THREE

HE WAS WAITING for me across the street. I tried calm down as I jaywalked over there, fiddling around with my knapsack. I wanted things to stay civil as possible in the following conversation, but knowing the two participants, that probably wasn't going to happen.

"I saw that outrageous sticker you put on your locker," KC growled as soon as I joined him, spinning around and beginning in the same direction we had walked to Degrassi from.

Well, at least social niceties had been abandoned at the beginning and there was not going to be any beating around the bush. "Yeah? And?"

"Why do you want the whole fricken school to know you think you're a lesbian?" he demanded, glaring at me out of the corner of his eyes. "I thought that you'd have given up this whole homosexual thing by now."

"You thought that being homeless would cure my gayness?" I rolled my eyes, anger beginning to boil my blood. "You are so fricken closed-minded, KC. Do you have any idea how many gay people go to Degrassi? We make up, like, 10% of the population!"

"Stop talking like you're one of them," he muttered, shoving his hands in his pockets.

I stopped in my tracks. "I am one of them!" I yelled, running to make up the ground I had lost. "Why is that so hard for you to accept? This isn't some phase, KC —this is who I am!"

It was his turn to roll his eyes. "It's a choice, Jordan. And I don't know why you'd choose eternal damnation and hellfire."

Are you kidding me? I hated that I was the one losing my temper, but I couldn't help it. "Since when are you religious!? I know we used to pray together when—"

"And that's another thing." He whirled around to face me. "When Dad gets out of jail, don't you think he'll come looking for us? And how do you think he's gonna feel about you wanting to be a lesbian?"

My insides went frosty and suddenly I was catapulted in time. I was so young. Dad was yelling, Mom was unconscious on the couch, and KC was crying. I pressed my hands to my ears, wanting to be somewhere —anywhere— than here….

I blinked. "I don't give a shit about him or what he thinks," I hissed, shoving past my brother. "Is that how you're gonna live your life, KC? Making your decisions on the chance of Dad maybe finding you someday? You've always been a coward."

He didn't say anything and wouldn't look at me.

I stared at my feet as we walked, my nails digging into my hands, every muscle in my body tensed. We had to get along, that's what my officer said. And I didn't want to be angry with him. He was the only family I had. I didn't want him to hate me…. "It isn't a choice," I said once we were stopped at a light. He didn't saying anything, just pressed the crosswalk button. "Why in the world would I choose to be discriminated against? You know how much shit I got at Oakdale —who's to say Degrassi won't be any different? I put that sticker on my locker because it is part of who I am. I can't change, KC, and even if I could I don't think I would. Yeah, it's a harder life, but…I'm okay with it. And I'm not going to hide to spare anyone's discomfort. Besides, what does my liking girls have anything to do with you —with anyone!?"

He wasn't going to talk. This infuriated me. I think I would've been happier if he was yelling. Was he not going to even acknowledge my efforts? I was trying to explain myself —I wanted him to understand. Couldn't he see that? "Well this is who I am, KC, and like it or not I can't change. I'm still your sister, I'm still going to be going to your school, and I'm still going to be living with you. If you don't want to associate, fine, that's your choice. I never meant to force myself upon you. I was perfectly content by myself."

That wasn't true. Those six months…I was not okay. And I had never needed anyone more in my life than KC. But I wasn't about to say anything that even hinted at that. If there was one thing I learned my half-year on the streets was that I could be a lone wolf if I wanted to. I did not need other people. I had survived by myself.

We reached the street —Spartan Avenue— where the cruiser had dropped me off when my officer spotted KC on his way to school. He, the cop, had been kind enough to let me go and take my crap to the group home for me. I mean, all and all the police were trying to be accommodating. They were placing me in a group home with my brother, not into some random orphanage in Quebec (which was where I wandered to over the span). They even furnished me with a wardrobe of brand-new clothes, seeing as the few outfits that had been in my possession were falling-apart and stained.

KC turned sharply to the right. I looked up at saw the building. It was painted a dingy green with a flat roof. Through the windows I saw kids —regular looking kids— walking around, some pantomiming laughing. An adult was chilling against one of the walls and said something, making a mark on the whiteboard behind him. KC headed up the steps and went inside, me close behind.

The place smelled like plaster, old carpet, teenagers, and a home-cooked meal all mixed together. There were maybe ten people in the room we had just entered, four of which were playing foosball, three boys were being swallowed by a couch as they watched a small TV, and two kids manned two ancient computers atop two desks, leaving one desk and computer vacant. Then there was a girl talking to the tall, broad-shouldered adult who couldn't have been older than twenty.

