roy g biv

by Jeremy Mauser

IT ALL HAPPENED VIA TEXT—the guessing, the confirming. The silence, the waiting.

He asked me to guess who he had a crush on. The options were limited—he was a high schooler, a fellow member of our local musical theater company, and a guy, which meant there were nine or ten possibilities. In other words, the odds were in my favor. I narrowed it down to three guys, then two, then made my final guess. I asked if it was Enzo, and he said I knew it wasn’t. Then I made my real guess: it was me. Among my sea of green bubbles, his white text, gray bubble, one word confirmed I was right.

At the time, I was already dating someone. She and I were nearly two years into our relationship, but I had tried to break up with her twice, and each time, she guilted me into staying with her, her tears clouding my vision while she coerced me into giving her another chance. I struggled to articulate how miserable I was with her, how my skin grew tight each time an argument sparked, how our break-up was inevitable and several months overdue. She cared more that we were together than how happy we were together.

He gave me the final push. He had dimples, and freckles, and, most importantly, he was into me. After he confessed his crush, I confessed that I was bi. Something I had never told anyone. I told him via text. I also told him via text that I had been planning on dumping her, which meant I wasn’t dumping her for him necessarily, but I would be single soon enough. He understood that as an invitation to try it out. I didn’t correct him.

I broke up with her via text because I was afraid of her rage, which unfurled itself in the least significant of arguments. A rage she had inherited from her stepfather. A rage that granted me an excuse to keep my distance while ending things.

I texted him that it was done. She texted me that she wasn’t okay.

Technically, he and I started to date that night. Except we never went on a date—we attended neighboring high schools, so we only saw each other in the five minutes between his dance class and my acting class at our local musical theater company. He texted me that he loved me, and even though I knew he didn’t, even though I knew I didn’t, I said I loved him, too. Because I was afraid of upsetting our equilibrium too soon. Because I had no idea what I was doing, and I wanted to follow his lead.

The first week, we said hello and goodbye in the same breath. The following week, his class ended after mine began, so I didn’t see him. The next week, I counted down the days until my acting class. Seven, six, five, four, three—on three, he texted me that our relationship wasn’t working out. He couldn’t be with someone who wasn’t ready to come out to the world.

And so I was single. And so was he. And so was she.

Why did he ask me to guess who his crush was instead of asking whether I was into guys? Why did he tell me I was his crush when I was already dating someone? When I was dating a girl? Why did he encourage me to dump her when he had met her multiple times and said he liked her? What did he claim to like about me? Did he feel like the villain as he plotted how to sabotage a two-year-long relationship?

How could she act surprised that I was breaking up with her when I had tried to break up with her twice already? Why did I back down as soon as she started crying and begging each time? Could she not tell I was miserable every moment we spent together? Did she not believe me each time I told her I was miserable?

Why did I break up with her via text? How could I explain that I broke up with her via text because I was afraid she would assault me? Was that the only reason I broke up with her via text? Did I convince myself this was the sole reason at the time, or am I applying this lens retroactively?

Why can’t I remember a single instance of her rage before the break-up? Was I actually afraid she would do something as drastic as assaulting me? Is my memory sparing me from something? Or is it attempting to soothe me with its fragility?

Does it count as cheating if you tell someone you’ll date them as soon as you break up with someone else? Are any of us any better or worse as people because, three years earlier, she told me she had a crush on me, even though she already had a boyfriend? Even though she stayed with that boyfriend for a few more months? Even though she told me at the time it wasn’t natural to only have feelings for one person?

Can I even say that he and I dated if we only saw each other in person once during those three weeks, which came with a quick hug, no kiss? How would our families have reacted if they had found out? How about our friends? Did he even want to date me? Why would he agree to a secret relationship if he didn’t want to keep it secret? What did he think would happen? What did his lips feel like? Would a kiss have kept us glued together?

Why did he tell me that he loved me? Did he seriously think that was true? And why did I say I loved him back, even though I knew I was lying? Were we trying to convince ourselves that the collateral damage was worth it? Why do so many queer relationships, at least on TV, involve two guys hurting a woman to get together?

What did I learn from the experience? When someone asks me how many guys I’ve dated, do I include him? Was it worth it? Did the ends justify the means? What is the end?

When he asked me to guess his crush, I hoped it wouldn’t be me. At least, that’s what I tell myself now. I also tell myself that I was skeptical of him from the beginning. From the beginning, I knew things would end poorly. I knew things with him would end.

I’m lying when I think that maybe, if it weren’t for him, she and I would still be together. We would’ve gone for more walks around Lynch Field, lost our virginities, built our lives around one another. Maybe we’d be engaged right now. Maybe we’d be married, and I wouldn’t be in Alabama, and she wouldn’t still be in Pennsylvania.

