CHAPTER 21
Steph put down her fiddle and looked at me sitting with my flute lowered.

“What?”

The chuckles started with her brother in law and gradually spread around the room while she looked just a little puzzled, a crease between her eyebrows. Geoff made the explanations.

“You went all hairy, love”

He looked across to me and Den. “Every now and then she gets into her own little world, sort of zones out while she plays. All you ever see of her then is the hair. Sometimes she even thinks she can dance”

She sniffed. “There are spare beds, Woodruff”

“Yes, my dearest sweet, but our family has already filled them”

There was more, but they were so obviously a double act it hurt. This was clearly one of the things Sally was praying I would see, something to give me my own hope. I was watching how things worked around them, and it was indeed remarkably unremarkable, a well-adjusted family who enjoyed taking the piss out of each other. It reminded me of some of the better reliefs I had worked on, the give and take of humour and teasing that lets you know you are part and parcel of the group, and just like my colleagues I suspected that the kidding about would turn very, very quickly into teeth and claws if any outsider pushed the wrong buttons.

Bill held up a squeezy thing.

“Right, you lot, now we have the willy waving out of the way, shall we have a look at some proper tunes? Eric, for this sort of thing we just need some rolls in three or four time, and the most common keys are D, G and A. Jan will give you the rhythm, I’ll shout the key. Adam, can you play unison with Steph? It’s almost always AABB, and two tunes for the set. First one is Salmon Tails and Jimmy Allen, then we’ll swing straight into Hindley Steel and Morpeth Rant. The latter pair have to be accented, it’s a hop-step dance, so lots of tongue, please. Jan?”

Jan had the sideways drum thing, and Kelly joined in with some miscellaneous percussion, and the first two bounced out nicely, but I really started to enjoy myself with the second two. Timing was everything, and Steph got low down so she could stare me in the eye, moving her fiddle about as my flute waved in time, and grinning past a fall of red hair. The tunes were indeed tumpty-tumpty stuff, but that simplicity suddenly took flight as her bow hand rocked and my tongue hit the tuck-oo-tuck-oo rhythm of the dance to come. I glanced across to Eric, and he was grinning like a maniac as he claw-hammered and rolled along with us.

Fuck me, this was living! The music came to an end as Bill shouted ‘out’ and I started laughing. Steph grinned at me.

“Now she understands! Music to live for, music to dance to, music to love! Adam, what do you think? Want to be in the band?”

“Let me have a think……oh gods yes! How the hell did I miss out on this stuff?”

Jan was the one who tried to put it into words. “It’s a body thing, Adam. The need to dance about, to move to it. When you see it written down, it’s simple. When you hear it played flat, it’s boring. When someone who loves it gets it rolling, well, sex is better, but not by much”

There was a joined shout from Kelly and Bill of “Mum!” and “You bitch” before the room dissolved in the laughter that seemed to be the default state. It wasn’t a question of how I had missed the music, but of how I had missed life. The whole room surged with life and happiness, and I caught both Eric and Den grinning at me.

“I don’t know what you two find do funny, neither of you will ever understand. You have to be a musician”

And on it went, and despite my constant jibes about Satan and purty mouths, it has to be said that Eric is actually rather good in his own right. I glanced over to Dennis a few times as we played and he just looked happy to be there, happy to sit and listen as the rest of us settled into the comfort of knowing the people around you can’t only keep up but can sometimes leave you behind. We broke eventually for food, and it was quite a spread. I got Steph a little way away from the others.

“Watch your pronouns, please…”

Her eyes widened a little. “Shit---sorry. I just got the impression, you know….which of them is it?”

“Fuck, do I make it that obvious?”

“Not quite, but it’s a girl thing. You do nothing but take the piss out of Eric, and you spend half your time looking at Dennis for approval. Both of those could say something”

“Steph, give me a chance, I don’t know where I stand yet, I don’t even know, you know, when, or even if”

She smiled, and it was tinged with just a hint of sadness. “I was there for quite a while, but it was more complicated. The hormones had done a lot, and it was just fear that kept me back”

“How did you handle work?”

She laughed, and this time it was a clear sound of happy memories.

“My best mate ran into me”

“What, when you were out dressed up?”

“A bit more than that, Annie, I was actually snogging Geoff at the time, and Dave goes ‘”Steve?” from right behind us. I nearly wet myself”

She sobered quickly. “Look, I know what that scheming sod McDuff is doing, but I will play along. If you ever need a chat, advice, anything, just call, OK?”

“Sally mentioned a Jerry”

“Oh, yes, he’s the little dynamo who runs the outreach group. Talks a lot of sense, but he does sort of believe in ‘I’m out and I’m proud’ so possibly not the best person to approach just yet. Later, yes.”

“You are making a lot of assumptions there, Steph. I haven’t actually made a decision yet.”

“Yes you have. You’ve come here, so you’ve decided to live. Look, I went through all that, in my case being drink and silly risk-taking. I was really going downhill, but I finally decided to take a risk, the right risk this time, and it could have been a killer, but my new family were there for me. What was more important, though, was the stuff already in place.

“Look, we do similar jobs, yeah? Same stresses in many ways, same team-bonding. There will be hiccups, but once they see who you are, that you are the same person as you were before, the same mate, they will almost certainly come round”

I sighed. “Still assuming a lot there. What if I decide not to change over? What then?”

I got another slightly sad smile. “Annie, it’s called transition, and, if you want my opinion, I think you’ve already made your mind up. You just need something to get you started. It doesn’t have to be the man of your dreams, nor a pair of killer shoes you have an urge to wear. Just the right moment, probably well away from here, just to start out.”

“But I’ll look like shit”

A careful inspection, and a long pause. “No. I don’t think you will. Look, go out in the garden and give Sal a ring. Just to make sure I am not treading on her toes. See you in a couple of minutes”

She moved off to where Dennis was surrounded by every other woman in the room, and I slipped out into the evening air, with the distant drone of planes from the airport.

“Annie! How is it going?”

“Probably just as you intended, you sneaky cow”

“Steph can talk a lot of sense, now she’s herself. I used to get a lot of self-serving cock from her before she got moving”

“Sally, there is no way I could ever look as good as her!”

“Yeah, she’s a right sod, that one, all legs and hair. I get jealous too”

“Stop taking the piss. You know what I mean, if I ever get the guts to come out I will look like the Bride of Frankenstein”

“But you’ve decided, haven’t you?”

I was silent for a while, but Sally just waited. Could I do it? With the support I already had, private life was a possibility, but work? And out on the street?

“Sally, I have, and I’m shit scared but the alternative is starting to look a lot worse. What do we have to do?”

“Right, my girl, you have just crossed the biggest hurdle of your life. I will set things in motion, including an appointment with an endocrinologist if you decide that you wish to go all the way”

“There are alternatives?”

“Oh yes, some just live and dress as a girl, no hormones or surgery. There can be health reasons for that.”

“So….I would start to change, then? Grow tits and so on?”

“Speak to the doctor. I am more concerned about your mental state, and keeping you alive”

I could feel myself trembling. “Sally, do you think, do you really think I could ever be a woman? I am shitting myself here”

“Annie, oh Annie, I’ve already told you what I believe you are. The rest is all down to you. See you tomorrow, OK?”

“OK”

As I hung up a voice spoke behind me.

“That explains an awful lot.”

It was Eric.