Mitchell Corrigan

You are standing in a kitchen in Phoenix, and the light through the blinds is the gray before anything has started. Andre Whitfield's body is thin and cold at the ankles. His thumb is rubbing the knuckle of his first finger, a habit of his you picked up in under a minute. The phone is face up on the counter. The wheel is already loaded on it.

You were Tyler Burkhart fifteen minutes ago. Tyler is the reason you are doing this, though you would not say so to anyone. You stood in his house and let his big hands open a drawer, and a photograph of two boys on a dock came up out of it. One of them was grinning with his whole face, and the grin was meant for Tyler. You felt what Tyler felt: a warmth with a weight under it. Then you left. You are not sure why, and you press the screen before you can find out.

Now you are standing on a ladder.

Your arms are over your head and there is a wire between your fingers. Warm air comes off the ocean and smells of salt and hot stucco. The motion of the wire goes wrong for half a second. You do it again slowly and correctly, and then the next ten come out checked, each one, on a job that has not needed checking in years.

Your breath is short and quick. The body is small, dense and light, and the calves are tight from standing on the rung. The shoulders ache pleasantly from holding the reach. Your jaw is smooth and clean when you turn it.

The shirt comes first. The cotton is stiff at the collar and the sleeve hem is rough against your biceps. You get the morning in his hands: a dark bedroom, the buttons done up from the bottom, a mirror, the silver spikes pushed up with gel until they stood right. He smiled at himself, and the smile was a little sad. A phone lay on the bed with a name on its screen that he did not touch.

The keys at your hip jingle. You get a landlord's voice, a ring of brass, a closet of paint cans, and the relief of being good at one thing. Then comes the pliers in your hand, and a thousand ceilings, and his father showing him how to strip a wire when he was nine years old. The shift comes with no ceremony and he never knew a thing. The script on the inside of your forearm is a name and a date. You feel it before you read it. It is an ache, and it is hers. The ex is recent and still bleeds.

You lower the pliers and turn your hand over. It is steady and the fingers are blunt. You look out past the pink pillar at the haze over the water, and then straight ahead.

"Okay," you say, in a voice that is higher and lighter than you are used to. "Hello."

The wheel is already somewhere behind your ribs, and the wanting has not started yet. You wonder how long this will take to come.