by Renee James
My Monday drags, as it often does. On this day, my appointment book is dominated by a succession of elderly ladies who come to me for perms. Many of the other stylists won’t do this work. Neither perms nor little old ladies are considered hip. But I love perms and I love being busy, so Monday is a good billing day for me, even if the conversation drags sometimes.
I survive the workday and dash home to change into a cute new party dress, do my hair, and put on makeup. One of my clients gave me a big tip because, she said, she wanted to buy my dinner for being so sweet. I feel honor-bound to dine out. Instead of dining in the safety of a Boystown eatery, I choose a mid-level café on the northwest side of the city, near the meeting I am attending tonight.
The neighborhood is a white middle-class enclave, with a mix of young professionals and older, second and third generation ethnics. Definitely not a magnet for gays or transgenders. Definitely not an area where I blend in.
That’s why I’m here. I’ve decided to make myself come out in the real world more and get used to it. Making the decision was easy, but acting it out is terrifying. Even though I’m very comfortable in the straight world as a somewhat effeminate male, I feel completely conspicuous as soon as I go fully femme.
The hostess at Café Lorenzo greets me with an automatic smile and hello before I step out of the shadows of the entry and into the dim light of the greeting area. When I am fully visible, her eyes register surprise. She glances away and her smile disappears. She is unable to look at me. This is how polite people express disgust at inappropriate people like me. I feel like a hairy giant in a tutu.
“One, please,” I say, without waiting for her to speak again. It simplifies things. No awkward silence, no grasping for words. She’ll either seat me or ask me to leave. She is young, transparent, visibly offended by my presentation. Her makeup is too red for her complexion, but not bad. She has chunky blond highlights in her level-6 brown hair and wears it below the shoulder. Her hair tells me this is her career, at least for now. A student’s color would have been homemade, from a drugstore bottle if she was poor enough to be waitressing at night. This color is a step up from home color. The makeup shows a lack of sophistication…maybe a high school dropout, definitely not a college girl. I’m fully aware that I am scrutinizing others just as they do me. It’s part of being human, maybe. Or maybe in my case it’s just the hairdresser mentality.
The café is almost empty—I’ve come early so there would be no waiting for tables. It’s not being asked to leave I fear; Chicago is pretty serious about civil rights for everyone. What worries me is waiting for a table at a crowded bar counter or having to stand in the reception area with all those disapproving eyes boring into me.
“Of course,” she says, and leads me into the dining area. She seats me at a small table for two in a corner, out of the way. Good. I won’t be the center of attention. And there is a lamp on the table that emits just enough light to read by. I will bury my head in the book I’ve brought along as soon as I have ordered so as to be oblivious of how those around me are reacting.
By the time I order, my bladder is killing me. It’s nerves, I know, but there’s no dismissing the urge. I have to go to the ladies room. Naturally, the café has begun filling up. Five or six tables are occupied; about half the customers are women.
Most transwomen have at least one nightmare story about being humiliated over their use of a women’s bathroom or a dressing room in a public place. I rise with real dread. I make myself concentrate on moving like a woman, even though I feel like an NFL lineman. My wedges add two inches to my height so I tower over most of the people I see in this place, even the men. I focus on my walk. It is a learned technique, the product of a lot of observation and practice. Casual pace, placing my forward foot almost directly in front of my navel with each step, letting my hips rotate just a little. My right arm swings, my hand bent up so the palm faces the floor. I carry my purse over my left arm.
There is no one in the place when I enter. I hustle into the far stall and do my business, hoping to get out before anyone else comes in. I hope that everyone who saw me come this way is waiting for me to leave before using the facilities themselves.
No such luck.
As I go to the sink to wash my hands, two women walk in. One goes into a stall, the other to the sinks to work on her makeup. We exchange glances in the mirror. She does that subtle kind of double take, where her eyes widen a notch in surprise then she suppresses it. I smile a little. She smiles a little back. It’s a humorless smile, but at least she isn’t screaming.
