Games Boys Play by Zoe X. Rider Page A

with him and dragging the door shut.
    It was just them and their breathing and the smell of stored clothing, the cigarette smoke that clung to Dylan’s hair and clothes, and Brian’s sweat. Dylan was on the other side of the wool coat. Part of him was wedged against Brian’s knee, but Brian couldn’t tell what part. His back was starting to ache from his crouched-bent position.
    Dylan’s hand reached through the coats and gripped his elbow.
    Then there was a sound outside the closet.
    Brian shifted his head a little, but that just made noise inside the closet, right at his ears.
    Footsteps? Had he heard footsteps?
    He heard nothing.
    And then footsteps.
    And then: “Oh, that’s cute. That’s really fucking cute.”
    It was his voice, the intruder’s voice. Brian’s heart pounded. If his hands were free, he’d be gripping Dylan’s arm twice as tightly as Dylan was gripping his. He shifted his foot, his knee digging harder against Dylan, who was here, in the closet with him—so who the fuck was out there?
    “Where’d you go, shitheel?”
    There came a clatter—the sound of a chair being knocked over?
    Dylan’s fingers tightened.
    Brian closed his eyes.
    The wool coat scratched against his cheek.
    Footsteps stamped across the floor.
    “I’ll find you. Wherever the fuck you went, I’ll find you.”
    Shit shit shit shit shit.
    A door slammed.
    Dylan’s grip was so hard it almost hurt. If Brian weren’t in a near panic, it would hurt. More bruises, he thought. But outside the closet, there was nothing.
    Silence.
    They crouched there unmoving, but there was nothing else.
    Eventually Dylan said quietly, “Are you okay?”
    “Yeah.”
    “I think it’s safe.”
    “Yeah. Good.” He hoped it was safe.
    Dylan eased the door open. He stuck his head out, then stepped into the hall. He helped Brian climb out, keeping him steady as he straightened, his wrists still taped tight behind him.
    “Are you sure you’re okay?”
    Brian nodded, his gaze darting around the room. Had someone been there?
    The chair was upright.
    The chair was upright.
    He sagged a little, relieved. The chair was upright. Nothing else, from what he could tell, had been disturbed. But an iPhone lay on the kitchen counter, just a few feet from the closet door, its screen still lit up. Dylan must have set it there and started up a sound file before jumping into the closet.
    “Let’s get you free,” Dylan said, flipping on the hallway light.
    He turned to let Dylan undo his wrists. They were standing close to a wall; he leaned until his shoulder touched it, then let it take his weight. “That was close,” he said quietly.
    “Shit yeah.”
    As the tape tugged his wrists, he said, “Who the fuck are you anyway?”—and then sucked in a gasp as the tape tore hair right out of his wrist. He turned, bringing his arms in front of him, rubbing his wrists, his back against the wall.
    Dylan just shrugged.
    Brian let his knees bend, let the wall support him as he slid down until he was sitting on his ass in the hall, rubbing a wrist, watching his cousin and best friend watch him back. “I can’t believe you did all this.”
    Dylan lowered himself to the floor.
    “Changing clothes, the recording,” Brian said. “You had to make that ahead of time.”
    Dylan circled his knees with his arms.
    “And the mask. The hoodie. The gun. I remember that fucking gun, you know.” Brian tipped his head back and closed his eyes. “I remember that gun.”
    “Aunt Terri didn’t let you have toy guns growing up.”
    “Neither did any of my friends’ moms.” He’d grown up in California. He and Dylan hadn’t met—hadn’t really met—until Brian was fifteen and his parents had moved back East again. That cap gun was the first toy gun he’d ever held in his hands. The smell… He’d fallen in love with the smell of fired caps. Dylan must not have fired any after digging the gun out of his mom’s basement, because Brian would have recognized that