Wrestling With Love (42 page)

Scott was still rubbing his arms. “You’re not kidding.” He sat back in his chair, looking at his plate. Picking up his fork, he started moving food around, but didn’t actually eat anything. It was unlike him not to dig right in and Derek watched him, confused and growing slightly worried. Finally, he looked up at Derek. “Last night, I’ve never felt closer to you. I thought about us as we were falling asleep and I’ve been thinking about us all morning.”

Derek let out a breath of relief knowing Scott was silent because of happy thoughts as opposed to lingering tension. He had also been thinking about their sex and was still floating, knowing that part of Scott had remained inside of him after he went to sleep.

“Last night was…it was…when you…”

“I love it when you can’t form full sentences.” Scott reached across the table, taking Derek’s hand. Derek reflexively looked around. “But I wasn’t talking about the sex.”

Derek cocked an eyebrow. “Okay, I wasn’t only talking about the sex. I was talking about us. You and me and what we are together.” Derek allowed Scott to turn his palm so it was facing up. Scott began tracing the lines with his index finger. “I want to come to the next Alliance meeting with you. I think I’m ready to take that step.”

Derek lost his ability to breathe for a moment. “Scott, you don’t have to do that. Last night, when we talked, I meant what I said. I’m the one who’s been pushing you. I understand that now. You can take as much time as you need. I don’t blame you for what I’ve been going through and I’m done being angry at myself. Please don’t feel pressured into doing something just because you think I want you to.”

Scott squeezed Derek’s hand. “It’s because of the conversation we had last night that I feel ready for this. Last night you opened up completely to me. You‘ve always showed me how much you love me, but last night, laying it out the way you did, taking ownership for everything, I realized I hadn’t even begun to understand the depth of how I feel about you.” Scott’s voice was strong and confident. There was no hesitancy or wavering. “What we have is something most people never find. I’m done hiding it. To hell with the consequences.”

As cheesy as Scott was being, the fact he was saying all these things made Derek feel like he was floating. “If that’s what you want, I won’t argue. You know I want that. But you don’t have to.”

201

D.H. Starr

Wrestling With Love

Scott released Derek’s hand and picked up his fork, this time spearing a huge bite of pancake and popping it into his mouth. Within three minutes, his plate was clean.

“Damn, I was hungry.”

Derek laughed. I guess you worked up your appetite last night after, you know.”

He winked and Scott blushed.

“Oh yeah. I know all right.” Scott got up taking his tray with him. “I’ve got class in twenty minutes. Meet me back at the room before lunch and maybe we can work up our appetite again.”

“That sounds like a great plan.” Derek stood up, taking his tray with him and the two headed off to their morning classes.

Derek’s first class was sociology. The day’s lecture began with a summary of Peter Berger’s theory of socially constructed reality. “What I want you to consider for a moment,” his professor said, “is the distinction between the individual and the group. Berger’s theory states that individuals form their own realities, but when in a group, those collective realities form a group norm. The group norm influences how individuals behave within their society. The term Berger gives to the norms which govern how individuals behave is socially constructed reality. They are rules that tell us what is acceptable behavior and what it not, but those rules came from individuals to begin with. Consider the power of that idea. It affects all of us every day of our lives.”

Derek had not expected to like his sociology class as much as he did. It was a course that seemed different and that was why he had enrolled, but the theories discussed, such as the one the professor was lecturing on, seemed perfectly aligned to what he was going through. He was living in a world where the socially constructed reality was that boys dated girls and everything else was considered different. It had been the reason why he had built walls around himself throughout high school and why he had become so frightened when Tyrell confronted him in front of his dorm. He looked around the room at the other students who were clearly excited by what the professor was talking about. “Let’s take, for example, an individual who believes in free speech. From the individual standpoint, that person should be able to talk or write about whatever they choose without the fear of negative sanction. Once the individual puts an idea out there for public scrutiny, others respond, utilizing their rights to free speech as well. Soon, what occurs is that you have multiple individuals all spouting their ideals and perspectives on a particular subject. What happens to the group dynamic in that situation? A group opinion emerges. What started as an individual belief becomes an over-arching ideal. What happens then? That over-arching ideal controls individuals who feel that they must conform to it in order to fit in.”

An image of Jared filled Derek’s mind. Jared was exercising his individuality. He was trying to create circumstances that would cause people to talk, to reflect, and ultimately to form opinions. If the dance achieved what Jared wanted it to, people would begin to see the similarities that bound people together. If people started to see that straight or gay, everyone has the same desires, fears, and hopes, perhaps a new norm would emerge.

202

D.H. Starr

Wrestling With Love

Returning his attention to the front of the class, Derek saw his professor clasping his hands in front of him and placing them on the podium, seeming satisfied with his summary. “You can see the irony of it. An idea that begins with an individual freely expressing their beliefs becomes a social governing rule that controls large groups of people. It’s fascinating. Group dynamic has the power to control individual behavior, yet nothing can become a group dynamic without individuals to create and sustain it. In other words, socially constructed realities control individuals, yet they are born from individuals. I want for you to reflect on this in your journals. I will expect a five page essay where you apply Berger’s theory of socially constructed reality to something in your life by the end of the week.”

