The start of our second date was both nonexistent and stressful, if that’s possible. Before we could even go on it, we had to explain to Charlotte, the youngest Anders, the surface of her brother’s new relationship. She had witnessed us being affectionate with one another because Ryan didn’t close the door. We sat her down and had to explain to her that she couldn’t tell anyone, not even Ryan’s parents.

But then Ryan’s parents appeared in the doorway, looking displeased at both him and me. She was ten. She told his parents.

I was asked to leave, to let them speak to him, supposedly. Ryan telling me to, “Please sit in the backyard” and his grip told me to sit nearby in case anything happened.

His backyard was technically a pool and a sizeable patio with stairs down to a private section of beach. It didn’t help in alleviating my nerves when I sat down in one of the lounge chairs and listened as Ryan spoke to his parents, then discussed. I felt sick by the time Ryan began screaming.

Listening to my boyfriend try and talk to his parents, and then listening to that deteriorate into screaming at them about my staying with him is always fun to listen to.

So he walked out and grabbed my arm. “Come on,” he told me, pulling me by my arm up and towards the side of the house.

“Where are we going?” I asked, stopping in my tracks and slipping purposefully from his grasp.

Ryan walked over and grabbed my wrist. “We’re leaving. I’ll grab your stuff, okay?”

It was like the words were spoken in another language. “Wait, what?”

“We’re leaving.”

I stopped again, still in view of the back windows. “What’s going on?”

“We’re leaving,” he told me again, now enunciating his words.

A pit formed in my stomach; I shook my head and pulled away. “No. Ryan. Please, go back inside.”

“What?” he asked in disbelief, still enunciating his words.

“Ryan, please, go back inside. Talk to them about it. I’ll talk to them. Just, please.”

He grabbed my wrist again and led me through the side gate to his car parked out front. “Get in,” he told me, unlocking the car and opening the front passenger door.

I gently rubbed the skin around my wrist that had been turned pink. My patience was slipping. “No.”

Ryan gestured again. “Adrian, get in the car.”

Now I was pissed. “Ryan, please, please, go back inside.”

He groaned. “Are you seriously listening to yourself? They kicked you out. I’m not going back in without you.”

“Ryan, just - ”

“God, Adrian, you are just so thick headed.”

I gritted my teeth together; now I was going to be listened to. “Listen to me, you asshole!” I shouted. He stepped back. “Please! Go back inside! I know what they did! I heard you trying to defend me, or whatever the fuck you were trying to do! But,” I drew in air, lowering my voice and running my hands over my face, “but I don’t want to see you go through what I went through. Family is important, and – ”

“You’re important,” he told me, his voice having lost quite a bit of volume. Ryan sighed exhaustively, his anger almost completely subsiding, which was then replaced by disappointment. Maybe in himself, I don’t know. “You’re important to me.”

“I know, but family should come first.” Yes, Adrian, and now you’re going to be homeless. Congratulations. At least your boyfriend’s family is still intact.

“Well…what’ll happen to you? Do you have somewhere to go?” I shook my head, without any sense of hesitation. The hesitation came after, because there wasn’t really anyone, in that moment, I thought I could turn to. The aunt that I liked, who was on my stepmom’s side, lived in the mountains, and was two hours away. I wasn’t well connected to Mom’s side anymore, and most of my Dad’s side just made me uncomfortable. “Adrian, I’m not going to let you be homeless.”

The number “40” uncomfortably popped up in my head. I shook my head, shaking the number away, stepped back once and sighed. “Go back inside,” I told him.

He took my hands in his. “Adrian, please don’t go.”

“Please, go back inside.”

Ryan was shaking now. “I’m not going.”

I slipped my hands from his. “Okay.” Starting off down the driveway, I just wanted to scream because I tried to do the better thing for him. Also because of how unnecessarily dramatic the entire conversation must’ve looked.

“Mr. Murphy.” I turned to see Ryan’s parents standing at the open front door. His mother moved away while his father gestured to come back inside. “I think we need to talk.” I looked to Ryan, who grabbed my hand and pulled me back inside. The front door closed behind us.

Ryan had to explain his sexuality again to his parents, which was another level of uncomfortable because I was the one who schooled them on the basics of sexuality. Because that’s what every parent wants – to be taught by their child’s boyfriend on something they thought they knew already.

