Page 92 of Mann Hunt
Justin continued, “Ian made himself up, too. I painted this big black star on his face and he covered the rest in white. Then we got into these cool white suits. He turned on some music, then started taking pictures as we both started to dance around. We were killing ourselves laughing. For the first time I didn’t care about anything—school, hockey, my dad, nothing—because for that moment I was justme.”
“That all sounds great.” Charlie said.
“It was. Then a couple of days later he showed me the pictures. They looked fantastic. He told me he was so proud of me. He said I was a natural.” Justin was getting agitated. He started to rub his thighs with the heels of his hands.
Charlie’s phone chirped with an incoming text. Without looking, he silenced it and put it on the nightstand. “What happened, Justin? What did he do?”
Justin took a few deep breaths before saying, “He said he was going to show the pictures to other people. Here. In Airdrie! He wanted to get people’s reactions.” Justin started to rock back and forth. “I emailed him and asked him not to, but he said he was going to submit them to a big magazine and people around the world would see them!”
“But…that’s what you wanted, wasn’t it?” Charlie asked.
“I never thought about it. Then all of a sudden it hit me. People would see me. Dressed up like that. They’d all know I was a fag. My dad would find out.”
Justin started to cry. Charlie moved closer and put his hand on Justin’s knee.
“I kept emailing Ian, telling him that he couldn’t do that. I told him people might hurt me if he did. Ian tried to tell me that no one would know it was me, but I knew better. They’d spot me the second they saw the pictures. Then Ian stopped returning my emails.”
Justin was choking with sobs. Charlie wrapped his arm around him and Justin leaned into him.
“I knew I had to do something to stop him,” Justin said.
“Justin… What did you do?”
“I went to his house but he was just leaving in his car. So I followed him.” Justin paused.
“It’s okay,” Charlie said. “You can tell me.”
“He went to one of those mansions in Mountain River Estates. I had to jump a stone wall to get in and I waited by his car until he came out. He was mad that I’d followed him.”
“Then what happened?” Charlie probed.
Justin continued, “When I told him he couldn’t publish the pictures, he still wouldn’t change his mind…so I pulled a knife on him.”
Charlie felt Justin’s body tense.
“I wasn’t planning on doing anything like that,” Justin said. “I thought if I scared him enough he’d rip up the pictures!”
Charlie held him by the shoulders and looked him in the eyes. “Justin…did you hurt Ian?”
“No,” Justin said. “When I pulled the knife, Ian just looked at me with these really sad eyes. He said he saw how much it was upsetting me. He apologised and said he never wanted to hurt me.”
Charlie asked, “Did you believe him?”
“Yes. He said that he’d give me a set of the photos and get rid of the files. And maybe someday, I would look at them and be proud of what I’d done.”
“And then what did you do?” Charlie asked.
“I got back into my truck and went home. We were going to meet up the next day, but Ian never showed. Then I heard that he’d disappeared.” Justin started shaking.
Charlie wrapped his arms around him, and held him tight. For the first time he noticed how muscular Justin was. He remembered the first time they’d seen each other, outside The Greek—how attractive Justin had looked. How in control he’d acted. And now, here he was, so vulnerable.
“Thanks for being here for me,” Justin said.
“Any time.”
“I feel like I can really trust you. It figures that if I was ever going to find a real friend, he wouldn’t be from this town.” Justin stared at Charlie, then leaned in and gave him a gentle kiss on the lips. Then a second,more passionate kiss. Justin undid the top button of Charlie’s shirt, then looked at him.
Charlie wasn’t sure what to do. He didn’t want to blow his cover and he sensed in his gut that Justin had told him the truth. And Justin was so… Charlie nodded that it was okay. Justin pulled open the shirt to reveal the bruises on Charlie’s torso.
