THE SHOCKING FINDINGS OF A TRANSGENDER SLEUTH THIS IS A TRUE STORY. ALL NAMES HAVE BEEN CHANGED TO PROTECT THE PRIVACY OF THOSE INVOLVED.
Written By Naomi Barbieri Art by Mel Paget Published in Issue 19
I’ve never sat down to watch an episode of The Real Housewives™ but I’m certain my life turned into something similar about a year ago. Something of a dramedy. A Housewives of my own. I want to share here the juicy details of my misadventure.
Go get your popcorn and your teacups!
I had been seeing this person on a non-exclusive basis and he was gone abroad for a few weeks. He ended up doing me wrong, but this story is not about him. I’d barely started feeling at ease in my transitioning body to be intimate. Still, I logged into my Grindr cuz this girl wanted attention, and trans, amorous men, whose attraction to fems like me ranges from preferred to exclusive, flock there and worship us unreservedly.
I chatted with a guy named Blake. His words were slick enough to make me want to meet him in person. I hardly meet guys I talk to online. Needless to say, he said all the right things. I accepted to meet over drinks after a 3-day e-courtship. I picked a bar located halfway between my place and his, put on some makeup, said a little prayer, and headed out to meet the Mystery Man. Blake is very tall and looks like an NHL player. I felt attracted to him and the flow of our conversation was easy enough. He told me he owned a motorcycle which I’m sure he knew would be extra points for him, as I absentmindedly mused on future rides around the city. Everything was cute. He was without a doubt a seasoned talker and had a way with (and a taste for) trannies, despite his claims to not being a chaser.
He told me we might know a few people in common, and that he’d recently had his heart broken and that the heartbreaker in question was another trans woman on the scene [insert red flag emoji]. She had been talked into breaking up with him by her friend and ex-roommate, also trans. This character is the glorious centerpiece of this story. We’ll call her Alexis.
Alexis was a friend of mine. I knew her from around and had nothing but kind words to say about her. I didn’t spend much time inquiring about what happened, but he told me she’d used all the Tumblr-wave feminist buzzwords in the book to convince his ex-girlfriend that he was toxic, patriarchal, etc. You know the vocab. Blake and I left the bar and headed out to a nearby park, hand-in-hand, and sat on a bench, talked more, and made out. It felt nice to be out with a man who wasn’t afraid to be seen with me. Then again, Blake, standing at 6’5″ is probably not one to be messed with. He told me he wanted to F but I wasn’t feeling it then so we parted ways after a few hot minutes and agreed to stay in touch.
I felt elevated. Dating as a trans woman of color can be quite crucial to one’s self-esteem. Despite recent strides, unspoken messages disseminated via mainstream images communicate for the most part that to be beautiful, one must be cis, slim, able-bodied, white or fair-complexioned, conventionally feminine…I didn’t grow up in a media context that made me feel pretty, and beauty and desirability are traits that many trans women seek out in order to feel a sense of agency and/or security.
Blake and I sent each other sweet nothings via text in the days that followed and I was looking forward to having my Bonnie-Parker Harley-Davidson moment. Right? Not. Alexis and I had been all up in each other’s DMs and I briefly told her I’d gone on a date with Blake. She didn’t make a fuss, barely acknowledged knowing him. Time went on and I introduced Blake to friends that were incidentally privy to our hangs, so much that buddies and colleagues started to ask me how things were going with the “hockey guy.”
Saturday came and I was at work. Blake had made plans to see his friends and go to a fundraising party for low-income trans women I’d encouraged him to attend. I knew there’d be other gurls there, but he wasn’t mine and lest you forget, I already had a semi-boo travelling overseas. So I’m at the job and in comes Alexis Full of Grace, Our Lady of Guadalupe, jovial and full of life, saying she came to “see [her] girl.” I was happy to see her too and our time together was only marred briefly, when she brought up Blake and said that he was “toxic” (well…) and “patriarchal” (wait.) and that I should stay away from him. While I appreciate a girlfriend’s advice, I’ve come to learn that it’s sometimes best for a girl to live out her desired experiences and not pay heed to what naysayers utter word-for-word—of course depending on the gravity and factuality of what is reported—as that may as well prevent one from a decent match, if not simple growth and learning. I told her that it was Blake and I’s business and shortly thanked her for her input. We exchanged a few more polite words and she too went off to that fundraiser.Girl. I know you know what’s about to happen but this gossip keeps giving.
