by KE Payne
Maybe I was in denial about everything, I dunno, but even I can see clearly that I’m gay. I’ve got no interest in boys at all—Ben or anyone else—and I spend every waking hour thinking about J. I mean, why would I deliberately go out of my way each day at school to try and see her, why would my heart beat faster every time I do see her, and why would I get so upset seeing her with someone else if I wasn’t just a little bit gay?
You can’t not be gay and fancy girls, can you? So, that’s it. It’s official. I’m a lesbian. Everything should be so much clearer, but it’s not. I mean, I do feel a, I dunno, a wave of relief that I’ve admitted it to MYSELF, but I’m shit scared about what’ll happen now. Okay, so I know nothing will happen immediately, it’s not like I’ll wake up tomorrow and find a badge pinned to my pj’s saying ‘welcome to the club’ or anything, but what I mean is something has to happen next, right? I mean, ’cos, like, it’s obvious to me that I’m gay, so does that mean it’ll be obvious to other people?
I suppose at some point I’ll have to tell Mum and Dad, and my friends of course, but how’s everyone gonna react? Will they expect me to shave my head and start wearing dungarees? OMG, what if I suddenly start dancing like Ellen DeGeneres at inappropriate moments???
And what about Mum and Dad? What’ll they say?? Are they gonna accept it??? Will they kick me out of the house? Maybe they don’t want a gay daughter. Maybe they want an ordinary daughter. What’s ordinary, anyway?
Oh God, this is just too confusing for words.
Monday 12 March
Couldn’t sleep last night for worrying about stuff. I’m relieved that I’ve finally figured out what’s going on with me, but then I lay awake half the night thinking about having to tell people. Just when it felt like my head would explode, though, I came to the conclusion that I don’t have to tell anyone until I’m ready to. I mean, I’m happy that I’ve admitted it to myself, but think I want to let it sink in a bit before I start telling people. I felt a bit better once I’d decided that, at least.
I did, however, avoid J like the plague all day ’cos I felt embarrassed about Saturday (although she probably didn’t even notice I’d gone, so busy was she chewing the revolting Garrrrrrreth’s face off). Was glad to get together with Hannah to do some work on our project (only two weeks to go—aaargh!) ’cos it took my mind off things, off thinking about J, off thinking about the fact I’m bent, and off thinking about what’s gonna happen to me.
Hannah gave me her mobile number and asked for mine, ’cos she said she’d wanted to text me yesterday to see how I was (after Saturday’s display), but she hadn’t had my number. She also gave me her Hotmail address so that we can e-mail each other from home with ideas for the project. Her e-mail address was funky_munky something or other, which makes me laugh. Mine’s just got plain old Clem.Atkins in it, which is hardly imaginative.
Texted Hannah when I got home, just to say ‘hi’. My message said ‘hiya, funky munky—how are you?’ and she replied ‘All the better 4 hearing from u. Been w8ing all day 4u 2 txt me!’ She needs to get out more! Noted that she used text-speak but very pleased to see that it is at least decipherable! I suppose it’s too much to ask your average seventeen-year-old to write everything out in full. I’m the exception to the rule in texty-speak land, but then I’m odd, I suppose!
OMG maybe that’s another sign of my gayness??
Tuesday 13 March
Another text from Hannah—sent at 7:30 a.m.!!!!!!! She asked me if I wanted to get together again today to do more work on the Cold War project, so we met up and had lunch. As we ate, she asked me what Clemmie was short for, so I told her it was short for Clementine. She cocked her head and said, ‘what, like the orange?’ and winked at me. Her wink made me feel a bit funny inside, but maybe it was gas from the apple I’d just eaten. I think I blushed a bit. She said Clemmie was a nice name, and I smiled. Then she said it sounded a bit like ‘phlegmy,’ and I wasn’t sure if she was taking the piss or not. But, really liked hanging out with her for the day, anyway.
