I go to Comic Book Asylum when they reopen for business on January 2. I head straight to the counter before I’m tempted to spend the gift card on some comics I’ll never find in the dollar cart. I catch up with Stan about his holidays and then ask, “Could I get a monthly subscription for The Dark Alternates?”

“Have you read the first yet? It’s epic, bro. When that tornado destroyed their headquarters I lost my head.”

“That was my friend’s favorite part too,” I say. He rings me up for the New Year’s promo and it comes out to twenty-four dollars. I use up the entire gift card and pay the difference. “So there are seven issues, right?”

“The magic number. Once a month.”

I have six more comics to read with Collin.

Awesome.

I’ve been throwing myself into a new project lately to distract myself from several things, like Kenneth’s death, Kyle’s distance from all of us, and my guilt over playing Genevieve. It’s a comic book about a hero I’ve made up, Sun Warden. I once had this dream where I was so hungry I ate the sun and my bones were really hot, but I didn’t blow up or melt or anything like that. Seemed like a decent enough idea. I think once I finish the comic, I’m going to give it to Collin as a gift.

(AGE SIXTEEN—FEBRUARY, FIVE MONTHS AGO)

“Aaron, you can tell me anything.”

I’m sitting across from Mom in her bedroom, and my heart is pounding like crazy.

“Since you were a kid, I’ve told you this. Remember when you didn’t want to tell me that—”

“I like guys, Mom.” I spit out the words. I stare at dirty laundry on the floor. “Sorry. I just . . . yeah.”

She steps to me and lifts my chin, but I still don’t look at her. “Baby, there’s nothing to be sorry about.”

“I’ve, you know, lied and been a dick,” I say. She holds my hand and I almost start crying what Collin would call little-bitch tears because guys don’t cry. “I can go stay somewhere, I don’t know where, but somewhere if—”

“Aaron Soto, you are going nowhere. Not until college. Then you get your ass out of here, graduate, get a job, and pay me back all the money I’ve spent on you since giving birth.” She smiles and I force a smile back.

“So, what? You going to tell me you always knew or something like that?”

“I’m better than that, my son.”

“Thanks. I owe you one.”

“You owe me about a million dollars, but that’s beside the point. I’m happy you’re ready and you seem okay with it. That’s always been my biggest worry, that you wouldn’t understand it.”

I know what she means. I’ve been hanging out less with Brendan and my friends, and they’ve seen me crossing the street to meet with Collin. He does come over and hang sometimes, but I try to keep Collin all to myself for the most part. I just know they won’t be so accepting of what we’re doing, and everyone’s mood has been off since we lost Kenneth.

“Is there a young gentleman in your life?” Mom asks.

“Yeah, but I bet you’re playing dumb and already know it’s Collin.” I talk about him enough. When someone makes you happy, it’s pretty impossible to cage the excitement.

She sits down beside me on the bed where we all slept together until I was thirteen, before I moved out into the living room with Eric to sleep in our own beds. “Do you have a photo?”

“I’m sixteen, no shit I have a photo.” I scroll through my phone’s photo album with Mom looking over my shoulders. We slide past a picture of me with Genevieve.

“So I take it you and Genevieve aren’t actually dating then, are you?”

Telling Mom was one thing. Telling Dad is another.

He’s in the living room smoking and watching what he claims is a very important Yankees game. It’s in the ninth inning and the teams are tied. I consider backing out, maybe waiting another week or so, but maybe he won’t actually care when I tell him. Maybe all that stuff he said when I was younger, about never acting like a girl or playing with any female action figures, will go away once he realizes I am the way I am without any choice. Maybe he’ll accept me.

Mom follows me into the living room and sits down on Eric’s bed. “Mark, do you have a minute? Aaron has something he wants to talk about.”

He exhales cigarette smoke. “I’m listening.” He never looks away from the game.

“Forget it, we can do it another time.” I turn around to go back into my parents’ room, but Mom catches my hand. She knows I may never feel ready to do this, that I may keep finding excuses to push this off until long after my dad is gone, and then maybe I’ll go to his grave and come out. But the time has to be now so I can feel as comfortable in my home as I am chilling with Collin.

“Mark,” Mom says again.

His eyes are still on the TV. I take a deep breath.

“Dad, I hope you’re cool with this, but I sort of, kind of am dating someone and . . .” I can already see him getting confused, like I’m challenging him to solve an algebraic equation with no pen, paper, or calculator. “And that someone is my friend Collin.”

Only then does Dad turn toward us. His face immediately goes from confused to furious. You would think the Yankees not only lost the game but also decided to give up and retire the team forever. He points his cigarette at Mom. “This is all your doing. You have to be the one to tell him he’s wrong.” He’s talking about me like I’m not even in the room.

“Mark, we always said we would love our kids no matter what, and—”

“Empty fucking promise, Elsie. Make him cut it out or get him out of here.”

“If there’s something about homosexuality you don’t understand, you can talk to your son about it in a kind way,” Mom says, maintaining a steady tone that’s both fearless for me and respectful toward Dad. We all know what he’s capable of. “If you want to ignore it or need time, we can give that to you, but Aaron isn’t going anywhere.”

Dad places his cigarette in the ashtray and then kicks over the hamper he was resting his feet on. We back up. I don’t often wish this, but I really, really wish Eric were here right now in case this gets as ugly as I think it might. He points his finger at me. “I’ll fucking throw him out myself.”

My mom guards me.

Dad wraps his big hands around her throat, shaking her. “Huh, you still think he’s making the right choice?”

I run over, grab his TV remote, and hit him so hard in the back of his head with it that the batteries pop out. He shoves my mom into the intercom phone and she falls to the floor, desperately trying to catch her breath. Before I can check on her, my dad—the man who fucking played catch with me—punches me in the back of my head, and I crash into a tower of Eric’s used games. He drags me by my shirt collar and leaves me outside the apartment door. “I’ll be damned if I’m alive the day you bring a boy home, you fucking faggot.”