Andrew encourages Billy to embrace his sexuality and to do what he feels is right. Town pariah Marty Saybrooke (Susan Haskell) eavesdrops on Billy and Andrew's counseling session. Marty seeks a romantic relationship with Andrew, but her advances are rebuffed. Angry, Marty goes to Billy's parents and tells them Andrew is a homosexual and molesting Billy. Billy's parents, Walter (Hogan) and Virginia Douglas (Susan Pellegrino), proceed to wage a campaign against the moral character of Reverend Carpenter and his Saint James Church. Andrew's girlfriend Cassie Callison (Laura Koffman) receives an anonymous letter calling her a "fag lover." The church is vandalized with hate speech, leading its vestry to ask the priest to come out, but he refuses, avowing a right to privacy. Andrew campaigns to bring the NAMES Project AIDS Memorial Quilt to Llanview and place a patch on it in honor of his brother, which angers Sloan.
