After my January summit with "Lisa Brown," I went back to my life as Kiara. I could already feel things changing. I left the door open for her to return to the life she left behind -- I really want her to -- but her attitude makes me think there's a strong chance she won't, that she's got this idea that she can make it big in that life, and there's no going back.
With that knowledge, suddenly this weird, blurry life I've been sleepwalking through started to come into focus as I was forced to confront the idea that... this may be it for me. This may be the rest of my life. This body, these clothes, this place, this child. I had to start looking at all of it as if it belonged to me, because it might.
I don't think I have a problem with being a woman. I'd rather be a man, but I'm not mad about it. If anything, I'm more mad I'm not mad. I want to see being a girl-woman-person as being torture, something to escape at all costs, not something I'm making my peace with. Not a passive fact of life. I'm quite literally in the wrong body -- not to mention the wrong age and the wrong race -- but 23 hours a day it feels normal. My body does what a woman's does, and that's different from what it used to, but it's all... fine. I don't have to be girly, womanly or ladylike -- I can throw on sweats and a soft bra and whatever and nobody is going to chastise me for not having my hair be perfect or not wearing a skirt and high heels and stockings. This isn't Mad Men. So that's an arrangement that's fine for me.
It's the age, the mommy, and the North Carolina of it all that weighs on me. Plotting my escape and wondering whether Sierra belongs with me, or if leaving her with Grandma and Mama Kelly is going to screw her up royally.
(You: 'If you're just going to leave the baby with the family members why stay as Kiara?' Me: 'Because putting a stranger in the mix still seems worse!')
Okay, I've potentially got a new life and I've got to figure out who to be. That's clearly not going to be a Japanese-American male journalist. Hell, looking at the landscape it won't likely be anything with words. How the hell are you supposed to make a life for yourself these days?
Whatever. That's long-term, Future-Tom/Kiara stuff. Today I have a bunch of homework.
Which is what brought me to a coffee shop on Friday the 13th (March version.) I was supposed to be meeting with some of my classmates to go over some readings, but for a variety of reasons they didn't show and I was left to leaf through my textbook alone.
I don't necessarily mind -- I'm a pretty solitary dude when I'm myself -- but it sucked to put some faith in people and be let down.
So there's me and my little coffee and my huge textbook, highlighting what I could, continually glancing at the door in case anyone did show up. I try to stay focussed, but I can't help people-watching. The mom who lets her twelve-year-old get a "fro-cho," the thirty-somethings on their first date, the high schoolers on their way out to a party (Thankfully, none of them acknowledge me, because I didn't know if maybe they would know Kiara.) And the guy in the corner just reading his book.
Eventually my little coffee felt a lot bigger in my bladder. Being alone in the place, I had to put all my stuff in my bag before using the restroom.
When I came out and sat back down, the reading guy had shuffled to the next table over from me.
"Homework?" he asked.
"No, actually," I said, "I'm getting ready for a date. I just like to be super-prepared."
"What is that, calculus? Are you dating Will Hunting?"
"It makes for really great conversation," I said.
I cursed myself. Was I flirting? I didn't want to be flirting. I didn't want to be flirted with. But I also kind of did. I was annoyed that this guy had insinuated himself into my night but I was also -- in a flicker of thought I've been trying to untangle ever since that night -- glad. As I've said, because of my general air of "Do Not Engage," people don't seem to see me as a female at all, which means I don't get flirted with. That means it was rare enough to be... not unwelcome.
I looked over at him. Older than Kiara, not older than Tom. Decent presentation, nothing that screams "beware of this jerk," but, I realize, I have no idea what signs those are. He just... looked like a guy.
I can't explain it. But I couldn't explain it when I hooked up with Lizzie DiFaccio at the sophomore mixer when I was 19, either. It wasn't attraction so much of lack-of-aversion. He kind of looked like a younger Glen Powell, without the weird upper lip thing going on, and a worse hairline.
He had broken the ice and I had gone alone with it. Rebuffing him would take effort I didn't feel like expending. So I ideated, how to play this situation. How I wanted to play it. For the first time in a long while I felt like I was being looked at not like a kid or a teen mom, but as a grown person.
It wasn't unappealing.
"Hey, listen," I said, "Give me an hour with this book, and then we can talk, okay?"
He smirked, and accepted my terms, pointedly putting a timer on his phone.
Once the term was up, I closed my book. "Ground rules," I said, "Don't ask me for any personal information. No last name, age, address, Instagram handle. If you're good, you'll get my phone number."
"Uh, okay," he said, confused but open.
I held up my phone and took a picture of him.
"Woah, what was that?"
"I just sent your picture to my mom. If I go missing, she'll know who to look for."
"Damn, you're not kidding around," he said, half amused. "Can I at least get a first name?"
I inhaled sharply and thought. God, why was it still so hard to do this? I almost tripped over it. "Ki-iara. Ahem. Kiara."
"Okay, Kiara," he said, "I'm Donovan." I almost snorted. That wasn't a name you hear often.
"Well, since so many things are off-limits, what can we talk about?"
"Calculus," I shrugged. "Trends in calculus."
"I'm afraid I don't know anything about that."
