Southern Michigan University seemed like a breath of fresh air to Nancy, especially now that classes were under way. Spearfish Lake and all the hassles that went with it were behind her.

Last summer had been especially bad, what with Mary Lou making such a pain in the ass of herself. The stupid bitch seemed to think she owned the world, and that everything ought to be done for her. It was especially good to be away from that!

Right from the moment she’d asked Jack and the others for assistance, they’d been nothing but friendly and helpful. The fact that Vixen loathed Mary Lou about as much as Nancy did may have had much to do with it, but the result was still the same – she’d made it out of Spearfish Lake without a confrontation with Mary Lou, and especially not another bad scene like graduation. Mary Lou ought to have realized back then that it would solve nothing and only drive Nancy even farther away from her, if such a thing were possible.

Mary Lou was still out there, and the likelihood of her being a problem at some point in the future was a possibility, at least if what Summer had gotten from Ashley Keilhorn was correct. By now Mary Lou ought to have gotten the idea that she had no intention of going to Meriwether – what a repugnant thought! – and that she had no intention of having anything to do with her former lover again.

But that was in the past, and Nancy was looking to the future, a future without Mary Lou, a future outside of the rumor mills of Spearfish Lake. Once again, Jack, Vixen, and the rest had been a huge help in getting her situated in her small upstairs apartment, helping her get checked in and used to being around the campus. She hadn’t had much in the way of friends the past few years – again with the “friendship” of Mary Lou being an exception – but that was in the past, too.

One of the things Nancy wanted to come to grips with here at Southern was the question of just how much of a lesbian she really was. Much of her way through high school she’d more or less considered herself to be one, although inactive, until she and Mary Lou had started experimenting with each other. But the reality had proved to be somewhat less fulfilling than the dream had been, and whether it was because of Mary Lou or her own inhibitions was still an open question. She still hadn’t had much to do with boys, at least in that sense, and at least partly because there weren’t many boys at Spearfish Lake High School who would have anything to do with the school lesbian in the first place. But even while she’d been at Spearfish Lake last spring when the relationship with Mary Lou was going sour, Nancy had found herself considering the concept of boys with an interest she’d never had before.

By the time she’d had the final breakup with Mary Lou, Nancy had more or less come to the conclusion that she wasn’t totally a lesbian, but bisexual – or possibly even more heterosexual than that. Right at the moment, Nancy considered her classes to be her main priority, just ahead of staying rid of Mary Lou. But right behind that was the idea of doing a little exploration of her own sexual polarity. The only problem was that she didn’t have any idea of how to go about it. Even Jack and the others from her class in the Spearfish Lake House weren’t totally aware of her interest in this area but Nancy had a habit of keeping things to herself, and this was no different, so she wasn’t exactly looking for suggestions.

Then in the orientation sessions the existence of the Special Interest Groups had come up, and Susan had even mentioned the existence of the Gay-Lesbian-Bisexual-Trans group. Nancy had no idea if she would find the answer she was looking for there, but it was a good place to start. She started checking the Activities board regularly, and soon discovered that the first meeting of the GLBT SIG was going to be this evening.

Even now Nancy wasn’t sure she wanted to be quite that public about her interest, but rationalized that most people she knew thought of her as being a lesbian, anyway. It probably wasn’t going to be any big deal to be seen at a meeting of the GLBT SIG in the lounge of the Community Services Center. It wasn’t as if she had to go to a second meeting, after all.

She had no idea of what to expect at the meeting, and was a little nervous about it. It turned out to be something of a relief – there were about a dozen or so people there, and only a couple of them she would have picked out of a crowd as being gay or lesbian, though on closer inspection a couple of them seemed to be real flamers. There was a jug of punch, an urn of coffee, and some cheap store-bought cookies, probably to help make newcomers like her feel at ease.

About ten or fifteen minutes after the meeting was to have started, a guy got up and said, “Hi, everybody, especially to those who’ve come for the first time. I’m Milo White, and looking around I think I’m the senior member of this group. We’re a pretty informal group. We have a few activities, but mostly this is a way for us to get together and be social, to share our concerns, and maybe get a few answers to some questions we have. I don’t think of this as a hook-up group, but instead as a safe house where you will be welcome, but you can make of it what you wish. We are not here to cut anyone down for the interests or orientations we may have. This is mostly a get-acquainted meeting, and I see we have several new people here. I’ll just start this off by saying I’m from Cleveland, I’m a senior, and a math major.”

