Loving Fiercely: How I Resist - 5. Chapter 5: Relationship #7

We met at a drag bar and restaurant. You were a dancer. I was a student. You were doing practice sessions with your co-workers, preparing for the next show, and you made it clear you were attracted to me, right then and there. I was flattered by your forwardness and felt my face warm up. I loved how you looked, and loved your outspokenness. You looked so comfortable with yourself, at least on the outside.

We met up with your friends in a karaoke joint. One of them would be the first person I met who disclosed themselves as trans* to me. When I misgendered him once, you made sure I didn’t do it again. The other friend I remember was a Jewish queer dude who you bumped heads with from cultural misunderstanding. Unfamiliar with both of your histories, I stayed out of it.

I would be smacked in the face with my own classism when I asked while laughing if we were really going to a trailer park. Without hesitation, you said yes, and I fixed myself up then. Strike two for me. Your friends would drop me off at your place then and you told me your stories working at the bar. You told me how you didn’t feel attractive. You told me you would sleep on park benches because you didn’t have a way home. Throughout these stories, I would feel protective of you and helpless not being able to assist you. We calmed each other down watching bad reality tv. We felt each other’s bodies, the bumps, the crevices, the curves. My hands were on your mini fro, yours on my back. Eventually, we went to sleep.

We had different love languages. You received love through what was said. I receive love when you make me feel like I’m the only one there. It didn’t take long to realize our incompatibility the next morning when you begged for me to tell you how I felt and I couldn’t say anything at all. Or when you seemed so preoccupied with your games and your shows, I hardly felt like I existed.

Once your roommate was off, we were back at it, touching, feeling, petting, and kissing for days. Eventually I had to go, having missed a job interview. It was okay, I got the job haha.

Our mini romance intrigued me. You meet people in your life who expose different parts of you that you don’t expect. This relationship was no different, forcing me to reconcile with pieces of myself that I didn’t like through self-compassion. I loved our shared solidarity as feminine men in this world. I loved that us both being black allowed us to feel for each other’s struggles. And I loved working with each other to dismantle our internal struggles with racism and classism. I appreciated that I could be called out for my transphobia and understand the importance of trans* people’s lives. I look back on this relationship and I even find myself being thankful for the fact that we didn’t have sex (the premise of far too many of my relationships).

Miscommunication, and admittedly lack of communication, would be the fall of the relationship. Rumors would taint the feelings I had for you, gossip coming from people I didn’t even know. I failed to be direct and ask you about them, one regret I still have. Our relationship needs were much different as well. The last straw came when you called demanding where I was and why I didn’t inform you. It looked like things were getting a little too deep. The world of dating sites was becoming more than I could handle: I wanted to remove myself away from these spaces that consistently provided me short-term pleasure and awful experiences. I’d remove you from my phone and my facebook, along with others who fell in these categories.

It was only after our time together that I began to really understand you. Clinginess might’ve came from the desire to be loved as a black feminine man when you’re told you're undesirable. Overstaying your welcome in people’s homes may have come from being afraid of sleeping another night on the streets. Here we were finding ourselves in this world together, and it ended so prematurely.

We would see each other waaaay more than necessary on the street and you would do a very great job ignoring my existence. I, instead, can’t take my eyes off you. You never know what you got til it’s gone. This was a lesson well learned.