Casey and Daniel seemed to glide through November. Even though they never made it official, they were dating. San Diego was having a mild fall, with the weather switching between perfect, and perfect but with just enough crispness in the air. They fell into a rhythm, between exploring parks and alleys on the mopeds, and Casey’s secret spots that no one seemed to know about yet, the little beaches in Sunset Cliffs, or south of Windansea. The taquerias where the mods met up on their Vespas on Friday nights. They would stash their mopeds a block away, pretending to eat taquitos while ogling the Vespas, and the boys.
Casey almost said “I love you.” Actually, he did say it, but he covered it up with: “and the way you turn without signaling, even in the slightest.” Daniel moved right past it, he wasn’t ready to deal with an “I love you” from Casey. Mostly because he knew he felt the same way and that not going there would be a lot easier. They were both feeling it though. Lifted by the Christmas lights and holiday decorations going up, everything felt romantic, everything felt possible. And even though Casey had covered his slip up, he had heard it himself and in his own voice, he knew it was true. He thought about it that night as they were drifting to sleep on Daniel’s boat, he felt okay with it. It felt like Matt, different though and much more exhilarating, but also safe, and beautiful. Buoyed by that conversation with himself Casey decided that he was going to come out to his family, or at least his parents, or his mom anyway.
The next morning, while they were sitting on the deck of the Ballina eating sausage breakfast sandwiches Daniel had made at the Quonset Hut, Casey said out loud: “I think I’m going to come out to my Mom.” Daniel stopped chewing for a moment, letting the words sink in and having to remember that Casey wasn’t out to his family, which he had seemed to forget. Casey just didn’t seem like the kind of person who wasn’t out yet. “Oh right” Daniel finally said, “I forgot you’re not out.” Casey retreated a bit, pulling his head back a little, “What do you mean? I told you.” Daniel heard the defense in Casey’s voice. He also remembered how scary it was to come out to his own parents. Even though that felt like a long time ago now, he still remembered sitting upstairs in his bedroom and rehearsing the lines he would say. He wouldn’t end up saying anything he had rehearsed, because when he came downstairs, his parents were in the kitchen, and his mom immediately asked if he was feeling sick; he looked grey. He said no, but by that point he was already crying, and his mom swooped in to hug him. As soon as her arms were around him he said “I’m gay,” and started sobbing. His parents took it very well, as these things go, especially considering that they didn’t have any inclination that Daniel was gay. Despite their surprise they didn’t need any time to adjust and accept him. At least not right then, standing in their kitchen, where their not super-emotional son was now sobbing. They would have to go through their own process later, the way most parents and families do. But for now, they just loved their son, as if being a teenage boy wasn’t hard enough already.
That conversation flashed through Daniel’s head. He knew it didn’t always go the way it had for him, he stopped eating and reached over to take Casey’s hand “That’s super brave Casey.” Casey looked relieved, like he wasn’t in trouble, Daniel’s hand helping to melt the defensiveness away. “Thanks” Casey made eye contact again. “Is there anything I can do?” Daniel asked. Casey thought for a second and then smiled while pointing around at the boat and the breakfast sandwich, “more of this would be great.” Daniel smiled and leaned in to kiss Casey on the lips “I’m proud of you Casey Kennedy.”
He told Casey all of the details of his own coming out, and then his friends from high school, and college too, and even a boyfriend. They were all very different stories; different parents, different kids, different endings. Casey was resolved, he had said it, and Daniel was proud, this was happening.
A few days later
Normally, noticing was natural for Casey, especially people’s moods, and vibe; it was more of something that he couldn’t stop from happening. Somehow though, he had mostly missed it in his parents, probably his brothers too for that matter. Deep inside he must have understood that the reality of his own parents not liking him was simply too big and too painful to grasp. It didn’t make any sense really, it still doesn’t, but the truth is they had nearly always felt this way, for the last ten years anyway. Some parents are just bad. They aren’t necessarily bad people just bad parents, to some of their kids and not others. Technically this does make them bad people, just not the kind that their co-workers or friends would notice. And that’s what happened here, to Casey, only he was still largely unaware of this, but it was coming.
