6
MORGAN
“Hey.” Allie bounds up behind me, flicking my shoulder. I’m studying the list of clubs tacked to the bulletin board in the main lobby of the school. The final bell just rang, and while most kids are heading to their buses, we’re supposed to be on our way to sports study hall before practice.
We’ve fallen into an easy routine, even just in the week I’ve been here. I thought some of my teammates would be pissed that I showed up out of nowhere, but they’ve been mostly really nice. I low-key wonder if the lawsuit my parents have going against my old school has something to do with that, but I try not to think about it too hard.
“Hey yourself,” I say, pulling a Pride Club flyer down and shoving the pin back into the corkboard.
“You coming to study hall?”
“I kind of want to check this out,” I say, because aside from Lydia, I haven’t really met anyone else that’s queer like me. Not that it’s exactly easy when you’re the new kid; you can’t just walk up to someone and be like, Hi, I’m super gay. Are you? despite what my mother seemed to think when we FaceTimed last night.
“Ohh, very on brand,” Allie says, eyeing the flyer.
“You want to come?”
Her face falls, just for a second. Just long enough for me to catch it. “That’s not really my kind of thing,” she says, her discomfort cutting me like a knife.
“It says ‘allies welcome,’” I press. “Which you are, so—”
“I know, and it’s cool and all. I don’t have a problem with anyone who goes. It’s just not my scene.”
“Does Lydia go?”
Allie shakes her head. “Uh, no, her parents are very much ‘look the other way and pretend it’s not happening’ when it comes to who she’s dating, and she’s pretty quiet about it at school. Plus, I don’t know how the team would react if she really put it out there.” She says it sort of offhandedly, like she’s talking to someone else—not someone queer and on the team.
“What does that mean?”
“Oh!” she says, her eyes getting wide. “I didn’t mean you. Nobody feels weird about you or anything! I swear! It’s just Lydia is . . . Lydia. We grew up with her. It’s different.”
“Okay.” I’m not really sure how it’s different, but also I don’t want to lose 50 percent of the friends I’ve made since moving here over this either.
“We’re proud that you’re proud, but I’m not proud.”
I narrow my eyes.
“I mean, I’m proud of you! Obviously! But I don’t have, you know, pride.” She whispers the last word, and, ah, okay, I get it.
“I know that you’re straight. That’s why I pointed out the whole ‘allies welcome’ thing.”
She seems relieved, like maybe she thought I was going to hit on her or try to convert her or something. And even though I’m smiling, inside my stomach hurts. Because why does this always have to be this huge, awkward thing? Just because I like girls doesn’t mean I like every girl.
I sigh and spin around to repin the flyer when—like the cherry on top of my solid crap sundae—Ruby Thompson pushes through the throngs of kids around us, and I smack her spectacularly with my track bag.
“Jesus, Matthews, watch what you’re doing,” she says as she stomps past. I watch her go, trying to stay annoyed and not care at all that she knows my name. Well, my last name at least. Don’t care. Not one bit. Who cares? Not me.
Dammit. Why does she have to be so cute?
“Sorry about that,” Allie calls after her, like she can actually apologize for someone else.
I shove the pin in a little harder, wishing I could stick a pin in my whole stupid crush. “Is it just me, or is Ruby perpetually pissed?”
“We tried to warn you.” Allie takes my arm. “Avoid, avoid, avoid.”
“It would be nice if she didn’t hate me for no reason, though.”
“You did touch her car.” Allie laughs. “But seriously, don’t take it personally. The only things that Ruby doesn’t blatantly hate are that car and Tyler Portman’s dick, so.”
I’m so caught off guard that I literally choke on my spit.
“What did you do now?” Lydia asks, walking up and fake glaring at Allie.
“Nothing, I swear.” She holds up her hands in surrender. “I think her body just full-on rejects any mention of dick.”
Lydia smacks Allie’s arm.
“What? It’s true! All I said was Ruby liked Tyler Portman’s—”
“Anywaaaaay,” I say, desperate to change the subject.
Lydia holds up her Government book, throwing me a bone. “You ready?”
“Um, actually,” I say, slouching a little, “I think I’m going to go to the Pride Club meeting instead, but I’ll meet you at the track for warm-ups . . . unless you want to come?” I focus on Lydia, trying to telepathically beg.
She hesitates for half a second, flicking her eyes to Allie before shaking her head. “No, I have a ton of homework. So I’ll see you at practice, then?”
“Yeah.” I watch them walk away. “See you at practice.”
• • •
I have no idea what to expect when I walk into the Pride Club meeting. We didn’t have anything like this at my old school. Just the thought of a club like this existing anywhere probably keeps the headmaster up at night in a cold sweat.
My mouth goes dry as I step into the room. I’m desperate for the springy feel of tartan track under my feet or asphalt under my sneakers or literally anything comfortable and expected. Running—running I get, but this . . . I don’t know what this even is. What does one do in a pride club? Is it a hangout? Or is it like group therapy? Should I even be here?
At my old school, pride was not something I was allowed to have—even acceptance was apparently pushing the envelope. I take a deep breath and then another. This is your fresh start, I remind myself. You promised yourself this. No more hiding. No more blending in. No more running away from the tough conversations.
