Disclaimer: The following entry is a work of fiction. It is part of an online collaboration called Music for the Masses. The lyrics quoted throughout the entry are from the Barenaked Ladies song "Lovers in a Dangerous Time." All lyrics are the property and copyright of their respective owners. All lyrics are provided for educational purposes and personal use only.

Don�t the hours grow shorter as the days go by?
We never get to stop and open our eyes.

Three months, two weeks, one day. That�s my personal best long-term relationship. It was an amazing time in my life, and it went by so fast�like, sometimes I just had to step outside myself and watch what was happening to me. I didn�t think I�d ever be so lucky. I still can�t believe it, but more than that, I can�t believe I didn�t appreciate it more when I had it. There was always so much pressure to act a certain way, like I was living a double life. Sometimes when I sit and think about my life then for, like, four hours, it starts to feel really wrong and I have to walk around the block a few times and try to think about something else.

I met Brian on a nipply November Thursday. It was a week before Thanksgiving. We hit it off right away. It was like our whole lives were in sync, down to our favorite drink (Jack and Coke) and our least favorite celebrity (Harrison Ford). It was perfect, a whirlwind romance. My mother told me that if something seems too good to be true, it probably is. I hate it when she�s right.

One minute you�re waiting for the sky to fall.
Next you�re dazzled by the beauty of it all.

I never have told her. All this time, all the icky, soapy angst, the stuff mothers live for, and she never knew the first thing about Brian. That�s by design, actually. My mother tends to scare people away on a good day, and I�m sure her first words to my gay lover would have been appropriately described as scathing. I was always so afraid that she would find out on her own: a poorly timed phone call, an unexpected drop-in. I don�t know why I thought it was such a big deal. It shouldn�t matter now, but it does.

Brian didn�t care if people knew. That�s one of the few things we didn�t have in common. Brian was way out and he had connections throughout the community. He was always direct, up front, honest. It worked for him. It fit him like a favorite shirt. He opened up a whole new world to me. I used to be so afraid of the clubs, afraid I�d run into someone from work, but the first time I stepped out onto that dance floor, all the fear vanished. I couldn�t dance for shit, but Brian didn�t care and I didn�t either. The two of us together was magic, the kind of love you�d immortalize with spray paint late at night on an overpass.

When you're lovers in a dangerous time,
Sometimes you're made to feel your love�s a crime.

Ironic that the same overpass on which I mentally tagged our initials is the overpass where the accident happened. He was driving me to this new gay bookstore, telling me how excited he was about how the community was growing so quickly. Everything happened at once. I couldn�t process it at first. It was horrible, like any car accident, but this one was different because the dead body was someone I loved, someone I knew, someone I cared about. I knew he was dead before anyone told me. It was the worst feeling I�d ever known...until my mom saw the story in the paper. She was clueless as she told me that another faggot had gotten what he deserved. I cried for three weeks.

Nothing worth having comes without some kind of fight
You gotta kick at the darkness till it bleeds daylight.

When I stopped crying, I opened the phone book and found the number for the local gay and lesbian center. Brian had done a lot of volunteer work there, but I�d never even set foot in the place. This was my tribute, though. This was how I would remember Brian. I wanted to become a volunteer, a crusader for gay rights, an activist for gay youth, but first I had to dial the number.

The girl who answered the phone had known Brian. She said that Brian had talked about me fondly and often. She�d always bugged him about bringing me down to the center to meet everybody, but he had never even asked me. So I went down there and met her. Her name is Shelley. She�s really nice. I�ve met a lot of nice people down there. It�s like a family. I can see why Brian loved it so much.

Sometimes, though, I have to go outside, across the street, and get a sandwich from the deli. I see his smile around the corner. I hear his voice quoting some statistic about HIV infections. I feel his hand brush across mine in the hallway. It makes me feel guilty, lost. I miss Brian.

Reading: The other MftM entries. Listening to: Alanis Morrisette. Watching: Adaptation.