by David Connor
Erika’s brows shot up, seemingly all on their own.
“I know it sounds conceited, but ask him. I came out in ninth grade. I knew what I was, and I was tough enough, yo, to kick any ass that frigging tried to cut me down. You stand up to a few, and nobody comes at you after that. I know it ain’t like that everywhere, and I know a lot of kids who kiss my hot gay ass from seven to two probably go home and sit around the table with their Republican ‘God hates fags’ parents and call me the school cocksucker. Sorry.” He seemed to mean it. “But you know what I mean, and I can’t think of a better phrase. Those kids don’t bring it around the school much, though, and so I decided I can’t be no more concerned for what they do at Sunday dinner than they should be with who I bang, ya know?”
“You aren’t an activist at your school?” Erika thought about what the principal almost told Tom Alan.
“Not really. I may have painted a poster or two.”
She’d bet it was more.
“Jesse and me, we’re not the only LGBTQ-whatever-letter-comes-after students, ya know? I’ve messed around with a couple. I give the best BJs. Everyone says.”
“Back on topic,” Erika suggested.
“Yeah. Sorry. I…I don’t know if Jesse and I were ever anything special. I thought we were, but everyone says we’re kids, what do we know?”
“Who says that? Your parents?”
“Shit. Not even. Like you guys, I bet. All’s I know is even after the crap hit the fan last week, I didn’t let Vijra blow me back after hockey. I give head. I don’t get it. That was the deal Jesse and I had, and I stuck to it.” Kensuke seemed so proud about that, so Erika tried to keep her expression neutral. It wasn’t the kind of deal she’d ever offer the man in her life—except she once had. “I mean, damn, yo! I got Olympic medalist dick. Even Jesse got off on that. Ask him.”
Erika doubted she would.
“I would never do nothing to hurt Jesse, but then I did.” Kensuke hung his head.
“Maybe it can be fixed. Maybe Jesse was trying, but didn’t know how.”
“Nuh-uh. Today was all show,” he said again. “And in the lunchroom…That’s our place, yo. It’s not for bullshit. He got all pissed off when I said so. He called me a pussy and I called him a dick. We both got busted, but I’m pretty sure the principal was afraid to do much to either one of us. Overcompensating, right, so’s he won’t get accused of being insensitive or prejudiced. Why I even need to have lunch?” Kensuke asked. “Frigging scheduling dipwads have me in Band before lunch and English after.”
“You stuck with Band. That’s good.” She squeezed his elbow.
“I liked band.”
“Jesse said you’re amazing.” The song “Matchmaker, Matchmaker” played in Erika’s mind.
“No one ever came to hear me play anyway.”
“We’d love to hear you play sometime—Tom Alan and Milo, Billy and me…Billy and I?”
“You’re asking me? I passed four years of French in four years. English, not so much.” He finally smiled, but it faded quickly. “Frigging Shakespeare.”
“You could always get your GED…I bet you could even start college in January, if you’re done with high school, if you want to catch up to your age. College has band…and orchestra, I bet.”
“High school’s alright…and being nineteen means I can pass easier for twenty-one and get booze. That makes me pretty popular.”
“Kensuke…”
“Kidding.”
“Then stay in. Two classes…heck, why not four?”
“The drama club is doing Music Man.” That brought some excitement.
“We’ll come see you in that, too. Why can’t you still be in the chorus? Maybe take an art course. Tom Alan would love that.”
Kensuke made a dismissive spitting sound. “He hates me.”
“He doesn’t hate you. He’s angry—disappointed. Smoking here that day, and now this…” Kensuke started to object, but Erika stopped him. “Tom Alan doesn’t know the whole story. Not yet. We’ll sit him down, you and me. He’s the sweetest man in the world. He’s always fair. I promise.”
“You guys are tight. Like Jesse and me.”
“And there are bumps,” Erika said softly.
“For real! Half the world thought you were having his kid while he was banging One Direction.”
“Yeah.”
“But now everything’s good?”
