“It was special,” Dad says. “It’s not your fault the fire marshall had a niece in the graduating class.”
“Nothing like a foot-high fireball over the rest of the food,” Justin snickers.
“I still don’t believe you need a permit to flambé food outdoors,” Mom mutters.
Two years ago, summer, was when my biggest irritation was Grandmama saying my bathing suit was ratty and tight. I wanted to dye a blue streak in my hair once, but Mom wouldn’t let me bleach it, and without the bleach, the color barely showed up. I had no idea about transpeople or gender identity, or Dad.
“That was a long time ago,” Dad says a little sadly, putting my thoughts into words.
“Yes,” Mom says dryly, “but not long enough.”
“Fortunately, we have the rest of our lives to watch you make new and embarrassing memories we’ll never let you live down.” I yawn, leaning my head against the window.
Mom snorts. “Thank you, Ysabel. I am deeply reassured.”
“That’s what I’m here for.”
A Trail of Bread Crumbs
Justin
“Hike!” Ysabel shouts. She throws the ball and Beth, in her trademark floppy hat, catches it and runs toward the water. A wave comes in and she shrieks, zigzagging away from the foam and back onto the packed sand.
“Tag!” shouts a woman with short, reddish hair, and smacks Beth’s arm. “First down!”
Beth plants the ball, and the rest of the kids charge along the beach. I recognize Marco’s little brother, who trips and knocks over another kid. The two of them roll around and get sandy, and for a few minutes, it turns into a free-for-all, with screeches and laughter.
I glance up the beach, watching Mom tend the fire. Between the driftwood, our store-bought kindling, and Mr. Han’s big oak logs, we put together a pretty nice bonfire. There will certainly be enough food; even Dad was impressed by the number of boxes and bowls.
At the thought of my father, I look around until I locate him, in baseball cap and sunglasses, the legs of his jeans rolled. He’s dragging Mom away from her fireside kitchen toward the surf. She seems to be arguing with him about this, and pretty soon, she’s digging in her heels—for all the good it does her. Dad laughs as she breaks away from him and runs back to the fire. Score one for Mom.
Dad catches my eye and gives a brief smile before glancing down at my running shoes. I look down at my shoes myself, trying to picture Christine as someone who would drag Mom into the ocean, but I remind myself that Christine is Dad. There are parts of him that we will never lose.
“Viking!” The dark-haired woman scans the beach, shading her eyes. “Come play!”
“Be right there,” Connor yells from behind me. I turn as he slogs through the sand in my direction. His legs and the bottom of his shorts are wet. “So, you don’t do football,” he says, and dusts the sand off his arms.
“I play. Just not in the mood.” I shrug, looking out over the sparkling waves.
“Huh.” Connor stands next to me, shoving his hands in his pockets. “You okay?”
“Yeah.” I give him the lie, because there’s nothing else to give him.
Connor turns to say something, then waves as the woman calls for him again.
“Viking! Come on!”
“Viking?” Ysabel emerges from the knot of little boys in the sand, balancing on one foot to try and dump the sand from her shoe. “As in, your other car is a longboat?”
“Ha ha. I picked up that nickname in Little League,” Connor says, and gently kicks a hill of sand over Ysabel’s other foot. He changes the subject. “When did you guys get here?”
“We’ve been here about a half hour or so.” I glance back up the beach toward where my father is now turning food on the grill. “I had to dig Mom a fire pit.”
“Your family are the most organized cookout people I’ve ever met,” Connor says, grinning. “You actually brought a shovel? To the beach?”
“It’s for a sand castle,” Ysabel explains, sitting flat and dusting the sand from her bare foot. She looks up as the ball flies past, then surges to her feet. “Hey, I’m still playing!”
In the area of churned-up beach, the dark-haired woman steals the ball from Ruben and passes it to a little girl, who runs in the other direction with it. Pursued, the girl throws the ball back to the woman, who turns and wedges it between her knees and holds out her arms.
“Red light!” she shouts, and all the little kids stop running. Ysabel, in the act of freezing, falls over laughing.
I turn to Connor. “Okay, what was that?”
