Chapter Eighteen

Birds and Bees

A FEW DAYS later, Austin pushed a cart around our favorite home furnishing store. Mom disappeared to look at a room set up to be a yoga studio. She was suddenly into yoga and practiced everyday with Christine in her own yoga room on the first floor. But that wasn’t good enough for Mom. She wanted her own place to practice yoga. Then again, when you live in a house with forty-eight rooms there was space for two yoga studios.

Austin paused the cart in front of a display of duvets. “This will look perfect for your bed, mate.” He pulled the duvet to his face, rubbing it and closing his eyes, “Soft,” he said, “and looks so clean.”

I frowned. “What about when we, you know?”

Austin paused rubbing the duvet cover peering at me through his glasses. “What?” He smiled mischievously.

“You know!”

“Say it.”

“Sex,” I hissed.

A woman turned to look at us with a disapproving look on her face.

“Puno, puno, puno!” Austin chanted the word for sex in the Old Language, which he knew she didn’t understand. She mumbled something about speaking English and pushed her cart away from us.

Austin just laughed. “Americans,” he announced loudly, “are very uptight when it comes to puno! Sex!” His eyes fell on an elderly Chinese woman who said something to him in Cantonese. He frowned, turning to me.

“What did she say?”

“That I should spend more time studying and less time thinking about sex. Sounds like my gran.” He chuckled. “Anyway, mate.” He lowered his voice. “We can wash these after…you know…someday…puno…you and me,” he said, placing the duvet set in the cart, then taking my hand and shouting for Mom to meet us in the restaurant for Swedish meatballs because, of course, he was hungry. Austin was always hungry.

“Do you think I’m weird?”

“Define weird,” Austin said, as he he reached over and snatched a donut from behind the glass separating the food from the line.

“Me. Prude. You think I’m Puritanical.”

“You’re American,” Austin said. “It’s not your fault.”

“I do… I mean…well…”

“Easy, Eli,” Austin said. “It’s fine. I’m not a sex-obsessed teenager,” he said, but he looked directly at a man behind the line who was slinging fries.

“Thanks for sharing that info, kid.” The guy rolled his eyes.

“Thanks for listening.”

“Fries?”

“Yeah.” And then he eyed the plate and the meager amount of fries. “Surely, you can do better than that?”

The man grunted and heaped on more fries.

While we waited in line to pay, I reflected on my session with Arnulfo.

I was scared of having sex. Of the risks. They always tell us that when we have sex, we’ll catch something.

“HIV is a scary thing, but it’s a manageable condition these days,” he said. “And there are things you can do to be safe. Use protection. Take medicine like pre-exposure prophylaxis. Be monogamous.”

“That’s me,” I told him. “I want to be monogamous with Austin."

“Then why are you worried?”

“I’m not ready for that step. I mean, when we do that, have sex, I’ll definitely be a man.”

“That’s a good thing.”

“What if I want to be a kid forever?”

“That’s impossible.”

“Why?”

“You have to grow up, Elijah.”

The last year taught me growing up was painful. Arnulfo looked at me. “If you are worried about taking your relationship to the next level, tell Austin. It’s that easy. Talk it over with him. That’s what adults do.”

Later that night, Austin helped me bathe, one of the perks of having casts on my arm and leg. We were both naked in his huge walk-in shower, with a bench, and steam from the sauna setting swirling around us.

“Kangy?”

“Yes, Eli?” he said, gently washing my back with a washcloth.

“I was talking to Arnulfo about sex.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah,” I said. “And my fears about it, and he suggested I talk it over with you.”

“Good,” Austin said. “Eli is learning to talk to his Kangy rather than running from him.”

“I’m afraid of having sex because they say it’s dirty between two boys.”

“They are stupid,” Austin said, gently washing my left arm. “I think it’s better. Neither one of us can get pregnant, and we love each other, and that is how we’ll share our love.”

“Call it lovemaking? Yuck.”

Austin laughed, his guttural laugh. “We can call it something else. Puno?”

“Barf.”

Austin laughed some more. “Eli cracks Kangy up.”

Now he was washing my hair as I leaned my head back to keep my arm and leg dry.

“Kangy?”

“Yes, Eli—keep your eyes closed tight, love.”

“When we have sex, will we still be us?”

“Of course, we will, love. I mean, we’ll be different but still us.”

“Different?”

“Well, not virgins.” He laughed. “You are still a virgin, right?”

“Am I ever.” I laughed. “I mean, I worry. What if we feel so different and it affects us?”

“We’ll feel different, but we’ll talk through it? Okay?”

“And we’ll be safe?”

“Of course.”

“You won’t do anything weird?”

“Define weird, love.”

“You know, drip hot wax on my face.”

“Maybe something else.”

He whispered in my ear.

I looked at him. I didn’t understand what he meant.

He just laughed, peering at me. “Eli, you are really one of a kind, and that’s why I love you.”

He dried my hair and kissed me on the lips.

Later, in bed, I remarked, “We’re so close to being men, Kangy.”

“Yes, but we still have a lot of growing to do.” He added, looking at me laying shirtless in his bed, “Though you’ve turned into a man, body-wise, Eli. You have this line of hair going from your belly button to your chest, and it’s so sexy.”

“Really?”

“Yes,” he said. “I have very little hair. I wish I had hair like you.”

We laughed a little. “We can trade if you want!”

“After we trade scalps?”

“Sure,” I said, rolling over to grab Ocho. “Austin?”

“Yes, mate.”

“Will you be with me? When we grow older?”

“Always,” he whispered. “And you?”

“Always, Kangy. Always.”

And he pulled me close to him, and told me to relax, close my eyes, and sleep.

I woke up like clockwork screaming, “Austin! Austin!”

“Let’s go and see the day start, Eli,” Austin said. He helped me up to the roof and we watched the sun rise over the Verdugo Mountains. The brown mountains turning from dark-gray to purple to burnt sienna, covered with splotches of dark-green chaparral.

We huddled close together as the morning chill dissipated and the sun gently warmed the roof around us.

“Thank you, Kangy.”

“For what, Eli?”

“For this, last night.”

“You’re welcome, Little Eli.”

“My panic attack wasn’t so bad this time.”

“Eli’s healing.”