'Hope for the future'

Pushing aside his coffee, Catoe reaches into his pocket and pulls out a plastic Ziploc bag. He extracts a small black-and-white picture of a Sudbury High School senior, Ian Holmes, who is 17 and handsome.

Two months after the historic decision by the state Supreme Judicial Court that affirms the right of gays to marry, and as politicians in the Legislature ponder a counterstrategy, the gay community is celebrating and, at the same time, fighting to retain one of the more significant triumphs in their quest for equality. Of the many people who have responded publicly to the ruling, those who have been heard from the least are those who will

live longest with the ruling and be most affected by it: gay teenagers. There's a reason for reticence. Given the difficulty of gay adolescence, some fear their public comments might lead to taunts at school or harassment at work.

Not Catoe.

"I'm not afraid to get hurt," he says, "and I'm not afraid to be made fun of."

A junior at Groton-Dunstable Regional High School, Catoe has publicly acknowledged his homosexuality for three years, and without apology. On the contrary, he's eager to talk about life as a gay teenager, the impact of the court decision, and about Ian.

"The main thing for young gay people," he says of the court's decision, "is that it gives kids, like, you know -- wow! -- there's hope for the future. I mean, I can live a normal life."

Such elation is no surprise to Grace Sterling Stowell, executive director of the Boston Alliance of Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgendered Youth, who remembers taunts at Bedford High School in the 1970s. She likens the potential impact of the gay-marriage ruling to that of the Massachusetts Gay and Lesbian Students' Rights Law passed 10 years ago and even to what she calls the depathologizing of gays by the American Psychiatric Association more than a quarter-century ago.

"To be able to marry the person you love is a fundamental legal and civil right that till now was denied to our community," she says. "It's not going to change the daily lives of teens, because they're in school, but symbolically it's important because it enables them to grow up knowing they're full citizens and that their sexual orientation does not make them less than anyone else."

For Holmes, it's a chance to dream.

"I'm only 17, so the ruling doesn't mean much to me right now, but at least there's the option of looking forward to getting married, and I can talk about it with Pat," he says. "He and I have this connection. I've known him only a few months, but it's like I've known him for years. It's scary."

At the restaurant, Catoe returns the photograph to the Ziploc but cannot stop talking about Ian.

They met on a Wednesday in December. Catoe had come to Boston to testify at a forum at the Harvard Club, asserting before the Governor's Commission on Gay and Lesbian Youth that when gay teens are harassed in school, corrective action is the responsibility of the faculty, not the victims.

"Derogatory terms directed to homosexuals are common in schools," he told the commission. "The terms `fag' and `homo' are used so latently they are not recognized as hateful. But these words are on the same continuum of hatred as `nigger,' `Jew,' or `spic.' "

That night, at a meeting of the Boston Alliance, Patrick and Ian were introduced. They talked about schools, politics, and gay issues. And they flirted.

"Ian said he was excited that we can get married," says Catoe, "and we laughed, because what he meant was that gay people can get married, but it came out as if he and I would get married."

For their first date Ian invited Patrick to lunch at Filho's Cucina in Groton. They ordered cheesecake and split it, then Caesar salad and split it.

"It was obvious that we were a couple," Catoe says between sips of coffee. "We don't try to hide it. I hold his hand in public. I kiss him in public. While we're in line at California Pizza Kitchen at Natick Mall, I'll lean against his chest and give him a hug, and why not? Love is love.

"Ian's been out of the closet since eighth grade, same as me. His mother knows, and she's invited me to Sudbury to sleep in a guest bedroom. We go through the same things straight people do, but the main difference is probably just the intercourse part. Otherwise, we love one another the same way everyone else does. [Gay people] are no different."

How does a mother respond to news that her son is gay?

"I have a 25-year-old daughter who's a rigger, and she called me once from a construction rig 100 feet in the air and told me she could see a tornado coming. If I can handle a call like that, I can handle the news that my son is gay," Patrick's mother, Patty Catoe of Mattapoisett, says. "Besides, who am I to judge what they are or who they become. Whatever they become, they will always be 110 percent in my eyes and in my heart."

Ian's mother, Marilyn Holmes, has been through a similar experience. "I've accepted this," she says. "I have a gay brother, an Episcopal priest who came out in the 1970s, when it was more difficult. That made it easier when Ian was 14 and I found out he was gay. I was surprised, but we sat down and talked about it. I know teens who hold it in because they're afraid of what their parents will say, and in some cases that can lead to suicide. People have to accept gay people for who they are, not their sexuality.

"I'm very proud of Ian," she says. "He doesn't do drugs. He doesn't drink. He doesn't get into trouble. The Lord made Ian the way he wanted, and I accept that."

Committed to the future On the last weekend of the old year, Patrick and Ian committed to each other exclusively, and at Ian's house, in the living room over submarine sandwiches, the conversation turned to their wedding, a dream that a year ago would have been futile.

