“Cake boy!” Sean said, laughing hysterically. “That’s your name! Cake boy!”
“Cake boy the queer!” Robbie laughed again. “Cake boy! Cake boy!”
Finally, my legs worked again. I lunged forward, snatching my bag, and then sprinted between the guys and back down the hallway, abandoning the notebooks that were strewn across the floor. Globs of cake fell as I clutched my bag to my chest, fighting off tears. Fighting off the fear that this would be the end of it and that I wouldn’t have a fresh start or new friends.
I’d just becake boy the queer.
And that, unfortunately, is exactly what happened. It didn’t matter if I came out of the closet or not. Everyone just called me cake boy. They called me cake boy when they tripped me and when they stole my school clothes while I was in gym class, and they chanted it when they threw cake at me during lunch.
You’d be surprised how often people brought cake to lunch.
And more often than not, Rip was right there, glaring at me, too. He didn’t join in the fun very often, usually just staring silently in the background, but when he did, it always felt especially painful. Especially humiliating.
He was the one who named me, after all.
He was the guy who caught my eye and revealed my secret before I had a chance to claim it on my own and show the school I wasn’t ashamed.
By second semester, the bullying got to be too much, and I dropped out and managed to transfer to an arts high school. Slowly, I recovered. I started talking to people again, and I came out of the closet in a friendly environment. By the time I graduated, I even had some geeky friends of my own. But a part of me never really got over the pain of being cake boy and of feeling so totally alone in North Seattle High.
The butt of everyone’s jokes, the loser who ate alone in a locked bathroom stall.
Which brings me to October first, 2019. Ten years exactly after that nightmare started.
The day I decided things had to change for good and the past had to stay permanently behind me.
“Okay,” my friend Ezra said, drumming his fingers on the countertop. We were in the comic shop where we both worked, enjoying a quiet afternoon. “Let me get this straight. You’ll only consider dating geeks? Or you’ve always had crushes on geeks, but you’ll make exceptions?”
I held my hand straight out, then waved it back and forward. “Somewhere between the two? Strong preference?”
Valeria plucked a comic off the display by the register. “Of course it’s a preference,” she said. “Geeks are the best. But you’ll have a lot more luck snagging a boyfriend if you’re willing to open yourself up a little and consider some guys outside of the box. Stretch your imagination.”
If there was one silver lining to being a total social outcast, it was the geeks. I’d only been an apprentice level nerd when I started at North Seattle High, back when I was just getting started with my love of sci-fi. But it was always the fellow geeks who showed me a little kindness and chatted with me between classes. By the time I transferred to the arts high school, I headed straight to the geeks. That’s where I met Valeria and learned the true value of finding friends you can rely on.
That’s what I had at Northstar. A comic book shop catering to LGBTQ fans in Seattle, it was a pretty special place. More than just a store to get new comics and play strategy games, it was a hub for geeky outcasts and loveable gay loners. People found sanctuary in the walls of our shop, and in that sanctuary, they found friendships, community, and sometimes even love. The welcoming feeling of the comic store was enough to keep Ezra and I working there for years and friends like Valeria coming in just to hang a couple days a week.
After leaving North Seattle High, I hadn’t just gotten comfortable with my sexuality, but with my geeky qualities, too. At twenty-four, I considered myself an out and proud gay geek. I’d happily sport my Northstar T-shirt around town and offer my advice and wisdom to younger LGBTQ geeks who found their way to the shop. I fancied myself a role model, a confident butterfly who emerged from years of awkward cocooning.
I’d done just about everything a proud gay geek could do, in fact, except one very important thing.
“Maybe a geek would be the best match for your first boyfriend,” Ezra mused. “There’s no one safer to lose your virginity to than a sweet, friendly gaymer.”
I shot my hand over Ezra’s mouth to hush him. “Don’t talk about my virginity in the store!” I whispered. “I don’t need every cute guy who comes in to buy the latestHouse of Xhearing my sad story.”
“Mhhhmhhm mhmmhm,” Ezra objected, his breath hot against my hand.
I laughed, pulling my hand back, and he sucked in an exaggerated breath. “I said you should probably avoid the superhero fans anyway. You’re a sci-fi geek, Clark. I’m envisioning some intergalactic love for you.”
Valeria flipped through the comic, expertly angling her long red fingernails to turn the pages. “Maybe,” she muttered. “If we’re just trying to get you laid, someone familiar could be easy. Although I do think tracking down some hot jock would do you good, too. Change it up a little, you know? Give you a confidence boost?”
A customer approached the counter with a stack of old comics, and I happily accepted the distraction. As helpful as my friends were, I knew I had to decide these things on my own. I had to figure out what I wanted—and who—and I had to make it happen for myself.
Otherwise, I might as well still be that awkward, bullied kid, hurrying from one class to the other, always scared of being cornered and harassed. It would be like Rip Cirillo had won after all. And honestly, even if I hadn’t figured out how to date yet, there was one thing I knew for damn sure, and that wasfuck Rip Cirillo.
Wherever he was and whatever he was doing, I hoped he got exactly what was coming to him.