“Mom plays football by her own rules.” Connor grins. “Come play.”
“How am I supposed to play when I can’t figure out the game?”
“It’ll come to you,” Connor says, smacking me on the shoulder.
We play a strange version of Keep-Away and Red Light/Green Light, with the occasional down, pass, and wobbly punt involved. Ysabel enjoys the game until she drops something out of her pocket and screams for everyone to stop. There’s a moment of ceremony as Ysabel retrieves a piece of jewelry and presents it to Bethany, who shows off the glass flower pendant and ties it around her neck. And then Mr. Han yells that it’s time to eat.
There are a few last introductions as the people wipe off sandy hands and grab plates. Marco’s mother, Mrs. Andrade, and his older sister, Sofia, are the makers of a pile of golden-brown empanadas, which Ruben and Marco’s youngest sister, Lucia, claims she helped make. Connor’s mom, who asked us to call her Laura, dishes out a chicken salad with grapes, almonds, and apples in it, which is surprisingly good. The Hans have brought deviled eggs, chili, and a massive fruit salad. Madison turns hamburgers, turkey dogs, and spicy hot wings on Dad’s little hibachi grill, her long silver tongs moving quickly as she serves.
Ysabel follows Bethany to the edge of tarp furthest from the fire and pulls open her hobo dinner, fanning the steam away from her face. Connor and Marco follow. Sofia joins us for a moment but then has to drag a pouting Lucia back to sit with the smaller kids.
“How much older than you is Sofia?” I ask Marco.
“Three years. She’s already a freshman at Stowe,” Marco says through a mouthful of food. “Statistics major.”
“Statistics.” Ysabel winces.
“Exactly,” Marco agrees.
Beth laughs. “You guys are such wimps.”
“Just because you’re a numbers person doesn’t mean we have to be,” Marco objects.
“I wonder if you can inherit that,” Ysabel says. “Is your mom good at math, Marco?”
“Madison’s a history professor,” Beth says. “Connor aces history. Obviously inherited.”
“That’s bogus, Ys. Mom’s a caterer, and you don’t cook. Connor’s probably only good at history because Madison would freak if he wasn’t.”
“Oh, trust me,” Connor agrees. “She acts like it’s the end of the world if I get a B.”
“Mama’s a nurse,” Marco says gloomily. “If I was going to inherit anything, I wouldn’t want the ability to stick needles in people and clean up—”
“Dude! Eating here,” Connor warns him.
Marco says something rude in Spanish, and Connor answers. Bethany puts her hands over her ears and sings loudly. “I can’t heeeear yoooou.”
Ysabel chuckles. “You guys are so weird. I wish we had more time to hang out.”
“I know.” Bethany puts her hands down and pushes out her bottom lip. “I can’t wait till your art show. Mom said we’ll be there.”
“Are we invited, too?” Connor asks.
“Um, anybody can come,” Ysabel says, and looks pleased. “We have lots of room.”
Sofia returns with a plate of empanadas, which Marco steals. Ysabel interrupts their fight, asking, “So, Marco, your dad couldn’t come today?”
Marco returns the empanadas and shakes his head. “Nope. He’s somewhere in Argentina at the moment.”
“Ooh, Argentina’s on my bucket list,” Ys
abel says. “I’d love to go.”
“I’m the only one of us that’s ever been,” Sofia says, snagging an empanada back from her brother’s pile. “Our parents grew up there.”
“Sweet,” I say. “You at least always have a place to go on vacation.”
Sofia snorts. “I wish. I can’t afford airfare when I’m buying textbooks. Going home on the weekend is as much a vacation as I get.”
Marco interrupts. “You could afford it if you asked Dad for the money.”
Sofia’s face tightens. “Which I won’t. So, we’re back at ‘I can’t afford it.’ ”
“Whoa. Sorry,” I say, realizing I’ve stumbled into an old sibling argument.
Marco shrugs. “It’s nothing. My father … can’t deal with things right now. So, he’s working for an import company in Argentina instead of living here. He sends money—”
“He just won’t send himself,” Sofia says, wiping her fingers on the napkin. She smiles a little. “I don’t want anything from him but that.”
