Out or In or Out or In or OUT? Even though I didn’t have a "crush" on a member of the same sex until freshman year in high school, it’s not like I just woke up one day and realized I wasn’t straight. I guess I always felt slightly attracted towards women, but it had never become an important issue in my life before that time when I fell head over heals for none other than my English teacher. As I look back on my early life now I see little pieces of foreshadowing which would have made me realize (or atleast question) my sexuality sooner if I had any wish to see them. But all in all, as a child, I knew I liked boys, and that was scary enough as it is. I remember my mom sitting me down at the age of nine to watch a TV show she recorded about "how to talk to your kids about sex". After that day, I don’t think I was ever the same. Once a person is exposed to sex and realizes the intimacy involved in a real relationship, love becomes a frightening and much more exciting aspect of humanity. I guess I’ve always been interested in people I couldn’t have. When I was very little I had this huge crush on an adorable boy, David, who I would chase around and try to kiss at recess. I also remember never fitting in, and spending the rest of my years of elementary school recess standing in the corner, singing and dancing by myself. My family life isn’t one too different from many people. My parents are still together, but haven’t been through one day without screaming at each other (atleast while I’ve been around.) They are both reform Jews, but barely go to temple. My mom is a semi-conservative democrat, depending on the issue. She doesn’t have a (paid) job and has always been an at-home mother my whole life. My dad seems to be a more liberal republican, but I’m still not exactly sure where he stands on everything. He is an actuary (I don’t know exactly what that means, but he gets paid well), and we all live in a nice neighborhood with a decent size house. I have one sister who is ten years old. I don’t think mom had the "sex" talk with her yet, and I’m glad that she has the chance to keep her innocence for a while longer than I did. In middle school, I guess I found another young female teacher there attractive, but I didn’t realize that meant anything at the time. What I did know was this huge crush on another boy who I had known since kindergarten. I got really attached to the obsession and ended up getting terribly hurt in the end. He just wasn’t interested, but it’s another long story which isn’t relevant to this one so I’ll just leave it at that. Also, during middle school, I had a few boyfriends. The first one, Greg, was from my Hebrew school and I thought he was kind of cute but I never felt any attraction towards him. I had my first kiss with him and it was at temple at an Oneic Shabbat after a Friday night service. His lips were slimy and tasted of all the wine he had drunk from the little burgundy filled cups they put out for the adults to drink. After Greg, I had a few really pathetic relationships with other boys, none of whom I was attracted to. It wasn’t that I didn’t feel attracted to any guys, I just didn’t feel anything for the ones I was going out with. Now that I think about it, when I was younger, I think I was always attracted to female characters on TV. One I can recall clearly was Winnie on the wonder years. As a child, I just thought she was pretty, but now I realize it was more than that. I also liked male celebrities. I had a thing for Devon Sawa for a while, and then a few others whose names I can’t recall. Then, in freshman year of high school, I remember walking into my third period English class and from the second I saw Ms. W smile I was totally hooked. At first I convinced myself that all it was a mix of envy and a normal thing to think she was so beautiful. But it was more than that. It was so much more than that. About halfway through the year these feelings were all tangling up inside me so tightly that I felt as if all my thoughts could snap at any moment. I couldn’t tell my friends because I didn’t know how they’d react and I definitely couldn’t tell my parents. Finally, I realized that by surfing the net I could find someone who could possibly help me out, and I did just that. I don’t know what would have happened if I didn’t find Starpoet ™ that day of frantically surfing the web. I e-mailed many different people, from someone who had a GLBT related message posting to owners of websites who were gay or seemed to be open-minded. I got a few different short, general responses back to my mile long call for help, but Starpoet ™ wrote back a long, caring reply. I do not recall what her words were, but what I do remember is that for the next few months I wrote her everyday and she always wrote back. I think I became comfortable with the idea of me liking others of the same sex a long time before I became comfortable with liking someone eleven years older than me. Also, at the beginning of 9th grade, I had a boyfriend (Ed) who was in my drama class. I, once again, was not attracted to him, though