This Must Be the Place

Chapter 1

RUSTIN

They really, truly had Uncle George entombed in a trophy case.

“I thought my father was joking,” Dad said, coming to an abrupt halt in Grandma and Grandpa’s foyer.

We had only just walked through the front door, exhausted and hungry and ready to get this over with, but the large, imposing green urn stopped us both in our tracks.

It was impossible to miss, glittering on the highest shelf of the glass display cabinet like a king atop his throne, lording above the dozens of trophies and plaques that made up his subjects.

In a break from routine, Grandpa had even left the display case open, almost like he wanted to ensure we would see its newest prize.

Because Grandpa, no doubt, considered his famous brother’s ashes to be a prize.

Just an hour ago, Grandpa had called to ream us out for missing the wake.

His sharp voice had crackled through the stereo in Dad’s truck, steamrolling us when we tried to explain that we had every intention of being there, but my flight had been delayed by the thunderstorms, and Dad had waited at the Birmingham airport for two hours, and then we’d still had to drive the hour and fifteen minutes to Rustin, and hadn’t he gotten all our texts about this?

I don’t have time to check your messages! Grandpa had snapped. I’m tending to the dead! I’ve got to put George with his trophies for the night!

Dad and I had been too frazzled to take this literally.

We should have taken it literally.

I dropped my travel backpack, tied my new UConn hoodie around my waist, and stared at the elaborate urn containing all that remained of my great-uncle. “Honestly,” I said, keeping my voice low, “I’m just shocked they haven’t had him stuffed and mounted.”

“Louisa,” Dad chided, but his heart wasn’t in it. He had been vacant and withdrawn the entire ride from the airport.

“What? They could have decked him out in his old football jersey and made a real show of it.”

I waited for the trace of a smile to appear on Dad’s face—we had always been able to bond over Grandma and Grandpa’s deranged antics—but he merely sagged his shoulders and gazed upon the urn like a lost little boy.

I couldn’t blame him. Uncle George had been Dad’s favorite person in the world, and now he wore his grief like a layer of rainwater from the storm outside.

“Let’s hope it’s temporary,” Dad said finally. “I’m sure they’ll find a better resting place after the funeral.”

“Doubt it. Grandpa will probably sell tickets, set up red-carpet ropes right here in the foyer.”

My grandfather had long been obsessed with his younger brother’s football career.

He and Uncle George had grown up right here in small-town Alabama, tussling in the backyard until the day Grandpa tore his ACL.

After that, Grandpa had poured everything he had into coaching his little brother, and eventually it paid off: Uncle George became the most successful quarterback in Rustin University history and the only Rustin player to have a career in the NFL.

When his NFL career ended with a knee injury, he returned to Rustin and built up a real estate empire that cemented his status as a local legend.

Even when his hair turned white, people still saw him as the golden boy.

Grandpa always told the story like it was his own triumph, as if he had formed Uncle George out of clay and molded him into the exact football god he himself wanted to be.

Now he curated this display cabinet to show off Uncle George’s trophies, medals, newspaper clippings, and even a former uniform—all of it a testament to Grandpa’s impact on his brother’s success.

“That you, finally?!” a grating voice shouted. “About time!”

“Speak of the devil,” Dad mumbled. He picked up the to-go bag from Tambrie’s Café and followed the sound of Grandpa’s voice to the kitchen.

“Literally,” I whispered, because I fully expected my grandparents to give me hell about something entirely unrelated to missing Uncle George’s wake. I took a deep breath and willed myself to walk to the kitchen. The collision between my old and new lives was about to begin.

The thing no one tells you about coming out as queer is that you really have to think through the logistics of it.

And believe me, I had.

My plan had been simple, strategic, and foolproof: Wait until the end of high school was in sight, ask a cute girl to prom, and post about it for everyone to see in their own time—including everyone I’d grown up with in conservative Rustin, Alabama.

Then stay in Connecticut for the summer, pick up a job at the mini-golf course, and wait for my college life to begin.

