Ten Thousand Saints - Eleanor Henderson [146]
Rooster answered the door with a towel around his waist. He’d had a good thirty seconds between the buzzer and the knock to throw on some clothes, but he stood there at the door bare-chested, barefoot, the black curls on his tattooed chest matted and wet. He was a hairy motherfucker, and he’d lost even more weight. He looked like a drowned black cat.
“Where’s Johnny?”
“Why? You gonna finish kickin’ his ass?” Rooster did not sound threatened, but the Band-Aid on his forehead, covering his own wound from the riot, made it difficult for Jude to take him seriously.
“I know he’s staying here. I know he sleeps in that bed with you, okay?”
Rooster thrust Jude into the apartment and closed the door. It seemed bigger, though not big, with the Murphy bed hidden away. Johnny’s army duffel was in the corner, next to his tattoo case and his guitar. “Jesus, you got a loud mouth, kid.” Rooster was half-laughing. “Tell everyone for all I care, but Johnny won’t be very happy with you.” He swaggered into the bathroom. With the door open, he sprayed a shot of deodorant into each armpit.
“I’m not happy with him, either.” Jude dropped his skateboard against the door. “Where is he?”
Rooster said, “Went out to buy some rubbers,” examining his teeth in the mirror. Rubbas. “Regular and Magnum. I won’t tell you who gets which.”
“Oh, Jeezum, don’t make me throw up.”
“You axed me.”
Jude stood with his arms crossed in the middle of the room. He didn’t want to sit. Every surface he imagined Johnny and Rooster fucking on. He had been mostly successful in fighting off these images, but now, in this apartment, they were not to be escaped. It wasn’t long ago that he’d learned how gay men actually had sex; Teddy’s mother, laughing at them, had used the word heinie. Now he saw Rooster bending Johnny over the bathroom sink, the kitchen counter, the milk crate on his delivery bike. Johnny fucking his hairy back, this man named Rooster who said “axed,” this bald, punk, homo Tony Danza. Rooster crying out, Ay, oh, oh, ay!
“Did you come over here to tell Johnny he’s a fag? ’Cause it ain’t news to him, not no more.”
“I need to talk to him about Eliza. His wife.”
“Soon to be ex.” Rooster came out of the bathroom. “His lawyer guy’s workin’ on a divorce as we speak. The Krishnas don’t look kindly at divorce, but it don’t look like he’s got a choice.”
“Yeah, well, Johnny needs to tell his lawyer guy to back the fuck off Eliza. She’s not giving him her baby.”
Rooster shrugged. “The guy wants to adopt the kid. Ain’t nothin’ Johnny can do about it now.”
“He can back him the fuck off. If they even think about making her take a drug test”—Jude was stabbing a finger in the air—“they will be fucking sorry. He’s put her through enough shit already.”
“Man, don’t axe me, but if the girl’s been doin’ drugs, what she needs to take is a drug test.”
Jude stepped up to Rooster and stabbed his finger into his pec. “You know why she was doing drugs? Two fucking joints? Because Johnny was here in this shithole, fucking you. She’s sixteen and she was alone and she was scared, and Johnny didn’t give one shit about her. He’s been using her all along, as a cover for what he’s been doing with you. Mr. Clean? What a fucking joke! And if he doesn’t back the fuck off her baby, I swear to God, I will tell her who he’s been fucking. I’ll tell everyone.”
“Calm down, kid.”
“You want all your friends knowing about you guys?”
“You think a bunch a straight edge kids are gonna care? We’re all fags anyways. It’s a fuckin’ front. So shut your fuckin’ homophobic mouth for a second and listen to yourself.” Rooster tossed Jude’s hand off him. “You sound like the fuckin’ jealous wife.” From the bag of laundry, Rooster plucked out a T-shirt and pulled it over his head. Youth of Today. “You sure you ain’t the one that’s jealous?”
Rooster let the wet towel drop to the floor. Jude looked away, but not before