Chapter 10: Thanksgiving
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I stood on the welcome mat by the front door, my hoodie dripping slightly onto the textured surface. My mom and dad had probably finished dinner and done the dishes by now. I listened for a moment, hearing the TV playing some cop show in the living room, then cracked open the door and looked inside. The path to the stairs looked clear, and I couldn’t see either of my parents. 

I went inside and quietly closed and locked the door behind me. Then I hurried down the hall and up the stairs, trying not to get too much water on the carpet, and successfully made it into my room. It felt very warm in here now, compared to the weather outside.

I went into the bathroom (which thankfully was not shared with anyone) and stripped out of my wet clothes. I ended up hanging them over the shower curtain rod, where they could drip into the bathtub. My clothes more or less taken care of, I grabbed a towel and worked on drying myself off.

Once I was dry, I paused for a bit and looked at myself in the mirror. My hair was still damp, and hung down in black messy sheets. My face was a little pale, and my eyes had big circles under them. Despite all this, I liked what I saw. My red lips and dark eyes stood out against my skin, and my face looked softer. My boobs had continued to develop, my waist was narrower than ever, and my thighs and butt were bigger than before. Maybe I was cute, like Liv constantly told me. Usually I couldn’t see what she meant, but maybe today I sorta could.

Still lost in thought, I went back into my room and changed into sleep clothes (in this case, a random t-shirt and pajama pants). I flopped onto my bed, feeling strangely tired. I scrolled through my phone for a bit, but I wasn’t really paying attention to anything I was reading. After a bit, I decided I should just turn off the lights.

I lay there in the dark for a long while. I had no idea what my parents were going to say to me tomorrow. They hadn’t locked the door when I went out, so maybe that was good? But on the other hand, maybe they were just waiting for their chance to yell at me and tell me what a freak I was. My mind kept going back and forth, constantly going through different pointless hypotheticals. Eventually after a few hours my exhaustion was able to conquer my anxiety, and finally I fell asleep.

 

---

 

    I walked slowly down the stairs, feeling a bit like I was marching to my doom. It was mid-afternoon and I had only woken up about half an hour ago. I was wearing leggings and a womens’ v-neck, because I figured I had nothing to lose at this point. The cat was thoroughly out of the bag.

I bravely ventured over to the living room, where I could hear the TV. My dad was watching a football game, and my mom was sitting in an armchair reading the newspaper. They looked up as I entered and said, “Can we talk?”

My dad muted the game and said, “Of course, kiddo,” and my mom nodded and folded up her paper. I sat down on the couch, across from my dad. They both seemed to be giving me their undivided attention now.

I quietly asked, “Do you hate me now?”

Mom said, “Of course not,” and Dad said, “No,” at about the same time. Well, that was something at least.

Mom said, “Honey, I’m sorry we reacted the way we did last night. Clearly we upset you and I wanted to apologize for that.”

Dad added, “We’re just worried about you. I looked into some information about this transgender stuff last night, and it seems like it might be dangerous for you. It sounds like a lot of transgenders have people harass them or even attack them. We just think well, maybe it would be better if you didn’t try to be one.”

Well, fuck.

He continued, “We think maybe you got some strange ideas in your head at college, and we’re hoping that you can just try to be a normal boy. We know you’ve been depressed, so we’re willing to pay for a therapist if you want. We just want you to be happy and well-adjusted. I’m very sorry if I wasn’t a god enough father to you and it led to this.”

I stared intensely down at the floor, and said, “Well, clearly you didn’t fucking learn anything.” My mom protested, “Language!” as I hurried up the stairs to my room and slammed the door as hard as I could.

I sat on my bed for a moment, quietly fuming. After a bit, I heard a knock on my door. I didn’t respond. Through the door, I could hear my mom quietly say, “I’m sorry about your father. Once he gets an idea in his head, he can be very stubborn. I think he’ll come around, given some time.” Yeah right.

I’m sure she could have tried harder to talk some sense into Dad. I just stayed silent and waited for her to go away. 

After I was confident she was gone, I got out my phone and called Liv, hoping she would pick up. I didn’t think text would be able to communicate how I felt right then.

After a few rings, she picked up and said, “Hi! How is it going? Are you doing ok?”

I said, “No,” then paused for a bit to gather my thoughts. “It’s not literally the worst-case scenario, like they’re not disowning me or anything, but it’s pretty fucking bad. Basically my dad just thinks I’m stupid and crazy.”

