Nikki Yeager

It was stop number three on my ride home, two girls sat across from me fiddling with loose threads, earrings, hands. Whatever was around them. 

The one girl looked at me, I looked away. 

Pretending I wasn't listening, but obviously I was. She continued her story. 

"And then my mom, she said 'Sleep with a boy for all I car. Get pregnant. I don't care what you do just don't tell me you're gay. Just tell me you're not gay!' but I couldn't tell her that." 

She flipped a piece of hair behind her ear and smiled, clearly with the past behind her. Not a trace of pain on her face. 

I continued looking down at my hands, listening intently. Hanging on her every word. 

"The next day I came home I tried to kill myself." 

Her friend's mouth flashed a quick grimace. She half fought it and then gave in, allowing the disdain to exist all over her face. The story teller didn't even take a breathe for emphasis, "But my mom found me. Sent me to a preacher, tried to turn me 'straight'. Told me she'd send me away... whatever..." 

The girl smiled once more, "but we're over that now. How'd your family take it?" 

My stop comes up and I nod at the girls, both twentysomethings in well-fitted button downs and black pencil skirts. I could only hope that some day a parent's love will run much deeper than a child's sexual orientation.

And I spent the rest of the walk home praying that someday it won't matter what sex you are- but rather that you're capable of love. And love, the real kind, that's all that matters.