At seven, I was bullied for being effeminate and gay. A cacophony; every word, whisper, and weakening knock on the closet door would sound like three. Every word, whisper and weakening knock would sound like three. Word, whisper, knock, sound like three.
Two years later, I attempted to absolve myself from reality by diving into literature, devouring nearly every book in my classroom. At home, my father read me Plato’s Allegory of the Cave he calls other people faggots when he’s angry, does he think I’m a faggot and explained it. The reading helped me see the homophobia in my fourth-grade classroom, the same homophobia that conditioned my classmates to hate me and that conditioned me to hate myself, dance in front of me like shadows on the cave walls. [DR1]