by Dani Jansen
“Wait. Wait. I beat all of you,” my sister said. Annie was laughing hard enough that her eyes were watering, smudging her eyeliner. “She sent me the one with a scared-looking cat that said, ‘Wait. Lesbians eat what?’ I mean, she’s like, ninety! Why is she sending sex jokes to her granddaughter?”
“You win, Annie,” my father said, blushing deep red, but still laughing. My mother was giggling so much that she couldn’t even sip her water. Annie took a little bow, acknowledging her win.
Now, a person with better timing than me—and let’s face it, most two-year-olds have a better sense of timing than I do—would not have chosen this exact moment to come out to her family. A bad lesbian joke is not exactly the best conversation starter, but I’d been waiting for weeks for an opening. So I jumped in. “Actually, guys, I have something I want to tell you.”
“If your grandmother sent you a sex joke too, I don’t want to know.” My father smiled at me as he raised his hands, signaling his surrender.
“Well, she also sent me the meme about oral sex, but that’s not what I wanted to tell you.” Yes, I said oral sex in front of my parents. I sounded like an uptight gym teacher who’s been roped into giving the sex talk to a group of freshmen. My dad choked on a bite of garlic bread, and my mother patted him hard on the back. When it was clear he was breathing again, I decided I’d come too far to look back, so I continued. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to…. Listen, I’ve been meaning to tell you that, well, I’m gay.”
They were all silent. I think they were trying to figure out if I was being serious. To be fair to them, we had all just spent half an hour telling increasingly ridiculous stories about Grandma’s awkward e-mails. Who could have seen this abrupt change of tone coming? It was Annie who spoke first, and for once I was grateful for her bluntness. “Al, you have the worst timing of anyone I know.” She smiled as she shook her head at me.
My parents took another couple seconds to recover from the shock, then they tripped over themselves trying to make up for the awkward silence. Mom said, “Thanks for sharing that with us.”
Dad got serious and went into lawyer mode, asking me how long I’d known, whether I’d been facing any trouble at school as a result, and how I’d like to proceed. I told him I’d only known for sure for a few months, that no one at school knew except Becca, and that I had no idea how to proceed. Other people might have taken his questioning as cold, but I knew it was his way of showing he cared, and I appreciated the fact that I wasn’t the one leading the conversation anymore. Obviously, I could not be trusted to be in charge of things.
After I’d answered his questions, Dad said, “You’ll tell us if you face any kind of discrimination or bullying at school, right?” My father’s sense of justice was part of what made him a great lawyer and one of the things I most admired about him. I nodded, tears threatening at the corners of my eyes.
My mother stood up from the table then, walked over to me, pulled me from my chair, and hugged me tight. My mother is a marathon runner who works out regularly. Her hugs are no joke. After an awkward yet comforting minute of intense hugging, she held me at arm’s length and said, “We love you no matter what, and we’re here for you. We’re incredibly proud of you. You’re so brave.” I admit that I cried at this point, both because I felt protected and loved but also because I felt a bit guilty. What was brave about coming out to parents you knew would be there for you? Coming out is brave when your parents are fundamentalist Christians who you know will kick you out of the house for telling them the truth. I didn’t deserve that kind of credit, but it wasn’t like I could explain that to my mom and dad, who were both hugging me now.
Annie was using this as an opportunity to eat the last piece of garlic bread. Later, though, she gave me a quick side hug and said, “It’s cool that you told us.”
And that had been it. I’d come out to my parents and sister, and life went on much the same as it had before. Since then, we hadn’t had any deep conversations about it, though Mom had given me the rainbow pin, some pamphlets, and a book titled The LGBTQI Survival Guide for Teens. Over the summer, my parents asked if I wanted to go to the Pride Parade, and I declined. Mom also sometimes asked me if there were any girls I liked, just as she asked Annie if there were any boys she was interested in. I politely told her “No,” while Annie just rolled her eyes and whined, “Mom!” I didn’t know what I’d say if my mom asked me now if there were any girls I had a crush on at school. Obviously, there was one. But I wasn’t planning on doing anything about it, so what would be the point in admitting it? Part of me wondered how out and proud I could really be if having a crush seemed so ridiculous to me. It was an uncomfortable thought, so I tried to ignore it as I arranged and rearranged the piles of paper and binders on my desk.
