Just A Drag No One Wants To Inhale

Red Angel Magic

***

We shared a cigarette together in the bathroom and told each other just how attractive we both felt the other look, because this motherfucker really does look the part of a handsome Devil and he doesn't get enough credit for it. We heard the front door slam and my Grandad's voice beckoned us downstairs and we raced to both clear the evidence and mask our scents with half a bottle of cologne each and two breath mints each.

We both straightened out our hair the way we wanted it to be for one last time, and for no reason at all, Jorden gave me his tie and he unbuttoned two extra buttons off the top of his own shirt.

Oh my God, can he not?

I held the tie stupidly in my hand as Jorden looked at me expectantly. "Didn't you used to go to Church every Sunday?"

I scowled at him and he laughed at me, ruffling up my already-made hair. "What the fuck kind of six-year-old ties his own ties once a week?" I hissed back.

We bickered back and forth like that just a little more before we both decided that Grandad would be happy to tie it for me. And so we left the bathroom and walked down the stairs together, one hand held the tie and the other brushed against Jorden's hand before we decided to latch our pinkies together. I don't know what we were promising each other, but I promised not to break it. The best part about it was that it was completely for us. For no one else to see or comment on... That's why anyone else who stood in front of us wouldn't be able to see it.

It's like when two actors are on stage and their characters are in love, and coincidentally the actors fall in love as well, because they mistake their character's love for their own. So in a scene in which the actors are on stage, in front of an audience, and they're facing each other, and they honestly do feel like they're on top of the world, when the plot demands it, they'll kiss. Just as planned. But what wasn't planned was that their hands find each other beside them, clasped. Away from the audience. Because that kiss, that moment, wasn't just for the show. It wasn't just because they were forced to by the script; But because that moment was theirs, and theirs to keep.

With every step down, we were on the off-beat of the drums that we assumed Grandad was playing. I exchanged looks with Jorden and we both smirked, detached our fingers and went into what was one known as the living room before the ghosts of my past crept up and laid itself out in boxes everywhere.

Try as I might, I could not manage to plaster on a smile on my face when I found that it was my father who was on the drums, with Grandad, Mimi and Mom all standing around, egging him on. He crashed the cymbal loudly for finality and we all gave him a round of applause respectfully as he stood up and stepped away from the drum kit, huffing and puffing because of how hard he played. I noticed that my guitar had been brought up from the basement and was standing on it's stand a few feet away from the drum kit. He turned to Jorden and I, and he looked back and forth between us.

He smiled genuinely at the both of us.

I was shocked to my very core that I almost didn't hear him when he asked me if he could do the tie for me. It was tight around my neck, for starters. Any tighter and I would have died of suffocation.

Dad slammed his hand onto my shoulder and ruffled up my hair. Can everyone please stop touching my hair? "Wish I had a camera, Junior."

"Me too." I told him, stealing a glance at Jorden, who knew exactly what I meant. But, of course, my father hadn't quite noticed, and neither did Mimi... But Grandad and Mom? Wow-ie, did they try their damnedest to keep a knowing smirk off their faces. What makes it even funnier is that neither knows that the other knows.