Here for It Or, How to Save Your Soul in America; Essays - R. Eric Thomas Page 0,30

that spoke to me. What, I wondered, was my East? And what waited beyond the horizon?

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During freshman orientation week, I had to attend an interactive assembly run by a team of trained facilitators that was meant to introduce different ideas around diversity and sensitivity. The word on the street was that it was just a bunch of people talking about not saying racial slurs and that one of the facilitators was gay. Even though this was New York City in the late nineties, the presence of a gay person at this event was still remarkable enough to comment on.

This diversity assembly therefore seemed like an entertaining affair all-around and it was mandatory, so I went. Their presentation was fine; I learned all the racial slurs I shouldn’t say. (I’m kidding. There’s too many for one workshop.) Afterward, they had a Q&A. One student, a black kid, asked a question about language used to talk about LGBTQ people. The (gay!) facilitator responded, “Good question! Clap it up for this guy! Okay, one of the things that gay people prefer—actually, are you gay?” The black kid paused and then replied yes, he was. The answer went on. We were all enlightened. But, we later learned, this was the first time that the black kid had been asked that question, and having to answer it in that way, on the first day of college, had been devastating. A year later, they were still talking about the incident in the Student Affairs Office, where I’d gotten a work-study job. They used it as an object lesson, warning us to be vigilant in all things sensitivity.

But they didn’t have to tell me twice. I never forgot the way that kid had tensed and twisted ever so slightly. I never forgot the clear feeling that the room was not safe in a way that was very specific and which perhaps we both understood. I never forgot how I’d craned my neck to see his face, because I wanted to know if I’d recognize what I saw. Even though I’d never verbalized it, I knew instantly that being asked “Are you gay?” was the worst possible thing that could happen. I marveled that he hadn’t spontaneously combusted. I decided on the first day that college would be a place of miracles and also of terror. I willed myself not to react as it was happening, for fear they’d poll the room for homosexuals, both known and oblivious. Although I wouldn’t allow myself to put a name to it at the time, the fact that I felt a visceral kinship with this kid should have been all the proof I needed. Either that or the fact that I looked at his face and its deep dark skin and thought, He is the most beautiful boy in the world and yet he looks so sad. I would like to kiss his eyelids. I do not know why I wanted to kiss his eyelids; I didn’t know how kissing worked. I didn’t know how anything worked.

And so, to learn, I decided to do some research. During my first year, I’d clocked that there was a Queer Student Alliance on campus and also a confidential meeting called the Coming Out Group, for queer and questioning students. The Queer Student Alliance seemed too revealing an endeavor for me to even acknowledge, so I set my sights on the Coming Out Group. As I understood from reading a thirty-word description in the activities book and asking exactly zero questions of anyone, it was a casual discussion group where member identities were held in confidence to allow students the space to process their sexuality. Obviously, this was a great space for me, so naturally I distrusted it.

First of all, I kept misremembering it as a secret group. Discreet and secret are not the same thing, apparently. And because I was constantly mischaracterizing the group as akin to some sort of spy organization and not just a support group, I had some major doubts about this so-called secrecy. Like, they advertised the time and location. Any idiot could just stand in the bushes and watch people going in and know they were gay. Which is what I did. I am nothing if not any idiot.

That semester, every Tuesday around 7 P.M. I would wander over to the chapel where the meetings were held, sometimes with a cappuccino or a candy bar in hand—good stakeout food—and I would situate myself in the