I sit back down. No one at my table is responding. Finally, Aunt Lil says, “We are so proud of our star. Now if you will excuse us, we are going to get back to dinner.”

“Of course,” Kelsey’s mom says, then heads back to the front of the diner.

Kelsey looks at me again. Puts her hand on my shoulder. “We are going to talk about that outfit,” she says, then walks off.

I hear every little sound of the restaurant. Knives scraping on plates. An old man laughing. A chair moving. No one at the table is talking. Mom’s face looks distressed. Randy is sitting back in his chair, arms crossed, face red.

“August?” Mom asks, her voice shaky.

“We asked one thing of you,” Randy says. “To not come up here and pretend to be a boy.”

I feel my aunt’s hand squeeze my knee. It’s time to come clean. I sit up straight, tighten my muscles to handle the emotional blowback, and say, “My name is August.”

“Your name is Audrey,” Mom says, a little too loud.

“And I’m transgender,” I say, pushing back tears.

Randy shifts in his chair. “We let you come here, and we asked one thing.”

Mom points at Aunt Lil. “You lied to me, too. You are responsible for this behavior. She’s confused and you’re allowing her to act that way.”

“Mom, Randy, whether you believe it or not, I’m transgender,” I say, my voice steady and low.

Mom waves me off. “I’m not listening. Pastor Tim told you this was a sickness.”

Sickness. The word makes my skin crawl. My stomach upset.

“Tammie,” Aunt Lil says. “Your child is talented. Smart. Kind and loving. And a boy. A transgender boy who needs your support. Look how much he’s grown.”

“Stop it. She’s a girl,” Mom says, not hearing anything.

“No, HE isn’t,” Aunt Lil shoots back. She hesitates. Thinking about something, she says, “And I’m a lesbian.”

We all look at Aunt Lil, shocked. At the perfectly wrong time, our food is delivered by our waiter, who’s trying to balance every plate on one tray. We all sit in awkward silence as the plates are put in front of us. Aunt Lil takes a big drink of water, probably wishing it were wine. I watch Mom’s face, wound tight, as she tries to process everything. My heart sinks when I realize my life in New York is over. As the last plate is set down, the waiter asks, “Are we good?”

We are definitely not good.