What Love Looks Like

I have these friends.

These friends I made for myself, on my own, after.

I met them because we are theatre kids.

One is a middle-class Southern straight white girl. She is a born leader, able to get things done with determination. She started up a theatre program so that us misfits could find each other. She is capable of many things, and I think she'll do whatever she wants. But deep down she's insecure about her weight, her looks, and her self. Her mother is verbally abusive and so she has learned to hide her emotions, even from herself. I call her Vulcan.

One is from a poor Southern pastor's family. He's gay. He is sassy. He loves parties, musicals, and Liza Minelli, good food, road trips, and people. He's a warm person, compassionate. He works with children with disabilities. But deep down he's worried that no one will ever love him. He also believes he needs to remain celibate because of his faith. I call him Sweet [name withheld].

One is from a truly "average" American Southern family. He's a 4 on the Kinsey scale [mostly homosexual but with some heterosexual attraction - may identify as pan, bi or queer]. He has a beautiful voice. He has a sunny disposition, a big smile and blue eyes, and he gets energized by hanging out with his favorite people. He's talented, with a big heart. But his dad has never connected with him emotionally and any story with a father and son makes him cry. I don't have a pet name for him yet. I'm working on it.

And then there's me. A poor white girl from a family with complicated emotional issues. I identify as a genderfluid, panromantic asexual. Two of those are wrong according to spellcheck. And most people don't recognize any of those terms as valid. I keep losing people, which has led to abandonment and trust issues. My parents abandoned me emotionally when my little brother died. I have had to say goodbye to so many people because we moved all the time. And my husband died less than a year ago. I'm not confident in my abilities and I'm not sure that I'm really good at any one thing.

They call me Kate. Or Katheryn Elizabeth (which is not my real name).

But we found each other doing theatre.

I love these people. But I didn't believe they loved me. Why would I?

So I became sad and withered, withholding myself from a relationship with them because of my abandonment and trust issues. I thought they would abandon me. I didn't know if I could trust them.

But I started talking yesterday. I'd been in a spiral for a month and I finally spilled my guts as they took me to work.

They send me the sweetest texts that afternoon and made a plan to meet me later. We went to our favorite place that night and talked honestly about ourselves. And then we went to the house and we cuddled on the couch together. We put on a fire (courtesy of Netflix), went outside for a smoke, and came in for tea and blankets. We scrunched up and just held each other.

We hugged each other goodnight and said "I love you". And they told me to ask for whatever I needed. That they were not going to leave.

I made these friends by myself. We are all broken. We are unique. We accept each other as we are, in all our messes, our faults, our mistakes, and our flounderings as we try to understand each other. We love each other.

I feel like I have finally found the type of friendship I have always been seeking. It's difficult to be honest with each other, it's difficult to navigate life alongside someone who may think quite differently from you - but it is worth it. The quiet moments where we feel safe with each other, the moments where we share ourselves, the moments where we decide to do something crazy...these are the moments I treasure because they mean we are being human, almost maybe the way we were meant to.

Last night was very nearly like the dream I had a few days ago, and it was with the same people.

So I guess sometimes, dreams do come true.

And I don't care if that's cheesy.

My good dreams hardly ever come true. This is worth celebrating.