he has to be the sweetest and nicest guy I’ve ever dated. We broke up around December, but remained good friends. By the end of the school year, I was basically obsessed with Ms. W. Her laugh, her smile, her walk- everything about her, was so amazing. I remember the last week of 9th grade when she was giving out grades, she called me to her desk and walked up with my "I know I failed" expression. As I got closer to her desk I became more nervous and finally looked over her shoulder to see a C next to my name in the gradebook. Genuinely surprised I said something like "wow, a C?" and she said something along the lines of "I knew you could do it." That summer I took courses at an art school in the nearby city and somehow didn’t think of Ms. W that much. When school time came around again, I made sure to find out the exact time of everyday I could pass her in the hallways. She had morning duty right outside the cafeteria where my friends all hung out, so when I actually made it to school on time I sometimes got a glimpse of her that way. Other than that, for the first half of the year she walked past me between second period vocal and third period art, but then I guess she found a new way to get to her class (I have a slight feeling she was catching on to my gaping and felt uncomfortable passing by me, but I could never be sure.) That year, I also met a bunch of new friends, who were freshman, in my vocal class. Among them was Jessica, a very shy girl who would be extremely happy one day and terribly depressed the next. She sat with the group of my friends in the back of the room and we would all talk when it wasn’t our turn to sing during class. I only really got to know her at the end of the year, which I will explain in further detail later. All of 10th grade I wasn’t attracted to anyone but Ms. W. Some days I wouldn’t see her at all and I wouldn’t be able to pay attention in any of my classes. When I did see her I’d either stare as she’d walk by or look the other way, with bright red cheeks. She was (and still is) very involved with school activities. She is a chaperone at every dance, volunteers for many sporting events and attends school plays and concerts. At dances, I would always purposely get myself within her range of view and then involuntary try my hardest to get noticed, even if it was in an immature or annoying way. At the Winter Ball I was dressed in a emerald green long dress with a black velvet tie around the empire waist. She was standing in the hallway, so I’d drag my friends to the end of it where refreshments were served and then walked back to the cafeteria about every five minutes. I was standing in the hallway with a few of my friends and one of the guys said something stupid so I jokingly kicked him in the backside and then she came up to me and grabbed my arm (I swear, I could have melted right there) and told me that I was dressed up like a lady and I wasn’t acting very lady-like (now that I think about it, it was actually a very sexist statement, but I know what she meant.) The truth was that that kind of attention was the exact reason for my insane behavior, if she only knew. I was in the school play that year, so I got to see her around when she stayed after to decorate the hallway or help out in random ways. I don’t understand how anyone couldn’t be atleast slightly attracted to her. She is the most modest, compassionate, and intelligent women I have ever met. In the springtime, the chorus went on a trip to Ocean City, Maryland and Jessica and two other girls were my roommates. One night, we were up late talking and Jessica began to go on and on about how much she hated Ms. W (who was currently her English teacher.) I got so angry at her but all I could do was just sit there and nod because I was afraid to let my feelings for the teacher out (even though I thought that my friends might accept my sexuality, I was sure the whole teacher-crush thing might freak them out a bit.) Also, about that time, I was talking to my friend Liz on AIM. She was telling me all this stuff about her recent sexual adventures and I was sitting there desperately wanting to tell her about what I was going through. I knew that out of all my friends, she was definitely the one who I could tell first about my sexuality issues, but I wasn’t ready to just say "guess what, I’m bi." So, I told her "I have a secret," and then made her guess until she finally asked "are you gay?" and I said "well, sort of…" and then continued to tell her the entire story. I stayed up late that night pouring my heart out to Liz through instant messager. The second she guessed the correct secret and told me that she would be there for me no matter what, I cried for the longest time. Tears of relief, comfort, more confusion, and of that amazing release of all these bottled up emotions (I know I had told them to someone online, but telling them to a friend was completely different.) After I confirmed her guess, she informed me that she also thought she might be bi. I was so glad that there was another girl who could relate to my