Chapter Text
Kit has a bad feeling when he gets out of the shower and sees that he’s missed three texts and a call from his mother. Scrubbing a towel through his hair, he reads the texts.
[9:04am] Mae: We’re in town. Meet us for brunch at our usual place.
[9:06am] Mae: Apparently they’re undergoing renovations. You’ll have to recommend somewhere else.
[9:09am] Mae: We’re only here for a few hours. There’s something we’d prefer to tell you in person. Call me.
Kit glances at the time. It’s 9:20 now. He lingered in the shower much longer than he normally does. Mark woke him up before his alarm to remind him that he’ll be gone on an all-day volunteer trip with the engineering department. For once, Kit was the one who tried to keep him in bed. Mark’s attempt at a goodbye kiss turned into Kit pinning him to the mattress and then riding him until they both came. By then, people were texting Mark to ask where he was and Kit felt sated enough to finally let him go. Which is why Kit spent most of the morning dozing in the mussed sheets after Mark left. He still felt pleasantly worn out when he finally got up to shower and ended up standing under the water for a long time, letting the heat massage his aching muscles.
And now he’s facing the consequences.
He calls his mother.
“I’m sorry, Mae,” he says as soon as she answers. “I was in the shower and—”
“Never mind,” she replies brusquely. “Text us your address. We’ll just have brunch at your place.”
A disconnect tone echoes in Kit’s ear and he stares at the phone in his hand in dismay. He shouldn’t be surprised, but somehow his parents always seem to find new ways to test him. He glances at his flushed face in the bathroom mirror. What are the odds that they’re somewhere far enough from his apartment that he’ll actually have time to dress and tidy and cook all before they arrive?
Because he knows he’ll hear about it later if he isn’t prompt, he sends his address to his mother. And then he races back to the bedroom to get dressed. His fingers fumble with the buttons on his shirt when he realizes: his parents are coming here. They’ll finally see Kit and Mark’s apartment.
Oh. This could be bad.
Kit shakes his head and finishes buttoning his shirt. He doesn’t have time to worry about what might happen. He tosses his towel and the dirty sheets in the washing machine and sprints back to the bathroom to brush his teeth. He passes the blow dryer over his hair for thirty seconds while he tries to think up something he can throw together for a meal that his parents will find acceptable because it’s far too late to order anything for delivery.
By the time he’s in the kitchen whipping together some French toast and Chinese sausages and fixing a plate of papaya salad, he can feel a trickle of sweat sliding down his spine. He’s going to have to shower all over again once his parents have left.
As breakfast cooks on the stove, Kit finally thinks to send a text to Phai to see if he’s free. If there’s ever a day he needs a buffer with his parents, this would be the one. While he waits for a reply, his mother’s words drift back into his head.
There’s something we’d prefer to tell you in person.
He groans. This is going to be like their last visit all over again, isn’t it? Three weeks ago they summoned him and Phai home without warning, only telling them that they needed to sign something with the family lawyer present. Kit and Phai spent the entire car ride home speculating on what it could be. Their parents have sprung lots of last-minute plans on them in the past: “hey, we rented a beach house in Tahiti for the winter so we won’t see you for five months” and “your father is being promoted but the ceremony is taking place in Singapore and you both need to be there” and “your great-grandmother who’s lived overseas your entire life is visiting and we want you to spend time with her.” They came up with some fairly outlandish ideas, but the fact that their parents had picked out a joint cemetery plot and wanted their sons to sign off on the resulting paperwork was not among those theories. Kit still remembers staring at Phai as their parents showed them pictures of said plot, both of them too shocked to react. Later, they laughed about it, but only until their parents insisted on dragging them to see the place — and then taking them on a tour to visit every single family they know in the area. Kit is still trying to recover.
So what is it they’re going to tell him this time? Kit turns the sausages and scoops the French toast onto a baking sheet to be kept warm in the oven. It’s probably a fool’s errand to theorize about the reason, but for a moment Kit does — and he ends up in a panic. Are they going to insist he and Phai get matching plots next to them in the same cemetery? Kit isn’t ready to commit to something like that. He might not even stay in Bangkok after school. And what if Mark wants to live somewhere else? What if they don’t even stay in Thailand? How can he even begin to explain any of that to his parents?
Kit pulls at the collar of his shirt and goes to lower the temperature of the air conditioning.
There’s a knock on the door. At the same time, his phone buzzes. Kit redirects his footsteps toward the door while he looks at his phone. It’s Phai telling him that he’s trapped in bed with a horrible head cold. Kit narrows his eyes at his brother’s words. Yeah, right. More likely he’s trapped in bed with one or both of the boys he keeps insisting he’s not actually dating, but fine. Kit will play along.
