I froze, my memories going back to the last time I saw them. It was the dinner on my twenty-first birthday before I went out to the club. We'd been joking about baby names and that if their baby was a boy, he should be named after me.
Everything seemed like it was happening in slow motion. They dropped their boxes on one of the worktops and went over to David. David's eyes nearly shot out of his face when he saw them.
"Uncle, Aunt, what are you doing here?"
Uncle? Aunt?
I felt a hand squeeze mine, but I didn't need to look to know it was Tiago's.
"We've come to help, of course," Teresa said.
My lungs felt like they were being squeezed in a vice, and suddenly, it was too hot in the kitchen. Fortunately, the garden door was behind me. I made a move to escape, but I was too slow because before I could turn, I heard two simultaneous gasps as both my brother and Teresa's eyes were on me.
"Oh my god, Vítor, is that you?" Teresa cried, her hands clasped together.
I couldn't react, couldn't think. I needed to breathe, but it was too hot. I turned to the garden, stopping only when I reached the far wall, damning it for not having an exit to the street. I took deep breaths and leaned on the wall, the cool stone against my forehead.
"Vítor." Tiago's voice was a balm. I turned around and hugged him like my life depended on it. My throat was too tight to speak. What was my brother doing here? Why would he be in an LGBTQ center?
"Vítor, please don't run again," my brother said, coming out of the kitchen and closer to where we were stood.
His words hit a spot in my mind that I hadn't revisited in years. Being in the hospital bed, wondering if my father would carry out his threats as soon as the nurse turned her back. His lies about the causes of my injuries, and his cold stare daring me to report him. And the absolute worst, when he was gone, waiting for my big brother to come for me.
I'd waited four days in which I'd been too unwell to move. Four days I'd spent gathering the courage to tell my brother everything, that I was gay, that my dad had done this to me, and that I was still the same little brother he'd protected all our lives. I'd gathered courage to apologize for keeping something so big from him. But there had been nothing. No visits, no phone calls to the hospital.
The nurse who didn't know who I was, who'd had no interest in my wellbeing other than me making it out of the hospital healthier than I went in, she was the one who'd cared. She'd given me some clothes that belonged to her son and had asked me if I needed money to go to a safe place. That was the one thing I hadn't needed.
As soon as I'd been able to walk out of hospital unaided, I'd walked away from my old life and into my new one. On my own.
"What are you doing here?" I couldn't hide my anger. "Why did David call you Uncle and Aunt?"
"Vítor, David is Paula's son," Mário said.
I looked at David who was just behind Mário looking at me with regret.
"You knew who I was that day we met, didn't you?" I asked.
He nodded.
"Why did you lie?"
He didn't reply or look me in the eye. Behind him, I noticed the kitchen had cleared, and I saw my escape.
I grabbed Tiago's hand and pulled him toward the door.
"Vítor, please listen to them."
I stopped in my tracks and turned around to look at Tiago. I no longer saw the man I'd fallen for. All I saw was the lies, and I was fucking tired of lies. I dropped his hand and left, not caring about the calls from the people behind me or the gut-wrenching sob I heard coming out of Tiago.
