American Goth

by J. D. Glass

  Making love with Fran had been amazing, gut-stirringly sensual, loving, friendly, fulfilling, but it had raised issues for me.

  The new images she’d painted in my mind had so stirred me, played through my body with such a visceral reality that an already incredible and intense experience had been heightened, sharpened—and those images had opened new questions.

  No different than most, I supposed, I’d always wondered what it would be like to be a boy; an only child, I’d played with neighborhood kids and grammar school classmates, as well as the children of other firefighters at the family events and barbecues my father had taken me to. There had been occasions, not too many, certainly, but enough for me to remember, where well-meaning moms and dads of other tots and tykes had told me I couldn’t climb a tree, or wrestle with the boys, or do some other activity because I was wearing a skirt, because I was a girl. And girls didn’t do that.

  The first time that had happened, I might have been about five or so, but I remembered the day clearly. Bruce and Mario, two of the boys I played with regularly (we didn’t like to play with Mario’s sister, Theresa, because she always wanted to play with her Barbies and after you took their clothes off, then lost their shoes, there was nothing else to do with them besides bend them into crazy inhuman positions or switch their heads around) had brought their knapsacks just like I had.

  We’d fill them up as heavy as we could, sling them over a shoulder, and then go climb trees, because we knew firemen had to climb ladders carrying heavy hoses, and one day, that would be us—we wanted to be ready.

  “Come here, Samantha,” Bruce’s mom called as she came walking over. “Let me see that pretty dress.”

  It was my favorite, a royal blue that my father, my Da, had picked for me because he said it matched my eyes, and it had a bunny with a red baseball cap on his head and a ready-to-swing bat over its shoulder appliquéd to the front. The cap I wore matched the bunny’s and I liked it—a lot.

  “But we have to practice,” I protested as she had snatched my resisting body.

  “Yeah, practice,” Bruce echoed behind me.

  “For the fireman’s test,” another little boy added.

  Bruce’s mom laughed. “You and Mario go,” she said to her son. “Samantha needs to sit here and play nice with Theresa. You don’t want to ruin that pretty dress,” she said to me with a smile.

  “It washes, my Da said so,” I informed her and turned to run away with the boys—they were gonna get there first!

  She reeled me in by my knapsack. “You can’t climb trees with a skirt on,” she told me in no-nonsense tones, “and you’re not going to grow up to be a fireman.” She bodily lifted me and placed me on the bench next to Theresa where she’d spread her dolls out along the table. “Girls can’t be firemen,” she said.

  She was wrong, I knew she was wrong, and I stared back up at her as I spoke. “I’m gonna be a fireman like my Da.”

  The smile fell from her face. “No. You’re not—you can’t—you’re a girl. Sit here and learn to play nice.”

  Play nice? Play nice? Theresa was boring, her dolls were boring, and her mother’s words had just ruined my world.

  I slid under the table and cried.

  “Come out from under there, Samantha,” she cajoled. “Do you want a hot dog?”

  Nothing answered her but my sob. “Here, honey, you can have Theresa’s favorite doll,” she offered under the table.

  That made me cry harder and just as I drew in enough breath to think, “I want my Da,” he climbed under with me.

  “What’s the matter, Sam-Sam?” he asked softly, his head crouched under the table.

  I crawled into his lap and snuggled my face into the coal-tar smell of his shirt, staining it with my tears. “Da, I don’t want to be a girl,” I cried onto his chest. “I don’t want to play nice, I want to be a boy so I can climb trees and be a fireman.”

  Later that night when Da had tucked me into bed and I said my nightly prayers, that woman’s words, the tone and the meaning, echoed through my mind. I didn’t know any other girls like me, I didn’t like any girls at all; maybe I wasn’t one. For the first time when I spoke to God, I asked for something new: to wake up the next morning a boy. I would ask this every night for the next eight years, and I never wore that dress again.

  The next week, in kindergarten, I cut my own hair with the duck-handled construction paper scissors. My father shook his head at me when he picked me up from the principal’s office, then drove me down to his barber, Moretti’s on the corner of New Dorp Lane and Railroad.

