“Kill…me…” I manage to hiss through my teeth.
The PTA moms in attendance do not respond. In some of their faces I can see the same desperation. Their teeth bared, eyes too bright, too wide. We exchange looks, the companionship of animals caught in the same trap. Others don’t seem to notice. They were always this way.
The men, caught up in their own little social swirl, mostly associate with one another, but now and then I see a strained look, a back a little too tight, the hard knot of jaw muscles clenching, laughs just a little too hearty to be real. The trapped among them suffer, too. Differently, but no less horribly.
Rachel has pulled a large knife from my Pioneer Woman knife block. Its factory edge is a little dull with use, but the plastic handle still a vivid and cheerful blue. Rachel has triplets; her arms are very strong. I know she will stab deep.
“Please,” I cough. I know she hears, I know she understands. The Game is about to start. I can’t do this again.
She raises it. For a moment my heart leaps, I dare to hope, then she passes me. “I saw this neat video on how to slice an avocado,” she says, pulling one from the thrifted vintage glass bowl I stenciled my children’s names onto after a sleepless night spent funneling Pinterest directly into my eye sockets as my husband slept beside me, unaware. She garnishes the guacamole with fresh slices, her movements displaying the expert precision of someone who was taught with pain. “I’m sorry,” she murmurs. “I tried.”
I pat her shoulder in sympathy and forgiveness and move on. I try to exclaim happily when my heavily-pregnant friend Karen talks about her impending gender reveal party, complete with “Guns or Glitter?” cake, but it’s more of a sad moan. The blade of the gender binary cuts so deep. I feel bad for her, really. She never knew the freedom of pronouns. Never knew the elation as the status quo, the good and God-ordained order of things, the English language itself, crumbling under the onslaught of the singular “they”.
Her words remind me, though, of the gendered marketing that segregates my day and I suddenly feel a crushing pressure in my ribs. I steal a moment to take my pink Lady Bic pen out of the drawer with the chalkboard label reading “this + that” and make a note on the grocery list. We need more girl Doritos and princess-themed goldfish crackers for the girls’ lunch boxes, and my husband is almost out of Dude Wipes and Bearglove. The compulsion eases. I sigh in relief.
Melissa, a hungry-looking size 10 brazen in her “Real Women Have Curves!” shirt, compliments the shabby chic washboard hanging over the sink, the one with the elegant script writing. I had tried so hard, so, so hard, to form the shapes that would unbind me from this hellish existence, but all that came out was “Bless this Mess”. I don’t even believe in God anymore; at least, not His power. If He exists, He too is powerless before the grinding fist of heteronormativity.
I manage to retreat into my craft room, away from talk of the Homeowner’s Association’s tribunal coming up. The Carsons put up a rainbow wind sock last weekend, and the Nextdoor.com post about it is already over 1,000 notes long. The HOA had to take action. They’re talking about a straight pride parade to bring the community together again after so divisive an act.
My craft room, my haven, is so much smaller than my husband’s man-cave, but it’s big enough for my Cricut machine, and there’s a small table where I shoot photos for my organizing and homemaking mommy blog, the one I had to start to end the nightmares. I sit among my washi tape and scrapbooking papers, heart as empty as my mason jars. The small things I make in here are beautiful, and the work of my hands is creative and clever, but it no longer satisfies me. It’s not genuine anymore.
For ten years I have floundered in this soft-focus bokeh heterosexual hell, ever since the cursed post came across my dash, the 20,000-likes-strong spell that ruined my life. February 4, 2018. Six months to the day before my marriage to Brad.
My former life is ruined. I don’t know where my girlfriend went. My last glimpse of her was in the sporting goods aisle at Wal-Mart, a pair of pink camo-print boots in her strong, scarred hands and a look of indescribable horror in her eyes. I love her so much, still. I can’t even remember her name. I would trade every crafting supply I own, every scrap of burlap, every button, every bead, for one more night, one more hour, with her.
I open the small cupboard beneath the cutting mat table. In it is a shrine, festooned with icons I have painstakingly assembled and painted. Reproductions of every good luck post I could find. The tip toad, Roger the magical good luck fish, Joe Biden eating ice cream, the devious doggie of destiny, the bagel with its sacred tongue of flame, double luck double banana, the lucky cat with coins on its belly, the endless “money” animal memes – cats, dogs, fish, monkeys, alligators, enough to fill out a full tarot deck – even a desperate slapdash Pepe, the rarest, its arcane energy jabbing through the rest like a rank smell in an otherwise immaculately landscaped garden. But he was not always a symbol of evil and his power is undeniable, so I added him to the rest.
I pull out my craft knife and cut my finger, and I let three drops of blood fall on the strongest icon of them all. One I created myself, from my heart. It is the image of Freddie Mercury astride a unicorn, a shooting star falling into his open hand.
“Reblog in 30 seconds for good luck,” I whisper, tears shimmering in my eyes, just before closing the cabinet door again. I get to make a wish now. My heart is full of grief. It is so full. Outside the room, the first cheer for the first goal of The Game. A tear snakes its way down my perfectly-blended cheek. “Please let me be queer again.”
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