So he closes his contacts. He opens an app. He decides to talk to some strangers instead.
There are ten messages on his phone, too. He ignores them.
Avery arrives in Kindling, and his nerves crescendo. He remembers everything about Ryan, but doesn’t really know much about him. What if last night was an aberration—what if, in the ordinary daylight of an ordinary day, the feeling of serendipity dissipates?
We called this hopegoggling. The fear that nighttime is really a rose-colored world, and that the morning will show that the things you hoped were happening weren’t really happening, that your heart got ahead of itself. And, let’s be honest, a lot of the time this was true—the force of loneliness was strong, and it swayed us. Or the euphoria of the helium hours was strong enough to lift us into the realm of improbability. The next day, the sugar rush had worn off. The next day, there was very little left to say to each other.
But sometimes—sometimes—it was there. The magic we’d created had remained. Maybe it even grew in the daylight. Because if it could be a part of our day, that meant it could be a part of our lives. And if it could be a part of our lives, it was a magic worth many risks and leaps.
We went through this so many times, but Avery has never felt like this before. He doesn’t know yet that doubt lingers around anticipation like bees hover around flowers. The trick is to not let the doubt intimidate you into walking away. Doubt is an acceptable risk for happiness.
We count down the minutes until Avery pulls into Ryan’s driveway. We count down the seconds until Ryan opens the door, comes stepping outside. Because we know that the best antidote for doubt is presence. Magic naturally fades over distance. But proximity—well, when it works, proximity amplifies magic.
The blue-haired boy smiles as he approaches the pink-haired boy. The pink-haired boy gets out of his car, finds the blue-haired boy waiting for him. They say their hellos. They teeter in an awkward moment. Then they teeter into a welcome hug, a reunion hug, a this-means-something hug.
Anticipation is no longer needed—because the moment is now.
Harry and Craig have taken their last proper bathroom breaks for the next thirty-two hours, twelve minutes, and ten seconds. The cameras are ready to go. Ms. Luna holds a stopwatch. Other friends have gathered. Harry’s parents give the two boys two thumbs up.
It’s time.
Harry leans over and whispers into Craig’s ear.
“I love you.”
And Craig leans over and whispers into Harry’s ear.
“I love you, too.”
Nobody hears them but us.
Then it’s here. Months of preparation, weeks of practice, and years of living have led up to this moment.
They kiss.
Harry has kissed Craig so many times, but this is different from all of the kisses that have come before. At first there were the excited dating kisses, the kisses used to punctuate their liking of each other, the kisses that were both proof and engine of their desire. Then the more serious kisses, the it’s-getting-serious kisses, followed by the relationship kisses—that variety pack, sometimes intense, sometimes resigned, sometimes playful, sometimes confused. Kisses that led to making out and kisses that led to saying goodbye. Kisses to mark territory, kisses meant only for private, kisses that lasted hours and kisses that were gone before they’d arrived. Kisses that said, I know you. Kisses that pleaded, Come back to me. Kisses that knew they weren’t working. Or at least Harry’s kisses knew they weren’t working. Craig’s kisses still believed. So the kissing had to stop. Harry had to tell Craig. And it was bad, but not as bad as he feared. They had built a friendship strong enough to withstand the disappearance of kisses. It was off balance at first, for sure—their bodies not knowing what to do, the magnetism toward kissing still there, because even when the mind shuts off the romance, it sometimes takes a while for the body to get the message. But they made it through that, and they never stopped hugging, never abandoned all contact. Then Craig had this idea, and Harry wanted to do it. Enough time had gone by that when they started kissing again, the electricity was gone, replaced by something closer to architecture. They were kissing with a purpose, but the purpose wasn’t them; it was the kiss itself. They weren’t using the kiss to keep their love alive, but were using their friendship to keep the kiss alive. First for minutes. Then for hours. The hardest thing, when kissing for hours, was staying awake. Focusing. To be connected to someone else, but to be retreating entirely into yourself. Because when you kiss someone, you can’t really see them. They become a blur. You must use touch as your touchstone, breath as your conversation. After many attempts, they found their rhythm. They made it to ten hours one Sunday. That was as far as they’d gotten. And now here they were, trying for more than three times as long. All to prove a point. And maybe it’s all of the hours and maybe it’s the point that’s making this kiss much more intense than Harry had thought it would be. Their lips make contact and Harry feels a charge. It doesn’t rise from the past as much as it’s created in the present. Even though it isn’t what they had planned, he finds himself putting his arm around Craig’s waist, finds himself drawing Craig a little closer, kissing him a little more than the rehearsal kisses. The small crowd cheers for them, and Harry can feel Craig smile underneath their contact. He can feel that smile in Craig’s breathing, in his lips, in his body. Harry wants to smile back, but is gripped by something more profound than a smile, something vast and inarticulate that fills his lungs, fills his head. He has no idea what he’s gotten into, no idea what this all means. He thought he knew. He’d thought it out so many times. But what use is abstraction when it comes to a kiss? What use is planning? Harry kisses Craig and feels there is something bigger than the two of them just outside the kiss. He doesn’t reach out to it—not yet. But he knows it’s there. And that makes this unlike any other kiss they’ve ever shared before. Immediately, he knows this.
Craig is still thrown by the I love you that Harry whispered to him. That is what he’s thinking about when the kiss begins.
