Some Assembly Required

by Arin Andrews

  Even though that specific argument didn’t quite compute with me, I was young enough back then to follow the school’s doctrines without much questioning. I dutifully memorized Bible passages and believed wholeheartedly in the teachers’ version of the gospel. The basic tenets about love and the importance of family resonated strongly.

  The school uniform was a gray, black, and maroon plaid skirt with a matching maroon polo shirt. In a way the outfit was a relief. It meant that I didn’t have to think about dressing myself, because shopping for clothes was a nightmare. Mom would drag me through the girls’ department, loading her arms up with dresses, while I’d stare longingly across the aisle at the boy stuff. It was all just so much more practical. If I hadn’t already had an assigned school getup, I know that Mom would have insisted I wear things that were ultrafeminine. As it was, she still stuck a bow in my hair every morning before I left the house.

  I’d like to say I was a rebel and tore it off right after she dropped me at school, but I didn’t. I hated the accessories, but I also couldn’t cross Mom. Not because I was scared of what she might do, but because . . . well, she was my mom. It didn’t even occur to me that I could disobey her. I kept the bows in to make her happy, even though every ribbon felt like a ten-pound rock on my head. My hair was long, and I begged her throughout my entire childhood to let me cut it short, but she’d never let me. I was very aware of the fact that she loved having a little girl, and the pressure to keep up that appearance for her began to take a toll. I became unable to sleep at night, a common symptom of anxiety. It got harder and harder for me to concentrate in class, and I was diagnosed with ADHD and put on medication. But I never made the connection between these mental problems and my confusion about why I felt so different—a sensation that increased more and more each year.

  On the school playground, I couldn’t understand why teachers discouraged me from playing with boys and insisted I hang with the girls. They made me feel like I was doing something bad. It made me feel like an “other”—an interloper. I lived in some weird dimension, peering out at the rest of existence from the strange prison of a body that didn’t match my mind. I knew that the church community had expectations of me because of how they defined me, but I wanted to define myself. And trying to do that was complicated. It wasn’t like I’d thought, Oh, I’m actually a guy from the get-go; that concept didn’t exist in my world yet. I didn’t even know you were allowed to think like that. Still, I tried to assert myself in little ways that came naturally to me. For example, when I’d meet someone new, I’d say, “Hi, I’m Emerald,” in the deepest growl I could muster, because the voice that came out of my mouth on its own wasn’t the one that I heard inside my head.

  One weekend during the fourth grade, I spent the night at a cousin’s house from my dad’s side of the family, a guy named Tye who is the same age as me. I had an annual mile run for gym class the next day, but I’d forgotten to bring any running clothes. So he let me borrow some of his—a black, skintight tank top and black shorts. I slipped them on and immediately felt a rush of power, like I’d put on a superhero suit. They were so easy and simple—there were no hidden zippers to mess with, tiny buttons to fasten, or collars to smooth down.

  The next day I ran the mile and made my best time ever up to that point. Tye let me keep the shorts and shirt, and I’d change into them the second I got home from school. Whenever I went to visit Tye after that, I would ask to try on more of his clothes, and he’d let me take additional pieces home. Mom didn’t really mind—she thought I was doing it because I looked up to him.

  But while I was happy to have my own growing collection of boys’ clothes, one thing continued to frustrate me. When I’d put on a pair of shorts or jeans, they’d fold inward between my legs. And I knew that they weren’t supposed to look like that. There was supposed to be a bulge there.

  I knew exactly what that missing shape was, despite the fact that no one had ever sat me down and recited the old “birds and the bees” speech. Mom gave me a book at one point that I promptly hid behind my dresser out of embarrassment, and the health teachers at Lincoln might as well have been walking and talking genital-free dolls, for the amount of information they had to offer. But I did have one valuable resource. When you have as many cousins as I do, you absorb a lot of knowledge. I picked up bits and pieces about bodies and what you could do with them, and it all seemed gross but sort of thrilling, mainly because it was something that no one else was talking about. It was secret information, handed down from cousin to cousin, full of half-truths, outright myths, and penis jokes. And it was the penis stuff that fascinated me the most.

