Gone, Gone, Gone(52)

“I know. And I will. But maybe not today. Craig’s mom got me ice cream on the way here. I’m sorry, I’m probably way too happy to be worth your time.”

She laughs a little.

But I don’t need her to tell me that I’ll be sad again. There will be days I wake up sweating and crying because I dreamed about Theodore and he’s not here, and I’m the only person in the world who looks like me. Craig is still emailing Cody, and there will probably be days that really gets under my skin. Right now, I can’t give a shit. I’m the one in Craig’s house. I’m the one he whispers about before he goes to sleep.

I tell her, “I’m basically made of perspective right now.”

She’s still smiling. “What are your plans for this week?”

“See you. Besides that, hide? Run when I’m outside? Duck if I see a white van? I have to go back to school, which sucks, but I’m basically living at Craig’s house. My dad’s letting me. Apparently, he knew I was gay the whole time.” We found Craig’s last cat yesterday. She’d had kittens, which seems too perfect to even be real. I say, “I’m auditioning for the GSA talent show—because my friend Jack is making me—and Craig says we’re doing some sort of protest today. Which . . . I’m terrified about.”

She raises her eyebrows. “Outside?”

“I know. He hasn’t told me any details. But he won’t let me get hurt.”

She says, “Craig can’t protect you from everything.”

I look down and nod and say, “I know.”

And that’s okay.

Craig and his mom pick me up from therapy, and I check my messages on my cell phone. Dad called and said he loves me and misses me. I’ll call him back later. I know he’s worried and probably would rather I was home, but I’m too comfortable here right now.

Here’s the protest, it turns out. Craig and I lie on our stomachs in the basement with the animals, two sheets of poster board, and a lot of paint. We groan when the animals walk through the paint, and my poster ends up with kitten footprints all over it. Craig dabs paint on my nose, which devolves into sneezing and tickling and kissing.

It takes us way too long to finish our posters, with all our screwing around, but eventually we’re done. Mine says PEACE and Craig’s says love.

We stand out in his backyard, in the open air, in this random-as-f*ck suburb, with our posters in the air and our fingers laced and our faces up to the sky. No one will ever see us.

Safe, I whisper, like we’re sliding into home.

Then Craig grabs my hand as we go inside and says, “And now for the real protest.”

“What?”

He pulls me into his bathroom and digs through the cabinet under the sink. Then he sits me down on the floor and leans my head back into the bathtub. I figure out then exactly what he’s doing, and I think about stopping him, but I don’t. Instead, I talk him through it. I’m kind of an expert at this by now.

Two hours later, I’m blond again.

I touch my reflection and Craig kisses my cheek.

“No hat,” he says.

I nod.

He drops his voice like he doesn’t want anyone to hear him. “I can see you.”

And I damn near swallow him whole.





CRAIG

OUR FIRST DAY BACK AT SCHOOL, TODD SUBS FOR A second-period class. Right after, he meets me at my locker and says, “Is today important?”

I don’t know how to answer this question.

He says, “I mean, if I pulled you out of school right now, would it be a major detriment to the health of your education?”

I’ve barely been to school this month, so it’s not like I’m really on track to being an upstanding citizen anyway. “Let’s go.”

“I’ll pull the car around. Stay inside.”



I leave a note on Lio’s locker. Spending the day with my brother. BREAK A LEG!!!!

His audition for the talent show is today. I wanted to go see him, but, to be honest, I’ve heard him sing, and I’m not sure the GSA is really my scene. Maybe someday. I do love community. I’ll be at the show, anyway, and right now, I really want to be with my brother, wherever he wants to take me.

Fishing, it turns out.

He hands me a floppy hat and takes me to f*cking West Virginia for the afternoon. He says he’s never felt safer in his life. I throw all my fish back, and he throws his back too, just to humor me.

He tells me a shitload of dirty jokes that I have to remember to tell Lio. He gathers me under his arm and tells me the point of working nights was supposed to be so he had days free. And he’s going to work on it. We talk about Lio, and about this girl at work who he thinks maybe, maybe . . .

He has no obligation to me. He’s not my parent. He’s just my big brother. And this is just one of the best days of my life.





LIO

THE AUDITION IS PRETTY MUCH A JOKE, BECAUSE everyone who auditions for the talent show gets in. I mean, it’s the GSA. But the audition decides the order of the program. You really want to be toward the beginning or the end, Jack explains to me. We’re in the back of the auditorium, watching a girl tap dance.

He says, “They put the second best act at the beginning and the very best at the end. In the middle is pure shit.”