Sunday morning I walked to Centennial Park and sat by the Duck Pond, mulling over the level of anger and jealousy I’d felt seeing Pericles with Isa. Then I called him to say I couldn’t work at Give Me the Juice anymore. He forced me to admit it was because of Isa. I accused him of cutting my grass and he reminded me that I’d been emphatic about not liking her that way.
‘You still knew that I liked her. Why didn’t you tell me you wanted to ask her? Because you’re Shady McShitball.’
‘I can’t believe you just called me Shady McShitball. I’m the one who really needs a friend right now.’
‘You should’ve considered that before the dog act.’
‘You’re not listening to anything I say.’
‘Because your mouth’s dribbling shit.’
Hanging up on Pericles was quite a rush. But rushes by definition don’t last long, and as I walked home I felt terrible about losing a friend over the stance I’d taken. I called him back three times before he answered.
‘What do you want now?’ he said.
‘I’ve been thinking about what happened and I’m willing to forgive you.’
‘That’s really special but I don’t want your forgiveness. A friendship should be built on honesty. I tried to be open and you cut me off. I wanted to tell you something important because I value our friendship. Now I think it might destroy what’s left of it – if there is anything.’
‘This had better be good.’
‘There’s nothing good about it. You may hate me even more when you hear the truth.’
‘I don’t hate you now.’
‘Can we meet somewhere? I can come over your way.’
‘Sure. Meet me at International Velvet. Do you know it?’
‘I’ve been there once or twice. I’ll be there at eleven.’
Pericles beat me to the café. He was sitting on the lips sofa, acting busy with his phone. All the outside tables were occupied by Sunday brunchers and their miniature dogs.
‘Thanks for coming,’ he said. ‘I ordered you a macchiato.’
‘How did you know?’
‘Isa talks about you nonstop.’
I slid in next to him and a waitress with a bleached pixie cut and Bambi eyes set our coffees on the knock-off Brillo® box. ‘Thanks, Candy,’ Pez said.
‘You know her?’
‘Isa and I used to come here all the time. That was our table under the Edie Sedgwick photo – my favourite Warhol superstar.’ He nodded towards the large framed print. ‘Now that couple in matching Gucci tracksuits have taken over.’ He paused. ‘You’ve got a coffee moustache.’
‘Always happens. What did you want to tell me?’
‘Where do I start? Isa and I clicked the first day we met back in Year 7, and we’ve been tight ever since. Never anything more than friends though. Last year Nads was hounding her and one day followed us to her place. I told him to back off and it turned into a fight. It got me thinking there might be something more between us after all.’
‘I knew it!’ I said and whapped the sofa, drawing stink eye from the tracksuit couple. ‘Sorry, that was a bit much. You should’ve told me from the start.’
‘Hold on, let me finish.’ Pericles delivered a padded-out story about how much everybody in his family loved Isa, especially his father, who assumed they were together. It was the one thing that made him proud but it wasn’t true. When Pez convinced him that he and Isa were just friends, his father told him it was time to man up and ask her out. So he did.
‘She laughed and said I’d caught her off guard and needed time to think about it. Two days later she said no, because there was a huge obstacle in the way.’ Pericles was pouring a sachet of sugar onto the glass on the Brillo® box and shaping the granules into a circle. ‘She told me I was gay.’
‘That’s stupid.’
‘She reckons she knew.’
‘You can’t tell somebody else what they are. Gaydar’s bullshit.’
Pericles grinned crookedly and swept the sugar crystals into a serviette. ‘Promise me you won’t tell anybody this?’
‘People have asked me that a few times lately. Yeah, okay I promise. But no pinky.’
Pez took a deep breath, turning his gaze to the framed photo. ‘Isa was right,’ he said to Edie Sedgwick, then turned back to me. ‘I bat for the other team. Well, I haven’t really batted yet, except on my own.’ He half-smiled. ‘But I am gay.’
‘You’re stitching me up?’
‘I wish I was, but it’s true. I’ve been attracted to guys for as long as I can remember but had fooled myself into thinking I could have something romantic with Isa and it would change me. She knew me better than I knew myself. I’m a legit fag.’
