Run Clarissa Run Read online

  Chapter Two

  “Mommy, is that a boy or a girl?” Britney asked.

  “Britney!” Shelley gasped. At four years old the girls asked all sorts of silly questions but this was going too far.

  The twin sisters were in the front of the car-shaped shopping cart. Britney, in the passenger side had stuck her head out and looked back to her mother, who was inspecting bottles of pasta sauce, to ask her question. While she shushed the girl she followed the line of her daughter's thumb down the aisle.

  At the far end of the aisle was a skinny teenager with shoulder length blond hair. They wore a white, gender neutral T-shirt and blue jeans. Shelley couldn't help but have the same question in her mind. Boy or girl?

  The teenager grabbed a bag of pasta and disappeared around the corner. Shelley shook her head dismissing the kid and returning to her sauce selection. Tony was raised in an Italian American home that took pasta seriously. Springing a new pasta sauce on her husband was a major decision.

  “Mom?” It was Britney's sister Holly this time, from the other side of the cart.

  “What?”

  “Was it a boy or a girl?”

  “I don't know,” she replied absentmindedly, selecting a bottle and putting it in the cart.

  Two aisles later Shelley rounded a corner to come face to face with a woman she knew, vaguely. They greeted each cordially, each trying to place the other. The woman appeared to be in her forties, about Shelley's age. They had similar names too, didn't they?

  Yes.

  “Kelly?” She said brightly, “Kelly Holden?”

  “That's right.” The woman responded.

  Tony had served briefly with Kelly's husband. They hadn't been close but Shelley and Kelly were both auxiliary members and had met at functions for army wives, especially during the early days of Afghanistan when their husbands were away. She remember that Kelly had lost her husband, a helicopter pilot.

  “How are you doing?” Shelley said.

  “Fine and you?” Kelly answered.

  “Can't complain.” Visions of white panties with pink spots circled her vision, but she shoved them down. You just didn't talk about that to an almost total stranger in the grocery store.

  “Mom, do you want this?” A voice asked.

  Shelley turned. It was the teenager again. She, Shelley decided, was holding Woman's day magazine. The cover article read, “The Home Spa: how to replace most store bought cleansers with products you already own”.

  “Look at these recipes,” the girl continued pointing to the holiday section in the lower right corner. “You were saying the other day we should do something different for Thanksgiving this year, since it's just the three of us. How about Cornish Game Hens?”

  Kelly took the magazine and said, “Shelley, this is my youngest son Clark.” The 'son' had a peculiar emphasis, as if she had heard the 'is that boy or a girl' question.

  Maybe she had. Looking at the teenager again she could see that it was indeed a boy but with the shoulder length hair layered the way it was and the conspicuously neutral clothing it was a close call. It wasn't even just that, there was something about the way he stood, with his weight on one leg so that the opposite hip stuck out or the way he put both hands in his back pockets and waited on his mother's verdict, that could only be described as feminine.

  “Whose going to cook these Cornish Game Hens?” Kelly was flipping through the magazine, looking for the recipe.

  “I will,” Clark responded. “It looks easy enough,” To Shelley he explained, “I like to cook.”

  It was then that Britney decided to pipe in with, “are you a boy or a girl?”

  “Britney!”

  “Umm, I'm a boy.” Clark didn't seem put out the question, in fact he seemed less than sure of the answer himself.

  “Boys don't cook” Holly put in.

  “They eat.” Clark responded. “Why shouldn't they cook?”

  The girls didn't have an answer to that. “What do you girls like to eat?” Clark bent over the cart and started talking to them. They giggled nervously and both began rambling at once, as they often did when strange adults showed them any attention.

  Shelley and Kelly exchanged pleasantries while Clark talked to the girls about donuts, which were the girls current favorite food. Kelly put the magazine in the cart without thinking about it.

  After a couple of minutes there was nothing left to say, so they passed on with vague promises to 'stay in touch'.

  “He was nice” one of the girl's commented as they went on. Shelley snorted but didn't answer. She would have to remember to pray for Kelly, for her dead husband and for her overtly flaming son. If he was not a homosexual (he was awfully young and besides their weren't any homosexuals in this small town, part of why she lived here) he was certainly a candidate.

  She knew very little about homosexuality but some guy had spoken at their church a few years back. It was, he had said, a lifestyle. Every gay person had a coming out story, a story about how they were first introduced to the lifestyle. In this story, he had explained, was the key to understanding the stereotypes about gay people. They (meaning the homosexuals) looked for outsiders, kids that didn't fit in. They were the most vulnerable, vulnerable to some gay who showed them positive attention.

  She spied them later in her shopping, in the shampoo aisle. He was holding a bottle of Herbal Essence, she a generic brand and they appeared to be arguing. Slowly a plan was forming in her mind. He most certainly not gay, he was so young and it was such a small town that there wasn't a gay presence here. But he was certainly somebody who would be vulnerable to the lifestyle. Keeping him off the streets, and away from those influences would almost be a good deed; the girls would be quite safe and Tony (she smirked as she thought it) well he didn't need the temptation either. Maybe she could prevent two sins with one act.

