Sweet Like Sugar

I think her words come out faster than she can process what she’s saying. Zoe always had a problem with not thinking before she spoke. I could count the times she’s mistakenly offended…well…just about everyone on all fingers and toes.

We both freeze. Her hand flies up to cover her mouth a second too late. She reeks of regret. We both do.

“I..uh...I didn’t mean that.” She plays with her hair and looks up as if her pink ceiling fan will have an answer to get both of us out of this awkward situation. “I didn’t mean you were gay…heh…I uh…shit.” She swears under her breath some more.

I am still frozen in fear. This was a nightmare come to life. It was like the horrible sinking feeling you got while falling, except it didn’t go away. I just keep falling.

“Don’t freak out, okay?” She says it as if she knows my next move already.

“You knew? All this time?” I say trying to follow her orders. It was a hard task to do. Freaking out about things was in my nature.

“No, I didn’t. I mean…I don’t.” She sighs. “I didn’t know know.”

“So you’re just assuming things about me just like everyone else?”

“No I’m not. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that…but Shug…I’ve known you all your life. You can’t expect me to not know these things about you.”

“Uh...yes I can. That is a completely acceptable thing to expect. What does knowing me your whole life have to do with it? This never even crossed my mind until a few weeks ago.”

“I said I was sorry oka-…wait…never. Not even once?”

“Zoe…” I whine.

“Sorry. I don’t get why you’re upset. Didn’t we just rip the bandaid off? Aren’t you supposed to feel better now?”

“No. I’m upset because…because….” Why was I so upset? Maybe it was because I thought I had a some control over this thing. But hearing her say it made me realize how much I just couldn’t control something like this. At least not for long. Not in this town. Peeps knew. Zoe knows…Luke suspected it.

There was no way of telling who else would know? I should’ve known there were no such things as secrets in Timbercreek.

“You don’t know what it feels like.” I think this without realizing I’ve just said it aloud thus leaving myself vulnerable to her.

“Okay.” She responds. “That’s fair. I don’t, but-“

“But what? That’s it, Zoe. That’s the bottom line. You don’t know and you never will. And we’ll never connect on this and you and Peeps and Mom and Dad or whoever else will say that everything’s okay, but in reality, in the real world that’s not happy lovely gay land where no one ever gets hurt for just being themselves, nothing is ever okay. ”

I don’t even realize that I’m crying until I feel a tickle on my cheek. Before this moment, I hadn’t fully realized how scared I was of coming out. And now, like Zoe said the Band-Aid had just been ripped off. I have to face , I can’t keep running from it.

Jesus. Pull it together.

“That’s not true.” She crosses her arms; her persona getting darker. “You know that’s not true.”

Before I can respond to her I hear our mom calling from downstairs for dinner. Both of us stand still not wanting to leave first; not wanting to lose.

She calls for us again.

“Whatever.” I sigh. “Just…don’t tell anyone okay?”

“Shug…”

“Promise me you won’t tell!”

Her shoulders drop. “Fine. Whatever.” She roll her eyes and shoos me away.

Mom calls again, this time threatening to come up the steps and drag us both down herself. I leave the room first and Zoe doesn’t mention it again.

I make sure that my face is completely dry before I reach the bottom of the stairs. This does not throw off my mother. She gives Zoe a look and Zoe returns a shrug. That was her way of keeping our promise. Thankfully she does not ask me what is wrong. If she would’ve, I don’t think I’d be able to keep it in. I’d cry all over my pasta salad.

Dinner is silent. That is until Dad starts talking about his day. I am trying to pretend like I’m interested because I don’t want them to notice how much my hands are still shaking. I don’t make eye contact with Zoe at all, though I can feel her eyes burning holes in me.

Halfway through my dad’s story, the doorbell rings and both of my parents immediately turn to Zoe.

“What? I didn’t invite anyone over.” She shrugs as my dad gets up to answer the door.

We all listen from the table.

“Oh Finn. What a pleasant surprise.”

“What?” My fork falls from my hand and makes a loud clinking sound as it hits the floor. I bend down to reach it, slowly, still trying to hear what he and my dad were talking about, but when I raise my head again both Mom and Zoe are gazing at me, Zoe with a smirk, and mom with raised eyebrows.

“I didn’t invite him. Honestly…I don’t even-“

Before I can finish my statement Dad walk backs into the room with a sweaty, dirty Finn trailing behind him, still in his soccer uniform.

“Good evening everyone. Sorry, I didn’t mean to barge in during dinner.” He offers his apologies with that award winning smile of his and Zoe and mom’s expressions immediately change. We lock eyes for exactly three seconds. I bite my lip to keep from smiling.

“Nonsense! Please join us.” Mom hops up and places a plate on the table next to me. “Pull up a chair sweetheart. There is enough food to go around.”

He does as she says and get an extra chair from the kitchen. I’m still trying to process what the hell was even happening.

“Hi.” He whispers in my ear before sitting down and beaming back up at my family. He smells exactly how he looks. His uniform was covered in dirt stains that probably drove my dad insane. There was a small piece of grass in his hair that went unnoticed.