  I saw a lot of penises as a little kid. Group baths, getting the mud showered off us after a day at the farm, and swimming were all normal cousin activities. None of us were taught to have shame about our bodies, yet I still felt it. I wished I could stand up and just pee wherever I wanted when we were playing outside, like my cousin Dewayne did. I’d seethe with jealousy whenever I had to run inside or hide behind a bush, while he could just let it fly.

  One day when I was alone in my room messing around with blue Play-Doh, I rolled some quickly between my hands to make a snake. The shape started to take on another familiar form. I stuck a round ball on the tip and walked up to the mirror, holding it between my legs. That’s more like it, I thought.

  I began experimenting with ways to pee standing up. I soaked my thighs a lot in the beginning, but after a while I developed a method of hiking one leg up against a tree and then straining really hard to force the stream out with more precision. This worked maybe 50 percent of the time.

  I had a lot of magazines on camping and outdoor life that I’d beg Mom to buy me at the grocery store. I started to notice ads in the back for funnel devices that allowed women to pee standing up, but I knew instinctively that I couldn’t ask Mom to get one for me. All of my outdoor bathroom experiments took place alone. I was embarrassed—not because I was trying to pee like a boy but because I couldn’t do it on my own. It just seemed like something I should already be able to do.

  I finally snuck on to Mom’s computer and searched “how to pee standing up.” And I learned how to craft a homemade funnel. It involved a plastic canister lid, so I watched Mom like a hawk every morning when she made coffee, and monitored the level of grounds inside the container whenever she wasn’t looking. I had to wait about a week, but I finally caught her throwing the can into the recycling bin.

  I snuck into the garage, removed the lid, and carefully trimmed off the lip with a pair of scissors, until it was just a simple, flexible round disc. I drank three huge glasses of water and waited until I had to go, and then ran out into the woods. I pulled down my pants, rolled the lid into a cone shape, and let my bladder go. It worked! I went back inside and cleaned the disc off. From that day on, I wouldn’t leave the house without it whenever I went to play outside. But I kept it a secret. I’d still go behind a bush if my cousins were around. I was proud of my newfound skill, but I knew that I would get teased if I showed anyone what I’d learned. Although camping magazines let me know that other girls were doing the same thing I was, the very fact that the ads were tucked away in the back of the issues let me know it was something to keep hidden.

  • • •

  I had one close friend who had body issues too, but for an entirely different reason. Her name was Andi; she was hard-core Baptist and incredibly modest. Like, Amish modest. She hated to show any skin below the collarbone, and would even sit on her hands whenever she was finished eating a meal. Like me, she hated wearing a bathing suit when we’d go swimming, and would instead put on shorts and a T-shirt.

  Andi didn’t go to Lincoln—we had met in dance class, and by fourth grade we were both focused solely on clogging. Luckily the costumes were very reserved. Since Andi was as shy about her body as I was about mine, we’d sneak off together to the bathroom and change into our outfits while locked safely inside the stalls. Our team was coed, and we usually all wore
the same version of what was basically a glorified tracksuit. We’d clog our brains out in purple, white, and navy outfits, but to modern songs such as “Let It Rock.” I genuinely liked the dancing, but I felt uncomfortable in front of the crowds. I was very aware that my long hair was flying everywhere, just like all the other girls’. I’d lose focus, staring with jealousy at the boys’ streamlined bodies, all the straight lines of their torsos, and hair so short that it did exactly what they wanted it to do. They just looked cleaner somehow.

  For my birthday in fourth grade, Mom invited Andi and all the girls on my school’s basketball team over. She dumped a huge pile of makeup onto the dining room table and said, “Have at it!”

