Hey Jude

The boy stood up as Mikey and I watched, and all I could think was 'aw, fuck,' because now we'd have to get involved. I, more than anyone, knew the degree to which Mikey would pursue the shit out of this.

I probably should have been happy for him, finally finding someone else he could see, but this boy had drama written all over him and I didn't feel like making a new friend. Maybe Mikey was staring at something else, like all the water that had flooded the grass as a result of the tap being run for ten minutes straight while the boy obsessed over the cleanliness of his damn shirt?

The boy contemplated his soaking shirt before opting to leave it off. He glanced around at the small group of teenagers watching him from the amphitheatre before hunching his shoulders, turning away from the light of the lamp, and beginning to make his way down the path in the opposite direction to us.

Mikey was out of my lap and running towards him before I had a chance to stop him. So that would be a 'no' to the 'maybe Mikey can't see the new guy' hope. I huffed in annoyance and followed to make sure he didn't get knifed by some crazy damp guy.

"What's your name?" I heard Mikey ask the very uncomfortable looking boy as I approached, and then he didn't bother waiting for a response before pulling a crumpled paper bag out of his pocket and offering it to the boy. "Want some candy?"

"Um, I'm not really..." the boy started awkwardly, but Mikey shook the bag insistently and the boy decided it would be easier to comply. He reached into the bag and took a piece. "Thanks," he mumbled, staring down at the candy but not eating it.

Mikey frowned in response, but it quickly morphed into a wide grin when he noticed my presence. "Jude Jude Juuude I found us a new friend!" Mikey turned to the new boy, pulling off one of the many bracelets from his wrist. “Here, new friend, have a friendship bracelet!” He thrust it forward and the boy blinked as he took it. Mikey beamed. “It even matches your eyes!”

Lime green and dark green weren't exactly a match, in my estimation, but as none of the crappy plastic jewellery Mikey wore was anything but eye searingly bright I supposed it was as close as he could get.

I raised an eyebrow at Mikey's unfortunate victim who looked like he wanted nothing more than to get away. I knew that feeling. "Mikey, not everyone wants to be your friend."

I immediately felt bad when Mikey's expression changed to one of absolute horror. Yeah, this guy wasn't getting away. "What's your name?"

"Um..." His hesitation had me expecting a lie. "Zion."

That was a weird name, but I was pretty sure it really was his name. "Like... the religious thing? Mount Zion?"

Zion shrugged and nodded.

"I like it!" Mikey declared. Zion flinched when Mikey grabbed his hand, but he didn't pull away. "Come on!"

It was only as Mikey dragged him back towards the amphitheatre that I noticed the drops of blood on Zion's pants, and suddenly his obsessive scrubbing reminded me of that bit in Macbeth. Out, damned spot! There was blood on his pants, and presumably there had been blood on his shirt. Every part of him I could see was uninjured. As meek and harmless as Zion seemed, I wasn't so sure I wanted Mikey around him. Unfortunately, I doubted Mikey would let me decide that for him.

Finn, previously skulking elsewhere, had crept up when Mikey had dragged Zion back to our spot. Finn and I were both blond and around the same height and build, but other than that didn’t resemble each other in any way. For one thing, Finn had a softness about his features that I lacked. He was the bright yellow haired, light brown eyed last born in a string of sons. He had something like two older brothers.

I had none. I think it showed. Not that I wanted any brothers, or sisters; that would mean either of my parents procreating again. I didn't have a soft face, and I didn't have bright eyes. Just pale blue ones. Finn was full of colour, and I was leached of it.

Finn was currently doing an unsubtle job of eavesdropping. If Mikey were even aware of it, he'd never call Finn out on it. Despite Finn's devotion, Mikey still denied his existence. I climbed up and sat beside Finn, a few rows back from where Mikey and Zion were sitting.

“This just isn't fair.” Finn glared at Zion's back. “If there is a God, he's cruel and he hates me.”

I patted him on the shoulder in an awkward show of support. “Well, the popular theory is that there is a God, and he hates the gays, so... enjoy that.”

Zion twisted around to give us a nervous glance, and I realised he was eavesdropping on us just as much as Finn was eavesdropping on them. I stared him down and he quickly dropped his gaze. He ran one hand through his light brown curls, self-conscious, and I saw he had put on Mikey's friendship bracelet. Maybe I didn't have to worry about him around Mikey after all.