problems and who I could talk to. By the end of 10th grade, a few of my close friends knew I was bi, but I was definitely not ready to come out to the whole school. That year I made a webpage about my current situation, that is still up online today (https://www.angelfire.com/nj2/maybedyke ). I wanted to make sure that other people in the same situation as me would have a website to go to that was written by someone in the "same shoes" (something I wish I had found in my searches through cyberspace.) Sometimes it helps to read someone else’s coming out story to know that you are not alone and that what you are thinking is not wrong or twisted. So, I made the site to help others and possibly help myself by getting in touch with other people who I could relate to. Sometime in the spring of my sophomore year, I was talking to Jessica online and she looked at my instant messager profile which had, at that point, said something along the lines of "I’m bi." She questioned, "are you bi?" I said "yes." She said "I think I might be too." And then we got into this long discussion about how we liked people who were odd to like. Finally, we both admitted to each other that we both had strong crushes on Ms. W. It was absolutely amazing to be able to talk to someone about my obsessive crush and have them completely understand. Before this moment, Jessica and I barely talked. From then on, I spoke with her everyday- either on the phone or online. I always wanted to know exactly what Ms. W had said to her that day and any other information she had gathered on her. We talked for hours every night on this one subject, and both of us had a lot to say. I spent most of the time being jealous of her because she was in Ms. W’s class and I wasn’t anymore. In June of 1999, I sung at graduation with the chorus, and I knew that would be the last time I’d be able to see Ms. W for an extremely long time. Our high school is set up in two campuses, ninth and tenth at East and eleventh and twelfth at West. Ms. W only taught at east and in llth grade I would only be taking classes at west. That summer was the toughest summer of my life. I once again went away to a (different) art school, and this time lived in the dorms there. I was paranoid, and I swear there wasn’t one day that I didn’t think about Ms. W atleast once. At times I’d just break down and cry, and my friends there would wonder why I was so depressed. I missed seeing those gentle, glimmering blue eyes more than anything in the world. Sometime after I got back, my friend Liz k. had a pool party. That was about when I began to be able to be open talking about my sexuality with my friends. I mentioned to Ed how I would really like to start a gay straight alliance at our school and he thought it would be a great idea. That day I came out to 3 more of my friends. In late August my friend Klaudia had this back to school party and most of my friends ended up getting trashed but I was sober and I ended up flirting with Liz and kissing her for a brief moment. I left her side to go do something or another and while I was away, I saw her making out with Derek, moments after I had shared that special moment with her. I had no right to feel jealous or hurt, since it was just a kiss and I knew it was nothing more than that. I went to sit on the hammock and suddenly an extremely drunk form pressed up again the sliding glass doors. She had gone into the house with Klaudia’s older brother (who was 21) and re-appeared disoriented and pantless. I led her to the hammock and held her for a few, short-lived, terrified and oddly arousing seconds, until others noticed her sitting there and begun to gather around to help. The rest of the night was spent taking care of Jessica, who was hallucinating and saying things about how she saw her (deceased) grandmother, dog, and the devil flying around- and eventually loosing control so much she began to say Ms. W’s phone number out loud (and I had to use all my energy to convince the rest of the people at the party not to dial it without informing them who’s number it was). We all finally fell asleep at 5 am. In the late morning, Jessica was unable to remember any of this. I saw her as this lost person who needed help, but who probably could never change. Another important person in the story of my life is my next-door neighbor, Sandra. We have always been more like sisters, fighting one day then getting along the next. Even though I knew she sometimes used secrets I told her to blackmail me, she had never told any of them and it had been that way since we met at the age of four. I told her I was bi sometime around the summer between 10th and 11th grade. She promised that she would keep it a secret. I told her everything. In November, Klaudia had a birthday party sleep-over and once again, most of the people at the party were pretty trashed. She had a video camera and throughout the entire night I entertained myself by recording the insanity’s of drunken teenagers. Jessica was only there for a few hours- just enough time to get drunk and be caught running around