19. Chapter 19

Chapter 19

Emil

“Have you picked a name yet?” Christian asks, his thumb distracting me as it glides over the skin near my belly button.

“A name?”

“For your new hermit crab,” he says, chuckling.

“Oh. Right. Um, not yet.”

He hums, the vibration of it feeling almost like a purr. Before I can rub back against him like a cat myself, my phone rings. I pick it up, seeing my brother Henry’s name on the screen.

“Hello?” I answer.

“Hey,” he says simply.

I scoot up, and Christian lets me go, rolling onto his back as I sit beside him. “What’s up?”

“So, I was wondering…”

My brother goes quiet, and I look at the time. It’s a school night, but early still. If he’s calling, there’s a reason. “Want me to pick you up?”

“Yeah. Can we go to that arcade by your place?”

I huff a laugh. “I actually moved, but yeah, we can still go there. Be ready in fifteen?”

“You got it,” Henry says and clicks off the call.

I turn toward Christian. “Want to play some arcade games with a fourteen-year-old?”

“Your brother?” he asks. I nod, and he grins, but the expression falls quickly away. “Should I go change first?”

“What? Why?” I say, glancing at his outfit. He’s wearing a skirt today, which isn’t a surprise. But unlike some of his bolder, shorter options, this one is long and black, with a bit of a flare that makes it billow out when he walks. He paired it with a t-shirt that has a somewhat distressed, vintage feel. It’s a casual look, perfect for the arcade, so I’m not sure why he would want to change. “You look great. You don’t need to be fancy for this.”

He cocks his head slightly. “The skirt, Specs. Would your brother be offended by the skirt?”

I nearly laugh but stop short fast. Christian doesn’t know my family. His concern is justified, as shitty as that fact is. And since I’m fairly positive Christian isn’t in the habit of hiding himself for anyone else’s benefit, the idea that he’s willing to do that just to make a good impression with my family is sweet yet tastes like a bitter pill.

“I don’t want you to be anyone but who you are,” I tell him seriously. “My brother will like you because I like you. Don’t change.”

Not your clothes. Not anything .

Christian’s expression softens, and he sits up at the same time as he leans forward, snagging my bottom lip between his teeth. It’s a kiss, yes, but there’s bite to it. It feels very much like a claim. “All right, Specs,” he says against my mouth. “Ready when you are.”

I nod, we disentangle, and after putting on our shoes, Christian and I head out the door.

Henry is sitting at the top of the porch steps when I pull up to my parents’ house. He hops up and sticks his game inside his pocket as he comes jogging over to the car. He opens the door and drops onto the backseat with all the finesse of a teenager.

“Do Mom and Dad know I’m stealing you?” I check.

He nods, hair flopping over his forehead. “Yup.”

“Okay, then.” I back out of the driveway, waiting until we’re going forward to make introductions. “Henry, this is my boyfriend Christian.”

“Hey,” Henry says.

“Nice to meet you,” Christian replies.

“You didn’t have a boyfriend the last time I saw you,” my brother informs me.

I snort. “No, I didn’t.”

“I’m telling Bec,” he says, pulling out his phone.

Christian raises a brow, but I shake my head. “It’s fine,” I tell him more than my brother, knowing the text has likely already been sent.

It doesn’t take long to get to the arcade near my old apartment building. The parking lot is fairly empty tonight, and Henry bursts from the car before I’ve even turned off the ignition.

“Never stops, that one,” I say wryly.

Christian looks amused.

We catch up with Henry inside of the arcade. The pinging and clanking of various games echo off the walls as we walk up to the attendant, neon lights giving the place a futuristic feel befitting the theme. Henry is engrossed in his phone as I fork over enough cash to get us a small bucket of tokens. When my brother finally pulls his face out of his game, he notices Christian’s skirt.

“Are you nonbinary?” he asks my boyfriend.

“I… No, I’m not,” Christian answers, seemingly taken aback by my brother’s bluntness.

“He/him, then?” Henry asks.

“That’s right.”

“Okay. Me, too,” my brother says, grabbing the bucket of tokens and hustling away.

Christian looks at me, eyes wide. “Kids these days, am I right?”

I bark a laugh, grabbing his hand and twining our fingers together. “We’re all woke.”

