Two Boys Kissing(18)
We don’t burden Avery with this. Why would we want to? There is the hope that the world will get less stupid, less arbitrary, as time goes on. The good thing about human progress is that it tends to move in one direction, and even a fool who looks at the difference between a hundred years ago and now can see which direction that is. Moves like an arrow, feels like an equal sign.
In the meantime, we are vigilant. Deaths like ours teach you to be vigilant.
Avery looks at the river, looks at Ryan on the other side of the boat.
“The world from here isn’t that bad, though,” he says. “This right now is a world I can live in.”
This is what the right people can do. They can make you see that better world.
There are things they aren’t saying, of course. Ryan came down with such a severe eating disorder when he was thirteen, about the time he was coming out, that the school nurse made him get help. Even his parents don’t know, because he swore the nurse and the counselor not to tell. And Avery isn’t advertising the fact that he’s never been past second base, and the idea of sex petrifies him. Ryan will not confide—not yet—his determination to head far, far away for college, and to never come back to Kindling again, not even for weddings or funerals. Avery will not detail the foolish lengths he went to get Freddy Dickson to like him, and how when it backfired spectacularly, he cut himself for the first and only time in his life. Not everything needs to be said at once. Sharing truth is not the kind of gift that comes in wrapping paper—ripped open once and, there, you’re done. No, this is a gift that must be unfolded. It is enough to start the telling. It’s enough to have the beginning and feel like it’s a beginning.
Harry has been kissing Craig for forty-seven minutes, and he’s amazed how easy it is. To be kissing Craig again, but without the drama of being boyfriends. It’s so much more comfortable now. Much less fraught. He’d known all along that they’d get here, that they’d have this. When it was ending—when the boyfriend part was ending—he had been very deliberate about choosing his words. He didn’t want to say Let’s just be friends or I hope we can stay friends, because that made friendship sound like a consolation prize, the blue ribbon to look at distractedly while someone else walks off with the gold cup. No, what he said was: “I think you and I will be even closer, and that we will be even better together and more to each other if we’re best friends, not boyfriends.” He knows it still hurt Craig, and he knows it took some time for Craig to adjust, but he’d been right, hadn’t he? They would have never attempted this if they’d been boyfriends. They would have never lasted long enough to get here. And he wouldn’t have lasted even forty-five minutes if he’d wanted to do anything more than kiss Craig, if Craig turned him on anymore. Maybe there was something at the start, but now it’s leveling off. He’s glad Craig can’t read his mind, because he knows it might be taken as harsh, but really it’s a compliment. There are moments where Harry is so revved up, is so horny, that he’d sleep with just about anything. It takes a lot of restraint to realize the damage this can do, and to not venture places where you shouldn’t go, even if you’re revved up. He and Craig had fun, for sure, but it was never about sex. And now Harry needs to stop thinking about sex, because his body is starting to … react. So he thinks about something else—about whether he should ask for a sip of water. They’re allowed to have some, but only if it’s through a straw, and the lips are still touching. Tricky, but it can be done. The problem is, if he drinks now, he runs the risk of having to pee later. And he really wants to avoid that. This is another of the rules: no diapers, no cheating in the bathroom department. If he has to go, he’s either got to whip it out and pee on the grass—or just leak a little into his pants. Neither option is really attractive, and the horny edge is totally off his mind now. Craig squeezes his arms, sensing that he’s drifting off. Good call. He has to focus on the kiss. Not letting go of the kiss. The worst thing he can do is drift off. There are people all around, but he can’t turn to look at any of them. He has to focus on Craig. And maybe the people over Craig’s shoulder. That’s it. He loves Craig, it’s true. And the number one reason he doesn’t want to mess this up is because he wants Craig to have this achievement. He wants to do this for Craig. Because it means more to him. Harry doesn’t know why—maybe because it was Craig’s idea, or maybe because he just needs something like this more. Yes, that must be it. Craig needs something like this more.
A small crowd is starting to form. People from town walking by, wondering what’s going on at the school. Kids from play practice—some knew this would be happening, but others are learning about it for the first time. Mykal is organizing their friends and other people they know to get the word out, to get some cheering going. Some people—mostly adults—are curious enough to come over and look, then are disgusted when they find out what it is.
“Do their parents know?” one woman, walking her poodle, asks. “How could they let something like this happen?”
“His parents are right here,” Mrs. Ramirez answers fiercely.
The woman shakes her head and walks away.
Other people—mostly kids—are asking how they can help. Lots of pictures are being taken on lots of phones.
One of the kids who asks to pitch in is eleven years old. His name is Max, and his dad brought him to see this.