like a lunatic on camera. Before she left, she told me that she had switched into Ms. W’s English class so she could have her for another year. I extremely envied her. Liz K was so out of it for most of the night. She had sex with her boyfriend atleast 4 times, once in the bathroom and once on the floor right next to me. I still liked her a little bit, and I have to admit that I’m a little bit of a voyeur and just knowing that they were having sex right next to me was arousing even though depressing since I felt completely alone. Mostly everyone at the party had settled down with a partner on the floor, except my friend Sam, out in the hallway, who I began to wish I was lying next too. Actually, I didn’t even like Liz that much anymore. I always had this whole thing against doing things with people who are in a relationship, especially because it’s what gives bisexuals a bad reputation. For a while, I just lied there, jokingly telling everyone that I was making out with my hand, because I do weird things like that when I’m in desperate need for attention. When Liz’s boyfriend left for the bathroom I made good use of the time and began to touch Liz k’s tender, smooth back. I regretted what happened next, mostly because I think she was still too drunk to know exactly what she was doing and though I was sober, I felt that the insanity around was getting to me. She fondled my breasts and I massaged hers for a few minutes, but when her boyfriend got back and began to pet her lower region, she lost interest in me and rolled back to him. All this time I was thinking about how much I wanted to be with Sam out in the hallway. Then I fell asleep. Unfortunately, I told Sandra about all of this. She said she didn’t have a problem with anything I was telling her and continued to listen as a good friend should. The next morning, I played the video and everyone was hysterically laughing. I guess it’s fun to watch yourself drunk, but I found it much more interesting to record. Once again, I mentioned to Ed about how we should start a gay straight alliance. This time I also mentioned it to Liz and a few other people at the party. They were all for it, but didn’t seem to interested in the extreme beginnings of it. In the late fall, I had an assignment on political parties for my history class. Since my dad is a republican and my mother is a democrat, I thought it would be best to ask them about their views on certain issues. I tried to get them to talk about everything, hoping they’d talk about their opinion on homosexuality, so I’d have more of an idea what to expect when the time was right to tell them. Later that night, I was upstairs, trying to get more information from my mother about democrats. I said "so democrats are generally more liberal." And she replied "yes." I began to ask her about her views on homosexuality. She didn’t say anything too negative but definitely disagreed with issues such as same-sex marriages and adoptions. I felt like I had nothing to loose, so I went into my whole philosophy on sexuality (at the time.) I told her how I thought everyone was neither 100% straight or gay, and that I’m personally not attracted to someone’s genitals, since I had no plans on having sex any time soon. I informed her that I was not currently seeing anyone, but if I was dating a girl in the future, I wanted her to know that it was possible so she wouldn’t be too surprised. My mother didn’t have much of a reaction to my words except that she figured it was just a confused adolescent phase. She originally wanted me to marry a smart, rich, cute, handsome Jewish man and that night she cut off the "Jewish" part of her semi-pliable requirements. Still, I knew that even if she was the democrat of the house, it would take longer for her to accept me than my right-winged father. After the holiday concert I was feeling a little sick. My mother talked to everyone at the after party for what seemed like hours, so I tried to go off with my friends and get my head-ache off my mind. As I was standing by the food table with Sandra, Ms. W walked by. Sandra loudly said "did you see who just walked by???" I could have slapped her, but I didn’t have the temper nor the energy to do so. I just let it pass and continued to ignore her with my cheeks turning bright red. When mom finally decided to leave, both my sister and Sandra made a vote without me that we would go see this house decorated for Christmas. I really didn’t want to go, but my mom took their side and off we went in the opposite direction of our house. I felt so terrible at this point that I was full of sweat and I began to pick my lips… (now, the story with lip picking is a long one but I’ll give you it in short. I have had a habit of picking my lips ever since I was little and at times I would pick them so much that they would bleed. This annoyed both my mother and Sandra, so one day, my mother sarcastically gave Sandra permission to hit me anytime I picked my lip. Sandra took her up on this offer, and creatively made it her own. Each time she caught me with my hands to my face