“You didn’t have to hit me. Damn you.” His voice was pain. Not like pain. Not full of pain. The thing itself. Pain. Horace felt sorry, so sorry, for causing this pain, and he knew it had not come from his fist alone. He never suspected he could inflict such a thing on another. He imagined another world, another place, in which he could gladly have complied with Gideon’s wish and fallen into lusty, steamy, lascivious abandon—but no.

“I’m sorry.”

“Go to hell.” Gideon went to the mirror and dabbed at the wounded lip. Sobs threatened. He rinsed his face with water.

“Gideon, please understand . . . I—”

Gideon spun around, and Horace tensed. Gideon had the mean, evil look of a hungry jackal. “Fuck you, Horace Cross.” He snatched up his books. “Damn you.”

“Gid—”

“Don’t ‘Gid’ me, man. I’m going to fix your ass. I know what you’re thinking. I see what you think you’re doing with your ‘new’ friends. But remember, black boy, you heard it here first: You’re a faggot, Horace. You know? You’re a faggot. You can run, you can hide, but when the shit comes down . . . you suck cock, you don’t eat pussy.”

“You’re sickening, Gideon.”

“I’m sickening. At least I know what I am.”

“Go to hell, Gideon.”

“Hey.” Gideon raised his hand in resignation. “Just like old times.” He touched his busted lip and gave a mocking wink. “Love you, baby.” He turned and walked out, leaving Horace with himself, with the smelly ghosts of the men who, for all these months, he had told himself he did not lust after, with the realization that it was a lie and that soon, soon and very soon he would fall, and fall hard.

Wait . . . he heard them again, the beating of wings, and he imagined them mauve and full, he could see them in his mind. They stopped. Over by the football field. Horace hopped up and ran, his genitals flapping against his thighs.