Chapter 16 -- Friday, September 27
Friday's are usually a wasted day at school. Most families here have weekend plans, so teachers don't want to assign much (if any) homework. Tuesday is test day, and so school-wise, the day is kinda shot. Lots of kids have "the flu" on Friday. Mondays too, for that matter.
No one had the flu today, cuz Saturday was the big school dance, and everyone was looking forward to it. Since we wear uniforms, it's the chance to put on a show. It's not the prom, but rumor has it a lot of V-cards get punched.
Classes were a bore, but then there was 4th period. I had been roped into trying out for Merchant of Venice, or at least Mr. Petrie's excuse to have Mr. MacCarthy watch over the school's wild, potentially revolutionary transgender girl for a period a day, and perhaps after school. Mom had concerns at first, but this morning, on the way to school, she seemed to be completely on-board. I told her this probably meant lots of afternoons and nights and weekends, and she seemed to be cool with that. I was secretly hoping she might veto it, but whatever karma was ruling my life right now kept flowing in that direction.
Promptly at the beginning of 4th period, I walked into the drama room, which was less a classroom and more looked like someone had been fighting a poltergeist in a used furniture store. Shitty old sofas, pillows tossed here and there, a few bean bags from the 1970's, a piano, a rack of assorted costumes, and books scattered everywhere. I... loved...it.... It was the exact opposite of the Scandinavian white neatness of my mother and her friends. The walls were bare brick, and in one corner, amazingly enough, there was graffiti.
No one was there yet (my mother's version of punctuality: if you're not early, you're late) so I coughed a couple of times to get Mr. MacCarthy's attention. I'd seen him on campus before, but never really paid much attention. For all the world he looked for all the world like Rupert Giles from `Buffy the Vampire Slayer'. I suddenly have these Sarah Michelle Gellar visions. I subconsciously knew what I'd be binge watching starting tonite.
"Mr. MacCarthy. I'm Christy. Christy Dancer. Mr. Petrie...."
"Yes, yes, yes. He told me you'd be coming." Was that a faint British accent? Tell me what you know about Merchant of Venice."
"We'll," I started. I'd had enough foresight to google it last night. "It's one of Shakespeare's comedies, and gave us the phrase, `pound of flesh', and is considered mildly anti-semitic."
"It's wildly antisemitic, Christy. Wildly. And that's one of the many reasons why it's not one of the favorites of school drama clubs. We're going to try to puncture that, and in fact skewer the antisemites, but we're still working on the script."
"Script? I thought it was a play already."
"Yes, well, we need to figure out a way to perform it without offending sensibilities, n'est pas? That will require a bit of, shall we say, re--arranging. Oh, here's our Shylock now."
Ahem. I'd read enough to know that in Shakespeare's version, Shylock was a man, and the bad guy. This was our head cheerleader, Brandi. Decidedly not an elderly Jewish banker.
"Yeah," said Brandi, "this is going to sound terrible, but I need drama on my college application, and don't have a lot of time, so Mac says he's gonna re-write this play for Shylock to be a female Wall Street type."
Huh.... Mac' plus the body language was interesting as shit. Was there something going on here I didn't understand, or maybe understood too much? I've been watching too many episodes of Glee'.
"Brandi, this is Christy. She'll be somewhere in the play, maybe one of Portia's gang or maybe your assistant, I don't know yet. I suddenly have this vision as Shylock straight out of `Devil Wears Prada'. Christy, can you do Emily Blunt?"
"Yeah..... "
"Great. Christy, for homework, I want you to watch `Devil Wears Prada' and channel Emily Blunt's character. Imagine Brandi here as Meryl Streep."
Brandi coo'd. "Meryl Streep. That's great. That will look great on my college application."
Trying to make small talk, I said, "Brandi, where are you planning to go to college?"
She looked at me with just a trace of disdain. "You're Christy, right? I've heard about you. Good luck with your thing. Anyway, I dunno yet. Mr. Petrie says it's all about my SATs when they come in. My dad will fix whatever ..."