He and my family start talking about his game but I don’t listen. That stupid little piece of grass keeps bothering me. What was he doing to get so dirty? Did someone push him down? How did he play?
Aggressively or clear headed? Did they win? By how many points? Who was there to cheer him on? Peeps? His dad? I should’ve been there. I should’ve been there rooting for him.

“Shug.”

“Huh?” I’m snapped back to reality by Zoe’s voice across the table.

“You’re staring.” She states.

Everyone is looking at me now and I look back to the piece of grass that had entranced me and pull it out of his hair.

“Sorry….that was bothering me.” I hold it up to show him, then flick it to the floor.

“Oh” He chuckles. “Yeah, I’m kind of a mess right now. Thanks.”

For the second time today we share eye contact but this time I don’t look away.

“So Finn…” My Dad pulls his attention away from we and I look down at my half eaten dinner, too afraid to look anywhere else. My face was probably as red as the tomato sauce that stained my plate.

For the rest of dinner, the conversations are steady and mostly about Finn. My parents ask him about his plans for high school and Zoe gives him some advice. They talk about his love for sports, they talking about his dad and his job and somehow we wander into talking about his mom.

“It was very sad. We were all very pained. I went to high school with her you know. We were all so happy when she moved back….it’s a tragedy really.” My mom explains as we all pay attention. I didn’t even know they knew each other. I didn’t know his mom grew up in this town.

“Yeah.” He pushes his food around on the plate and doesn’t look up.

“She was an artist right?”

“Yes mam, she was.” I can tell it’s was paining him to keep talking about her so I hop in.

“I’m thinking of taking art classes in high school.”

Everyone switches their focus to me yet again.

I continue. “I was looking at all the electives the high school offers and they have a pretty good visual arts department. I never knew that. I’ve never actually had lessons so...it’d be cool I guess.”

“Albie’s drawing me a picture right now.” Finn perks up. “It’s really why we’ve been hanging out so much. Have you shown them yet?”

“No he hasn’t.” My mom answers for me, pretty surprised. “He never shows us anything. He’s really shy when it comes to his drawings, you know. I’m surprised he’s even doing that for you.”

“Yeah. He must really like you.” Zoe adds on while smirking back and forth at Finn and I.

I want to strangle her.

“I guess I’m pretty lucky then.”

He glances at me and I stuff my face with the rest of my meal and smile back with my chipmunk sized cheeks and pasta falling out of my mouth, hopefully distracting everyone from how red I was sure my face was by now.

What the hell was he trying to do to me?

“Don’t be gross, Sugar.” Mom snaps.

“Orrray(Sorry)” I mumble.

Finn giggles and I feel his cleats brush against my bare foot under the table. I catch my breath and inwardly swoon.

This boy is trying to kill me.
--
After dinner my Dad informs Finn that he can’t stay any longer because Zoe and I were still grounded for getting in a fight earlier. He politely understand and thanks my mom for her delicious meal. She responds by telling him he can come over any time he wanted.

I offer to see him out. We have five minutes to talk alone and say goodbye before I have to come inside and officially start my week of isolation. We spend the first two minutes gawking awkwardly at each other, looking away too soon, and smiling at absolutely nothing.

“Sorry I didn’t come to your game.”

He shrugs. ”It’s probably better that you didn’t. We got our asses handed to us by the other team.
Coach is pissed so we’ll probably have extra-long and intense practices now. There goes my summer.”

“Maybe I should try out for the team too.” I say just to keep talking.

“You should…we’d be able to see each other more often.”

“I’d die.”

“As if I’d let that happen.”

Silence takes over in the conversation again and I feel his hand brush up against mine. Just like when we were in the field together. Just like a tonight at dinner. I take a deep breath and look around to see if anyone is watching. If this is some kind of ongoing joke he keeps doing that everyone else is in on except me. But all I see are empty streets lit up by the yellowish colored lamps that travel down the road. I lean against my front door an exhale.

I want to ask. What is this? What does this mean? Do you know what you’re doing to me?”
But I don’t. I just keep quiet. I don’t want to scare him away. Or get scared away myself. He doesn’t brush hands with the other boys. They don’t get his small embraces like I do. This was something. I wasn’t going crazy.

He hooks his index finger onto mine and I can feel my heartbeat in my ears.

“I gotta go soon.” I breathe out.

He’s no longer looking at me but at my lips. Either I was imagining things or he was leaning into me.

Everything was all happening too fast. I could feel myself getting cold feet.

“I-I won’t be able to see you all week so...”

“…”

“What are you…” I nervously laugh.

He gets closer and I can feel his breath now.

“Finn…stop.” I whisper glancing down at hips lips and tensing up.

He does. He just stops, inches away from my face and we share our final few seconds of eye contact.

He takes a step back rubbing the back of his neck. “Sorry…I-”

“Goodnight.” I say before rushing inside and closing the door behind me. I pause…and breathe.

“Everything okay?” Mom calls from the living room as I walk past on my way up stairs.

I lie. “Yeah…everything’s fine.”