Casper had already disappeared down the street by the time Desi got outside. It took him a few times driving around the nearby blocks before he finally found the boy, a skinny shadow that he barely saw through the darkness now that it was approaching midnight.
He slowed to a crawl and rolled down his window, waiting to see if Casper would drop the ignoring act. When the boy continued to walk without acknowledgement, Desi let out a playful scoff.
"Come on, Casper. Get in the car."
"I can walk, thanks," he responded, ice on his tone as he stared ahead.
Desi offered a gentle argument. "You live on the other side of town."
"I could use the exercise." Another deadpan reply as he continued forward, picking up his pace as if that was going to help him lose the trailing car.
Desi gave a defeated sigh, slouching forward onto the steering wheel for a moment before shifted to a begging inflection with his next words. "Don't make me feel like more of an asshole than I already do, Cas. Please, just let me take you home. It's the least I can do..."
Casper kept walking, but with the plea, he'd dropped his gaze down to his feet, fingers clenching around the strap of his bag. With a hissed curse under his breath, he slacked his tense shoulders in surrender, and after a few more step, turned sharply and rounded the back of Desi's vehicle to the passenger side.
He dropped into the seat like a disgruntled teenager, tossing his bag into the back and slamming the door. He didn't fasten his seatbelt. Desi resisted rolling his eyes, accepting the minute victory without further argument, stepping on the gas and turning off onto the main road.
The air in the car was stifling, but after a few minutes it felt like Casper was starting to deflate. Desi tested the waters with some grovelling. "Listen... I'm really sorry about... well. I didn't realize it was a big deal at the time but, I shouldn't have told anyone about the whole uh, asking me to prom thing. I knew you weren't officially out but I told people anyway and that was shitty of me. This wouldn't have happened if—."
Casper interrupted with a sharp scoff, folding his arms and slouching down into his seat further. "I don't give a shit about people knowing I'm gay, Jesus Christ."
Desi hummed, picking nervously at the old pleather flaking off his steering wheel while he reevaluated, continuing cautiously. "Still... I imagine you'd want something like that to be on your own terms and not come out because of a slip up from a stupid joke."
Casper scoffed again, this time the sound more like a cough, or maybe a laugh, harsher with his disbelief. "A joke? Please. I know you're too nice for your own good, Desi, but you can't be that naive. That was entirely intentional."
"Come on..." Desi tried at a smile to lighten the tension. He hoped it was just the alcohol making Casper overly dramatic. Like Ashley was when she got drunk. "Ashley's a little hard to swallow sometimes. Believe me, I know. But, we were all joking around... I'm sure she didn't mean for it to be cruel."
"She did," he responded, flatly and without doubt.
Desi resisted rolling his eyes, finding himself a little defensive on his girlfriend's behalf. He tried to let it out with a controlled exhale, but he felt his tone shift as he changed gears. "You barely know her. How can you be so sure?"
Casper didn't respond right away, maybe picking up on Desi's growing irritation and deciding to tone down his own stubbornness. He bit at his lip instead, debating his answer. When he spoke again, it was a softer admission. "I just know..."
The non-answer only itched at Desi's nerves further though, his voice rising to agitated. "Look, I didn't tell her about what you said. You know? About it being better to not be friends. So, if you think she's jealous—."
"I don't think she's jealous," Casper interrupted again, his tone creeping along after Desi's into frustrated.
"Good! Because like, that's not the reason! I know that she can get possessive sometimes but it's because she's insecure about that stuff. And maybe she did something kinda shitty but—"
"It doesn't fucking matter!" Casper was the first to snap under the pressure, raising his voice to a near yell as he interrupted yet again. Desi flounded for a second in the shock of being yelled at, only giving Casper time to add, "if you know what she did was wrong why are you making excuses for her?"
"They aren't excuses I just..."
Casper was stuck in his outburst though, continuing over the attempt at a retort. "You deserve better than someone that forces you to justify their shitty behavior all the time! You know that right?"
Objectively, Desi understood those words weren't meant to sting as much as they did. It was one of those phrases people used a lot, you deserve better. And he knew it was meant to be a positive. Like they thought highly of him. That he was capable of more. With your grades, you deserve better than a community college in your hometown. Why are you still selling drugs? You deserve a real job with your work ethic. You're so talented. You deserve more than just playing in your garage.
