Unlabeled 🌈

The Question

Chapter Seventeen

It wasn’t even a big moment. Not like in the movies where the music swells and someone corners you with a dramatic “so what are you?” No—this was smaller. Casual. Almost careless.

I was sitting outside the library, knees pulled up, notebook balanced against my legs. Mariah plopped down beside me, chewing on the end of a lollipop. She didn’t look at me when she said it, which somehow made it worse.

“So, do you like girls? Or guys? Or… both?”

The words hung in the air, sugary-sweet and heavy at the same time.

My throat tightened. I wanted to laugh it off, make some dumb joke. I wanted to say something bold, like I knew exactly who I was. Instead, all that came out was a thin, cracked: “I don’t know.”

Mariah finally turned to look at me. Her eyes weren’t judgmental. Just curious, like she really wanted to understand. But the silence after my answer stretched long, too long. I felt my chest caving in, like I’d said the wrong thing, like admitting I didn’t know made me less real.

The truth is, I hated the question. Not because it was cruel, but because it demanded an answer I didn’t have. And maybe never would.

When Mariah finally smiled and shrugged—“Fair enough”—I almost cried. Because maybe, just maybe, not knowing didn’t mean I was broken.