They went around the room introducing themselves, most with little more detail than White had given about himself. Nancy described herself as a freshman from northern Michigan and that she expected to major in nano-engineering. She did notice that there was one other nano-engineering major in the group, a freshman named Logan McBride. Nobody mentioned their sexual orientation.

“Yes, we’re all a little shy with each other,” White said. “So let’s get to know each other a little better by talking about high school. I’m sure we all have memories good and bad of what it was like in high school, and it’s rare in a group like this to find someone who didn’t have some tough times over what they were and what they wanted to be. I’m going to kick things off by saying that I had a fairly reasonable time in high school, though I was scared to death that I was going to get outed. My school was not very friendly to gays, and there were any number of gay-bashing incidents, so I took my partner’s advice to stay firmly in the closet. He was a little older and not in our school, so we could keep things low profile a little more easily than some. Still, I was glad to get out of there and come here where I could at least acknowledge who I am. Would anyone else like to tell a tale out of school?”

That got things rolling. The stories were a little shy at first, especially from the new freshmen, but they got more and more detailed. After a while, White directed the question to Nancy, who hadn’t said much so far. She replied that she hadn’t had an easy time of it; she’d been labeled as a lesbian early on, long before she’d done anything to verify it, even to her. “Then, I started going with another girl, who was a skank but who wanted to explore other girls,” she reported. “It wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t good, either. She finally got demanding and over-controlling and I had to break up with her. I haven’t done anything since, but I’m sure glad to be here at SMU so I don’t have to put up with her.”

That was a mild capsule summary; Nancy could have talked much longer, of course. There were a couple brief questions, but when they started to get personal White deftly moved on to another person.

Logan, who was not bad looking if on the small side for a guy, was a little more explicit. “My partner Ronnie and I started fooling around with each other while we were still in grade school,” he reported. “I think we taught each other most of what we knew, but he always seemed to be the one in charge. However, in a lot of ways we were pretty different and we grew apart while we were in high school. Our school was pretty liberal and we were pretty much in the open with each other, but he sort of fell in with a group of flamers, and I didn’t think that was my scene, so finally we just slowly stopped seeing each other. The last I knew he was working in a burger shack and wasn’t planning on going to college for a while, if at all.”

The talk went on for a couple of hours, never getting very specific, but people started to loosen up with each other. It didn’t die down until the coffee and punch were gone and the last of the cookies had been eaten.

“Good meeting, folks,” White said. “I’m sure as time goes on we’ll get a little more specific and personal with each other, but I think we made a good start tonight. Same time, same station next week. Anybody want to volunteer to bring refreshments?” Some upperclassman volunteered, and that seemed likely to be that.

“One other thing,” White said. “In a few weeks we’ll have Campus Activities Day. It’s traditional to hold off on that until after school has been in session for a while, so people new to Southern can get their feet under them first. In the past this group has set up an informational table and we’ve brought in several new people over the course of such events. All I can say is that we need to do it again, so keep it in mind and please offer to help out.”

Nancy walked out of the meeting glad she’d come. She hadn’t answered any of her questions but she hadn’t expected to this evening. It seemed like this was at least one step on a path that could give her some ideas of what she wanted to be. What’s more, she had the feeling that once she got a little more comfortable with the people in the group, she could be a little more open with them than she could even with Jack and the others at the Spearfish Lake House. These people, at least, had some idea of what she was going through.

*   *   *

Kyle Reed felt both incensed and insulted. A seventy-two-hour psychiatric hold! What an insult to a man of God! A man would have to be insane not to love God! And especially, to be taken to jail and put in the psych ward for preaching the Word of God! It was his duty to the Lord to bring the Word to the unsaved.

He’d prayed and prayed about it, and spent most of his time there reading a Gideon New Testament, since the police had taken his own treasured copy of the King James Version. Eventually the Lord had brought solace to him by reminding him of how in the Book of Acts the Apostle Paul had been placed in the stocks for preaching the Gospel, and how it had increased his faith. That had been a great inspiration and understanding that had allowed him to tolerate the insult.

