Yes, I Am

Chapter Four.

The sounds of a thump and something crashing washed through the grogginess behind my eyelids, waking me from my peaceful sleep. A voice apologized, followed by another crash and the door slammed shut.

"What the holy hell?" muttered Caleb.

I froze. He was wrapped up around me, his arms cuddling me close to him. Sometime through the night, we had rolled over to each other like two ill-advised magnets and now my south pole was in trouble. I never knew I would be the kind to make bad sexual innuendos in times of hyperventilation but apparently I was.

I lifted my head off his insanely hard chest and pretended to be busy in finding some object around me that could hide my flustered face. The thought that I had slept with him wasn't as scary as the knowledge that I liked it. He was like a cozy sleeping bag that I ached to be inside again.

There goes another one. Could someone bring me a censor? And a gun while you're at it?

"Fuck, I'm getting late. I gotta rush," said Caleb. He kneeled down in front of me and lifted my chin with two fingers so I had to look in his eyes. "Thanks for last night."

I swallowed and made a sound that I hoped sounded affirming and not like the imitation of a penguin committing suicide. He bit his lip through the smile tugging his lips, obviously amused at my rattled state. He leaned in and pressed a soft kiss to my cheek before rushing out. I was glad he was running late because I really wanted to do things that would make Austin's adventures the night before look very tame in comparison.

Speaking of Austin, he thought it was appropriate to show up at the door of the attic and smirk down at me the moment Caleb left. "Sorry, bro. Didn't know you guys were...busy."

"We weren't busy." I glared at him although the reddening of my skin may have begged to differ.

"Alright." He held up his hands in surrender. "I don't need to know the details."

"We just slept together," I grumbled and then rushed to clarify, "As in, slept slept, not slept slept. Jeez, stop smirking at me."

"I'm not doing anything," he insisted with an expression I was assuming he thought was innocent. "I'm going to make breakfast. You want some?"

"No. I'm not hungry," I said weakly, all the hyperventilating energy leaving me.

"Of course you aren't."

My neck snapped up, another chance to shoot him a withering glare. "What do you mean?"

"Obviously you've already eaten."

He was out of the door and down the ladder before the cushion I threw could hit him.

I sighed in resignation. I couldn't ignore this any longer. I had officially run out of every rationalization in the book. The whole illusion I had created around myself had finally shattered. There was no explaining this with any other conclusion than the fact that I was gay.

And thus began the most harrowing two weeks of my life. I went to my trusted friends- books and Google- to support me in this time. I was so programmed to thinking that I wasn't gay that acceptance at the age of twenty made it tougher to be okay with it.

Yes, I was a hypocrite. Sue me. I didn't think there was anything wrong with homosexuality until I was one of those people. It's tougher on this side of the tunnel. My parents' constant disgust towards the queer society and their incessant disappointment in me somehow ingrained it in my fucked up brain to not be another thing that makes them want to drown in a gutter, hence homophobia.

I read every article possible on helping people through this time. I watched every 'coming out' video on YouTube. I read as many books on homosexuality as I could, from Barry D. Adam to David Levithan. I swallowed the words of every activist and their arguments for the LGBT community. I didn't go to college for a couple of days until our winter break started so I didn't have Betty to answer to. I don't know when we became friends, especially after that horrid start, but apparently we had. So I had to tell her to shove it and stop nagging me, just like I had told Austin in the same exact words, resulting in him being scared enough to not even enter the attic by mistake. It wasn't like they were actually scared of me, per se. But I got angry so rarely that they knew to stay out of my way on the rare occasions I did.