Pronoun Problems: A Novel About Friendship, Transgender and (eventually) Ninjas

37 - What Kind of Lunatic?

May, 2011

Tom came out to me around 6 p.m. 

By 10 p.m. I was very drunk.

I am, I confess, a bit of a wine snob and I spent an inordinate amount of time puzzling over what would be the ideal wine to pair with transgender — surprisingly, even the world's foremost sommeliers were silent on the subject — and ultimately decided on a Central Coast Pinot Noir, because it was a little fruity.

And that, friends and neighbors, is some damn fine viticultural wordplay.

As shaken as I had been after Tom blindsided me with his stunning news, I still savored the opportunity to do the exact same thing to Samantha. I am not a gossip, but I understand the appeal. The delicious anticipation, the sense of control.

During our family dinner I listened to my daughters talk about their day, Hannah going on and on in tremendous emotional detail about the Machiavellian social maneuvering of her teenage peers, Jana getting in a sentence or two — a terse observation or a pithy quip whenever her sister paused for a bite of meat loaf or a sip of juice — and I smiled to myself, imagining what Samantha's reaction would be to the bombshell I was patiently preparing to drop.

The girls cleared the dishes and went off to their rooms to do their homework. I asked Samantha about her day and listened attentively as she told me about it. Coffee with her friends, working at the student store at our kids' school, the frustrations of unreturned phone calls. And then it was my turn.

"Well, let's see," I began coyly. "I had an animatic review which went pretty well. Did a rewrite on the hedge maze script. And there was one other thing..." I took a slow, deliberate sip of my Pinot. "Oh! Right! Tom is going to be a woman."

Samantha did not disappoint. Her head snapped back like she had taken a tree branch to the face, then she let out a long, incredulous laugh, as she struggled to form a word, which she eventually did.

"WHAT?!"

I brought her up to speed. Tom's gender dysphoria, the anti-depressants, the years of hiding. The years of lies. Samantha listened with open-mouthed amazement, occasionally gesturing incoherently with her hands, while her eyebrows leapt balletically around her forehead.

"More, please," she said, when I finished, holding up her wine glass. I poured out the rest of the bottle and then went over to the kitchen counter to crack open another. I tore the foil off as Samantha collected herself. And when she did, she had a lot of questions.

"How long has Tom known he was a woman?"

"I don't know," I replied. I pierced the cork and twisted the corkscrew, the sharp steel sinking into the soft material.

"When is Tom planning to come out publicly?"

"No idea." I gripped the bottle and pulled on the corkscrew.

"Is he going to have surgery?"

"I didn't ask."

"What is he going to tell his kids?"

"We didn't discuss it." The cork gave way with a soft pop and I rejoined her at the kitchen table.

"Is he taking hormones?"

I shrugged apologetically. These were all things that I should have asked Tom, but I had been too gobsmacked by the headline to delve into the details.

"I told you," she said with a grin, "there was something weird about your relationship." I had always bristled at the suggestion, but there was no arguing with it now.