How long was he in there? Five minutes or five hours? He had no idea, so many emotions crowding in, his whole self a swirl of confusion, but how good it felt, how fine the fabric against his cheek, how astonishing the sensation of, of glamour, how could he deny that, and what followed from it, what was the right next step.
Then Vasilisa was standing in the doorway, watching him. “Can I help you,” she said.
Can I help you, really?, as if this was a department store and she was accusing him of shoplifting, so passive-aggressive, standing there so calm and even smiling slightly, don’t condescend to me, lady, can I help you, no, probably not. Okay, he’s in her closet, he’s nuzzling her frocks, this is true, but still, it’s not right. Or maybe this is just a language problem, maybe it’s a question she learned from a phrasebook, she doesn’t understand about inflections, either, ask the question that way and it sounds hostile when maybe, can it be, she meant it literally, she literally wants to help me and is asking how, she’s not judging me or angry and is actually holding out a hand to help, I don’t want to misread her here, the situation is embarrassing enough already, but yes, she’s coming right up to me and now she’s hugging me, and here’s another phrasebook phrase, “Let’s see what we can do for you.”
Vasilisa began pulling out stuff and holding it up against him, this one? this one?, she asked, and reassuringly, “You and I we are similar,” she said, “in the shape. Willowy, is that a word.” Yes, he nodded, it was a word. “Willowy like the willow tree,” she went on, herself reassured by the confirmation. “Your mother must have been tall and slim, like a fashion model.”
He stiffened. “My mother was a whore,” he said. He had begun to tremble. “She sold me to my father and vanished into Whoreistan.”
“Shh, shh,” she said. “Shh now. That is for another day. Just now it is a moment for you. Try this one.”
“I can’t. I don’t want to spoil your clothes.”
“It doesn’t matter. I have so many. Here, take off your shirt, slip this over your head. You see, only a little tight. What do you think?”
“Can I try that one?”
“Yes. Of course.”
(I want to leave them there for a minute, to give the two of them their privacy, averting my eyes discreetly and turning off my I-am-a-cellphone-camera, or perhaps turning it around, here is the landing, here are the stairs leading down to the entrance lobby where now, after the redecoration, the balloon dog keeps watch, the pickled piranha snarls from a wall, and neon words of love shine in lurid pink and green above the doorway, and here is the front door, opening. Enter Nero Golden. The king is back in his palace. I watch his face. He looks around, annoyed. He wants her standing here to greet him, where is she, didn’t she read his text. He hangs his hat and cane on the stand in the entrance hall and calls out.)
“Vasilisa!”
(Imagine my I-am-a-Steadicam racing upstairs now, up and into the room where she and the young fellow in her clothes stand transfixed by his voice, and she, Vasilisa, looks at D and understands that he still fears his father.)
“He’ll kill me. He’s going to kill me. Oh my God.”
“No, he absolutely will not kill you.”
She hands him back his street clothes.
“Put them back on. I’m going to distract him.”
“How?”
“I will bring him upstairs…”
“No!”
“…into the bedroom and close the door. When you hear me beginning to make a lot of noise you will know it’s safe to leave.”
“What sort of noise.”
“You can certainly guess what sort of noise. I don’t have to be explicit here.”
“Oh.”
She pauses in the doorway before going down to Nero.
“And D?”
“What! I mean, sorry, yes, what?”
“Maybe I am not a completely, thousand percent evil bitch.”
“Yeah. Yeah. Obviously. I mean no. Obviously not.”
“You’re welcome.”
“Thank you.”
She smiles conspiratorially. I should end the scene there, a tight close-up of that sphinxlike Mona Lisa smile.
Later.
He has made his peace with patient, understanding Riya, and here they are with Ivy Manuel in the Jamaican place on Houston and Sullivan drinking dangerous cocktails late at night. Or, to reimagine it: the three people are seated around a simple round table in a completely black studio, drinking their drinks (dangerous cocktails are acceptable, even in Limbo), the world doesn’t exist except for them as they discuss profound questions of language and philosophy. (Deliberate reference: Jean-Luc Godard movie, Le gai savoir, 1969, starring Jean-Pierre Léaud and Juliet Berto. Considered too didactic by many, but sometimes didacticism is required.) At first D is in low spirits, quoting Nietzsche (author of Die fröhliche Wissenschaft) asking “the Schopenhauerian question: Has existence then a significance at all?—the question which will require a couple of centuries even to be completely heard in all its profundity.” But gradually the two women cheer him up, encouraging him, supporting him, cajoling him, and then, after he gives a small nod of acceptance and smiles cautiously, introducing him little by little to the vocabulary of his future, a future in which the pronoun his will stop being his. The first and most important word is transition. In music, a momentary modulation from one key to another. In physics, a change of an atom, nucleus, electron, etc., from one quantum state to another, with emission or absorption of radiation. In literature, a passage in a piece of writing that smoothly connects two topics or sections to each other. In the present case…in the present case, the process by which a person permanently adopts the outward or physical characteristics of the gender with which they identify, as opposed to those of the gender they were assigned at birth. The process may or may not involve measures such as hormone therapy and gender reassignment surgery.
“Don’t think about surgery,” the women say. “Don’t even let it cross your mind. We are nowhere near that point yet.” (When this scene is filmed the women actors can decide who says which line. But for now let’s say this is Riya speaking, and then Ivy, and so on.)
“You need to work out who you are. For this, there is professional help.”
“Right now you could be TG, TS, TV, CD. Whatever feels right to you.” Transgender, transsexual, transvestite, cross-dresser. “No need to go one step further than what feels right.”
“For this there is professional help.”
“It used to be, people got labels in front of their names. Like, TS Ivy, or CD Riya. Also there was Sex Change. ‘Look, here comes Sex Change Sally.’ The whole trans world has grown up now. Now she’s just Sally or whoever. No compartmentalization.”
“You should think about pronouns, however. Words are important. If you’re giving up he, who steps in? You could choose they. If you decide you don’t identify as either female or male. They equals unknown gender identity. Very private.”