The knock on the door repeats, louder this time, and Kit stuffs his phone in his pocket.
“Mae! Pa!” he says, self-consciously rubbing away the sweat at his temples. “Come in, please.”
They take the slippers Kit thankfully remembered to pull out of the closet before they got here and walk into his apartment. Their gazes move to assess their surroundings.
“This is a nice part of town,” his father says like he’s surprised. “You get great views.”
Kit shuts the door behind him and takes his mother’s proffered purse. “I sent you a link before I signed the lease,” he points out. “You don’t remember?”
“Sweetheart,” his mother says, patting his arm while he hangs up her purse. “Don’t be insulted. Do you know how many emails your father gets every day?” She laughs lightly and goes to join her husband by the windows to look at the skyline.
Kit tries not to grind his teeth. He actually texted his father rather than emailing him for that exact reason. And he’d responded with a ‘looks good to me’ so Kit felt like he did his due diligence before signing his name on the lease next to Mark’s. It’s not Kit’s fault that his father probably barely glanced at it.
“Food is almost ready,” he says, swallowing his disappointment. “Are you in town for long?”
“Not at all,” his mother replies. “We have a three o’clock flight back to France. The director sent us here to woo some Americans, but one of them apparently came down with yellow fever and now they’re all quarantining until further notice. It’s such an inconvenience.”
“Probably more of an inconvenience for them,” Kit murmurs. He turns the stove off and starts bringing food to the table. “What are you doing in France?”
“The normal fundraising,” his father says dismissively. He pulls out Mark’s usual chair for Kit’s mother. She sits, daintily touching the silverware with a curious look at Kit.
“Did your grandmother give you this?” she asks, holding up a fork.
Kit leaves his chair for his father and sits down across from his mother. “Yes…” He takes a deep breath. Maybe it’s better to just bite the bullet and get this over with. They’re bound to notice something else around the apartment before they leave anyway. “I saw Yaai over the summer and she gave me the set when I told her I was moving in with my partner,” he goes on, doing his best to meet his mother’s eyes when he’s done.
Suddenly both of his parents are looking at him, and the silverware is forgotten.
“You’re dating someone?” his father asks sharply.
“That’s wonderful,” his mother says, clearing her throat. She looks around the apartment like Mark might jump out from behind the couch.
“You didn’t tell us,” his father says. He frowns. “And you’re already living together? When did you start dating? Who is she?”
Kit swallows. This isn’t really the way he would have chosen to do this, but it’s too late to take his words back. And after his last visit home, he doesn’t want to make Mark wait much longer before Kit introduces him to his parents. But before he can do that, he needs to make sure they both understand the scope of his relationship.
He’s tried to tell his parents about Mark before. But they’re always flitting in and out of his life these days. Whenever he does have time with them, they’re usually enforcing an itinerary that leaves Kit no room for doing anything but managing everyone else’s moods as they jump from one place to the next, socializing with people he doesn’t know and pretending in the meantime that he understands what it is his parents want from him.
“We started dating last year,” he says. “And we moved in together right before this semester started.” He realizes he’s twisting the pendant of his necklace between his fingers and he drops it with a start. “Mae, Pa,” he says, leaning across the table toward them. “I want you to meet him. Can’t you move your flight and stay a little longer? He’s on a volunteer trip today, but he’ll be back this evening and I know he’d love to meet you.”
Kit sees the instant his father’s eyes focus on one of the many photos Mark has on display of the two of them together. In it, Mark’s arms are wrapped firmly around Kit’s waist and his lips are pressed to Kit’s cheek. Kit’s face goes hot. His stomach swoops. Why did he decide to tell them about Mark like this?
He stares at his father, waiting for the inevitable.
“You’re dating a man?” his father asks in a deceptively soft voice.
Because Kit is already steeling himself, he doesn’t flinch.
“Yes,” he says. And then — because he wants them to hear the rest before they really weigh in — he adds quickly, “You know my friend Pha, the Prapatanakul’s son? Mark is best friends with Pha’s partner.” He doesn’t add that Wayu is a man too. “He’s an engineering student at my university.”
“Kit, sweetheart,” his mother says. She’s folded her hands together on top of the table and she’s surveying Kit with the cool gaze she’s used on him his entire life for reviewing report cards. “Are you sure you’ve thought this through?”
Before Kit can reply, his father snorts. “Don’t you know, Siri? Our son is an adult now. He’s free to make his own mistakes.”
“Mark isn’t a mistake.” Kit nearly snaps. He’s clenched his hands on his knees under the table. “He’s my boyfriend. And I love him.”
His mother’s eyebrows climb toward her hairline.
