Gideon

The taste of bourbon on my lips. The soft burn in my throat and the warmth spreading in my chest.

"Ah, hell."

A single tear escaped an eye, and I wiped it away hastily. Sitting alone on the couch sifting through Netflix sort of just added insult to injury. It's a Friday night, I'm perpetually single, perpetually alone. Depressed, suicidal... oh, and my only son fucking hates me.

She should be here, not me.

Bourbon only fixed so much, but I felt it somehow did a better job than my anti-anxiety meds, so whatever. I'd already taken an Ativan earlier, why not throw some alcohol on top for funsies? I have a high tolerance to benzos, anyway.

I toggled through show after show with the PS-4 controller but couldn't fucking settle on anything. Nothing new that caught my eye, and I'd probably watched nearly everything else on there over the past year. Work from home, exercise from home, party from home... on the couch. Always in my lounge pants. Alone.

Twenty more minutes or so passed, and I had long since switched to one of the various streaming platforms I was stupid enough to pay for. I ended up settling on Alien. Something to zone out to, something that I guess never got old, unlike me.

Then from upstairs, I heard a soft shuffle. Footfalls which were light and unobtrusive trailing their way down to me. It wasn't Drew, because at six-foot-two, Drew walked like a one-man herd of elephants. I didn't bother to look, didn't bother to change my position.

I knew it to be Marcus. He and Drew were hanging out for the weekend, as they often had lately. Marcus did a sort of shuffle, not in an obnoxious way, just like, this little "swish, swish" sound from his socked feet as he glided across the laminate flooring.

The swishing stopped just short of the couch, where the carpeting began. He greeted me with a soft, "hey".

I rubbed my eyes and looked over just in time to see him round the couch. He lingered near the cushion furthest away, dark brown eyes settling on the television. He squinted a bit, eyes adjusting to the lowlight.

I took a lazy swig of Bourbon, not necessarily proud to admit I'd already worked my way halfway through the bottle tonight alone. I tried to rationalize it by telling myself tonight was just 'different'.

"... sup." I mumbled, and let my gaze wander back to the television. The Nostromo waking slowly, computers starting up, running code, lights flickering on, the Crew's cryo-pods opening one by one.

He hummed, wandering closer until he was hovering in front of the cushion next to me. His eyes lingered on the screen for a bit longer before they found mine. I wasn't sure what to do except return the look, and anyway, the ever-observant Marcus Anderson could probably see my inebriation plain as day.

"This is a classic." He exhaled, slipping a black scrunchie off his wrist. I observed silently as he put his shoulder-length hair up into a pleasing, albeit haphazard knot on top of his head. Everything about the way Marcus dressed screamed androgyny, down to his jewelry, and short, well-kept, glossy black nails, and it always seemed to suit him somehow. His face leaned more on the masculine side, mostly in his cheekbones I thought, and his jawline, but still there was also something inherently soft about him that I couldn't quite put my finger on.

There was a lot about Marcus that sort of puzzled me; it was like I couldn't look away when he was around, but then I wasn't sure why I was looking at him in the first place either. Not missing my silence, his eyes found mine in question. "Do you mind if I join you?"

I tried to blink some of the stupor away and ran my hand down my face. "Uh, no..."

"Sweet."

He lent me a warm smile. Yeah, that classic, crooked grin. Marcus had a bit of a gap between his front teeth, but his teeth altogether were otherwise pretty straight. He'd never had braces, and his canines were sharp-looking, and more pronounced than average, while the right one was a bit crooked. It tilted to the left, overlapping slightly with the outer edge of the right front tooth. He reminded me of a cat, but that wasn't necessarily a bad thing.

He had a nice smile, and I like cats.

I'd never met someone like him before, and the pierced young man standing there with his hair done up was a far cry from the fourteen-year-old who used to talk my ear off about 14-year-old things on the rare occasion he saw me. The boys used to play together, back when life was better, before my family fell apart, before Yahaira passed. Before a lot of awful shit happened.

In any case, Marcus always seemed to recall more about me than I did him, which I think embarrassed him a bit. He was really a piece of our past. A piece that returned to us on a random, blustery, autumn day a few months back. His reappearance was uncanny, and I found a welcome anomaly in my otherwise very depressing life. Marcus was my son's opposite in every single way. He had a wonderful relationship with his parents, he was pleasant, talkative, helpful, and for some bizarre reason, didn't seem to hate me.