“That sucks,” Bethany says, grimacing. “It would be rough if my mom just … left, and stayed away. I’m sorry.”
In the little silence that follows, I realize that Ysabel is looking at me, her expression troubled. I meet her eyes and give her a What? look, but she shakes her head slightly and looks away.
Sofia says, “For some people, it’s impossible to live with being transsexual, I guess.” She flicks a glance at her mother on the other side of the fire, talking animatedly to Mr. Han. “I’m taking a Gender and Culture Studies course at school, and our professor talked about how shame forces people into certain behaviors in this culture.”
Connor makes a disgusted noise. “Shame sucks. If you couldn’t talk to your wife, or your priest—I guess going away would make sense.”
“He’s just embarrassed,” Marco mutters, and shrugs.
“He should be embarrassed,” Sofia says, her voice sharp. “He’s been gone so long Lucia barely remembers him. Who cares if he’s not like every other dad in our society? He should come home.”
Abruptly, Ysabel stands and heads up the beach at a fast walk.
I’m on my feet a moment later, jogging a few feet to fall into step with my sister. I keep my mouth shut, letting the boom and the hiss of the waves crawling up the sand fill the space between us.
Ysabel walks until the others are a ways off before she veers toward the waterline to pick up a half-submerged shell. She flings it sideways into the surf and stares after it. “Dad’s doing what Marco’s dad did.”
I consider pretending I don’t know what she’s talking about, then breathe out a huge sigh. “Pretty much, yeah. Mom says it was all his decision to leave.”
Ysabel picks up a rock, then throws it down viciously. “So stupid.”
“Well.” I hesitate. “We were pretty twisted for a while. I think we needed the space. Dad never meant for us to find out, Ys.”
Ysabel shakes her head, still staring into the waves. “I don’t mean Dad’s stupid. I mean, I feel stupid. All this time, I kept worrying about him coming home and freaking out our friends. I kept feeling like we’d lost our father.”
My stomach gives a guilty twist. “I know.”
“I kept thinking, ‘Man, what are people going to say about Mom? That she’s a lesbian?’ I couldn’t stop thinking how people were going to look at me, you know? Then I got up here, and talked to him, and met Treva and Mr. Han and it didn’t scare me so much anymore. Dad wasn’t scary. He was just Dad. I thought, ‘Okay. I can deal with this.’ I figured I could work it out later if something else came up.” Ysabel drags in a breath and shoves her hands in her pockets. “And all this time, he wasn’t even planning on coming home.”
“That’s not true, Ys.” I say the words as much to myself as to my sister. “He says he’s coming home. Probably if we act like we expect him, he’ll show up. We’ve just got to give him some time.”
“How much time?” Ysabel asks, her voice rising. “I don’t want to be like the Andrades, waiting for years.” She looks at me, her eyes distressed. “I’m still not sure about Christine. I still worry about what people are going to say. But Dad staying away is wrong.”
“Well, Mr. Lester says in order to defeat an opponent, you not only have to have a watertight argument, you have to deliver it in unexpected ways,” I begin.
Ysabel interrupts furiously. “You want to have a debate? Now?”
I roll my eyes. “No. Mom says Dad needs to find his way home. We’re going to figure out a way to leave him some clues. I don’t know how yet either, but if we both think about it, we’ll come up with something. I’m not willing to wait as long as Marco’s family has.”
Ysabel picks up another shell fragment and pitches it into the waves. “We miss him. I know he misses us. It doesn’t seem like he’d need that many clues.”
“Maybe he won’t.” I turn to see my parents walking up the beach toward us.
Happy Families
Ysabel
If this were a movie, my parents walking along the beach would be accompanied by some random piece of sentimental music, maybe with lots of violins. Dad grabbing Mom’s hand would be Something Meaningful, and the angle of the sinking sun would make them blind to everyone but each other.
Unfortunately for all involved, this is not a movie. Dad walking toward me, all smiles and swinging Mom’s hand, makes something inside of me twist.
