The Revelation by Lauren Rowe Page A

laughs and takes another bite of his food.
“Don’t worry, Car. I’ll just get it on my ass, like my boy here. A
little barbed wire on my ass for you and no one else.” He
laughs.
    “There you go,” Josh says, laughing. “Genius. It’s
just skin, right?” He takes a bite of his steak.
    “Fuck yeah,” Will agrees. “I’m totally gonna do it.
We’re all a pile of skin and bones sooner or later. That’s what
gets me going every fucking day, knowing I’m running out of
time.”
    “Amen,” Josh says. “Hey, maybe I’ll join you—add a
little barbed wire to my dragon’s neck, maybe?”
    “Hey, great idea,” Will says. “I’ll totally add
barbed wire to my dragon.”
    “Jesus Christ,” Reed says. “Will, stop listening to
Josh Faraday of all people about tattoos. Listen to him about
everything else, because the guy’s a fucking genius, just not about
tattoos.”
    “Shut the fuck up,” Josh says. “I’m wise and
powerful about all things, including tattoos.”
    “Don’t do it,” Reed says to Will.
    “Dude, Reed’s using reverse psychology on you,” Henn
warns Will. “He’s being the puppet master.”
    “No, I’m not. I’m sincerely telling Will not
to do it,” Reed says. “Although you should absolutely do it,
Faraday. Add yet another stupid tattoo to your stupid
collection.”
    “My collection isn’t stupid,” Josh says. “Didn’t you
hear a damned thing Will and I were just saying? Even the stupid
ones are profound, man. We’re living canvases, Reed . Duh. We’re artists and art, all at the
same time.”
    “Yeah, Reed. We’re living canvases, ” Will
agrees with solemnity. “We’re artists and art, all at the same
time. We’re living performance art and our tattoos are our way of
flipping the bird to mortality .”
    “That’s right,” Josh says emphatically. “Getting
barbed wire would be like saying, ‘Mortality, fuck you. You might
be gunning for me, but you’ll have to get through my barbed wire to
get me , motherfucker. Raaaaah.’”
    Reed rolls his eyes.
    “So lemme get this straight, boss,” Henn says,
pursing his lips like he’s considering something very serious. “You
got YOLO stamped on your ass because you were flipping the
bird to mortality ?”
    Josh laughs. “Absolutely. Now, when the Grim Reaper
comes for my ass, maybe he’ll see it and stop and say, ‘Never
mind.’”
    Everyone laughs.
    Carmen leans into me. “Josh is hilarious,” she
whispers.
    I nod and bite my lip. “He sure is.”
    Josh swigs his drink happily. Man, he’s having fun
tonight.
    “Okay, okay, I cannot tell a lie,” Josh is saying.
“I must admit, I wasn’t thinking deep and profound thoughts about
my mortality when I got YOLO stamped on my ass. I wasn’t thinking
much of anything, actually. I was just a twenty-year-old asswipe
who thought he knew everything.”
    “Aw, don’t be too hard on yourself,” Reed says. “All
twenty-year-old dudes are asswipes who think they know everything.
I know I was.”
    “How old are you, Will?” I ask.
    “Twenty-three,” he replies. “And I don’t think I
know everything.”
    “Well, I thought I knew everything when I was
twenty-three,” Reed says, shaking his head. “Turns out I sure had a
whole lot to learn between twenty and thirty.”
    “Ditto,” Henn agrees. “Jesus, has it really been ten
years since Josh got his stupid YOLO tat? Oh my shit, we’re getting
old.”
    “Remember when thirty sounded so old?” Reed says,
looking wistful.
    Josh nods. “I never thought I’d make it to
thirty.”
    “Really?” I ask, the hair on my arms standing up.
“Doesn’t everyone think they’re gonna live to a hundred and
three?”
    Josh shrugs and takes a bite of his food but doesn’t
reply.
    I look at Josh for a long beat. When I opened my
door to him last night and wordlessly took him into my arms, the
look on his face was so vulnerable, it took my breath away—and,
just now, that exact same expression flashed across