M or F? (26 page)

“Hm.” He nodded.

I nodded.

Frannie burst out laughing and put her hand over her mouth, trying not to spit chocolate pudding onto the table. “So true,” she said to Glenn through her fingers. “Did you see
Juicy Gossip
? The Botox did more acting than she did.” I knew right away they were talking about Kitty Elizabeth Benson, who headed up mine and Frannie's most-overrated-actresses-of-all-time list.

Glenn cocked his head and widened his eyes in a dead-on Kitty Elizabeth Benson impersonation. “What do you mean, Frannie?”

Now she did spit out her pudding. “Sorry!” she practically screamed.

“Mmmm, nutritious,” Glenn-Kitty said, pretending to scoop it up and eat it. Frannie waved her hands in front of her face and lifted her knees like she was going to wet her pants.

“Can't take him anywhere,” Jeffrey said to me.

“I know what you mean,” I said. “My best friend spits it out. Yours eats it up. Nice couple, right?” Then I stopped short.

“What is it?” Frannie asked me between gasps. I'm sure I was doing the deer-in-the-headlights thing.

“Nothing,” I said. “I just remembered something I have to do.” In truth, I was stuck on the “nice couple” comment from a second ago. Was I crazy, or were Frannie and Glenn good together? Not that I
wanted
them to be a couple or thought they should be, but . . .

Jeffrey was a good person, and he liked Glenn. Frannie seemed to at least find Glenn entertaining, and for that matter, had more to say to him than she ever had to with Jeffrey. The fact that I'd been outvoted about Glenn wasn't lost on me, either. And Glenn was . . . what? Funny. I'd give him that. He liked movies. That was a plus. He seemed like a loyal enough friend, even if he did always want to be the center of attention. I supposed I could relate to that. And . . .

My stomach lurched with another, whole new realization. I took a bite of my cereal mush just to stall for time while Frannie, Glenn, and Jeffrey went on talking.

Movie hound . . . loyal friend . . . uses humor . . . wants attention . . .

Glenn was
me
.

He was the straight version of me, whether or not I wanted to admit it.

Which made him totally perfect for Frannie.

The whole thing was starting to take shape in my head, and the only glitch I could see was that it was too perfect to believe. Frannie and Glenn. Me and Jeffrey. I didn't want to get attached to the idea, but I liked where it was going. And if Frannie was wrong about Jeffrey being gay, well, then I'd just have to kill her. No, maim her. Then she'd never be able to get away from me again.

“Hey, why don't we all do something after school?” Jeffrey asked. I could see he was jumping on this opportunity. It was something he had suggested in one of our chats, and I (Frannie) had shot it down. Now for the first time, this little foursome seemed like a good idea to me.

“Sure,” I said, but then remembered. “Wait. I promised Ethan Schumacher I'd go to the GSA meeting today.”

“You did?” Frannie asked me.

“Well, yeah,” I said. “He's been working it really hard, trying to get more people there.” I felt a little sheepish since my original motivation had been more about shopping for new friends, even if Frannie didn't know that.

“What time's the meeting?” Jeffrey asked.

“Right after school,” I said. “Three-thirty.”

He looked around at us. “Well, it's the Gay-Straight Alliance, right? We can all go and then do something after. Get something to eat or whatever. How's that?”

Frannie and I exchanged a super-concentrated bit of eye contact—tiny on the outside, huge on the inside. This was perfect.

“That's perfect,” she said.

“Can I meet you guys later?” Glenn asked. “Like five o'clock? I have to be home with my sister today until my mom gets off work.”

Sure, you do, Glenn, I thought. He probably wouldn't have been caught dead at a GSA meeting.

“Sounds like a plan to me,” Jeffrey said. “Frannie? Marcus?”

Frannie's face looked like a mirror of my own little smile. There was plenty of time to get the full lowdown from her before the meeting, and we both knew it.

“Sounds like a plan,” we both said at the same time.

 

 

Room 108 was crowded at three-thirty. Apparently, Ethan had recruited more than just me to this meeting. Brendan Thomas had cracked open the closet door and shown up, I was glad to see. And there were about two dozen other people, many of them obviously queer, some obviously straight, and a few hard-to-tells, including the blue-eyed hottie sitting with Frannie and me on a wide windowsill at the back of the room. Jeffrey seemed perfectly comfortable to be there, no crossed arms, no tension on his face. I wrote it all down in my mental notebook.

By now, Frannie had told me the full story of her little seduction scheme and how that had gone. The more we talked about everything, the more I agreed with her that this had potential—if not for her, then for me. There was still the whole question of how—and if—she needed to break things off with Jeffrey, since maybe he'd been faking it all along, and/or maybe we'd been imagining that things were more “on” between them than they actually were. Either way, Frannie was now officially hands-off where Jeffrey was concerned, and I was hands-on, if I wanted to be, with her blessing. Still, I was going to need some kind of push or sign or something before I'd be ready to do anything about it.

“Okay, everyone, let's come to order.” That was Ms. Bayonne, the well-meaning but clueless faculty liaison to the GSA, who tended to use phrases like
tolerance for homosexuals
and
life partner
. “It looks like Ethan's done a marvelous job turning out some new faces,” she said. Ethan got a polite round of applause. “I thought we'd start with a little ice breaker to get things going. Let's go around the room and say one thing you think we can do to make RBHS a more tolerant place for everyone. Bridget, would you like to go first?”

Bridget thought for a second and said, “We should write our own nondiscrimination policy for the school.”

Ms. Bayonne wrote the idea on a flip chart. “Good. Let's keep going around.”

