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In the end, after everything they’d been through, there was only one thing the residents of Sandpiper Township could agree upon: that all the fighting, all the commotion, all the rallying came down to how a person chose to read a single sentence.
At that moment Rick knew just how deeply he loved Oliver, and Oliver knew just how deeply he loved Rick, and the understanding of this moment would lead them to much of the happiness and adventure that came next.
He’d do all of this in his head because early in the year he’d tried writing it all down and Ms. June had caught him doing it and instead of thinking he was doing something smart, she treated him like he was doing something wrong. That had put an end to writing it down.
Like many Adventurers, Rick had a great respect for art. In this case, it meant he whispered a quick apology to the glassmakers before crashing through their creation.
Rick Mason was an orphan, but that didn’t mean he lived a life bereft of family. Part of being an Adventurer was knowing the other Adventurers had your back. Or, in this case, would give you his own back to hang on to as you zoomed your way to safety.
The thing is, my mom doesn’t read books like I read books. I like to be surprised, so I try to avoid even the summary on the back. My mom, though, doesn’t like to be surprised. So she’ll read a few pages at the start, to get a sense of what the book is about, and then she’ll read the last page, so she knows where it’s going. If she’s happy with that, she’ll return to the beginning and keep reading.
“I spoke to your principal today about the book your teacher assigned, and its inappropriate content. She said she needed to read the book before passing judgment, and I told her I understood that. But she better be a quick reader, because I know I’m not the only parent she’s going to be hearing from. Many of us are upset by this.” Upset by what? I wanted to ask. But really, I didn’t want to have anything to do with whatever they were doing. I’d read the book and find out for myself. In secret.
Most of the other kids made fun of the name language arts, but Gideon liked the idea that you could use words to paint or sculpt or compose.)
there’s something important about going back to books you’ve already read. You will always find new things inside, or have new reactions to characters you thought you already knew well. You learn more about the story and you also learn more about yourself as a reader, and where you are in life.
For the first time, he realized teachers had a hard job, deciding which really good books to teach, since there were definitely more really good books than there were days in the school year.)
“Please don’t take this the wrong way…but I think your mom has finally lost her mind.” In response, I could only manage to gulp out a simple “What?” Allison studied me. “Do you really not know? Your mom has been calling all the other moms, telling them that Mr. Howe is trying to turn us all gay.” This time, my “WHAT?!” was genuine.
I never in a million years thought there was anything in it that would cause an objection. And having given it some more thought, I still feel there is nothing in it that’s wrong to teach in this class. But in the end, it’s not my opinion that matters the most. Nor is it any single parent’s opinion that matters the most. Our school system has a procedure for book challenges, and the principal has assured me that it will be followed here.”
“Rick and Oliver aren’t gay, right?” Luther blurted out. “I mean, my dad said it’s a gay book and it isn’t really, is it?” The smile drained from Mr. Howe’s face, and now he just looked sad. “We’re not going to have this conversation now, Luther. I’m hoping that we’ll continue reading the book in class, and then when we get to the end, we can talk about whatever you’d like. But I want to make this very clear to all of you: It doesn’t matter how you identify Rick or Oliver, or what you think their relationship is or ultimately will be. If we’re going to defend this book—and I promise you, I
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I knew my parents liked Narnia—we’d watched all the movies together—so if they opened my door and asked me what I was doing, I could simply hold up the book and they’d be satisfied. Or so I hoped. Luckily, they left me alone in my room for a lot of the weekend. My father gardened. My mother talked to people on the phone. My room was my only-child fortress.
I honestly didn’t see what the fuss was about. But nobody was asking me.
There were other parents, like Mr. and Mrs. Fitzhugh (Allison’s mom and dad) and Mrs. and Mrs. Pausacker (Kira’s moms), who were explaining that they were not turning in their child’s copy of the book, because they didn’t believe that parents like my mom should have the power to choose what their own children read or didn’t read.
“I think the point of the book is that the Adventurers need to stop McAllister from unleashing his evil on the world through the Doomsday Code,” Jeffrey put in. “I don’t think Rick and Oliver are in love or not in love. I think they’re friends and, most importantly, Adventurers. You guys just don’t understand the Adventurers’ mission at all.”
The only reason we’re talking about whether or not Rick and Oliver are gay is because we were told that was a part of it before we had a chance to read it.”
