Chapter Twenty-Seven
Twenty-Seven
BY THE END OF THE long weekend, we have a tentative plan—one that involves my brother and me working together. Tomorrow we’ll leave for South Florida to talk to Mom and Victor in person, the mere thought of which is enough to send my stupid, anxious heart into cardiac arrest.
Now it’s DnD night, and with Jamie at work, the group has taken pity on my bored brother and absorbed him into their new campaign.
It’s rowdier than ever in there, so I’ve taken refuge on the patio to distract myself with a first attempt at my soapstone.
I’m carving what I hope will soon look like a fish, but it’s mostly turning into a misshapen blob.
When the sliding glass door bangs open, I jump at the noise, and my small chisel makes a deep groove down the center of the maybe-fish-maybe-blob thing.
I groan, dropping my head back against the wall.
“Sorry,” Mikey says, closing the door behind her. “Did I do that?”
“No, you’re fine.” I set the stone aside. “I’ve been struggling with it all day. I’m taking this as a sign. The fish isn’t happening.”
Mikey brushes some stone shavings aside so she can sit next to me. “Well, I have good news.”
I turn to Mikey, taking in her outfit. She’s in a work shirt, half buttoned with most of her bra showing, and hot-pink bike shorts. Her skirt hangs limply in her fist, and she twists it up like a rope.
“Did you get cut early?” I ask. Mikey left for the dinner shift only an hour or so ago.
“Nope,” Mikey says. “I quit.”
I drop my chisel, twisting to face her. “You what?”
“I quit. That’s my good news.” Mikey holds up the skirt, finds the undone zipper, and pulls with all her strength. Her face reddens. Cheeks puff out. Eyes bulge.
She stops, breathing hard, and then tries again.
“Okay… What’s going on here?” I ask, looking from Mikey’s face to the skirt.
Mikey lets out a frustrated sound, yanking furiously at the skirt. “Why. Won’t. You. Just. RIP ALREADY!” She yanks harder. “You piece of shit!”
I stare at her, eyes wide. “Mikey.”
Mikey finally throws the skirt, and it sails over the patio rail and lands in the grass.
“I’m not a girl!”
I blink. “What?”
“I’m not a girl! He said girls must wear skirts. Well, I’m not a girl! I’m enby!”
“Oh my god, have I been misgendering you this whole time?”
Mikey blows out a breath. “No, I was using she/they pronouns, but no one really knew except Liss. I asked her to only use they/them pronouns with me in private, so I could get used to it. I just knew I was somewhere else on the gender spectrum, you know? But I didn’t know, like, if I decided, Okay, I’m going to go full-on they/them and make a whole deal out of it, what if I change my mind?
Like, I know gender is fluid, and there’s nothing wrong with deciding that actually, I do want to use she/her pronouns sometimes, but people don’t always get that.
I worried it’d make me seem like a flaky queer. ”
I take their hand. “Mikey, hear me when I say this: fuck those people.”
“Yeah… fuck those people,” Mikey agrees with a small smile, though it dims quickly. “That wasn’t the only reason I’ve been hesitating though. There’s the issue of my parents, who will just not get this. They are down-home, backwoods Floribama Christians. They think Liss is my gal pal.”
“What do you think would happen if you tried to tell them?”
“I don’t even know.” They pull their knees to their chest and drop their head.
“There was one out queer kid in my entire town, and my parents were all Bless his heart about it. Like, they weren’t rude to him, but they definitely had opinions they probably said when I wasn’t in the room.
It’s not like I want to be in the closet for the rest of my life, but I don’t know if I can be brave about it right now. ”
“Hey, you’re the one who gets to set the pace here. No one else can make you do anything.”
They lift their head and smile, squeezing my hand.
I squeeze back. “Mikey.”
“Hmm?”
“I’m really… I’m feeling a lot of feelings right now.”
Mikey smirks. “Don’t go falling in love with me, Bee. I’m taken. Plus, I’m pretty sure Jamie would shoot through the roof with jealousy. And remember, there are two other floors to get through before he could even reach the roof.”
“No!” I smack their arm. “That you’re telling me all this.”
They grin. “You’re the one who inspired me.”
“Oh yeah, that’s me. Queer icon.”
Mikey laughs. “No, because of everything with your brother! And your parents! Bee, you’re being honest about yourself to people who scare the hell out of you. It made me realize I wanted to be honest with my actual fucking friends who love me.”
“I do,” I say. I love you, I’m about to add, but the words die in my throat when I hear a familiar voice float over the patio railing.
“Oh my god, clothes just out here on the sidewalk. I told you this place was a dump. I can’t believe she’s been living here!”
