Sue's Story

I was having another rough patch in a relationship. Nine years of still not knowing what it was to be loved, and I wanted it so much. We were going to counseling, couples and individually, hoping to fix the relationship. I was ignorantly hoping to find love. 

     I was going to school, again.

     The first night of class I noticed a woman walk in. I watched her as she walked across the Room and took her seat. It was several weeks into the class when a classmate introduced us at a break. Sitting in a booth in the cafeteria, with others from the class, we looked at one another and said, "I know you. We have met before. What classes have we taken together?" This "connection" allowed us to become fast friends. I desperately needed a new friend to talk to and thank God she listened. We had our school friendship. She was kind enough to check in with me every now and again to see if I was okay, and we played golf every now and then with some of her friends. 

     I have lived my life with three different lives, my work life, my family life, and my real life. Fear of losing my family, mother, father, brothers, and fear of losing my job prevented me from letting all those people know me; however, I am a person that, if you are a friend of mine, I want you to know me, really know me. I had been carrying on this friendship leaving one important detail out. I was gay. This was weighing on me, but once again I feared losing a friendship. 

     One night we decided to have dinner, just the two of us. We talked a lot, we laughed. On a trip to the restroom I decided enough was enough. I needed to tell her. I came back to the table, sat down, looked at her and said, "You have figured out, haven't you, that I am gay?" Silence. And in a matter of seconds, I was heartbroken and sick to my stomach. I was going to lose a friend.

     After what seemed like an eternity, she reached across the table, took my hand, and said, "I have had those same feelings." 

     A few months later she told me that one night after a test she walked down the stairs and saw me standing there waiting for her. She was excited that I had waited. She also told me that the times we played golf and I would hand her a ball, she always felt something as she took it from my hand. 

     It's been 24 years. We have hosted, in our home, a rehearsal dinner for her son. A wedding reception for her daughter. I was at the hospital when Abby was born, and I became a grandmother. Several times I got out of bed and drove all over town looking for her son, after his wife called in tears. When they needed a home, her daughter and brother lived with us for a short time. Our families know each other: parents, brothers, grandchildren, nieces, nephews. We have supported each other through the deaths of our parents, disagreements among each others' families. But we can't get married. Our relationship is stronger than most, but we can't get married. I don't have the legal right to make decisions on medical care, funeral, or where to be buried. Don't misunderstand, we did pay a lawyer to define those things.

     We have family, children, grandchildren, brothers, nieces, and nephews. We have defended the family unit. You would think the life we have built together would be enough and give us the right to get married. 

     We never determined how we knew each other or where we had met, because we had never met. We were just meant to find each other.

