Label Me Gay

Introduction

Seventeen. It is my 17th birthday today and even my parents don't want to come to my party. No one does, really, except my one girl friend, Leslie. Notice the space between girl and friend. She's my friend that's a girl, and she's gay, but I'm straight, and she's my girl friend. Now, if there wasn't a space in between those two words, it'd be shown as: girlfriend, which implies that this girl is more than a friend, and that I see her as more than a friend - but I don't, so please take into deep consideration that there is a significant space in between those two very important words, which can both easily determine my relationship status and my sexuality; not to mention my popularity status at school. Anyways, let me start over, I think we got off on a bad start.

Hi, my name's Ashley, it's my 17th birthday today, and I'm straight. I have a good friend coming over today for my birthday, but she is nothing more than a friend, let me clarify again that if you didn't get the memo earlier. Camera on me please. Pause. This is me, I have long blonde hair, green eyes, some freckles, average height, average weight, and average shoe size. Continue on... pause. Leslie's here.

Continue. Open the door - pause! This is Leslie. Short, wavy brown hair. Seventeen years old, below average weight, above average height, no freckles, clear skin, blue eyes, and a lesbian with big boobs. Not that I notice - I'm straight, remember? Continue. "He-" pause! I didn't know Tyler was going to show up. Focus in on Tyler please... alright, thanks. This is Tyler, a wanna-be jock, but in reality; a nerd. Dirty blonde hair, average weight, above average height, and overwhelmingly good GPA- although no one besides me and Leslie know this, because he doesn't want to be labeled as a nerd (you know, like how I labeled him five seconds ago?) Actually, he even acts dumb sometimes so that people don't find out. Continue.

"Hey!" Leslie said, stepping forward and embracing me in a hug and stepping back before I even had the chance to wrap my arms around her. "I brought Tyler, I hope you don't mind." I didn't. "Hey, Tyler!" I said, smiling and giving him a hug before letting them inside. "Parents home?" Tyler asked, raising a brow at me once we'd gone into the living room and spread out on the couches, staring blankly at each other. "Nope, why?" Silence, then after a few moments of thinking, "we should throw a party," he grinned at me, then turned to Leslie then looked back at me. "Yeah, and invite who?" I laughed, mimicking him and raising an expectant brow.

More silence. Exactly. There you go, that's what sums up my life.

Pause. You know when someone asks you a question and you don't understand what they said, so you ask them to repeat their question and once they do, you still don't understand? You don't want to ask what they said a third time, because that's embarrassing, so you just smile and nod and say, "yeah!" Maybe you even laugh a little and agree to whatever they said, and you just silently pray they don't figure out that you have no idea what the hell they just said? Yeah, that's pretty much how I feel about life twenty-four/seven. If that makes sense. If it doesn't, just nod your head, laugh, and agree with me.

Anyways, you know how in school, especially high school, everyone is "labeled"? You know - "over there you have the football players, the jocks. They sleep around with the preps, which are the cheerleaders, mainly. Then you have the nerds... they don't sleep with anyone, same with the loners. You have the three G's, the goths, the gays, and the gangsters. You have the ISWPME, the 'I sleep with pretty much everyone' group, and you always have those IEOPOLTIAF, the 'I eat one piece of lettuce then I am full' girls, also the IAUHOD, the 'I am usually high or drunk' group... they never know what's going on. Honestly, even if they were sober I still don't think they would still know what's going on. Lastly, you have us. Me, Tyler, and Leslie. The IDKWGIAISIAPLAAL - that ones kind of long. The 'I don't know what group I am in so I am probably labeled as a loner' group.

Well me and Tyler are in that group, at least. Leslie isn't apart of that group, not anymore. She came out of the closet a few weeks ago, and she's been the talk of the school ever since. Actually, all of the people like her have been. Anyways, she's an easy one to label. Just label her gay.