romeo x mercutio alternate universe. posted here cos it feels more like journal stuff. if you don't like queer, quit reading.

Some Consequence

It's quiet at Capitan's at four in the afternoon; the bartender puts Lou Reed on the jukebox and the whores come in with their baskets from the launderette next door to drink beer and fold their towels and wait for the rain to stop. I'm up at the bar with my cousin and he's telling me I have to quit thinking with my dick and I'm telling him it's different this time, she's not like that and he says, You say that every time, dumb-ass.

The universe hates me, is all the answer I've got.

You say THAT every time, too. Hey, Johnny – Rico Suave here needs a refill.

Then you come in, fall in through the door marked Exit; rain-wet, torn shirt, split lip, black lines smudged like city-dirt under your eyes. I don't know how you do it, but you make falling down look like the opening act; like the next thing you'll do is shoot the heart out of an ace of spades or eat fire.

I look at you again, and it's not wide or deep, but it still hurts, somewhere. And I watch you stand up and spit, and a laugh comes out of your bloody mouth as you catch me watching.

Go ahead and look, beautiful. That's what you got eyes for.

The fuck? I say, but your narrow ass is already on the barstool next to mine, and you're finishing what's left of my drink and rattling the ice cubes like glass dice.

Buy me another. You owe me.

I don't know what, but I nod at Johnny.

My cousin says Aw, Jesus. This is a new one, and I want to say, Maybe not.

It's like flies and meat. I'm out of here - if you mother asks me, I haven't seen you. The whores watch him go, the old one with a gold tooth smiling.

They watch when we leave, too. A sale…

And I'm sitting in your room full of cards and masks and voodoo shit, pieces of junk and clothes on the floor. Sitting on your bed drinking Puerto Rican rum and watching you throw knives, hearing their thin song in the air and way you're breathing. The last one's shivering, point buried in the wallboard and you yawn and say You ever been fucked by a guy?

No.

In your dreams, you say, but not the way most people say it.

You're crazy, I swear. No.

You pull off what's left of your shirt and I see the scar, the scratch, the sacred heart with a crown of fire inked half over it.

Six Hail Marys for swearing, beautiful. Don't worry. I can make it do.

And you taste like smoke and fate and river water, jesus-blood and candy. The way you knew I knew you would.

Took you long enough, you say, against my mouth, back deep somewhere in my head.