***
THOSE TEPID ACTS of tolerance in the restaurant are enough to put me in a light mood as I walk into the monthly meeting of the Chicago TransGender Alliance. It’s pathetic that I am so sensitive about these things, but that’s just how it is.
Chicago’s TransGender Alliance was established back in the seventies, when cross-dressers dwelled in closets and transsexualism was a dark science. The membership today takes in the whole transgender spectrum: hetero male cross-dressers, flamboyant gay queens, transsexuals, and transsexual wannabes, and a smattering of fetishists. Plus spouses, lovers, partners, friends, and the occasional tranny chaser—guys who have a thing for transwomen. Female-to-male transsexuals are rare in TGA. They don’t need a support group as much as those of us flying the other way do. After a few months on testosterone and maybe a mastectomy, they can pass easily as males and move into the mainstream of society.
Our group is made up of mostly older transgenders—most members are somewhere over forty and some are in their sixties and seventies. Younger trans people who are out no longer really need a support group, I suppose. They can feminize themselves with Internet-purchased hormones, and they live the club life in Boystown, or take refuge on trans-friendly college campuses.
The average TGA member is a male-to-female transgender who denied her feminine identity for decades, until some incident or just the rising pressure of life made her come out. Most of us were the male in a male-female marriage at some point; around half have children. Most are divorced, and most divorces came within a year or two of coming out as a cross-dresser.
Our group has a preponderance of transsexuals. The classic story is the individual comes out to his spouse as a cross-dresser. The spouse struggles for a year or two trying to understand, while the cross-dresser pursues his feminine self like a teenage boy chasing his first sexual encounter. The spouse freaks and leaves. The cross-dresser is left with nothing but his femme side, comes out to the rest of the family, friends, maybe even work associates and ends up being disowned by most of them. Women he dates drop him when he comes out to them. He gets more into the femme life, starts hormones, and lives as a transsexual.
Of the transsexuals I know, only half have gone all the way with reassignment surgery, where they trade in their penis for a vagina. Many have no intention of going all the way with it, some aren’t sure, and some just don’t have the tens of thousands of dollars it takes.
***
He watches the trannies drift into the banquet hall. They’re older. Not his cup of tea. But he feels the need for arousal and this is a much safer venue for him than the clubs where the young stuff lurks. Or searching for new meat on the Internet.
He idly evaluates each one from a window seat in the deli across the street. Not the best vantage point but the material isn’t that great anyway. Older. Bigger. Lots of fatties. He shudders. He hates fat. It makes him nauseous. It drives him to keep his own body lean and trim, even in his early fifties. It’s a big turn-on for women, an older man with a little gray in his hair having a hard body.
A trans man passes by. There’s an idea, he thinks. What would that be like? Catch him when he still has breasts, not too much body hair. He tries to picture that in an erotic way. It doesn’t work.
A tall masculine looking tranny passes right in front of his window and crosses the street to the banquet hall. She has broad shoulders and a strong male jaw, but she looks sex
y anyway. Her boobs jiggle. Her arms flail a little as she trots across the street, short steps, just a little awkward in summer wedges. He wonders how far along she is, what she’d be like in bed. A big girl might be fun.
He pictures her with bared breasts and a little tranny penis and starts to get aroused.
***
I DRIFT INTO THE ROOM and make my way to the bar. There are maybe twenty ladies in the room and one transman so far. The crowd won’t be big tonight—there’s no special event scheduled, and no free food.
I find a stool next to Cecilia and place my drink order, crossing my legs, checking my posture. Part of transitioning is learning to do these things naturally, but it takes practice. Leg crossing is especially difficult when you have the male appendages to deal with.
Cecilia gives me a faint nod as I sit down. She is one of the longest-tenured members of the group and has been fully transitioned for many years. Still, she is as loud and gross as a redneck laborer, and as arrogant as a millionaire stockbroker. She has made sure no one is offended by her transsexuality by making the obnoxiousness of her person the most obvious thing about herself.
