Right Where I Left You

by Julian Winters

The thing about coming out is you’re so focused on making sure who you are doesn’t hurt or change your relationship with your loved ones that you never really think about yourself. About your moment. About how wonderful it is to just . . . be.

Not all families are created by blood. Some families are made through love and companionship.

Diego’s smile is so bright, I forget the sun exists.

I wish I had that. I wish I could see a stranger wearing an officially licensed Disaster Academy T-shirt on the street and look them in the eye to say “That’s cool.”

And that after someone dies, you only get to keep the memories and the photos and the songs you danced to. You never get to keep the person, only the loneliness their absence leaves behind.

Being anything other than straight means performing your queerness for everyone, all the time, for validation. But that’s stupid. Queer people don’t have to prove anything. We are who we are.

When it comes to other people, expectation is one hell of a disaster waiting to happen.

It’s years and years of waiting to feel . . . normal. Thing is, normal isn’t what the everyone tells us it is. It’s what we make it. Normal is finding the place where you belong. Sometimes you find it early. Sometimes it happens late. In the middle of the afternoon, in the unforgiving summer heat, I know this: finding your normal is the best feeling ever.

The thing about apologies is you can’t force the other person to listen, no matter how badly you want them to. You can only gather the words, hold them in your heart, and hope the person on the other end will meet you halfway to hear them. Once you’ve hurt someone, wanting to fix things is the easiest part. It’s the waiting on acceptance that truly destroys you.

Maybe not every friend is the one you share your deepest secrets with. Maybe you’re that friend to someone else—the one they confide in. Maybe there are friends for laughing and crying and sharing food with while avoiding problems. Maybe every friend plays a different role.

Sometimes, you have to be brave enough to give yourself the thing everyone else won’t.

People don’t just fall in love. No, we stumble and trip and collapse face-first into it.