  Everyone squealed and dove their little hands into the sea of pink and red lipsticks. Compacts of blush skittered around the table like hockey pucks, and the air was quickly filled with the harsh, chemical pinch of nail polish. Andi and I took one look at each other and marched outside to play secret agents. I had a bunch of little toy tools, like a flashlight that transformed into a periscope, and we took turns spying on the girls through the window, with a mix of awe and disgust. Neither of us could understand the allure of smearing those garish colors all over our faces.

  Another big part of what I loved about Andi was that she had this weird, offbeat personality. She was constantly sending me these bizarre, imaginary missions via e-mail. Things like:

  Go to the electrical outlet located in your bedroom, the one that’s just to the left of your chinchilla cage. Knock on it three times, and a secret door will open up next to it. Enter the tunnel and crawl forward until you reach a crossroad. There you will find a red button. After you press the button, a small troll will appear. Recite the alphabet backward to him, and when you get to the letter T , he will call a tiny zebra to give you a ride to your next task.

  I’d pretend to do whatever it was that she told me, and then I’d send her back instructions of my own, so that even when we were apart, we could continue running rampant through our imaginations together.

  Mom ended up becoming good friends with Andi’s mother, Kelli. Our families would caravan on trips, like to the Crater of Diamonds State Park in Arkansas, where our pretend adventures could actually come true because we’d get to go on digs for actual gems. We never found any, but that wasn’t the point. The fact that our mothers indulged and encouraged these fantasies was its own sort of treasure.

  On one overnight camping excursion, our mothers rented a small cabin by a lake. Andi and I went exploring along the shoreline and came upon a giant piece of Styrofoam, bigger than a twin-size mattress. We both had the same idea immediately—boat! We went into the woods and collected branches that we fashioned into oars, and then we pushed out into the water. We cruised along the shoreline all afternoon, captains of our own private world.

  As awesome as my friendship with Andi was, Mom was worried that I didn’t have anyone from Lincoln to hang out with, since Andi and my cousins attended different schools. The girls from my basketball team were okay, but my mom’s attempt to have me forge new bonds with them at the makeup birthday party had failed because of my disinterest in the theme, and Billy had stopped talking to me after I’d refused to kiss him. It wasn’t like I didn’t want other friends, but I felt so separate from almost everyone else that I had no idea how to even approach people. I always sat alone at lunch.

  The one girl from Lincoln who lived in our neighborhood was named Heather, and she was a classic popular mean girl. She ignored me completely whenever she saw me on the street, and in school she constantly made fun of me to my face about the masculine way I walked and talked. She’d imitate my awkward shuffle down the hallway, and repeat anything I said in a mocking, cartoonish low voice.

  Her best friend was a girl named Jillian who was on my basketball team. In fourth grade Jillian and Heather were in different classes. Jillian ended up in mine, and I was surprised to discover that she was actually a pretty nice person. Maybe being separated from Heather’s influence did her some good, because one day, out of the blue, she invited me to sit with her at the pizza joint our basketball team always went to after a game. From that point forward she sat with me at lunch every day. She did most of the talking—mostly about who liked whom in our school—but she didn’t seem to mind or care that I didn’t say much in return. I didn’t care about the gossip; I was just happy to no longer be eating alone.

  Lincoln is such a huge school that the cafeteria is located in a separate building far away from the main campus, in a giant structure that also serves as the mega church that most of the kids at our school went to. We’d file on to buses to get driven there and back from the classroom buildings.

  One Friday, Mom showed up at the cafeteria and sat down with Jillian and me.

  “Would you like to have a sleepover with Emerald tonight?” she asked Jillian.

  I was secretly grateful. I wanted to hang out with Jillian more since she was being so nice, but I was so socially awkward that I had no idea how to further the friendship.

  “I’d love to,” she said. “Somehow I just knew that you were going to ask me that! I’ll call my dad and see if he’ll bring a bag for me after school.”

  He agreed, and Mom was determined to make it a special night, one that forced lots of social interaction. She didn’t want us to just sit around and watch movies, since she was trying to get me out of my shell.

