“Yes. Of course. I can see her pulling her expression into place. That little twitchy thing she does around her mouth. The way she folds her expression into something that subtly implies diminished expectation. Slightly disappointed is her neutral, resting state.”

“I think most of her disappointment is around my being queer.”

“Oh no, it goes way beyond that. She’d also like you to have some sort of regular job. She’d like you to be working on Broadway shows. But if you were, she wouldn’t like the particular show. And she doesn’t care for your hair. She told me you look like a boy from an English boarding school. She’d like for you to go long and ombré.”

“The hair thing.” Cate runs a hand through it. “At least I won’t have to have another depressing conversation about the election. It’s only been a couple of weeks. There’s a possibility my mother hasn’t heard yet that there was an election. Why do you get to have warm, friendly holidays?”

“Well, friendly, yes, but you know parties at my parents’ aren’t exactly warm. More like spirited. All those old lefties in a small, enclosed space. All those saggy sweaters, all that corduroy. This year it’ll probably be a wake, a funeral for democracy. My parents have worked their whole lives for equality and diversity, the good of the common man. What’s coming is going to be a total teardown of all that. That guy’s going to come in thrashing at everything decent and good. Thrashing with a machete.”

“I know.”

“There’s going to be a women’s march. Around the inauguration. My mother’s working on it. It’s going to be big.” Then she puts a light, restraining hand on Cate’s arm. “I need to talk with you about something. It’s Joe. I need you to tell me what to do.”

“What is it? God, I hate to ask.”

“I went through the browser history on his laptop.”

“Porn.”

“Well, of course. I mean, he’s twelve. And I wouldn’t worry about busty babes, or even blow jobs. But what I found was Czech Fantasy 8—Part 3.”

“Oh, I really don’t want to hear this, do I?”