23. Noah

It"s hot. So hot. And my right arm is dead. There"s something very heavy...

Lane.

My eyes fly open, the faint sunlight piercing my retinas. I can"t move.

Lane"s giant body is sprawled face down, almost entirely on top of me. His face is nuzzled into the crock of my neck and one of his legs is hooked over mine.

I can't help but smile at the warmth of his breath on my neck. Despite being incredibly uncomfortable, I kind of love this.

A chiming sound comes from the living room. It must be an alarm, because it doesn"t stop. We have an early class today. Part of me hopes the alarm stops so we can doze some more, maybe play hooky. I didn't get a ton of sleep last night, and I'm not ready for whatever this is to end.

Lane stirs, and I have to roll my lips in to keep the idiotic grin off my face. He"s probably going to hate waking up like this. Not just in my bed, but wrapped around me like some kind of marsupial. And, oh fuck, how could I forget he"s naked?!

This is going to be good.

I stay completely still while he lifts his head and assesses the situation. He pushes himself up, slowly trailing his disoriented gaze down my body. I"m at least wearing sleep pants, but my I woke up next to a naked Lane Blakely morning wood is on full display.

"W-what..."

"I had no idea you were such a snuggler."

Okay. I know. I"m a massive asshole. But I fucking can"t resist.

Lane sits up completely, groggily rubbing both hands over his face. He looks up, registering the chiming.

"How long has that been going off?"

"I don't know, but it's ruining the morning I had planned for you. I had a very different type of alarm in mind to wake you up with—What?"

He doesn"t look like he"s panicking. But he doesn"t look amused at all, either. He scoots over to the opposite edge of the bed and goes to stand up, apparently just now realizing that he"s stark naked. He looks down at himself, then at the disheveled sheets, and to the basket of wet clothes that"s still sitting in the middle of my bedroom floor.

Lane turns his steely eyes to me, looking me over. His glare stops on my neck for a few beats, and then he looks around at the bed again. He bends to swipe something from the ground, then stands, holding the embroidered soccer ball pillow in front of him to hide his massive erection. I roll my eyes so hard, I"m surprised they don"t dislodge from their sockets.

"You can't hide that thing!" I call after him. "And if you poke a hole in that pillow, you're going to be the one to explain it to Hannah!"

As he walks out of my room, I get another look at his muscular thighs and round, firm butt. I bite my lip and groan, still surprised by how much the view affects me.

He turns back and catches me staring, scowling at me before pulling my door shut. I can"t help but laugh, falling back into my pillows that smell like soap and fresh cut grass. Like Lane.

"This day is dragging so hard," I whine to Miah. We take a seat on the stone wall that surrounds the courtyard outside the student center. The sun is blazing today, but I'm thankful for it, because that means our match tomorrow won't be canceled. Which is a bright spot on what has otherwise been a very slow and disappointing day.

"You will not believe who I got stuck with as a lab partner," I say, tossing a balled-up napkin at his face. He's not paying nearly enough attention to me, and I need someone to bitch to.

Fucking Danny Hastings is in my applied sciences course with a weekly lab that starts next week. Of course, today of all days, Danny had to come sit right next to me, and ended up getting assigned to be my lab partner.

Oh, speak of the devil.

"Hey guys, mind if I join you?"

I don't say a word, picking at my chicken sandwich while Miah and Danny talk about a class they have together. I don't take part in the conversation until it involves our match tomorrow. Virginia Tech had one of the best records in the NCAA last year, narrowly missing the championship in the third round. I feel like our team is playing well together, but there"s a lot of new blood on our team— including me, Miah, Lane, and Danny. We've won the last couple of matches, and I feel like we're growing stronger as a team, but this match will definitely test us.

"Where's Lane?" Danny asks.

"Do I look like his keeper?" I should feel bad for being such an asshole to him, but that Danny is such a nice guy isn't actually working in his favor here.

"He seemed upset when he left Randy's. I texted him but he didn't answer."

"He's fine," I say, glaring. He's right though, Lane is definitely off. He's upset, that much is clear, but he won't talk about it. And the way he was acting giggly and high was less fun than it should have been. It freaked me out. I think I'd worry less if he cried or got upset. Hulking out and breaking shit would have been less frightening.

I'm not about to admit to Danny that, despite living with him, I've barely spoken to Lane since teasing him about waking him up with a blow job. We have the same first morning class, but he sits far away from me and didn't look at me even once today.

