Sands

Waves wake me. 

Hushed murmuring 

in and out, in and out. 

They’ve been cloying all morning, 

and now they take more. 

Sand creeping up my thighs, telling 

my body 

it wants to be buried. 

I told my brother I wouldn’t sleep on the beach again, but I can’t be still in beds anymore. After dad left, my brother kept the furniture, not out of some naive hope of a grand return, but out of stubbornness. My room has been caught in stasis, frozen since I was eleven, the sheets clammy with every night of my life; they crease wrinkles into my cheeks deeper than my years. 

I prefer sand, 

tearing me away - 

an exorcism through exfoliation. 

I’ve stopped wearing shoes at night, so the water can wake me sooner. The flat is a short walk from the beach and drunken students have scattered broken beer bottles as breadcrumbs home. My feet are traced with the red lines of their maps. 

Outside our flat door I can hear my brother in the kitchen. I’m sure he’s tutting at the walls like they’d agree he’s a martyr for taking me back in. I don’t intend to stay long. I’d tell the walls myself but they wouldn’t hear me through the coating of bacon grease. Elbowing through his stiff front door I trip over jumbled shoes queued along the hall. The clanging of the frying pan is my only greeting. The walls can go fuck themselves. 

Two cups of milky coffee eye my entrance to the kitchen, one has extra grains circling the rim, refusing to dissolve; I take this one. My brother’s thoughts are like TV static, crackling. He wants to ask when I’m leaving, instead he asks if I’m ever going to see any friends while visiting. I tell him I don’t have any friends left up here and he mumbles something about escaping this dump. If he’d ever left, he’d know every place has its own shit. 

I left my phone out last night. He tells me the buzzing kept him up. He fries my vegan bacon in the same pan as his real bacon and says he’s too tired for my shit today. He’s too tired every day. Something harsh was folded into him when he was seven and mum decided he looked too much like dad to love. He grew around this sharp little thing and now it’s too deep to tug free, instead it jabs and jabs and jabs. He likes to find other reasons for his mood and I’m conscientious enough to give him plenty. Yesterday I left the door unlocked, the day before I left the water running in the bath and almost flooded the neighbours. He flicks a plate of soggy bacon sandwiches my way and I call him a prick because what else are little brothers good for. 

My phone battery is at 12%. Thirty messages from group chats I only lurk in, seven reels from friends who gave up trying to talk to me properly months ago, one Tinder match, three Feeld likes, and seven Grindr messages. I ignore them all and tap through Instagram stories, like I do every day. 

I find You with ease.

Cropped fluffy mullet, ironic heart-shaped sunglasses, glitter rubbed through your stubble. You post three times a week, five times if you have a night out, eight if you’re feeling anxious. The week after we met, you got to ten. 

It’s Thursday and you’re on your fourth story of the week: hills behind a streaked train window, your faint reflection a mound of its own, tousled bracken hair against smooth stone skin. EDI - ABN. You have a gig tonight, I already knew this from Tuesday’s story. It’s an indie band, small enough that you tagged them so I followed the link and bought my own ticket. 

I tell my brother I’ll do the dishes, he leaves for work and I leave the pan to soak. 

My bedroom door frame is vibrating. The air shivers, unable to

escape, it ripples through every object: 

through limp piles of washing, 

half eaten meal deals, 

posters of indie punk bands 

I liked when I was fifteen 

who turned out to be Alt-right 

or nonces. 

I lift my hand into the room, 

crossing the boundary, 

and my hairs 

stand on end, 

prickling. 

I retract 

and move to the bathroom instead.

Dust-coated bleach bottles have fainted around the toilet - I aim my piss down the worst of the shit streaks. I’ll have a bath, I’ll trim my pubes, I’ll prep for tonight. The water comes out tepid but clean. I’ve brought sand in with me and the granules don’t know what to do in this environment so instead they wait for me to make my move. I have hours to waste. 

The first month after I met You, I couldn’t touch myself. Now I can’t think of anything else. I pull myself awake and my dick protests with a sickening ache. I think of You and I feel the sand clogging my arse. When I cum it’s a jab, uncomfortable, but out. I stay in the bath, watching my cum refuse to dissipate. I start to tug again. My skin burns but eventually I’ll give in. 

