I suggested that the best way to prove that we were both right was to give her a demonstration. Bad move. When I was finished, I turned around and I could tell by the look on her face that something was wrong.
“What?” I asked her.
“Nothing.”
I went straight home and threw out my black leotard and sequined cape and all of my glitter makeup. No way was I ever going to dress up as Lady Gaga ever again. That phase of my life was over.
After that I decided to spend some time doing push-ups and also sitting in front of the mirror in my room taking a good hard look at myself. Something was wrong with me and it was definitely showing. But what? No matter how long I stood there in front of the mirror, no matter how hard I stared at my own reflection, I couldn’t see the thing that was making me seem different from everybody else. My life had become an obvious tragedy; ironic that I was the only person who couldn’t see it.
The next day at school Pinky stopped saying hey to me in between classes, and he seemed to be going out of his way to avoid me in the cafeteria. English class was a particular kind of torture because I was forced to see him for forty minutes, and he refused to look at me or acknowledge my existence. No one knew how deeply I suffered over this because I was determined to keep it to myself. This went on for more than a week, and the whole time I just wanted to know what had happened to my friendship with Pinky. Where did it go? What had I done to upset him? Was it because I walked like a girl? Maybe there was something I could do to make it better. But what?
Then Mr. Kienast asked me to read aloud from my report on the short story. This was like a form of torture specially designed to humiliate and embarrass me. As I made my way to the front of the class, I could hear the kids whispering behind my back. That’s the kid who has a crush on Pinky Faraday. This was the longest walk I had ever taken in my life. I stood there facing the class with my stupid paper, and even though I knew it wasn’t possible, I hoped that maybe this was all just a bad dream. When I realized that it wasn’t a bad dream, I hoped instead that I might drop dead in front of the entire class. When that didn’t happen, I swallowed hard and began.
“I chose for my topic The Loss of Innocence as Reflected in Literature. Here’s what I wrote:
“The loss of innocence is brought about because of an experience with no explanation. The character must be involved in the experience and must experience the loss. Must be hurt. Must survive. The experience must be potent enough to be remembered and must create a subtle change in the character . . .”
Mr. Kienast gave me an A for my report. No one could tell that I copied it all from a book. Pinky continued to ignore me, and for the rest of the day I was officially invisible.
Eight
Mom was cleaning my room, and she just happened to read something that I’d been typing on my computer, a confidential email that I could have sent to my BFF—if I’d had a BFF. But since I do not have a BFF, or even a close friend in whom I could confide my deepest and most intimate feelings, the email was just idling on my screen unread—until Mom came along.
She had a fit and then we had an all-out fight. I told her that my private life was none of her business and maybe I was crazy but it seemed to me that I ought to be able to have the freedom to express my own private thoughts in the privacy of my own room and on my own “personal” computer. She claimed that I was still too young to have any kind of a life that didn’t concern her, personal, private, or otherwise.
“I’m your mother,” she said louder than was absolutely necessary. “And in case you haven’t noticed, I am in charge of your life.”
To express my opposition to this extremely unfair point of view and to protest against people feeling that they had the right to read emails without the say-so of the person who wrote them, I attempted to run away to San Francisco. I did not leave a note. I simply packed a bag and snuck out through the garage. Unfortunately, I only got as far as the bus station. Mom dragged me back home so that she could tell me that she was very, very, very worried about me (she used three very’s). She sat me down in the living room and announced that we needed to have a talk.
“A talk?” I said.
“Yes,” she replied. “For example, do you think you might be depressed?”
“Um,” I remarked. “I’m not sure. I don’t think so.”
She then went on to explain that depression can often go undetected, but if left untreated it could become a serious problem in the life of a teen. Apparently, drug abuse and self-loathing are possible next steps when depression is involved—and worse.
“Worse?”
She didn’t care to elaborate. Instead she told me that she couldn’t even begin to imagine what it must be like for me to be a teenager living in the modern world. When she was my age, the world was an entirely different place and there were no such things as the Internet or Facebook or cell phones or texting or tweeting, and computers hadn’t even been invented yet.
“But how did you communicate with your friends?” I asked her.
“By speaking to them,” she replied. “Either face-to-face or on the telephone.”
She explained that when she was growing up, they only had one telephone and it was located in the hallway of the house. Her sisters, her mother and father, everyone knew all about her business. And though at the time she resented the fact that she was not allowed to have secrets, she had come to realize that her family was able to help her simply because they always knew what she was going through.
“So that’s why I was wondering,” Mom said. “Are you going through something I should know about?”
When I didn’t respond, she pulled out my art history notebook, opened it, and showed me the inside cover. There, alongside a pencil sketch of some random fruits and an earthenware jug, Pinky’s name was doodled in script. Each letter was carefully shaded and colored. Then she slowly turned the pages, showing me other examples of Pinky’s name written over and over in all the margins.
“That’s Katie’s notebook,” I blurted out. “She loaned it to me. It’s not mine, if that’s what you’re thinking.”
