“So,” he said. “Am I? Taking you?”
“Miles … I …”
“Lee,” he said, his voice sounding clearer and less sleepy than usual. “If it’s about me … if you don’t like me, I get it. But we can go as friends. Whatever you want.”
“It’s not that I don’t like you,” I said. “But I’m …”
“What?”
I sighed and turned the truck onto my driveway. I turned off the engine and pulled the keys from the ignition. “Miles,” I said, looking down at the purple, crescent moon–shaped key chain Denny had gotten me for Christmas two years earlier. I ran my thumb over the raised dots on its surface, the Braille that spelled out my name. I knew that, right then, in his pocket, Miles had a blue star embossed with his name. We were a set. “Miles, I’m asexual.”
There was silence in the truck at first. Which I guess was to be expected. When I finally worked up the courage to look at him, he was staring at me. He didn’t look disgusted or annoyed. I hadn’t expected him to—that wasn’t Miles at all—but deep down, I think I’d still feared it. Instead, he just looked confused.
“Asexual?”
I lifted a shoulder and let it drop. “Somewhere on that spectrum. It’s not that I’m repulsed by sex. I’m not. Ideally, I’d love to find someone I want to sleep with one day but …” I pick at my nails, thinking of the best way to explain. “Okay. Think of it like when you open the fridge because you’re hungry, but nothing is appealing. You don’t have anything against eating—you’d like to eat at some point—but you can’t imagine eating anything you see in that fridge.”
“So … sex is eating.”
“This might be a terrible metaphor.”
“No,” he said. “I think I get it. So you’ve never been attracted to … anyone.”
“Not in that way, no,” I said. “I’ve had crushes. But they’ve all been emotional. Not physical. I’ve never felt that kind of sexual attraction. Not even to any of the hot famous guys on TV.”
“Not to me either, then.”
I bit my lip and looked down at my hands again. “No,” I said. “Not even to you.”
“Oh … Okay.”
“I’m sorry, Miles.”
“Don’t,” he said. “That’s … that’s not something you have to apologize for. It’s cool.”
But when I looked up again and found Miles looking out the window, away from me, I knew that I’d hurt him. I hadn’t been apologizing for who I was. If anything, I was sorry that I’d waited this long to tell him. I felt like a jerk, like I’d let him believe something more could happen between us when I’d known for a while that it couldn’t. At least, not the way I thought he’d want. But I liked himsomuch, and even though my feelings for him weren’t sexual, they were romantic.
Maybe, selfishly, I’d kept this from him for so long because I wanted him to keep liking me. I kept him at a distance, trying to keep my own feelings safe, but I’d failed us both in that way.
“So …” He turned back to me. “What about prom?”
I blinked. “You still want to go with me?”
“Yeah.”
“I just figured …”
He raised an eyebrow. “Did you think I wanted to have sex on prom night?”
“No,” I said. “I mean … I don’t know.”
“Where would we even do it?” he asked, his slow words vibrating with a hint of laughter. “We could never afford a motel. And I’m not giving it up in the bed of your dirty old truck.”
“Hey,” I said. “Don’t put down my truck just because you’re sad about not getting laid.”
We both smiled at each other, and I was relieved to still be able to do this, to joke like this, even after being honest with him. But eventually, both our smiles slipped, and we were left staring across the cab of my truck at each other.
“Do you … like me?” he asked. “You can be honest. I just … You said you still have crushes. Am I one of them?”
