Page 83 of Let's Talk About Love
Oh shit. Holy shit. Cosmic rainbow-colored unicorn shit.
She said it. She came outandshe said it. She told him.
Dr. Burris had been wrong. It was not herjobto be prepared to elucidate or enlighten—it was a kindness. One that she wasn’t 100 percent ready to provide. What if Takumi asked questions? What if he made fun of her? What if he said she was lying or regurgitated any of the other knee-jerk responses she had come to fear?
“Huh,” he said, face neutral. “I thought you were bisexual.”
“I am. Minus the sexual.” She waited, watching him process through her answer. She waited for the judgment, the questions, the confusion, the thoughtful concern followed by the inevitable interruptions. Second by second, it dawned on her that she waited in vain because he was waiting forher. “My sexuality is nope.” She laughed with relief because still, second by second, he continued to wait, to listen. So she laughed again, tiny bubbles of happy that floated out of her. All too soon, she thought better of it. “That’s not a joke. I’m being serious.”
He frowned and smiled at the same time, a curious look that made her stomach flip. “I can tell the difference between you telling a joke and you being happy about something. How many people have you told?”
“Explicitly? You’re number four. Feenie, Ryan, and a counselor I’m seeing.”
Takumi started to speak but closed his mouth and stood up straight, focusing on the counter. Each second he didn’t look at her made tiny seeds of dread bloom in the depths of her soul. “That’s why you’re happy,” he mumbled. He nodded as if he couldn’t stop and sighed before looking at her again. His eyes had taken on a glossy, reddened tint.
“Thank you for trusting me. Realizing that, um,” Takumi said, pausing for a moment, “that hit me kind of hard.”
“What do you mean?” Alice asked quietly.
“Four. Obviously, you’ve been keeping this a secret for a reason.”
She hadn’t been thinking about trust when she told him. Ryan and Feenie had been there when she figured it out (thank God). Dr. Burris had to pry it out of her, didn’t he? And shestillcouldn’t say the word properly to him. Telling Takumi had been a choice—not by chance or out of necessity. It washerdecision, completely on her own.
(She trusted him.)
“I have this list,” she said. “I got it from Tumblr. It’s the thingspeople say when you tell them you’re asexual. I only sort of told my ex-girlfriend, but she still said them. Almost verbatim, like she was reading it off the list. My ex-boyfriend before that? Even worse.”
(She trusted him not to say those things to her.)
“I’m sorry they did that to you.”
“It’s okay.” She rolled her eyes at herself. “I mean, it’s not okay, but I’m okay that it happened now. If I think about it too much it hurts, so I don’t. I move on.”
“Forgive and forget.”
“I didn’t say that.” Alice eyed him. “Believe it or not, I am capable of holding a grudge.”
“I bet it’s fearsome to behold.”
“It is. I’m like a honeybee hive. Cute, useful, but deadly when provoked. Relatedly,” she said, wanting to lighten the mood, “I’ve always wondered if worker bees ever sting someone and immediately thinkI have made a terrible mistakeafter.”
When he didn’t laugh, she rubbed the heel of her hand into her left eye.
“I wasn’t trying to have sex with you the other night,” he said. “And I am so, so sorry if I made you feel that way.”
He was so close and so far away, as if there was an imaginary pane of glass between them. She wanted him to hug her and make the tension go away.
“No, I didn’t think that at all. That’s not why I told you.”
“This should go without saying, but I’m going to say it anyway, partly because I want to, but also because I think you need to hear it. If knowing you’re asexual makes someone see you differently, then they don’t deserve to be in your life. My feelings for you are exactly the same as they were an hour ago. This doesn’t change anything betweenus.”
CHAPTER
27
Dr. Burris sighed for the third time in five minutes. “I’m afraid I’m still a bit lost. Could you please sit and remember to breathe in between words?”
Alice crossed her arms. She told him the entire Takumi story while pacing from the door to the window. “What’s not to get? All I need to know is if he meant it in a good way or a bad way?” Instead of sitting in her usual seat, the armchair, she stomped to the couch, flung her arm over her eyes, and fell backward. “I already know what you’re going to say: ‘I can’t give you the answer you want, Alice,’” she said in a deeply flawed imitation of his voice. “I don’t need an answer. I need insight.” She sat up. “You are the King of Insight, so get to the reigning.”
