Changers Book Four

by T Cooper

  It was easy skipping Chronicling for a couple weeks after first ditching the Changers Mixer—with very little to no consequences, outside of a BS e-mail update I sent to Turner affirming how much I’m learning as Kyle, poster boy of traditional masculinity. Everybody—the Council, Tracy, even my dad—seems to be letting up the pressure on me during Y-4. Kyle, I guess, can do no wrong.

  I don’t really have an instinct to “process” anymore. My brain feels rejiggered. More set in the present. Introspection and regret largely a habit of the past. All is mad easy when you are Mr. Basic Wonderful, King of Bachelor Nation, making all-American dreams come true.

  I keep reminding myself that I’m only hurting myself if I don’t get my thoughts down in these Chronicles. So much is happening—so much has happened since I first changed into Drew—that I know I’ll forget a lot when it comes time to make a decision about who I’m going to be for the rest of my life. I mean, that’s like seven months away. I can’t bear to think of it right now.

  Well, well, what do we have here? Me reminding me to do the right thing, with nary a guilt trip from Tracy, or a stink eye from Dad. Who, by the way, was at long last inducted into the Council last week, and is spending more hours than ever at Changers HQ. Mom joking she’s a Changers widow, but secretly she likes her alone time and has taken up doubles tennis with some friends she shares her therapy practice with.

  To Dad, everything appears to be great on the outside with me—I’m the ideal son this year, winning football game after football game (yeah, I stayed on). I’m keeping the grades up, not getting distracted by dating anybody, much less Static-non-grata Audrey. No shaved head and black wardrobe, no running away from home to bunk with Radical Changers. No cloud of depression bumming everyone out. No Abider drama, or arrests, or out-and-proud marches.

  Even Jason, my quarterback coach Abider-in-waiting, has become president and CEO of the Kyle Smith fan club. (What that says about Kyle I shudder to think.)

  Anyway, the reason I came home and resumed Chronicling tonight is because of homecoming. Always drama at the homecoming.

  First off, after my game (which we won, 35–10), I was so ragged all I wanted to do was stay home and finish season two of The Fall. But Andy begged me to hit the dance with him, because he’d never been to one and was still trying to mack on this sophomore girl he won’t stop talking about, using me as his wingman. He said the girl reminds him of Destiny. (He’s pathetic.)

  That said, I sort of feel bad for Andy, seeing as his family members haven’t called to check on him even once since we told them he was bunking with us, and all he ever does is go to school and then go to work on weekends, so he can “pay rent,” even though my parents keep telling him that’s crazy. Anyhow, the Andy guilt got me to go to a dance that triggered severe PTSD, but hey, what are friends for?

  I barely dress up for it, throwing on a tie at the last minute when I realize a short-sleeve, button-down Hawaiian surf shirt probably isn’t proper enough to get me in the door. Wish I could fit into that retro tuxedo I wore when I was Drew. I was so much cooler then. I actually cared about stuff. As Kyle, everything comes so easy, it’s hard to care. But, whatever. (See what I mean?)

  Andy is sporting an ill-fitting, boxy tuxedo that he rented for himself, and which Mom somehow made less tragic with a couple of hems and stitches. I add a fake flower to my shirt pocket, and some dorky blue suspenders with frogs on them, loud-ass socks, and shorts. The full Urkel. Technically I’m wearing a tie, so they can’t keep me out.

  Mom snaps a photo with her iPhone of Andy and me mugging in front of the fireplace, with Snoopy between us in sunglasses that keep falling off his thick head.

  “Don’t drink tonight,” Dad says, handing me the keys to his car.

  “Yep, got it,” I say.

  “I’ll keep him out of the punch bowl,” Andy promises, and it seems like it’s the first time he’s been mildly excited about anything for a long time.

  Flash forward to the dance, where I instantly spot Audrey, mostly keeping to herself. Michelle Hu is there too, and I ask her to save me a slow jam, which makes her table full of fellow mathletes lose their collective brainiac minds. Michelle is chill though. She truly gives zero effs. (Every year I wonder why I don’t spend more time with her. That girl’s gonna be a senator or invent a new Internet someday, I’m sure of it.)

