It's been several years now, I guess, and so the whole ordeal doesn't seem quite as awful as it once did. I have, now, outed myself to all my family - extended as well as immediate -, my friends and, yes, my co-workers, who had suspected as much, anyway. I rather think I'm a bit of a pro at it. I've gotten anger, happiness, ambivalence, disbelief. Nothing can really phase me about the whole deal. Taking all that into account, I still find my palms sweating when I think about my first coming-out, to my parents.
The summer I turned 19 - that would be 6 years ago, I think - wasn't one of my favourites. Okay, that's putting it mildly. It sucked! I had finished my first year of medical school.... or, almost. I found out that I'd flunked a few days before the end of the spring term. This did not please me, in that I knew my parents would string me up by my toenails and pluck out my body hair, one strand at a time. For myself, I didn't really care. I wasn't so sure I wanted to go into medicine, anyway. I'd decided last term that I'd rather become an English teacher. I wasn't quite sure how to broach that subject with my parents, who were determined to have at least one doctor in the family, damnit!
Besides, the day after I flunked, my girlfriend of 6 months (6 and 4/15ths of a month, to be precise. Yes, I was smitten) announced, over
the phone, that:
1) She was pregnant by a mutual friend of ours
2) She planned to keep the baby
3) She had decided that she was straight now (hence the screwing of - and subsequent getting impregnated by - our friend, I'm assuming)
and,
3b) She was breaking up with me.
Did I mention she told me this over the phone?
I was horribly hurt, because I had been convinced that she was my soulmate, so I went out, got very, very drunk and screwed another drunk chick, who was, strangely enough, drinking because her girlfriend had dumped her. We shacked up for a weekend, and then her errant girlfriend showed up and, wham! I was out on my ass muttering "You weren't such a good fuck, anyway" (a comment which convinced her freshly reinstated, very butch girlfriend to kick my ass). I admitted defeat, then, and, pulling out my piercings and washing the purple dye out of my hair, I crawled home for the summer vacation.
My parents weren't pissed (or at least, so they said. The grinding of teeth and red-knuckled-grip-on-coffee-mug led me to suspect otherwise) and even seemed okay with paying my tuition. Then, upon taking my bags up to my room, I discovered that in my absence, ownership had been transferred to my little sister. I took one glance at the N'Sync-plastered walls, and stormed downstairs and demanded to know what the fu- I mean, heck, was going on? They smiled placidly, ignored my protests and gave me the guest room. Incidentally, no-one had any idea where all my posters had gone, though I suspected that my younger brother had something to do with the disappearance of my Lucy Lawless poster (we apparently have the same taste in women). I discovered later that my sister had given my Ani DiFranco posters to a lesbian at school. I refrained - barely - from stringing her up.
Wow. All this to explain why that summer could easily win the Summer From Hell award.
So, I already had a lot on my plate, and then my mother chose to finally realize that I'm not her little girl anymore, and isn't it time I got married and started working on some grandchildren? Suddenly, all the single men she could find between 17 and 35 were coming over for dinner regularly and somehow 'accidentally' being left alone with me.
It was about this time that Nichole's family moved in across the street. It was an instant attraction, for both of us, and before the week was out, I had totally forgotten about my ex, and had taken up writing love poems. About her long red hair and her pale skin and her green eyes and her pert... um... where was I? Oh yes.
I was smitten. I was beyond smitten. I was in love. I told her so and she just smiled. Told me she knew that already. She also told me
that her parents had offered to buy us a coffee-maker if- when we moved in together. Very sensible people, those.
It got me thinking. If her parents knew everything... maybe, should I tell mine? Perhaps they would give us a toaster or something.
Actually, I was prepared to be happy if they didn't disown me on the spot. I didn't expect them to be thrilled about it. Hell, if that had been the case, I'd have been out of the closet years ago. It gets a bit stuffy after a while.
I told Nichole what I planned to do, and she was supportive but wary. Said that I could stay with her family if mine didn't take it well, that her parents wouldn't mind - in fact, they appeared delighted with the prospect. I wasn't sure quite what to make of them.
On the 1st of July, early in the afternoon, when both my brother and sister were out being juvenile delinquents, I made coffee and nervously told my parents that I had something important to say, could they come into the kitchen?
They sat at the kitchen table with the coffee I had poured for them. I don't know what my father was expecting, but I could see my mother figuring that I had met that Someone. Little did she know.
I lowered my gaze from theirs - mom's, bubbling with pent up excitement and dad's, eyelids lowered, almost disinterested - and carefully observed my hand as it twisted my coffee mug, while my stomach methodically twisted itself into the Queen Mother of all knots.
"Mom? Dad?" I began, heart thumping. "I've got something to tell you. Please, please don't say anything until I've finished, please? Okay, well...
"I'm, um..." A pause, then, "I'm gay." Seeing the shock plain on their faces, I hurried on. "I'm a lesbian. I've known this for what seems like forever and I have hated keeping it from you, but I was scared that you would hate me for it." I could see their brains realigning themselves with the aid of this new information. No-one had burst a blood vessel, yet, which I took as a good sign. "I am telling you now because I've finally, yes, finally met someone. Nichole, across the street, and I think I love her and she loves me and we're moving in together, soon, I think. I hope. I also hope that you can understand this all, understand that I'm not trying to hurt you. I would never intentionally do so."
By the time I finished that, and paused for a breath, my mother was in tears and I was nearly there, myself. Even my father's eyes looked wet. They got up and hugged me, saying over and over how much they loved me. I muttered incoherently into my mother's hair that I loved them back.
She pulled back, at last, and laughed shakily. "I guess I had better stop setting you up with boys, then."
We all laughed, then, but neither of them would meet my eye, and later, when I introduced them to Nichole, they seemed a bit stiff.
So I was glad when Nichole and I moved into our own apartment.
As I said, though, that was years ago. There is no "The End". Certainly not yet, anyway. My parents are now just fine with me being gay. Or so they say. But, in this case, I have cause to believe them, because they meet my eyes steadily, and there has been no teeth-grinding - or, at least, not on this particular issue. My grades are another matter entirely.
There was also no "Happily Ever After". Not then. Two years later, Nichole and I broke up and went our separate ways. I was still convinced that we were
soul mates, and so I took it very hard. I spent a year being very miserable, getting bad grades, writing bad poetry and deciding to be an author, and so, when Nichole showed up on my doorstep with 13 roses (one for every month we'd been apart), I was ecstatic. I kissed her, then, and hustled my latest - now ex - girlfriend out the door, ignoring the comments she made about me being a lousy fuck. Nichole, who had been working out a lot, chose not to ignore them and kicked the poor girl's ass.
I kissed Nichole again, and drew her inside the apartment.
And now I think we can say "Happily Ever After." But never, ever "The End."
This is copywritten to me.