“What’s going on?” Mr. Howe asked in Curtis’s general direction. “I’m gay, Mr. Howe,” Curtis replied. This was not the answer Mr. Howe was expecting, but he took it in stride. “I’m gay too,” he said. “Feels good to say it out loud, doesn’t it?” Curtis smiled. “It does, Mr. Howe.” “Okay, then,” Mr. Howe said. “If any of you want to talk about this some more, you know where to find me. But for now, it’s time for us to hear a few current events reports.”
“While the meaning of a book may be informed by the author’s intentions, it isn’t defined by them. Meaning comes from the combination of what the author puts in and what the reader takes out.
“That’s not the way I’d say it…but yes.” “The kids are fine. But I don’t understand why Mom is doing it. It doesn’t make any sense to me.” Dad sighed again. “Your mother cares a lot about you. This is coming from a caring place.” “Maybe if she cared about me she wouldn’t be attacking my favorite teacher or a good book.”
“You can’t have adventures without freedom,” Melody pointed out. “And you can’t have freedom if you’re not willing to defend it from the people who want to take it away.” “You’re not even an Adventurer,” Oliver scoffed. “You talk to headquarters. You go along with us. But you refuse to join up. So how can you talk?” “Because I don’t believe you have to belong to any group to have adventures,” Melody said calmly. “And I don’t believe you should have to join any organization in order to have freedom.”
My friends really loved the phrase homosexual book, which made it sound like the book itself was gay and was going to start kissing the other gay books on the shelf.
Allison’s mom was also quoted in the article, saying, “This isn’t the nineteenth century. The presence of gay people in our world is not something that should be hidden from children—it’s something that should be celebrated. The whole point of education is to dispel ignorance and teach children about the world they live in. I don’t know what world the other parents think our children live in, but it’s not this world. If [the complaining parent] thinks that hiding books with gay content will prevent her son from knowing there are loving, wonderful gay people in our community and in our world, I
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If anyone in our class was on the anti-Adventurers side, they weren’t saying it. Instead, all the kids were abuzz with ways to help Mr. Howe and the book at the board meeting we weren’t supposed to go to without our parents. Most kids said their parents were okay with them reading the book—it was just that the ones who weren’t, like my mom, were pretty loud about it. And it only took one parent to make a book challenge, not a majority.
“I’m sure I can ask my moms to kiss instead. It’s kind of gross how often they do it in front of my friends. Not because they’re lesbian. But because, like, who wants their parents to do that all the time?” We all shook our heads. None of us did.
“Look, Donovan,” he continued, “I want to make sure you understand this. You are never responsible for your parents’ actions. Never. Whatever they do, whatever they say, you cannot bear any of the blame for it.”
There’s nothing wrong with keeping quiet if you feel you aren’t safe. But I wasn’t going to hide my life or my husband from you kids. How could I claim to be an educator while hiding such an essential truth from you? And you know what—while a couple of parents have been surprised over the years, or have had to open their minds a little more than they’d been planning to, most of the time, it’s no big deal. And that’s what Rick and Oliver’s love should be, too. Whether or not you think they’re gay, it’s no big deal. It’s not the point of the story. Being gay is not the point of my life or Bert’s
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loud. “Do you think my mom thinks I’m gay?” I asked. Mr. Howe thought about his answer for a second, then said, “I don’t know what she thinks, honestly. So all I can do is point out that whatever she thinks doesn’t define you anyplace other than her mind. It’s okay if you’re gay. It’s also okay if you’re not gay. And it’s okay if you haven’t figured it out, because most of us don’t figure it out when we’re in fifth grade.”
Gideon and Roberto became a pair. Not a couple. (*Gideon would never have used that word.) Or boyfriends. (*Because, weirdly, girls were allowed to call their close friends who were girls girlfriends, but boys weren’t allowed to call their close friends who were boys boyfriends.) They were a pair in the same way a pair of headphones was a pair—connected and sharing a music only they possessed.
I definitely was not going to tell my mom or dad that I’d been in touch with the author of the book that was dividing my town. Actually, that wasn’t fair—the book wasn’t dividing anything. It was just a book. It was my mom who was doing the dividing,
“There are so many books your teacher can choose from,” she said. “So many great books. All I’m saying is that he should choose one of those books, not this one. I loved that you read Johnny Tremain. I still remember reading that when I was your age. And when you told me I had to read A Long Walk to Water, I was so glad you did, because that’s a fantastic book. I’m not saying Mr. Howe makes bad choices or that he’s a bad teacher. I think he’s a very good teacher. He just chose the wrong book. And when parents think a teacher has chosen the wrong book, there’s a process in place for us to say
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Normally I would have kept my head down and eaten my dinner. Normally I wouldn’t have spoken because when a kid speaks in a way that is in opposition to an adult, adults call it talking back. And when they call it that, they never mean talking back is a good thing.