I understood only about half of that, maybe less, but if I remembered Devil Wears Prada", I think Mr. MacCarthy's casting was spot on. Anyway, I kinda though I was looking at Madison in 3 year. '
Mr. MacCarthy turned to me and said, "I'm going to discuss lines with Brandi. Why don't you grab a copy of `Merchant of Venice' and make yourself comfie, but remember, we're going to rewrite it. Also set it in the 21st century, so think about Emily Blunt's costume."
Huh... there was a Keureg in the corner, and some Splenda and some paper cups, so I took full advantage of some caffeine infusion and found a spot on what I could only imagine was a 50 year old sofa. There were copies of `Merchant of Venice' laying around everywhere, so I grabbed one and started reading.
In sooth, I know not why I am so sad:
It wearies me; you say it wearies you;
But how I caught it, found it, or came by it,
What stuff 'tis made of, whereof it is born
I am to learn;
And such a want-wit sadness makes of me,
That I have much ado to know myself.
OMG. WTF have I gotten myself into? I heard him say he was re-writing this, and I'm catching on it's to make Brandi happy, but .... WTF?
Suddenly a creature dropped onto the sofa next to me. "Hi. I'm Bassanio. Who are you?"
"Ahhh.... I know you. You're Eric. You're dating my friend Emma."
"Yeah, but for now, I'm Bassanio, courting the fair Portia, who has not yet been cast."
"Yeah, OK, I'm apparently Emily Blunt, executive assistant to Shylock."
"Got it. That sounds like Mac. Welcome to the drama den. You got coffee? You're gonna need it."
"Is this all serious?, and yeah, I do, thanks."
"Mac has a funny job. You see, maybe 1 out of 100 students who come thru here are actually gonna major in drama in college, or for that matter actually give a shit about drama. This is all about padding college entrance resumes. Drama looks good because it means you have communications skills and B-schools love that shit. Even pre-med likes it. And pre-law cums in its pants over good communications skills... sorry.... Didn't mean to offend, but we kinda talk that way here."
"So, Brandi?"
"Yeah, it's cool. Nothing actually happening there, but Brandi knows how to play to her own strengths, ya know?"
I thought about Eric for a couple of moments, sorta staring him up and down. "You're smart for a 10th grade jock."
Eric fell back on the sofa laughing. "Me? Jock? Oh hell no. Again, it's about building a college resume. You should think about it sometime. Neat thing about track is that you don't have to be that good at it to build up enough points over time to earn a letter. You just have to be consistent. You also need to start early enough so that you earn your letter by the end of junior year. Drama club, track letter, and reasonably good SATs and I'm scholarship material, which is what I'm counting on because my family isn't nearly as rich as most of the rest around here.
Eric sipped his coffee and then asked, "mind if I ask about the elephant in the room?"
"Yeah. Go ahead. I'm pretty much an open book. It's why I'm here in drama."
"Yeah, I was gonna ask you about that, too. Anyway, the gay guys in school for whatever reason seem to flock to drama. You'll find I'm one of the rare straight ones, although more than one of the gays has tried to draft me to the other team. But uh-uh. Anyway, most of these guys didn't really figure out they were gay until around puberty, when most of us start mooning over cheerleaders, and they started realizing they were mooning over the quarterback. Same with you?"
"Nah. Gender is different, although I'm probably also attracted to boys, but that's a completely different thing entirely. No, gender starts popping up early. Think about your earliest memories, when you'd go a toy store and want to buy a truck or a toy gun?"
"Well, my parents don't really like guns, but yeah, I get you."
"You probably also grew up wanting to wear boy-clothes and dress and look like other boys, right?" He nodded, and I continued, "I've been thinking about this a lot and reading about it as much as I can. Internally, you identified as a boy, and while some of that was reinforced by media stereotypes, most of it came from inside you. You were wired the way something like ninety percent of boys are wired -- a straight boy. Now, what if, growing up, your parents forced you to wear girl clothes and only let you do girl things and play with girl toys, or for that matter only play with other girls. How would you feel?"
