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This story is part of a special feature package celebrating Selena, the Queen of Tejano. Lee la historia en español aquí.
On a humid, warm night in the spring of 2008, at a party in McAllen, I met the man who would become my first boyfriend. After staring at me all evening from across the room, he finally walked up, introduced himself, and asked who I knew there. “Hardly anyone,” I said.
“Good,” he replied. “I don’t know anyone, either. Do you want to get out of here?”
“Where did you want to go?” I asked.
He shrugged and said, “Let’s go to Whataburger.”
The breeze blew weakly through palm trees as we drove. We ordered double Whataburgers in the drive-through, then settled into the garishly lit parking lot to eat. Hundreds of moths fluttered around the lights, reminding me of the Friday night football games I used to watch in my hometown of Harlingen. As we ate in silence, too nervous to look at one another, he played the only Selena album that he was familiar with at the time—her fifth, Dreaming of You—on the car stereo. Later that night, after we went to his condo on South Padre Island, ostensibly to walk along the beach, I held his hand while humming the bridge to the album’s title track. When we shared our first kiss later that evening, “I’m Getting Used to You” swayed gently in the background.
It’s not unusual for South Texas queers to have tender, personal Selena stories. In the years since her death, she has become a gay icon, especially in Texas and especially among queer Tejanos. But how is it that a Jehovah’s Witness from Lake Jackson who never, to my knowledge, expressed explicit support for her gay fans has come to occupy such an important place in many of their lives?
A big part of this stems from Selena’s life story. Her family, like so many...