  Chloe and her bees are predictably skulking around, making fun of other girls and saying “cute” like it’s a curse word. And then there is Kris, being extra, even for him, costumed in a fabulous fitted leopard-print catsuit with a high-necked ruffled shirt underneath.

  Stoner Jerry walks by. Stoned. “What’s the haps?” he says to me, as Caden, my tight end, rolls up behind him.

  “Dance, dance revolution,” I joke with Jerry, who nods slowly.

  “No doubt,” he replies, carrying on his way.

  “Why are you talking with that loser?” Caden says before Jerry is even out of earshot.

  “Who says he’s a loser?”

  “Everyone who has ever looked at him for even two seconds,” Caden spits. “You know, you don’t have to talk with everybody, right? Wouldn’t want people getting the wrong impression.”

  I want to ask him what impression that would be exactly, but Andy pops up, two Cokes in hand, bristling with anticipation about finding his latest infatuation. Caden saunters off, put off by yet another “loser” I don’t know that I don’t need to talk to.

  “Okay, where is she?” I ask Andy, and he points across the room.

  “Her?” I ask, spying a sweet, bespectacled white girl digging into a bag of popcorn. Not Andy’s type, in my ample experience.

  “No, the one in the blue skirt, by the cake. Isn’t she gorgeous?”

  I start laughing.

  “What?” Andy asks, suddenly insecure. “You’re being a dick.”

  “No, it’s . . .” Of course he’s crushing on Charlie, the only other Changer in school. We’d exchanged nods since Tracy filled me in about her, but both of us have tacitly kept our distance once we clocked one another.

  I’m not sure what to do, like, can I tell him? I’m not supposed to be outing myself to Statics (Andy’s not even supposed to be in on my identity), so outing another Changer is probably like fifty times worse of a cardinal offense than self-disclosure.

  “She’s really cute,” I finally say, deciding to let it ride. “Let’s go talk to her.”

  “Would you?” Andy asks, positively puppy-doggish. As we cross the room to chat up Charlie, I can’t help but wonder what it is in Andy that keeps attracting him to Changers. He’s got Changer radar. Chay-dar. (That’s dumb.)

  “This is my buddy Andy,” I announce with faux formality when we arrive. “He’s one awesome guy, and he’s been crushing on you from afar, and so I was wondering if you’d do the honor of dancing with him, and at some point maybe even being seen in the daylight with him?”

  Andy’s face goes white, whispers, “Asshole,” through his teeth.

  “Radical honesty. It’s what’s for dinner,” Charlie says, laughing, even seemingly somewhat charmed. So my job is clearly done here. Plus I have to take a leak.

  On the way to the bathroom I grab a few mouthfuls of cookies, gulp them down with a swig of punch, which I can tell has miraculously NOT been spiked tonight—likely because Jason (the proverbial turd in every punch bowl ever) graduated from Central last year.

  I’m at the urinal when Andy comes bursting in the bathroom door, hollering, “Kyle! Kyle!”

  “What the hell, man?” I ask, the pee scared right back in me. “I thought I got you set up.”

  “You won! You won!” he shouts.

  “Won what?”

  “Homecoming king!”

  “Stop messing with me, I wasn’t even running,” I say, zipping up.

  “It’s student vote, dumbass. I swear to whatever, they totally called your name. You need to get out there.”

  I’m sure you can guess who my homecoming quee
n is . . .

  Chloe. Chlo-Jo. The Chlo Monster. Chlo-zilla. The girl who sets all other females back ten years every time she opens her mouth. When I come out of the john, she’s already onstage, posing and arching her back like she’s a movie star in front of a step-and-repeat at the Oscars. I walk up to join her, because that’s what it seems like everybody is expecting me to do, and that’s when I spot Audrey and Kris sarcastic-clapping from the side of stage as the tiara is placed on Chloe’s head, then an even bigger, shinier crown on mine.

  Everybody is hooting and whistling as we are forced to dance to “All My Life” by K-Ci & JoJo in the middle of the dance floor, and Chloe immediately adheres her body to mine like the aliens in, well, Alien. Attempting to suck the life out of me while we sway back and forth and everybody takes our photo and swoons and ostensibly wants to be us—although if they knew the real story of our lives, I think they might feel differently.

  I catch a glimpse of Audrey making gagging faces to Kris. For his part, Kris goes full drag shade by flat-out ignoring Chloe and my existence entirely.

