Big Brother – Cole Blue, Colton Fox
My family has always been very close. I mean, that’s not a bad thing. I have friends whose parents split up and their mom went to work and pretty much left them alone, and others whose parents were so busy spending their money that they barely remembered they had kids. I’m glad my family is close, but sometimes that makes it hard to tell us apart; to discover who you are outside of your expectations and assumptions.
I always loved my younger brother. Since he was born, my parents told me that I was older and needed to take care of him and protect him. It never felt like a burden. It was… I don’t know… a purpose. I felt proud and special to be the one with experience who knew things; the one Colton admired. As we both got older though, he could do things on his own and make his own choices, and I started to realize that I didn’t know everything and made my own mistakes, I just hoped he still looked up to me.
But I’m four years older and it was inevitable that I would go to college and leave him behind. I didn’t need to stay away, though. I chose this. I started dating my girlfriend, Sarah, before I knew she was gay, before I even seriously thought about sex. We were more best friends than a couple, but in high school, guys can’t be friends with girls unless they’re dating, so that’s what we call hanging out. Sarah came from a proper family, so I think she was relieved that I wasn’t pressuring her to have sex. For me, one of the first clues I had that I was gay was the fact that, as much as I liked her, I didn’t want to have sex with her.
I think it took me longer than a lot of gay boys to figure things out because I really like older men more than guys my own age and that was another thing to come to terms with. Anyway, I had a lot of things to discover about myself. Going to college was a good time to break up with Sarah. She accepted it well. I think she always knew we were just friends. In fact, my mother suffered more than Sarah. She was already thinking about our wedding and how beautiful our children would be. In her mind, it was a done deal and she was happy to accept.
