Breakthrough (8 page)

Tell them to stop? Tell jokes? Walk away? Stay near adults?

One site even suggested that I “try to talk it out and come to a common place of understanding.”

Sure. And then let's all hold hands and sing “Kumbaya.”

I began to wonder if maybe a bunch of haters got together to make this website as the ultimate taunt. I noticed that a lot of the advice I found online seemed to push this idea that if only the victim worked a little harder to accommodate the haters, maybe the haters would accept them. Anyone who has actually been through the gauntlet of hate understands that no amount of jokes, walking away, or ignoring can get a hater off your back.

I was fed up with everything. I realized that I wouldn't be able to change
who I was
. See, being gay isn't like having an ugly pair of shoes. I can change my shoes, but my sexuality is part of who I am. When you feel ashamed of who you are as a person, the whole world begins to seem like an alien place where you don't belong. Nothing can feel good. And it didn't. Hiding who I was didn't fool anyone. Joining the chorus of haters proved to be an epically bad idea. Maybe, I thought, if I stopped hiding my sexuality, everything would get better.

I put those awful feelings of rejection from the math camp incident behind me. That was different, I told myself, because I was confessing my feelings about someone else. I thought if I was just honest with everyone about who I was, I'd endure some good-natured ribbing before finally being accepted.

Maybe I was just desperate. I don't know. My memory of those dark days isn't always perfectly clear, but in either case, I had finally made the decision—I was coming out.

I tried to put a positive spin on it. I thought my coming out would be a dramatic and proud moment, like those stories we see on TV or in movies. You know, the ones where the gay kid summons up the courage and makes a heroic stand. Like declaring into the microphone minutes after being declared prom king that, guess what, the prom king is gay, and that's all right because he's really the same guy you just voted for! And then, after a few unsettling moments when all the students nervously look around at one another, a slow, small clap begins to fill the silence—and then, suddenly, that clapping breaks out into frenzied applause until the newly out gay prom king is hoisted off the stage, onto the shoulders of his friends, and triumphantly carried out the door to an upbeat pop song that lets the audience know that only great things lie ahead!

What actually happened wasn't like that.

There was no grand announcement.

There wasn't even an in-person announcement.

The coming out of Jack Andraka was announced via text message.

That's right. I came out via text message. LOL.

I fired off the text to Logan. It was simple, direct, and to the point. “I am gay,” I wrote.

The most dramatic moment came before tapping the “send” button. Believe me, that was hard.

Logan didn't act surprised at all to receive my text confession. In fact, she acted like she already knew. She was just happy that I had told her the truth.

That went well!
Maybe I was onto something. I told her to spread the word. And she did.

As soon as that text was delivered, I felt a small bit of relief and a lot of terror.

What will my friends say?

What will my teachers say?

Clinging to the chance that this actually might work, I waited. I didn't have to wait for very long. The next day I went to school and the
entire
student body was talking about my sexuality. Instead of winning over my classmates and teachers as I had hoped, it only made me more of a target.

Now it wasn't just students who ignored me, but after word of my sexuality had circulated throughout the faculty room, some of the teachers wouldn't talk to me either. And those times when some
classmates did acknowledge my existence, it was to address me by my new name.

Fag.

People called me a fag. Usually behind my back. Sometimes to my face. Looking back, it was hard to tell which was worse. But almost as bad as the name-calling were the persistent looks of disgust I saw out of the corner of my eye every time I walked down the halls.

The jocks were the worst. I avoided them whenever possible, but every week when it came time for gym class, I knew I was in for another round.

“Jack, why are you so gay?” one classmate asked.

“Why are you so bad at math?” I lamely responded.

I'd try to look away and signal that the conversation was over, but it never worked.

“Did you hear about that gay kid that got beat up?” he asked with a glimmer of amusement in his eyes.

I ignored him. But I knew what he was talking about. In school we had discussed a story about a young man who had been beaten up for being gay. He was beaten so severely that he ended up in the hospital. They never caught the people who did it.

“You're next!” he shouted.

There's just no place for me in this world.

I needed to visit Uncle Ted in the worst way. He had been
hospitalized since the beginning of the year. I tried to see him as much as possible, but somehow a few weeks had slipped by without a visit. I hadn't told him of the problems I was having, but now I was thinking it was time to come clean. If anyone could point me in the right direction, it was Uncle Ted. He always knew what to say.

As soon as I walked into the hospital room, I was taken off guard by how dramatically his appearance had changed. Although it had been only four or five weeks since I had last seen him, it looked like he had aged twenty years. All his hair was gone, and he was thin and pale.

“Hi, Uncle Ted.”

“Hey, Jack.”

He asked about my science projects, and I told him my idea of using bacteria to detect water pollution. I knew he would like that. I didn't mention my troubles in school like I had planned. I just couldn't do it. With the state he was in, I didn't want him to worry about anything else. At the end of my visit, I gave him a hug. He felt like a skeleton. I could feel his shoulder blades poking through his back.

“Jack,” he whispered in my ear, “I'm so proud of you.”

“I'll see you next week,” I told him.

That hospital room experience didn't square with my usual vision of Uncle Ted. Uncle Ted wasn't that sick. I discarded all the evidence and chalked it up to a bad day.

After coming out as gay and revealing something so personal, I felt totally exposed to the world. There was nowhere to hide. No more masks to wear. Now everyone knew—everyone except my family, that is. A few days after delivering the now-infamous text message, I came home from school to discover my mom waiting at the front door. In my house, the sight of Mom waiting by the door is never a good sign.

“Jack,” she said, “do you want to go on a long walk?” That was my mother's way of telling me that she needed to talk to me about something important. We both knew the asking part was nothing more than a formality. It wasn't really a question. It was a command.