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Buddy Lemontree's Story

I have been a groomsman five times. I have been a bridesman three times. I have been a witness for a wedding on the beaches of Hawaii. I have driven to be in a wedding on the lake shores of New York. I have flown to Texas for a military wedding of the southern variety. I have walked down the aisle wearing a tux. I have walked down the aisle holding a bouquet. I have bundled up for a winter wedding and sweat my butt off for a summer wedding. I was in the wedding party for a wedding at the Center of Science and Industry. I have worn penis necklaces and stuffed dollar bills into men's g-strings at bachelorette parties. I have smoked cigars and watched women spin topless around a pole at bachelor parties. I have bought everything from wine glasses to sexy lingerie. I have a shoe box in my closet bursting at the lid full of wedding invites and wedding gift thank you notes. Some fading with years in existence and others fresh and vibrant, optimistic and ready to proclaim married life. I think it's fair to say I could register to be a professional wedding attendee without so much as a batted lash and I'm only in my mid-twenties.
     And yet, there is a sad truth to the twist of phrase, "Always a groomsman, never a groom," that rings a little too clearly every time I take a seat to see two more friends take the vow to always be with each other. To always support each other. To put no one else before soon to be betrothed. While eyes tear up in joy to see two people I care about take that leap, a few of those tears are of frustration.   
     Tilly and I met, I believe, at a college activity fair. I was the fresh faced, fresh off the bus freshman and she was the over eager sorority girl who was trying to get everyone to sign up for her group. Being an eager young pup, I was willing to sign up and be one of the victims. Flash forward a few months and we were best buddies, sharing mozzarella sticks in the cafeteria and staying up late putting off studying in exchange for another episode of Conan O'Brien. Bu far from Will and Grace were we. One night at a college block party, as we were bumping and grinding to the latest Pussy Cat Dolls single, I let slip, "God . . . if only you were a guy, we'd be perfect for each other." In a sitcom, this is where you'd insert the sound of a record skip and a slow motion pan to her face as her jaw slowly lowered. Apparently, our hours of listening to Ms. Spears and gossiping like the cast of The View hadn't tipped her off. You see, Tilly was one of those rare breeds of people who had never actually met a gay person. That one guy from that one season of The Real World was the closet thing she had gotten to those of us of the rainbow persuasion.
     And here's where every gay's fear kicks in--the, "I don't agree with your lifestyle," discussion. She said she love me. Supported me. Would go to gay bars with me. But she just couldn't accept in her fait that it was ok. It was a bit like throwing the brakes on your mountain bike halfway down the hill. I felt like I'd been tossed off a smooth ride in a matter of seconds. We fought. We argued. We both brought points to the table. We cried. We hugged. But in the end, we agreed that it would not be something we could change each other's minds about. As the years passed, and Tilly met the boy who broke my heart or the date whose pants ripped when we sat down for dinner, she began to soften. She began to realize that in a world that likes to categorize, sometimes you just can't. Gays couldn't be just put in the shoe box marked, "Fags," and buried from sight. 
     I think the first time I met Will was when I bought him a shot of tequila at my alma mater's young alumni night. Tilly had brought her new man of the hour to the bar that night. He was everything I was not: Barrel chested, truck driving, and NASCAR cheering. If you sang, "One of these things is not like the other . . ." a child would likely point at us. Trying to be welcoming, I went to the first unifier of straight and gay men: booze. I grabbed Will's arm, lead him through the mudge and grudge of the local dive bar on alumni night and flashed Jack, the always stoned bartender, two fingers and he returned shortly with tequila, no training wheels. Manly, yet fun. Will smiled, clanked shot glasses, and tossed it back. The rest of the night is a blur of stale popcorn, fake glee at seeing people you could care/remember nothing about. I'm sure I said nothing charming or endearing to Will, but we shook hands a the end of the night, said we should do this again sometime, yet thinking this would probably be a one time encounter as Tilly would be on to some new guy the following week.
     Push forward about two years and part of that prediction was correct. I didn't see him after that night for a long time. He and Tilly continued to date, but careers and locations had put our paths in different worlds. I saw Tilly every few moths for our group gatherings, but the, "no significant others," clause kept Will and I at bay. So when Tilly announced her engagement and subsequent night on the town to celebrate, I was caught off guard. She had said yes to Will and they were going to take the plunge. So, as obligated when your closest circle of friends has never really met the man you'll wed, we made plans for a group outing. His audition if you will. I would be remiss if I said I wasn't half expecting him to drive a pickup truck with and, "Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve," decal when I remembered he was from her home town. 
     But like her judgment of me when I first came out, I was completely wrong for judging him. He was warm, welcoming, and made us feel like we mattered. After several rounds of shots and a cab ride call, we said good night and parted ways. As I snuggled into bed with a gallon of Gatorade at my side, I felt the bed rustle a bit. I looked at my phone and saw Tilly's name as an incoming call. Figuring she was calling for the post meet up low down, I quickly answered and began to gush over how great Will was and how happy I was for her. That's when I heard Will laugh on the other end of the line. 
     Thanks man," he said chuckling. "Glad to hear I got a passing grade. I know you mean the world to Tilly, so that means a lot to me."
     Blushing, I stammered out, "Oh . . . hey . . . no problem. I meant every word."
     "So . . . umm . . . I was wondering . . . we . . . were wondering . . . would you be in our wedding? I mean stand with us. Support us? I want you to be one of my groomsmen."
     Here was a guy who I assumed wanted nothing to do with me. Nothing in common, really. And he was asking me to be a part of his big day and to stand on his side of the aisle because he knew this wasn't a gay issue or a straight issue, but a matter of love. My heart warmed a bit. If you asked me on that cold fall day at the block party if I'd be standing up for the wedding of a strong Christian woman and her small town, honky husband, I would have be my Golden Girls DVDs against it. But there I was standing, 6 months later, as a witness to their marriage. As they said their vows, I meant it when I said I would do everything in my power to support them as a couple. Because I believed in them and I believed in the power of change. I couldn't have been more proud to say that maybe even in some small way I had changed them and they had changed me. 
     I was one of the first ones they told they were expecting a year later. I was one of the first to hold their son when he was born. And it makes me smile to think that he would be raised in a house where Uncle Buddy was more than just that gay guy who everyone whispered about snarkily. He will be raised with love and support that knows no preference. Recently, the three of us found ourselves at a wedding for another friend. As the music began to hit the speakers, Tilly stepped out to call the babysitter and Will grabbed my hand and took me for a dance. Sure. Grandma Ethel probably frowned a bit, but to us it was just two guys, one gay and one straight, having a good laugh. Tilly came back and joined us and as the glasses of champagne bubbled and the band played on, I couldn't help but smile and think that someday we would dance like that at my wedding. Someday.

