Pageboy, page 22
Bloodwork and an EKG were required before the procedure. I walked east along Queen Street to LifeLabs, with each brisk step I grew closer. The day of my surgery, November 17, I went to the clinic alone, you were not able to bring a companion due to Covid. Mark dropped me off. Oddly, I was not nervous, all I wanted was the time to move, that bright light above while the ceiling and I grow apart. I was the second surgery of the day, one o’clock. You could not eat or drink anything, including water, before, which felt fine, because my stomach was interested in nothing. I waited in a small room with a bed, TV, and side table with a peaceful lamp. The nurse came in to take my vitals and talk over everything. The morning surgery was running over, so it would most likely be a while. I curled up in the bed, no TV, no book, no music, and I just lay there for three hours until it was time. Like the moment before I came out, holding myself.
On the table. Light above. Mouth covered. Down, down, down.
Mark picked me up after the three-or-so-hour procedure. He took a photo of me when he first walked in the room. I lay there, partially propped up, high as fuck, wearing a black compression vest, my nipples just removed and slapped back on. The smile on my face, in my eyes, the degree of contentment glowing off me, phew.
Mark drove me home from the clinic in Yorkville to where we were staying near Queen and Bathurst. My friend Marin was filming a different show in Toronto, but she would be back in New York for that month, so she offered her place. We made a spot for me on a daybed in the cozy living room with low ceilings. Mark had the bedroom upstairs with a wall of windows looking out onto a beautiful wooden terrace that was often occupied by raccoons.
The recovery felt appropriate, considering the operation. Those first couple days, meds a-rockin’, emotion seeped out like my blood in the dangling drains. Poor Mark contended with bursts of grief and anger, at all the time lost, at all the self-hate, at all that could have been. He’d sit with me, listen to me, rub my back, be patient with me. He monitored my medication and measured the drained blood, which dripped through two tubes that came from a tiny hole under each armpit. At the bottom hung little partially red, translucent orbs on either side of my waist.
I was grateful for painkillers and Shark Tank and Guy’s Grocery Games. Mark could be on Triple G or Chopped, I do believe. Something delicious was always brewing, from dal to apple crisp like nothing. No recipes and always delicious.
Mark stayed with me for a week and a half. A couple days post-op I had my wits about me again. After eating a meal, Mark started fiddling with the Omnichord he had brought, a synth instrument originally developed in 1981. Not very big, it can rest in your lap. With it you have everything from drums to guitar to organ, a little electric world to uncover. Melodies simmered with the rice, beats worked themselves out on the table, the crunch of a half-full popcorn bag offered an interesting sound. Finding the words and the flow, the tone and heart, we set up a recording zone in the compact spare room. Mark brought a 4-track and a microphone, and we started to put the songs together. We huddled, crouched on the carpet, listening back, recording again, lyrics scribbled, changing words, laughing and surprising ourselves, completely lost in creation, in each other, the moment, like being kids again. How lucky that we will always have those songs. How lucky am I for Mark, my love.
This was the most time we’d spent together since backpacking through Eastern Europe. Long, meandering journeys leading us back to the frigid winter in Queen West, Toronto, thirteen years after Juno’s premiere. He was my guest at that Toronto International Film Festival. I’ll never forget the look on his face when he saw me as hair and makeup did their final touches. His eyes were big, an expression like a stomach drop, he looked on with noticeable concern. I had the urge to take him aside, to explain, but what was there to say?
And after this, there was a drift. We no longer lived in the same city and I progressively disappeared as I tucked myself away. I didn’t want to see that expression on his face, I didn’t want to be reminded, I already knew. It all felt choiceless. And we never really did talk about it, I felt embarrassed, ashamed, betraying myself felt like betraying him, too.
He knew it wasn’t me then. Now, he knew it was.
A couple days after my surgery, we drove to High Park, one of our old haunts as teens. Overestimating my abilities, I grew weak as we were nearing the end of our stroll. Deep breaths, I took my time, not wanting to admit I might not make it. Walking up a hill, I winced. Closing my eyes, I felt Mark hold my hand, squeezing it tight, and we made our way home.
