“It’s ’cause she has…those feelings,” Kira says. “It shows up in her hair.”
“What feelings?” I’m impressed at the way Kira is already inventing lore for characters she barely knows.
“She has hot pink feelings.”
“Hot pink feelings?” I repeat. Is this a Gen Alpha saying?
“Yeah. Like…you know.” Kira moves her hand around in a way that provides zero helpful context.
But intuitively, I know that there’s only one subject you canindicate by playing coy with the vaguest possible hand gesture and still have the other person understand.
“Like…boyfriend-girlfriend?” I say, because it seems like the safest term.
“No,” she says. “Because sometimes it can be boyfriend-boyfriend. Or sometimes they’re lesbians. There are a lot of lesbians in this story. So many.”
“You’re absolutely right.” I nod rapidly, silently scolding myself for defaulting to heteronormativity in front of an impressionable child.
Kira continues. “You know how animals mate?” I’m terrified that she has just used the termmate.“And then they have a baby?”
“Uh-huh,” I say cautiously.Tread carefully.
“It’s kinda like that.”
I try to stop my face from re-creating the grimace emoji expression.
“She likes someone?” I pause. I’m sweating, because this conversation seems so dangerous. “Like,like-like?”
Kira rolls her eyes at me and I feel like such a loser. “No, like…hot pink feelings.”
“Oh.” I nod. “Cool. I get it.”
I don’t getit.
“Are you my dad’s girlfriend?” she asks. And I need to be clear about this: despite the question mark, it’s not an inquiry. It’s an accusation.
And I’m frozen. I look down at the comic book in my hand.
Should we have talked about this? Why hasn’t any permutation of Nick, Kira, and me talked about this? I feel a pang of anger toward Nick for putting me in this position. I shouldn’t be the one to address this with her! I don’t know how to explain this to a kid! I’m sweating just talking about fictional characters.
The longer she stares at me, the more obvious it becomesthat there’s something I don’t know how to say. Kids are actually so intuitive. They haven’t built up the layers of bullshit that keep adults from seeing the reality of a situation. And I know that’s what’s happening right now.
“Maybe it’s something we can all talk about—”
“I don’t want my dad to cheat on my mom.”
“Oh.” I sit with that statement. “That’s totally reasonable. I was nervous about my mom or dad dating other people when they got divorced. I was afraid that if they spent time with a new person it would mean I’d be less important. The thing about parents is that they don’t run out of space in their hearts. You know how some families have, like, two or three kids, or more? The parents love all those kids, right? It’s kind of the same when a new person comes into your life. My mom loves me because I’m her daughter, and for a lot of my life it was just her and me in our house together. But a couple years ago, she met Perry, and now she loves them, too. And the three of us live in this apartment and it’s okay. She loves me the same amount. People’s hearts are stretchy.”
Kira looks back down at her paper, contemplating something.
“Do you want to have a baby?” she asks finally. Her skill at pivoting conversations is unmatched. I have whiplash.
“I’m too young to have a baby!”
Kira’s face scrunches up. “No, you’re not.”
I try not to feel wounded by this reaction. I regret not investing in more skin care products.
“My dad’s too old to date,” she says. “Kissing people when you’re that old isew.”