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RJ's Story

I jumped out of my car, anxious to be back after the car ride from Cincinnati. It was Thanksgiving weekend and I had just spent time at home with my family and my girlfriend's family. It was a wonderful time but, in true American tradition, the Thanksgiving holiday had already passed from my mind. A new fever had taken hold: the artificial tree in the back of the car.
     Forgoing my book bag and most of my luggage, I grabbed the box from the car and jogged as quickly as I could to the door. I threw it open, calling for Leah as I stumped up the stairs with the tree.
     I gave Leah a kiss hello and dropped the tree in our small living room. Scoops, our mischievous young cat, rolled over on his back and meowed at me to say hi. I ruffled his belly as I sat down next to the box and excitedly ripped it open. 
     I have always loved Christmastime, have always loved being a part of the annual ritual of putting decorations up with the family. This year, my first year living with Leah, was going to be the most exciting Christmas yet. The tow of us and Scoops in our cold little apartment in small-town Ohio were sharing our first holiday season together. 

     I pulled the tree out of the box, set up the stand, and promptly proceeded to put the top of the tree in first. Leah helped me fix it, and together we began to assemble our fake foliage into a beautiful tree. We had a third set of hands--or rather, paws--helping us out as well. The tree was not even halfway up before Scoops had crawled into it and was sitting in the branches, batting at our hands as we went to fluff out the tree. The strands of lights were of great interest to him as well; he chased after them as we tried to plug them in. And the ornaments? Well, some of them are still hanging but the majority have been taken down and made into cat toys. I don't go a day without seeing a cloth mitten or plush snowman ornament on the floor, showing signs of having been bitten and dragged around by little cat teeth. The star on the tree has been knocked over and is hanging limply, still lit, on top of the tree.  
     The other decorations we have put up have been turned into objects of amusement, too: I am convinced that Scoops' mission is to spread Christmas cheer to every corner of the apartment by putting items in every room. 
     I think I'll buy him a sweater or something. And in the meantime, I'll enjoy the glow of the lights as I watch Glee or play video games next to my girl. This season is something that has always meant a lot to me, and I'm so glad we get to share it together. Ornaments or no ornaments.