When he'd wandered back into our lives, I fully anticipated he would glower in my direction and non-person me the same way my son did. After all, I was sure Drew trash-talked me thoroughly to whatever friends he might have. But Marcus didn't seem to absorb said trash-talking if he was hearing it, or perhaps he was just good at hiding his disdain for me. Who knows. From what I could see on the outside, Marcus was direct with Drew, and straight-shooter. A 'cut the bullshit' kind of guy, and my son desperately needed a friend like that in his life. But the one thing that confused me the most was that he often went out of his way to converse with me in the small, passing moments when he wasn't hanging with my son. I didn't really get it but appreciated his kindness more than he had to know.

"... got any more of that?"

His voice broke the silence again, and although I welcomed it, the whole encounter threw me for a loop. I couldn't recall the last time someone just sat with me and watched a movie. It'd been years, probably. It's not like I'd been trying my hand at online dating, anyway.

At thirty-eight, I'd long since lost my sense of self. My purpose in life. That all died with my ex-wife, and the self-loathing only grew with every hateful look my son bestowed upon me. Coupled with PTSD, depression, and anxiety, I was a shell of my former self. Nothing to see here. Nothing that mattered. I just kinda hoped if I drank enough I might O.D. one night and leave Drew all my assets, especially the life insurance policy. I didn't have much else to offer him. I'd tried in vain to rebuild our relationship, but he had no desire to connect, and I guess I couldn't blame him either. But even so, I grieved the loss of him daily. I missed my son so much that what was left of my heart physically ached.

"Gid, you in there?"

I stared into the tumbler in my hand and swirled the amber liquid around.
"... yeah."

Marcus adjusted on the cushion, turning himself to face me, knees drawn up to his chest all cozy-like. He wasn't wearing much. An undeniably short, snug pair of sleep shorts, while he was bare from the waist up, save for a black, oversized zip-up sweatshirt falling off his shoulders. He had black socks on with little sparkly crescent moons on them, pulled up to his shins, while his thighs were toned and as fair as the rest of him. His piercings glinted under the glow of the television as he swayed here and there in his seat, and I found myself staring at them as usual.

"I asked you if you had any more of that." He pointed at the bourbon in my hand, and there was this sort of look in his eyes that seemed to be doing all the thinking for me. All the complex thoughts I couldn't manage on a lonely Friday night. Or, well, not so lonely now...

I glanced down at my glass, then at the bottle nestled on the floor on the other side of the couch.
"... You're like, what, twenty?"

He rolled his eyes. "I'll be twenty-one in two months, what's the difference?"

I grunted in some amusement. "Um, it would seem the 'difference' is two months."

Marcus huffed and gave me a catty look before helping himself with the pack of smokes I had on the coffee table. I said nothing, just watched as he lit one up, then relaxed deep into the couch as if he lived here.

I put my hand out and wiggled my fingers. "Klepto. Now gimme."

He smirked, and handed over the pack, eyes consuming me like an open book or some shit. I tried to ignore that.

"Mm, y' know what?" he exhaled a plume of smoke and watched it float away, rolling the cigarette between his thumb and forefinger. "On second thought, you're not grumpy right now, you're just brooding."

I exhaled a dry laugh. "Wasn't aware you had initial thoughts about my mood in the first place, but okay."

His voice was confident, gazing away at the television lazily. "I have many thoughts, Gideon. And you get a certain look on your face when you brood anyway, you're literally wearing it right now."

I frowned and took a heavy drag off my smoke, eyeing him tiredly. "... Uh-huh. Sure. Anyway, there a reason you're down here, and not up there?" I gestured with my chin at the ceiling, Drew's room was just above the den, and to be honest, I wasn't really in the mood to have my emotions exposed by Marcus. For some reason he was painfully good at dredging up feelings I worked constantly to repress.

Marcus just smiled and took in a lungful of smoke, tendrils of it escaping from his lips like a living thing. "Cause, I'm bored."

"... bored? Weren't you guys playing video games?"

