Date: Tue, 20 Mar 2001 00:01:51 -0800 (PST) From: Mike Elder Subject: Jordan Summer Conclusion DISCLAIMER: The characters in this story are fiction. This is not to imply any lifestyle of actual persons. This is strictly from the imagination of the author. Jordan Summer By J. Larson Conclusion. I should never have worried about being found out by the preppies. They already had a favorite target for their abuse. They picked on Jordan. With his delicate looks, and painfully slight build, he made the perfect sitting duck. One that didn't fight back. As much as they shoved Jordan around, all he ever did was take it. I wanted so much to help him, to protect him and keep him safe. I should have done something, but I was too concerned about being found out myself. I came up with a million excuses, telling myself that they never really hurt him too much. I wasn't his keeper, after all. Besides, he could and should do more to defend himself. Why didn't he fight them back? In our room, Jordan never confronted me about why I didn't help him. He didn't say much to me at all, anymore. The more weeks went by, the quieter he got with me. He looked so sad, his smile slow to come. He just sat on his bed and read, or worked on his computer. No friends came to see him, and he didn't go out much. It hurt me to see him so miserable. I wished there were something I could do to make him feel better, but I knew that I was part of the cause. I was no better than those others who hurt him for their own pleasure were. I could have done something to stop it, so I was worse than they were. I was so selfish. * It hit the fan yesterday, when Sanders and a couple of his buddies got Jordan pinned up against the wall in the locker room. They yelled at him, shoved him, trapped him. Like always, he didn't do anything to defend himself. He just looked really scared. Jordan saw me there. His eyes begged for help, but the look on his face said that he didn't expect me to help him. That felt like a knife in my gut. Even so, I didn't do anything. God, I hated myself. I let it go on until one of them hit Jordan. Not just a shove, but a close- fisted punch. They had never gone that far before. I heard that fist connect with Jordan's face, and I heard him cry out, and all of my selfish thoughts were gone. One of them was on the ground before they even knew I was there, and another followed quickly. I faced Sanders, the one that had hit Jordan. I wanted to tear his head off. "What the...?" Sanders was angry and surprised. I suspected he was a little scared, too. One of his buddies had a fat lip, and the other had a broken nose. They were both crab-walking away backwards. They would be of no help. "If we're having a fight," I said, stepping back. "Let's make it a fair one." I crossed my arms. "Go ahead. He's all yours." Jordan's eyes were as big as plates. If Sanders had so much as looked at Jordan wrong, I would have cheerfully ripped his nuts off for him. I didn't think I would have to, though. Chicken-shits like that are only brave in packs. Not alone. I was right. He backed away. "I knew it!" He yelled from a safe distance. "What, are you one, too?" There it was, after all. I surprised myself by not feeling mortified. "Why?" I asked coolly. "Are you interested?" Sanders didn't have an answer for that, go figure. He just made a disgusted sound and ducked out the door. The others were already gone. Jordan was still there. I looked at him and saw that his eye was puffing up. It would be black by supper. His lip was bleeding a little, too. Knowing I could have stopped it sooner made me sick. I couldn't own up to that. In my room, I stuffed clothes into my backpack at random. Whatever I could carry was what I was taking. It was stupid for me to ever have thought I could belong in this kind of world. It was time to go home. To the Southend, not to Dad's It was all over. I was almost ready to go when I heard the door to the room close. I knew it was Jordan. If it were any of the others, they'd be making a lot more noise. They would be here to either turn me over to the law or, more likely, hang me from the nearest tree. I did not intend to be around for either eventuality. "Why?" He asked from behind me. I turned around and saw him sitting on his bed. His eye was bruising up, and his lip was split. My gut wrenched. His wounds made him look smaller, even more vulnerable. Thank God he wasn't bleeding any more. I couldn't have taken that. "Why did you help me?" He repeated. "You hate me." Is that what he thought? "Jordan, I don't hate you." That didn't sound like much, but it was all I had. "You should have just let them beat me up. It's like a tradition. They do it every year." He shrugged his shoulders, like it made sense. I looked at him. "Why do you say it like that? Like it's okay for them to do that?" "Because they're right about me, and they know it." Right about him? Could Jordan be telling me that he thought he deserved to be beaten because of it? Did he really believe that? That was crazy. "Then why in hell do you keep coming back here?" Damned if I was going to. Trying to figure Jordan out was so exasperating. I didn't understand how he thought at all. "Tell them to send you somewhere else." "What makes you think I have a choice? My parents don't give a shit what happens to me, as long as they can say they give me the best of everything. That way, whatever I am isn't their fault. They send me to the best summer camp, and give me the best clothes. They even send me to a boarding school called 'Westerhaven' in England. Sounds snobby, doesn't it? I guess it is. "West-what?" "Westerhaven. Private school." Oh. "The point is that going to Westerhaven is like coming to Wanakonda. I keep coming because I keep getting sent. One day, I'll be able to do whatever I want. Until then, I have to take it. See, I'm mot like you. I'm not big. I'm not strong." "No," I said, sinking onto the couch. "I think you're the strongest person I've ever met." I knew he was stronger than I was. It surprised me to hear Jordan start to laugh. Great, whooping gulps of laughter. He fell over on his bed, grabbing his belly. I looked at him, stunned. "'Why, are you interested?'" He gasped. "That was beautiful! I can't believe you said that. Did you see the look on Sanders' face? Aaaack!" Jordan crumbled into laughter again. I couldn't help but laugh, too. It was infectious. Soon, I was hysterical, with tears leaking out the corners of my eyes. We must have looked like a couple of idiots. My sides ached, but I couldn't make it stop for a long time. When there was no laughter left, I sat gasping for breath. Jordan quit, too, his peals fading to hitches. Finally, he caught his breath. He looked at me bluntly, like he was sizing me up. I knew I could never lie to him. "What are you doing here?" He said. "You don't come from money, no matter