Chapter 3
“Come on in the kitchen,” he said. “There’s a birthday cake they bought me.” Frederick reached out his hand to me, and I took it, dying inside.
We walked out of the church and through the parish hall, enjoying the afternoon light shining through the stained glass windows. It was a beautiful church; a beautiful place for a young man like me to have his first nervous breakdown. When we reached the kitchen nobody else was there and my spirits lifted, because while the room was mostly empty, in the back half were stacked some of the cots from the last time they’d housed the homeless overnight. For some obscure reason this made me happy, giddy even, and I grinned. He ignored me, but he blushed. We walked over to the table on which there were the cake and several plates. He cut the cake.