Erika didn’t answer. “Hey. Pick up another math class. That way I can help you. I’m Asian smart.”
“Ain’t that a stereotype?”
“A true one in my case.”
“We’ll see.”
“Your parents aren’t going to let you give up so close to your diploma. And what about college?”
Kensuke shrugged. “My parents kind of washed their hands of me finally.”
“How about I let you in on a little secret? Parents say stuff like that all the time. I can see where you might frustrate someone once in a while.” She said it with a smirk and waited for one to come back. It didn’t. “Go home, Kensuke. Talk to them like you just did to me.”
Kensuke didn’t offer a response right away. “You say my name like my mom.” That was what he said a few seconds into the longest silence yet, then he added, “I should probably take off, ya know, before Tom Alan comes out of the shower.” He tugged at his magenta skinny jeans in front. “See ya.” Kensuke stopped at the door. “I really did love her…whether it made sense or not. I know I could really love him, so maybe it made sense all along.”
Damn. The kid was good with words.
Almost as if on purpose, Tom Alan didn’t appear again until Kensuke’s Camaro peeled out of the parking lot. He and Erika rode to the Wahl home in silence—except for inane topics like whether or not Supergirl would still be good over on The WB Network. Erika was a bit surprised Tom Alan had even agreed to join her and Billy at his parents’ for dinner.
“So, you’re an inconsiderate, teenage hoodlum,” Billy said to his brother at the table. “What’s your take on everything?”
Peanut—Burgess—was the exact opposite. He was an honor roll student and a choir boy—literally. “How are things for gay kids at your school?” Tom Alan asked, buttering a third dinner roll. “As far as you know?”
“Seems good to me,” Burgess answered, between bites of the deliciousness that was Mrs. Wahl’s roast chicken dinner.
“You’ve met them both through Billy, right?” Erika asked. “Jesse and Kensuke?”
Burgess nodded.
“My vote, concerning Jesse moving in, as a member of Baranowski, Tsuchino, Fisher, and Wahl, is no. Jesse’s a good kid, but it’s a huge responsibility and I’m not sure we’d do him any good.” Billy took a bite of peas and carrots. “I doubt it will even come to a vote, though. Teenagers are flighty—boys and girls. He’ll probably change his mind again tomorrow. Dada?” He looked to Etsuko, who was busy playing in the creamiest mashed potatoes Erika had ever eaten.
“You should know,” Mr. Wahl said.
Billy squinted at his father like one of the cats at home Tom Alan had left behind.
“My boys were definitely as bad as my girls,” his mother added. “Remember the time you pulled up half my flowerbeds for Lisa Carlson?”
“Who’s Lisa Carlson?” Erika asked.
“His Sunday school teacher’s helper. He was eleven. She was seventeen. The next week, he asked her to give them back so he could give them to Pamela Ferber next door.”
“Mom!” Billy hid behind his napkin a moment. “Must we dwell in the past?”
Erika glanced over his shoulder, to the wall where a picture of him hung in his Army dress blues. A shadow box with a pair of medals hung on either side. Billy never talked much about those five years, several of which he had spent overseas. All Erika really knew about them was that he’d been in combat and that his time in Afghanistan had a lot to do with his decision to become a veterinarian. He’d told her that in a story about one of the medics in
his unit who’d saved the stray puppy he had brought back home with him. Erika passed Tuxedo some chicken under the table. She hoped Billy would be able to tell her more someday.
“You raised eight kids, Mrs. Wahl.” Erika stared at her with a new admiration. “How on earth did you survive?”
“I had help.” She touched her husband’s wrist, and the look they exchanged, after so many years, warmed Erika’s heart. Of course, Mr. Wahl had just taken another bite of potatoes and gravy, so his expression could have been from that. “But you know what else helped?”
“What?”
“It’s something I had to learn along the way, so I’m saving you some heartache by sharing the secret. When a teenager says they hate you, they’re likely lying. When they tell you they love you, they likely want something.”
