Skaterboy by J. M. Snyder Read online

  CJ thinks Mr. NYPD Blue will stop, just ease out of the flow of traffic and pull up along the curb, roll down his passenger side window, lean over the seats and call out, "Hey kid." But the light is green and he keeps moving, thank God. And right behind him comes the bus, its brakes wheezing to a stop. CJ jumps off the skateboard and steps on the back to flip it up to him while he digs in his pocket for change. The bus driver gives him a look that he's all too familiar with, one he's learned to ignore. It's his short hair, spiked and dyed an unnatural shade of burgundy that's too dark against his pale skin. It's his layers of clothes, flannel shirt and baggy pants. It's the chain that hangs from a belt loop on the front of his pants to his wallet crammed into his back pocket. But mostly it's the board. People see it and suddenly he's not human anymore.

  "Hello," he says. He doesn't expect a response and surprise, doesn't get one. He's used to it by now. His quarters plink off the other change in the fare box with a hollow, metallic sound.

  There are only two other people on the bus, old women who huddle together in the seat right behind the driver. They watch him pass with wide, distrustful eyes, their painted lips wrinkled into tight frowns. CJ smiles at them anyway and takes a seat in the back. His skateboard goes on the floor, his feet planted firmly on it to keep it from getting away from him. Hands crammed into the pockets of his jacket, he buries himself in his hood and stares out the window.

  The bus pulls away from the curb slowly, as if it'd rather have left him to wait for the next one.

  At 12:23 the bus pulls to a stop in front of the Chester Meadows shopping center. The only "meadow" anywhere near the place is the empty stretch of land beside the parking lot, overgrown with weeds that come to CJ's knees. Among the straggly grass, mounds of yellow dirt stick up like tiny islands and thick tread marks crisscross the field where some of the older kids go dirt biking after dark. From his seat on the bus, CJ can see the concrete pipe like the mouth of a cave in the shade of Harrison's grocery, but no one's riding over the cracked surface. Maybe he's early. He hopes to get in some good moves on his board before Richard shows up.

  Retrieving his skateboard, he heads to the front of the bus. As he starts down the steps, though, people are already pushing on and he stands back to let them pass. The first onboard is a young woman about Richard's age, late twenties, with a baby in her hands -- she glares at CJ and clutches the baby closer as if afraid he's going to snatch it from her. What the hell would he do with it? The man in a suit behind her turns his back to CJ as he digs into his wallet for his bus pass, like he doesn't want anyone to see what else he might have in there. Then a couple of girls from the college climb on amid giggles, their gazes like butterflies fluttering around CJ and never quite landing on him, never really seeing him.

  Finally the bus driver starts to close the door, and CJ jogs down the steps. "This is my stop." Before the door can shut in his face, he shoves it aside and jumps to the curb below. Out, he thinks, taking a deep breath as the bus shudders behind him. Free.

  The board beneath his arm falls to his feet. CJ steps onto it and pushes off from the ground in one fluid motion. He skates a little farther down the sidewalk despite the NO SKATING sign nearby -- the words are half obscured by spray paint anyway, the work of taggers that no amount of scrubbing or rain can wash away. But when he starts to draw nasty looks from shoppers passing him, he jumps the board off onto the street and picks up speed to get out of the traffic. This place is too damn busy. At least no one will bother him at the pipe.

  Only thin yellow tape blocks the truck entrance that leads around the side of Harrison's grocery. For a moment CJ stands on his board and stares at the tape, dumbfounded. When did they put that up? What the hell for? He was just here over the weekend, riding the inside of the pipe like a surfer on a tight wave. Richard picked up a few groceries while CJ skated -- when he was done, he stood right here where CJ stands now and watched him. Richard loves to see him skate.

  That's how they met, really, in a parking lot sort of like this one over a year ago now. CJ palled around with a different crowd then, younger boys still in school like he himself was at the time, and he used to spend half the night hanging around in the shadows outside convenience stores, popping wheelies and whistling at the people who came in after midnight for beer or cigs or munchies. That night he was outside a gas station and he noticed Richard the moment he got out of his car. While he filled his tank, he kept one hand fisted in his pocket, pulling the material of his pants tight across his full ass. CJ liked the way Richard's sports coat looked pushed back behind his wrist. The fuzzy brown hair that covered the guy's cheeks and chin, a contrast to the receding line above his brow. The wire-frame glasses that made him look smart. And the way Richard glanced around the lot uneasily, saw him with his friends, looked at the gas pump and then looked back again. CJ had never gotten a second glance before, from anyone. That right there won Richard his heart.