#

It was a school night. I might have stayed out, just drifting and thinking, but I had to take Mikey back to his house. Afterwards, I followed some older guys back to their place and crashed on their couch without their consent, each of them assuming one of the others had given me permission. Too easy.

I didn't sleep well that night. Mikey was naïve enough to assume Zion had a home to go to when we'd left him, but I was fully aware that Zion had nowhere to go. It was bothering me. I wasn't used to being bothered by other peoples' problems, but Mikey had gone and gotten us involved and now I had ended up caring.

The next morning, I headed back to the park instead of going to school. Mikey wouldn't be happy about being abandoned, but I'd done it plenty of times before and Finn would at least be there to keep him safe, even if he couldn't keep Mikey company. His hang-dog devotion was good for something.

Zion was nowhere in sight when I got there. I felt immediate disappointment, but I'd gone to the grocery store on the way over and bought him some food with my limited funds, so there was no way I was giving up without a search.

Eventually, I did find him. Up a tree. A tall tree, in fact, right near the top. I didn’t know how he’d gotten up there — I was taller than him, and I couldn't have reached the lowest branch even with a running jump. Why he was up there was also a mystery, but I was beginning to realise that strangeness was something I would have to get used to from this boy. That was okay. Mikey had gotten me used to tolerating peculiar behaviour, even if Zion was a different brand of weird entirely.

I hadn't exactly been looking for Zion up in the trees, because who would, but I'd spotted him by the contrast of his white t-shirt against the dark greens and browns of the tree. It was the same one he’d been obsessively washing the night before. All his tree climbing had left it stained again, but I suspected he wouldn't be washing those marks out with nearly as much dedication.

“Hey, Zion!” I called up to him, as he didn't seem to have noticed me. He’d been staring off into space, as though in a trance, but upon hearing his name his head snapped down, eyes meeting mine, and a moment later he started his descent.

He moved with an almost unnatural grace, fast and smooth, unafraid of falling. He dropped from the lowest branch onto the ground, landing perfectly. The awkward look on his face as his eyes met mine contrasted dramatically with his confidence in the tree.

For a moment a just stopped and stared, mouth open to speak but words caught in my throat, when I noticed the forest green of his eyes. The dim lighting the night before had hidden how unusually bright they were. It had hidden a lot of things about them. In the full light of day, I didn’t have to be attracted to men to acknowledge he was gorgeous. I shut my mouth and wet my lips, and when I tried to speak again I managed to get words out.

“Hunting birds?” I asked, attempting to reassure him that I meant no harm. He didn't look any less uneasy, so I was fairly sure I'd failed.

He smiled nervously. “Just… climbing. I like to climb.”

Right. Weird. He was looking at me like he wasn’t sure why I was talking to him or what I was doing there, so I cut right to the chase. “Hungry?”

Unsurprisingly, he was. I sipped slowly at my bottle of Mountain Dew, trying to give myself something to do other than stare at him. He was nervous enough. Every now and then, though, when he was too focussed on consuming his food to notice, I found my gaze drawn to him as I tried to make sense of the strange boy before me.

He was healthy. Dirty and tired from recent events, but healthy. He’d probably lived a pretty comfortable life before. Which was why, though I wasn’t generally one to pry, I asked my next question.

“Why’d you get kicked out?” Blunt. To the point.

He froze, his anxiousness quickly morphing into panic. Wrong question.

“Or did you run away?” He hadn't said, so either was possible. I let my gaze wander to a couple of guys playing frisbee on the other side of the park. Zion was freaking out enough without me staring him down.

“I, uh…” Desperately searching for an answer. “I’m gay,” he decided, sounding a bit too relieved that he’d come up with it. Obvious lie. I could believe that he was gay, but I doubted it was the reason for his eviction.

“Okay,” was all I said in response. I wasn’t going to ask for answers he didn’t want to give, despite my curiosity. Not my business.

“But you... That's okay with you?” he asked, and I suddenly remembered what he'd overheard me saying to Finn the night before. I valiantly managed not to laugh. If I was actually homophobic, I'd probably have picked different friends. Finn hardly kept his sexuality a secret, and Mikey... well, whether Mikey was gay or not I didn't know, but I doubted a homophobe would want to be anywhere near him. He was rather affectionate.

“I don't care who you stick your dick in as long as it isn't me,” I told him, then struggled to keep a straight face as his eyes widened and his face flushed. It was pretty funny, and not a reaction I'd ever be able to extract from Mikey no matter what I said or did to him. New game: making Zion blush.

