Don We Now Our Gay Apparel

My husband, Mark, came out to me at Disney World. As we laid in the bed, our skin charred and toasty from the Central Florida sun he said to me with a totally straight face:

“I think I am gay.”

I froze. The incongruence of Mark’s announcement and our flawless heteronormative life, never mind the tinkling joys of Disney outside our windows, was absurd. Our dogs and our cute little house and our good jobs waited for us at home. We enjoyed each other. After we fell in love in college and got married young we were inseparable.  We rarely fought. What would “I am gay” mean for our relationship? 

After we got back from Disney World, I tried to hold the news of Mark’s gayness to myself as long as possible. We processed alone together: in therapy, in our living room, over the phone or text during work. Mark was not ready to tell anyone and I would not out him. But the new development gnawed at me from the inside. I suffered from debilitating migraines, missed work. My family, whom I was close to, sensed something was wrong. 

I was reluctant to tell my folks, married for 40 years and whose frame of reference for gay men were my flamboyant theater uncles. I worried that they would chalk this up to another ridiculous happening in my life, that Mark’s coming out was my failing. Long regarded as the wildcard in my family, I was keen to keep my perfect-looking marriage intact. My family had no problem with gay people, though. 

“Let them get married and be miserable like the rest of us,” Dad loved to roar. 

But it might be different to explain that I, their child, did not have the right genitalia for said marriage. Plus Mark was everyone’s favorite. He gave me a lot of cred in my family as my grandmother liked to remind me when we visited my teensy-weensy hometown:

“Don’t fuck this up! He’s the only thing we like about you sometimes.”

Thanks Grams.

The pressure mounted. I was anxious all the time, afraid I was bad at keeping this secret from my family and I also felt alone as we navigated just me and Mark. Finally, it was too much. I wanted to tell Mom and Dad. And I handled telling my parents like I normally handled a crisis. Like a complete banshee with absolutely zero chill. 

I punched Mom’s contact on my iPhone. She answered brightly, excited and surprised to hear from me.

My Mom, Jan, was your quintessential Mom. She had the short, curly Mom haircut. She was armed with a purse which had everything you ever needed in it. She thought positively, loved cute videos of babies and puppies on Instagram, texted in her own garbled language and was in constant need of tech support. She loved me in a cloying way.

“Hi honey! Oh I didn’t think we would hear from you until we were back! I’m thrilled you called! We are driving home from the beach!”

“Mom,” I interrupted. I never interrupted Mom when she gleefully recounted anything. 

Her voice dropped about 7 octaves, and took on a grave tone, the buoyance deflated. “What’s wrong?”

“Mom, Mark is gay. He told me last month and I think he’s going to want an open marriage and I don’t know how I feel about having sex with other people and I’m scared.”

“WHAT?!” She screamed into the phone. 

I sobbed in reply.

Dad’s gruff, muffled voice in the driver’s seat asked, “What the fuck is wrong?”

Where my Mom was slight, sunny, bright, my Dad was burly, brusque, and curt. Unless, of course, he told a story about the prison where he worked for 20 years or about some obscure person he knew “in the old days” who is either long dead or potentially made up. He loved the History Channel and had brash opinions loudly in front of new people. Six foot plus, we called him Big Paul. He had got a shock of white hair and liked to wear his facial hair in an usual goatee or mustache, never a beard. And he loved me in his way. Usually taciturn.

My mom fumbled the phone to get it on speaker.

“Mark told Lauren he is gay and wants to have an open marriage and Lauren doesn’t know if she wants to,” Mom recapped to Dad.

The car screeched as it swerved.  Mom muttered, “Be careful.” 

“Whaaaaat the fuck?” Dad asked Mom, me and no one in particular. 

“Where are you now?” Mom asked me, Dad’s unanswerable question ignored.

“New York for work.”

She sighed. “How can we help?”

“I don’t know yet, Mom,” I whispered into the phone. “I’m sad and scared.”

“Oh, Lauren,” she said, tears in her voice. “Don’t panic, we are here.”

“I know. I love you. Thanks, Mom. I have to get back to work,” I whimpered.

