Sean Beaudoin - Welcome Thieves

“Why?” I ask.

“I guess it was just her time.”

“No. Not that.”

Cher makes a face. “I’m Dilly . Explain the world to me.”

“Not the world. Just Butterfly.”

She pokes me in the chest, hard.

“Because I didn’t want to come in second or third, okay Dillard?”

“What did you want?”

“To come in worst.”

She leans over. I’m shoved up against the casket. There’s a commiserating brush of lips. A sisterly acknowledgment of our mutual loss. For two beats. Three. Then the time to separate comes and goes. She moves closer. Cautiously exploring. It’s like being ten again, because all my friends were right. I did watch her take a shower, since she always pushed the curtain aside. There were special games in the basement, almost never a winner.

We say nothing, send messages like we used to, when words were for parents and teachers and friends too dumb to know an entire life existed beyond homework and sneakers and bikes, too busy talking shit and throwing punches that wouldn’t matter until they gained fifty pounds. I never wanted any part of the thefts and lies and fights because there was always the plaid couch against the far wall, the broken lamp, me and Cher giggling while Mom chuffed around upstairs, calling our names.

She pulls me closer, tap tap tap with the point of her tongue. I send gentle replies, like walking heel-toe toward a deer on the lawn. Slowly, slowly. Careful not to spook. Pull aside a branch. Wait for it to sniff the air, go back to chewing leaves.

I open my eyes. Hers are closed.

I absorb the pressure of her lips, the heat of her everything.

“Dilly,” she whispers, and somehow hearing my name collapses a scaffold of restraint that had already begun to buckle.

I run my hands up her sides, under her dress, too hard, too fast.

“Jesus,” she says, spins away.

“Wait.”

The door slams.

I wipe lipstick from my chin, thinking it’s weird how almost everyone does the worst thing, every time. Gives in to their essential natures without thought or complaint. Our little brains suckered by the first shiny thing. And then, when we have a chance not to be, a real and obvious chance to prove we’re actually half-human, still fuck it up.

I’m looking at Mom when the Russian cracks the door. “Finish?”

“Yeah.”

He holds out his hand. “You want to see another, is sixty dollars.”

THE BURIAL IS SHORT and quick, the priest drunk or in a hurry.

Ashes to ashes and so forth amen.

Handfuls of dirt, palms dried on slacks.

A walk along a gravel path.

AT THE BORDER we stop at a Tas-T-Grill. Cher leans against the car with a cigarette, one long line of smoke floating straight up, like there hasn’t been any wind in the desert for a hundred years.

“You coming?” Wade asks.

No answer.

“You want me to get you something?”

No answer.

There’s a plastic table under a plastic umbrella. It’s too small. We slap down trays, touch knees. I’d forgotten what it was like to watch Wade eat, the stop-motion animation from scalp to cleft, the butterfly dancing from cheek to cheek.

“Something on your mind, Dillard?”

“No.”

“You sure? Now’s your chance. Dead mommy buys you a one-time pass.”

“For what?”

“Being way too honest without I’m kicking your ass after.”

A family comes and sits. The kids stare, get scolded. They get up, decide to eat in the car after all.

“I guess I have been thinking.”

“Proceed.”

“Just how you should get out before you get busted.”

“Yeah? You worried about my career prospects?”

“Maybe head back down to Santa Monica or whatever. Stay one step ahead.”

He starts in on the second burger. “So I can sling drinks for drunk frats? Pocket wet quarters like you?”

“No one leaves change anymore.”

“Or, hey, maybe I could go back to school. Volunteer on weekends. Listen, kids, don’t forget that everyone’s special in their own special way. ”

A pair of hornets crawl around the edge of his soda. One falls in.

“I didn’t say school.”

“You’re right. My apologies. But here’s what I’m wondering. In this scenario where I hit the bricks, does Cher happen to stay behind?”

“How should I know?”

“Yeah, I guess I can see how it’d play out. Her all sad without me around, figures it’s probably time to move back on over to Dilly’s place.”

I try to get up, but he slides forward, pins me against the bench. It hurts.

“Anything else you need to get off your chest?”

“No.”

“You’re making a really weird face.”

“Stop.”

He pushes harder. “Why? Something wrong?”

I take a swing that misses, scrape my knuckles on the table.

Wade smiles, lets go. We’re six inches apart. His scar seems angrier with the sun directly above, looks like spilled tea, burned and peeled away, again and again.

“Hey, Dilly, you think you could carry this weight?” He runs his fingers gently around the wings, knows exactly where the perimeter is. “You got the shoulders for this?”

He’s right. I would have folded a long time ago.

“No. But at least you’ve got my sister.”

“You dumb shit. No one has your sister.”

WE MOTOR THROUGH the night, without a word, and then drop Wade just outside town.

“I got business.”

He hands me the keys. I adjust the seat. There’s no traffic for once. We’re almost at their place when I’m finally like, “Hey, you wanna get a beer or something?”

“No.”

“No?”

“But maybe coffee.”

I find a spot and then a booth. Cher orders two donuts. The cooks watch and wish, press themselves against the counter, never bring my tea.

“Well?” She says.

I know there’s an important question full of layers and meaning. A statement or an apology, I’m so so so whatever. But it’s like how I always laugh instead of being the one who makes the joke. How I stand and watch while someone else puts out the fire, rescues the baby. I’ve always known I’d have exactly the life I do. That Dilly, he’s a good guy, everyone slapping my back and picking me for their team and inviting me to the movies first even though there were better, cooler people, but at least with me there’d never be any surprises.

She licks her fingers.

“It wasn’t a monkey, it was a capuchin.”

“Huh?”

“All these years we’ve been saying monkey. That’s fucked up, don’t you think?”

“I guess.”

“You know, those first nights after I came back, I kept thinking you were secretly winking at me. Like you were acting dumb, but still in on the game. All Where you been? What was it like? And so I figured one night you’d finally break down, laugh in my face. But you just sat there sucking your thumb.”

“I never sucked my thumb.”

“You know what an analogy is, Dillard?”

“A fancy word for none of it was real?”

“Exactly.”

“What about L.A.?”

“I mean, it exists.”

“What about Terrence?”

“He runs a dozen websites. Guess what kind?”

“But we went to his agency. He gave us Moët.”

Cher stands, drops three dollars on the table, leans close enough that I can smell myself on her.

“I mean seriously, Dillard. Who in fuck ever heard of a school for models?”

IT’S MAYBE A YEAR later and we’re sitting in the kitchen. Dilly Jr. is under the table going vroom vroom with his little cars and grr grr with his little bears. I have the morning shift, since Manny had a stroke Fourth of July and bumped me up to manager. First thing, I got rid of all the Christmas lights and beer signs, the pinball and ashtrays. Put a little stage in the corner. We have live music, trivia, rich-fucker whiskey. Cute girls bringing drinks to dudes who come in for the drinks and cute girls.