3. "Why Do You Have To Be So Gay?"
Darren's POV on Chapter 2 of As a White Knight on His Steed
1999
Anyone who knows me will tell you that I'm a touchy-feely kind of guy. That's been true my whole life. It's true with my family, it's true with my friends, but it's always been the most true with Chris.
From the moment we met, I felt like Chris and I were connected emotionally, and for me that translated into wanting to be physically connected, as well. Our first summer at camp, we walked around holding hands constantly. It just felt natural to have his hand in mine. I never stopped to think about it, and it certainly never occurred to me that anyone might have a problem with it.
When we returned to camp the following summer, Chris and I picked up right where we'd left off. Being physically affectionate was a big part of our friendship – we'd hug, we'd roughhouse, we'd bump shoulders or sit with our knees touching. And nearly everywhere we went, we'd hold hands. Everyone knew we were best friends, and everyone was cool with that.
Until Max showed up.
…
I'd heard kids at school say "That's so gay!" and then everyone would go "Oooooh!" and look around to see if the teacher had heard someone using a bad word. And then, of course, growing up in San Francisco, I knew there were people who were gay. But I'd never associated those two things.
I guess, in my mind, 'gay' was one of those multiple meaning words that Mrs. Wilson taught us about. Like 'hard' can mean the opposite of easy, or 'hard' can mean the opposite of soft. She even brought a bag of cotton balls and a bag of rocks outside one day, and set up some empty plastic water bottles for us to try to knock down. She had us predict which would be harder to throw, and which we could throw harder. Man, that blew my mind. Do you have any idea how hard it is to throw a cotton ball? No one could even hit the bottles, let alone knock one over. Our aim wasn't that much better with the rocks, but at least when someone did get a hit, the bottle would fall over with a satisfying thunk.
Most of the kids were just so excited that the teacher was actually letting them throw rocks (instead of sending them to the principal's office for even thinking about it) that I'm not sure how much they were focused on what she was trying to teach us. But it really struck me – the magic of words, and how the same one can mean two totally different things.
That's how 'gay' was in my mind – one meaning was the opposite of cool, and one was the opposite of straight, and the two meanings were the opposite of each other.
So, at first, when Max said, "Why do you have to be so gay?" I thought he meant, "Why do you have to be so lame?" (Which was another one of those multiple meaning words that I hadn't thought about until I got to camp and heard the word 'lame' used in its non-slang form to refer to a horse who was walking with a limp.) And that seemed like a mean thing to say.
Then Andrew, our Horse Sense instructor, stepped in and told Max, "The primary value of this camp is respect. Now, 'gay' is not a bad word, and being gay is not a bad thing. But when you call someone 'gay' with a scornful tone of voice, you are using the word as an insult. That is not something that we tolerate here. I would like you to apologize to Darren and Chris."
And Max said he was sorry, so I figured that was then end of it.
But I was wrong.
So, so wrong.
Later that day, as Chris and I were walking along, holding hands, Max came up behind us and snarled, "Since I'm not supposed to call you 'gay' I should just call you what you are – a couple of little fags!"
That memory still hurts me. Not because of the words themselves, but because of the look they put on Chris's face. Shock, and pain, and then this terrifying, shuttered-down shame. God, I needed to take those feelings away from him more than I needed to breathe.
I wrapped my arms around him, and wrapped my love around him, and willed the world to disappear. But the world did something better than disappearing. It filled up with the voices of all of our friends:
"That was so mean!"
"I can't believe Max was so rude!"
"Don't pay any attention to him."
"He's just mad because you're both better riders than he is."
"Yeah, and he's jealous because he doesn't have a best friend here."
"Don't listen to him!"
And I loved all of them so much in that moment. Not because of the words themselves, but because of the look they put on Chris's face. Relief, and confidence, and that sparkly-eyed aliveness that is just so Chris. And suddenly I was able to breathe again.
End Notes: If you want to see how Darren looked in this chapter, click on the link and then scroll down to the picture of him with his brother, Chuck, outside Stuart Hall: (adorkabledarrencriss dot tumblr dot com / tagged / pre%20highschool) Wasn't he a cutie? And if you want to see what makes me update more quickly, try writing me a review. ;D