Perfect

by Kathleen Hayes

  His lip twitched up on one side. “Well, you don’t have to be attracted to men to admit that he is one badass dude. But, I’m bi.”

  “Oh, okay. That’s cool.” I was amazed at how open he was. He just put who he was out there. For some reason the fact that he had a girlfriend made me feel safe with him.

  Before I had time to think much more about it, Jesse pressed play and claimed a seat on the end of the bed. I let my brain turn off for an hour and half of gunfights and explosions.

  Even after the movie ended, it was amazing how easily we just sat around talking.

  ***

  Over the next couple of weeks, I ran into Jesse at the cafeteria and we continued our weekly Gerard Butler movie night. I had never had a friend before. It was kind of surprising that I had a friend at all. I still felt all that wrongness deep inside, but when I hung out with Jesse, it seemed to settle into something bearable.

  It was Friday, five weeks after that night so I was getting ready to go over to Jesse’s room to watch Gerard the bounty hunter chase after his ex-wife. Kira had left earlier for a date so I had the whole room to myself. I always liked that because it meant I didn’t have to get dressed in the bathroom and risk the mirrors.

  I had just grabbed my ID stuffed it in my pocket when my phone started jumping around on my desk. I answered it immediately when I saw Jesse’s name on the screen.

  “Hey, what’s up?”

  He sounded a little sheepish when he answered, “I got GERM’d. I’m gonna have to cancel tonight.”

  My brain didn’t quite process that. “You what?”

  “I got GERM’d. I broke my leg and Georgetown Emergency Response Medical Services had to take me to the hospital.”

  I would have to parse that later because all I heard was hospital. “Are you okay? Are you still in the ER? I’m on my way.” My rising panic was evident in my voice and I had to sit down for a moment and take a deep breath.

  “I’m fine – really. I just fractured one of my bottom leg bones. They’re going to put a cast on me and send me on my way. You don’t need to come.”

  “Of course I do. I’ll see you in ten minutes.”

  I grabbed my laptop and randomly picked one of my DVDs, threw them into my bag and hit the hallway at a run. It was a about a twelve minute walk across campus to the hospital at a normal pace. I made it in eight minutes at a run.

  Once I reached the ER desk, I had to take a moment to catch my breath before I could speak to the lady behind it where Jesse was.

  She looked at her list, nodded, gave me a stern look and said, “He’s already got one visitor. So don’t be too loud or bothersome or you will be asked to leave.”

  I assured her I would be the paradigm of well behaved as I turned to walk into the ER proper. I barely had time to wonder who Jesse’s other visitor might be when I heard his girlfriend’s voice ringing shrilly through the open space.

  “You can’t even bother to show up on time to anything and then you miss a date because of a stupid dare! Don’t expect any calls from me anytime soon.”

  I saw her storm out of one of the curtained exam rooms and headed that way as soon as she had passed me.

  I peeked my head around the curtain slowly, since there was really no way to knock. “Knock, knock.”

  A strained smile spread across Jesse’s face. “Hey, Li.”

  “Hey.” I stood there awkwardly for a moment, unsure if I should mention what I had just witnessed. “You okay?” I asked with a wave of my arm that encompassed his leg and the direction his ex-girlfriend had fled.

  He shrugged his shoulders and winced before saying, “Leg hurts, glad she’s gone. She was starting to get clingy.”

  “You’re horrible.”

  I just about swallowed my tongue when Jesse actually blushed. “Yeah, I kinda suck at relationships – boys and girls. I never can seem to keep one going more than a month or so.”

  “Well, I guess it’s good I’m not your girlfriend or it would be about time for me to be on my way.” It took me a second to register what I had said. “Crap. Umm…” Now it was my turn to blush. I could feel the red spreading across my cheeks and down my neck.

  Jesse looked uncommonly serious when he replied, “No. I would never let you kick me to the curb. You’re the best friend I’ve ever had.”

  My heart tightened, and I had to blink a few times before I responded, “Well, it’s a good thing I showed up, then. After all, what are friends for?”

  He smiled at me, and after that, the awkward left the party for the time being. I pulled up a chair, set up my laptop on the tray table and pressed play on the random movie I had grabbed. By the end of the night we had been interrupted about a dozen times – Jesse went to x-ray, got a cast, and was checked up on many times. It was about three in the morning by the time I had a called a cab to take us the half a mile back across campus to our dorm. Jesse’s roommate, Mike, was still out for the night when I helped him hobble through the door, so I set up a pallet of blankets on the floor in case he needed anything in the night.

  I woke up about ten in the morning, saw Mike was back, and left quietly to go back to my room.

  ***

  The next month and a half passed quickly, as I spent most of my spare time helping Jesse get from one place to another, or bringing him food, or just hanging out and doing homework.

