Drunk and Disorderly

Tangled Up in Blue

It was 2015 and I was in yoga teacher training the first time around. On my way home, bored and hungry, I stop at a bar downtown for lunch. Sitting alone at the bar, I glance around at the few patrons there on that early weekday afternoon and I spot him — rather, her. By this point, Kyle had officially become Kyla. She’d come out as transgender in 2007, a year into our relationship, but didn’t transition — or change her pronouns — until after we broke up a year later. She was there with her wife, a woman who looked like she put up with absolutely no shit, which made me happy. Knowing Kyle had changed her name by that point and no longer being as angry as I used to be after so many years had passed, I decided to say hi. I cautiously walked up to the two of them at the pool table where they were playing nearby.

“KT?” I said, using what I knew to be her preferred nickname from some Facebook snooping. Her wife looks at me first, then KT glances over, not recognizing me right away. I was thinner, prettier, and noticeably healthier than I was when we were together.

“Oh my god,” she says, recognition finally dawning on her face. Her hair is longer now, longer than mine, and she's wearing light makeup, maybe mascara and some eyeliner, and nail polish. She's wearing fitted flare-leg jeans and a pink hoodie with tennis shoes, basically what she wore before her transition, only more feminized. She had always said she felt like a “tomboy.” Her voice is a little higher now, manipulated consciously to be softer and more feminine, and I think of how loud and masculine and angry it used to sound when it was directed at me and I can’t help but wonder which one her wife hears most often.