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| I thought that love was a kind of emptiness | ||
| And at least I understood then, the hunger I felt | ||
| And I didn't have to call it loneliness | ||
| — Hunger, Florence and the Machine, 2018 |
Carmy has this—this fuckin smear of chocolate frosting on the corner of his mouth all day. After the five o’clock rush, Richie says,
“You got, uh—” and points.
“Huh?” Carmy says, already looking past him, “Sydney you got those—the—”
“Yes Chef, all set,” she says.
The chocolate’s still there when they’re out back having a cig. Carmy sighs and closes his eyes when he takes the first drag. Richie was sweating inside, but the wind in the alley blows sharp against his face, picks up goosebumps on his arms.
“You know you got chocolate all over your face,” he says, and Carmy swipes at his mouth and misses it. “Other side,” Richie says, thinking he’s going to have to just lean in himself, hold him still, rub his thumb along the edge of Carmy’s lower lip, but Carmy wipes at it again and gets it off, it’s fine.
*
He kept coming to work after Mikey—, the day after the wake, even, hung over, sick with it, because what else could he do. His throat closed up, burning, every time he had to walk by the office, the stacks of folders and ballpoints without caps, like Mikey had just stepped out the back for a smoke and would be back in a few and then Carmy showed up and started tearing everything apart and that was—whatever. Fine, or whatever.
*
Thing about Carmy is he’s 20 pounds of bullshit in a five pound bag. Mikey had been a big guy and Richie figured Carmy would catch up at some point, back when they were seniors in high school and Carmy was in eighth grade, voice cracking, five one and pretending he didn’t care. Fuck, he hadn’t thought about it that much, Mikey’s pain in the ass little brother, hunched over algebra homework at the kitchen table while he and Mikey were digging through the fridge for something to eat before heading out.
He doesn’t even think about it now, he just—it’s interesting, maybe, how Carmy is short without being small, or. You know, it’s good, actually, that Carmy is so different from Mikey, because that would make it unbearable, wouldn’t it? Richie checks: Carmy’s scrubbing a counter, leaning over to run the sponge along the back edge, up the wall, t-shirt tight over his bicep, pulling against the curve of his back.
“You need something?” Carmy says, turning to rinse the sponge.
“No,” Richie says. Carmy’s eyes narrow, but he doesn’t say anything. There it is; Mikey always knew what to say to everyone.
*
He didn’t do anything wrong. He kept the restaurant going when Mikey was showing up late or sitting zoned out in the office for hours, shuffling papers around or mumbling into the phone, disappearing halfway through the dinner shift, all the times Mikey fucked up the supply deliveries or didn’t pay on time and Richie got on the phone and begged—fucking begged—just so they could have napkins or tinfoil or sub rolls. It’s not like he expects a thank you. It sits like lead in his gut anyway, all of it. If he’d—. But he didn’t.
“You should really consider talking to someone,” the doctor says, when he doles out the next round of xanax. “This isn’t meant to be taken for long periods of time, without therapeutic support—”
“Yeah,” Richie says.
“Divorce, the loss of a close friend, these are tremendously stressful life events—” the doctor says, but Richie’s stopped listening, because it’s fucking annoying. He didn’t lose Mikey, like car keys underneath a pile of crap on your counter. Mikey offed himself. It riles him up, pisses him off the rest of the day, makes him screw up five orders in a row until Carmy comes out of the back and makes him take a smoke break, and then he stays outside for so long that Tina comes out and checks on him.
“You need me?” he says.
“No,” Tina says. “It’s slow. You take your time.”
“Okay,” Richie says. It’s cold out, wind beating in against his face, making his eyes water, so he goes to sit in his car, fits one hand over the vent to thaw out his knuckles, sits and smokes and tries to make his brain flat as an overcooked lasagna noodle and the weight of the air is different when it’s Carmy, when Carmy opens the door and drops into the passenger seat.
“It’s nothing,” Richie says, automatically. His voice comes out rusty, worn out. Carmy nods. His hands fold, clench, drum nervously against his leg until he presses them flat against his knees, still.
“I’m fine,” Richie says rebelliously.
“I didn’t know how bad it was,” Carmy says finally. “How bad he was doing. I wasn’t—. We weren’t really talking.”
Mikey wasn’t really talking to anyone at that point, Richie wants to say. It wasn’t personal. There was nothing Carmy could have done about any of it, and he opens his mouth and says,
“It was my fault.”
