I've decided it's time to come out.
It might seem like a weird thing to have to discover about yourself, but...I have only recently finally realized it's true. I am a heterosexual.
That's right. I'm straight.
I've thought I was bi for a very long time. I got my first girl-crush in eighth grade, on a girl named Nikki, and I fought that one. I fought it hard. But then in high school, I got another. Then another. And I started to realize that maybe...maybe I wasn't as straight as I'd always assumed.
For anyone reading this who might not know, I live in the midwest. Biblebelt. Jesus country. And let me tell you something...it's not exactly acceptable to be anything but straight out here. Maybe that's why I fought it--not because I thought it was wrong, theologically or morally, but because it would make me different. And as the chubby shy one, that was the last thing I wanted to be. So I hid my feelings, buried them deep, told myself that okay, maybe I was bi, but really...that didn't mean anything. I KNEW I still liked guys. I could keep liking them, and ignore my feelings for girls, and even if they didn't go away, no one would ever have to know about them. All would be well.
In college my outlook changed a little. First, I'd grown a little, but two other things happened, too: I discovered a campus community of alternate sexualities, and I made my first close internet friendship. This was with a girl, and she was a self-declared bisexual, so I knew from the start she was open and available, even if she WAS several states away.
I'd never had a friendship online before--not a super close one--and I was unprepared, emotionally, for the sorts of things one finds oneself revealing, when one is typing instead of talking, looking at an IM box and an avatar instead of into another pair of eyes. We told each other everything, it seemed to me then (though I've now learned there are much, much higher standards of "No Such Thing As TMI"--yes, I'm looking at you, and you know who you are. ;) ). We talked about things I'd never talked about with anyone. Personal things. Secret, private things. Forbidden things. And the thrill I felt at having someone to share those things with began to manifest as a crush, too. I thought I was in love.
Things with that particular internet friend didn't end well, and I was crushed. But the groundwork had been laid. I was bi. Surely. I'd been in love with a girl. I had to have been bi.
There were other crushes, too. Jackie, the tall, smart, sassy, sexy bisexual in my Acting class. I blushed whenever I saw her, and I lived to make her laugh. A few other nameless female classmates who caught my eye and made me blush. Gorgeous girls, funny girls. Strong girls.
"So, what the hell," I said to myself. "I'm bi."
I began to assign percentages. I was, I decided, more often attracted to guys than girls. So I wasn't 50/50% bi. More like 75%/25%. Or maybe 80/20%. 90/10%? I told myself I was physically attracted to girls but didn't see much chance for a decent emotional connection with one. I told myself I was straight with wiggle room. I told myself I was more interested in guys but I wasn't gonna rule anything out.
And then I made the most incredible internet friend. The most incredible friend, period. And unlike the somewhat nebulous friendship from before, this one wasn't built on half-truths and flattery. Sure it started much the same way--similar fandom interests--but it grew, developing into something far more than just a fandom friend, and after a few months, I even dared to do something I'd never dared to do before: fly out and meet, in person, someone I'd only known online.
Surely, I thought. Surely we will fall in love, because we are perfect for each other: my strengths complimented her weaknesses, her strengths complimented mine, we knew each other's vulnerabilities and rather than exploit them, we guarded them fiercely. We confessed things, we shared things, we laughed and we cried together. And I just knew it would be love at first sight.
It wasn't.
This perplexed me greatly. It also upset me quite a lot. I didn't know what I was doing wrong, because if I really was bi, why didn't I feel anything? She was pretty, she was funny, she was my friend, and I felt...nothing.
Something was wrong with me. Something had to be wrong. This made perfect sense. So why wasn't it happening the way it did in the stories? In the movies? Why wasn't the perfect friendship developing naturally into the perfect romance the way it was supposed to?
I was so afraid I'd disappointed her. I knew I'd disappointed myself. And such was my terror that I might hurt her, I skirted the issue, avoided talking about it, avoided flirting even in the fun, playful way we used to flirt online. Avoided anything that might potentially be considered misleading, because the last thing I wanted to do was hurt her. I didn't even know if she felt anything for me, but if she did, and was expecting something in return...I hated that I couldn't deliver it. And bringing it up might have injured both our prides, and damaged our fledgling friendship beyond its ability to repair itself. That was the last thing I could have borne.
So I said nothing. For weeks, then months, I said nothing. She visited me, I said nothing. We were more physically affectionate this time, but nothing ever progressed beyond what could be labeled close friendship. That was fine with me. It was what I'd learned I wanted from her. Maybe, I thought, I'm just a particular sort of bisexual. Maybe I'm only looking for the kind of girl Jackie was, or Nikki. Maybe I'm looking for the sassy sort of top they would've been.
Then something happened that still bothers me. A lot. And I never told my friend about this, because I didn't want to hurt her, or make her uncomfortable for the rest of the trip. But when I was at work one morning, alone in the office, my mom came in. She said she needed to talk to me about something, and pulled me back into the doctor's sleep room, where we could have privacy even if someone did come in. She was obviously upset, and I didn't know what to think. Had someone died? What was going on?
She was fighting tears, and doing a bad job of it, too. She said she was going to ask me something, and she wanted me to tell her the truth. I said okay. And she looked at me, tears spilling over, and said, "Are you gay?"
I was shocked--not that she had asked, but that she was that upset about it. I'd always thought of my family as a very open-minded one, and to see my mother actually crying over the thought of me being gay...
I shook my head, baffled and more than a little angry. "No," I said. "But nice to know how you'd react if I were."
And I realized as I said it that it wasn't a knee-jerk response. She had pulled a stunned, startled, and completely honest response out of me. And it wasn't the one I'd expected.
I was straight.
My mom apologized. She told me she was ashamed of her reaction. She told me if I had said yes, she'd've had a hard couple of days, then been okay with it. I asked her what would have made it so difficult to accept, and she said she wasn't sure, but that it was probably just the fact that it would be so hard on me.
Not sure I believed her--and still not at all impressed, because if she was worried about it being difficult on me, she wasn't exactly taking steps to make it easier by crying about it, was she?--I told her I was disappointed in her, and asked her to leave. She begged me not to tell my friend, because she "knew we were close" but that she and I "went a little further back." I snorted and said, "Believe me, I won't." And silently, I added, But not for your sake, Mom. For hers.
But ashamed and disappointed with her or not, her question had surprised me--because of my answer. Because the more I thought about it, the more I realized it was true. It hadn't been the kneejerk response of a child trying to say what she knew would keep her out of trouble. It was the truth. I was...straight.
But then how to account for all those crushes?
I was talking to my friend today, and the topic came up. I said I thought I was straight. She admitted I'd never pinged gay for her, and she has pretty accurate gaydar. "But what," I asked, "about those crushes on those girls?"
"Think about it," she responded. "Do you want to be with them? Or do you just want to be like them?"
Talk about a lightbulb moment. It seemed the excuse I'd consoled myself with about Nikki--that I just admired her--was actually the truth. Yes, I'd had crushes on these girls. But it wasn't them I was in love with. It was everything they represented that I wanted for myself.
In essence? I had put them up on hero-worship pedestals. I wanted to be them. But I didn't want them. I never had.
And as badly as I wanted to fall for my perfect friend...I now knew I never could. But I also now know, finally, that it's not my fault.
I was born this way.