I was really getting into Denny’s cock, even with the taste. I went down to the hilt, and came back with my teeth narrowed and nipping. Denny’s hand came up, hesitant and jerky, rested on my head; every once in a while I could feel his thumb twitch in my hair.

“The kid gives a fuckin’ good blowjob,” Hawk said, “don’t he?”

“It’s …” Denny whispered above me in the oddest voice I’d ever heard, “it’s all right.”

The nigger chuckled, like he knew something.

I pushed my mouth into Denny’s rough hair (his cock and the nail wedged way down); lots of it was stuck together, and some of what stuck it had dried sharp. I went back for the tip and got my tongue through the nail. I thought about the twist working inside the head, worrying the infected flesh, tearing the rigid sponge. I went down to the hilt again. And you could tell he was stiff now. My hands were on his thighs; one of his thighs kept shaking. And sometimes his arm.

Whenever I mashed him between my teeth, near the head, more of that stuff leaked.

“You wanna make some money, Hawk?” Nigg asked.

Hawk said: “Huh?”

On my head, Denny’s fingers twitched; his leg shook under my hand. And Hawk and Nigg went on like he wasn’t even there:

“Yeah,” the nigger said. “Really. I know where we can get ourselves some bread, man. If you wanna go in on it with me, see?”

“How?” Hawk asked; it was the kind of question where the voice, disbelieving, goes down at the end, not up.

I kept on sucking Denny, like they weren’t there.

“You know at the dock, man? Where all the niggers got the fishin’ boats?”

“Over on Frontwater Pier—”

“Naw, man. Naw … I mean down at Crawhole, where the nigger boats are.”

“You mean down on the other side of the spit—”

“Yeah! Yeah, that’s it. I know some niggers down there, man, who’d love to fuck this little blond-headed cocksucker’s face. Bet we could get forty-five, fifty dollars for him.”

“Yeah? A white kid?” Then I heard Hawk frown. “He’s white, ain’t he?”

“Sure he is,” the nigger said. “You got your bike; you could run us over there; and I could set up something. I’d split it with you, man. It would be real easy.”

“You wanna sell the little cocksucker down on the nigger boats?”

“Sure,” the nigger said. “Just take ’im down there, get our money, and leave ’im.”

“Shit,” Hawk said. “They’d really buy ’im?”

“Sure they would,” the nigger said. “They like cocksuckers like him—white ones.”