Sunshine

It feels like you were fifteen only yesterday, and well, if you want to get technical about it, it was just yesterday, seeing as your birthday is today. But well, it's like this. When you were twelve you realized some pretty crazy stuff, and well, when you were fourteen you sort of allowed yourself to accept the scariness that is of finding out that you like girls, especially since you are a girl.

To the point: you're gay.

And you're not exactly closeted since currently the girl who has been calling herself your girlfriend is sprawled out on your bed. And really, almost everyone knows. Your brother knows, most of the school knows, you're sure some of the younger teachers know, but they're not about to -say- anything even if it is a Catholic School. Why? Well the fact that your father makes a pretty penny at his world government job and donates a lot of those pretty pennies to St. Ig's might be one reason. The fact that you wear the 'boy' pant uniform instead of the itchy woolen pleated skirt is irrelevant. And while you might come off as well, pretty damn gay, no one's going to point it out to the world. It's like an unspoken understanding between you and everyone else.

Well except your mother and father. Your father definitely isn't around enough to actually know, and your mother is someone your sure you'll never tell. Well you know you will, but you've been avoiding it. No matter how you dress or act you're sure if your mother asked you if you were gay you'd give her the one answer she wants to hear: "No."

It's not that your mother is anti-gay, but she's pretty traditional and set in on her old-fashioned ways. So you're happy to have a large body of water and a country or even ten between you and her during the school year, after all why else would you be attending St. Ignatius Academy in Portugal when you normally live in Brazil?

The point is you're here now. You're pretty 'out' to begin with, well other than with your family or extended family for that matter, which is probably a good thing since Tio Neto is supposed to be pretty homophobic. And you're pretty damn happy about the fact that you've survived to reach the age of sixteen.

So you're lying in bed, and when you glance at the time on the clock you realize you've been sixteen for a whole five hours and while you don't feel any different, a lot of things have changed since you were fifteen, and a lot of things are going to change. For one, you have a girlfriend, who while rather flirtatious and sometimes irrationally seductive is amazing and beautiful. For another, in a little less than six hours you're going to be coming out to your mother. And right now you're wondering why you made that promise to yourself when you were fourteen, and why you didn't say, when I turned seventeenbecause seventeen is a much better number than sixteen.

The only reason you promised yourself this is because you knew, even at the age of fourteen that living two lives was going to eventually get to you, and it did. Because really there are all sorts of lies, there are white lies, black lies, and various shades of grey lies, but a lie about who you are as a person is a lie you can't even begin to categorize. And it's hard to breathe. And it's worse because sometimes you're not sure who you really are, because when you're here you're one person (the person you feel comfortable being) and then when you're there you have to morph into someone else (the person you think they're comfortable being around). And you were right. You do feel this. Even when you're on the phone you completely change. The people who know you, know you do. Your voice becomes higher and lighter and more 'girly,' that is if your voice can actually be girly. And you talk in a rapid gossipy prettily tone that people never hear you use normally. You just want to be honest about who you are, and you wish you could be honest -all- the time rather than only sometimes. And you want to be honest with -everyone- rather than just some people.

And that's why your sitting at lunch with your brother and mother --- your father couldn't make it because of work -- and it's why your brother is shaking his head at you telling you to shut up. Because he knows, just as well as you know, that this won't end well, not at all. It never was going to, but you keep talking. And you wince as you see your mother's face contort into a look of disgust and disappointment.

And you try to explain. You try to explain that it's not a bad thing. That it's not her fault. It's no one's fault. You try to explain to her, but she's really not listening, you know you've lost her because she immediately asks for the check and tells both you and your brother that she forgot she was going to meet some old school friend. And she's sorry but would you both excuse her. And right now she's taking a small box out of her purse and shoving it in your hands. It's your birthday present she says before hailing a cab and leaving. And you know she's going to pretend that the conversation never happened. You should have known, and you did know, and you find yourself thinking you're a fool for being so upset about it. And Belle's telling you to not worry about it, but even playing the ceiling-cloud game isn't helping.

It's why you're leaving right now, for good. It's the reason you're packing up all your things and shipping them to a storage place over in Canada. Your mother found out you actually had a girlfriend. And in some way you understand why she's doing what she's doing, but you still hate her for it.


You’re spending the summer in Portugal, well it's really spending the summer in 'Europe' to your mother, and because if she knew you've spent the entire summer at Belle's house she'd probably disown you. But your brother's covering for you while he visits with friends in France and Italy. But now it's time to go. And honestly you've really never been too good at saying goodbye, you tend to avoid it; you avoid it so much that when you finally realize you're ready to say goodbye it's just too late.

And you're on a plane. You've been on this plane before, going to some new place where you have to establish new relationships with people, where you have to be someone. And you decide who you are going to be as the pilot's voice crackles over the intercom telling the passengers to 'please stay seated until the aircraft has come to a complete stop at the gate.' You find it funny that this is said in both Portuguese and French. Everything’s different, and you knew it would be; everything’s changed, as it was bound to, but you're still you, and as you get off the plane with your brother that little piece of knowledge makes you smile.