His eyes never left Trevor's as he wet his hand with saliva and rubbed it up and down his penis, then lifted Trevor's knees and spread his legs and eased in. The sensation was not so much painful as completely alien. Trevor felt his asshole trying to contract, his whole body trying to tense up. He sought Zach's mouth and sucked at his tongue. He would have this boy inside him any and every way he could. It was time.

Then his intestines were loosening and warming, his muscles melting in concentric rings around Zach, drawing him in deep. He linked his hands at the small of Zach's back. Blood ran down his arms, dripped over their bodies, began to soak into the mattress.

“Ahhh-” Zach's teeth closed on Trevor's shoulder, a tiny exquisite pain. “You're so tight. It almost hurts. ”

“You can fuck me hard. You can open me up. ”

“Yeah? ” Zach scrambled to his knees, put his hands on Trevor's thighs and pushed them up and back, driving in still deeper. His face was streaked with blood, his expression poised between pain and ecstasy. “Like that? Does that feel good? ”

“Yes-but harder-” Trevor groped for Zach's hand, guided it to his penis. When Zach closed his fingers around the head and began to stroke, Trevor put his hand over Zach's and squeezed brutally.

“Trev, I don't want to hurt you—”

“Harder! ” Trevor sobbed. “I have to get there! ”

“WHERE, DAMMIT? ” Zach grabbed Trevor's chin with his free hand, forced Trevor to look him in the face. Zach's eyes were huge, wild. “WHAT ARE YOU MAKING ME DO TO YOU? ”

The pleasure and the drugs overloaded Trevor's synapses with towering sensation. But he felt a vortex beginning to open in his brain. His consciousness swirled around the edges of it, began to be drawn into it. He drove his hips up hard against Zach, impaling himself. The area between his asshole and his balls and the tip of his penis felt like one huge raw nerve. Zach's heartbeat throbbed deep in his guts. Light poured out of the vortex, sparkling, swarming.

Beyond that vortex was Birdland. If he was ever going to be with Zach again, he had to go there now.

Trevor let himself go.

“Trev? Trevor?! GODDAMMIT, TREVOR!!! ” Zach punched the pillow beside Trevor's head. Trevor didn't move or seem to hear.

Zach had felt Trevor's back arching, Trevor's come welling into his palm and dripping between his ringers, and he had nearly come too. But then Trevor had stopped moaning and his eyes had gone blank and he had fallen back on the mattress.

Zach's heart lurched painfully. He felt for Trevor's heartbeat, listened for his breathing. Both were strong and steady. Trevor's eyes were half-open, blinking slowly. But they were unfocused, and did not flicker when Zach passed his hand before them or peered into them. Zach shivered. Trevor's eyes looked abandoned.

“Trev? ” he whispered. “Remember, you promised not to leave me. ”

No response.

“Trevor? . . . Please? ” Zach pressed his mouth against Trevor's slack lips, kissed hard. Again no response.

He didn't think Trevor was in there. Or perhaps Trevor had gone so deep that he couldn't hear. A word rang in Zach's mind like the tolling of a deep dissonant bell. Catotonia.

The thought scared him so badly that he grabbed Trevor by the shoulders and shook him hard. Trevor's head rolled bonelessly on his neck. A silvery thread of saliva leaked from one corner of his mouth. There was nothing in his eyes, nothing in his face.

Zach clawed at his own face, bit his fingers viciously, sobbed in frustration and dread. Why had he ever thought it was a good idea to feed Trevor mushrooms? Why had he thought either of them could handle such a heavy-duty mindfuck within these cursed, malicious walls?

Suddenly he remembered what Trevor had said right before passing out. I have to get there. Had Trevor used the shock of orgasm to detach himself from his body somehow? Was his spirit careening around the house, unable to communicate with Zach, unable to get back in?

Or, worse, was Trevor no longer here at all? What if he went crashing into the spirit world, demanding his explanation for being alive, and Bobby decided to keep him there? What if Bobby just wanted to finish the job he'd left undone before? Embodied or not, Trevor was still tripping his ass off, and that made him more vulnerable than he already was. If Trevor had gone somewhere else, Zach knew he had to follow.

But how in hell was Zach supposed to leave his body? He was used to having orgasms; no matter how intense they were, his spirit did not separate from his flesh, did not extrude on some umbilical thread of ectoplasm, did not detach. He had never thought about how solidly mired in his body he was until now, when he wanted to get out of it.

He concentrated furiously, tried to project himself into Trevor's brain. He'd gotten in once, but it seemed the password had been changed. Zach tried to imagine what the new one might be, tried to feel around the edges of Trevor's blown consciousness. He forced himself to go limp, surrender to the drug, think about anything but projecting. He tore at his hair and his scalp, trying to rip his own ghost out of his skull. None of it worked. Zach collapsed back on the mattress, hugged Trevor and sobbed into his chest. A thin sheen of sweat had come up on Trevor's skin. It rippled with opalescent colors and smelled faintly of coffee.

Coffee. . .

Zach had a dangerous idea.

He tested Trevor's heartbeat again. It remained even and strong. He kissed Trevor's cheek, spoke into his ear. “I love you, Trev. I'm coming to get you. Just try not to go too far in. ”

He pushed himself up, nearly passed out himself as the blood rushed to his head, tried to let it happen but recovered. He crossed the bedroom and edged into the hall, refused to look toward the bathroom or at the doorway into the living room, would not glance over his shoulder as he entered the kitchen. He had never felt so unsafe in this house.

Zach opened the refrigerator, squinted into the dazzling light, took out the bag of coffee Trevor had bought. He carried it over to the coffee maker from Potter's Store and shook a generous amount into the filter basket, then ran tapwater into the pot and poured it through. A few seconds later the machine began to bubble and a dark, rich scent filled the kitchen. The odor nauseated him: he knew what he was probably going to have to do.

Zach couldn't wait for the pot to fill. As soon as a cupful had collected, he yanked it out and splashed it into a mug. The stream of brewing coffee sizzled against the hotplate. Zach's nerves twitched in sympathy. He thrust the pot back in, flipped the switch off, grabbed the steaming mug, and hurried back to the bedroom.

“Trev? Want some joe? C'mon. . . ” He slid a hand behind Trevor's neck and propped his head up, wafted the mug back and forth under Trevor's nose without much hope. As he had feared, Trevor made no response. He was gone, all right.

Zach looked into the mug. The black surface of the coffee shimmered, as full of subtle sinister colors as an oil slick. To Zach it looked like the surface of death. His heart twinged, and Zach apologized to it in advance for what he was about to do.

He took a deep breath and blew on the demon joe, the drug that bore his father's name. He said a prayer to his various gods, steadied his hand.

Then he raised the mug to his lips and drank the bitter brew straight down.