I Can't Date Jesus Read online

  Eight years later, I finally got to bow before the presence of greatness. It took a minute to get in. The fire marshall was being spiteful by putting our safety first and not allowing more people in. J. Cole was standing outside with the rest of us until he went around to another entrance for famous people who didn’t care about the fire code. Eventually, we made our way inside. It was packed as hell, and as we were making our way through the crowd to find the free alcohol these rich people were providing, I heard Candy shout, “Michael, Beyoncé is coming this way!” I turned into the fastest sprinter on the planet and bypassed the lessers to make my way to glory. While rushing, I spotted Ryan Phillippe, who under any other circumstances would have warranted my full attention. But I had to walk on by his fine ass because I was on a mission.

  Candy pointed in the direction of Beyoncé, and I rushed that way.

  As soon as I spotted her, I did what any reasonable person would do: I started bowing. I couldn’t do a complete drop because there were too many people. But I did the best I could to pay homage. I think she appreciated it. So, I tapped her and said, “I’m from Houston.” Then she looked at me and smiled. “You from Houston?” I went, “Yeah and actually my brother went to Johnston with Solange. Same year.” She touched me after and was like, “That’s cool.” She was not being fake about it either. Her smile and the way she raised her voice in response were genuine.

  Then she smiled at me and touched my shoulder. Now, when Oprah had spoken at my college graduation, I had felt my credit score rising, but this was much more spiritual than that. I immediately felt like I was a better man. I asked for a hug, and she hugged me. She was leaving the party, so after the embrace, she floated away, and Candy just kept repeating “Oh, my God!”

  I should note that Jay-Z was standing behind Beyoncé the whole time. As much as I love Jay-Z, I am a gay Black man from Houston, Texas, so my focus was on her, not him.

  Hours after it happened, a friend of mine asked, “Did you act like a stan or did you act like a normal person?” What a ridiculous question. Of course I acted like a stan. If you don’t act like a stan when you meet Beyoncé, something is wrong with you. I wasn’t about to play it cool like she was the Pope or something. No, no, no, parts one and two.

  By the way, the person who asked this was a Beytheist. A Beytheist is someone who denies the splendor of Beyoncé. I don’t get people like that. I feel like they have a disability that’s somehow contagious, which is why I’ve developed a rule to stop dating men who dislike Beyoncé. I have tried to respect other people’s religious beliefs, but sometimes the biases you develop are well-earned. I’ve learned my lesson when it comes to Beytheists: they’re garbage human beings who don’t deserve to be around someone like me, a person with much better taste in music, a wiser embrace of excellence, and a champion of a Black woman who never let a beat bet her out. Can I get an uh oh, uh oh, uh oh, oh no no?

  I wish I could have talked to Beyoncé longer, though. I wish I could have told her what an impact she’s had on my life. How she motivates me with her work ethic. How her music brings the kind of joy that I can barely put into words. And, yes, how her femininity made me comfortable with the parts of me that read as feminine. And how I find that to be a source of strength, maybe even more than the other side, because masculinity is never put down the way femininity can be. It shouldn’t have taken me so long to accept that side. The strongest people I know are my mother, my sister, and other women I’ve been fortunate enough to befriend along the way. So many women provided insight into my sexuality in my formative years, but even in my appreciation for them as complex, strong, phenomenal women, I made the mistake of not seeing their femininity as so vital an influence on me. Beyoncé was the one who helped me understand this, and in the end, she gave me the confidence to fully accept all parts of myself. These days, I like to describe myself as someone sitting at the intersection of Beyoncé and Bun B. She’ll know what I mean. She’s from Houston.

  It’s probably too late to become besties. If it’s not, let the record show that I would happily sign whatever NDA is required to be around her. The same goes for human sacrifices.

  I would like to think I will cross paths with her again. Ideally, it would be at Pappadeaux’s at 610, the one closest to me and the one she used to always go to. We would sit over a lot of fried alligator and so many Swamp Things and I would tell her everything. And I would thank her, because if not for her and the other women I’ve admired over time, I wouldn’t be this man I enjoy being now. I feel like she’d get that.

