Slimy's Tales

Soldier, Poet, King

Word Count: 1693 words 

Warnings: homophobia & (brief) transphobia

➼ This is a sequel to 'Bitter Water', although you don't have to read Bitter Water to understand this, and if you've read Bitter Water, you don't have to read this, both can just be read as standalones which is mostly what they are!! :D

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"Thank you Gisette, for your inspiring presentation on recycling. Next we have.." Mrs Simone glances down at the sheet of paper on her desk, "Susanna! Is your presentation ready Susanna?" She smiles as she looks around the room.

I take a deep breath and stand up, i walk to the front of the classroom and turn to Mrs Simone, "um.. could I please use the slideshow I have prepared?". Mrs Simone nods, "as long as you're still talking and making an effort". I nod, "yea".

I made the decision to do this presentation on a Saturday when I was sleep deprived and had a sudden stroke of inspiration, fully knowing about my classmate's view on the matter, I thought it would be an act of bravery and defiance, that I could somehow change their minds. But now that I'm standing in front of the class, waiting for the slideshow to load, I'm absolutely terrified.

And then the computer connects and the colours of my backdrop reflect off the walls and I can tell my classmates are anticipating a boring speech of which they have heard before, but I can't do that, I have to surprise them, and so I shall.

I turn back to look at the current slide on the screen, the gay pride flag, surely making some of my classmates click into defensive homophobe mode, and I turn to face them, prepared.

"I'm sure we've all heard about Homophobia, about the suppression of those who do not fit society's idea of normal, whether you back it or not, I bet you don't know about it's history".

Out of the corner of my eye I know that the slideshow now shows the pictures of three people, two boys, around the age of my classmates, and a woman, probably a few years older, the drawings look as if they were drawn by a young child from memory, which is exactly what they are.

"No, these aren't some badly drawn pictures of LGBTQ+ celebrities that you might hear about every now and then, even more so as we near June. These are actually three people from hundreds of years ago," I turn around and point them out, "Estrilda Ashdwon, Aldred Foreman, and Osric Brooker. These three people were drawn by a girl, who was the same age as the two boys at the time, Joan Corrington, she was well acquainted with the woman, Estrilda, family friends with the Brookers, and a childhood friend of Aldred".

The screen then flicks to a picture of an old book, that was said to once be a nice green colour.

"This was Joan's diary, in which she wrote down the accounts of these three people," now a thick brown book shows on the screen, "and this is a book of which the elders of the neighbouring village to where those three lived wrote of the affairs in their town".

"To understand this as much as possible with the information we have, we have to go back two years before the two boys became involved".

"Didn't you say this was about queers!" Isla yells from the back of the classroom and a few people laugh, others i can tell are not homophobes and feel bad, giving me sympathetic looks and burying their faces, Isla knows that some people in our class are not straight, one of the many reasons why she does this, and another reason why I keep talking without acknowledging her.