---Prologue---
Love. Love of nature, love of family, love of partners, love of music, love of hobbies. We have the right to love. Or so I thought. People are exiled, shunned, and hated because of their sexuality. It perfectly normal to have feelings deeper than friendship and kinship toward people of your same gender. I should know; I’m bisexual. I ‘came out of the closet’ last month and have regretted it ever since. I should probably go back to when I first realized that I was bisexual and then jump forward again to when my currently ex-best friend, Tina Blackwood, found out. So, let’s go back now to when I was fourteen-years-old.
---Chapter 1---
My back was ablaze with the sun’s heat bearing down on it as I ran – straight to the finish line. I was so close that I could almost feel my body running through the ribbon. My feet were pounding hard against the asphalt of the running track sprinting full speed toward my mom. She always came to my track meets without fail. My dad on the other hand was most likely at the house on the ground and unconscious and recovering from a hangover. My mother’s fiery red hair, the same shade and texture as my own, was blowing in the wind along with her loose white cotton blouse and jean cutoffs. My own white running shorts and blue running t-shirt were sticking to my legs and torso with sweat. I glanced to my left and saw the runner from the middle school across town pass me effortlessly. More determined than ever I pushed myself onward to the finishing line. I watched helplessly as she passed the ribbon and flew into her father’s arms with joy. I ran over the line and stomped my feet in aggravation. This was supposed to be my race, I was supposed to win. My mom rushed over to me and embraced me in a huge hug. She let me go and gave me a bottle of water. I drank from it thirstily then looked over at the girl again. I decided that I’d better say congratulations for winning the race. She won and there was nothing I could do about it. I walked over to her and saw for the first time that she was wearing the same shorts as me. She had beach blonde hair and a tanned completion. Her shirt was the same cherry red as the lipstick she was wearing. I guessed she was a year or two older than myself so she was a shoo-in to win the race anyway.
“Hi, congrats on the win. I’m Melissa.” I say to her.
“Thanks, I’m Stevie.” She replies to me.
“Nice shorts by the way.” I say conversationally.
“Thanks again. Same to you.” She replies while smiling. “Where’re you from?”
“I’m from New York. You?”
“Same! Do you wanna hang out some time?”
“Sure, that’d be fun.” I reply a little shocked by the question.
“How about 5 o’clock tomorrow afternoon at McDonalds?”
“Sure, I’ve got nothing on then.” I reply.
“Okay I’ll see you there.” She says as she walks away.
As she walks away I am almost certain that she winks at me before climbing into her dad’s car where he was waiting. I walk over to my mom again and we climb into her pickup truck. The ancient vinyl seats squeak when I slid in covered in sweat. The drive home is long and I stare out the window the entire time. My mom doesn’t say anything to me nor turns on the radio as she knows that I’m a bit upset about not winning the race, but what neither of us realize is that I have a date for tomorrow at five o’clock.
When we pull up into our driveway I glimpse at the digital clock on my wrist – 6:00pm. Meaning that dad’s still asleep; thank god. We slide in the back door to the house that we can barely afford to keep right now with dad out of a job. I dash upstairs and jump into the shower. I throw on my old track bottoms and a California t-shirt to go to bed in. Mom stays downstairs and makes dinner for dad and myself. I rush downstairs and sit down at the table. Mom just sets the plate of spaghetti bolognaise in front of me without a word and sits down on the other side of the table facing me.
“Mellissa, I have something important to tell you.” She says her voice wavering.
“Sure mom, shoot.” I reply while sucking in my spaghetti.
“Your father left for a little while. He’ll be back soon but he needs some space.” She tonelessly says.
“Okay.” I reply knowing that he had obviously disappeared without a trace again.
I had unfortunately walked in on my dad and some blonde haired, big breasted, chick and him in the living room. I had just ran out of the house without my dad seeing me so he didn’t know that I knew about his affair. I assumed the right now he was at her house and was unconscious. Whatever the case he wouldn’t be missed. Just to make sure I’d put the chair up against my door if he came back before eight tomorrow – which was very unlikely slurped up the rest of my spaghetti and washed up my dish. I walked through to see my mom still sitting at the table staring straight ahead. I went up to her and hugged her tight.
“I’m going to bed now. Night mom.” I said.
“Night hun.” She replied.
I walked up the stairs and went to bed ready for whatever was to come tomorrow.
---Chapter 2---
I woke up to the sun in my eyes at around noon. I clambered down off my bed and ambled downstairs. I grabbed a cup and poured some orange juice. I couldn’t be bothered to make anything and didn’t want to wake mom up so I popped two pieces of bread into the toaster. The morning passed quickly and before I knew it the grandfather clock in the hall rang for four o’clock. I pulled out some jeans and a t-shirt and put on deodorant. Makeup was never really my scene but I wanted to look nice today. I slapped on some foundation and concealer and put on a little lip-gloss. I picked up my bag that was lying on my bed and rushed out the door. The 008 bus to town was at the bus stop already when I came around the bend. After the quick bus ride to town I walked to the mall where the McDonalds was. It was bustling with people and it took a few seconds to find Stevie. She was sitting in the far corner with her back to the wall in her own table. She had her mobile phone out and she was texting I supposed.