How did things get so complicated? We all love my father—Mom does, even in ways I don’t understand. Justin loves him, even though it freaks him out to think of Dad as a she. I love him, even though I admit I know it will be more than tough when I meet Christine. We all love Dad. Poppy and Grandmama love him. So why can’t he just pack up his generic little condo and come back and live with us?
Why is he pretending he will?
“You guys done eating already?” Dad asks, pulling off his sunglasses to squint at us.
“What’s going on?” My mother’s observant eyes narrow. “Are you two fighting?”
“Why are we even here?” I blurt, which confuses both my parents.
“On Earth?” Dad laughs, but my expression shuts him down.
“You know what I mean. Why are you making jokes? I hate it when you make jokes,” I say, frustrated. “I need you to be serious.”
“Okay,” Dad says, wiping the smile off his face with a wave of his hand. “I’m serious.”
“You’re not ever coming home, are you?”
Dad’s brow furrows. “What?”
“I figured it out. You’re going to just keep putting us off, and it’ll be years, like Marco and Sofia’s dad, and you’ll just keep stringing us along, like that’s okay, and it’s not okay, Dad. I need to know, right now. Are you coming home? If you’re not, just—don’t pretend anymore, all right? Please.”
My parents exchange looks, and Dad moves close to me. “Ysabel. I don’t think you understand—”
“I’m not finished,” I blurt, warding him off with a raised hand. I have to say this before I lose my nerve. “We didn’t ask for this, Dad. Things were fine, and then we found out you were transgender, and we thought we would lose you, but then you were still Dad, and I thought that someday we were going to be okay. But it’s not going to be okay, is it? Things are going to suck forever.”
My mother sighs, and I’m grateful she doesn’t voice her usual objection to the word suck. She wraps her arm around my waist, silently supportive. My father looks conflicted, his expression moving from stunned to angry.
“It’s not low blood sugar this time,” I add, defensive even though no one is speaking. “I just hate that we’re all pretending. If you’re not coming home, Dad, just say so.”
There’s a pause. Dad glances at Justin, who’s stepped back a little, his arms crossed. “Well, Justin, since you started this, do you have anything to add?”
“He didn’t start this!” I exclaim.
Justin shrugs, but his body language is stiff. “Hey, don
’t blame me. It’s not my fault if the shoes don’t want to stay in the box.”
My mother steps between us. “Time-out a second—just wait.”
“But—”
“Ysabel.”
Impatient, I look off toward the water, watching a flock of gulls bobbing on the surface. Next to me, Justin shifts, his hands going into his pockets. I turn back to see my father watching me.
“Okay.” Apparently our Mom-mandated moment of silence is over. “Nothing is going to be solved by shouting or accusing each other,” my mother says, and I barely resist rolling my eyes.
“Sorry.” Even though I’m not.
“I don’t apologize. I didn’t start this,” Justin repeats, stubborn.
“All right. I apologize, Justin. Blame is uncalled for,” Dad says, then heaves a heavy sigh. “Ysabel, I am coming home. If I could give you three a date, I would,” he says, pulling off his baseball cap and rasping the palm of his hand over his close-cut hair. “I know that’s not the answer you want, but right now it’s what we’ve got to work with.”
“So, that still means you’re coming home … ‘someday,’ ” I say, making air quotes. Mom squeezes my shoulder.
“I’m sorry I can’t give you what you’re after,” my father says tiredly. He closes his eyes. The laugh lines around them look like scars. “Everybody fears change, Ysabel. Everybody. Even me. This isn’t easy. I’ve kept a part of my life to myself for as long as we’ve been a family. It’s going to take time to work through that.”
“How are we supposed to get used to Christine and everything if you’re up here? When is that even going to start?” How am I supposed to get past this, and just get on with my life?
Dad shakes his head. “Belly, I don’t know. I can’t give you a timeline. But we’ll get there, eventually. It just takes time.”
“Okay,” I say, defeated. I don’t understand, but I try to smile. “Whatever.”
“Belly,” Dad says, and pulls me to him. He touches his forehead to mine, and I feel Mom’s hand on my back. “I will come home, soon. I promise you. I promise me.”
Happy Families Page 17