"So are we going to talk about the hickey or are we still pretending it"s not there, because that thing is really hard to ignore," Miah says.

My head jerks up, realizing that Danny has walked off. Good riddance. Although now I have to deal with being badgered by Miah, who thinks I have a secret girlfriend. We haven't been hanging out much because he has been seeing someone, and I've been preoccupied with Lane.

"Look, I can totally respect wanting to keep things on the DL, but we"ve been best friends since kindergarten. It"s against bro code not to tell me." It takes effort not to laugh uncomfortably at those words.

"Did I tell you I have to be fucking chem buddies with Danny Hastings this semester?" I say, trying to change the subject.

"Yeah, uh huh," Miah says, waving his water bottle in the air dismissively. "Whatever. Unless Danny"s the one that gave you that love bite, I don"t care."

"Gross."

Miah shrugs. "Fess up then, playa. Otherwise, this love affair you have with hating him is getting a little sus."

"Whatever, man," I say, getting up to throw my trash away so I can get to my next class.

"Why won't you tell me?" he whines, bouncing in his seat. If I wasn't actually afraid of him finding out who it really is, this would be significantly more entertaining.

"Because you have a big mouth. Which, by the way, reminds me I wanted to talk to you." I stand in front of him, crossing my arms and giving him my most serious expression. "You need to keep anything you know about Lane's past to yourself. Don't mention shit. Don't act like you know shit. You don't know shit." I make a zipper gesture in front of my mouth, and then a slashing motion over my throat.

"You don't think anyone's going to find out when that documentary airs?"

"Not if you don't open your fat mouth, Miah. And don't you fucking watch it, either. I'm serious. He deserves some damn peace."

Miah's eyes narrow thoughtfully. "I guess you two are getting along better?"

"It doesn't matter if we are. No one deserves to have their shit aired out like that."

"Alright."

"Miah," I say sternly.

"Down boy. I fucking promise, okay?"

"Thank you."

"You're welcome. Now, back to these hickeys. You know I won't let it go until I figure it out, right?"

"Yeah, I know."

"And you're going to give me nothing?! After I just swore to keep your sworn enemy's secrets?!"

A loud sigh escapes me. "Fine. One thing."

Miah nods enthusiastically. "It better be good," he says, pointing at me.

"You know the kind of bubble butt that has dimples on the side?"

"Yeah?" Miah's eyes light up.

"They've got an ass like it"s been carved from marble, with just enough jiggle to make you want to bite into it."

The sound of the key in the door spikes my heart rate. Lane has barely talked to me since yesterday. Other than passing him on campus between classes once, I haven"t seen him at all since our shared class this morning. I was happy to hang out with Miah for a while this afternoon, because I"ve missed his company, but I made excuses to go home. Miah followed me, begging to hear more about my supposed secret girlfriend. I love the guy, but the moment Lane comes home I'm ready for Miah to leave.

I want to talk to Lane, to check in with him to make sure he"s okay. Not just if he"s okay with the hot as hell shit that went down in my bedroom yesterday. There are a lot of other things we still haven't talked about, like the documentary, or what happened at the restaurant, or his nightmares.

He had another one last night, which I'm pretty sure he doesn't remember. He's had one every night since Hannah called him.

When Lane walks in, he takes one look at Miah, who holds his hand up in greeting, and quickly glances in my direction before heading straight to his room. He doesn"t join us to go down for dinner, and makes excuses when I knock on his door afterward. I don"t have a chance to talk to him at all, and it's clear he"s avoiding me again.

I leave my door open and climb into bed early, hoping a good night"s sleep will get me out of my head. But I wake up to Lane having another nightmare, and run into his room immediately.

He"s not thrashing about as much as he did last night, so I"m able to slip into his bed and lie on his chest, letting my weight press into him. He startles awake and tenses for long enough I think he might throw me out, but then allows himself to relax and drifts back off again.

I nearly fall asleep on top of him. I'm exhausted, and I imagine he is too. I'm not sure how long either of us can keep going like this. It"s not that I mind being there for him; I like that I can bring him comfort. I'm worried about him, and it's gotten to the point that his anxiety is rubbing off on me.

I consider telling my dad, or Hannah. But what would I say? Would they be able to tell that my interest runs deeper than brotherhood if they see how closely I've been watching him?

On the surface, Lane seems fine. He"s going through all the motions, playing his part, wearing his mask well. But at night when he"s sleeping, all his demons come for him.