They had more so been moved by my plea to not distance himself from his family, which they thought was noble, them seeing that the relationship between me and their son had almost ended right there on the driveway. I don’t necessarily agree with the notion that the relationship would’ve ended right then and there, but Ryan and I let them believe it. But this resulted in his parents letting me back in. We postponed the date when we decided that our energy needed to be spent on trying to have his parent’s understand who their son was.

Most of his parent’s knowledge was built on rumors and scandals that served the seedy underbelly of homosexuality. They didn’t like Ryan because he was gay; they didn’t want him to supposedly become a pedophile, or get AIDS and die young, or commit suicide. They wanted him to be himself, but not different.

They took some time to talk it over, understandably, and then they set ground rules for us, where, basically, we could only get to first base and nothing passed it, and even then, first base was kinda taboo. I assumed it didn’t need to be said at all. We partook in occasional kissing and cuddling, and that’s about it.

After that, it was pretty clear sailing. Or what you would define as “clear sailing” for me and Ryan.

Summer began ordinarily. Ryan became a senior and I became a junior. His family, besides Will, stopped badgering him about “finding the right girl”, and accepted that they couldn’t change him. His mom and dad accepted the fact that I was dating their son. They really watched what they said when we were around. Either way, they still acted like typical parents; embarrassing their son as much as possible.

And for those who are curious, this is the summer of 2010.

There isn’t that much to say about that summer. I wish I could make up some story about…how…Ryan and I got marooned on the side of the road after a date, but that didn’t happen that summer. It wasn’t all that interesting, to be honest.

When it was finally discovered that I wasn’t leaving the house soon, Will apathetically apologized to me about the way he acted. His behavior didn’t change much.

We both got part time jobs, too. I volunteered at the local theater and walked dogs, and Ryan went to work at an outlet mall ten minutes away. He began looking at colleges, which I watched from the side because I was curious to see the process.

Ryan and I had our awkward dates and our horrible dates that summer, and when school started up again. And our good dates. And our romantic dates. Though most of the time, we had awkward dates. Not that I’m complaining. Awkward dates with Ryan are still really entertaining. He tells some of the funniest, charming, and awkward stories.

He had a bad problem with wanting to be together all the time, which was kinda hard to do when I was living in his house, but he eventually understood that I needed my space sometimes. Also, I didn’t want him, or our relationship, to become my life. Which, again, was a little difficult to accomplish since I was living in his basement. I kept my social life and my relationship life separate and then slowly blended them together when I thought the moment was right, which was weird at the start because it was weird having Ryan hanging with Kendall and Davis.

Towards the end of the summer was where I realized Alyssa’s disappearance from the face of the planet. Suddenly her calls to check up on me were not a fixed point in my week anymore, or even my month. The rare instances where we could meet up and talk dwindled and vanished.

Being in Ryan’s house was nice. But I did miss being in my own bed. I missed pulling up the blinds in my room and seeing the sun and the backyard, and not the stones for the basement window well. I missed waking up to the sound of bacon cooking on Saturday mornings, and the sound of the news playing on the TV. I missed that stupid reading room where I had watched Ryan pass so many times.

One day, a few weeks after school started up again, I received a call from my dad asking specifically for me to come back. I immediately told Ryan.

“You sound so hesitant,” he pointed out.

“Well, duh. The man hasn’t talked to me in months.”

I was packing my bag with clothes, excited nonetheless. Ryan walked over to me and said, “I’m coming with you.”

Ryan was perfect, or at least, at the time, that’s what I thought. He was caring, understanding, sweet, and deviously charming. And he was extremely, like ridiculously, accommodating – he respected my boundaries, and, though the relationship had been progressing slowly, much slower than a “normal” relationship, we were both still pleased with the outcome at the time. He constantly watched out for me, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but it can become a little bit of a nuisance sometimes.

I placed my hand on his cheek. “Don’t worry, Ryan. I can take care of myself. You know I can.”

“I’m coming with you,” he insisted.