  As the song switches to a Kesha number and people start filling in around us, Kris takes off for the bathroom, while Audrey plops down on the side of the stage, swinging her legs off the edge. She’s so pretty tonight, and I would do almost anything to be dancing with her instead of the succubus who’s still clinging to my torso and CURRENTLY TRYING TO SHOVE HER SLIPPERY SEA SLUG OF A TONGUE DOWN MY THROAT. She tastes like peach liqueur and breath mints, and seems oblivious to the fact that I might not want her saliva on my face. By the time I disentangle from my long Chlo-mare, I notice Audrey is gone.

  “Are you a homo?” Chloe sneers at me, as I peel off to search for Audrey.

  “What?” I say, frantically glancing around.

  “There is no way you’re into chicks if you aren’t into me,” she says, snickering to herself as she flicks the crown off my head. It tumbles down my body and onto the floor.

  I kick it under a banquet table and hightail it out of there, rubbing Chloe’s DNA off my lips as I go.

  The halls are empty, some completely dark, everything eerily quiet. Rows and rows of lockers containing everybody’s secrets. I peer down the freshman wing, and then the junior. Nada. Finally, in the pitch-black sophomore section, I think I can hear something. I head down, calling out: “Audrey?”

  When I turn the corner past the chem lab, I spot two figures at the end of the hall—one big, with his back up against the lockers, and a smaller one kneeling in front. A part of me worries for a second that it might be Audrey, even though as I get closer it becomes unmistakable that it is a skinny dude kneeling in front of the other larger guy.

  I start backing up to give them their privacy, but soon as I turn, the bigger guy hears my sneakers squeak and clocks me. I recognize immediately who it is: Buster, my offensive lineman, whose own parents would buy him a ticket to hell if they knew he digs guys.

  “Faggot, get off me!” I hear Buster yell theatrically. He reaches down and grabs the skinny dude by the neck, hoists him up, and launches him into the lockers on the other side of the hallway. Poor guy slides like a rag doll to the floor. Buster quickly zips up his pants, marches over, and begins viciously kicking the guy curled on the ground.

  Something in me snaps. I sprint over, tackling Buster. “What the hell are you doing?” I scream in his face, pinning him to the cold floor beneath me, my elbow across his neck.

  “Get off!” he shouts, spittle flying onto my face.

  I stay put, craning my neck to check on the second guy, and realize, Oh god, it’s Kris, his lips split and bloody, a huge gash on the side of his skull. “Are you okay?” I ask him, as he struggles to stand, but can’t seem to find his feet.

  It’s at this point that Buster frees an arm and sucker-

  punches me right in the chin. The blow startles me, but it barely hurts, thanks to adrenaline and my essential Kyle alpha-maleness. I feel a very clear urge to beat Buster like a piñata, but I tamp it down, opting to body-check him back to the floor instead, hard enough that he loses his breath.

  “Chill OUT!” I shout into his face. “Kris, are you okay?”

  He still won’t answer, but he’s hoisted himself to a sitting position and is blotting his lip with a scarf from his pocket.

  It’s then that Audrey turns the corner and comes running down the hall, her fancy shoes clip-clop-echoing on the shiny linoleum. While I’m distracted at the sight of her, Buster somehow summons the strength to roll out from beneath me, scrambles to his feet, and bolts. Audrey hurries up, kneels next to Kris, gently touches his face.

  “Oh my god, what happened?” she asks him, but he pushes her hand away.

  “Nothing,” Kris says, pulling himself upright and limping toward the bathroom.

  “Let me help,” Audrey coos, putting an arm around him as they walk.

  “I just want to be alone!” Kris yells, shrugging off her arm and pushing into the first bathroom he comes to, the girls’.

  Soon as the door closes behind Kris, Audrey asks me, “What. The. Hell. Happened?”

  I don’t answer either. Because how can I explain all of the psychological mechanics at play? Buster’s self-loathing and fear of his desires. Kris’s hunger to be wanted, even by someone who can’t do it openly. How it doesn’t matter how many kids identify as queer or nonbinary, there’s still the so-called “normal” and the “not-normal,” and the “normal” people get to decide how much “not-normal” they’ll tolerate on any given day, in any given situation, and the effects of these two dynamics clashing are written all over Kris’s battered face.