"Hey KC," the skinhead said, his emerald eyes flashing. "You must be Jordan." I approached him and offered my hand, trying to smile despite the emotions ravaging inside of me. "My name's Caleb —I'm one of the counselors who volunteer here." He turned to my brother. "KC, why don't you show Jordan to your room? Martin's coming by later to help me get another single in there."

My twin nodded and feigned a smile for Caleb, but his mouth was still sewn shut as we exited the front room and entered a long, narrow hallway. Doors lined each side, each with a white board attached, numbered 1-16, odds on the left, evens on the right. We continued until we reached room 11, which had KC Guthrie written in a cursive I doubted was his, and underneath…was my name. I don't know why, but that struck me. We were about to enter my room. I was going to have a home for the first time in six months.

KC shouldered open the door. The room was painted a tan shade and bore white carpet. There was a bed propped into the left corner with a navy blue comforter. Opposite it, just to the left of the door was the closet. A window was the only source of illumination, although directly below it stood an end table with a diminutive lap residing atop it. Judging by the size of his bed, there would be just enough room for mine. In the current space where my bed would go was KC's skateboard —the same one that he'd had since we were like, ten— and a duffle bag with a Degrassi panther on it. The zipper was half-drawn, so I could see a basketball and a sliver of gold from his uniform.

He followed my gaze and went over there, taking his things and dumping them in the floor of the closet. I could see that he had already moved his clothes to the rightmost section, leaving half of the space for me, which was filled with my new garments. That consideration must have been done this morning, while he was still able to live in the delusion that when we reunited, I would be straight.

KC abandoned his backpack and settled on top of his bed, pulling out a paperback from the drawer of the end table and burrowing his nose in it.

He was going to give me the cold shoulder? Fine. So fricken immature. I deposited my knapsack and squatted, liberating my wallet from the side pocket. My officer had given me five twenties when he was driving me from the juvy they put me in at Montréal to Toronto. They were definitely generous in every meaning of the word.

"Where do you think you're going?" he asked, setting his book down on his chest.

"Declan and Fiona invited me to a party tonight," I replied, standing and brushing myself off. "Seeing as neither of them have a problem with my sexuality, I'd rather spend time with them than you at the moment."

He returned his attention to his book. "You can't leave."

"Oh yeah? And why is that?"

KC turned the page. "You don't have enough points."

Points? What the fricken-frack was he talking about? Without any more words I exited the room, having to press myself against the wall as a few girls passed me to get to their rooms. One of them sort of looked like a younger version of Alex, which made me get a feeling I didn't quite understand. I took a gander at my hand and saw her number. Maybe I wouldn't need to get a taxi….

"Whoa there!" someone said, touching my shoulder. I turned around to come face-to-face with Caleb. "Where you headed off to, Jordan?"

I wavered. I wasn't sure how to treat this guy. Was he supposed to be my parental figure? Was he like a babysitter? Exactly what was his authority over me? I decided to play it safe. "One of my friends is throwing a party —I wanted to attend."

He grimaced with sympathy. "I'm sorry sweetie, but you don't have enough points." He gestured towards the white board that was up in the front room. It seemed to be a table, names across the top with tally-marks underneath. I raised an eyebrow. "You see, residents here earn points by doing housework, doing well in school, being an active member in the community…things of that sort. We even do projects and assignments from time to time for you guys to earn extra points." Points. This place had a point system. "Basically, if you make good choices, you get points! If you make bad choices, you might get points taken away." Oh…my…god. "Points are kind of like money around here. You want to go out? That costs points. Use the phone? Points. Watch TV? Points. Now, we give all our new members 20 points to start with. That's good for an hour of TV time, or an hour on the phone. Unfortunately, for a party, you're looking at around 50 points. Even then, you'd have to be back by 11:00pm. That's the curfew."

I stared at him, not comprehending. I had watched a total of maybe five hours of TV in the past six months, through strangers' open windows. I had gotten to use a payphone maybe twice, and both times it was to call KC. Here I was, thinking that I was finally going to be able to indulge in the luxuries of domestic life, but no. It costs points.

Now I didn't know what to do with myself. I dragged myself back into room 11 only to find KC smiling smugly into his book. Ugh. I tucked my wallet away and got out that night's homework, going back into the front room to do it.

It had been awhile since I was made to do homework, so I had forgotten how unfun (my word, not anyone else's) it is. I may have been flabbergasted and disappointed before, but I had morphed into nothing more than a sad mound of flesh.

