CHAPTER 17
I couldn’t help giggling at her swearing, remembering Steph’s use of the same word, as well as its eruption from my own lips. I looked out over Annie’s shoulder, and yes, it was raining again.

“Annie?”

“Aye?”

“Practice session, you said. What do you mean?”

“Oh, something Steph says hooked her first time she came here. There’s a big session on the last night, aye? The festival, or people who work with them, they do a tune book, and organise some confidence-builders. Helps include people who might feel a little nervous, and the first one is at four. What do you play?”

That struck me, the automatic assumption that everyone she met shared her interests. It wasn’t anything nasty; I could clearly see that music was her passion, and it wasn’t that she was contemptuous of those who didn’t or couldn’t understand, but rather that she had a blind spot for them. I shrugged.

“I’m a harpist, but that’s not something I can easily drag on a train. Got some whistles instead. Alys is a drummer”

Annie called past me, “Jan? Got some time to show Alys your axe while we do the shower thing?”

Jan nodded, and with a mutter from Annie of “Getting wet twice. Arsebollocks”, they were off, as Jan showed a small drum to my love. There was a long explanation of how it worked (It’s a drum! You hit it with something!), and then the tent zip went again as four younger people entered, shaking the rain off their jackets. One tall boy with seriously red hair, a younger one with very pale skin and restless eyes, a stunningly pretty brunette and a smiling blonde in a pink fleece, pink waterproof jacket, pink laces and probably pink knickers and bra. The last gave Alys and me a quick once-over, then grinned, life dancing in her eyes.

“Hiya! I’m Shan! Which one is Alys?”

My girl’s head rose, her smile returning.

“That’s my name”

“Grab your coat, then. We need a chat”

Alys looked at me for a decision, but what did I know? In the end, she shrugged, and disappeared into the rain with Miss Pinky, as the other three settled into the available chairs and demanded tea. As I was still apparently duty wench, I did the necessaries, and by the time everyone’s tannin and caffeine needs had been addressed, the other four were back with us, accompanied by Alys and Shan. The former settled herself next to me, taking my hand and whispering “Tell you later. Nothing to worry about”

The ‘practice session was fun, and was led by some individuals with a sense of humour that clearly matched our hosts’, and I managed to sight-read the tunes I didn’t know. Jan stayed with Alys, talking her through the finer points of her spare sideways drum device, while Steph stayed amazingly calm with her fiddling, the others joining in on flute, mixed percussion, mandolin, squeezebox and banjo. Kelly had a whistle like my own, and I got quite a few winks as I did my best to follow the dots. An awful lot of people seemed to need to say hello to Steph and Annie for some reason, but I understood why as soon as I heard the first “It’s that ginger nutter”

Back to the Edifice for a meal of stew, and then Steph took me to one side, just as Shan had done with Alys.

“Decision time, Enfys. Lots of decisions, in fact. What we do now, sort of tradition, is a dance, a ceilidh. Are you up for that?”

She chuckled, then continued.

“One thing… years ago, yeah? Me and Geoff had just met, and I am shitting myself, knowing I’m a girl and at the same time knowing that I’m. well, you know. And there’s my Geoff, except he’s not my Geoff just then…”

She looked off into some distance of time and place, then smiled at the clouds.

“Sometimes, Enfys, life hands you a choice, and if you are able, you need to seize it. That was mine, and, well, you can see how it turned out for us. One of these ceilidhs, it was where he proposed to me…”

She drifted away again, then shook her head, coming back to the there and then.

“Practicalities, love. It’s a dance, and what happens in them is that girls dance together. It’s a way of finding a safe partner. It means you two can dance together, and nobody will think it’s weird. Not unless you snog, of course”

Suddenly, she was laughing.

“Sorry, love! Memories. There I am, snogging my man, and someone deadnames me from behind, and it’s only one of my colleagues. Not the best way to come out at work, that”

“Was it a problem?”

“Not at all. People are good, in the main. Those that aren’t can be avoided, or nullified, or…”

A bark of laughter.

“There are other options, Later, maybe. Anyway, time to get moving. Not got to sing, but do got to dance!”