  #####

  “Whatch'ya got there?” Ben snatched the book out of Clark's hand before he could stop him. He was much bigger than Clark. This was a small Iowa school with barely sixty-some kids in his class and less than three hundred in all four grades combined. The cliques were well established and rarely violated. As a jock the boy was one of the kings of the school. Clark on the other hand, didn't have enough status to hang out with the geeks. It seemed like the only time anyone even noticed him was when they needed a punching bag.

  “Windows for Dummies? They got it half right.” Ben laughed. Clark scowled. He was smarter than this kid but he was smart enough to keep his mouth shut too. Ben was on the defensive line, six foot and a heavily muscled. Clark was one of the few sophomores that didn't call him 'sir' but he wasn't about to push his luck.

  “Maybe you should check out, faggots for dummies,” Ben kept on. Clark's face burned but he kept his mouth shut. “But I guess you're already an expert on being a fag.”

  It wasn't exactly wit, Clark thought.

  “Look what your kid brother's got,” Ben told Jeremy as he came up. Jeremy never stood up for Clark but at least most of the kids toned it down in his presence.

  Jeremy took the book and shrugged, handing it back to Clark. “Yeah, he thinks he can fix my old laptop. He's a f-ing genius you know.”

  Ben laughed and went on his way while the two brothers left the school and headed for Jeremy's car. Well, they both thought of it as his car. Mom considered it 'the second car' because it was rightfully hers. It was just too much for their single mom to also play chauffeur. So Jeremy got the second car as long as he let his kid brother tag along.

  They also both had clear and opposite ideas about what would happen in the spring when Clark could drive. Jeremy had said he intended to take the car when he went to college. Clark didn't doubt he'd try. Clark would stand up for his own right to drive and to keep the car. Not that he had much hope. He was already bracing himself to be riding the bus again next year.

  “Just remember,” Jeremy cautioned, “don't you dare fix the laptop before tomorrow.” For all of his disparaging statements, Jeremy had been in on many of the family discussions about Clark's performance at school and the numerous aptitude tests Clark had taken and excelled at. He knew that while genius might be a stretch, it wasn't a big one. He was afraid that Clark might actually succeed.

  #####

  “Are you boys ready yet?” Their mom was wandering through the kitchen as she said it, her purse in hand.

  “Almost,” Clark said, pushing his plate away, “Just got to clean up.” He started towards the bathroom.

  “Your boy is ready.” Jeremy drawled out slowly, barely even looking up from the copy of Men's health he was reading at the table opposite Clark.

  Clark flipped his brother off without stopping. Neither of the brothers were in any hurry. Mom would spend at least the next half an hour running around with her purse in hand, gathering all the things she thought she might need. All the time she would berate the boys about not being ready. It was an old pattern.

  Clark brushed his hair and looked in the mirror until his mom's voice had reached a near feverish pitch. When he came back into the living room he saw that Jeremy had taken the hint too and was getting his letter jacket out of the closet.

  “No, no,” Mom said flatly. “It's going to be really cold today. Wear your winter coat.”

  Jeremy shrugged and put the letter jacket back. He pulled out a black leather jacket. Clark reached around for his winter coat, a tan leather jacket with a line of fringe around the bottom. He liked that jacket. It was one of the few easy compromises between him and his mother. She had initially tried to push a black jacket on him, like his brother's but he liked this color better and he loved the fringe.

  A blast of cold air hit him as his mom opened the door. “Come on, we don't want to be late.” Mom said.

  “We have plenty of time before Clark's appointment, mom,” Jeremy said as he followed her out the door.

  It was eight o'clock on Saturday morning. It would take just under two hours to get to Des Moines. He glanced at his watch. His appointment with his current therapist would be at ten thirty. They were doing fine.

  He was looking forward to today, at least after he got through with therapy. He didn't like this new therapist but he was much better than the last one. Still it was therapy. However today he would have therapy followed by the new therapy group. Then mom and Jeremy would pick him up and they would go out for lunch and then shopping. Jeremy's new laptop would take the majority of the time, attention and money but Clark could still wander the mall and window shop. It beat sitting around his room in Grundy Center, a town too small to have it's own mall.

  #####

  “How are you doing, kiddo?” Dr. Carlton, no Philip, always sounded so cheerful. He had insisted that Clark call him by name, instead of the formal title. Clark in turn had insisted that Philip not use the term 'buddy' in his presence. That term always grated on his ears. Maybe it was because too many of dad's old buddies and mom's new boyfriends, all the men who tried to play surrogate father to Clark, liked to call him “little buddy”.

  “I'm doing fine,” Clark replied nonchalantly. And waited. This is what he hated about therapy. The therapist always tried to get him to talk and he had little to say. The result was long awkward silences.

  “School going okay so far this fall?” Phillip asked.

  “Yeah, fine.” Clark replied.

  “Still getting picked on?” Phillip asked next.

  He thought about getting shoved into the locker on Monday, the word faggot, about a dozen incidents since then. The boy who squealed every time Clark entered the locker room for gym class, “oh no, a girl in the boy's locker room.” Yes, he was still being picked on. Why talk about it? He had talked and talked, what good had come of it? “Yeah,” and after a long pause, “about the same, you know.”

