having left a crimson fan on the wall behind her. Eyes open, bulging violently. Adam’s apple absurdly prominent. Her skirt was bunched messily around her hips, showing silken panties.
And that unmistakable bulge of male genitalia.
*
“What you’ve got to keep remembering is that you are not responsible for anyone else’s happiness but your own.”
Gary nodded like a man who’d heard all this before. “It’s not the happiness part I have a problem with. It’s the responsibility for her killing herself.”
Across the desk, uncluttered and orderly, Dr. Thatcher laced her fingers. “But it was Lana’s decision. You didn’t put the gun in her hand. You never even knew she owned it.”
Gary slumped in his chair, glanced about the room. For a psychiatrist’s office, it appeared remarkably non-academic. The furniture was shiny and modern, more in keeping with a corporate reception lobby. Even the couch was out of the way, in a corner in case someone felt their therapy mandated the horizontal — a nod to tradition, but only grudging. Of this, Gary approved, being no respecter of tradition. Tradition was too often a mask worn by regression.
“She was an adult who made her own decisions. And as painful as it may be to come to terms with, she lived and died according to those decisions. Her own. Not yours.”
“God knows I’ve never been the most reliable guy to get involved with. I’ve always tried to make that understood up front, at least.” Gary had been giving his hands a workout, tugging at fingers and knuckles. “But Lana … I’ve never had anybody place so much importance on me. I wasn’t used to that. Almost like she idealized our relationship.”
Dr. Thatcher nodded. Her hair was trimmed into a short blond helmet, and it wavered as one distinct mass. “That’s common among transsexuals. When a relationship is going well, there’s no greater person on earth than their partner. If it’s going badly? Then their partner is just this side of an ogre.”
Gary rose from his chair and paced to the window. Outside, Spanish moss swayed from willow branches in warm spring winds, like tattered flags on the masts of rotting ships.
Painful business, this visit to Lana’s psychotherapist. Catharsis, purging the guilt, whatever. Lana was two days gone, and on a whim Gary had phoned Thatcher to beg for the slot that Lana would never honor this week. There had been no mutual friends to speak of, none that he could open up to. Family? Laughable. He wasn’t even sure that he could’ve confided with Lana’s shrink had it been a man. That underlying shame of admitting the masquerade’s success, of having been duped into lusting for a guy in drag … and after he found out, it didn’t matter. Difficult to own up to that before another male. When he had entered Thatcher’s office, first greeted her, he’d had a brief impulse to request that she hoist her skirt. Double checking.
“It might also help you to realize that transsexuals can be suicidal over a long timespan. Feeling trapped in the wrong body isn’t a problem they can resolve as easily as a nose they don’t like. They’re at constant war with themselves, and with the perceptions of what their families and society expect them to be. Not all of them can shoulder that heavy a burden for long.”
Gary leaned against the window. “Lana didn’t much care what anybody on the outside thought. She had her friends in the same position she was in, these people she used to hang out with at some club called the Fringe. That seemed all the acceptance she needed.”
“I know. She was very stable in that respect.”
Gary turned from the window. “Lana wanted to have children with me. Does that sounds stable to you? The biggest miracle since the Virgin Birth?” He shook his head, his voice hoarse. “How could you approve her final surgery under those conditions?”
Dr. Thatcher smiled gently. She was good at that — years of practice, he reasoned.
And that unmistakable bulge of male genitalia.
*
“What you’ve got to keep remembering is that you are not responsible for anyone else’s happiness but your own.”
Gary nodded like a man who’d heard all this before. “It’s not the happiness part I have a problem with. It’s the responsibility for her killing herself.”
Across the desk, uncluttered and orderly, Dr. Thatcher laced her fingers. “But it was Lana’s decision. You didn’t put the gun in her hand. You never even knew she owned it.”
Gary slumped in his chair, glanced about the room. For a psychiatrist’s office, it appeared remarkably non-academic. The furniture was shiny and modern, more in keeping with a corporate reception lobby. Even the couch was out of the way, in a corner in case someone felt their therapy mandated the horizontal — a nod to tradition, but only grudging. Of this, Gary approved, being no respecter of tradition. Tradition was too often a mask worn by regression.
“She was an adult who made her own decisions. And as painful as it may be to come to terms with, she lived and died according to those decisions. Her own. Not yours.”
“God knows I’ve never been the most reliable guy to get involved with. I’ve always tried to make that understood up front, at least.” Gary had been giving his hands a workout, tugging at fingers and knuckles. “But Lana … I’ve never had anybody place so much importance on me. I wasn’t used to that. Almost like she idealized our relationship.”
Dr. Thatcher nodded. Her hair was trimmed into a short blond helmet, and it wavered as one distinct mass. “That’s common among transsexuals. When a relationship is going well, there’s no greater person on earth than their partner. If it’s going badly? Then their partner is just this side of an ogre.”
Gary rose from his chair and paced to the window. Outside, Spanish moss swayed from willow branches in warm spring winds, like tattered flags on the masts of rotting ships.
Painful business, this visit to Lana’s psychotherapist. Catharsis, purging the guilt, whatever. Lana was two days gone, and on a whim Gary had phoned Thatcher to beg for the slot that Lana would never honor this week. There had been no mutual friends to speak of, none that he could open up to. Family? Laughable. He wasn’t even sure that he could’ve confided with Lana’s shrink had it been a man. That underlying shame of admitting the masquerade’s success, of having been duped into lusting for a guy in drag … and after he found out, it didn’t matter. Difficult to own up to that before another male. When he had entered Thatcher’s office, first greeted her, he’d had a brief impulse to request that she hoist her skirt. Double checking.
“It might also help you to realize that transsexuals can be suicidal over a long timespan. Feeling trapped in the wrong body isn’t a problem they can resolve as easily as a nose they don’t like. They’re at constant war with themselves, and with the perceptions of what their families and society expect them to be. Not all of them can shoulder that heavy a burden for long.”
Gary leaned against the window. “Lana didn’t much care what anybody on the outside thought. She had her friends in the same position she was in, these people she used to hang out with at some club called the Fringe. That seemed all the acceptance she needed.”
“I know. She was very stable in that respect.”
Gary turned from the window. “Lana wanted to have children with me. Does that sounds stable to you? The biggest miracle since the Virgin Birth?” He shook his head, his voice hoarse. “How could you approve her final surgery under those conditions?”
Dr. Thatcher smiled gently. She was good at that — years of practice, he reasoned.
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