“You’ve thought this through, haven’t you?”
“It was a busy drive over.”
“What if he doesn’t care? What if he doesn’t believe her?”
“Then you grab his keys and drive to the nearest hospital. Bring the journal with you.”
Hearing her say it, it all makes sense.
She sits back down on the bed.
“Come here,” she says. But this time we don’t kiss. Instead, she hugs my frail body.
“I don’t know if I can do this,” I whisper.
“You can,” she tells me. “Of course you can.”
I am alone in Kelsea’s room when her father comes home. I hear him throw down his keys, take something out of the refrigerator. I hear him walk to his bedroom, then come back out. He doesn’t call out a hello. I don’t even know if he realizes I’m here.
Five minutes pass. Ten minutes. Finally, he calls out, “Dinner!”
I haven’t heard any activity in the kitchen, so I’m not surprised to find a KFC bucket on the table. He’s already started on a drumstick.
I can guess how this usually works. He takes his dinner into the den, in front of the TV. She takes hers back to her room. And that marks the rest of the night for them.
But tonight is different. Tonight she says, “I want to kill myself.”
At first I don’t think he’s heard me.
“I know you don’t want to hear this,” I say. “But it’s the truth.”
He drops his hand to his side, still holding the drumstick.
“What are you saying?” he asks.
“I want to die,” I tell him.
“C’mon now,” he says. “Really?”
If I were Kelsea, I’d probably leave the room in disgust. I’d give up.
“You need to get me help,” I say. “This is something I’ve been thinking about for a long time.” I put the journal on the table, shove it over to him. This might ultimately be my biggest betrayal of Kelsea. I feel awful, but then I conjure Rhiannon’s voice in my ear, telling me I am doing the right thing.
Kelsea’s father puts down the drumstick, picks up the journal. Starts reading it. I try to decode his expression. He doesn’t want to be seeing this. Resents that it’s happening. Hates it, even. But not her. He keeps reading because even if he hates the situation, he doesn’t hate her.
“Kelsea …,” he chokes out.
I wish she could see how it hits him. The look on his face, his life caving in. Because then maybe she’d realize, if only for a split second, that even though the world doesn’t matter to her, she matters to the world.
“This isn’t just some … thing?” he asks.
I shake my head. It’s a stupid question, but I’m not going to call him on it.
“So what do we do?”
There. I have him.
“We need to get help,” I tell him. “Tomorrow morning we need to find a counselor who’s open on Saturday, and we need to see what we have to do. I probably need medication. I definitely need to talk to a doctor. I have been living this for so long.”
“But why didn’t you tell me?”
Why didn’t you see? I want to ask back. But now’s not the time for that. He’ll get there on his own.
“That doesn’t matter. We need to focus on now. I am asking for help. You need to get me help.”
“Are you sure it can wait until morning?”
“I’m not going to do anything tonight. But tomorrow you have to watch me. You have to force me if I change my mind. I might change my mind. I might pretend that this whole conversation didn’t happen. Keep that notebook. It’s the truth. If I fight you, fight me back. Call an ambulance.”
“An ambulance?”
“That’s how serious this is, Dad.”
It’s the last word that really brings it home to him. I don’t think Kelsea uses it that often.
He’s crying now. We just stay there, looking at each other.
Finally, he says, “Have some dinner.”
I take some chicken from the bucket, then bring it back to my room. I’ve said everything I’ve needed to say.
Kelsea will have to tell him the rest.
I hear him pacing throughout the house. I hear him on the phone to someone, and I hope it’s someone who can help him the way Rhiannon helped me. I hear him stop outside the door, afraid to open it but still listening in. I make small stirring noises, so he knows I’m awake, alive.
I fall asleep to the sound of his concern.
Day 6006
The phone rings.
I reach for it, thinking it’s Rhiannon.
Even though it can’t be.
I look at the name on the screen. Austin.
My boyfriend.
“Hello?” I answer.
“Hugo! This is your nine a.m. wake-up call. I will be there in an hour. Go make yourself purdy.”
“Whatever you say,” I mumble.
There’s a lot I have to do in an hour.
First, there’s the usual getting up, getting showered, and getting dressed. In the kitchen, I can hear my parents talking loudly in a language I don’t know. It sounds like Spanish but isn’t Spanish, so I’m guessing it’s Portuguese. Foreign languages throw me—I have a beginner’s grasp of a few of them, but I can’t really access a person’s memory fast enough to pretend to be fluent in any of them. I access and find that Hugo’s parents are from Brazil. But that’s not going to help me understand them better. So I steer clear of the kitchen.
Austin is picking Hugo up to go to a gay pride parade in Annapolis. Two of their friends, William and Nicolas, will be coming along. It’s marked on Hugo’s calendar as well as his mind.
Luckily, Hugo has a laptop in his room—since it’s the weekend and a school computer isn’t an option, I am going to risk checking in. I quickly open my email and find something that Rhiannon sent only ten minutes ago.