  One evening, I was suddenly hit with the fact that I really did know just about everything going in Jesse’s life. He just didn’t hold back. He’d briefly dated one of the GERMS EMTs who took him to the hospital, but as he had said he was no better at relationships with guys than he was with girls, and he broke up with Jesse after only three weeks. His sixteen year old sister had a brief pregnancy scare. He was freaking out about passing all his classes.

  Still I told him almost nothing about myself. I realized that Jesse had been a great friend to me, but I was being a kind of sucky friend to him. I decided to change that.

  On Friday, I went to Jesse’s room for our regular movie night. Pizza had been added to the tradition about three weeks in. Before he could start the movie up, I stopped him.

  “Can we talk?” I barely got the words out around the lump of fear in my throat. I had never spoken about any of this to anyone. Ever.

  Jesse seemed to sense the importance of the moment, because he turned his chair to face mine, sat down, and said, “Sure.”

  “So, you remember the night we met?” He nodded. “I am sure you have wondered what that was all about.” He nodded again. “I think I’m ready to tell you.”

  He stayed quiet as I stared at my hands, trying to gather my courage. It was another minute or so before I was able to begin.

  “I had gone to that cliff to kill myself.” I waited for shock or disgust but all Jesse did was reach across the distance between us and and take my hand in his. Finally, I looked up and met his eyes. That gaze seemed to break us both. Matching trails of tears ran down both our faces as he grabbed me in a hug.

  “I’m so glad I was there. I’m so glad I met you.”

  All I could do was nod and cry into his shoulder. Even in that moment, an angry thought flit across my mind that I couldn’t fully experience his hug because my breasts were giant mounds of flesh, creating an unnatural barrier between us.

  I cried for what I was before I met Jesse, and I cried for what I still was. I cried for my wrongness, and I cried for my loneliness. Through it all, Jesse held me and cried as well.

  When the tears had finished, I felt empty as I had before, but it was more a space to be filled than the hollowness of that day three months before.

  We sat back down in our chairs, and I told him everything. Through it all he listened and didn’t run screaming from the room. For that, I was grateful.

  When I was done, he looked a little lost. “Have you ever talked to anyone about this before?”

  I shook my head.

  He gently took my chin and tilted my head so I was looking at him, “Li, I am now
and will always be your friend. I will always be here to listen if you need it. But I am out of my depth here.”

  It was like a blow to my already fragile heart. I felt my arms and legs folding in towards my torso, trying to protect myself as I sunk into the darkness.

  “Li, wait. Stop. I just meant that you might think about talking to a counselor.”

  I looked up and whispered, “No. I’m not crazy.”

  “No, you’re not. But something is obviously going on. Maybe someone else will be able to help you understand it better.”

  “You think so?”

  “It can’t hurt, can it?”

  “Will you go with me?”

  “Definitely.”

  It was one of the few Friday nights that we didn’t watch a movie. Jesse helped me look up the hours of the Student Health Center Counseling center and we spent the rest of the evening talking.

  ***

  On Tuesday morning, I met Jesse outside Village C, and we walked to the counseling center together. We had decided that he would walk there with me and wait for me outside my appointment.

  An hour later I came out of my session feeling better than I had in a long time. My counselor hadn’t called me crazy. She hadn’t dismissed my feelings. For once I felt like someone else could understand what I was feeling. I wasn’t sure how it all would turn out, but I felt the beginnings of hope furling out in my chest.

  Jesse stood when I came out of the office. He took one look at my smile and jumped up to hug me in the middle of the waiting room.

  “Did it go well?”

  “Yeah. I think so. I set up another appointment on Friday.”

  “That’s awesome!”

  “My counselor, Janet, gave me some homework. You wanna help me with it?”

  Jesse grinned as he said, “Of course.”

  “You have any classes this afternoon?”

  “Nope.”

  “Then let’s go.”

  Thirty minutes later. we were sitting on a metro train and Jesse was pestering me about what exactly my homework was.

  I finally told him as we were getting off the train at the Pentagon City stop. I dragged him up the stairs, into the mall, and into one of the salons.

  “Janet said for me to find a way to make me feel more at home in my body. I have always hated my long hair, but kept it that way because that was how my Mom kept it for me when I was younger. I’m getting a hair cut.” I grinned as I spoke.

  “Good for you.” Jesse grinned back.

  Jesse and I looked through all the style books in the salon and after he suggested all the most ridiculous styles, helped me pick one that I really liked. By the end of the day, I felt like a new person. Jesse had dragged me shopping after my hair cut.

  When I got back to my dorm, for the first time ever, I walked into the bathroom and looked at myself in the full length mirror on the back of the door.

  My long hair was gone, replaced by a short, spiky do that was only about an inch long. I had gotten rid of the skirt I had worn that morning and replaced it with cargo pants and a short sleeved cotton button up shirt. It was loose enough that it did not emphasize my breasts. It was still not perfect but it felt like a step in the right direction.

