Marked

Sixteen

Parker was going to do it. That day. He had to do it. They were dating now, he wasn't going to be able to hide it for very long anymore. He was going to tell them. He had even said that he needed to talk to them that night at dinner and to make sure that everyone was there. He wasn't going to be doing this twice.

He was going to tell him that he was gay. He had to do it sooner or later, and it was so... exhausting hiding something that shouldn't even be such a big deal from some of the people that he loved more than most of the people in the world.

He was a nervous wreck. And he couldn't even talk to Seb about it. He was still in psych, and it had been longer than a week. He didn't know why he was still in there, just that nobody really knew anymore why he was there. And if his dad knew, he wasn't saying anything to Parker.

He should be giving them space, but he was worried.

He didn't have time to think about that right then. He only had time to rehearse exactly what he was going to say when it came time to say it. He could barely even do that though. How was he supposed to know how they reacted? He couldn't just rehearse the entire scene in his head. He could only think of those two words. Those words that seemed so easy, yet so hard and impossible to say.

He knew his family would be okay with it. But what if they looked at him differently from now on? What if they never treated him the same again? What if everything changed?

***

Dinner came all too soon.

Parker was sitting at his usual spot at the table, next to both of his parents, and with his sisters across from him. He was freaking out. His palms were sweaty, and he was so nervous that he could hardly even breathe. He was terrified.

Everyone got food on their plates, and nobody talked. They knew that he had something to tell them. It was too late to back out now. He had to do it. He just had to.

Two words. I'm gay. Two words. That's it. He thought to himself, repeating that over and over and over again.

"Honey, what did you want to talk to us about? You said that it was important," His mom asked, and he could tell that she was worried about him. He knew her, he knew how she rolled.

"Um... yeah. It is," He said. His voice was shaky, and he couldn't even bring himself to look at any of them.

"Okay, what is it?" His dad asked.

It was so quiet that you could probably hear a pin drop onto the ground.

Two words.

Two words.

Just two words.

"I'm gay," He said quickly. Maybe they wouldn't have been able to hear him, but it felt like a weight was lifted off his shoulders the second that the words left his mouth. "And it's not a big deal, I just wanted to tell you because I met this guy, and he's my boyfriend, and I really like him, and I really wanted to tell you guys,"

And it was silent again. And Parker wanted to get up and leave the table, he wanted to run away so that he could avoid the conversation that was going to follow.

He was staring down at the table, at his plate of food, and wasn't looking at anything else. He couldn't look at anything else, because he was just so scared.

He heard his mom take a deep breath. "Okay. Thank you for telling us... that's really brave of you sweetie, now tell me about this boyfriend of yours. And you better be inviting him round for dinner sometime soon,"

He felt himself smile and look up at her, and she was smiling too. "I will as soon as he's... he's in the hospital right now. Um, psych floor actually. It's nothing bad, just a long story,"

She looked like she wanted to ask some more questions, but she didn't ask anything, and Parker turned his attention to Ellie when she started to say something.

"Is he at least your soulmate? If he's not then you're kinda wasting your time. Okay, sorry," Their mom must've given her a look after she asked her question.

"Yes, he is. Don't worry, I'm not that dumb," Parker said with a grin.

"Well..." His mom said. "Parker, we'll talk more after dinner. Don't worry, it's all good things. Allie, how did you do on your math test?"

And just like that, dinner was normal, which was exactly what Parker had wanted. For things to just be normal. And he was so glad that was what he was getting.