An hour or two later I was almost done, but needed to check a fact about Custer's Last Stand for a History quick-write. I bit my lip and looked around. I had settled into a beanbag chair next to the front door, out of the way of everyone else. Was I allowed to go on the computer? Or was I supposed to pay points? And how did one actually spend—

A low-throated bell donged rapidly. "CHOW!" Caleb yelled, letting go of the rope that dangled from the bell that was next to the whiteboard. Somewhere, some invisible hand turned a switch on. Everyone in the front room was instantly on their feet and racing down the hallway. Shortly after, everyone that was within one of the bedrooms flooded into the passage and turned left at the end of the hallway.

The color the interior of the front room and hallway were painted was a sort of beige that blended into itself, so it appeared as if the residents were disappearing into the wall itself. This was the only reason I hadn't noticed the continuation of the house before.

"…19…20…21…who are we missing?" Caleb's voice carried from the hidden corridor.

"…KC's sister?" an uncertain female voice tried.

I closed what I was working on and made my way down the hall. A room just as big as the front room, with an elongated dining table to the left and a kitchen to the right, was revealed to me. Kids and teenagers were seated, one empty seat in the middle of my brother and another adult who was not Caleb, because Caleb was sitting at one of the heads. I guess the fact that I completely missed this stranger's entrance is a testimony to my intensity when I'm focusing on something, even if that something is school work.

I took the only empty seat and took the paper towel that was folded underneath my silverware and put it on my lap, following the suit of the people sitting beside me.

"Join hands," Caleb said, outstretching both of his arms. Everyone obeyed, and at once I saw an expectant hand on either side of me. Were we going to say grace? I bit my lip, taking the hands of KC and the other adult. Anything about religion makes me sort of...itchy. Once I had completed their little oval, eyes were closed and heads were bowed. I hastily copied this maneuver as well. "Dear Lord," Caleb started again, "thank you for this food. Bless the hands that prepared it, bless it to our use and us to your service, and make us ever mindful of the needs of others. Through Christ our Lord we pray. Amen."

A gentle echo of 'amen' circled the assembled, mine squeaking out a little later.

On display were three moist, plump chickens with succulent skin and exquisite barbecue scars. Next to the main dishes were a bowl of mashed potatoes, a pitcher of gravy, and a platter of broccoli with melted cheese on top. A fresh influx of water burst into my mouth. The Degrassi lunch I had eaten was no better than the food one can recover from Dumpsters, but this....

People left and right were helping themselves, asking politely to pass the gravy or for a serving of chicken from Caleb, who was the one wielding the cutting knife. I put my plate forth and gathered a hefty serving of everything offered, to the point where my plate was overflowing.

"Are you sure your eyes aren't too big for your stomach, Jordan?" asked the stranger guy to my left, wearing a good-natured smile. "We don't like to waste food here if we can help it."

Previous to this comment I had been shoveling the contents into my mouth shamelessly, but to answer him, a slowed slightly. "I understand. I'll eat all of it, I swear." The other residents laughed, flashing me harmless smiles. This made me slow down a little more. I hadn't regarded the group home as hostile before, but...I don't know. Their friendly gazes made me feel good. I turned to KC, but he was just as preoccupied with his dinner as he was with his lunch.

Some kid cracked a joke about his math teacher, so we all started talking about geometry. Another girl went on this rant about how it was her favorite class and I fearlessly combated her, complaining about its pointlessness (I mean, really? Geometry is only useful for people who aspire to be architects or something. Not for the common population). We got into kinda a debate but it wasn't tense at all. She was funny, actually, and I made the table laugh a second time with some wisecrack.

Needless to say, I was beginning to ease myself out of the anxiety that had gripped me the entire day. I tried to focus on our conversation (which had somehow segued to NASCAR), but my stomach curled into knots every time I glanced at KC out of my peripherals.

Why couldn't he cut me some slack, just this one time?

Martin (the other adult who agreed with my views on geometry) must have noticed KC's antisocial attitude, because a few minutes later he asked: "Did everything go okay at school, KC?"

My attention was trained on my brother and a talking burning bush would not have diverted it. He tensed, either at the query or at my having stopped eating, buying himself some extra time by sending a morsel of chicken into his mouth. My twin chewed slowly, probably contemplating on what to say. Was he going to out me? I raised an eyebrow at the thought. Maybe I should out myself...maybe all of them could convince him that nothing was wrong with being born homosexual.

"Everything went fine," he said, his voice resigned. "Jordan just...made some decisions that I don't necessarily agreed with." A spoonful of gravy and mashed potatoes was gone.

"Jordan," Caleb interjected. "Care to elaborate?"

