In school I was always made fun of for being “gay” or “queer,” even before I knew what those words meant. I remember one day in church, after I started going to the youth group, I learned what the words meant. An older boy yelled at me and called me queer, and I broke down and started crying. I can’t explain the emotions that I felt at that exact moment, but it felt like a mixture of fear, anger and hate. But mostly what I felt was fear.
I was scared of being found out. I was angry at him for making face the thing that I was trying to hide. I hated the way that what he said made me feel. And still more fear about what would happen to me. That moment defined how I would act for the rest of my years in middle school. I was the quiet kid in the back, often times with my nose in a book, who never spoke up and did his best not to be noticed. I floated around the school like a ghost.
However, things began to change my freshman year of high school. After the first semester my bipolar sister made some accusations against another member of our family. As a result I ended up getting shuffled around in the foster care system for a year. Before my aunt got custody of me I stayed at two different places. The first was a residential type place for kids called Vera Loyd. It was there that I had my first experience with a guy, his name was Woody. After that I decided to be true to myself, but not openly or in public. Not yet. I just wasn’t ready.
While at my aunt’s I got online and starting looking for answers to the questions that I had. I wanted to know what the feelings I had been suppressing for so long meant. I wanted to know if there were others like me. Eventually my aunt found out about the websites I was visiting and decided to send me to a therapist. In two days I was able to convince the therapist that I was a “normal heterosexual boy” and end the therapy. After a while I moved in with my grandparents and continued living a quiet life of self oppression.
I met one of my best friends, Angie, my junior year of high school. After a Christmas party she was driving me home. After pulling up into my driveway I looked at her in the eyes and asked, “Do you think I’m straight?” Angie just looked at me like a deer caught in the headlights. After a few terrible seconds she said, “Yes.” “Well, I’m not,” then I darted out of the car and ran into my house.
I dreaded going back to school the next day and seeing her again, and when the time came I was nervous. I was unsure of how she would react or what she would say, but when I met up with her she was still Angie and I was still Robert. Everything was normal, but my curiosity would not let me leave it at that. So I asked her about the night before and she just laughed and said that I was still her friend and that it did not matter if I liked guys or not. Then she jumped right into who I had a crush on. Oh, the talks we had after that.
That experience spurred me on to come out to my other friends: Michelle, Sarah, Luanne, Kat and Leathia. It was my own circle of friends where I could let loose and be myself. They made up a personal haven for me where I could escape the homophobia of a small town in the middle of the south. While I was with them I was safe and I was happy.
My aunt found out about my secret during my senior year when she stumbled across some of the websites I had been visiting. She took them and showed them to my grandmother. I was taken to the back room where my grandmother asked me if I was responsible for the websites. I said, “Yes.” Then she looked at me with an expression I hope to never see again and asked me, “Are you one of those homos?” I sat there looking at the floor, wishing to anything that something would happen to take me somewhere else – anywhere else but here – but there was no escape. While I looked at the pattern in the linoleum, following the lines with my eyes, I said in a quiet voice, “Yes.” She started crying. I didn’t understand why she would cry. After a moment she said she wished I didn’t choose that lifestyle for myself and she left, leaving me alone in the room.
Since then she has come to terms with who I am, and now she believes that God made some people gay to show others how to be open minded. She is a silent advocate for me, but not for the gay community. I am lucky, though. I still have a grandmother when so many others end up worse. My grandmother and I still have a good relationship, and many others in my family know about me. But we all keep it from my grandfather. It’s something that never required a talk – we all instinctively know not to tell him. It’s a bridge that I am still not yet ready to cross.
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