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            Zack sat up. He looked at Bart, sitting there clutching his knees to his chest. It was a beautiful night, and the smell of the newly flowering corn was everywhere. What am I going to say now? I can't believe my little brother's so afraid of me. I told him, we needed to talk but how do we start. Bart - gay? I thought I knew him, but I guess not, I guess I just took him for granted.
            Bart was feeling lost and terribly alone. What's this shit with Zack anyways? I just don't know what he's going to do.
            "Zack, you're not going to tell mom & dad, are you?"
            "Of course not. You're not planning to tell em, are you? ... Don't think they'd take it well. Shit - This takes some getting used to, you know." In the distance, he could make out their house. The yellow light streaming from the windows, night swallowing up the trees and barn.
            In a voice dripping with sarcasm, "Yeah, I feel so sorry for you. You got a queer for a brother. Poor Zack!"

            "Bart, do you really think, I'd have pounded your face in?"
            "Sure, you'd come home all shit faced from drinking with 'your buds'. Then start talkin about this 'fag' or that 'queer fucker'. How you'd guys bust their heads. How they got what they deserved. Zack, you're an asshole. Shit, Zack, I had to sit there and listen to all the crap. Knowing how you felt about me. I used to pretend to be asleep when I heard you coming home, so I wouldn't have to talk to you. I was hiding from you right in plain sight 'cause I was so scared of you."
          Zack's trying to imagine what it would have been like if they had traded places. It must have been hell. Being told that deep inside, you were only good for getting beat up. Knowing that you were different, and different meant worthless. What if someone else had found out about Bart, and Bart got smashed up. ... His little brother. ... In the warm night, he started to shiver. ... Bart ...
          "Bart, I'm so ... so sorry. There's no fucking excuse." Zack then let  out a sob that shook his whole body. Tears started trickling down his cheeks.
          This is some sick dream, listening to Zack sniffling, Bart couldn't cope with it, and got to his feet. "Zack, you wanna walk over to the creek."
          "Yeah, okay." Getting up, they started heading across the fields. Not that long ago, a couple, maybe three, years at the most, the two of them would spend whole days down at the creek. Bart used to tag along with Zack every place he'd go. Zack couldn't figure out what had happened. One moment, Bart was his shaddow, now he's become Bart's nightmare.

           They walked in silence. The sound of the water on the rocks guided them to their small stream. They sat down on the old log. They used to sit there and Zack would make up silly, stupid stories that Bart used to love.

           "You ... ah being gay ... " the words have left Zack, "Are you sure, Bart?"
           "Yeah, I'm sure."
           "Did you ever...? You know."
            "Zack, do you really want to know?" Bart is still having a tough time accepting this change in Zack. After listening to him for years, talking about 'faggots' and 'queers', this is too sudden. But he watched as Zack nodded to him. Well, it can't get any worse than it is now. "Screw you, Zack! Your brother, Zack, Yeah, Your Brother, he likes to suck cock!", came out,  "I've been with someone."
             "Who?"
            "You really think I'm gonna tell you. I saw how you and your friends treat Tom and Steve." I can't tell him about Will. Bart'd promised Will he'd never tell anyone. He was gonna have to tell Will to be scarse for awhile, so Zack doesn't get  the right idea."What if you got drunk with your asshole friends, and said something about your faggot brother's boyfriend? I can't take that chance! Remember I've seen you drunk, Zack. You might regret it the next day, but someone would still be dead. Dead is permanent, Zack."
          "Bart, does any body else know? Does Will know?" Will's been best friends with Bart for years. They hang out all the time.
          I've really got to be careful here, Bart senses, "Will knows, he's the only one I told."
          "And he's all right with it?"
          "You know Zack, not every one's a pigheaded asshole. Will don't care - HE'S MY FRIEND!"
          Zack's arms ache from not hugging Bart, and wanting to. He wanted to hold him close, wash away all the pain he caused. But he's lost the right. "Do you ever think we could be friends again?"
          "I don't know. Are you gonna suddenly go back to being shit? You seem to care now, but will you really care tomorrow, or is this ... " Before he continue,  Zack stops him and says, "Can I try? You might not believe this but you're my brother and" ... using words he seldom says, or says with any meaning, "and I love you."