  He got a third look when Richard went inside to pay for his gas. On his way back to his car, CJ skated up behind him. "Hey," he called.

  Richard turned immediately. "Excuse me?" he asked. His gaze danced past CJ to the other boys along the front window of the store, backlit by the lights inside, and for a brief second fear flickered behind those thin glasses he wore. This close CJ could see his eyes were a pale blue, like faded denim or the endless summer sky on a clear day. Sexy eyes. He wondered what they looked like without the lens refracting them, first thing in the morning or late at night. And he was staring, had to be, because Richard cleared his throat and asked, a little perturbed, "Yes?"

  With a nonchalant shrug, CJ pointed past him and said, "I like your car." A BMW because Richard is a bang-up salesman, though CJ didn't know that at the time. It was an older model but still in top condition, shiny like wet latex in the overhead lights. Impressive really, even to someone like CJ who wasn't easily impressed. "I'm CJ."

  "Richard," the guy said.

  Behind CJ his friends laughed, a childish sound in the empty parking lot, and CJ half turned to hiss at them, "Shut up." They were cramping his action here.

  Richard glanced at the boys by the store, then back at CJ. The way he looked him over made every drop of blood in his body rush to his dick, and his baggy pants felt two sizes too tight when Richard's eyes met his. "How old are you?" he wanted to know.

  "Nineteen," CJ whispered.

  Richard frowned -- CJ looks a lot younger, he knows he does, he still gets carded buying scratch-off lottery tickets. "You sure?" he asked. When CJ nodded, Richard started, "If you're shitting me --"

  "I have my license," CJ offered. He dug into his back pocket to extract his wallet, the one he wears on a chain not so much to be cool but so he won't lose it. All of a sudden he wanted Richard to believe him, more than anything. I'm old enough, he thought, scrambling through the folds of his wallet, past movie tickets and business cards and receipts, crap he stuck in there and promptly forgot. "If you want to see it --"

  "I believe you." Richard took a step closer and the boys behind CJ snickered. Looking over his shoulder, he saw his friends for the first time as the rest of the world did -- a bunch of rowdy boys looking for trouble. Skaters dressed in sloppy clothes with bad haircuts, kids screaming for discipline, headed down the wrong road of life. At that exact moment, he hated them.

  Fumbling with his wallet, CJ tried to extract his driver's license but his fingers trembled and refused to work. His eyes stung, his throat burned, he wanted to take his board and go home. "Dammit," he muttered, yanking at his license. The thin plastic was caught in the billfold and he couldn't seem to get it free. His friends' laughter only made things worse. Beneath his breath, he mumbled, "You know I need to ditch them, right? I'm not ... this isn't really me ..."

  A warm hand closed over his, and CJ blinked back tears of embarrassment as he looked up at Richard. Surprisingly, the guy was smiling at him, CJ couldn't imagine why. Unless he was laughing, too. But then, in a soft voice, he asked, "Want to go for a ride?"
When CJ didn't reply, he winked. "Don't worry. I won't do anything you don't want me to. You said you liked the car?"

  CJ nodded. Richard's hand squeezed his and the trembling in his fingers stopped. "Want to take her for a spin then?"

  He believes in me, CJ thought, that's the main thing. Richard believes in him, no matter what anyone else seems to do or say or think. Take the jerks on the bus -- they all thought he was going to cause trouble. Or the shoppers here, they look at him like he's a brazen thief just waiting for his chance to jump someone. If the police tape wasn't up, at least he could skate on the pipe for a bit, away from the traffic and the whispers and the stares. He considers jumping the tape -- there's no real reason for it to be here anyway, not that he can tell -- but he knows there's a cop around here somewhere, casing the lot, waiting for a punk kid like himself to start up on the pipe so the badge could bust some ass after lunch.