The girl holding Bridget's hand said, “We should have unisex bathrooms.”

“I don't know about that,” Ms. Bayonne said nervously, clicking the cap back onto her felt marker.

“I do,” said Nicole, who was the closest thing to an out trans kid I knew at our school. “People shouldn't assume that everyone's either just gay or lesbian.” Several people nodded supportively.

“Ethan?” Ms. Bayonne asked, anxiously moving things along.

“I think everyone who feels like they can be out at school should be. There's nothing more powerful than that.” He got another little round of applause for that one. I whistled, too.

As it came around to us, I couldn't wait to hear what Jeffrey had to say. I didn't even think about my own answer ahead of time, so I just said, “I agree with Ethan. People should be out when they can.” Then, in a mini-moment of inspiration, I added, “We should have some kind of buddy system for people who aren't ready to be out but want to talk to someone about it. I'd be willing to work on that.”
Are you listening, Jeffrey?

Frannie went next. “I think we should stop talking about ‘tolerance' and start looking at real diversity,” she said. “Correct me if I'm wrong, but tolerance is for things that you wish weren't there.”

I love my brain twin. I couldn't have said it better.

Ms. Bayonne gave a tight smile. This clearly wasn't going the way she had planned. “Next?” she said hopefully.

Jeffrey looked a little uncomfortable with all the eyes on him. “Well,” he said, nodding in Nicole's direction, “I like what you said. People shouldn't make so many assumptions about other people. You can't tell anything just by looking at someone.” It seemed like he was going to say more, but then he just ducked his chin, as though he were putting a period on the sentence.

I looked down at my hands in case my face was showing more than I wanted it to. Jeffrey didn't know it, but he had just given me the little push I was looking for. I knew right then what I was going to . . .

. . . or at least, wanted to . . .

. . . but was scared to death to . . .

. . . but maybe just absolutely had to . . .

. . . do.

“Hey, Mom,” I said gently as I walked into the kitchen.

 

Mom looked up from a cup of coffee and smiled at me. She was wearing a black tank and black silk drawstring pants—pretty sophisticated for her. She looked really pretty—in a casual way. “Hi, sweetheart,” she said, sliding a plate of oatmeal raisin cookies across the table in my direction.

“Are you going out?” I asked tentatively. She and I had never actually discussed the whole Intimate Pleasures moment—thank God. I was hoping that I might be able to spend the rest of my life pretending that it hadn't happened. Although I was pretty sure that Mom's silence wasn't going to last. Mom's a brooder. She'll process something for a long time, and then, once she has the right words—
bam!
—she'll bring it up. Permanent, total denial is more
my
style.

“Staying in,” Mom corrected.

“Really?” I asked as I slid into the chair across from hers. “It's Saturday—don't you have a date with Dad?”

Mom chuckled softly. “Oh, sweetie, I think that's over.”

I pressed my lips together as guilt stabbed through me. “You're giving up on
The Romance Handbook
?” I asked guiltily.

“Absolutely.” Mom sighed.

I didn't say anything for a moment—I just sat there, feeling like the worst daughter ever. What was it that Laura had said? “It's important that we all support Mom and Dad on their journey to reenergize their marriage.” Okay, so it sounded like something that a TV talk show host would spout. But it was still true. And what had I done? Borrowed Mom's slip and tried to seduce my gay boyfriend in it.

I'd never even returned it for the smaller size—I'd just put it back in the bag and kicked it way to the rear of my closet.

Way to go, Frannie, I thought. You're really supportive.

An image of Marcus flashed in my mind. Maybe if I'd been more supportive of
him
, he wouldn't have ever had to lie about chatting with Jeffrey—and then things wouldn't be as complicated as they were now. . . .

The fact was, despite incontrovertible evidence that Jeffrey was queer, Marcus still hadn't made his move. I wasn't sure what was holding him back. He knew that they got along great. So what was the risk? I wasn't sure. But whenever I tried to bring it up, Marcus shut me down. Not yet, he'd say. Soon.

So, okay. I didn't want to press him. But I couldn't help feeling that this whole mess was kind of my fault. If only I hadn't gone for Jeffrey in the first place. If only Marcus had felt he could tell me about his feelings. If only I hadn't been so focused on what
I
wanted . . .

So maybe permanent, total denial isn't really fair to Mom, I thought. Maybe it's time to start being a little more supportive. . . .

“Mom,” I said in a soft voice, “I'm really sorry about your slip. . . .”

“What?” Mom's brow crinkled for a moment. “Oh, that.” She laughed uncomfortably and sat back in her chair.

My breath left my chest in a rush, like air from a balloon you've just let go of. “I can get you a new one. . . .”

“Forget it,” Mom said, waving her head dismissively. Actually, she looked like she didn't want to discuss this topic any more than I did. Still, there was something I needed to say. And I just couldn't wait until she had finished brooding. I mean, who knew how long that could take?

I cleared my throat. “I'm sorry,” I told her.

Mom's pale eyebrows drew together. “What for?”

“For ruining your date with Dad,” I said slowly. “For ruining
The Romance Handbook
. For everything.”

Mom blew on her coffee. “Honey, you didn't ruin
The Romance Handbook
. . . .” She shook her head. “Look, seeing you in that nightie made me realize just how ridiculous the whole thing was.”

“Um . . .” I wasn't really sure how to take that.

“It's just . . .” Mom toyed with a few crumbs on the table. “I realized that your father and I just aren't really romantic types. We're not spontaneous. Your dad likes to have a plan, and so do I.” She shrugged. “We're never going to be Laura and Steve—drinking champagne on a sunset picnic. That's great—for them. But it's just not who we are.”