Page 16 of Men in Shorts

“There’s nae lectures this week, just revision period, so I can rest.”

“I ken there’s nae lectures, which is why you should’ve bided here until exams start next week. Are you eating?”

“Aye, my mate Dun—erm, my mates have me sorted.”

“Your mates?” Her voice took on an edge. “Quines, I hope, not loons.”

Brodie bristled. “I’ve male and female friends, Ma. Fit’s the difference who looks after me?”

One of the girls glanced over at him. She gave him a shy smile, then went back to tapping the washer control buttons with a long, pink fingernail.

“Everybody kens, women make the best nurses,” Ma said with a laugh. “Talking of work, I spoke to Mr. Kendrick yesterday, and he says he’s got a summer job for you at the inn.”

Brodie hesitated. He was far too tired to have this conversation, but it wasn’t fair to commit to a position he’d no intention of taking, especially when others desperately needed the work.

“Ma, I’m keen on staying in Glasgow. I’ve applied for student accommodation and a few jobs.” He rushed to continue before she could protest. “If I’m to work in psychology one day, I need experience in my field. Most of the other first-year students are staying to work the summer.” This was technically true, but only because many of them, like Lorna and Paul and Duncan, lived in Glasgow to begin with. “Tell Mr. Kendrick thanks, though, okay?” When she didn’t respond, he said, “Ma, you still there?”

“I am.” She released an aching sigh that made him nervous. “Fit about me? I miss you. I worry for you.”

“Dinna fash, I’m fine. And I’ll come and visit.” His fingers were cramping from tension, so he shifted the phone to his other hand. “But this is my home now, ken?”

“Oh, I ken.” She said the last word with a sharp hack. “I ken exactly fit you’re doing there, with those other loons.”

A chill snaked over the back of his neck.Oh God. She knows.“I-I don’t?—”

“Something was off, I could feel it, the way you and that farmer boy were having a bicker when he was here last week. He was greetin’ like a bairn on the way out the door.”

Geoffrey was crying after their fight? Brodie’s chest went tight with fear and regret. “Has he said something?”

“He’s come out at uni, says Mrs. Baines. Her niece knows him there.” His mother’s voice broke. “Tell me it’s not true, Brodie.”

Eyes and throat burning, he turned away from the girls at the washing machines. “Dinna cry, Ma. Please. Aye, it’s true, but it’s okay.”

“It’s not okay!” she screeched. “You’re up to filthy things in a filthy city, and it breaks my heart.”

He pressed his lips together, knowing if he said one word, he’d explode into tears like a burst water balloon.

“There’s treatments could fix you,” Ma said. “Mind that American preacher who visited last year? He’s coming again Sunday.” She sniffled hard. “He used to be—he used to have your problem, but he’s cured now.”

Brodie’s fury at this dangerous lie gave him the strength to steady his voice. “It can’t be changed. And even if I could change it, I wouldn’t.”

“But why, when you could be so much happier? This is why those bullies in school hurt you, isn’t it? They knew.”

“I wasn’t out then, so they couldn’t know for certain.”

“But they sensed it,” she hissed. “They sensed there was something wrong. They wanted to beat that wrongness out of you.”

Brodie gasped, his stomach crumpling like he’d taken a kick in the gut.She didn’t say that. She didn’t mean that.

He pulled the phone from his ear and stared at it. The photo of his mother from his contacts file smiled up at him as her vicious words streamed from the speaker, words he could hear even over the churn of the washing machines.

With a trembling finger, Brodie hung up. He quickly selectedAdd to reject listfrom the menu, confirmed the blocked number, then set the phone on the floor beside him. He didn’t trust himself not to hurl it against the wall.

From the corner of his eye, he saw the girls leave the launderette, shutting the door softly. Waves of dizziness swept over him then, like someone had lifted one end of the linoleum floor and was flapping the entire room up and down. Brodie lay back across the hard plastic seats again, fixing his eyes on the sprinkler in the ceiling, the one stationary point he could see.

For years he’d dreaded the moment his mother found out for certain he was gay, but he’d often wondered if it would be a relief. He’d expected her disappointment, her pleas for him to change, even her grieving for his soul. All of those he could have handled (probably).

But she’d spoken of his tormentors like she understood them. Like she agreed with them. The woman who’d nursed his wounds with bandages and ice packs, who’d demanded his school do more to ensure his safety—she wished his bullies’ mission had succeeded.

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