Felix Ever After

by Kacen Callender

  “Lucky?” he says. “You there?”

  I stand up, wobbling on the mattress, and jump onto the wooden floor, slipping a little as I run down the hall and slide into the bathroom, closing the door behind me so that I’m in almost-total darkness, purple shadowed light filtering in through the tiny window. I climb into the tub and huddle against the cold porcelain.

  “Yeah,” I whisper. My voice squeaks a little, embarrassingly. I clear my throat. “Yeah, I’m here.”

  “I should’ve asked if I could call first,” he says. “Sorry. I just—without thinking, I just pressed the call button—”

  “It’s okay. It’s all right.” My heart’s going way too hard, way too fast. I’m nervous as hell. Scared, too. What if he figures out that it’s me? Do I have a recognizable voice? Should I try to lower it, so he can’t tell?

  “I wanted to hear your explanation,” he says. “I mean, I can’t believe you don’t think anyone would fall in love with you.”

  I laugh a little—I can’t help it. “So you had to call me so I could tell you?”

  “I also wanted to hear your voice,” he admits. “Make sure you aren’t Jill.”

  I laugh harder at that one. I can hear him laughing, too. I’m not sure I’ve heard Declan laugh, not once since he broke up with Ezra. It’s a nice sound—trailing, like he might remember the joke days later and keep on laughing.

  He speaks softly. “You really think no one could fall in love with you?”

  I bite my lip. “It’s a little hard to explain.”

  “Try anyway.”

  I rub the back of my neck. “I mean . . . I don’t want you to know who I am.”

  “What does that have to do with it?”

  Everything. The fact that I’m Black, the fact that I’m queer, the fact that I’m trans. “It’s like every identity I have . . . the more different I am from everyone else . . . the less interested people are. The less . . . lovable I feel, I guess. The love interests in books, or in movies or TV shows, are always white, cis, straight, blond hair, blue eyes. Chris Evans, Jennifer Lawrence. It becomes a little hard, I guess, to convince myself I deserve the kind of love you see on movie screens.”

  “That’s ridiculous,” Declan says in regular pretentious-asshole-Declan fashion—except this time, his words make my chest warm.

  It’s hard to explain. “I guess it just feels like I have one marginalization too many, sometimes. So many differences that I can never fit in with everyone else. I can feel people are uncomfortable with me, so I end up feeling uncomfortable, too, and then I end up standing and watching everyone else make connections, fall in love with each other, and I . . .”

  I don’t finish. Declan doesn’t answer, not for a while. I feel relaxed, sitting there in the tub, phone pressed to my ear, knowing that he’s on the other end, even if neither of us is speaking.

  “I think I might be falling in love with you,” he says. I bury my face in my knees. “Does that help?”

  I shake my head, even though he can’t see me.

  “Tell me who you are,” he says when I don’t answer him. “Please.”

  “What if you don’t like the answer?”

  “You really are Jill, then?”

  “No, I’m not Jill.”

  “You somehow made your voice a lot deeper, Jill.”

  I laugh into my knees.

  “I just want to talk to you in person. I just want to meet you. That’s all I want.”

  I sink into the tub until I’m lying on my back. I take a moment. Try to imagine meeting with Declan. Even if he doesn’t freak out that I’m Lucky, and that I’d been trying to hurt him for revenge, I’d also have to explain everything to Ezra. And then, even if Ezra was okay with this—thing, whatever is going on between me and Declan—there’d be other little details to consider. If Declan still, after all that, wanted to date me, would he be interested in me . . . physically? As far as I know, Declan’s only ever dated guys. I know that trans guys are guys, and I know that there’re plenty of gay guys who’re into trans guys, because certain equipment doesn’t always matter, and shouldn’t always matter. But, still, there are parts that I don’t have that most guys do, parts that I don’t even want, that Declan might end up missing. Even more confusing is that I’m not sure I identify as a trans guy anymore, anyway.

  It would suck—really, really effing suck—to go through all of that, just for Declan to reject me.

  “Lucky?” Declan says, voice soft. “You still there?”

