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Despite having been raised by one (well, a former human who had been mutated into a rat), Leo didn’t really understand humans very much.
So many things they did just didn’t make any sense.
Humans sent their kids to school for hours and hours each day, for five days a week.
Humans committed all sorts of awful crimes.
Okay, well, mutants do that too, but still.
Shredder was a human.
Humans were the reason that he and his family had to hide away, because of how humans would react if they saw them.
Well, that’s not really completely fair either, I guess.
April’s accepted us. Casey’s pretty cool too.
But there was one thing that humans did that Leo just couldn’t wrap his head around.
Humans have ‘social norms’, as Donnie and April call them.
Leo could remember years and years ago, when he and his siblings had been watching an old Lou Jitsu movie with their father.
I couldn’t have been any older than six.
Splinter hadn’t really been watching, instead he’d been reading a book on the couch whilst the four turtles had been sitting cross-legged in front of the screen, enchanted with the movie.
Their father had suddenly looked up, and gasped.
“What is it, Pops?” Raph had asked. “Are you okay?”
Splinter blinked for a few moments, staring at the screen.
It was one of Lou Jitsu’s older movies, but one of his most famous ones.
It was so popular because of the inclusion of one of his most famous co-stars, who played the role as Lou Jitsu’s best friend and strongest ally.
“Did the movie upset you, Dad?” Mikey asked.
“Oh, no, my sons.” Splinter replied, his voice wobbly, like he’d been shaken hard.
“I read,” Donnie said, “that Lou Jitsu wanted to kiss his best friend in the final scene of this movie, but the producers wouldn’t allow it.”
“Why?” Leo asked, sucking his thumb.
Donnie shrugged. “Don’t know.”
Leo hummed. “I guess humans just don’t like kissing very much.”
Splinter laughed from his place on the couch. It was a sad and heavy laugh, since he clearly didn’t find anything funny about what they’d just been discussing.
“Oh my children,” he whispered, his voice broken and his eyes watery, “never change.”
The four turtles had all been very confused about their father’s behaviour, but hadn’t said anything.
Leo would probably have forgotten the whole event altogether if it wasn’t for the conversation that they had with April, not long after meeting her.
They’d taken her to Señor Hueso’s pizza restaurant, and Donnie had been begging her to tell him more about school.
He was just so fascinated by it.
Like the nerd he is.
“Honestly, Donnie.” April had insisted. “I’m sure I’ve told you everything there is to know about school.”
“Really? Are you sure?” Donnie asked, leaning closer to her. “Are you sure you haven’t forgotten something? Anything?”
April nodded. “Sorry, D. I don’t know why you’re so interested in school, anyway. It’s boring.”
“It sure sounds boring.” Raph muttered under his breath.
Donnie ignored him, sighing in disappointment.
“It just sounds so cool, April. Hours and hours of learning, what could be better?”
“Literally anything else.” Mikey huffed, causing Leo and Raph to laugh.
As Señor Hueso arrived at their table to give them their pizzas, a yokai couple walked in.
Leo recognised them, as he’d seen them in the restaurant just the previous weeks, but April couldn’t stop staring at them.
Is she okay?
Has she never seen a couple before?
Do humans hate romance in general, not just kissing?
“Hey, April?” Leo asked, waving a hand in front of her face. “You okay?”
April blinked a few times, then rubbed her eyes.
“W-what?” She asked, seemingly coming back to reality.
“You look really surprised.” Mikey observed.
“Yeah.” Raph said. “We told you there would be other mutants here.”
She shook her head. “No, no… it’s not that.”
“What is it, then?” Donnie asked.
April sighed. She gestured at the couple she’d been staring at.
“Those guys?” Leo frowned. “What about them?”
“They’re just… two women. A couple. Out in public. Together. And no one’s saying anything.”
Raph frowned. “Why would they?”
April laughed humorlessly, shaking her head.
That’s the same type of laugh as Splinter's all those years ago.
Sad and heavy.
What’s going on?
Is April okay?
“Guys…” April whispered, playing with her fingers. “I need to tell you something. I’m… like those yokai.”
Mikey spewed his lemonade.
“You’re a yokai?!” He shouted, causing everyone in the restaurant to stare at them.
“No, no,” April replied, lowering her voice and beckoning for the turtles to come closer, “what I mean is that… I’m like them in… another way.”