After three days they’d let him go, apparently unable to charge him with anything. And well they should – he shouldn’t be considered a criminal for daring to preach the Word to the unsaved, even such heinous sinners as those on Fremont Street! What a Gomorrah San Francisco was! What a Sodom, especially with all the queers and sodomites! Why had he even come to this sinful place?

Why, indeed? He really hadn’t felt much of a leading from God as to where he ought to be ever since he left Kingston, and it had been clear the Lord hadn’t wanted him there, either. He’d been so blind he hadn’t realized that the one piece of guidance the Lord had given him was when he’d visited Hawthorne and seen what a travesty the honor of Hawthorne College had become. If there was any place that needed the Word of God more than San Francisco, it was there.

But that was a problem. When he’d been released from the holding section, they hadn’t even had the courtesy to take a man of God back to where they’d picked him up. It seemed as if he’d had to walk halfway across the city to where he’d left his car on Folsom Street – and it wasn’t there! There was no sign of it!

When he’d confronted the local police station about his missing car, he’d been informed that it had been towed to a holding compound, halfway across the city again. Since he only had a tiny amount of money in his pocket, once again he’d had to walk, only to find more bad news. The car was there all right – but it had been stripped and stripped again. It really was not surprising in this city of thieves, when the arrogant police hadn’t even allowed him to lock it up when they dragged him away from where he was trying to bring the Word to the unsaved. On top of that insult, the people at the holding compound wanted more to release the car than it had been worth before it had been stripped. Only the memory of the Apostle Paul in the stocks gave him any solace.

But with the car gone, he was without anything but the few dollars in his wallet. He’d had to sleep where he could, behind a dumpster a couple nights, in a homeless shelter another night. He’d tried to preach the Word there, but it hadn’t been appreciated. It was clear that the Lord was testing his faith, his commitment to his Mission. He knew in his heart that he would emerge from this trial even stronger, even more prepared to be a Servant of God. The Lord clearly wanted him to learn from this experience, to show his faith by making it back to Hawthorne and taking up his Mission there.

The lack of possessions wasn’t a burden; it was an opportunity. The Lord Himself hadn’t walked through Galilee carrying a moving van full of possessions; He only carried His faith with him, and Reed knew he could do no less. Hawthorne wasn’t out of reach, only far away, and he still had his thumb; the Lord would provide for everything else so long as he kept his faith.

*   *   *

Nancy didn’t know it, but at the same time the LGBT group was meeting in one room of the Community Services Building, Alan and Summer were at the meeting of the Wiccan SIG on the next floor.

Both Summer and Alan were committed pagans – albeit of slightly different flavors that they’d managed to reconcile over the past year. Both had come into their beliefs through family influence, Alan more recently and through distant relatives, while Summer’s mother and her older sister were passionate about their beliefs. As such, Summer was a little less than totally crazy about the students who gathered in the classroom, without the benefit of refreshments.

There were only two or three people there who seemed to have any idea of what they were talking about. The rest were foundlings of one kind or another who had picked up their idea of Wicca from books or the Internet, and who didn’t seem to have any real degree of belief in it. To them, it was something to play with. Oh, they may have mouthed the words, but she couldn’t sense any real feeling behind them.

Summer and Alan decided to just sit back, let the foundlings make fools of themselves, and at some point quietly approach the people who seemed to be more serious. It wasn’t that they were being arrogant about it, but they were serious, and wanted to share their feelings with like-minded people who were as serious and knowledgeable as they were.

Partway through the meeting, one of the foundlings – a girl named Elise – began to tell a story about a group of Bible-slinging students at their high school. The girl telling the story had two or three foundling friends who were playing around with the idea of Wicca.

“So one day, after these creeps had called us witches once too often, Sandra had enough. She stood up in front of them and said, ‘Of course I’m a witch, and I’ll prove it to you.’ She grabbed a plastic table knife, they’re the only kind we had in the cafeteria, climbed up on the table, held the knife high, and said, ‘Goddess, forgive me for coming before you with a plastic athame. I can hardly think of a worse abomination.’”

Summer rolled her eyes, and willed herself to not say anything – but she noticed a similar look on some of the others in the group, those she thought likely to share her thinking.

