The past lives we lived

prologue

We all have to start somewhere. Every story has a beginning. I was raised in a conservative family teaching the values of life and death and the roles of women. our duties. I always knew I was different, it's something you just know. Girls from the age of 13 on were thinking about boys and the like. I never did
My tastes were always different, I was 9 when I realized my tastes were "unclean" when I watched the news with my mother. My father was a cop and he was out every night arresting these depraved degenerates as he called them. my mother made me sit on the couch as we watched a bar raid women dressed as men and men with feminine attributes. My mother sat and told me to pray with her for their families and the pain these people have caused. I remember asking her what those people have done that's so wrong with them and the look she gave me I'll never forget. She took my hand and cried as she told me "they are depraved souls bee and they don't think like you or me. They are twisted and need help. They want to destroy the family and the home. Our children."

As a kid we want to make our parents happy, when they hear their parents talk with such disdain, such hatred. It alters you. My parents never knew that by hating them. They were hating me. I never told them. I took all that hatred and all that ugliness and buried it. Deep down until it was drowned by my need to be loved. Even at the cost of myself. I went out of my way overcompensating, desperate to be the woman my family wanted me to be. I got accepted to college and became a teacher, an English teacher. Even met a man. His name was Emmett a good man who worked on Wall Street. Staying pure and virtuous isn't hard when you don't feel anything at all. Its easy to fall into a steady routine if you want it badly enough. After a while you go numb to the misery and self hatred. It all becomes monotonous and going through the motions of life feels natural.

I never realized how miserable I was til I met her.

Mavis Grey

A woman of many talents and many mysteries. When I met her she saved me. I can truly say that. I will never be sorry for the events that happened after. She saw me. She was the only one who saw through the mask and seemed to free me from my own mind. I write this now to tell my story and many others who are silenced by prejudice and unable to live the life they were born to live.

We are not depraved souls wanting to destroy the family, or anything else my mother and people like her say. We are men and women just like you that yearn to love and be loved. We are your son's and daughters, your doctor, your lawyers, your friends. Your neighbors. Everyday people out there trying to live and make the most out of life where we are constantly being told we don't belong. We do belong. We have always been there in very powerful places, in the background. Blending in. But it is time we stop blending in and we bleed out. Into the world. To let everyone know being gay, isn't a choice and it isn't a crime.

How can love ever be a crime...

In order to explain my story I must start at the beginning. So I suppose I should start in summer of 1945. I was 22 and young, naive and full of life not yet lived. My boyfriend Emmett young wanted me to visit him and his family. I was sure he was gonna ask me to marry him, we had been dating for 3 years. Met in college. I rehearsed my answer and painted on a shocked face to try and look excited yet every fiber of my being was numb to the thought of marrying him. He was a good man, had a good job, loyal and faithful. What more should I want? I should be happy. Yet I felt trapped. I unpack my grocery bag placing wine in the fridge. I bought a nice merlot to bring tonight for when I meet his family for dinner as we had every year on his parents anniversary. They were such a sweet couple been married for 35 years I never could imagine being with someone for that long. But I guess when you spend your life indifferent and faking every connection with the opposite sex life becomes a theatre performance.

The night goes smoothly, I laugh and smile. Sit pretty like a doll praying silently for the night to end. His mother asks the same question she does every year "so bee when can we expect you and Emmy to give us grandchildren they be so precious" I smile and swallow the lump in my throat as I manage to say "not sure Mrs young but I do hope soon" I grab his arm in comfort. Though it might have been more for show if I'm being a hundred percent honest. We are halfway through dinner when the door opens. And she walks in. Like fresh strawberries in the field her black hair and darks eyes scope the room as she goes around hugging everyone. Mavis Grey. A perfect storm all wrapped in a little bow, the gift of destruction. She took her mother's maiden name when she became an author she called it freeing. Personally people on the street wondered about her. At her age she was 26 and unmarried. Said to have went to California with a girl before. But those were all just talk ultimately nothing stuck to her. Her father definitely had some shame. He rarely looked her in the eye in fact never talked about her til a year ago when she sent a postcard from Paris. No pictures of her hang in the house and Emmett always stays quiet about her.

When she comes in the tension in the house becomes thick and tangible. Like glass about to break. A pot of water about to boil over. She looked at me and smirked "so your the girl that's gonna take my baby brother away" she walked towards me a look on her face I'll never forget not quite smug but definitely knowing. I believe she knew even then I often wonder how it is that she knew maybe I wasn't as good of a actress as I believed. "Yes my name is Bianca Washington I teach 3rd grade English" I put on my best smile trying to convince her that I was normal. Maybe I was trying to convince myself. She stared at me like a exhibit at a museum as she chuckled "has he proposed yet" to which Emmett cut her off "please Mavis, let's be civil this year. Why are you back. Now of all times." He said with annoyance in his voice. One I've never heard before. "Haven't you shamed this family enough" he said a lot quieter obviously trying to not let me hear. "Don't worry about her brother I won't ruin your good girl. I'm here for the anniversary party I wanted to see my family" she said sitting down next to her mother. Through the attitude I could feel the ice around her, the raw pain as she tried to get acceptance. "This hasn't been your home in years Mavis" her dad burt said as he looked down. The first time he spoke all night. She looked down tears in her eyes as she looked to her mother for some sort of comfort. For a moment I felt her pain. It's pain I've felt and buried for a long time "don't look at her it's my house" burt barked as he pointed to the door. The mother looked down scared to say anything. In this time men really do own everything even us. I look at her as she walks out sobbing and I wish I could help her. But I don't know how. Or at least I didn't at the time. Now I know....

She needed me just like I needed her.