The Gift Of Divine Planning

20260606

Prompt from “pridemonthprompts” 2025 list.

It was a typical unremarkable adult birthday. Leon had received nice messages, opened the one card (from Auntie Doris, the only person who insisted on sending cards to ‘the kids’ even after they were adults), treated himself to a cupcake, and the rest of the day was as normal.
Until his phone started buzzing. A call? From his brother Graham?? While they frequently texted, and Graham had sent a lovely message that morning, calling signified Serious Matters. Leon braced himself, the minor pleasant glow of the day dispersing, and stoically answered. “Hey.”
“Are you talking to mum and dad again??”
“Huh?”
“Are you-”
“I told them I wasn’t going to talk to them until they accepted they have two sons.”
Which, given how Graham had thankfully always been an ally in this, it felt weird having to remind him-
“That’s the thing! Mum put out a post, like she does for everyone’s birthdays, and she’s using your proper name!!”
“Really??”
“Yeah! It’s got a picture of you as a kid drawing - and, I mean, you’re in a dress and have long hair and everything, but she’s captioned it ‘Leon working on his first comic, a moving story about trains. He loved that Thomas cartoon, an obsession he passed on to Gray’. And she goes on about you getting your art degree and then links to your book and asks people to go buy it as a ‘present to her oldest baby boy’.”
“Are you fucking with me? Because if you are, that’s so not-”
“Dude I am one hundred percent serious! I was like, have you all reconciled without telling me?? I feel so out of the loop!”
“Well, apparently so am I. Send me a screenshot?”
“Will do. And I’m gonna ask her about what’s happened, ok?”
“Yeah. Just… don’t say you’ve already talked to me?”
“Gotcha.”
Leon stared at the screenshot, unable to believe his eyes. It was… ok, so it was overly sentimental, like mum’s celebratory posts always were. And she did go on. But it being so exactly like the ones she’d written about him for years, every year until he came out in fact, made that clumsy saccharine prose downright magical. He wouldn’t change a thing.
Alright, he wished he didn’t look like a girl in the photo, but to be fair there probably weren’t any photos of him as a kid where he didn’t look like a girl. Except some Halloween costumes, and that wouldn’t fit the theme at all. So he could totally deal.
It took way too long for Graham to call back. Leon had fretted his nails down to nubs, wracking his brains trying to figure out what could possibly have brought about this miracle.
“Ok, so, to summarise a super emotional and honestly kinda confusing conversation… someone in mum’s bible study group recommended this theologian whose entire brand is helping Christians ‘understand the divine in gender variance’? And her and dad went along to his talk.”
“Wow.”
“Yeah, apparently they were struggling with having been total pieces of shit to you.”
“Good to know.”
“And this guy convinces them that god is, like, so vast that you can’t put any gender label on ‘him’, and every gender people experience is just one facet of god’s infinite majesty.”
“Huh.” Leon rolled this explanation around his head. “I kinda like that.”
“So did they. Especially once he started throwing scripture quotes at them. Oh, and here’s another bombshell - mum and dad both have tattoos now!”
“What??”
“After they went to this guy’s talk they bought his book and worked through it, and after that they got ‘Psalm 23’ tattooed on their wrists as, like, a reminder of their new resolutions, I guess? I went and looked it up for you - it’s that one about god not creating mistakes.”
“I… that’s one of the bits people kept throwing in my face, trying to push me back in the closet.”
“Not surprised. But now they’re seeing it as god gave them a son who looked like a daughter, and they failed the test he set them, or something.”
“Well, that’s…” Leon stared at the wall, trying to tease apart the tangled mess in his chest, then decided “You know what? Cool.”
“Bottom line, they’ve decided they fucked up and didn’t love you the way god wanted them to, and to make it right they have to love and cherish you as much as Jesus would? Kinda thought Jesus’s whole shtick was you doing that to everybody, but whatever man, if they’re off the brimstone brigade and have educated themselves…”
“Yeah, that… this is incredible.”
“Oh, oh, and the reason they hadn’t reached out to you is the stuff they worked through said forgiveness takes time, so they’re not expecting us to be one big happy family because of this.”
“Good. I mean, I would like to… but yeah, it’s gonna be really hard to trust after…”
“I gotcha. I told them I was going to send you the post, and they got super anxious, so I need to call them back after this…”
Leon laughed, and Graham ruefully joined in.
“But I thought, maybe a family meet-up somewhere, like, neutral? For your birthday?”
“That… would be nice, yeah.”
“No worries bro, I’ll totally have your back and stand by ya if you have to bail early for whatever reason. By the way, did anyone actually buy your comic?”
“Oh. I didn’t even check.”
Graham heaved a heavy sigh. “Dude, I keep telling you, the starving artist routine needs to-”
“I had a lot on my mind, asshole! Hang on.”
After all, Leon had the dashboard saved on his phone. Checking was a matter of moments.
“Twelve sales!”
“Is that good?”
“Twelve more sales than the rest of the week.”
“Eesh. Long way from giving up the day job, huh? But I can tell mum the present worked, at least.”
“Yeah. And… set lunch up?”
“Will do. Chat deets later.”
“Thanks, bro. So much.”

Prompt was “Growth”.