True Letters from a Fictional Life by Kenneth Logan Page B

bed to find that nothing had happened.
    â€œI was reading the town’s online forum this morning,” my dad said suddenly. “There was a thread about bullying at your school.” And then he asked point-blank, “Is Aaron really gay?”
    I glanced at Hawken in the rearview mirror. He made his eyes wide. They were exactly the same color as his bright blue fleece. I took a few seconds to think about my answer.
    Aaron acts gay. He dresses gay. He walks and talks gay. I’d heard that he has declared more than once, publicly, “I am gay.”
    â€œI don’t know,” I mumbled.
    â€œWhy do so many people think he’s gay? Does he have a boyfriend?”
    â€œI don’t know,” I said again. Not a word from Hawken.
    â€œI mean, is he really effeminate? Your mom said he dresses sort of differently from other boys in your class, buthe might just have a different sort of style, right? It doesn’t necessarily mean he’s a homosexual.”
    Neither Hawken nor I responded, but my dad went on doggedly. “The reason I wonder about it is because some people are saying that Mark punched Aaron because he’s gay, right? But how would Mark know? How would Aaron even know? He’s, what, sixteen? Seventeen? I mean, it’s clear that he goes out of his way to be different, and if kids are bullying him, it might be because they feel threatened somehow by Aaron’s decision to flout social norms. But if Aaron blended in a bit more, the other boys might not feel so aggressive toward him, right?”
    â€œI don’t know,” I muttered.
    â€œI’m not at all defending Mark for being a belligerent drunk. I’m not saying that he deserves our sympathy for throwing punches, although I have to say I do feel sorry for anyone who’s messed up his own life for a while, not to mention someone else’s. But I wonder whether Aaron’s sexual orientation makes any difference here. If Aaron were straight and dressed and acted the way he does, wouldn’t he be just as likely to earn your classmates’ contempt?”
    â€œI don’t know.”
    â€œAnd if kids like you two, who dress normally, walk and talk normally, do well in school and in sports, try to makes friends with everyone, if either of you were gay, you probably wouldn’t be a target of violence, would you? I bet, in fact, that no one would care very much that you were gay. Theywouldn’t feel like you were challenging them, the way that Aaron seems to.”
    â€œIt’s true,” Hawken finally chimed in. “I don’t think anyone would care that much if one of us were gay.” He uttered those last words uncomfortably slowly. We made eye contact in the rearview mirror again, and I felt like I could read his mind: Tell him . I scowled just enough for him to see, and he put his forehead on the cold window. I wanted to do the same thing.
    â€œSlow down, James.”
    Glancing at the dashboard, I saw that I was doing seventy-five. I slowed down.
    If I’d been alone with my dad in the car, I wondered, would I have taken the chance to open up? Would I have found the guts just to start talking and say, Well, as a matter of fact . . . I wondered if Aaron had told his mom. I mean, unless his mom’s brain-damaged, the news wouldn’t be a big surprise to her. He could probably just say, “Mom, I’m gay, and also I need more glitter nail polish.” He wouldn’t be turning her world upside down.
    â€œIt must be hard for Aaron’s parents,” my dad mused.
    I looked back at Hawken. He frowned and sat up straight. “His father’s not in the picture,” he said. “I think his parents are divorced.”
    â€œRocket Man” by Elton John came on the radio just then, and my hand collided with my dad’s as we both lunged for the dial. He cracked up. My brother Luke used to play that tuneon the piano so often that my dad