  And if that never happens, I will continue to say thanks as I always do: by giving her whatever dollar amount she requires of me for great seats at her concerts—where I dance proudly, without fear or worry.

  The Marrying Kind

  If it were to ever happen, I have long had a working idea of how it would all go. After months of working out with an annoying but highly effective trainer I found on Instagram who I thought was sexy but turned out to be straight (I will try to respect his lifestyle choices), I will have achieved my goal in creating the sort of body I’ve always dreamed of having. I don’t necessarily mean perfect IG thot physique, but I will no longer have the love handles with which I developed a codependent relationship back in my chubbier years. As a result of those lofty goals being met, he will find me standing in front of the mirror freakishly observing myself in a ridiculously expensive suit that I hopefully didn’t pay for minutes before the ceremony is to begin. It fits perfectly. Yes, I am being self-involved, but in light of the event at hand, I’m well within my rights to stunt on you hoes. The selfies will soon commence, only to be interrupted by various friends joining together to screech, “Bitch, get over yourself. We need to start.”

  After their reality check is cashed, we all make our way to the ultrafancy room that I can now afford in my post-private-student-loan-debt world. We will not be at a church. God will be with us in spirit because God is omnipotent, but this won’t go down at God’s house. Maybe we’ll be at the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston. Perhaps we will be at a garden—albeit a garden located somewhere in the country where it won’t be unbearably hot or too damn cold. Extremes only work for me if I am ordering Popeyes following a long night of drinking or a good ole time with some weed.

  Before I make my way down the aisle, there will be a shot waiting for me at the door, as my nerves will be bad. Plus, why not have one? It’s a party, after all. Someone will then quickly cue the DJ, and my march, which is more like a subtle strut, will begin. The song blaring from the speakers is Beyoncé’s “Get Me Bodied.” My march that’s more like a strut soon shifts to a jig. I’m dancing all up and down the aisle, and not long after the wedding attendees rise from their seats at the appropriate time—the call-and-response portion of the extended mix, obviously—proceed to drop down low and sweep the flo’ with it. Preferably, Beyoncé is there in person. Like, we should be besties by then. If not, she will at least be there in spirit because I carry her with me wherever I go. Duh.

  I’m not doing that gendered nonsense where one groom does the bride part and the other groom is the manly man. The other groom will get his moment down the aisle too. Just my luck he’ll pick some song I hate like “Thong Song” or “One Sweet Day,” but since I love him, whatever. Have your moment, dude.

  (I’m totally kidding.)

  (I would never marry anyone who still listens to “Thong Song.” At best, he can get away with SisQó’s “Got to Get It.”)

  The reception will be catered by the No Limit gold-selling female rapper and legend Mia X, who has since started cooking. She will do double duty with a performance of “Party Don’t Stop.” My husband and I will fill in for Foxy Brown and Master P. (Master P will probably charge too much, and while I adore Fox Boogie, she is an insurance risk. She once performed at a New York Black Pride event and fell off the stage. I don’t have the time to worry about rap royalty tripping over their 37,000-inch weave on my watch.) The reception will be an all-night pa
rty. I’m not cheap, so the bar will be open, though I might require that the alcohol be served in either a champagne flute or a red Solo cup. The combination is me in a nutshell: country as hell, but into nice things when I can afford them. For those who require an emotional roller coaster at a wedding, I’ll definitely include cry-inducing songs. Once all that wraps, we’ll go to whatever island that won’t be in some ferocious hurricane’s path that summer. Scratch that: we’re going somewhere inland with a pool. He’ll deal. I can’t swim anyway.

  The only other wedding option I have since thought of goes like this: I wake up early one Sunday morning, bop my man on the head in bed, and say, “Yo, we really need to get this arrangement on paper. What if my clumsy ass falls down somewhere, breaks a leg, and finds out I have some kind of rare disease and your ass can’t see me in the hospital?” And then we run down to the courthouse or whatever. Maybe get some Chick-fil-A afterward for irony’s sake. That’s equally romantic . . . and cheaper.

