When Luke and I get back to the condo, I decide to face the music andFaceTimewith her. Luke throws me one of his easy smiles as he heads for the fridge for the infamous snack number two.If he skips it, he’ll be cranky all afternoon and the only thing that helps is if I promise to watchLove, Simonwith him later. Things have been strangely normal between Luke and me since we kissed. But we’ve gotten close. Perhaps closer than I’ve been with anyone since Leo. It feels like I’ve always known Luke; everything about him so familiar to me by now that I can predict most things he says and does.
Like right now, when he’s headed for his snack and I know that in exactly3, 2, 1, he’s going to ask me if I want something, even though he knows I never eat right after practice.
“Bro, you want somethin’?” he peeks out from behind the door to the fridge. See?
“Nah, I’m good,” I smile back. “Gotta call Mommy Dearest back.” I wiggle my phone back at him.
“Oooohhhh,” Luke coos warningly. “She mad?” He mock-shivers and I can’t help laughing.
“Worse,” I chuckle, shaking my head at him as he starts putting stacks of boxes out on the kitchen counter, along with a wide variety of condiments I didn’t even know existed. “She’s…” I trail off because I know my mom’s modus operandi. When she wants something, she starts out sugary sweet, which is the tone of her texts now. “Nice,” I wince.
“Oh, shit,” Luke laughs. “We hate nice parents.” He winks at me. I know Luke has a very different relationship with his parents. They’re coming to the game tonight, and they speak over FaceTime at least a few times a week. I stick out my tongue at him while I murmur, “Shut up.”
We haven’t talked about the kiss. We’ve gone back to how things were pre-best kiss ever.Our routine is the same every day and there’s at least some comfort in that because I don’t know how Luke feels about that night, but I’m a fucking mess. At random times during the day, I find myself brushing my fingers along my lips, recalling the sensation of his soft mouth against mine. The way he hummed into my mouth. The intense smell of him engulfing me, the heat from his body wrapping around me.
It gets even worse at night when my head hits the pillow and the world goes quiet. It’s not that I hate being ace—I’d come to terms with it a long time ago, just like I’ve accepted being gay. There’s nothing I can do about it and if I could, I know I wouldn’t want to change it, anyway. Because then I wouldn’t be me. No, being ace is who I am. But that doesn’t mean that it isn’t a lonely place to be some days. When the talk centers around hookups and sex in the locker room, I feel like I’m on the outside looking in. I know that according to statistics, I’m hardly the only ace person I know, but it’s still something very few people actually talk about. There’s still this underlying notion it’s unnatural to not want sex. That there’s something wrong with you.
After I broke up with Leo, I started going to an ace support group down at the community center and it helped me a lot. Although all of us identified as ace, we were still very different and at various stages of coming to terms with being ace. It helped to talk and listen to people who were going through the same turmoil as me. It made me feel less alone and lesswrong. Maybe I need to find a group in Aurora if there is one. Maybe there’s one in Denver. After kissing Luke, old feelings ofinadequacy and doubt have started surfacing, and I don’t need that right now, not when things are finally going my way.
The thing is, when I lie alone in the dark, I can’t help but hope for the first time in a long while. And hope is such a stupid thing. I know that. And yet, people never lose hope, right? It’s such a fundamental part of being human. To hope. And I hope. I hope the reason Luke has never had sex is that he’s asexual, too, and just hasn’t realized it yet. Because I really want to kiss him again. And touch him. And hold his hand in mine. I want to cuddle up next to him when we lie on the couch at night watching Nick carry Charlie into the water screaming from the top of his lungs, ‘I like Charlie Spring in a romantic way and not just a friend way!’ I want to imagine that it could one day be me. Finding someone who’s just right for me. And the more time I spend with Luke, it’s not justsomeoneanymore, buthimI see when the world goes quiet, and I close my eyes.
My phone buzzes in my hand and I shrug at Luke, who’s currently putting together a massive sandwich, stuffing lettuce and tomato on top of a bun that’s already spilling over with turkey.
“Oh shit,” I groan, looking at the screen, my mother’s name showing. She’s going to call the police or the National Guard unless I call her back soon.
