Talk Me Down

MY NAME IS DYLAN CARTWRIGHT, and I have never felt like my life is normal.

I know how cliche that sounds. Typical homosexual storybook teenager, feeling like an outcast and always dreading the moment when I have to utter the words, "I'm gay," to my family.

I suppose I am sort of that common character in life. Except I don't necessarily feel like an outcast. I've always been perfectly fine on my own. I don't mind what other people think of me. I haven't even found out who I am yet, so there's no sense in me worrying about whether or not other people already have. That doesn't mean I'm confident or content by any means, because I'm not- not really.

It's not like I'm unfortunate and don't have anything to my name. We have money, we have a nice house, and my mom works for a really well-paying real estate agency. My problems root at the place where most other teenagers' do- my appearance.

I don't like the way my hair parts down the middle when I sleep at night. I don't like the way my voice squeaks and cracks at the most inconvenient times, such as when I have to present a project that my grade is highly dependent on, or when I meet eyes with the cute boy who works night shifts at Circle K.

I don't like how thin my lips are, or how bushy and uneven my eyebrows sometimes appear to be. I don't like my pale skin or the fact that my wardrobe is filled with nearly nothing but button ups with unflattering collars and khakis and church attire. I don't like how long and thin my fingers are, or how you can sometimes see the prominent veins in my forearms.

I could go on and on, but the point is- I'm not very fond of myself. I don't think I'm ugly, not really, but I know I'm not the sort of person that someone would jump at the chance to be with.

The one thing I'm not ashamed of or afraid to admit to myself is the fact that I'm gay. I know, shocking, considering a lot of boys my age are terrified of it. They have a right to be, too, especially with the way the world is right now.

I've just always accepted that part of myself so easily and naturally. That doesn't mean I've ever told anyone- well, aside from my best friend in the world, Colin. That's sort of different, though. Colin is openly bisexual, so he knows what it's like to go through at least half of what runs through my mind every day.

My family, though, that is a whole other story. It's not like they're intensely homophobic- or I hope not, at least, but they've never really shown any red flags in that area. It's just that I'm not sure how it would affect my mother, and you can't really blame me for that.

You see, I was born into a majorly religious family. By some kind of miracle, everyone turned out to be the sort of Christian family that is extremely pleasant and tolerant to be around. With the exception of my great aunt Ruth, who likes to spew a few derogatory terms from her bright pink lips every now and then, the rest of my family is really accepting toward everyone else. Even if they don't quite understand them.

"God wants us to love everyone just as he does. That's how the world is meant to be, so it's our job to spread that love and treat everyone with the respect we ourselves want to be given," my mother had once said.

I like to believe that she was right.

Still, even with her words always at the back of my mind, I just can't seem to work up the nerve to tell her my sexuality. It's not like I think she's going to hate me for who I am or anything. I can't explain exactly what it is that I'm afraid of, I just know that the nervous feeling that twists in my gut and makes me nauseous is there every time I open my mouth.

Things are just sort of different without my father around, I suppose.

He passed away a few years ago, because of a cancer that hit him too hard and too fast. It took his life before we could even blink.

My dad was my confident, my best friend, and overall the best man I've ever known. I could come to him about anything and everything. If he hadn't gone too soon, I probably would have told him about myself long before I told Colin.

He wasn't one of those intimidating fathers who wanted to rush his son into sports or force his daughter to dress and behave like a lady at all times. He'd never had a drop of alcohol in his life, or even a single hit off of a blunt. He did his best to make sure my younger sister, Zoe, and I felt comfortable and safe in our own home, or wherever we would go.

I remember that he never wanted my mother to work. He wanted to be the provider for the family. He wanted to be the one to be certain that each of us had everything we needed. He'd had his way for a while, but by the time I was eight and Zoe had just turned one, Mom put her foot down and told him that she wanted to help too.

"We need all the money we can get, Joe," I remember my mother stating. "It won't hurt if I get a little job."

They'd bickered about it for three days, but in the end, Mom had gotten what she wanted..

So, Dad was a bank accountant and Mom had just started working part-time for the local Christian bookstore.

We still had family dinners on Thursdays. We still attended church every Sunday morning. I was still able to keep a perfect attendance at school and finish all of my third grade multiplication problems with the help of my parents. We still made time to go out as a family. We were happy. I remember. We were so happy.

Time passed by so fast. Before I knew it, I was turning twelve and Zoe was turning five. She was heading into kindergarten while I was starting seventh grade. Mom had quit her job at the bookstore and started working as the local librarian instead.

"Books are important, Dylan," she'd told me once when I asked her why she liked to be surrounded by books so much. "They give you a chance to escape reality, to delve into a whole new world. It's like no one can touch you when you're reading. It's magic. You should try it sometime, it's one of the best habits you could have."

As usual, Mom was right, and I followed her advice. I picked up my first book outside of school that night. It was my mom's copy of The Perks of Being A Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky. I remembered seeing her reading it once or twice or twenty times. She had seemed to love it, if her facial expressions and the tears that would stream down her face were anything to go by.

I ended up finishing the book that same night. I got off the bus after school the next afternoon and rushed inside the house as fast as I could to tell her. I was buzzing with excitement, clutching the book in my small hands, running through every room to find her.

She'd been leaning against the kitchen island, sipping from a steaming mug of coffee and skimming through the mail.

"Mom! Mom!" I remember shouting.

She'd jumped at the volume of my voice, but looked up and gave me a wide smile.

"Yes, honey?" she'd asked.

I'd told her all about how I finished the book, and how it was so sad but it was so touching. I'd told her about how I took the book with me to school that day and showed it to each person in my classes, including my teachers.

Her smile had widened with every word, and the words she said to me are the ones I hold in my heart to this very day.

"I'm proud of you."

By the time November rolled around, we weren't very happy anymore.