  I know Audrey fancies herself a member of the club. But she’s never fully come out, walked the walk, told her family and her friends and her church that she’s bisexual, lesbian, pansexual, whatever. She’s kept it close. And that’s fine. But it is a far shout from someone like Kris who actually puts his life on the line every single day in order to roam the planet as himself. Or themself, which, if I had to guess, is where he’s headed.

  Kris lost his home, his family, because he wasn’t willing to forfeit a single color from his crayon box. That takes guts. And heart. And fortitude. And grit. And this part I can tell Audrey.

  “Kris will be fine,” I say. “He’s one of the strongest people I know.”

  Change 4–Day 52

  Dear Kyle,

  I hope you don’t take this the wrong way, and that it’s not too “Downton Abbey” that I’m writing you a letter, but I wanted to ask you something, and it seems like we never get more than a few passing seconds in homeroom or the hall to connect. I really find myself wanting to talk to you in more depth than those passing encounters can allow.

  I know you’re totally busy with (meathead) football and the playoffs, so I figured a note might be the easiest way to go, so you don’t feel like you have to respond immediately, and can take your time to think about things before getting back to me. Or not getting back to me! Whatever you want.

  Anyway, I don’t really know how to say this, so I’m just going to say it, because I have a feeling from what I’ve seen in you that this wouldn’t be taken as an insult. But I’m wondering: are you gay? I’m not sure if you know this, but rumors are being spread by Buster and Chloe that you are. I don’t trust rumors. And by the way, it’s TOTALLY cool if you are gay, I am 100% down with that. In fact, if I’m being honest, I’m pretty much bisexual, since my last relationship was with a girl. And before that a guy, and before that another girl . . . which I can’t believe I’m telling you since I’ve never told anyone before. But this note is about taking that leap of trust. I want you to feel like you can be honest with me if you feel comfortable. And there will be no judgment.

  Because here’s why I’m asking: I like you. Like, really, really like you.

  You’re a good guy, Kyle. I can tell about these things.

  For some reason—don’t freak out—I feel very connected to you. And I can’t help but feel that you feel some connecti
on to me too. Please tell me if I’m wrong. (I can take it, I’m a big girl! I’ve lived through some shit, trust and believe.) But I don’t want to keep pretending I don’t feel something I do.

  A dear friend showed me once that keeping secrets makes you sick. And that life is shorter than we think. I know I would always wonder, if I didn’t at least try with you. So this is me, trying.

  xo,

  Audrey

  p.s. You did a really good thing for Kris the other night. There’s something about you that makes me feel safe.

  Change 4–Day 54

  I don’t think I’ve ever been knocked around so badly on a football field. This evening was by far the toughest team we played all season, and my body ached from the stripe on my helmet to the tips of my cleats by the time I hobbled off that field after those forty-eight minutes of play.

  We managed to secure the victory in the last few seconds of the fourth quarter, when my third down, thirty-yard bullet into the end zone hit one of my receivers right in his outstretched hands—and you’ve never heard a high school stadium erupt like that. At least I never had.

  I won’t lie: this win felt good. I think because I had to work for every single yard we earned. And because it was the first playoff game of the postseason. Afterward, people were saying if we keep playing like this, we could maybe have a shot at winning the Tennessee State Championship.

  Why do I care that people think we could win a state championship? No clue. But I do. Not even Jason did that during his four years as QB-1. A fact he keeps reminding me of at every opportunity. “With your arm and my mentorship, this could go all the way,” he whispered to me as the last seconds of the game wound down and it was clear our opponents weren’t going to be able to tie it back up with a touchdown. It’s perpetually disorienting how much Jason needs me to need him.

  After the referee’s last whistle, my whole team rushed me, lifting me up and carrying me around the edge of the field like I was a conquering emperor returning from distant lands with the spoils of victory. Chloe and the other cheerleaders were handspringing maniacally across the field, maroon pom-poms flying everywhere and landing in little puffs on the grass. The color guard dudes sprinted around the track with their giant Central flags whipping in the wind behind them, and the marching band started blasting a kick-ass rendition of Daft Punk’s “Get Lucky,” which caused everybody in the stands to start rocking out in unison.