Hi,
I just finished reading your work, “Picture Perfect,” and I honestly don’t know where to begin—because it felt less like reading a story and more like remembering a life I once lived… and am still living in parts.
Thank you. Truly. Thank you for writing something so real, so raw, and so painfully honest.
Your story did not try to romanticize pain, nor did it soften the truth. It showed life as it is—hard, heavy, heartbreaking, and at times suffocating. It carried the weight of loneliness, confusion, and quiet suffering, yet it never felt empty. Instead, it felt full—full of truth, of emotion, of humanity. You didn’t just write characters. You wrote existence. You wrote what it feels like to wake up every day carrying parts of yourself that the world tells you should not exist.
While “Picture Perfect” may not directly tell the exact, specific experiences of every LGBTQIA+ individual, it still speaks our truth in the deepest way possible. Because the struggle is universal. The fear is universal. The pain of hiding, denying, and pretending is universal. Being gay, being part of the community, is not easy. It is not a simple journey of self-discovery—it is a war with yourself, with society, with the people you love, and sometimes even with God.
There are days when it crushes you. Days when it pulls you so far down that breathing feels like a chore. And when you’re too tired, too broken, or too scared to fight anymore, you lie—not to the world, but to yourself. You convince yourself that denial is safer than truth, that silence is easier than honesty. And that—realizing too late, accepting too slowly—is one of the most painful things a person can go through.