"Pretty shitty. I'd hate it."
"If you were lucky, you'd learn to live with it, and a lot of people do. But every time you closed your eyes, you'd visualize yourself as a girl. When you went shopping with your mom, on the way to the boys' department you'd pass the girls' department and you'd think of how cute the outfits looked. When you watched a movie or tv show, you'd visualize yourself as the female character. I binge watch Grey's Anatomy, and I really sync with the Izzy character. It's not sexual, and in fact she has a pretty shitty love life on that show. Although, now that I think about it, she really turned into a horn-dog in season 3. Anyway though, when I was able to finally start wearing girls' clothes, even on the sly, it was like I'd been held under water and was finally able to breathe. That's the way I feel right now, even though I'm not sure about this whole drama thing."
"Yeah, like, don't take this the wrong way, but this is a small school, and I've never really noticed you. Drama is usually for people who crave being noticed. What's that about?
"This is about the school wanting to keep eyes on their little bio-sociology experiment, me. Ms. Weston promises the school will be a `loving, exclusive environment' for my transition, but she wanted me to check in with Mr. Petrie just so he could keep eyes on me, and he wanted me to try out for this play just so I wouldn't be cooking up anything revolutionary during 4th period, like a RuPaul drag show or something."
"Ohhh.... Kay.... So we're like your baby sitters, right?"
"Well, Mr. MacCarthy, yeah, but I'll try to hang out here in the corner and stay under the radar."
"Yeah, sister, that's not going to happen. For one, the whole drama club is in here at lunch. You may not realize this, but you're a star attraction at this school. All of the gay guys are jealous -- a real, live trannie..."
"I hate that word!"
"Ok, ok, ok, don't bite me! But listen, this is a very boring school. Everyone here is a Type A from a Type A family, and that leads to a lot of boring and studying and.... Did I mention boring? Anyway, you're the new thing. No one's ever seen anything like you, or at least not that they knew. It's not like anyone's talking behind your back or being shitty, but in a group like drama that's totally focused on being out there, you are the pointy end of the spear, sister."
"But this lunch thing. I eat lunch with my little pack of friends, we call ourselves..."
"Yeah, the sister wives. Emma told me all about your group. I think it's cool. Look, they love you -- Emma told me so -- and they will continue to love you. You are their adopted little sister, and they're going to have your back. But notice, I don't eat lunch with Emma? She's cool with that. I have my thing, she has hers, and anyway, as the school year evolves, they're all probably going to cycle out into various clubs and student council and shit. Look, ninth grade is a lot different from eight. What you did last year is going to change a lot this year. When lunch starts, go tell them you've got to do this thing, and explain why, and I'll save your seat."
"OK, gotcha. Lemme go tell them. If I'm not back in 5, send out a search party."
I ran to the table where the sister wives usually gather, and Brie was there with Madison and Emma-Brunette. "Where's Emma-Red?"
Maddy spoke up, "You know how she's on student council? Well, they've decided to have every-Friday lunch meetings."
"Yeah, well, about that." I told them the whole story again about Mr. Petrie and Mr. MacCarthy and the play and the drama club and such. They just nodded and ate their sandwiches.
Finally, Brie spoke up, "So, our little birdie is going to try to fly from then nest?"
"It's not like I want to, Brie. I'm pretty sure I'm going to piss off everyone up to Ms. Weston if I'm not there for lunch."
Brie put down her sandwich, leaned over, and hugged me tight. "It's OK. We're still your friends."
"You're my best friends."
"Yes, we are, and don't you forget that. Now go be whatever... secretary to the Devil or whoever..."
I ran back to the drama room and, as promised, Eric was right there on the sofa waiting for me. "That was six minutes, girl. You're pushing it!"
"Oh shut the fuck up, jock. I'm doing the best I can to turn Shakespeare into a drag show."
