*Non-Fiction — November 1, 2018
Threshold
'Tyne & Wear Archives & Museums, 2012
The story had too many beginnings.
If you stepped through a door, twelve others might open.
—Naomi Shihab Nye
It isn’t a secret exactly, though I never say it out loud: I have always wanted to wear a suit. Matching vest, jacket, and slacks. Shiny, tasseled shoes. In my imagination, it’s always a three-piece suit, neatly tailored. My breasts never get in the way. The suit is sometimes silver, sometimes black. I choose a crisp white shirt, or a crisp blue shirt, with onyx cufflinks and a silk Pierre Cardin tie. I bought one once at T.J. Maxx, but I was too shy. I took it back. I didn’t want anyone to think I don’t love being a woman, that I didn’t love being a girl. It’s just that I can’t imagine anything would make me feel more feminine than a three-piece suit with a pastel tie and a handkerchief peeking out of the pocket. Or a tuxedo! Don’t even get me started.
2.
My friend tried to talk me into being a call girl when we were in grad school. It wasn’t my morals exactly that got in the way. It was more that I was terrified of sex. Even more terrified of violence. My friend thought I was crazy. You’re going to have sex with people you don’t like anyway. You’re going to have sex with people who eventually repulse you. Why not get paid for it? There was a business card. An agency. An agency she said gave her agency. A way to get out of student loans. Love doesn’t come easily to artists like us. Besides, most of her johns were harmless, ancient. Many just wanted to walk around with a young woman. It was easy. One with erectile dysfunction liked to take her to a diner to watch her eat lemon meringue pie.
My friend tried to talk me into being a call girl when we were in grad school. It wasn’t my morals exactly that got in the way. It was more that I was terrified of sex. Even more terrified of violence. My friend thought I was crazy. You’re going to have sex with people you don’t like anyway. You’re going to have sex with people who eventually repulse you. Why not get paid for it? There was a business card. An agency. An agency she said gave her agency. A way to get out of student loans. Love doesn’t come easily to artists like us. Besides, most of her johns were harmless, ancient. Many just wanted to walk around with a young woman. It was easy. One with erectile dysfunction liked to take her to a diner to watch her eat lemon meringue pie.
3.
It was autumn in the Midwest. I won’t get more specific than that. I was thirty, give or take. I had lived with my partner for many years. In fact, I could hear her laughing—her sincere laugh—in the next room with this man’s wife. Shall we? I said, rising. He rose also, nodded, then reached over and cupped my ass with his hand, gave it a firm squeeze, waited. A voice in my head said, Call out to his wife! Expose him! Another said, reminiscent of my mother, Knee him in the groin! He was grinning by then. He was daring me to do something he knew I wouldn’t do. But the worst part was—the voice in my head that was louder than all the others said—Why would he grab my ass when his wife has a much better body?
It was autumn in the Midwest. I won’t get more specific than that. I was thirty, give or take. I had lived with my partner for many years. In fact, I could hear her laughing—her sincere laugh—in the next room with this man’s wife. Shall we? I said, rising. He rose also, nodded, then reached over and cupped my ass with his hand, gave it a firm squeeze, waited. A voice in my head said, Call out to his wife! Expose him! Another said, reminiscent of my mother, Knee him in the groin! He was grinning by then. He was daring me to do something he knew I wouldn’t do. But the worst part was—the voice in my head that was louder than all the others said—Why would he grab my ass when his wife has a much better body?
4.
A colleague from another department pinched my ass after I’d forgotten his name. He was an earnest kind of guy, with no signs of outward machismo. I pretended it didn’t happen. I pretended it was a bee sting. I pretended I was kidding around. Of course I know your name. My colleague’s wife was a knitter. Though I’d never met her, he once made a big deal of the scarf she’d made him. I pretended I’d backed into one of her needles. I avoided him for a long time after, staying on a different side of the room if we had to be in the same one. I thought maybe he had a crush. But a year later he said, I owe you an apology for that goosing. It’s just that I hate being invisible and—well, frankly—you remind me of my sister.
A colleague from another department pinched my ass after I’d forgotten his name. He was an earnest kind of guy, with no signs of outward machismo. I pretended it didn’t happen. I pretended it was a bee sting. I pretended I was kidding around. Of course I know your name. My colleague’s wife was a knitter. Though I’d never met her, he once made a big deal of the scarf she’d made him. I pretended I’d backed into one of her needles. I avoided him for a long time after, staying on a different side of the room if we had to be in the same one. I thought maybe he had a crush. But a year later he said, I owe you an apology for that goosing. It’s just that I hate being invisible and—well, frankly—you remind me of my sister.
5.
Everywhere we go, my partner and I are mistaken for sisters. There is nothing specifically malicious about it, but still I cringe and fume. Then, Angie reminds me, They would think it impolite to presume. I have a close friend named James, a man I think of like a brother. We have that kind of relationship—goofing around on campus, lifting weights at the gym, going for coffee in between classes. One day the barista said, Your boyfriend is so sweet! I love his red hair. You two seem really happy together. For a moment, I basked shamelessly in her affirmation. I hadn’t intended to pass, and I knew I wasn’t supposed to enjoy being mistaken for somebody else, somebody straight. When my partner and I chose our wedding rings, the clerk exclaimed, What luck! Both of you finding love at the same time!