When he committed to coming out to his mom, he knew that she would have some sort of reaction but he hadn’t imagined the one that he got. This reaction would cause a crack to appear which would eventually open his eyes to their indifference about him. Really, it was a sour combination of contempt and unexamined disgust, but for now it was better to just accept indifference.
It was 10 am on Thursday morning when Casey sat down across from his mother at their round wooden table in the kitchen nook where they only ever sat to eat dinner. She was trying to look lost in reading, a book on nutritional dieting, before he sat down. He hadn’t noticed her trying to look occupied and said, “You have a sec?”
There was a pause before his mom finally said, “Oh okay,” leaning back and looking up with the expectation that this would stop him from sitting down. She lightly closed her book around a finger, holding her spot. When he didn’t see the cue and started pulling out a chair to sit down, she straightened up almost imperceptibly and then nervously opened the book up again as if to pretend to read. Catching herself she set the book upside down on the table so the page would be saved, the arched binding creating a small barrier between them.
The coldness and suspicion with how they treated him was heartbreaking, fortunately he had always overlooked this, even today. She always felt that something was wrong with Casey, at some point she had begun to think it in her head too. That was a long time ago when Casey was younger, and much more vulnerable than he ever knew. She blamed him for her own wrongness. She also blamed him for the things that had happened to him, that they had let happen, or at least that they didn’t prevent or fix when they found out. Instead, it just confirmed for them that he was broken, and at the very least that it was not their fault.
She would never say this so clearly to him or to herself, that was too on the money for her type of blood. If she had failed this far to miss her son, sensitive but strong, even when he was lost, she wouldn’t see it today either. And because of who she was, it would simply serve to reinforce the one thing she had understood about Casey: “He’s not like the rest of us.” She soothingly repeated this to herself in her head. These would, for the rest of her life, be the truest words she would speak of her son. She would never know him, and he was, in fact, not the slightest bit like the rest of the Kennedys.
Casey leaned in towards the table and rested his elbows, holding up his face in one hand, not to be dramatic but because it was heavy, his eyelashes felt heavy, like his lips and his cheeks, like everything else. He looked at his mom to find some extra intimacy, some comfort he might have failed to notice. She couldn’t really look at him at all, and so when he started talking it was without defense.
"Mom, I'm Bisexual," he said quickly to silence.
"I'm, a, bisexual" he repeated, this time slowing it down and emphasizing bisexual. He was again met with silence, which turned into fidgeting with the book.
"A bisexual" he added slowly.
"One bisexual" he joked, playing with the words as much to break the silence as actually to hear the words himself.
More silence followed.
She fidgeted with her book without looking up, at him, or even like he was in the room at all. Casey on the other hand was completely in the room, in his body, and on the verge of having a moment. Her awkward staring away gave him the opportunity to really look at her; how tense she was, how she was holding her shoulders, every thing about her felt scrunched, how she seemed like a stranger to herself. Her simply manicured hands were cagey and betrayed her heart, she wanted to leave. He suddenly noticed and felt everything. He looked at her with sadness, love, but sadness mostly. Casey generally enjoyed his ability to read other people and give them what they needed, especially when they hurt and doubly so when they were unaware of his awareness. But this read was different, this was hard.
Another moment of silence followed and he was about to break the tension with a joke when she blurted out: "I don't know what you want me to say, I really don't"
Casey scrunched his face a little bit, he felt a warm, "I don't want you to say anything, mostly I just needed you to hear this, for you to know who I am."
He took a breath and hearing himself, a smile crept across his face because he knew that he was about to say what he had really come to say, to speak his truth. Speaking his truth was a rarity for him about his queerness, or anything really, but when he did it was almost always when he was having a moment, it elated him, it was so freeing.
"I'm bisexual. There's nothing you or Dad did to make me this way and nothing you could have done to prevent it, this is just who I am."
He paused briefly to appreciate the respect he had just shown himself. Having a moment allowed this real-time reflection, somehow he could be himself and watch himself at the same time.
"Being a bisexual is weird, and I'm sorry for that. I feel like it would have been easier or something if I could just say I was gay."
She shuddered privately and held very still. He felt like he was looking at her from above and from the future, he felt compassion.