Burgess snickered with a mouth full of food.
“When they ask you for help, they probably need it. When they don’t, they probably need it more.”
“Oh.” Erika looked to Billy and then Tom Alan. “How do you know they’re in trouble, then?”
“That’s the hard part. There’s no secret I can spill on it either. You just have to guess. And here’s another thing: you’ll drive yourself crazy if you try to raise the ones that aren’t yours.” Though it could have come off as sarcastic and brash, it was said quite softly, almost with a hint of defeat. “Every one of mine had friends with one issue or another. You do the best you can with those—offer a place to sleep when they need it, say something to your own when it seems as if the lot of them are about to make a huge mistake…In the end, though, no matter how hard you try, there will be days you wish to God you would have done more and days you’ll end up with a broken heart anyway.”
Chapter 11
Erika woke up from another eerie dream about her father at 2:17 A.M., according to the clock on the table beside the bed. It was something about—“Black marbles,” she said, reaching for Billy. He wasn’t there. Too tense to roll over and go back to sleep, she got up. The nursery next door to her room was empty. Tiptoeing out into the hallway again, she noticed a light above and some cooing. “He missed you, baby girl,” she whispered. She had gotten Tom Alan back to the house by laying a guilt trip on him. “She looks for you in the morning. So do the cats.” So if Etsuko was with him, where was Billy?
When Erika peeked into Tom Alan’s room upstairs, she smiled and Etsuko smiled back, from the middle of the bed, wide awake. Tom Alan was on his back, his hand on hers, his mouth agape, softly snoring, bare-chested atop the covers with both cats between his legs. Billy was on his stomach, his boxers halfway down. They never stayed up when he slept, because his ass was so flat. That was what Erika had always told him. Milo claimed it was genetic.
“The male body was not designed for pants,” he’d once claimed. “With evolution, men’s hips are getting even smaller, while willies are getting bigger. If men literally can’t keep their pants up it insures procreation will continue.”
“Is any of that real?” Erika never knew with him.
“Perhaps the research hasn’t made it across the pond yet, but European scientists have been recording evidence for decades. Look it up.”
Erika reached for Etsuko. “Uncle Milo’s silly,” she said at barely a whisper. She didn’t want to wake the guys, but the moment she lifted the baby, they both were alert—at least somewhat.
“Huh?” Tom Alan stared blearily.
“Go back to sleep.”
Billy rolled over and stretched. “She’s been awake half the night.”
“I’m sorry I didn’t hear her right away.”
“We’re a team, babe,” he said sleepily.
“I wasn’t sure anymore.”
Billy looked to his right. “Oh…yeah.”
Etsuko yawned. “You need sleep,” Erika told her. “You guys, too. Stay put. I wish I had my phone. Milo would love this.”
Billy was back beside her the next time she woke. It was almost time to get up, but Etsuko was finally sleeping soundly on Erika’s chest. She didn’t dare move.
“You off to bed soon?” Tom Alan’s voice came through the vent.
“Yeah.” He had Milo on chat. “Was nice to have the room to myself for an hour or so after that miserable all-nighter. And even better to put it to good use. I love you.”
Erika tried really hard not to listen.
“I love you, too. Can I confess something too before you go?”
“Sounds serious.”
“Kind of. I should probably wait until you get home, but it’s almost easier if I don’t have to look you in the eye.”
“Now you’re scaring me.”
“It’s about cheating,” Tom Alan said.
Erika’s breath caught.
“Okay.” Milo took a loud one. “Now I’m really scared. Me or you?”
“Me.”
Erika’s breath stopped. She held it.
“It’s the guilt. That’s why everything has been messed up so long…my mood…us…everything.”
“Did something happen when you were in Japan in the spring?” Milo asked.
“No. God, no. Okay. I am going about this all wrong. Let me start over. Ha-ha-ha, wait until you hear this.” The fake dorky laughter made Erika smile. Hopefully it worked on Milo. “Guess who I keep having sex dreams about.”
