My Best Friend's Exorcism

by Grady Hendrix

“DBNQ,” Abby replied. It was their shorthand for “I love you.” Dearly But Not Queerly.

When I was in Cub Scouts, our favorite game was Smear the Queer where someone would throw a football into a pack of kids, whoever caught it was “the queer,” and everyone would try to “smear” them. Thinking about it today, I’m mortified, but it was just another one of those cruel things kids said and did without a second thought (see also, The Lord of the Flies). We knew gay people, many of them were our friends, and we were ferociously protective of them, but we never made the connection between saying “DBNQ” or playing Smear the Queer and our friends. We couldn’t see how our words created an environment that might make someone feel alienated and unwelcome. Also, we were idiots. To drive that point home, another favorite game we played was Fireworks War where we’d run around in the woods and shoot bottle rockets and Roman candles at each other. I wound up blowing off two fingernails and getting third degree burns down my right thigh doing that, and my biggest regret while I was recovering? That I couldn’t go out and play Fireworks War. Like I said: idiots.