Michael

If you're expecting graphic details about my first night with Michael and all the banging on the wall from Mrs. P, you won't get them here. I'm saving those details for the book. I haven't written it yet, but we all know it's coming.

I'll just say Michael and I fell head over heels. He took me to Johnny Angel's for my first Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas Eve and New Year's Eve. Holidays were always like homecoming because everyone home for the holidays needed to get out and decompress after a stressful day with the family.

Coming out is hard. My world turned upside down. Dizzying highs and gut-wrenching lows came in rapid succession. Trying to keep one leg firmly planted on boats going in different directions was ripping me apart and keeping me from moving forward.

The emotional hurricane was driven by opposing forces. Now in full panic mode, Mom pulled out all the stops to divert me from the path I was on. We fought to the point of tears weekly, if not daily for many, many months.

My new gay friends were an island of support in an otherwise stormy sea. They understood what I was going through and stood by me. Because he liked to feel needed almost as much as he liked to hear himself talk, Jeff was particularly helpful.

Sweet, beautiful Michael was sensitive, compassionate and extremely patient. My hurricane was his hurricane, too. He never complained and was always there.

An attack of appendicitis in January landed me back at Saint Joseph Hospital. I'd quit a few months earlier to work full-time at McAlpin's. After surgery I went to my parent's house to recuperate.

Michael came to see me every day. I can only imagine the looks he got from my family in that big fur coat of his. Aside from the coat, he looked butch enough. But once he opened his mouth the gig was up.

I needed to talk to someone. Mom suggested a priest. My friends told me to do it just to shut her up. The priest told me it was OK to be gay as long as I never acted on it.

So I didn't. Michael often spent the night on the sofa so we could still spend time together. No matter how much I begged and pleaded, he held me to my word.

I couldn't do it. Being gay was just too hard. When I told Michael about my decision, we cried together.

And then he left...