David Levithan

It's up to you, not fate.

Maybe fate's arithmetic is so diffuse that it's not arithmetic at all.

I'll see you soon. I promise.__nd there is, that moment, a shock of recognition. Elijah doesn't even know yet what he is recognizing. There is only the shock. The sense. That feeling of something happening that was meant to happen. Two people fitting in a space and time.For a moment.

How did my world get so small?

...because if you can make yourself happy in the rain then you're doing pretty alright in life.

What are your interests?""Your son in my room," I said."Excuse me?""The sun and the moon," I said. "Astronomy.

We could call you an ambisexual. A duosexual. A____o I really have to find a word for it?_ Kyle interrupts. __an__ it just be what it is?___f course,_ I say, even though in the bigger world I__ not so sure. The world loves stupid labels. I wish we got to choose our own.We pause for a moment. I wonder if that__ all__f he just needed to say the truth and have it heard. But then Kyle looks at me with unsure eyes and says, __ou see, I don__ know who I__ supposed to be.___obody does,_ I assure him.

I wake up feverish, sore, uncomfortable.Is it sickness or is it heartbreak?I can't tell.The thermometer says I'm normal, but I'm clearly not.

As soon as Neil is out of the shower, he texts Peter. You up? he asks.And the reply comes instantly:For anything.

Love, he thinks, is a lie that people tell each other in order to make the world bearable. He is not up for the lie anymore. And nobody is going to lie to him like that, anyway. He's not even worth a lie.

We are young and the night is young. We are in the middle of somewhere and we are feeling everything.

I'm sorry," he says. "I don't usually like people. So when I do, part of me is really amused and the other part refuses to believe it's happening.

Love doesn__ have to be on Valentine__ Day. It doesn__ have to be by the time you turn eighteen or thirty-three or fifty-nine. It doesn__ have to conform to whatever is usual. It doesn__ have to be kismet at once, or rhapsody by the third day.It just has to be. In time. In place. In spirt.It just has to be.

No. I don't. You don't always have to be who they want you to be, you know.

In my experience, desire is desire, love is love. I have never fallen in love for a gender. I have fallen for individuals. I know this is hard for people to do, but I don__ understand why it__ so hard, when it__ so obvious.

It was so much easier when I didn't want anything. Not getting what you want can make you cruel.

I am constantly torn between killing myself and killing everyone around me.

It's true, look at Erik Johnson on the dance floor. Seriously-look at him. Six feet tall, one hundred eighty pounds, all of which can be converted by the right clothes and the right song into a mass of headless joy. (the right hair helps, too). He treats his body like it's made of fireworks, each one timed to the beat. Is he dancing alone or dancing with everyone? here is the secret: it doesn't matter. he travelled for two hours to get to the city, and when it's all over, it will take him over two hours to get home. But it's worth it. Freedom isn't just about voting and marrying and kissing on the street, although all of these things are important. Freedom is also about what you will allow yourself to do.