The Wrong McElroy

by KL Hughes

  “Guess he forgot about that.” Lizzie ran a hand through Fiona’s bed head. Her fingers snagged on a tangle, then smoothed it out. “Good thing no one else in the family cares about Instagram. Well, except Jessie, but she doesn’t even follow Michael.”

  “How do you not think to check something like that when you ask a lesbian to pretend to be your straight girlfriend?” She burrowed into Lizzie’s neck, scooting closer and closer until she was practically in her lap. “God, you smell good.” She nosed up the length of her neck, unable to help herself. The warm skin there was too inviting. She pressed her lips to Lizzie’s throat and was rewarded with a vibrating, pleasant hum.

  “You’re friendly in the morning, aren’t you?”

  Fiona pulled back, and her breath caught somewhere in her chest. Her stomach clenched. Lizzie was so close, so open to her, so goddamned beautiful. One of her hands rested casually on Fiona’s thigh over the covers, comfortable and familiar, and everything about it felt right. It felt good. Fiona’s heart seemed eager to escape, hammering away at her insides as she curled a hand into the front of Lizzie’s shirt and drew her in. Then, finally, relief. Their lips touched, and everything calmed. All the boiling world slowed to a simmer, and for just a moment, there was nothing but perfection—the perfect heat, the perfect touch, the perfect kiss, the perfect girl.

  Then, the moment erupted, taking the perfect kiss and the simmering world right along with it. The gasp that shattered the stillness pulled Fiona’s heart right up into her throat, and she choked on it. She couldn’t move. Lizzie spun toward the door, but Fiona was frozen, staring at the back of Lizzie’s head. This was what she had been afraid of—ruining things.

  “Mom!” Lizzie’s hand was still resting on Fiona’s thigh. She quickly jerked it free.

  Rosie stood in the now open door, one hand splayed across her chest as if she was trying to reach in and physically soothe her shocked heart. The other gripped the doorknob like a lifeline. Fiona hadn’t even heard the door open. Apparently, neither had Lizzie. “Elizabeth Dawn,” she said, breathless, “what in God’s name is going on in here?”

  Lizzie seemed lost for words. Her mouth moved without a sound, opening and closing as if she was trying to suck in air that simply wouldn’t go down. Her beautifully unique eyes glossed over, an elegant sight that seemed out of place on such a playful, funny person. There was a shock of fear in them, one Fiona recognized all too well. She’d seen it in her own reflection when she was younger, when she had hovered around the edges of coming out but hadn’t yet taken the dive. That fear, now alive on Lizzie’s face, begged to be chased away. It was enough to jog Fiona from her frozen stupor. She grabbed Lizzie’s hand and squeezed as tight as she could. “It’s okay.” Her voice barely worked. “It’s okay.”

  Lizzie took a breath and nodded and faced her mother again. “Um,” she said. “Well, Mom, I guess what’s going on in here is exactly what it looks like.” She swallowed as if she was trying to choke down vomit and took another breath. “I…”

  “Hey, Mom. You guys get her up yet?” The sound of Michael’s voice was like iced water spilling down Fiona’s spine. “I’m telling you she sleeps like a rock sometimes.” He appeared around the door frame a second later. His smile fell. “What’s wrong?” He glanced from his mother to his sister, then down to Fiona’s hand resting on top of Lizzie’s. Fiona watched as he put the pieces together. His eyes blew wide.

  “Oh, Michael, honey,” Rosie said, reaching for him, but Michael shook his head.

  “Give us a minute, Mom.”

  “Honey, I think I should sta—”

  Her words were silenced by the door closing in her face. Michael had squeezed right past her and slammed it behind him, barely giving her a chance to move. “What the hell, Fiona?”

  “I can explain,” Fiona said, though she wasn’t the least bit sure how. There wasn’t really anything to explain. Michael had figured it out in seconds, hadn’t he? All there was left to do was apologize. At the same time, an apology didn’t seem right. It seemed like an admission of wrongdoing, and what she felt for Lizzie scared the hell out of her, but it didn’t feel wrong. It was the circumstances that felt wrong, not the want. Not the passion. Not them and what they were becoming together.

  “I think it’s pretty self-explanatory,” Michael said. “My sister, Fi?”