she would punch me one more time than the last. The year before we got into a huge fight over it during the chorus trip and I ended up crying outside on the balcony in very light pajamas on an extremely cold spring night. Finally, we made up and she stopped hitting me for a while.) After we saw the interestingly lit house, the van headed for home. Sandra noticed I was picking my lips and began to hit me. At first I just ignored it. I wasn’t in the mood to deal with her at the time and I was about to cry at any moment. About a minute crawled by and she continued to punch me, harder each time. Finally I hit her back, very gently, almost jokingly, and she smacks me back even harder- so I hit her back again. Thirty more seconds of this and I burst. I start screaming at her and slapping her and the next thing I know is hearing her say "well at least I’m not the disgusting one… at least "I’m" not a lesbian and "I" don’t suck on girls tits!" I was so stunned I didn’t know what to say. I couldn’t tell if my mother had heard any of this but I couldn’t understand how she could have missed it. I yelled back, drenched with tears, "first of all I’m not a lesbian and second of all, she sucked on my tits! I didn’t suck on hers!" Could my mother truly be this oblivious or was she purposely ignoring us? After I had lost it I sunk down into my chair and continued to cry for the entire ride home. Mom started to talk to Sandra as if nothing had happened, and yelled in a normal voice at both of us for hitting each other. I could barely breathe. As soon as I got home I ran up to the bathroom and began to stare at all those tempting bottles of random ingredients with magnetic warning labels. I think that was the time I held a stop-itch spray bottle to my mouth for an hour, staring at the mirror in tears, until I finally fell to the floor. My dad was calling from downstairs, asking what was wrong. He was fairly sympathetic since he had a personal dislike for Sandra in the first place, though I’m not sure what mom had told him when they got home. Eventually I made my way out of the bathroom to the computer and still in dazed tears, begged my father to leave me in the room alone so I could talk to my friends online. After assuring him that I didn’t need his help, he left and I signed on. I think Sam was the only person on my buddy list signed on at the time, so I think I scared the crap out of her with how depressed I was. I bombarded her with my frozen thoughts and talked for hours into the morning. That whole weekend I was numb. It wasn’t even because she had told my personal business that she had promised to keep secret. What hurt more was the "I’m not the disgusting one—I’m not a LESBIAN!" part. She had promised me that she was fine with it, that she didn’t think bisexuality was odd or disgusting. After years of going through periods of not speaking and then becoming good friends again, I finally cut all ties with Sandra. I couldn’t handle the pain anymore, but the damage was already done. A few weeks went by and I felt better just by not talking to Sandra anymore, though I missed certain things about our friendship. Since I’m an online addict, I surfed onto Planetout.com, a GLBT community site with a good selection of personal ads. I had been visiting there for a while, and even had my own ad up, but hadn’t found anyone of too much interest to talk to. One night, I found a girl from my town and I e-mailed her. It turned out that she was in a grade lower than me at my school, though I had never met her before. We talked on instant messager late the next night about many subjects. I found out that she knew Jessica, and actually used to be good friends with her. Eventually, the subject on how I wanted to start a GSA came up and instead of all my other friends who had just thought it was a good idea, she said "well, why don’t we?" Together, we decided the best idea was to e-mail a teacher that we both knew and thought would be a good resource for information on how to go about starting a club. I wrote the first e-mail and sent it to her address, and signed it anonymous. She wrote back asking for a few days to think our questions over, and she promised she would ask some people from the administration how to go about starting the club. At first she was very cautious about giving us too much information on starting the GSA, but after she got in touch with the school’s substance abuse counselor who was interested in helping us start this club, she began to respond more positively. After a week of e-mailing her just with the one girl I met online, I told my other friends about it and they also began to e-mail the teacher and the substance abuse advisor, Mrs. V. Ed got really involved right away, sending mail to Mrs. V and she must have though he was the original founder because even though I’m not one for jealousy, later on in the story he does basically get the credit. During all this, I also ask Jess if she wants to help us out. Then, she was more closeted then our other friends who were going to start the club, but she wanted to help