Mom’s shoulders dropped and she let out a sigh of either defeat or relief. As she stood up, she handed me the notebook and said: “Well, let’s make sure that Katie gets it back.”
And then to signal that our talk was over, she leaned over and took me in her arms. She hugged me hard for like a full minute until I said, “Mom? I kind of can’t breathe.” I don’t think she knew that I was lying to her about the notebook, but I’m pretty sure she knew I wasn’t telling the truth.
After that, I was bigger than TV in our house, and that’s saying a lot. Mom kept a close eye on me, and Dad was pretty interested in my moods and whereabouts as well. I was like the star of my own reality series, except for the fact that the only people watching were my mother and father. And I wasn’t on just once a week; I was broadcasting every day, all day.
Dad came into my room one evening, sat on my bed, and asked if there was maybe something I wanted to discuss with him. I watched as little beads of sweat began to form on his brow. His leg twitched and though he tried to hold my gaze, his eyes kept shifting toward the door as though he was sizing up the exits in case of an emergency. I knew that Mom had put him up to this and I could tell that he wanted to go back downstairs and watch his show on TV. I took pity on him and said, “I’m good.” He gave me a pat on the shoulder and told me that any time I needed to talk with him, mano-a-mano, he was available 24-7.
Nine
Meanwhile school continued to be dreaded and horrible. Whose idea was school anyway? A sadist’s, no doubt. For example, my particular form of torture was being trapped in an environment in which everyone was going around saying that I was gay. Whether I am gay or not is not the issue. The issue is this: it is wrong to declare someone else’s sexuality, and it is equally wrong to go around deman
ding that someone declare his or her own sexuality if he or she doesn’t feel like it. Just because you yourself happen to be uncomfortable with uncertainty and can’t stand ambiguity and/or paradox, does not mean that everyone in the world is wired in the same way. Some of us prefer to remain a mystery—even to ourselves—until we are ready.
The GSA-ers were the worst; they claimed that I was in denial, and they told me to my face (repeatedly) that if I would just admit my homosexual tendencies I would feel a whole lot better about myself. I thought they were just trying to up their membership and make it seem as though the Gay-Straight-Alliance was a real club with actual members instead of a fringe group of geeks with dyed hair and pierced eyebrows. I told them (repeatedly) that I would feel a whole lot better if they would just leave me alone, which of course they didn’t seem to want to do. They suggested that I consider labeling myself “Questioning” and leave it at that. Or maybe I could declare myself an “ally.” I asked them why I needed a label at all; why did I need to declare myself as anything other than Trevor? Isn’t that enough?
Miranda Lemley, a sophomore with a round face, sparkly blue eyes, baggy pants, perfunctory piercings, and an impressive grill of dental work, sighed hard. As she fussed with her green Mohawk, she said, “Look, Travis, we’re just trying to be friendly. You seem lost and lonely. Once upon a time we were the same way, so we thought you could use a kind word. But if you’re gonna be that way about it, forget we ever said anything.” She then turned on her heel and walked away. The others followed after her.
“TREVOR,” I called out after her. “My name is Trevor!”
The jocks also began to taunt and abuse me. Without Pinky and his posse around to provide a little street cred, I might as well have been wearing a target on my back. In addition to Faggot, some of the names they called me to my face were as follows: Fruit Loop, Poof, Sissy, Girlyboy, Nellie, Big Nell-box, Nancy, Mary, and Evelyn. There was a large football player named Turk who apparently decided that his mission in life was to make my life extra miserable. Why Turk felt the need to pick on me when there happened to be so many other kids in our school who were weaker, more defenseless, and (excuse me for saying it) more deserving, remains a mystery to this day. In any case, Turk found it in his heart to jab me with his fist, his elbow, his knee, his thumb, a book, or whatever he had handy whenever I passed him in the hallway. And because he was the king of the jocks, his minions did the same. As a way of defending myself I tried to make myself invisible, but again and again I was unable to activate that particular superpower. At night, I busied myself by deleting the hateful comments that were posted to my Facebook wall. It was exhausting work, but the thought that Pinky might be checking out my profile and could possibly see these remarks made me work even harder and I was kept up late into the night.
Sometimes to entertain myself I tried to imagine the unhappy futures that were in store for my fellow schoolmates. For example, I envisioned Turk living in a one-bedroom, low-rise apartment with a partial view of an unremarkable third-tier American city. I imagined that by the age of 30 Turk would be stuck in a job that went nowhere and meant nothing. He would have neither a wife nor a girlfriend, maybe a cat. His football trophies would be placed prominently on top of his TV, but only he would admire them. Most nights he would sit there trying to figure out where he went wrong. How did it happen that one day he was so on top of the world and then practically overnight he was nothing, no one? Then one evening after months and months of soul-searching, it would come to him in a flash. I see now, he would say to himself. I should’ve been nicer to that Trevor kid back in high school. Everything in my life would be different if I just hadn’t been so outright mean to him. Later that evening he would get the idea to call me so he could make it up to me personally, tell me that he was sorry before it was too late. He would look me up on Facebook, and when he couldn’t find me there he’d go to the White Pages website and do a search. Sadly, he would not be able to find me there either because it would be too late. I’d already be dead.