“Kensuke.”
Tom Alan practically growled. “No. Why would you even go there?”
“Just a guess, love. Sorry. Who, then?”
“It’s…It’s Erika. Just last night…after I woke up in bed next to Bill, when I drifted off a—”
“Whoa. Back up a bit. ‘Woke up in bed next to Bill’? What the bloody hell is happening up there while I’m away?” His tone was waggish. Erika liked that word, and it fit. “And why didn’t you wait for me to get back?”
“Etsuko was having a rough night with her teeth,” Tom Alan explained. “Bill and I both went to her and we ended up in our room. He sat on the bed, and next thing I know…”
“Hockey Puck’s not a butt virgin anymore?”
Tom Alan chuckled. “You take everything so lightly.”
“Not everything. But you and Willie Wahl in bed…”
“Maybe I haven’t been sleeping any better than Etsuko. All of a sudden, I’m out like a light. Then we woke up, when Erika took Etsuko back to her room, but before Bill could get up and leave, my arm was around him and I was out again.”
“He’s a giant ginger teddy bear, that one. I’ve slept on his manly chest before. It was nice, until he woke up and got all cuddle-phobic, which we now know was his way of doth protesting too much.”
“I wasn’t on his chest, but he stayed…which was kind of sweet. Having a body beside me did the trick, except in my dream I wasn’t in bed with Bill.”
Erika bit her bottom lip. Tom Alan’s dream sounded way better than hers.
“And that’s wrong. It felt horrible,” he said.
Hearing that gave Erika the very same feeling, for several reasons.
“Well, Skater Boy, the psychologist in me says it’s completely normal you would carry your very strong partnership feelings for Erika over into something sexual. I mean, I bet every skating pair ever has had a sex dream about their partner.”
“You and Jenn?
How could she not?”
Tom Alan laughed. “She is only human. He was quiet a moment. Okay. You’re good. But what if…?”
“What if?”
“What if?” Erika kept her voice low.
“I’ve been obsessing over it, and it’s really taking a toll.”
“Ah. The poor showing upstate.”
“Yeah. Every time I touch her, Milo, I’m thinking about touching her in a different way, even when…when I’m…awake. So it’s not just dreams…it’s…it’s thoughts.”
Erika closed her eyes and had some of her own.
“Maybe not just thoughts,” Tom Alan said. “Maybe…”
“Wants?” Milo suggested.
“Just Flower-curious, Skater Boy?”
“Maybe. Though I guess bisexual is bisexual, whether I’m attracted to one woman or more than one. I realize now why my reaction to Bill coming out as bi was so cruddy. I had my own issues going on. Everything I said to him, I’ve been saying to myself. Way worse than questioning my sexuality, even though I did think that was written in stone a long time ago, was this nagging feeling I have that I’m being unfaithful to you, or that I very easily could be if the opportunity presents itself.”
“See, that’s what I’m supposed to do,” Milo said, “lead you to your own revelation, to your own truth, to your own self-discovery. Then, if I do it right, you get arrested.”“
Erika could picture Tom Alan smiling.
“Sometimes, in the dreams—always when I’m awake—you’re there, too,” he said.
“Good to know.”
“God. I’m such a pervert.”
“Naw. That had its own chapter in class. I got all A’s, by the way, and you don’t fit the definition. Listen. Actions are choices. You’re having feelings, and feelings are feelings. There’s no right or wrong about them.”
“Thanks, Dr. Fisher.”
“Love…we can survive this,” Milo promised.
“Yeah?” Tom Alan still sounded worried.
“Here’s my advice, the kind I’m not allowed to give out officially, so don’t tell anyone. Run it by her, I say, and see what her reaction is.”
“Seriously?” Tom Alan asked.
“Just to get it off your chest, at least. Unless…I mean, I’d be game.”
“Wait. Game for what, Milo? Did this suddenly go from a discussion about a fantasy to something else?”
“How do you feel about that?” Milo answered the question with another one.