11.15

He was gay, and he knew it. He had known it for years, but knowing something and telling his disapproving parents about something are totally different things. Some days, he tried to bring it up, sideways, so they would have to talk to him about it.
"Hey, mom. Do you know John at school?"
"The dark kid with the glasses? He's . . . fashionable."
"Yeah, that one. He invited me to a party for his birthday, and I wanted to go . . ."
His mother seemed to always know when he was trying to out think her. He could always first smell the faint acrid scent of her anger before he noticed anything else. Then she would speak. "Who all is at this party?"
"Just some guys."
"Just guys? Why?"
Aggressive.
He eventually stopped trying to sidle up to the problem and ran for it full-bore.
"Dad, how did you know you liked mom?"
"Oh, I'm sure you'll find a girl, son. You're a good kid."
"Dad . . . "
"Alright. Well, I had dated a few girls in my time, and I took a shine to quite a few of them. Got into some scrapes over one in particular. Valerie. What a woman. The problem was, once I 'got' her, I didn't know what to 'do' with her, so I ended up 'doing' her, and we had quite a scare when she missed, well, you know. Anyway, turned out that she had no ability to think about it, just did what her parents told her to, and I decided then and there that I wanted a woman who knew what she was. And when I met your mom, well. That was it."
"No, but how did you know? What changed?"
"Everything changed, champ. Why, you got a girl you've got an eye on?"
Of course not.
"Yes."
"Well, don't worry. When you find the right one, she'll come to you."
Worthless.

When he finally got around to telling them, they acted all shocked like it was something they didn't expect. Ticked him off. So he brought a man home just to spite them. Fitz didn't like being used like that, and he left.
Terrible.

He didn't understand how his parents must have felt that night until his adopted son Phillip brought home a Republican friend from school.
Past.