I don't know what to do. The documentary aired tonight. I overheard Lane telling Hannah he didn"t want to talk about it, and that he wasn't going to watch it.

I don"t want to watch it.

But I need to know something. And I"m never going to break through Lane"s mental hangups without having some basis of understanding.

Tomorrow morning, I'm likely to have some time to myself. Especially if he remembers me coming into his room to comfort him, he'll avoid me like the plague until I see him for warm-ups before the game. Instead of going to the library to study, or meeting up with Miah and the guys to hang out, I decide I'm going to watch the documentary, in case there"s anything I can learn about what Lane is going through.

Just as I expected, Lane slips out before I wake up. I stayed in his room until close to dawn, slipping out before his alarm went off. In case he does come home, I bring my laptop into the living room and put on a pair of headphones. It doesn"t take me more than a second to find it,, and I curl up on the couch with a bowl of cereal to watch.

My cereal is quickly forgotten as the documentary does a deep dive on the three top leaders of Deliverance Summit, starting with Lane"s grandfather, Pastor Nathanael Warren. His pictures give me the creeps, the way looking at a photo of a serial killer might. He"s handsome in a very clean-cut way, and I can see the family resemblance. But there"s nothing behind his eyes. In every picture and video clip, he seems cold and calculated, detached. The only exception is a clip of him giving a sermon, where he"s so worked up that he"s dribbling spit. The congregation is worked up to the point of hysteria, and several people faint. I"ve never seen someone have a seizure in real life, but the way some people are shaking and jerking around is concerning. Their eyes are bulging and they tilt their faces towards the sky, babbling in what could be another language, but sounds like gibberish. There are children present in the video footage, but their faces are blurred, so I can"t tell if any of them might be Lane.

The entire display is far scarier than any horror movie I"ve ever watched, so much so that it makes me question my own beliefs. We were never regular churchgoers, but the services we did attend, usually for special occasions or when my grandma would visit, were nothing like this.

The documentary describes Pastor Warren as highly charismatic. And intelligent, it seems, considering how long he kept his church compound secluded and free from the scrutiny of the public and the law. They lived almost entirely off-grid, aside from electricity. The compound was so rural, they rarely had visitors, and it was easy for them to pass as a farmstead, rather than a religious commune.

Behind those gates, there was an entire community of people living in their own bubble, away from the rest of the world. The women were subservient, the children often too afraid to be anything other than obedient. The journalist describes harsh punishments that would incur child abuse charges in the modern world. But the people living on the Deliverance Summit compound didn"t live in the same reality we do. At the time of the raid, nearly all the children, and many of the adults, had never been outside the compound. They"d never heard music or seen a television set or used a computer. Many of them had never even seen an actual licensed physician or had appropriate schooling.

It makes me think about just how smart Lane must be to have caught on the way he did, to have gotten the SAT scores he did, not to mention being accepted to a prestigious school like Harrison University. And, aside from being a little standoffish in crowds, and a complete dick to me at times, he turned out to be kind. Which, considering the man that raised him, and the man that sired him, is a miracle in its own right.

Wanting to feel the least bit connected to him, I pull out my phone to message him.

Noah: Hey. You feeling ready for the match tonight?

Noah: I'm looking forward to seeing Dad and Hannah.

He leaves the messages on read. That"s fine. At least I know he"s seen it. Him ignoring me and being his usual grouchy self is probably healthier than the giggly, flirty Lane that his anxiety conjured the other day. That wasn"t him. Not really.

The documentary covers some basic background on the other leaders, including Gideon Larsen, the man I recognize as being Lane"s father. Him and the man that acted as the physician for the people living on the compound were both charged with sexual assault of minors. Gideon was also charged with aggravated assault and abuse related to the Deliverance Summit conversion therapy camp.

I sit up straighter. This is the part I"m most curious about and afraid of. Like a terrible car accident, I don"t want to see the grisly evidence of someone smeared across the asphalt, but I can"t look away. This accident involves people I care about.

The journalist says that it was only in the last decade that Deliverance Summit opened their gates to welcome guests. None of the victims of the so-called ‘reparative therapy' camp were comfortable enough to be interviewed openly, but there are two men that agreed to disguised interviews. The filming is a little hokey, casting one man in dark shadows and using a deep voice changer to disguise his voice. The other man uses his normal voice, but they blur his face.