  I liked going to Moretti’s with Da, and we went at least once every three weeks. I liked the smell of talc, the bottles of blue water, the striped glass pole by the door and the overstuffed red-brown leather and metal chairs. And then there was Mr. Moretti himself, with his thick jet black hair and even thicker mustache, the soda he always had for me (in a glass bottle with a top he had to open), and the warm, indulgent smile he threw my way while I watched his hands as he worked.

  “Logan!” he exclaimed as we walked in, and he slapped the towel he carried over his shoulder. “You’re at least a week early. What are you—oh…” he said as he looked at me. “I think someone needs a seat.”

  Da sighed as he patted my shoulder. “Jump up, Sam-Sam,” he said. “Vinny, cut it any way she wants.”

  I was thrilled—I wanted it short, really, really short. As Mr. Moretti clipped, trimmed, then buzzed the back of my neck, I felt delight sneak through me like warmth from the sun after a cloudy day. Maybe if I looked like a boy, no one would tell me I couldn’t be a fireman anymore.

  “I don’t like girls,” I explained to my Da over my slice of pizza as we drove home. “They like cats—and cats bite and scratch and are sneaky and mean. I like boys, boys like dogs, and dogs are nice.” I’d watched a lot of Disney movies; I knew what I was talking about. “And they play in mud,” I added, “and girls don’t.”

  He nodded as he drove. “Well, you know, Sam-Sam, your mommy was a girl, and she wasn’t like that.”

  That was a revelation. Mommy was a girl? Mommy was, well, Mommy, and while I didn’t remember much, I did remember that she liked to play, that she’d liked to laugh, and that she’d never scolded over dirt.

  “Mommy can’t be a girl,” I said finally. “Mommy was nice.”

  Bruce and Mario knew the score, though, and because we lived in the same neighborhood, we ignored Bruce’s mom and did whatever we wanted to anyway, from playing soldier in the dunes of the beach a few blocks away, to pick-up games of baseball (softball was for girls), or just riding our bikes as fast as we could, everywhere they’d take us. And everyone we met, from the teenagers that drove the ice-cream trucks that trolled our streets, to Old Man Joe who owned the candy shop on the corner, called me Sam. No one questioned whether I was a boy or a girl, and I had too much fun to think about it.

  Until I was about ten. Every year, the members of Rescue Five would get a bunch of cabins someplace up in the Pennsylvania Poconos and make the trek, either every weekend or for two weeks or so depending on their schedule, to what we kids simply called Firemen’s Camp.

  It was great—we’d run the trails, swim in the lake, boat, fish, and generally get as dirty as we could without any parental supervision so long as everyone made it back on time to the central picnic area for lunch and the nightly barbecues, and me and the boys, we had our routine down pat.

  This particular year promised to be no different, and my excitement grew as Da went over the checklist with me before we made the annual pilgrimage.

  He laughed when I jumped out of the car on arrival, knowing the first place I’d run to was Mario’s cabin and we’d go together from there to collect Bruce, and then on to Dave’s, who was a little older than all of us, until the four of us were gathered and we’d head down to our favorite spot by the lake.

  There was the usual friendly squabbling and shoving, the “you’re such a dickhead” joking around until Dave dropped
his pants.

  “Yeah? Well, mine’s growing,” he announced, and showed us.

  We all stared a moment, then Bruce unzipped and did the same. “Mine looks nicer than yours,” he said. “You’ve got that weird skin thing.”

  Mario dropped next. “I don’t have that skin stuff,” he said.

  They looked at me expectantly, and I could feel my neck turn as red as my canvas sneakers. We all knew I didn’t have one of those. But if I didn’t do it, I’d be a wuss, a sissy, and couldn’t hang with them, relegated like Tim and couple of others, like the Scanlon kids, to play with Theresa and the other babies. I was one of the guys, so I unzipped my pants. “I don’t have one,” I muttered, the burn in my neck now blazing through my face.

  “That’s a pussy,” Dave said, “because you’re a girl.”

