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“Okay. If you need our help in having that conversation, let us know. He’s always welcome here, but…”
“No, I get it,” Avery says. “I really appreciate you doing this.”
“Make sure you get some sleep,” Avery’s dad says, patting him on the shoulder. “Big day tomorrow.”
—
Although he’s stayedhere before, Ryan can’t help the feeling that he doesn’t really know the house at all…and that the house doesn’t know him, either. He doesn’t feel like a trespasser—he understands now that he’s welcome. But hefeels more like a visitor than a boyfriend. He wonders when it is that you cross that line, and stop being a guest in someone else’s life.
When Avery returns, Ryan laughs because Avery’s face is barely visible over the stack of pillows and sheets and towels he’s holding.
“Here, let me help you,” Ryan says, but Avery just tilts his arms like the back of a garbage truck and everything falls beside the couch.
“Ta-da!” Avery sings.
Ryan smiles…but then he shakes his head and says, “I’m sorry this isn’t much of a date. My timing couldn’t be worse.”
“What, you don’t consider having grilled cheese with my parents to be a date?”
“In some cultures, maybe? But not sure about ours.”
“Hmmm.” Avery makes a show of thinking. “I have an idea. Let me take you somewhere on a date.”
Before Ryan can ask whether he’ll need to put his shoes back on, Avery is removing the big cushions from the couch and standing them up to make an L on the floor, touching one of the couch’s arms. Then he takes the blanket and drapes it over the U shape the cushions and the couch make. He pulls two pillows from the linen pile and scoots them into the enclosure he’s made.
“What’s that?” Ryan asks.
“It’s my hiding place. Let’s go.”
Avery crawls in, and Ryan follows. The red-blanket ceilingis too low to allow them to sit up, and Ryan’s legs are a little too long to fit entirely inside. So they put the pillows under their heads and lie there like they’re sharing a single bed. Avery stares up as the light breaks through the blanket in places, fabric starshine. Ryan is on his side, watching as Avery gazes.
“It’s great,” Ryan says. “Although maybe not the most subtle hiding place?”
“Oh,” Avery says, “that’s where the invisibility powder comes in. There’s some right by your elbow.”
“Of course.” Ryan reaches over and throws some invisibility powder in the air. “Did I do that right?”
“Perfectly.”
“And when you used the invisibility powder as a kid, your parents weren’t able to find you?”
“Um…most of the time. It depended on why I was using the hiding place.”
“I honestly can’t imagine my parents going along with that. Respecting a hiding place.”
“Mine are good that way. And in general,” Avery says. “But there were still plenty of reasons for me to need a hiding place.”
Ryan finds this hard to believe. “Like what?” he challenges.
Now Avery turns to him. “I mean, some stupid things. My parents were always telling me not to run through the halls, but there wasn’t anything I loved more than sliding around in my socks, so I kept doing it—and, sure enough, one time I slammed into the wall hard enough to make thepicture that was hanging there fall. The glass of the frame just exploded. I was probably seven or eight—I had no perspective whatsoever. I thought I’d be sent to jail. So I ran in here, built the hiding place, and waited.”
“I imagine the invisibility powder didn’t work well then?”
“It did for a time. I think my parents let me calm down a little before talking to me about what had happened. I was probably more upset than they were.”
“So many things seem like the end of the world when they’re not.”
“Exactly. And even with the more serious things…I know I told you my parents were cool about the whole gender thing, and they were. But that doesn’t mean there weren’t moments when it was hard. I get it now—kids change their minds all the time about things, so when your kid says, ‘I’m a boy and you need to help me get my body to match that,’ there has to be uncertainty. They never expressed it to me outright, but my dad, especially, was always full of questions. Most of all, ‘Are you sure?’ And honestly, I was always pretty sure. Like, it was obvious to me. But I still needed to come here sometimes as they debated it, as they decided whethermychoice was going to betheirchoice. Which didn’t feel fair to me at all, that it had to be both. I mean, it all worked out. But I didn’t always want to be present for the deliberations, because they only frustrated me or, worse, made me feel like it was possible they’d say no, and I’d be stuck.”