“How’s that?” Carmy says.
“I was, um. I was trying to get my head straight,” Richie says. “I was—I wasn’t around like I shoulda been and then he—”
“Cousin—”
“I swear to god if—if I knew he was using—”
“You knew he was using,” Carmy says, some emotion flashing up in his pale eyes.
“Yeah, I knew,” Richie says. Mikey had always used, since they were in high school, but he’d had it under control, mostly, he’d always—pulled it back when he needed to. before. “I didn’t know he was—swear to god Carmy. If I knew I never would have, I woulda just sucked it up and—”
“Thought you two were joined at the hip,” Carmy says.
“It was too hard,” Richie says. His voice cracks, that’s fucking embarrassing. “Feeling like, what I felt like.”
“what you felt like,” Carmy echoes warily.
Richie doesn’t say anything but Carmy gets it anyway.
“Holy shit,” he says, eyebrows lifting. “Is that, uh. That’s what happened with Charlene?”
“No, that’s not what happened with Charlene, fuck off,” Richie says. “I mean yeah, kinda. It was just—Mikey was. I—”
Thing is he’d loved Mikey his whole life, long as he could remember. And things went bad with Charlene but that felt different than what it felt like when Mikey clasped a heavy, friendly hand down over his shoulder at the end of a shift and Richie felt his dick twitch, even though he told himself it didn’t mean anything, just that he was horny and lonely and Mikey had always been handsy, and he kept telling himself that for longer than he should have, a chickenshit lie because he couldn’t face it, he couldn’t stand it, what it felt like to want to go to bed with Mikey Berzatto and know it was never going to fucking happen.
“You know, your brother was a great guy,” Richie says, weakly.
“Okay,” Carmy says. He’s stopped looking surprised and now he just looks thoughtful. “It’s fine. I just didn’t really figure you for—”
“A homo?” Richie says viciously.
“No, jesus,” Carmy says. “No, I—I was gonna say, like. Lovelorn.”
Lovelorn. Motherfucking—
*
It’s better, though, when Carmy knows. He’d carried around like this ugly perverted secret and Carmy just—didn’t care. Went out of his way to talk to Richie, actually, smoke breaks that spill into getting a drink at this after hours place—
“You don’t have to,” Richie says. “If, um, I don’t know if you’re supposed to drink—”
“That’s not how it works,” Carmy says, an amused twist to his mouth, but they don’t drink like they used to. Like he used to with Mikey, shitfaced and talking too loud, the most fun guys in the whole goddamn room.
Carmy drinks expensive booze now, barely an inch of amber and an orange peel is 20 bucks and takes him forty-five minutes to drink. Richie has a beer. They get fries or something sometimes.
Carmy’s place is closer so Richie crashes there sometimes, if the roads are icy and they haven’t salted yet, when it’s not his turn with Dana. It’s—he tried to make the place nice for her, so it’s depressing when she’s not there, the unicorn pillow he got her on the couch, the apple juice boxes in the fridge. He doesn’t have to say any of it to Carmy, who finds him an extra blanket from somewhere when it drops below 20.
Neither of them can sleep for shit anyway. They watch late night, Seinfeld re-runs, whatever, until Carmy’s eyes start to slip shut and Richie shoves him awake and tells him to go to bed.
*
It’s not like a healthy choice or whatever, looking at Carmy too much, waiting, waiting, for the flashing moment when he can see Mikey again, split his heart in two again, over the way Carmy wrings out a washcloth, sighs when he takes off his shoes.
There’s not any reason he does it. It’s all just too fucking—familiar; the low blare of the TV, the jutting beak of Carmy’s nose, his honking laugh, and the back of Richie’s hand bumps against his knee, slips up onto his thigh, squeezing, and then it gets quiet, like a long comfortable silence that makes it ok to slide his fingers against the seam of Carmy’s jeans, get down on his knees between Carmy’s thighs and work down his zipper.
He’d been drunk the first time he did this, scared, Mikey’s dick choking him, afraid to pull back in case they realized what they were doing, unable to look at himself in the bathroom mirror, after.
Carmy shifts in his seat, slides down a little, an almost patient silence, like he knows Richie’s gonna fuck this up too. Richie leans in closer, enough to go down halfway, feel Carmy’s prick against the roof of his mouth, and Carmy’s breath gets ragged, his fingers brushing hesitantly against the back of Richie’s neck. Mikey used to—never mind, never fucking mind, because Carmy’s prick is thick and hard in his mouth, and Richie makes himself stop thinking and suck him off. Carmy’s almost silent underneath him, only a stifled “fuck—” when Richie drags his mouth, his lower lip, the flat of his tongue against the head of his prick and after Carmy’s eyes are heavy, half-dazed.