"We decided the ideal would be a wedding on the beach at sunset, and afterward everybody could go swimming," said Patrick. "Ian thinks that the one who was proposed to should wear the white tux, and the one who did the proposing should wear black -- I think that's adorable -- and our cake would have a rainbow with lots of colors. It was fun to imagine.

"I told him I was going to write my own vows, and if it's going to be a gay marriage, then we're going to make sure it's a good gay marriage. And at my wedding, I want to dance with my mom. I want that so bad."

Catoe remembers a sense of awareness at age 8 that something was different.

"GI Joe was 10 times more fun than a Barbie doll, you know what I mean? Strictly on the way they looked. I knew that, and I came to terms with it when I was 14. It was so natural. It was like, I'm gay! That's the way it is."

Catoe's self-reliance may be rooted in a peripatetic childhood.

He was born in South Carolina, and his mother moved the family 24 times to escape an abusive husband before settling in New England. From sixth to 10th grade, he attended Old Rochester Regional High School in Mattapoisett, and when he confided to friends that he was gay, word passed quickly that Old Rochester had its first openly gay student.

"I told people, `I don't care what you think of me, but if you're going to yell `faggot' at me, I already know this. I know I'm gay. So does the entire school, so get over it."

Now 6-foot-1 and 180 pounds, Catoe is physically imposing, which may have discouraged confrontations.

"Yes, there were threats, but I'd say: `I'm not afraid to get hurt. So if you're going to make fun of me, then be ready to have someone come back at you, because I'm not going to let someone walk over me.' "

The venue that aroused the most fear among all students was the bathroom.

"They'd say, `Watch out if I'm in the bathroom,' and I'd say, `What are you going to do, point a finger at me and laugh? We're not in kindergarten. We're in high school, so get over it.' Gym was rough. Gym will always be rough for every openly gay teen, because you walk into the locker room and suddenly you're there in underwear and you're singled out. People would make sure I was turned around before they took off their pants. So I'd just go in 10 minutes late. Even for someone like me who is openly gay and comfortable with myself, it's no fun."

A clean slate Having suffered a heart attack brought on by stress and anxiety, Catoe's mother was unable to care for him when he was a teenager. Catoe had a bout with drugs and alcohol and spent his 16th birthday in a shelter, but he's been clean and dry, as he puts it, for 19 months and now lives in Groton with a foster father, Robert Feldmann, who is gay.

"Patrick is charismatic and confident," says Feldmann, 36, an environmental consultant. "He's not ashamed of being gay, because there's no reason to be, and he knows that."

It was Feldmann, says Catoe, who saved his life.

"It was him or the shelter. Where I live now I can be myself. I can invite boyfriends over and not have them dress straight or talk straight or whatever. I'm living the normal, average, fun life of a 16-year-old."

Upon enrolling at Groton-Dunstable high school in September, Catoe was determined to maintain a low profile. On the third day, however, in sociology class, the topic turned to suicide, and the teacher noted that gay teens were more likely to commit suicide than straight teens. Catoe was eager to hear a response. He didn't have to wait long. One student said he wished gay kids would kill themselves more often.

"I stood up and yelled that I was gay and how dare he speak like that," Catoe says.

In the ensuing discussion, he heard an earful.

"One kid said he didn't understand how gays did things. I said, you don't have to understand if you're not gay. Another said he didn't like gays, and I said, well stop thinking about it. Another complained about the idea of gay foster parents, and with me having just moved in with a gay foster family, and really caring for Bob, that made me fly off the handle. I said, `Look, some kids would kill to have any place to stay, whether the people were gay, straight, black, white, or whatever.

"Then someone used the word `fag' and I said what I said at the Harvard Club, that `fag' has the same hatred as `nigger' and `spic,' but you guys are too stupid to realize it. Then I stopped, because prejudice goes both ways, and when I started calling them stupid, I knew I had to get out of there."

He went to the office of the guidance counselor, shaking in anger, and rejected a suggestion that he switch classes.

"I said I'd go back with a rainbow on my backpack and a sticker that says `Does anyone know I'm gay?' It's a joke, because of course everyone knows."

Word circulated about the confrontation, and in the hall some students congratulated Catoe.

"Eventually, people respected me, because when it comes to hatred the best defense is the best offense. Show you're not afraid and people back away."

Maybe someday Patrick will open the New York nightclub he dreams about. Maybe Ian will become, as he hopes, a fashion designer. Maybe they will marry, maybe not. But meanwhile, like other teen couples, due to the Supreme Judicial Court decision, now they can dream.

"I know now that one day I'll dance with my mom at my wedding," Catoe says, "and thank you, government, for finally making it OK."

Jack Thomas can be reached at thomas@globe.com.