I reach over over and switch on the lamp.
“It’s nearly two
in the morning for Christ’s sake. Two questions: who are you, how
did you get in and what are you doing here?”
OK, three questions.
Perhaps I shouldn’t have had that last glass of wine.
But once I am able
to focus properly I already know the answer to the first one. The
other two are going to take a bit more working out.
I wait for her to
speak first. After all, I already know and share most of her story.
“How long?” she
asks.
“From you to me?” It's August 2024, so just a couple of weeks over 9 years”.
“You look older obviously, but more confident and sure of yourself.”
“Compared to you,
or how I remember being you, yes, I’m in a fairly good place at the
moment. It’s not perfect and it’s not always been an easy road,
but we’ve got through it. Finding friends we could talk to and
confide in was a first step, even if only online, and a set of labels
(trans, bi-gender, gender fluid) that finally fitted how we felt. And
starting to learn not to worry – or indeed give a f**k – about
what other people might think when they see you, and accept that if
they have a problem then that’s theirs, not ours. That was really
liberating.”
“So do I go out
more?”
“Oh yes. Not
properly for a while yet. There’s a bit of a rough patch to go
though first, and then the world will get and feel very strange for a
couple of years, but once you’re out the other side of that things
will start to look up, especially as you get more confident about
yourself and your ability to blend in. One of the keys to that is to
pay attention to what other women are wearing and try not to draw the
wrong sort of attention. That short dress and those heels for
instance - especially when out unaccompanied after dark. I know,” I
hold up a hand to forestall her. “You’re worried you won’t pass
unless it’s dark. Don’t be. You don’t. I don’t. We’re tall,
my posture and walk is wrong and I probably give myself away the
moment I speak. We’re still working on that. But you know what? No
one really gives a toss. And if they read you and peg you as trans,
so what? There are some definite advantages to being older. You
become socially invisible. Most people don’t give you a second
glance or seem happy to treat you as you present. You won’t get
many wolf whistles as a 50 plus woman, but a cheery ‘love’ can
give you a buzz for the rest of the day.”
“Although,” I
add, jealously, “you do have better legs. They won’t look quite
that good again”.
“Maybe”, I muse,
“I should visit you instead so I can have your body and my
confidence.” She has the grace to look alarmed. “No, we’ve both
seen Invasion of the Body Snatchers. And not without a good
dose of jealousy, although neither us ever understood quite how the
heroine ended up swanning around the desert in that in that gorgeous
evening dress after being taken over. Perhaps even aliens have an
inner drag queen.”
“On the other hand
I have gained a bit more flab over the last few years, so with a bit
of help I can almost fake small tits and a bit of cleavage. We’ve
always wanted to have breasts, through experimenting with those pills
wasn’t such a good idea.” She smiles, nods.
“But please, for
our sake, don’t make a habit of going out dressed on your own late
at night. It’s not really safe.” Perhaps I should warn her of the
scary feeling of being followed late at night, feeling someone still
behind you whichever way you turned, but she’ll learn soon enough
and it’ll put a stop to many more night time jaunts,
“And at home…?”
The question hangs unspoken.
“No, that hasn’t
changed. But we’ve learned how to compromise, and give each other
time and space to do our own things, even if this is one thing we
still can’t share. I still wish, of course, though not without much
real hope. It would be nice (big understatement) to be accepted
rather than merely acknowledged and tolerated. Birthdays and
Christmas can still be tough. Outside the house, though, I can be a
bit more open, less guarded.”
“Do other people
know about you/Susie/us?”
“A few. It means
not always having to pretend or cover up any longer any, which is a
relief.”
“How many? Who?”
“Sis initially,
then big brother. Not mum though.” I don’t say what provoked that
first drunken coming out. It’ll be too much to cope with. I’m not
sure I can reply on the MIB memory wipe thing, and there are some
thing you shouldn’t know in advance, especially family
bereavements.
“Two or three
people in fandom who we’ve known for years. I think you can guess
who. Then three people on the new Pride Committee at work when I
first joined. Rather more now since I attended the last Witney Pride
March as Susie. The family don’t know about that one yet, though.”