how nice your clothes are. What's your story?" I told Jordan everything from my mother's death on, I told him all of it. It surprised me, how much of it there was. All the way up to when those miffed johns kicked me senseless, which had put me in the hospital where Dad found me. The only thing I left out was how I felt about him. I couldn't bring myself to confess that. Not yet. I couldn't. I don't know how long I talked. It seemed like a long time. Jordan had come to sit beside me. He listened until I finished, and there was no more laughter in his eyes. He listened to me, and it even looked like he cared about what I was saying. Nobody had ever done that before. I brushed a lock of hair away from his hurt eye, and touched his face with my fingertips. His expression was so open to me, so trusting and so pure. There were so many reasons why I should pick up my bags and leave. Walk out of his life and leave him to live it without the complications of being involved with me. There was no place in the world for us. His friends would chastise him too harshly. His family would certainly never understand. They'd probably have me shot. The thought of doing that, walking away from Jordan and never seeing him again, made my gut do a slow turn, almost as bad as the sound of Sander's fist hitting Jordan in the eye did. As many reasons as there were why I should, I couldn't face the thought of doing that. The look on his face told me he didn't want me to. Never mind the fight downstairs, and never mind Sanders. I kissed Jordan then, and he let me. I leaned to him and touched my closed lips to his. His mouth was tender and sweet and met mine just right. His eyes were closed, trusting me, and I closed my eyes too. If he trusted me, with the grace of God, I could find it within myself to trust him. Jordan's trust scared the hell out of me. I prayed that I deserved it, and vowed to the bottom of my heart never to betray it. No matter what. I would never do anything to hurt Jordan. I didn't search for Jordan's tongue or think to offer him mine. I didn't think of anything. My whole world existed in that place where his lips met mine. It was a breathless place where nothing else but the kiss could live. Nothing else mattered. Nothing else existed. I gave a part of myself to it, to Jordan. It was a piece of my soul that I would never want or get back again. It was his. He took it from me and kept it. When the kiss ended, a lifetime too soon, Jordan's bottom lip brushed gently against mine. I felt it in every nerve of my body. Of my soul, too, if such a thing is possible. As many times as I've been used in my lifetime, nothing ever felt like that single, soft kiss. Nothing ever could. I opened my eyes and he was looking at me. His astonishing blue eyes were bright, and misted over the slightest bit, our kiss still fresh in them. The color in his cheeks was high, a schoolboy's blush. I swear, he looked like an angel, only more beautiful. "That was my first real kiss." He said it almost apologetically, like he thought he might have done it wrong. I touched his face again. "I think it was mine, too," I said, and he smiled. "Jordan, I love you." I hadn't planned to say it, but when the words were spoken, I knew they were true. The truth of it spread beneath my breast like a hot drink on a cold winter day. I smiled, thinking of Jordan as hot buttered rum, warming and intoxicating me. "I love you, too." He said it without hesitation. Jordan reached up and wiped the tears from my cheek. When did I start to cry? More than ever, I didn't know what to do, now. How could I leave Jordan? How could I not? Ultimately, it was a decision I didn't have to make. Pounding on the door shattered my moment with Jordan. A couple of counselors and camp security had come to take us to Craig's office. Apparently, Sanders had reported our fight, putting his own slant to it. It figured. Jordan tried telling Buster Craig the truth about the fight. He didn't know, yet, that authority didn't want to hear about the truth. Especially with people like us. I loved him for his naivet‚, but I knew that it was futile. Authority didn't have to care about the truth, especially when it came to people like us. Buster waved Jordan's effort aside, barely hearing him, and informed us that he had decided not to call the local authorities. Instead, our parents were being called to come and take us home. They called my father? Oh, fucking great. We would not be invited to return. For our benefit, he said. Jordan looked relieved, almost grateful for the consideration. He didn't know what it really meant. He believed Buster. I shook my head. I knew better. Buster was concerned with Wanakonda's reputation, not ours. His kind were like that. As long as they kept their hands clean, and people like Jordan and me could be swept under the rug, or shoved back into the closet, that was all that mattered. Keeping the peace and not tolerating any boat-rockers, that was the status quo. They didn't let me say good-bye to Jordan. We were locked in separate rooms in the infirmary until our parents came to get us. He gave me a pleading look as they led him away, and that was the last I saw of him. I didn't sleep at all, thinking of Jordan. I didn't like to think of him locked up over there, all alone. What was going to happen to him after this, all things considered? What was going to happen to us? Whatever happened with my life, I knew I had to have Jordan in it. No matter what it took, no matter how far I had to go to find him. I would stand on the corner day and night, if that's what it took. I didn't care. I don't know if it was when we kissed, or when I cried, but I had a soul again. Jordan gave it back to me. He changed something over inside me, and now there was no going back. 'Please,' I begged Jordan silently, touching the wall that separated us. 'Please believe in me. I'll find a way to get to you. Please don't forget me.' I don't know if Jordan's parents came first, of if my Dad did. When they let me out of the infirmary, I was ushered to the car without pause. To Dad's credit, he almost managed to contain his loathing for the entire situation and me. Almost. My bags were already in the trunk. If it weren't illegal, I think Dad would have stuffed me in there, too. Instead, he put me in the back seat. He doesn't want me up front with him. He doesn't want me anywhere near him. Especially after this. He's up there now, babbling away about what's best for me. How the fuck would he know what that is? He doesn't even know me. Wait. What was that? I almost laughed when Dad said that just now. I had to bite my lip hard enough to draw blood to stop it. I don't think he would appreciate my sense of humor. I don't have to worry about how to find my way to Jordan. I won't have to sell myself to get there, either. Dad's sending me to Westerhaven.