Page 97 of Disco Witches of Fire Island

“Joe!” Fergal dropped to his knees, pulled his wet T-shirt from his own back, and used it as a blanket over Joe’s naked chest as he helped him back into his white shorts. When Joe stopped coughing, he looked at Fergal and smiled, not with any sort of contrition, but like he was happier than he had ever been. “What the fuck happened to you?” Fergal shouted, shaking Joe by the shoulders. “Everyone’s been crazed looking for you! I thought you were dead!”

Joe pointed up at Fergal’s face and laughed. “Would you look at that?”

“Why are you laughing?” Fergal’s fists punched his own legs. “You are the most selfish piece of—”

“Sorry!” Joe blurted. “It’s just your eyelashes. They are so thick and beautiful and have these little waterfalls falling off them.” He squinched his face, failing to suppress another happy giggle. “I’m so sorry. Seriously, I am.”

“Well, you should be!” Fergal raged. “Why are you still smiling?”

At that very moment Vince showed up, having fallen way behind Fergal. His face was Pepto Bismol pink from the effort, and he was shivering from the cold rain.

“Well, there you are, lad,” Vince said to Joe, relief palpable in his voice. “You had us all mad with worry. For a minute I swore I saw young Fergal here lift off the ground and swim through that storm to get to you. Anyway, where have you been?”

“I got pretty sick on some stupid party drugs,” Joe said, as if it might be a slightly humorous anecdote. “I also maybe died a little. But I’m not sure.”

Fergal glared at Joe, then clenched his fists and stormed over to the edge of the small clearing. Rivulets of raindrops slid down his astoundingly beautiful, shirtless back.

“I guess I better stick to beer from now on, huh?” Joe chuckled nervously. “Hey, I’m sorry, but …” He let his voice trail off, seemingly stuck on what to say next.

Fergal, without looking back, snorted with derision. Then he picked up an old piece of rotted wood and hurled it into the Great South Bay. For almost a full minute the three men stood speechless in the rain, Joe looking at Fergal’s back, Vince looking awkwardly at the two men. The downpour suddenly slowed to a mere drizzle while jelly bean–size drops still plopped down from the forest canopy.

“Maybe I should leave you two alone for a bit,” Vince said. He pointed to the sky. “Would you look at that? Clear skies with a moon, full and white like a boiled potato. You’d never know there had been an eclipse, nor a flash storm. What a thing!” He looked for a response from the men, but none came. “Well, despite it all, you’re looking well, Joseph. I’ll see you back in the harbor, I hope. Try not to get into any more trouble, will ya?”

“Sorry about everything, Vince,” Joe said.

“That’s all right, lad. We all have our bad nights. I’ll go and tell the others the good news.” He crossed to Fergal and patted him on his back. “Ya did well, son.”

For a long time neither Joe nor Fergal spoke. The wind blew through the wet trees. The flock of birds flew off one by one. Joe’s joyful heart quieted as he finally absorbed the level of Fergal’s distress.How to make him understand?

“Would you mind walking with me to the beach?” Joe finally asked Fergal. “The mosquitos are killing me here. I need to tell you something important—about what happened. But I think I want to tell you by the ocean. Also, it will give me a chance to clean myself up.”

Fergal grunted and, without even looking back at Joe, began to walk. By the time Joe got to his feet, he was twenty paces behind. After ten minutes of walking, he found Fergal already sitting at the ocean’s bubbling edge, fiddling with a twig of driftwood. Joe first washed Fergal’s shirt of the mucky sick, then dove into the frothy waves and scrubbed himself clean, gargling with the saltwater. When he was done, he handed Fergal his wet shirt back and sat a foot away. He really wished to take Fergal into his arms and warmhim with the heat of his newfound bravery. But the ferryman still wouldn’t look at him.

“So, what happened?” Fergal finally asked, his voice low and cold.

“Well, I was kind of a mess, so I got really fucked up on this trail-mix drug Scotty Black gave me. Made me all hyped up and crazed. Then I met the Gladiator Man … er … this guy, and he had this Blue Nitro stuff—”

“Who or what is a Gladiator Man?” Fergal wrenched the wet T-shirt between his fists, wringing the water into the sand in front of him. “You dating him now?”

“God, no.” Joe sniffed. “He was a total douchebag. Just some homophobic muscle head. At one point I thought he was hot. But I’m different now.” He looked at Fergal, hoping he’d look back, but he didn’t. “That’s the thing. Something crazy happened to me back there. I know no one is going to believe me, but I have to tell someone, and I want it to be you.”

“Why?” Fergal finally turned to look at Joe. His eyes were like blazing blue switchblades. “We’renotfriends, Joe.”

Fergal’s words would have stung if it wasn’t for the ring of brilliant light encircling Joe’s heart. “I know I hurt you,” he said, “and I don’t expect you to forgive me, but can I tell you?”

“Go ahead.”

And Joe told him everything that had happened that night. He told him about his plan to escape the island without telling anyone, about doing all the drugs he could find and not caring if he lived or died. He told him of going with Gladiator Glen because the man seemed to hate Joe as much as he hated himself. And then Joe told Fergal about the dream—if it was a dream. He told him how he thought he might have died, but it didn’t matter, because either way he felt something miraculous had happened. He told him about seeing Elliot and the others, and how he had come to a new understanding about what had happened and could finally forgive himself.

He considered explaining how he also saw the end of time and how the ability to feel peace, joy, and bravery had been instilled permanently in his heart, but he was wise enough to know that no one, not even Fergal, would fully comprehend the momentous shiftin consciousness he had experienced. Even he didn’t understand it, but he knew it was true.

So, instead, Joe jumped to the result, saying how he no longer wanted to escape or die and how he was excited by life again and was less fearful of the future, and planning to start pursuing his dream of going to med school as soon as he left the island. Then he explained how the rain saved him by making him choke and vomit out all the Blue Nitro. He watched Fergal’s face for signals—belief, disbelief—but there were none.

“So why are you telling me all this?” Fergal finally said.

Joe took a deep breath and dug his feet into the sand. “Because, well, I’m in love with you, Fergal. I think I have been from that first moment I saw you swimming in the ocean like a wild, insane dolphin with those weird webbed feet. I know you may not feel the same way right now, or like you did in my dream, but if there is anything like love for me left inside you—and I know there is, so you don’t have to lie—I’m asking you to give me another chance. I think we can make each other happy—or happy enough … but in a really deep and meaningful way.”

Fergal’s arms remained locked around his hairy knees while his blue-blue eyes fixed themselves on the farthest edge of the sea. He finally turned to Joe with a seriousness that prepared Joe for the worst—and still Joe wasn’t afraid, because he knew, with his new self, he could handle anything. “You hurt me so bad, Joe.”

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