The words hurt because he believed them, and because part of me wished they were true.
“No,” I said gently. “You just gave me reasons to be afraid of what you’d say.”
The silence that followed felt endless.
I swallowed. “I know you love me.” My eyes burned. “I have never doubted that.” That much had always been true. “But I also know what would have happened if I’d come to you at fourteen and told you I was gay.”
My mother inhaled sharply once more.
I pressed on before I lost my nerve.
“You would have told me not to rush.”
Neither of them answered.
“You would have told me I was confused.”
Still nothing.
“You would have told me I was too young to know.” The ache inmy chest deepened. “Maybe you would have prayed for me. Maybe you would have found somebody to talk to me. Maybe you would have convinced yourselves it was a phase.” I swallowed hard again. “But neither of you would have said, ‘Thank you for trusting us.’”
My mother started crying, and the sound nearly broke me.
“Mama—”
“We were trying to protect you.”
“I know.” That was the tragedy of it. The city beyond the window blurred. “I’ve always known.” I rested my forehead against the glass one more time. “But protecting me and accepting me aren’t the same thing.”
The words hung between us, heavy and impossible to take back.
When my father finally answered, his voice sounded tired.
“We didn’t know.”
I closed my eyes. “No, you didn’t.” A lump rose in my throat. “And I never gave you the chance to know because I was terrified of this conversation.”
For a long moment all I could hear was my mother’s quiet crying.
Then she whispered, “Why didn’t you tell us?”
The question nearly undid me because there was no anger in it, only heartbreak.
I thought about the man waiting somewhere in the Village for me to call and say, ‘You can come back now.’
“Because I thought you would ask me to choose.” My voice cracked again.
My mother made a sound that was almost a sob. “Luka…”
I swallowed. “I know now that you love me.” The words came slowly, carefully. “I just don’t know whether you know how to love all of me.”
My mother was crying openly now, and I hated knowing I’d caused it. But I couldn’t see a way to make it better without breaking something inside myself.
“We just want your life to be easier,” shewhispered.
I closed my eyes. Everything we’d been talking around for the last ten minutes came back to the same place.
“Mama. Papa.” My voice shook. “I love you.”
