I knew I would always love Gretchen.
What I didn’t know then was that love changes. Just like everything else.
6
OCTOBER
FRESHMAN YEAR OF COLLEGE
2 MONTHS APART
GRETCHEN
“Tell me how this works,” Samantha says while I’m trying to read. “Do you wear a dress and she wears a tux?”
“Nobody wears a tux,” I tell her. “It isn’t a wedding.”
“Do you both wear a dress?” Sam asks.
“I might wear a dress if we can find one I like. I don’t know what Toni will wear.”
I pointedly look at my laptop. I’m rereading the instructions for Boston University’s spring transfer application. The due date is November 1. Exactly one week from today. I need to decide soon if I’m going to apply.
I haven’t said anything about that to Toni. But then, Toni hasn’t asked me about it, either.
“Does she pick you up and buy you a corsage?” Samantha asks. “Do you dance together at the dance? Who leads?”
Samantha is very, very sweet. I have to remind myself of this often, because Samantha asks these questions all the time, and it would be annoying if she weren’t so sweet.
“No,” I tell her. “Toni’s not picking me up. We will walk from Toni’s dorm room to the other side of campus.”
At least, that’s what I think will happen. I haven’t talked to Toni in a while. T always says it’s never a good time to talk on video chat, which I understand given the horrific roommate situation. When I send a text, I always get a reply, but lately when I call Toni’s phone, it’s been going straight to voice mail. Then I get a text half an hour later with an apology saying Toni was out with the guys and didn’t hear the phone ring.
The thing is, I know that happens. It happens to me, too. There’s a lot going on for both of us. A couple of weeks ago I started going out to the middle school in Inwood with Briana to coach their debate team for our volunteer project, and I realized that holy crap, it takes a long time to prep for debate-team coaching, and it also takes a really long time to get to Inwood. Between homework and volunteering and the alternative spring break group I joined just in case I’m still here in the spring, plus all my regular life stuff—going to the gym, hanging out with Carroll, trying to read the news so I have a vague idea of what’s going on outside the Village—it’s really hard to find time to sign on to chat in the first place.
It’s just that sometimes it feels like I’m the only one who’s even trying.
Well, if Toni doesn’t want to talk to me, that’s my own fault. I’m the one who lied.
I shake my head. Subtly, so Samantha won’t see. I don’t want to think about that now. I don’t want to think about that ever.
“Right, right, okay.” Sam’s quiet for a minute, and I think she’s going to let me read. Then she asks, “How do you know how to kiss? Who starts?”
I give up and close my laptop. “Either one of us. Same as with straight people. You don’t always let guys kiss you first, do you?”
“Yeah.” Samantha says this like I’m really dumb. “That’s how you’re supposed to do it. Let them think they’re the boss.”
Considering that she’s wearing about three pounds of black glitter eyeliner, a black leather skirt and dark green fishnets, my roommate is really very old-school.
Carroll is coming by soon. We’re going shopping for the outfit I’ll wear to the Halloween dance at Harvard. Samantha has been fascinated by this ever since I told her I was going. She’s been fascinated since she found out I was gay in the first place.
That was Carroll’s doing. When they met, the first thing he said to Samantha was, “Hey, you’re from the South, right? Will your parents yank you out of school when they find out your roommate’s a gay?”
Samantha thought he was joking. She played along for a while. Then she went online and saw the photos of Toni and me.
She turned out to be totally fine with it all. I think that was partly because this way she got to ask a real, live gay person all the questions that had been building up in her head for eighteen years.
I’ve steered clear of mentioning the word genderqueer, though. I’m dreading a whole new round of interrogation. Plus, I’m still trying to avoid thinking about all that stuff that came up when Toni told me about the pronouns. I’ve done some research, so I feel like I have a better grip on the basics, but Toni’s crew talks about all the nuances of gender day in and day out. Anything I say is bound to sound dumb. It’s safest to avoid the topic altogether.
“Are you going to get a dress with rainbows on it?” Samantha asks me.
I laugh, remembering Toni’s story about the girl who always makes rainbow cupcakes for their UBA meetings. “No way. Carroll wouldn’t allow that. Too tacky.”
“How come you’re going shopping with Carroll? Is he a fashion genius? Like Tim Gunn?”