I watch her walk away down the street, her head in her phone, and tell myself it’s all fine. It’s fine.

*   *   *

The next morning, I’m chewing on the bum end of a bluish loaf of bread in the kitchen. Mom is sucking the death out of a cigarette while reading the local paper. It will tell her when the garden club sales are and about the watercolor classes at the library, but it won’t tell her about the real world. My world. I watch her and am amazed by how little she knows about me or my life. About her incredibly shrinking daughter with her secretive, fickle friends. I want to shock her, to get her to snap out of her little dream life she’s been in lately.

I clear my throat. “So … Lottie’s mom is transitioning. Into a man.”

Her dull eyes register me out of the fog. “What? Who is? Rhonda?”

“Lottie doesn’t have another mom. Yes, Rhonda.”

“What do you mean—she’s having a sex change operation?”

“I don’t think they call it that anymore, Mom.”

“What the hell do you mean, ‘she’s transitioning’?”

“Well, she is a man. He is. That’s what he told Lottie.”

“Who did? Rhonda?”

“Yes, but that’s not going to be his name now.”

She thought about this. “Holy. I had no idea. I mean, I haven’t seen her in a while, but … What’s she changing her name to? I guess Ron? At least that part will be easy.”

“Actually, his name is Pete.”

“Oh, Jesus.”

She takes a deep breath, her eyes blinking slowly. “What about school?”

“I guess he’s telling the students soon. And then—” A lump in my throat. I can’t bear the idea of school without Rhonda. Without Pete. Come on, Stevie, hold it together. “Then he’s changing schools next fall. Going to teach somewhere else. To start fresh.”

She nods, up and down, up and down, while this information sinks in.

“Huh,” she says. “That makes sense, I guess.” She picks at her nail polish. “I mean. Well. She was always a bit mannish.” She exhales. “I don’t blame her for wanting to ditch this club. It’s a huge racket.” She nods some more. “Pete, eh? I bet she can’t wait to stop shaving her pits. That’s what I’d look forward to if I were her.”

“Him.”

“Who?”

“Pete. You have to call him ‘him.’ That’s how he’s chosen to identify.”

“Oh jeez, Stevie, will you cut me some slack? I’m forty-six; sometimes I forget who I am. Him. God, you’re insufferable.”