Lessons In Lesbianism - 8

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The buzz of her alarm clock dragged Olivia out of bed hours before she felt prepared for it. The sun, obnoxiously, was already up, so going back to bed seemed impractical. She just had to pretend her internal clock wasn’t convinced it was 4:30 am.

Trudging downstairs, she found her mother making breakfast. Nothing complicated, just some fried eggs, bacon, and store bought hash browns, but it was filling at least. As she ate her mother asked her some questions that she mumbled answers too that her brain wasn’t really processing. It seemed her mouth was slightly more awake than the rest of her, and she was willing to give it free reign to keep her mother happily conversed with. It worked flawlessly until she found her mother staring at her, mouth held ajar.

Olivia tried to dig through her brain, to remember what she’d just said, but it seemed to have slipped out without the proper paperwork.

“Pardon?” her mother asked.

“Uhhh… I maybe have misheard you?” she offered, hoping that that would make sense in this situation. “Jetlag and all that?”

It seemed to work, her mother nodding. “I had asked if you were looking forward to seeing Carl this afternoon.”

“Ah,” Olivia replied. “Of course I’m happy to see him. He’s my boyfriend.”

She said the words, well practiced acting skills helping to sell a greater enthusiasm than she really felt. Olivia had always appreciated Carl helping to keep her safe from bullies, and dating him had cut down on the gossip from other girls in high school. So… she was glad to be dating him.

But it had always left her disappointed. There was none of the rush of romantic joy that she’d been promised by plays or movies. Chalking it up to poetic licence and Hollywood sensationalism had worked through high school, but some of the other girls in her pod at the academy showed such joy about the idea of going home to their girlfriends (or boyfriends, in a few rare cases for stage-boys).

She rolled the question around in her brain, but got nowhere. Well, not nowhere, but her mind tried to bring up the irrelevant excitement she’d felt about spending time with Eliza. Whether or not she was excited to spend time with a friend was not the issue at hand… and she continued to refuse the idea there was anything more there than friendship. Confusion and crossed wires was all that was.

Before she managed to reach a meaningful conclusion as to her feelings about Carl, she found herself dragged into babysitting duty. Though Portia was walking and talking more these days so it wasn’t as bad as looking after her had once been. Even if the toddler could only manage to call her ‘Oli’ in place of Olivia. She made up for it by being cute.

She was also, thankfully, old enough that the tv could keep her fairly distracted, which made looking after her low effort. Even if the shows she watched were painfully mind numbing for an adult brain.

-

Carl arrived shortly after lunch, smiling and chatting away with her father as he always did. At least dating him made her father happy. Carl was serving as the heir in waiting he’d always wanted, which caused her father to be more than a little lenient with her staying out late with Carl. Possibly too lenient, in Olivia’s opinion. It had always given Carl ideas, and she wasn’t ready for some of those things.

She’d been a late bloomer with the puberty blockers and still had comfort issues with her body, after all.

“Hey there, Liv,” Carl said, when he at last joined her in the living room. “How was your flight?”

“It was alright. I managed to avoid talking to a chatty old guy by watching movies, but he smelled sort of odd,” she replied, as Carl strolled over and sat beside her.

“Ooof. Not fun… maybe you should just skip out on flying back, then?” he said, grinning away. “I get lonely without you.”

“It’s too late to get a refund on my tuition,” she replied, perhaps a little flatter than she intended to.

Though not as harshly as she’d wanted to. Why couldn’t he just give it a rest?

“Can’t blame a guy for trying, though,” he said, slipping an arm around her shoulder. “I’m patient, but I am a guy. I can only wait so long for certain things.”

She felt a slight shiver at the implication. “I told you, not until I’ve had surgery… and you know the other option gives me the heeby-jeebies.”

“Well we cou—” he trailed off as Portia rushed into the room.

“Hi-lo!” she called out, waving.

“Hello Portia,” he replied flatly.

“Bye!” she announced, before hurrying off again.

She was always in a hurry to go everywhere whenever she wasn’t napping. Possibly to make up for all the time she spent napping.

“We’ve got to do something, though,” Carl muttered, once the toddler was out of earshot. “The guys heard where you’re studying, and apparently it has a reputation for the girls who go there turning lesbian, so now they’re all spreading rumours about m—you.”

Olivia couldn’t help but blush a little at that, but… what could she do? “You know I’m not comfortable about my body, though… can’t you just remind them that the psychiatrists checked me for… you know, tendencies like that?”

Tendencies the psychiatrists had deemed a sign of masculinity. An indication of a desire to transition being confused and misplaced desires. Though she had to wonder just how ‘masculine’ those tendencies could be with the way she saw other stage-maidens drooling over Eliza (and other stage-boys). Those were some of the girliest girls Olivia had ever met.

Then again, Eliza was attractive enough to make Olivia get a little flustered, so maybe it was just attraction to butch girls that was still feminine?

Carl made a face at the suggestion, quite separate from any of Olivia’s worries and confusion. “If I remind them about that then they start being weird about you being trans. Which is worse, right? You put in so much effort in looking like a normal girl, and you manage to make them forget most of the time, you don’t want to undo that, do you?”

Biting her tongue, Olivia swallowed the desire to tell Carl he needed to get better friends, and instead settled for a thin lipped expression of thoughtfulness as she hunted for a more diplomatic reply.

