Page 25 of Kitty Season
By the time I decide it wasn’t a hallucination, and search the halls, Troye, if it was him, is gone.
When I arrive backat my dorm, a solitary figure is leaning against my door, two large bags of groceries at their feet. Facing away from me, with their hair tucked beneath a Boston B’s cap, I have no way of telling who it is. My first pick is Lotte, but whoever this is, is far too tall, and it’s not Professor Plum, she wouldn’t be caught dead in baggy sweats.
“Big D,” a familiar Bostonian accent says.
“Claire?” I’m so bloody happy to see her, my vision blurs. “What are you doing here?”
“Noah was worried, and asked me to check in on you.”
I continue on my path to the door, feet tripping on nothing as she speaks. With one glance, Claire recognizes me for what I am,a man looking as bad as he feels, a goalie taking the blame for his entire team’s loss.
“Come here, Brades.” She drops the one bag remaining in her grip and opens her arms. With no care to how pathetic I may look, I break into a mini sprint, crashing into her at such a pace I nearly knock her off her feet, the same dizziness that cut short my workout hits me again as her arms enclose around me. Her gesture. Her floral scent. Her taking the time to be here, solidifies how deeply I miss my mum, brothers and sister, and those fat, vision-blurring tears are no longer just a threat.
An hourafter I stumbled upon Claire at my doorstep, I’ve finished three bowls of diet approved chicken soup, lied that I feel no adverse effects from the concussion, whined about Quinn extraditing me from the friend zone to the much worse no-go zone, and apologized a thousand times. What for, I’m not sure. Maybe it’s the lies. Or the embarrassment of crying in front of her like a six foot five baby. Or the embarrassment that dwarfed the first embarrassment when I open the door to my dorm room.
“For the fiftieth time, Noah, stop saying sorry. I’m related to Noah-what even is a fresh sheet-Petterson. He’s a pig. This—” A rainbow ring covered finger points to the discarded sweats, tees and Gatorade bottles littering the floor “—is nothing. Honestly I don’t know how Lotte puts up with him.” Voice cute, gruff and grumpy, she crosses her arms over her chest, and rolls her eyes.
“You miss him a lot, don’t you?”
“Lord help me I do.” Sighing, Claire slumps deeper into my tiny sofa, almost disappearing into the crack between the two back cushions. “Same goes for you I guess. You and numb nutsfell headfirst into a bromance the second you landed. It must be hard for you without him.” Now, I don’t know Claire as well as hernumb nutsbro, but as she studies me, I notice the same curious, mischievous twinkle lighting her eyes. “You know, Lotte, my wife Kelly and I used to wonder if, for you, there was more to it than just friendship. For you,” she repeats in case I didn’t catch it the first time.
Had this theory been expressed a few weeks ago, I would have denied, denied, denied. But I’m tired of holding this in. Of being ashamed. “I wondered that a few times myself.”
Clearly surprised by my openness, Claire’s shoulders drop from around her ears, settling in a far more comfortable position as she taps the empty space beside her. “Wading through the mud of sexuality can be difficult. Especially when you’re young, playing a traditionally male dominated sport, and so far from everything you know. Did you ever come to any conclusions? ”
With a pang for home cracking against my rib cage, I drop next to her and let my head fall backward. “Well, when I was maybe twelve, my aunt gave mum this chesty-man calendar for Chrissy … Oh, Christmas,” I clarify when Claire goes a little cross-eyed. “It was of this Australian male stripper group calledThe Thunder From Down Under.I was mesmerized. The oil-coated, bronze skin. The muscle. The bulges.” At that Claire snorts a laugh, and I do too. “In hindsight they looked bloody ridiculous, but back then, whoa.” I sigh, puffing out my cheeks. “I was an absolute string bean, six feet already and skin and bone. I told myself I admired their bodies because they were manly and buff and that’s what I wanted to be one day. But by the time I was eighteen, and the same stolen calendar was still hidden beneath my mattress, I had an inkling that something was wrong. That I was … abnormal.”
“Abnormal? Brady, who the hell told you that. There’s nothing wrong with being queer, just like there’s nothing wrong with being straight.”
“No one in particular ever said it. I just … felt different. You know? I mean, sometimes Mum would see a friend of my older brothers from school at the shops, tut and say,‘such a shame he’s gay.’Like, who is it a shame for?” I shrug. “Mum is one of the kindest, most loving souls on earth, so she would never mean to be intentionally prejudiced. But I guess I absorbed things like that, you know? I was always sporty and calling someone a fruit or poof or cocksucker was the highest form of insult. And it wasn’t just that. I liked, and still do like girls. Like … a lot.” Girls like Quinn, I think to myself. “But I didn’t understand how I could like both, so I never made a move on either. Ever.” An angry blush burns my cheeks, and I consider hiding. But I don’t. Because there’s nothing but acceptance and kindness and support on Claire’s face. “I’m not like you, Claire.”
She mock-gasps and clutches at her heart. “What? You mean, you’re not a lesbian?”
“Haha, very funny,” I scold, trying and failing to not return her cheeky smile. “I mean I’m not brave like you are. I already don’t fit in, and I’m afraid of how people would treat me if I … you know. And, and what if I don’t really feel what I feel, but just think I feel it. And so many people are so dismissive or nonchalant about it all now, and I’m still so … rigid. Being so afraid of something that doesn’t even matter, seems kind of stupid. You must think I’m kind of stupid.” How could she not after that crap heap?
“Nothing you just said is stupid Brady, and nothing you have done is lacking courage. Trust me, a lot of people care in good, and sadly, bad ways. As for not knowing what you want, some people know who they are, and who they want from a really young age, but some, like me, take time to sort it all out. Youcan experiment or not. Label it or not. Like boys, girls, and they/them, hotties. Take a day, a month, ten years. There is no queer timetable. No one is grading you. Just be patient and open to new people and experiences and you will find where you fit. I promise.”
Suddenly tired, I let my body collapse to the side till I’m squishing my seat buddy, and her fluffy space bun hairdo is tickling my nose. “You’re very wise for someone with such a dumbass brother … and such pink hair.”
“Thanks. You’re very heavy.”
“Thanks. Actually, that reminds me. I’m hungry.”
Claire snorts a laugh. “How did that remind you of being hungry?”
“Dunno. But it did.” Standing, I make my way over to the kitchen and start plucking stray noodles stuck to the sides of the pan Claire used to heat the soup. After all, I’m a growing boy and it’s been at least twenty minutes since I ate.
“I know you guys train like machines, but I swear my grocery bill is a quarter of what it used to be with garbage guts gone. I can’t believe how much you can eat.”
“Faith said that, too,” I reply, opening the fridge and swiping a handful of grapes. In my periphery I see Claire’s jerk upright, her ears practically pointing like a fairy.
“Faith. Whose Faith?”
“No one special. Just one of my teachers. She’s Aussie too, and has taken me under her wing, I guess.” Quinn’s odd reaction to Faith’s presence in my room jumps to the front of my mind. “Actually she was here the morning after the Battle game. She let Quinn and Troye in when I was in the shower, and Quinn completely freaked out.”
“Wa, wa, wait. So Quinnandyour female professor were in your dorm room?”
“Yeah. That freaking boof-head Troye was too. Freaking hate that guy.”