By two weeks I was up and back at it (somewhat). I just would not be able to lift anything over five pounds for the next couple months. I was alone, and changing my nipple bandages on my own was an adjustment. The shock of seeing them, bruised and unrecognizable, tiny bubbles of blood, every time thinking I’d done something wrong and every time learning I had not. The prospect of taking off the compression vest for good, to have my chest out, forward, unconfined … wordless, leaning into the mystical. But this was not my imagination. This was finally it. I had to block it out and just wait for the time to tick or it barely fucking ticked. A few more weeks.
The most painful point for me was having the drains removed. Massive needle after massive needle to freeze around the tiny holes under my pits. The nurse stood beside me, speaking calmly as I tried to let go, to embrace the hurt. When both sides were frozen the surgeon was set to remove the tubes. The nurse counted down from three … two … one, the doctor pulled, it wiggled under my skin, an angry worm forced out from my insides.
I purchased too many button-down shirts online. Typically too big, but some work out. Putting on each, I looked at my profile in the mirror, huge grin, running my hand from my neck to my abdomen. A mini fashion show, a montage sequence gone on way too long. My phone filled up with pictures of my smooth chest, the new angles, that smile. It healed well, as planned, my left side a few days behind the right.
And when the vest was gone and the nipple bandages done … well, I have no words for that.
* * *
As a trans person and a public one, the sensation is that I’m always pleading for people to believe me, which I imagine most trans people relate to. Tired of the wink and nod. When I came out in 2014, the vast majority of people believed me, they did not ask for proof. But the hate and backlash I received were nothing compared to now. Not even close. I was not nervous to tell anyone in my close circle when I came out as gay, but disclosing this new information felt different. I do wonder what some friends say behind my back, what they really think when they look at me.
I am sick of the creepy focus on my body and compulsion to infantilize (which I have always experienced, but nothing like this). And it isn’t just people online, or on the street, or strangers at a party, but good acquaintances and friends.
“You look adorable,” a pal said at an awards show after-party. Someone who is a Pulitzer Prize–winning progressive force. You’re feeling dashing AF, literally for the first time at an event, and then a friend has to roll in with that. Fuck you, “adorable.”
“Wow, one of my best friends is trans?!” a bosom buddy said in response to me being me.
“I guess that is just something you don’t make a comment about,” one of my dearest friends said on the heels of a long pause after I shared my decision to get top surgery, one of the first people I told. She most certainly made “a comment” without “making a comment” and proceeded to make more, offering her opinion unprompted. I couldn’t talk to her for a long time.
“My friend asked if you’re going to get the other surgery…”
“I was surprised to hear your voice, but I will get used to it.”
Or the classic: “This won’t give you all the answers, you know that, right?”
Of course. Nothing ever could.
Friends making quips about my facial hair growing in. Jokes about what name I should have chosen. A year and a half later and the pronouns are still just too much for some. I am patient, we all are endlessly learning and I’ve made the same mistakes, but sometimes patience wears thin. I know these instances and remarks may seem tiny, but when your existence is constantly debated and denied, it sucks you dry. Sprawled out, bare, I crave gentleness.
The truth is, in many ways, my narrative is still unfolding. I have been on testosterone for over a year now. Every Friday I wake up excited yet content, a new sense of calm in my life. I inject myself with forty milligrams of T, I’m changing, I’m growing, it’s all just beginning.
Let me just exist with you, happier than ever.
29
PEACHES
Mark and I arrived at the Opera House on Queen Street East early early. I have never lined up that far in advance for anything and been among the first few in line. We stood freezing in the Toronto winter. Peaches was playing. It was her tour after the release of her second record, Fatherfucker. I used to dance like a fatherfucker to it. Shirt off, sports bra tight, blinds down.
The moment we got in, we jogged to the stage, pressing our bodies against it. I waited irritably through the opener. They were good, but the time between them finishing and Peaches emerging crawled. The place continued to fill, lights of purple and red. A sold-out show. And tons and tons of queer people. Arguably the queerest space I had been in at that point in my life.
