I tighten my arm across his chest. Hold him there.
“Do you know he's going to say that?”
“Yes.”
He stays still under my hand.
“Do you know why he's going to say that?”
“Because he doesn't want me to be gay.”
I turn his jaw toward me with two fingers.
“Because he doesn't want you to beyours.”
He looks at me.
I tighten my hand on his neck. One squeeze.
“Kid. Listen. He's had you for twenty years. He's had every day. Every practice. Every meal. He's told you who to be every second of every day since you could remember. And then I came along and you did one thing he didn't plan for and he's going to burn the house down to put you back in the box. That's what this is. It's not about me. I'm the excuse. It's about you being a person without asking him first. Do you hear me.”
“Yes.”
“You're allowed to be a person.”
His eyes go wet.
“You're allowed to have a life. You're allowed to fuck who you want. You're allowed to play hockey how you want to play it. You're allowed to eat pasta at lunch if you want pasta at lunch. You're twenty years old and you get to be a person. Not his. Yours.”
“Maddox.”
“What.”
His voice breaks.
“I don't know how.”
“I know.”
My cheek rests against his temple.
“I've never tried,” he confesses.
“I know.”
My hand spreads flat over his sternum. Holds him against me.
“I don't know how to?—”
“You don't have to know. You just have to not go back in the box.”
He's crying now. Not loud. Just his face doing the thing where tears run out the corners of his eyes and he doesn't try to stop them. I wipe one off his jaw with my thumb.
“Hey.”
“I'm okay.”
I kiss the wet spot on his cheekbone.