  “Yeah.” I sit up, tapping my fingers on the side of the tub. “I’m sorry. I am. I just . . . I can’t.”

  He lets out a breath of impatience that I’m very familiar with and is quiet on the other end for a while. Then, “All right. I’ll just have to respect that.”

  I swallow. “If you don’t want to talk to me anymore, I understand.” That’s what I say, but internally, all of my being is screaming no. I’ve gotten too used to speaking to Declan. To opening up to him about things I’m not sure I can tell anyone else, not even Ezra. To feeling, for once in my life, like I’m the kind of person who gets to be loved, too. I can already feel a hollow loss growing in my chest, at the thought of Declan saying that he doesn’t want to speak to me anymore.

  “I probably should cut things off,” he says, “but I’m not sure I could stop talking to you at this point, even if I wanted to.”

  I try not to smile. Fuck. This is so weird, and I’m in so deep. “Same,” I say.

  Seventeen

  DECLAN AND I KEEP TALKING FOR HOURS, SPEAKING ABOUT anything and everything, total bullshit about MCU movies and whether Steve and Bucky are a canonical couple, to our theories on love.

  “The issue is that we’ve never really gotten to see our own stories,” Declan tells me. “We have to make those stories ourselves. Even if a creator made a character to be straight, they put those characters out into the world, right? So those characters are mine now. And I say that Steve and Bucky are gay as hell.”

  We play music for each other through the phones. From Khalid to Billie Holiday, until we eventually fall into a pattern of Sigur Rós–like instrumentals. There’s a song that Declan tells me played in that Amy Adams alien movie that has me burying my face into my pillow so he won’t hear me cry, because there’s something about that song, the highs and lows and depth, and hearing Declan’s voice asking me if this isn’t one of the most beautiful songs I’ve ever heard, that makes me too fucking emotional.

  On Friday morning, I wake up after about only two hours of sleep. I’m back at my Harlem apartment. My dad’s already up, making scrambled eggs.

  “I’m surprised you’re awake,” he says to me from across the kitchen counter. “I got up at five to use the bathroom and saw your bedroom light was still on.”

  “Oh,” I say, trying to pretend like it isn’t a big deal. “Must’ve fallen asleep without turning it off again.”

  He gives me his I don’t believe you face, and I give him my I know, and I don’t care face. I sit at the counter while he slides my plate over. My dad takes a bite of toast, watching me carefully. I raise an eyebrow.

  “Is there something on my face?”

  “You seem really happy,” he says.

  I raise both eyebrows this time. “Really?”

  “It’s a good look, kid,” he says, reaching out to land a meaty hand on my head. “Smiling does wonders for you.”

  I swat his hand away, trying not to grin. “Thanks, I guess?”

  “So I take it you’re staying up until sunrise because you’re talking to someone on the phone?”

  I scrunch up my face. Guilty.

  “You teenagers,” he says, “always thinking you’ve invented the wheel. I’d spend hours talking to your mom when we were kids.”

  My smile fades. There’s always an automatic stab of pain to my chest whenever my dad mentions my mom. When I was younger, I’d hoped they would get back together. It was a few years before I realized it was never going to happen. I cou
ld never understand how my dad seemed okay with that. How he decided to move on. She was supposed to be the love of his life, right? I’d asked him if he didn’t love my mom anymore once, and he told me that of course he did.

  “I probably always will love her,” he’d said. “But it was a tough lesson to learn, realizing that I couldn’t wait for her to decide she would love me again. It wasn’t healthy. If I fall in love again, it’ll be with a woman who loves me also—not someone who I have to convince to love me. It’s easier, I think, to love someone you know won’t love you—to chase them, knowing they won’t feel the same way—than to love someone who might love you back. To risk loving each other and losing it all.”

  He lets out a heavy sigh as he drops the toast on his plate. “Anyway—I’m happy that you’re happy. That’s all that ever matters, right?”

  “Right.”

  He picks up a glass of orange juice. “Is it Ezra?”

  “What? No!”

  He narrows his eyes, like he doesn’t believe me. “You two spend every second together, so I just assumed . . .”