CHAPTER 7
Now that the play was cast, Mr. Evans started issuing commands regarding the set, costumes, and props. I needed to find people with actual artistic talent if we were going to create the “magical, but edgy atmosphere—something like a cross between Lady Gaga and Disney” that Mr. Evans wanted. (At least, that’s what he wanted now. Only a few days before, he’d wanted “understated.”) I couldn’t draw a stick figure, I didn’t know much about fashion, and I couldn’t be trusted with power tools, so it was time to do some more recruiting. The Red Binder suggested I start by speaking with the art department, so I headed there after school with Annie, who had reluctantly agreed to be my tour guide. She was the only person I knew who continued to take art classes once they became optional, and I was hoping she could help me communicate with the locals.
The art room smelled pleasantly of dried paint, a scent I associated with kindergarten and sunny afternoon naps. Along with the gym, this was one of the few corners of the school that remained busy after last bell. The artsy kids stayed late most days to work on paintings, sculptures, and weird multimedia pieces under the watchful eye of the much-beloved Ms. James. When we walked in, not a single student looked our way. They were concentrating too hard on what they were doing to be bothered by a stranger passing through their land.
“Hey, Ms. J,” Annie said as we wound our way through stacks of art supplies to the teacher’s desk in the far corner. It was clear that Annie felt comfortable here, and I wondered how many afternoons she’d spent in this room. I always just assumed that she waited for me impatiently in the gym or caf when I stayed late for an extracurricular, but I was starting to think I might have been wrong.
“Hi, Annie.” Ms. James smiled but didn’t look up from a painting she was closely inspecting. We stood at her desk next to a goth girl who I was pretty sure was the painter, given the dark tones and blood-like splashes in the piece. Ms. James took off her purple cat’s-eye glasses and let them dangle on the chain around her neck. She said to Goth Girl, “I like what you’re doing with texture here, but you need to think about creating more contrast.” Goth Girl nodded and took the painting back to her workstation without looking at us even once.
Ms. James turned to us, wiping her hands on a paint-splattered apron. Her skin was a rich black, and she wore a beautiful teal-and-yellow head wrap that only an art teacher could so perfectly pair with purple eyeglasses and a deep coral tunic. “What can I do for you?”
Annie dived in. “We need to find people who can help out with the school play. My sister,” she nodded at me, and I tried to give my most winning smile, “is producing the play, and we need people to do sets and costumes. I’m acting as prop master or I’d do some scene painting myself. Anyway, we were wondering if you could recommend some people.”
Ms. James looked at me and cocked her head to the side. “I heard Mrs. Abrams asked a student to take over producing the school play this year. It’s a lot of work.” She sounded a little like she pitied me. Or maybe it was that she didn’t entirely approve of Mrs. Abrams. It was hard to tell.
“It is a lot of work, but I like being busy,” I answered, not wanting to let on how
overwhelmed I felt. The valedictorian wasn’t going to be some whiner who complained about too much work. I had to keep it together.
There was something about the way Ms. James looked at me that made me think she knew this was an act of bravado, and I appreciated that she didn’t press the point. “So you need help finding people. What exactly needs to be done?”
“We need a costume designer and a set painter.” I looked around the room at the potential candidates. I was not filled with confidence. Besides Goth Girl, who had just shot us a dirty look, there were a couple of boys dressed like hipsters wrestling with a wire sculpture, a group of girls wearing T-shirts with political statements like “Good planets are hard to find!” who were gluing things to a large canvas, and a guy wearing a red blazer and oversized glasses working on a laptop. These were not my people. I felt self-conscious in my boring long-sleeve T-shirt and clean black sneakers. Annie, with her blue hair and knee-high, multicolored socks, fit in much better.
