Re: Campbells.
Russ hadn't thought of high school since he'd walked out of his own for the very last time. There had been no pomp and circumstance, no tacky polyester robe and tassel. He hadn't thought about the last day in advance because it hadn't been the last day until right then, when he was done. A fight, with his knuckles split and dripping red on tile, and a teacher yelling like they knew anything about anything and a roaring in his ears that blanked any good high school might do him right out.
The smell was putting him on edge. Cleaning fluid and gym sneakers and teenage sweat and he didn't know it was doing anything until the minute Ford stepped out, skittish as a cat in a rain-storm and the tension snapped like an over-stretched elastic band. Russ was not overly given to assumption or reading between the lines. He saw the sparsity of fat over muscle and the length of Ford's hair rather than the look in his eyes or the way he held himself, uncertain and electric. The kid looked half-starved, he reminded Russ strongly of the day he'd sat in his kitchen in Vegas.
And then he wasn't looking at him at a distance like a nervy coyote who'd wandered into a high school hallway, he was hanging heavily from Russ's shoulder. He smelled like the cheap pink soap that came in a dispenser at the garage, and like cotton and Russ squeezed him briefly and then hastily disengaged, mostly because he smelled like a cathouse himself and the man who'd fucked himself stupid in his body had made it clear how and why. He reached out and ruffled Ford's hair, instead, a rough palm over the dark mop and he grinned, hard and fond and the blue eyes were very steadily fixed on Ford's face.
"Kid," he said, "Sight for sore fucking eyes." And then fuck the cathouse stink, because he flung an arm around Ford's shoulders and hauled him in tight.