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Greg's Story

Losing someone you love is always difficult. When my parents divorced, I felt like I had lost both of them. I felt like I had lost a piece of myself. When my parents divorced, I started looking for that piece of myself that I thought I lost. I thought I found it when I met Kyle. 
     Kyle was everything I could have ever wanted in a partner. He was sweet, funny, strong--not to mention good looking. Kyle and I quickly became friends. We were soon closer than brothers. One day, I got tired of hiding my feelings. Being fourteen years old and not knowing what to do, I told Kyle that I was falling in love with him. He let me down as easily as he could, "Dude," he said, "I'm straight." 
     I cried right there in the school's cafeteria. Loving Kyle was the easiest thing I had ever done; it was easier than breathing. How can he not feel the same? I began to hate myself, my homosexuality.
     I turned to drugs, alcohol, and cutting myself to deal with my anger and pain. Eventually, I decided that I couldn't live anymore. I promised God that if He didn't give me someone who would love me, I would kill myself the following night. The next day, I met Danielle. 
     Looking back, I realize that Danielle was most definitely not a good person for me to be associating with. She was promiscuous, heavier into drugs and alcohol than I was, and she lacked respect for authority. None of that mattered to me, though. She treated me how I wanted to be treated. I convinced myself that I was in love with her. After a year of living that lie, Danielle ended our relationship. I don't doubt that I loved her. The heartbreak, I now understand, didn't come from losing her, though. I was heartbroken that I was losing the feeling of being loved. 
     Since then, Kyle and I have grown apart. He has gotten into trouble with the law. The last I heard, he was in jail. I haven't spoken to Danielle in years. I have turned my life around though. 
     I'm still a broken person. I'm still looking for that piece of myself I lost seven years ago. Maybe I'll find Mr. Right and he'll help me find myself. Only time will tell, and, being as I'm only 19, I have plenty of time to look.


