Who Is Lucas Ryker O'Riley?

71. A MORE AMAZING FAMILY

Dad picked up his glass of beer and held it in the air.

Getting everyone's attention he began, "Since tonight is a celebration, I'd like to make a toast."

We all lifted our glasses, mom a glass of wine, and Dave and I, some of the sweetest tea I'd ever tasted. Dad got serious and again began to express his love and support for me.

I could see from the smile on her face, mom was so proud of dad for all he was saying. Before he could finish his amazingly supportive and quite long toast, she had tears dripping off the side of her jaw.

When he was finally done, we all took a sip.

Dave then let the whole family know that he would have my back in school and wouldn't let anything bad happen to his little sister.

We paused our conversation when the waitress brought out the appetizer.

Once she was gone, we all reached for one of the steaming hot, golden, crispy fried, cream cheese and lobster filled Rangoon.

Dave took a bite and brought up what he called a hypothetical situation.

"Mom, and especially Dad," he began after taking another bite of the rangoon, "you say you're 100% supportive of Carla."

"We are," Mom replied defensively.

"I think I just made that pretty clear," Dad added, reaching for a second rangoon.

"Okay, so what happens if Carla comes home one day and announces she's decided she found a boy she's interested in and wants to date? What then? Will you still feel the same way?"

I choked on the bite of Rangoon I was swallowing at the moment Dave said that. I was mortified that he was bringing this up with dad.

I looked over at Dave. He grinned and winked back at me.

I was terrified by what I was sure dad's reaction might be, but understood what Dave was doing. He was trying to get things out in the open before dad found out about me and Jeremy. He was trying to get a commitment from Dad before he found out and had a chance to disapprove, and he was doing it in a way that kept mom's knowledge of the whole thing, a secret.

Dad started to speak, but then stopped himself, he carefully pondered what he was about to say. Mom reached over and took hold of his hand, and smiled at him in a show of support.

He looked her in the eyes and at that moment, not a word was spoken, but a whole conversation transpired between them.

I hoped that I would find someone someday that I could have their kind of deep, committed, almost perfect relationship with.

I have always admired the closeness between them, and their amazing communication skills. They almost never fight, and when they do, it isn't even like a real fight. They disagree, work it out by talking about it, and it's over in no time. They are so in tune with one another, they often, just as now, have non-verbal conversations that occur through nothing more than a look and a facial expression or two.

After a couple seconds of their gaze, dad spoke.

"Carla," he began, looking down at a spot in the middle of the table. "Observing the way you have changed since the move and so easily adapted to living as a girl, this says to me we made a mistake. You should have been living your life as a girl the whole time. I know you had a great life as a boy up until the move, but I truly believe you probably would have had an even better life as a girl. Probably would have still kicked a** in football too."

He paused and looked up at me.

"or maybe," he continued. "maybe you would have just cheered your brother on as the best d@mn cheer captain that school had ever seen. Who knows. What I do know is that I'm sorry, from the bottom of my heart, truly sorry we made the decision we did about raising you as a boy. However, I do believe all things happen for a reason, whether we know why or not, and your experience living as a boy will serve to make you a better young lady, woman, wife and mother. I also think things would be easier for you now if we hadn't made such a shortsighted decision when you were born. After all this time, I can't believe it took us till now to figure that out."