It was the Summer of 2004. Phones were free after 9 p.m. Texts were strung together using nine keys. Dial-up internet was the only link between rural New Jersey and the outside world. And, like so many boys of a certain persuasion, Internet chatrooms had evolved from a pastime to a lifeline.

I found a boy in one of those rooms—the first of many, the first of many manys. He was the first boy I kissed, the first to pick me up and park his car down a dark road, the first to make my mother look me in the eye and ask, “Are you still the same person?”, and the first to make me lie and say “Yes.” More than anything, he was my first “real” boy, not a fantasy or a construct. He was nothing like the ones I had dreamed up. He was short, with an oval face and a soft chin. His lips were tight, and his teeth were too small for his mouth. But he was gentle and smart, a scientist and a nerd who could carry on a conversation about literally anything.

One night, he took me out on a date, not to the movies to cuddle in the back of the theater, or to a twenty-four-hour diner to split a plate of disco fries. Like so many boys of a certain persuasion in rural New Jersey, we rode the black, windy roads past cornfields and peacock farms. He reached over the center armrest and held my hand. His warmth radiated through my body and out into the cool summer air. We drove confident in the knowledge that at sixty miles an hour we could be whoever the hell we wanted to be.

I watched him watching the road, so beguiled that I didn’t notice the car had slowed. We turned down a long driveway and pulled up to a modest ranch-style house.

“My parents are away,” he said, flashing me a tight, toothy smile. “My brother won’t be home for a while...” It sounded like a question.

“Oh, o-okay,” I squeaked.

The house was quiet. The air felt heavy—full—as if the walls were holding their breath. After a quick tour, we settled in the living room. With no armrest between us, my arm grazed his dewy skin. I was scouring my brain for the most romantic way of igniting our evening when his body tensed. His head perked up and he craned his neck towards the front door. It was only then that I heard the hum coming down the driveway, the crackle of tires on gravel and the squeak of brakes long overdue for repair.

“It’s my brother,” he said, his voice cracking.

The car door slammed. We had seconds. The gears in my head creaked and groaned, but I was unable to concoct a coherent story of how we met and why I was standing in their living room. I was ready to give up face the inevitable when his eyes caught mine—vacant and wide.

“What do you want me to do?” I said.

His shoulders slumped a little. “Hide...?”

His voice was small...

I nodded.

Like a gale he swept me away and down the hall, into a small room at the back of the house. He closed the door just as the front opened.

The room was black, no streetlights or starry night to chase away the dark. I couldn’t make sense of the shadows crowded alongside me. Like ghosts, they had lost all distinction. My brain tried to fill in the blanks like a drunken game of Mad Libs. There were spears and rifles hanging from the wall, headless torsos and snarled bunches of barbed wire strewn about, and towers of musty cages leaning in on me. I hugged the door, terrified to move. There was no quiet like “country” quiet—one sniffle could make its way a mile down the road; one sneeze and the towers around me could come crashing down. Dust tickled my nose, so I squared my shoulders and shallowed my breath.

His brother had a bright but raucous voice, one that echoed down hallways and penetrated walls. But I already knew that. It was the same voice that had snickered next to me during English class, the same voice that cackled and bounded across the cafeteria when a crude joke was told, the same voice that invited me to bunk with him and his friends on our senior trip when I had no other offers. Sound and memory coalesced in my mind. They formed a face, the same oval shape and soft chin that had caught my attention online.

“You look familiar,” I said to the boy in one of our earlier correspondences. At some point, in-between flirting, I ascertained why.

“I went to school with your brother,” I confessed.

In the years since, I’ve often wondered whether I chose him because of his brother. His was a familiar face in a dark sea of leering eyes, headless naked torsos, and unsolicited dick pics. And maybe, if I’m being honest with myself, a part of me was acting out unrequited feelings for the sweet, nasally voice that had made those lost years a bit more bearable. Nevertheless, I was no stranger to the two voices laughing down the hall.

Like a scientist who uses the brightness of stars to determine their distance, I tried to use the volume of their voices to gauge their position within the house, but their textures proved more similar than I expected. I couldn’t tell if the boy was standing between me and his brother, guarding me, or if my brain was playing another round of Mad Libs.

I let myself exhale. As I did, a voice bellowed down the hall. My heart lurched. A door squeaked. I thought about dropping to the floor, burying myself among the other shadows. But something held me in place. I was unsure of who or what was waiting for me on the other side, but I wouldn’t close my eyes.

I held my breath...

...

...

...

 A stream of urine burbled into the toilet across the hall. I stifled a laugh just as a roar of water echoed throughout the house. Like static, it drowned out all other sounds. By the time it cleared, their voices had been swallowed by the quiet.

I forgot how long I stood there. I used the time to prepare excuses for why I wouldn’t make curfew. Sorry mom, I was locked in a closet had the same energy as my dog ate my homework. It was then that I realized the black cloud around me had faded into a dusty gray veil, bringing the ghostly shadows back to life. Spears became oars and rifles reshaped into fishing rods. Headless torsos shifted into child-sized kayaks and what I thought were tangled webs of barbed wire made my heart yearn for snowflakes and eggnog.

I ran my hand along the side of one of the caged towers, now a stack of dented cardboard boxes. I held my breath and covered my nose until the dust settled. I squinted, pulling the scribbles on each box into view.

[Boy]’s Toys, age 9.

[Brother]’s Toys, age 4.

[Boy]’s Science Fair, age 11.

[Brother]’s Little League, age 7.

[Boy] + [Brother] room 1991, 1992, 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998.

I felt so small.

What was an hour riding black and windy roads and holding hands across an armrest compared to a lifetime of brotherhood? What was the heat of a body in need compared to the warmth of a room full of memories? My eyes watered. What was it like to have a brother who came home just to see you, who called because they missed you, who never went to prison when you needed him the most?

The door creaked open. My eyes shied away from the light. I wiped them on the back of my hand and turned to see the boy beaming at me.

 “Thank you,” he said, his voice airy.

In the light of the hallway, flakes of dust hung between us.

“It was nothing,” I said, leaving another me to one day fill in the blanks.