  “Hmm. You and mom getting along?”

  “Yeah, we're fine.” Clark said.

  “Jeremy?”

  Clark shrugged. “Same.”

  “How did you like the group last time?”

  This was the pivotal moment in this session Clark had been dreading the question.

  “It was okay.” He said.

  “Just okay?” Phillip asked.

  “I am not gay.”

  “We've discussed this before,” Philip said. Philip was gay. He had said so himself. Besides he had a picture of himself with his partner, Eric, on his desk.

  “I know,” Clark jumped in, “it's just, well, like that group.” It had been a gay youth group that Philip had suggested might be helpful. “I don't have a problem with them, I really don't. But I don't fit in there either. I can't explain it, I just don't. I am not like them.” Clark continued.

  “What is it about them you don't like?”

  He knew what Philip was trying to imply. Philip thought he was gay, that he had some sort of “internalized homophobia” and couldn't accept himself as a gay kid. It was a logical thought, Clark conceded, but he didn't think of himself as gay. It wasn't that he had anything against gay people and it didn't mean he hated himself.

  “It's not that I don't like them, I am just not like them.” He persisted.

  “How are they?” Phillip asked.

  “I don't know, they are just, you know, boys.”

  “And you?”

  “We've discussed this before,” was all Clark would say.

  “Randy?”

  Randy was the reason that Clark didn't like therapy. Part of the reason anyway. His mom had taken him to see Dr. Edgerton two years ago, when he was barely fourteen. It hadn't gone well. At least Dr. Edgerton had never called him buddy or kiddo and Clark had never learned his first name. But Dr. Edgerton hadn't had a clue about Clark either.

  “Why are you here?” Dr. Edgerton had asked.

  “Because,” Clark's voice had dripped with sarcasm, “I didn't know that fourteen year old boys weren't supposed to cry because they aren't girls.”

  Dr. Edgerton's solution was that he didn't have enough “gender appropriate” male role models so he was set up with another boy, Randy, who was also in the doctor's practice. Randy had anger management issues and under normal circumstances would have been exactly the kind of boy to torment or beat Clark. Instead they had somehow became friends, at least for awhile.

  They shared similar tastes in music and Clark had even visited Randy's home a few of times. They had gone to Randy's room and listened to music and talked. Randy had slowly opened up to Clark and most likely had benefited as Dr. Edgerton had planned. Then one day Randy had kissed Clark, taking him totally off guard.

  A big part of him said it wasn't him. He hadn't started it. A smaller part said he didn't object either. It had gone on for several weeks then Randy started to want to do more. Clark didn't so he told his mom what was going on, and then under her orders, he told Dr. Edgerton.

  That had ended the friendship with Randy. Luckily he was from several towns away, so he didn't have to see him at school. When Dr. Edgerton had suggested someone else, that ended the sessions with him. Mom was finally convinced he was a quack who couldn't help her son.

  Enter Dr. Philip Carlton. Philip was definitely an improvement over Dr. Edgerton. Clark could handle being accused of being gay once a month. He got that several times a day at school.

  “I liked the kids okay.” He went on describing the youth group, “but the way they talk about being gay, makes me all the more sure I am not. They are so...” he groped for the right word, “Sexual.”

  Philip gave a good natured laugh. “How do you expect them to talk about their sexuality?”

  “I don't know. Look I don't deny the whole Randy thing. I don't deny that I am sometimes attracted to guys but it's not the same as those boys.”

  "Some times attracted to guys," Phillip echoed gently, "but definitely not gay?"

  "It's just different for me." Clark shot back angrily.

  "Different how?"

  "I just," Clark fumbled for the words, "It's, I don't know, it's not sexual, not like those guys talk anyway. It's more...romantic."

  "So if you love the boy, it's not gay?" Phillip obviously was not understanding or accepting the difference.

  "No, I mean I don't think about having sex with boys." Clark knew he was not explaining himself well. The problem was that he had no clue how to explain what he felt, other than it was not like how those boys in the group talked.

  "Girls?" Phillip inquired mildly.

  "No," Clark said sullenly.

  Phillip shrugged dismissively. "Fine, you don't have to be anything. And it's certainly not my place to tell you how to identify yourself. The real reason I wanted you to attend the group was because the harassment you face at school is a lot like what many in the group go through. Did it help to talk about that?"

  Clark nodded slightly, glad to change the subject. "Yeah, I mean it's kind of depressing to think every school is the same, that there are bullies there too. But it was good to talk about it. Back home everyone just acts like if I would "tone it down" somehow the bullies wouldn't target me. Those kids understood. You can't stop who you are. It's impossible."

  "So do you want to stay for the group again?"

  Clark surprised himself by answering, "yeah."

  "Good. Few formalities and then we'll head over, it's about time anyway. Drugs or alcohol?" Phillip asked.

  "No."

  "Suicidal thoughts?"

  After a long pause Clark responded, "Sometimes, but I can contract." Contracting, Clark had learned early on in therapy meant that he agreed he would not attempt suicide without talking to a professional first. He had also learned that if you weren't able to "contract for safety" they would start talking nut ward and he did not want that.