by Robin Talley
“Oh, my God,” I whispered.
Peter yanked the magazine out of my grip. Then he started ripping it, tearing the paper into strips, tearing the strips into confetti.
“Where were you tonight?” I asked him, my voice starting to shake. “Your eyes are all red.”
He ripped off another strip of paper, then another. “I was finishing my delivery route, and I ran into Gary Knopp. Or, well, he ran into me.”
I shuddered. “Was he alone?”
“He’s never alone. Had two other guys with him. Stupider than he is, if you can imagine that.”
I could imagine it easily. I tightened my hand into a fist. “What did they do to you?”
Peter rolled his eyes. “Said some shit. It’s no big deal. I didn’t know what brought it on at first, but as they were leaving, they threw that in my face.”
I stared down at the magazine scraps on the floor. Then I grabbed the biggest shred and crumpled it in my fist. I grabbed the next-biggest piece after that, then the third-biggest, crumpling them all. It wasn’t as satisfying as I’d expected. “Do you think they’ll come back?”
“It doesn’t matter. I don’t care about Gary Knopp. I want to know who else’s seen this.”
Oh. Oh, shit. “You mean...”
“That crappy little paper has boxes all over the city.” Peter gave up on ripping and threw himself back onto the bed. “It’s only a matter of time before Mom sees. For all I know, someone’s already shown her.”
I shook my head, my heart pounding. “We’d know. She wouldn’t keep that quiet.”
“What do you think she’ll do?”
I had no idea what Mom would do if she saw a photo of Peter kissing a guy. I freaked when I saw him do it, and I already knew he was gay.
What if Mom recognized Tammy in the photo, too? What if she figured out that was my hand entwined with hers?
“Fuck,” I muttered.
“I’d been thinking of telling her, too.” Peter shook his head without lifting his arm from his face. “Can you believe that shit? I was talking to Dean about it last week. He came out to his parents last year, and they didn’t kick him out. It’s a good thing he had a scholarship for college, though, because his dad refused to pay tuition anymore. Without that, he’d never have risked telling them.”
“I thought you didn’t want Mom to ever find out.”
“I didn’t. I don’t, but...” He lowered his arm and met my eyes. “I hate all this lying.”
I sunk onto the mattress by his feet. “Me, too.”
“I was thinking about moving in with Dean.” He picked at a stray thread on his quilt. Our grandmother made it before we were born. Dad’s mother. “I could get a job down there. To help with rent.”
“In Palo Alto?” I don’t know which part of what he was saying stunned me the most. He was thinking about telling Mom? About moving away? “What about going to State in the fall?”
“There’s not much point. Mom can barely afford it, anyway, and it’s four years to get a degree—that’s another four years of lies, and if she finds out, I’ll have to leave no matter what.”
“Oh, God.” I can’t lose my brother. I can’t. I’ve already lost Dad.
And if Mom found out that was me in the photo...what if I lost her, too?
Can Peter take that kind of risk? Could I?
“Anyway...” He smiled darkly, stirring the scraps of paper on the floor around with his foot. “You really think you’re one of us?”
I winced. “I don’t even know how to find out. At school the closest the teachers got to saying anything about sex was when they told us to ask our mothers how to use maxi pads.”
Peter winced, too. “Once Father Murphy told us if we ever felt like jerking off, we should pray to Jesus to make it go away.”
“Oh, my gosh, are you serious?”
He laughed harder than before. “Thanks for saying, ‘Oh, my gosh.’ That’s the most you’ve sounded like my actual sister in weeks. When you said ‘fuck’ before, I almost lost it.”
I laughed so hard I started hiccuping. We were risking being too loud, though, so I hiccuped into a pillow, waving my arm so Peter would know to be quiet, too.
“Anyway, if you have the option...” His voice turned serious again. “If you can be straight, I mean. I’d think about it, if I were you.”
My laughter faded. “What?”
“Well, you said you were scared...and maybe that’s good.” He shrugged. “If I’d been more scared, that picture wouldn’t have wound up in there.”
“I thought you—?”
He frowned, and I could tell he was about to interrupt me when there was a knock on the door.
We both froze.
Was it Mom? Did she hear us? What did she hear?
“Peter?” Tammy’s voice was barely above a whisper. “Are you awake?”
The record was still playing. She knew he was here.
I could see Peter doing the same mental calculation as he stood up and brushed off his jeans. I tried to signal him to wait so I could hide or something—not that there was anywhere to hide in this tight space—but he was already at the door.
“Hey,” he whispered, holding the door open just enough to peer out, blocking her view of me. He’s a good brother. “What’s up?”
“I can’t sleep. Could I borrow that book you were telling me about?”
“Yeah, one sec.” He stepped back, trying to close the door while he reached for the stack of books behind him, but Tammy stepped forward at the same moment. She saw me over his shoulder.
“Oh.” She stepped back quickly, but it was too late. “Sorry, Sharon. I thought you were in your room.”
“I couldn’t sleep, either.”
All three of us fell silent. I looked straight at Tammy, and she looked back at me. Peter glanced from me to her and back again.
“You know what?” He took a breath, then nodded, as if he’d made a quick decision. “I’m going to the bathroom.”
