Will did as David said. If that crack was enough to make David scared, then Will knew he should be shitting his pants. David pulled a disposable lighter out of his pocket.
“Stay calm. Okay? I can fix this,” David said as he sparked the lighter and held the flame up to the top of the crack. Will took infant breaths as he watched the plastic begin to smoke and soften under the flame. David moved the lighter down the crack at a slug’s pace, leaving a warped trail behind.
Behind David’s mask, sweat fell down his face in steady streams and fogged his face shield near the temples. His anger had vaporized, replaced by emotions that Will was accustomed to seeing on his brother’s face: fear and guilt.
“Come on, come on, come on,” David muttered.
Why was it, Will wondered, that the moments he felt closest to his brother were the ones when they came close to killing each other?
“I think it’s gonna work,” David said, flicking his eye to meet Will’s.
He finished melting the bottom of the crack, and Will dared to take full breaths again. His vision was now marred by a thick, blackened stripe of bubbled plastic scar tissue. If he closed his right eye, the world looked distorted. He felt like an ashtray.
David fell back against the wall with an exhausted huff, like he’d just fought off a heart attack. They looked at each other as they both gulped down air. Will couldn’t help but be struck with a sense of déjà vu. Here they were again, sitting in their elevator home after a blowout fight, hiding from the rest of the school.
“Thanks,” Will said.
“Sorry,” David said.
“I deserved it—sort of.”
David stayed quiet.
Will knew he owed David the real explanation. If there was ever a time to clear the air, it was now. Will just really wished it wasn’t. He’d come into the school hoping that he wouldn’t have to. He’d planned on finding Lucy and lifting them both out before David even knew he was gone, and then he’d tell him. But it didn’t happen like that. He had to tell him now … or maybe he should warm up to it.
“How’d you find me?” Will said.
“Lucky,” David said. His voice was sour.
This was going to suck.
“I didn’t mean to drag you into this,” Will said.
“No?”
“No, I didn’t come back here just to stress you out, you know. I had a real reason—”
“You got Lucy pregnant.”
He stared at David, stunned by the very truth he was about to reveal. David shook his head.
“Goddamn it, Will.”
Will instinctively reached for his forehead to ease the tension in his head, but his hand bounced off his gas mask.
“I’m sorry,” Will said. “It was an accident.”
“No shit?”
Will sighed. David was going to be mad at him forever.
“How did you—how did you find out?” Will said.
“Saw Mort. I guess everybody knows you and Lucy were together,” David said. Disappointment dripped from his every word. “I guessed the rest.”
They sat in silence again.
“You should have told me,” David said.
Will met David’s indignant eye. He saw what he’d been dreading there, what he’d been hoping to avoid—betrayal. Stabbed in the back by his own flesh and blood.
“We thought you were dead,” Will said in a rush.
“Yeah, I got that part.”
“It’s not like either of us thought we were going behind your back.”
“So, then, I’ve got no right to be upset? Is that what you’re saying?”
“I guess I’m saying …,” Will paused and wondered why he was holding back. “I’m saying, join the club. I was in love with Lucy first, and that didn’t stop you from moving in on her.”
“I said I was sorry about that, back then,” David said.
“Yeah, and I said sorry just now. Does that make you any less pissed off?”
David’s face was puckered with a frown. Will knew he was bringing up ancient history, but he needed David to understand that when it came to Lucy, Will won. David could be as hurt as he wanted to be. What Will and Lucy had was deeper. That was just the way it was.
“Ever heard of condoms?” David said.
Will wanted to fire something back, but his child’s life hung in the balance. Everything wasn’t about Will anymore.
“I’m sorry,” Will said.
“What?” David’s tone was aggravated but his face was scrunched up in confusion. Clearly, Will apologizing was a new experience for him.
“I know we had it good out there on the farm. It was great. I didn’t mean to fuck it up. I didn’t mean for any of this to happen. I’m just trying to do the right thing.”
David stared at him with the same confusion, but only for a few more seconds before he closed his eyes and sighed. He exhaled, and all the tension in his body seemed to exit with his breath.
“I know,” David said. He massaged his neck. “I know you are.”
David had forgiven him after arguments in this elevator so many times in the past. Their love for each other would always be stronger than any conflict that came between them.
“Hey, remember when I wanted to knock a hole in the floor so we wouldn’t have to leave to go to the bathroom?” Will said.
One side of David’s mouth tilted up.
“How long did we fight about that?” Will said.
“Four months? Five?”
Will chuckled. “I still say it’s way more convenient. You’d only have to go into the school for food!”
“I can’t believe you want to get into this—what don’t you understand about me not wanting to watch you shit? About my house smelling like your ass?” David said, his smile widening.
“So the other person has to go up top and not come back till the smell’s gone. Is that so bad?”
“What about the giant pile of it that would build up at the bottom of the shaft? That would stink the whole shaft up.”
“I never smelled anything.”
“What does that mean?”
“I don’t think that’s a real problem, that’s all I’m sayin’.”
“Did you crap off the roof?” David said, pointing above.
“Well … yeah, I always figured you did too, but that we both kinda knew not to talk about it,” Will said.