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Jason's Story

During a year-long stretch in 2008, John and Jay's house felt like my second home. It was better decorated, of course. It was perpetually spotless, (I think John's hands might have their own lemon-fresh scent.) And, it was always there for me.
"Well . . . got any plans tomorrow?" John would ask while I was pulling on my sneakers to leave in the afternoon. 
"Nope. You?" I'd smile. 
"Just cleaning the house. . . . Want to go shopping? Or, you know, it's been a while since I've seen a zombie movie . . ." 
The next day, usually around ten in the morning, the silver Jetta would stop in front of my house and I'd jump inside. John and I would make our way to Scottsboro, to see what strange, misplaced luggage was on sale that month at the Unclaimed Baggage. (Our most memorable find: leather underwear, complete with chain-link buckles and attachments. We left it for a more adventurous customer.) Or we'd battle over the cheapest bargains at the area flea markets and antique stores. We only ever bought a few things: the tiny Le Creuset dish that I couldn't believe John found, the Crafsman-style plant stand that I grabbed even though John swore he saw it first. Mostly, it was just something to do. 
We were unemployed together. I was new to the city, and while Emily and Jay were working, John and I could only apply for so many jobs. We would drive around for hours, usually while I watched the scenery pass without a clue where we were. We'd hit Big Lots and Goodwills, wineries and plant nurseries all over southeast Tennessee. We had adventures and misadventures--the time the gas pedal broke somewhere past Dunlap and we could only drive about five miles an hour, and John still managed to make me chase him down after I jumped out for a quick bathroom break; The weeks we droe to Lookout Mountain to pilfer chunks of the rock face from the side of the road to complete his fabulous rock garden. 
I got to learn about places like Chattanooga and Nashville, and John got to keep busy. His previous job as a disability benefits specialist, where he was asked to deny people insurance coverage, left a mark on his conscience that caused him to leave, and his resulting unemployment didn't make it any better. I felt like we were helping each other along. 
We'd grab a bit to eat (always an interesting challenge in the middle of nowhere for a vegetarian). Then we'd arrive back to their house and I would settle into a familiar spot on the couch. John, or Jay if he had gotten home, would hold up a glass. 
"What would you like?"
Wine or cocktails in hand, we'd compare and show off any good fins and turn on Hitchcock or Romero, or fall into familiar discussions about our hopes for the next election and our gentrifying neighborhood.
It had been our proximity and our politics that brought us together in the first place, so those conversations came up a lot. After eight years of G.W., we had plenty to talk about when it came to politics. And whenever we brought up our neighborhood there were some hearty grievances to discuss too. The housing crisis had stalled the "up" in our "up-and-coming" area, which meant more crime, more slumlords, more prostitutes, and more malaise. We complained about ratty yards with trucks parked in the grass, trashy tenants who drank 40oz's all day in the street, which neighbors used to be involved with the neighborhood association and now weren't, who could be and who couldn't. Basically, we gossiped. 
"Well, you know, we used to be close," John would inevitably say about a dozen or so of the neighbors that had seemed to fall off the earth at some point in the past few years. 
"They came to our commitment ceremony," Jay would chime in. They would both nod and be silent for a moment. 
The ceremony came up a lot when we discussed our neighborhood. On October 11th a few years earlier, John and Jay gathered with about thirty of their good friends. They had their ceremony on their anniversary, which was also National Coming Out Day. They were committed in front of a crowd of their closest friends, despite not being able to actually marry according to the state. 
Emily and I also got married on our anniversary (August 24), but we exchanged vows in a tiny room in the Dekalb county courthouse a few years earlier, just us and a woman in a black cloak. We were living in Atlanta, where we knew almost no one, and we had done it mostly for convenience. At the time we were in love, and happy, but not really interested in marriage except for the health insurance and tax benefits. It was a depressing ceremony. We repeated after the official while otherwise alone, even though we could have had a wedding if we'd decided to do so. 
"Do you have any special vows?" the official asked. Nope. 
"Do you have the rings?" she added. No. 
Our lack of money, our distance from family, and our problems with the government overseeing marriage kept us from having a traditional ceremony. We told ourselves that this was good enough, but it never felt right. 
While no one was at our ceremony, it was very special to John and Jay both f someone had attended theirs. For believing in their relationship and showing up to prove it, those people had earned themselves a sort of pass. Maybe they weren't as close anymore, maybe she had a child, or he got a new, busier job, or the family had moved away, but to John and Jay, having been a part of their commitment ceremony left a lasting and unassailable impression. It was a strong political statement to hold a commitment ceremony and defy the old norms of marriage in the old South. Just being there meant that the attendees were committed, themselves, to an idea of love that still doesn't have popular support. Despite having no state approval--and, in fact, partly because it had no approval--the ceremony was more meaningful in many way than a traditional wedding or marriage.
John and Jay were my and Emily's first friends in the neighborhood, and even though, with their help, we now have several very good friends here, they remain our closest. And so it seemed appropriate that they were who we told first when we determined, painfully, that we would be getting a divorce.
We pulled up to their house at ten in the morning on that Sunday. I hauled the Craftsman-style plant stand out of the car and onto the porch. Jay opened the door, his short blond hair sticking up sideways in bed-head fashion, and we asked if we could come inside.
I took the familiar spot on the couch, beside Emily. I was pushing my lips tightly together to keep tears from coming. Despite it being her decision, she didn't seem able to say anything.
"We're going to be getting a divorce," I said, with as calm a face as I could manage. "We just thought, since you've been so good to us, and you were our first friends here, that you should be the first to know."
Before a few more sentences got out Emily and I had tears in our eyes. We tried to speak through our quivering, drawn faces. My eyes focused on the closed television cabinet to keep from looking too closely at anyone.
"John," I said, "I want you to have the plant stand. We're going to be selling a lot and I just thought, you know, that it always seemed like yours." I had already started going through the attic and trying to clean up for the sale of the house.
"No, no it isn't." he said. We had joked so many times about how he wanted it.
"Bitch," he would say, "I still think I saw it first!"
I had to laugh.
We believed that they would understand what we were going through, and we knew that they would have enough respect for us to listen. They did. They were so sorry for us that I felt almost worse for including them, but they were the most important friends to tell first.
We didn't know John and Jay when they had their commitment ceremony. It must have been a good one--if they didn't understand commitment, they wouldn't have been the first people we told when we were ending our eight-year relationship.
Emily is living elsewhere now. Our couch is at her new apartment. But the soft cushion in the living room at John and Jay's is still there for me, and when I need to, I still use it. One day, my gay friends will have the right to get married, even in the states of Tennessee and Georgia. And wherever we are in our now separate lives, Emily and I will be right there with them when they do.


