bamboo doesn't grow in dark spaces. [80K Words / Complete]

chapter fifteen, part one. 💚

Losing his virginity had been an accident. A heat of the moment mistake. It happened a few months into his relationship with Hannah, a few months before he turned sixteen. He'd been sleeping over at her house, which usually didn't involve much sleeping. They didn't have a condom—they hadn't planned on having sex, hadn't even come to that conversation. But Hannah wanted to. And, afterall, hadn't his parents told him she would know when they were ready? She made him roll on top of her, kept saying she wanted him to do it and it'll be alright, you can pull out. She wanted it, so it happened. Case was the boy, so it was his job to make sure the girl was okay; to ask the is this alright? Can I touch you here? Do you want me to stop? type questions. Hannah never asked him if he was okay. And the only other girl he'd slept with . . . well, she didn't ask either. No-one had ever asked Case permission to touch him, to fuck him.

No-one, until Sir.

*    *    *

The cigarette wavered between Sir's thin lips. He kept the hand-rolled joint balanced in a tight scowl as he placed his hands against Case's throat. Tentative fingers pressed into faded bruises, no longer tender and sore. He guided Case to turn his head left-right-up. "Does that hurt?"

"No," Case replied. Single syllable. Crackly but clear enough.

Up this close, Case could see the flecks of red in Sir's yellow-green bruises, and the weathered lines around his stormy eyes. The fresh scar on his face from Case's attempted escape was a pink-turning-white line, swiping across his temple. Neat and clean, as if done by a professional hand.

Tucked away under the stairs, Case's supplies tub had finally been restocked. Fresh rolls of toilet paper, alcohol-free Total Care Listerine, another 3-pack of antiseptic soap he'd likely burn through too soon. New supplies at the end of the month—August. Christ, it was already August. Case was meant to be starting his senior year soon . . .

Sir took a long drag from his cigarette, gray tendrils of smoke unfurling around his face as he exhaled. "Looking good," he said, sweeping a thumb over Case's cheekbone.

Burst capillaries. Painless. But not having a mirror to see the damage himself left Case's gut swirly and tense. He swallowed, steeling his nerves. "Good."

"How's the pain?" Sir asked, offering his joint.

Case hesitated for a moment, mind flicking back to the last time Sir offered to share. One puff turning into two, turning into forced chain-smoking, turning into—

It's okay. He hasn't tried anything like that in days. Or is it weeks now?

Case pinched the joint—the voice whispering from the dark, see, Sir can be gentle. Sir can be kind—and took a shallow puff; wanting to be numbed by the drug. The smoke burned on its way down. A fiery roundhouse kick inside his chest. Lungs tickling with the urge to cough. Case handed the joint back to Sir, managing to suppress his coughing fit like a pro. Or intermediate, anyway.

See? You've got this, he told himself, forcing the voice back into its shadowy corner. A taste of cannabis easing his anxiety. A small high bolstering his confidence. A slice of his old-self emerging through the haze.

"No pain," he replied, voice hoarse from smoking instead of internal damage. Daringly, he added a flippant, "Everything is . . . A-Okay."

Sir's lips twisted into a dimple-free smile. "I'll be the judge of that." He took a pensive drag. Exhaled. The plume of smoke diffusing in the small space between them. "You seem coherent," he said, low and husky. "Let's give those vocal cords a test run. Tell me your name."