The shortest recorded horror story goes something like this:
The last man on Earth sat alone in a room. There was a knock on the door.
The story is by Fredric Brown, and debuted in a pulp rag in 1948. There’s a longer version naturally-but I love those two sentences. On the surface, they’re almost pointless. Something you’d probably make a smarmy comment about and forget. But the longer your mind dwells on it, there comes a nagging fear. Who-or what-is at the door? The mystery therein builds into this awful dread. You don’t know. You’ll never know (unless you read the slightly longer version). The only way to find out is to answer the knock, on your own, away from the story.
Those two sentences have made a lot of noise over my life. First, it addiction behind the door. Then mental health. But there came a knock beyond those still. A soft thing, always rapping upon the wood. Something I ignored until roughly 2010.
Something I did in private, that I would never admit in the light of day. A secret I kept close to my heart and chest. It took until my early 20s to finally get the balls to answer that knock. And, with the last few years, embrace what lay behind it.
Today, we’re going to talk about realizing you’re queer. This series is going to be a long read, kinda like this one. Get some coffee (or tea), get comfortable.
Let’s begin.
On Knowing
Being raised in the rural south, you were either “normal” or “one of those”. There was a myriad of terms for it. “Faggot” flew from lips quick and easy like a river. “Gay” was tossed like a slur. All of this in a place where the town motto was “small town friendly”. The place has changed, sure. But growing up? I held on to my masculinity and assumed hetrosexuality like a weapon. So long as I was manly and straight, I was fine. I’d do damn near anything to prove both, too. I got in plenty of school yard scraps over it. Being a teen brought hormones, and with them sex was the forefront of all my thoughts.
But way back in my skull, I knew. I didn’t place a word to it. If I’d done that, it would have admitting. But with my dick getting hard over so much as a breeze came questions. Ones that made me feel awful guilty. And conflicted. Suicidal, at times. I stopped regularly attending a baptist church I’d gone to for years. That helped a bit, but the questions still came. I couldn’t turn to my folks-mom was a devout woman. Dad “had gay friends”, but also touted “don’t ask, don’t tell” as the holy grail of queer policy. I couldn’t turn to my friends. Every single one of them talked about girls endlessly. Every one of them dropped “faggot” as a noun, a verb, an adjective.
I had myself, and an internet connection. That’s it.
Net culture wasn’t like it is now. It was just as bad in a lot of ways-but also more open. There were no massive tendriled platforms-Facebook had just started giving MySpace a run for its money. Twitter was “new”. Forum boards and roleplay chats were my out. On there, I could be damn near anyone I wanted to be. A guy, a lady, a fucking mystery. While these opportunities were great, they didn’t tackle the questions in any real meaningful way. A trans friend of mine once said “I know so many girls wasting away behind Second Life”-and I couldn’t help but nod my head.
Because it’s true. All these social networks, all that time I spent behind the keys, I’d trade it all for a moment of real introspection with myself back then. It was a way to pretend something wasn’t there. A way to hand-wave my affections for boys and men.
“Oh, it’s a role, I’m just horny,”
“It’s just pretend,”
My crushes came and I played the tsundere. I made a lot of “friends” I’d spend endless hours talking to. I traded pics with dudes my age (18, mind), twice my age. I excused it all-the real amorous intents, and the moments I was exploited-as “I’m just horny”. I remember thinking it was something I’d do until I got a “girlfriend”, an impossibility given my shyness. I did this for literal years.
All the while, they were there.
They know who they are.
They’re even reading this article.
We’d known each other literally forever. Our lives were split between either of our houses. Hell, my folks even bought bunk beds because of it. We killed hours playing video games and Magic: The Gathering. It was, and still is, one of those friendships that seems mandated by god. We were always there for each other, through every scrap and sour word from the crowd. And as we got older, always joking about girls, there came an evening we had a conversation.
“Dude,” they said, with such infliction that I paused our game ( a sacred thing). “Can I ask you something?”
I scoffed and laughed. “Fuck, of course,”
They bit their lip for a moment as their eyes searched my face. They took a deep breath, and sat the controller on the table. “Let’s say, like-maybe. Uh, maybe. I didn’t exactly-”
They began to wring their hands. My heart sank in that moment. I just knew something major was coming-something so big and scary that all the bravado of my youth couldn’t spare me from.
“Like, you know, hypothetically. Like if I liked a guy, would that be weird?”
There was maybe a milisecond pause before I said “No? I mean like, we’d still hang out, right?”
The words came out of my mouth before my brain caught up, and flashed OH FUCK THEY KNOW, THEY SAW THE SEARCH HISTORY ON THE COMPUTER, AH FUCK, AH SHIT, AH-
They smiled, a tinge in their cheeks as they shook their head. “I mean like. Yeah. Of course we would,”
“Good,” I said, stuffing my face as fast as I could with chips. I wasn’t hungry, but it was enough to mumble anything stupid that might slip.
“ ‘cause if this guys an asshole, I’m gonna fucking tell you. You know that right?”
“Nah. He’s not,” they said with a laugh. “But like. That’s not weird, right?”
“Dude,” I replied between crunches, “as long as me and you can still hang, that’s all the fuck that matters to me,”
I turned back to the screen, and raised my controller. I unpaused the game and just fucking unloaded on them in Tekken Tag. I mean, until I noticed they weren’t playing. I looked over at them, with their controller just out of reach on the table. They had just the stupidest grin on their face. I swallowed the last of my chips and wiped at my face.
