“My parents think I’m straight, Shapelsky.”
“Wait, really?”
“A shocker, I know. You’d think they were legally blind.”
“No, I don’t know.”
“No, it’s completely ridiculous. But they need to believe I’m straight, I guess. For their own twisted reasons. And I like having the space they give me, knowing I’m their good, Christian, heterosexual son.”
“They really think that?”
“They think I have a girlfriend named Marta.”
“Wow.”
“What do you need to tell your parents?” he asked.
“It’s this weird, kind of unusual thing…”
“You can be whatever you want to be, Shapelsky. I certainly won’t judge.”
I blushed. “No, I mean … maybe I don’t need to tell them.”
“There’s no harm in trying,” he said. “Just drop a hint or two. What’s the worst that could happen?”
“I guess nothing too terrible.”
“I’ve met your parents, Shapelsky. Your parents are not going to kick you out of the house. They might get very stressed out, but they’re not going to disown you.”
I sighed. “You’re probably right.”
* * *
I spent most of the rest of the day not paying attention in class, figuring out how I wanted to broach the subject. I couldn’t just come right out with it, the way I had with Tracy. I needed to introduce the concept slowly, and also get a sense of where I stood. I started to feel good about my plan on the bus ride home. I took my moment toward the end of dinner. My dad was scooping the last of the pasta onto his plate, and my mom was scraping the last of the salad toward the center of the bowl.
“Do you ever think,” I began, “about how most teenagers have this big moment where they reinvent themselves? Like they become goth, or they get really into exercise?”
My mom carried the bowl into the kitchen.
My dad studied my face. “We’re not letting you get a tattoo,” he responded.
“No, no, that’s not … I just wonder about it sometimes,” I muttered.
“Are you thinking of taking up a new hobby?” my mom asked from the kitchen. “I hear that very hip kids are getting into knitting.”
“No,” I said. “I wonder about changing my name.”
My dad chuckled.
My mom came back in, wiping her hands on a dish towel. “Is that really something you think about?” she asked, concerned.
“Sometimes, I don’t know.”
“What would you change your name to? Al or something? Xander?” my dad volunteered.
I flinched. A moment of doubt. And then I said it. “Like, maybe … Sasha Masha.”
They both looked at me, mouths open, completely surprised a moment. At least I’d gotten their attention. Then they both started to laugh.
“Oh, sweetie,” my mom said. “I thought you were serious for a second.”
“Yeah, I don’t know,” I said, trying to cover up how flustered I felt. My dad shook his head and chuckled. “I don’t know where I got that one.”
And I felt very far away from both of them.
* * *
Mabel was excited I’d been hanging out with someone from the Lavender Ladder.
“Blue hair! He sounds cute. Is he cute?”
“Yeah,” I said. “He’s cute.”
“Nice work, Alexidore. When do you see him next?”
“Tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow!”
“Yeah. Tomorrow.”
“That’s so soon.”
“It is. I’m a little obsessed. But I don’t wanna talk about me. Let’s talk about you.”
“What about me?”
“I don’t know, tell me about school. Tell me about your people.”
And she told me about the five other people she hung out with most days after school. Last week they made tamales together. Next week they were going to a concert. One of them was Alice. Mabel was crushing hard.
“I like it here, Alexidore. I have to say.”
“I’m glad,” I told her. “I miss you a lot, but I’m glad.”
“Me too. I miss you, too,” she said. “How about Sasha Masha? How’s she? Is that all right, to call her ‘she’?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “But yeah, I guess it’s all right.”
“What’s going on?”
“I almost talked to my parents about it tonight, but then I got a weird vibe and chickened out.”
“That’s okay. Truly. Parents are hard.” She took a big inhale and sighed.
I was tired of talking about it. I just wanted to be living it. And I wished I knew what living it meant.
“I think I’m gonna go to bed,” I told her.
“All right. Sleep well, Sasha Masha.”
“Thanks, Maybelline. Love you.”
Chapter 17
“Is it okay if I use the car tonight?”
“Why, do you have plans?”
“I might go hang out with this new friend,” I said as casually as I could.
They exchanged a look I couldn’t read, but then they said it was fine and just to make sure my phone was charged so they could get in touch with me. They asked me my friend’s name.
“Andrew,” I told them.
My mom wanted me to write down Andrew’s parents’ names and their number, but I said I’d never met them and it would be weird to ask. Eventually she nodded and said okay. “Just—take care of yourself, sweetie, okay? Don’t do anything unsafe.”
I told them okay thanks and I’d see them in a few hours.
* * *
Andre’s neighborhood looked completely different in the last light of day. There were kids’ tricycles on the lawns and signs in the grass, reminding dog walkers to curb their dogs.
Andre came out to meet me and said Coco and Green didn’t live far.
“Coco used to host this performance night at the Lavender Ladder—that’s how we met. I guess Coco’s my drag mother. But then we started hanging out outside of that. Green’s amazing, too.”
“You do drag?”
“Eh, sometimes. Not so much anymore. But sometimes.”
“That’s cool.”
“Anyway, mostly I wanted you to meet them because I think it’s hard to do what you’re doing without a little bit of, um … context.” He looked at me. “Does that make sense?”