Ms. James seemed to guess what I was thinking because she said, “Annie knows most of the regulars here, but why don’t I introduce you to some people who might be able to help you? Zach, can you come here?” The boy in the blazer put up a finger to ask for a second, finished something important on the laptop, then walked over to us. Up close, his outfit looked even more unusual for a high-schooler. He’d pushed up the sleeves of the blazer, and his black T-shirt was only half tucked into his dark skinny jeans. The whole look seemed purposeful and sophisticated in a way that I associated with teens on TV shows, the ones who are dressed by stylists.
“What’s up, Ms. J?”
“This is Annie’s sister. She’s producing the school play, and she wants to speak to you.” Having made introductions, Ms. James left us to see to a student who wanted her help.
“Hi, I’m Alison.” I reached out a hand. Zach looked at it for a second before shaking it. Of course, I know it isn’t normal for teenagers to greet each other with handshakes, so I couldn’t blame him for hesitating. “I don’t usually go in for handshakes,” I explained, making things even more awkward.
Zach laughed. “I’m very pleased to make your acquaintance, Miss Alison, play producer. How may I be of assistance?”
I looked at Annie for help. She got right to the point. “We’re looking for a costume designer for Ye Olde Shakespearean Disaster.”
“What? I’m the one gay guy you know, so obviously I have to be the costume designer?” Zach frowned at Annie and crossed his arms.
I was horrified. What had Annie just done? I had to fix this. Fast. “Um. No, that’s not…It’s just…you’re the best- dressed person here, so Annie must have…I mean, would you like to build sets?” I finished lamely.
Zach snorted. “Hell no. What do I know about building things? Clothing, I know. I’d be happy to help out with costumes.” Annie, who must have known Zach was into fashion, was having a good giggle beside me. Yup, I was making a real impression here.
“That would be great,” I said to Zach, after I had properly glared at Annie. “Production meetings should start in a few weeks. They’ll be Wednesdays after school. Will that work for you?”
“It will. Annie can give you my number, and you can text me when the first meeting is set up.” Zach nodded at Annie in what I now suspected was a conspiratorial way, then returned to his laptop.
Ms. James came back to check on us. “I’m assuming Zach agreed to do costumes?” I nodded. “Great! So that means you still need a set painter. I think Jenny would do a wonderful job with sets.”
“Jenny?” Annie asked. She looked a bit nervous; she was even biting her lower lip, a habit she had mostly given up ever since I’d teased her about it being her “tell.”
“Jenny is a great painter, and she can work on a large scale,” Ms. James told us.
“I know, it’s just that she…” Annie was looking for the right words—words she could use with a teacher, “she can be difficult to work with.”
Ms. James nodded. “She can be, but she’s also very talented, and I think this would be good for her.” I could see why the art kids liked Ms. James. She was honest, and she obviously cared about them.
“Okay.” I could tell Annie was still hesitant, but she trusted Ms. James, so I decided to as well.
“Great!” Ms. James’s smile was warm and wide. It was the kind of smile that was contagious, like a yawn. “Jenny? Can we speak with you?”
Goth Girl looked up from her work, which was when I understood she was Jenny. I’d like to say that I decided then to give her a real chance, that I chastised myself for judging her based solely on her appearance, but I didn’t. What I did was stare at Annie and try to communicate telepathically How are we going to get out of this? Annie must have understood the desperation in my eyes because she shrugged her shoulders as if to say I have no idea. We’re in for it now.
