Unconventional chapter 5

*Before…

“You call me later tonight, we can like talk?” I say.
“Aren’t you going to be asleep?”
“I’m leaving early for Halifax so not likely and especially after this.”
“Okay.”
I look at her when we break the hug. “You going to be okay?”
She nods and sniffles. “Yeah, hey when you get back maybe you can come up and like hang out and stuff?”
She looks at her mom who is giving her this look and Penny signs something to her and she looks and me and she signs and does that deaf talking thing. “It’s cool with me, we’re all good.” and she does that close her mouth thing and turns the key and tosses it away thing.
I look right at her and say so she can read me better. “Thanks Aunt Maggie.”
She hugs me and Penny does too and they head out right after that since it’s late enough and it’s still like a two hour drive for them to get home and I go and I actually try and help mom with cleaning stuff up and avoiding the he’s gay looks from the gousins that are getting read the riot act from Great Uncle Peter who’s taking keys and going off about drinking and driving.
Soon…soon I’ll be out of here.

*And Now…

It’s a rough night and I really do hate it.

There’s all the family bullcrap that goes on with who we are and how poor we are and all of that stuff that just drives me nuts with the yelling and the swearing with the gousins.

I’m not like that, I will never be like that and I never will.

But I really hate that there’s no other options for me that I can see.

And it goes on for like freaking hours.

It’s after midnight when I get to talk to Penny online a little more and I actually come out to her as trans.

Even online it’s like there’s this huge chunk of something getting lifted off of me.

So Penny gets to meet Tia.

And for a good three hours I’m up really later than I should having the first really in depth girl talk with my cousin.

And it’s a lot of the same stuff really the things that we’re into and the things that we’ve always liked but it soooo much better because we are talking as girls and we’re not policing our language.

Which is huge for me and it’s really important to Penny too because there’s a huge slap down that happens to geek girls with the fake geek girls thing and she gets a whole boatload of that all of the time.

And I get to vent about how much it makes me actually want to rage more than hurt over all the transphobic people out there and all of the bullcrap about us not being real girls, about us not having real girlhoods of that stuff that those hateful people that call themselves “Gender critical” get to pass off as how they think we’re socialized.

Penny gets the anger too from her own end.

Trans girls are allowed to be angry, it’s “Male violence” no matter how much bullshit we get piled on us.

Native girls aren’t allowed to get angry without getting type casted as crazy or wild or like a problem child because she’s native.

Assumptions on her family, on how she grew up, if she was raised on a res or not.

It was like a three hour long bitch session that I needed way more than I thought I did.

And apparently trans girls and native girls aren’t allowed to like metal either.

Dad was less than enthused by my being up when he was getting up to get coffee’d up for the drive to Halifax and he really gently knocked to like not wake anyone else up but he definitely gave me the squinty parental eye as he looked in on me.

I shrugged. “Talking to Penny, we actually hit it off.”

He actually semi brightened at that or as much as he could like without coffee into him and he smiled. “Good, she’s freaking smart as heck and had a kinda raw deal it’s good that you too are getting along because neither one of you really do that with the family.”

“Sorry Dad.”

He actually shrugged. “It happens, family is complicated but we do try and be family.”

I nod and grab my things and I redo my passwords on my computer and I power it down and I even unplug it just so that Parker can’t mess with it. Not that he’d know how or anything but I’m still…well…he’s an asshole.

So I check all of my other stuff that he might actually try and mess with and make sure that my games and my comics and things are piled and locked into my closet and then I go to join dad.

The smell of coffee would wake the dead and choke a horse.

Seriously dad makes walk on it coffee and I have zero clue really as how he can drink it black. He fills the filter as high as he can and he runs it through and it comes out with a heavy, heavy bitter coffee acrid smell.

Like when it’s done the grounds are full to the top of the filter basket.

I am not a huge coffee drinker really because around here well it’s like either instant or home perk and that’s okay but there’s this whole kind of thing where there’s the coffee kids.

I know I sound like a stuck up jerk but these are those asshatts that you see wearing their pjammas in the daytime smoking rollies and drinking coffee and just hanging around doing nothing all day long and acting like their cool.

The occasionally mix it up with leather jackets and Truro Goth make-up and faux punker stuff and well teenaged baby carriages.

And there’s like a few indie places and a few Tim Horton’s and there’s like one StarSmucks down on toward the community college.

So yeah I’m not a big coffee drinker and I’m not into the energy drinks either since that stuff just ends up giving me a headache.

But with dad’s I do what mom does actually and it’s actually sort of semi-pleasant…I mean since I get to like share something even this with her.

Skim milk in my travel mug and about half way and two teaspoons of sugar and I nuke it for like a couple of minutes and then I add the coffee and sort of mild it out.

Dad skips breakfast and we get my stuff in the trunk and mom’s up with the same coffee as me to see me off.

Okay we’re not that close but her really emotional hug has me swallowing myself down in the whole trans-edit that I always have going.

“Be careful Tommy.”

“I will Mom.”

“Call us when you get to each airport so we know what’s going on.”

I roll my eyes. “Yes Mom.”

“No you don’t roll your eyes, it’s dangerous out there and you’re still young, young enough to get hurt.”

She hugs me tight with that whole Mom concern she has and part of me does like it but part of me can’t help but wonder if she’d feel the same way if she knew.

I’ve heard and read a lot of stories where the mothers of trans kids especially trans girls are like totally freaked and adamant that their son is not a girl.

And I know a lot of parents that freak are religious types and stuff but there’s a lot that aren’t as well and there’s lots for me to be afraid of.

And Parker would just likely disown me and never talk to me again at best or just like try and kill me or something.

We share another squeeze her and I and she’s mom-crying as we pull out and I drink my coffee as we hit the TCH and head for Halifax.

I was going to put some tunes on to drown out the trip but instead dad decides to brush me up on my Spanish so I’m at least not likely to be rude to Tomas’s parents and other relatives that I meet while I’m staying down there.

Okay that turns out to be okay as Dad actually doesn’t suck at it and he seems to know at least what he’s talking about.

I know a little myself and I’m sure I’ll pick up more too once I’m living down there but it does kill the time even though Dad still ends up being a spaz and doing stuff like asking where the library is and who cut the cheese.

Halifax airport’s small but it’s still pretty cool because it’s the first time I’ve been in it and it’s the first time I’ve been in an airport actually and we’re there with enough time for pre-boarding and instructions from Dad about what I need to do once I land in New York for the hundredth time and some from the airline lady who actually calls ahead to their desk there about me since I’m flying as a minor.

It takes a lot for me to not get all crowded feeling and pressured by everything that’s going on that’s not me actually having any say in doing any of this stuff.

Which gets me angry.

But I’m not really allowed to be angry, so I bury it and close off once we’re done and I wait with Dad until my flight with my headphones on mostly and blasting Within Temptation, Stormfront, and a whole lot of Nightwish getting a few looks from dad as I listen to mostly woman rockers and metal singers and stuff.

And then it’s time for my flight and he walks me to the gate and we hug really hard and then I’m getting shown to my seat and the plane gets filled pretty quickly and then we’re off.

Going down the runway, picking ups speed, then there’s the tilt up and back and I can actually feel that disconnect from the ground through the wheels as they’re pulling up and away.

It’s actually one of the best feelings I’ve ever felt.