eight

On that day last year when I finally got the guts to tell my mother who I am, everything completely blew apart, breaking me into so many pieces that I didn’t think I could find them all and put myself back together.

I still have nightmares about standing in the living room trying to tell her what was going on in my life. Ryan was sitting there with me, trying to be supportive but probably wishing the floor would open up and swallow him while I tried to tell my mother how unhappy and confused I’d been feeling basically forever. I just about lost my courage when her eyes filled up with tears as I tried to explain how I ended up in the water that day. How I had felt so desperately tired of being afraid that I wanted to escape from everything, including myself. Especially myself.

That I was so terrified of hurting her, I didn’t know what to do.

When I first started talking, Mom nodded sympathetically, as if she knew what I was going to say, and I had this flash of hope that maybe she did. That maybe she was going to tell me she’d known all along, like on that TV show Glee, where the gay kid comes out to his dad, and his dad says, “I’ve known since you were three,” and they hug and everything is okay.

But our conversation was nothing like that.

It took about thirty seconds for me to realize that she thought I was upset because of the divorce. Like, somehow I’d been battered and bruised by her finding the courage to kick out the man who had made both our lives miserable. She thought I felt responsible for the breakup and that my guilt drove me into the river.

I wish I had been responsible for it. That would be something to be proud of.

Mom was trying so hard to be sympathetic and understanding that it made my head start to hurt like it was caught in a vise. I could feel the blood throbbing, pounding in my brain. I knew I had to get it over with before she said anything else. I had to just tell her before she came up with six other reasons to explain my messed up life.

My throat closed up every time I imagined saying it out loud. Two little syllables that choked me every time I tried to shake them loose.

Two little syllables that would change everything.

I’m gay.

I don’t know how I finally managed to get the words out, but the second I did, I wanted to reach out and grab them so I could shove them back down my throat. I was shaking so badly that the room vibrated and, at first, I couldn’t focus on my mother’s face. I was so afraid of what I was going to see written on it that I thought I was going to pass out before I got the shaking under control enough to actually see her.

I closed my eyes, trying to calm myself down. After a few seconds, I managed to risk opening them.

My mother was just sitting there, still and silent like a petrified version of herself, staring at me with no expression at all on her face. I understood in that moment what Ryan meant when he said that my eyes looked like black holes the first time he met me. My mother’s eyes seemed dark and empty, reaching back to somewhere I didn’t want to go.

I’d had enough nightmares about this moment that I thought I was prepared for the worst. That I’d be ready for whatever she said or did after I told her. I knew it could go really badly and that I had to be ready to deal with whatever happened.

But I wasn’t ready for those empty eyes staring me into nothingness. And I wasn’t ready when they filled up with tears as she came to life again and begged me to tell her it wasn’t true. That I couldn’t possibly be gay without her knowing it. That I had a girlfriend when I was twelve, so obviously I couldn’t be gay. That she had spent my whole life believing I would grow up and marry a woman who would give her grandchildren.

Her son couldn’t be gay. It was impossible!

She wanted me to agree with her. To tell her I was wrong and she was right. That I had made a mistake, and everything would be fixed if I just took it back and buried it where it belonged. And part of me wanted to do it. Just rewind the conversation ten minutes into the past and keep this secret to myself. To live a lie until I was old enough to get away and find out if there might be some truth somewhere else.

But I couldn’t do it. The words were finally out, and I wasn’t going to take them back.

She tried calm, rational persuasion, reminding me that her church would never approve of me, as if somehow that would be so desperately important to me that I could just decide to be someone else. I told her I wanted her approval. I didn’t care about some stupid church.

And then she changed tactics and decided it wasn’t my fault after all. That I had somehow been persuaded to become gay because of something I’d seen or read on the Internet. Somehow I had been duped into believing it would be so wonderful to be different from everyone around me that I had spent all of this time living a lie inside of my own mind. I was pretending to be gay instead of pretending not to be. She told me not to worry. She wouldn’t stand by and watch me destroy my life. She was going to find a way to fix me.

Fix me. Like I was someone’s broken cell phone headed for the dumpster behind my school.