"Were." he shrugged. "Drew snuck out his window and climbed down the arbor to go fuck a girl."

For some reason I couldn't help but focus on his pale, toned shoulders and arms as he spoke, the way his chest looked when he took a deep breath. His skin was almost creamy, like alabaster. Huh. I rubbed my eyes and dropped my head back against the couch, feeling really weird. Heavily buzzed wasn't the right word to describe me, no, I was definitely drunk.

"Drew's nearly twenty-one, he could've just used the front door." I mumbled. 

"That's what I said."

"So, you thought the next funnest thing would be to come hang with an old man?" I jested at my own expense, clutching to the nicotine in my lungs like a lifeline.

"You're not old." He hummed, brushing a stray, wavy bit of hair behind his ear.

I shifted in my seat and rubbed the back of my neck, sort of uncomfortable. Yes, yes. Marcus was forward. He kind of just said whatever was on his mind, I knew this. But I just couldn't really fathom why he'd gone out of his way to spend his evening with me. I could understand being bored, sure, but I had to be the last resort if he was down here.

"... Tell that to my body." I relented and watched the smoke drift from my lips and dance in the low light. "Anyway, kind of a dick move for Drew to ditch, if you ask me. Sorry 'bout that."

He shrugged. "Eh. She's horny, he's horny, I don't blame 'em. Guy's got oats to sow."

I swallowed hard and sighed. Please tell me said oats are being wrapped up. I hadn't actually known if Drew was into women to be honest, because of course he never talked to me. I didn't know if he was gay or straight, or in between. It didn't matter to me either way, and this was the first I'd ever heard of my son fucking around with a member of the opposite sex since he moved in two years back. Point is, this shit was 'news' to me.

"... she got a name?"

Marcus looked away from the television and eyed me. "Rayleigh."

"Oh."

"I know. Underwhelming name, but she's cute enough. Not the first time they've fucked." He mumbled, twirling the end of a loose strand with his free hand. "But don't worry. Drew's a tightass about using protection."

I felt my face burn. Not out of embarrassment of knowing that my son was probably nuts deep in pussy right now, but that his friend could tell I was worried about my adult child being safe while he did it. That his friend had to be the one assuring me my son wasn't being a dumbass with his dick. That his friend knew more about my own son than I did.

"... okay."

"I mean, that's what you were worried about, yeah?" He chirped, reading me again as if he were ordering off a menu.

I let out a sigh of defeat. "... Drew doesn't tell me much."

"And so, you worry about him, huh?" Marcus' chest rose and fell gently, and I don't think he was concerned about whether this might be a touchy subject for me one bit. He probably saw it just like he saw everything else in this home- clearly. I studied him thoughtfully, finding my gaze settling on his pierced nipples. Every piercing he had was gold or gold plated, and these were no exceptions. Simple gold bars that looked undeniably pretty against his fair skin, against pink nipples.

They made him look sexual in a way I didn't know what to do with, or what to make of. I wasn't really attracted to men; not to say I couldn't appreciate a good-looking guy, but I'd always thought myself straight. Marcus... sort of fucked with me, and I couldn't even begin to untangle the confusing shit running through my inebriated brain. The only way I knew to handle it was to simply not think about it at all. Why was I staring at his nipples again? What about them? They're just nipples.

I rubbed my temple and sighed, filing away every weird thought best I could. "Of course I worry, Marcus, he's all I got."

That was truly all I could muster, but it felt futile to even voice it. Drew didn't care if I lost sleep over him. Drew certainly didn't lose sleep over me, but it still didn't change the fact that he was legitimately all I had left. All I had to live for at this point, if this could even be called living.

Marcus draped his arm around the back of the couch, fingertips now just a few inches from my shoulder. He heaved a matter-of-fact sigh. "Gideon, you know what you need?"

"A Lobotomy." I chuckled.

He clicked his tongue against the roof of his mouth and waved me off. "Don't be ridiculous. You just need your cock sucked."

What the fuck? My heart skipped multiple beats, and everything seemed to slow to a halt as I tried to process what I thought I heard. I had to have misheard him.

"... I'm sorry?"

He gazed flatly into my eyes and blew smoke at my face. "Your cock. I know you heard me the first time. You're not that old."