Page 245 of For the Fans

This was a moment that changed her.

“The rain stopped abruptly,” she says, her lips curving into a smile. “And when we looked up, all you could see were stars. Millions of them, covering the entire sky.” She holds me in close. “Aviel, God is not some old, bearded man sitting up in the sky, punishing us when we’re bad. God islove, and laughter and light. God is the good things, and the bad. He…They, I should say, are the Earth and the stars and the vast openness of an existence we’re only a small fraction of.”

Tears roll down my cheeks, and she swipes them away with her fingers. “God isfaith, Avi. Faith inyourself,as a part of the world as it turns. And for all the hate, and sickness and despair we experience, there are equal parts love and joy. You just have to look up.”

Releasing a heavy breath feels like I’m expelling the negativity inside. I hug my mother tight, letting her console me the way she did when I was boy…

Because she’s right. I know she is.

Good people get hurt, bad ones walk free, and things just happen. Chaos within an infinite, spiraling cosmic circus. The only thing we can do is have faith inus, find beauty in the pain, and laugh as much as possible.

No matter what Kyran feels he needs to do to get himself past the torment he holds, I won’t give up on us. I’ll never stop chasing him while he runs.

And hopefully he knows that when he shows back up, I’ll always open the door.

@Backwardz_Avi: I’d give up candy for the rest of my life for one more kiss… He’s all the sugar I need.

Here’s how I know sexuality isn’t achoice.

When I was eleven, I played peewee football. I was good, even back then, which is what led me to believe if I kept pushing myself, getting better, I could make it to the NFL someday. The dream became tangible the more I played, the more I learned about the game and how to develop a synergy with my teammates.

One of our receivers was a kid named Cody. Cody was also very good for his age. We were young, yes, but there was a distinguishable difference between us and the kids who were playing because their parents didn’t want to deal with them and forced them into after-school sports.

That might be part of the reason mine got me into football, but regardless, it turned out to be the best negligent decision they ever made.But I digress.

The carefree side I used to have slowly fell away the more I was pushed into the Catholic faith. After I began tofearGod, my subservience took shape, and even though I hated the imagemy parents projected to everyone else of ourgood Catholic family, I really tried to do as I was told, while still holding on to my individuality as best I could. Because all I cared about was getting good at football and not being sidetracked by other things. So I followed their rules. I took communion, I served as an altar boy—only a few times until I begged my dad to let me stop—and I went to church camp. Because I had to.

Where does Cody fit into this?you might be asking…Well, I’ll tell you.

Cody and I played well together. We had a sort of chemistry that you wouldn’t think would apply to peewee football, but for us, it just happened naturally. He was always there for a pass when I needed him, and it wasn’t long until we became friends.

One day, after a rousing game in which we schooled Malden Catholic thirty-one to three, we were in the locker room, getting changed. Cody and I were joking around about a few of his catches, and he playfully shoved me.

It was something that happened often; it wasn’t new or distinct in any real way. But for some reason,this time, his hand lingered a little on my chest before it sort of swooped down and off of my body.

Now, I know this doesn’t sound like anything shocking, and yes, I was still pretty young at the time. But apparently, I was old enough for my brain to send a signal to the rest of my body. The receptors that distinguish good things you want more of versus bad things you don’t care for pinged to life and told me…yea. I think I like that.

That part of me was alwaysthere. But like a perennial seedling, it only pops up when it’s the right time to present itself. And from that point on, my brain began to water and nourish it with thoughts and contemplations.

It was all completely innocent. I was still too young to really be thinking about sex at all, though I knew how it workedand what it was for. But the only sex they ever taught us about was between a man and awoman. Sex between two men wasn’t something that was supposed to happen, according to our school, and my parents, and the church, and pretty much everyone I knew directly.

And despite the fear of God in me, I couldn’t find it in myself to discourage my feelings. Because the way I saw it, God had made me. If he didn’t want me to feel excited by a playful shove in the locker room from another boy, then he shouldn’t have wired my brain that way.Simple.

I spent the next year of my life subtly looking at my fellow students, both boys and girls, in an attempt to figure out if this feeling was real or just a fluke. But the more I did it, the more I was leaning toward verification. I was too young to find interest in expressing my attraction… The thought of actually telling a boy I liked him, or God forbid,kissinghim, still made me sort of nervous. But I knew, deep down, that it was what I wanted eventually.

When I was old enough, I would date a boy…

And my parents would hate me for it.

That notion was a little overwhelming, but still, I wasn’t devastated by it. I figured that if my parents couldn’t see this wasn’t something I was choosing for no reason, like deciding on what cereal to have for breakfast, then they clearly didn’t love me, nor did they truly understand God’s plan.

And honestly, if they thought my attraction to boys was achoice, then they were probably pretty stupid, too. My entire upbringing was based on the idea that boys should likegirls. Being a boy who wanted to be with anotherboy, despite all of those ideals that are drilled into your head from the time you’re an infant, would mean there’s nopossible wayit’s a choice, right?

I mean, who wouldchoosesomething knowing it directly contradicts their biological nature?

Anyway, over the course of that year, I also grew to really hate church and all of its forced activities for us Catholic kids. Because it didn’t even feelreal. It was like almost everyone was just going through the motions. It was an image they wanted for themselves, like a banner that screamed to the rest of the world,hey, look at me! I’m a great person!While simultaneously using it as an excuse to be judgmental and sometimes even downright nefarious.

Case in point… the man responsible for my trauma.