Jenny made her way over to us, her combat boots thumping ominously with every step. She stopped a few feet away, keeping an awkward distance between us. I could see that she was giving me the once-over and she was not impressed. As I got a good look at her, I realized that I had grossly underestimated just how much dark eyeliner a person could wear. I’d always thought Annie was much too liberal with her eyeliner, but this girl looked like she must go through a new eye pencil every week. Her eyes were a dark brown, and the whole effect, especially against her pale skin, was a bit intimidating. Which I suppose was kind of the point.
Ms. James made the introductions, and this time I didn’t try to shake hands. “Jenny, Alison here is producing the school play. She’s looking for a set painter, and I recommended you.”
Jenny continued to glare at me. I looked at Ms. James, desperate for help.
“I think adding set painting to your portfolio could help with your applications for art school,” Ms. James explained. At this point, Jenny finally blinked.
“What’s the play?” Jenny asked, looking at Ms. James and ignoring me completely.
Ms. James turned to me for the answer. “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” I croaked.
“A comedy? I don’t think so.” Jenny started to turn away from us, which is when Annie finally spoke up.
“Mr. Evans wants to do something different with the design,” Annie said, her voice much steadier than mine. “I think he’d be open to suggestions.”
“My kind of suggestions?” Jenny challenged Annie.
“Why not? You’d just have to help him see things your way,” Annie answered.
Jenny locked eyes with Annie, who was much better at holding eye contact than her older sister. “Okay, then. I’ll do it. But only if Mr. Evans will agree to my designs.” I did not like how she said that. I was pretty sure she was going to design something freaky that not even Mr. Evans would like. But I didn’t have a better alternative, or any alternative at all, so I just stood there, completely useless.
Ms. James clapped her hands together. “I’m so excited about this! I think you’re going to make something memorable together. There’s a lot of potential in A Midsummer Night’s Dream.” Ms. James grinned at all of us. At least one person was happy with this arrangement.
CHAPTER 8
During AP English the next day, instead of listening to Ms. Merriam’s lecture on the psychological significance of monsters in Victorian literature, I grappled with my own monster, the grotesque Ben Weber. I split the page in my notebook into two columns: Things I’d Rather Do Than Ask Ben to Star in the Play and Reasons I Have to Ask Ben to Star in the Play. One list was longer than the other. Guess which one.
Things I’d Rather Do Than Ask Ben to Star in the Play
Tell Becca I think Chris Martin is overrated.
Explain Grumpy Cat to Grandma.
Take the blame for Mom’s car.
Break up a fight between the Otters and their nemeses, the Bridgetown Bears.
Finish wa
tching Charlie Egan perform his striptease.
Eat the surprise casserole from the caf.
Set fire to my own hair.
Reasons I Have to Ask Ben to Star in the Play
There’s no one else who’s even half as good as him.
If I refuse to ask Ben to play Oberon, I can kiss good-bye any chance Mr. Evans will recommend me for valedictorian.
I said I would do it.
Rehearsals start tomorrow.
At the end of class, I fearfully approached my monster. Though he wasn’t breathing fire or making a feast of a village, he was doodling boobs all over his binder, so I was repelled already.
“Ben, we need to talk.” No time for pleasantries when you’re dealing with a monster. Best to just get to the point.
“Yeah?” He didn’t even bother to look up from his “masterpiece,” too focused on his shading to make eye contact. It was probably for the best. Many monsters have the power to immobilize their prey with their eyes.
“Mr. Evans wanted me to ask you to be in the play. You in?”
“Who am I playing?” Damn. I had hoped that Ben would be too distracted to ask any pesky questions.
“Theseus, just like you wanted.”
Ben looked up now. He squinted his rat eyes at me. Classic monster intimidation. “And?”
“What do you mean?” I tried to sound casual. I failed.
“You’re being way too weird about this. You’re leaving something out. I can tell.” Ben could be perceptive at the most inopportune moments.
“Fine. Mr. Evans wants you to play two roles: Theseus and Oberon.”
“The king of the fairies?”
“Yes. It’s one of the lead roles.”