“Wait...” I began, but he was already gone.
“I’m sorry.” Tammy reached both hands behind her neck, as though to gather her hair into a ponytail, but then I guess she realized her hair was too short for that and turned the movement into an awkward shoulder stretch. “I didn’t mean to interrupt. I really thought you were asleep. I should be, too. You know how sometimes you lie there staring at the ceiling for hours because, I don’t know, you’re thinking too much, and you know you should be sleeping, but there’s absolutely nothing you can do to make your body go along with that idea? It’s the worst, don’t you think?”
She was babbling. It was kind of adorable.
“Right?” she said, when I didn’t answer. “You get what I’m saying?”
“I get it.” I nodded, studying her.
She was dressed in a plain white T-shirt and threadbare blue sweatpants she’d gotten at a thrift store during one of our trips to Valencia Street. Her skin was still Southern California bronze, and her blue eyes were perfectly wide and round and locked on me. She was stammering a little, as though she wanted to fill the silence, her lips opening and closing and shifting around as she let out little ums and ahs, and I wanted to kiss her. I wanted to kiss her badly.
More than I’d ever wanted to kiss Midge, or Kevin, or anyone.
More than I’d ever known it was possible to want something.
“Anyway, sorry, I’ll leave you alone.” She whispered the words so quietly I wouldn’t have heard her over the music if I hadn’t been watching every movement of her lips. She turned back toward the door, nearly tripping as she spun around.
“Wait,” I said.
Tammy froze, her hand on the knob.
I stared at her—the rigid line of her tense shoulders, the hesitant set of her jaw, the freshly shorn hair curling past her ears—and t
hat was when I knew it was true. Everything I’ve been afraid of.
People like Anita Bryant and Senator Briggs, and Tammy’s aunt, too—they hate me. They could come after me, the same way they’ve come after so many others.
And Mom. Oh, God. What about Mom?
“Sharon?” Tammy asked, half-turning back to me. “Are you okay?”
I was crying by then. Tears dripped down my cheeks in a sloppy mess, right in front of Tammy.
“I, um... You probably want me to go.” She looked down and drew in a sharp breath. “I’m sorry I bothered you. I’ll, ah, I’ll see you...”
She reached for the doorknob. It took her three tries to pull it open and step through.
I wanted to tell her to wait. I wanted to tell her to stay. I wanted to beg her to stay there with me.
But she was already sliding the door shut silently behind her.
Yours, Sharon
Tuesday, June 27, 1978
Dear Sharon,
Hey, so. I just wanted to say I’m sorry, again.
It’s obvious I screwed up your life by coming here. Besides, it’s past time I found somewhere else to live. You and your family have been so generous to me, and I need to stop taking advantage of that.
You probably won’t read this until tomorrow, if you read it at all. I’m sticking it under your door now, but it’s been more than an hour since you left your brother’s room and you’re probably asleep. I’ll try to be out of the house before you wake up.
I’m so, so sorry, Sharon.
Yours, Tammy
Tuesday, June 27, 1978
Dear Tammy,
Oh, my gosh, no, please don’t leave! I’m sorry I’ve been so horrible lately, but I don’t want you to go.
I’m going to sneak downstairs and leave this for you after you’re already asleep so you’ll find it as soon as you wake up. Seriously, please, I can’t stand the idea of you living anywhere but here.
I just... I don’t know. I need to think more. I’m sorry.
Yours, Sharon
P.S. I was awake when you slid that letter under my door. I wanted to get up and let you in, but I was afraid I’d fall apart and embarrass us both all over again.
Wednesday, June 28, 1978
Dear Sharon,
All right, but...could we talk soon? Please?
Yours, Tammy
Wednesday, June 28, 1978
Dear Diary,
I don’t think I’ve ever felt this lost.
My dreams last night were horrible. I was running from a crowd of people, all of them seconds away from catching me. I couldn’t turn around to see their faces. All I knew was that I had to keep running, faster, faster, faster...until I stumbled and felt long, thick fingers dig into my shoulder. I turned slowly, fear pulsing through my entire body, and when I finally saw them, they were laughing at me.
Tammy’s aunt. Sister Catherine. Gary Knopp and the boys from school. My mother. Hundreds of others, too—faces I recognized and faces I didn’t, all of them dissolving into an angry, laughing darkness, pinning me to the ground.
When I woke up, it took me twenty minutes to stop shaking.
I don’t want Tammy to move out. That’s the only thing I know for sure. My mind’s been too muddy to think about anything else.
I got lucky, though—my letter back to her was short and probably incoherent, but it worked. There was a short note from her under my door when I woke up this morning, and when I went downstairs she’d already left for work, but her stuff was still stacked up neatly next to our plaid sofa.
I went to the O’Sullivans’, tried to pretend everything was normal for Chris and Penny’s benefit, and spent the next few hours wandering around the city. When it finally got dark, I started walking up to North Beach. There was a show tonight, and shows are the one place where I never have to think.
It was a long walk, but I didn’t care. Once I was in the thick of the crowd, I knew I’d made the right choice. All I had to do was shut my eyes and let the screaming fill my head.