A,
I hope it went well yesterday. I called her house just now and no one was home—do you think they’re getting help? I’m trying to take it as a good sign.
Meanwhile, here’s a link you need to see. It’s out of control.
Where are you today?
R
I click on the link beneath her initial and am taken to the home page of a big Baltimore tabloid website. The headline blares:
THE DEVIL AMONG US!
It’s Nathan’s story, but it’s not only Nathan’s story. This time there are five or six other people from the area claiming to have been possessed by the devil. Much to my relief, none of them besides Nathan are familiar to me. All of them are older than I am. Most claim to have been possessed for a time much longer than a single day.
I would think the reporter would have been more skeptical, but she buys the stories uncritically. She even links to other stories of demonic possession—death-row criminals who claimed they were under the influence of satanic forces, politicians and preachers who were caught in compromising positions and said that something very uncharacteristic had come over them. It all sounds very convenient.
I quickly run Nathan through a search engine and find more coverage. The story, it seems, is going wide.
In article after article, there is one person quoted. Essentially, he says the same thing every time:
“I have no doubt that these are cases of demonic possession,” says Rev. Anderson Poole, who has been counseling Daldry. “These are textbook examples. The devil is nothing if not predictable.”
“These possessions should come as no surprise,” says Poole. “We as a society have been leaving the door wide open. Why wouldn’t the devil walk right in?”
People are believing this. The articles and posts in the comments sections are legion—all from people who see the devil’s work in everything.
Even though I should know better, I shoot off a quick email to Nathan.
I am not the devil.
I hit send, but I don’t feel any better.
I email Rhiannon, telling her ho
w it went with Kelsea’s father. I also let her know that I’m going to be in Annapolis for the day, and tell her what T-shirt I’m wearing and what I look like.
There’s a honk outside, and I see a car that must be Austin’s. I race through the kitchen and say a hurried goodbye to Hugo’s parents. Then I pile into the car—the boy in the passenger seat (William) moves into the back with the other boy (Nicolas) so I can sit next to my boyfriend. For his part, Austin takes one look at my outfit and tsk-tsks, “You’re wearing that to Pride?” But he’s joking. I think.
There is conversation around me the whole car ride, but I’m not really a part of it. My mind is completely elsewhere.
I shouldn’t have sent Nathan that email.
One simple line, but it admits too much.
From the moment we hit Annapolis, Austin is in his element.
“Isn’t this fun?” he keeps asking.
William, Nicolas, and I nod, agree. In truth, the Annapolis Pride events aren’t that elaborate—in many ways it feels like the navy has turned gay and lesbian for the day, and a ragtag assortment of people have come along to cheer it on. The weather is sunny and cool, and that seems to cheer everyone further. Austin likes to hold my hand and swing it like we’re walking down the yellow brick road. Ordinarily, I’d be charmed. He has every right to be proud, to enjoy this day. It’s not his fault I’m so distracted.
I’m looking for Rhiannon in the crowd. I can’t help it. Every now and then, Austin catches me.
“See someone you know?” he asks.
“No,” I say truthfully.
She’s not here. She hasn’t made it. And I feel foolish for expecting her to. She can’t just drop her life every time I’m available. Her day is no less important than mine.
We come to a corner where there are a few people protesting the festivities. I don’t understand this at all. It’s like protesting the fact that some people are red-haired.
In my experience, desire is desire, love is love. I have never fallen in love with a gender. I have fallen for individuals. I know this is hard for people to do, but I don’t understand why it’s so hard, when it’s so obvious.
I remember Rhiannon’s hesitation to kiss me longer when I was Kelsea. I am hoping this reason was nowhere near the heart of it. There were so many other reasons in that moment.
One of the protestor’s signs catches my eye. HOMOSEXUALITY IS THE DEVIL’S WORK, it says. And once again I think about how people use the devil as an alias for the things they fear. The cause and effect is backward. The devil doesn’t make anyone do anything. People just do things and blame the devil after.
Predictably, Austin stops to kiss me in front of the protestors. I try to oblige. Philosophically, I am with him. But I’m not inside the kiss. I cannot manufacture the intensity.
He notices. He doesn’t say anything, but he notices.
I want to check my email on Hugo’s phone, but Austin isn’t letting me out of his sight. When William and Nicolas make a move to get some lunch, Austin says he and I are going to go our own way for a little while.
I assume we’re going to get lunch, too, but instead he pulls me into a hip clothing store and spends the next hour trying things on, with me giving my outside-the-changing-room opinion. At one point, he pulls me into the changing room to steal some kisses, and I oblige. But at the same time, I’m thinking that if we’re inside, there’s no way Rhiannon is going to find me.
While Austin debates whether the skinny jeans are skinny enough, I find myself wondering what Kelsea is doing at this moment. Is she unburdening herself, going along with it, or is she defiant, denying that she ever wanted help in the first place? I picture Tom and James in their rec room, playing video games, not having any sense that their week was disrupted. I think of Roger Wilson later tonight, preparing his clothes for church tomorrow morning.
