It's been fifteen minutes but it feels like hours. Monty is sitting on the edge of the stiff bed in this strange room, waiting. All around him, the windows are drawn shut so that no light and no wandering eyes come in. The air conditioning is loud and persistent but Monty still finds themselves sweating, palms damp.
They wipe their hands down on their pants. They're so nervous.
Today, they're dressed like a boy. Their hair is short (they had just cut it a month ago after a year of wearing it wavy and long, pulled back with ribbons and clips) and the softness of their body is mostly hidden behind a boxy shirt that was one size too big. They didn't bind today either which makes them feel uncomfortable but the caseworker had been explicit about that: they had been asked to arrive with no alterations, decorations, or enhancements. Nothing "misleading" was to be allowed. Today was about honesty.
Monty squirms at the thought. Honesty was for the straightforward and the simple. The privileged. It was for the kinds of people not stuck living their lives in-between realities, between half-truths. What has honesty ever done for them other than put a target on their back, expose them and strip them of their comfort in ambiguity, force their fluidity into a cage and beat it until it made sense to everyone else looking in?
The doorknob turns. The sound feels so loud in the empty room and Monty's head whips instantly over to look at who has decided to walk in, their eyes wide and blue and so, so pretty.
now it's like snow at the beach, weird but fuckin' beautiful
They wipe their hands down on their pants. They're so nervous.
Today, they're dressed like a boy. Their hair is short (they had just cut it a month ago after a year of wearing it wavy and long, pulled back with ribbons and clips) and the softness of their body is mostly hidden behind a boxy shirt that was one size too big. They didn't bind today either which makes them feel uncomfortable but the caseworker had been explicit about that: they had been asked to arrive with no alterations, decorations, or enhancements. Nothing "misleading" was to be allowed. Today was about honesty.
Monty squirms at the thought. Honesty was for the straightforward and the simple. The privileged. It was for the kinds of people not stuck living their lives in-between realities, between half-truths. What has honesty ever done for them other than put a target on their back, expose them and strip them of their comfort in ambiguity, force their fluidity into a cage and beat it until it made sense to everyone else looking in?
The doorknob turns. The sound feels so loud in the empty room and Monty's head whips instantly over to look at who has decided to walk in, their eyes wide and blue and so, so pretty.