Under the Bridge by R. Cooper Read Free Book Online

Under the Bridge
     
    By R. Cooper
     
     
     
    Copyright 2012 by R. Cooper
     
    Smashwords Edition
     
     
     
     
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    “What’d you do this time to get your ass
kicked?”
    Chris jumped at the question. He was already
shivering from the cold and shaking with adrenaline and tension but
he raised his head and peered around the aura from Stanley Street’s
one streetlamp until he saw the shape of a boy at the very edge of
the light.
    Shape of a man , he should say, since
according to the commencement speech that morning, they were men
now, ready to face the world, or at least life after high school.
Chris didn’t feel like a man. He felt pissed off and sore and
stinging and scared, and he was tired of feeling all of those
things so despite the kick of his heart against his ribs, he
frowned and lifted his chin.
    “Nothing.” He thought he was too loud, but it
was at least two in the morning and the street was deserted. The
distant noise of the grad party he’d just left would be blamed if
anyone heard him, and the people around here were used to ignoring
what their kids did.
    Nicky, because that had to be Nicky over
there no matter how unbelievable it was that that he’d be talking
to Chris, snorted.
    “Isn’t that like this town? Punishing you for
what they think you want to do?” Nick’s voice was far away and
slightly slower than Chris remembered it, but he hadn’t really
heard Nick talking up close since grade school. He sounded drunk,
Chris decided immediately and watched as the outline of Nicky
tipped his head back to drink something from a bottle that was
probably alcoholic.
    Who knew who had sold it to him. He could
have stolen it, since according to the rumors Nick was all kinds of
criminal. The cool, scary, hot kind. The kind that good girls
denied hooking up with despite how their eyes stayed on him when he
crossed a room. The kind who had weed or beer if you needed it,
even if he wasn’t allowed in your house when your parents were
home. The kind who came to school with scraped and bruised knuckles
every other week and a fat lip that only made him sexy instead of
dangerous, or sexy and dangerous. Whichever, he was the kind who
didn’t talk to Chris.
    Very few people talked to Chris unless they
were punching him and then the words were along the lines of “Fuck
you, faggot” which seemed a gayer and gayer thing to say every time
he heard it.
    Chris licked at the cut in his bottom lip and
squinted his one good eye at Nicky. At Nick . Nick hadn’t
been Nicky since they’d been kids, back before Nick’s mom had
married his first stepdad and they’d moved away only to move back
two years later with stepdad number two. Chris had been twelve,
Nick just thirteen, and the Nick who had come back to town had not
been interested in being best friends again.
    Nick hadn’t been interested in being anyone’s friend. It had been a surprise to see him with the
rest of the class waiting to walk across the stage to get his
diploma. Only his grandmother had been in the audience, not his
mom.
    “You didn’t go to Ryan’s party?” Chris didn’t
know why he said it; it was the last thing he wanted to talk about
and of course Nick hadn’t gone. Nick was having his own little
party right here. He’d probably been getting drink under the small
bridge that was part of the fire access road behind the last houses
up here in the hills. The creek it was built over was dried up most
of the year and that was where Nick spent his time, according to
everyone.
    “So