Number Two
At my gate I am in a staring mood and am therefore pleased to sit next to a transsexual. I know this is true because I am sitting next to a man who has these things, these cement looking things, protruding from the chest. They just sit there. Round. Obtrusive. And they are far too large for the body to which they now belong. They are so large that they pull the skin from under the arms with strange tautness and the surrounding skin has turned from a soft brown to a yellowed tightness and I imagine it must feel like the snakebites that first-graders give each other, twist- ing the forearm’s skin in opposite directions. S/he answers her cell phone which rings to Gwennie’s “Sweet Escape” And I could be your favorite girl forever, perfectly together, tell me boy now wouldn’t that be sweet… And s/he greets the caller once in a twittering female voice telling the listener, who she only refers to as ‘baby’, that she will be in Long Island at four. It rings again and she switches to a vocal register that is distinctly a man’s giving the same message, only this time, she replaces the ‘baby’ with ‘man’. On the other side of me is sitting a girl that I know I have seen before. On the subway, at the Nuts 4 Nuts stand, naked and overdosed at a rave, I don’t know. I can not place her because I am distracted staring at the lay- ers of crusty herpetic cold sores that are scabbing over her lips. Ripe pink ones overlaying older ones that have turned white and pussy. She licks at them absentmindedly with the corner of her tongue. I gag. There is a man shaking the change in his pocket by the Wolfgang Puck kiosk across from where we are sitting. He maneuvers it, rolling, back and forth in his hand which is hidden in the right pocket of his pleated Dockers. From behind, his arm is the only thing that is moving. Quickly. Suspiciously. The tranny and I are both watching, transfixed. Our gazes meet and we both arch our eyebrows, feigning offense. We are thinking the same thought, s/he and I. When we realize this, we scoff. Together. S/he looks away. This is the only interaction we share.