“Most guys are afraid I’ll like… hit on them, or perv on them, or something.” He looked embarrassed as soon as he realised what he’d just said, but I just tried to hide my amused smile. He was making the game easy.

“I have better things to worry about. I don’t get it, anyway. What’s to be afraid of? You gonna rape me?” His cheeks were red by now. “I'm thinking even if you had the inclination, you might have some difficulty pulling that one off. And if you really want to look, go ahead. I don't care.”

Somewhere in my quest to embarrass Zion, I seemed to have diffused his fear. That was more satisfying than I would have expected.

#

Mikey and I both had some pretty major issues, but we'd become masters of not talking about our own and not asking about each others'. When Zion had joined our group, he'd naturally started doing the same. Whatever had happened to him, he really didn't want to talk about it. Sometimes, though, he let small things slip, and when he did I listened.

"I'm staying in a church," Zion said out of the blue one day. He'd been hanging out with me and Mikey at Mikey's house, distracting us from our homework. Mikey had finished his and fallen asleep on the sofa a few minutes ago.

I looked over at him from where I was sitting on the floor, sorting through my worksheets to make sure I'd completed them all. "Oh?"

Zion was sitting on the floor next to me, his knees up and his arms folded on top of them. "Yeah, in this room right up the top. I think the pastor knows, but he's never bothered me."

Since he seemed to want to talk, I kept the conversation going. "How'd you get in?"

“Climbed up. The window wasn’t locked.” Somehow, that didn’t surprise me. Not that the window wasn’t locked — that was just stupid — but that he was able to climb up. Zion could climb anything. “But if there is a God, he probably wouldn’t like me staying there. But whatever. If he wants me to leave, he can smite me a little or something.”

“Why wouldn’t he want you staying there?” I pressed, hoping I wasn’t pushing it.

He paused, closed off slightly, and I knew before he even spoke that he was about to lie to me. “Because I’m gay, and the Bible says that’s bad, I guess?”

“Hmm. The Bible says a lot of things. If there is a God, I wouldn’t put it on him. It’s the people you have to concern yourself with.”

Zion frowned for a moment.“Most people aren't so bad, you know.”

“If people weren't so bad you wouldn't be living on your own in a fucking church. Good people don't let that happen to their kids,” I insisted.

He frowned, bit his lip, and shook his head. "It's late. I should go."

I wanted to stop him, and almost did, before realising that pushing him after he'd opened up was a bad idea. It would have been if I was in his position, anyway.

"Okay. See you tomorrow after school?"

He gave me a small, hesitant smile. "Of course. Night, Jude."

"Goodnight," I mumbled back as he headed for the door.

I gathered my school supplies, shoved them in my bag, and then went to steal Mikey's bed before he woke up and claimed it for himself.

#

It was a few days later that I woke up in my mum's house after a very shitty night's sleep. We had thin walls. Normally I would have just found somewhere else to sleep — something I'd become very good at — but I'd been out late hanging out with Zion and that had cut my options somewhat short. Next time, I vowed, I'd just sleep on a park bench.

I yawned and rolled over, lifting my arm up to sniff my armpit. Good, I didn't smell. I wouldn't have taken a shower here regardless, of course, because the bathroom was so gross I always felt dirtier coming out than I had going in, but it was good to know. That was one reason I kept my hair so short; nobody could tell if I'd even bothered combing it or not, let alone when it had last been washed.

I'd slept in my clothes, so getting ready consisted of putting on my shoes and grabbing my backpack. I'd piss at school, for aforementioned gross bathroom reasons. Though it was probably a bit of an exaggeration, I always imagined every surface of the house outside of my room (I kept my door locked at all times) was covered in a thin layer of crack and bodily fluids. This went about tenfold for the bathroom, though in reality it was more likely a mix of mold and soap scum.

Being used to all this bullshit, I shouldn't have been as surprised as I was to find a naked man in the kitchen as I made my way through it towards the front door. Being greeted by a bare, hairy ass first thing in the morning was not my idea of a good start to the day.

I grimaced in disgust as I tried to sneak past unnoticed, but unfortunately it was not to be. I held back a sound of dismay as he turned around to look at me, exposing me to the horror of full frontal male nudity. Yep, I was definitely sleeping on a park bench next time.

