The celebration for the pair of Nevada high-schoolers whose touching "promposal" and subsequent gay-straight slow dance are currently lighting up the Internet hasn't been limited to virtual fawning, as Ellen DeGeneres proved last week.
But the festivities hit a snag when a family member tried to order a cake from the local Walmart that included the word "gay," reports Las Vegas TV station KVVU.
The teens became media stars soon after Jacob Lescenski asked his best friend, Anthony Martinez, to attend the prom after he learned Martinez didn't have a date but had always dreamed of going to prom with a boy. Martinez is gay, Lescenski is straight.
"You're hella gay, I'm hella str8," read the promposal banner Lescenski unfurled before Martinez. "But you're like my brother, so be my d8?"
Martinez's aunt Jennifer Sandoval was so overjoyed at all the positive attention her nephew's promposal received that she decided to present the boys with a custom-decorated cake to enjoy before the dance.
Sandoval went to a Walmart on Las Vegas Boulevard in the hours before the prom Saturday, according to KVVU. She showed the clerk a cellphone picture of what she wanted inscribed in icing: “You're gay, he's straight, you're going to prom, you couldn't have had a better date.”
The associate told her she couldn’t write that because the inscription contained the word “gay.”
Sandoval told KVVU she asked for a supervisor.
"Supervisor takes my phone, looks at it, and was like stuck for a minute,” Sandoval told the station. “And she was like, 'OK, I'm sorry, we can't use this.' And then I said, 'I'm going to ask you what I asked her because you're the supervisor. Why can't I use this? I don't understand. It's one word. It's gay.’”
Sandoval expressed her disappointment in a video uploaded to Teen Vogue that shows the teens preparing for their date.
Ultimately, she decided to settle for a cake with a different message in icing: "You matter, prom kings."
And as it turns out, the prom kings matter to Walmart too. A spokesperson for the retail giant told KVVU they are investigating the issue, but noted that corporate management had not been consulted in this case and said there is no store policy against the word "gay" being written on a cake.
According to KVVU, a store manager was going to attempt to make it right with Sandoval, but she told the TV station that while she appreciates the gesture, it's a little too late.
She only wanted “to make my nephew happy, to see a smile on his face," said Sandoval. “I love that smile, to see that smile — that's all I wanted, and I'm disappointed. I really am.”
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