“Dude? You gonna come and get these hands, or-”
“Oh, right. Uh, tell you what. You already got me. You wanna watch a movie?”
“Fight Club or Reservoir Dogs?”
They grinned, and chose Fight Club. We pulled out the whiskey I kept hidden beneath my mattress, and settled in. As the drink hit our brains, I loosened at looked at him.
“So guys?” I said.
“Dudes,” They replied.
“What about pussy?!”
“Meh,” they said with a roll of their shoulders. “Never really been a fan?”
“Oh. So like. Is this a new thing, or-”
“Oh, god no,” they said with a shot. They nearly choked as they laughed, and shook their head. They pulled the bottle from my grip, and poured another. “I mean like, maybe. But it’s something I’ve only really thought about like, the last few years,”
“…Well fuck, why didn’t you tell me?”
They paused, and downed the shot. They exhaled, and stared at the screen. Edward Norton had just pounded Angel into ground chuck. He rose, blood on his knuckles as he walked out of the basement.
“I felt like destroying something beautiful,” he said. A line that weighed heavy in the air for almost a minute.
My friend turned to me, and shrugged. “Dunno. Guess I thought you’d be mad at me,”
“Not in a million,” I said, my words leaning on each other. “Fuck man, I’d die for you,”
“I know,” they said. They turned to me, and just looked deep into me for a moment. Then they turned back to the screen, and we didn’t talk for a long moment. I stared down at their hand, and in a spur of the moment reached to grab it. I gave it a tight squeeze, and said “Ain’t a mother fucker gonna hurt you for this shit either. Not while I’m around, a’ight?”
They turned their palm up to mine, and squeezed back.
We kept drinking, and didn’t say anything else as the movie played.
I should mention at this point I was a very dumb and dense boy. In the moment, all I cared about was my bro-who I very seriously would have died for. I was already thinking of all the Double-Dragon style ways I was gonna lay the smackdown on people that fucked with him. Because that’s what friends did.
But over the next few weeks, they started to talk. Just like we did that night, into the long lonely hours of morning. They explained their heart, their head. I didn’t open up at first, but with the door cracked I started to tiptoe on in. Why yeah, I saw the appeal of cock. And yeah, some dudes were cute. But I was gonna get a girlfriend. We were drinking and watching Graveyard Of Honor because Yakuza flicks were the flavor of the month. I made some crack about him having some super rich dude in the Hills, and me living out of a trailer in the woods.
“With HOOKERS! And BLACKJACK, DAMN IT!” I shouted, with a pound on my chest. They snorted, and rolled their eyes.
“Jack? Do you even know how to kiss someone?”
“Fuck you! I can kiss with the best of them! I suck face so hard I could put Hoover out of business!” I said, splaying my hands out like a drunken god.
“Oh yeah? Show me,” they said with a smirk.
I nearly choked on my drink.
“What like? On the lips?”
They blinked, and busted into a laugh. “I mean, if you’re not a pussy, sure,”
“I ain’t a fucking coward! Get the fuck over here!”
“Oh, right away,” they answered. They staggered up from their chair, and made their way towards me. I sat there, heart pounding like a sledge against my ribs until they were inches from me. They splayed their hands at their side, and looked at me.
“…well?”
“…I-I mean do you want me to stand, or-”
“Jack. If you kiss me sitting down, you’ll kiss my stomach,”
“Fine! I’m gettin’ up, I’m gettin’ up,”
I didn’t want to get up.
I did want to get up.
My hands were shaking. Not because I hadn’t kissed someone, but because this was that thing I’d fought so long to ignore. That part of my brain that kept me up at night after I’d looked at gay porn “on a lark”. But I rose to my feet with only the slightest sway in my step and tremor in my hands.
A showman is always a showman, after all.
I closed my eyes.
And we kissed.
It wasn’t the last one, either. In the months that unfolded, that cracked door my friend opened flew wide open. The details, if I listed them, would make both of us blush. I’ll spare them that. But the reason I write all of this is, looking back?
I wish I hadn’t ignored that voice. I wish I hadn’t denied that part of my soul, my person. In trying to push it down, it surfaced in the lonely moments as this wriggling demon. One that made me take a knee and pray to god to have mercy on me for maybe, possibly having “impure thoughts”. Between my own internalized shame and my environment, I very easily could have been a statistic.
But my friend was there.
One person gave a damn, and told me all I felt was normal. That I was normal. That what I was thinking wasn’t something to be ashamed of. And as I sit here typing this, I struggle to find the words to express how fully they saved my life.
One person giving a damn. That’s all it took.
Don’t ignore that voice.
Don’t feel guilty about it.
Don’t waste your life pretending.
Listen to that voice. Embrace it. Turn it over in your head, and realize that whatever passes for a higher authority made everything you’re feeling beautiful. What you’re feeling?
It’s love.
And that’s the most powerful god damn thing in the universe.
There’s no guilt or shame that can stand it’s blinding power. The only thing that can truly, honestly stand in it’s way is you.
If you can’t admit it out loud, that’s okay. If you only have yourself to admit it to, that doesn’t take away from it’s validity. That doesn’t make what you’re experiencing any less real. But take that truth, and own it. Realize too that how you’re feeling it, how you’re experiencing it and your support network to aid you can and will change. I’m absolutely OUT to everyone except my mother-who politely stopped asking why my friend stayed for weeks at a time. There was a point in my life I was far too fucking afraid to even dream of that.
You’re beautiful. You’re valid. And you’re going to be okay.
Next Up: Building Support