out as well. Rebecca talked to her on instant messager when I was in another box, so I couldn’t see what they were saying. Next thing I knew, Rebecca IM’d me asking if I’d be interested in going out with Jess. My immediate reaction was "no." since I had previously turned down Liz since she drunk and partied too much, and Jessica was like that but worse. She smoked, drank, did drugs and tried just about anything (as far as I knew). I said this to Rebecca and the box blinked a few minutes later saying that Jessica was willing to give up drugs, alcohol and eventually smoking for me. I was flattered, but in all honesty I didn’t really believe it. But I thought back to that time when I held Jess in my arms and I somehow decided that I’d give her a chance and see how it went. The first time we hung out together as a couple, I was extremely nervous. I went over her house and we ended up having a very hard time communicating. We would both stare off into space and search for something to say but the only sound so abundant around us was hollow silence. Eventually, she turned on her Sara McClaclin CD and we began to dance. I wanted to kiss her but I was quite afraid to do so because I knew that she had never kissed another girl before and I wasn’t exactly the worlds most experienced adolescent based on sexual experiences. Sometime when we were dancing I leaned in to kiss her and we ended up making out for an hour. The first few months of our relationship turned out to be just like that: we barely talked and just kissed, "traveled the bases" and held each other. It was the first time the physical stuff actually felt right, but without the communication we ended up doing things with each other just because we thought the other person wanted it even though we both thought we were moving too fast. Eventually, my parents became suspicious of Jess and I. Unfortunately, I didn’t have much of a social life at the time, and I wanted to go over Jessica’s house every second I had free time, so they knew something was up. There was a time when I promised Jess I would go bowling and sleep over, but then I got punished for teasing my sister and I wasn’t allowed to go so I started crying which made the whole thing completely obvious. My dad called me in to talk to me, and went on about how they would not "drive me so that I could continue with such behavior." Then, he asked if I was going out with Jess. I hate lying to my parents, but I couldn’t bring myself to telling them so I said "no." I ran upstairs in tears and took eight Sudafed (they are little pills that aren’t to harmful, but I realized it was such a stupid thing to do after I did it.) I called Jess and was crying to her and didn’t know what to do. I wrote a long letter to Mrs. V and stupidly wrote about the pills I took. I e-mailed the letter to her, and the next day while my dad was driving me to school he told me that him and my mother were called in for a conference with Mrs. V. It turns out that the counselors have the right to break confidentiality if you harm yourself or others. I spent the morning counting down the seconds till 10:00, when I was supposed to be called down to talk. I was scared because I realized I’d have to tell my parents I was dating Jess and that I lied to them. At the meeting, we barely spoke of my sexuality. Luckily, Mrs. V said that I didn’t have to show my parents the letter if I didn’t want to. This whole situation was awful, and besides this I was having severe trouble with my relationship with Jess due to severe communication difficulty. I hated how my father managed to turn the whole meeting around to "why Adena isn’t achieving in school like she should be" instead of speaking about the real reason we were there. Mrs. V suggested that I go see a counselor. That night, I was depressed once again. I spoke to Jessica on the phone and told her that I needed some time. She took that as me breaking up with her, and got a little drunk that night. Once she was partially drunk, we spoke on the phone for a long time and I told her all the problems I was having with the lack of communication. Our conversation that night was beautiful and it made me want to be back with her, but with the situation at home I knew I still needed some time apart. After being so uncharacteristically happy in school for the past few months, Jessica went to school in a dark sulk once again. Ms. W noticed instantly since she knows Jess so well. After school that day, Jess stayed after for English help and ending up pouring her heart out to Ms. W. She vaguely told her the situation and greatly hinted at who I was, though she didn’t actually say "her," "she," or my name. Jessica told me this and it made me feel even worse. Although I didn’t like Ms. W as much as I had in the past, I still hate being the antagonist, and I must have sounded like such a mean devil because the next day, after me and Jess "made up" and she was all giddy again, Ms. W said to her "she’s only going to hurt you again." Of course, the all-knowing Ms. W was right, but I didn’t want to have to live up to her