Bridges 43

Chapter 43

*Before…

I mean she loved me for me and she loved me pre-op as a woman loving and falling in love with another woman.

And I’ve been a long, long time in getting here and finding a soul like hers.

I’m smiling and we head out from town and head to the Olympic village compound and it’s way more than cool when we avoid the car lines and the parking hassles and the lines when we pull up to an alternate gate and she shows her ID and gets me signed in.

There some designated parking and we’re pretty close to the security station or one of them and she waves to the guys who wave back and we get our jackets and scarves and team Canada toques and she takes my arm in hers and we head off towards the pavilions.

*And Now…

Okay I will admit that I’m not just happy or just content but I’m kind of excited too about getting to go into the whole Olympic pavilion area. I know it’s open to the public but like so much of everything there’s being allowed to and actually getting to go.

I always treat it like the beach. I love the beach everything about it right down to even the damp and grey and stormy days but even with it not being that far from home it’s been a long time since I’ve actually gone.

This is like that, one of those things that’s… “If the Olympics ever came here I so would go…”

Well it wasn’t on my agenda at all really but like a lot of people it’s a wish moment.

And to have a wish moment happen and to have it with Cass who’s holding my hand and our fingers are interlaced is this huge thing really.

I feel like a much younger and much lighter me.

I burst out laughing as the first place that Cass drags me too is the Tim Horton’s kiosk. “We just ate!”

“I want something sweet okay and something hot to drink.”

“Okay…okay…”

We still hold hands and wait in line and I’m halfway between smiling and blushing because we’re getting looks but at the same time we’re getting some pretty happy for us looks too. I get a case of the grins when I see a guy and a guy see us and there’s a sort of second pause and then then slip their hands together.

Representation means a lot because it’s saying that this is normal.

Cass uses her card and she gets a box of timbits and me a coffee and herself a hot chocolate and then we head off and she’s showing me around and it’s really very cool.

I’m a die-hard Canadian girl and the whole thing of it even being here and the way that it reflects on us as Canadians and the atmosphere with the people and the athletes from the other countries and everything makes it just such a pride filled experience for me.

Yes I went into the armed forces to get my nursing degree and to get it as a guy and get out of the whole stigma against male nurses and the like that you sometimes get in the industry and I’ve heard some pretty rough stuff about how they get treated in nursing school or because they went to nursing school.

Besides combat medic has such ring to it and then there was the trans-in-the-forces thing.

There’d be none of the shameful stuff for my family if something happened…? I mean I didn’t know it then and I was holding so much of that past stuff back shoved down until it took a serious encounter for my trans self to wake back up.

But as much as that was part of why I joined there was the fact I wanted to be a nurse, I wanted to travel and to have stories, I wanted to be able to see places and do things that people home just didn’t do.

And part of me loved it, loved the adrenaline shot but helping people and there was a feeling that you got whether you were in a chopper heading out to rescue or you were running clinics out of a bunch of tents working with the military GP’s and the people from Doctors Without Borders.

But with the bad and the good I loved my country.

You ask anyone that served…in anyplace if they wouldn’t get the good goosebump tingle at being to a place where all these people and nations are competing with sportsmanship and grace and there’s no IED’s or snipers and all the bad stuff instead this is sort of like being in the middle of what soldiers fight for.

And seeing the maple leaf here so much and all of it the other colors flown by other countries and the atmosphere.

The good will.

It’s such a big place to wander around and to see things in too and even better I get to meet some of the security staff that works with Cass and apparently I got talked up quite a bit as I get a lot of.

“Sam! So you’re the famous Samantha.”

Yeah I know it’s not my name but really there’s not a whole lot of people named Samaritan out there. So I just kind of let it go…besides it’s way more fun to hear all the cute belly stories about Cass from the others especially the other female officers there and spend time in Cass’s world.

I’ve spent so much…too much time living in my world, she’s made it so much better but I’ve still spent too much time in my world.

This, this is so much more than nice it’s something I think that I honestly really needed in my life.

………………………………………..The rest of the week was actually just amazing even with her working. Just getting to curl up with her and sleep even if we do have our soft and intimate moments.

Sleeping in the arms of someone that loves you to me really is lovemaking too. There is a part of my life that went on for way too long where I thought that I wasn’t going to ever see that sort of love.

That I wasn’t going to be anybody’s somebody special.

She gets dressed and she’s wearing spanx to go with her uniform pants and her vest is two sizes larger than she usually wears but she still looks amazing in her blue and greys and there’s a serious pride thing there for me too. I sort of get the job, my mom did that job and there’s a bit maybe of me loving that parallel too.

But the rest of the week was really fun too and it was very much what I needed I think because it got me out of the house and out of town even and in a good way and not out of town for a stay in a facility for my mental health.

Not that I didn’t need that too or that there is anything wrong with getting help especially when you hold things in for too long.

No this was something really, really good.

Cass goes to do her stuff for work doing the security stuff and I have passes courtesy of her to go and see some of the things going on and I definitely take advantage of them and go see different things like some of the downhill stuff and the bobsledding and she’ll join me after we take some time when she’s done her shift and we head out to see the skaters or watch the curling.

What? I like curling I actually curled in high school and to hear “Hard! Hurry Hard!” just makes me smile. I know it might just be like a kind of cliché but I’m very Canadian about that sort of thing.

And the nights were just great too like I said with the cuddling and sleeping with each other and everything and when the week was running its course and everything it was kind of still good as much as I sort of wanted to stay here.

We went back to Ohana’s twice for breakfast and just to be there really.

But once I was packed and we were ready for me to leave and get a cab to take the train home it was kind of emotional and stuff.

“I’m going to miss you.” I say as I kiss her and she kisses me back and she holds me and she rubs my back instead of me doing that for her.

“I’ll miss you more hon.”

“Good…I know it’s selfish but good.”

She kisses me again… and I get my bags and we head outside from the motel she’s staying at and she’s going to drive me to the train and I hear her squeal. “Brandon!”

She’s running over to him and I can’t help but to smile as he’s there and he’s been waiting for us and everything leaning against his truck and drinking a coffee.

Him and me…the things we had and have and the stuff that’s still there between us and it’s all just this.

We’re not together, together and it doesn’t matter to him I don’t think. We still love each other and he shows it by doing stuff like this.

Having him be that guy for me, to be this unasked for rock of support. It means so much and I set down my bags and go over and join Cass in hugging our guy.