She didn’t listen when I tried to tell her that I’m not broken or sick or trying to hurt her. That I didn’t decide to be gay. She didn’t listen when I tried to tell her that this is just who I am. That pretending to be someone I’m not was destroying my life.

She just kept shaking her head and coming up with her own version of the truth, while my world started to disintegrate around me.

I remember begging her to understand me, accept me. I walked toward her with my hands stretched out as if I were three again and wanted to be picked up. She stopped talking and sat staring at me, like I was stranger who had invaded her living room. I tried to talk to her again, but she just shook her head, leaned forward, and burst into harsh hysterical sobbing, rocking back and forth, holding her arms tightly against her stomach, like something inside her was about to break.

The room suddenly felt unbearably hot as the air disappeared, taking my breath away with it. I was afraid if I stayed there one more second, I would either faint or start screaming and never stop.

So I ran out of the room, leaving Ryan alone with her, probably wondering what he was doing there and what the hell he was supposed to do next.

I was out the door and halfway down the street when the sky split open and started to pour rain down on my head, but I couldn’t slow down. I just kept running until I found myself at the bridge.

I don’t know why I ended up there. I just knew I couldn’t be anywhere near my mother with her endless tears and plans to make me into someone I’m not.

Matthew thinks I was planning to jump in and finish the job I started in the spring. Ryan obviously thought that too, because he sent Cody there to stop me before coming himself.

I don’t know if I was planning anything. I’m not sure I was thinking at all. I don’t remember the details of those first few minutes on the bridge. My memories are a soggy mess of tears and rain that just swirl around inside my mind without sense or direction. All I know is that Cody kept grabbing me and Ryan kept talking to me until I wanted to throw both of them over the railing. I don’t know how long the three of us were there before my mom showed up.

I found out later that Ryan called his mom before leaving for the bridge and she went straight over to my house so she could get my mom and bring her to us. Mrs. Malloy told me that when she got to my place, my mother was already out the front door and coming to find me. I hope that’s true.

My mother came over to me and stood there, rain pounding down, plastering her hair to her skull and soaking through her thin sweater. She shivered a little as she reached over and put her arms around me, telling me she was sorry. She had been taken by surprise and she had reacted badly. She said she loved me and wanted me to come home so we could figure it out together.

I had no idea what she meant by that, but she was holding me and saying she loved me, and that was all that mattered. In that moment, it was enough to get me out of the rain.

My mother still comes and sits in on the first half hour of my counseling sessions with Matthew so that we can all talk about how we’re going to “figure it out.” After all these months, I don’t know how much we have figured out. She is definitely trying really hard to understand that being gay isn’t something I just decided to try on like a new coat. She’s also doing her best to get past her own lifelong belief that homosexuality is inherently wrong or evil. I guess she’s trying to reconcile the teachings of the church that she loves with the realities of the son that she loves. But she’s definitely not ready to head to a Pride parade, no matter what Benjamin would like to believe is possible in this town.

I know she’s only lived with it for a few months, but it’s obvious to me that she still wants to cry every time she actually has to say the word gay, which she only does when Matthew makes her. When Matthew and I are alone, he says that I have to be patient with her and give her time to join us here in the twenty-first century. That I have to try to understand where she’s coming from and to recognize how far she’s going to have to travel to get to where I am. So, I’m trying. But it’s hard to wait sometimes. I feel like life is passing by too fast for her to keep up, and I’ll be gone from home before she can fully accept me, and by then it’ll be too late. Now that I’ve had the guts to tell her, I don’t want to leave home next year and have to wonder if I’ll be welcomed back.

The other thing Matthew tries to talk to me about is my father. He’s been living in another town for months now and doesn’t have any real idea what’s been going on. He only knows that I had an accident in the river back in the spring and that Ryan jumped in and saved me. He doesn’t know anything else. Matthew thinks it’s a mistake to keep the truth from him, but I don’t care what Matthew thinks. I actually don’t care what my father thinks either, but I don’t want to deal with whatever poison he would send my way if he knew that his son liked boys. And pretty clothes. And makeup.

Lucas would tell me I should put on a fabulous dress, find some matching lip gloss, and march right up to my dad and kiss him on the cheek.

It would probably give him a heart attack.

Maybe it’s not such a bad idea after all.