prophecy. Once we started going back out again, our relationship improved greatly. We moved slower on the intimate side and decided that we were going to talk more. I still wished that she would be more open during social activities such as school dances, but I figured that it wasn’t a big deal. In March, Jess and I helped Ms. W out with the decorations in the hallway for Anything Goes (since I was on prop crew I had time to help out). I was so nervous each day and looked forward to staying after school. The odd thing was, I didn’t feel attracted to her in the same way when I was actually standing right there talking to her face. But, since I was afraid to look into her eyes, that rarely happened and when I didn’t remember the different feeling, my heart beat rose to a million miles per hour. There were moments during those few days that were dreamy. When Ms. W was standing up on the wheeled high thing so she could reach the top of the wall, she asked me to push her over. But the best part was the day when all of the students helping out went home at 4 and I stayed till about 5 to help out with her and a few other teachers. It was the only time when I got to really see how she acted around other adults and I almost felt as if I could have been a momentary friend. I did by best to sincerely make her laugh. Her laughter is like the most brilliant harmony in one voice. Also, during one of the times decorating the hallway, she was having a conversation with some of the students and commented that she was old. I said "you’re not old, Ms. W." I don’t think she’s old at all. I went to junior prom alone, but Jessica went as a friend with Ray so that she could be there with me. We were too afraid to slow dance together, but during the fast dances we "ended up" standing right by the table where Ms. W. was sitting. Jess spoke to her but I didn’t even say hi. The two angels looked adorable in their gowns. Ms. W was wearing a navy blue tight velvet (?) dress with a sweetheart neckline and short sleeves. Jess wore a long floral dress with her hair in a spiked pony tail. She barely ever gets dressed up and it was a big difference to see her like that (not that it matters what a person wears or anything but she looked extra hot that night.) It was the end of the year again, and I saw Ms. W at graduation as always. That summer, I went to yet another art program and honestly thought less about her. I did miss Jess a lot and ended up with a 600 dollar cell phone bill to prove it. I met this girl Zoe at the program and learned a lot from her. She was a completely out "dyke" who wasn’t ashamed of it in the least. I respected her for her brains but not for her morals. She got drunk without a care and made out with and/or slept with women who she barely knew, but those women also happened to be completely breathtaking and somehow she got them fairly easily. I ended up going to a few lesbian/gay bars and clubs with her, using a friends fake id. I have no clue how that got me in since it said I was 22 (I do not look 22!) and the picture on it looked nothing like me. But- I got in and I ordered one beer just so that I would not look too suspicious and drank it extremely slowly. It took be about 4 hours to finish the bottle of Corona and Zoe drank about a quarter of it. I had the most fun at the one club we went to, even though I was lonely and depressed most of the time since Zoe had run off with another girl and began to dance with her. I was sitting on the end of the "stage" with a frown on my face and an older (and cute) lady lifted my chin and said that it is a requirement to smile (she said more than that, in a sweet way, but I don’t remember exactly), and after a few more minutes of moping I got up and just danced- alone. It was something I would never do at home, but I was in a strange place with people I didn’t know and atleast it made the time fly by quicker. And- one girl there was so hilariously drunk and when I paused from dancing, her insane flirting with the other girls was entertaining enough. I admit that I sort of liked a few people at the summer program. I thought two of the RA’s were cute, one male and one female, both non-obtainable. I kind of liked Zoe although that changed when I got to know her more and this girl, Rachel, was also quite adorable and sweet. On one of those many cell phone calls, I told Jess that I kind of wanted to be "free," just in case something came up. I didn’t want to break up with her, but it was so hard being far away and with all the temptation. Although she said she wouldn’t be hurt (too much) if something did happen, nothing did and I came home with some interesting memories, the large cell phone bill and my stuff. Jess and I hung out a bit in August, but nothing big happened. We continued to go on the bumpy road of adolescent relationships (multiplied by ten since it’s a relationship with me involved.) Right before my vacation to the Bahamas, Jess and I were going through a difficult time. I was talking to her online and my dad was yelling at me to get off the computer. I was about to