I grew up in a very Catholic environment, but it wasn’t too crazy. I think my big disadvantage has also been my great advantage. I’d never even touched anyone! I’ve since shared that experience with some of my friends, and we kind of all went through the same thing, maybe not with Freddie Mercury, but with other well-known figures. I mean, I really thought I was going to die of HIV. So to me, the link between being gay and dying of HIV was there from the very beginning. I was in my mid-teens, and he was the first cultural reference of a gay or bisexual male I’d seen. I do remember very distinctly when Freddie Mercury died. But then Spain was one of the first countries in the world to pass gay marriage. It was still very traditional, very Catholic, and very conservative, in the worst possible ways. So I was born into democracy, if you will. I was born in Spain, the same year that the country’s dictator, Francisco Franco, died. I think there was some trauma just because I grew up in a very rural background and never had any reference of what a gay man could look like. I always knew that I was attracted to the same sex. I’m very open professionally, personally, spiritually…you name it. (The first time I said, “I’m gay,” to somebody was to a very close friend when I was 21.) I’m actually very open about it I love talking about sex and sexuality. That doesn’t mean that I haven’t had to share my sexual preferences with the world at certain points. So for me, there’s not a coming-out narrative that I endorse for my own personal life. I’m not saying that that’s not a good narrative. It assumes that you’re hiding somewhere, and then there’s a moment of enlightenment where you realize who you truly are and decide to share it with the world. I’m not a big fan of the coming-out narrative. We hadn’t hung out together at school.“Very traumatizing, but also very liberating” I could get hurt, and badly! Jeremy and I didn’t really know each other. People didn’t like gays, though, which is why I was scared about coming out. Technically, I was bisexual, but I wanted a boyfriend. I had known I was gay ever since I’d turned twelve. Jeremy was the cutest boy in high school, to me. He must have found a tube of lipstick, I assumed. I got that from a Benny Hill Show episode I had seen a while ago. "I feel like a woman, too, sometimes," I joked.
a girl," I said, noticing the pink lipstick as he puckered for a kiss. "Hey, you," Jeremy said, slapping my shoulder from behind me, "look at my face. ed, standing with the guys near the exit of the boy’s locker room. To find out more about the author, visit Chapter 1
Maxwell Carlsen is an author of gay coming-of-age love stories. How will Robbie find love and have his first gay experience? Fifteen-year-old Robbie has the hots for blue-eyed Jeremy, the handsome boy with cute dimples, whom he doesn’t know very well. High school is almost out for winter break. It was published very recently.Ĭover Photograph Credit: macsim/ Keywords: gay fiction, gay coming of age, gay boys, gay boy fiction, young adult, gay stories, gay story, gay teen fiction