After we hung up a dread crept from the base of my spine and settled behind my eyes. Shit, fuck. I made a mistake. I outed Mark to Mom and Dad. The dread morphed into shame. The fear about what might happen to us was always right at the back of my throat, but the desire to do everything right for Mark was stronger. How had I done this? I wrung my hands and slunk down onto the floor against the wall, put my head in my hands.

“Fuck,” I muttered quietly.

The phone call with my parents quelled my anxiety for only a brief moment, like digging a hole in the sand, the water rushed back, filled again, undid any work. The anxiety rose. I spent the remainder of the time away fretting. I wanted to make it up to Mark, to show him I paid attention and I understood that I had made a grievous error. 

“It’s okay, Bears,” he said, completely nonplussed when I got home. “I’m honestly more worried that everyone hates me now.”

We were in our sun drenched living room, dogs lazed about in the beams, each of us on either side of our navy blue couch. I reached across the small divide and grabbed his hands. 

“Mark, no one hates you. Why would they hate you? You’re gay, you didn’t kill anyone.” 

He shrugged and was quiet for a moment. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “I don’t want to let anyone down.”

I sighed hard. I knew what he meant.

“I think they might just be,” I searched for the right words, “confused.”

I stopped to think, careful not to drop his hands. 

“Maybe it would help if you came out to the family the way you want to, like have a sit down with them or something,” I suggested.

Mark slowly shook his head yes as he pulled me across the couch for a hug. 

It was decided that day. Mark would come out again, officially, to the family a few weeks later at our Christmas gathering. Mom, Dad, Eric, my brother, and his wife, Amanda, would be there with Mark and I before presents and music to play with our niece and nephew. I prepped the family that this would go down, to give Mark a chance to come out on his own terms. Everyone agreed.

We woke up nervous that morning. We took a seat on the oversized couch in the family room of my childhood home and held hands wordlessly. The wood paneling made the room feel like a cottage, a magical cottage at Christmas when Mom decked the halls. I glanced up at the vaulted ceiling, which reminded me of a pastoral church, sunlight poured through the windows onto dust mites as they danced, backlit by holiday twinkle lights. Last year at Christmas in this house, my life was more whole. I understood my marriage and my place in it. Now things were less certain, more scary. And this talk. Who knew how this was going to go?

Mom got an enormous cup of coffee and settled into her comfy, swivel easy chair and gave us a shy smile without her usual chatter. Dad took the matching chair next to her, faced me and Mark on the couch, stone faced, not speaking. Eric and Amanda, who only lived about a mile away, appeared, coffee in hand, not somber exactly but not with the usual verve with which we are greeted at Christmastime. 

Once they settled at the dining table behind Mom and Dad’s easy chairs, I started. 

“Okay,” I breathed, my voice caught in my nervous chest. “We’re going to give Mark a chance to, you know,” I said as I swept my hand towards Mark. 

Everyone nodded solemnly like a jury of his peers.

Mark started slowly after he drew a long breath, squeezed my hand.

“I’m gay and I couldn’t keep it in any longer. I’ve always known.”

Mom gasped dramatically which forced Mark to pause. Dad made a face at her I could not read. Eric’s eyes found mine. He shrugged as if to say, ‘told ya’. I nodded slightly. We had talked about this the night before, Eric and me.

“Be ready for this to be about Mom and Dad,” Eric said into the phone, in his usual clipped tone. He was always in a hurry. 

“Yeah, I’m ready,” I replied, as I rolled my eyes, sighed. 

Back on the couch, Mark continued.

“I thought I would keep it to myself forever. I met Lauren and here’s this beautiful, wonderful woman and I love her and I’m attracted to her, and I thought maybe I’m not all the way gay. But I am. And Lauren is amazing, she has made our relationship a safe place for me to come out. And she’s been super supportive.”

He stopped to catch his breath. I stared at him. I could not look at my family. I would have cried and never stopped. Or I would have burst into laughter. Here was my darling husband, awkward, bald, bearded, brilliant, and gay, as he told my septuagenarian parents in my childhood home that he was a huge homo. And had been. At Christmas time. They stared at him agog, even though they already had most of this information.

Mom took the opportunity to ask the first question. 

“Are you going to get divorced?”

“No,” I interjected quickly. 

