Her shoulders drop and she softens. “Clarity, you could’ve told me. You don’t have to be scared of me.”
“I wasn’t scared of you,” I say, the words tumbling out. “I was scared of everything. I didn’t wantanyoneto know. And I thought if I just went along with Maurice, maybe it would make keeping the secret easier.”
Kris shakes her head. I catch a shimmer in her eyes that immediately sparks tears in mine.
“You shouldn’t have to hide who you are, especially not from me. I mean, I get why you did it, but still. I love you, Clarity, and I want you to be happy.”
I want you to be happy…
Jameson’s words transform now. Coming from Kristen, I believe them in my heart.
“I know,” I whisper, because this time it’s true.
Kristen’s eyes brighten, and she clicks her tongue. “Okay,okay, look. What if we keep using Maurice as a cover? Like, we lean into it. If people think you’re dating him, you’re right, no one will question anything, and you can take your time to figure things out.”
I stare at her, shock floodingmenow. “Seriously?” I was waiting for her to circle back and call me out for lying to Maurice, not for her to start strategizing how to dig that hole deeper.
“Of course,” she says, her grin returning. “I’ll make sure Vincent’s on board too. We’ll make it look—”
I shake my head, cutting her off before she can get going. “No, you can’t tell Vincent. Promise me, Kris. Youcan’t.”
She leans back a bit as if she’s seeing something new about or around me, newer than the information we’re discussing. “Vincent wouldn’t say anything, Clarity. I promise you can trust him.”
“I know you trust him, and I get that you care about him, but nobody else can know. Not yet.” I keep my voice steady and firm because her telling him or anyone else absolutely cannothappen.
She presses her lips into a thin line. With her eyes narrowed, I can practically see the gears grinding in her head. Her loyalty to me battles against her desire to be honest with her boyfriend. I know keeping my secret from Vincent is a huge ask, and is unfair. She has every right to push back, insist that Vincent can handle it, and ultimately, I can’t stop her. That lack of control is what I fear the most about anyone knowing. It’s what makes me afraid of Jameson and Yasmin.
“Okay,” she says, running a hand through her hair. “I won’t tell him. I’ll figure something out.”
She hesitates though, tilting her head in thought.
“This might be a stupid question, but… why are you so afraid of anyone else knowing? Don’t you want to tell your parents?”
The knot in my chest tightens again at the mention of my parents and at the realization that we’ve arrived at the conversation I’ve avoided for so long. At least now that Kristen knows I’m gay, the rest of the story doesn’t seem as scary.
“There’s more to it,” I mumble, my eyes dropping to my hands. “Something happened…”
I tell her about Camp Refuge, about the Incident and the real reason why I never talk about Jameson anymore. I even tell her what Yasmin said the other day at the workshop.
“Oh, Clarity,” she gushes when I’m done, pulling me into another hug. “I’m so sorry. That sounds awful.” When we pull apart, she’s shaking her head. “I’ve been talking trash about Hannah this whole time when Yasmin is the one with a stick up her—”
“Kris,” I hiss, though I can’t help smiling.
“I’m sorry you had to go through that, and that you felt like you couldn’t tell me.”
“I can’t lose anyone else. I can’t go through what happened at camp again,” I explain. “I don’t want my parents to find out and feel that kind of shame or disgust toward me.”
Kristen is silent for a moment. Her eyes scan my face like she’s piecing everything together. I wait, not knowing what to hope for, but hoping she comes up with something nonetheless.
“I know it’s scary, but you can’t keep this a secret forever,” she says. “You’ve been miserable; I can tell.”
I want to argue, but the words, a denial, don’t bubble up. She’s right. The lies, the secrecy—they’ve been making it impossible to function. I let out a shaky breath, teetering on the unstable idea of my parents ever finding out. I reach for the large rainbow Squishmallow on the foot of her bed and start squeezing it.
“I don’t know what to do” is all I can say.
“You don’t have to. I mean, you don’t have to do it alone. We’ll come up with a plan, something that gives you time to work up to telling them.”
I can see determination in her eyes, in the way she nods along to her own words as thoughts and ideas begin to ignite.