She texted me a few weeks ago saying, “ur gr8 gma’s friend Beatrice lives in dc & said u could stay if u need 2.” (My mom texts that way because she thinks it’s cool. I don’t even know where to start with that one.)

“ALCOHOL: BECAUSE NO GREAT STORY EVER STARTED WITH SOMEONE EATING A SALAD,”

“It used to be my master bedroom, back when my husband was alive.” Beatrice plops down on the edge of the bed. I sit beside her. “I’m so sorry.” “Don’t be, doll. He died fifty years ago.” Beatrice gazes wistfully around the room. “We made so many good memories in here.”

What I haven’t missed is the fact that natural history museums were founded to glorify empires and display specimens collected during colonialist expeditions.

“Yeah, he’s kind of a DILF,” Tasha adds, and I try not to choke on my own saliva. They don’t yet know that there are approximately zero dads I’d like to fuck.

I smile at the boy, hoping it’s enough to get me free coffee.

I’m not at all surprised that Mandira’s queer, because she’s incredibly cool and has short hair and wears button-downs and has a mammoth tattoo. Not that any of these things mean someone has to be queer, but taken together they’re a pretty good indicator.

I hate that I don’t hate the way she talks to me. I hate that I sort of like it

“I’m fine, really,” I say. “Just relaxing.” She grabs my arm. “You can relax when you’re dead.”

If Christmas weren’t such an all-consuming holiday, we’d be perfectly productive capitalist cogs. But instead, we’re perfectly unproductive capitalist cogs, awaiting the arrival of the most capitalist holiday of the year.

“Of course he has a corgi,” Dr. Graham says, laughing and shaking his head. “My intern knows Greg Stern!”

May wraps her arms around her waist and rocks back and forth. “You need to get out of those clothes.” If there were enough heat in my body to allow my face to blush, it would.

“I’m choosing the outfit.” I roll my eyes. “Fine. But don’t you have, like, a T-shirt and jeans I can wear?” “I do.” “But I’m not wearing them, am I?” “Nope!”

“Are we the youngest people here?” She surveys the crowd and stifles a laugh. “By about fifty years, I think.”

And she kisses me, hard, with tongue and teeth and feeling. So, uh. I guess that answers one question: there seems to be a strong likelihood that May is queer.

“But honestly, if this was really a Hallmark movie, we’d both be the quirky sidekicks for the WASPish main character who returned to DC to work on her family’s hot chocolate farm or whatever.”

“And I told her that’s a silly goal, because fifty books is too many!” Beatrice cuts in, smacking Lauren’s shoulder with a folded newspaper. “What’s she doing, reading fifty books? Watch some damn TV. That’s what I say. Doctor’s orders.”

“Just let me talk. Don’t, like, say anything. Okay?”

“I can’t believe you’re a literal cougar,” she says. “Well, not a literal cougar,” I say.

TAY: yeah he’ll do fine in life he’s hot and gives great head ME: TRULY TMI didn’t need to know that TAY: sorry!!!!

“Table for one?” the hostess asks. Is that the vibe I’m giving off? I try not to sound offended when I say, “I’m actually meeting someone.” I look around to find said someone, and when I do I get very sweaty.

We look at each other for a beat, and I don’t know what to do and I wish I wasn’t nervous but also there’s a cute girl in front of me so of course I’m nervous.

“Isn’t it a stereotype that like every queer person is a vegetarian?”

To quote the most famous lesbian of all time, Elsa of Arendelle, “The past is in the past.”

: I don’t think we should see each other anymore I stare at my phone. One part of me is screaming, DON’T SEND THIS! DON’T YOU DARE! and another part is goading me on, whispering, Tap the little blue arrow. Come on, do it. I listen to the goader. Then I run to the en suite and try to vomit, but nothing comes out. So I go back to pacing. I don’t know what I expect her to say in response to that message. Well, no, that’s not quite true. What I want her to say, no matter how deluded it is, is this: “No, we’re not ending things with a text. Tell me what’s wrong. Tell me why you kicked me out. We’ll take things even slower. It’ll all be okay.” I get a response after an hour, when it’s so late—or maybe so early—that the sky is beginning to turn from black to dark blue to gray, like a bruise. MAY: I think that’s for the best. I read the text over and over. Each time, new tears form in my eyes, blurring my vision. And then I wipe them away so I can read it again. I think that’s for the best. I think that’s for the best. I think that’s for the best.

Homo fuckup.

“Are you talking to anyone at school?” “What?” “I mean, a therapist? They have those available to you, right?”

“What happened in ’fifty-three?” Lauren asks. “Oh, you know, being accused of having Communist sympathies, that bastard McCarthy, yada yada. Don’t want to bore you with the details.”

“On this level: café and morgue.”

“In my head, the new way we met is that I saw you flirting with a child barista at a coffee shop and I thought you were so cute that I was jealous of the kid so I dueled him for your honor.”

I look over, and she’s laughing. “What are you doing?” “The conversation we had before,” she says, taking a breath to quell the giddy excitement, “was so unbelievably gay.” “What?” “We just processed our feelings”—she tries to take another breath—“for like a full half hour. I’ve never felt more like a lesbian in my entire life,” she says, “and I pined for one girl for five years.”

Like, my girlfriend’s a freak for infrastructure. She knows more about the DC sewer system than practically anyone else.” Mandira grins. “I love her so much.”

“Now go be young,” Beatrice says with a wink. “It’s only your last night in DC once—but don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.”

thumb rubbing the soft skin where my ear meets my neck. I nod, and lift my head so that our noses bump. She pushes me back. “No, really. Is this okay? I want to make sure.” I try to hold in laughter, but it’s hard. “Yes. It’s so totally okay.” “And you’ll let me know when it’s not?” I pull her into me, so that we’re facing each other and one of her legs is resting on top of mine. We’re almost falling off the stairs, but it’s fine. It’s incredible. I touch her waist gently with both of my hands. “I’ll let you know. I promise.”

“Can you let me finish? I’m trying to tell you something.” I snort, but when she looks over at me her face is serious. “It’s only been a few weeks, and this is so dumb, and I know we haven’t even been on our first date yet”—I grin at her playing along with my starting-over game—“but I think I—what I want to say is that I—” “May, I love you, too.”

“So, um . . . ,” I start. I’m not sure how to finish the thought, but I’m determined to do it all the same. “You know that girl who we, uh, kind of hit with the car when you dropped me off?” “Oh boy, do I,” she says. “I haven’t stopped thinking about her.”

“So, I’m kind of . . . dating her?”