“I think so.”
“It’s just up here on the left.”
We pulled up in front of a stretch of duplex houses—one porch, two front doors. Even in the dusky light you could tell that one half of the building was painted a staid gray and the other was bright green with orange trim. A man in jeans and a tiny black T-shirt under an open silk robe opened the door.
“My dears! Come in!”
I smiled and ducked past. I could feel him scanning my face. A round, furry belly poked out from under his shirt. He seemed like he might be in his late fifties—older than my parents. Andre said, “Hi, Coco,” and gave him a hug.
“Ah, mademoiselle! Please!” He was calling after me. Mademoiselle. I didn’t object.
“Shoes off, please, por favor,” Coco clarified, with a winning smile. “I don’t think we know each other.”
“No, I’m Al—,” I started to say, but I was bent over untying my shoes, so Andre chimed in.
“This is my new friend, Sasha Masha.”
“A pleasure, Sasha Masha. I’m Coco.”
He said my name rather solemnly and put his hands on my shoulders and kissed me on each cheek.
“These are the most astonishing biscuits!”
A voice from another room. A timer was going off.
“They look good?”
“They look astonishing!”
“Well, just put them on a plate, honey!” Andre led me into the kitchen and introduced me to Green as Green pulled said biscuits out of the oven, turned off the timer, and arranged things on the counter. Green was a little taller than Coco, but not by
much—a green striped shirt, baggy, and a wispy little mustache. He seemed about the same age.
“Go go go go go sit in the living room,” he urged.
We settled in on a couch and plush chairs, piled high with pillows, and Green brought in a whole succession of foods: biscuits, jam, tortilla chips, salsa, baby carrots, oatmeal raisin cookies from a Tupperware. I leaned into a pillow on a sheet on the couch.
“I love these baby carrots, Green,” Coco said as Green settled in to join us.
“Yes, baby carrots are in season this time of year.”
“She has a magnificent deadpan,” Coco said, turning to me.
“Oh, do I? What else do I have?”
“Well, let me see. You have a nice neck.”
Green mmed appreciatively and then leaped up to bring in one last thing—a bowl of grapes. Andre passed me food and Green offered beers, but Coco objected and retracted the offer, proposing ginger ale or Coke instead (“These are children, my dear!”). I said I’d have some ginger ale and Andre said he’d have some, too. Green went to get them and Coco turned his attention to me. He was crunching a carrot.
“Is this a new friend? Sasha Masha, you said?”
“Yeah, Sasha Masha’s awesome,” Andre said.
“And do you ever speak for yourself, Sasha Masha?”
“Yeah,” I said. “I do, sometimes.”
“Well, that’s good. How do you know Andre?”
“We met at … a group. This group thing. At the Lavender Ladder?” I kept turning to look at Andre, as if he needed to approve. Coco’s direct gaze made me squirm a little. I felt like I wasn’t the person I wanted to be with him.
“What kind of a group?”
“It’s like a teen group? Would you say? For queer teens?”
“And it’s a knitting circle, or…?”
“Be nice, Coco,” Green called from the kitchen.
“Who, me? Oh, I’m just giving Sasha Masha a hard time. I know the group.”
Andre swooped in. “I just wanted Sasha Masha to meet you because he’s at the beginning of a journey. Finding his way. Is that fair to say?” I nodded.
“I see,” Coco said. “I do think Sasha Masha will have to learn to speak for Sasha Masha’s self at some point, however.”
“Leave the child alone!” Green called again from the kitchen.
Coco leaned in to me. “I’m not nearly as terrible as they all make me out to be. You realize that, my dear?”
I nodded.
“So what’s this journey you’re on?”
“I guess I figured out this name, Sasha Masha, not too long ago. But now I have to figure out the rest of it.”
“A name, a name,” Coco said thoughtfully. “So is this a drag name?”
“I don’t think so. I think it’s just me.”
“I see. And who are you?”
“That’s the thing. I’m trying to figure that out.”
Green popped in from the kitchen. “Did you ever think about trying a Russian accent?”
My face got hot.
“No,” I said. “But I’m not sure if that’s quite what I’m after.”
“Sure, all right,” Green said, waving his hands and lifting his eyebrows and wandering back to the kitchen. “No harm in trying, though. I always say … try it all…”
Andre intervened. “Mostly I wanted Sasha Masha to know that he comes from a tradition,” he said. “That he doesn’t have to do this in a void.”
“Well,” Coco replied, “you know me, always happy to fill a void.”
He looked back and forth between our faces.
“Look at the two of you! So deadly serious! Green, when was the last time you saw such serious young faggots? If there’s one lesson I have to impart it’s that you need to lighten up a little bit.”
“Who, us?” Andre asked, out of the side of his mouth.
“Yes, you. Serious as chickens.” Coco sighed. “And this is a serious piece of advice, so listen up: a sense of the absurd is essential. If you want to be ready for a fight—”
“Dear Coco,” Green called from the kitchen again. “She’s always spoiling for a fight.”
