Today is Thursday. Somehow, I’m already on my fourth day in the old/new world, and I might feel worse about that if I wasn’t so obsessed with what Leeza said about my mom before we got into the Buckman mess.

It’s not like my mom has ever been capital H homophobic, and she has always been majorly loving, but her reservations come across loud and clear. The wince when she hears me “yassss”-ing my friends and the tightened lips when I say “sis.” The refusal to let friends sleep over. Her insistence that I could go to Capitol Pride with the regional queer youth group only if there were adult chaperones—as if some crazy debauchery is ever gonna happen on the streets of Albany. (Does she know I’ve been to the real Pride in NYC twice, claiming I was with Cheng’s family at their cabin? No, no she does not.) It’s never directly about me being gay, only what the world is like for gays like me: those who don’t play sports or dress like Sears models. Honestly, she could have handled being a mom to Cheng way better. It’s a gentler, kinder way of disapproving, but if you have to deploy a “gentler, kinder” version of anything, the underlying sentiment is neither.

I want to witness this progressive version of her, the one before whatever happened to Chaz. So ignoring what Leeza told me to do, I’m lying in wait at the poster board near her locker when she enters the ad building. I pretend to be looking at the Last Call for Prom Council flyer, which turns out to be genius since she is the head of the team.

“Are you going to help out? I’m pumped! It takes forever to get all the streamers up, but if you don’t do it, the cafeteria just looks like the cafeteria.”

The cafeteria? Seriously? Instead of a hotel ballroom or a ship?

This place! I correct myself. This time.

“I’d love to!”

Lie. I hate crepe paper. So tacky.

“Do I need to sign up or—”

She trills a laugh. “Duh. I’m in charge, and you just told me! But walk with me …” She sets a pretty brisk pace with those short legs, and we’re heading away from the classrooms toward what is the computer lab in my day but turns out to be a huge supply closet. The girl who didn’t go to prom is actually the Shreya of the operation? She has some ’splaining to do when I get back to my time.

Along the storage room’s back wall are two metal tables covered with bolts of shimmery blue-black fabric taller than I am and rows of glass vases shaped like stars. “Night Under the Stars?” I guess, a little bummed that Mom chose such a predictable theme.