Days passed and I declared Blake MIA. I started to feel a bit insecure. I’d sent him my new Instagram pic which had my followers a-liking, and yet, no news from him. Of all my friends who attended the party, everyone I spoke to acted like they didn’t know what had happened. It all started to sink in that something had gone down. In the friendliest manner, I decided to confront Alexis who, after a few skirting moments, confirmed what my psychic senses had told me all along:
BITCH WENT AND SLEPT WITH HIM LITERALLY HOURS AFTER SHE CAME TO ME AS A FRIEND SAYING I SHOULD STAY AWAY FROM HIM BECAUSE HE WAS BAD NEWS!!!
Bad news, indeed. I guess Alexis was on such a desperate quest to show me how truly bad those toxic white men are. That’s what friends are for. Or not. I don’t know. What did I do? I should add that Blake knew Alexis and I were friends.Don’t rub it in.
Alexis further explained that she’d been curved by someone else at the party and in came Blake so she thought, “Meh, why not.” Really, queen? And that since she’s much younger than me, needs to live out her youth “while [she’s] still got it.” Wow.
Despite my old age, I started transitioning after Alexis, and therefore have had less opportunities to date and be out in the world. Not that it’s her problem, but what a shady queen she is. She went on to say that he was “good” in bed, that there were unresolved tensions between them, and that she’d always RESENTED HER FRIEND FOR BEING WITH HIM! Our Facebook chat pretty much ended there, at which point I thought to myself: “Fuck that girl.”
But it doesn’t end here. I faced the most shocking revelations while talking to my trans girl Krystle about it a week later. We’re talking about hormones and other miscellaneous shemale stuff when Krystle drops a bomb. I paraphrase:
“Don’t worry girl, I’m not competitive, I’m not like Alexis.” Record scratch. Rewind. Come again? “Girl, I said I’m not like Alexis.”
“Oh, you didn’t know? Alexis came to my house and we spent an evening filled with joy and laughter as she complimented me on every single detail, telling me I’m legendary this, iconic that. I sent my man to walk her home and that’s when skank made a move on him and tried to yak him. Little did I know she’d been texting him on the DL for weeks. I have all the receipts.”
Wow. What’s more, Krystle reported Alexis telling her that she should leave her boyfriend (who was providing for her—Krystle is a trans migrant and is not allowed to work legally) on the pretense of his work contributing to the displacement of Native communities up North which, while true, is slick and evil. May I present to you, ladies, Alexis, the serial homewrecker. Little miss who thinks she can have what she wants in a blink of an eye. Little miss who acts like she’s your best friend then you turn your back and she’s off with your guy. Yes girl! That’s her!
Lily-white Alexis later went on a PR campaign and told people in the community Krystle’s BF had been improper towards her, while she’s devoid of ill intentions and is so irresistible none of her friends’ boyfriends are able to control their impulses. The shade. Believe you me, I know how crazed tranny chasers are. This in no way absolves any of those phalluses from wrongdoing, but where is Alexis in all this? So much for the advent of the Empowered Political Trans Woman.
I brought up Krystle’s allegations to Alexis in relation to her yakking my date behind my back and how that constituted, IMO, a serial antisocial or narcissistic behavioural pattern she needed to unpack. She flatly denied any wrongdoing, perhaps out of defensiveness. I don’t blame her. I’m sure it was a lot to handle and I most certainly can imagine why she was upset: I’d decrypted her modus operandi.
As expected, she went around and told our friends Blake had been “coercive” towards her which, while possibly true, was not her initial statement to me. What do I know. All I did is expose telltale signs of deceit, but most of all, of a trans girl who, like me, desperately wants to be loved in a world that too often deprives us of so much.
I never heard back from Blake. Save for that one time we ran into each other—he smiled and tried to talk to me, but I paid him dust. He was not my friend and we’d gone on two dates so it is fair to say he owed me no explanation. He is such a fool, yes. The loss is all his.
What I did lose is a friend in Alexis. I never got to tell her I still have fond memories of cackling together on a bench one night two summers ago, while guys were trying to holler at us. We looked so fish. I unfriended her a few months after we fell out because she sad-reacted to a status update I posted regarding a deeply triggering Christmas family dinner I’d gone to, lol. I was still sour about her failed apology and because no one in the community truly sympathized with my plight. Not to mention I later found out she’d sneaked into my overseas boo’s DMs and invited him on a date. Bitch!
That Bitch Tried to Steal My Man!