‘Don’t even use that word.’
‘Legit? Sorry.’ He mimicked the screaming-in-fear emoji. ‘I’m just a fag. And you know what?’ he said with a theatrical hand flourish. ‘It’s liberating to own the word after being called it so many times by people who had no idea I was one.’ Pericles had raised his voice and I could see other customers registering the conversation. ‘I am a fag. F-A-G fag! Hello, everybody. I, Pericles Pappas, am a legit homosexual.’
The tracksuit couple fairy-clapped. I asked why he’d chosen this moment to come out to me.
‘Because you lost your shit about Isa. The only reason I’d asked her was because she was upset you hadn’t. That’s why I spoke to you first – to give you a nudge. I don’t want to lose our friendship, but I’m giving you the chance to distance yourself before it’s all out in the open.’
‘Give me some credit. Why would I do that?’
‘So people don’t think you’re a poof by association.’
‘Now you’re talking mad shit again.’
Pericles looked around the room, buried his face in his hands and pressed his fingers into his eyes, as if preparing to pluck them out.
‘There’s more,’ he said. ‘You’re going to hate me for this and I don’t blame you.’
‘I won’t hate you. Keep going.’
‘I was in the library messaging Isa when Starkey swiped my phone and locked himself in a toilet cubicle to read through our conversation. There was a part where she was talking about being jealous of your and my friendship, and wondering if you were gay too. I told her I hoped so and made a stupid joke about her being a fag-magnet.’
‘Shit, Pericles!’
‘I’m not attracted to you. I was being smartarsey because I was jealous of Isa spending more time with you. It’s all good now because you like each other. God – I completely hate myself right now though. I want to melt and disappear through the cracks in the floor.’
‘Don’t beat yourself up. Things must’ve been really difficult for you in ways that I can hardly imagine. But I can relate to how you feel because I’ve felt that way as well. I’ve got a problem that I’m disgusted by, and it means I’ll never be able to date Isa, or any other girl.’
‘What is it? You have to tell now.’
And just like that I’d reached the point of no return. I took Pericles through a similar build-up, swearing him to secrecy and making him promise that he wouldn’t laugh at me. Dr Finster and Nicole Parker were the only people who knew about my unnatural extension – assuming that Nicole hadn’t told anybody, that is. ‘Unnatural extension’ was the term I used instead of tail, and I could see Pericles struggling to keep a straight face. But instead of being repelled he seemed fascinated, which made me feel a small degree less uncomfortable. I finished my tale of woe by saying, ‘It’s been quite a mission to keep it hidden. And I want to keep it that way – but your coming-out will probably make you feel freer than you’ve ever felt before.’
I leant over and hugged Pericles on the lips sofa, then felt him shuddering in my arms. ‘Love you, bruh,’ I said, and hugged tighter. The waterworks fully opened. The Gucci couple were staring, so I blew them a kiss over his shoulder and they went back to their eggs. After calming down, Pez told me it was the best day of his life, which made me think the rest had been one extended stay in Shitsville. Turns out Starkey had been blackmailing him. Against my wishes, Pez had confronted him about his uncle. He’d asked him directly if Ken Barnsdale had paid him to harass Bert. Starkey initially denied everything but then contradicted himself by revealing he’d taken screenshots of Pericles’ messaging session with Isa, and threatening to out him if he told anybody about Barnsdale.
‘Everything will be okay.’ I went to pay the bill. On our way out I said, ‘Our generation’s way more accepting than our parents’.’
‘That’s who I’m afraid of. I don’t want them to find out about me from somebody else.’
‘There’s only one way of preventing it.’
‘I could tell Mum. But it would kill my father.’ His eyes widened. ‘Unless he actually kills me first.’
‘You might be surprised.’
‘And I might be thrown out.’
‘I’m sure that won’t happen – and you can stay with me if it does.’ I gripped his shoulders.
‘Serious?’
‘I’ve got your back, no matter what.’
‘Same.’
Once we’d parted ways, I walked up Bayswater Road, kicking the orange and brown leaves, happy that I’d patched things up with Pericles and even happier that I might be able to do a little patchwork with Isa as well.