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Grandpa waved his hand. “You two have fun. Good to see you again, Stefon.”

“Bye, honey,” Grandma added.

Stefon and I walked out the door holding hands, and Stefon said, “I think I’m the family favorite, which is saying something since you’re an only child.”

“Hey!” I hit his arm, laughing.

“How about being a rebel tonight?” he asked.

I got into the car, giving him a suspicious look as he got in on his side. “A rebel? At the movie theater?”

“We’re not going to the movies.” He buckled in and turned on the car.

“Then where are we going?”

“We’re going to LA.”

My mouth dropped open. “It’s an hour away!”

“Your parents didn’t give you a curfew, did they?”

“No, but—”

“Tell them we went over to Alyssa’s to watch movies.”

“When we’re really going to...”

He had a wicked grin. “A queer bar.”

My heart beat faster. “What? We’re not twenty-one!”

“It’s eighteen and up.”

I sat back in my seat, taking it in. Realizing that I would be going to my first queer space. “What if we’re seen?”

He shrugged, still holding on to the wheel. “We’ll say we got curious what it was like. No big deal.”

We were silent for a moment.

“Or...” he said.

I raised my eyebrows. “Or?”

“You could tell your parents.”

Why was he rushing this? “We agreed not to tell them until we left for college.”

“True, but we only have two weeks until we leave,” he said.

“Don’t remind me,” I muttered.

His phone spoke, and he glanced at the screen, following the directions downtown. He drove past a building called Moth and then entered a parking garage. It was dark and dank and looked exactly like the kind of place they’d film on the news announcing our murders.

“Are you sure you don’t want to go to the movies?” I asked, looking around.

He opened his door. “It’ll be fine.”

Not wanting to go but not wanting to be alone in the car either, I got out and wrapped both my hands around his arm, walking at his side.