I stopped folding and looked at him. I blinked and said, “Yeah. Come with me. Suddenly I don’t feel so confident in the outcome of this, and anything could happen there.” I looked at him and finished, “I’d rather have backup than nothing at all.” Ryan smiled, and I noted how that smile had changed slightly. That smile that could melt anyone’s heart. “You’re sitting in the car, though.” Ryan nodded quickly. “You’re such a watchdog,” I told him teasingly.

“Can I help it?” He wrapped his arms around my waist and placed his chin on my shoulder. “I promised you that I’d always try to be there for you, and I have no intentions of breaking that promise now, or anytime soon.”

“You can ease up a little on the promise, okay?” I asked, fiddling with his fingers to free myself. “It isn’t like I’m alone anymore.”

I heard him sigh, or at least I felt his sigh pass by my ear. He swallowed audibly, like he wanted to say something, but simply repeated, “I promised you that I’d always try to be there for you, and I have no intentions of breaking that promise now, or anytime soon.”

There was something that felt avoidant, but I blatantly ignored it. I turned my head and kissed him. “I never thanked you for that.”

He stepped back. Officially, Ryan bowed and, in a god-awful English accent (or it was Irish? Maybe English cockney, I’m not entirely sure), told me, “No thanks are necessary, sir.” He looked up and stuck out his tongue.

I sighed with slight skepticism. I’m dating such a dork, I love it. I smiled and pulled him to his feet, saying, “Come on. At least help me pack.”

The landscaping had changed around my house, which seems like something stupid to be bothered by. To me, it was a little unsettling, seeing as it never changed for the years I lived there. I had to remind Ryan to wait in the car, and I walked through the front doors into the familiar front hall with my bag behind me.

Ryan watched from outside. He looked so sad, like a dog being abandoned. But he understood why I wanted to do this alone. But he knew that his presence, even if he wasn’t near, was reassuring.

At first, it looked like no one was home. The family albums had been scattered all over the dining room table. And then a blast of sound came from the family room; I left my bag and found found the recent-college dropout Sam watching something stupid on MTV.

Nerve-wracking moment #1 –
Sam looked over his shoulder at me and said, “Hey, faggot” so nonchalantly.

I returned to the front hall to grab my bag, like it was a lifeline or something. Alyssa was descending the steps, having heard the front door open. I smiled upon seeing her and and asked, “Hey, I guess you heard the good news?”

Nerve-wracking moment #2 –
Alyssa didn’t smile when she saw me. She looked scared and conflicted. “What’s wrong with you?” I asked happily. “Dad’s asked me to come back.”

She gestured towards the dining room. When I didn’t understand, she took my hand and led me in. She handed me one of the more recent family albums. I smiled, thinking that she wanted me to recall stories. I opened the album.

Nerve-wracking moment #3 –
Page after page had nothing of me at all. You would assume that a family photo album had at least one picture of you, but I went through that entire album and couldn’t find my face. The pictures when we went to Florida – those were gone completely. When we went on that cruise and we were standing by the pool – I was gone. When I was a toddler and Mom and Dad took me to Disneyland – I was gone.

I threw down the album and picked up another. Page after page I noticed the lengths my Dad took on trying to erase my existence from his life.

It was the same for all of them. All thirteen of them.

“Dad! Get down here, you fucking asshole!” I shouted, my voice resonating through the house. I turned back to Alyssa, who was visibly holding back tears. She hadn’t moved since she handed me the first album. I pulled her in close and hugged her tight. I told her, tearing up slightly as well, “No matter what happens, you will always be my sister.”

She smiled through the tears, and hugged me again. “I promise I’ll try to see you.”

“Sam, I told you, no swearing!” I turned to see my stepmom descending the front hall stairs. She was just as surprised at my appearance as I was about her looking surprised. She didn’t notice Alyssa, or me, about to fall apart in tears, though that was probably because she was standing behind me. “Adrian, welcome back!” she shouted, running over and hugging me.

I pushed her away. “Bullshit.”

“What?” she asked. I pointed to the albums, and she frowned, now seeing my eyes filled with angry tears. “Wh…what? Your dad put those out.” Then she noticed Alyssa. “Sweetie, are you okay?” she asked, leaning down and cupping her daughter’s face in her hands. “Adrian,” my stepmom began, looking back to me, “what are you doing? I thought you were at your friends house still.”