‘We’ve had some complaints,’ the policeman said. He had taken Matthew away from Lukas, had drawn him up toward the road where the police car was parked, before he turned to Matthew, and started. The policewoman had stayed behind. She was bending down beside Lukas, and speaking to him, as Matthew was led away.

‘Two complaints from a couple of weeks ago, and another from today,’ the policeman said, looking at his notebook. ‘Complaints about the boy being inappropriately dressed, and about you, touching him inappropriately.’

Matthew swallowed. He couldn’t speak.

‘On one occasion. On the fifteenth, he was naked, apparently. Can you tell me what your relationship to the child is?’

‘He’s an adult,’ Matthew managed.

The policeman offered Matthew a wry smile.

‘He’s eighteen.’

The policeman laughed, and shook his head.

‘It’s true,’ Matthew said, finding his voice.

On the beach, he could see Lukas going through his bag and pulling out his wallet. He was showing the woman his ID. And she was nodding. He put it away and she stood up. Lukas stood up, still dressed in the thong and listened, while she spoke to him. Every now and then he said something back, and then Matthew saw him look down and motion at what he was wearing before he looked up at her again, asking her a question.

She nodded, and left him, and a moment or two later she was beside them.

‘He’s eighteen,’ she said.

‘Well, well. How about you two boys play at home, where no one can see you?’ the policeman said.

Matthew nodded, and the two of them walked away.

On the beach, Lukas was pulling his T-shirt over his head and looking in his bag for his jeans. He was pulling them out and stepping into them when Matthew came up to him.

‘What did she say?’ Matthew said.

‘She thought I was a boy. She said I looked thirteen.’

Lukas was upset about it.

‘Do you think I look thirteen?’

Matthew shook his head, staring at Lukas. He was so beautiful. His face flushed. And his lips dark red. His skin had turned a honey brown colour from all the sun, and it was just like he had said. He had never burned. But he did look thirteen. Fifteen when he was properly dressed.

‘Are you in trouble?’

‘No. She asked me if you’d been hurting me, touching me, and asked me how I knew you, making out like you were a pedophile or something. I told her I was eighteen and that you were my friend, and that I’d lost my jocks a couple of times, and she laughed, and then I asked her about the thong and she said it was fine. I could wear it if I wanted to, but she said it like I was an idiot for doing it.’

He was upset.

‘Hey. Don’t worry about it.’

Lukas nodded. He pulled his sandals onto his feet.

‘Can we go?’ he said.

Matthew got his stuff and followed Lukas up to the road, wondering what Lukas felt like with that thong on under his jeans. He was going to have to put up with that string up his arse all the way home.

#

‘So have you decided?’

‘I suppose so.’

‘They are fucked, Lukey.’

Lukas nodded.

He bit his lips for a while, red in the face, and then said, ‘Are you going to like me better? Really?’

‘I think so.’

‘Are we going to do stuff?’

‘If you want.’

‘All the time?’

‘What do you mean by all the time?’

‘I don’t know. Like, heaps of times. Not just three times.’

‘How many times?’

‘Weeks of times.’

‘Weeks of times?’

‘Yeah. Weeks of times. Like you’re my boyfriend.’

‘I can’t be your boyfriend.’

‘Why can’t you?’

‘You’ve got a cock, Lukey. I don’t want to be with someone who has a cock.’

Lukas started biting his lips again. His face turned redder.

‘Well you have to pretend like you are.’

‘Like I’m what.’

‘Like you’re my boyfriend.’

Matthew turned his head away.

‘For weeks.’

‘I can’t go out in public, Lukas. I can’t be seen out with you, in public, holding hands, or kissing you.’

‘I didn’t mean that. I mean when we’re together, alone. And you have to do things.’

‘What sort of things?’

‘Fuck me. And let me suck your cock.’ He stopped, and turned his head down. ‘And you have to let me.’

‘What?’

‘Fuck you.’

‘What?’ Matthew said.

Lukas put his head forward into his hands, and started blinking tears onto the carpet. ‘Can’t I?’ he said, turning his head and looking up at Matthew quickly.

Matthew shook his head.

‘Can you suck my cock?’ he said, bursting into a sob directed at the carpet.

‘No.’

‘How come?’ Lukas’ mouth opened wide, contorted.

‘I don’t want to.’

He nodded.

For a long time, there was silence.

‘Well you have to do the other stuff for weeks then, till I go to England.’

‘That’s months away.’

Lukas nodded.

‘You have to be like my boyfriend, or I’m not doing it.’

‘They’re already smashed, Luke.’

‘Don’t tell me that. Don’t keep saying it. You don’t have to keep saying it like I don’t already know it. They’re fucked,’ he said, turning his head toward Matthew. ‘They’re smashed up. They’re crushed. They’ve been pulverised. They’re nuked, Luko. How many ways can you find to say it? Do you think it’s funny? Do you think I don’t know they’re fucked?’

Matthew swallowed.

He thought for a while.

‘Okay,’ he said.

‘What?’ Lukas was still crying, and still had his head in his hands.

‘Okay. I’ll do what you say. I’ll be like your boyfriend.’

‘Till I go to England.’

‘Till you go to England.’

‘Can you hug me?’ Lukas said, his mouth contorting with a sob.

Matthew opened his arms to move toward him, but Lukas met him halfway, reaching out and grabbing Matthew like he was a lifeboat and Lukas was drowning.

‘Can I do it however I want?’

‘Whatever.’

#

That night, Matthew stole the keys to his father’s office and took a cab downtown. He let himself in, and fired up his father’s computer. After searching through MIMS for half an hour or so, he found an antibiotic that sounded right for Lukas. He prescribed some for himself, and, after looking through the MIMS again, he decided to prescribe some Capanol as well. There wasn’t any point in Lukas feeling any pain, and morphine would have to help with that. The only problem would be in giving him too much. Even so, he decided to prescribe the hundred milligram capsules. That way, there would be enough for when he did Lukas’ cock, which was bound to hurt a hell of a lot more than cutting out his nuts was going to.

He printed the prescriptions out and forged his father’s signature on them, and then he went into the room beside his father’s, where he knew there was a tall cabinet with atraumatic needles, sutures, scalpels, iodine, cotton swabs and some other stuff he might need. He hadn’t ever sutured a wound before, though he had watched his father once or twice. When he was fifteen, he had spent his holidays at the practice, seriously considering becoming a doctor, though he later changed his mind. He didn’t have the grades, and never would have them.

He made sure everything was as he had found it, reset the alarm, and called himself a cab, having to find a payphone first, because, as usual, he had forgotten his phone.

When he got home there was a light on in his parents’ bedroom. And as he was walking toward the house, someone switched on a light in the living room. It was four in the morning. He let himself in, quietly, though as he was walking past the living room, he saw his mother, at the drinks cabinet, pouring herself a whisky and soda.

‘Ellen,’ his father called from their room. ‘Why the hell is this light on?’

Matthew managed to get onto the stairs before his father came out of their room.

‘Where are you?’ his father said.

In the morning, Matthew went back to three tablets. It was too difficult taking two.