19 Coming Out

After Jack Mitchell had left us, we sat in silence, deep in thought, for a few minutes, before I looked at him and broke into a smile.

“ We both know that it was going to be impossible to keep this a secret for ever, at the end of my two years I am going to have to make a decision about where my life is going. At the moment, all the people I care about know all about me, with the possible exceptions of Chloe and Gareth Makepeace, anybody else can think what they like. If we let him write his article in a sympathetic manner, I might be the talk of the office for a while and get the occasional snide comments, but I will soon be yesterday’s news. I am reasonably well liked and I think most people will accept me. I also think that even if he writes a basic brief article that is the fallback position, someone else, a lot more unscrupulous will pick up on the story dig a bit further and turn it into a lurid exposé .I think a sympathetic and forward thinking article by Mitchell may well be the best choice. If you and your senior people think that it will seriously affect the standing of the firm, one way or the other, I can live with whatever decision you make.”

“ That’s extremely brave of you Dani, and you are probably correct in your assessment, I’m sure that most people in your situation would just want to crawl under a rock and hide. I will speak in confidence to my colleagues and, with your permission, to Gareth, and see what reaction I get. Mitchell might be right, it could be a positive thing to say that we are supporting diversity across all racial and gender spectra. If it will not be too embarrassing, can I suggest that you also discuss it with Chloe, she and you know and trust each other well enough to get an honest reaction from her.”

Telling Chloe that we needed to have a serious confidential discussion, we left the office and found a bench in the parkland behind St. Paul’s where we were out of earshot of anyone but the most casual passers-by.

“ I have something I need to tell you about myself Chloe, i have been trying to think of a gentle way of saying this, but I can’t, so I will just come out with it. I am not who I seem to be, I am not really Danielle, I am really a man called Daniel.”

Chloe just sat there in total shock for a while before she could speak.

“ No way, I don’t understand, I have seen you when you have been changing your clothes, you are as female and feminine as anyone I know.”

“It’s true Chloe, this started off as a temporary pretence, but it all just snowballed. Let me tell you how I have got here.”

I went through my whole journey from first meeting Sir Charles, the temporary role becoming semi-permanent, and how I had adjusted to life as a woman.

“ Why are you telling me all this, and why now? I would never have found out, you are one of the most attractive and feminine women I know. If you must continue like this nobody would ever guess.”

“ That is the problem, somebody has guessed and they want to write an article about me for the local news sheet.” I explained all about Jack Mitchell and his proposal to write a positive account of my experiences and the supportive attitude of Cunninghams, and what Sir Charles and I were considering to do about it.

“ I will understand if you feel uncomfortable working and socialising with me, but I am still me, I would like to still be your friend and to have you working next to me. What do you think?”

“ I am still trying to get my head around it all, but I have only ever known you as Danielle and you have been kind and friendly to me, I don’t see why that should change, although I will be a bit more careful about changing my clothes in front of you.”

“Thank you Chloe, I really appreciate your understanding and friendship. Obviously this is between you and me at the moment, please don’t mention it to anyone else in the office, but if you need to talk it through with someone to get your head straight, your mum should be ok, she seems a kind and tolerant person. Do you feel ok to go back to the office now, or do you want to spend a bit more time alone to think things through?”

“You go back, I’ll be with you in a bit.”

When I got back to the office, there was a note from Sir Charles. ‘I’m in a meeting with the Director of HR and our Commercial Director to discuss your situation, I may be a while. If you can concentrate, just get on with your work, if your mind is wandering just leave things until later’.

Twenty minutes later Chloe returned, came over to me and gave me a big hug. “Nothing has changed Dani, you are still the same person you were this morning before all this came out, no matter what happens you will aways be my friend, and you will aways be Danielle to me”

As Sir Charles was unlikely to return soon, Chloe made some coffees and we sat down and talked a lot more. She was more interested in the details of how I felt, and about how hard in was adjusting to being a woman,, mainly out of inquisitiveness rather than critical questioning.