“Hey Stevie!” I shouted over the crowd.
“Hey Mellissa! How are you?” She replied as I took the seat opposite her.
“I’m fine. And you?”
“Great. Do you want to eat here or go to my house or your house or just crawl the mall?” She asked.
“Umm, my house is a mess right now because my mom is reorganizing so can we go to yours?”
“Sure. It’s just a quick five minute walk from here. Do you want to go to the park first through?” She replied as she got up and picked up the can of coke that was sitting on the table.
“That’s fine.”
We left the busy McDonalds behind us and walked down the baking streets towards the town park. The playground was filled with toddlers playing on the swings and slides and the field was filled with teens playing soccer. We carried on between the playground and field to the edge of the park. There was a tiny clearing with a bench and table surrounded by trees. The light was dimming and sooner or later it would start to get dark. After I sat down on the bench Stevie sat down alongside me. She started talking about the trends at her school and how the boys were so immature and she moved the topic to true love.
“Have you ever been in love?” I asked her to keep the conversation alive.
“Yeah. Do you believe in love at first sight?” She replied.
“I guess; it depends. You?”
“Yeah, it was love at first sight when I saw you.” She replied and she bent down toward me and kissed me passionately on the lips.
She kept kissing me and her hands gripped mine. It was strange for me as I had always thought of myself as straight but this was a new experience for me and I found that I actually liked it. It wasn’t like kissing a guy because she just held my hand and guys usually brought their hands up and fondled my breasts. We kept kissing till the sun went down and we were forced to go home.
That is the first time I realized that I was bisexual and not straight as I had always thought I was. It was a new experience and I have never looked at girl or guy the same since. Stevie and I, unfortunately, broke up after she moved away to China with her parents.
---Chapter 3---
Back to present day – I am currently sixteen and a sophomore in high school. I’ve kissed many more girls and guys since when I was fourteen. I was leading a happy life inside the closet with only my former girlfriends knowing that I am bisexual (all of which had moved away before I came out). Not even my best friend knew – and hell was to pay for it. How did my now ex-best friend find out? Well, it all started when one of my former girlfriends, who didn’t know that my Tina didn’t know that I was bisexual, emailed her asking her to pass on a message to me since I didn’t have internet. Tina emailed back asking who it was and the ex-girlfriend told her that she was my ex-girlfriend. Tina was furious that I hadn’t told her and sent a blast text declaring that I was bisexual to everyone and in doing so she completely ruined my social and academic life. The first day back to school after the long weekend was the first time I found out about the leak.
---Chapter 4---
“Hey Mellissa, changed teams without us knowin’ did you?” Taunted yet another classmate.
This time it was Henry Burk – the class clown. Everyone laughed at his joke but stopped abruptly when Mrs. Kith, the sophomore English teacher, walked in. It was the same routine in every class I’ve been to since this morning when a blast text was sent by Tina to everyone in the school telling them that I was bi. No one seemed to understand except Sarah Medline, the only other bi person in the entire school. At lunch I sat by myself at an empty table in the corner and she came and sat by me. We became lab partners during science and have stuck together overall. I don’t know what I would do without her during this time.
People continuously taunted, teased, and bullied me right up till just after Christmas break when I decided that enough was enough. I was in severe depression and couldn’t and wouldn’t sleep, eat, drink, or talk. So one night I walked to the school myself.
The warm evening air warmed my bare shoulders as I walked to the school carrying a bag with a scarf, an arm’s length of rope, a notebook, and a pencil. I was wearing my favorite white tank top and blue jeans. When I reached the school gates I merely pushed them aside and entered the school grounds. It was 5 am and I planned to hang myself from the gym roof. The P.E. teacher doesn’t come in till 8:10 am given that she doesn’t have classes till 8:30 am and no one goes into the gym in the mornings until 8:10 when everyone will see me – See me hanging dead from the gym beams. No more idiots teasing me, no more prissy girls taunting me, no more nothing. I’d be free.
I walked into the cool gym and grabbed the pencil and notebook out of my bag. I wrote the note telling everyone why I had done it. Telling everyone how much I hated it. Enough to take my own life. As I wrote the note tears streamed down my cheeks. I took the scarf and bound the note to my ankle. I ascended the thick climbing rope with the other rope in hand. When I reached the top of the rope I heard the gym door clank and my mother and the principal walked in.
“Mellissa, come down. Please come down.” My mother said in a shaky voice.
“O-okay.” I replied while my eyes filled with tears.
I shimmied down the rope to the gym floor. My mother wrapped me in an embrace that made me think about how much she would miss me if I had hung myself, how alone Sarah would be, how vulnerable my mother was to dad, and how much I’d miss both of them.
To put it in short I started going to a councilor daily, my mom divorced dad, we moved to California, my mom got a job as a secretary, and everything turned out okay. At my new school I was accepted and I became great friends with a girl called Silvia Spektor and started dating a girl named Lisa Callas. A very cheesy ending to my life, so far, that would have ended if my mom hadn’t gotten up because of the next-door neighbor’s dog barking and noticed I wasn’t there. She’d looked everywhere and decided to call up the principal and see if I was at the school. Let’s just say I gave the dog, Olivia, a big bone for saving my life from me.