He snorts, and I tug him along after Henry, curious what my brother wants to say to me that he hasn’t yet worked up the courage for. He’s at a Skee-Ball machine, and I take up position next to him, letting go of Christian’s hand to send a ball flying.

For a while, we simply play, hitting all of my brother’s favorite games and a couple of my own. Christian doesn’t seem as familiar with them, but he joins in, smiling the whole while. He even manages to beat my brother on the dance pads, a sight that has me wanting to drag Christian back to the club to see what he’d look like really letting loose. We only slow danced together, and I didn’t realize it at the time, but I think I was missing out. Christian is sexy as fuck, which, sure, I already knew. But damn . Maybe he’d show me some of his less PG moves later.

When Christian heads off to grab us all drinks, I catch Henry glancing at me. I know that look.

“Want to talk about it?” I ask, taking a seat at a nearby table.

He sits across from me and shrugs. “It’s nothing.”

I wait him out.

“It’s just… I think Mom and Dad are disappointed in me.”

His statement hits my chest with all the blunt force of a hammer. “What makes you think that?” I ask, my own old wounds flaring beneath my sternum.

“I don’t know,” he says with a huff. “I’m not a big deal like Julian or out saving the world like Eloise. I can’t play an instrument like Bec, and I’m not smart like you. I’m just me, which isn’t much.”

“Hey,” I say sternly, catching Henry’s eye. “Just you is worth a hell of a lot, okay? It doesn’t matter what you do with your life or whether or not you follow anyone else’s footsteps. You’re important to me, to Bec, to Mom and Dad, and to Eloise and Julian. You’re important to your friends and people you probably don’t even know. You’re important, point blank. And being smart in your own way doesn’t make you not good enough, Henry. You could never be a disappointment.”

Even as I say it, I wonder why I have such trouble believing the words myself. But I don’t linger on the thought while Henry is sitting in front of me, looking so uncharacteristically down.

“I don’t want the things everyone else wants, Emil,” he says. “Sometimes I feel like I’m missing some important piece. Like something was left out during manufacturing, and now I don’t function the way I’m supposed to.”

“Are you unhappy with who you are?” I ask.

“No,” he says, and I can tell he means it, which is a relief. “I like myself. But that doesn’t change the fact that I’m different.”

From the corner of my eye, I spot Christian approaching. He stops a few feet away from the table, drinks in hand, likely having caught on to the fact that Henry and I are having a serious conversation. But before he can back away, Henry notices him. Christian walks the remaining distance to the table and sets down our drinks.

“Should I come back?” he asks.

Henry shakes his head and grabs his soda. Christian mouths sorry , but I give a little headshake. It’s not his fault.

Christian takes a seat, and, much to my surprise, says, “I’m different, too.”

Henry lifts his gaze off the table. “What do you mean?”

Christian fiddles with the straw in his drink before saying, “I never knew my dad, but my grandma told me about him. He worked in construction when he and my mom met. Before that, back in high school, he played football. He was the hypermasculine type, you know? And all my mom seemed to see when she looked at me were the ways I was different from him. She had a box she expected me to fit in, and I never did. My grandma, though, she also told me my dad was kind and sensitive. Sometimes I wonder what he would have thought of me, but I’ll never get to know that.”

I set my hand on Christian’s arm, my heart aching. It’s not difficult to read between the lines. His dad is gone, one way or another, from Christian’s life. He shoots me a tiny smile, a brave smile, before going on.

“I haven’t fit in many people’s boxes, Henry. I’m gay and femme. I wear skirts but have body hair. I’m vocal when some people expect me to be meek. And it took me time to be comfortable with all that. Being different isn’t bad . The important part is whether or not you’re happy. So fuck anyone who doesn’t get that, and if your parents aren’t proud of the person you are, then that’s on them, not you.”

For a beat, Henry simply stares at Christian, his eyes wide. I stare, too.

Christian turns to me and winces. “Too much? I probably shouldn’t have said fuck, huh?”

I shake my head, huffing a laugh as my heart beats a fast staccato inside my chest. “No. It was perfect.” Christian gives me a relieved smile, and I turn to my brother. “Henry?”

His gaze meets mine.

“I’m proud of you all the time,” I tell him, meaning it. “I thought that the last time I saw you. You’re strong and independent, you think for yourself, you care about your friends and family, and you are smart, whether or not you think it. Didn’t you tell me you figured out a cheat for your game that lets you map the best spots to mine precious gems based on loot drop rates?”