But Cecelia knows everything that’s going on in the community, every rumor, every tryst, every bust, everything. So I violate one of my cardinal rules and sit next to her with the intent of conversing, which usually consists in listening to her.
“Good evening, Cecilia,” I start. “I heard a rumor that one of our girls got beat up last weekend. Have you heard anything about that?”
“Not beat up, honey,” she answers grandly, like an aristocrat speaking to a laborer. She turns to look at me through hooded eyes, like a socialite. “She was beaten to death. A real mess, from what I hear.”
“Do we know her?” I ask.
“I do. I don’t know about you.” Cecilia is boasting and putting me down at the same time. “Mandy Marvin is the victim. There are no suspects.”
My mind goes numb. I can’t speak, but in my head I can hear a terrible scream straining to be heard. As the shock sinks in, it becomes unbearable but all I can do is cradle my glass of wine and look at it. My eyes tear up.
Mandy was a friend and a client, sweet and beautiful. She had dreams.
***
MURDER IS AN ABSTRACT concept to most of us. Violent crime is something that happens to people who live in "bad neighborhoods," or to sex workers. Oh most of us in the trans world get verbally abused, even physically intimidated. But mostly these acts are blows to our pride. They make us feel like freaks, unwelcome, unwanted members of polite society.
Mandy’s death is a shock on many levels. She was my friend and I am grieving for her. I had no idea Marilee and Mandy knew each other, but she must be the client Marilee was talking about on Saturday. And her death is a message to all us trannies: no matter where you are, who you are or how good you look, you are not safe. You will never be safe.
Mandy was one of the most beautiful women I’ve ever seen, trans or genetic. She was beautiful even before she transitioned and afterward she was beyond stunning. She was 5'-5" with a willowy build, thick lush hair that changed color several times a year, an oval face, and shapely legs. Hormones gave her a nice set of perky breasts and gradually feminized her facial features even more. Her voice was androgynous, a hint of smoky resonance at the octave where men’s and women’s ranges meet. She cultivated a breathless quality to go with it, and she had always formed words like a girl. I would have given anything to be her. Physically at least.
She came to Boystown as a teen. Knew she was trans all her life and was thrown out by her family. She started living full-time femme right away and made a living turning tricks. She had been a hooker and a dancer in a tranny club for a couple years by the time she started coming to TransGender Alliance functions, which is where I met her. Even though we were a generation apart in age, she liked the way I did my hair and I ended up doing hers and I have ever since.
We ugly girls think pretty girls have it made, but it’s not true. Mandy’s beauty gave her a doorway to life that wasn’t available to me and she took it. It meant good money and it was mostly easy. And when you’ve lived half your life taking abuse from men for being effeminate, having them finally lust for you seems like a fantasy come true. But once you start down that path, it’s very hard to go anywhere else.
Mandy wasn’t especially bright, but after a couple years in the sex trade she could see the limits of her career. By then she was starting to think of herself as a woman. She didn’t want to be a prostitute any more. When I met her she was trying to get off the streets. She did waitressing and worked retail. The money was awful, but she got by. She got help from boyfriends and some in the community said she still did tricks, but for bigger bucks for an escort service. She got her gender reassignment surgery a year ago.
We weren’t best friends. We were too different for that. But I was her hairdresser and a sort of older sister for her, and I thought she was one of the sweetest people I’ve ever met, so we quite naturally drifted into a warm friendship.
For the past year or so she mentioned a special guy she was seeing. Handsome, rich, and great in bed, he even had her thinking about happily ever-after.
Maybe Mr. Wonderful had some issues.
My thoughts are short-circuited by Cecelia’s loud voice. Two other girls have joined us. She’s holding court.
“I’m guessing she was with a john,” says Cecilia. “She never bothered to work on a career . . .” Cecilia launches into a monologue on the younger trans generation, preoccupied with sex, drugs, and rock and roll. She can be the transwoman incarnation of a right wing talk-radio host—an opinion on everything, untiringly judgmental, malformed physically and emotionally, yet somehow charismatic for those who lack self-esteem or any trace of intelligence.
