“Greenland Rainbow” © Robert Fleming

 

The Loudest Girl in the Closet

Picture a grown woman running
like she’s being hunted
out of Bloomingdale’s
San Francisco.

Gulping a vape
the exhaust-ed air
like pure oxygen
like a mountain fucking spring.

At eight I hid in the racks
of clothing
not yet in the closet.

My little
sister
in the aisle, belting:
“Becca is a lesbian.”

I stuffed the line
in my bag.

Where it stayed until I realized
that she was four
in 1989.

She must have
learned that from my parents
the way I taught her to shriek “fuck”
as in how fucking gay was I acting
at eight?

And if my parents clocked me so early
why did they say all those horrible things?
“She’s a dyke.”
“He’s a little faggy.”
Countless limp wrist act outs
affectation instead of affection.

I rolled over quietly
on the pullout couch
when Katie whispered into the eighth grade dark
“I think everyone is bisexual.”

I got kicked out of summer camp
for shoplifting something I didn’t even want
because the hot girls were doing it
but not before Kim and I
traded butt massages
that meant a little
more to me.

When she announced her engagement on Facebook
I didn’t get it.

Puberty evenings when my dad was gone, my mother drunk
and I could live
I canoodled with a large doll
her ceramic breasts buds
the damp cloth between her legs on my tongue
until I reached the castle on a cloud.

I was kind of a theater kid
but couldn’t commit
to anything but private delusion.

Mental choreography
the only thing I could get away with.

Got so turned on when the girls kissed in the movie
Kids I checked my room to make sure nobody was hiding
closed my door, muted the sound
and rewound it over and over
I was terrified of AIDS
how much I liked that part?
The true horror.

When I dropped acid one teen summer
I couldn’t go to sleep
until I came
and I couldn’t cum
until I thought about a woman
“there’s your answer”
the acid said and I dropped that
in the case files
and sealed them
with the first orgasm
I had with another
person, a boy with long hair
while thinking about the prettiest girl in school.

I promised myself I would try it in college
but the LGB center sat bare
in the center of a field of neatly mowed grass
like a buzz cut whispering don’t ask, don’t tell.

Miranda on Sex and the City said it was selfish
to be bisexual, pick a lane
it’s a stopover on the road to gaytown.

I was obsessed with other people’s closets
just like my Dad
all his jokes the same punchline
that his friends are being gay
in the locker room
he’s the only one that ever laughs.

I’m like 99 percent sure
He’s my gay source
Gerald the fag factory.

On winter break
I stripped with my best friend
to see what she was doing to herself
but really it was
to see her.

My junior year in college we were
mad at our boyfriends when
she said she had never cum
she was twenty-one
and didn’t know how to
touch herself.

I asked, then dropped my panties while she drove
home from the bar to show her.

Months earlier she told me about fooling around with
her female castmate in an indie film
the way it was acceptable then; to entertain boys, while you were on drugs.

I’d never been more turned on in my life
until she opened her bathrobe
displaying herself
the way she’d learnt to do for rent
we laid frozen on the pull out couch
in her parents basement until she said
“I’ll make the first move.”
instinct took over
I’d never felt less clumsy
more in my body
more, more–
until she jumped up
to puke.

I laid there rejected, touching myself and thinking about it
until the sun came up
years later.

Centering hot women who centered
men so that when they were mad at them
they’d soak up my attention
until a real relationship came along.

I sat on the bus on the way to class
and used muscle memory
to convince myself I
enjoyed sex with my boyfriend
though remembering his body in mine
felt the same as when I think about my vibrator.

Muscle memory.

I’m not gay,
most people are probably bisexual;
I’m just such a black and white thinker.

When I met my husband
I could admit that I liked women
planted on the stage of heteronormativity.

It was the upskirt era
and he was always wearing mine
clenched fists, ankles twisting
peeking from the hallway
around the doorframe
into the living room
while I whacked off to Girls Gone Wild.

Later, he’d get angry and call me a lesbian.
I hate that he was right about something.

Don’t all women who’ve been harmed by men
prefer lesbian porn?

Maybe my aunt who doesn’t believe in divorce
is correct
it’s just trauma
it’s just my parents’ fault.

If we could will the body to be straight
I wouldn’t have scoliosis.

I wasn’t sure what was worse
being gay or that they
were right about something
and I never was.

I became a comedian
the ultimate cover story
if I tell you all this private stuff
you’ll think there’s nothing left to hide.

I then became an escort
to monetize the act.

When I moved to the West Village
flush with some married painter’s cash I
felt brave enough to take acid again
which helped me realize that nobody cared
that I was gay
besides myself and a family
I barely spoke to.

Came out as bisexual
for an article
a modern Carrie Bradshaw now
and just like that
the rumors began that I digitally raped
an open mic’er
at the height of #MeToo
I spent that summer canceled
doing podcasts where I didn’t realize they were making fun of me
trying to prove
I was not that.

My strongest argument was that
if raping was my jam
why would I go all the way to Brooklyn
when I could hawk a loogie from my fire escape
and hit Stonewall?

My strongest argument was that I never had
acrylic nails, that I never had spare Xanax
that I’d never bang an open
mic’er.

Still, I called the girls I’d slept with drunk
just to make sure they hadn’t revoked consent
a legitimate thing in 2017
like returning an outfit you no longer wanted
after wearing it to a party.

After that I tried to come out every spring
like being young again because the flowers are.

A gay friend said no you aren’t
that’s my thing.
A straight friend said
you’re just trying to run from yourself.

After all this self deception
I had learned one thing; that I couldn’t be trusted
so, seeing my shadow, I ran back into hiding.

Six more weeks of winter.

It took a health crisis
to come out this year and
stay.

Becca is a lesbian.

Bisexuality was a stopover
on the road to gaytown

with a really long
layover.

This is the part where it all goes technicolor
but I don’t want anyone in my bed
for longer than an hour.

I finally like myself
and want to get to know her better.

Back at that Bloomingdale’s
spilling onto the street
about to have a meltdown
because the thing I wanted wasn’t worth the wait.

stimming furiously, waiting to detonate
but in the Big Brown Bag
I’d reclaimed myself
and when I unwrapped me back in the hotel room
I slid right on.

I was finally
gay enough

I was finally
right about something.

 

Rebecca Rush(she/they) is a queer, autigender writer and neurodivergent peer support coach from New England, currently residing in LA. Her work has been published in numerous journals and anthologies, including Surreal Confessional Anthology, Rock Salt Journal, and Arc Poetry Magazine. They were recently featured by the Los Angeles Poetry Society. They hold a B.A. in English Literature with a Concentration in Creative Writing from the University of Connecticut. She currently blogs here and coaches here.

Robert Fleming (b. 1963) is a visual poet and digital artist from Lewes, DE. He is an editor at Old Scratch Press, Instant Noodles magazine, and the banner creator for Oddball magazine’s Horrorthon and Christmas wars. His books are White Noir, an Amazon best seller, and Con-Way in 4 in 1, #4. He is an award-winner: 2025 Massachusetts poetry Olympics silver/bronze medals; 2022 San Gabriel Valley California-broadside, 2024/2021 Best of Mad Swirl poetry; Delaware Press: Poetry: 3rd, 2 honorable mentions (HM), graphic design 4 HM, photography 1 HM; nominations: 2025 best of short fiction; 2023 Blood Rag Poet, 2 Pushcart, 2 Best of the Net.