  So CJ guides his board away from the pipe and onto the sidewalk that runs the length of the strip mall. The midday shoppers steer clear of him, keeping a wide berth. A handful of little kids gawk as he passes, two teenaged girls giggle, an old man hollers after him to watch it, kiddo. CJ is watching it, though. These people don't appreciate the fact that he swerves to avoid them, he doesn't hit anyone, he skates like a pro and no one notices. How much longer until Richard shows up? With the pipe off limits, what the hell is he supposed to do to kill the next half hour?

  At 12:50 CJ notices the two boarders by Harrison's EXIT doors. He's been skating away from the store just to keep out of the flow of traffic or he might have seen them sooner. Two boys of indeterminable age -- they look young but then again, CJ's learned that most skaters look young, regardless of how old they are. He himself looks twelve on a good day, and he'll be able to drink legally in another six months. The first time Richard ever kissed him, in the car after their third date, he actually did check CJ's license, just to make sure he was of age. "I believe you," he said as he reached around CJ to tuck his wallet back into his pants. The angle was wrong, though, and Richard only succeeded in dropping it to the floor. When he reached for it, he ended up in CJ's lap, which was right where they both wanted him to be. "I just don't want to get in trouble, you know?" he murmured, kissing the hollow of CJ's throat -- his flannel shirt had come unbuttoned somehow, and Richard's hands were slipping into his pants. "You sure as hell don't look nineteen --"

  "Shh," CJ purred then, silencing him with a kiss. Thinking of it now makes him hungry for his lover. How much longer does he have to wait until Richard shows up? Maybe he can talk him into taking the rest of the day off from work. CJ doesn't want to go back to the empty apartment alone. He could call Richard this afternoon, but if someone else comes into his guy's office, then he'll disappear again. He hates that shit. Sometimes he wishes neither of them had to work.

  But he still has a few minutes so to pass the time, he heads over to the other two skaters. He doesn't know who they are but they have boards, right? One of them wears a bandanna over his head, pirate style, hiding his hair. He stands against the wall as if he's the only thing holding it up, one foot propped back against the bricks, cigarette dangling from his lips. His skateboard rests at his feet and he watches CJ approach with an unreadable expression on his smooth face. His friend is too busy trying to grind off the curb to notice CJ or any of the shoppers who have to dodge his board when it skitters across the pavement away from him. This boy has short, thick dreadlocks, and when he bends to retrieve his board, CJ sees kanji letters tattooed on the back of his neck. The two kids wear a ragtag assortment of clothes, baggy pants with torn knees, dark tshirts with logos from skateboard companies like Spitfire and Ebola -- the one with the dreads has a sweatshirt tied around his waist and his friend wears a dingy long-sleeved thermal shirt beneath his tee. Skating over to them, CJ brakes and flips the board up into his hands. The guy with the headband notices the board and nods. "Nice deck," he says.

  "Did it myself," CJ tells them, turning the board so the skaters can see the deck he spent weeks designing. Richard let him spread newspapers out all over the living room floor and he would lay on his stomach painting while his guy watched the nightly news. CJ can't draw worth crap but he can copy pretty well -- it took days but he managed to recreate an old cover of the Sandman comic book onto his deck, it kicks ass. All done in black and grays and purples, and Richard helped him set it with shellac so it wouldn't chip off. "You could do this, you know," his lover told him, awed. CJ has to admit that he likes the glassy look that creeps into Richard's eyes when he looks at CJ's artwork, such as it is. For some reason he can't quite understand, Richard gets horny as hell just thinking about CJ's drawings, and he watched CJ work on the board more than he watched the TV sometimes. The night it was finished, he touched the board with an almost holy reverence and told him, "You could make goddamn good money doing these for people, babe. You're amazing."

  CJ doesn't know about all that, but these guys here seem impressed. "You did that, dude?" The skater pushes off against the wall and reaches for CJ's board, which he willingly surrenders. His cheeks hurt from trying not to smile too wide. Turning the board to study the artwork, the kid sounds like he's holding the Grail as he tells his friend, "Check this out, Mick. Fucking A."

  The kid in dreads -- Mick -- grunts in approval without looking. He's too busy popping off the curb and more often then not, his board gets away from him. He isn't really all that good. Handing his board back, the first guy says, "Wicked, man. Too rad. You do these?"