Mark shook his head no, too. “Lauren is my person. I always want to take care of her and be with her. We are a family.”

“We are going to change some things about our relationship,” I offered. “Like we are going to practice polyamory.”

Mom pursed her lips ready to ask her next question. 

“You know,” Dad interrupted, “it’s always been hard for me to make friends.”

My forehead moved into a deep crease, as frustration mounted in my body. I glanced quickly at Eric and Amanda. My brother raised his eyebrows and then lowered his head, the corners of his lips curled into a smile. Amanda’s green eyes widened behind her cat eye glasses. This could go anywhere.

I glanced over at Mark, the panic etched on his face. 

“Gay is great. I understand wanting to connect with people, like when I worked on D block. I tried hard to connect with the other corrections officers over there. But in the end it was the inmates I had the best bond with. I sometimes wonder what happened to this one fella…” his voice trailed off wistfully. It sounded as if there were tears choked in his throat. 

Eric and Amanda barely managed to stifle their giggles. Either Dad was about to come out alongside Mark or he took Mark’s coming out as an opportunity to tell a prison story. I was about to exasperatedly remind Dad that this was not the time for prison stories when Mom cut in. 

“I don’t think I like open marriage,” she said, her voice louder than normal to drown out Dad.

Mark and I exchanged confused looks.

“Well, it’s okay if you don’t like it, Mom. This is what we are going to do. That way each us can have our needs met and we can stay together,” I responded

She shook her head quickly back and forth as if rejecting this information. “No, it’s cheating.”

“Umm,” I said. I glanced at Mark for support but, no. Now he had his head in his hands to stifle the giggles. I sighed quickly. 

“Mom, I’m not a man, you know, Mark is going to want to…”

I made a sort of spinning motion with my hands, not exactly imitated anal sex but hoped she would get the picture. As her favorite Christmas clock marked the hour with a tinny rendition of Deck the Halls, she explained.

“I think that it is cheating if you have sex with another person and you are married.”

I furrowed my brows and cocked my head to the side. 

“Well,” I continued. “If it feels like cheating, you definitely don’t have to have an open marriage,” I managed, as I tried to contain my vexation. 

Mom still appeared completely flummoxed. If she thought open marriages were cheating, why would I have an open marriage?

“Dad,” I said confidently, as Mom worked this out internally. “It sounds like Mom doesn’t want to have an open marriage.” 

Dad regarded Mom and then me, incredulous. “I don’t care what she does!”

My eyebrows shot up and I could feel my mouth making an “O” the laughs that everyone else felt finally showed up for me. Mom was about to say something else but then my brother stood up abruptly and declared:

  “I have something to say.” 

Mom and Dad swiveled their easy chairs around and faced the dining room as Mark's eyes widened. I tried to fix my face. What now? 

Eric waited until the room fell quiet with anticipation. He puffed up his chest and put his hand on Amanda’s arm. He raised his chin bravely. 

“I am coming out as straight,” he bellowed like a viking, throwing his arms open like a warrior ready to be welcomed to Valhalla. Eric had a compact build and dirty blonde hair that was long on top and short on the sides, such that he could toss it back which he did in that moment with very dramatic effect. He flexed his biceps a little as if to put a fine point on this current charade. I sighed and rolled my eyes, flopped back into the couch cushions.   

He paused a beat, downed the remainder of his coffee, slammed the cup on the table and marched off. The air in the room hung like so much cheap tinsel. Nothing was appropriate to do or say. 

Was the coming out over?  

Mark’s chortling rose from the couch. I cut him a glance and he was doubled over in a fit of laughter. Amanda took this cue to let out the breath she was holding. She shook her head and mouthed sorry to me as she slipped out of the room, on her way to pick up the kids to celebrate Christmas. Mom turned back to us. 

“I don’t get it,” she deadpanned. This made Mark laugh harder. 

“It’s okay, Mom. I think Eric made a joke,” I said, starting to laugh as Mark tried without success to catch his breath.

She shook her head, scrunched her face up, confused. “Well is Eric still straight or not?”

“We’re good here?” Dad asked, hauling himself out of his chair, ready to lumber into the other easy chair down the hall to watch The Haunted History of Christmas. 

“All good,” Mark managed between peals of joy.