Don't Forget Me

Chapter 26

Over the next week, I do everything I can to keep myself busy. I pick up a few extra shifts at work, I drop off lunch to my dad a couple of times, I help my mom stuff bulletins and we go see a movie and make plans to do it every Wednesday from now on, even after I start at Bower. I play music in the shower and fall asleep to Netflix on my laptop every night, because whenever I find myself completely alone in the quiet, all I do is think about her. And the more time I spend thinking about her, the harder it gets to keep myself convinced that being with her is a bad idea.

Because the truth is, while I was doing all that other shit this week, the only thing I really wanted to do was go see her.

To ride a four-wheeler.

To fix a fence.

To stick my hand in a disgusting vat of ground meat.

Anything to just be near her.

She lit something in me that day in the field and despite my best efforts to snuff it out, it's been burning ever since.

It burns even as I look between my parents in the front seat of my mom's car while we drive back home from St. Joe's on Sunday. It was weird being back at Mass after knowing the truth. My freshman-year theology teacher was just a few pews ahead of us, and I kept replaying the entire stupid class period that he spent explaining why marriage should only take place between a man and a woman.

What would it even feel like to tell my parents?

Mom. Dad. I like Lisa Manobal.

My dad's head would probably just explode right here in the car, brain matter and blood all over my mom's fabric seats.

Kidding. I'm kidding. But it's an easier image for me to swallow than the truth. In reality, he'd probably just disown me. He didn't even want "the queers" on his television station, so I highly doubt he'd want one living in his house.

But my mom? She wouldn't, right? I'm the one who shut her out, she would never do that to me. I mean, I've seen her roll her eyes at my dad's political rants... but I guess she never stops him either. And more than that, there's the Church, and the truth is her status at St. Joe's means the world to her. If having a daughter who got an abortion was grounds for Mrs. O'Doyle to step down from her post, certainly having a gay daughter would be catastrophic to my mom's image and the progress she's finally making. Not that abortion and sexuality have anything to do with each other, but in the eyes of the Church, they're both basically a one-way ticket to the fiery pits of hell.

But would my mom really choose the Church over me? It's hard for me to believe, but I did choose to leave her behind for California... for Lisa. So I must've really believed that she would.

It's so hard for me to understand how something that feels so right could be seen as so wrong. If they could just get into my head for a second to feel how I feel about her, they would understand immediately. And maybe...

"Roseanne?" my mom asks, adjusting the rearview mirror so she can see me in the backseat. "I asked if you want to get breakfast at the Dinor."

"No!" I reply too quickly and too loudly. "I mean, uh... I was actually going to look at my class schedule this morning and see what books I need." Nice save.

"I've gotta get into the garage by eleven, anyway." My dad wipes a hand down his face. I'm starting to wonder if he looks tired or if he actually just looks older than I remember.

"Do you really have to go into work again, Louis? It's Sunday," my mom says with an edge to her voice.

"Babe, we talked about this... I have to take every job I can right now," he replies, then the two of them start talking in hushed tones in the front seat while my attention wanders back out the window, grasping for something else to focus on. Like Oliver.

I haven't spoken to him since... the incident. He must think I'm actually nuts or something, to jump him like that and then disappear. I know I need to call him. Apologize. I just... don't know how to explain it.