I looked to my plate for something to buy me time, but it was everything but licked clean. Should I tell them what this was really all about, or do I lie? I don't have a real aversion to lying, although I think it makes one's life more difficult and puts in question the authenticity of your relations with other human beings. It was then I recalled the grace we had recited before dinner. "I, uh…just put an obnoxious sticker up on my locker at school. I stand behind its message, but uh…I think KC may have a point. It is kind of uncalled-for to be that, uh…flamboyant."

Martin spoke next. "KC, what do you think about what your sister said?"

He was so quiet for so long I thought he was going to just ignore Martin, who (I gained by the dinner conversation) was another counselor who volunteered at the home on occasion. After agonizing seconds, he said this: "That sticker isn't going to make her life any easier, that's all I'm saying. She used to get roughed up at our old school for preaching crap like that, and I think that could all be avoided. I don't really care about what the sticker says I guess, or what it means for her to be so avid to flaunt it. It's just …something bad could've gone down at Oakdale, and she would have never landed herself in that situation if she wasn't so…outspoken."

Dinner ended. Someone volunteered to round up all the silverware and plates we used, while someone else volunteered to wash the dishes, and another asked to dry them and put them away. All for points, believe it or not. I wasn't feeling particularly driven to clean, so I didn't , but I realized I would have to sometime if I ever wanted to go anywhere besides school and the home. Someone else even cooked that dinner for points. Evidently, points were crucial to group-home life.

I followed Martin and Caleb outside as the sky grew darker, needing to clear my head. I had no idea where I stood with KC now. What he said at dinner was not the same thing he said on our walk over here.

Getting a single bed into a bedroom at that building is a multistep process, believe me. First of all, we needed to break down the bed frame into all of its initial parts —there was no way we could get it through the door, let alone that narrow hallway into room 11. Some of the other residents, including Geometry Enthusiast, assisted us in transporting the fragments into the room in question. Then came the transportation of the mattress, which seems like it would be the easy part, though it took four of us to navigate it into room 11 (you would not believe how sharp of a turn you have to make in such little space). Once the mattress was inside, we had to reassemble the frame, wedge it into the area between the end table and the right-side wall, place the mattress correctly, and then make the bed. All in all it totaled into an hour of hard labor, and Martin and Caleb collaborated to award each of us 10 points.

Current total points: 30. While it may seem anticlimactic, after going through all that trouble…I don't know. It seemed like 10 points well-earned.

By 9:00pm that night, KC and I were lounging on our respective beds, he just starting his homework, me just relaxing. Well, trying to relax. Not knowing what my twin was thinking bothered me. Were the both of us on good terms now? Did he really believe I was going to hell for being gay? Were we just NOT going to talk about it?

"…So are you upset with me or no?" I asked once I had cultivated enough nerve, staring at the ceiling. Seconds crawled by as he took his time conjuring up his answer. Why, I wondered. A simple yes or no would do. 'Yes' was a perfectly acceptable answer. I just needed to know.

"I don't really give a shit about any of the homosexual crap," he muttered. My eyebrows rose. Language is language to me, whether or not the word is a four-letter one or not. It's just that KC rarely curses. I held my breath, inwardly coaxing him to keep talking. "You can like girls, I don't care. I don't think either of us is going to heaven either way."

I seconded that statement, but…. "Then why the temper-tantrum?"

He didn't laugh. "That guy could've killed you," was all he replied.

I sat up and scooted around to face my brother, leaning against the wall and tucking my knees to my chest. "He was all talk," I said, making a dismissing gesture with my hand for emphasis. "He would've never done anything."

"Yeah? But what if he had?" KC looked me in the eye for the first time in what seemed like centuries. "He was twice as big as me, Jordan. If he decided he didn't want you living anymore, you'd be dead."

I scoffed at this. "He was a pussy! He never would've—"

The look that came over KC's face stopped me mid-sentence. "He shoved you, he tripped you, he said unforgivable things to your face —how long do you think it would've been before one of his threats came true?"

I was torn. Part of me wanted to argue because Mykel would've never tried anything… he was an idiot by all accounts, but not that stupid. Yet part of me was…touched, I guess. The whole reason this gay thing bothered KC was because he didn't want me getting hurt. "I never go anywhere without that knife you gave me," I told him, lying back down on my bed. "And you learn shit on the streets…if he came back around, I could mess him up."

This comment managed a chuckle out of my twin, who mimicked me by tucking his school-things away and switching off the lap, shrouding us in darkness. "You better hope he doesn't come back around," was all he said, but with pounds of pounds of relief, I could hear a smile on his mouth. Day one of being re-assimilated into society had come to a close, and all I know is I slept like a rock.