Identify

by Lesley Choyce

  “But you agreed to their suggestion for you to come and talk to me.”

  “I figured it couldn’t hurt.”

  “Well, I’m glad you came.”

  Gabe just shrugged.

  “Why do you think people want you to look and act a certain way?” Liz continued.

  Gabe looked over at me, and I could see that she was uneasy. I almost wanted to answer for her.

  “Because I’m not like everyone else. And that makes people uncomfortable.”

  “How do you identify yourself?”

  “What do you mean?” Despite her words, I got the feeling Gabe knew exactly what Liz meant.

  “You say that you are not like everyone else. So how do you describe yourself?”

  “I just describe myself as ‘different,’” Gabe answered, crossing her arms and scowling a bit.

  “In what way?”

  “Look at me.”

  “I am looking at you,” Liz replied calmly. “But I would like to know more about how you see yourself.”

  I had to admit, I was grateful that the counselor was being so persistent. I wanted to hear Gabe’s answer too.

  “Sometimes,” Gabe began, and then stopped. She took a deep breath. “Sometimes I think I’m a boy in a girl’s body.”

  Liz nodded.

  “But sometimes,” Gabe continued, “I feel like a girl in a girl’s body. Especially when I’m with Ethan.”

  Liz looked over at me with a faint smile. “That’s not so unusual,” she said. “But do you find that confusing?”

  “Sometimes. But isn’t everyone a little confused sometimes?”

  “Of course.”

  “Then why can’t people, especially my parents, just accept me for who I am?”

  “I don’t know if I can truly answer that. But tell me this: Do you want to change, for your parents, or for anyone else, so that you can fit in more easily?”

  “No, I don’t. Is there anything wrong with that?”

  “No, there isn’t,” Liz answered. “And that’s a good starting point for our discussions. I wanted to have a better sense of your perspective before we began. And I want you to know that you’re not the only one who has feelings like this.”

  “I know that,” said Gabe. “In fact, I’ve read enough to know that it’s way more complicated than what kind of clothes I wear.”

  “Yes, you’re right. Gender identity and gender expression go way beyond male and female,” Liz agreed.

  “And I know that some people even feel so conflicted about how they were born and who they really want to be that they have an operation to change from one gender to the other.”

  “Yes, that’s referred to as gender reassignment surgery.” Liz said. “Have you ever thought about that?”

  There was a long awkward silence. I felt like a bomb had just exploded.

  Gabe just sat there. She turned her head and looked out the window. I couldn’t read the look on her face.

  After that, Liz kept the conversation light, sticking to everyday, trivial stuff. She tried to draw me in as well, but I was still in shock. When the session was over, Liz walked us to the door and said, “Well, Gabe, I really appreciate your coming in and letting me get to know you. I look forward to talking more with you in the weeks ahead. And thank you, Ethan, for being such a good friend.”

  Chapter Nine

  As we walked out into the afternoon, I was thinking it had been a bad idea to come along. I was in way over my head.

  Finally, I just blurted out what I was feeling. “What were you talking about back there? That stuff about surgery and changing from how you were born?”

  Gabe stopped walking. “What? You’re afraid I’ll become more like a guy?”

  “I just don’t want you to change,” I said. I looked around and realized we were just outside the cemetery where Gabe had helped me pull myself together that day.

  “But…would you still like me…if I did decide to change?”

  I didn’t know how to answer. I was thinking that if Gabe did something like that—I mean, surgery—and it turned out I still liked her…that it might be a bit too weird, a bit too much. But I didn’t want to tell her that. Not yet.

  She saw my confusion, and she clearly didn’t like it. “I’m going to go,” she said abruptly. “I’m sorry you came with me today,” she added. And then she walked away.

  I didn’t try to stop her. I knew if I said anything, anything at all right now, it would be the wrong thing.

