Roy runs and Nathan follows, into the waist high weeds behind the bam, into the flood of moonlight that pools within the pokeweed and broom straw. Roy is laughing from deep inside his chest, and he runs ahead into the white, glowing world. Nathan follows at his slower pace. The twinned houses dwindle behind, and the shadow pines rise up toward the stars. Nearing the pond, they descend the slight embankment leading to the watery Up. Roy pauses at the edge, touching his sneaker to the waterline. He checks to make sure Nathan is following, then kneels with a sycamore branch, drawing a line in the pale muddy pond bottom. The moonlight records the motion perfectly, they can see everything. Clouds of mud rise in the water from the tip of the stick.
"I like this place at night."
Nathan stops near Roy's elbow. "It's quiet."
"There's a cemetery over yonder." Roy points with the stick. To a thickening of shadow.
He shivers. "A real one?"
"Yeah. With great big tombstones. There's a lot of them, with angels and statues. They look pretty spooky at night."
"Can we go there?"
"You sure you want to? Your mom might get mad if we stay out too long." "I want to."
Willows, arrow arum, and cattails grow to the edge of the pond, and royal fern and honeysuckle overhang the glimmering water. Branches crack underfoot, pine needles protesting. Roy's passage is quieter than Nathan's, his feet somehow lighter. He lifts aside limber branches with an easy hand, holding them over Nathan's head. The path through the darkening trees is washed with light, and the substance of Roy moves through it dense and shadowed. Nathan hurries behind Roy, drawing audible breath after audible breath. The pond spreads a hush, the trees lift their branches, the stars and moon bum. Between is a blackness the eye fails to fathom.
The cemetery gate and iron fence form out of nothing, within a circle of trees at the top of a rise of land. Roy opens the iron gate and shows Nathan the rust stains on his palms. The two are silent as they move into the enclosure, overgrown with weeds. Tombstones, some toppled, and the leavings of wreaths impede their passage. The ground gives off a clotted, dank smell. Roy is breathless. He passes his hand along eroded marble in which letters are carved. Nathan studies the words but fails to read diem, so Roy leans close and whispers, "This one says,
Sarah Jane Kennicutt, Her Father's Favorite Daughter. The Kennicutts used to own all this land, that's what people say. There were two Kennicutt plantations, one right around here that burned down, and another one off in the woods."
"Then why is it Poke's Road?"
Roy shrugs. "Poke's Road goes for a long ways. It must have been some Pokes on it, once upon a time." He is leaning against Nathan. "I'll take you to the end of that road one of these days. Way off in the woods where it's overgrown and nobody can use it."
Nathan nods, but is rendered speechless by touch. Roy grips Nathan's arm and leads him to another grave over which looms a guardian obelisk. The shadow of the granite shaft passes across Roy's face, and his expression is inscrutable. Something in Roy's stance lays a field of silence around them both.
Now both Roy's hands touch both Nathan's arms. He watches Nathan with a new quiet. It is hard for Nathan to be conscious of anything but the touch of those hands on his arms, the texture of tough skin and strong fingers. Nathan makes one sound, throaty and startled, like an animal giving a single warning. Roy exerts the slightest pressure.
His body is full of curves beneath the clothes. Nathan leans against him, as Roy slightly smiles. He kneels in the grass and brings Nathan down with him. The two are trembling and huddle together in the dark of the grave.
The sweetness of the moment lingers. The salty smell of Roy's body rises out of the shirt that he unbuttons and slides over his shoulders. Moonlight glitters on the slight sweat of his chest. A calm deliberateness engulfs him. Nathan eases the worn jeans down Roy's thighs. Air pours against Nathan's skin as Roy strips away his cotton tee shirt. Nathan shivers with the chill.
Roy embraces the slighter boy and their warmth multiplies, their bodies shuddering and yet clinging each to the other, dressed only in white underwear in the shadow of the granite marker. The warmth makes chromosomes sing. Roy says, "Now we're buddies," with a tone of deep relief in his voice, and Nathan mouths the words soundlessly, watching the North Star over the pond. He wonders what a buddy is and whether he is the only one Roy has. He is farther from home than he has ever been. Roy cradles him as if he will never let go. "Bats fly around here sometimes. You can hear them making that squeak noise."
"Do you hear any now?"