Leo, for one, did not understand what his friend was trying to say at all.
What is she talking about?
She’s not a yokai, but she’s like them?
How?
They’re a yokai couple and she’s a human teenager.
Leo, Donnie and Mikey all frowned in confusion, and Leo opened his mouth to say something, but Raph cut him off.
“I think I get it, April,” Raph whispered, his voice soft and understanding, “you like other girls the way those yokai like each other, don’t you?”
April was silent for a minute, then nodded stiffly. “Y-yeah. You’ve got it. Thanks, Raph.”
“But if you’re like those yokai, why are you so surprised to see them out in public with no one saying anything? Surely you get to go out with other girls like they do.” Donnie said, frowning with suspicion.
She laughed sadly again. “Oh, you guys. What I’d give to be one of you.”
“What are you talking about?” Mikey asked.
“Guys,” April started, “humans aren’t as… accepting as you guys are. A lot of them believe that romance only exists between a man and a woman and no one else.”
Mikey spat out his pizza crust, Donnie choked on his drink, Raph gasped loudly and Leo was stunned into silence.
What?
She can’t be for real.
Are humans really that stupid?
Are they so shallow that they only believe that a man and a woman can love each other?
What about men who love men, and women who love women?
What about humans who love all genders?
What about humans who don’t fancy anyone?
What about humans who aren’t men or women?
What about humans who are men sometimes, but women other times, and sometimes neither or both?
What then?
Humans can’t be that cruel.
Right?
“W-what did you just say?” Raph squeaked, his voice high.
“A lot of humans only accept that a man and a woman can love each other. It’s stupid, I know.”
Mikey reached out for April’s hand across the table and squeezed it.
“That must be really hard.” He whispered.
She nodded. “Yeah. It sucks. You guys are actually the first people I’ve come out to.”
“What’s that?” Leo asked.
She sighed again. “If you don’t fit into social norms, you have to tell everyone or else they’ll assume you’re ‘normal’. I’ve been waiting for the right moment for so long… but I just realised that there is no ‘right moment’. That it’s scary no matter when you say it, because you never know how people will react.”
Leo was completely speechless.
Okay, wow.
So if you don’t fall into social categories designed by the oppressors, you have to make yourself vulnerable and open up because if you don’t then you’ll be assumed to be ‘normal’?!
What kind of society is that?
“April,” Raph spoke up, his voice wobbly, “we’re sorry if we made you feel pressured into telling us. You should’ve have done it if we pressured you into it.”
She shook her head, wiping her glasses.
“Thanks, but you didn’t. I’ve been wanting to tell somebody for a long time, but I just didn’t know how.”
“And how does it feel now that you’ve told someone?” Mikey asked.
April’s face lit up like a Christmas tree.
“Great. I feel like I’ve just unlocked a cage I’ve been trapped in my whole life. Thanks, guys.”
“Don’t thank us.” Donnie replied. “You’re our first and only friend, April. Thank you.”
Leo, Raph and Mikey all nodded.
“Besides,” Leo giggled, “you can bring as many lady-friends down here as you want; the guys down here don’t judge. They’re cool.”
“But do be careful of the ones who will try and take your money,” Donnie whispered, “stay clear of those ones.”
April laughed. “Noted. Thanks.”
Since that day, Leo had been doing a lot of research about the social norms of human society, and it turns out April was right.
People did face all sorts of horrible abuse if they were a man who loved someone other than a woman, or if they were a woman who loved someone other than a man.
It made Leo burn inside.
It’s all so unfair.
What also shocked him was that a lot of humans also believed that people could only identify as the gender they were assigned at birth.
That’s stupid.
What about people like us?
Leo, Donnie, Raph and Mikey had been assigned female at birth. Their father (not knowing much about the anatomy of turtles) had mistaken them all for boys, and had raised them as such.
So when not long ago Donnie had discovered in a book that they were biologically female, they all just brushed it off. They were boys. The circumstances of their births were irrelevant.
After all, we were all born as tiny little turtles, but now we’re the ninjas we are today.
Just like how we’re boys, regardless of how we were born.
But these people didn’t see that at all.
Leo had been so confused, that he’d had no choice but to barge into his twin’s room and beg him for answers.
Surely Donnie, smart, genius Donnie, could make sense of this.
Right?
