How did I ever think their behavior was normal?
The fact that I was ever used to their thinking makes my stomach churn.
Feeling more frustrated than anything else, I rub my temples, resolving to end this. It isn’t worth my time or energy to keep engaging with my parents, and in the long run, the three of us will be way happier if we part ways now.
“Do you even have a plan beyond driving for twenty hours to shout at me on the street?” I wave my hands, realizing a little toolate that I’m doing so exactly how my mom does, and I stick them into my pockets. “What now? Are you going to kidnap me and shove me into a car in front of hundreds of people?”
I gesture at the crowd around us. Some people are filming. Good for them. They’ll capture my delusional, dumbfounded parents.
Dad crosses his arms. “Your behavior has been nothing short of disobedient and reckless.” He pauses, and I use the last remaining bits of my tact to avoid rolling my eyes in the silence. “You’ve gone againsteverythingwe taught you.”
“Like what? Thatexistingin public was basically a shortcut to hell? That no woman would ever be good enough for Mom’sspecial little boy, to the point where I was forbidden from even thinking about girls?”Or having any kind of sexual thoughts, lest Iacton them.I scoff out a dry, humorless laugh. “Well, you specified a woman, but I found aman,and he’stoogood for me, so I don’t know why you’re so mad.”
Am I poking the proverbial bear? Absolutely. I know Mom’s problem is with me dating and having sex, no matter who it’s with. Add that to her hatred of gay people, and that’s a recipe for pure rage.
Mom points at me, her lips curled into a sneer. “Look, he’s wearing that degenerate fruitcake’s sweater.”
She called Ian awhat?How unhingedisshe? Is that how she’s going to deflect?—
“Grant, our son really is a fucking f?—”
Are you fucking kidding me?
What surprises me is that I’m more insulted by my mom referring to my boyfriend as a degenerate fruitcake than her calling me anactual slur.
“You aren’t wrong,” I say, ignoring her insult and keeping to a monotone. “I’m gay.”
I expect my parents to do a dramatic recoil, but their faces screw up in disgust instead, not that I care.
“And I’ve known since I was fourteen,” I continue. “That wasbeforeI learned about it in school. Oh, and guess what—pulling meoutof school did nothing to change that because they didn’t even teach us what being gaywasby then.” I let out a frustrated chuckle. “Sorry, but there’s nothing that could have changed me. You failed.”
I have enough restraint left in me to not tack on “as parents” to the end of that sentence.
“You have some nerve, don’t you!” Mom raises her hand and jabs a finger in my direction. “Do you even care about how this looks on us?”
“No, Mom, I don’t,” I deadpan.
“Was four months all it took for you to forget everything we taught you?”
Again, no, but it was enough for me to stop caring as much.
“Are you going to say something?”
“Why should I?” I shrug my hands, making both of my parents blink in surprise. “I have nothing to say to anyone who wants to make me hate myself. We’re done here.”
“No, we aren’t!” Mom spits out.
“Yes,we are.” I point my thumbs to the entrance of the ballpark. “Yeah, I’m gonna…like, head out now.”
Wishful thinking on my part, because I don’t make more than two steps back before Mom reaches to her rear and?—
My veins turn to ice.
She unholsters a gun.
Fuck, I didn’t think to check for one on her, I thought she got her license revoked?—
None of that matters. She has a pistol in her hands, and she’s pointing itstraight at me.
