I suspect the reason why so many gay stories, especially stories written by teenagers, that have so much "Schmaltz, saccharine, sickening" romantic plot lines, is because they are basically writing wish fantasies. How they wish, fantasize about how their lives could be lived, as opposed to the way they really are. Who can blame them; life is hard sometimes, even today, for gay teens. I remember that time so many years ago, and even being 44 now; I still feel the temptation to write that way. But I have also read a lot of dark stories about teenage gay life filled with drugs and sexual abuse. Maybe when you confront the worse that could possibly happen in fiction, what happens in real life does not seem so bad in comparison.