If all had gone according to plan, I wouldn’t have had to face anyone in Rustin until next summer, after my sexuality had become old news, and after I’d finished my first year of college.

By then, I would surely be a blazing, confident, full-fledged lesbian, completely immune to what anyone thought of me.

But my plan hadn’t accounted for Uncle George’s sudden diagnosis.

The cancer lay in wait like an undetected predator, then struck as fast and violent as lightning.

Dad had gotten the call only last week, while he’d been in Connecticut for my graduation.

I’d known it was bad when he excused himself from my party and returned twenty minutes later with a face as white as a ghost. Collapsed on his way to the post office, he’d told Mom and me in a shaky voice.

The doctors estimate three to six months.

Uncle George died five days later.

For a day or two, I had debated skipping the funeral altogether.

First, because Mom wasn’t invited; my grandparents had erased her from the family six years ago after she’d had the audacity to ask my dad for a divorce.

The fact that she moved us up north further enraged them, though I never knew whether this was because they actually missed me or because they couldn’t stomach having a Yankee in the family.

Second, it wasn’t like I had been close with Uncle George.

He was more of a peripheral figure in my life: the white-haired great-uncle who breezed into family gatherings, gave me a quick hug, and asked, So what grade are you in now, Miss Louisa?

before trotting off to have cocktails with my grandparents.

And third, because I was absolutely terrified of returning to Rustin a mere month after I’d come out.

I would have to face my relatives, old neighbors, and the entire town as this new, openly queer version of myself, a version I was only just beginning to know.

The only people I was guaranteed to feel safe around were my two oldest friends, Emma and Candor, whom I had grown up with and continued to visit every summer.

They’d had my back since kindergarten, but even they couldn’t protect me from the Rustin gossip mill.

In the end, I kept picturing Dad’s ashen face when he’d gotten the call.

For me, Uncle George’s death was a small ping on my heart, like a pebble hitting a windshield.

But for Dad, it was an avalanche that sent the whole car careening off the road.

I didn’t want him to face this sudden loss alone, especially because I knew how rotten my grandparents could be.

So I made myself a promise. I would fly down just for the weekend, put on a steely resolve, and hold my dad’s hand until we got through the funeral.

And I would do it as my real self, even if I was still nervous and new.

Now the reality of that promise put a stone in my throat.

This would be my first time seeing Grandma and Grandpa since I had come out, and my heart was beating so fast that I felt like I might pass out.

I wasn’t clear on the details of how Dad had told them about me—maybe he’d shown them my Instagram post, or maybe he’d fixed them drinks and dropped the news as delicately as he could—but I knew they knew, and that they would have something to say about it now that I’d come home.

Home. It was a complicated word for me. Connecticut had been my home for the past six years, but Rustin would always feel like my deepest, truest home, even when I was away from it, even when I was afraid of it.

And now that I had unearthed a newer, truer version of myself, could that home still hold space for me?

Grandpa was bent over the old wooden dining table, sorting through a stack of papers. He had already changed out of his dress clothes and didn’t bother to look up when Dad and I entered the kitchen.

“Sorry about the wake,” my dad said with the air of one approaching a lion’s den. “Longest I’ve ever waited at the airport. Lou’s plane circled for an hour.”

“Last I checked, those airplanes could fly through a damn rain shower just fine,” Grandpa snapped.

I waited for him to look up and notice me, but he remained focused on the papers. I darted a glance at Dad, then squared my shoulders, squeezed the rainbow bracelet on my wrist, and recited my new mantra in my head: I am gay, I am here, I am gay, I am here …

“Hi, Grandpa,” I said in the steadiest voice I could muster.

Grandpa finally looked up and examined me through his wire-framed glasses.

I braced myself for the grand judgment, for some snarky version of Well, if it isn’t our little lesbian, or maybe, Don’t bring your lifestyle to the funeral tomorrow.

What I got was: “The hell are you wearing? Maybe it’s better you missed the wake,” which, all things considered, was probably the best I could hope for.