“But it is a fight, you know? And not for chump change either. This is where you little chicks need to wake up to what’s going on in the world. We’re the ones who can see beyond. And they don’t want us to see beyond. They pat us on the head and tell us we can get married, and put on uniforms, and go shoot brown people overseas. But is that really the best we can imagine for our lives? We have a chance to build something totally different, we who feel differently, who live differently, who see that the way things are isn’t the way they have to be. We have a chance to build toward a place where kids aren’t locked away in prisons forever and where people have enough food to eat. Is the limit of our imaginations gonna be a goddamn wedding cake? Because don’t get it twisted, they don’t give a fuck about us, the Johns in suits, they’ll brand their shit with the rainbow flag come pride month and they’ll pay lip service to ‘equality’ or the HRC or whatever cis-rich bullshit, but when it comes to actually questioning the foundations of the world, they cling to the status quo and their nuclear families like some kind of terrified animal … Do you think they’re gonna worry about our sorry faggot asses when they feel the things they’ve hoarded for years slipping away from them?”
“I think it’s getting better, though,” Andre said. “Don’t you think? There’s a ways to go, but it’s getting better. With representation of queer people in the media…”
Green came in with two tall glasses of ginger ale, and I thanked him under my breath.
“Representation is chump change, darling! I’m sorry to break it to you, dear. People who hold power don’t like to put themselves at risk. And that’s why queer people have generally been the visionaries. Because when your everyday life is a risk, you start to think about it all differently. You start to realize that organizing your days around keeping yourself protected is dumb as shit, and that there’s a whole universe of meaning and connection when you get beyond that.”
“I agree with you,” Andre replied. “But I just think there are young people out there who don’t know queer people exist, who don’t know about this as a possibility. And you have queer people getting work being themselves in industries where they didn’t use to be able to—”
Coco waved his hand. “Yes. Please. By all means. I’ll never object to a girl getting paid. But I’ve had my heart broken too many times to think that visibility means everything. I don’t think it changes who steps up and who stands back. Where were the white cis faggots at Stonewall? And where are they now, with Black and Brown trans sisters getting murdered in the dozens? For some people, visibility is about saving a life. And for other people, it’s about making things more comfortable. But again, my dears, it’s not about comfort. Safety, yes, please. But comfort? Comfort is overrated. As far as I’m concerned, life is about being alive and being connected to our fellow creatures. Full stop. And your generation is making it worse with your serious faces and goddamn safe spaces and trigger warnings … Hello, my darlings! Loosen up! Live a little! Suck a dick! Tell a joke! Fall in love! Show up to start trouble when it’s necessary and don’t whine when the world doesn’t hold your hand!”
Andre was shaking his head, but he was smiling. It seemed clear that they’d had a version of this argument many times before. Green grinned. “Tell us what you really feel, will you?”
Coco sighed and tossed an imaginary mane of hair. “I know. I get … swept away.”
Then turned to me. “Do you know Marsha P. Johnson?”
I shook my head.
“Sylvia Rivera?”
I shook my head again.
“A crime.” He turned to Andre. “You realize you have some work to do, correct?”
Andre laughed. “I do.”
As conversation turned to other things, I looked around the room. It was covered with posters, and paintings, and books, and paper ornaments, and silk
flowers, and a few drawings of naked men. Green had put on some music by then. He and Coco sipped their beers, and Andre and I slurped our ginger ale, and before long we had finished the carrots and the tortilla chips and the oatmeal raisin cookies. Green asked Andre how school was going, and Andre talked about how he and his friend Michelle were getting into writing songs. I could feel my face glowing. Here I was, wrapped in the heart of one of the warmest, coziest homes I’d ever visited, and I never wanted to leave.
“Sasha Masha,” Andre said, “let me show you the hall of ancestors.”
It was just a regular hallway, really. Off the living room. A long wall covered in framed photos. Some looked recent, others looked ten years old, twenty, fifty—a hundred.
“Coco’s going to quiz us all,” Green said as he and Coco joined us in front of the images.
“I don’t have to quiz anybody,” Coco insisted. “And anyway, I don’t want to put Sasha Masha on the spot. We can just pay homage.”
“Andre knows who some of these people are, of course,” Green said.
“Some … that’s James Baldwin,” Andre said. “And that’s Oscar Wilde.”
“Yes!”
“And that’s … David Wojnarowicz.”
“Yes…”
“Who’s David Wojna…?” I asked.
“You’ll have to go home and look him up, my dear,” said Coco.
Andre explained in a low voice. “He was an artist,” he said.
“Is that it, baby doll? That’s all you’ve got?” Coco was scanning the wall with intensity and pride.
“No, I’ve got a few more. Okay.” Andre was scanning the wall, too. It was a dim hallway, and crowded, but all the faces started to vibrate, somehow, as we looked at them and said their names.
“Walt Whitman,” Andre said.
“Yes,” Coco said.
“Joan of Arc?”
“Yep.”
“I think that’s Lorraine Hansberry?”
“Yes!”
“And Harvey Milk … But then I start to get … These other people look familiar, but I’m not sure I know…”
“That’s Langston Hughes,” I chimed in. I was starting to recognize some of the faces. “And I think that’s Gertrude somebody?”
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