MOM SLID A LARGE RECTANGULAR envelope across the kitchen counter in my direction. “This came for you today.”
I stared at the handwriting in the center of the envelope that spelled out my name. Then my eyes tracked a line to the upper left-hand corner. To her name.
My fingertips grazed the surface of the letters, the slightest indentations from where her pen had pressed down. I closed my eyes, and I was instantly brought back to that day in the car when I first saw her write on her palm.
I picked the envelope up and held it my hands. It felt substantial, more than just paper. The postmark was from Carson, NC. Red capital letters across the front spelled out:
DO NOT BEND
I walked directly to the garbage can and stomped on the foot pedal. The lid swung open like the mouth of a whale, ready to devour. The corners of the envelope collapsed as I stuffed it in, and I felt the bubble wrap inside crushing and snapping under my palm as I pressed it toward the bottom of the garbage.
Mom shouted, “Chris!”
I didn’t acknowledge her. I simply went to the cupboard and pulled down a glass—the afternoon sun shining through the window exposing all the spots and streaks left behind by the dishwasher—and filled it with water.
I gulped it down, trying to drown out whatever was boiling up inside me. I swallowed hard several times and washed it away. “I’ll be upstairs,” I told her on my way out of the room.
I took the stairs two at a time. I closed the door behind me. I exhaled. No sooner had I taken one step inside than my mom pushed the door open, walked in, and slammed it shut again behind her.
“Look.” She planted her feet firmly into my carpet. “Love is messy. It’s painful and confusing and fucked up—”
“Mom.”
“Well, it is.” She thrashed her arms around. “Nobody knows how to do it right, okay? It takes a lifetime to figure it out.”
“I don’t want to talk about this.”
“That’s just too damn bad!” she shouted. “You wanted space, I gave you space. But enough is enough.”
“Not to me, it’s not enough.”
“You know what, Chris? I’ve known you your entire life, from the moment you came into this world—”
I had to interrupt her. “A lot’s changed since then, Mom.”
“And a lot hasn’t,” she countered. “I see this girl, this Maia, trying so hard, and you’re just shutting her down.”
I winced at the sound of her name.
“You have no idea what happened, Mom.”
“You’re right. Maybe I don’t. But I know you. Whether you believe it or not, I know you.”
I shook my head. “I appreciate the fact that you’re trying to help or whatever, but you don’t understand,” I told her.
“I know that you expect people to always know the exact right thing to do and say, the exact right way to feel and love and be.”
“No I don’t,” I snorted.
“Oh, Chris.” She smiled, but it was not a smile. “Please.”
“Who are we talking about, anyway? Me and Maia, or me and you?”
“Both, all right?” She tossed her arms up in the air, and as they fell to her sides something in her softened. She brought her hand to her forehead and held her face at the temples between her thumb and the rest of her fingers. She walked over to my bed and sat down.
“Please,” she said again, but this time it wasn’t a “give me a break please”; it was simply a request, as she patted the empty space next to her. “I’m not gonna try to pry it out of you, okay? You don’t have to tell me what happened with her. I just want you to listen.”
“Fine,” I relented.
“I love you. You’re special. And beautiful—”
“God, Mom, please don’t—”
“No, I mean beautiful in your soul, honey.” She reached out and placed her hand above my heart. “It has nothing to do with appearance or being a girl or a boy, or anything like that. It just is.” She held my face between her hands so that I was forced to look at her. They felt so soft and cool, and I couldn’t remember the last time she had touched me with this kind of tenderness.
“I wouldn’t change a single, minute, microscopic thing about you,” she said. “Do you understand that?”
I pulled away from her. “I don’t believe that for one second, Mom.”
She sighed, and rubbed her temples once more. “You challenge me. You make me think and question and doubt myself, and that’s good. You force me to do better—you force everyone around you to do better, you always have. And that’s what I’m trying to do here.”
“Then why do you look at me like you . . .” I’d thought the word so many times, but looking her in the eye, I was having trouble getting it out of my mouth. “Like you hate me?”
“No, no, no.” She just kept repeating it as she pulled me in toward her, and I gave in and let my head fall against her shoulder. “NoNoNoNoNo,” she whispered, like the chorus to a song.
My forehead was touching her neck, and her skin was so cool, it reminded me of being a kid, back when she’d have defended me and whatever I wanted to the death. I suddenly felt a million words I’d never been able to say to her bubbling up from somewhere deep within me, crawling up through my stomach and into my throat, getting lodged there in one giant lump I needed to release before it strangled me. If I could convince myself I really was just a kid again, then maybe it was okay to cry just one more time.
She let me, rocking me slowly, not saying anything, not trying to make me feel better or find the magic words or tell me any of her old standby white lies about how this will pass and how great I am and how one day everyone will see it too.
She was silent.
I lifted my head, and wiped my eyes, and laughed at myself because I was embarrassed. But she didn’t laugh or smile or frown; she looked me in the eye and repeated, firmly, “I could never hate you.”
“Then why have you been so hard on me?” I finally asked the question I hadn’t been able to bring myself to utter this whole past year.
“When you’re a parent, you’ll understand. You are everything to me—it’s like you’re walking around with my heart inside your chest. And I am terrified for you, Chris. I am terrified of what could happen to you because of other people’s hatred and ignorance.”
“I know, but—” I argued.
“Chris! You were not just beat up. You were targeted, and those boys could’ve raped or killed you. I know you don’t want to believe that, but it’s true, and you were so very lucky that you weren’t hurt worse than you were.”
“Mom, that’s not what was going to—” I tried once more, but her words sent this tingle crawling along the back of my neck that prevented me from finishing.
“And then I see you wanting to just put yourself back out there in this big, bold way and it’s terrifying,” she continued. “I was so angry at you for so long.”
“But why? That’s what I don’t understand. It wasn’t my fault. I can’t help being who I am!”
“I know it wasn’t your fault. You weren’t asking for it. You did not deserve what happened.”
“Then why are you so angry at me?” I said again.
She shook her head with purpose. “It’s not about you being trans. It truly isn’t. It’s taken me all year to realize this, but it was about me. I think it felt like as you were rejecting being a woman, you were rejecting me—”
“That’s not what I was doing, Mom.”
“I know that now,” she said. “But it was more than just my fragile little ego.” She paused and grabbed my hand, her voice low when she said, “I loved my daughter something fierce. You know that.”
“Yes,” I agreed—that was one thing I knew for sure.
“You have to understand”—she gripped my hands tight—“you were taking her away from me. That’s why I was angry. I had to get all mama tiger on someone, and that someone was you.” She coughed, trying to hold back her tears. “And I think I was grieving too, mourning you. I was holding on so hard to the person you used to be, I didn’t realize you were still here. But that’s what you were telling me all along, wasn’t it?”
I nodded.
“I never wanted to hurt you, Chris—I wanted to protect you, even from yourself.”
“I know,” I told her. And this time I did.
“I’m sorry, and I will try my best to be what you need,” she said, her voice shaking. “I don’t want to lose you.”
I suddenly felt all these walls crashing down around me. Walls I didn’t even know were there. I swallowed hard and told her the truth: “You won’t.”