I’m absolutely positive that my subconscious didn’t invent her untamed anger as an excuse for breaking up with her via text. I’m absolutely positive it had nothing to do with me being a coward. I’m absolutely positive it was my idea to break up via text, and he had nothing to do with it. I’m absolutely positive. I’m positive. It’s absolute.

The secrecy haunted me. Hiding my phone underneath the table whenever he texted, telling my friends I was grateful to be single for the first time in two years—it didn’t invigorate me in any way. I was bored of it from the beginning.

I knew we’d only last three weeks. I saw all the warning signs. I knew exactly what I was doing. That’s what I tell myself.

I loved him. He loved me. I didn’t love her anymore. She didn’t love me anymore.

When I broke up with her, I cried. When he broke up with me, I cried.

I was straight. I thought I was straight. I knew I was bi. I was absolutely positive I wasn’t gay. I remember every emotion that pulsed across my body during those three weeks. By the end of our relationship, I knew my sexuality. And I was comfortable with it.

I’m lying when I say I was happy at the time. Before the first break-up, after the second one, in between—I was so happy it hurt. I was so hurt it made me happy.

I regret everything. At least, that’s what I tell myself. But I don’t. And I never did.

Despite these regrets, despite my lies, when I stop lying—to others, to myself—I look back on these days with some fondness. Yes, beneath the lies, I unearth the fondness.

After our breakup, the girl, at first, was sad and angry. Then she was just angry. Angry that I didn’t want to sit at the same lunch table as her anymore, then angry I sat two seats down from her. Then, during class, she started to unzip every pocket on my backpack so that everything would fall out when I picked it up. She watched me out of the corner of her eye, suppressing a smirk as she gauged my reaction, and I refused to indulge her, refused to show anything other than insincere indifference. Then I heard her say to my friend, “Look at how he walks. He’s definitely gay.” She didn’t even know I wasn’t single. When I turned around and asked if she was talking about me, as I refused to mask my resentment any longer, she grew pale. Looked at the floor. Said, “No.” When I started to date another girl several months later, she called her a “rat-faced bitch.”

When the guy and I broke up, we kept our distance for some time. Then we became best friends. I drove him everywhere, and he changed his clothes in front of me more than once. So many people asked if he and I were dating, and it felt strange to tell the uninteresting truth. I wondered whether he’d want to try dating again, but I didn’t want to dismantle our friendship, which grew stronger by the day, with another doomed attempt at romance. I didn’t want to risk him demanding that I come out on his terms.

A glimpse into a future that could’ve been.

A few months later, he said we couldn’t be friends anymore because I refused to go vegan. He really meant it. He ended other friendships over the same issue, but apologized and resumed every friendship other than ours. The last time I saw him was at his graduation party, which I attended one year after he attended mine, where he and I exchanged two hugs. We haven’t texted since.

The girl and I have talked a few times since we graduated. Nearly two years after we broke up, she rekindled a relationship with the guy whom she had dumped to be with me all those years ago, and, at last, she and I became friends again. We texted about our AP English class. We’ve texted each other happy birthday and Merry Christmas. When she sees my brother in our hometown, she talks to him like they’re in-laws. Each time she posts on Instagram, I hope it’s an engagement announcement.

Now, I’ve been dating a different girl for more than three years, and I don’t see that changing. I have dated one other guy—another secret relationship—but now I’m out to most people. Not to most family members, though. Not to most people in my hometown. Now, I realize that I needed that meaningless three-week relationship. I needed to leave the girl, and I needed to tell someone I was queer, because otherwise, I wouldn’t have told a second person I was queer.

They each drew me in with their blue eyes. The girl first, then the guy. She wore an indigo shirt the day we broke up, the last outfit she would put on as my girlfriend.

He and I were green in more ways than one when he told me he loved me. I thought we were jumping into the deep end without learning to swim, but really, our feet touched the middle of the pool, and we walked around aimlessly as ultraviolet rays battered us with reality.

She and I needed to break up. After all, I grew yellow at the thought of seeing her. While she made me red with anger, he made me red with affection. There was no decision to make.

The one time he and I saw each other while we were dating, he was wearing an orange shirt, and our hug lasted maybe two seconds, but it felt even shorter. How fleeting our time together. How fleeting our desire for one another.

After I dumped her, and he dumped me, every color of the rainbow rushed through my veins. I shed not a single tear for either of them. At least, I don’t think I did. And, for the first time in years, I felt free to lust again. Free to lust after a girl who was ready to grow with me. Free to lust after a guy who wanted me. Free to lust after happiness of any color, any shape, any gender.

About the author:

Jeremy Mauser (he/him) is pursuing an MFA in Creative Writing at the University of Alabama. His prose and poetry can be found, or is forthcoming, in I Have That on Vinyl, Cloudscent Journal, Prairie Margins, Catfish Creek, and New College Review, among other publications. He is an Assistant Fiction Editor at the Black Warrior Review, a self-proclaimed amateur stand-up comic, and an Oscars trivia expert who can be found on Instagram and Bluesky.