Love's Awakening Read Free Page B

like when he served a customer wine or when one of his professors set up a PowerPoint presentation.
    Paul Joseph.
    Erin Elizabeth.
    He could call them “the twins.” Their parents probably did. But they were two separate people with two separate, equally cool names. Paul Joseph and Erin Elizabeth were what Oliver called them. Significant, nice names.
    Anyway, so what was going through David’s mind while he waited to pull out in the street? Maybe he had decided not to do it. He’d decided he wanted to live, but looked left one last time, saw a truck, and something, something, took over. He did it even as his body, his brain, shouted: “No! No!”
    Or maybe it was a cry for help. David Hall was a planner. If he wanted to end his life, he would damn well end it the right way. He would leave nothing up to chance.
    Cry for help. That’s what it had to be.
    “Sweetie?” Shirley’s voice jarred Oliver out of his reverie. “I’m going to bed.”
    Oliver hugged his grandmother goodbye. “Sleep well.”
    He made his way home. Driving with a cast was not too bad as long as he took turns slowly and carefully. Once he got home, he popped open a beer. Lori had called his cell with frantic apologies a couple of times. OhmygoshOliver! I never meant to push you. I am SO sorry. Can I come over tomorrow?
    Oliver walked through the apartment. Lori had left her stuff—not that much stuff in the first place, but still—and his blood boiled. He grabbed a plastic bag and filled it with her toothbrush, hairbrush, makeup and the rest of her stuff. He tossed the bag into the dumpster behind the building.
    “Good riddance,” he muttered. At least he’d had sense enough to never give her keys to the place.
    Back in the apartment, Oliver rested his feet on the ottoman and texted Lori: We’re done. Your shit’s in the dumpster.
    He waited for her to reply immediately with protestations and declarations of love. Nothing. Nothing at all, and disappointment stirred in his throat. Tasted like acid reflux.
    Lori was damn good in bed. Good enough for Oliver keep her around months past her expiration date. The two of them had started off great. Lori used to be the opposite of clingy. She had been perfect for Oliver, didn’t mind his heavy schedule of school and work.
    He had been too busy to notice her turning into an insecure nag. A mean drunk. Or maybe he hadn’t been too busy. Maybe the transformation happened so gradually he never had a chance.
    Well, whatever. He and Lori were over. But Oliver’s chest hurt. He had loved Lori and maybe still did. Even if she had accused him of being in love with his stepmother and accidentally pushed him down the steps.
    Oliver re-read his father’s message on the cast. Plenty of fish in the sea.
    “You should’ve left these as your last words,” Oliver mumbled. He got the letter back out. How was he going to tell Celia? His grandparents? Should he?
    Oliver swilled the rest of his beer and sat at his computer. Time to type his own letter to Celia, time to commit to paper what David couldn’t tell his own wife.
    Celia:
    I don’t know where to start. Maybe six months ago, when I found out Dad was a woman in a man’s body. He walked into Azizi. Midnight, Wednesday.
    “Just water,” Dad said, but I knew that.
    I took a break, and we went outside. We sat and made conversation. Dad told me you were pregnant, and I said: “Congratulations” or something like that. The usual pleasantries.
    Then Dad bit his lip and said: “I have something to tell you.”
    “Make it quick. I have to go back in.”
    “I’m like your friend Sebastian,” Dad blurted out. “You treat him like he’s normal. I love you for that. More than you will ever know.”
    Understanding eluded me at first. The realization dawned gradually, a brain cell here, a brain cell there, and…
    Aw, hell. No point in typing the whole sob story. Dad’s transgender, he’s a woman, and he was too chickenshit to tell you.
    Oliver bit his