Apart from the usual junior-school silliness, where a couple of teachers had tried to get us to do the Gay Gordons or Circassian Circle, neither of us had done anything in that style before. The first one we tried was a four-couple square, with all of the Woodruffs plus Mark, and Steph made sure that Alys and I were fourth couple, and so last to do each of the various moves. Alys was seriously nervous as we began, but she was laughing out loud by the time we finished the final swing, using a hand and waist grip that Geoff had taught us both. We avoided ‘snogging’, and just as Steph had promised, there were other pairs of girls and women dancing. I could see why the rest of our group loved it.

After we had worn ourselves down, it was off to a huge marquee for a series of professional acts, some of which weren’t really to my taste, but then I had the wonderful distraction of Alys pressed against me as we sat in the middle of a long row of chairs, the others screening us to each side. The evening finished with a much more lively ‘session’ in a big bar, where both Steph and Annie were much less restrained than they had been in the afternoon. I suspected that their exuberance was only partly explained by the beer they consumed; I was used to Steph’s wildness, but in Annie, she really seemed to have found a soul mate. All she needed to do, I thought, would be to stand on one--- Oh.

Absolutely barking, even more so than the redhead. Eventually, possibly out of some respect for our youth, we returned to the huge tent and our beds, where someone had zipped our sleeping bags together.

Oh.

I changed into some lightweight fleece trousers and a T-shirt, Alys wearing much the same, and after I had done all the necessary washing and brushing, we slipped into our nest. This time, I found my head resting on Alys’ shoulder, an arm across her chest as we settled down to the sound of light rain on the flysheet.

“Enfys?”

“That’s my name”

“Serious for a bit, please. You thinking this is all a set-up?”

“A bloody nice one if it is. No complaints from me, so far”

“Nor me. Just a lot of things are… It’s all very convenient. You know that Annie is trans? Darren’s adopted?”

“I’d guessed the first bit, and the seconds would follow, I suppose”

“Yeah. I think Steph wanted me to see some others like I am, being happy in life. Being lucky”

“And?”

“There’s more. A lot more. Shan, she told me a lot of things when we had that chat, but I think there’s an awful lot they haven’t said, any of them. Darren, for example. He’s got what Dad calls ‘copper’s eyes’, always looking around him, never still. You watch him tomorrow”

“Today now, love”

“Be serious. Anyway, that Shan. It’s all part of the set-up, I think, because what we talked about were her parents, she’s adopted too, and a couple of friends from Carmarthen. She’s got two Mams, she said, and the other couple, they’re both women, and they’ve got their own kids, not adopted. All the adults, they’re all lesbians”

I gave her a squeeze.

“Just like us, then. That’s what we are. All they’re doing is like we said about Annie, letting us see people like us. Happy people like us”

She drew a long, sighing breath.

“Enfys?”

“Um?”

“What if I don’t want to be a lesbian?”

She felt me start to pull away, and drew me back into her arms.

“No! Not what I meant! Look, let me speak, just listen, please”

“Look and listen?”

“Serious! Please”

“Okay. I promise”

“Right. You know what I am”

“A girl I love”

“Thank you. I know I’m a girl. Always have known. People told me I was a boy, so I had to keep telling them they were wrong, and finally Mam and Dad listened, and you know the rest. I’m still wrong, though. I see that every time I undress, and it’s… I thought I was mad, at first. Sick in the head. So I started one of those balance sheet things, whatever they call them. Pros and cons, for and against. List all the things I do, that I feel, and write what girls think and do and feel next to mine, see if they match up. And girls fancy boys, just like Sali and the others at school, all of them, even the ones who hang around with Ifor Idiot. Our parents. Our teachers. My shrink. If I’m a girl, I’m thinking, why don’t I dream like girls do, about boys? So, all the time, I’m asking myself, is this real? Am I actually just like that lecturer at that college says, a perve trying to get to real girls by lying?”

I reached up to stroke her cheek, and of course it was wet.

“Is that what you think you are, love?”

“What do you think I am, Enfys?”

“The girl I love, growing into the woman I will love just as much”

“Not real, though. That’s what I’ve been thinking. That’s what I think Mam spotted, when we came back from the shrink the last couple of times. He is so insistent, Enfys: real girls are straight girls”

I moved upwards, just a little, so could kiss her tears away.

“You feel real to me, love”

She turned her head towards me and kissed me softly on the mouth.

“Don’t drop me, Enfys. I would break again”