“Who are you?” the naked man had the nerve to ask. His hand reached down and I feared I was about to witness a naked dude scratching his balls, but he instead settled for somewhere on his upper thigh. I averted my eyes to save them from any potential future horrors.

“Put some clothes on,” I countered.

He laughed. “Oh, you the kid?”

I eyed the front door, wondering if he'd try to stop me if I just walked past him. I decided not to risk it for now. If he touched me, I would need a shower. And clean clothes.

“I fucked your mum, kid.” The man smiled broadly, leaning back against the kitchen counter. Ah, yes, that was why I didn't eat the food here. Thank you for the reminder, universe.

I heard, I thought but didn't say. “Congratulations?” I said instead, quirking an eyebrow at him.

“She begged for it,” he continued, apparently on a failing mission to get a rise out of me. If she had begged I hadn't heard it, for which I was grateful.

I grinned at him stiffly. “Well, I hope you used condoms.”

“Why?” he asked, and when he turned to look towards the living room where I assumed my mother was, I took the opportunity to dart past him. “Why?” he shouted after me, but luckily for the sanity of the neighbours he didn't pursue me outside.

Okay, so I didn't really know anything about my mum's STI status, but between the number of guys she slept with and the amount of drugs she did, I tended to assume she had something. From my mum, I had learnt that sex was gross. This was possibly not as bad as what I'd learnt from my father and his fondness of prostitutes. Sex was about control, I knew. It wasn't about love.

So, off to a bad start, and my skin was crawling, but I wasn’t late for once. Quite a bit too early, in fact. I sat on the low fence next to the gate that led into the school and watched a group of guys play soccer while I waited for Mikey. I was busy enough being grumpy that I didn't notice someone coming up behind me until I felt teeth digging into my shoulder. I only just managed to process the fact that Mikey was the only person who would do such a thing in time to stop myself from elbowing him in the face. I aimed lower and got him in the ribs instead.

#

At lunch Mikey, Finn, and I sat together at a cafeteria table, along with some other random idiots who we mostly ignored. Except Mikey, of course, who ignored them completely.

Finn had so kindly provided Mikey with a blueberry muffin — Mikey’s favourite — which Mikey proclaimed was ‘magic!’. That’s what you get for not existing, Finn. I shook my head sadly at Finn, just to make sure Mikey's excessive enthusiasm didn't make him forget how pathetic he was.

“What? My mum made them…” he said sheepishly. I raised my eyebrows at him sceptically and he relented. “Okay, I made them. But my mum taught me.”

“I’d say ‘this is getting sad’, but it got sad a very long time ago.”

“What?” Mikey asked.

“Nothing, Mikey.” I'd stopped bothering to tell him I wasn't talking to him a long time ago. If I did he'd just claim there was nobody else there, and I was a little tired of that. Sometimes I got the feeling he was too, but I knew he'd never admit to knowing we weren't the only people there.

Mikey went back to his magical blueberry muffin with a cheery, “Okay!”

Denial was Mikey's coping mechanism, and while it may not have been healthy it did keep him happy. That was good enough for me.

#

Normally I would have headed straight from school to the amphitheatre, but by the end of the school day I was still feeling grumpy from staying the night at my mum's house and decided I needed some time alone. Mikey didn't complain when I sent him home on his own. Considering all his eccentricities, he was surprisingly good at knowing when I needed space.

I picked a direction and began walking, hoping to exhaust my mind along with my body. My mind kept returning to things I'd rather it didn't, flashing to memories I'd rather forget.

Despite the fact that it was being at my mum's house that had put me in this mood, it was usually my father my thoughts drifted to at times like this. The nightmares usually starred him too, which was even more frustrating. He'd left when I was a child and at the time I'd been scared of him, but I knew he wouldn't be any threat to me now. He had always been a violent man and would likely always be bulkier and stronger than me, but he wasn't brave or skilled. I kept my head when things got ugly, and I didn't back down. I was fairly sure I could beat him in a fight. But knowing all this when I was awake didn't keep him from intimidating me in my dreams.

It didn't keep me from thinking about him, either. Remembering him, and the things he'd done to other people that I wished I hadn’t seen. I'd relived just one of the days with him over a hundred times in my head, replaying it obsessively, my imagination trying out dozens of tiny variations to see if I could have gotten away from him faster. I would never know for sure, because time only ran one way, but I couldn't stop myself. Trying just dragged out the exercise, and I knew better by now. The only way out of it was to bull through, and it was night by the time my brain finally exhausted the chosen scenario.