“Oh, sorry!” Mikey calls. “That’s mine! I was making a statement, but I was going to pick it up.”
I lurch to my feet, staggering to the railing. My hands grip it so hard, I’m sure I’ll bend the iron.
“Mom?”
Mom and Victor stop on the sidewalk, turning toward my voice.
For a second I think I’m hallucinating. I fell asleep, and now I’m having stress dreams about my parents showing up here, right when I’m about to come clean about everything on my own.
But then Mikey says, “Oh shit,” grabs my hand, and squeezes painfully.
Which is how I know I’m awake. Wide awake and totally fucked.
The disdain in my parents’ expressions only intensifies when I meet them at the front door and they have a chance to take in the apartment.
The elbow-shaped hole in the wall. The shoe pile in the entryway.
The dull carpeting and cheap linoleum, chipped cabinets and ugly furniture.
The snackpocalypse happening in the kitchen thanks to the DnD group, who Sawyer abandoned after I walked past him with a breathless “They’re here” just a few seconds ago.
He stands beside me now, shoulders back like he’s preparing for a physical blow.
“You knew?” Mom asks him, tears in her eyes. “That she was living in a place like this?”
Sawyer glances at me. We planned how we would handle telling Mom and Victor everything—that he’d come clean first, and then me. That I’d lead with dropping out of the APM before rounding it out with where I’ve been living this summer.
Opening the front door was like looking into a kiln and seeing a heap of shattered pottery after firing. Our carefully made plan is in shambles.
“I think we should talk in Blair’s room,” Sawyer says, motioning to my open door. He’s recovering faster than I am. My heart is beating so hard, it might fling itself from my chest and make a great escape.
I want to go with it.
As Sawyer shepherds us into my bedroom, he gives my arm a comforting squeeze. Then he shuts the door, closing the four of us in the small space together.
On the other side of the door, I hear the DnD group packing up.
“So,” Mom says, nodding toward the sound, “I take it those are not, in fact, your friends from the APM.” I’m so frazzled, it takes me a second to remember that Mom has met them already—weeks ago over video call, completely by accident. All my lies are catching up to me now, it seems.
“No,” I say. “They’re my friends with my roommate, Andres.”
“Andres,” Mom repeats. “A boy. And not the only boy living here, from what I’ve heard.” She looks at Sawyer. “Which I guess explains what you’re doing here. This is Jamie’s apartment, isn’t it?”
Sawyer nods.
Victor is silent, which is somehow scarier than yelling. I see him taking in my bedroom, the desk where some of my sculpting tools are still laid out, and then the soapstone I’m holding, which I quickly set down.
“How are you here?” I ask. “How’d you even know—”
“I was chatting with Mrs. Feldman this morning,” Mom says. “She’s in my Pilates class now. She told me she’s very disappointed you chose not to move into the house with Leni.”
I blink at her. “She said what?”
“That Starr and Leni had to scramble to find a third roommate because you didn’t want to live with them anymore,” she says.
“And now the two of them are fighting, and Starr wants to move out. She said Leni tried to make up with you, and you wouldn’t have it.
She said you must be very happy living with your boyfriend.
Your boyfriend, Blair! Imagine my surprise. ”
“Leni is a liar,” I say.
“So you aren’t dating Jamie?” Mom says.
I open my mouth to deny it—to lie again—but stop. I don’t want to deny Jamie. He’s not something I should be embarrassed about, and we haven’t done anything wrong.
“I am,” I say.
Mom looks sharply at Sawyer, as though this is somehow his fault too. But my brother takes a small step closer to me, his shoulder touching mine. “And?” he says. “What’s the problem?”
“Oh my god, Sawyer, don’t start.” Mom turns to me again. “I’m not sure what makes Leni such a liar then, Blair. Because when I talked to her—”
“Wait. You talked to Leni?”
Mom ignores me. “—she said she begged you to move in again, and you refused. So it sounds like you are, in fact, very happy with this”—she grits her teeth—“live-in boyfriend situation.”
“She and Starr dropped me, Mom! Was I supposed to be grateful she wants me there now, after she ignored me for weeks? Do you want to know the other lovely things that were said that night? Should I remind you that you don’t even like Leni?”
“I don’t dislike Leni, and I like her much better than you living with a bunch of degenerates, Blair Catherine!”
“They aren’t degenerates. Those are my friends.”
“Which you’ve had such a stellar record of choosing,” Mom says. “First Starr, now—” She motions to the door.
“I won’t defend Starr,” I say. “But don’t talk about my friends like that. They’ve done nothing but be good to me when I had no one to help me and nowhere else to go.”