  I stared at the ground as I redressed. I knew that, but I’d never felt quite so ashamed of it before, or so angry about it, either.

  “Hey, maybe Sam’s dick is different, you know? Like eye color or something,” Bruce offered.

  I looked at him with gratitude. Maybe I was just different—that could happen, right?

  Dave guffawed. “Yeah, it’s on the inside, ’cuz that’s where dicks go—in pussies.”

  Mario smacked his head. “What are you, a faggot or something? You can’t stick a dick in Sam, she’s, you know, like a boy.”

  I could feel the blush grow even worse at that and the guys looked away. I didn’t know how to explain it either.

  “Hey, at least I don’t have that weird skin thing,” I told Dave as everyone else zipped up and we dropped the subject to discuss whether we wanted to fish from the dock or from a boat the next morning.

  Still, confusion, resentment at the unfairness, and the strange sense of shame still roiled through my head, and I went for a walk by myself after dinner, just because I could. I wasn’t going too far, I knew we were supposed to watch out for bears and all of that, but I wanted to get away from everything, from everyone, smell the deep scent of the pine and the moldy leaves, the water off the lake, and the smoke that floated in the cool breeze. I wore my favorite denim jacket under the summer night sky.

  “Hey,” Bruce said as he fell into step behind me.

  “Hey,” I said back and kept walking.

  “You know,” he said after we’d gone about another dozen yards or so, “maybe yours is just stuck inside or something, you know?”

  “Huh?”

  “Well, my big brother, Johnny, he said his gets bigger when his girlfriend sucks on it—maybe you just need to suck it out or something.”

  I stopped so suddenly my sneakers dug into the trail dirt. “You think that would work?”

  “Can’t hurt.”

  Just as quickly as hope rose, a bright burning that thumped in my chest, it grew cold and fell. “I can’t do that,” I said. “Can’t reach.”

  Bruce shrugged. “I could help you, I mean…you’re my friend.”

  Yeah. We were friends, good friends. And just like that, with the burning smoke smell from the fire pit, the slight breeze through my hair, and the occasional sound of crickets in the high grass, I got my first blow job.

  *

  That was the year my father did two new things when we got home: he registered us with the swim club and put me on the team, and I was given my first guitar, with twice weekly lessons with Mr. Dobson at Lane Music, on New Dorp Lane.

  It turned out that not only were these two things I was good at, they also effectively curtailed a lot of my neighborhood hanging out—and that’s where I first met Frankie. But still, when I tried out for swim team right before the semester started at the all-girls high school Da insisted I go to, I was miserable; it sounded to me like it would be four years without my friends, four years without the guys to pal around with, four years surrounded by bitchy, nasty, catty girls, with their lies and their meanness and their talk about makeup and boys. Not a brain in the entire bunch. For the life of me I couldn’t figure out why, why, why my Da was sending me there of all places when there were co-ed schools I could go to as well, and I protested and complained daily until he sat me down at dinner and explained.

  “Sam, I know how important your grades are to you, and you want to go to college. You passed an entrance exam to a school famous for its academic program—a ninety-two percent or better scholarship rate!” His eyes shone with genuine enthusiasm. “The girls there? I’ll bet they care as much about that as you do—you’ll make friends, I promise.”

  I eyed him doubtfully over the dinner we’d ordered. “I’ll also bet,” he said as he cut into the food on his plate, “you even meet a few girls you like.”

  As much as I didn’t believe it, my Da had been right. For the first time ever, I met girls I could actually like, girls who cared about academics, girls who cared about sports, and even music, girls who weren’t solely into boys and makeup, and to make it that much easier for me, Frankie was there too, with her beautiful smile. She loved the hair I’d allowed to grow a bit too long, and she made me think maybe, just maybe, this “girl” thing wouldn’t be so bad after all. And because Frankie—Fran, now—liked to run her fingers through my hair, for the first time since I was five, I really let it grow.

  I still wasn’t thrilled about my body, the twin swellings on my chest that needed to be supported and the accompanying monthly inconveniences, but I learned to ignore all of that as I made friends and devoted my attention to my studies, my instrument, and my sport.

