Almost Perfect - Brian Katcher [84]
There was a long pause. “Sit down, Logan. I have something to tell you.”
I was already sitting. I braced myself. Did this have anything do to with Mike? She said he was a nice guy, but what if he had a darker side? Maybe they’d had a fight and broken up. Or something worse.
It was worse. But it wasn’t about Laura.
“Logan, this morning Sage went to the bathroom to change her clothes. I had an outfit I wanted her to try on, so I followed her in. She didn’t notice me.”
I nearly hung up the phone right then. I knew what was coming. Maybe if I didn’t listen, maybe if I refused to talk to my sister, I wouldn’t have to face this.
“Logan …,” she continued. There was a long, long silence. “She was in a shower stall undressing. And … are you still there?”
“Ugh.”
“I don’t know how to tell you this. I only just glimpsed her behind the curtain; it wasn’t all the way closed. But I know what I saw. Logan …”
Ten thousand years passed before I could bring myself to say, “Yes?”
“Sage has a penis. She’s really a boy, Logan.”
I sat alone on a tombstone, waiting. Sage approached from the west. The setting sun cast her body into a silhouette and I could only make out her outline. It killed me how feminine she looked. Her curvy figure, her long, wavy hair … even her walk was womanly.
As soon as Laura had dropped the bomb, I’d hung up on her. She’d called right back, but I hadn’t picked up. I’d have to deal with that disaster later. Instead, I’d phoned Sage. Tammi answered. I didn’t ask for Sage, I just left a message to pass on: meet me at Arborville Road Cemetery as soon as possible.
The graveyard was the most abandoned place I could think of. Brenda and I used to go there to look at the stars. More recently, it was where Sage and I had our nasty New Year’s Day confrontation. The day I’d told her I wanted her out of my life forever and that I was sorry we’d ever met. Why hadn’t I just left well enough alone?
Sage passed under the shadow of a gnarled oak, and I could see her features: her red lips, her braces, her many freckles. She had a big goofy grin on her face, and I wondered why. Then I remembered. She was in love.
As she got closer to me, her smile began to falter, then died. I must have had an unpleasant look on my face. She sat opposite me on the wooden rail fence.
“I guess you didn’t call me out here because you wanted a repeat of last night.”
I didn’t meet her eyes. “Sage, Laura knows.”
The sun touched the horizon. It would be dark soon.
“About what?”
I glared at her. “What do you think?”
Sage worked at a splinter in the fence and didn’t reply.
“She saw you in the bathroom! How could you let her find out?” My voice boomed above the crickets that were just beginning to sing. Everything had been so perfect the night before, and then Sage got careless and ruined everything. We almost had something beautiful. Now when I looked at Sage, I didn’t see the girl I wanted to spend the next four years with. I saw the person who made me look like a fag in front of my sister.
She sighed. “I wear a rubber device to hide my … parts. It was killing me earlier. I had to take it off. I was in a shower stall; I thought I was alone.”
The shadows grew longer. In the eastern sky, I could see a few stars.
“Well, you weren’t.” I winced at the thought of what my sister had seen. What Sage kept hidden in those panties.
Sage stood and faced me. “So what did you do?”
“I hung up on her. I don’t know what the fuck I’m going to say when I talk to her again.” My nightmares were coming true. The person I was closest to in the world now knew my darkest secret the very next day! This was worse than anything I’d feared.
Sage leaned nearer but didn’t touch me. “Just tell her the truth.”
It honestly hadn’t occured to me that Sage would suggest that. She took my stunned silence for quiet listening. “Tell her that you already know and we’re happy together.”
I came very close to screaming. Instead, I only bellowed my reply. “Sage, have you lost your goddamned mind? I can’t tell her that!” Did Sage think this was some kind