She asked me to talk today

Said she had something she needed to say

She needed to tell me right away

Nearly to tears she said; "Mama, I'm gay"

Only thing is

I already knew this

I've suspected for a while now

So on her forehead I planted a kiss

"It's alright, my dear"

I pulled her into a tight hug

"I accept you as you are,

It's not like you're on a drug"

I'll have to get used to this

Learn to understand

But we'll get through this together

Hand in hand 

“Hey, get out fast, Har. I needa get ready for an event!”

Harry Jackson stood stiffly in the middle of his sister’s room, clenching and unclenching his fists as if trying to consider what he should or should not do. With his sturdy body, towering height and tanned skin, it was hard to think of him as anything but an extremely muscular young man. He had carefully styled hair, short at the back and long at the front, combed to the right side of his face. His facial features, however, had a touch of surprising softness in them, causing him to look slightly odd. Harry shifted uncomfortably, then sat down at his sister’s makeup table.

Harry looked at the jumble of makeup tools on the table with a rising sickness in his gut, not because he hated them, but because he was somehow afraid of them. He had never thought he would be sitting at this table looking at all the cosmetics. It should have been his sister, the owner of this room, this table, this chair and everything surrounding him. Certainly, it would have made more sense if she was the one looking at all the makeups, considering which lipstick to apply or which perfume to wear. Instead, he felt like an outcast. Harry reached his hand out and fixed a lipstick that was not facing the right direction, shyly, as if he was afraid of getting caught. It was the first time he had done something like this, although he must have randomly occupied his sister’s room for a million times.

On the other hand, Harry liked the cosmetics just as much. He liked the scarlet Chanel lipstick carefully chosen by his sister when he took her on a surprise eighteenth birthday, the Lancôme perfume she insisted on buying during their trip to France two years earlier, even the old Sephora mascara she had stopped using for what felt like a dozen years. Harry stared vacantly at the table, images running through his muddy brain in slow-motion. He could see his sister getting a lovely flower bouquet on her seventeenth birthday, precisely a hundred and seventy roses, red ones forming a heart in the center and white ones bracing the outside. He could see his mother doing a perfect winged eyeliner for his sister on the day of her senior prom, using solely an old, dried-out liquid eyeliner. He could also see him standing helplessly in the gigantic Louis Vuitton shop, trying to pick the most elegant handbag for his sister, at the same time wondering who would deserve the chance to use the bag if it weren’t to be her.

“Knock-knock,” the simultaneous sound of knocking and voice from the outside startled him, causing him to jump a little. He turned his head back, perhaps a little too hastily. “Har, your sister is getting impatient. I think she needs to get ready for something.”

Harry recognized his mother’s clear and sonorous voice, the one that he had always loved and feared. Three. Six. Nine. Twelve. Some umpteen seconds.

“Har, you alright? You’ve gotta come out, dear!”

Silence. Harry didn’t answer, not because he didn’t want to, but because he didn’t know how to. It was just a simple question, as simple as “Are you going to have dinner with us?”, or “How was school today?”, but for Harry, it felt extremely loaded. He shifted his eyes to the right side of the door, and there she was, framed on the wall–his sister, standing in her brocade tank top and designer jeans–the one that perfectly accentuated her waist and revealed her shapely legs. The Chanel sunglasses hanging loose on her dazzling brunette hair. A sudden, sharp pain hit him too severely he had to double over.

“Harry, I know you are in there. Will you please open the door? For goodness sake!”

Impatience. Harry could detect impatience in his mother’s sentences. Oh God. He thought to himself. His body started to shiver, even though it was in the middle of July and the sun was showing off the best it could.

“Harry, you cannot lock yourself in there forever. Please get out and we can talk about it, okay?” His mom begged one more time–perhaps the last time, he thought–and Harry could hear the desperation in her voice. He closed his eyes and turned back to the mirror on top of the makeup table, his face painted plainly with discomfort and fatigue–that of a soldier fighting an endless moral battle.

Harry sighed, and when he opened his eyes, tears welled up. He mumbled something to himself, breathlessly but with a newly adopted confidence from the decision he had just made. He grabbed the Chanel lipstick and looked at it intently, his hands fumbled; the cap felt strangely heavy on his palm.

