Kieran & Drew (16 page)

“I’m—” He winced when his voice cracked, and cleared his throat. “I’m kind of tired, Dad.”

 

“Kieran, is everything alright?”

 

Before he could tell his dad not to, his father was opening his bedroom door, and stopped stock still after spotting his black eye.

“Kieran, what’s going on—what the
hell
?” He rushed over to examine Kieran’s eye, taking Kieran’s chin in his hand and turning it to see the extent of bruising. “Who hit you?” he demanded.

“
No
one. God.” He yanked his chin free and stepped back. He was distantly aware of how pathetic he must look with his hair all mussed, a black eye, and standing there in nothing but his socks, boxers, and his dad’s ratty old T-shirt that was three sizes too big.

“Why didn’t I get a call from the school? Are you being bullied?” “Dad,
Jesus
, drop it, I told you no one hit me!”
“Then how did you get a black eye, Kieran?”

“Look, it was after school, I was horsing around with some friends and I
accidentally
got an elbow to the eye. I’m fine.” It was at least partially true.

His dad seemed only slightly mollified as he stood with one hand on his hip, the other swiping over his mouth. “You’re telling me the truth?”

“Yes.” He wrapped his arms around his middle, not quite able to meet his father’s gaze.

 

“Would you even tell me if it wasn’t the truth?”

Kieran looked up at him, unable to speak or even hide what it was he was feeling. His father’s head tilted to one side as he let out a heavy sigh, and he stepped toward him, one hand extended toward Kieran’s elbow. “Kier…,” he said softly.

But it was too much. He was too raw and too tired. He was tired from the constant hot and cold, back and forth with Toby that evening. Tired of missing Drew, and tired of not knowing how to talk to his dad—the one person in the world who was supposed to know him, inside and out. He couldn’t talk to his dad because there was too much to explain, and they were now so estranged from each other that instead of feeling reassured by his father’s presence, he felt vulnerable. When his dad reached for him, he snatched his arm away.

“Would you just leave it be? I mean, that’s what you’re good at, right? Leaving shit be and taking off to do your own thing that doesn’t involve me.”

“Kieran, come on. I know I’m not around as much as I should be, but—”

 

“Just leave me alone! I don’t want to fucking talk to you!”

His father balked, his eyes widening slightly with shock. He opened his mouth to say something and closed it again. He shook his head minutely, turned, and closed the bedroom door behind him as he left.

Kieran automatically took a step after him but stopped. He’d never sworn directly at his father before. He’d made snide comments about his absence, but he’d never intentionally said anything cruel to him.

The one time his dad reached out to him and the one time when he truly needed it, and what had he done? He’d pushed him away. He sat on the edge of his bed and put his head in his hands after hearing the front door open and then close. He was alone in the house. He was completely and utterly alone.
CHApter EiGhT.

D
REW sat at the kitchen table with his head in his hands and with only one thought running through his head:
keep it together, keep it together
. She was cleaning again, and there was nothing he could do about it. To an outsider, a mother keeping a tidy home may not seem like much to fret over, but his mother was not your average stay-at-home mom.

One two-minute phone call from his father, and the house now stank of bleach. When his mother cleaned, it was usually an early indication that her fragile sense of wellbeing was circling the drain. She didn’t just run a vacuum over the carpets; she shampooed them. More than once. She didn’t just clean the cupboards, she washed and rewashed every plate and mug, she scrubbed the insides of the cupboards with every foul-smelling cleaning product known to man, and then repeated the entire process. It was pointless trying to keep up a normal conversation; when she spoke it was mostly disjointed, and she’d constantly start the next sentence before finishing the last. It was exhausting, and it was lonely to be the only observer and be unable to walk away.

Though feeling lonely was quickly becoming less of a novelty to him. He hadn’t seen or spoken to Kieran in three weeks, and it was a horrible thing he was doing, avoiding him—he knew that. But at the time, it had seemed the smart thing to do.
Now
? Now he kind of hated himself. He hated himself for the way he treated Kieran, just cutting him off like that, and he hated himself for not being as brave as he wanted to be. Problem was, there was no other person he could point at to lay the blame on, not even Jefferson.

