painkillers that made him drowsy.

I went outside and got in to his car. There was a bloody stain on the headrest of the passenger’s seat,

too bad because the car was brand new. I doubted that you could wash blood out of the fabric easily.

There was still puke all over the dashboard too. I opened the windows and drove to David’s apartment.

Although he lived pretty close to my place, I’d never been to David’s apartment before. His apartment

was on the first floor in a bright and sunny building that had been constructed only a couple of years ago. I

opened the door with his key and got in. His living room was bright with lightly colored walls and a

kitchen island attached to the living area. His stuff was scattered across the room, some dirty clothes on

the couch, two pairs of shoes just kicked in a corner, books and magazines on his coffee-table and the

floor and his dishes still on the kitchen table. “You are such a pig David,” I whispered with a smile.

On the wall above his couch was a big foam board full of pictures of our family. It had all of us on it;

our parents, Christine and Brad, the twins and me. There were a dozen of pictures of me, some of which I

didn’t even remember being taken. It had me in a goofy football outfit after we’d won a big game back and

me in my prom-suit with a tie that Christine had bought me, looking young and annoyed in to the camera.

There were pictures that we’d taken during a holiday in Mexico with our family when I was sixteen and

some of the two of us in New York. One of them we were sitting on the couch during a party of one of

David’s friends, sharing a bottle of beer, my arm wrapped around his shoulder. Next to the huge foam

board, he’d framed the pictures that I’d sent him from Paris on his birthday. The picture where I was

holding the paper with the heart drawn on, was in the middle. On the coffee table next to the couch, there

was a framed picture of his biological dad too. I picked it up and looked at it. His dad must have been in

his early twenties when it was taken. David looked like him a lot; they had the same wild curly hair and

the same sweet eyes. Looking at his picture I was sure that David’s dad hadn’t been the loser my dad told

me about when I was twelve. But the issue of his death was still a taboo subject in our house… just like

the feelings David and I had for each other were a taboo subject.

I went in to David’s bedroom to pick up some of his clothes. His bed was unmade and some of his

laundry was piled up on the floor. I couldn’t help but pick it up and putting in the laundry basket that was

standing there unused. There were comic books on the floor, X-factor and some older X-men issues.

David always liked to read about super heroes in bed. Next to his bed, on his nightstand, was one more

picture of me; the one that he’d taken during that perfect day at our poolside. I almost choked up when I

saw it and quickly started to cram some of his clothes in a backpack to keep busy. When I walked in to

the bathroom to get his toothbrush, I saw again how bad I looked myself with my bloody clothes. I

stripped off my clothes and took a shower. David’s shampoo smelled like him, the vanilla scent filled the

little shower cabin. When I was finished, I dumped my own clothes and the wet towel in the laundry

basket. I took a pair of David’s jeans out of his closet and put them on, they were just a little too short but

it didn’t look ridiculous. I pulled a fresh T-shirt out of his closet, put it on and headed back to the

hospital.

When I got back to the hospital David was waiting for me. “Hey”, he said when I came in and kissed

him on his head. His face was swollen and bluish. I put his backpack on the chair.

“I’ve brought you some clothes.” He smiled.

“I see that you’re wearing one of my favorite T-shirts, I never imagined you as an X-men fan.” I looked

down at the print for the first time, there was a guy with big claws on the shirt. I hadn’t even seen that

when I put it on.

“I’m wearing your jeans too,” I said and he laughed. “I knew you’d like that,” I smiled. His face turned

serious again.

“Let’s not mention what happened at home alright?” he asked.

“What do you mean?” I replied.

“We’ll just say that I had some stupid accident. I don’t want them to be mad at you.”

“They have every right to be mad at me and so have you. Look at what I did to you.”

“Just pick me up in the morning, I want to go home. I don’t feel like making a big scene out of this. Mom

is so looking forward to that party, I don’t want to ruin things.”

The next morning I picked David up in the hospital and drove him home. “Ah I see that you cleaned up

all the vomit,” he said cynically as he got in the car.

“I did, but it still smells like puke. I’ll get you one of those pine-scented thingies to put on your rearview

mirror. And I couldn’t get all the blood out of the fabric. I spend an hour scrubbing the passenger’s

seat yesterday but nothing helped.”

“You should probably go over to mom and dad’s place and tell them that I’ve had a little accident,” he

said.

“No I’m not going. I don’t want to leave you here all alone in your apartment. You really look like shit.

That nurse said that you have a concussion and that you need to take it easy.”

“Just drop by and tell them that I got hurt but that there’s nothing to worry about. I don’t feel like calling

them now, my mom will rush over here right away and I need to get some more sleep if I want to go to

dad’s party tomorrow.”

“You can’t be serious about going to that stupid party,” I said shocked. “Did you hear what I just said;

you’ve got a concussion. You should stay in bed.”

“I’m very serious and I’m going tomorrow. I feel fine.” He sounded stubborn. I sighed. “I’ll go to your

mom and dad, but I’ll be back in two hours and if I catch you still being up all hell will break loose. I saw

what state you were in yesterday.”

I drove over to our parent’s place. Juliette opened the door and kissed me as I walked in. “Are you

driving David’s car?” she asked me. I nodded. “So where’s David?”

“David has had a little accident,” I said, trying to sound neutral. His mom looked worried. “It’s nothing

serious,” I said and squeezed her hand. “He fell kind of badly when we were hauling some boxes and I

had to take him to the ER to get some stitches.”

“My God, why didn’t you call?” his mom exclaimed. She clasped her mouth with her hand.

“David didn’t want you to worry. He broke his nose but they told us that it’ll heal up just the way it

was.” Juliette was almost in tears.

“He broke his nose? That must have been some accident, are you sure he’s alright?”

“He’s really fine,” I lied. “He wanted to get some more sleep. He’s had a bad night. I promise you that

he’s fine.”

I told the rest of our family the same bullshit story. “Typical of David to do something foolish just before a

big event,” my dad said when we were in the kitchen together. “It really wasn’t his fault,” I said but my

dad wasn’t listening.

Later that day, I drove back to David’s place with some food in plastic containers. His mom had

insisted that I’d bring him some dinner, even though we could just as easily have ordered a pizza. I heated

the food up for him in the microwave. He still looked like shit; pale with a bruised face. He had two

black eyes from the impact my fist had made on his face. I stroked his hair while he lay in bed. This was

the first night that I would sleep in his apartment and it was nothing like I’d imagined. I rolled in bed next