The project is going really well, though! It’s going to get an A*, I’m sure of it. I keep calling that Russian fellow Kalashnikov, rather than Khrushchev, but apart from that, it’s pretty darned perfect.
Wednesday 14 March
I caught Hannah staring at me during break this morning!! OMG, what if she’s sussed that I’m gay? She had this look of…I dunno…knowing, and I’m sure she’s guessed my secret. Am I being paranoid? Is it because I’ve admitted to myself that I’m gay, I think everyone else knows too? Maybe it’s obvious? I dunno. I mean, I’m cool about it now, but there are times when I still try to get my head around the fact that I am a bona fide gay person, and I sure as hell know I’m not ready for anyone else to know about it.
I’m being ridiculous. I know I’m not very feminine, but I’m not exactly butch, either. I know I don’t dress like other girls my age, and I’m not into makeup and pink, fluffy things and stuff, but it’s not as if I’m shouting my gayness from the rooftops. I don’t wear ‘sensible’ shoes and I don’t walk with my hands in my pockets (well, not all the time, and I don’t even know if either of those indicate gayness in the first place). Granted, I don’t wear skirts—only to school, and that’s only ’cos I go to some la-di-da high school that insists we wear them—but it’s not as if I’ve got ‘poof’ written across my forehead. I go out of my way to make sure I never arouse anyone’s suspicion, so how could she possibly know?
Had lunch with Alice today. Felt a bit of a cow, ’cos I’ve been spending so much time with Hannah doing this project, that I feel I’ve neglected Alice a bit. I noticed that she’s lost loads of weight; I think I’ve seen more meat under a butcher’s fingernails. She didn’t eat much at lunchtime either…I hope she’s not got this dyslexia malarkey.
Thursday 15 March
Dad told me tonight that he’s booked our summer holiday! We’re going to France!! Wahay!! And there was me thinking we’d be going to boring old Cornwall again! We’re going to Brittany in August, to a campsite, but we’re staying in a caravan, not camping, thank God. I’ve never seen the attraction of camping: a flimsy bit of material over your head, hard ground to sleep on, and only a bush to pee behind. It’s not exactly my idea of a break! Anyway, HRBH has already said she doesn’t want to come ’cos she feels that, at nearly twenty, she’s too old and sophisticated to be coming on holiday with her ancient mum and dad and younger sister. She’s so sad! Dad says I can ask Alice if she wants to come with us instead. I’ll ask her in school tomorrow rather than texting her tonight ’cos I’ve only got 50p left on my phone and I want to text Hannah later.
Friday 16 March
School: boring as usual. Asked Alice if she wanted to come to France with us in the summer and she said she’d ask her parents tonight. She seemed pretty excited, though.
Logged on when I got home, and went onto MSN to see who was around. I noticed Hannah had added me as a contact, so I accepted and, two seconds later, my box was flashing with a message from her. It said ‘hiya’, so I said, ‘hiya’ back. Three hours later, when I was summoned for my tea, we’d talked about just about everything from The X Factor to the size of men’s dicks!!! (Yeah, right—as if I know anything about that!!) She’s very funny, and I found myself laughing out loud at the things she was writing. Alice came online and, I’m ashamed to say, I blocked her ’cos I didn’t want to have to talk to her at the same time.
So I can’t multi-task! Sue me! [/sarcasm/].
Saturday 17 March
Spent most of today catching up with homework and cleaning out Uncle Buck’s hutch. Ems texted me and asked me if I wanted to meet her and Caroline outside Burger King later, but I made up an excuse and said I couldn’t. I wanted to chat with Hannah on MSN ’cos she said she’d be around later this evening. Logged on around 8 p.m. but was disappointed that she wasn’t there.
Watched TV with Mum and Dad, but didn’t really do anything else this evening.
Oh, and Alice can come to F
rance with us, which is cool.