  “I know. I know. I’m sorry, but I can’t help how I feel. It’s not like I was trying to—”

  “Trying to what? Trying to fuck my sister?”

  “I wasn’t trying to ‘fuck’ anyone. In fact, I’ve been trying really hard not to feel anything at all.”

  “Well, clearly, you didn’t try hard enough, because Mom obviously just caught you doing something. With my sister.”

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean for any of this to happen. We didn’t—”

  “Oh don’t. Don’t say ‘we’ like you two are a thing now. Please don’t.” He ran his hands up his face and through his hair, paced for a few seconds, then turned back to her. “She’s my baby sister, Fi.”

  Fiona felt her eyes begin to burn and sting with moisture. Her skin crawled. An awkward, inappropriate laugh sat in her throat like a bubble, waiting to pop. Oh God. Don’t laugh. She hated the way her body responded to discomfort.

  “Stop it, Mike.” Lizzie’s eyes were glossed, but no tears had fallen. Fiona could still see the nerves ticking, the fear making her muscles rigid and skin paler than usual. “I’m not a baby. I’m twenty-six. So, can we please stop with the fake outrage, already? I can’t deal with it right now.”

  “Fake outrage? Who’s faking? I’m serious, and don’t think you’re off the hook here either. You went after my girlfriend.”

  “Jesus Christ.” Lizzie took a breath, blew it out toward her eyes. “She’s not even really your girlfriend.”

  “That’s not the point!”

  “How is that not the point? That’s exactly the point. She’s not your girlfriend. She’s not even into guys. And it’s not like you really care anyway, since you don’t like girls either.”

  “Wait, what?” Fiona looked up, shocked.

  “Or guys,” Lizzie continued, barreling right through the interruption. “Or anyone, for that matter. So, you can be mad that we hid it from you or whatever, but stop acting like it’s because anyone here stole anyone else’s girlfriend or whatever the hell. I’ve got a lot bigger issues on my plate right now than you being mad at me for no reason.”

  Michael’s cheeks reddened. He shuffled in place for a moment, and when he spoke again, there wasn’t a hint of anger in it. He was quiet, his voice now stopped in his throat as if reluctant, as if mortified. “I only ever said that once, Lizzie.”

  “But you still said it.”

  “I was drunk.”

  Lizzie wiped the building wetness from her eyes. “You’re more honest when you’re drunk.” A heavy breath pushed up and out as she plopped back onto the mattress and patted the slim space between her and Fiona. All her fear seemed to leak away with each pat. Just the three of them, Fiona realized, was a balm for Lizzie, whether Michael was angry or not. It was the thought of facing her parents that scared Lizzie most. “Now, can you please stop being dramatic and help me figure out what we’re going to say to Mom? Because I’m pretty sure she’s pasted to the other side of the door, trying to figure out what’s going on in here, and us saying ‘April Fool’s’ about my tongue down your girlfriend’s throat isn’t going to work on Christmas Day.”

  “Ugh, God.” He shoved her over and sat down between them. “Can you not?”

  Fiona wriggled out from under the blanket and on top of it. She wrapped an arm around his back and rubbed circles between his shoulder blades. “Hey,” she whispered, but he didn’t answer. He wouldn’t even look at her. “You never told me you might be asexual. Or aromantic? Both?” He didn’t say anything, just shrugged and kept his eyes on
the floor. “Why didn’t you talk to me about it?”

  He leaned his head against hers. “I’m still figuring it out, I guess.”

  “That’s okay. I think we all are.” She rested her chin on his shoulder. “Are you mad at me?”

  “Yes.” He sighed. “No.” He slipped his hand into hers and laced their fingers together. “Well, maybe a little. It’s just, you know she’s my sister, right?”

  Fiona smiled. “She’s cute.”

  “I am,” Lizzie said from his other side. “Cut her some slack.”

  Fiona smacked a kiss to his cheek. “You’re still my favorite McElroy, though.”

  “For now,” Lizzie said, grabbing Fiona’s other hand from Michael’s back and knitting their fingers together.

  Michael and Fiona lay back, Fiona’s arm stuck under his back and each hand tangled with another. The three of them lay on the bed together, staring up at the ceiling in silence. It was strange but easy, nice, and for a moment, Fiona didn’t even care that they’d been exposed. It was Christmas morning, and she was happy with her beautiful boy and her beautiful girl, and for that one blip in time, that could be all there was in the world. She was happy.

