Page 77 of My Own Kind of Person

“Definitely.”

I light up. “Have you ever kissed a girl?”

He thinks about it. “Once.”

“And?”

“She started it.”

“And?”

“I’m glad she did!”

A full body rush. I know Elijah has been out forever, but I don’t know specifically how he identifies. He’s kissed people of different genders and it’s no big deal to him.

The exits get fewer and the pine barrens spring up, thin trees reaching toward the cloudless sky with all its stars. I don’t know anything about this region except that it’s called a region, and before I was born the trees burned for weeks and now they’ve all re-grown. This far out on the island, you could almost forget we live in the most suburban suburbs around.

Elijah zooms out on the map. “It looks like the expressway ends soon.”

“I’ve never actually gone this far east.”

“Yeah. I thought when I moved here it would be all beaches and farms.”

“Not where we live. But I think it gets more nature-y if you go past where the island forks?”

There’s a long silence before he says, “Let’s see.”

He turns the music up and we take the final exit off the expressway, slowing down onto a smaller road. We pass non-chain stores in buildings that look like houses. We pass a gas station advertising homemade ice cream. We go through a town that looks like a town.

“What happened with the girl who kissed you?” I say.

“Duck!” he shouts.

A building shaped like a white duck appears from behind the trees, towering above an open field.

Elijah pulls over and we get out and behold the duck. Its expression is alternately stoic, confident, dopey, and blank. It’s baffling and mesmerizing.

“Long Island,” I say.

“There’s a door in its breast.”

“Maybe it’s a house for wayward ducks.”

Elijah runs up and peers into the dark interior through the window in the door. “It’s a gift shop.”

“Are the gifts live ducks?”

“They’re mostly postcards.”

The grass in the field is lit gold and blue by the streetlights and moonlight. Elijah rolls his sleeves to his shoulders, stretches one leg forward, and begins leaping across the field. I put my hands in my pockets and trot behind him. He twirls with arms outstretched and gracefully lowers himself to the ground. I thump down beside him.

“So you definitely know how to dance,” I say.

He laughs. “Because of that?”

“It might not seem like anything to you but that was very cool.”

He hops up and strikes a pose with one foot stretched behind him.