Sunday 18 March
Switched my phone on first thing and had a text from Hannah saying she was sorry she’d missed me on MSN last night. Wanted to text her back and tell her I was really disappointed she hadn’t been there but for some reason I didn’t feel like I could.
It was Mother’s Day, so took Mum down to the pub for lunch. I also gave her a card and a bunch of flowers that Dad had hastily bought from the petrol station last night. I thought I saw the tiniest hint of a tear in her eye when I gave them to her, but maybe the flowers had given her hay fever. Mum doesn’t do tears.
Took Barbara out for a long walk in the woods this afternoon, to work off the lasagne and banoffee pie I’d eaten at the pub. I suddenly realised while I was out walking that I’d not thought about J for about three days now. Could this be it? Could I finally be getting over her? I think avoiding her at school has really helped. Maybe soon I won’t think about her at all.
Monday 19 March
Only two weeks till we break up for Easter! I can’t wait! I’m so sick of school it’s unreal. We’ve only got one week left to get this bloody History presentation ready, so spent yet another lunch break making up PowerPoint slides and finding out information on the computers. I’d asked my parents if they knew anything about it; I figured they had to be around when it happened, ’cos they’re both so old (43 and 42), so I assumed they’d know at least something. My dad said, considering he was only born in 1964, he’d missed it by two years so, no, he didn’t have any newspaper cuttings from it. He’s useless!
Tuesday 20 March
Got told in assembly this morning that some local dignitary will be coming to the school in May to officially open our new Art block. He’s a Lord Someone-or-Other and is some distant relative of the Queen apparently. Mrs. Russell got very excited when she was talking about him. She has this rather annoying habit of letting her voice get shriller and shriller when she’s whipped up, until she’s practically squawking like a horny parrot! Apparently it’s seen as quite a coup for our school, and the local TV and press will be here. We’ve all been told to look tidy and be on our best behaviour. I glanced across at Matty and saw a glint in her eye, which means she’ll probably turn up with her hair dyed pink or something!!
Wednesday 21 March
Hannah asked me today if I wanted to go round to her house to get on with some more work on the presentation, but I told her I couldn’t ’cos I had, like, a million lots of homework to get done. She seemed a bit disappointed, but I know that if my parents find out I’ve not been doing all my other work, they’ll give me earache about it for the next fortnight. I told Hannah I could probably come over tomorrow or Friday and she seemed to cheer up a bit. I got home tonight and did my French, Science, and RE homework in exactly one hour and six minutes.
Ems told me today that Carrie told her that J and Garrrrrrreth have had a falling-out, and she’s thinking about dumping him. Good! She’s too good for that prat!
Thursday 22 March
A strange e-mail appeared in my in-box tonight from someone called lovesickpuppy; it said, ‘u have no idea how I feel. I bet u don’t even notice me do you?’ Curious! I wondered whether I should e-mail lovesickpuppy back, but figured it had been sent to me by mistake, and didn’t want to strike up an e-mail correspondence with some random person who could be, for all I know, an axe murderer. Well, you hear such horrible stories, don’t you?
Friday 23 March
Had lunch with Hannah again today to finalise the presentation. We’ve had lunch with each other pretty much every day for the last couple of weeks instead of with the gang, and it’s been great ’cos it means I don’t have to suffer the pain of eating with J. Hannah asked me if I wanted to go to her house after tea tonight to do some last-minute tweaking to the layout of the presentation on her PC. I must say, Hannah’s taking this project really seriously; every opportunity she has, she asks to work on it with me. This is going to be the best damned presentation in the history of St Bartholomew’s School! I wish I could be as dedicated to my work as she is!
My fascist mother deigned to allow me to go over to Han’s after tea, ’cos it was homework-related. Han’s parents were out for the evening, so we were undisturbed all night. By the end of the evening, we had everything ready to go for first thing Monday morning, with some quite brilliant PowerPoint slides, natty pictures of the American President, JFK, and the Russian President, Kalashnikov—sorry—Khrushchev, in various poses which we’d superimposed over a map of Cuba. Pritchard’s gonna be blown away (like Cuba nearly was—ha ha ha ha!!)
