I imagine two teenage boys, neighborhood boys, bored from being trapped inside, this hellish summer an acid eating away at them.

I imagine them peeking through blinds, watching as the men set the blacktop, the tar stink creeping into their bedrooms. The plan hatching, unfolding slowly. Like scratching an itch. The need to wreck.

I can see the midnight when they sneak out, cans snatched from sheds, the curve of the moon, the spray of stars lighting their canvas. I imagine rattling backpacks.

And then the art, something I don’t have to imagine, something I’ll remember for a good, long time—two six-foot dicks, opposite directions: one pointing up the hill towards my house, one pointing down towards the main road with the racist bakery and the Portuguese consulate, balls included, little dashes of hair included, veins included, twin squiggles of semen, too.

I imagine the stifled laughter, hands over mouths, the bikes or skateboards, and maybe a ride to Cumberland Farms for energy drinks or jerky or Cheetos or something to shake tobacco out of.

Sometimes I imagine them falling in love. But only sometimes. Then again, maybe what they have between them is a kind of love. Who’s to say?

I imagine them opening back storm doors to avoid spring-squeaks. The sleeplessness, the waiting.

I picture the neighbors the morning after, groups of them barefoot in pajama pants, looking dumbly at the road. Mostly horrified. A few astonished. Awestruck.

In my version, the boys get away with it. I want a happy ending.

For a good month, when I’d leave the house to get coffee, the only indulgence I allow myself right now, I’d take that route just to see the dicks. Just to tease out the making of the dicks. When I’d reach the crest of the hill, I would hold my breath, hope rising in me that they’d survived another night.

But the city workers came out to re-pave. Now all you can see is the slightly darker patch job, an in memoriam square. I can picture the boys sighing, thinking how of course it couldn’t last, their disappointment tinged with a bit of optimism as they ruminate on the next destruction. And I imagine the city workers coming home from work, imagine them telling their wives, their friends. Yeah, they say. You should’ve seen the size of them.