Page 24 of Unfix Me

West turned to me expectantly. I shifted a little. Kai still had his head on the table, but he was leaning on his cheek with his face angled toward me.

Fuck me.

“Yeah, would suck,” I said, grimacing when I stumbled over the words. “So, you’re both… gay.”

West laughed. “No, just Kai.”

“Oh. Kasey said she saw you kiss a guy.”

“That was me,” Kai mumbled. “West assaulted me.”

I’d never met anyone like this group. West and Brooks were straight, but they so easily made comments about how attractive Kai was. West kissed him like it was nothing. I didn’t know how they did that without feeling wrong. All it took was looking at a guy for too long and I would be overcome with shame.

Something twisted in my stomach, but it wasn’t the feeling I’d become familiar with. It was akin to jealousy. These people were so comfortable with who they were and they lived unapologetically. I had no idea what that was like. I couldn’t do that for fear of losing myself to myurgesagain. Like before Camp Dumont. Like with Travis. My dad would look at me in the way that made me want to hide or run away.

Feeling awkward, I went back to my phone. There was a text from Kasey asking if I wanted to hang out tonight. She sent it a few hours ago and I still didn’t know what to say. I liked her, but I also wasn’t sure if I wanted to pursue anything. Dating just felt like work and with everything on my plate, it wasn’t a good idea.

The phone buzzed and I pulled down the notification bar to look at the message so that it wouldn’t show that I read it.

Dad:I made you an appointment for Friday. Mr. Hamilton is excited to meet you.

What the hell?

Swinging my legs over the bench, I left without a word. When I got outside, I punched the call button and held the phone to my ear.

“Hey, Sen,” Dad answered. “How are classes?”

“What the fuck, Dad?”

“You better watch your mouth. What is wrong with you?”

His tone immediately had me second-guessing myself. After a moment, I shook my head and reminded myself why I was angry.

“You can’t just schedule things for me and demand that I go.”

“You want to go. That’s what you told Mom.”

“No, I didn’t. I said I’d look at it. If I decide to go, I’ll call the guy.”

There was silence on the other end. It made me more nervous than if he yelled at me.

“You need to calm down,” he said after a minute. “Just go on Friday and see how you feel about it.”

“I don’t want to go.”

“What’s going on with you? You’ve been there a week and you’re already acting different. I knew this was a bad idea.”

“Just stop,” I sighed. Suddenly feeling exhausted, I leaned back against the building. “Stop worrying about me so much. You act like I’m gonna fall off the deep end as soon as I’m out of your sight.”

“We’re worried about you, Seneca. Your mother was in tears last night over it.”

In tears? Really? I had a hard time trying to feel bad. I hadn’t given them a reason to worry.

“Dad, I don’t want to go. I don’t need constant reminders.”

“It’s a sickness, son. Maybe you need a refresher sometimes. It couldn’t hurt and it would make us both feel a lot better.”

My eyes burned, whether from anger or something else, I wasn’t sure. I wondered if it would be like this forever- me always having to actively fix my thoughts and them worrying endlessly. It was so exhausting.

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