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Carrie's Story

I didn't realize that Jen was a person who could break my heart until it was almost too late.
     It's not uncommon on nights when we turn off the the lights before we're really ready to go to sleep for Jen to rest her head on my chest and say, "Tell me the story of how we fell in love." For the sake of time, and because I know it's what she wants to hear, I typically start with the events of the day she sent me away cold and shaking at 4 in the morning with a gross misunderstanding of her feelings for me. I tell her that it started when I asked her if she wanted to walk down to our city's arts district for the monthly gallery hop. I remind her how disappointed I was when she asked 10 of her friends from grad school if they wanted to join us. I talk about our group at dinner with 3 chairs too few at our table. A couple other chivalrous folks and I stood around the table. Never knowing what to do with my hands I rested one on the back of Jen's chair at which point she promptly leaned back. When I moved my hand, and she told me not to my heart swelled faster than the Grinch's at the end of the Dr. Seuss classic. I fill Jen in on the parts of the story she didn't know about at the time. I tell her about leaving her after the gallery hop and going to a party down the street from her house, how I told a friend at the party that Jen felt like my surrogate girlfriend, and how that was just fine. I liked my single life, but it was nice to have someone to take the occasional walk with. I tell her how my friend told me to be careful. I tell how I practically sprinted back to her house when she called me at 3 a.m. to see if I was still in the neighborhood and if I might like to stop back by her place before heading home for the night. I ask if she could tell how hard I was shaking as I sat there next to her on her stoop and if it was as cold as I remember or if she thinks I was just nervous. I remind her that I had to ask her a dozen times if she was cold before she finally said that she supposed she was, a little, and agreed to share the quilt I'd gone inside and retrieved. I confess that I have no idea what we talked about, but it was nice sitting there under the quilt with my arm around her. "Then you said, 'I don't want to be another girl who breaks your heart,'" I say. "And that's when I knew I wanted to spend the rest of my life with you."
     Jen still doesn't believe this. "How could you not know?" she asks. It's true though.  It all seems ridiculous now, but honest, I'm the last one to know when I like someone. I normally don't figure it out until someone else points it out or, like in this situation, the object of my affection crushes my heart into a million little pieces
     "But you thought I was saying I didn't like you that way," she says so I'll finish the story.
     I always rush through the end of the story, since the part about being sent away bravely not crying is the most entertaining part of the story. I continue by telling her how I went home and zipped myself up in my sleeping bag on my bed under 6 blankets and still couldn't get warm enough to fall asleep. When I finally gave up and got out of bed around 9 in the morning I turned on my computer to find an email from Jen, concerned that I may have misunderstood her. She did like me "that way" after all. She just wasn't sure she'd feel that way in 6 days or 6 weeks or 6 month. This was something I could work with. Something I could handle without going into convulsions. One day later we had our first kiss. Five months later we were living together, "and now here we are," I conclue.
     It's more than two and a half years later and Jen still feels "that way" about me. I still grin like a school girl with a crush every time she enters a room. We've travelled half the country together and have plans to see the other half. We've picked out furniture together. We've argued over whose turn it is to do the dishes. We've created household budgets. We've supported each other through unemployment and stressful days at work and family crises.  I've never been so sure about something as I am about us. I can't wait to spend the next 60 years with this person.


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