Matty finally blew his nose into the cardigan and wiped red eyes and said, his voice rough and honking, “Do you want to be my therapist too? I’ll pay you double.”

“I just want you to talk about whatever you want to talk about.”

“I’ve never told anybody that stuff.”

“But you need to.”

Matty nodded.

In the quiet, Shaw was suddenly aware of the enormous wash of blood in his ears, so loud that he couldn’t hear his own breathing, couldn’t hear the traffic outside, couldn’t hear anything.

“You need roosters,” Shaw said, more to say something, anything, because the tidal sound of blood in his ears was going to make him do—the thought imploded into blackness again.

“What?” Matty said, blowing his nose again.

“Lots and lots of pictures of roosters.”

Matty blinked and shook his head.

“All over the walls. Everywhere. On the dinner plates. On the napkins. On the tea towels. The soap dish in the bathroom.”

“What are you talking about?”

“And then, when your mom and dad come over, you just tell them straight out.”

Matty must have figured out the punchline because he buried his face in his hands again. “Oh no.”

“Mom, Dad, you tell them: I like cocks.”

Matty dissolved into giggles, falling against Shaw, burying his face in Shaw’s chest. And the giggles turned into tears. And the tears turned into sobs, and Shaw ran his hand through the unruly wave of blond hair and stroked Matty’s back until the boy had stopped shaking.

“I look like shit,” Matty said after he peeled himself away from Shaw. Touching his red eyes and his snotty nose, he said, “I feel like shit, so I must really look like shit.”

“Matty, I don’t know what you’re going through. My parents are, like, the ultra-liberal hippies that every gay boy probably dreams about. I mean, my dad runs the family business, and my mom teaches art at WashU, but they’re still massive hippies. I think they knew I was gay before I did. My dad set me up on my first date, for Christ’s sake. But God knows I’ve still found plenty of ways to disappoint them.”

“You? You’re perfect.”

Shaw’s cheeks heated. “If you think I’m perfect, ask North sometime. He’s got a list of all the things wrong with me, and it’s the size of a phonebook. But that’s not the point. The point is, I know what it’s like to be keeping a secret from your parents. Something you know is going to disappoint them. Something you know will break their hearts. And I’m telling you, it’ll kill you if you keep it inside too long. No matter how bad it is when you tell them, it won’t be worse than dying from the inside out for the next ten years, or twenty, or fifty.”

Matty’s red eyes were still dry, and his gaze was steady, and Shaw found himself thinking, again, of how remarkable those eyes were, how incredible, and then—just a blip, a hot spot, a flare at the back of his head that vanished a moment later—the thought: North never once looked at me like that.