Boys of West Denton ✓

chapter twenty

I've begun packing for fall semester already, because knowing me, I'm going to procrastinate till the very end of the summer and then wind up in a panic. But if I get it done now, then that's one thing off my mind, and all the more free I'll be as the summer winds to an end. I'm not making it easy for myself; I'm playing all the old songs my parents and I used to listen to when I was a kid, stuff like "Crayon Angels" by Judee Sill. I'm folding up the green Blues-Clues-looking-ass sweater when my dad comes and leans against my door frame.

"Getting a head start?" he asks, nodding at the half-filled suitcase lying open on my bed. He's wearing his typical dad summer wear, khakis and a polo, a red ball cap on his head that barely contains his curls. I've never been able to wear a cap. I'm surprised he has the audacity to try. I'm less surprised to see the slogan he's proudly worn around town since 2016: Make America Great Again. Sure.

"Yeah." I fold the sweater and roll it into a little log. Saves space. Things you learn when you go on overnight trips for school all the time. "Just so I don't have to worry about it later."

"Smart."

"Thanks."

He watches me in silence. Anticipation crawls up the back of my neck, but I try not to let it get to me. I don't know why he's here, but I feel like I'm going to get interrogated. Usually, Dad and I are chill, but outside of being father and son, I'm not convinced that we really like each other all too much. Finally, unable to take it any longer, I ask him, "What's up?"

He seems surprised I asked, but recovers quickly. Unlike me and Mom, Dad and I are fairly all business, no play. Just right straight to the fact. "Are you...." He clears his throat. Phlegmy. Gross. "Are you seeing someone?"

I force myself to focus on the suitcase. The less eye contact, the better. Maybe. Or not at all. I don't know, I'm kind of panicking.

They say that in an interrogation, you want to stick as close to the truth as possible. And the truth here is that Harris and I aren't so much 'seeing each other' as we're briefly fooling around, engaged in a not-technically-monogamous friendship. So it doesn't feel like a lie when I tell my dad, "Nope. Still single as ever."

"You're not with Saanvi yet?" Dad asks. He pronounces her name wrong, always has—more like 'ann' than 'ahn.' Maybe it's a northern Minnesota accent thing. She's never corrected him, claiming that she doesn't care, so I stopped correcting him myself. It's not my name, and goodness knows she feels comfortable enough with my parents to tell them herself—she's told them plenty of other things. (Although thinking back to The Great Toilet Paper Debacle makes me beyond nervous; that shit gave me borderline-PTSD, I swear.)

Still, there's a reason we do our best to be here only when my parents are gone. Just because Saanvi is confident enough to not back down in the face of my parents doesn't mean that either of us necessarily feel safe here. It's not as if Saanvi can hide her first-generation Indian-American Brownness when she's here. And, as shitty as it is, it's certainly easier for me to be less myself when she's not around; I can hide when it's just me and I can neatly tuck and fold away every loose edge that doesn't work with my conservative parents' image of a perfect son. I can shrink inside myself.

I'm safe at home so long as I'm not too much myself.

I give him a look, picking up another shirt to fold. "We're not going to get together, Dad."

"Right, sure." He sighs. I know, I'm just such a disappointment. Boo hoo. So sad. Why even have a girl best friend if you're not going to play grab-ass with her? "Have fun packing, kiddo. Mom and I have book club this evening, so don't get into too much mischief."

"I thought book club was at, like, three."

"That's the Maple Grove Coffee book club," he says, like this should be obvious. Maybe it is, and my powers of Not Caring™ have grown this powerful. Good for me. "This is the one at West Denton Beanery."

"Oh." Well, at least now I don't have to feel bad about never knowing which one has the book club. I guess they both do. "What was the book?"

Dad shrugs. "'Messy Book People' or something, by Someone Patrick. I don't actually read the books—your mom does, and then gossips with me about the plots. I'm just in it for the coffee. Oh, West Denton Beanery does have really nice wine slushies though."

"Sounds about right for a Tuesday night," I say, instead of Wine slushies? I dunno, sounds kinda GAY to me, Dad.

"Yep." He's already walking away, headed down the stairs. "There's pizza on the counter. Don't add to the population while we're gone. Text us where you are if you go somewhere!" He's already at the bottom of the stairs when he stops shouting up to me and begins chatting with Mom, their voices soft and low. I catch a glimpse of my dad hissing, "No he'd never.... not right...." and decide that eavesdropping isn't worth it. I don't want to know what they have to discuss that quietly.

I turn back to my suitcase. It had felt like I'd been making progress before. Now, I'm looking at the mess in front of me—the assortment of clothes I wanted to get out of the way hastily strewn about my bed, the rolled green shirt in my hand, the mostly empty suitcase itself—and I have to wonder just what I'm doing here. Not just packing. Leaving, I guess. Maybe it's this summer, and everything with Harris, or maybe it's simply the fact that I'm still burnt out from senior year. But, I don't know how much I'm actually looking forward to college.

I don't like that realization at all.

I shove the shirt in my hand against the few that I'd packed before it. Just a few months ago, I'd been so looking forward to finally getting out of West Denton and living how I want to. Do what I want to, be who I want to be with without worrying about judgement from my family or peers. Be my own person. Finally have the freedom to figure out just who that person even is.

Now, though, it's all wrong. I think I might be terrified of moving? Something I never thought I'd say. Although it has plenty of drawbacks, there is a perk of living in Denton—it's impossible not to understand it. Maybe everyone feels that way about where they come from. Or maybe it mostly applies to people from small towns, the ones where you know your entire graduating class, and Main Street is only three blocks long. For better or worse, I know West Denton. Having to work to understand somewhere else is a learning curve I'm not looking forward to.

I don't know if I'll talk to Saanvi about this. She's been preparing to go to college since we were little kids. It started off with tall-order parental expectations, leading into the idolization of Rory Gilmore, closely followed by the high of academic validation. She used to send me dorm move-in vlogs, so long ago that we were using Google Hangouts for our one hour on electronic devices, because we were "too young" for phones. I feel like being nervous for college is one thing that she wouldn't get.

To be fair, I didn't expect she'd have understood the whole Harris thing, but she's been incredibly receptive. Honestly, I'm thankful. The two of them get along better than I had hoped for. What more could I ask? All this college anxiety is nothing in the grand scheme of things. I think.

Also, Harrison has actually been great for me, I'm finding. Saanvi and I go to his house like every night to play board games or watch movies with him and Granny Mac. Last night, she made us watch I Am Legend, because it's "culture," supposedly. Somehow, the kooky old lady has become an integral facet of our hangouts. It's all good. Really, it's all fantastic.

After the party, I've been trying to be more careful around him. I'm not going to bring up that night until he's ready to, but it makes it difficult to know how okay he's going to be with anything. I've resigned myself to follow his lead no matter what, because he deserves that—the bare minimum, really. I'll be okay with whatever he wants to do.

The bare minimum. I can't believe Liam couldn't even give him the bare-fucking minimum. I hate him, I really do. I just can't let myself be like that. Ever. Harris is safe with me—he deserves to be safe with anyone. Just like he makes me feel safe with him.

I toss some pajamas into the suitcase and zip it up. I can't look at this right now.

a/n - i hate calculus <3

OKAY BYE SEE YOU TUESDAY innit