“Maybe you can find a job in BC, so we can meet up more?” she tried, only to find her gut disliking the idea.

“I’ve got my job here, though,” he replied. “And you could totally get a job in town too, without some degree from an academy that’s three thousand miles away. You’ve got a resumé already.”

“A resumé that comes with rumours swirling around my head,” Olivia muttered. “Everyone in Stratford knows each other, and they all remember the stuff my dad and the other troupe heads shouted at each other. Even if they’re not as traditionalist, no one in town wants to risk alienating big names for me.”

“They’ll have to figure it out when you come back after school. I think you should just deal with it now.”

She turned to stare at him. “Who said I was going to try to get a job in Stratford afterwards?”

“Basic logic?” he replied, staring at her as if she’d asked who’d said the little numbers on the side of the road were speed limits.

Faced with his incredulous stare, Olivia did have to admit she hadn’t really thought that thoroughly about her prospects for afterwards. Had she hoped it would prove her abilities separate from the scandal of her high school years, and get her work in town? Or had she been hoping to stay on at Freebairn’s, moving from the Academy to the Theatres? The option of working in Victoria or Whistler both fascinated her.

Then there was the option to try to get a job closer to home, but not in Stratford itself. Toronto wasn’t too far away, not for an adult. Hammer City was closer still, if a bit smaller of a market. There was also London (Ontario) or Berlin (Ontario). They weren’t theatres on the national stage, but one could still make a living in either.

No, London and Berlin didn’t really appeal to her. They were utter mediocrity with the only advantage being a shorter drive to Stratford. She could do better than that.

She really wanted to stay in BC, though. The mountains were so beautiful. Something about them felt so comforting, even as they felt ancient and unknowable.

“See? You’re obviously coming back,” Carl said, apparently misreading the expressions her face had gone through. “So I still think it’s smarter to try to build bridges sooner, rather than to come back with that pointless piece of paper that tells everyone what they already knew.”

“Maybe,” she mumbled, realising that she didn’t want to argue about it right now.

She rarely wanted to argue about things with Carl. He was more stubborn than her, and, the rare times she stuck to her guns, he’d start yelling. She wasn’t good at dealing with yelling. Not when she couldn’t match it without feeling like there was masculinity trying to crawl out of her throat when her raised voice sounded too deep.

She wished again that she’d started the hormone blockers before her voice had started to crack. That she’d realised it would happen to her before it did. Before it forever scarred her vocal cords with a length she didn’t want.

Which was one of the main reasons she’d gone to Freebairn’s. She wanted the voice training a musically inclined school of theatre could offer. She needed to learn to project her voice again.

With all that weighing on her shoulders, it was easier just to let Carl feel like the winner for right now. However much it sucked. She’d also burnt through enough of his patience to know not to argue when he decided they should go out for a drive. So she followed along, faking a smile as they went out, even if she was tired and mostly just wanted to go take a nap.

They went to his friend’s place. The friend’s dad owned the local grocery store, and had decided to set his son up with a condo in a small building near downtown. Probably just to get his parties out of the house. The other friends hanging out were similarly spoiled rich kids.

The apartment in question was barely decorated, most of the furnishings consisting of a tv that was at least twice as large as made sense in an apartment of that size and a couch pointed at said tv. There were a few game consoles set up, which Carl and his friends dove into playing. Olivia sat quietly in an armchair, also watching the tv despite having minimal interest in whatever first person shooter it was that they were playing.

At least she was able to figure out which part of the split screen belonged to Carl and cheer whenever she thought he’d gotten a kill in. And… well, she hadn’t really figured out what else she was supposed to do. Sit there and try to look pretty, maybe? She tried her best with that, despite the boredom.

Her phone vibrated a few times, but she only checked further when it was a text from her mother. Anything else would probably get complaints from Carl, no matter how much she wanted to answer the messages from Kala and Eliza.

In the end, her patience watching the gaming was rewarded with pizza. Greasy delivery from a local chain, but pizza was pizza. The warmth of the cheese and the crunch of the pepperoni was enjoyable. Even if she didn’t dare to have more than two slices, not wanting to risk the ‘proper girlfriend’ reputation she’d apparently managed to cultivate with Carl’s friends.

After pizza they watched a couple of shows, before Carl noticed the time and suddenly seemed concerned he’d kept Olivia out too late. He’d kept her out later plenty of times (and her brain was still running on Pacific Time, so it didn’t feel very late at all) but she wasn’t exactly going to argue about being home before 7pm. Not when the alternative was watching baseball with Carl’s friends.

The drive home ended in him giving her a kiss goodbye. One with garlicky breath from his love of crust dipping sauce. Still, she returned it with the best enthusiasm she could muster, mostly powered by the relief of getting to go back to bed soon.

“How was it, dear?” her mother asked, as she took off her shoes.

“It was boys,” Olivia muttered, heading into the house.

“You never were very good at hanging out with boys,” her mother replied with a small nod.

“Mhm… glad we figured out the reason for that,” she said, walking past her mother to go flop on the couch.

She then pulled out her phone, answering the messages from her friends, asking her how her family was treating her. She complained liberally about how Carl had acted, glad to be able to vent to someone.