Author's Note: This story is based on a meme created by someone who found the note that one of their HS linebackers put in a bully's locker. The linebacker has two amazing dads.
James Alphonse Vincent-Barr was a good kid. Never one to really cause a ruckus. Just wasn't who he was. Adopted at birth by his two amazing dads, Kevin and Eddward, he knew that life could be unconventional. Didn't make it any less amazing. He was lucky to have friends and family who loved and appreciated him and his dads for who they were: a family of three.
When he got to high school, his football coach thanked his biological parents, whoever they were, for his good genes and Edd for maintaining them. James, or Jim, which is what he prefered to be called, was about 6'2 by the end of his sophomore year. And built like a tank. Edd, seeing that his growing boy was as physical as Kevin, made sure he had a healthy diet, while Kevin made sure he burnt up all his growing boy energy wisely.
He'd spend hours on the football field and basketball court. He didn't take to baseball like Kevin did when he was his age, but he did enjoy playing catch in the evenings with his Papa after Kevin came home from his car and motorcycle repair shop. Edd got home earlier from his job as a pharmacist at Walgreens and would help him with his homework and then kick him out of his sanctuary, their chef's kitchen, that Kevin designed just for Edd, so he could get dinner started.
Life was simple. Simply amazing.
It was in the middle of his junior year, that he saw that for some, life wasn't so amazing.
His name was Taylor. Taylor Willis. He was the only openly gay kid in his class. Quite possibly, the whole school. And Hellfire rained down on his perfectly coiffed blond head everyday for about the first month he was at school. Even at 5'7, Taylor held his own, even if he sported more black eyes than his normal blue ones for the first few days he was on campus. Most of the bullies, seeing him not back down, laid off. The point was made, though. Taylor wasn't well liked by the many traditionally minded students at their school. C'est la vie.
But Jim, being who he was, decided that Taylor shouldn't fight alone. He'd invite him over for video games and pizza, take him to Kevin's shop as Taylor had a bit of an interest in classic cars and made sure he knew he was welcome to sit with him and his friends at lunch. Jim's girlfriend, Annalise Frank, an olive skinned, green eyed, brunette bombshell, adopted Taylor as her new best friend through Jim's slow, but persistent pace of bringing him around.
As soon as she saw that he was just another cool kid, who just happened to be gay, it was over. The two were peas in a pod, and Jim was done for. A nagging girlfriend and her gay best friend?! He's screwed! Edd just laughed. As long as his son knew that he'd always have an army of people to care for him, he was just fine with whoever he befriended.
Not so many other people were, though. It was one thing for Taylor and Annalise to hang out. The gay kid and his brunette bombshell of a best friend. It was so stereotypical as to be comical. But Jim's friendship with Taylor was damn near verboten. Why in the world would the school's top athlete hang out with the school's second coming of Jack McFarland?
But Jim continued to stand up for Taylor. Taylor was as normal as they came as far as he was concerned. Things came to a head senior year, though. And Jim let it be known that he had had enough.
Joseph Lane was the ugliest bully in their class. The long haired, dirty blond douchebag with the soul patch to match wasn't much to look at. 5'10 and lanky as hell. But fury tended to rage in his green eyes all the damn time. Jim often wondered if Joe's own existence was what made him so angry and lash out to anyone within 10 feet of his personal space. Not much was known about his home life, but that much teenage angst has roots somewhere. Thing is, no one ever wanted to find out where.
Joe, Taylor and Jim had AP World History 101 together. As the class discussions over Hitler's extermination of not only the Jews, but gays, gypsies, and anyone not fitting into the crazed dictator's strict regulations of what made the perfect German citizen, got heated, Joe would never miss a chance to say how he felt about gays. No one else. Just gays.
"It's sick, you know! Why should we let people like that live? They're not serving any real purpose here!," Joe argued one day.
"How do you think gays aren't serving any real purpose, Joe?," Ms Mitchell, their teacher asked. She was just as shocked as anyone that Joe would dare say such a thing and needed an explanation.
"What do they do? Nothing. Just take up space. We don't need them."
"You do realize that if it wasn't for a gay man, we'd probably still be in the middle of World War II?," Taylor quipped.
"Alright, you fudge packer, what the hell are you gonna do for society besides take up space and die? Because that's what that fucktard did. He had his chance to live his life right. But he took the coward's way out. It's all good, though, because society is better off without people like him."
Taylor snickered and shook his head.
