I get it. There have been a couple of minor incidents in my time here, like a sophomore who kept calling me Fancy Nancy my freshman year and the kid who wrote “gay” on my junior year election posters. And there was the time the baseball team mocked this one freshman constantly for his lisp, which is like caveman-level trolling. But I mean, please—if prom attendance was determined by who escaped teasing, nobody would get in.

And yes, I know terrible things still happen in other places. (Keyword: other.) But I’m not going to prom anywhere else. If you took a poll right now—gays at prom or not—we’d win by a landslide. Why can’t the school keep up? I’m only a senior once.

“If there is any lesson life will teach you, it should be this …” She pauses dramatically, and I wait for whatever not-profound thing she is about to say. “You don’t always get the outcome you want.”

There’s no point in arguing that, until about ten minutes ago, I pretty much did.

The Chaz Wilson Card

The Chaz Wilson Card

I need to get off campus and as far away from the humiliation of that meeting as I can. Nix sees me bolting and follows me into the parking lot. “What happened?”

A tiny part of me wants to say, “The school isn’t ready for me, much less you,” but instead, I shrug them off and mutter, “Nothing,” because I am not ready to admit defeat. Honestly, I’m not ready to deal with humans period right this minute, so I keep walking out of the lot and away from school. Nix lets me go. I mean, they know my moods—sometimes, I’m best left alone.

I live less than a mile away from school in the Wormwood Apartments (which have to be named for a dead person, because why else would you pick “Wormwood”?). Let me be clear: this does not make me a Townie. A Townie is a local who does not go to ASA, and no one would want to be lumped in with them. ASA is mostly a boarding school and the on-campus kids have always seen Townies as being roughly equivalent to cavepeople. I, however, am simply a “day student,” which means I enjoy the privilege of living off campus and having more freedom than most—best of all worlds, which is just how I like it.