Ten
I came home from my piano lesson and found Father Joe sitting on our living room sofa. He looked like a dark cloud in his priestly blacks and clerical collar, but a cloud with a big smile and a firm handshake. Right away, he offered to take me to the Dairy Queen. I was suspicious from the start. First of all, we were never that religious as a family. Yes, we believed in God, but we were never that big on His local representatives regardless of their affiliation. For example, I can’t remember any one of them being invited into our house. Ever. Father Joe and I drove across town to the Dairy Queen in Father Joe’s blue, midsize Malibu, and the whole time he asked me questions about my schoolwork, about how I was getting on with Mom and Dad, and about the kids at school.
Father Joe had a big doughy face with features that were unremarkable: nose, lips, eyes, and chin were all standard issue, not one of them stood out among the others. I noticed that his hands were unnaturally clean and he kept his fingernails neatly clipped. Dandruff dotted his shoulders like the first bit of snow on a paved street. And the whole time he was talking, I couldn’t help wondering if he had ever kissed a girl. Did he turn against a life of sex and then decide to devote himself to God, or was it the other way around? Did he find God and then force himself to forgo the sex altogether? Either way, it seemed a shame. Not that I was interested in having sex with Father Joe. Please. But still, shouldn’t everyone have the right to enjoy themselves in this world? Shouldn’t everyone be loved? And why would God want a person to not have sex? What would be the point of that?
Anyway, he parked the Malibu around the side of the building, and as he ran down the list of ice cream treats we might enjoy, I found myself actually praying: Please, God, do not let anyone from school see me in the company of a priest on a Saturday afternoon. No offense, but it will ruin me.
Instead of accompanying Father Joe into the place, I opted to stay in the car and wait for him to bring me a hot-fudge sundae. And it’s a good thing because, as I was going through the glove compartment (a Bible, a pack of tissues, a county map, a bottle of aspirin, the registration, and a book of matches from a bar called The Hideaway), I happened to look up and spot Miranda Lemley walking into the Dairy Queen with a few of her lesbian friends. I thanked God for saving me the embarrassment of being recognized, and promised to do charitable works for the rest of my life. Eventually, Father Joe returned to the car and, just as I was about to dig into my sundae, he introduced the topic of sex.
“What about it?” I inquired.
Father Joe seemed to be under the impression that I didn’t know where babies came from or how they got made. Before I could correct this misperception, he launched into a description of the process, giving me a blow-by-blow account of what men and women get up to when they are naked with each other. It was only then that I began to realize this whole outing had been a miserable set-up between my parents and Father Joe.
“So then the man’s penis becomes blood engorged,” said Father Joe as he reached for his soft drink and took a sip. “He gets hard.”
How was it possible that this was happening? Why hadn’t I seen it coming? I felt like a total stooge.
“And then the man inserts his penis into the vagina of the woman, which is lubricated in its own natural juices.”
I swear it was like gag city.
And then just when I was grossed out to the max and humiliated to the point of never wanting to have sex with a single living person for the rest of my totally sorry life, Father Joe turned to me and said: “Trevor, have you ever had desires? And I’m talking about sexual desires for another boy.”
I decided that in fact this was not happening; it was a bad dream. It was a nightmare and I’d be waking up in my bed in just a moment. Wake up, I told to myself. Wake up! Wake up! I tried to scream, but I found that just like in a dream, I couldn’t. WAKE UP!
“Be honest with me, Trevor. I can h
elp you if you are honest.”
I looked away, hoping that by removing Father Joe from my sight I might somehow make him disappear from the face of the earth or at least from my vicinity; it didn’t work. I was still trapped in a nightmare, and he kept talking, making it worse.
“Have you, for example, ever wanted to touch another boy . . . like . . . and I’m not suggesting anything here, but, like Pinky Faraday?”
After that I can’t remember much of what was said. I completely blocked him out, and all of my powers of concentration were focused on devising a getaway plan. I briefly considered opening the car door, leaping from my seat, and throwing myself into the oncoming highway traffic, but every time I took hold of the door handle, something made me pause. Eventually, Father Joe stopped talking, drove me back home, and dropped me off, but not without first promising that we would do this again real soon. What I wanted to say was: Just kill me now.
“How was your visit with Father Joe?” Mom called out from the kitchen.
“Fine,” I replied as I ran up the stairs and into my room.
After what they’d put me through, I felt entirely justified in not mentioning my plans. Mom and Dad did not need to know that the following day I was going to start a new life. That was my business. But just so that the plan would remain fresh in my mind, I sat down at my desk and wrote it all out longhand.
MY PLAN
Dye hair and eye lashes.
Change name, identity.
Change schools.
MapQuest Mexico.
Change religion.
Eleven
They say that when you die your whole life flashes before you, but what they don’t tell you is that the very last day is the worst day of all and you’d rather not replay it. There are no statistics, but I’m guessing that the last day is the final straw, proof that your life was so not worth living.
Trevor Page 3
