Page 81 of Every Almost

When they finally pulled apart, Helen cupped Charlie's face with both hands and looked at her. Charlie's eyes were red and her shirt was ruined and there was a mark on her forehead where she'd pressed it against the hood.

"He was so proud of you," Helen said. "You know that, right?"

Charlie pressed her hands against her eyes, and Helen's face shifted.

"Sweetie." Helen tilted Charlie's chin up. "What's wrong?"

The same thought that had been circling her all week, about the conversation she'd never get to have, the answer she'd never get to hear, pressed so hard against her chest she was worried she wouldn't be able to breathe.

She did finally look up at Helen. The timing was wrong, she knew that. It might even seem selfish and the last thing she wanted to do was make this about her when the whole day was supposed to be about Frank. She considered waiting. Driving back to California and calling Helen in a week, or a month, or when it felt right.

But in a single instance, she knew it was never going to feel right. And the truth was, the reason it was pressing so hard right now wasbecauseof Frank. Because she would never get to say it to him, and that was eating her alive. Helen was standing right in front of her, expecting a reason as to why Charlie didn't think Frank was proud of her. How could she know if he would have been after knowing the truth?

But then it occurred to her that, of all people, Helen was probably the only other person in the world who could give her the answer she'd never get from the man she'd lost.

"There's something I need to tell you."

Helen searched Charlie's face, some of the concern disappearing but not gone. "What is it, sweetheart?"

Charlie took a breath. She closed her eyes for just a moment. Then she opened them and looked directly at Helen.

"I'm... gay." She said it with stoicism, but the tears still fell down her cheeks.

Helen's face didn't change. There was no flinch, no tightening, no flash of something unreadable. Helen just looked at her, the same way she'd looked at her across the kitchen table a hundred times. Then she nodded, just once.

"I know, dear."

Charlie's breath caught. "You... know?"

"I've known for a while. Or suspected, at least. I notice things, Charlie. It's what I do." Helen's hands were still on Charlie's face, radiating such warmth against her skin, as she began to wipe the tears from Charlie's cheeks. "It's what I've always done." Helendidn't let go, but she concentrated more on Charlie's gaze. "And Frank knew, too. We talked about it once, a few years ago."

The ground shifted under Charlie's feet. "Heknew?"

She could hear it in her own voice. The desperation and the need for an answer to the question that had been destroying her. The question of what Frank would have thought. The one she'd been carrying through the drive and the eulogy and every minute she'd spent under the hood of his car in the last 30 minutes, trying to fix the things she could because the thing that mattered most would never know. Or so she thought.

"He didn't need to be told. He saw you the way he saw everything, honey. Clearly, and with his whole heart." Helen's eyes were bright. "Frank would never have even thought of you being gay in any other way than just being another part ofyou.And he loved you, through and through."

A held breath she'd been carrying for years finally allowed out. She bent forward and Helen caught her, and this time the tears were different. They were relief, vast and flooding, the kind that comes when you've been carrying something alone for so long that you forgot it had weight until someone helped you set it down.

Helen held her through this one, too.

Charlie madeplans to have dinner with Katie and her parents the next evening. She and Katie had been staying with Helen, but Charlie was set to return to California the next day, and she knew it was time to tell her parents.

She was done hiding. Frank was gone and death had made her intolerant of lies. Helen had accepted her, fully and withoutcondition, and that acceptance had given her enough ground to stand on.

Katie wanted to go with her as soon as she knew Charlie was going to tell Ed and Diane. She understood what Charlie was about to do, and she was not going to let her do it alone.

They sat at the kitchen table after dinner. Charlie sat next to Katie and was wearing Frank's sport coat to feel a part of him with her. Ed was in his chair, Diane clearing plates with a particular efficiency that made the kitchen feel like a set being struck after a performance.

"I have something I need to tell you," Charlie said.

Diane stopped clearing. Ed looked up from his coffee.

Charlie said it the way she said everything that mattered. Plainly. Without apology. Without preamble.

"I'm gay." She took a quick pause before continuing. "I've known for a long time and I'm telling you because I don't want to lie to you anymore."

The kitchen went quiet. The clock on the wall ticked and the refrigerator hummed.