Page 54 of The Corruption of Hollis Brown

He laced Hollis’s hands together, resting his elbows on the porcelain, then deliberately locked his gaze on them in the mirror. The closest they could get to looking back at each other.

It chilled Hollis to the marrow.

His palms felt warm, there was stickiness from the pomade. Walt gave him his arms back, made it his choice to keep their hands locked together. Hollis could control his own face now too. His neck.

At all the points where he and Walt touched, it felt strange. It itched at first but rapidly escalated to something violent and electric.

Hollis looked between their embrace and himself in the mirror frantically, seeking explanation, but Walt said nothing. Their fingers twitched against the sensation, but Walt didn’t let go.

Instead, Walt slid his right hand up, and Hollis’s nerves jangled sweet and discordant. This touching and being touched and touching all at once meant something, but Hollis didn’t know what. It scared him and made their breath come fast and hot. Hollis tightened their grip with a gasp, like grabbing a branch while falling from a tree.

He stared into the mirror at his own face, cheeks burning, eyebrows twisted in confusion. Walt’s sad brown eyes that no one had noticed—not even his ma—gazed back at him. Old and sure.

Walt separated their fingers but kept their palms close, then delicately touched their fingertips together. Each ridge of Hollis’s fingerprints scraped harmonious like angels screaming, and Hollis’s knees failed him.

Their hands separated to catch them, slamming to the tile floor.

Walt picked them up off the ground.

What was that?

It was us.

What do you mean it was us? Why did it feel like that? Why doesn’t it feel like that all the time? What did you do to me?

Walt pressed Hollis’s lips together, tight and unhappy. He went back to getting ready like he hadn’t just rocked Hollis’s world. Finished brushing their hair, then checked the time on Hollis’s phone. But Hollis could feel him turning over inside, like a dog in a crate that was way too small. The panic of it.

Walt, stop. What was that? How, why—

Walt put Hollis’s keys and wallet in his pocket and headed downstairs to get their coat.

I shouldn’t have done that.

WALT, STOP.

FUCKING STOP!

Walt shrugged on their coat and opened the door. It wasn’t even close to the time the party was supposed to be. It was barely eight o’clock.

Bleed

Walt was walking them toward the bus stop, quick and silent.

Where are we going?

Walt didn’t answer.

There was one last bus before the route was done for the night. Hollis knew that if they made it in time, Walt was going to catch it. And if he caught the bus, they would leave this town, and Hollis didn’t know if they would ever come back.

I can’t do this. I can’t do this.

Walt was saying it over and over, and Hollis knew he wasn’t talking to him.

This was ridiculous.

Hey, calm down, dude, Hollis begged. I’m not mad, I just wanted to know what happened.

Walt was shaking his head.