“Wasn’t hungry.”
“We eat together at six.”
“I said I wasn’t hungry.”
“Your uncle waited for you—”
“I bet he did,” I said, walking around Aunt Anne Marie.
“What’s gotten into you?” she called after me.
“I suspect you don’t want to know.”
“Alexis, I’m concerned about you. You weren’t interested in sinning before.”
Interested in sinning? I couldn’t help it. Not today. Any day but today, I could have held my tongue. But after judging a man because he was the easy target, spying on him and the woman I had a crush on, bulldozing an abused kid instead of letting him talk to me on his own terms . . . I was supposed to be doing better. Maybe I wasn’t acting like a jackass the way I had in the cosplay world, but if anything, I was worse.
And yet Aunt Anne Marie didn’t care about that. She was worried about something I hadn’t chosen, something that didn’t hurt anyone.
I faced my aunt. “Can’t be a sinner if you don’t believe in sin. But if you insist, sure. I’ll bite. I love it. I love sinning.”
My aunt gasped like I’d mortally wounded her. “You watch your mouth. This is our home.”
“Then maybe I should leave, since you hate me.”
“I don’t hate you.”
“Of course you do,” I said, a cruelty creeping into my voice that I thought I’d buried. “You think queer people are going to hell. Well, guess what? I’m queer. You knew that. Me not dressing in my boy clothes doesn’t change that. You called my friend a slur. I am that. That means you hate me by default.”
I went in my room and barely kept from slamming the door. I turned the lock, grabbed my pillow, and screamed into it. I was bad. The worst. The literal worst.
I wasn’t meant to be Raziel. I wasn’t strong enough. I’d fooled myself, like I did with cosplay. Professional pretender, that’s all I was. That and an idiot. I was wrong more often than I was right. I thought I knew everything, I thought I could be the hero. I couldn’t. I was never meant to be one. I was the loser. I was the one who had no friends, desperately lonely, until I got into cosplay.
I could put my friends’ past transgressions behind me. I could go right back where I was.
I booted up my computer and logged into all of my social media accounts. Tons of notifications popped up. Yes. This was it. This was what I needed. Forget about this horrible mess. It never happened. I’d go back home, say everything was taken care of. I’d make new cosplays and go to conventions with those same friends.
A window popped up at the bottom of my screen. I didn’t need to read the name. I knew.
Lee: Why are you ignoring me?
I’d do it. I’d confront him. I started to type:
You’re an asshole, Lee.
No. Stop. Delete. Better idea. I’d apologize.
Yes. That was it. I’d apologize. I’d ask did he really mean it, could he take it back. I’d ask if we could do our cosplays together, comics or anime, I didn’t care. We could hold hands. We could make out. Behind a closed door at a convention hotel or hell, out in public, in cosplay, under the glare of camera flashes.
Coward.
Faux-trans.
Is this what you came for?
What about Michael?
Are you that stupid?
Don’t you learn?
Do something.
DO SOMETHING.
I started crying. Shut up, shut up, shut up.
I won’t shut up.
You’re a disgrace.
A disappointment.
Failure.
This is why people hate you.
This is why I hate you.
I gripped my hair, torso bowing forward as I dug my fingers across my scalp. Shut up, shut up, shut up. The noise was so loud. Buzzing in my ears. Like mosquitos. Mosquitos who fed off my failures and insecurities.
Where’s your backbone?
Piece of shit.
Why are you crying?
Why are you curled up like that?
Are you fucking giving up?
Look in the goddamn mirror.
Do it!
Look in the mirror.
Think long and hard.
Then you can reply.
I trembled as I dragged myself to the mirror. Dark circles were below my eyes, nose swollen and puffy, skin sickly pale, almost a jaundice hue. I stripped, twisting my body. There were no back dimples anymore. My stomach had a small paunch. Breasts small and low.
Ugly girl.
Ugly, ugly girl.
The back of my throat stung.
I pinched my hip. A curve I hated. My inner thigh. Despicable. Every trace of something female, hideous. Just like my friends, former friends, said. Ugly girl, ugly girl. But such a beautiful boy. And they were so trans-inclusive, didn’t I know that? Couldn’t I tell when they told me I was holding myself back from my full potential? It’d be easy to get HRT with parents as supportive and cool as mine. Why are you wimping out? Are you scared? We’ll support you. You’re such a beautiful boy. Such a beautiful, beautiful boy.
I dropped to my knees, like I was held up by a cord that snapped. They were right. I was a hideous girl. I was also a beautiful boy. But I couldn’t be a beautiful boy all the time. And if everyone wanted me to be a boy, why did Lee tell people I was a girl?
No. Not a girl. A slur.
My body rolled to the side, arms wrapped around my knees as I wheezed. My hand slid between my legs. I couldn’t bear to touch what I knew was there. I was disgusting.
I pictured Lee’s smiling face. I love you. Really. I do. You’re beautiful.
I pictured my cosplay friends saying how much I loved it. That I wanted to be objectified. That I’d have told them years ago if I didn’t really want it.
I gazed at my reflection. If I wanted to be objectified at one point, did that mean I was bound to it? Did it mean my former friends were good people or bad people? If they didn’t know, was it still bad? If they really thought I liked it, did that nullify everything?
You have the right to change your mind.
The voice was right. I couldn’t go back to the life I had before. Maybe at one time I was welcome, or at least half of me was welcome, but I wasn’t safe there anymore. I wasn’t safe anywhere, but especially not there.
Now, I was in a new place. It was me at fault. I made a mistake. I made a horrible judgment. Now Dima was MIA, and it seemed unlikely that I’d get Michael to open up now that I’d blown my chance to just shut up and listen, the way I hoped people would listen to me and they never did.
Refocus.
You had a plan.
Can’t you amend it?
Yes. Yes, of course I could amend it!
First, I would keep my phone within reach at all times. The abusive priest would be back, and I would be ready with my recording app. Maybe I’d get in trouble, but I needed evidence in order to help others. Someone had to risk it and it might as well be me. I wasn’t going to major in costume design anymore, I didn’t have friends except Dima, who was at some camp, and I didn’t have a lot of prospects.
Second, I would need to get Michael to trust me. That would be hard, especially since I’d alienated him, thinking Deacon Jameson was his abuser when instead Deacon Jameson was trying to save him.
Third, I needed someone on my side. I needed an insider, a person who believed in justice over vows of silence. I didn’t need to waste another second. I knew exactly who I needed to confide in and ask for help in solving the crime.