Saturday 24 March
A text from Hannah first thing! She asked me if I fancied bringing Barbara over so that we could walk her along with Toffee, Hannah’s Shih-tzu. So I dragged a grumbling Barbara from her basket (Barbara doesn’t do mornings) and walked her round to Hannah’s house, then we went up to some nearby woods, which was really nice.
We started talking about boys (groan) and Hannah asked me if I was going out with anyone now that me and Ben were finished. What could I say? I could hardly tell her that I had absolutely no interest in the opposite sex, and would rather chew my own arm off than go out with a boy, so full is my head of J. Actually, my head is full of girls in general at the moment; I find myself looking at girls, on the street, at school, on the telly, and fancying the pants off them. Must be hormones!
So I told her, no, I wasn’t going out with anyone, just stopping short of adding that I would give anything to go out with J. I asked Hannah if she was seeing anyone and she said she wasn’t interested in going out with any boy at the moment. I figured as much. Judging by the amount of time and attention she’s been giving schoolwork—and our presentation task in particular—over the last three weeks, she’d never have time to go out with anyone!
I told her that I’d thought her brother Dan was her boyfriend when we all went out bowling and she laughed and gave me this strange look. She looked like she was about to say something, but must have thought better of it, ’cos she turned her head away and whistled for Toffee. When we turned to walk back down the woods, the conversation turned to other things. I was glad; I hate talking about boys and everything to do with them. It makes me uncomfortable.
Sunday 25 March
Spent, like, FIVE hours on MSN with Hannah this afternoon. We were just talking and joking and sending each other silly pictures (I sent her one of Chairman Meow wearing a bow-tie), and it was FAB!
She also sent me some photos of herself cuddling Toffee, presumably taken in the summertime ’cos it was dead sunny and she looked really tanned, which I liked very much! She was looking right into the camera, sort of squinting, like you do when it’s sunny, and I felt kinda weird and wobbly when I saw her, like how I feel inside when I see J down the corridor or something.
Hmm.
Monday 26 March
The day of the presentation! I woke up with my tummy churning and dreading the whole day, but in actual fact, it wasn’t too bad!
Hannah and I stood at the front of the class and did our little piece, along with our slides and pictures. We’d done handouts for everyone, with bullet points giving a brief synopsis of what the Cuban Missile Crisis was all about. Mr. Pritchard said he was very pleased with the effort we’d put into it, and was especially impressed that we’d thought of the handout ideas. He gave us both a merit! Well chuffed with that!
Hannah and I left the lesson giggling and whooping, and I bought her a hot chocolate at break to say thanks. I told her I’d had a blast doing the presentation with her, and that I’d enjoyed working so closely with her for the last three weeks. She said she’d enjoyed spending time with me as well, adding ‘more than you’ll ever know’, which puzzled me a bit.
And you know the best thing? Me and Hannah were laughing and hugging each other at break and J saw us and I’m sure I saw a hint of jealousy in her eyes, which pleased me greatly!
Tuesday 27 March
Was lying in bed, thinki
ng about Hannah last night. I was remembering us hugging and laughing and I got this strange feeling! I really like Hannah, but I’m worried that it’s going to turn into ‘like’ as in nudge-nudge wink like, and I don’t want that. Trouble is, my head’s so full of J that I don’t think there’s room for anyone else in there (I have but a small brain).
But whenever I picture Hannah in my head, it makes me smile.
Wednesday 28 March
Met up with Alice, Ems, and Caroline at lunchtime and we talked about how crap Mr. Troutt’s lesson had been. Hannah came over and joined us; the gang were all pleased to see her, and I suddenly realised that everyone likes Hannah ’cos she’s that sort of girl—hugely likeable.