“ How do you think it will go down with the staff if we go ahead and let it all become public?”

“ Who knows? There will be some that are supportive and understanding, there will be a few who are antagonistic and even nasty, but I think most will be curious and tolerant. I don’t think you will have any problem with the executive secretaries’ office, you still have a lot of ‘brownie points’ from what you did for Anne at the Christmas party, and the girls in the general office that we were there with all thought that you were good fun and easy to get on with and quite like you. You will be the talk of the office for a while, but they will soon settle down, move onto something or someone else to gossip about, and you will again just be Dani, Sir Charles’ Executive Assistant.”

“ Thank you so much Chloe, I was worried that it would be too much of a shock for you and that you would be unable to work with me.”

“ Don’t be daft this is the 21st century, every time you open one of the tabloid newspapers, there is a story about someone being somewhere on the LGBT rainbow, attitudes are changing, most just get on with their lives as they want to live them.”

We were interrupted by a call from Sir Charles. “How did it go with Chloe?”

“ No problems there, she is very understanding and supportive, and thinks that any problems with other staff will be five-minute wonders.”

“ That’s good. If we can’t persuade Mitchell to drop the story, we are convinced that we can put a positive spin on all this. A lot of the finance houses actually make a point of stressing their commitment to gender and racial equality and their policies are widely accepted. We could just be the first to include gender diversity into the mix, not just as bland words on corporate policy statements but by demonstrating actual cases. Believe me, you are not the only one with secrets in the closet. I am going to see Gareth to see how he reacts and will let you know later.”

Sir Charles came back from his discussions with Gareth, just as I was about to leave the office for home.

“ Are you in a rush Dani? Gareth would like to have a talk with you. He was astounded when I told him about you, but was quite supportive of you and how we propose to go forward. There is something that he wants to discuss with you though before we go ahead. Are you happy to go along to his office, I will give him a call to let him know you are coming while you are getting there?”

Feeling a bit unsure as to what was coming, I walked into his office 10 minutes later.

“ Hello again Dani, don’t worry , I am not going to have a go at you, in fact quite the opposite, but there is something I need to tell you. Charles has related how you came to be in this situation and I am amazed at how well you have adjusted and have carried it off, you are very lucky. One of Fiona’s brothers was transgender, and kept it all well in the closet until he was discovered and given the option to stop it all or leave the family forever. He chose to live his life as a woman and was going through transition, but did not have the support network that you have, Fiona tried to get the family to relent, but her parents were adamant and would not let her make contact. Eventually the constant rejection and name-calling became too much and he killed himself by jumping off a bridge into the Thames.

If you intend to continue in your role at Cunninghams you have to be prepared for losing friends, being the talk of the office, snide remarks and disgusted looks. You are a strong character to get where you are, but are you strong enough to face up to everybody?”

“ I am comfortable in myself ,and the people that are important to me accept what I am doing. I have committed to Sir Charles to continue for the two years I agreed to and unless circumstances change I will see it out. I have no intention until then of going back to my former life or taking things further and go through transition. I hope that I will be allowed by the people I work with and have business relationships with to continue as I am. If people want to talk about me behind my back i can live with that, but if anyone is particularly nasty or things become difficult for me and for Cunninghams I will deal with that when it happens.”

“ That is good to know. The offer of being the CEO of Cunninghams, under my chairmanship, still stands, but if you think that it will be too high profile I would rather know now so that we can prepare an alternative appointment.”

“It sounds like you and Sir Charles are giving me the responsibility of making the decision as to whether we carry on as before. Unless there is a major backlash when ’The Square Mile’ article is published, I can live with any personal embarrassment and would like to continue as we have planned.”

“ That is what I wanted to hear. How do you feel about celebrating by going for a meal with me? Fiona is in town and I can ask her to join us. I am sure that she will have a lot of questions and opinions that I would be too reserved to voice, and now is as good a time as any to face your first test of public opinion, I’ll give her a call.”

