Read Online Femme by marshall thornton - Free Book Online

names. I could call The Bird and ask, or I could go to his apartment and see if his last name was on the mailbox.
    Except, he was going to hate me no matter what.
    Crap. Abandoning him in the middle of dinner. What a shitty thing to do. What would I even say to him if I did have his phone number? I mean, when I told him I wasn’t out to my parents he hadn’t been exactly understanding. He’d made that joke about CPR. Like it would be okay to give my dad a heart attack because I could save him. It was never good to have a heart attack, and even though I knew CPR there wasn’t any guarantee I could save my dad. And what did Lionel think I was going to do, go over to my parents house with a defibrillator and say, ‘Hi, Dad, there’s something I have to tell you. Let me plug this in first.” No, the thing with Lionel was over. There wasn’t anything I could do about that. At least not at that particular moment. And probably never. Yeah, definitely never.
    I started my truck and drove out of the garage.
    And what were my parents doing at Massie’s? Their anniversary was a long time ago and they weren’t the kind of people who’d treat themselves to a nice dinner just because. Something must have happened. Something good.
    I pressed the phone button on my steering wheel and told the system to “CALL MADISON.” I hated talking to my dashboard, but it did make more sense than scrolling through my contacts one by one. The phone rang a couple of times and my sister picked up.
    “Hey, how’s it going?”
    “Not bad. The kids are going to bed in about twenty minutes. You want to call me back then?”
    “Oh that’s okay. I just have a quick question. Is something going on with mom and dad?”
    “What do you mean?”
    “They’re having dinner at Massie’s. Are they celebrating something?”
    “Mom got accepted at Cal State to do her master’s.” My mom was an RN at Memorial. Had been since I was a kid. She’d gotten me my first hospital job as an orderly when I was eighteen. I kind of remembered her telling me she was thinking of going back for her master’s. Which was great. For her.
    “She didn’t tell you?” Maddy asked.
    “Maybe.”
    “Men. You never remember anything. I bet you don’t remember giving them a gift card to Massie’s either.”
    “Wait? They hadn’t used that yet?” I’d given them dinner at Massie’s for their last anniversary. Eight, nine months before.
    “It was about to expire.”
    That meant they were at Massie’s because of me. Without even trying I’d sabotaged my own date. Great.
    “What were you doing at Massie’s?”
    “Oh, I wasn’t there. I mean, I was driving by and saw them going in.”
    “Oh. Okay. So, you’re not going to call me back in twenty minutes.”
    “That was all I needed. I mean, we can hang out on the weekend, if you want.”
    “No. You’re having dinner with us tomorrow. Remember? I have a surprise for you.”
    Another fix-up. That’s why I’d forgotten it. I was trying to.
    “Maddy, I told you no more blind dates.”
    “It’s not a date. How can it be a date with Arthur and I staring at the two of you?”
    “You know I don’t like being fixed up.” We’d been round and round about this. Unfortunately, I kept losing and having to spend the occasional evening making small talk with Maddy’s co-workers, friends, and friends of friends.
    “I’ve already promised,” she said. “Tomorrow night. Seven o’clock.”
    And then she hung up.
    Of course, I could just tell Maddy I was gay. She wasn’t going to have a heart attack. But I was afraid she’d tell Mom, and if they both knew, it was only a matter of time until one of them slipped and told my dad.
    I was home. I parked the truck in my space and just sat for a bit. My ex-boyfriend Daniel crossed my mind. The fact that I wasn’t out to my family had been a huge deal for him. He wanted to meet them and go for holidays and do all the things we did with his family. And we did tons of