Everywhere we go, my partner and I are mistaken for sisters. There is nothing specifically malicious about it, but still I cringe and fume. Then, Angie reminds me, They would think it impolite to presume. I have a close friend named James, a man I think of like a brother. We have that kind of relationship—goofing around on campus, lifting weights at the gym, going for coffee in between classes. One day the barista said, Your boyfriend is so sweet! I love his red hair. You two seem really happy together. For a moment, I basked shamelessly in her affirmation. I hadn’t intended to pass, and I knew I wasn’t supposed to enjoy being mistaken for somebody else, somebody straight. When my partner and I chose our wedding rings, the clerk exclaimed, What luck! Both of you finding love at the same time!
6.
When I was in high school, empire waist maxi dresses were all the rage. I had a patchwork one made with chambray squares that I imagined made me look like Stevie Nicks. I hummed You make loving fun… as I stocked gum and mints into the racks in front of my checkout lane. It was almost closing time when a customer with a full cart said, Congratulations! referring, I’d assumed, to my upcoming graduation. I thanked Mrs. Bergeron as I slid behind my register and started to ring her up. Cheerios, milk, sliced bologna, the usual. She asked if I wanted a boy or a girl, a conspiratorial smile across her powdered face. I fumbled her carton of eggs, the cardboard lid popping open. Shame splashed across my cheeks—fatso, porker, all the childhood teasing. I would never subject a kid to all that.
When I was in high school, empire waist maxi dresses were all the rage. I had a patchwork one made with chambray squares that I imagined made me look like Stevie Nicks. I hummed You make loving fun… as I stocked gum and mints into the racks in front of my checkout lane. It was almost closing time when a customer with a full cart said, Congratulations! referring, I’d assumed, to my upcoming graduation. I thanked Mrs. Bergeron as I slid behind my register and started to ring her up. Cheerios, milk, sliced bologna, the usual. She asked if I wanted a boy or a girl, a conspiratorial smile across her powdered face. I fumbled her carton of eggs, the cardboard lid popping open. Shame splashed across my cheeks—fatso, porker, all the childhood teasing. I would never subject a kid to all that.
7.
I don’t know when I knew I would never be beautiful. Was it before the home permanents with the rotten smell, the solution that burned my scalp? Before the glasses with thick lenses and the eye patch so big it stuck to my brow? Was it before the man at the park asked me if I wasn’t a little too big to be playing on the jungle gym with the other kids from kindergarten? Before big for your age, big-boned, big girl, large-breasted, broad-shouldered, strapping young woman, even mesomorph—with its superficial nod to science—began to trickle down like the Northwest rain? You’re not fat, my best friend said. You’re just not delicate. Some boys like that. Was it before I realized how ominous it was to say, Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, how terrible it was to believe it?
I don’t know when I knew I would never be beautiful. Was it before the home permanents with the rotten smell, the solution that burned my scalp? Before the glasses with thick lenses and the eye patch so big it stuck to my brow? Was it before the man at the park asked me if I wasn’t a little too big to be playing on the jungle gym with the other kids from kindergarten? Before big for your age, big-boned, big girl, large-breasted, broad-shouldered, strapping young woman, even mesomorph—with its superficial nod to science—began to trickle down like the Northwest rain? You’re not fat, my best friend said. You’re just not delicate. Some boys like that. Was it before I realized how ominous it was to say, Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, how terrible it was to believe it?
8.
I don’t know when I first knew I’d never have children. Before puberty, I’m guessing. Before the Children’s Hospital, with its kids clanking down the hall in leg braces, with its kids sporting burns, with its kids like me hooked up to tubes. I don’t remember dolls except for Barbie Color Magic and a sailor with a pipe permanently affixed to its mouth. I don’t remember pretending to mother anyone. I’d sit my younger sister, my lone pupil, in a class where I was the teacher. Or I’d pretend I was a famous dancer, even though because of my asthma, I couldn’t take lessons. My sister was the one who leapt into modern jazz, her damp leotards and bodysuit curling in the hamper. When she leapt into pregnancy, I was an exchange student overseas. I was probably asleep when her test stick turned pink.
I don’t know when I first knew I’d never have children. Before puberty, I’m guessing. Before the Children’s Hospital, with its kids clanking down the hall in leg braces, with its kids sporting burns, with its kids like me hooked up to tubes. I don’t remember dolls except for Barbie Color Magic and a sailor with a pipe permanently affixed to its mouth. I don’t remember pretending to mother anyone. I’d sit my younger sister, my lone pupil, in a class where I was the teacher. Or I’d pretend I was a famous dancer, even though because of my asthma, I couldn’t take lessons. My sister was the one who leapt into modern jazz, her damp leotards and bodysuit curling in the hamper. When she leapt into pregnancy, I was an exchange student overseas. I was probably asleep when her test stick turned pink.
9.
