“We should call my aunt Ruth,” he says. “She’ll know what to do.”
“And Father Peters,” I add. Now that I spend time every week with a Catholic priest, I finally understand what they’re for.
“Yeah. Him too. Thanks.”
We find Kieran’s family quickly, but then we all sit for hours in the waiting room, with no news.
Mr. Shipley is in surgery. Kyle looks red-eyed and sad. Kieran’s mom looks white with fear. There’s blood on her clothes, at least until Ruth Shipley arrives with fresh clothes to put on.
When I summoned Ruth Shipley, I apparently summoned the entire Shipley clan. Griffin and Audrey are here. Strangers keep glancing at Audrey, wondering if she’s here to have her baby, I think. That’s how round she is. Dylan is here, too, along with Grandpa Shipley.
Zara dropped off sandwiches that nobody is eating.
Kieran sits hunched in a chair. When I bring him a soda, he drinks it without noticing. Griffin and his other cousins stop by to speak to him in hushed tones, and Kieran nods at their kind words. But he seems to have retreated into himself.
Father Peters sits beside Kyle, an arm around his shoulder, while Kyle tries to hold it together.
Finally—seventy-two years after we arrive—a nurse manager comes out to brief the family. “He’s still in surgery, but that will be over soon,” she says. “He lost a lot of blood, but his vitals seem to be stabilizing.”
“That’s good, right?” Kieran’s mom asks.
“It’s a positive sign,” the nurse says gently. “It will still be a while before the surgeon can come out to explain the procedure.”
“Okay,” Kieran’s mother says shakily. “He has a rare blood type.”
“Yes, he does,” the nurse agrees. “We had to ask the Red Cross to transfer some more units. It’s coming, just in case he needs it.”
“I’m B negative,” Kyle says, raising a hand. “Can I donate? My mother is B positive, so she can’t. But maybe my brother can.”
Kieran stiffens beside me, and I feel a chill roll down my spine, because I have a bad feeling about the turn of this conversation. Whether he knows it or not, Kieran is now an “MSM,” or a man who’s had sex with men. It makes you ineligible to donate blood.
Oh shit.
“Well, you can absolutely donate, if you feel like you want to make that contribution,” the nurse says. “We can take both of you right now. And if you’re not the right blood type, another patient will benefit.”
Kyle shoots out of his chair. “Nah, I’m a good match. I wrote a paper about this in bio class. I swear it was my only good grade that year because I thought testing blood was cool.”
Oh Kyle, I think wistfully. Don’t ever change. It’s a shame we’re never going to be in-laws.
“Let’s go, Kieran,” he says.
Everyone watches Kieran give his head a slow shake. “I can’t.”
“Sure you can,” Kyle says. “At least try.”
“I’m O neg!” Audrey says, rising out of her chair, her big pregnant belly leading the way. “I’m a hundred percent match for anyone, so I’ll go.”
“I’m sorry,” the Nurse says, shaking her head. “There are rules against pregnant women giving blood.”
“Oh, geez.” Audrey says. “I’m not allowed to do anything.”
“Thank God,” Griffin says.
“Let’s go, Kieran,” Kyle says. “You’re probably a match.”
He shakes his head, and my heart drops. This could be the most awkward coming out in the history of ever. Don’t do it, I beg, even though I’ve wanted him to do this very thing for months.
“What? Why?” Kyle thunders. “Dad would do it for you.”
“I’m not a match,” Kieran says quietly.
His mother gasps. Her eyes are round and worried.
And now I’m really confused.
Kieran looks up at his mom, seeming to snap out of his trance. “You want me to walk in there and pretend? My blood type is AB. I already know.”
“You can’t be AB,” Kyle argues. “Mom and Dad are both B. That’s impossible.”
And that’s when it finally dawns on me. Kieran isn’t talking about the homophobic regulations at all. One of his parents is not his bio parent. He knows this. But Kyle has no idea.
“Kieran,” his mother sobs. “Wait. How did you…”
“I took that class, too.” At that, he stands up and walks out of the room, while more than a dozen pairs of eyes follow him.
Meanwhile, the nurse has turned as white as her shoes. “My goodness,” is all she says.
“Hey, try me,” Griffin says, rising. “I’m the patient’s nephew.” He puts an arm around a stunned Kyle. “If you want to donate blood, I’ll go with you.”
“But—” Kyle’s eyes are fixed on the doorway where Kieran disappeared.
“You can talk to him later,” Griff says, leading Kyle away before the moment gets any freakier.
“Excuse me,” I whisper, standing, although nobody is paying me any mind. “I’m just going to…”
Then I gallop after Kieran.
Luckily, Kieran isn’t hard to find. He’s right outside the sliding door of the hospital. “Do you have a cigarette?” he asks me when I arrive at his side.
“No way. Let’s not poison our lungs over this,” I say, startled.
“Fine.” He tucks his chin against his chest.
I move to stand next to him, so we’re both holding up the wall together. And, very surreptitiously, I reach a pinky finger out and hook it over his. “Are you okay?”
“Not really.”
“That was your real secret, right? The thing that made everything else hard.”
“Yeah.” His finger hooks around mine.
I look up at the wintry sky, but I’m really seeing all those faces in the waiting room, staring at Kieran as he drops this bomb—that somehow he’s not his father’s biological son. He didn’t say why, but if it’s such a big secret, the reason must be something shameful.
“I should have just gone with Kyle, right?” he says. “Maybe the hospital wouldn’t have said anything. My whole life I’ve dreaded this.” He looks up at me with red eyes, and it’s as if I can see right through him.
He’d said his family had secrets, but I hadn’t really understood. “You’ve been sitting on this a long time, then? That couldn’t have been easy.”
“It wasn’t my secret to tell,” he croaks. “I was just supposed to pretend I don’t know the things I know. So my parents could save face.”
“That’s exhausting.”
“Sure, but…” He swallows. “The reward was staying in the group, you know? My cousins aren’t even my cousins, for fuck’s sake.”
Oh. “Of course they are,” I say fiercely. And then I step into Kieran’s personal space and hug him. And he wraps his arms around me and puts his chin on my shoulder.
It feels so good and so necessary that I feel like crying. It’s just hitting me why Kieran is so obsessed with his secrecy. He’s been clinging to it all his life.