Tonight and Every Night

Chapter 3-1

Chapter 3PJ didn’t run into Giant on campus during the week, which was normal. They didn’t have any classes together. Once he was eating in the dining hall when Giant came in with some other loudly talking men. He didn’t notice PJ, and PJ couldn’t think of any excuse to walk over to the table where they were flicking one another with pieces of dry cereal and shoveling down food. He sat by himself, pretending to eat and staring at Giant until he left, still surrounded by friends.

Once he passed Bradley in the entryway of the Liberal Arts building. The outside of Bradley’s arm was mottled purple with bruises. If he noticed PJ, he gave no sign of it.

The week passed the way it usually did—a mortifying struggle with classes and social interactions that he didn’t understand, punctuated with discrete and restful hours of math. Bland, lonely meals. Evenings of studying made slightly tense by the conversations of strangers in the library or the interruptions of his roommate Dayton or Dayton’s friends if he used the dorm room that he never thought of as his. Nights of fitful sleep.

It was funny how it had taken him days to sleep at all in a new room with a stranger, and weeks to sleep through the night with Dayton snoring a few feet away, but he had slept just fine in Giant’s bed with Giant pressed up against him. Even in the morning hours when he had been sticky with c*m and sweat.

He clapped a hand over his mouth and bit his palm punitively. Thank goodness he was alone and no one had heard him make that noise.

There had to be a way to see Giant again.

* * * *

It took PJ a while to track down a party where he might find Giant. He had to ask around, which involved talking to people who weren’t talking to him first, which was hard always, and he didn’t want to ask about Giant specifically, so he had to start a conversation with a banality like, “What are you doing this weekend?” and then bring it around to parties and then find out who was having the party and where it was. Eventually his Composition classmate Ewan, who sat next to him in the back row and sometimes commiserated with him about how poorly they were both doing, mentioned a party that Billy’s former roommate Non was having, which was the best lead PJ had gotten so far.

He showed up at a quarter to ten, because he wasn’t sure if this was a really cool party where people came and stayed for a long time, or a lame party where the cool people only put in an appearance and moved on, or the best party available that they would come to later and end up staying. Usually he just went to whatever party Taylor and Billy invited him to and stayed until they left. He hadn’t spoken to either of them since that night, and had avoided even looking in Taylor’s direction when they had class together.

He drank one beer too fast, then half the second, then felt ready to converse awkwardly with strangers. After a dozen heys and another beer, he found himself heying Ewan, who was just giving up on a conversation with a girl whose plastic cup of something magenta had caught up with her. She was slumping against her short-shorted friend, who absently held her up with one arm while gesticulating with her own pink drink to a bleary-eyed freckled boy.

“Hey. Have you seen Giant?”

“Giant…” Ewan tilted his head, thoughtfully or maybe drunkfully.

“Um, like a foot taller than me, dark hair, really muscular? He lives with Bradley.”

“Oh, from the hockey team?”

“Yes, he plays hockey.”

“He’s starting tomorrow. He wouldn’t be partying tonight.”

“Starting?”

“Yeah, you know. The players who are on the ice first, the ones who definitely play. Not on the bench.”

“Oh. Right. Um, can people go watch that?”

Ewan looked at him funny. That must have been a Dumb Question. “Of course. I have a season pass. You can buy individual tickets before the games. They’re probably not sold out this early in the season.”

“Oh. Thanks.”

He would go to the game tomorrow, PJ decided. He could at least look at Giant from far away.

* * * *

PJ knew that hockey was played on ice; he wore a sweatshirt. He was still pretty cold. He huddled on the bench, waiting for the game to start. He had imagined the playing simply beginning, maybe with a whistle or a bell. In reality, there were a bunch of shouted announcements he couldn’t understand, then introductions of the players with statistics he didn’t understand. He did understand that the announcer showed photos of the team members on the big screen at one side as he talked about them. Giant looked into the camera with a self-conscious smile that PJ had never seen in real life. The photo must have been taken at least a few months ago because his hair came to just below his earlobes. It was curlier shorter. PJ stared until Giant’s face was replaced by another oversized portrait.

Next, the teams skated in their separate rows onto the ice. Giant was easy to spot because he was the tallest and had the widest shoulders.

Then some playing happened. PJ didn’t know the rules or if there was a strategy, but it was kind of fun to watch how quickly and smoothly everyone zoomed around the ice.

Suddenly, the spectators around him shouted angrily, making him jump and flinch. Then he saw Giant slamming into a player from the opposing team and smashing him into the partition so forcefully that the bang was audible even at PJ’s distance. People cheered again, this time happily. The referees were scolding someone.

PJ never sorted out what had happened, but it appeared to be the opposing team that had done wrong, so that was good. And Giant kept playing, so he must not have gotten hurt crashing into the other guy. Was he supposed to do that? PJ hadn’t seen the referee yell at him, so maybe he was. Did he have to do it a lot? It looked terrifying.

PJ started reading the Wikipedia article about hockey, which seemed to say that sometimes running into people was allowed and sometimes it wasn’t. Hockey involved a lot of weird words. PJ didn’t feel like he understood it much better by the time the game ended.

