Page 87 of The Photograph

Ugh. The last thing I want to do is go back. I’m kind of done with the covering up and pretending I’m not gay, but worry burns through me at what might happen to my sisters, what Dad is capable of.

“You still outnumber them,” I say.

“It doesn’t feel like it. You’re a guy, Alex. You could hit him back if you wanted to, take him on. Hannah’s stammer has come back.”

Oh shit. It took her years to get that under control.

“You don’t have to live there, you know.”

“And leave Mom to his rages? I can’t do that to her.” Her voice hitches and breaks, and an ache starts in the back of my throat.

“It’s okay, Becs.”

“You see why I can’t get anything for you? What would he do or say if he found me taking a whole bunch of your things out of the house?”

I could go back and collect my own clothes, let things calm down and go and see them.

“Don’t worry about it, Becs. I don’t want to put you in that position,” I say. “I’ll come back at some point and pick up some stuff.”

“Please think about coming home, Alex. Even if it was just short-term. We need you.”

33

DES

“Ishould go and visit my family this weekend,” Alex says on Friday morning three weeks into our idyllic living-together experiment. Shoveling another spoonful of yoghurt into my mouth, I eye his damp hair over my bowl.

We go to the gym at 6:30 a.m. every day now, and it’s become my new favorite regime because seeing Alex sweaty and spent after a hard workout makes me want to drag him back to bed and wear him out in another way. Before Alex, I did my exercise in the evenings to decompress after work, but his forcing me out of the apartment each morning has made me calmer and more motivated.

Over the last few weeks, he’s had some difficult conversations with his sisters about what’s been going on at home, but he hasn’t mentioned talking to his dad again. I’d bet my life that someone forced his dad to come around and apologize. There was no remorse when he came to visit, and he’s been suspiciously quiet ever since.

“Any news on your dad?”

“Apparently, they’re praying.”

“What?”

“For God to deliver my soul.”

“Who told you that?”

“Becs.”

“The accountant with the secret craft business, right?”

He nods.

“It’s great you’re speaking to your sisters.”

He shakes his head. “I’m surprised after what happened with Tom. Hannah and Becs ignored me for two weeks. Hannah said afterward that I’d humiliated the whole family. No doubt parroting what my mom and dad were saying. Rachel intervened to sweep it all under the rug. She said a lot of things to my parents like how it didn’t mean anything, that it was normal to experiment, although I think she knew.”

“Hannah and Becs … are they more conformist?”

“Yeah, they are.”

“And did you ask Rachel to intervene?”

“No, she just stepped into that role. Because I’m the youngest, she and Cara have always looked out for me.”

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