"Good, I like to have all the power in a conversation," I said. (Ooh, flirty Tom/Kiara is feisty. I like her.)
I asked if he was new in town because he didn't have the same accent as everyone else, and he confirmed he was from out of state but "Won't say where, because that's personal info." Touche. We talked about the book he was reading, I talked about how I spend much of my time, tactfully omitting that it's largely spent reading nursery rhymes.
We had a surprisingly good conversation, considering the guardrails I had put up. He seemed to get a kick out of it, like I was a puzzle he could figure out. I caught his eyes occasionally drifting down my baggy gray sweatshirt, which featured the logo of the local community college (I think one of Jen's exes left it at the house.) I wanted to tell him Don't worry, they're a good size, if a bit saggy, but in the name of good taste I pretended I didn't notice.
At 9, the place was closing up.
He asked, "Do you... want to go to a bar or something?" I had left my fake ID at home -- I should know better than to leave home without it but in fairness I really did not intend to meet anyone or go anywhere besides the coffee shop.
So I said probably the stupidest thing any man-trapped-in-a-girl's-body has ever said and asked if he had anything to drink at his place.
He kind of sucked in his breath. "Well, there's a lot of people there... it's kind of a bro-y house,"
"I don't mind," I said, "You're going to let them cockblock you?" Now I was being bold, invoking the C-word. What the hell was my endgame?
"No, I..." he sighed, "I mean, I just want to warn you."
"I'll be fine," I said.
The whole drive over, I stared out the window and thought this is stupid, I'm going to get murdered or worse. I'm an idiot, what am I doing?
We get there, and well, at least it's in the nice part of town. It's a little one-floor place. He leads me in and, yep: sparsely decorated, functional furniture, messy kitchenette... and some dudes in gaming chairs who are barely fazed by our presence. I pause in case he wants to introduce me, but instead he just gestures toward the back bedroom.
By now, I'm starting to come to my senses. What am I doing here? What's my endgame, my exit strategy?
We sit on his bed, which is in the corner of the room against the wall, because of course it is, all guys do that. He asks if I want to watch something, and at this point I'm kind of over needing a pretext, so I just say no and put my hand on his thigh.
He leans in for a kiss, and, well... it's a kiss. I'm kissing a man. I'm nervous and uncomfortable and... and thrown by how okay with it I am, especially judging by the pulsing between my legs. Shit, I think, there's no denying this. Kiara's body wants this, and I kind of just want her to take the wheel, so to speak.
So we make out for a while, and I'm kind of aware that he's got a hard-on in his jeans, and eventually he gathers the courage to wind his hand up my sweater -- pausing just long enough for me to voice any objections if I have any. I don't, and he proceeds.
And it feels good. Not necessarily the fondling itself, which was a little weird at times like "Oh, I have something to touch there, and it feels not-bad," but -- and here's where I curse Marc for putting this thought into my head with all his posts -- the connection. The being wanted, the being touched. That, I liked. His hands went other places too, and so did mine. He had an okay body for a guy.
Then he started to toy with the waistband of my pants -- which are really not what one would have worn on an intentional date -- and I just reared back. Totally instinctual, saying "Oh, time out."
"Oh, sorry," he said.
"Yeah, just... not ready for that yet," I said. Truth was, if you had asked me a half-hour earlier back at the coffee shop, I probably would have said yes, I can go all the way, but as he had predicted, the house kind of was a turn-off, although it may have just been the feeling of really physically being present that reminded me I was in deep.
"Okay, good to know where the limit is," he said gamely, then went back to kissing my neck and stroking my hair.
"Well, that's my limit," I said, "What about yours?"
"Mine?" he asked, muffled by my shoulder.
"Yeah..." I said, "I mean, I could..."
"Could what?"
I reached down for the fly of his jeans. I don't know where my head was at, except obviously all these months of Kiara hormones have been steering me toward this kind of behavior. I open his jeans and his erect cock pops out at me.
Funny looking thing from this angle. We-e-eirdly big, but maybe it's because my hand is small.
He gives me a look like, "Are you sure?" Maybe he said it out loud, I don't remember.
But yeah, I was sure. I started rubbing and touching and... putting my mouth on it. Stuff I liked girls to do when I was with them, when I was a guy. Trying to find my own limits on that... and to my surprise, I didn't have one.
I played with him, I played with myself, I had him play with me a little bit, and then he... finished.
And it was all right, a little surprising. Some of it got in my hair, which was annoying.
After that happened, I felt Tom get back into the driver's seat. I felt my face get hot with shame and confusion.
He clearly couldn't read it on me, because he asked, "So, did I rate getting your number?"
I blew out a tense exhale.
"You give me your number," I said, "And I'll figure it out."
I called a ride and went home, and have spent the days since with my finger hovering over his name in my contacts.
I don't need someone right now, but it's nice to know I could have it if I wanted it.
***
I wrote the above a few weeks back, but I didn't post it at the time because it felt distinctly TMI. It's one thing for Marc to post about his ongoing relationship with a fellow transformee he has a history with, but another for me to cross that boundary with a guy I just met.
Anyway, every day that goes by I feel that pull a little more strongly, but if there's still even half a chance I'm going back to the Inn I should probably stay on mission.
-T/K
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