Bury Your Gays

by Chuck Tingle

Some events are timeless, I guess, stuck between past, present, and future. They’re a different color than the rest. A different scale. A different tense. When you turn them into a screenplay or a song or a novel or even a piece of erotic fanfiction, these are the moments that will outlive your body.)

“Of course, you’d have to find a way to turn the earthquake into some kind of artistic commentary on gay sex—” “Girthquake,” I interject.

“The studio may be a ruthless capitalist machine,” he opines, “but we’re not evil.”

I may never show my whole authentic self to the world without slathering it in a mask of artistic expression.

Sometimes kindness is a duty, a job that one sets out to accomplish with time and patience and effort. People who feel this way, myself included, fight against some other gnawing instinct within; we bloom like a flower from the dirt. It’s an honorable thing to strive for, and there’s nothing bad I can say about that kind of growth. Other folks, however, don’t even think about it. There’s some uncanny spark that always pushes them to make the right choice, because they’re not even aware a choice exists. It’s just what they do. Zeke is that kind of man.

Even in the middle of nowhere, in the dead of night, something was here to bear witness to my hidden truths. In this raw state, my face ruptured and my soul crushed, I was still exposed. I was still gay.

It suddenly occurs to me this is the first time I’ve accepted my own shortcomings on the topic. Being quietly out of the closet was always good enough, but as the hourglass of my life drains I can’t help considering if good enough is really what I’d like written on my tombstone.

If the story is good, it will find an audience. Whether it’s a tragedy or a triumph doesn’t matter.

“Are you kidding me? You’re the queer joy guy. You’re out here changing everything.” “I mean, of course there’s a time and a place for that stuff, but there’s also plenty of nuance to explore,”

On a long enough timeline, endings are inevitable. Tragedy is inevitable. Fortunately, so is joy.