Cecilia’s jabber oozes off to the corners of my consciousness then slips into the ether. Mandy’s image fills my mind. I always think of her as smiling and laughing. She had an infectious laugh. She livened up every room she ever entered.
She had a good heart, too. With her looks, she could have been arrogant, but I never heard her say anything nasty about anyone.
“You’re full of shit about Mandy,” I blurt out. The others are stunned at my brazen challenge to Cecelia’s authority. “She had a day job. She quit tricking a long time ago.”
I stare into Cecelia’s eyes. “Mandy was my friend. She never mentioned you.”
I move away from the group and find a seat at an empty table. I am beginning the mourning process. This has hit me hard. I need to find a private place to think. And weep.
***
THERE IS STILL NO PRESS COVERAGE of Mandy's death on Tuesday. Retail clerks don't have the status for such coverage, I guess, and prostitutes, her former profession, are even less remarkable in death.
Tuesday night I get a call at home from a cop. My pulse picks up a few beats. Why is a cop calling me?
“Hi, Bobbi,” he says. “It's Phil Pavlik, Chicago PD. We met at Marilee and Bill’s party on Saturday. I mentioned that my beat is the LGBT community…?”
“Oh, yes!” Relief. I’m not sure why I thought I might be in trouble with the law, but contact with the police has always made me nervous. His image comes into my mind—nice looking, late thirties, maybe forty, in good shape. Kind eyes. I remember that especially. I find kind eyes very attractive in a person. “How are you?” I’m speaking in my femme voice and feeling very self-conscious about it. I’m sure Officer Phil perceives me more as a beer-drinking buddy than a woman.
“I’m fine,” he says. “I was hoping to talk with you at the party, but you got away too fast.” Pause. I wait for him to move on to another subject so I don’t have to explain myself, but he’s a trained listener and waits.
“Yes, well, I had some other obligations that day,” I say.
He doesn’t respond right away. I think he is trying to decide whether or not to draw me out.
“What I had hoped to ask you is if we might meet once
in a while so you could tell me a little about the trans community and what I can do to connect with people. We want trans people to feel they can trust us.”
I don’t draw the attention of tranny chasers—they go for the cuter, younger girls—so I know this isn’t a veiled pass. Plus, something about Officer Phil seemed very sincere and human, even in that brief moment we met.
“I think all of us will appreciate that, officer,” I reply. “What did you have in mind?”
“Well, I was hoping we could meet for a drink or a meal or a coffee tomorrow—whatever works for you.”
An image floats into my mind of me walking into my favorite Boystown café on the arm of a nice looking cop. I actually blush at the thought. I have forbidden myself to engage in carnal activities during my transition so that whatever I end up doing, it’s based on the real me, and not fulfilling the fantasy of some lover I’ve taken along the way. It can get complicated. I’ve heard of one girl who went all the way so she could keep her heart-throb, and of course, he left her eventually. And I know a pre-op girl who has put off her gender reassignment surgery because her boyfriend was only interested in pre-op transwomen, not post-ops and not genetic women. Go figure, huh?
“Okay,” I say, drawing out the word while I get my mind back on the question. “I get off at six tomorrow.”
“That works,” he says. “I’ll be off-duty so I can imbibe. Let’s have a drink somewhere convenient for you at, say, six-thirty or so.”
So we make a date for six-thirty at Halsted House, a trans-friendly gay bar near my apartment. After I hang up I realize I will have no time to go home and change into my femme self. Ordinarily, this wouldn’t bother me at all. I’d just go in my androgynous work get up. But things are changing for me. I’m very intent on expressing my female self. And the news about Mandy is eating at me. It’s one thing for the straight world to call us names and recoil at our looks, it’s quite another for a transwoman to be murdered and for the murder to be ignored.