“Yeah,” he says quietly.

“See? I don’t know anyone else who could write code like that at fourteen. You’re your own person, and I’m really proud of that person. And Christian is right. If Mom and Dad can’t see all that you are, that’s on them.” I speak past the lump in my throat to add, “But I don’t think they’re disappointed in you.”

“You don’t?” he asks.

I shake my head. “I think they just forget sometimes that we need to hear the things they think in their heads.”

He nods, looking down.

“Want me to grab some more tokens?” I ask, looking inside the empty bucket. “We could stay a while longer. It’s only…” I check my phone and cringe. “Eleven.”

Henry huffs a small laugh. “It’s past my bedtime.”

“Yeah, well, Mom and Dad can be mad at me for keeping you out.”

“Thanks, Emil,” he says, voice quiet but a little lighter. “I’m ready to go home, though.”

“All right,” I say before giving Christian’s arm a nudge. Thank you , I mouth.

His lips twist into a smile.

The three of us leave the same way we came, Christian in the front passenger seat of my car and Henry in back. We’re quiet on the drive to my parents’, but Henry is back to playing his game, so he must not be too upset.

When I park, Henry opens his door.

“Hey, Henry?” I say before he has a chance to climb out. “Thank you for calling me.”

“Yeah, Emil,” he responds. “You’re always easy to talk to.”

With that, he scoots out the door, leaving my chest swirling with a mixture of happiness and something foreign and a little hot. I watch Henry make his way inside before turning to Christian.

“Would you give me five minutes?” I ask.

He nods slowly. “Of course.”

“Thanks,” I say, opening my door.

My feet carry me toward the house on autopilot, that burning in my chest propelling me forward. The front door is unlocked, and I step inside, not bothering to toe off my shoes. I don’t see Henry in the living room when I pass, and he’s not in the kitchen, either. But my father is.

“Emil?” my dad says, looking up from his laptop, which is sitting in front of him on the kitchen table. His glasses are perched on the end of his nose, and he lowers his head a little to see me over them. “Did you see this article?”

I step around the table to get a look at what he’s talking about. It’s a medical journal, this particular article co-authored by my brother Julian, the cardiac surgeon. Julian, the big deal , as Henry called him. The firstborn who followed in our father’s footsteps, even going so far as to work in the same hospital where our dad is a surgeon still.

“I saw it,” I tell him.

He hums, the single sound full of so much appreciation and parental pride that I snap, just a little.

“Henry thinks he’s a disappointment to you and Mom.”

My dad looks at me sharply, plucking his reading glasses off his nose. “Pardon?”

“Henry. Your youngest son. He thinks he’s a failure. He’s fourteen .”

“Why on Earth would he think that?” my dad asks, sounding genuinely perplexed.

“Really?” I say a touch hotly. “You have no idea?” I wave my hand at the laptop. “Maybe because you can’t go a day without spouting off about Jules’s successes?” I point at the fridge next, where there’s a picture of Eloise and her wife next to one of Rebecca holding her violin. “Maybe because in last year’s Christmas card, Mom gushed all about her activist daughter’s win against big oil and her youngest daughter’s solo exhibition that was ‘art in its purest form,’ but Henry got a single line about how he’s growing up and in high school now?”

My dad blinks at me.

“Do you really not see it?” I ask, my voice betraying me by wobbling. “How is he supposed to know you care when you never show it?”

“Emil,” my mom says quietly from the doorway. I hadn’t even heard her approach.

I turn, speaking to the both of them. “Don’t assume, just because he never says anything, that Henry knows you’re proud of him. He’s hurting, and neither of you can see it.”

With that, I walk out of the kitchen and through the front door. My blood is pumping, my face is hot, and righteous indignation continues to course through my veins as I stomp down the steps toward my car. I don’t think that was the constructive conversation my therapist has been encouraging me to have with my parents, but it felt fucking good nonetheless, even if it was for Henry’s benefit and not mine. Even if my own hurt and anger are still roiling inside of me like a pot left unchecked.

It doesn’t matter. For once, I said the words my parents needed to hear. My brother deserves someone in his corner, and I’ll always be that for him.

If only I knew how to stick up for myself.