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When Summer was younger, she used to play a little game. The rules were simple: when your friends all talk about the boys they like, you pick one to like as well, you make up things you like about him–like his eyes, or his smile, or his laugh–and when you tell your friends, you act like the thought of even discussing it makes you flustered and embarrassed. It’s an easy act to put up and Summer Dileo loves acting. So, this little game of Summer’s came to her as easily as breathing. Almost too easily…
There came a moment in Summer’s early middle school years where she had started to convince herself that she actually did like those boys, that it wasn’t a game anymore, it couldn’t be, not if Summer wanted to fit in. So she bit down every instinct that shouted she didn’t like boys and ignored the feelings that would creep into her chest when she held a girl’s hand for a little too long. And because Summer Dileo loves acting, she took up the role of “normal middle-school girl” until it no longer felt like an act anymore. Until she could convince herself that the sickness she felt holding a boy’s hand was actually the feeling of butterflies.
This act had worked very well, and Summer had felt like any other “normal” girl, and then she decided to take a World Literature preparation class in sophomore year and assigned seating had found her sitting next to one Jade Ngô. Before then, Summer hadn’t really known anything about Jade other than seeing him in the halls of school enough too briefly to assign a name to the face she saw. She’d known more about her sister really, who spent enough time helping paint sets for Centurion High’s theatre department that Summer had spoken to her a few times - not once had Jade come up. All is to say that after that fateful seating arrangement, there wasn’t any time where Summer was not aware of Jade. His smile, her eyes, his laugh - if Jade was in the room, Summer knew, and if she wasn’t, then he was on Summer’s mind instead.
Summer felt sick.
She wasn’t ready to let go of her act yet, not when it felt like a safety net, a precaution from the feeling she’d always denied herself to feel. And no matter how hard she tried, Summer couldn’t get it to stop. She’d fallen so incredibly hard for the pretty person who sat next to her in World Literature and she had hated herself for it.
For so long she’d get home from hanging out with Jade or finally say goodnight to her after messaging him for hours and she would just cry. She wasn’t perfect or “normal” anymore and the thought ate her up so much inside her chest she felt like it was rotting. Summer never shared this feeling with anyone, too scared they would never look at her the same.
And then one night she did tell someone. She told her older sister. She didn’t plan to, only Marisol was visiting for the first time in months and finally her busy schedule had spared her time to visit her family. Seeing her again had made Summer so emotional. She’d hugged her like they were 6 and 16 again and Marisol was protecting her from the monsters in her closet; protected in her big sister’s arms, Summer began to breathe again.
When she’d told Marisol how she feared she wasn't normal anymore, that maybe she was never normal to begin with and never could be, her older sister only responded “What’s even normal anyway?” and held Summer while she cried a little more. It had taken a while for the notion to set in…
What’s even normal anyway?
But when she’d look at Jade and think of how incredibly pretty she looked in that particular moment—like a deity in human form or the personification of the moon—thoughts about her supposed abnormality would be dismissed at a single repeated thought, a mantra that echoed again and again inside her head until she could breathe again: What’s even normal anyway?
Summer, looking at Jade sitting at the adjacent desk now, no longer needs to repeat this mantra to feel okay. She can admire Jade from his chair, thinking how she’s the most wonderful person Summer has ever met and thinking she’s so lucky to have fallen in love with him. And when she gets caught staring at Jade, she’ll flush and look away not because she’s ashamed, but because this happens often enough that there is no way Jade doesn’t know she’s entirely infatuated. The thought gives Summer butterflies.
Summer almost feels like she’s dreaming. Like she’s floating on cloud nine all because she has actually let herself feel this - let her be herself, sexuality and all. Summer finally let herself be free and she was so much happier for it. She smiles more, she laughs more, she dances more. Summer Dileo let herself be a lesbian, let herself accept the feelings she always tried to deny, and the world felt lighter for it. And she would happily stay here, feeling this feeling, for forever and a day…
No one could take her away from this feeling, this euphoria, not anymore. Not when Summer looks at Jade and only falls in love a little more. Not when she hears one of his rants and feels a little lighter, a little softer. Not when Summer Dileo has learned to love every part of herself, even the parts of herself she used to hate, because she trusts Jade’s judgement, and if she’s worthy enough for Jade to love her, then she’s worthy enough to love herself as well. And this isn’t a feeling she can crash from, not anymore. It isn’t some kind of sugar rush that will wear off as it goes through her system, it’s here to stay.
