Christine’s Reviews > Body Count > Status Update

So, I got in the minivan. In the middle row, because Emery was driving. It felt a little like my gay dads were taking me to soccer practice, which also could have been the start of a really raunchy porno. I told Emery, and he told me they’d gotten me coffee, so why didn’t I drink my coffee and shut the fuck up?

“I don’t do motivational speeches, bro. I do, however, totally know how to throw a pity bone.” 
“Jesus Christ, Gray.”
“What? We’re both pretty fucked up.”  He gave me a look.”Emery would totally be okay with it.” 
“Great. You tell him.” That made me grin. John-Henry had a hint of a smile around his eyes. And for an instant it felt like things were back the way they were supposed to be.

I knew, without wanting to put it into words, that I was avoiding thinking too closely about things. I thought for a moment I was about to be sick.
My mom sitting at the little shitty vanity in her bedroom, looking at herself in that shitty little makeup mirror from Sears, covering up a bruise and saying, We want to look nice for daddy.
I am really fucked up. That was it. That was as far as I could go on my own.

“The same reasons you’re going to let me do whatever I want to you… because it means someone is paying attention to them. Do you have any idea how intense that connection is?” His fingers crept up into my hair, twisting until my eyes stung, pulling on me until my back arched. “When you know that you exist wholly and completely in someone else’s universe, that their full attention is centered on you?” 

“I couldn’t move. The party swirled around me, and I kept staring. The afternoon light raised highlights in his hair. When he stretched out one arm to shake a newcomer’s hand, a hint of ink showed at his wrist… I recognized the way he held his head, like he was listening. Which was strange because I couldn’t seem to hear anything. And his smile. If he smiles at me, I thought. If he even looks at me.”

“I showed him my badge. A badge is like a six-inch dick: it gets you in pretty much everywhere.”
(Oh Dulac 😂 Loving the audio by Greg Tremblay!)