Since that Toby guy walked in on them, nothing had happened. No one else knew, and the world hadn’t ended. And not only that, but since hearing Adam let rip the F-word at that stupid fucking party, he’d even shown to himself that he could handle the kind of ignorant aggression he would expect from others. He and he alone was responsible for how miserable he felt now. He couldn’t talk to his uncle, his mother was already going through a rough time, he’d been a dick to Matt and had flat out refused to discuss anything to do with what happened at the party, and he’d cut Kieran out of his life—which was ironic really, because the one person he wanted to talk to right now was him.

The past three weeks had brought him nothing but regret and guilt. He missed Kieran. As new as their undefined relationship had been, he missed his friend. He missed the person who knew and shared his secret. Despite realizing that he and Kieran hadn’t taken the time to really get to know one another and had instead ploughed straight into necking, he missed him. He caught himself thinking about that quiet, nice laugh he had. How shy and self-conscious he got when talking about what turned him on. The way Kieran looked at him—like he was the guy who was the exception in an otherwise harsh, boring world. Mostly, he missed having the opportunity to know Kieran better, because they could have been something amazing.

He thought perhaps his greatest realization had been that he hadn’t prevented trouble by dismissing Kieran. He’d instead cut off the one person who had—or could have—truly known him. He didn’t have that now. No one honestly knew him, and the resulting feeling of disconnection was crushing him.

He looked up at his mother, who was muttering to herself as she scrubbed the granite kitchen counter with more force than necessary. It was just the two of them in the house, but he may as well have been sitting there by himself. He didn’t want to be alone right then, and not for the first time he wished he had a normal mother, or at least a mom who wasn’t so fragile. He splayed his hands across the table cloth, and he swallowed thickly. “Mom?”

“Honey, I’m going to need some Pledge. Could you run out and get me a can, one of the big ones?”

“Mom, I’m gay.”
“There’s money in the cookie jar.”

His sigh was more of a shuddering breath as he pushed away from the kitchen table, his chair scraping against the squeaky clean linoleum floor. “’Kay.”

He unscrewed the lid to the cookie jar where his mom kept the cash. It was looking a little empty. He looked forward to the day when he’d be working and able to help out. As it was, they got by with his father’s alimony payments, help from his uncle, and the occasional washing and mending his mother did for a few regulars who would bring their clothing over to the house for her.

“And you get yourself something, sweetie. Are you running low on anything?”

“I could use some new socks,” he muttered. He’d never really missed out on anything as a kid. When he wanted a new bike, his mom and uncle made it happen, and whenever he needed new clothes or school supplies, he always got them, but that didn’t mean he liked to ask. He took a ten-dollar bill, folded it, and slid it into his back pocket. “I’ll be back soon.”

“Alright, honey. Be care—”

He looked back at his mom when she suddenly fell quiet midsentence. She stood up from where she’d been crouched under the sink, still wearing her yellow rubber gloves and clutching her plastic spray bottle of disinfectant.

“Mom?”

 

“What did you say?” she asked softly, her eyes a little wider than usual.

He felt his heart begin to hammer. “I… socks?”
“No, no, honey. You said something else.”

What had he been thinking? Blurting it out like that when she was already frazzled. He swallowed hard, figuring that she had to know some time. “I-I said I’m gay, Mom.”

She gasped, one yellow rubber glove coming up to cover her mouth. He knew she was shocked, but he couldn’t tell if she was upset or… he didn’t know. If his mom was to shout at him or hate him, he knew he’d crack, right there and then.

“Mom,” he spoke, his voice thick. “Are… are you okay?” “You’re gay?” she asked. Her eyes were glassy, but she was still mostly unreadable.

He nodded. “Yes.”
“How do you… are-are you sure, Drew?”
He nodded again. “I’m sure.”
“But how do you know?”

He felt himself flush, and he was unable hold her gaze. “I just know, Mom.”

 

Her answer was a breathy “oh,” realization dawning. “You… you have a, ah, a special friend?”

He was confused. Though there was a hesitant and shaky smile beginning at one corner of her mouth, there were also tears shining in her eyes.

