learned all I needed to know about what the world thinks of ‘someone like me,’ by which I mean . . . Manos a Dios, I don’t know how to say this . . .” I drew a deep breath. “A Puerto Rican boy who falls in love with other boys.” If I hadn’t had it already, I had Río’s complete attention now. I thought my whole body might dissolve through the grill from shame. “What ridiculous savagery,” he breathed in English, “would make humans spurn a person for something so . . . so . . . ordinary?”
