Blaze’s POV
Some years ago
I'm seven years old, and I think Tommy Miller has the prettiest eyes in second grade.
Green like the grass on the playground. Bright when he laughs. Which is often. Tommy laughs at everything.
I watch him during recess. The way he runs. The way his hair flops when he jumps. The way those green eyes crinkle at the corners.
I don't say any of this out loud. Don't know why I shouldn't. No one told me it was wrong.
But something in my gut tells me to keep it secret. Like the candy I hide under my pillow. Like the dreams I don't tell anyone about.
Secrets feel safer. Even at seven, I understand that much.
So I watch Tommy from across the playground. Never mention his pretty eyes. Never tell anyone about the flutter in my chest when he picks me for his kickball team.
Some things are meant to stay hidden. I learn that early.
I'm ten years old, and my walls are covered with cutouts. Other boys in my class plaster their rooms with sports cars. Superheroes. Wrestlers flexing muscles. The usual stuff.
My collage is different.
I cut photos from my mother's magazines. Fashion spreads and movie promotions and celebrity profiles. Actresses with perfect smiles. Actors with sharp jawlines.
I like looking at them equally. The women are beautiful. The men are beautiful too. Doesn't seem strange to me. Beauty is beauty.
I don't question it. Don't analyze why my eyes linger on both.
My mother walks into my room one afternoon. Laundry basket balanced on her hip. Ready to put away my clean clothes.
She sees the collage. Stops in the doorway. Her expression flickers. Just for a second. Something complicated and cold passing across her features like a shadow.
Then her smile snaps back into place. Too bright. Too quick.
"Cleaning up in here, sweetheart?" Her voice is cheerful. Normal. "Those magazines are getting old anyway."
She never mentions the collage directly. Never asks why I chose those particular photos. Never comments on the men's faces arranged beside the women's.
But the magazines disappear from the house. Every single one. The coffee table sits empty where they used to stack.
My mother switches to digital subscriptions. Reads everything on her tablet now.
I'm ten years old, and I learn that some things don't need words to be forbidden.
I'm twelve when my father enrolls me in hockey.
He shows up at breakfast one morning with registration forms already filled out. My name printed in his careful handwriting. Check already written.
"You need a real sport," he says. Slides the papers across the table. "Something tough. Build some muscle. Make a man out of you."
I stare at the forms. Peewee hockey league. Practice three times a week. Games on weekends.
I hadn't asked for hockey. Hadn't shown any interest in skating or pucks or checking people into boards.
What I'd asked for, two weeks earlier, was a drama club.
The school was putting on a production of Peter Pan. I wanted to audition. Thought maybe I could play one of the Lost Boys. Or help with costumes. Or anything, really.
I remember my father's face when I suggested it. The way his expression shifted. Disgust masked as disappointment. Contempt dressed up as concern.
"Drama club?" He'd repeated the words like they tasted rotten. "That's not... that's not really your thing, son."
"How do you know? I've never tried—"
"Hockey." His voice left no room for argument. "I'll sign you up for hockey. You'll love it."
I didn't argue. Didn't push back. Didn't ask why drama was wrong and hockey was right.
The look on his face taught me never to ask again.
So I learned to skate. Learned to shoot. Learned to love a sport I never chose because loving it was easier than fighting.
And I was good at it. That was the cruelest part. I was actually good.
I'm fourteen, and we're watching a movie together. Family night. Popcorn and sodas. The rare evening when all three of us occupy the same room.
Some romantic comedy my mother picked. Light and forgettable. Background noise for a Thursday night.
Then two men kiss on screen.
It's brief. Maybe three seconds. A side plot. A minor character finding happiness. Nothing graphic. Nothing shocking.
Something twists in my lower abdomen, but Mom reaches for the remote so fast she knocks over her wine glass.
Red spreads across the coffee table. Drips onto the carpet. She doesn't even look at the mess.
The screen goes black. Silence fills the room.
"Garbage." My father's voice cuts through the quiet. Low and disgusted. "Don't know why they put this stuff on TV. Nobody wants to see that."
My mother murmurs agreement. Grabs napkins. Starts cleaning the wine without meeting anyone's eyes.
I stare at the blank screen. Say nothing. Feel something inside me curl up and hide. Something that had been slowly unfurling. Testing the light. Wondering if maybe, possibly, it was okay to exist.
That something retreats deep inside my chest. Builds walls around itself. Learns to stay very, very quiet.
They never said the words. My parents.
Never called me wrong. Never said broken or disgusting or that way. Never sat me down for a conversation about what was acceptable and what wasn't.
They didn't have to.
I learned to read the silences instead. The tight smiles when I mentioned a male classmate too often. The quick subject changes when anything "inappropriate" appeared on screen.
The way my father's jaw clenched whenever my wrist went "too limp." The sharp looks when my laugh got "too loud." The corrections disguised as suggestions.
"Stand up straighter, son."
"Don't gesture so much when you talk."
"That shirt's a little... bright, isn't it?"
Small adjustments. Constant calibrations. Teaching me to sand down my edges until I fit the shape they needed.
I learned to perform. Learned it so well I sometimes forgot I was acting.
The straight son. The hockey star. The masculine ideal they could brag about to their friends.
And later, when I finally stopped performing, when I sat at their kitchen table and told them the truth, they couldn't handle the real version.
The son they'd actually raised. The one who liked boys and girls. The one who'd hidden Tommy Miller's pretty eyes for twenty years.
They chose the performance over the person. Chose their comfort over their child.
Nine years of silence proved that.
And now they want me back. Welcome me with open arms and home-cooked meals. Smile at Sophie like she's the answer to prayers they've been whispering since I was seven.
They still don't want me. Not really.
They want the performance. The version of their son who fits. Who doesn't make them uncomfortable. Who brings home girlfriends instead of boyfriends.
I've been performing my whole life. For them. For the world. For everyone except myself.
I'm so tired of performing.
But I don't know how to stop.