  "I did this one," CJ beams. Maybe Richard is right, maybe there is something here after all. He drops his board to the ground and loves the way the other skater's gaze falls with it, like his eyes are glued to the deck. As nonchalantly as he can, CJ steps onto the board. "I'm CJ," he says, spinning the board in a kick flip. Unlike Mick, he's damn good at it, and the board turns once before settling back into place beneath his feet. "What's up with the pipe?"

  "Cops busted some kids in there last night," the guy who's not Mick says. He leans back against the wall again, nudging his board back and forth with one foot while he shoves his hands deep into the pockets of his jeans. "Hash or pot, something like that. They're patrolling the whole damn lot now. I'm Brendan. He's Mick."

  With a nod, CJ says, "That's shit about the pipe." He came out here early just to skate it and now he can't. Where's Richard already?

  Brendan nods, it is shit. For a few moments they're silent -- the only sound is the scritch of Mick's wheels on the concrete. He might be a good skater in time, but right now CJ secretly thinks he's shit, too. Can't keep his feet on the board, it just gets away from him. As it flies out into traffic he falls hard on his butt ... he sucks, plain and simple. CJ thinks he should say something, show the kid how to really skate, but he's not here to compete so he keeps his mouth shut.

  But Mick's next jump sends him off the curb, straight into the path of an oncoming Lexus SUV. The driver isn't going all that fast but she slams on the brakes anyway, and the look she throws at them could melt glass. Mick ignores it and Brendan laughs. "You're lucky she didn't run your ass down," he smirks, kicking out his board. It shoots across the sidewalk and rams into the back of Mick's battered Converse sneakers.

  "Fuck you," Mick mutters. He kicks the board back to his friend, then flicks off the SUV as it passes by.

  Leaning from side to side slowly to move his board back and forth, CJ shoves his hands into the pockets of his jacket and frowns at Mick's feet. The kid is doing it all wrong. He waits too long to jump off the curb, that's what's throwing him off. As Mick sets up for another try, CJ suggests, "Maybe you should kick up sooner."

  Mick gives him a hateful stare. "I know what I'm doing," he growls.

  "I'm just saying." CJ shrugs. It's nothing to him. He waits until Mick jumps -- and the skateboard skitters away, another fouled attempt -- before he adds, "You're waiting too long. If you set up just before the curb --"

  Mick glares at Brendan. "Who the fuck is this?" he wants to know.<
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  "I'm CJ --"

  "Can you even skate?" Mick asks. Beneath those stumpy dreads, his eyes flash in a challenge, and CJ's cheeks burn with an indignant heat.

  "I can do a kick flip," CJ replies. As he steps off his board, his heart begins to thud like a drum in his chest -- Brendan's watching him now, Mick sees him, and his body floods with adrenaline. His legs feel shaky, his fingers numb. He gets this way when he's put on the spot, one reason he used to hate school, it made him this nervous whenever the teacher called on him in class. No, not nervous, anxious, brimming with anticipation because he knows he can skate, he knows he's better than these jokers, and now's his chance to prove it. "I can even do a triple heel flip," he tells them, which isn't exactly true but he's thought about it and thought about it until he's pretty damn sure he can pull it off. With a laugh that sounds more confident than he feels, he brags, "Shit man, I was skating before I could walk and I'm telling you, you're doing it wrong."

  Mick snatches up his board and stands aside. "Show us, then," he mutters. When CJ doesn't move, he nods at the empty curb. "Go on. Show us if you know what the hell you're doing."

  I do. Before he can think it through, CJ nudges his board into position. In his mind, he hears Richard's sensible voice, Babe, don't. You don't have to prove anything to these jerks. You're better than them and we both know it.

  Yeah, he knows. But he's talked himself up, he can't wimp out now. "You have to start back a bit farther," he mumbles, only partially speaking to the skaters. Richard's voice is his conscience, telling him to not be foolish, this is a parking lot with cars passing by and no one's going to stop if he falls on his ass in the street, they'll run him the fuck over, Mick was just lucky. Richard, please, he thinks, silencing his lover. I know what I'm doing. Trust me -- you always do. To Mick, he says, "And kick up before the curb, that's the secret. Watch me, I'll show you."