  “So, this is nice and all, you guys,” Lizzie said after a while, “and I’m glad no one’s really mad at anyone, but seriously. What the fuck are we gonna tell Mom?”

  Fiona feared the door opening. In only a few minutes, the room had become their own little bubble, their safe haven, a place where they didn’t have to explain anything to anyone or even contemplate what they were feeling and why. They could just be, be together, be themselves, and not think. But Fiona kept imagining Rosie shuffling impatiently just outside, an angry fire in her eyes, or perhaps just a shock of confusion. When Michael flung the door open, however, they found not only Rosie but the entire McElroy clan, save Lily, Madison, Jessie, and Grandma Sophia, lingering in the hall.

  “Vultures,” Michael said, shaking his head. “Should’ve known.” He looked at Rosie. “Did you really have to tell them everything? You couldn’t have waited for me?”

  Sophie and Grace, at least, had the decency to look ashamed. Brian, on the other hand, defended her. “What’d you expect, Mike? She was worried about you. We all are.”

  “Well, don’t be. I’m fine.”

  “Yeah, right.” Brian leaned past him and looked at Fiona and Lizzie sitting on the edge of the bed. Fiona had donned a sweatshirt over her tank top, but she still felt exposed. His gaze was cutting, then it fixed on his sister. “Tell me you didn’t actually do what Mom said you did.” He noticed their hands then, their fingers tangled together. “You’ve got to be kidding me. Are you serious right now, Lizzie? He’s your brother, and you’re not even gay!”

  Lizzie didn’t bother answering. She didn’t even look him in the eyes. “Mom,” she said, focusing instead on the woman now filling up the door frame, “can I talk to you? Alone?”

  “Sure thing, pumpkin,” Charlie Sr. said, though his wife’s face communicated that she wasn’t entirely sure she was ready to have the conversation Lizzie planned on having. “Let’s go, knuckleheads. All of you. Get.” He shuffled his adult children away from the door and down the hall, but Brian hung back.

  “Come on, man.” Clearly, he wasn’t convinced that Michael was fine. After all, how could anyone be fine after catching their significant other cheating on them with their sister of all people? He clapped Michael on the shoulder and nodded his head toward the hall. “Let’s get out of here. We can take some beers out to the barn. It’s early, but who cares? I’ll grab the space heater from the closet.”

  “Thanks, but I’m okay.” He patted Brian’s back. “I need to stay here.”

  “No, you need to drink. Trust me. That’s the only thing that’s going to fix this shit-show.”

  “Brian.”

  “Just calling it like it is, Mom.”

  “Really, I’m okay,” Michael said with a light laugh. “Really. I promise. It’s not what you guys think. Just go on. I’ll catch up with you later.”

  “You sure?”

  “Yeah. I’m sure.”

  “All right, but I’ll be downstairs if you change your mind.”

  His footsteps thudded heavily in the hallway as he left, both Rosie and Michael watching him go. Michael turned toward his mother. They didn’t say anything to one another; they simply stared. Rosie seemed to have caved in on herself, transforming into something so much less than the larger-than-life, full-of-heart woman Fiona had come to know. Now she stood with her arms wrapped around herself, chin tilted toward her chest, and eyes tormented by something that looked like a cross between anger and hurt. Or maybe, Fiona thought, she was simply confused. It would be understandable. The situation she’d walked in on would confuse anyone.

  After a moment, Rosie took a deep, audible breath, as if preparing herself. Her chest puffed out, her spine straightened, and she steeled herself the way mothers had been steeling themselves for centuries—for bad news, terrifying news, confusing news, surprising news, wonderful news. Mothers had to be prepared for anything where their kids were concerned, especially when they had as many kids as Rosie McElroy did. So, she hardened up her exterior and took a step ahead of Michael into the room. He walked in after her and closed the door, shutting the four of them in together.

  “I thought you wanted to talk alone,” Rosie said, glancing between Lizzie and Michael. She avoided looking at Fiona, a fact which stung, but Fiona understood. She was a potential enemy, a thorn amongst Rosie’s darling little roses, someone she believed had hurt one of her babies, betrayed them. As far as Rosie was concerned, Fiona was the source of the mess fouling up her perfect Christmas morning, and there was simply no forgiving that.