“You did what?!”
“I thought it was
time I lived up to the slogan on the company’s Pride t-shirt
-“Bring Your True Self to Work’. OK it wasn’t work exactly, but
we had a banner and a place in the march as one the sponsors, and a
stall at the event. Although nothing’s been said about it since.”
She’s starting to
fade a bit and go transparent. I can see part of the wall behind her.
Her coffee remains untouched.
I’m aware I’m
talking to much. But there's so much to tell her. To reassure her.
“Listen”, I say.
“It’ll be alright. I’m -you’ll be – happy. Or if not happy,
content. Just stay away from TERFs and right wing politics and media.
Not that I need to tell you that. There’s an anti-trans backlash
coming. It won’t be pretty. But real people will have a lot more
important things to worry about than whether the unusually tall woman
walking along the canal path or in a park, shopping or waiting at a
bus stop is trans or not. You’ll do all of those in time, and more.
Though you still need to be wary of
teenage girls in groups. On their own there’s no
problem, they’re usually too busy looking at their phone to even
notice you, but in groups of three or four they seem to develop a
collective t-dar that can result in odd looks or giggles that can be a bit unsettling. Older women, though, are quite happy to chat to you at a bus stop or in a queue without giving any indication of anything amiss.”
“T-dar?”
“Sorry. Trans
radar. It’s a term I picked up from a friend. You’ll develop one
of your own because we are constantly watching people around us for
clues as to how to try and fit in. You can’t help it.”
“You’ll have
good days. Euphoric ones even. Ones you’ll look back on and
remember fondly. You’ll have a bucket list of things you want to do
as Susie and see a lot of those ticked off. Days out in the park,
visits to art exhibitions, museums and church sales, tea rooms,
shopping.”
I open the phone and
scroll through folders of photos of Susie out at different times and
places.
“Wow. That’s
quite a lot. I see what you mean about dressing down when out. That
little red number would attract all sorts of unwanted attention.”
“Outside of our
private fantasies, yes.” We haven’t changed that much it seems,
though it now requires a longer stretch of imagination from my
perspective than it would from hers. In 2015 she could still get away
with something that short without her internal critic muttering
something about mutton and lamb.
“And as someone
pointed out recently, as a group we are notoriously prone to self documenting.
But then so is almost everybody else now on social media. Posting photos
is a mix of holding on to and preserving the good times as well as looking for a bit of validation or reassurance. Plus, it has to be said, an element of narcissism.”
I point the phone at
her and take a quick snap.
“That’s
strange.” She’s not there. Not in the photo anyway, although I
can still see her sitting across from me even if I can see most of
the wall behind her now. I’ve heard of camera shy (try getting
non-Susie me in a group photo) but this is taking it to an extreme.
Struck by a sudden thought, I turn the camera around a take a quick
selfie. No, I’m still there. I wince a bit and delete it. Not that
this really proves anything. Dreams have their own peculiar logic. If
this is a dream. I can never remember my dreams anyway, except as
short disconnected fragments. And aren’t ghosts supposed to be
scary and bring dire warnings rather than appearing as nervous
figures from the past looking for reassurance? Or is it me that’s
looking for reassurance, that while not perfect, things have actually
turned out to be OK after all, or at least something I am reasonably
comfortable with? It’s nearly three am now and my brain really
isn’t up to this.
She’s almost
disappeared now. I wonder what will happen when she’s finally gone.
Which of us will wake up and remember any of this?
I can still just
about see her. I’m tempted to give her a hug before
she goes but I don’t know what would happen or whether it would
freak her out. And then it’s too late.
“It’s nearly two
in the morning for Christ’s sake”, I hear someone say before the
room floods with light.
*****
This was partly inspired by an article written by a friend of mine about an imaginary conversation with her younger self in a dream. Then though my Tumblr page is long deleted my account seems to be still active and sent me an email to remind me that Susie turned 9 on the 18 July, around the same time I started this blog, and the two came together and set me thinking about what had happened in the time between then and now.
xx
S
