Page 457 of Seasons of Love
“No.”
“A carnival.”
“No.”
“Karaoke.”
“No.”
“This is going to be the most boring party ever,” Zak said, turning over on his beach towel to face me.
“You’re forgetting that I don’t want a party.”
“Bah, everyone wants a party. What are you going to tell your grandchildren when they ask you what wild things you did in your youth?”
I looked at him with a raised brow.
“Oh yeah, I forget you’re fucking two guys. Can’t get wilder than that. Although you might not want to tell your grandchildren that.”
I laughed. “Can we stop talking about my grandchildren and focus on this thing you want to plan? Why can’t I just have a bunch of friends over, grill some steak, have drinks, music, and hang out?”
“That’s the daytime program. I’m talking about the nighttime program. Unless you were planning on…oh my god, you were totally planning on sneaking out of your own party to go do the horizontal dance with the boss and the hot writer.”
“How do you know Griff’s hot?”
Zak rolled his eyes. “Social media, you dumbass. Shame he doesn’t have any photos of his husband on his page, but I bet he’s hot too, amiright?”
I grabbed a shell from the sand and threw it at him.
“Now, stop deflecting. I know exactly what you’re doing,” I said.
“What do you mean?”
“Come on, Zak, this is me. Whatever is going on, you can talk to me.”
He rolled onto his back and shielded his eyes from the sun with his hands.
“The thing I have in LA tomorrow. It’s a job interview.”
“That’s amazing, Zak. It’ll be great to have you closer.”
“Yeah, well…my parents may not feel the same way,” he said. There was a strange edge to his voice.
“Why’s that? I mean, I know you said they’re a little overbearing, but—”
“I came out to them.”
The way he said it told me things hadn’t exactly gone well for him.
“What happened?”
“It was like I was talking to a wall. I told them I’m gay, and the next words out of their mouth were that the daughter of this woman in my mom’s Shodo club is back home from college. Now that we’re both home, maybe they should invite her to come over for dinner.”
I reached out and squeezed his arm.
“I always knew they wouldn’t accept me, but in a perverted way, I think it would have been better if they’d shouted at me or even kicked me out. I couldn’t have felt more invisible to my parents if I actually were invisible.”
“I’m so sorry, Zak. What are you going to do?”