"At first, it just seemed like a normal church camp. There were activities, and plenty of children that lived there did all of that stuff with us. We could socialize with them, but never with each other," the man with the blurred face starts, wiping his palms on his lap before twisting his fingers together nervously. "I thought it was a bit boring, and maybe a little weird because it was like they were living in the past. There weren't any TV's or computers or anything like that. But I wasn"t scared. Not at first." He pauses and looks down, his chin resting on his chest. "I realize now that nothing started until I let my guard down. The pastor would go for walks with me, ask me questions, but always seemed friendly. I believed he cared about me."

"But things took a dark turn," the journalist says, leading the men to describe the horrors that took place at Deliverance Camp.

The footage jumps back and forth between the two men, who both describe a similar process that started with a church service where the entire congregation surrounded them, one at a time, and prayed over them.

"It was embarrassing to be singled out like that, and uncomfortable. It went on for a really long time. I remember I had to use the bathroom, but I was too afraid to ask," the blurred man says.

"The prayers continued after I was led to the basement of the church building," the man in the shadows says. "It went on for a long time. Long enough that I lost all sense of time. There were no windows or clocks, and the people came and went in shifts. The praying never stopped, and they wouldn"t let me sleep."

"Whenever I"d nod off, they"d start screaming the prayers in my face," says the blurred man. "At some point, when I was far past exhaustion, the things they were saying weren"t prayers."

"What would they say?" the interviewer asks.

Both men have similar answers. Slurs were hurled at them. Hateful rhetoric and twisted scripture passages. One of them describes a man yelling in his face that all the atrocities of the world—war, sickness, poverty—were all punishment for his sins.

After what felt like days, the program changed. Pastor Warren would come in and send the other men away, acting like some kind of savior. He"d sit down with the boys, act fatherly, and ask them questions about themselves. About whether they wanted to live a life of abomination and depravity, and if they understood that he and his staff were here to help them.

Even when they swore they weren"t gay, and spent hours on their knees praying and crying and begging, the process would start all over again. And with each cycle, different tactics would be introduced. They were forced to ingest unidentifiable substances to ‘purify them.' Both men mention that sometimes the little food they were fed was drugged. There were even staged exorcisms, and one of the men said he believed it was real at the time because of hallucinations he was having, probably because of whatever drugs he'd been given.

Most of the abuse occurred in one of two rooms. The documentary shows windowless tiled rooms, one with a hospital bed for the ‘treatments', and the other a chair with straps. When they were allowed to rest, they slept in rooms that resemble what I imagine solitary confinement would look like. They showered in a dingy-looking room with a drain in the floor, and weren"t allowed privacy. One of the men describes being stripped naked and sprayed with a cold hose. He says it was one of the worst parts for him, not just because it hurt, but because it drove home that he was, "less than nothing. Worthless." His words.

Just when they didn"t think they could live through another hour of torture, they would be returned to the congregation like nothing happened. The other children never even mentioned their absences, going on as if everything were normal.

While the two men answer the interviewer"s questions, the screen shows footage of the camera crew walking through the grounds of the compound. They walk past small houses, a little town square with a massive marble cross statue, and into the church. It all looks pretty normal, but behind the pulpit, they take a staircase to the basement. The voices of the two victims speak as the viewers get a look at the very rooms the victims were tortured in. There's no other word for what happened to them there.

"The first time, I thought it was over. I thought I"d passed their test. That I was cured," the man in the shadows says. His silhouette dips as he hunches over, putting his head in his hands.

The camera switches to the other man, who corroborates being given freedom, only to have it taken away again. "After the first time, I didn"t know how long I"d have. Could be an hour, could be a couple days."

Both men were returned to their families after four or five weeks, with certificates in hand, signed by a church-approved mental health practitioner. They were declared cured by the Grace of God.

"Of course I wasn"t cured," the shadowy man spits, his voice hoarse with unseen tears. "All that place gave me was PTSD and an incurable disdain for anything involving organized religion. I still have nightmares."

"I was never gay to begin with," rasps the other man.

My body is trembling with rage and bone-deep sadness. I can"t imagine what it would have been like to be raised around this stuff, to think that whatever was happening with your playmates is normal. To listen to that kind of hateful talk day in and day out. It's no wonder Lane is repressed.

I"m only halfway through the documentary, but I don"t think I can stomach any more, and I'm about to turn it off. But then the interviewer asks the men if they"d known or heard of a young man named Christian Blakely, and I perk back up.

"Chris."

It"s the name he said the other day. The friend whose voice he hears in his head. And Lane"s last name…

Neither of the men being interviewed recognize the name, but they"d been kept separate from each other and were only allowed to speak to or play with the kids that lived on the compound.