I’d circled back to my most frequent hangout, the park. The only light came from the moon shining dimly through the cloud cover and from the light posts lining the path. A gruff, angry voice cut through the quiet, barely audible in the distance.

It was curiosity, mostly, that had me heading towards the voice, though for the right person I wouldn't have minded getting into a fight. I still had a bit of energy to burn off, and while I didn't really give a fuck about most people there were limits to what I could walk away from. Still, there were even more things I wasn't interested in getting involved with, so I approached quietly. If it was just a drug deal gone wrong or something else I couldn't care less about, I would be able to back off.

“Jus' gimme the money an' you don't hafta get hurt,” the gruff voice was saying. Now that I was closer, I could tell that the speaker wasn't entirely sober.

I was about to leave, having decided it was probably a drug deal after all, when Zion's voice rooted me to the spot. “I told you, I don't have any money. Do I look like I have money?” He sounded more edgy than afraid.

My initial instinct was to charge in immediately to defend my friend, but logic had me creeping closer to assess the situation first. They weren't far from the path, and the light from the closest lamp was just bright enough to reveal three guys boxing Zion in against a tree.

Shit. Could Zion fight at all? Unless the men were really shitty fighters, I was going to have a tough time taking all of them on my own. I held back in the hope that they might back down and we could avoid a fight.

“Not gonna be smart, eh?” said Mr Gruff, who seemed to be the one running things. He shook his head at Zion disparagingly. “Stupid kid.”

When Gruff grabbed Zion I was ready to abandon my caution and defend him as best I could, but before I took more than two steps towards them Zion had twisted out of Gruff's clutches and easily dodged a punch aimed at his stomach. Surprise stopped me in my tracks as I quickly reassessed the situation.

The shift had brought Zion into the glow of one of the lamps, lighting up his face and revealing a savage expression that was almost a grin. My gut clenched uncomfortably, and suddenly the idea that Zion would be able to defend himself disturbed me more than the alternative.

The danger in Zion's eyes had been so clear to me that I was surprised when the men seemed unfazed.

What happened next was swift and brutal. While their ringleader was recovering from the hit Gruff’s two goons approached Zion, confident that this would be over quickly. And it would be. A fist swung at Zion. Dodged. A fist — Zion’s — to a goon’s face. Target hit. Crack. Blood.

The second goon was on him right away, but he was less confident now, having seen his friends go down so quickly, so efficiently. Having no backup. Goon number two’s fist headed straight for Zion, aimed high. Zion didn’t bother dodging, just grabbed the fist in mid-air before it made contact. He twisted the goon’s arm around, sending him to the ground. Too strong, too fast, too agile. A kick to the side, and I thought I heard a rib snap from the force. Screaming.

When Zion’s eyes caught in the light from the lamp, they seemed to glow. It reminded me of the stray cats who prowled the alley behind my mum's house, how the light from the hall caught their eyes when I snuck out the back door.

Gruff was up again. He must have missed what happened to his lackeys, because he didn’t look nearly scared enough. He had to have heard, though; heard fists and shoes hit flesh, the sickening crack of bones, the screaming. He must have heard the screaming. Maybe he was just stupid. I watched in horrified fascination.

It might have ended there, had Gruff thought better of attacking Zion again. Zion stood passively and watched as Gruff staggered slightly before he regained his equilibrium and charged at Zion with a loud shout, shoulder forward as though attempting to break down a door.

The man must have weighed almost twice as much as Zion, but the force of Gruff's body colliding with his didn't even stagger him. Zion wrapped his arms around Gruff like a hug, holding him still. And then he bit into Gruff's neck.

When I was a kid, a stray cat made the mistake of going into a yard with a dog in it. The dog grabbed it by the neck and shook it, and by the time I had pried open the dog's jaws, the cat had been dead. It had been soft and warm, and almost alive. I still had a tiny scar on my hand from where the dog had accidentally bitten me, and I still regretted kicking the dog because it wasn't its fault. It was just following its instincts.

So that was what I was thinking of, seeing Zion sink his teeth into the guy's neck, seeing blood begin to redden Zion's lips as Gruff swore and struggled. Of course, no matter what weird shit Zion had up his sleeve it would be literally physically impossible for him to shake Gruff like a rag doll by his throat; the several inches of height Gruff had on him would prevent it without even taking his weight into account. But that was the image I had, and I felt certain Gruff was about to die if I didn't intervene.

