“What’s wrong with you?” Ezra immediately says. His hair is down, but it doesn’t look like he bothered putting a comb through it, so tangled curls flop into his eyes. Ezra can always tell when I’m pissed or upset. He says that he’s an empath. I think he’s full of shit.
“Nothing.” He keeps staring at me as we walk, waiting, so I say, “It’s just my dad. He deadnamed me again.”
“Shit,” Ez mutters. “I’m sorry.”
I shrug, because while I want to say it’s okay, it really isn’t. Some trans folks have always known exactly who they are, declaring their correct gender and pronouns as toddlers and insisting that they be given different clothes and toys. But it took me a while to figure out my identity. I’d always hated being forced into dresses and being given dolls. The dresses and dolls weren’t even the real issue. The real issue was me realizing that these were things society had assigned to girls, and while I didn’t even know what trans was, something about being forced into the role of girl has always upset the hell out of me. I’d always tried to line up with the other boys whenever teachers split us up. I followed those boys around the playgrounds, upset that they’d ignore me and push me away. I had dreams, sometimes—dreams where I’d be in a different body, the kind of body society says belongs to men. I’d be so effing happy, but then I would wake up and see that nothing had changed. I remember thinking to myself, Hopefully, if I’m reincarnated, I’ll be born a boy.
It wasn’t until I was twelve, almost five years ago now, that I read this book that had a trans character in it: I Am J by Cris Beam. Reading about J, it was like . . . I don’t know, not only did a lightbulb go off in me, but the sun itself came out from behind these eternal clouds, and everything inside me blazed with the realization: I’m a guy.
I’m a freaking guy.
It took me a few months of flipping out and going back and forth over whether I was really trans or not. Another few months to figure out how to tell my parents. I sat my dad down in the living room of our old Bed-Stuy apartment. I felt like I was going to throw up the entire time, and I was so nervous that the only words I could get out were, “Dad, I have something to tell you,” and, “I’m trans.” He was quiet. He had this expression, like he was confused. And then he said, “Okay.” But I could tell it wasn’t okay, not to him—could tell the whole coming out thing wasn’t going so well. He said he was tired and went to bed, and that was the end of the conversation. I emailed my mom the next day, since she’s lived in Florida with my stepdad and my stepsister since I’ve been ten years old. She never responded. It was the first and last time I actually hit send on an email I wrote her.
It was almost an entire year of begging before my dad agreed to let me see a doctor for hormones. It isn’t always easy to start hormones, so I’m lucky that I could. That was around the time I started to show I was really talented in art and he decided to send me to St. Catherine’s, which was great, because I didn’t have to be around people who knew the old me. I didn’t have any friends at my former school anyway, so it wasn’t a big deal. It took a lot of convincing, and my doctor’s help, but almost a year ago now, my dad even helped me get top surgery. I know how lucky I am for that. Not everyone who wants surgery can afford it. My dad had to do a lot of paperwork with letters and providers and everything, and he had to figure out my health insurance to make it happen. Even then, he still had to pay some money out of pocket. No matter how much he pisses me off sometimes, I wouldn’t have been able to start my physical transition without my dad. Maybe that’s what’s most confusing of all: Why would he pay for my hormones, my surgery, my doctor’s visits, everything—but refuse to say my real name?
Ezra met me right at the beginning of my transition. We sat next to each other in class and gravitated to each other’s sarcastic comments, until we found ourselves spending practically every second of every day together. Ezra has only ever known me as Felix. I haven’t told him, or anyone else, my old name. I’ve tried to wipe out all evidence of my past life: photos or videos where I have long hair, or where I’m wearing dresses, or anything society’s prescribed to girls. It just isn’t who I am anymore—who I ever was. It’s funny. In a way, I guess I did experience reincarnation. I’ve started a new life, in a new physical form. I got exactly what I’d wished for.
My dad asked me to keep a few of my old pictures—for the memories, you never know if you’ll want to remember who you used to be one of these days. It wasn’t really for me. I could tell he wanted those pictures for himself, one last anchor to who he thinks I was, or who he thinks I still am, which is enough of a reason for me to want to delete each and every single one of them. I have the pictures stored on Instagram, and I’ve come pretty close to deleting the photos a few times. I get a lurch of nausea whenever I see the old me pop up in my gallery. But I still keep the pictures. It’s weird. He pisses me off, but he’s still my dad, and I shouldn’t feel like I owe him anything for helping me with my transition, but I do. I guess I figured it doesn’t really matter. I’ve hidden the photos from the public. Only I can access them anyway. It doesn’t really hurt to keep them around until my dad can finally accept me for who I am.
But . . . Even after coming out, even after starting my transition, sometimes I get this feeling. The feeling that something still isn’t right. Questions float to the surface. Those questions begin to pull on this thread of anxiety, and I’m afraid if I pull too hard, I’ll unweave and become completely undone. Maybe that’s why I hate my dad deadnaming me, more than anything else. It makes me wonder if I really am Felix, no matter how loud I shout that name.
Three
THE WALK TO ST. CATHERINE’S FROM EZRA’S PLACE IS pretty short. We step over cracks and dog shit on the sidewalk as we pass the basketball and tennis courts and the park, guys doing pull-ups on the monkey bars and little kids chasing each other and squealing as their moms sit and watch. There’s a new wood-paneled coffee shop on the corner—not quite a Starbucks, but all signs point to gentrification. I glance at Ezra. He might not be white, but he still has a million-dollar apartment down the street. And what about me? Even if we’re poor as fuck, my dad and I are basically doing the same thing by moving to Harlem, aren’t we?
Eventually, the apartments become smaller until there’s a series of bodegas and bars with rainbow Pride flags hanging on their doors, and the fenced-off campus with its hedges and trees appears. St. Catherine’s is affiliated with an arts college that takes up four blocks on its own, but we get a private building in the corner of the campus near the parking lot. We’ve got about one hundred students, all enrolled on talent, wealth, or both. Most people in my grade do the summer program to work on their portfolios for their college applications, and I need as much help on my portfolio as I can get. I don’t even know what my portfolio’s theme is going to be yet, while everyone else is almost halfway finished. Brown has one of the lowest acceptance rates in the country, and I have to get in—need to get that scholarship if I want to attend. Sure, there’re other good art colleges, and I’m applying to a bunch of them, too, but I don’t know . . . I want to prove, I guess, that I’m good enough for a school like Brown.