A Fantastic Holiday Season: The Gift of Stories by Kevin J. Anderson Page B

Kaylee.
    “Dad, I’ve been wanting to I’ve been waiting to—Dad—”
    Leo waited. They both sat, staring toward Kaylee. Leo had just the lightest connection to Riley. He wondered whether he should boost it to find out what Riley was trying to tell him. He used to do that all the time. Lately, he’d been wondering if that was such a good idea.
    “Dad, I think I’m gay.”
    Leo stared at the floor. Dismay swamped him, and a storm of thoughts he wanted to edit out as they swarmed through his mind—so there’s my legacy gone to a dead end, people will hate my son and hurt him because he’s different, he’s not the same to me anymore either, what do I do now? How could this happen? Whose fault is it? Why Riley, why me?—
    He touched his sternum and listened to what Riley hadn’t said aloud. Riley had been sitting on a volcano, and now he was swallowed up in a cloud of dark gray fear and despair.
    Leo took Riley’s hand. He leaned back, holding his son’s hand, and let his mind relax, let the whirling thoughts fade. When he felt calm, he said, “Okay.”
    “I wish I wasn’t. I’ve been trying to make it change, but it doesn’t. I thought if I didn’t ever say it out loud, it would go away, but it didn’t.”
    “How long have you been struggling with this?”
    Riley looked away. Leo waited.
    “About two years,” Riley said at last. “There’s a guy at school, we’ve been in the same classes for a couple years, and I had a crush on him, kinda, but I knew he’d hate me if I did anything about it, and—and the other guys are all talking about girls, but—I don’t feel—I—”
    Leo squeezed his hand. “It’s all right, Riley. It’s okay. It’s—it’s natural, and you’re not alone.” Two years? Two years, and Leo had been living in the same house with him for one and a half of those years, connected through family magic, and hadn’t noticed this dark cloud wrapping around his son. Maybe he was losing his magic, too, the way his brother Rick had.
    Riley sighed. They sat side by side, Leo holding Riley’s hand, until Kaylee was through looking at bird nests. “Let’s go to the hall of minerals,” she said.
    Leo stood up and tugged Riley to his feet. His son was almost as tall as he was. Fear and guilt still thrummed through the boy. Leo pulled his son into a hug. “Hey. You’re a fine kid. Nothing wrong with you. Got it?”
    “No,” said Riley, muffled, speaking to Leo’s shoulder, his arms tight around his father. Then he laughed.
    “We can work on that.” Leo thumped him on the back and let go. They could work on it … when Leo had visits with the kids. Or if he moved home. Or, he supposed, on the phone, if it came down to it. He needed to get online and do some research, find out what Riley was likely to need and how to help him. “Call me anytime if you need help. Does your mom know?”
    “I didn’t tell her, but I think she—sometimes she—I don’t know.”
    Leo felt a glow at the thought that Riley had told him first, then tried to tamp it down. “We can worry about that later. Right now, we’ve got some rocks to visit.”
    “Yeah. Okay.” Riley rubbed his eyes with his fists. Leo patted his back again, and they followed Kaylee to the hall of minerals.
    Riley was calmer, smiling, when Leo dropped him and Kaylee off at the house later that afternoon.
    The locked box inside of Kaylee was jiggling and jumping. The lid rattled as if something inside was trying to scratch its way out.

    Wednesday was Christmas Day. At eight a.m., Leo parked in front of the house. The front lawn was still frosty with last night’s freeze, and his breath puffed out of him, little clouds that spun and vanished. The trees were bare-branched black. He grabbed the shopping bags of presents and headed up the walk to the front door. If this Christmas was like others, the kids would have been up at least two hours already.
    He’d missed the big Christmas Eve dinner. In the past, Melissa had