“What do you think?” Austin asks.
“They’re great,” I say.
“You didn’t even look.”
I can’t argue this. He’s right. I didn’t.
I look at him now. I need to pay more attention.
“I like them,” I tell him.
“Well, I don’t,” he says. Then he storms back into the changing room.
I haven’t been a good guest in Hugo’s life. I access his memories and discover that he and Austin first became boyfriends at this very celebration, a year ago this weekend. They’d been friends for a little while, but they’d never talked about how they felt. They were each afraid of ruining the friendship, and instead of making it better, their caution made everything awkward. So finally, as a pair of twentysomething men passed by holding hands, Austin said, “Hey, that could be us in ten years.”
And Hugo said, “Or ten months.”
And Austin said, “Or ten days.”
And Hugo said, “Or ten minutes.”
And Austin said, “Or ten seconds.”
Then they each counted to ten, and held hands for the rest of the day.
The start of it.
Hugo would have remembered this.
But I didn’t.
Austin senses something has changed. He comes back from the dressing room without any clothes in his arms, looks at me, and makes a decision.
“Let’s get out of here,” he says. “I don’t want to have this particular conversation in this particular store.”
He leads me down to the water, away from the celebration, away from the crowds. He finds a somewhat secluded bench and I follow him there. Once we sit down, it all comes out.
“You haven’t been with me once this whole day,” he says. “You aren’t listening to a word I say. You keep looking around for someone else. And kissing you is like kissing a block of wood. And today, of all days. I thought you said you were going to give it a chance. I thought you said you were snapping out of whatever it is that’s been afflicting you the past couple of weeks. I am sure I recall you saying there wasn’t anyone else. But maybe I’m mistaken. I was willing to bend over backward, Hugo. But I can’t bend over backward and walk around at the same time. I can’t bend over backward and have a conversation. I guess when it all comes down to it, I’m just not that damn flexible.”
“Austin, I’m sorry,” I say.
“Do you even love me?”
I have no idea if Hugo loves him or not. If I tried, I’m sure I could access moments when he loved him and moments when he didn’t. But I can’t answer the question and be sure I’m being truthful. I’m caught.
“My feelings haven’t changed,” I say. “I’m just a little off today. It has nothing to do with you.”
Austin laughs. “Our anniversary has nothing to do with me?”
“That’s not what I said. I mean my mood.”
Now Austin is shaking his head.
“I can’t do this, Hugo. You know I can’t do this.”
“Are you breaking up with me?” I ask, genuine fear in my voice. I can’t believe I’m doing this to both of them.
Austin hears the fear, looks at me and maybe sees something worth keeping.
“This isn’t the way I want today to go,” he says. “But I have to believe that it isn’t the way you want it to go, either.”
I can’t imagine that Hugo was planning to break up with Austin today. And if he was, he can always do it tomorrow.
“Come here,” I say. Austin moves in to me and I lean into his shoulder. We sit like that for a moment, looking at the ships on the bay. I take his hand. When I turn to look at him, he’s blinking back tears.
This time when I kiss him, I know there’s something in it. When he feels it, it may come across as love. It is my thanks to him for not ending it. It is my thanks to him for giving it at least one day more.
We stay out until late, and I am a good boyfriend the whole time. Eventually I lose myself a little in his life, dancing along with Austin, William, Nicolas, and a few hundred other gays and lesbians when the parade organizers blast the Village People’s “In the Navy.”
&n
bsp; I keep looking for Rhiannon, but only when Austin is distracted. And, at a certain point, I give up.
When I get home, there’s an email from her:
A,
Sorry I couldn’t make it to Annapolis—there were some things I had to do.
Maybe tomorrow?
R
I wonder what the “things I had to do” were. I have to assume they involve Justin, because otherwise, wouldn’t she have told me what they were?
I’m pondering this when Austin texts me to say he ended up having a great day. I text him back and say I had a great day, too. I can only hope that’s the way Hugo remembers it, because now Austin has proof if he denies it.
Hugo’s mother comes in and says something to me in Portuguese. I only get about half of it.
“I’m tired,” I tell her in English. “I think it’s time for bed.”
I don’t think I’ve addressed her questions, but she just shakes her head—I am a typical, unforthcoming teenager—and heads back to her room.
Before I go to sleep, I decide to see if Nathan has written me back.
He has.
Two words.
Prove it.
Day 6007
I wake up the next morning in Beyoncé’s body.
Not the real Beyoncé. But a body remarkably like hers. All the curves in all the right places.
I open my eyes to a blur. I reach for the glasses on the night-stand, but they’re not there. So I stumble into the bathroom and put in my contact lenses.
Then I look in the mirror.
I am not pretty. I am not beautiful.
I’m top-to-bottom gorgeous.
I am always happiest when I am just attractive enough. Meaning: other people won’t find me unattractive. Meaning: I make a positive impression. Meaning: my life is not defined by my attractiveness, because that brings its own perils as well as its own rewards.