But that doesn’t mean I’m ready to sit front and center for them either.
I head straight to the back of the room and slide into a seat in the very last row, trying to remain inconspicuous while I feel things out. There are about a dozen kids sitting up at the front, some cross-legged on top of desks, some eating snacks, but other than a few curious glances, they mostly ignore me. I don’t know what I was expecting—not a group hug or a giant welcome banner, but maybe, like, at least a lone “hey” or “hi.”
I pull out my phone and start checking my texts, not that I have any good ones. Most of my old friends cut me off, either by choice or because their parents made them. It was like they thought they could catch the gay—or the expulsion—from me. At least there are like a thousand texts in the group chat between me, my parents, and Dylan to catch up on. I jump in just long enough to say Hi, I’m alive, yes, I’m having a good day, and no, I don’t need anyone to drive out and check up on me just because I took too long to respond today. I’ll see them at our regular family dinner in a few days—one of my parents’ conditions for my moving here.
My parents are admittedly kind of freaking out with me gone. Which I get. I had to move; they didn’t—or couldn’t really, not with their jobs. But with college looming anyway, this is practically a trial run of a semester away . . . at least that’s how I’m trying to think about it. And, hey, people lose their friends back home and make new ones in college all the time. It’s normal. This is normal. I stare down at my now-empty text alerts. What happened at St. Mary’s was just an acceleration of the inevitable, that’s all. Friends move on after high school.
“Oh! We have a new face today!” the teacher says as she walks in. It’s Ms. Ming, my English teacher. I was not expecting that. “Happy to see you here, Morgan. I was hoping you’d turn up.”
“Thanks,” I say.
“Why don’t you come up here and join us.”
I hesitate for a second, because this feels important. This feels big. Like a first step I can only barely understand and—
“We don’t bite,” one of the girls says with a friendly smile. She has one perfect dimple and deep bronze skin that pops against the bright white of her Harry Styles hoodie. I think I recognize her from my second-period class. Anika, maybe?
“Speak for yourself,” another kid says, lobbing a candy wrapper at her and gnashing his teeth. He’s East Asian, I think, and when he turns toward me with a wink, I realize he’s wearing a Hamilton shirt. I like him already.
“Enough, Drew,” Ms. Ming says with an impatient smile as I take a seat near the front. “Brennan, will you lead us off today?”
The boy sitting beside me—Brennan, I’m guessing—flashes me an easy smile beneath a mountain of bright red hair and freckles and then grabs a notebook off his desk to join Ms. Ming up front.
He starts to run through what he calls “old business.” Apparently, he’s reviewing the club’s expenditures and remaining budget after a recent field trip to see The Prom on tour. The words wash over me; I’m only half listening as I look around the room, taking in the idea that all of these kids from across the entire high school social scene are here working toward the common goal of acceptance and unity. It’s everything I ever wanted, maybe even needed.
But I can’t help but feel that something’s not quite right. Something’s missing, and it takes me a minute to figure it out. Every group in the school seems to be here, represented in this room, except one. Except mine. I wait for them to wrap up the updates, and then raise my hand, not really sure what the protocol is but wanting to get Ms. Ming’s attention.
“You don’t need to raise your hand, Morgan. This isn’t a class; it’s a club.”
“Sorry,” I say, lowering my arm. “I was just wondering, um, if any school athletes come to these meetings?”
A girl turns and glares at me. “What, are we not good enough for you?”
“No, that’s not why I asked.”
“Uh-huh,” she says, and turns back around.
“Sports and Pride Club don’t always mix at this school,” a boy says, almost apologetically.
“Well, I do sports. Sport, really. I run. Well, sports plural if you count track and cross-country as two different things,” I mumble. “But yeah, I do sports and I’d like to mix.” A couple kids laugh, and I blush.
“Let her talk!” Drew says, shutting them up.
“We didn’t have anything like this at my old school. And I’m still trying to figure out where I fit at this new one. But if you’re saying sports and Pride Club don’t mix, then . . .” My words trail off, my face burning as I struggle to work out what to say next.
A short white boy with dyed black hair and the darkest green eyes I’ve ever seen stands up and moves to the empty seat on the other side of me. “Hi, I’m Aaron,” he says, holding out his hand. “Gay, trans, he/him, and I may not be a sports kid, but I can definitely kick your ass at kickball.”
I shake his hand for way too long, utterly caught off guard. And then the girl in the white hoodie raises her hand with a little wave. “Hi, I’m Anika, queer, she/her, and I hate most sports, but I can do a mean doggy paddle. And you mix with us. You do.”
I stare at her for a second, just kind of floored by the niceness, before she adds, “Now, are you ever going to tell us who you are?”
And who am I? It’s such a loaded question. One I’ve been running from just as hard as I’ve been holding on to it. But in this moment, it feels right. In this moment, I want to claim it. Loudly. And hopefully never stop.
In this moment, I feel proud.
“Hi, I’m Morgan.” My voice breaks as I swallow back some tears, because for the first time, maybe I’m exactly where I need to be, exactly where I fit. “I’m a lesbian. She/her. And I like to run.”