"Maybe I shouldn't pick Dionysus, I am pretty sure Dionysus would want me to have gay sex." 

"I think pretty much all the Greek gods are going to be out."

Lev is really profoundly uncomfortable about Sasha doing pagan rituals! But he doesn't actually have a good argument why he shouldn't. 

"I could go for Artemis or Hestia! I'm not going to, though, the image of Dionysus claiming I shouldn't have gay sex and should instead do my gender properly is hilarious." 

"Didn't Artemis turn a man into a stag for looking at her naked? Sounds pretty gay to me."

"She is in theory a virgin goddess! I could make the argument that Artemis wouldn't want me to have sex at all! I would not generally make this argument but I could." 

"But we're supposed to 'attain heterosexual functioning' or whatever. --I guess that by that argument dance doesn't want me to be straight either so I should pick something else."

"I realize this entire concept is terrible warmed-over Protestantism but you could pick, like, God," he does not say, because that would not be helpful.

"I don't know if there is anything I could claim to worship with any amount of sincerity that would actually want me to be straight. — maybe Juliet Capulet, I guess?" 

"Wait, I forgot I'm straight. I could pick any higher power that doesn't actively want me to be gay. I'm going with dance."

Lev, who has seen the way Asher looks at Sasha, is deeply skeptical of this claim. 

"Cute. I think I'm going to go with Artemis, she'll be easier to fill out this worksheet about in a way that makes half of a sense, but know that I totally would pick Dionysus." 

This seems like not a super productive conversation to continue to have opinions on!

"Marlo, do you want to work on our worksheets together?"

"Sure!" He angles his entire body towards Lev. 

Throughout this process Lev is going to edit the entire worksheet and incidentally teach Marlo quite a lot of things about how Judaism is different from evangelicalism. 

He listens and doesn't edit his own worksheet but he does learn a lot! 

He'd say it's surprisingly interesting, but it's not a surprise that he's interested in what Lev has to say. 

Lev is kind of surprised by how many opinions he has. 

And Marlo is not at all surprised by how much he enjoys listening to them. 

They only get to do sports half the time in the morning now, which is clearly not enough sports. Asher finds himself twitching constantly with nervous energy. He's not used to being this sedentary. 

Asher is eventually convinced that falsely accusing his parents of abuse would probably cause them not to pay for his apartment. So instead he gets teary and emotional about how alone he felt when his mother abandoned him at day care, like her work was more important than he was, how confusing it was that she didn't play her appropriate feminine role. He recalls how his father used to miss some of his dance recitals but always went to all his sister's soccer games, which left him with an unmet need for male affection. He questions, tearily, whether more heterosexual male role models in dance would have helped him stay straight.

It's actually kind of fun. 

Raine is so beautiful. He wants to spend every spare moment he can with her, wants to learn everything about her. He asks for a secret pocket in his clothes, not because he needs it, but so he can carry around something she made with him all the time. Every other night, they sneak into the bathroom and fuck. It feels a bit disloyal to Robin to say that it's better than sex with Robin, but it is. Raine pins him to the wall and puts a hand on his throat and hurts him and tells him what to do, and he's not really sure why he likes this so much but it makes him feel right and safe and home. 

Sasha talks about being friendless in early elementary school, and how the people who eventually befriended him were all girls, talks about his friends — he doesn't name Natalie in particular — teaching him how to braid hair and put on makeup, talks about how he would come up with games that would involve the boy he had a crush on tying him up with jump ropes and talks about how being kissed felt affectionate and loving and warm. He talks about how both his parents worked and treated the library as a daycare; he talks about reading Greek myths and vampire novels. He carefully avoids talking about crafts; he doesn't want to be forced to give them up. 

Raine has kind of a lot of sex with Asher — he's good at it, he's so good for her, he melts when she puts a hand on his throat. She kind of misses subbing, but Asher makes the softest face when she doms him and sometimes it's difficult to wait an entire day. She sews a secret pocket into his clothes, offers to embroider them (no flowers, which is unfortunate, but she can add rainclouds, add parsley and sage and rosemary and thyme to match her own jacket, if he wants). 

The food at camp is... less appealing than it was. She's not really sure why; maybe it's that they were trying harder at the beginning of the session. Regardless, she has to make herself eat at meals, now. 

She doesn't try to reach out to Lev, but she pays attention. 

His clothes acquire rainclouds and parsley and sage and rosemary and thyme!

Lev doesn't talk in group. Christine tries to bring him out but all she gets are monosyllables. 

He knows he should talk in group. He's not going to get better unless he can tell people what's wrong with him. But every time he thinks about it he just freezes up and wants to die. He can't shake the thought that if he tells someone then they'll know how much of a failure he is. 

Lev spends a lot of time around Marlo. He talks incessantly, and worries that he's boring Marlo, but Marlo seeks him out and asks questions that show that he was listening and in general it seems like Marlo actually likes him and wants to spend time with him. Lev is perfectly aware that part of the reason he wants to spend so much time with Marlo is that Marlo has a beautiful smile and a beautiful body and lips that would be so nice to kiss, but... Marlo seems to be doing really well in ex-gay therapy, and wouldn't kiss him, and Christine said it was okay to have crushes as long as he didn't put himself in a situation to do anything about them. When he addressed his root, they'd go away.

He answers questions in group, is happy to ask them; he can tell that Christine wants him to talk more, but there's nothing else to say, nothing else he knows with enough certainty that he can share it. He still has no idea what his root is — his parents love him and want the best for him, he had teachers and coaches and plenty of role models, he hasn't been abused, he knows he's well-liked — it's hard to tell. 

He spends a lot of time around Lev. He probably shouldn't, but it's very very difficult to say no when Lev needs something, even when it's something that Marlo knows he shouldn't give. 

He could say that he was gay because he told Sasha first. He can't tell Sasha his root but he could tell Marlo. 

"Marlo, could I ask you for something?"

"Of course."