“Hey. PJ.” Ewan was on his way out with two girls who walked with their arms linked and their phones out. They both wore puffy coats. When Ewan paused, they stopped without looking away from the screens.

“Were you here by yourself?” Ewan asked. “You should have come and sat with us.”

“My ticket wasn’t near anyone I know.”

“Oh, that doesn’t matter unless the stands are full. If there’s space, you can take any empty seat.”

“What if the people who have that seat come later?”

Ewan shrugged. “They can ask you to move.”

That sounded terrifying, but PJ said, “Okay, thanks. I will next time.” He had already decided to come back.

PJ saw a small crowd gathering by one of the side doors. “What’s going on over there?”

Ewan glanced around. “Family and friends waiting for the players to come out. They have to shower and change, and probably the coach says something about how they played.”

“Movie,” one of the girls remarked.

“We’re going to see Death Mall 5 if you want to come.”

“Um, no, but thanks.”

Ewan gave him a half-wave and strolled away, followed by the two girls. They still hadn’t looked up.

PJ couldn’t go wait by the doors. He wasn’t a family or a friend. But walking in that direction was probably fine. Just passing by. He moved as slowly as he could, trying to look lost in thought. The people waiting stood in small clusters, talking to one another. He had already passed them when he heard a sudden surge in volume as the players came out.

He let himself glance back briefly, grateful that Giant was so easy to spot, then made himself keep moving. When Giant’s deep voice called his name, his heart went tha-thunk so hard his chest actually hurt. He turned, trying to look casual. His hands were shaking, so he stuffed them in the front pocket of his sweatshirt.

“Were you inside?” Giant asked.

PJ nodded. Giant had showered. He smelled clean and his hair curled damply around his neck. PJ tried not to think of Giant wet and naked, or of his warm, wet hands on PJ’s body. It was working as well as trying not to think about something usually worked. He clenched his hands on the absorbent cotton of his shirt.

“…weren’t cold?”

He had lost track of what Giant was saying. Was he cold? “No.”

“Oh. Good. Hey, are you going to the party at Mark B’s later?”

PJ didn’t think he knew Mark B. “Uh, I hadn’t heard about it.”

“Well, come if you want. Mark and Brody are always too stoned to care. I’ll give you the address. It’s on the same street as my building, a couple blocks closer to campus. Easy to find.” Giant was looking for something in his gym bag. “Here, give me your hand.”

PJ managed to make his hand let go of the sweatshirt and come out of his pocket. Giant’s larger hand closed around it, then smoothed it open and straight so he could write on PJ’s palm. PJ tried not to tremble as Giant wrote, 23A Camino, and under that, International Court Apts.

A guy from the team was calling Giant. “See you later,” Giant said.

Halfway back to his dormitory it occurred to PJ that Giant could have told him to put the address in his phone.

* * * *

Mark and Brody’s was as easy to find as Giant had said. PJ’s phone told him it was seven tenths of a mile from campus. He had barely gotten too hot.

He stood in the dark parking lot for twenty minutes, watching to see if Giant arrived. Then he started feeling stupid, and also wondering if someone might call the police because he was loitering, so he went in. The door was ajar, so he didn’t have to knock and talk to whoever answered.

Giant was sitting on the couch, listening to a heavy guy PJ was pretty sure had been playing earlier. The guy had his arm around a girl with fluffy blonde hair, and Giant had a brunette in a mini-dress leaning on him.

PJ knew the brunette’s name. It was Nialle, and she had been making out with Giant at a party last month. Then, PJ had thought what he felt watching them might have been jealousy, but now he knew it had been something milder, like wishful thinking. This was jealousy, and it felt a lot ickier in his stomach.

Just go before he sees you. PJ turned and was confronted by the incoming crowd of Taylor and his followers.

“BJ! Hey guys, Blow-Job in da house! Wassup, Beej? Have a beer! Or do you want something else in your mouth?”

PJ’s entire head felt hot. There was a pulsating sound in his ears so that he couldn’t hear the laughter that had to be coming from the sea of gaping, grinning mouths.

He saw something collide with Taylor’s face. It was a beer can at the end of Giant’s long arm.

“You’re pretty loud for someone who’s been hiding from me all week.” Giant’s voice was even deeper and growlier than the one he had used with Bradley. PJ ducked under his arm and walked away, heart pounding sickeningly. Behind him he heard a yelp and a man saying, “Whoa, whoa! Guys!”

The back door to the common area was open. PJ went outside. A couple of girls sharing a joint glanced up, then ignored him as he leaned against the wall and breathed in and out.

After a minute, a shadow fell across his face. He raised his head and saw Giant leaning against the wall, blocking the light from the bulb over the door.

Giant held up two longnecks. When PJ nodded, Giant popped off the caps with his thumb and handed one to him.

They both drank. “Don’t let those guys get to you,” Giant said. “They’re assholes.”

“Okay. Yeah.”

“Anyway, I kicked them out. You don’t have to leave because of them.”

“That wasn’t why—” PJ stopped himself.

“Why what? Hey, were you leaving? Without even saying hi? How come?”

PJ picked at the damp beer label with his fingernail. “Is Nialle your girlfriend?”