My closet never felt like one. It stood gathering dust for years before I even noticed it was there. The hinges creaked when it swung open, revealing an antiquated French oak interior—nice and neat, compartmentalised, just how I like it. Initially, it felt confining, sitting there, but I wore down the left corner until it was perfectly me-sized. And then one day, the door was just... gone? Friends and family walked past, nobody stopping to greet me. Odd, I thought at first. But it had taken me years to see the closet in my own room; they would never notice unless I pointed it out. Chameleons, my closet and I.
I grew comfortable both inside and outside that space, relishing the ability to hop about at will. The urge to come out raising hell never presented itself, but my friends knew, my brother knew, and my parents would, too, when I brought home someone other than a man.
This summer, my best friend stayed over for the weekend. After he left, my father said, "He doesn't really act gay, does he?"
Nausea washed over me, a decision was made. I love my father, I do, but to deny him knowledge of a part of myself felt like a necessary cruelty, a poetic justice. And how I grappled with the notion that coming out meant admitting the door had never truly vanished.
YOU ARE READING
Blood Orange Periphery
PoetryMy suicide had been two years in the making when I decided not to follow through at the last minute. Over the past decade, I've written poems, books, short stories, fanfiction and hundreds of thousands of words, but nothing felt complete. This coll...