The Stranglers’ song “Peaches” came on, the lights lowered, signaling that she was about to start.
Walking on the beaches, looking at the peaches
The song is only slightly over four minutes, but it felt a whole lot longer, looking it up for this, I’d anticipated at least seven. It ended. Finally. And Peaches came out. Ferocious, confident, sexy, fearless. Barely clad in tight pink underwear and a black bra. There were dildos swinging, protruding out of the backup dancers’ crotches as “Shake Yer Dix” began. Spicy, gyrating queerness all around.
Girls and boys they want it all
Lay back and make the call
You need that flip, yeah really quick
And keep it so slow it sick
You gotta shake yer dix and yer tits
I’ll be me and you be you
Shake yer dix and shake yer tits
And let me be you, too
Sweat, smoke machines, cocks and tits … the show excelled, but more than halfway through, Peaches’s face narrowed, bending over partially, a soft sway, as if she might lose her balance. A concern fell over the crowd. She leaned forward, resting her hands on her knees, head down, she began to dry heave. The music stopped. Stumbling to the end of the stage, she projectile vomited blood, spewing it all over the audience. Music back on, everyone screamed. I had fake blood all over me. My hands in the air, Peaches grabbed my elbow and ran her hand up to my wrist, smearing the red along my arm.
She was radically herself in a way that not many people are, or at least not many people in my life had been. Being as shy as I was at the time, I was in awe of her ability to be so raw and bare. She was unapologetically sexual, bold, and aggressive, her work instilled with moments of beautiful vulnerability. I only wished to be that confident and liberated, to lose the dread that held me back.
Electrified, Mark and I skipped the streetcar and walked west along Queen, the 5.2 kilometers home. The “blood” on my forearm glinted under the streetlights, we stared at it, relishing the artifact as we bounced down the sidewalk. She was still with us, that show was still with us, the queerest thing I had ever seen, that possible world. I did not want to lose that. I would cherish the relic.
I showered with my arm sticking out through the side of the curtain. It was winter, and I would be wearing long sleeves anyway. I kept it for almost two weeks. For a sixteen-year-old trans kid, she offered something that I could not find elsewhere. A voice that said, fuck shame, fuck gender stereotypes, fuck not embracing your desires, and fuck not owning yourself.
Altered by the concert, it wasn’t just the fake blood I took home, but also a sense of discovery. I’d been in a new dimension where I’d touched my queerness, where I’d jumped and flailed in a crowd with people like me. A space for celebration, not ridicule.
I remember walking out the doors after the concert ended and a woman with a half-shaved head asking us, “How old are you guys?”
“Sixteen and fifteen,” we said. Hyper and exhilarated.
“Right on,” she exclaimed, seeming so proud and happy. Like all was right in the world.
Taking a deep breath, exhaling down to my toes, I wanted to hold on to the feeling, to pocket the joy, the fleeting moments of self-love. Marching home with Mark in the cold I felt the soles of my feet pressing the ground, one foot then the other. I sensed I was heading in the right direction.
Acknowledgments
Thank you to all the people who have helped me on my way to feeling present and alive enough to write this book. A special thank you to Julia Sanderson, who modeled queerness for me when I was younger and has stuck by me year after year. I wouldn’t have been able to write this, or be here at all, without your endless love and support. To my incredible editor, Bryn Clark, thank you for believing in me and this book and making it a reality. I don’t know how I got so lucky. My editor in the UK, Bobby Mostyn-Owen, thank you for your brilliance, insight, and heart. My agents at UTA, Albert Lee and Pilar Queen, thank you for thinking this possible before I did, for pushing me and making me make the time. Thank you to Meredith Miller and Zoe Nelson for all of your hard work and passion. Thank you to my manager Kelly Bush Novak for being on this journey with me, for all you’ve done and continue to do. Thank you to Courtenay Barrett, Amanda Pelletier, and all at IDPR. Thank you, Kevin Yorn, for always having my back. Thank you to my health-care providers, I wouldn’t be typing this right now if it weren’t for you and your care. Thank you to my friends who I reached out to while writing this book, for all of your guidance and support—Thomas Page Mcbee, Chase Strangio, Lauren Matheson, Kiersey Clemons, Madisyn Ritland, Mark Rendall, Star Amerasu, Nick Adams, Paula Robbins, Brit Marling, Marin Ireland, Cazzie David, Kate Mara, Ian Daniel, Catherine Keener, and Beatrice Brown. To my mom—I love you with all my heart, thank you for being so understanding and open, you truly inspire me. To all those who have created space in this world for me to exist, well, I don’t have enough words to express how fortunate I feel. This book yes, but really this newfound strength, joy, and connection is because of countless people, some I know and others I’ve never met. All of us on our winding paths, all of us in this together, I am grateful to be here with you.