            "Bart, are you - like - in love?"
            Looking at Zack, whispers, "Don't know for sure, maybe."
            "Is it like me and Shelly?"
            "How the fuck should I know! ... He makes me feel good just bein there where I can see him. The earth doesn't shake, the sun doesn't turn colors, and the stars stay in place. But when we talk, there's no one in the world I'd rather listen to. I wake up thinking about him, and the same when
I go to bed. ... Is that love, Zack, or can't two guys be in in love?"
             God, I almost wish Will was here.

     It's been 15 minutes since anyone said something. Both of them sat there with a blaze of stars burning in the moonless night. Zack's mind kept going back years, he'd remember all sort of things that he and Bart used to do, how much fun they used to have. He was trying desperately to avoid thinking about the shit he put Bart through. He didn't know Bart was gay, but what difference does that make. The look of sheer terror he saw in Bart's eyes tonite could not be set aside with excuses of any kind. Then when Bart just gave up, the life drained out of Zach at the same time. Shame and guilt, don't even come close to his mood right now. ... My own brother! ... I'm a fucking monster.

     Bart also remembered those times when Zack and he would be so close people couldn't tell them apart. They talked the same, they laughed the same, and they loved the ... STOP! ... they didn't love the same! I am not going to just sit there and say everything's all right and all is forgiven, when it's not. That's bullshit. I AM NOT GOING TO LET MY GUARD DOWN! There's someone I have to keep out of this. If anything happened to Will, I might as well be dead. For whatever reason, it became crystal clear at that moment. He rather be dead than live without Will. At 16, there were only absolutes. Black or White,  No Grays. And he absolutely needed Will in the same way he needed air. For years, he had thought they were more than just best friends, then when Ted left, he knew they were more than that to each other. Maybe when you got right down to it, what so pissed him off about Zack, wasn't how he made him feel, but that every cut, and every comment was about Will too.

    It was so un-naturally quiet, Zack, when he started to talk, it seemed as if it he was shouting. "Bart, would you like me to see if mom & dad would let us have our own rooms? I could talk them into fixing up, Henry's old room, Henry was a long gone hired hand, who used to help around the farm. I know you probably would like to have a room of your own. I wouldn't want to live with me if I were you.
     "Zack, shut the fuck up. ... We're going to declare a truce here, but a truce on my terms. ... You said it before we are brothers, and I really want to love you like I used to Zack. But you are going to have to respect me, and ... who I am. ... Maybe, ... maybe, ... respect is too strong a word, maybe it should be tolerate me, cause that's what I doing to you ... tolerating you. God knows that I have no fucking respect for you. You can't understand, that right now you make no difference to me at all. Zack, you used to be everything I ever wanted to be, but you changed and I grew up. I know I still have a lot of growing up to do, but I am already a better man now than you have ever been."

     "No more fag jokes while I'm around. If I hear that you've gone 'bashing', you will be dead to me, getting fucking drunk's no excuse. It'll  prove to me what a worthless piece of shit you are. I have enough shit to deal with for a lifetime." Bart remembered the time he and Zack had got out their dad's old hunting knife, and became 'blood' brothers. The scar on his hand was still visible. "I will try very hard to get us to be blood brothers again. This would have been a lot easier if there was no one else to worry about. ... You asked before if I was in love, and I said maybe. That's also bullshit .. I am in love. He's alot more important to me right now than you are. It would be great if you could be there too."

     Zack, sat there thinking about what Bart was saying, then he remembered the blood brother ritual they had, the scar on the palm of his hand, how Bart held back the tears from the pain of the knife, so Zack'd proud of him. Zack had already been 10 years old, but Bart was still 8, but going on 9 in a few weeks. Zack now made a promise to himself, that they would have more than a fading scar to look back on.
    "Bart, it sounds kinda hokey, but, if you and I try, we can be real friends, it might be the first time."

    Zack extended his hand, the hand with their scar on it, quietly begging Bart to reach out and take it. So unsure what Bart would do he had to look at his own feet, and couldn't look up to see that a flash of hesitation pass over Bart's face, before he too, grasped his brother's hand, holding it and barely shaking it. "Okay, Zack, we can try."


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