"But I'm not gay. So the net result is that for some random Christmas down the road, probably far far down the road (he laughed, but thought of Daniel) I could possibly, but might not, bring home a boyfriend instead of a girlfriend, might be a girlfriend or probably nobody but I didn't want to wait until then"
"That's fine Casey." She drew up all of the energy she had left, “These are your decisions and your actions. They have nothing to do with this family."
He paused and heard what she said but was determined to continue without reaction or real recognition, which was good because it would gut him when he eventually processed that despicable truth.
"Is that all?" she said with a rippled brow poking up under her bangs and and folding her book back over her finger.
"Almost," he smiled again.
This was really weird, and he felt super good, kind of like he was on drugs, so good that her defensive non-reaction hadn't thrown him.
"One last thing,” he now delivered the hardest part.
“When I was a kid, that is actually until very recently" he made a face to himself now just realizing that it was strange the recent change but he charged forward without an answer.
"Until very recently, you and Dad called gay people fags, a lot, mainly at dinner and at this table, talking about people you had seen or men in the news or the 2 guys who moved out of the neighborhood together. You always used it for people you knew were gay and not just as a nasty word."
She raised her head slightly as if to defend herself but instead just sat.
"It has been very painful for me, especially when I was younger and before I was... or had any clear thoughts of who or what exactly I was, the bisexual thing," he continued as she turned to stone.
“I always knew you were talking about me, even though you didn't know, I did.”
She interjected angrily, "We were absolutely not talking about you. That is a complete lie."
Casey softened a bit and tried to make eye contact, she was in pain, but he had to continue when she wouldn't give it.
"Please let me finish, and I promise this will be all," he offered, giving her a glimpse of the end.
"So, here's the thing, I forgive you."
She scoffed and looked at him, but Casey continued, although a bit coarser.
"See, you were talking about me. I am a fag. Other people have called me faggot outright, in public.”
The pain welled up inside, surprising him, and he reached out for eye contact; for something. He found nothing and instead choked down what was obviously a sob; his mother looked perplexed. Holding a fist over his mouth with his head tilted down and his eyes squinting out tears, Casey gathered himself like someone who had sobbed about this before, he imagined Daniel, he wished Daniel were there.
He paused again but there was no chance she was going to speak next, so after taking a slow breath he finished talking, although these words were really for himself:
"It was uncomfortable for me for a long time for reasons you didn't understand, and that moved from uncomfortable and hurtful to very painful as I, well, grew up, and started to understand myself better. At some point, those damning loops in my head could have ended me, I know. But they didn't,” Casey stalled, taking in what he was saying for a moment before finishing. “I was ok, I figured out how to be ok, and now I am. I forgave you and Dad already, and I love you. That's all I needed to say"
She continued staring blankly at her book and aging hands.
"Ok, well I better get my day started then, I have a lot to get done before your brother comes home" she said projecting herself away.
"Sure,” he replied, “Thanks mom, and thanks for hearing me." He came around the table to get a hug before walking out the back door.
Casey wasn’t sure exactly what his expectations had been but in the immediate aftermath he somehow felt good about how it went. On the surface it was completely fine, and he didn’t want to go any deeper than that. This would make an acceptable coming-out story he told himself. There was no yelling, or accusations, or fighting. Of course, there was also no consoling, no questions, no affirmative statements of love or acceptance either. It was transactional, but the Kennedys were transactional, so it was a success.
The only fault in that reasoning though, and it was glaring, was that Casey wasn’t really like the rest of the Kennedys, he wasn’t transactional at all. Daniel would know this later that afternoon when Casey retold the story. Daniel didn’t bring up how horrible it sounded, he just moved the conversation to his bed and let Casey talk while they lay down and he stroked Casey’s hair and temples the same way his mom had the morning he came out to his parents in the kitchen.
Coming out stories are always fascinating to me. In my case, coming out was a process rather than one event. I came out to myself first, and that took a while, but hormones dictated what appealed to me sexually, so that was helpful. Then I came out to roommates and very close friends. Finally, I came out to my family. So what most people consider "the" event --coming out to our family-- for me it was the last of a series of events.
Thanks Bianca! So true for all of us, so true for our parents and families too