  “Bad assumption to make. Bad, bad assumption.”

  He raises his hands defensively. “Okay. All right. Who is it, then?”

  It’s not like he knows who Declan Keane is, but even so, it feels strange to say his name out loud. “No one you know.”

  He nods slowly. “And . . . I take it that you’re being—ah—safe?”

  I stare at him blankly. “Really? You’re going to give me the talk? Right now? Over breakfast?”

  He clears his throat. “Well,” he says, “you should just be prepared. There are—um—specific things I can’t really help you with . . . I don’t know a lot about the pill . . .”

  I clench my jaw and look away. He’s right, I guess, technically. He might not have a lot of information on birth control options, if that’s something I wanted to start—testosterone might make Shark Week disappear (thank God), but it wouldn’t stop me from getting pregnant, if I were actually having sex—which, obviously, I’m not.

  But the way my dad said it . . . Once again, I get the sense that my father categorizes me as his daughter, and not his son. There’s always a flare of anger whenever he misgenders me, but at the spark of that anger is hurt, a dull ache in my chest.

  My dad chews for a while. “Maybe the Callen-Lorde center could help,” he says. “They could give you more information, if you need it. Though I sure as hell hope you don’t. You’re only seventeen, and fine, I’ve lost the fight in you not hanging out with Ezra so much, but—”

  “I don’t,” I say loudly, just to get him to shut up. “Need the information.”

  “You don’t?” he repeats.

  “Nope.” Not yet, anyway.

  He mouths, Thank God.

  It’s still pretty early by the time I get to St. Catherine’s. The sky is a bright, clear blue, sun shining yellow, birds twittering. Only a few students linger around outside the building. I get through the front sliding glass doors and pass into the lobby. My heart doesn’t hammer as hard as it usually does in this space, and my hands don’t get as sweaty, so, I guess, progress?

  I get to the acrylics classroom about an hour before Jill’s supposed to give her usual morning check-in. I have two self-portraits now: one where I look like I’m on fire, and another that I’m still working on from time to time, where it looks like I’m underwater. My latest painting is in the space I occupy with Ezra. I’m excited to get back to it. I haven’t worked on the painting in a couple of days now, but the memory of holding the brush, finding peace in the colors, inspiration in the strokes . . .

  Paint on the palette, brush in my hand—oranges today, then swaths of red. The red sinks into a darker purple of shadows, which filters in the light of blue, shifting to a color as bright as the sky outside. The bell echoes, but I don’t stop. The classroom door opens and closes, voices filter into the room, laughter and chatter, the scraping of stools. The blue meets yellow, then gold.

  When I feel someone standing behind me, I assume it’s just Jill—she always likes to observe, will offer advice before moving on—but I startle when the person speaks.

  “That’s good,” Declan says.

  That’s all he tells me. A simple, two-word sentence—but my heart feels like it’s about to break out of my chest. He moves on, heading for his regular seat in the back of the classroom. I watch him go as he nods at James, already at the table and talking to Hazel, who lets out a loud laugh. Declan hops up onto his own stool and pulls out his phone, checking the screen with a quick glance—probably looking for a message from me. From Lucky.

  That’s good.

  I turn back to the canvas. Fuck. My heart’s going crazy. I try to take deep breaths, air swelling in my chest. I shouldn’t be this excited to see Declan, but I am. I have to remind myself: He thinks he’s in love with Lucky. Not me.

  The second bell rings, and I can hear Jill calling for us to quiet down and take our seats. I leave my station and my canvas. Declan sits with James and Marc and Hazel, at the table beside Marisol and Leah. Ezra isn’t here yet. There’s no way I want to sit beside Marisol now, not after the Great Dumpster Fire of Coney Island, but the two last stools are on either side of her.

  Marisol ignores me as I walk up to the table and grab my stool, pulling it as far away from her as possible, scooching closer to Declan’s table. Declan barely glances my way.

  “I’m surprised he’s willing to be anywhere near me,” Marisol tells Leah. “I mean, I’m such an ignorant bigot, right?”

  Leah shifts uncomfortably in her seat.

