I always hated old books and movies with gay people in them because something terrible always happens: the characters die or get beaten up or get AIDS. I was always like, that’s so tired. Why always tell the bad stuff when there’s so much more? I only wanted the happy stories, stories about the Chengs and Nixes of the world. We deserve it, right? I mean, I knew that stuff like that was still happening, and not just in like Chechnya or Zimbabwe. But I figured if we could focus on the better stuff, people would think that’s how it should be, and they’d become better too, and that’d be progress.

Now, I have blood dripping from my face onto my fancy jacket, and the guy I just kissed is about to take a beating, and I am helpless to stop it.

“God wiped out a whole town to get rid of people like you, you know. So he won’t mind if we teach you a little lesson.”

“Both of you!” Vin Weasel laughs to make sure I don’t think I’m safe.

Red and Buzz Cut lift me up and strong-arm me away from the bleachers. Gordo and Vin do the same to Chaz, and we’re soon being forced across the road and into the field. In my time, the woods are only a half-mile deep before a housing development starts. But in this time, the trees stretch uninterrupted all the way to …

Oh my god. The Ledges.

I don’t know if that thought has occurred to Chaz yet, but I can barely breathe. I’m lightheaded, picturing the eighty-foot drop to the jagged limestone floor of the quarry. I was never one of those daredevil kids who played there, especially after the summer I was twelve, when a pair of teens fell off while making out, one dying on impact and the other ending up a paraplegic. I can still see the newspaper photo of her being airlifted on a stretcher, black and blue face peering from between pads and wraps meant to stabilize her neck.

“Are you insane? You won’t just get kicked out! You’ll be arrested!”

Buzz Cut smacks the back of my head, and I stumble, sagging to one knee, before he rights me, and we keep going into the woods.

Vin Weasel looks like a kid in a candy shop. “Arrested? For what?”

“Assault … kidnapping …” I don’t want to say “murder” out loud.

They all laugh at this idea. “How could we do anything like that? We’re all at prom. We took pictures and everything.”

Chaz mutters, “Someone’s going to notice, morons.”

Gordo shoves him hard. “It’s not my fault you dickwads planned a black-light party. Can’t see anything in there but stars, actually, so thanks for that.”

“Yeah, it’s heavenly,” sneers Vin Weasel. And they all laugh again.