In 2024, six gay guys in the city of Toronto moved against me. I’ve been calling them “My Six.” Via soft to not-so-soft “launches” on Instagram, I learned that six men from my past had coupled up with each other, forming three uniquely beautiful and, to me, torturous unions. This was extra challenging because each of these men had dumped me, forcing me to reckon with the fact that what must have bonded them together was their rejection of me. In my head, this is all they talk about to this day.
None of these men were going to be the loves of my life. One or two had a moderate effect on my psyche, but most of them could hardly qualify as anything more than decent sex or vague romantic chemistry. My first was a hot body to lust after for a couple of weeks in university. My second was the first boy I ever thought I loved, and acted as the catalyst for coming out to my family. My third introduced me to The Real Housewives of New York, the current love of my life. My fourth and I avoid each other at parties. When my fifth ended things, he called me while I was studying for my final exams, and as soon as it was clear that he was breaking up with me, the only way I could think of to cling to any shred of dignity was to start typing as loud as possible on my laptop and respond only with mmm-hms and totallys to make myself sound as uninterested and unaffected as possible. My sixth bought me dinner on our second date because I had asked him to do so beforehand, despite our obvious lack of connection.
By the time they all got together, my ego had mostly healed from the rejections, but each coupling still threw me for some kind of loop. Beyond my own unhappy singledom, I resented them for daring to recover from the loss of me in their lives, and joining forces in their rejection of me. These assaults to my dignity made me feel claustrophobic in my dating pool and in my city. Aside from my curse of having lived a few blocks away from multiple exes, gay guys in the city are destined to be regularly confronted by their past in the form of past flings. Despite my best efforts, My Six remain series regulars in my daily life. This has factored into my decision to start anew in London, the Toronto of Europe.
Most (queer) readers will relate to this tangled and messy dating reality. My Six may seem like a Tuesday afternoon to my L, T, Q and 2S+ sisters who don’t have the apps designed for instant dating gratification that we gay guys are blessed and cursed with. But I hope my story is nonetheless relatable and comforting. Like many others, I’m constantly playing the game of figuring out how many mutuals my new crush and I share, whether my ex is one of those people and whether or not I am yet again competing for their affection, especially with that one twink who could be cast as my better-looking twin. And if somehow they make it through that assessment with flying colours, I simply have to assume that they’ll end up in a polycule with my exes in the next few years.
What were My Six missing in me that they found in each other? What question did they answer for each other that I couldn’t? And, most importantly, why couldn’t I?
Exes and flings are a metric of time that I rely on heavily. Where others may lean on their God-given autobiographical memory, landmark events or developmental milestones, I have an easier time recalling boys to build my narrative of time. Ruminating on My Six, I’m forced to reflect on where I was, who I was and how I was doing while dating each of them. They span my closeted Queen’s University undergrad experience, my substance- and regrettable-tattoo-fuelled COVID era, my confused year of working in advertising for a major Canadian home-improvement brand and my identity-crisis-laden master’s degree. I suspect that this may be the crux of the claustrophobia I’m feeling in Toronto. I’m constantly reminded of my dating faux pas and the parts of my growing up that I haven’t yet embraced as being golden moments of learning.
This past summer, I was dumped rather unexpectedly, drunk off two-for-one spicy margaritas, mere days before Pride Weekend. Not only was there no Pride to be felt that weekend but I was totally undone by the uncoupling. Inside the comfort of the relationship, I was able to forget about the shame and insecurities that My Six incites, freeing up mental energy to live my life completely occupied by different self-made crises. However, once my boyfriend was gone, a build-up of shame was there waiting for me. With time, therapy, friends and multiple threats to run a half-marathon, I have been falling back in love with myself. Needless to say, I’m hoping to feel more Proud this year.
After a year in that relationship, I recently re-entered the hallowed halls of Grindr U. After setting up my mostly blank (sexily indifferent?) profile, I am back in the perennial habit of making weak passes at, and hollow sexual promises to, strange men and boys I’ve made shy eye contact with across the dance floor at some queer rave we keep going back to, no matter how little fun we had at the last one.
I had hoped that the options on my grid would have completely refreshed since I’d been away, and that there would be a whole new platter of torsos to choose from. Not only was this not the case but, to my horror, the ads have gotten even more persistent, and the grid has literally gotten smaller. So I am back to being mostly ignored by the same Toronto-famous art hoes, twunks, circuit gays and daddies. While my exercise of Grindr-ing is undoubtedly fuelled by the same self-flagellating cycle that my therapist and I have been discussing the possibility of breaking, I was hoping it would still offer a way to reconnect with my community. This hasn’t happened, but I haven’t lost all hope.
My Six represent major pain points for my self-esteem, but maybe I can choose to see them as a representation of the tight-knit network of Toronto gays I’m part of. I often neglect to appreciate the community that my sexual and romantic proclivities have gifted me. I’ve had two significant relationships and countless situationships born out of dating apps and the gay network. I’ve also met some really quality gays on dates that have turned into valuable friendships. At the end of the day, I couldn’t say that I would trade this in for a more emotionally convenient dating experience. So yes, sometimes gay dating can feel suffocating, but sometimes the cost of community is inconvenience. Maybe the pain doesn’t mean I’m excluded—it means I’m embedded.
And so, as I plan my trite relocation from Toronto to London, I’ve been reflecting a lot on my time here and my relationship to the city and its gay guys. Having been here for the better part of my 26 years, I’ve lived a lot of different lives in Toronto. I’ve been in and out of the closet here, in love and heartbroken, a student and a not-so-recent grad, employed and unemployed, a friendly face and a social pariah, a server at an inexplicably successful Italian chain restaurant and a server at an Instagrammable Dundas West bistro. Maybe everything will be different, but I hope it’s not. London will have a fresh crop of faces and torsos, but I hope I quickly find myself in a sexy and welcoming tangled web of gays. I’m looking ahead to a lot of unknowns, but for now, I have My Six.
And if you’re reading this and thinking that you may be one of them, you’re not. Unless, of course, it’s made you reconsider everything and you want to give us another chance, then it’s probably you, and I’ll be waiting with open arms! And lastly, to my seventh and eighth, whether here or across the pond … I shudder to think about who you may be.
Why you can trust Xtra