  Jill begins her daily check-in. “Before we get started, I’d like to remind everyone that we’ll be having the end-of-summer gallery again. The administration, myself included, will be choosing one student from all of the applicants. It’s a wonderful honor,” she tells us with a brilliant smile.

  I stare at the table. Just the mention of the gallery makes me feel self-conscious, like everyone’s looking at me, thinking of the old pictures they’d seen of me, remembering my deadname. Jill starts a speech on inspiration and its origins, but I zone out—between Marisol sitting to my right and Declan sitting to my left, there’s absolutely no way I can pay attention.

  I try not to look at Declan—I really do—but I can’t stop myself. He went out of his way to tell me he thinks my painting is good, but he won’t spare me a single glance—or even a glare—now. And why would he? To him, I’m just Felix, the prick who hates him.

  “If I’m ignorant,” Marisol whispers to Leah, “would he really want to be anywhere near me? I find that a little hard to believe, I guess.”

  “Okay, all right,” Leah says beneath her breath, flailing her hands around, like she’s trying to wave away the bullshit. “Let’s just chill, all right?”

  Declan stares straight ahead, listening to Jill. I’m almost too afraid to answer Marisol. If I speak and he hears me, will he suddenly recognize my voice—realize that I’m Lucky?

  Marisol rolls her eyes and turns back to the front of the class. James turns his head and mutters something to Declan, and I’m almost jealous. I want to speak to Declan, too—talk to him with the same casual ease. I want to ask him how he is, tell him about what happened at Coney Island and hear what he thinks, ask for his advice on Marisol, if I should just tell her to go fuck herself.

  Christ. He said he’s in love with me.

  I can’t look away. Declan has a pinch in between his eyebrows as he listens to Jill. He has this habit, I never really noticed it before, of leaning his head a little to the side as if he can hear better out of one ear. His eyelashes are redder than his brown hair in the yellow sunlight that floods the classroom—but even in the light, his eyes are a dark, deep brown. His nose is almost too fine for his face, and his sturdy jaw is all sharp angles. His mouth . . . his lips are parted, just a little. I’m embarrassed just noticing. Even the word lips feels so . . .

  He looks up at me, through his eyelashes, and I realize I�
��ve been staring. He gives me a look. Like, what? He even says it. A low rumble, impatient. “What?”

  Breath catches in my throat. I’m still afraid to speak, but even if I wasn’t, I don’t think I could anyway. I shake my head, sit up straight, and keep my eyes on Jill for the rest of her lecture, pretending to listen but unable to think about anything else but the heat that seems to be radiating from Declan.

  What if I did it? Just turned to him, right now, and told him that I’m Lucky?

  Well, he’d probably hate me for all fucking eternity.

  But he says he has feelings for me. That means he has feelings for who I am, no matter what he thinks my name is, or if we only speak on the phone or in person. Right?

  Maybe there’s a way I could talk to him alone—get him to realize that he likes me, maybe even loves me, without ever having to tell him the truth. Without him ever knowing that I was Lucky.

  By the time lunch rolls around, Ezra’s texted me back to let me know he has a cold, and he’s skipping today. I ask if I can bring him anything, and he says no.

  Stay away. I don’t want you to get sick, too.

  I don’t usually find myself at St. Cat’s without Ezra. It’s in these moments that I realize Ez is really my only friend here. I’m embarrassed, almost, without anyone to hang out with, anyone to speak to.

  When my phone buzzes, I hope that it might be Ezra, and that he’s changed his mind—has asked me to bring him some chicken wings and French fries or something—but the notification is for a message from Instagram. My heart starts to pound.

  Alone without your friend to follow around?

  There’s a reason no one else wants to talk to you.

  You’re pathetic, pretending to be a boy.

  What the fuck?

  My hands shake. I fight the desire to chuck my phone. Why can’t this piece of shit just leave me the hell alone? And—what the hell, are they watching me, right here and now?

  I look up and stare around at the groups of people in the parking lot—some standing by the lobby’s glass doors, Marisol smoking a cigarette. Some stand under the shade of the trees. Almost every single person has their phones out. It could be any of them, literally anyone here.