Page 14 of These Secret Years

Surprisingly, it’s only midnight. Since I have my phone out and plenty of battery life, I stand up. “I can go look.” I need to take a piss anyway.

“That flashlight sucks,” Knight says, when I turn on the phone light. “I’ll go with you.”

We’re not the only two getting up to gather wood, but we might be the only two who wander off into the woods in the same direction. I tell him I need a moment to myself.

“Don’t go far,” he says.

I find a tree to pee behind in case his flashlight sweeps my way. It takes a solid minute to take care of my business. I’m used to alcohol, but I’ve had a lot of soda tonight, too.

When I meet up with Knight again, he’s kicked a few larger fallen branches into a pile. He drops the beam of his light to the ground as I walk up to him.

“Sorry about that back there.”

I dare a step closer, into his personal space. “Why?”

He lowers his voice. “I, um…wow. How do I say this?”

I’m curious about how he’s going to say it, too.

“I’m not like the other guys, I guess.”

“Because you don’t have a girlfriend and weren’t all that interested in the Playboy centerfold calendar?”

He doesn’t say it out loud, but he nods.

“Is it a secret?”

Another nod. “It has to be.”

I scowl at that. “Why?”

“Because of football. Because I can’t fuck this up.”

“You know…we’re well into the twenty-first century…”

“Missouri still has sodomy laws,” he informs me.

“Oh.”

“I’m just saying there’s some places even now that it’s not okay.”

“Including football?”

“Especially football.”

“Sorry,” I tell him because what else can I say? That sucks. Whatever I discover about my own sexuality, my life is leading me to LA or New York. Ideally I’ll be in the entertainment industry—creating scores and making music. Eventually, it won’t matter who I want to be with. It never occurred to me that some people might not have that kind of choice. Or I guess they do have a choice—the choice just sucks.

“No, I’m sorry,” he says. “I’ve been up your ass all night, and it’s probably making you uncomfortable.”

I shake my head. “Not because—look. My reasons for being uncomfortable don’t have anything to do with you or the fact that you’re a guy. We all have our own shit, right?”

“Apparently.”

We’ve been listening to eighteen-year-old men spill their guts for over an hour around a fire. No one came into their college experience untainted by life.

“Are you straight?” he comes out and asks.

“I don’t know,” I tell him.