"You realize that the original Shakespeare plays were all drag shows, right? Women were not allowed to perform, so all of the female characters were played by men in drag?"
"Huh... don't say that out loud. You might give Mr. MacCarthy some ideas."
By then, just about everyone had taken some sort of seat in the room. The older kids had a couple of sofas all to themselves, and most everyone else was scattered on random couches and the floor. Mr. MacCarthy stood in the middle of the room, and got everyone's attention. "Good morning. How is everyone. I'm still working on the script, and I'm sure the Bard would be pleased with how it's coming along. Hopefully, I'll have it to you by Monday. We're staying fairly close to the original dialog, with a few changes, but as we discussed, centering the play in the modern era. Over here on the sofa please welcome our newest edition, Christy Dancer, who will be playing Launcelot, the assistant to our banker, Shylock. I visualize their bank, and thus the relationship of their characters, as something like Devil Wears Prada, where our banker, much like Meryl Streep's character, has some redemption in the end rather than being a wholly bad character. Maybe that redemption will come earlier. I'm not sure yet. Anyway, study your likes like the Bard wrote them over the weekend, and we'll discuss the dialog and set changes next week. Any questions?"
A dozen hands went up, and everyone seemed focused on their own parts. Mr. MacCarthy gave each one tips on their read' and how he envisioned the play evolving. It was w-a-a-a-ay over my head, and I was sure I would blow this entirely, and I mean blow' in a bad way.
Lunch came close to an end, and Mr. MacCarthy motioned for me to stick around for a minute. As everyone filed out, except those with a 5th period activities period', he came over and said, "I know this is all new to you, and Launcelot is not an insignificant character. There are no women in the crowd' in this play, because, frankly, our stage is too small and frankly, our school is too small. I'm sure you're going to do fine."
"So, you want me to look like Emily Blunt, but play this as a female reading words Shakespeare wrote for a male, and being the assistant to an overbearing female who Shakespear had written as the villainous male. Did I get that straight?"
"Yes, perfect. You've perfectly captured what I want from you. Now, go learn your lines, and think about your wardrobe."
"When is the play?"
"The week before Christmas break."
Oh good. We had two and a half months. I knew absolutely nothing about drama, about staging a play, about Shakespeare, about this play, or about playing a female character on stage. What I was certain of, though, was that a theater full of people who knew I was a 14 year old transgender female would laugh their asses off at me. I was absolutely positively sure of that. In fact, I had a slight idea that Emily Blunt herself would fly in from Hollywood just to laugh.
I rejoined Brie at English class, and told her more of my ongoing drama saga. She said, "yeah, I think that's probably going to happen to all of the sister wives. Even Maddy will probably find some sort of extra-curricular, I'm sure having something to do with hanging out with boys at lunch. When she started growing boobs, we knew it was all over."
"I was gonna ask you about that. Boobs. I don't have any, and I'm not sure how or when Dr. Strange is going to kick in something that starts building me a figure."
"Don't sweat it. They're nice to have, but growing ems a pain. They never come in even and they itch like hell when they're growing. Nothing you can do about it -- can't zactly sit in class scratching your new boobs, right?"
"Anyway," she went on, "your sisterhood with your best friends is not about your boobs and vagina, or lack thereof. You're our sister, and we love you. Sure, you're gonna want a vagina one day, for all the obvious reasons, and if you're going to make drama a career, I hear you'll really need the boobs. But for now, you're my sister and I love you."
I though I was going to cry. English lit and the cleanup on Tuesday's miserable grammar quiz shocked everyone out of a stupor and into attention. The rest of school was pretty much the same.
On the ride home, I told mom the whole story about drama, and my role, and Emily Blunt, and having to have lunch with the drama club. Parts of it seemed to make her happy. She was glad I had new `friends' (well, the jury was still out on that)
We watched "Devil Wears Prada". Apparently, in 2 months, I needed to learn to walk in stilettos, look good in a pencil skirt, and be snarky to everyone around me. I had one of those down pat.