Being Kalli(69)

I smile openly then and for the whole of forever we stare at each other. I can’t wipe it, can’t think of anything, swept up in this light-headed feeling. I slide my hands up his forearms, feeling his sinewy muscles tense at my touch. “Fuck, I missed you,” I say, when my fingers separate to grip around the inside of his elbow, around the top of his forearm, and my lips a whisper away from his ear.

“Me too, baby.”

Here, I’m wondering why neither of us had the balls to just see each other face-to-face.

“Hey, Nate!” Scout barges in and kisses him hi.

On the way to our seats, I nudge her and she almost topples over. We serious-up before getting to our table and sit down. Small talk starts up right away.

Naturally, Scout’s parents are curious why we nineteen-year-olds want to have dinner with her parents on a Friday night. Scout tries to quell their curiosity by saying “to properly catch up and for a small announcement later” which is the exact point our small talk turns into death stares and her mum tries to hide whispers to her husband. Scout’s sister is fifteen and just proud to get an expensive meal for free since her McDonald’s wage doesn’t suffice.

The restaurant is packed. Meals take forever, and at one point Scout’s dad blurts out, “Scout, your mum is having a right old heart attack here waiting to know. You know how she gets. Since we’re waiting, why not just tell us now?”

Of course, there’s not much anyone can say back to that. We’re at our table, at the organised dinner, waiting. Scout draws a blank.

“Um,” I cut in, “I hate to be a pain but my bra clip is about to come undone. We won’t be a sec.”

I know this moment isn’t about me, but I am proud to be subtle.

In the bathroom, I show Scout some deep breathing exercises. In effect, it actually looks like we’re imitating elephant trunks swishing, but she does start to calm to a point where I can talk and she hears what I say.

“Vomit.”

“What?” she says, freezing with her hands an inch away from combing through her hair—again.

“It’s like vomit. It’s going to come up, and you don’t want it while you’re running and screaming around like a headless chicken, trying to stop the unstoppable. Just say it. It’s your prerogative, and you want to do this, remember? Think of Steph and you. You both deserve to feel free and accepted.”

“If they don’t? Accept me?”

I answer with a thoughtful look.

I walk back to our table with Scout under my wing, me rubbing a bit on her back. It seems corny but I actually feel her muscles relax by the time we arrive.

I didn’t expect it to happen like this.

Scout rolls ahead so fast I don’t even manage to take a polite sip of my water as she says, “I’m gay. I’m a woman-loving lesbian. Steph is my girlfriend. Before you ask, I’ve always been gay. Um, that’s it.”

There’s always one kid in school that doesn’t handle shock well. His mouth will drop as if it’s a hinge hanging on by the last screw. His body will shut down and he’s as good as a non-living statue.

That’s Scout’s mum.

Her dad is animated. His shoulder convulse a little. His hands come up in a defensive, “stay back” stance. And the blinks; he blinks as if he can wake himself up from this dream.

“You’re gay?” Scout’s sister calls across the table.

“What? Uh, yeah, I just said that.”

“So you like girls. And … is that your, like, proper girlfriend?” Her head tilts and she points, but it isn’t directed at Steph—more of a marker of something she’s just realised. “Wait, so you full kiss her and make out and touch each other and shit?”

She shakes away something. “That’s fucked.”

“Holly!” Scout’s mum cries.

“Holly, please,” her dad whispers.

“And you know better than that,” her mum says through grit teeth, leant forward to her ear.

This is what goes on for a while, just banter on Holly’s reaction, not noticing Scout. I get a text, see the name “Donovan” come up and wonder how he got into my contacts or why he’s texting. No one from the table even notices me looking at my phone.

It gets so bad that Nate leans in soon after and whispers, “How shit. I feel so bad for Scout,” and I whisper back, “We’ll get out of here soon. Look at the poor girl,” and still no one notices us.

No one except everyone in the whole damn radius of earshot.

I place my hand on Scout’s shoulder and when she looks, I nudge my chin to where her mum and dad are.

“So,” Scout says with inflected sarcasm. Her tone is louder than needed to reach them over there, yet it takes all three of them a few seconds to look. “So can you stop telling Holly off and say something?”