Carmy went away to New York some scrawny little kid and came back too pretty, and now he blinks down solemnly at Richie and says,
“Okay,” reaches for him.
“Nah that’s—I’m good,” Richie says, pushing himself up and back into the opposite corner of the couch. He can just jerk off at home later. That’ll be better, probably.
Carmy frowns.
“You don’t need to put yourself out is all,” Richie says. Carmy’s still lying there with his perfect prick against his thigh and his shirt shoved up and his skin golden in the orange streetlights slanting through the blinds, and Richie just needs to get the fuck out of there before.
“You ever suck Mikey’s dick?” Carmy says.
“No, I never fucking—fuck, no,” Richie says. “None of your fucking business. It happened like one fucking time anyway.”
“And then what? He didn’t—”
“He wasn’t like that,” Richie says. “I’d never ask him—it’s fucking rude to just expect—. Mikey liked—you know he always had hot chicks hanging all over him, just walk into a room with Mikey and half the girls panties are wet just getting a look at him, so I wouldn’t—I—what are you—” because Carmy’s hands are unzipping his pants, deft. Richie’s been hard for a while, so his prick is red, and hard, and looks big, even in Carmy’s big-knuckled fist.
“Huh,” Carmy says.
“What?” Richie says. “Fuck off—”
“Just—it’s a nice looking dick,” Carmy says.
“Oh,” Richie says. Carmy’s hand is heavy and tight. He leans in to get a closer look and Richie gets out of the way, just to give him a little space, and ends up sprawled against the corner of the couch, his chin angled down when Carmy looks back up. Carmy shrugs and kisses him, it startles him so bad his mouth opens, and Carmy kind of laughs against his mouth, presses in soft and opens his mouth, deep, all tongue, rubs his hand in a long jerk up Richie’s cock.
Carmy kisses with total concentration and after a moment he shuffles forward on the couch and catches the back of Richie’s neck in his palm, catches Richie’s broken off groans in a kiss, anyhow, it’s a huge fucking mess, jizz on Carmy’s shirt and his hand, on Richie’s fucking jacket, and Carmy laughs and wipes his hand down his front.
“I’m sorry,” Richie says. “You shouldnta done that. Why’d you do that?”
“I don’t know,” Carmy says. “You looked like you were wound pretty tight.”
“Cousin,” Richie says repressively.
“Cousin,” Carmy says affably, and then. “You hungry?”
Richie had seconds at family dinner and then half a sandwich from a no-show order.
“I could eat,” he says.
Carmy leans back on the couch. His pants are still unbuttoned, slipping low down his belly, but he doesn’t seem bothered by it.
“I got, uh, PB and J, or some cereal, maybe,” he says.
“What?” Richie says, “I’m not eating a PB and fucking J,” even though all he has at home in his fridge is a frozen microwave lasagna and half a six pack of Labatt’s Blue.
Carmy’s brows lift. “Suit yourself,” he says.
“No I want, you know, the veal with the—brown stuff,” Richie says. “Or that thing, the little chicken pot pie, you know.”
“No,” Carmy says patiently.
“From your book, from all the—” Richie waves his hand vaguely, meaning, all the fucking pictures tacked up all over the restaurant, from Carmy’s own fucking book, so you’d think he’d know, the little pie with the crisped up edges, dark gold. “Sorry I don’t know the pretentious name you gave it.”
“Nice,” Carmy says.
“I didn’t mean it like that,” Richie says. “I just thought it looked good is all.”
“Takes two days to make,” Carmy says.
“I wasn’t even saying that,” Richie says. “I wasn’t—” the same ugly swoop in his stomach as before whenever he realized what a fucking loser he was, trying to get more than his share of Mikey, that Mikey was just tolerating him.
“The pastry has to rest for 12 hours,” Carmy says. “And then there’s poaching the chicken, fennel's not in season—”
“Jesus, I get it,” Richie says, just as Carmy says, “I can make you one.”
“That’s—never mind,” Richie says, embarrassed by it, he always talks too much after sex, “you don’t have to do that.”
