Chapter Text
“Hey, um… Mitchell? Can I talk to you for a sec?”
Thirteen-year-old Mitchell Conrad looked up to see his fourteen-year-old cousin in the doorway, holding their uncle’s old laptop in both hands. “Aw, crap, you didn’t break it-”
“No! That’s not- heyyy,” Zigmund pouted. “That’s not fair.”
“So, what do you want?” Silently, Zigmund turned the screen to face him. “Q Christian Fellowship”, and a big rainbow logo on the screen. “Huh?”
“There’s some, ah, ‘stuff’ I’ve been thinking about… just don’t tell anyone else, okay?” He didn’t wait for an answer. “It isn’t sodomy if you don’t actually do anything, is it? Just being… like that doesn’t count.”
“Just being like-”
“You… you know, like that.”
“Is this you trying to come out of the closet?” Immediately Zigmund tensed. “It’s okay, it’s okay… Actually, I kinda guessed already.”
“What?! No, but I… It’s fine. Is it just you?
“… Sure?”
“Okay. I can… nobody can know, alright? I don’t want anybody to-”
“What’s with the computer?”
He brightened immediately. “Oh! It’s this site I found, it’s great… it’s… I think it’s okay if I don’t act on it, there are a lot of people saying that…”
“And you… agree with them?”
“Don’t you?” He paused. “Well, I guess there are those ‘Side A’ people, but… I don’t know, seems awful convenient.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“It’s part of the website,” Zigmund whined. “Side A thinks it’s sort of okay to date… other guys and stuff.”
“What about Side B?”
“They know it’s not… It has to stay a secret. It doesn’t have to be a sin.”
“And you’re… okay with that?”
Zigmund glanced up at the ceiling and whatever was above it. “It’s not up to me.”