I went to make myself presentable and phoned Charles to arrange to stay overnight in Chelsea rather than travel back to Canterbury late at night while Gareth talked to Fiona, and I rang Carol to let her know what I was doing. We soon made our way to the restaurant where we had agreed to meet but when we walked in and I saw Fiona, I nearly walked out again. This was all happening too quickly and I felt a bit steamrollered, but she didn’t give me any choice by coming straight over and giving me a big hug.

“ Oh Dani, I have so much respect for what you are going through, I just wish my brother had been as fortunate and well-supported as you. I just didn’t believe it when Gareth told me, you are just so natural as a woman. However, let’s forget about all that for a while and just sit and have a nice meal, but we must meet up for a proper talk, there is so much I want to ask you.”

I was amazed that I had been so readily accepted by Gareth and Fiona, I had been worried that they would have felt cheated and deceived. However they were totally unperturbed by it all and for the rest of the evening we just chatted about people we all knew and what was going on in the world and we were able to enjoy a delicious meal without constant references to my situation.

They dropped me off at the Chelsea flat, luckily Charles had given me a key to use as required. I kicked off my shoes and sat down with a bottle of wine from the chiller and went through all the events of the day. This had all started off innocently with me masquerading as Dani for a couple of weeks, but now it appeared that everyone accepted me as a woman and my life was being mapped out for me. I was really worried that I was not in control anymore.

Although it was late, I phoned Carol again and we had a long deep discussion about it all, the gist of which was that it was up to me, but she wanted Dani as her partner with Danny as a ‘friend with benefits’.

The next morning I called Jack Mitchell and asked him to come in to speak with Sir Charles and me.

“ Good morning Mr Mitchell,” I confidently led the discussion, “We are quite happy for you to write your article, however there are some conditions.

#1 The completed article is to be subject to vetting by me and will not be published without any alterations that I request.
#2 You work with our commercial director and legal department to incorporate the company’s slant on our corporate policies on diversity and inclusion.
#3 The article is not to include any lewd or salacious comments on my personal circumstances, or personal relationships.

These conditions are non-negotiable, do you agree?”

“ There is nothing there that I would not have expected. I am not writing for one of the ‘Red Top’ daily newspaper scandal sheets, my market is to keep the industry up-to-date with what is happening, and who to watch out for, and your story will show a significant shift in corporate policies. I was anticipating your comments and have almost completed the article, it should be finished and included in the next issue, which is due to be out at the end of next week. Thank you.”

“ You did well.” said Sir Charles, after Mitchell had left, “ I couldn’t have handled it better myself. Let’s see what he comes up with.”

In the week before ‘The Square Mile’ article was published I met up with Fiona for lunch a couple of times, she was trying to get answers as to why her brother turned out as transgender and why people could not accept him for what he was, but I was not able to help her a lot. I explained that although I was comfortable in what I was doing, that it had not been driven by any deep-seated desires to be female like her brother had felt. As to why I had been accepted by most people whereas her brother had suffered nothing but rejection, I had to leave it for others to judge, maybe it was just a question of confidence in who I really was deep-down that allowed me to to just treat people as I always had.

On the Friday that ‘The Square Mile’ was published I did not go into the office, we felt it better if my colleagues had a few days for their emotions to get under control rather than me being in their face to deal with any immediate reactions. As it happened, the article was well-written, factual and positive for both myself and for Cunninghams.

‘ The changing face of the industry

However what you will not know is the personal struggle that she has lived with for the last year while she has been making a name for herself. Danielle is actually male, Daniel , and took on a new life to get experience in our industry. Cunninghams were not initially aware of her situation, but were so impressed with her talent and personality that when they discovered the truth they allowed her to continue.
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The company has issued a statement stressing that their diversity policies are now some of the most forward thinking, and that people will in future be appointed or promoted purely on their ability and merit, and that race, gender or sexuality will not be considered when assessing candidates.
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I am sure that you all wish Danielle future success and that you will continue to be impressed with her work and enjoy meeting her ’

It was a very favourable article for both the company and for me, and it was now a case of seeing what reaction it would get.

To be continued.