  But I sure as hell didn’t want to go home. So I went into the cemetery. Someone had vandalized the place even more since I had been here before. About a dozen old gravestones had been broken in half or knocked over. And then I found an Ethan. It kind of freaked me out. Only the first name was the same, but there it was. Ethan Clarke, 1840–1856. Whoever this Ethan was, he had died at sixteen, my age. But even weirder than that were the words beneath the name and date. We forgive you.

  I sat down right there on the grass. What had he done? Something awful? Killed somebody? Killed himself? Whoever he was, he had been a kid with a problem. A really big problem. “Speak to me, Ethan,” I said out loud.

  But Ethan had been dead for a long time. He wasn’t talking to anyone. When I got home my dad was sitting at the kitchen table, fussing with his checkbook. “How did the studying go?”

  “Fine,” I lied.

  “This girl, Gabriella. You really should invite her over sometime. We’d like to meet her.”

  “Sure, Dad,” I said. Truth was, I wondered if Gabe would even ever speak to me again. I guess my dad could read something in the way I said it.

  “Ethan, you okay?”

  I was back to feeling the way I used to feel before I met Gabe. Alone in the world. Afraid. “Sure. I’m okay.”

  He closed his checkbook. “Look, I’m going to court next week, and I will take my punishment. Then we’ll move to a new town and I’ll get a good job. We’ll start all over. I’ve explained this to your mother, but she just can’t see the light at the end of the tunnel. You’ll like it in a new place, right?”

  “Right,” I said. Maybe I would. Maybe it could never work out between Gabe and me. So hell yeah. Move someplace new where no one knew me. Start all over.

  Chapter Ten

  I saw Gabe as I was walking into the school. She saw me too. But she just kept walking. I didn’t try to catch up to her but hung back and sat down on the low wall out front. When all the other kids had gone in and I felt that old fear creeping up my spine and into my head, I took a couple of my pills. I needed them to get through this day.

  I found myself falling into the dreamy state that came with the downers. The tension faded—everything sort of faded. I knew I was slipping back into familiar territory. The school day would drift on by, and me with it. I didn’t pay much attention in any class, and walking through the hallways was just noise and a blur of people. It wasn’t good, but then, it wasn’t as bad as cowering at the back of the school between the dumpsters. I even found myself thinking, Yeah, this all sucks. Leave it all behind when we move and start over again someplace new.

  I was on my way to my locker pretty close to the end of the day when I heard someone shouting. I lifted myself out of the fog and went to see what it was all about.

  Skylar was shouting. Shouting at Gabe. “Give it up, bitch,” Skylar said. “I didn’t put anything in your locker. You don’t even register on my radar. I don’t care anything about you, so why would I leave you some stupid threat?” I actually thought Skylar was going to hit Gabe, she was so out of control. And Skylar’s posse was right there, ready to back her up.

  A crowd was forming around them in a circle in that insane way that happens when a fight, especially a girl fight, is about to happen.

  I pushed my way through the gawking students and grabbed Gabe by the arm. I could see the anger in her eyes. She was ready to take on Skylar. For exactly what, I didn’t know. But I needed to get her out of there quickly.

  “L
et’s go,” I said, half pushing her through the mob. I heard Skylar yelling something really crude as we cleared the group and headed toward the sunlight streaming through at the end of the hall.

  Outside, Gabe started walking away from me really fast. I went after her and tried to speak to her, but she kept pushing me away. Then she started running. She was fast, and still feeling the effects of the downers, I couldn’t keep up.

  I watched her, though, and kept walking as fast as I could, hoping she would slow down. Soon she was out of sight, but I kept walking anyway. Eventually I caught up with her. She was sitting in the doorway of an out-of-business bakery. Crying.

  Breathing hard, I sat down beside her. The doorway smelled like stale urine. There was garbage on the ground and graffiti on the windows. It was a hellish place. But at least it was just the two of us.

  I cautiously touched her shoulder. “What happened?” I asked, but she just shook her head and cried some more.