No, I felt something rise in me. It made my heart beat faster. It pumped my blood faster. It made my brain feel like it was coming into focus. It was something that was nameless to me, but it contained anger at unfairness, resistance to restriction, and an inability to remain silent even when I knew the easiest course would be silence. It was nameless as I felt it, but really it had a name: outrage.
Instead, I started asking questions. I began with: “Why do you think it’s the wrong book?” She’d been lifting a forkful of mac and cheese to her mouth. Now she held it there, as if for two seconds I’d stopped time. “It’s inappropriate,” she said. Then she took a bite. “Why do you think it’s inappropriate?” I asked. She swallowed. “We aren’t having this conversation, Donovan,” she said. “Why not?” I asked. “You know why I think it’s inappropriate.” “Not from you. Only from other kids who heard it from their parents. You didn’t talk to me about it. Not once.”
“It contains themes that aren’t appropriate for kids your age.” “What themes?” I asked. She sighed again. “This display of immaturity only proves my point, Donovan.”
“I don’t know what world you think we live in, Mom,” I said, remembering what Allison’s mom had told the newspaper. “There are plenty of gay, lesbian, bi, trans, and nonbinary people on YouTube and TikTok and all the other things we watch. And other books I’ve read have had gay, lesbian, bi, trans, and nonbinary characters. Kira in our class has two moms, and there are other kids in our school with two moms or two dads or two parents who just want to be called parents. Some kids have nonbinary older siblings. And there’s even a gay kid in my class.” “No, there isn’t,” Mom said. “Yes, there
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“We are who we are,” I said. “And we’ll be who we’ll be. A book can make us feel that, but it can’t invent that. It’s already inside us.”
I’m not coming out to you, I could have said. Because for all I felt at that moment, I wasn’t gay. But at the same time I wanted her to understand what she was doing to all the kids who were or would be gay or lesbian or bi or trans or nonbinary by trying to pull a book from our class just because it had one boy saying he loved another boy. So what I told her was: “I’m saying it’s a good book and that Mr. Howe should teach it.”
“I know you’re on my side,” I told her. “Just not this one time. This one time you thought you were on my side, but you got it wrong.”
“I can’t believe this,” someone behind me said. I looked and saw it was Curtis. “This is so stupid,” Allison agreed, turning around and reaching out her hand to put it consolingly on Curtis’s leg. “They’re not talking about you, because they don’t know you. You can’t listen to insults from people who’ve never met you.” A few people around us chimed in to agree.
“The nature of Rick and Oliver’s love is completely open to interpretation. But for the sake of this forum, let us assume that they are, in fact, gay. What, then, are the grounds for complaint? We are told that having a book with two gay characters is ‘inappropriate’—but what does that really mean? And, just as important, what does that say to our students? I will tell you: It says that being gay is inappropriate. It says that it is shameful. It says that it is something you become instead of something that you are. It sends the message that if you don’t read about it, it will go away. It
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“These books didn’t make me who I am,” they said. “But they showed me I wasn’t alone, long before I met other kids like me. How dare you try to take away that belonging and security from other kids.”
“Hello,” Curtis said softly. I could see a few people on the stage lean forward to hear him. “My name is Curtis. Mr. Howe is my teacher. I want to tell everyone here that I am gay. I think it’s important you know that. A lot of the people here have been talking like there aren’t any gay kids in Mr. Howe’s class. They say that kids like me aren’t ready to read about Rick and Oliver. But they have that wrong. There are plenty of fifth graders who are LGBTQIA+. Some of us are ready to talk about it. Some of us want to keep it to ourselves. Some of us still need to figure it out. Being ready is
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“Thank you, Gideon,” Bright said. “Thank you, Roberto,” Mr. Howe replied.
Roberto H. Garcia Great Rare Bright
Time stopped long enough to deepen into a memory, and then time moved quickly again.
The first openly queer book by an openly queer author for kids or teens that I knew about was Nancy Garden’s Annie on My Mind.
Donovan is named after John Donovan, author of I’ll Get There. It Better Be Worth the Trip, a YA novel that came out in 1969, the same year as Stonewall, and
Mr. Howe is named after my friend James Howe, whose book Totally Joe was the first joyful, unabashedly gay middle-grade novel I ever read.
