Chapter Twenty
“I knew it!”
“Oh my god. Finally.”
“Oh, Zach, this is wonderful!”
Zach stands nervously in front of Bea, Paige, and Isaac as they sit squished together on his couch.
Parker is standing beside him, even though he’d insisted there was no reason to stand, and that there was definitely no reason for Zach to have notecards.
Zach holds his notes in front of him anyway, gripping the cardstock, his thumb smudging the ink.
It’d been easier to get the words out because he’d had them prepared: There’s something we want to tell you.
We hope it does not change the dynamic of our group.
You’re our friends, and we care about you very much.
Because of this, we want to announce that we are currently dating.
Winter break started just after the play closed, so they’ve been out of school for a week. Christmas is around the corner. Zach had been the one to insist they tell the others. Parker had contended that it was “none of their fucking business,” but now that it’s out, he looks pleased with himself.
Dating. Zach is dating Parker Reid. It’s almost beyond his comprehension that he’s dating anyone. The fact that it’s Parker is as unprecedented as it is exciting.
So far, dating Parker Reid mostly involves driving around in his Subaru and finding places to park so they can kiss over the center console.
It’s awesome. Sometimes they go to a movie and sit in the back of the theater.
There’s a lot of kissing involved. Zach feels like he’s making up for his entire teenage years of having never kissed anyone.
“I knew it; I knew it,” Isaac says again, throwing his hands up. “I knew you two were up to some gay shit.”
Parker points at him sharply. “Watch it, Brackenborough,” he warns.
“Thank you for telling us,” Bea says seriously. “And for trusting us enough to come out to us.”
“I was never in the closet,” Parker reminds her. “It’s just nobody’s business.”
“I, um, I didn’t know I was… well, you know,” Zach says, squeezing his notecards. “I’m still not sure. Just… you know. I’m happy.”
Paige sighs and collapses into the back of the couch, sinking down between Isaac and Bea. “Thank God,” she says in a comically dull voice. “Maybe now Parker and I can have a conversation that doesn’t devolve into him talking nonstop about you.”
Parker raises his eyebrows at her, his eyes wide in a clear plea that she shut up.
“’Zach wants to go to school for environmental conservation, isn’t that amazing?’” Paige mocks, her voice pitched higher and her hands over her heart. “‘Did you know that Zach knows the name of every fungus and mushroom in North Ameri—’”
She’s cut off as Parker dives on top of her on the couch. Isaac and Bea leap out of the way just in time and Zach stands there, speechless, blushing furiously. The Reid twins grapple with each other on the couch, screaming and laughing, until Paige wins by throwing Parker onto the floor.
All in all, it goes fine. It goes well. Zach has friends who love him, who don’t care if he’s dating Parker—who prefer it, actually.
He doesn’t say anything to his mom yet. He’s not sure how she’ll feel about it, and the idea of telling her something so personal makes his skin crawl.
For now, he wants whatever this is between him and Parker to belong to them. If only for a little while.
In the space between the party and the start of the holidays, Zach spends a lot of time figuring out how to be someone’s boyfriend.
Not a lot changes, except for all the kissing, and Zach thinks he’s getting that part down.
Parker shows him more music—some of it even good—and Zach lets him borrow some of his favorite foraging and mushroom books.
Zach is exceptionally aware that they could be doing more than just kissing—he’s a teenage boy; it’s pretty much all he thinks about now, in the abstract sense—but he’s too nervous to broach the subject.
Parker has more experience than him at basically everything.
It’s embarrassing to think about. For his part, though, Parker seems perfectly happy to continue as they are, so Zach follows his lead.
For the first time in his life, he goes with the flow. And the flow is pretty awesome.
For the first time in three years, Zach’s mom has Christmas off from work.
Zach is actually excited to spend the day with her.
She’s well-prepared with cookie dough supplies and a package of Christmas-themed cookie cutters.
They spend most of the morning following a recipe very poorly, eventually laying their lumpy Christmas trees and Santa Clauses on a cookie sheet to be decorated.
When the cookies are in the oven, Zach gets to open the three presents his mom has for him.
She smiles at him in a sad sort of way, like she wishes that she’d been able to pile presents underneath the tree.
But Zach has had small Christmases ever since he can remember.
The fact that his mom buys him presents at all almost sends him into an anxiety spiral every year.