  —

  Most of the conversations that I have about marriage are with straight people. And whenever the subject of marriage comes up with the straights, I am either going along with the conversation for the sake of not playing spoiler or assuring my friends that no matter what article is floating across social media, there is still hope that they will get married and put some buns that oven. In truth, though, as optimistic as I can be for others about the subject, I have long maintained ambivalence toward the institution of marriage. For most of my life, I did not have to tackle those mixed feelings. I could put them on the sidelines and let them fester, because it was not as if the freedom to marry a man was a nationwide right. Little by little did that start to change, depending on the state, and as the marriage-equality wave spread, I eventually had a seat directly in front of the possibilities.

  In 2014, I attended a gay wedding. Derrence, whom I knew from high school, was marrying Nick Denton, whom I didn’t know personally but who I certainly recognized as the founder of Gawker. Their wedding was at the American Museum of Natural History in New York. It was both the first time I saw two dudes tie the knot and the first time I had seen more than two people from high school outside of Houston—the latter of which was the more surprising aspect of the day. It was also my first fancy wedding, as evidenced by the fact that it was covered by the New York Times. If you want to feel poor, attend a One Percent wedding.

  Like me, Derrence had a strong affinity for Queen Bey, which was why I heard a pianist play the instrumental of “Dangerously in Love” so much throughout the ceremony. I came with dré. It was a black-tie affair, so I had ended up buying a tuxedo, assuming that if I worked in media and lived in New York City, I’d presumably be required to wear one every so often. The wedding and the reception were a nicely blended mix of the grooms’ two very different backgrounds. Every table at the reception was a mixed crowd of both their respective families and friends. I enjoyed watching rich white people marvel at the crawfish étouffée in front of them. To be fair to the northerners who prepared the meal, it was pretty solid. Lord knows folks up north don’t know a thing about Slap Ya Mama seasoning.

  While I was ecstatic for Derrence and happy to reconnect with old classmates and friends, at no point did I stop that evening and think, “This could be me.” This was Derrence and Nick’s moment. I was just happy to see them happy, but not thinking that type of happiness was something I could have or even want.

  However, the question would soon command larger scrutiny, as nearly a year after I attended that big, great gay wedding, on June 26, 2015, the Supreme Court made same-sex marriage legal nationwide. I’ve donated money to causes supporting marriage equality initiatives in various states and to nationwide efforts. I’ve written about marriage equality as part of my work as a political commentator. I’ve argued with various simpletons who struggle to understand that the religious fables they were told about marriage don’t quite match up to the actual history of it. That Adam and Eve don’t have a damn thing to do with marriage, and that “holy matrimony” began as a means to establish property rights. That marriage is determined by the state, not a church, and if the state can recognize common-law marriage without great protest, heterosexuals can shut themselves up and let the gays get married too. So, as far as justice goes, I was overjoyed when the Supreme Court ruled that every same-gender-loving individual had as much right to become a divorcée as the straights. Yet as a personal matter and for what the decision meant for my life, I wasn’t moved. My friends surely were, though. I think a lot of that has to do with “love is love” so often being the uniting messaging behind equality for LGBTQ rights. I’ve long struggled with that, because there is more to me than who I love—and love itself is far more complicated than slogans make it out to be.

  As soon as the ruling was announced, Kim, who, as you’ll recall, is my closest friend from high school and one of the few folks from Houston I’ve managed to remain close to over the last twenty years, called me in complete jubilee. “Bitch, are you crying?” She very much was. Kim will tell you that she’s a thug, and while there is indeed a Rap-A-Lot Records element to her, Chief Justice Roberts’s choice not to be completely useless brought out the Céline Dion ballad in her. I loved how happy she was for me. I appreciated how much this historic moment meant to her as the friend of a gay man. Of course, I couldn’t help but joke that I didn’t have a man and so was in no position to get married anytime soon. Kim chuckled at the quip, but she remained optimistic about my future both individually and as a part of the community. More calls and texts came—including from those who recalled my self-described dream wedding from a drunken brunch. To their collective delight, I performed elation the way they wanted to hear it from me. It wasn’t the time to piss on marriage and bring up my issues. Once again, I opted out of rocking the boat.