THE SHOCKING FINDINGS OF A TRANSGENDER SLEUTH
THIS IS A TRUE STORY. ALL NAMES HAVE BEEN CHANGED TO PROTECT THE PRIVACY OF THOSE INVOLVED.
Written By Naomi Barbieri
Art by Mel Paget
Published in Issue 19
I’ve never sat down to watch an episode of The Real Housewives™ but I’m certain my life turned into something similar about a year ago. Something of a dramedy. A Housewives of my own. I want to share here the juicy details of my misadventure.
Go get your popcorn and your teacups!
I had been seeing this person on a non-exclusive basis and he was gone abroad for a few weeks. He ended up doing me wrong, but this story is not about him. I’d barely started feeling at ease in my transitioning body to be intimate. Still, I logged into my Grindr cuz this girl wanted attention, and trans, amorous men, whose attraction to fems like me ranges from preferred to exclusive, flock there and worship us unreservedly.
I chatted with a guy named Blake. His words were slick enough to make me want to meet him in person. I hardly meet guys I talk to online. Needless to say, he said all the right things. I accepted to meet over drinks after a 3-day e-courtship. I picked a bar located halfway between my place and his, put on some makeup, said a little prayer, and headed out to meet the Mystery Man. Blake is very tall and looks like an NHL player. I felt attracted to him and the flow of our conversation was easy enough. He told me he owned a motorcycle which I’m sure he knew would be extra points for him, as I absentmindedly mused on future rides around the city. Everything was cute. He was without a doubt a seasoned talker and had a way with (and a taste for) trannies, despite his claims to not being a chaser.
He told me we might know a few people in common, and that he’d recently had his heart broken and that the heartbreaker in question was another trans woman on the scene [insert red flag emoji]. She had been talked into breaking up with him by her friend and ex-roommate, also trans. This character is the glorious centerpiece of this story. We’ll call her Alexis.
Alexis was a friend of mine. I knew her from around and had nothing but kind words to say about her. I didn’t spend much time inquiring about what happened, but he told me she’d used all the Tumblr-wave feminist buzzwords in the book to convince his ex-girlfriend that he was toxic, patriarchal, etc. You know the vocab. Blake and I left the bar and headed out to a nearby park, hand-in-hand, and sat on a bench, talked more, and made out. It felt nice to be out with a man who wasn’t afraid to be seen with me. Then again, Blake, standing at 6’5″ is probably not one to be messed with. He told me he wanted to F but I wasn’t feeling it then so we parted ways after a few hot minutes and agreed to stay in touch.
I felt elevated. Dating as a trans woman of color can be quite crucial to one’s self-esteem. Despite recent strides, unspoken messages disseminated via mainstream images communicate for the most part that to be beautiful, one must be cis, slim, able-bodied, white or fair-complexioned, conventionally feminine…I didn’t grow up in a media context that made me feel pretty, and beauty and desirability are traits that many trans women seek out in order to feel a sense of agency and/or security.
Blake and I sent each other sweet nothings via text in the days that followed and I was looking forward to having my Bonnie-Parker Harley-Davidson moment. Right? Not. Alexis and I had been all up in each other’s DMs and I briefly told her I’d gone on a date with Blake. She didn’t make a fuss, barely acknowledged knowing him. Time went on and I introduced Blake to friends that were incidentally privy to our hangs, so much that buddies and colleagues started to ask me how things were going with the “hockey guy.”
Saturday came and I was at work. Blake had made plans to see his friends and go to a fundraising party for low-income trans women I’d encouraged him to attend. I knew there’d be other gurls there, but he wasn’t mine and lest you forget, I already had a semi-boo travelling overseas. So I’m at the job and in comes Alexis Full of Grace, Our Lady of Guadalupe, jovial and full of life, saying she came to “see [her] girl.” I was happy to see her too and our time together was only marred briefly, when she brought up Blake and said that he was “toxic” (well…) and “patriarchal” (wait.) and that I should stay away from him. While I appreciate a girlfriend’s advice, I’ve come to learn that it’s sometimes best for a girl to live out her desired experiences and not pay heed to what naysayers utter word-for-word—of course depending on the gravity and factuality of what is reported—as that may as well prevent one from a decent match, if not simple growth and learning. I told her that it was Blake and I’s business and shortly thanked her for her input. We exchanged a few more polite words and she too went off to that fundraiser.Girl. I know you know what’s about to happen but this gossip keeps giving.
