“Something about myself?”

  In my adolescent years, I started locking the door to my room at night. It was mostly because of the death threats that hovered over me like a Damocles, ready to drop at any moment. I never knew if this would be the night he finally decided he’d had enough, slipped into my room, and smothered me. At least once, he’d barged in while I was sleeping just to shout at me about something.

  Even then, my mind was busy drawing up escape plans. I thought about running away, but I knew that if I were caught and dragged back home, the punishment would be worse than anything I’d suffered so far. Besides, he had drilled it into me that I had no skills and no chance of surviving on my own. Like a prison dropped in the middle of an open desert, the house I grew up in offered freedom in every direction and death with every step. There was nowhere to run.

  Back then, there were moments when I fantasized about doing exactly what I did on that fateful night. Whenever those thoughts crept in, I always asked myself, “What then?” Capture and interrogation felt like the inevitable ending.

  I never imagined the interrogation would look like this. No police. No bright light burning into my eyes. No stranger barking accusations while a machine listened for lies in my head. Just a pretty girl, alone with me in a car, beneath an ocean of stars, with one gentle demand.

  “You are going to tell me something about yourself.”

  There was no threat in her voice. No promise of punishment if I refused. It sounded less like an order and more like a statement of fact, as though my cooperation had already been decided.

  I couldn’t tell her the truth, and if I was going to lie, I needed to buy myself a little more time.

  “What do you want to know?” I asked.

  She raised a brow at me. “Oh, so I don’t have to convince you? Alright. Let’s start with this. Tell me something funny from your past.”

  “Funny?”

  “A funny story,” she said. “I know you’re Mr. Gloomy, but it can’t all have been bad, right?”

  Humor. Yeah, I could probably manage that. What was the alternative? Get out and walk back to the ranch?

  “I used to work for a land surveyor,” I said.

  “What’s that?” she asked.

  “They measure legal property boundaries. Usually, they start with a municipal map, and based on the coordinates of the boundary markers, they go and mark where one property ends and another begins.”

  “Ah. Sounds complicated,” she said.

  “I suppose.” I stared out the window, letting my eyes settle on the black silhouettes of trees, their branches clawing at a sky swimming with stars. “But my part of the job was simple. I carried things for him and did the manual labor. We went to a lot of interesting places. Golf courses, ranches, construction sites, anywhere that needed his help.”

  “Huh,” she gave a half-smile. “And you were how old?”

  “Eighteen,” I said.

  “Oh, so this was last year?”

  “Yeah.” I rubbed the back of my neck. “Anyway, last August we went out west, to the state border, where it’s all desert. In that heat, we measured the legal boundaries of a road the county wanted to expand. Sometimes we worked at night so we wouldn’t roast, but more often we went out during the day just so we could see what we were doing. Anyway, my part of the job was simple. My boss would find a point we needed to measure, and that’s where I’d drive a stake into the ground with a hammer.”

  “Mhmm.” She nodded.

  “Then there was this tool I had to use,” I said, lifting my hands to help her picture it. “It was a long pole with a flat piece on top that sent and received satellite signals. Once I drove the stake into the ground, I had to hold the pole on top of it and keep it perfectly still for a full minute while it talked to the satellites.”

  “Alright,” she said, giving me a puzzled look. “But how is this the funny part?”

  “Well, one of those points was right in an ant hill.”

  Her eyes widened, and she fought back a laugh. “Oh.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “Desert ants too. You get them good and angry by driving a chunk of wood into their home, then try standing perfectly still for sixty seconds while they wreak their fiery revenge.”

  She snorted. “Ouch!”

  I laughed with her. “And it wasn’t just one ant hill either. For some reason, the next two points were also in ant hills, like the little buggers had figured out exactly where county land ended and private property began and decided to plant themselves right in the middle. After the second round of that insanity, I asked Bob if we could just set a stake and write an arrow on it that said ‘two feet that way.’”

  Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.

  “Bob?” she asked.

  I paused, realizing I’d let his name slip. It was a small detail, but small details had a way of opening big doors. I cursed myself silently and kept going. “Yeah, my boss. Anyway, I told him, ‘This is crazy! These ants are eating me alive!’”

  I was almost sure I heard Katie mutter, “Lucky ants.”

  “What?” I asked.

  “Nothing. Continue.”

  “The man showed zero sympathy,” I said. “I kept grumbling under my breath, angry that he made me go through it every time. Then the next point was right in front of a badger hole, and I never complained about ants again.”

  “Cute,” said Katie. “Yeah, badgers can be real mean. I’ve heard the joke that badgers in England look like they want to invite you over for tea, but badgers in America want to mug you for meth money.”