"I have a full ride scholarship to Yale in the fall. I plan on majoring in chemical engineering. What the fuck are you gonna do with your life?"
Joe's eyes grew cold.
"I'm gonna kick your ass. Maybe then you'll use it like you're supposed to."
At this, Ms. Mitchell halted the discussion for the day and wrote Joe up for threatening to hurt Taylor. But Jim was done. So mother fucking done.
That night, as he typed up his book report on Pride and Prejudice for his AP English 101 class, he typed up another note and when he went to school the next morning, he casually dropped it off and went about his day.
By lunch time it was all over school that a lineback with two amazing dads, dared Joe to lay a finger on Taylor. Joe, never one to back down from a challenge, skipped his math class and snuck onto the school's track to confront Taylor, who had gym that hour, teachers, truancy officers and linebackers with two amazing dads be damned.
Thing is, Jim had gym that hour, too. Seeing Joe on the track as Taylor ran laps, he sprang into action. Breaking his own 50 yard dash record, he sprinted to Taylor's side, but not before Joe took a swing at the boy. Taylor, who was surprised to see Joe there as anyone else, dropped back into the fighting stance Kevin taught him, which gave Jim the space he needed to jump between the two boys.
"Da fuck you doing down here, Joe?!," Jim asked, rage seething in his green eyes.
"Told this faggot I'd kick his ass, so I'm doing it. And can't nobody stop me," Joe spat.
Jim cocked a brow. He may be adopted, but if anything, he picked up all of Kevin's defensive traits. Namely, don't fuck with things he likes. Prepare for destruction if you lose your mind and decide to fuck with something he loves. Taylor was a friend and Jim loved all of his friends. RJ, Rolf's oldest son and Jim's best friend, who knew this better than anyone, raced to the growing group of kids on the track, calling on his father's ancestors for peace the whole way.
"Joe, stand down. Taylor hasn't done shit to you or anyone here. Fighting him because you don't like the fact that he likes guys is the stupidest thing you can possibly ever do," RJ said as he tried to get between a seething Jim and bristling Joe.
"Make me," Joe sneered.
Jim threw a mean left hook at his jaw and Joe went down like a sack of potatoes. The other kids gasped. Taylor facepalmed and sighed.
"Guess he made you," the blond said, hand on his hip and shaking his head as he sucked his teeth.
Their PE teacher, Coach Woodford, couldn't let Joe skipping class or Jim socking him in the face slide. Both boys were suspended. Jim for three days, in school, but Joe got a full week of out of school suspension, for threatening and attempting to assault Taylor after being warned not to, and then another three days of in school suspension for skipping class to go fight Taylor.
Edd and Kevin wanted to be angry. Fighting, when word's would do better, wasn't looked fondly on, no matter how many times Kevin regaled him with tales about all the fights he had gotten into when he was in school. Especially those that involved him standing up for himself, Edd or their relationship. Edd knew it was those stories that Jim took to heart and was the reason why he would stand up for Taylor.
But both father's couldn't have been more proud. It would have been easier for Jim to take his usual quiet stance and let Taylor sort things out for himself or let RJ step in, as he was the one that was so great with words, a trait he picked up from Angela, his journalist mother.
But, no. Jim took a stand himself.
"I'm an ally, Dad. If I can't stand up for people like Taylor, what good am I doing?," he asked as Edd fixed dinner the night the school called to tell the two father's their otherwise good son had done a very bad thing.
Edd looked his son in the eye. Sincere green eyes that reminded him of the love his life looked back at him. Tousling inky black curly locks that looked like his own, he sighed.
"Not much, I'm afraid," he said with a small smile. "But you're still in trouble! I'll talk with your Papa about what we're going to do about this and we'll discuss it over dinner. Go wash up."
Kevin wanted to take Jim to Disneyland, but acquiesced to Edd's more logical approach of no video games until Jim's suspension was over. Taylor's Mom invited the whole family over for dinner to thank them for being so kind to her baby boy. And it was amazing.
Joe dropped out not long after the fight. His education wasn't worth dealing with people like Taylor and Jim anymore. And for the rest of his life he struggled as his hate and pride, which ulitmately destroyed his chances at a decent education and life, stood in the way of the business of living.
Jim went on to college on a basketball scholarship and majored in adolescence counseling so he could continue to help kids like Taylor and be the ally his two amazing dads raised him to be.
Taylor couldn't have been prouder.