Kit bites his lip. He wants to say more because Mark is so much more than just the bare facts he’s laid out so far, but he doesn’t really know how to explain that to his parents. They might be impressed if he told them about Mark’s father’s company, but he’d rather they accepted Mark on his own merits first.
Which means he needs them to accept Kit as he is first. The way this conversation is going, he’s not sure that’s going to happen.
His father gets out of his chair and goes over to the nearest shelf with its collection of pictures: Mark squishing Kit’s cheeks in one, both of them flashing peace signs at Wayu behind the camera in another, and then Kit’s favorite — the one in which they’re facing each other and smiling like they’re the only two people who matter in the whole world. Kit’s father surveys them all silently with crossed arms.
Kit clenches his fingers tighter on his knees, adamantly not fidgeting. There are far too many things Kit has capitulated to in his life; he refuses to let his parents see him sweat about this. It’s his life after all.
His father turns back to him. “How did this happen?” he asks in an almost accusatory tone.
Kit’s spine stiffens. “It’s not like I was tricked into it, Pa,” he says, reaching for an icy tone even though he’s afraid he’s too quiet for it to have the right effect. “It happened just like with you and Mae. We fell in love. We want to be together. So that’s what we’re doing.”
“What about your degree?” his mother interrupts. “This is a ridiculous distraction.”
Kit’s blood feels like it’s fizzing hot in his veins. He looks at his mother steadily. “If anything, Mark has helped by supporting me when school is difficult. Don’t worry. I’m still number one in my faculty.”
She huffs and turns toward his father again. “Tell him this is unacceptable, Somchai. What about your family? What will they think?”
His father frowns. “They don’t need to know. This is probably just a phase anyway. He’s young. He doesn’t know what he wants.”
Kit is clenching his jaw so hard his teeth ache. He wasn’t expecting this conversation to go particularly well, but this sort of dismissal is almost worse than them being angry with him.
“That’s not fair,” he says — but his father swiftly interrupts him by sitting back down at the table and picking up his fork.
“The food is getting cold,” he says gruffly. “Let’s eat.” He glances at his wife. “Before we have to leave.”
“But I still—” Kit starts.
“Kit,” his mother breaks in sharply. And even though Kit hates it, he automatically shuts his mouth and presses his hands together in an apologetic wai. His mother nods and starts serving the food.
Kit sinks back against his chair while his parents start eating. They chatter to each other about work, using jargon Kit doesn’t recognize, shutting him out other than when they ask him to pass the water pitcher. He’s almost grateful to be ignored so he has a moment to pull himself together without their eyes on him. There’s a burning in the back of his throat and behind his eyes, but he’d rather cut off his hand with one of his grandmother’s knives than let them see him cry.
Suddenly he remembers his mother’s text again.
“What did you want to tell me?” he asks abruptly, interrupting something his mother is saying about upgrading airline tickets.
They both turn to look at him again as though they’ve just noticed him. Kit swallows hard and tips his chin up.
“You said there was something you preferred to tell me in person,” he elaborates, glad that his voice somehow remains steady. “What is it?”
His parents glance at each other. His father shrugs and picks up his glass for a drink while Kit’s mother sets her silverware down on top of her half-empty plate.
“Your father is being scouted by another company.” There’s an air of exhilaration to her words that strikes a discordant note to Kit. “It’s based out of China, so we may be moving. We’ll probably sell the house.”
Kit blinks. “You mean, our house here in Bangkok?”
“Yes,” his mother says without a hint of regret or nostalgia for the only home Kit has known his whole life. “So if there’s anything you and your brother want out of your rooms there, you should make plans to get it soon. This job change could happen very quickly. It’s a good thing we were in town so we could tell you.”
“Right,” Kit says faintly. “Thank you for thinking of me.”
He doesn’t register the rest of the conversation as his parents finish eating and then get up and collect their things. Kit follows them to the door and makes the vaguely appropriate noises he’s supposed to make to see them off. They don’t say anything else about Mark, and Kit knows it would be useless to insist on making it an issue right now. They’d only start guilt-tripping him about missing their flight if he asked them to stay again.
After they’re gone, Kit leans back against the door and exhales a heavy breath. Some part of him feels a deep sense of relief to have finally told his parents this secret he’s been keeping from them for years. He’d been harboring a distant hope that maybe they’d be pleased to know that at least he’s in a stable relationship. Now that that hope has been shattered beyond repair, he can go on much as he did before; he’ll live his life and they can live theirs. If his father changes jobs and they sell the house, maybe Kit won’t have to see them more than once or twice a year. He can handle that.
Kit slides slowly down the door until he’s sitting on the ground, his arms wrapped around his folded legs. He sighs and presses his forehead into his knees.
At least the hardest part is over with.