Page 84 of Him
Sad as I am, I can at least take one heart-lifting thing from this experience. One piece of insight I’ve been reluctant to give a label to.
I’m…bisexual.
Yep, I know, not exactly a mind-blowing M. Night Shyamalan plot twist over here, but it’s the first time I’ve allowed the word to take root in my consciousness. I’m bisexual, and it’s not just a physical connection I feel with Wes.
I can also see myself in a relationship with him. I can see myself being happy with him and never feeling like things were lacking.
I’d had this idea I could find a job near Toronto. That Wes and I could keep up… whatever it is we are to each other. But that isn’t going to happen. Wes all but told me to go to Detroit. He needs me to stay four hours away.
We only have the summer, he’d said the night we argued. He was right. That’s all we’re going to get.
Some time later I hear a commotion out in the hallway. The place echoes, so even though Killfeather’s room is on the opposite end of the building it’s easy to hear him. “I don’t want to leave!” he yells after a door bangs open.
“You will get your ass in my car right now.”
“You can’t make me!” The kid is putting his best effort into the resistance. But I know very well who always wins these fights.
The voice that answers him is low and steely. “If you’re not in that car in sixty seconds, you’re not playing in the Labor Day tournament this year.”
Ouch. Hit the kid where it hurts, why don’t you?
I hear the inevitable—the sound of a suitcase rolling across the tile and feet on the stairs. When I look out the window a minute later, I see my goalie slouching toward the passenger seat, and his father heaving suitcases into the trunk. That asshole didn’t even get a ticket for parking in the fire lane.
They peel off a minute later, and that’s the end of the Killfeathers, both junior and senior.
I blow off the barbecue, too.
Since I’ve missed the scrimmage, Pat doesn’t really need me, and I use the time to regroup. I need to face the fact that summer will end soon.
So I call my mom on her business phone—the one that’s always smudged with clay. “Hi baby!” she chirps when she answers. “Are you calling to tell me that you’re coming home?” The woman always cuts to the chase. With six kids, she’s always had to. There just aren’t enough hours in the day for small talk.
“I am, as a matter of fact. Coach Pat hasn’t replaced me yet, but I’m going to tell him I need that week off.”
“Excellent,” she says in the same tone of voice she’d always reserved for good report cards. “We need to see you before you join the NHL. While you still have all your teeth.”
“That’s uplifting,” I complain.
“I don’t know why my boys choose dangerous careers,” she says. “I always tell your brother to make sure he visits while he still has all his vital organs.”
My brother is a cop. “Gross, mom. And Scott has never drawn his weapon in the line of duty.”
“Truthfully, bullets aren’t his biggest problem right now.” She fills me in on the fact my brother has moved back home for a little while. He’s the one whose girlfriend recently dumped him. And since they lived together, he needed a temporary place to land.
“So he’s in his old room?” I ask, trying to picture it. Scott is twenty-eight years old.
“He is, but rarely. He’s picked up a lot of extra shifts lately. I think he’s just trying to stay busy.”
“Ouch,” I mumble.
“James,” my mother says sharply. “Why are you blue?”
“I’m not,” I try. But bullshitting my mother is impossible. You don’t raise six kids without having laser-sharp perceptive abilities.
She clucks her tongue. “If you say so. But I’ll be taking a good look at you later this month, young man. I’m going to make lasagna and hold it under your nose while I grill you with questions.”
Mom’s lasagna is damn good. I’ll probably confess everything if she does that. “Can’t wait,” I say truthfully. Home sounds pretty good right now.
“Love you, Jamie boy,” she says. “Buy your plane ticket.”