“Sort of. Are you mad?” He felt as if he was five and he’d just broken her favorite crystal rather than having told his mother his biggest secret.

“Oh,
no
, baby,” she breathed, taking a few steps closer but seeming hesitant to touch him, as if she thought
he
was the one who might bolt.

“But you’re crying,” he said with a hitch in his voice. “If you’re not mad then why are you crying?”

Her mouth turned downward. “I’m crying because you look so scared, Drew. You just told me you’re gay and you look like you’re expecting me to scream at you. That’s why I’m crying, baby.”

She pulled off a glove and quickly wiped away a tear with a dainty sniff. She stepped forward and then cupped his cheek with her bare—and now damp—hand. “Why on earth would you ever be afraid of me?”

“Mom,” he whispered, and fell into her thin arms, which she automatically opened for him. He sighed when she stroked his hair, and the relief he felt was a balm of sort to the jagged edges of all the complicated details. “I’ve been having kind of a rough time with it.”

“Honey,” she crooned. “It’s alright, everything is going to be alright, I promise.”

 

“You don’t know that. I screwed up.”

“Okay, come on….” She led him back to the kitchen table and encouraged him to sit down. She took a glass out of the cabinet to pour him a glass of water from the faucet, and he thought distantly that at least she’d stopped cleaning.

She handed him the glass, and it was only when seeing that his hands shook that he realized how much his mom’s approval meant to him. He took a sip of the water and looked at her when she pulled another kitchen chair close, right beside him so she could stroke his arm.

“This would have been so much easier for you if I had just asked you the question.”

“You mean you suspected?” he asked hopefully. For some reason, the thought of her having suspicions made actually telling her feel less exposing for himself, and less like a burden for her to acknowledge.

She pressed her lips together and shook her head. “No. I know you never really talked about girls or ever brought any home, but to be honest I… I just thought that maybe you were too embarrassed to.” She tilted her head. “Too embarrassed to bring anyone home because of me,” she added gently.

He frowned. “You don’t embarrass me, mom. I just worry about you, that’s all.”

 

She squeezed his arm. “You shouldn’t have to.” She took a deep breath. “I didn’t suspect, but your uncle….”

 

His eyes went wide. “Un-Uncle Rich
knows
?”

“No, no, he
suspected
.” She lifted one shoulder in an almost apologetic shrug. “He said that if you’d wanted a girlfriend by now, you’d have one, no problem, and that you were never unkind. Not like how most boys can be sometimes, not even when joking around. And before you panic, no, he did not care either way, he just worried about you. He didn’t want you to be carrying around such a big secret—if there
was
a secret—like some kind of burden.”

His opened and closed his mouth, too stunned for the moment to speak. “Why
didn’t
he say anything?” he managed eventually.

“Well, I didn’t think it was the case—because evidently I’m a
moron
—and… well, if there was a chance, we agreed that it would be best for you to approach us.” She looked at him remorsefully. “Honey, if I knew I could have made this easier for you by listening to your uncle, I never would have just waited to see what happened. I’m so sorry, sweetie.”

He shook his head slowly, still digesting. “It doesn’t matter, I guess. I’m just glad you’re not throwing me out or something.”

She slapped his arm, and just as quickly she pulled him into a hug, making him crack a tremulous smile. “Don’t you dare say such a thing. I’m agoraphobic, not one of those religious nut-bags off the television.”

He managed a garbled laugh and let her squeeze him for a minute. “I like this,” she said quietly.
“What?”

She rubbed his back. “When you let me be your mom. Seems like it’s always you taking care of me lately. It shouldn’t be like that.” “Mom,” he said gently. “I’ll always take care of you. You know that.”

 

She let out a watery little laugh and kissed the top of his head before letting him go. “What on earth did I do to deserve you, hmm?”

The relief he felt was overwhelming. He finally told someone, and he was still standing. His mom loved him, his uncle already knew, and while he was sure Matt suspected something, his friend was still trying to get through to him rather than pushing him away. Though he knew he didn’t have the balls to tell Matt yet, not by a long shot, he still felt a world of relief now that someone else knew. Someone as important as his mother.