  Slowly, deliberately, I unbuttoned my shirt and took off my bra. I stared at my breasts in the mirror. The sight of them still invoked an extreme discomfort. but I forced myself to keep looking. I saw the eight pale scars across the tops of them and remembered the utter despair of that day.

  I ran my fingers over the scars and as I stared openly at myself. I made a promise to myself. I promised I would find a way to live in my own skin – I would not give up on figuring how to be right within myself.

  ***

  I met with Janet twice a week for the next month and half. During that time, I still hung out with Jesse and we had our Friday movie nights, but I kept him at a bit of a distance. The things I was thinking about and having to come to terms with were just too big. I needed space.

  It took the whole first month for me to be able hear the word transgender in relation to myself and not freak out, and two more weeks before I could say it myself. Janet used some clinical term but somehow the non-clinical phrase was easier to wrap my head around. She was great. She never made it seem like she knew more about me that I did.

  I was walking back to my dorm from my Friday afternoon appointment when my phone buzzed in my pocket.

  I took it out and answered it without looking at the caller ID. “Hello.”

  “Li,” Jesse’s voice was strained even through the phone, “I need you. Can you come to my dorm?”

  “I’m on my way. I’ll be there in ten.”

  I hung up the phone and picked up my pace. My mind raced with what could be wrong with Jesse. Because something was definitely wrong. I walked as fast as I could with my heavy back pack and burst into Jesse’s room without knocking as soon as I arrived.

  His face was pale and drawn. He looked the worst I had ever seen him. I let my bag drop to the floor and ran the three paces across the room to grab him up in my arms. As soon as I was close enough to support him, he started shaking like a leaf. I shifted us until we were seated on the edge of his bed and rubbed his back until the shaking slowed down some.

  “What happened?”

  “My sister is gone.”

  “What?” I didn’t know much about Kayla, but I knew Jesse talked to her on the phone at least once every week. They were as close as any siblings I’d ever known.

  “After the whole pregnancy scare thing a few months back, apparently she started doing drugs and skipping school. A couple of days ago my parents staged an intervention. They tried to get her to see what she was doing to herself. She pretended to agree and went to bed. They haven’t seen her since.”

  “Oh my God.”

  “I should have known. I mean, I knew she was having trouble, but I talk to her all the time. How could I not have known that she was going through all this stuff?”

  My heart broke to hear his despair. “You couldn’t have known unless she wanted you to. You couldn’t have known.”

  I had no idea what to do. I just kept repeating that as he shook in my arms and my heart broke for him.

  After a few more minutes, the overwhelming need to do something took control. “Let’s call your Mom and see if they have heard anything.”

  He nodded but didn’t make any move towards the phone.

  I leaned down so I could look in his eyes and asked, “Would you like me to call your Mom for you?”

  He nodded again.

  I grabbed his phone from the desk and pressed “2” to speed dial his Mom and put the phone on speaker.

  “Mrs. Pena?”

  “Yes, who is this?”

  “This is Li McKenna. I am a friend of Jesse’s. He told me what happened and is in a bit of a shock. He asked if I would call and see if there is any news about Kayla.”

  “Oh. Nothing new. None of her friends, that we know about, have heard from her. We reported her missing to the police but they don’t have much hope at this point.”

  “I am so sorry. If there is anything I can do, you just have to let me know.”

  “Just take care of Jesse. He and Kayla are so close.”

  “I will. Don’t worry about him.”

  “A mother always worries.”

  “Of course.”

  “Thank you, Li. I’ll let you know if we get any news.”

  “Thanks.”

  I looked up at Jesse after I put the phone down and found him still staring blankly ahead. I shook his shoulder a bit. “Hey, Jesse, look at me for a second. Have you eaten yet?” A head shake was all I got. “Do you want to wait here while I get you some food or do you want to order something in?”

  I was able to get about half a piece of pizza in him before he fell asleep in his clothes on top of his bed. I sat up against the wall so he wouldn’t wake up alone. At some point I fell asleep in that position. When Jesse woke up, he
wasn’t much better. He was pretty much a zombie for the next two days.

  On Monday afternoon, Jesse woke up and spoke directly to me for the first time since Friday.

  “God, I’m sorry I have been such douche these past couple of days.”

  “No. It’s fine. You got some horrible news. It just took you a little time to deal.”

  “Can we just do something totally normal tonight? I want to pretend this doesn’t exist for a little while.”

  “Sure. Let’s have Friday movie night on a Monday.”

  “Yes!” Jesse latched on to that idea with a bit of a manic fervor. We ended up spending a few hours watching Heath Ledger make a fool of himself pretending to be a knight.

  The next week or so were a bit of a blur. Jesse went back and forth from attempts at “being normal” to spacing out. One or the other of us spoke with his parents every night. It was an extremely tense time.