Felix Ever After

by Kacen Callender

Seventeen is just one of those in-between years, easily forgotten, like a Tuesday—stuck in between sweet sixteen and legal eighteen.

Watching, watching, watching. It feels like that’s all I ever do sometimes. Watch other people dance, watch other people kiss.

When someone hurts me, I either obsess over how to convince them I’m worthy of their love or obsess over how to destroy them.

“Yourself,” he suggests. “Loving and accepting and celebrating yourself, and loving and celebrating and supporting the young women like you who will come next. Changing this world, yes—we need people who will fight for our rights, fight for justice in the courts so that it will be better for the next generation. But creating our own world, not just for ourselves in our bubble, but one that can spread to those who need it most—one filled with our stories, our history, our love and pride—that’s just as beautiful. That’s just as necessary. Without that, we forget ourselves. Crumple under the pain of feeling isolated, unaccepted by others, without realizing that, above all else, we need to love and accept ourselves first.”

Live. Live them for the people who didn’t get to enjoy being a teenager. For the people who never lived past being a teenager.”

Once I start screaming, I can’t stop. I scream so hard my throat feels raw and my heart pounds. I’m screaming with joy. I’m screaming with pain. I’m screaming with the awe that I’m here, that we’re all here, and that we’re here because of the people before us, the people who couldn’t be here, and I’m screaming for myself, too.