Nocturnal by Scott Sigler Page B

five
negative
pounds, because you don’t weigh anything if you float.
    “I’ll stay away,” high-pitch said. “But I’m not going home. Not yet.”
    “Just don’t draw attention,” said the sandpaper voice. “And
stay away
from the king. Hillary said he’s not ready yet. You get us caught, Firstborn will kill us. Pierre, let’s go, we’re due back.”
    “Okay, Sthly.”
    Aggie felt like he was falling, only for a second, then he went
up
. So fast, herky-jerky,
pop … pop … pop
 … like someone taking the stairs three at a time, yet the arms holding him felt gentle, like the guy carrying him was being careful — much like you would be careful carrying a dozen eggs you just bought from the store.
    Aggie struggled to open his eyes again. He was on a rooftop. He could see Van Ness far below, his attention drawn to a green Starbucks sign. Not that a Starbucks sign was much of a landmark; those things were everywhere.
    Then, the world lurched under him. Up, then down, then up, then down.
    Despite the motion, the horse — that goddamn
fine
horse — finally caught up with him. Aggie James let himself slide into the warmth and the darkness, into the one place where the memories didn’t haunt him.

The Belt
    B ut I feel sick.”
    Roberta Deprovdechuk crossed her arms and stared. “Get up, boy. You go to school.”
    The very word
school
did, in fact, make Rex feel sick. Sick inside, a cold sensation that made him want to crawl into a hole and hide forever.
    “Honest, I really don’t feel good.”
    She rolled her eyes. “You think I was born yesterday? You’re not sick. Those kids pick on you because you’re obnoxious. You leave them alone and they’ll leave you alone. Get up and get to school. And no skipping! You skip school like some good-for-nothing burnout, sit here and draw all day. I let you put your stupid pictures up on your walls, don’t I? Now
get up
.”
    She grabbed the blankets and yanked them off. He had a horrid, frozen moment of exposure, of his boner pushing his underwear out in a little tent. Rex slammed his body into a fetal position, hands over his underwear-clad privates.
    “You
filthy
boy! Did you touch it?”
    Still curled up, he shook his head.
    “Rex, did you
touch yourself
?”
    “No!”
    He heard the familiar hiss of leather sliding through denim belt loops. He closed his eyes tight in anticipation of the pain to come.
    “Roberta, I didn’t touch it! Honest, I—”
    The
crack
of leather on his back cut his words short.
    “You little liar.”
    A second
crack
, this time on his legs. Despite the stinging pain, he stayed curled up. Rex knew better than to cry out, or to try and get away.
    “I told you
never
to be like the other dirty boys, didn’t I?”
    Crack
, his shoulder lit up.
    “I’m sorry! I won’t do it ever again!”
    Crack
, on the thin underwear fabric covering his ass. That one made him lurch, twitch, his body screaming at him to
run
, but he fought himself back into a tight ball.
    If he ran or resisted, it would only get worse.
    “There,” Roberta said. “I’m helping you, Rex. You need to learn thesethings. If you’re not ready for school in five minutes, you get more. You hear me talking to you?”
    She walked out, slamming the door behind her.
    The pain faded a little, but the cold feeling in his chest would not leave.
    He still had to go to school.
    Rex sat up on the bed. His boner had gone away. Roberta had always told him boners were bad, and the lingering stings on his back, his legs, his ass told him she was right.
    He’d dreamed again, and this time he’d remembered more. He’d been watching Alex Panos, waiting for a chance to
kill
Alex. And that was what made Rex feel funny. Not girls, not even boys — the
stalking
gave him the boner. Hunting Alex felt exciting,
arousing
, but the dream also carried a dark fear that someone was watching Rex, waiting in the darkness to
hurt
him.
    Dream-Rex had turned away from Alex. Instead, Rex and