I nodded, put my backpack down, and followed her down one of the wooded paths outside our house. My mom got right to the point—one of my classmates heard I was gay and told her parents. The parents called my mom to ask if the rumor was true.

Now my mom wanted to hear it from me. “Jack, is it true? Are you gay?” My mom could always tell when I was lying. I felt frozen. I just couldn't find the strength to meet her eyes. The only safe place to look was down.

What will she think if she finds out the truth?

I willed one foot in front of the other.

Yes, Mom! It's true! I'm gay!!

But the words wouldn't come out.

“Jack, I am ready to walk all night. I want you to answer me,” she said.

I knew she wasn't bluffing. My mom didn't bluff. She was stubborn to the core.

I felt defeated. Rock bottom. I had become a joke to my classmates. I didn't really have any friends. I felt as though I did not have much left to lose.

So I told her.

“Yes,” I whispered.

“Oh,” she said, without a hint of shock or disappointment. “Is that what has been bothering you?”

I was looking at the ground. Leaves and rocks. Rocks and leaves.

“Jack, we don't care about that,” she said. “It's part of who you are. I love you.”

And that was that. It was no big deal. I was my mother's son. All she cared about was that I was happy.

After hearing it, I realized that I wasn't surprised by Mom's reaction. I had spent so much time telling myself that it didn't matter what my mom thought that I had somehow convinced myself I didn't care whether my mom accepted that I was gay. I was so wrong. Her acceptance mattered to me. Part of me wished I had told her earlier. Maybe she could have helped.

However, I wasn't finished. I still needed to tell my dad. After returning home, I retreated directly to my room. I didn't want to be downstairs when my dad came home. I didn't want to see anyone.

I felt my heart jump into my throat a few hours later when I heard
the sound of my dad's car pull up the driveway. It was the sound of inevitability. First the car door opening, then the house door closing. I counted down from fourteen, the number of steps leading up to my bedroom, as he ascended the stairs.

I grabbed a book and pretended I was reading.

He knocked on the door.

“Come in,” I said, as if it were just another day.

Of course my mom had told him all about what happened. At least I didn't have to be subjected to that conversation.

He sat down on my bed and asked me to put the book down.

“Jack, I want you to look at me,” he said. “I love you, Jack. Just know that you'll always be my son, and I'll always love you.”

Like Mom, my dad wasn't upset that I was gay. He also just wanted me to be happy. And I could tell he meant it.

“I know,” I said.

I had never asked for his support, but having it meant the world.

Luke, however, was a different story. We barely spoke the first few days after I told my parents, even though I was sure that he knew what had happened. I knew he was busy, so it didn't worry me at first. But once we did start talking, I could tell that something was different. I noticed his sense of humor toward me had changed. He had always picked on me for just about everything, which I knew was to be expected from a big brother, but now there seemed to be a bit of an edge to his jabs.

It was clear to me that Luke was not cool with having a gay brother. Not even a little. This hurt on so many levels. My classmates and teachers were one thing, but I'd always looked up to Luke. His approval meant far more than I'd ever be comfortable letting him know.

One day after Luke had made a particularly hurtful comment, I ran up to my room because I couldn't let him see me cry. I felt miserable and lost.

My mom tried to make me feel better, but she didn't always succeed. One day as we sat in the waiting room at the dentist's office, she told me that I was going to have to toughen up.

“You are going to have to be ready in the event that some people might treat you differently now,” she told me.

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“Well,” she said, “some parents might have an issue with letting their kids have sleepovers with you and things like that, but don't worry, whatever comes up, we will get through it.”

Since Jake and Sam had moved, I didn't have any friends to have sleepovers with, but still, I hadn't even thought about future friends. I began thinking of all the things that could change in my life now that everyone knew I was gay.

During my final stretch of middle school, I thought that I was going to have to live a life completely without real friends. I didn't want to show how much pain I was feeling, so I kicked my cheerful
“I'm gay and amazing” act into full gear.

I buried myself in the world of science and math, which was always an escape for me. After I stopped pretending that I was heterosexual, I also gave up the act that I wasn't into math—as if anyone had believed that anyway! When I was doing an experiment, I didn't have to hide who I was or worry about how others viewed me. It was a safe space where the only things that mattered were my ideas and how well I could execute them.

But no amount of first-place awards could give me relief from the crushing pain I felt every day. After coming out, there was a clique of girls who were nicer to me, but the guys were a different story. They were hell-bent on making sure I never experienced a single moment of peace. And they succeeded.

How's it going, fag?

Are you going to run to the bathroom and cry, Jack?

You know what happens to homos, right?

I tried to remind myself that eventually middle school would end. I was counting down the days.

One afternoon, when my middle school graduation was finally in sight, I came home to find Mom waiting by the door again.

“Jack, sit down,” she said. There were tears in her eyes. “There is something I need to tell you.”

It was Uncle Ted. He had passed away.

I felt too numb to cry.

It shouldn't have come as a shock, but it did. Uncle Ted had been fighting pancreatic cancer for the past six months and had become very, very sick. But despite all the evidence, I just believed what I wanted to believe: Uncle Ted would find some way to pull through.

I felt my stomach crash down to my feet. In those moments that followed, I felt as though I was looking in on my life from afar. Then the questions came in rapid-fire succession, one after another, but unlike the equations I was used to solving, all the answers seemed so distant, so far out of reach.

Why Uncle Ted? And why did it all have to happen so quickly?

Although I knew how much he had been suffering, in most ways he was the same Uncle Ted, always upbeat and giving great advice. I didn't even get a chance to say a real good-bye. There were so many things I wanted to say—but now it was too late.