“Zion, stop,” I said as I stepped forward, closer to the glow of the lamp. My voice may have shaken a little.

Zion's body jolted at my surprise interruption, and the movement of his mouth caused Gruff to yelp as blood began to trickle out from between Zion's lips and soak into Gruff's shirt. Zion's arms pinned Gruff's arms down and then wrapped around Gruff's back as far as they could reach. Gruff was too wide for Zion's arms to link, but Zion appeared to have no difficulty restraining him.

Zion didn't release him immediately, his mouth remaining on Gruff''s neck as he watched me over Gruff's shoulder. His eyes were golden, almost feline. Unnatural. Slowly, though, the look in them changed from animal to human. Before my eyes, he changed from an angry predator into a scared, confused kid. He removed his teeth from Gruff's neck and released him, stepping away smoothly.

I was relieved to see that Gruff's new neck wound was bleeding only in a slow trickle. As soon as he was out of Zion’s grasp he ran, abandoning his injured friends who were still struggling to stagger to their feet. They looked like they were more interested in getting out of there as fast as they could than in pursuing further violence, so I turned my attention back to Zion.

There was still something animalistic in Zion's eyes as he stared back at me, and that was fear. He hadn't looked afraid once throughout the fight, but at that moment he looked terrified, ready to bolt if I made any sudden movement.

I slowly extended a hand in his direction, though he was too far away to grasp it. “Come on,” I said calmly, quietly. “We should leave.”

He didn't take my hand but he did follow me, head down. I saw him lick the blood from his lips from the corner of my eye. We were just out of visual range of the guys Zion had beat the shit out of and I was trying to figure out where the hell to take him when Zion stopped walking and dropped to the ground, knees up to his chest and face buried in them. He rocked forward and his shoulders trembled.

Fuck. How was it that dealing with someone who could tear my throat out with his sharp, sharp teeth sounded so much easier than dealing with a crying teenage boy?

“Zion. Zi.” I nudged his shoulder. “We should get out of here. I really do not want to have to explain what just happened to the cops.” I was having a hard enough time explaining it to myself.

He lifted his head and schooled his expression into one of calm determination, though the blood and tears on his face reduced its impact somewhat. “I need to leave.” He stood up, but I grabbed his arm before he could run off.

“No.” My grip tightened and I stared him down. I was sure in that moment that if I let him run away I would never see him again. I was confused about a lot of things right then, but I was certain I didn't want that.

He was still the boy I knew. He was still confused and alone and in desperate need of someone to look out for him. Whatever else he was, he was my friend. He was less than a year younger than me, but when he looked up at me with wet, terrified eyes, that gap seemed so much larger. To me he was a kid and, regardless of his physical capabilities, he needed my protection.

Figuring out where to take him was the next problem. It wasn't too late and there were a few people whose couches I could rely on, but Zion still had blood on his face, shirt, and hands... the latter of which he was currently licking clean.

I slapped his hand away from his mouth. “Don't do that, it's gross. He was probably on drugs, and who knows what diseases he might have.”

Zion grimaced and dropped his hands to his side, staring down at his feet guiltily.

I was worried the cops were going to show up, but all that blood on Zion would look alarming to anyone who saw him. It was also a rather uncomfortable reminder to me of where it had come from.

I pushed Zion to the drinking fountain near the children's play equipment on the outskirts on the park. “Wash it off. Quickly.”

I still didn't know where to take him. My mum's place was an option, but I really didn't want him to see that — for both our sakes. Blood aside, with the emotional state he was in I decided putting him around any other people right then would be a bad idea. That left only one option I could think of.

I placed a hand on Zion's back as he splashed water on his face and was pleased when, after an initial jolt of surprise at the contact, he ever so slightly relaxed.

I pulled his damp curls away from his face to keep them from getting any wetter. “Are you hurt?”

He took a deep breath before he spoke, trying to steady his shaking voice as if I didn't already know how close to tears he was. “No.”

“Good.” I stepped back when he pulled his shirt off but stopped him before he could start scrubbing at it too. “Don't bother. We'll dump it somewhere. I'll get you a new one.”

Zion nodded compliantly and balled up his shirt.

“Now,” I said, “how about you show me that church you've been staying in?”