  I laughed. “Yeah, we saw a dead one by the side of the road out there. Must’ve been as big as a bulldog.”

  “We get those out here sometimes too.” She giggled and gave my arm a playful shove. “See? You can talk with people. It’s alright. You don’t have to be like a turtle all the time, all bundled up inside your shell, then only taking the slowest of steps when you dare to come out.”

  “Huh. No one’s ever compared me to a turtle before.” I brushed a strand of hair back. “Usually, the comparison is something more like ‘bat.’”

  “Why a bat?” she asked.

  “Because I used to wear black all the time,” I said. “And I stayed up late and slept in late, so my family used to joke that I ‘only came out at night.’”

  I clamped my mouth shut, realizing I’d let my family slip into the open.

  Despite my silent plea that she let it drop, Katie leaned closer. “Tell me more about your family.”

  “No.” I meant it to sound firm, but it came out sharper than I intended.

  “Why not?” she asked.

  “Because I said no.”

  “Hurts too much?”

  I didn’t answer. I bowed my head, letting my hair fall forward like curtains closing on a stage. Eye contact felt dangerous, invasive. I would take any excuse to avoid it.

  Just as my hair hid my eyes, it hid her movement until her fingers were already parting the strands. I flinched and pulled back, every muscle locking tight.

  “I was just brushing your hair back,” she said. “Why so jumpy?”

  “I’m sorry,” I said.

  She raised a brow. “Sorry for what?”

  “I don’t know,” I said, my face heating. “For flinching?”

  “No need to be sorry for that.” Katie rested her elbow on the steering wheel and her cheek in her palm. “Did I hurt you?”

  “Not at all.”

  “Then who did?”

  Once again, the words lodged in my throat.

  “It’s alright,” she said. “You don’t have to say it. I think I understand. But when’s the last time someone touched you in a way you liked?”

  My thoughts drifted to Lilah and what we’d had. I told her again and again that I loved her, and I was genuinely happy to be around her and little Ophelia, but if I was honest with myself, I often didn’t like the way Lilah touched me. Sometimes I reached out for comfort, and it never took long before she turned it sexual. I wasn’t asexual or gay, but it still hurt. What brought joy to so many people, what some men treated as life’s only purpose, often brought me pain instead. Yet, I never felt I could discuss that with Lilah. I feared that if I didn’t give her all the passion she wanted, she’d leave me for a real man who would.

  When I looked back over my life, most instances of touch felt unwanted. Pokes and prods. A vise grip on my arm forcing me to go places I did not want to go. Other boys hitting me and then laughing that I couldn’t take a punch as well as they could. At school, classmates sometimes heard me say something dark and asked, “Were you not hugged enough as a child?” My family was not one to give hugs or say phrases like, “I love you.”

  But there was one memory that stood apart, undeniably good.

  “When you shook my hand,” I said at last.

  She bit her lower lip and dipped her head, then looked back up at me through her lashes. “And before that?”

  I didn’t answer, and I didn’t need to.

  “Then it’s been too long.” She reached out again, her hand moving toward my face. I flinched once more. “I’m not going to hurt you. I promise. And if you decide you don’t like the way I’m touching you, please tell me to stop. Alright?”

  “Alright.”

  She curled her fingers, brushing the back of her hand against my cheek. Warmth bloomed where her skin met mine, and I leaned into it, eyes closing as I soaked it in. She traced along my jaw, slow and gentle.

  “You’re beautiful,” she said, almost breathless.

  The words sank deep. I wanted to believe them, not as pity or seduction, but as something honest and unguarded.

  “You’re beautiful too, Katie,” I said.

  A brief silence stretched between us before she spoke again. “Alex, do you want to kiss me?”

  “Yes.”

  It was true. I’d wanted it for a long time, but the consequences loomed large. My demons waited in the dark, salivating in anticipation of another opportunity to rend my soul.

  When I didn’t move, she asked, “Will you?”

  I bowed my head, shame heavy in my chest, and she cradled it in her hand.

  “I can’t.”

  Katie sighed. “I understand. Didn’t mean to move too fast for you. Well, can we at least be friends for now?”

  The idea warmed me from the inside. “Yeah. I’d like that.”

  She spoke out of the corner of her mouth, putting on an old-timey affect. “Well, ol’ buddy ol’ pal, let’s get you back home. Some shut-eye will do us both good.”

  Our laughter broke the tension of the romantic moment gone awry.

  We left the secluded spot and followed the winding mountain roads back toward the ranch. My head spun, buoyed by the night. We’d laughed, she’d touched me, and I knew she thought I was beautiful, just as I thought she was.

  If I hadn’t been riding that high, I might have noticed the police car tailing us halfway home and wondered what kind of trouble the morning sun would bring.