Tariq makes sure all the cameras and the computers are working. He makes sure the live feed is working.
Right now, Tariq is the only viewer online.
We settle in. We watch.
Ryan doesn’t invite Avery inside his house, and Avery doesn’t ask why.
“Where are we headed?” Avery asks once they’re both strapped into their seats. “What’s the best Kindling has to offer?”
Ryan is torn. The Kindling Café is easily the best Kindling has to offer. But because of that, most of his school will be there on a Saturday, using the wi-fi and hanging out. If he takes Avery there, it will become a group event, and he doesn’t want it to become a group event, not yet.
So there’s only one destination that makes any kind of sense.
“The river,” he tells Avery. “How do you feel about heading to the river?”
“I feel great about heading to the river,” Avery replies.
Exactly what Ryan wants to hear.
One of the many horrible things about dying the way we died was the way it robbed us of the outdoor world and trapped us in the indoor world. For every one of us who was able to die peacefully on a deck chair, blanket pulled high, as the wind stirred his hair and the sun warmed his face, there were hundreds of us whose last glimpse of the world was white walls and metal machinery, the tease of a window, the inadequate flowers in a vase, elected representatives from the wilds we had lost. Our last breaths were of climate-controlled air. We died under ceilings.
Either the wallpaper goes, or I do.
It makes us more grateful now for rivers, more grateful for sky.
Avery figures they’ll just sit by the river and talk. But Ryan has grander plans than that; he calls his aunt and asks if they can park in her yard and borrow her canoe. She says sure. So instead of heading by the river, they head right into it. It’s a boat big enough for two—one in front, one in back. The current isn’t very strong, and the space between the shores isn’t very wide. They head upstream, not talking much, just a running commentary on the houses they pass, the shape of the clouds overhead. Then they get to a murmuring stretch, a shallow inlet.
“Here,” Ryan says. “A drifting spot.”
They put down their paddles, and Ryan turns his body so they’re facing one another.
“Hi,” he says.
“Hi,” Avery says back.
“I would’ve brought fishing gear, but it’s just so, well, mean to the fish.”
“I’m a vegetarian.”
“Me too.”
A smile. “Of course you are.”
Avery leans over a little, spreads his fingers in the water. It feels good to create a current, however small. The air is light and the water is quiet, the trees bending from the shore to listen to the tiny waves. The boat rocks gently.
“So what’s your story?” Ryan asks.
Avery looks up at him, hand still in the water. “My story?”
“Yeah. Everybody has at least one.”
For a few uncomfortable seconds, Avery worries that Ryan thinks he’s a mutant, thinks he’s a joke, and wants him to come clean. But then Avery realizes from Ryan’s expression that, no, it isn’t about that. Ryan is trying to craft a conversation, and wants it to be a meaningful one. Because what’s more meaningful than a person’s story?
“I can start if you want me to,” Ryan volunteers.
“Sure,” Avery says. “You start.” Because it’s a little safer that way. Avery doesn’t know how he can tell a story without telling the story, and he wants to be sure Ryan was really looking for something that big when he asked his question.
“Okay,” Ryan says. “Here goes.” He takes in an endearingly nervous breath, then exhales the start of his story, telling Avery how almost everybody in his family was born here and how almost everybody in his family has stayed here. His father being the big exception. He left when Ryan was three, and Ryan and his mom were stuck for about five years after that, until she met his stepfather, Don. He’s not that bad, as stepfathers go, but he’s not what Ryan would’ve chosen, either. He’s very old-fashioned about what men do and what women do. Ryan’s mom is fine with that—she likes him being the boss. But Ryan’s not as okay with it. They had two kids together, Ryan’s half-sisters, Dina and Sharon.
“Dina’s really sweet,” Ryan says, “and Sharon is going to grow up to be a monster. She’s only eight, but you can tell. If things don’t go her way, the world has to pay for it, you know?”
Avery nods, and Ryan continues. “So yeah. That’s the background. I grew up here, and I get into fights sometimes with my parents. My aunt Caitlin saves my life daily. Okay, that’s an exaggeration. She saves my life weekly. She totally called it on me being g*y. My mother was too lost in herself to notice, and Don didn’t want to see it, so he ignored it. Caitlin waited for me to catch up to her. I had other things to think about at first—with Don, and then my sisters, and just fitting in to Kindling. Little League, that kind of thing. But eventually I noticed who I was staring at, and it wasn’t the girls. I’ll be honest—it freaked me out. I tried to like girls instead. I really did.”
“How’d that work for you?” Avery asks, letting his voice joke a little.
Ryan mocks up a sigh. “Well … I went out with Tammy Goodwin for almost a year, in fourth grade. Really serious. I mean, we bought each other stuffed animals on Valentine’s Day. That’s practically marriage in fourth grade, right? By high school, I knew who I was. And when I told Caitlin, she wasn’t shocked at all. She took me out on this river, in this canoe, and we’d talk about things. She’s not a whole lot older than me—she’s about to turn thirty—and she’s had about as much luck with guys as I have. She’s the one who convinced me I shouldn’t try to hide. She said hiding never worked. She told me my dad spent so much time hiding that it was impossible for him to be happy here. He isn’t g*y—I guess that makes it sound like he’s g*y. He isn’t. But he didn’t want to stay here. He never wanted to stay here. He just wasn’t strong enough to tell my mom until it was way too late.”