Red, White & Royal Blue

by Casey McQuiston

NERD!

Henry’s smile has gone sheepish and reserved, and Alex understands their friendship at last. Henry doesn’t want the spotlight, and Pez naturally absorbs what Henry deflects.

Straight people, he thinks, probably don’t spend this much time convincing themselves they’re straight.

In an instant of sudden, vivid clarity, he can’t believe he ever thought he was straight.

Alex thinks, dizzily, that it’s been nearly five years of foreplay, and enough is enough.

Alex makes a mental note to figure out which shadowy gay noble taught Henry all this and send the man a fruit basket.

once again, how had he convinced himself he was straight?—

The search tells him Pyramus and Thisbe were lovers in a Greek myth, children of rival families, forbidden to be together. Their only way to speak to each other was through a thin crack in the wall built between them.

Even that thought depresses him because Henry’s the only reason he’s become a person who cites Plato.