Credits
Grateful acknowledgment is made for permission to reprint the following previously published material:
Lyrics from “A Song and Many Moons,” Words and Music by Beverly Glenn Copeland. (Granny Mabel Leaf’s Retirement Fund Music Pub) Copyright © Third Side Music SOCAN 2004. International Copyright Secured All Rights Reserved. Reprinted by Permission.
Lyrics from “Barbie Girl,” Words and Music by Johnny Mosegaard, Karsten Dahlgaard, Claus Norreen, Soren Rasted, Rene Dif, and Lene Nystrom. Copyright © 1997 Warner/Chappell Music Denmark A/S and Universal/MCA Music Scandanavia AB. All Rights for Universal/MCA Music Scandanavia AB in the United States and Canada Controlled and Administered by Universal Music Corp. All Rights for Warner/Chappell Music Denmark A/S in the United States and Canada Administered by WB Music Corp. Reprinted by Permission of Hal Leonard LLC.
Lyrics from “Anthems for a Seventeen-Year-Old Girl,” Words and Music by Brendan Canning, Emily Haines, James Shaw, John Crossingham, Kevin Drew, Jessica Moss, Justin Peroff, and Charles Spearin. Copyright © 2002 by Brendan Canning Music, c/o Southern Music Pub. Co. Canada Ltd., BMG Rights Management (UK) Limited, Josh Crossingham Publishing Designee, Kevin Drew Publishing Designee, Jessica Moss Publishing Designee, Justin Peroff Publishing Designee and Charles Spearin Publishing Designee. All Rights for Brendan Canning Music and Southern Music Pub. Co. Canada Ltd. Administered by Songs Of Peer, Ltd. All Rights for BMG Rights Management (UK) Limited Administered by BMG Rights Management (US) LLC. International Copyright Secured All Rights Reserved. Reprinted by Permission of Hal Leonard LLC, Peermusic, Arts & Crafts (Toronto), John Crossingham, and Jessica Moss.
Lyrics from “Scary Monsters and Nice Sprites,” Words and Music by Anton Zaslavski and Sonny Moore. Copyright © 2010 Copaface. All Rights Administered by Kobalt Music Publishing America, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Reprinted by Permission of Hal Leonard LLC
Lyrics from “The Fox,” Words and Music by Carrie Rachel Brownstein, Corin Lisa Tucker, and Janet Lee Weiss. Copyright © 2005 by Code Word Nemesis. All Rights Administered by BMG Rights Management (US) LLC All Rights Reserved. Reprinted by Permission of Hal Leonard LLC.
Lyrics from “Entertain,” Words and Music by Carrie Rachel Brownstein, Corin Lisa Tucker, and Janet Lee Weiss. Copyright © 2005 by Code Word Nemesis. All Rights Administered by BMG Rights Management (US) LLC All Rights Reserved. Reprinted by Permission of Hal Leonard LLC.
Lyrics from “Fireheads,” Words and Music by Emiliana Torrini and Daniel De Mussenden Carey. Copyright © 2008 Warner Chappell Music Ltd (PRS) and Manata Ltd (NS) All Rights Administered by WC Music Corp. All Rights Reserved.
Lyrics from “Heartbreaker,” Words and Music by Star Amerasu and Vice Cooler. Copyright © by Amerasu Music / Male Bondage Music. International Copyright Secured All Rights Reserved. Reprinted by Permission of Star Amerasu.