I track time based on my brother’s movements. 

When I hear him tripping over my shoes, I know it’s 5:35. 

When I hear him shouting about the pan, I know it’s 6:10. 

When I hear him bitching at the walls, I know it’s 6:30 and I get dressed. 

I’ve considered our reunion every day since the party. I choose the same T-shirt I wore when we first met and wonder if you’ll notice I haven’t washed it since. I almost scrubbed it, then I almost chucked it. Eventually I realised I couldn’t touch it so it sat in the corner of my room like a mousetrap. 

The gig is in a venue I remember from university and the floors feel as if they haven’t been scrubbed since. Somewhere under the layers is the WKD I spilled back when I still called it poof juice. With every step I feel sticky fingers on my soles pulling me back.

You’re near the front, haloed by orange light. I can smell You on my shirt: stale, 

sickly, 

heavy on the chest. 

Shapes move on stage behind you but they’re shadow puppets. The band’s shit: average indie boys with the same guitar and the same lyrics and the same schtick as everyone else. My blood groans louder and louder in my ear. I won’t let You see me first. I’ll lead. 

When our eyes meet you pretend you don’t recognise me but I can feel the static, 

prickling. 

I smile and that eases things. We chat about the party where we met and I lie. I offer to buy you a drink, You say you owe me because I’d given you a fag that night. I drink whatever you’re having and You don’t question it because it’s easier for you. You relax. You’ll probably only post one more story this week. I hold your arm as if I might fall and invite you back to a room I hate. 

When you enter my room, it no longer shivers. Objects become solid, still, like the room has inhaled and is afraid to breathe You out. We kiss and your stubble scratches into me, exfoliating. Your tongue scraps along my neck like sandpaper and when you suck you leave behind burrows for lugworms. Your hands run down my back and this time I let You. There’s sand in my trousers and when You grind into me I start to tear. I tell You I’m ready and you don’t question it because it’s easier for You. I rip open and tell myself I want this. Like I told myself I wanted it last time, too: when I woke up on someone’s spare bed and felt jabbing 

in my back, felt rough 

hands cloying,

telling my body 

it wants to be buried. 

When I pretended to be asleep because confronting You would make it real for both of us. 

My dick is harder than it's ever been and 

it feels horrible, forbidden, 

and when I cum it’s with urgency. 

I ask You to choke me 

and you don’t hesitate. 

I gag, 

my eyes water, salt floods my lips and You cum 

watching me drown. 

Everything from before is undone. 

Re-written. 

We’ll keep fucking after tonight. I’ll keep asking You 

to hurt me, 

slap me, 

whatever You want. 

You’ll keep waiting till I’m asleep because you like it better that way. 

We’re casual but You'll make sure it’s known 

to anyone who asks or ever thinks of asking 

that I want this. 

I wanted all of this, 

no one can believe any different now.

You’ll introduce me to your friends 

who are all loud 

and like to post 

feminist book quotes 

on their social feeds. 

ANON 

You’ll meet my brother and he likes you. 

You’ll tease me about all the things I’d asked you not to tease me about and his laugh churns together with yours, 

waves crashing and washing the walls. 

He’ll call You a good lad, 

just like everyone does. 

He’ll make You coffee in the morning 

and you wash up all the mugs. 

I don’t meet your family - You say it’s complicated. 

In the weeks You don’t text me, 

I wait on the beach 

and bury my feet, then my calves, then my thighs 

I bury myself the way children do 

I pretend to be treasure 

or castles 

or sinkholes. 

Morning waves 

and my covers crumble 

but I’ll build it again

and again 

and again. 

And when I date a soft man just for something to do:

someone who kisses the back of my neck, and

flinches when I ask him to hit me 

I still find myself sleepwalking, 

following the breadcrumbs 

and lines on my feet 

back to the sands 

and the waves 

and You.

---

Caleb (they/them) is a writer, filmmaker, and artist based in Glasgow with an MLitt in Digital Journalism. They write horror, dark comedy, and odd little stories that make their friends ask: why don’t you try something a little more jolly? Their writing has appeared in various publications, including Little White Lies, and their films in multiple festivals, as well as the international streaming service, Shudder.

Instagram: @caleb_r_barton