Days passed and I declared Blake MIA. I started to feel a bit insecure. I’d sent him my new Instagram pic which had my followers a-liking, and yet, no news from him. Of all my friends who attended the party, everyone I spoke to acted like they didn’t know what had happened. It all started to sink in that something had gone down. In the friendliest manner, I decided to confront Alexis who, after a few skirting moments, confirmed what my psychic senses had told me all along:
BITCH WENT AND SLEPT WITH HIM LITERALLY HOURS AFTER SHE CAME TO ME AS A FRIEND SAYING I SHOULD STAY AWAY FROM HIM BECAUSE HE WAS BAD NEWS!!!
Bad news, indeed. I guess Alexis was on such a desperate quest to show me how truly bad those toxic white men are. That’s what friends are for. Or not. I don’t know. What did I do? I should add that Blake knew Alexis and I were friends.Don’t rub it in.
Alexis further explained that she’d been curved by someone else at the party and in came Blake so she thought, “Meh, why not.” Really, queen? And that since she’s much younger than me, needs to live out her youth “while [she’s] still got it.” Wow.
Despite my old age, I started transitioning after Alexis, and therefore have had less opportunities to date and be out in the world. Not that it’s her problem, but what a shady queen she is. She went on to say that he was “good” in bed, that there were unresolved tensions between them, and that she’d always RESENTED HER FRIEND FOR BEING WITH HIM! Our Facebook chat pretty much ended there, at which point I thought to myself: “Fuck that girl.”
But it doesn’t end here. I faced the most shocking revelations while talking to my trans girl Krystle about it a week later. We’re talking about hormones and other miscellaneous shemale stuff when Krystle drops a bomb. I paraphrase:
“Don’t worry girl, I’m not competitive, I’m not like Alexis.” Record scratch. Rewind. Come again? “Girl, I said I’m not like Alexis.”
“Oh, you didn’t know? Alexis came to my house and we spent an evening filled with joy and laughter as she complimented me on every single detail, telling me I’m legendary this, iconic that. I sent my man to walk her home and that’s when skank made a move on him and tried to yak him. Little did I know she’d been texting him on the DL for weeks. I have all the receipts.”
Wow. What’s more, Krystle reported Alexis telling her that she should leave her boyfriend (who was providing for her—Krystle is a trans migrant and is not allowed to work legally) on the pretense of his work contributing to the displacement of Native communities up North which, while true, is slick and evil. May I present to you, ladies, Alexis, the serial homewrecker. Little miss who thinks she can have what she wants in a blink of an eye. Little miss who acts like she’s your best friend then you turn your back and she’s off with your guy. Yes girl! That’s her!
Lily-white Alexis later went on a PR campaign and told people in the community Krystle’s BF had been improper towards her, while she’s devoid of ill intentions and is so irresistible none of her friends’ boyfriends are able to control their impulses. The shade. Believe you me, I know how crazed tranny chasers are. This in no way absolves any of those phalluses from wrongdoing, but where is Alexis in all this? So much for the advent of the Empowered Political Trans Woman.
I brought up Krystle’s allegations to Alexis in relation to her yakking my date behind my back and how that constituted, IMO, a serial antisocial or narcissistic behavioural pattern she needed to unpack. She flatly denied any wrongdoing, perhaps out of defensiveness. I don’t blame her. I’m sure it was a lot to handle and I most certainly can imagine why she was upset: I’d decrypted her modus operandi.
As expected, she went around and told our friends Blake had been “coercive” towards her which, while possibly true, was not her initial statement to me. What do I know. All I did is expose telltale signs of deceit, but most of all, of a trans girl who, like me, desperately wants to be loved in a world that too often deprives us of so much.
I never heard back from Blake. Save for that one time we ran into each other—he smiled and tried to talk to me, but I paid him dust. He was not my friend and we’d gone on two dates so it is fair to say he owed me no explanation. He is such a fool, yes. The loss is all his.
What I did lose is a friend in Alexis. I never got to tell her I still have fond memories of cackling together on a bench one night two summers ago, while guys were trying to holler at us. We looked so fish. I unfriended her a few months after we fell out because she sad-reacted to a status update I posted regarding a deeply triggering Christmas family dinner I’d gone to, lol. I was still sour about her failed apology and because no one in the community truly sympathized with my plight. Not to mention I later found out she’d sneaked into my overseas boo’s DMs and invited him on a date. Bitch!