“May the odds be forever in your favor,” Luke salutes me, cackling, while I flip him the bird, before heading for my room, Luke singing ‘Let’s Hear It For The Boy’ accompanying me down the hallway.
Leaning against the headboard, I scrub my hands along my face a couple of times, inhaling deeply. When I feel like my heart has settled down enough to keep my voice steady, I pull up FaceTime and call my mom. Of course, she answers immediately, her blond ponytail bouncing from side to side asshe power walks down the sidewalk from our house to what I assume is her favorite juice bar or nail salon.
“Well, finally, hon,” she flashes me a bright smile that doesn’t reach her eyes. I think she’s trying, though, because something weird is happening across her Botox forehead. “I was startin’ to worry about you, baby,” she purrs.
“Hey, Mom.” I wink at the screen, offering her a small smile.
“Awww, look at you, baby.” She purses her lips in a concerned pout. “You look so tired.” And there it is. When she talks to me like that, when she looks at me with concern in her eyes, I can almost imagine that she cares. That she is, in fact, worried about me, Cody—the person. Her son, Cody. But I know she’s not. Genuinely worried about me, that is. She sees me as an investment. I know that.
“Yeah, I’m okay.” I shrug, my fingers toying with the comforter.
“Ready for the game tonight, sweetie?” She jogs across the street, greeting someone in passing.
“Yes,” I reply, trying to keep my voice peppy without a trace of doubt or uncertainty. My mom will sniff it out in a second if I project anything else thanI was born ready!
“Good, good.” She smiles, stopping in front of the entrance to a coffee shop. “You know you gotta look out for that number 10…” she drones, and I tune her out like I always do when she starts offering advice. “You can’t lose focus, honey. You tend to lose focus in the third and that just won’t do against a team…” I nod at the screen. I never lose fucking focus. If I get any more focused, my fucking head is going to explode. From the second my skates hit the ice to the moment the buzzer sounds, I’m the poster child for focus. “… on the 28th. So, you won’t be able to come home during the All-Star Week.” She pauses, looking at me expectantly, a semi-impatient frown between her brows.
“Sorry, what?” I mumble, blinking my eyes at the screen. My mom looks like she’s about to say something, but then she seems to catch herself, plastering a worried expression on her face, smiling overbearingly.
“Awww, you poor thing. You need to rest, honey. Are you gettin’ enough sleep?” She tilts her head, a silent question in her eyes.You better not be messing up our dream.
“Yeah, I’m good,” I offer. “But Mom, you were saying something…” She interrupts me as she opens the door to the coffee shop.
“Yes, baby. You won’t be able to come home during All-Stars. Remember we talked about that? Comin’ home?” I shake my head. I have zero recollection of that, but I might’ve agreed to it during one of my mother’s guilt trips that I’ve forgotten about her, now that my career is taking off. I usually zone out when I talk to my mom, so there’s probably a lot of stuff I’ve agreed to over the years.
“Oh, okay. That’s fine, Mom,” I nod. Thank God I won’t have to go home to Arizona. Relief courses through me. I haven’t been home since Christmas, which was a shit show because Mom’s deadbeat boyfriend dumped her on the 22ndand went back to his wife and 2.5 kids.
“Matt invited me to Cabo,” she nearly squeals. I have no fucking idea who Matt is. Probably her latest in an endless line of boyfriends who promise her the world and all she ends up with is a broken heart and a maxed-out credit card when she goes on a post-breakup shopping spree. My mom doesn’t drown her sorrows in food or alcohol like other people do. She’s too controlled for that. No, she shops until she drops, or the bank closes her card, whatever comes first. That’s her longtime cure for a broken heart. In theory. I bet my mom doesn’t have one—a heart.
But I know the drill, so I play along, telling her what I know she wants to hear.
“Oh, that’s nice,” I offer her a smile that lacks any kind of enthusiasm. Mom doesn’t notice though, because she’s already mentally in Cabo, sipping drinks by the pool, Boyfriend-of-the-Month Matt promising her the world.