It had become a little backhanded, though. Because it implied that he had a choice. And that he was choosing to settle. Like it was his fault he didn't have better. Like he wasn't forced to stay in this shithole to take care of his mother, or stuck with selling drugs because there were no jobs for punks like him, or that it wasn't enough that he made music just because it was one thing that made him happy for a change.
He probably heard it the most about Ashley, though. You're such a nice guy. You deserve better than that bitch. Because she was an acquired tasted that nobody wanted to bother acquiring. Because she had issues just like he did, only she had a shittier way of dealing with them. Because her rough edges and distastefulness were not as palettable as Desi's failsafe of painful optimism.
You deserve better.
"What, like you?" It was Desi's turn to snap, barking the words at Casper with anger and offense that wasn't entirely directed at him. Still, he took the brunt of it, instantly deflating back into his seat, realizing too quickly that he'd unintentional hit a nerve just like he had with Ashley.
"That's not what I meant..." Casper tried to croak out a response past his regret, but it was Desi stuck in an outburst now.
"Yeah well, you seem to think you know a lot about me and my girlfriend and our fucking relationship and our fucking lives! What gives you the right to judge us? You have no idea how we are with each other or what goes on between us, how dar— "
"She's cheating on you!"
Instantly the angry back and forth dropped back down to a stagnant, suffocating silence.
Desi kept his eyes on the road, but he could hardly breathe with how thin the air was, and he worried his vision would fail him if his heart picked up any more extra beats. This was what palpitations felt like? It was a good thing that it was late and the roads were quiet...
Casper let a broken swear escape from under his breath as he leaned forward to put his head on the dashboard. From the corner of Desi's eye, he looked like he was going to be sick, and surprisingly he imagined it wasn't because of the alcohol.
"I'm sorry— I didn't... I wasn't supposed to tell you... you shouldn't have heard it from me— I..."
Desi's instinct was to argue. The logic ran through his head as quickly as the yellow lines on the road passed. It wasn't true. A lie. It couldn't be true. Casper was the one that was jealous. Trying to ruin their relationship. Liar.
When he spoke though, the anger of his thoughts was barely even there in his hoarse question. "How do you know that?"
Casper exhaled, swallowing thick. "I saw her, at the show, just before you started. She told me not to say anything... She said she was going to tell you."
That was why she was being weird. That was why she invited Casper to the party in the first place. That was why she reacted to his teasing like she did, and why she put him in his place. Desi felt a chill shiver over the skin of his arms. It wasn't true though. He was a liar. A jealous, spiteful liar.
But Desi was a sucker for the torment. "Who was she with?"
Casper hesitated. "I don't—."
"Who was she with."
He swallowed again, another sigh. "Nic..."
Desi stopped breathing altogether. Something surely punctured his lungs: a hot knife of sharp, searing betrayal buried in his sternum.
No. Lying. He's lying. He's a liar.
Desi had known Nic since junior high. They were best friends.
"Desi, I'm sorry, I—."
"Where's your place?"
Desi knew his non-reaction was probably more concerning than if he had snapped and started screaming or crying or something, but he couldn't muster it. Something had shut off. Inside his head there was noise, so much noise: the sound of his heart pounding like a double bass and his breathe, ragged and strained through the gaping gash in his chest. But between them it was a black hole of impossible silence.
Casper watched him for a little too long, in that way that was not really looking at him, but instead trying to make a decision. He didn't know Desi after all. Not really. He didn't know what leaving him alone would mean. He didn't make Desi repeat himself again, though. "It's up ahead. On the right."
Desi pulled over too quickly, his aggression showing in the turn of his wheel and slamming roughly on his breaks. Casper lingered in his seat even after the car had come to a full stop, watching again, debating.
"Desi, I... I really am sor—."
"Get out of the car, Casper."
He opened his mouth as if to argue, but no noise came out, and when he couldn't find further protest, he exited the vehicle and shut the door behind him.
Desi was pulling away from the curb before the door had even closed completely, making a u-turn in the empty side street and heading back the way he came to pick up Ashley from the party.