Secondhand Life

Chapter 27, Section Two.

Ash's P.O.V.

Maria and I got into my room and she opened my closet and pulled out a grey and blue coloured fitness bag.

"Who does that belong to?" I asked surprised. It wasn't mine and I had no idea how it got there. 

"It's mine." Maria said almost too quickly.

"How the hell?" I asked her and myself tilting my head in confusion.

"Well one night I brought it over here and after you fell asleep I put it here. It was my plan all along to invite my family over here to tell them this in front of your family. I knew they wouldn't accept me so I hid this here for a plan B. If I would've gone home tonight I'd be put in a correction center tomorrow. They wanted the perfect straight, and straight A daughter. I swear, they're so old, how do they not understand that there is a big difference between people who are smart and people who get good grades?" She finished her small rant and sat down at the side of my bed next to me sighing.

It was quiet as we sat without words for a couple of moments. The clock ticked by and no sound was heard. I put my arm around Maria's shoulders and that was all I could do at the moment. Maria's face was blank as she stared at the ground and tapped her fingers against her leg. 

After a couple more minutes we let go and decided to watch TV. We clicked through the channels of the small TV in my room and found a show to watch. An hour later Maria had fallen asleep on my lap. I smiled and turned the TV off with the remote just as my Mom burst in. 

"Happy Coming Out Day!" She shouted enough to awake Maria with a smile.

I checked the clock on the wall to see it was midnight. I guess my mom made this into happy coming out day.

My dad brought in a cake behind her that had rainbows all over it. The cake read "We all accept you." In frosting. 

I don't think I've ever seen Maria that happy in her life. Someone finally accepted her, even if it wasn't her family, she was thankful my family did.

***

We sat in the living room watching Disney Channel eating the cake that my mom had made and Maria's face looked elated with happiness. Maria and I sat next to each other and I rested my head against her shoulder. I was sleepy and today had been a roller coaster. Once we all finished eating Maria talked with my family calmly, as if she had known them forever. Maria and I picked up all the new glass plates my parents bought for the new house and brought them to the kitchen to wash them. I turned on the water and got a sponge from the cabinet below the sink. As I started to wash the dishes Maria dried them. After we then headed back up to my room to sleep and now since I had a big enough bed for the both of us, we could both sleep there.

"I'm going to change in my closet, you can change in my room if you want to." I said to Maria as I closed my closet door to get changed. 

I picked up my grey bed shorts from a box labeled. 'Comfy Clothes.'  along with a dark red shirt that somehow matched the natural red highlights of my hair. I untied my now longer black and red hair and walked out to see Maria laying in the covers on one side of my bed looking at her phone until I walked out of the closet.

"Well look who came out of the closet today." She said smirking and laughing at her own joke.

I laughed too while sighing and flopping down on the bed beside her. 

"Well today was quite the adventure huh?" She asked rubbing the sleepiness out of her eyes.

"Yeah no shit, Christopher seeing us kiss and then he smacked his head against the table when you were about to tell our parents about us. Poor kid." I said smiling when I remembered him smacking his head into the table.