  It wasn’t until I realized that Fran and I liked each other (another bit of knowledge imparted to me by my Da with his casual, “That there Fran, she likes you now, huh?” after a swim meet), and then, a few weeks later, the feel of her hands as they caressed me with real enjoyment over my curves that I thought that my body might have some redeeming qualities after all.

  But then there was Nina, someone I’d wanted to be strong for, someone I wanted to do things, amazing things, anything, for—and I’d failed, failed in all of it. I wasn’t able to keep her safe, I wasn’t able to keep her alive, and I wasn’t able to bring her back.

  I couldn’t help but think that if I’d been a guy maybe I could have made a difference. Of course, the fact that the girl I was obsessed with would probably not have been interested in me at all if I was male made no difference.

  Guys had strength, power, absolute ownership—of everything. They strode through the world, back straight, legs wide, and stared it unblinkingly in the eye, daring it to strike, ready to strike back with the muscle to back it up.

  No one, no one, questioned their right to do so, and people got out of the way for those that flexed their muscle, even if it just looked like they might. Guys wanted, guys got, and asked or apologized to no one.

  I wanted that—the respect, the untouchableness, the sense of invulnerability that guys carried with them all the time. There were times I’d had that sense of strength, of purposeful power, moments where I’d felt strong and untouchable, undefeatable…and in none of those instances was I aware of anything other than my mind and body working at the best possible level. I wasn’t aware in any way of being “male” or “female” in thought or deed—but simply of being, of being whole. On those occasions there were no questions at all, just a steady surety. I’d had it during swim practices and competitions, band rehearsals, sessions with Cort that left my muscles aching while my mind spun, and when Fran and I were alone together.

  Did that make me “that” kind of dyke, as Fran had put it? Did I really want to be a man? The feel of her breasts, full and supple in my hands, the pebbled hardness under my fingertips or my tongue was something I really enjoyed. I even liked just looking at them, the way those curves pushed out her shirt and rounded under a sweater, or just the rise of them above her skin… I loved watching her walk, the perfect sweeping lines that defined her, unmistakably feminine and equally unmistakably strong, proud in a way that so, so flattened me with sheer desire until I was almost on the bare edge of insane with t
he need to make her come. I loved doing that. Loved the sexy, hot taste, the warm and wet embrace, the hard push, the slick pace, wherever on me, my mouth, my hands, my cunt, oh my God, she’d get so hard, so wet, the way her clit would grow and her body open under my hands, only to tighten around me again. And when she touched me—any way she touched me—it felt so damn good: the way she stroked my clit with her body, her tongue, her hands. And when she was inside me in any way…oh the intense of it…

  But that was confusing too, because if I was “that” kind of a dyke, then wouldn’t I not like that? Or maybe…maybe I was straight, because wasn’t that something straight girls were into? The guys I’d pretty much lost contact with since the middle of high school thought so, and God, Fran’s words had so turned me on. And now I was hard, so fucking hard, and I didn’t know if it was because I wanted her touch me like that or because I wanted to fuck her with a dick I didn’t have. Even that troubled me, because “fucking” seemed so disrespectful, as if I didn’t care, as if I was one of the guys I’d hung around with.

  Ah hell…what did I know about being gay anyway? I still didn’t like girls—but women, there was a definite difference. Women with their fine steel strength flashing over and under an almost delicate softness, intelligence bare and proud, hard muscle or yielding tenderness…I was attracted, turned on, into that. I wanted to shield that and in turn be covered by it. It was what drew me to Fran, what I had seen blaze from Nina, what I so admired and respected about Elizabeth. Hannah had that too.

  Bruce and I had tried once, just once, to go on a date when we were both freshman, and it had gone terribly, from my not noticing his attempts to hold my hand and the awkward reach of his arm over my shoulder, to both of us trying to flirt with the counter girl at the popcorn stand. There wasn’t even an attempt at a kiss; by the time the movie was over and we’d just relaxed into being buddies again, it wasn’t even a consideration. We’d mutually, mutely, decided to forget it was a date.