  “She meant the four of us.” Michael crossed to the bed to fill the empty space beside Fiona. She was grateful for his presence, his warmth, because the longer she sat there waiting in the tense, thick air of a quiet room that seemed to be holding its breath, the more uncomfortable she became. Michael motioned toward the chair in front of Jack’s old desk in the corner. “Maybe you should sit down, Mom.”

  “I think I’d rather stand.” All the joy and humor Fiona had come to associate with Rosie had left her voice. She sounded as stiff as she appeared.

  “So you can escape if you don’t like what I have to say?” Lizzie tried for humor, but it fell flat. It fell hard, like a water balloon hitting concrete, only what spilled out instead was all the awkwardness they’d been trying to hold in. It flooded the room and stunk up the air, and Fiona’s skin began to crawl again. It itched and writhed, and all she wanted to do was bolt.

  I shouldn’t be here, she thought. Not in this room or in this house, in this entire state. She hung her head, not wanting to draw any attention to herself. I never should have come here.

  “Mom, please just sit down,” Michael said. “I think it’ll make everyone more comfortable.”

  With a huff, Rosie grabbed the desk chair and dragged it over in front of the bed. The moment she sat, facing them, Fiona was struck with the urge to confess to something. She didn’t know what, because there wasn’t a person in the room who wasn’t already entirely aware of what had transpired. There was just something so very motherly about Rosie’s posture and expression, something that reached in and latched onto Fiona’s inner child and reminded her of all the times she’d sat, as a kid, in front of her own mother, preparing for a lecture or a scolding or for the “opportunity” to admit whatever wrong she’d done and face the consequences. Lizzie and Michael must have felt the same, because they shriveled beside her until Fiona imagined the three of them appeared like moping dogs who’d gotten into something they shouldn’t have.

  “Well?” Rosie said after a pregnant pause. She looked expectantly at her kids. “Someone’s going to have to start talking. Michael? Elizabeth? One of you had better explain, because I’ll be perfectly ho
nest, I’m just about as confused as a fart in a fan factory, and I don’t know which of you I ought to be comforting and which I ought to be lecturing. So, let’s be out with it, one of you.”

  Fiona’s lips rolled inward as an untimely laugh suddenly pushed its way up her throat. She tried to hold it in, but one glance Michael’s way then Lizzie’s, and it burst forth. The three of them laughed together, and Fiona was relieved to see a smile starting at the corners of Rosie’s mouth as well. Clearly, she was trying to make her children a little more comfortable, even if she, herself, was anything but.

  “Okay.” Lizzie shook out her arms, took a huge, animated breath, and blew it out as loudly as she could. “Let’s get serious.” She slipped her hand back into Fiona’s and squeezed. “Mom.”

  “Elizabeth.”

  “Stop calling me Elizabeth.” Her shoulders caved a bit. “It makes me feel like you’re scolding me, and I really can’t feel like this is a bad thing right now. Okay? I’ve wanted to talk to you about this for a long time, and I haven’t been able to bring myself to do it, because I’ve been afraid that this is how it would go. That I’d tell you and you would be disappointed in me or mad and scold me the way you did when I was a kid.”

  “Well.” Rosie’s voice trembled a bit. Her eyes watered. “I can’t know how to react until you tell me. I don’t know what else I can do.”

  “I’m gay.”

  Fiona blinked, a bit startled by the confession, not because she didn’t know it was coming but because of the way it was expressed. All that buildup and Lizzie had just spat it out as if it was a piece of fuzz trapped on her tongue. A moment earlier, it had been locked up tight in Lizzie’s throat, a sticky, painful secret she’d been choking on for years, and the next, it hit the air with a blunt splat.

  “I’m sorry,” Lizzie said immediately after, gripping Fiona’s hand so hard that it hurt. “I mean, no.” She whined and rolled her eyes at herself. “I’m not sorry, I mean not for being gay, but I’m sorry for the way I just sort of word-vomited it at you. I meant to have a little more finesse, but I guess… Anyway.” She cleared her throat. “So, yeah, well, there it is. I’m gay, Mom.”