After a few seconds, he stood up, took one last breath, fixed his sagging shoulders and walked away without turning back. The door slowly opened and Harry thought he had never felt more naked.

You did it, baby,

Now you don't have to be afraid.

I gave you your life, but your debt is repaid.

I've known who you are,

Now you know it, too,

And I'm so proud of you!

Don't hide, and don't lie,

You don't know what'll happen if you never try.

Be the voice for the mute and the fearful,

Even if the result is ultimately tearful.

No matter what happens,

You can come to me,

And don't ever think that you have to run from me.

I may be your mother,

But I'm also your friend,

And whether in body or in spirit,

I'll be with you until the end.

I opened the door, and there he was.  Always the one never to listen, always coming back. Just . . . standing.  I knew he'd be back for this.  His mother would have called him.

"Hi, Dad," he said quietly.  I looked down at my boots.  Years back, that would be the first swing.  "Hi, Dad.  How's it going, Dad.  What's up, Dad."  He always swung first, playing the offspring card.  It worked with his mother, but I didn't have the connection they did.  Shit, when he was a kid, I'd come home some days and find them under a blanket on the couch, reading or playing some game she'd made up.  Not a lick to be had for dinner, but I didn't begrudge her being a momma.  But for every "Dad," I never gave in.  Not a one.

As he got older, I seen it coming.  I'd finish a weld, push my helmet up and catch the guys in the end of a joke or a saying.  They said making a big to-do about it was the rage, so I knew what we had to do to hold our heads up.  His mother wouldn't have any of it at first, but we talked it out, talked it at church, talked it with her sister.  Talked it until it was clear what to do.  I mean, Christ, this was our town.  In the city, he could just be "away." 

"Dad.  Can I come in?"  I gave him a look, then back down at my boot tops.  He had her eyes.  Those eyes got me through every lost job, every unpaid weld, every broken tractor coupling.  Her eyes that would never open again.  I looked at the dust on my boots, the burns from welding sparks, the fresh scuff from getting her down the stairs.  I had some hard years on these boots.  I moved my eyes across the threshold, looked at his shoes.  City shoes.  Shoes you bought because they'd go with a job, a date, a funeral.  His were thin soled.  Hard years of a different sort.         

I looked at him.  The sun was setting, blowing the leaves I'd not had time to rake across the lawn.  Over his shoulder by the curb, I saw a shadow in his car.  A man.  I saw a leaf flutter down, and a light rain began to patter.  The light was fast dropping off.  I looked down again, standing inside the doorway, searching through the years in the leather.  I'd been so smart pushing him out.  No boy; no problem; no questions.    

It first hit me in a question.  Where were all them who'd talked us through it?  Told us it was the righteous path.  Her sister was long dead.  If I had any comfort in her passing, it was she'd never know how few of them had shown their faces. Or how quick the service had been. In the end, they were rushing to just shut door.

The questions kept on.  Who was that here with him?  No doubt some brave sumbuck, knowing what he was getting into.  I was grateful he'd had the grace to wait in the car. The more I let it in, the more trouble I had breathing. As I stood there in the night, in my mind, the boy and his mother of years ago looked out at me from the couch with those eyes of theirs, books scattered on the floor in their happiness.  How many years had I denied?   

The first drop spattered on my boot top.  The rest just rolled down as I looked back at him.  I reached up for him, and I held him.      

He said he was gay

Should I scream "Nay!" or "Yay!"

I really don't know what to say

If I could only be

as honest as this precious gift

brought to my world...

Well, I wonder where

he gets it from.

oh shit.

i mean i love you

you're my daughter

but shit

i had a life

planned out for you.

a wedding, colors blue and white,

a boy's tears matching his shirt

as he saw you walk down the aisle.

two children, maybe three,

little rugrats to call me grandma

no

not grandma

i'm too young for that.

i had a life planned out for you but

you just ripped it away

tore it up like paper

tossed it away like trash

it's gone.

the life i wanted

you to have —

shit.

They're nevous;

I wish I knew why

Maybe I can help.

Thankful, concerned.

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