This is how the documentary segues into talking about how the church landed on the fed"s radar. They introduce a woman named Colleen Blakely, who looks visibly distraught. This woman sent her fifteen-year-old son to Deliverance Camp, believing that Pastor Warren was a kind man of God. She"d met him, and he"d only expressed to her a gentle, faith-based therapy that could ‘cure' her son.

"I just wanted the best for him," is the first thing she says." I was afraid. I thought Pastor Warren was going to help him."

But when he returned after six weeks at the camp, things were bad. He"d lost so much weight, his ribs were showing, and he had bruises. The pictures from the reports are blurred, but you can get a good enough idea of how terribly he'd been injured.

"Christian was such a happy boy. He loved to play soccer and his guitar. His father, who died when he was very young, loved The Beatles. Chris taught himself almost every one of their songs." She pauses and looks down at her hands, where she"s twisting a tissue between her fingers, taking several shuttered breaths before she can continue. "After the camp, he was a shell of the kid I knew. He barely talked to anyone, fell behind in school, and became sickly. He had horrific nightmares. I"ll never regret anything more than handing my child"s life over to those monsters. They killed my son."

I"d been searching for social media accounts for Christian Blakely while I listened, but now my eyes are back on my laptop screen. Overwhelming sadness grips me as the journalist"s voice confirms that a year after returning home from Deliverance Camp, Chris Blakely killed himself.

My sadness turns to anger as the interviewer asks questions about the contracts, clearly signed by Colleen Blakely, that gave permission for Pastor Warren and the Deliverance Summit staff to perform all manner of experimental treatments.

"They assured me that extreme tactics were never used anymore. Pastor Warren seemed so gentle and loving." She sniffs. "I was more afraid that I"d caught him kissing another boy than the possibility of someone hurting him in an effort to save him. I was wrong. I was so wrong," she repeats, her voice cracking. "I got in contact with the police within six months of Chris getting home. He didn"t want me to, otherwise I would have sooner. It"s taken years to finally see any progress being made."

Colleen Blakely breaks down when the interviewer tells her that Gideon Larsen, second in charge of the conversion therapy camp, and reportedly the cruelest of them all, was denied bail, and will await trial from a state penitentiary. With the charges against him, it's likely he'll spend the rest of his life in prison if convicted, and the evidence against him is significant. The information hadn"t been released to the public at the time the interview was recorded, but it would be by the time it aired, so they could give her that small amount of peace.

After taking some time to compose herself, Ms. Blakley finally takes some responsibility for her part in her son"s death. With a montage of pictures and video clips playing in the background—of Chris playing soccer, playing his guitar, doing a cannonball into a pool—she implores parents everywhere to love and accept their children for who they are.

"One of the worst parts is that he died believing something was wrong with him. He died believing I hated him for something that was just part of who he was. My beautiful baby boy." With her last words, they show a clip of him blowing out fifteen candles on a cake decorated like a soccer ball. It freezes on the last frame, and the words "Rest In Peace," come up on the screen, showing the dates of his birth and death.

They pan back to a closeup of Ms. Blakely, her eyes closed against a barrage of tears before she forces them open to focus on the camera. Her eyes seem to bore into my soul, and as if she were talking directly to me, she says, "You are beautiful just as God made you, and this world is so much brighter with you in it. Don"t listen to anyone that says differently, no matter how loud or important they think they are."

Tears fall over my cheeks, and I tune out the documentary while I cover my eyes with the inside of my shirt. The journalist mentions the surviving daughter and grandson of the late Nathanael Warren have declined to be interviewed, but that they have been contacted by the authorities and are expected to testify as the court cases go on. There"s some speculation over whether the rest of the parties will follow Gideon Larsen"s lead and plead guilty, and I wonder if Lane and Hannah will be forced to testify if that happens. There"s about ten minutes of closing details, a slideshow of pictures, and information about how you can support the displaced families and victims of Deliverance Summit and the camp, but I can"t watch anymore.

I slam the lid of my laptop down and busy myself with cleaning the disintegrated sludge that used to be cereal, thinking about Lane. Knowing that this Chris could possibly be his Chris, that he might have known him and lost him that way. That he could have witnessed any of the atrocities committed at that camp.

It kills me.

I don't know what to do with the information now that I have it. Even if every word was exaggerated and sensationalized, it's clear to me that something terrible happened to Lane on that compound.