  I touched her hair. “Talk to me. Please.” She reached into her pocket and pulled out a folded-up piece of paper. There was a message on it in big bold letters.

  WE’RE GOING TO KILL YOU, FREAK. TAKE THIS AS A WARNING!

  “This was in my locker,” Gabe said. “I thought maybe Skylar did it.”

  “We should go to the principal,” I said the second I read the words. “This is a death threat. This is crazy.” Maybe for the first time it was really beginning to sink in for me how difficult life must be for Gabe.

  She was still sniffling a bit but pulling herself back together. “No,” she said, “it would only complicate things. It would draw more attention to me, and I don’t want that. Besides, it’s only words.” Then she tore up the note and threw the pieces on the ground with the other trash.

  “Yeah, but this isn’t a joke. This is serious.”

  “Ethan, people have been posting things online about me for a long time. I stopped paying attention to it. I got off all social media ’cause I was getting hate mail. As long as I didn’t read it, it couldn’t get to me.”

  “You thought Skylar was behind it?”

  “Maybe some of it. Early on, I could figure out that some of those postings were hers. The wording was unmistakable. But I think I was wrong about this.”

  “But someone did it.” I couldn’t believe how calm she was about someone threatening to kill her.

  “Could be anyone. This kind of shit is easy if you can be anonymous. But like I said, it’s only words.”

  Chapter Eleven

  “Let’s get out of here,” I said.

  We stood up and walked in silence for a bit. I was glad the pills were wearing off. My head was getting clear now. Gabe had stopped crying. I told her about the Ethan I had found in the cemetery. She said we should go back there together sometime and check out more gravestones. I said I’d like that.

  Then a weird thing happened.

  I heard a car coming up behind us and realized it was slowing down. When it was right alongside us, somebody threw something out the window. It hit me in the leg. But it didn’t hurt. When I looked down, I saw it was a taped-up cardboard box. The car, an old blue Honda, raced away. I couldn’t see the license plate.

  Gabe bent over to look at the box, and I grabbed her. “Just leave it,” I said. “Don’t touch it.” I didn’t know exactly what I was thinking. Maybe a bomb. Maybe poison or something.

  Gabe pulled away from me though. She knelt down to the box and picked it up, then shook it. “Definitely not a bomb,” she said.

  “Just leave it, Gabe. Get rid of it.”

  Instead, she ripped the tape off and opened it. She lifted out what was inside. It was a Barbie doll in boys’ clothes, with the hair shaved off and a razor blade stuck into its neck.

  “What the hell?” I said.

  Gabe was visibly shaken. Then she was angry. She threw the box and the doll to the ground. Then she let out the most awful scream I had ever heard. I stood there and didn’t move.

  A few seconds passed. I could see that she was about to kick the doll into the street.

  “Don’t,” I said. “We need to take this to the police.”

  Gabe shook her head. “It won’t do any good.”

  I understood what she was thinking. Going to the authorities when bad stuff happened often caused more grief than good. But I was thinking about the cop who had talked to me the day my dad got arrested.

  “Trust me on this,” I said. “Please.”

  Gabe stood there, mute, looking hurt and defeated. She watched me as I picked up the doll and put it back in the box. I tucked it under my arm and took her hand. We started walking to the police station.

  At the desk inside the station, the clerk in uniform gave us a once-over as we walked in the door. The look on his face said he had already made his mind up about us before we even spoke.

  “What can I do for you?” he said.

  “I wonder if I can speak to Officer Newton,” I said. I could tell Gabe was very uncomfortable.

  “You got an appointment?” the man asked.

  “No,” I said. “But I’ve got this.” I reached into my wallet and showed him the business card. The guy gave me a funny look. Then he leaned over his speaker phone.

  “Dave,” he said. “You in your office? There’s a couple of…um…kids here who want to talk to you.”