The knowledge makes Summer want to dance around her room… a lot. And she does. Sometimes she comes home from a particularly average day of school and will spin happily around her room because she’s a lesbian! She likes girls and that won’t ever change and she’ll spin happily before crashing onto her bed with a giddy laugh. Or sometimes when she's with Jade and neither are talking, Jade is doing something random—he could be reading, scrolling on her phone, studying something, anything, and Summer will get the urge to do something reckless—while Summer will only be looking at him. She’ll trace the outline of her face with her eyes and notice every little feature on his face; freckles that spot Jade’s face like stars; the strands of hair that frame her face with a purple sunset; the piercings on his lips that sometimes make it hard for Summer to concentrate on anything that isn’t the thought of kissing Jade…
And maybe that confession should make Summer feel more embarrassed, but it doesn’t, because being foolish like that in front of Jade is just admitting to her lover that she is entirely comfortable around her; she loves him too much to ever feel regret in how much love she feels for her. And some people—Dakota, Doug, her friends in her theatre group—will joke about how sappy she is towards Jade, and she’ll simply laugh along without a single ounce of indignity in her bones because her days of succumbing to shame for her feelings for Jade are long behind her.
Instead, she can uncover the mirror in her room and truly smile at the girl she sees looking back at her, can truly look at her reflection and love the girl who falls in love with the world, with girls, and with Jade. Summer can dance around her room happily knowing she doesn’t have to feel isolated anymore in her experiences - she is far from alone in her identity and who she loves doesn’t have to make anyone happy but herself.
Summer is allowed to ignore society when it tells her what type of love life is expected of her and can ignore the heteronormative ideals that urge her to deny a piece of herself. She’s been through all of that already—kissing boys at parties because she thought she was supposed to, dating them so she didn’t feel like a mismatched piece in her high school’s puzzle, thinking about futures with random boys she’d labelled as her crush just so her old friends didn’t find her weird—and the hurt she felt doing that could never justify denying her sexuality ever again.
In fact, Summer finds she would rather sit alone at school with not a single soul around—not that her friends now would ever let her isolate herself like that—knowing she was 100% honest with herself than be surrounded by the people she used to call her friends, ticking every box for “normal teenage girl”, but knowing deep down she’s ignoring the love that blooms in her chest. And maybe that’s too dramatic of a feeling to have, to prefer complete solitude just to feel truly alive, but Summer can only feel happy she’s grown so much as to finally feel comfortable in her own skin. When Summer calls her late one evening, love in her heart and pride in her chest, Marisol says she’s proud of her for, and happy that she's finally letting herself be happy and Summer can’t help but agree.
Because not only has she grown from hating her sexuality to embracing it, but she’s also grown from making it define who she is. This period didn’t last very long (hardly lasted throughout junior year), but Summer used to think the best way to accept herself and her sexuality was to unhealthily let it dictate everything she did. What she wore, what music she listened to, the media she consumed, the colours she liked, the way styled her hair or talked... just so Summer could be considered the “perfect lesbian”. From wanting to be the most perfect girl to the perfect lesbian, Summer hadn’t changed all too much yet still so much…
And it wasn’t something she was consciously aware of, only she was so happy to be finally comfortable in her sexuality that she made it who she was. Ignored her love for theatre, biology, and dance (among other things) in favour of falling into habits she was familiar with: striving for perfection. Summer, in junior year, had begun to define herself only by sapphic stereotypes, which while helpful for some people, only acted to push Summer into another box. She’s unconsciously learned that even though she’d found a part of herself truly worth loving, it came with the cost of a part of Summer; a part of her soul.
Summer’s friends had tried to advise her against it, telling her it wasn’t healthy. That defining herself by who she loved was mad; it would only hurt her in the long-run. In the end, it was Marisol who helped her again (and their youngest sister, Violeta, too). Summer couldn’t say she was surprised with this though, what with her sisters always being the ones to pick her up when she’s feeling down.
Any time Summer felt the parts of herself were flung across the universe so far they were out of reach, Marisol and Violeta searched together until all the pieces we returned and Summer began to feel whole again. This time was no different. They’d shown Summer they loved her so much as she was that Summer began to as well. No longer did she define herself purely with how well she fit her sexuality - Summer loved herself for herself, and not just who she happened to love. She hasn’t regretted a day since.
Now, Summer Dileo can confidently say her melancholic days are few and far away. And there is no one, not a single soul, who could take this away from her. Not a single person who could shatter her confidence and pierce her porcelain heart. Because Summer Dileo is a lesbian! And she loves herself for it. And she loves Jade Ngô with her full heart’s content. But that isn’t the only thing to know about Summer Dileo.
She’s a performer, a dancer, a lover of biology, a Spider-Man fanatic (thanks to Jade), lover of lemon sorbet ice cream, an embroiderer, a crocheter, and sister of Marisol and Violeta Dileo. She’s a novice skateboarder, an armature paper flower maker, and a lesbian too…
And she’s never going to supress that part of herself again; no one's going to kill the dreamer in Summer Dileo.