“Thank you,” I said, catching Stacey’s eye as she clapped and whooped. Matt stuck his thumb up, but the glaringly obvious empty seat next to him made my stomach flip. Will hadn’t arrived, and despite assurances that he wanted to be at the premiere, he wasn’t in his seat.
“Oh my goodness, this all feels like it’s been a long time coming. Not just the length of time it took to put it together, but the journey before that. The one that brought me here.” I looked to Dr Chris, sitting in the front row who was dabbing her eyes with a handkerchief. It had a rainbow flag embroidered in the corner and the bright colours were so vivid to me, it was like Elliott was shining a light on them.
“My brother, Elliott took his life when he struggled to accept his sexuality. I made it my mission to make his short life mean something. I started volunteering at the LGBTQ+ sexual health clinic – where we had been given so much support – and through this work I realised that young people are continuing to struggle in more ways than I had anticipated. Social media and instant connection are powerful. It’s both positive and negative, hard and soft. It has an impact. Young people are comparing each other. There is so much competition and most of it is unobtainable. The young people I work with are chasing perfection, whether it be body image, lifestyle, relationships or sex.” I took a breath and smiled before carrying on. “Porn is readily available. People are accessing it at a younger age, all tastes are catered for, all levels of soft and hardcore porn can be found with the click of a mouse or the tap of a screen. I’m not against the porn industry, but I am against the acceptance that in reality, sexual relationships have an anything goes mentality. This film is about the promotion of mutual consent and safe sex. It’s about taking the stigma out of testing yourself for sexually transmitted diseases and HIV. I wanted to show that it should be an acceptable part of self-care and sexual health. We want conversations to happen as a result of this film.” Margot held up her hands and whistled. “I didn’t want to be the next big thing in porn.” I laughed, stepping back from the podium and collecting myself. “I’m not going to change the porn industry. There will always be films catering for all tastes and kink, but if I can deliver one thing, it’s the message of safe sex and that porn doesn’t have to be nasty or scandalous. It can be beautiful and made out of love.”
I heard a door at the back of the cinema. Mickey opened it and his silver sequinned jumpsuit, catching the sparkles of the large chandeliers above was eclipsed by the person standing next to him. Will looked around until he found me in the middle of my speech standing at the front of the packed cinema. He was holding a bunch of red roses and he held them up, offering them to me from so far away. I smiled as Mickey looped his arm with his and took him to the seat that had been waiting for him since the beginning of the night.
Oh, man, he looked good. His white shirt framed him like a boss. Dark denim jeans, formal shoes. His hair was longer. Curly. He’d tried to tame it, but it had given him a delicious just-rolled-out-of-bed look. His face had the best kind of scruff and he was wearing his Clark Kent glasses. I placed my hands on the podium and tried to take deep breaths, remembering a breathing technique where you imagine you’re blowing a bubble until it popped.
I laughed as Stace gave him a death stare and mouthed, Where the fuck have you been?
“Before I go,” I continued. “I wanted to say that this film came from a place of love. In fact, it was surrounded by love. The love for my brother and keeping his memory alive. My love for Doctor Chris and the clinic. Reid and James, a real-life couple who were kind enough to show their love on camera.” I watched as they kissed, and laughed as they stood and took a bow on my avid encouragement. “Thank you so much for being real and raw. The importance of having an emotional connection is non-existent in sex education and it was so important to me that we captured it within this film.” More applause, more cheers, more whoops. I waited until it calmed down and there was an opportunity for me to meet Will’s gaze and talk only to him.
“Love grew for me because of this film, with a man who should be credited as joint producer because there were so many ways he helped me through this. I found a clear focus because of him. He showed me what sex should be like.” I looked up and found him staring at me, he couldn’t take his eyes away. “We did a lot of pissing about, Will.” He smiled. “Denial was the culprit. I didn’t want to ruin a good thing with sex, but we didn’t ruin it. We only increased what we had…doubled it in size. Tripled it!”
The crowd cheered again, and Matt slapped Will on the back. He didn’t flinch. Eyes on me. Hooded. Lustful. Full of wonder. “I thought I messed it up.” He fiddled with his glasses. “I was scared because I’d never had anyone