*
So fine, he thought about it, once or twice, before all this. Thought about when Carmy was being uptight and prissy about some shit, how long to fucking braise something, how the onions had to be chopped like so, if he ever just fucking relaxed a little; thought about it when Carmy’s shirt, damp with sweat, dipped in against his back, outlined the cut of his shoulders, like sure he fucking thought about it because who wouldn’t, like noticing a guy is fuckable is a federal offense, christ.
*
Probably just like a one and done thing, Richie tells himself. Probably—definitely—a pity fuck. He waits for Carmy to, like, let him down easy, say “We should talk,” so Richie can say yeah, yeah, yeah, I know. Don’t worry about it. It didn’t mean anything, kid. It happens like this instead, watching Carmy slide down and put his head against the couch cushion, like his back hurts:
“You ever, like—”
Carmy stares at him, waiting. Richie scratches his neck.
“You know,” he says, “like, fuck?”
The corner of Carmy’s mouth twists, faintly amused. “Yeah,” he says. “Why?”
“No reason,” Richie says. “I, uh—”
Carmy in his bedroom, shoving his jeans down his legs while Richie sits hesitantly on the edge of the bed, Carmy against him, on top of him, Carmy letting him grab his ass, which is small and tight and nice, Carmy drawing in a sharp, low breath when Richie’s fingers slip up his crack, brush in against his hole, “Fucking Christ,” Carmy says, his hands rough on Richie’s face, yanking him up hard against his mouth, and Carmy kisses hungry, crawling in closer against him and folding his hand over the headboard shuddering when Richie works two fingers against him, slipping just inside, not wanting to hurt him, even though Carmy grinds back roughly against him, one hand twisted in Richie’s t-shirt tight enough that the seams creak.
“D’you, um—you wanna—” Carmy says, looking down at him. There’s a splotchy blush on his cheeks, all down over his chest.
He has one bad moment, a sick twist of shame when he already has the condom on and he’s half in and Carmy’s ribs are heaving against his hands, thinking what the fuck, Mikey would kill me for this, for fooling around with his kid brother—
“Hm,” Carmy says, low and soft, hitching back against him, and Richie gives into it, to making it good for him, like the mechanics are all pretty much the same, aren’t they, and Carmy’s, like, easy—not like that, but Richie gets a hand on his dick and Carmy’s breath hitches and he rides back on Richie’s prick and takes it, groaning, it’s—
Carmy tosses him the pack of cigarettes after, drags on his underwear with his cigarette hanging out of the corner of his mouth. Richie reaches for it, too stupidly slow still from coming his brains out, and misses.
“So,” Carmy says, slumping down on the end of the bed. There are red marks on his throat, his hips.
“You want me to go?” Richie says, lifting up on his elbows.
“No,” Carmy says. “That’s not what I said.”
“You didn’t have to,” Richie says. He leans over and drags his tangled pants from underneath the bed, sits up to start pulling them on. “I don’t want to bother you, or, or—”
“I’m not him,” Carmy says. “I’m not some closet case—”
“He wasn’t—he didn’t—”
“Stop fucking defending him,” Carmy says wearily.
“It wasn’t his fault,” Richie says. “He couldn’t help it if I went and—and got the wrong idea—”
“Did you though?” Carmy says. “Did you ever think it was going to really turn into anything?”
“No,” Richie says quietly. That’s what you always forgot about Carmy, because he was the littlest, and he’d never been able to keep up with them on their bikes, was kind of a scrawny runt, but he was so fucking mean, he could just—
“Fuck,” Carmy says. “Sorry.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Richie says. Carmy looks up at him, scrubs his hair off his forehead, passes over the cigarette, wordless. So maybe he had thought about it, not just going to bed with Mikey but the rest of it, too. Thing was, Mikey had girlfriends, some of them serious, but they all faded away after a while. It hadn’t been too hard to think they could have had something, maybe. Been two old men taking a smoke break behind a sandwich joint.
“You don’t have to feel sorry for me or nothing,” he says, his voice thick. pathetic.
“I know you loved him,” Carmy says after a moment.
“Yeah, well,” Richie says. “Fat lot of good it did him.”
“Yeah,” Carmy agrees. What Carmy should do, Richie admits to himself, is get together with Sydney. Make a restaurant, make some babies, feed them handmade pasta or whatever. Make their cookbooks, speak their secret language to each other. Be happy. Richie should get up and get the fuck out so Carmy can get on with it.
“You hungry or—” Carmy asks.
“Starving,” Richie says.