Liv said, “Oh no, I’m really sorry to hear that. That’s awful. What did they say?”

“He was like, we read being trans is dangerous and also we think you’re just depressed and not trans. And then said some bullshit about me getting weird ideas at college, which isn’t even fucking true.”

“God, that really really sucks. I’m sorry your dad is being stupid and terrible.”

“I don’t even want to talk to them at all right now. Hopefully I can just stay locked in my room for the rest of this shitty week. I can’t wait to get back and hang out with you again.”

“Aww, I miss you too. You’re so cute and good.”

I felt a little better, and we ended up chatting about less important things. Liv sent me some pictures of her mom’s cats, which were very floofy and cute.

After a while, we said our goodbyes. I lay back on my bed, staring up at the ceiling and thinking.

 

--- a few days later ---

 

I awoke with a start as the doorbell rang downstairs. I had basically become nocturnal the last few days in order to avoid my parents as much as possible. Last night I had gone to bed around 6am, an hour or so before my mom usually got up.

Today was finally Thanksgiving itself, so unfortunately that was probably some relatives at the door. I checked my phone. It was around 3pm, so yep that was probably them. Ugh.

I heard Mom’s footsteps coming up the stairs. She always walked a lot more quietly than dad, and also a little quicker. She knocked on my door and said, “Sam! Don’t you want to come down and say hi to your cousin?”

I groaned and said, “No.” Mom said, “Sam, don’t be rude. Come downstairs.”

I figured she was gonna keep bothering me until I did something, so I said, “Fine, let me get dressed.”

An idea struck me. What if I just did what I wanted, despite what my stupid dad said? If I was really obviously girly in front of my relatives, he couldn’t just ignore that.

I decided to put on the only dress I had brought with me. It was pale green and kinda flowy. I also tried brushing out my hair and styling it a bit. After putting on a little lip gloss, I decided that was gonna have to do for now.

I opened my door and hurried down the stairs and into the living room. My parents and aunt and uncle and cousin looked up in surprise.

 Dad yelled, “Sam, what the hell are you wearing? We just talked to you about this the other day.” He turned to my relatives and said, “Sorry, he’s been going through some, uh, issues recently.”

In as feminine a voice as I could manage (a.k.a exaggeratedly girly), I said, “What do you mean, father? What’s wrong with the dress I’m wearing?”

Dad said, “I don’t want my only son to look like some kind of, uh, some kind of … y’know. And you don’t have to drag them into it,” gesturing to my relatives.

My cousin Angela, the only person in the room under forty, said, “Well, I think you look nice.” It wasn’t too surprising, she was always a lot more liberal than the rest of my family. Still, it was nice to get some support.

Mom quietly said, “Frank, let’s not do this right now. I just want to have a nice family event.”

Dad said, “Fine. But we’re gonna talk about this later.”

That seemed like the end of it for now. My aunt and uncle resumed their casual small talk, clearly wanting to stay clear of the whole thing.

I went over and sat by Angela. She said, “You really do look cute. Um, what are your pronouns?”

I quietly said, “She/her,” hoping my dad wouldn’t hear. It seemed to work.

We ended up chatting about my university and her job. She had recently been promoted from junior sales representative to sales representative. Exciting stuff.

After an hour or so, we moved over to the big dining room table, which we only really used during holidays. As I sat down, I ostentatiously crossed my legs and smoothed out my dress. Dad looked like he was going to launch into another rant, but Mom gave him a look that stopped him in his tracks.

The rest of the evening went by pretty smoothly. I ate turkey and stuffing and green beans and ham and gravy and a giant heap of mashed potatoes. My aunt and uncle seemed to relax a bit, and they asked me some questions about school. I gave detailed answers for once, figuring the more I talked the more I could piss off my dad.

Eventually everyone finished eating. My mom said, “Sam, do you think you could come help me with the dishes?” I said, “Um, sure,” and followed her into the kitchen.

She said, “Again, I’m sorry about your father.” She smiled at me and said, “You know, I always wanted to have a daughter. And you look very pretty today.”

Hearing this, my heart rose. At least one of my parents wasn’t being a total asshole. I said, “Thanks, Mom,” and gave her a hug.

We worked away at the dishes, Mom scrubbing and me drying. We didn’t talk a whole lot more, but I felt like we had a mutual understanding.

After a while we finally finished up. I gave Mom another hug, then headed upstairs to take a classic Thanksgiving nap.

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