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As soon as I’m inside my apartment, my phone dings, and I reach for it, hoping it’s him.

Mikey:

You down to get drinks after work on Thursday?

I groan and lock my phone. I am, but it’s Marcus I want to hear from. I’ll text Mikey back later.

Instead, I call Marcus again. It rings and rings until it goes to voicemail. He doesn’t have a personalized message, which I’ve discovered over the last few days, and I don’t bother leaving another voicemail. Three seems a bit desperate, and there are only so many times I can try to be casual before it stops feeling like it.

“Fuck,” I sigh as soon as I hang up. Instead of continuing to stare at my unanswered phone, I head to the freezer to pull out a meal to stick in the oven, already missing my parents’ home-cooked meals.

While I wait, I pull up Mikey’s text to confirm drinks, and as soon as I do, a new text pops up.

Marcus:

What’s up?

I stare at the words and call him again. I’m almost surprised when he answers on the second ring.

“Hey.” His voice is flat, like he’s answering out of obligation and not as though he’s particularly excited to talk to me.

“Hey, stranger,” I tease, attempting to test the waters. “I was wondering if I’d scared you off completely with my Thanksgiving invite.” I tilt the phone away from my ear slightly to drop my face into my palm. What the hell was that? Why do I have to be so direct?

“Nah, don’t worry about it.”

“Okay,” I say awkwardly. “Well, how was the rest of the weekend? With your family.”

“Fine.”

“Just fine?”

“What do you want me to say, Evan?” There’s an edge to his voice now that I’ve never heard before. “That it was great? That we had a nice chat, I told them everything, and they hugged me like it was a fucking Hallmark movie? It wasn’t. It’s never going to be that. I was only there for one night, and it sucked.”

I sit with that response for a second. It stings, even though it’s not really about me. “I’d figured it wasn’t a great time. I just wanted to let you know I’m here if you want to talk about it.”

Silence stretches between us, and I worry I’ve ruined everything—just days after I got him to open up. It’s long enough that I check the screen to make sure he didn’t hang up.

“I know,” he mutters. The edge is out of his voice, replaced by a sigh that sounds more like exhaustion. “Sorry. I’m not great company right now.”

“You don’t have to be good company. Do you want to talk about it? Vent?”

There’s another pause before he starts. “Being around them… I hate how it makes me feel. Every year, I tell myself it’ll be different, and every year it’s not. I don’t know why I keep expecting a different outcome. Why can’t I just move on? I’m twenty-five, for fuck’s sake, I shouldn’t need my unloving, unsupportive, bigoted parents. It’s embarrassing.” His voice rises as he builds more and more, and I stay silent, so he can let it all out.

“You know what my mom loves to ask me? If I’d found a ‘nice girl’ yet. Purposely leaving out the fact that I could’ve found a man. When I came out as bisexual at nineteen, she’d smiled tightly and said, ‘Well, that just means you have options, doesn’t it? You can still choose to be with a woman.’ As if being bi means my sexuality is a menu I could order from, and she was gently suggesting I pick the dish that wouldn’t embarrass her in front of her equally shitty, closed-minded friends. God, they’re much easier to hate. And my dad never says a word. I’m not the son he wanted, but at least he doesn’t make me feel bad about it. He just doesn’t care, which is almost better. Fuck.”

He stops abruptly, as if he’s surprised himself by how much came out. Something protective flares up in my chest, catching me off guard. I’m angry. He had told me a less detailed version in Bloomington, but now I find myself wanting to fly back there myself and say something to his mother that I definitely shouldn’t say to anyone’s mom, but fuck her for making him feel like this.

“Sorry,” he groans. “Didn’t mean to dump all that on you.”

“Don’t apologize. I asked and I’m glad you told me. And by the way, fuck your parents. You deserve so much better than that.”

There’s a beat of silence, then he laughs, surprised and a little rough around the edges, as if it snuck out of him. “Wow. Okay.”

“I mean it, Marcus. Fuck them.”

“I know you do. That’s what makes it funny. I guess I needed that. Thank you.”

The sound of his laugh loosens the knot in my chest. He’s still in there, he’s just hurting right now.