The first two presents are books, ones that he’s mentioned he wants to read. The last present is a heavy square, and when Zach peels the wrapping back, he finds a pristine white box. There’s a huge picture on top that advertises the product inside: a new laptop.
“Mom…” Zach says, stunned. He’s had his second-hand laptop since his freshman year and, despite the fact that it runs slower than the computers in the library at school, he’s never even considered when he might get a new one.
His heart pounds nervously, like maybe the laptop will dematerialize if he doesn’t hold it tightly enough.
His mom leans forward in her seat a little.
“I just thought, well… you’re starting college soon, and you can’t take that old thing to college with you!
You need something new, modern, you know?
” She pauses then, seeming embarrassed as she says, “And, well, my laptop is done for. Won’t even hold a charge. So, I figured—”
“Oh, yeah, of course!” Zach says quickly, looking up at his mom. “Of course, you can… yeah, take my old one! I’ll clear it off for you.”
“Well, great!” his mom laughs, nervous and relieved. “We can all upgrade.”
After cookies and lunch—and that Christmas movie about the elf who wants to be a dentist—Zach goes to his room to set up his new laptop.
He fiddles with it until it’s exactly to his liking.
He’s in the middle of saving some of his old bookmarks when he hears the phone ring.
His mom answers it, then calls down the hall: “Zach, it’s for you! ”
Frowning, Zach gets up and goes to the kitchen, where his mom is holding out the phone. He takes it, wedging it against his ear as he takes it back to his bedroom. “Hello?”
On the other end, there’s a mess of voices:
“Hi! Hold on—wait, Parker, go get the other phone!”
“Is Bea on? Paige, did you call her?”
“I’m here, hi.”
“What is happening?” Zach asks, closing his bedroom door and dropping to sit at his desk.
“Hi, Zach!” Paige says, the other voices dying down. There’s a click of another phone being picked up, and then Parker says: “Merry Christmas.”
“Hi,” Zach says. Hearing Parker’s voice immediately makes his heart flutter. “Merry Christmas.”
“So, when are we getting together?” Isaac says. He doesn’t celebrate Christmas. Zach had always found the concept interesting, but it was never something they discussed at length.
“Well, my parents like to do Christmas very early,” Bea says. “We opened presents at eight this morning. We had lunch at eleven. Dad is already asleep on the couch.” There’s a brief pause, then she says, “I could get away.”
“And we have presents for you!” Paige says excitedly.
“Shit,” Isaac says. “We were supposed to get presents?”
Zach is a little overwhelmed by everyone talking over each other at once.
“I want it noted that she didn’t get me a present,” Parker grumbles down the line.
“Zach, can you hang out or not?” Paige asks, pointedly talking over her brother.
“Maybe,” Zach says, laughing a little. “Um, this is the first Christmas my mom has had off in a while.”
“Kate can join the party!” Isaac says. There’s some more overlapping agreement.
“We can come hang out at your place, if you want,” Bea says. “That way you can still spend time with your mom.”
The idea sounds a little overwhelming, but there’s a cacophony of voices that want to come see him. That are waiting for him to say yes. All of his friends want to come to his house on Christmas day, just to see him.
“Okay,” Zach says, pressing his smile against the receiver. “Let me ask.”
An hour later, Parker pulls his Subaru into Zach’s driveway, and he, Paige, and Bea clamber out of it.
Isaac had walked over right after they’d gotten off the phone.
Paige is carrying a big gift bag stuffed with red and orange tissue paper.
Zach meets them on the porch, and Parker glances toward the half-open door before bending down to kiss him briefly.
“Gross,” Isaac hisses teasingly as they squeeze past him into the house. Parker tries to kick him but misses.
Zach’s mom is pretty much over the moon, not only because Zach has four individual friends, but also because they’re all in her house at the same time.
Everyone arranges themselves on the couch and loveseat, and Paige sets the gift bag between her knees.
“Mrs. Williams, we wanted to thank you for everything you did for us, and—well, also it’s Christmas, so…” She digs into the bag and pulls out a bottle of wine, then leans forward to pass it to Zach’s mom.
“Oh, my goodness,” his mom says, her brows lifting as she admires the vintage. “Oh, wow, this is—” She cuts herself off with a frown, suddenly realizing she’s been handed wine by a seventeen-year-old. “Well, okay, how did you get this?”
“Our parents helped us pick it out,” Parker says quickly, in his lying to adults voice.
“Thank you,” Zach’s mom says, touched. “And tell your parents thank you as well.”