Derek laughed out loud when he heard the assignment, having just outlined a thesis in his mind during the lecture. The current norm dictated that being gay was different, not bad, but different. People shy away from showing their differences, therefore, it would be reasonable to assume people don’t come out as openly gay for fear of being seen as dissimilar from everyone else and treated differently. He wondered whether socially constructed realities could be changed and realized immediately they could. What was accepted as normal changed time and time again. What if gay people were willing to be who they are unapologetically, without worrying about how it made their differences obvious to others? Those individual actions would spark discussion and the formation of opinions. Ultimately, those opinions would spread and have greater influence over what constituted acceptable behavior and a new socially constructed reality would emerge. The thought was empowering. If people began to truly believe that being gay only distinguished people by who they loved romantically and had sex with, that would become the idea that would influence the larger group opinion and therefore it would become the new socially constructed reality. Wasn’t that what The Alliance was trying to accomplish? Weren’t they trying to send the message that gay people are only different to a small degree, but that overwhelmingly, their similarities to other people far outweighed the differences? That could break down barriers. What had to happen was voices like Tyrell’s had to be quieted, or at least, they had to be drowned out by a much larger sea of voices sending a different message.

When class ended, Derek not only had a detailed outline planned for his essay, but he felt like he had come to understand what it was he had been trying to accomplish this year in coming out. He wanted people to see he wasn’t really different. He wanted people to know this one aspect of who he was did not separate him as someone others couldn’t relate to or like. He wanted to take the power into his own hands to begin the process, as an individual, to shift the opinions of others and to cause a shift in how gay people were viewed.

Suddenly, he understood why he had been so angry at Scott. Derek had wanted Scott to support the belief that gay people weren’t different, but he had ignored that Scott was an individual and had to be given time. Scott made friends easily and he was not ashamed of being gay. His beliefs would support what The Alliance was trying to 203

D.H. Starr

Wrestling With Love

promote and would ultimately help to bring people together, as opposed to Tyrell’s behavior which forced people apart. How could I have been so blind? Scott and I are the same. We both believe in the same things. We’re just going about it differently. Realizing he and Scott were promoting the same message, just at different rates, Derek felt a connection which ran deeper than love and friendship. Scott wasn’t just a great guy. He wasn’t just sexy and kind and loving. He held the same belief system as Derek. Rushing towards his dorm, he couldn’t wait to see Scott, wanting to share what he’d been thinking.

Remembering what Scott had insinuated at breakfast about meeting before lunch, Derek amended his thinking. I can’t wait to tell him what I’ve been thinking after we work up our appetite for lunch. He wasn’t so obsessed with his theoretical revelation to allow it to stand in the way of mind-blowing sex.

When he got to his dorm, he rushed up the stairs. When he entered the hallway where his room was located, he stopped dead in his tracks. Scott was standing by the door with Elizabeth and several other students. Derek approached the door and his mouth dropped in shock. Written in thick black lettering was one word: FAGGOT!

When Scott saw Derek, he walked over to him and pulled him into a hug. Derek looked around and saw that everyone was watching them. Looking back at Scott, he was fairly certain his surprise at being held in front of everyone was obvious, but Scott continued to hold him. When he released Derek from the hug, he kept hold of his hand and led him to the door. Everyone was still watching the two of them, but no one seemed to look disapproving. Instead, there were murmurs which included words like

‘horrible’, ‘Who would do such a thing?’ and ‘I wish I had seen who did this.’

“What in the hell?” Derek walked up to the door to stare at the letters forming the malicious word.

Elizabeth, who had been standing to the side of the door, spoke up. “Derek, Scott, I can’t begin to tell you how sorry I am this has happened. I want you to know I’ve already reported it to campus security and to the deans. We are going to get to the bottom of this. I promise you. No one here would do this to you. We’re all horrified and personally offended anyone would do something like this. It feels like a violation to us all.” Their dorm mates nodded and verbalized agreement.

Scott pulled Derek closer. “It gets worse.” Derek steeled himself. How could it get worse than having someone personally attack the two of them? “When Elizabeth questioned people, someone saw something.”

Elizabeth continued. “Katy, could you come here for a minute.” Katy was a small freshman who lived on their floor. “Could you please tell Derek and Scott what you saw?”

Katy looked pale. When she spoke, her voice wavered. “I’m so sorry this happened. I was in my room, getting ready for my class and realized I had left my toothbrush in the bathroom, so I darted into the hallway to go and get it. When I did, there was this boy standing outside your room with a can of something. He looked at me and then 204

D.H. Starr

Wrestling With Love

took off down the hallway. No one else was in the hall and I only had time to catch a glimpse of him.”

Derek felt his heart sink. “Did you recognize who it was?”

Katy shook her head. “No. I’ve never seen him before. He was tall and thin. His head was shaved and he had darker skin, but he wasn’t black. I really didn’t get a good enough look to be sure of what he looked like though. There are tons of kids who fit that description.”

Derek looked at Scott who held his stare knowingly. “I think I know who you’re talking about.”

Elizabeth interrupted. “I think we all suspect who did this, but unfortunately, Katy doesn’t have enough for us to actually accuse him. She doesn’t even feel she would be able to recognize him if she saw him again unless he were standing in exactly the same position and wearing exactly the same clothing. That’s pretty weak evidence to make an accusation.” She turned to Derek. “But I do have the notes from the time he came to the dorm. You can still file a complaint against him for harassment if you like.”

Scott put a protective arm around Derek’s shoulder. “And I’m a witness to the fact that he grabbed you and caused a visible bruise on your arm. You could file a complaint about that as well. You said Jared had to intervene at the last Alliance meeting and sent Tyrell away.”

Derek took in what was being said, but couldn’t process it. Just a few minutes earlier, he had come to some incredible realizations about his life and about Scott. He had been elated and finally felt a sense of relief from the stress he had been placing on himself all year. Now he was staring at his door which had been vandalized in a hateful manner. “I need to think about this. Just give me a little time to think about what I want to do.”