A band I’d never heard of was on the stage, and they were having technical problems. Feedback whines filled the room, and the crowd was getting more raucous than usual. The last thing I’d seen before I shut my eyes was the lead singer flipping off the audience, a bunch of people in the crowd flipping him off in return, and one of the other band guys trying to smash his guitar on an amp and stopping because the singer punched him in the face. The whole room was a sea of anger.
It was exactly what I needed.
Until a sudden force jostled me from the left. I stumbled to the side, my eyes flying open. Fists were already flying just a few feet from me, so I didn’t wait to see what would happen. I spun around and charged toward the bar.
I’d already had one screwdriver—the bartenders only bother checking your ID if you’re a man—but I needed another drink. Anything that would make it harder to think.
I wove through the crowd, dodging the guys surging in to watch the fight, and reached the bar quickly. I spotted a free stool and lunged for it, sliding my hand over the sticky plastic-covered countertop to wave at the bartender. I was reaching into the pocket of my worn leather jacket for a five-dollar bill when I saw them.
They were around the corner of the bar, only a yard or so away. Evelyn was standing with Midge Spelling at her side, and on her other side...was Tammy.
I pushed back from the bar so fast, the legs of my stool scraped across the floor. It was so loud in that room I was sure no one would hear, but Tammy’s head swiveled my way.
“Sharon?”
Her voice was incredulous, and as soon as the word was out of her mouth she clapped a hand over it, her eyes widening in a silent apology. It was too late.
“Hey, Sharon!” Evelyn waved while Midge silently lifted her cigarette in my direction. “Join us!”
“I, um.” I stepped backward, stumbling. Suddenly, it hurt to breathe. “I’ve got to...go.”
I tried to act normal, but before I knew what was happening I was angling my way through the crowd elbows-first, ignoring sharp voices in my ears and shoves against my back, and the guy who shouted, “FUCK YOU!” as I pushed past. I shut it all out until I’d forced my way past every obstacle and the front door was swinging closed behind me.
I focused on breathing, since I didn’t have the strength for anything else. I barely had the strength for that, as it turned out, and I had to bend forward, my hands on my knees.
Two men on their way into the club leaned down and said something to me. I tried to wave them off, but they lingered. They were asking if I was okay, but they weren’t asking in a particularly friendly way.
“She’s fine,” a voice said above me. Tammy’s voice—I could hear the smile in it. She was charming them, the way she charms everyone. “I’ve got her. You can go on in.”
The men shuffled away. I wanted to stand up, act normal, but I couldn’t lift my head.
“It’s okay.” Tammy’s hand dropped lightly to my shoulder. The feel of her touching me, the sound of her saying my name, nearly made me choke. “Just breathe.”
I wanted to tell her I couldn’t, that that was the problem, but my throat swallowed the words.
“She all right?” The new voice was husky with cigarettes and something thicker. Midge Spelling was out here, too. As if I hadn’t been humiliated enough already.
“I don’t know.” Tammy kneeled and looked up at my sweaty, probably purple face. “Sharon? Can you stand up? I’ll get us a cab.”
Hell no. If I had to share a back seat with Tammy, I’d never breathe again.
“Uh,” Midge said above us, “no offense, but I think you’re making her worse.”
Tammy pulled away. With her out of my space, my eyes fell closed, and I managed to gasp in a breath of air.
“Do you think she needs to go to the
emergency room or something?” Tammy asked. I twisted up to look at them out of the corner of my eye. Midge was wearing a man’s button-down shirt with a pleated skirt that was about two feet shorter than the kilt I wear to school, with black boots laced up to her knees.
“Nah, I’ve seen this before.” Midge exhaled slowly. Of course, she was smoking right next to me while I could barely breathe. “I’ll stay. You go back inside.”
“But—”
“Trust me. She’ll be better off.”
Tammy’s feet shifted on the sidewalk as she considered what to do.
Listen to Midge, I silently begged her. Go away, Tammy. I can’t function when you’re this close.
“Well...” Tammy touched my shoulder again. I flinched. “All right. Sharon, I’ll wait by the bar. Come find me when you’re feeling better, okay?”
Somehow, I bobbed my head, bending back down toward the pavement. When I heard her shuffle away, I finally managed to take in a little more air.
“She’s gone,” Midge said a moment later, blowing out a stream of smoke above me. “You can get up now.”
Did she think I’d been faking it? I twisted my head back up as Midge popped her cigarette into her mouth again.
I flattened my hands against the greasy wall behind me, slowly pressing my upper body into a slightly less horizontal position. I didn’t know if it was Tammy’s absence or Midge’s judgment that had changed things, but she was right—I could get up. My chest kept heaving, though.
Midge didn’t look at me as I staggered to my feet. She was gazing coolly at the line of traffic rolling down the dark street in front of us, her free hand tapping out a quick rhythm on her hip, her skirt swinging with each movement.
“It’s okay, you know.” Midge exhaled a long stream of smoke. “I don’t think she knows you’re mad at her. Assuming you’re trying to keep that a secret.”
“I’m not mad at her.” I sighed. Those were more words than I’d thought I’d be able to string together. “It’s...complicated.”
