Chapter Twenty-Four
“Mom?”
Twenty-six years old, and yet I still felt like I was trying to explain a poor report card.
She paused, her back to me, damp cloth in hand. Both arms outstretched on the edge of the counter, her posture brittle and tight.
They’d not pestered me about girlfriends, or dating, or when they might get grandchildren. Had been scrupulous, in fact, at respecting my privacy, my boundaries.
I couldn’t help but feel like I’d taken advantage of that respect, used it as an excuse not to correct them on their fundamental misunderstanding about what I wanted from a partner.
“Say your piece, Oliver.”
I could’ve spent a hundred years trying to decode the tone with which those four words were delivered. Only I knew I didn’t have the luxury of time.
“I... I didn’t know how to tell you. Either of you.”
You hide it for so long, I wanted to explain, that deception becomes second-nature. Not just a secret, something you want to keep from everyone else, but a whole other layer of yourself that you can’t even imagine sharing.
“Tell us what, exactly.”
I swallowed, my throat suddenly feeling tight. “That I’m gay.”
She turned, wiping her hands on the cloth. A familiar motion, not that I’d ever given it much thought before. The mark of one chore ending, and time for another to begin.
“And you thought we wouldn’t understand.”
A question, or a comment, it wasn’t clear. Then again, perhaps it didn’t matter either way.
“Based on your reaction now, are you really surprised I might’ve wondered about that?”
Lips narrowed, she looked away. There was a sense of distance between us that I could never remember feeling before.
“Say something, mom.”
“For the record, it wouldn’t have mattered. Doesn’t matter.”
I nodded, slowly. “But?”
“But I’m angry,” she admitted. “Angry that you didn’t want to tell us, that it was better leaving us in the dark about this part of our son, who he is.”
My turn to glance away. “That was more about me, than it was about you and dad.”
The sigh sounded tired. “I know. And I feel... ridiculous isn’t the word, but maybe... disloyal. Making all this about me, when I know it’s really not.”
Somehow, the lump in my throat felt twice the size. “Are you disappointed?”
A snort. “What mother would dare say yes, to that.”
I thought about the stories I’d heard, the disasters.
The times when coming out had meant being thrown out, too; the happy families fractured, because someone didn’t quite fit the space that had been carved out for them.
Plenty of mothers might not dare say it, but that didn’t mean they’d have love in their hearts for a queer child.
“It just got easier to hide it,” I confessed, softly.
“And Flynn?”
“I don’t think his parents know, no.”
The laugh was loud, surprising. Genuine amusement in her expression. “Well, no. I figured that.”
Which left a list of other potential questions. I stuck a pin in one of them, the one the answer to which was still simmering in the back of my mind.
“He and I... reconnected. Recently, I mean.”
“He’s a handsome boy,” she said, wryly. “Grew up nicely.”
Not like I could argue with that, though agreeing seemed fraught, too.
“He wants me to move in with him.”
“I’m assuming you don’t mean next door.”
Silence, for a stretching moment.
“I won’t go, if you don’t want me to. If you and dad need me here.”
“Don’t be ridiculous.” The scowl was back. “Do you think we’re weak old fools?”
“No, of course not, but...”
It was that piercing look again, the one which made me cringe inwardly. “Or do you think we’d stand in the way of our son being happy? Do you think so little of us?”
I hissed, a sudden spike of frustration. “No! It’s not about you, it’s...”
She waited, expression eventually softening. “Do you want to move in with him?”
I chewed my lip. “I like him.”
“That wasn’t the question I asked.”
For a moment I thought I was going to snap again, that the reaction was inescapable. Only it came out as a long sigh. “I wish he lived here. It’d be so much... easier.”
“Would it? Easier for two young men dating, in a town like this?”
“I wouldn’t have to move,” I pointed out, sullenly.
She pulled out a chair at the kitchen table, sitting down and gesturing for me to do the same. Waited, until I was opposite her, to reach out and clasp both my hands in her own.
“Your father and I have loved having you here, with us. Living with us. It’s been a joy for the both of us, to see you growing up into the man you are right now.
” She squeezed my fingers. “But at some point, for all our sakes, you need to go do your own thing for a while. See what it’s like, being on your own.
Or, perhaps, being with someone else, someone who isn’t us. ”
I smiled softly at her. “Are you evicting me?”
Mom chuckled. “You can move back in when we really are weak old fools, how about that?”
“It might not work out.” I knew she’d understand what I was referring to.
“No, perhaps not. If things worth trying were guaranteed to succeed, I’m not sure they’d be worth trying quite so much.”
I closed my eyes for a moment. Trying to imagine what it’d feel like, jumping feet-first into something with Flynn, only for it to all fall apart later.
Where I might go after that; what life would turn into, if the ties that bound me to my hometown had been, not severed, but stretched out of recognition.
“There’s only so long you can stand in that little thrift store, Oliver, sifting through the remains of other people’s lives and hoping that’s enough to fill your own.” She smiled, as if to sap the sting. “Once in a while, you need something brand new.”