  I couldn’t make out the response, but not more than a minute passed before Newton walked into the waiting room. He smiled at me and nodded toward Gabe. Then he looked at the cardboard box in my hands. “C’mon into my office,” he said.

  We followed him into a small cubicle and sat on two folding chairs. I set the box on his desk and tried to hold Gabe’s hand, but she pulled away.

  “What do we have here?” he asked.

  I opened the box and Newton took a look. I explained what had happened.

  “I’m guessing,” he said, “that you don’t consider this a joke.”

  I nodded. “There was also a death-threat note in her locker,” I added. “And other threats.”

  “Why didn’t you come to us earlier?” he asked Gabe.

  She just shrugged.

  Newton folded his hands in front of him and looked at Gabe and then me. “I think we should look into this,” he said to Gabe. “You gonna be all right?”

  Gabe nodded.

  Newton asked us some more questions about the other threats and for a description of the car. Gabe explained about the emails and the note in her locker that she had torn up and thrown away.

  “Why do you think anyone would want to do this?” he finally asked. But Gabe just shrugged again and didn’t answer him.

  Chapter Twelve

  Officer Newton offered to give us a ride home, but Gabe said no. I knew she was still uncomfortable about getting the police involved, and I was hoping I had done the right thing.

  We walked a roundabout route to her house, and I was about to go inside with her, but she stopped me. “I just want to be alone for a while,” she said.

  I had noticed there was no car in the driveway. That meant that neither her mother nor her father was home.

  “I don’t think that’s such a good idea,” I said. “I’m worried about you.”

  “I’ll be okay,” Gabe said.

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yeah, I’m sure.”

  I didn’t like the feel of this. “Hey,” I said. “Come to my house. Just for a while, until your parents get home.” I had been avoiding having Gabe come to my house because my parents fought so much, and there was always a lot of tension there. But it didn’t feel right leaving her alone at a time like this.

  She hesitated but then gave in. “Okay. I guess you’re right. I don’t really want to be alone right now.”

  When we got to my house, as predicted, I could hear my parents arguing inside. “Oh shit,” I said out loud.

  Gabe smiled. “It’s okay.”

  I felt embarrassed but was determined to keep Gabe near for as long as I could.


  “I’m home,” I yelled as we went in the door.

  The arguing stopped. “Ethan, is that you?” my mom called.

  “Yep.”

  They both came in from the other room. My mom was still in her housecoat, and my dad had his work pants on and an old, dirty T-shirt. They looked like a couple of slobs, and I felt even more embarrassed.

  “This is Gabe,” I said.

  There was a puzzled look on both their faces, and a few seconds of silence during which I truly hated my parents. Then my stupid father looked at Gabe and said, “Oh, um, hello.” I could tell he was about to say more, probably something about how she looked—her clothes, her hair.

  My mom could tell, too, and tried her best to shut him up. But not before he added, “I don’t get it.”

  Just like my dad. He rarely did.

  “I’d better go,” Gabe said, inching back toward the door.

  “No,” I said. “Please stay.” Despite my idiot father and the awkward situation, I didn’t want Gabe to be on her own right then.

  “Yes,” my mom added. “Please stay.” My dad nodded his head then, afraid to add anything further lest he get himself into more hot water.

  I led Gabe down to the rec room in the basement, where we had a pool table. “I’m not very good at this, but do you want to play?”

  “What, no homework today?”

  “No. I think we could just hang out.”

  “Hang out it is,” Gabe said, picking up a pool cue and taking the first shot.

  It turned out she was a pretty good pool player, and she ended up teaching me a few things about the game. After some time I found myself feeling really relaxed, despite the day’s events and the fact that the pills had worn off.

  Gabe beat me three games in a row, but it didn’t matter because I was just happy she was here.

  “You’re good for me,” I heard myself blurt out at one point. “You know that?”

  “And you’re good for me, Ethan. You’re also good to me.” Gabe smiled. She had a beautiful smile, one I hadn’t seen very often in the short time I’d known her.