It's the day after Christmas and I don't think I've ever seen my recycling can so full before. Broken down Amazon boxes and crumpled up wrapping paper keep the lid from being anywhere near closed. These are just the remnants of our favorite capitalist holiday, and there are still five days until the next pick-up. I might need to take a trip to the dump, especially because Spencer's third birthday is Saturday and that will inevitably create even more waste.

My eyes shift from the overflowing cans over to the nearly-leafless hedge that divides my driveway from the neighbor's front lawn. Everything looks so gray. So cold. Lifeless.

"Daddy, play with me!" Spencer tugs on my hand.

"Of course, man," I smile as I turn away from the window and scoot onto the floor from the couch.

He is holding one of his new presents: the board game Sneaky Squirrel. "Teaches color matching! Learn to take turns! Practice following rules!" the reviews raved. Spencer opens the box and carefully takes out the spinner and the plastic stumps that each person uses to play.

"Nora, you a baby. You can't play," he announces to his sister who is happily ignoring us and is trying to solve a shape-sorting puzzle.

"You're right, these acorns are too small for Nora. We need to be careful and keep them in the box. You are a big boy and know not to put them in your mouth." I gently remind him.

"My turn!" He takes the spinner and uses his finger to place the arrow on the green space. Cheater. "Green!" he squeals as he attempts to use the Squirrel-shaped tongs to pick up a green acorn.

"Here, let me help you." I reach out my hand to guide him.

"No, I do myself." He swats my hand away. He winds up holding the tongs in one hand and using his free hand to pick up the acorn and place it on the green circle on his plastic stump. "Your turn, Daddy." He hands me the tongs. I'm actually quite impressed with his ability to share.

I flick the spinner and the arrow whirls around and lands on the picture of a sad squirrel. "Oh no, I lost a turn." I hand the tongs back to my boy.

We continue like this for a while. Him moving the spinner to the color he wants, but taking turns nicely. Unsurprisingly, he beats me every round.

Then, Nora realizes we're doing something fun and decides to join us. Before I can block her, she grabs a handful of small plastic acorns from the box and tosses them across the living room. Spencer immediately screams, "NO!" and goes to grab her hair.

"Eh, eh, eh, hold it there, buddy!" My hand shoots out to grab his, but not quite fast enough. Nora shrieks. Her face turns tomato red. Spencer lets go and starts to scream at the top of his lungs. I scoop up Nora, and he swings the box, causing the rest of the acorns to go flying in every direction.

I can feel the rage building in my chest. I want to throw the damned box myself. Stomp on it. Scream, Why the fuck did you just do that! Have the unhinged emotional reactions of a toddler.

But instead I take a deep breath through my nose. "Ok, it's calm down time."

Tiffany emerges from the bedroom where she was putting away laundry. "Everything okay?"

"What do you think?" I retort.

"Don't get snarky with me because the kids are out of control," she snaps.

Things have been a bit tense all break. The reality that Steve knows that I am trans has been a dark cloud hanging over us.

When first I told her about Steve her immediate response was support. "That man is irrelevant! He's a fucking dinosaur. Don't let him affect you!" she had said while stroking my cheek. The principal had my back. I had a job. That seemed to ease her mind. "You are an amazing father! Your family, that's what is important, not that old fuck."

With small plastic acorns strewn across the floor and two hysterical kids, I don't feel like an amazing father right now.

Tiffany walks down the hallway and into the living room. "Spencer, you better pick up all those acorns right now," she demands in her stern-mom voice.

"No!" He folds his arms and stomps his foot for emphasis.

I always feel a tad better when he defies us both equally. At least it's not just me, right?

"You better not be saying no to me, buster." She walks over and squats to make eye contact with him.

Nora is still whimpering in my arms and I walk away, bouncing my knees, patting her back, and shushing her. "Poor baby girl. Getting your hair pulled is the worst, isn't it?" That is definitely one benefit to my hairstyle: you can't yank someone's hair when they have a buzzcut.

With Spencer being stubborn and Nora still with tears in her eyes, I feel like I'm living in a circus. And I'm just some sideshow clown. No way I'm the ringmaster. I have no control.

Control. That's what it all boils down to, doesn't it?

The night after everything happened with Steve, while we were laying in bed, decompressing, I told Tiffany that the scariest thing was that I no longer knew who knew.

"Tell me about it," she scoffed, putting her phone down to look at me.

"What is that supposed to mean?"

"It's just out there now, you know? Who knows how far it could spread. This sort of information can have consequences."

"The only consequence it's having right now is that Steve is being an asshole," I said defensively, even though that's not one hundred percent true. Ms. Reid had said she would take care of things, but what did that really mean? "Jessica was cool. Well, relatively cool. My job is secure. Blake has support. Nothing substantial has been negatively affected," I argued.

"But you lost control of the narrative." Tiffany stared at me, her features illuminated only by the slight glow of her phone screen.

"In some ways, that's actually kind of freeing," I said, turning my head away from her.

I wasn't sure if I meant it then, and now, just over two weeks later, I'm still not sure if that statement was true.

Does the truth really set you free? Or does it just put you in the trap of other people's preconceptions?

I never found out what discipline measures were taken, if any. Legally, that's none of my business. But Steve left me alone those eight days between the incident and winter break. Maybe things really were taken care of and it will all be okay. Only time will tell.

As Nora settles in my arms, we walk back into the living room where Tiffany has successfully won the battle of wills. I look around at the scattered acorns that Spencer is picking up and it makes me wonder. Sometimes throwing caution into the wind is reckless. But it also feels so damn cathartic.