  She took us to a fondue restaurant, and then out for shakes, and when we got back to the house, she offered to let us take a bubble bath in her giant Jacuzzi tub.

  “Oh, yes!” Jillian squealed.

  “No,” I said firmly.

  “You won’t be naked,” Mom said. “Jillian can borrow a bathing suit.”

  I certainly had enough unused ones in my dresser, but I still said no. The thought of getting into a tub with this girl horrified me. Even if I wore my standard shorts and T-shirt, it was just still too close and intimate. It filled me with dread. In such slippery, small quarters I didn’t want her to see any part of my body that was normally covered by clothing. Mom and Jillian begged and pleaded for me to relent, but I refused.

  Mom finally gave up and put on a movie for us to watch. I snuck off into the kitchen and tugged on her shirt.

  “Mom, where is she going to sleep?” I asked.

  “In your bed,” she said, looking surprised. “It’s big. There’s room for two.”

  “No way,” I said. “Nope.”

  “What are you talking about?” she whispered so Jillian couldn’t hear in the other room. “That’s what little girls do! You sleep in the same bed, and you can even stay up late if you want and talk!”

  “Uh-uh,” I said, shaking my head.

  She got frustrated. “Where is she going to sleep, then? We can’t put her on the couch!”

  I brightened. “Cool. Then I’ll sleep on the couch. She can have my room to herself!”

  Mom wasn’t having that. I finally gave in and agreed to sleep in the bed with her, but I stayed close enough to the edge that I ran the risk of tumbling out in my sleep. Except that I couldn’t sleep. I just stared for hours at the outline of my bedside lamp in the dark. It was shaped like a poodle, with a white lamp shade surrounded by fluffy pink trim. (Mom had decorated my room; everything was pink.)

  I tried to figure out what my feelings meant. I didn’t want my friend to have any proximity to my body, or me to hers. Maybe it was because their similarities only compounded my confusion about what I felt was wrong with mine. And even though I was fully clothed in pajamas, the thin material hardly acted as a sufficient barrier. The whole situation was just too awkward.

  Looking back, it’s funny to think that just a few years later I’d be longing for the days when Mom was willing to toss me under the sheets with a girl and close the door.

  Jillian’s father came and got her in the morning, and later that day I was playing soldier in the yard by myself when I felt someone standing nearby. I glanced up and saw Heather looming ov
er me, scowling.

  “You are not allowed to be friends with Jillian,” she snarled. “She is MY friend.”

  “Whatever, Heather,” I mumbled.

  “I mean it,” she said threateningly.

  Heather must have said something to Jillian, because Jillian avoided me from then on. Mom made one last attempt at finding me friends at school by inviting all the girls on my basketball team over for a sleepover. Their mothers must have insisted they attend; it was the only reason I could think of as to why they’d show up. Normally I hardly spoke to any of them unless we were on the court.

  On the night of the slumber party, I essentially became a stranger in my own home. At one point all the girls herded themselves into the bathroom to play with their hair, and I wandered in to try to integrate.

  “What’s up, guys?” I said.

  Jillian turned to me, narrowing her eyes into mean little slits. “What are you doing in here?” she said. “Get out!”

  I didn’t even bother trying to sleep in the same room with them that night. Everyone piled up together in our den, but I unrolled my camo sleeping bag in the living room and tossed and turned with a pillow pressed over my ears in an attempt to drown out the giggles and high-pitched squeals coming from the other room.

  At least I have Andi, I consoled myself as I finally managed to drift off. I wished she could have been there to help make the night bearable. I believed with all my heart that she would be my best friend for life. I was totally clueless that she’d soon turn her back on me, just like Jillian had.

  4

  Sometime just after the start of fifth grade, Mom picked me up from school as usual, but out of nowhere she started talking about how I was going to grow breasts someday. I was horrified. I had been so preoccupied with what I didn’t have on my body that it hadn’t even occurred to me what I would have.

  But it got worse.