I wanted a child when I was a child. I prayed every night for a baby sister, abandoned on the doorstep, discarded in the trash. It wasn’t noble. I didn’t want to share my doll collection or my dresses. I only wanted to share the blame. In high school, I was everybody’s favorite babysitter. I let the kids run wild so I could write poems, made them promise to feign sleep when their parents came home. In my twenties, I left a man at the altar. He wanted children, but that wasn’t why I left. In my thirties, people begin to pry: “No children yet?” Their heads cocked, their faces filled with concern. I feign interest or change the subject with a smile. The new mommies would never forgive me if I said: “Couldn’t you think of anything better to do with your time?”
I wanted a child when I was a child. I prayed every night for a baby sister, abandoned on the doorstep, discarded in the trash. It wasn’t noble. I didn’t want to share my doll collection or my dresses. I only wanted to share the blame. In high school, I was everybody’s favorite babysitter. I let the kids run wild so I could write poems, made them promise to feign sleep when their parents came home. In my twenties, I left a man at the altar. He wanted children, but that wasn’t why I left. In my thirties, people begin to pry: “No children yet?” Their heads cocked, their faces filled with concern. I feign interest or change the subject with a smile. The new mommies would never forgive me if I said: “Couldn’t you think of anything better to do with your time?”
10.
“The life I live now is that risk I didn’t take,” writes the poet Cristin O’Keefe Aptowicz. But it is also true that the life she lives now is a result of all the risks she did take. Failure and ambition one humongous knotted ball of yarn, impossible to separate even with painstakingly steady fingers. Sometimes you just have to reach for the scissors. For example, no one ever carried me over a threshold—I was a big bride who ran through the honeymoon door, plopped on the bed, and started to laugh. I was the one who answered a question before anyone else, silence a white space for which I didn’t have patience. I jumped into the pool, never testing the temperature first with my toe. Once I took a bite out of a tiny cube of French soap sure it was chocolate.
“The life I live now is that risk I didn’t take,” writes the poet Cristin O’Keefe Aptowicz. But it is also true that the life she lives now is a result of all the risks she did take. Failure and ambition one humongous knotted ball of yarn, impossible to separate even with painstakingly steady fingers. Sometimes you just have to reach for the scissors. For example, no one ever carried me over a threshold—I was a big bride who ran through the honeymoon door, plopped on the bed, and started to laugh. I was the one who answered a question before anyone else, silence a white space for which I didn’t have patience. I jumped into the pool, never testing the temperature first with my toe. Once I took a bite out of a tiny cube of French soap sure it was chocolate.
11.
Linda Zerilli writes, “Because it can be neither forgotten nor changed, the past must be redeemed.” But how to do this, exactly? When I married Angie, my parents were two hours away in their house by the sea, watching Wheel of Fortune. I wanted to wear a tuxedo, but I didn’t— because I hate that question which one of you is the man? more than I hate feeling bulky and cramped in a gown made for a slender, girlish body. Maybe this was enough, I thought, redeeming the definition of marriage. We both wore black without garters or heels. We walked each other down the makeshift aisle. No bridesmaids drenched in expensive fuchsia, no groomsmen drunk and groping. The next day at the hotel, a woman said, “I heard you got married last night.” I nodded, smiled. “Tell me, what does your husband do?”
Linda Zerilli writes, “Because it can be neither forgotten nor changed, the past must be redeemed.” But how to do this, exactly? When I married Angie, my parents were two hours away in their house by the sea, watching Wheel of Fortune. I wanted to wear a tuxedo, but I didn’t— because I hate that question which one of you is the man? more than I hate feeling bulky and cramped in a gown made for a slender, girlish body. Maybe this was enough, I thought, redeeming the definition of marriage. We both wore black without garters or heels. We walked each other down the makeshift aisle. No bridesmaids drenched in expensive fuchsia, no groomsmen drunk and groping. The next day at the hotel, a woman said, “I heard you got married last night.” I nodded, smiled. “Tell me, what does your husband do?”
12.
Adrienne Rich writes, “Every journey into the past is complicated by delusions, false memories, false namings of real events.” I married a man because it was time. I married a man because I was scared. I never wanted to get married, then suddenly in my early thirties, I did. He married because it was time. He married because he was lazy and I was right there. What is the difference between a heterosexual marriage and a pimp and a whore? What did I lose? What did I gain? In the end we repulsed each other, our neediness and demands. We avoided contact, skirting through dark rooms. Still, I liked to wear his shirts to bed, his shirts over my bathing suit. In many ways I was the husband—wage earner, the one who took out the trash. I left the money on the dresser.
Adrienne Rich writes, “Every journey into the past is complicated by delusions, false memories, false namings of real events.” I married a man because it was time. I married a man because I was scared. I never wanted to get married, then suddenly in my early thirties, I did. He married because it was time. He married because he was lazy and I was right there. What is the difference between a heterosexual marriage and a pimp and a whore? What did I lose? What did I gain? In the end we repulsed each other, our neediness and demands. We avoided contact, skirting through dark rooms. Still, I liked to wear his shirts to bed, his shirts over my bathing suit. In many ways I was the husband—wage earner, the one who took out the trash. I left the money on the dresser.
Originally published in No Tokens Issue No. 2. View full issue & more.