I usually hate waking up early for school. I’m probably one of the young writers on this website that still goes to high school but that’s not important. What is important is that I do not hate this morning as much. Why? Because my promised day has come, It’s the day I go to my first Gay-straight Alliance leadership summit. Yesterday I spent my time freaking out trying to get everyone to turn in their signed field trip forms. It’s my big day and I still have some stressing to do because I need to get someone to turn in their form. I ask my mom to drive me to school today, I don’t want to risk coming late because of my bus driver. The ride to school is a blur, all I care about is getting to school, screw the small talk. I’m finally at school and I don’t even bother with school breakfast, I really don’t need a stomach ache for the rest of the day. The next hour is spent outside at the bus loop biding my time, watching my fellow classmates walk in and get to class, time drifts by as I wait in excitement.

The bus arrives and we board, we don’t know the other small group on the bus and since I’m on the hunt for a boyfriend none of them are really cute or my type so I sit near my friends. Our bus isn’t packed we’ve got one other GSA with us, I don’t talk to any of them, sadly I am a bit shallow and there aren’t any cute boys. The ride is short and soon we arrive at SunServe. I’m deathly afraid, so many people congregated in one place makes me nervous, but I’ve got people I know with me so it’s going to be fine. The rest of this goes on in an incredibly boring fashion, they have a few cool guest speakers. Then we have breakout sessions, my first session is a discussion on what gender is. While the session was underway, I went to go get tested for HIV. While waiting I met a lesbian and another fellow gay, we were fast friends, the topic of choice was actually how we came to get numbers off the opposite sex. She gave me her kik and shortly after that I decided to leave and go back to my session. The next session is about my rights as an LGTBTQ+ student, I actually found this part to be very enlightening and figured out what a gender-neutral bathroom is. For such a long time I never knew and from the sounds of it, it seemed like trans-teens just go use the staff bathroom, no qualms at this end!

The final session before lunch was about teen sex, with a focus on LGTBTQ+ teens, I didn’t stick around for this one since I really wanted to get tested. As I waited outside the testing van I didn’t feel very nervous. I was actually the only one there currently. The guy then called me in, that’s where my stomach drops. He begins the usual questions about my sexual partners. A  number I’m ashamed of. The guy then proceeds to prick my finger and take my blood, I’m incredibly squeamish, so looking at my own blood just really upsets me. He does his magic HIV test stuff and soon he tells me that I am negative. I feel relieved, all that bad behavior had not caught up to me and for that, I was so grateful. So I take my card and head back into my session, luckily just as its ending.

Next was the open mic. It’s obviously my time to shine so I go up there and do my personal favorite story of mine, my coming-out story. But we’ll save that story for a later article. The summit ends and we head back to school, silently walk the halls and for a second I thought about the future, I thought about how exciting it was to be a part of my opportunity, about all the fun I’d have advocating equal rights and all the cute guys of course. I guess you could say I drifted away for a moment.