Page 108 of Nearly Roadkill
“So now I’m saying I may be neither,” ze said. “Not a man. Probably not a woman. Seems like the most honest thing to say.”
“Whoa. Okay.” Scratch threw hir head back against the headrest. “So you were socialized as a man, you have no idea what it’s like to be a woman, except online you can come off as one when you want. This is textbook; I know everything about this conversation. But…” Ze shook hir head stubbornly, like ze had to go through with the thought, even if it wasn’t pretty. “It’s not going down real well, this story of yours. Because I’m making the wonderful discovery that I’m as bigoted and uptight as your average asshole.”
“You’re not bigoted, Scratch,” Winc said. “This is hard.”
Winc was going someplace else, someplace just a little farther away. I don’t think Scratch saw it, but I did.
Scratch kept driving and shook hir head. “Look, it’s like all of a sudden you’re another species. Being female is its own thing; so is male. You say you’re not a boy, but I have to say, you’re not a girl either.”
“I know that, Scratch; that’s what I just said.” Real calm, real quiet.
“Right, you did. I’m having a hard time relating to no-gender right now. I mean, in person. I mean, sitting here right next to you. Also god, you’rebeautiful, I’ve been thinking that, and I haven’t said it so now I have. Fucking beautiful. But what the… no gender?” Scratch sat very still then, eyes on the road. Ze gathered up hir thoughts like fish, you could almost see the net.
Scratch continued, “If you’re a woman trapped in a man’s body then… then I don’t know what that means. I want to ask you a million questions to see if you match some kind of internal test I’ve got set up for people like you….”
Ze shook hir head again, as if trying to bodily throw out the half-formed thoughts.
Winc studied hir fingernails, turning them this way and that. Ze didn’t jump all over the “people like you” remark—ze sure could have.
Scratch doubled down. “On the other hand, I’ve never met people like you—not that I know of, anyway.” Ze looked lost again. “All the thoughts inside me, like that you’re not a ‘real’ woman, not like I am, all those thoughts are bigoted and ignorant…. As if I’m a ‘real woman,’ hah!” Ze trailed off. Finally ze said, “I do NOT like what I’m thinking! How can I be thinking this?!”
“How can you be thinking what, exactly?” Winc said back softly. I thought ze was so brave, cuz even I didn’t want to hear how Scratch answered.
“Men can do any fucking thing they want to. Now they even want to be women, and sure enough, they’re doing that too! Why the fuck do they have to take every fucking thing in sight?”
Scratch looked shocked at what ze’d said. Even from the backseat, I could see hir cheeks were flushed. “No, that’s not what I mean. Let me try again. You’re not a woman or a man and…” Ze was muttering. “Talk about no traction…. How the fuck do I relate to you?”
“Like you always have,” Winc said in that tone that sounds so reasonable.
Scratch winced before starting again. “All right… now I’m looking at you, studying your face for clues of manness. If we were walking down the street, what would people think of you?”
“You mean what would they think of you?” Winc said, real quick. “Isn’t that what you’re really concerned about?”
There was one of those terrible pauses that kept filling up the car with already-breathed air.
“Look,” Winc went on, “I don’t have answers—”
“I know that, goddammit!” Scratch interrupted. “I know you’re the person I fell in love with online, and nothing has changed since last week!”
“Fell in love with?” I knew Winc would never let that one pass, and ze didn’t.
Scratch was sputtering. “Okay! Yes! I fell in love with a… with a… ze!”
We all kinda laughed a little, even Winc. Felt like there was more air in the car again. I just had to pipe up from the backseat: “You get used to it, after a while.”
“Oh, easy for you to say, little dude,” Scratch said, but I could tell ze wasn’t really mad. “Winc, I have one more question. Why are you presenting yourself as a woman if you’re saying that’s not who you are?”
Winc and I looked at each other and then down at our clothes. Winc fingered hir necktie, still trying not to smile. I held up my fishnets.
“You know what I mean! Why are you—”
“But that’s just it, Scratch,” Winc said quietly. “Today I look like a man… tomorrow I may look like a girl cheerleader.”
Scratch and I laughed a little again.
But Winc went on. “It’s because I’ve had the chance to do all that with you—online—changing from one thing to another to another to another… that’s given me the courage to do it in real life.”
Winc looked at Scratch in this really funny way, hir mouth all crooked and hir eyes kind of lit up, and ze said real quietly, “I like it, Scratch. I like girl. It feels right. It’s fun. I just like walking through the world that way.”