“So anyway,” the foundling girl went on, “Sandra proceeded to put on an entirely faked show for the benefit of the pinheads. She said some mumbo jumbo, then jumped down and said, ‘There. Bad things will happen to you.’ I mean, it was all bullshit but these Christian zombies were too dorky to believe it. But she’d no more than said it when one of these pinhead’s purse fell off the table, and out rolls four or five packages of condoms. And of course, she was embarrassed as hell, because what upstanding, righteous Christian girl is going to carry rubbers around in her purse?”

There was laughter around the room, and even Summer had to break out in a smile. Although the story was extremely disrespectful to the Goddess, it really was funny for Christian zealots to get their hypocrisy shown off like that.

“So for the next couple days,” the girl went on, “When anything bad happened, and I mean anything at all, like a pencil rolling off a desk, dropping a book, blowing a test, Sandra got blamed for it, but it sure was amusing to watch when it happened.”

A couple of the other foundlings had similar stories, if not just as bad. This was distressful to Summer, who was all but ready to get up and walk out. The Goddess was supposed to be taken seriously, damn it!

Eventually – and almost not soon enough for Summer and Alan – the guy who seemed to be the moderator of the group, Darrin, stood up and said. “I guess that’s just about that for tonight. Keep your eyes on the Activities board for notice of our next meeting.”

Summer and Alan were getting all set to leave, when Summer caught a sly signal from Darrin, something that made her wonder. She and Alan went over to talk to him, along with another girl who to Summer had looked to not like the atmosphere the foundlings had presented. Darrin looked at the three and said, “Did the rest of you find that as disrespectful to the Goddess as I did?”

“Very much so,” Summer replied. “It was all I could do to keep from getting up and walking out.”

“Me, too,” the other girl said. “I’m no new-found, I’ve believed in the Goddess for years and I take it seriously.”

“I do, too,” Alan said.

“Good,” Darrin said. “I thought I read the three of you pretty well. I was about ready to walk out myself, but I could see you agreed with me.”

“Is that what this group is like?” Summer asked.

“Not in the slightest,” Darrin smiled. “We have to have open meetings like this once in a while to provide a contact point, or else we might never make contact with new people who do truly have respect for the Goddess. The real meeting of the group is in half an hour at my apartment. You’re welcome to come join us so we can honor the Goddess together, and maybe get to know each other a little better.”

“What a relief,” Summer replied. “I was beginning to think that this was going to be more of the same old Alan and me against the world stuff. I’m glad to know there are some real believers around here.”

“We try to be,” Darrin said. “But there are too many halfwits running around like those we just saw so we have to be somewhat careful. But at the same time, we feel we need to be available to teach those who are willing to learn.”

“Alan and I have never had the opportunity,” Summer said. “It will be nice to be that much out in the open.”

“You’ve been hidden?”

“Very hidden. It was a miracle of the Goddess that Alan and I managed to find each other.”

“Then come on over to my apartment so you can be embraced by your fellow believers. It’s not far and I’ll be glad to lead you.”

Darrin’s apartment wasn’t far – about a block up the street past the Spearfish Lake House. They were greeted by a group of five others, one of whom Darrin introduced as his wife Bremusa, and two of whom had also been at the meeting. Darrin told the ones waiting, “It was the usual bullshit, but things went better than they normally do. While I don’t know these three well, they seem to be worthy of the respect of the Goddess.”

They all said, “Pleased to meet you,” as Darrin made introductions all around. They were just finishing up when there was a knock on the door. Darrin’s wife opened it, and they found Elise, the girl who had told the disrespectful story standing there; she’d changed her clothes. “Come on in, Elise,” Darrin smiled. “You did well tonight.”

“Goddess, that’s hard, but it needed to be done,” Elise said, shaking her head. “I always hate doing it, but it looks like it paid off again.”

“Huh?” Summer frowned. “I don’t get it.”

“Think about it,” Darrin smiled. “That story was a test, and Elise was the one who agreed to present it, so those of us who are really members of the group could see who is disgusted by someone showing disrespect to the Goddess. It’s part of how we filter out the wannabes and those who are unworthy.”

“Was that a real story?” Alan asked.

“It was,” Elise nodded. “I have to tell it about twice a year. The disrespect Sandra showed to the Goddess was one of the reasons I pulled away from that group and started to really learn what I was doing. It was one of the better things the Goddess did for me.”

Alan shook his head. “You guys are sneaky.”

“We have to be,” Darrin smiled. “Our traditions wouldn’t have survived this long if we weren’t.”

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