Blusey Week #2
The first time it comes up is on the drive to the church. Gansey, in a typical state of anxiety, is talking more than she means to.
“I’m sorry if it’s difficult or awkward,” she says. “Hanging out with us. Being the only boy. And let me know if Ronan gives you any shit, she doesn’t really like being around guys but she should get used to it, she’s not going to be at Aglionby forever.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” Blue says.
The answer strikes Gansey as odd, and she glances over at him. He’s tugging at the hem of his shirt, the same way Eve does. She wonders if it’s a tic he picked up from her. “Don’t know what?”
“About being a boy.”
Gansey could kick herself. Her, of all people, to make assumptions -- but she stops herself before she thinks about it too much and just says. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have taken that for granted. Gender, in my experience, can be quite difficult.”
“Your experience?”
Gansey swallows hard. She hadn’t been intending to come out today, hadn’t woken up with it in her mind as something she had to prepare for, and even though Blue has basically just said he (they? She makes a mental note that she should ask) isn’t cis, she can feel the familiar terror welling up inside of her. “I’m trans,” she says, keeping her eyes firmly on the road.
“Oh,” Blue says, and there’s a new warmth in his voice. “I didn’t realize.”
“I’ve put a lot of time and money into making sure people don’t.” The words come out to fast for her to mask the bitterness in them, and in the ensuing silence, she wishes she hadn’t said anything. She takes another deep breath and glances at Blue, and decides to fix it. “I’m kind of glad you know, though. Eve and Leah and Ronan do. I generally prefer to keep it private but it’d be nice to have someone I could talk to. I mean really have a conversation with. Ronan gets some parts of it. She’s been out for years and she gets a lot of heat for it. And she doesn’t exactly conform to societal expectations of femininity but it’s --”
“Different,” Blue says, and his voice is low and understanding and Gansey feels her entire body relax at the tone. “I’m AFAB and I’ve never had a lot of money but my mom spent all her savings to help pay for surgery and hormones and stuff. And sometimes I feel guilty about it, because like I said. I’m not sure I’m 100% a boy. Or at least, I’m not a boy 100% of the time. You know? Like I use he/him pronouns and when I look in the mirror most of the time I think yeah, that’s a boy, and when I think about myself I usually feel like a boy but I’m not -- I’m not a boy the way the guys at school are boys, I think. And not because I’m trans. And then there are days when I’m sure I’m not a boy. So sometimes I feel like I wasted her money. But then I think --” He pauses for a minute, as though weighing whether or not he should actually finish the sentence. “Then I think about how much less often I want to die now, and that’s got to be worth it.”
Gansey has to resist the urge to pull of the side of the road and just hug Blue, because she’s never gotten to talk to anyone like this before, not ever in her life. “I know exactly what you mean,” she says, and it feels good for those words to be true. “I mean -- it was never hard for me and my family to afford those things. I’m aware of how lucky I am. But I know what you mean about --”
“Yeah.”
They settle into a comfortable silence, and Gansey marvels at how much closer to him she feels than she had a few minutes ago. After a few moments, he says, “So Aglionby’s okay with it?”
“I think Aglionby would be okay with just about anyone carrying the Gansey name. My sister, Helen, went to Aglionby and my parents are both big donors. If it had been Eve -- I don’t think it would have gone so smoothly.” She squeezes the steering wheel and says again, “I’m aware of how lucky I am.”
“Hmm,” Blue says, and Gansey glances over at him, wondering why there’s a sudden skepticism in his voice. “I don’t know about that.”
“About what?”
“About you being lucky. I mean, you’re lucky to have money and a family willing to spend it on you. You’re lucky to go to Aglionby. But I don’t think it’s very smart to just say you’re lucky and ignore the fact that you have problems too. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I’m all about trans positivity, but there’s a certain level where it’s just -- it’s hard. It’s hard to be trans and Eve doesn’t know that in all the ways you do.”
Gansey clears her throat, aware that her voice would shake if she spoke without doing so. “Thank you for saying that,” she says. “I do appreciate it.”
“You don’t think it’s true?” Blue asks, sensing the hesitation in her reply.
“No, it is true. And it helps to be reminded of that. But at the same time -- you haven’t seen Eve at her worst. I don’t mean her worst like her personal worst, I mean like when the world around her is at it’s worst. You haven’t seen how tired she can be. You haven’t seen how hard she’s had to work for every tiny thing she has. So even if I know that my life isn’t perfect, it’s hard to not to feel lucky when I see her like that. It’s hard not to think it isn’t fair.”
Blue shrugs. “Life’s not fair,” he says, and he seems okay with that in a way Gansey can’t imagine being. Then again, she realizes, she hasn’t seen all of him, either. She hasn’t seen him face to face with that unfairness, and she thinks there are probably cracks in that smooth, calm answer of his when he isn’t sitting quietly in the passenger seat of a car, when it isn’t a lovely, sunny spring day, when the unfairness of life becomes material.
“Yes,” she says. “That’s true. But thank you for saying that to me, anyway.”