gaity

The girl is presenting a speech in class about her favorite band and it’s the Jonas Brothers and she says, to the class, a bit embarrassedly, “And I don’t care if you think they’re gay,” and the class twitters, even as the teacher stops her presentation and admonishes her, though gently, for it has become commonplace for kids to joke about homosexuality in that manner and she, the speaker, is too nice to mean great harm, if any harm at all. A boy to the side says, “But the Bible says it’s a sin,” and another concurs and the teacher backs away from a theological confrontation, because she must. In the far corner, sits Enzo Ford. He’s a co-captain on the football team and the homecoming king and he’s gay, though he hasn’t admitted it, yet, even to himself. And he feels a great shame wash over him, now, a shame even greater than the one he feels at night, when he’s left alone with his thoughts and his worries and his fears about going to hell, and he says, too, “Yes, it says so in the Bible – and the Jonas Brothers are gay.” And, so, Enzo Ford leads the second wave of laughter. It is all he can do.