“Nardo?” Donnie grumbled, sitting up in his bed and rubbing the grain from his eyes. “What are you doing? It’s past midnight!”
“This is important.” Leo insisted. “I’ve got stuff to show you. Those humans are worse than we thought.”
That seemed to wake Donnie up and he allowed Leo to sit beside him on his bed and show him all that he’d found.
Donnie was speechless by the end.
“Oh, Leo,” he breathed, after Leo had finished showing him the last site, “for once, you’re right - humans are worse than we thought.”
“I know!” Leo replied. “They have ‘social norms’ for everything! What about the humans who don’t fit into those boxes?”
“What about humans like us?” Donnie mumbled, his voice wavering. He’d curled himself up into a ball, and was rocking himself back and forth.
Like he always does to calm himself down whenever he’s upset.
“It’s stupid, really.” Leo muttured. “Do they think apples still count as seeds because that’s how they started out as? It doesn’t make any sense!”
Why can’t they just admit their differences and live their lives? Why are they so obsessed with what’s normal and what’s not?
Humans sure do suck.
“Hey, what’s this?” Donnie asked, clicking on another article.
Leo shuffled closer to his twin. “What is it?”
“It’s something called a ‘pride parade’.”
“What’s that?”
“I don’t know, Nardo,” Donnie quipped, “that’s why I’m looking.”
Leo stuck his tongue out at him while the article loaded, and Donnie read it all out loud.
It told the two of them all about how humans who used all sorts of labels that Leo had just discovered - gay, lesbian, transgender, bisexual, pansexual, queer, non-binary, genderfluid, agender, bigender, asexual, aromantic, questioning, and so many more - as well as people who didn’t use labels would all get together and have a big party to celebrate who they were.
They would show that they were proud of who they were, they were unashamed, they weren’t embarrassed, or disgusted or-
-or anything that their oppressors called them or said they should be.
They’re taking away all of the power from the haters, by being unapologetically themselves.
Donnie looked as enchanted as Leo did, and the two of them spent the rest of the night looking at videos from pride parades all over the world, watching all of the joy, the expression, the freedom.
Watching all of those people be so proud made him feel something he’d never felt before.
He wanted to jump into the screen and start dancing to Madonna songs like they were.
Even three years later, Leo didn’t forget what he’d seen on that screen.
Which is why after April told them that she had a girlfriend, he’d had an idea.
It had taken some persuading, but Señor Hueso agreed.
And now here he was, with his three siblings, wearing a glittery blue suit and a new blonde wig.
They were all wearing matching suits, but different colours. Raph’s was red, Donnie’s was purple and Mikey’s was orange.
“Ready?” Raph asked, opening the door.
“Ready.” Leo nodded, and the four of them walked in.
It wasn’t a pride parade, but it was the next best thing.
It was the biggest party that Leo had ever been to.
There were so many familiar faces - Señor Hueso (obviously, as it was his restaurant), the strange worm-man who they’d never met before and Hypno, Todd, the Foot Lieutenant and the Foot Brute, and so many others. There were even a few humans there, too.
And everyone was having so much fun, not caring what anyone thought about them.
Because we’re not outsiders here.
We’re not freaks, or monsters, or anything that those horrible humans say we are.
We’re us.
“Hey guys! Over here!”
They all turned to see April waving frantically.
She was wearing a yellow party dress, tights and high heels, with a lesbian flag tied around her shoulders like a cape.
The turtles all sat down at the table, opposite her.
“What took you four so long?” she asked. “We’ve been waiting here for ages!”
“Blame Leo.” Donnie replied. “He was the one who took hours to get ready.”
Leo scoffed. “Well, I had to take my time to make sure I beat you at the costume competition.”
“Are Dad and Draxum here yet?” Mikey asked.
April shuddered. “Yeah. They’re having a karaoke competition as we speak.”
“Oh no.” Raph groaned. “We’d better go and sort this out, Mad Dogs.”
They all nodded and followed April to the stage, and even though Leo was certain that he and his brothers were about to witness the most humiliating thing of their lives, he was happy.
He wasn’t an outsider.
He was here, with his family, celebrating who he was.
Who cares about what those humans think?
They’re the ones losing by being unable to accept us for who we are.
And I’m not ashamed of who I am.
I’m a queer, trans, mutant ninja turtle teenager.
Leo grinned firmly.
Yeah, that sounds just right.