  Before I even accepted that I was gay, I had already soured on the idea of ever getting married. It wasn’t because I didn’t think gay marriage was a possibility at the time. Even when marriage equality was nothing more than a pipe dream, I resented marriage and found it to be something that probably wouldn’t work for me. I wish my hesitation had been majorly rooted in the question of whether or not such a heteronormative institution fit my gay ass or if expressing immediate glee over the Supreme Court ruling meant I was genuflecting to norms not designed with me in mind anyway. In panels, I’ve heard others shout about that while highlighting that polyamorous relationships and other kinds of romantic and sexual arrangements that break tradition should be exalted the same way monogamous relationships—like marriage—are. I feel their pain, but that ain’t got shit to do with me. My uneasiness with marriage mirrors that of so many others: my parents’ marriage haunts me.

  My parents are still married, though I’m not particularly sure why. Granted, it’s ultimately not my business, but as a by-product of their relationship, I reserve the right to remain both curious and puzzled. I usually say each is waiting for the other to die. Apparently, patience is a good way to prevent premeditated murder. Whenever I make this comment, people assume that I am being facetious. It’s likely because I say it so matter-of-factly, but it’s how I feel based on my observations and experiences. I constantly lived with the fear that my dad would make good on his threats to kill my mom. I’m surprised my mom hasn’t killed him. I used to offer to be a character witness or an alibi if she needed one. I’ve made peace with the reality that as a victim of physical, verbal, and mental abuse, my dad is just a symptom of a disease that has soiled so many members of our family. I would not say I have forgiven him for the terror he put all of us through, but I have learned to accept the reasons why he ended up the way he did and love him in spite of that.

  As a young adult, I asked my mother why she kept us in that household of madness. Why did she put up with him? Why didn’t she free her own self from the burdens of being with him? I asked this when I was in college in order to deal with the resentment I had toward her for keeping us in that environment for so long.
She responded that she simply didn’t want to end up on welfare raising multiple kids. I couldn’t argue with that. I was not trying to victim-blame. I just wanted clarity on what her thinking was. Likewise, I wanted to know if the pressures from work and marriage were why, though she may have loved her kids dearly, she wasn’t always kind to us.

  Though my dad often used to say, “Don’t ever get married!” my mom never discouraged marriage. She encouraged it, albeit slanted toward holy matrimony with a woman. Bless her heart. She also encouraged my sister to get married. I don’t recall my sister ever wanting to do so. She did, however. There was no formal wedding ceremony. She just casually told me she was married over the phone long after the fact—and right as she was on the verge of divorcing her husband. As she was telling me about the divorce, she mentioned that our mama was the one who had pushed for her to get married in the first place. My response was immediate. “Why would you listen to her?” My sister is amazing. She is one of the strongest, hardest-working people I have ever met. She is a remarkable human being. However, much like I saw with my folks, I looked at how remarkable people could be put through so much needless strain thanks to marriage. Well, with the wrong people, anyway.

  The failure to learn how to love someone properly is a trait that has since been passed down to me. I know it isn’t right to base the failures of your parents on anything you do, but we are all products of our living experiences. Generally, I didn’t grow up seeing a lot of people in what I’d consider to be happy marriages. I barely saw married couples—period—outside of a few family members. When I think about the kind of commitment that most people associate with marriage, I think about people losing. Losing themselves, their dreams, or at the very least a part of their happiness. And though I really am happy gay people are making strides in our efforts to have our love recognized fairly in terms of property, taxes, and medical visits, I struggle to wrap my head around the idea of ever making that kind of move myself.