I was about a month late to the phenomenon that is Heated Rivalry, but I have been seeking out queer love stories in entertainment for most of my adult life. Usually I have to go looking for them, but this show was everywhere: Filling up my social media feeds, giving me a digital tap on the shoulder, whispering, “You need to watch this.”
So I did. And I’m not ashamed to tell you that I was swiftly a woman possessed. I watched every episode. Then I watched them again. And again. Those in the know call it a reheat.
Initially, I felt like the cliché of the middle-aged straight woman watching this show—except that I’m not. I’m queer, married, and raising my kids with Sam, my wife of 12 years. As I obsessively replay Ilya’s Russian monologue scene, I realize that what has drawn me to this story is not just the steamy love scenes or the sweet vulnerability, but that Shane and Ilya’s story reminds me of my own.
For so long, queer stories were often told through a violent lens; entertainment that highlighted suffering, loss, and heartbreak. It feels like queer stories that celebrate the joys of falling in love and finding community have only recently become mainstream, but still, they are not always easy to find.
I understand why straight women are flocking to this romance. Yes, there are sexy scenes between two very capable and attractive actors, and we get to see men in a light that doesn’t usually shine on them: Illuminated moments in which they are vulnerable, raw, and tender. But the feelings the series evoked in me were visceral, long buried memories of my own yearning, my own shame, of the questions I couldn’t quite answer.
Now that my daily routines are organized around work calls and grocery shopping and driving the kids to practice, watching Heated Rivalry has renewed my own infatuation with my wife, because, like Shane and Ilya, I loved her before I really knew her, before we got to the deep conversations and intimate confessions. I know from experience that sometimes our hearts know love before our brains have a chance to catch up. Watching this happen onscreen felt painfully, beautifully familiar.
When Sam pledged my college sorority in 2004 I had never considered my own sexuality beyond crushes on boys and occasional hook-ups. For months I didn’t have the language for my attraction to her, for the feelings she evoked in me, and when we finally kissed–in the dorm bathroom, after a night of drinking–I was a lot like Shane Hollander in the hotel room during his first sexual encounter with Ilya. This is a bad idea, I thought. This is a bad idea, I said. But I couldn’t help myself. I couldn’t stop myself.
Over the next couple of years our clandestine hook-ups had me feeling guilty and confused. I even tried to find my own Rose Landry, dragging a tall, handsome boy to sorority events and leaving him asleep in my bed during morning sorority board meetings. When Shane tells his mom, “I tried, I really tried,” I felt that sorrow. I tried too.
A straight, female mom friend of mine recently messaged me about Heated Rivalry. It’s all over my social media, she texted me, what is this? I’m a millennial, so I responded with a handful of excited and shocked emojis. Watch it! I told her. Let it rewire your brain. I checked in with her after each episode, and as the story progressed into something sweet and unexpected, she, like so many of us on our first watch, anticipated the fall out. We’ve been programmed to watch queer love stories through a lens of fear, waiting for the couple to be caught, to be outed, to be shamed. I promise you, I texted, it’s going to be okay.
While I’ll yap about Heated Rivalry to anyone who will listen, the conversations with my queer friends are different. We remember our own secret lives, our own versions of telling our parents who we were, what we were. There is an electricity as Sam and I recall–and settle into middle age–what we overcame to make a life together. We didn’t just overcome adversity, but we face it daily as queer people raising our family. This makes our “boring” everyday lives that much sweeter.
As I watch Ilya and Shane at the beginning of that journey, I know the path ahead will not always be a smooth one. I know, too, that no love story is forged without challenges.
As I live my own happy ending–adolescent confusion and fear that gave way to a long-term commitment and a beautiful family–I want to watch and read stories of queer people who are doing the same. I am grateful to see this piece of the queer experience come alive for a new audience. Our stories are not only written through adversity, but through bravery, vulnerability, and the quiet moments in which we can be ourselves, entirely. Beautiful freckles and all.