sign off when he flipped and screamed at me to get off. I signed off, but I was angry, so I was on the verge of tears and tried to leave the room as peacefully as possible. My dad said goodnight and I said "good night" in a whisper, but my dad got extremely angry because he didn’t hear me say it and started to yell about how I should say goodnight to him so I screamed it and slammed the door. For some reason, I felt really distraught that night and I ended up taking 4 (or was it 6?) extra strength Tylenol and 2 Advil. It really wasn’t enough to do anything to me, but after reading the warning labels on the side of the bottles I freaked so I told my parents that I took the pills and my dad took me to the emergency room where they told me to make myself throw up and took my blood. I was fine, but it sucked having to wait there for so long and talk to a social worker who I really didn’t feel like telling all my problems too. Jessica came to the hospital and sat in the waiting room till early in the morning when I was released. Everything was "fine" again. My dad realized that he should be a little bit more gentle with me sometimes because I’m fragile and I do break easily, though not often. In September, Jess and I went to the homecoming dance. She didn’t want to fast dance (it was giving her a panic attack and she didn’t like the music) but for some reason she was comfortable slow dancing. I was a little nervous but I kind of didn’t care what other people thought anymore. During one slow dance, Jessica has placed us all the way at the end of the dance floor where the hallway lights shined in illuminated our figures, and I asked to move closer to the large crowd but she refused. For some reason, I didn’t wonder why… that is, until I final got her to turn around and I saw Ms. W standing right at the doorway staring at us. Within a second, my eyes were shut tight, and I continued to keep them closed for the rest of the dance. As I pulled away from Jess at the end, I saw that her eyes had been glued tightly as well. I wonder what Ms. W was thinking. After that, Jess had to run off to smoke (or be alone/away from the dance floor) because the music was getting to her. I really wanted to dance, but I know that if I don’t follow her she’ll be sad even though she always said that I should stay and dance if I want too. I attempted to find her, but by the time I did, I saw that she was sitting down with Ms. W in the corner of the cafeteria. I didn’t want to interrupt, but Jess saw me and asked if she could have a minute so I went to the other corner and took pictures with my friends. When I looked up, they had both disappeared. Some kid passed out in the gymnasium so Ms. W had to go attend to that and Jess had followed (or something?). Anyway, after a long depressing evening, I sat down on the lighted side of the gym and talked to Jessica. Understandably, she was a little nervous about people staring at her. I told her how I’m scared as well, but the only way to make ourselves be "normal" is to act like any other "normal" straight couple. "Who cares what other people think? We should just have a good time. (etc etc)" The last ten minutes of the evening were enjoyable. Jessica danced to fast songs with me (once again in the view of Ms. W, but this time I think it was really not on purpose) and at the very end Jess walked over to say goodbye to her and I came and spoke as well. Our relationship continues to be shaky, but each time we go through a "down" we inevitably go back up due to stronger and more honest communication. We are almost completely out in school, and even kiss in public- although I’m still uncomfortable with PDAs (it has nothing to do with the fact that she’s a girl.) As for my parents, they still are both not in agreement on my "choice." My mother continues to make comments in a negative way about the relationship, and she does it with the intent of hurting me. My father doesn’t make his feelings as known, but when Jess and I were together at my sisters chorus show, he was giving us a weird, mean look. He has said that he likes Jessica as a person, but I’m still not sure what he thinks. Right now, I’m involved with a documentary being put together for the Oxygen network on teenage sexuality. The people are actually coming tomorrow to speak with my mother and I at our house (oh god, my room is such a mess!) I hope that the documentary shows how unfair she is being and how I am as "right" on this manner as I can be. I don’t like or dislike someone because of the gender they are. I like them for their mind, their laugh, and their heart. There are only a hundred or so years in a lifetime, and after death there is infinite possibilities. I am what I am and I live for the now. I’m not hurting anyone by going out with Jess. I agree with the quote that "love is never wrong." Most importantly, I live by this quote: "labels are for clothing, not for people." If only my parents and the world would accept this and move on. With more education on homosexuality and bisexuality, I’m hopeful that some day maybe they will.