Page 100 of Monarch
“I’ve already waited ten years,” I half-laugh.
“Yes, but you weren’t just waiting on Lex. In fact, I think you’d say you were doing everything but waiting on xem,” Mum points out. “You were living your life.”
“And it’s clear you’re doing that now.” Dove nods at me.
Our server returns with a smile and three glasses of Heineken. We thank him, and all three of us move at the same time to pick up ourbiertjes.
“A toast?” I suggest, and Mum and Dove agree, holding their drinks aloft and waiting for it.
“To living your life,” I say because I have no better words.
Mum was right. I was living my life before Amsterdam, before Roos and before Lex. But since I got here, living my life has stretched into something bigger and more all-encompassing. Not better, but more intense, more real, more of an adventure. More out of my control. Loving Lex means life will always be a bit out of my control, but that doesn’t have to be a bad thing. In fact, it feels like it could be a very exciting and thrilling thing indeed, whether xe is here or not.
“To living your life,” Mum and Dove chorus, and our glasses chime together.
When I lift the glass to my lips, the beer is cool and refreshing. It tastes like summer and future nostalgia for a day like today, when I am with people I love in a city I love, maybe one day,allthe people I love.
Chapter Forty-Three
Roos
Two Months Later - October
Lieve Lex,
Six months. A half of a year. So long and yet, so short. Mari waited ten years to see you again. I’ve started to think I could do the same.
I haven’t written for a while because life has been…life. The summer was busy and honestly, wonderful.
Mari’s mum and her wife were here, and we had so much fun with them. We persuaded them to avoid all the biggest tourist traps and instead we went to Brouwerij ‘t IJ instead of the Heineken Experience, we went to the Resistance Museum instead of Anne Frank Huis and we explored the Stedelijk (where I just know your art will exhibit one day) rather than get lost in the Rijksmuseum. We ate out every night and the weather was very kind to us all. I even got sunburnt one evening when we hired bikes for Dove and Keeley and we picnicked in Vondelpark.
I was a little afraid at times during their visit that it would make Mari homesick. They haven’t been home in a while and I didn’t realise just how close they were to their mum (and Dove) until it was right in front of my face. And then I became kind of fixated on it. Like, if you were that close to your family, why would you live so far away from them?
I thought of you a lot then. I felt like you would understand where I was coming from. But then Keeley said something that slowed down my brain. She said that she was proud of Mari for livinghere and all she’d ever wanted was for them to proudly and happily live their own life, and that was exactly what they were doing.
God knows my parents aren’t proud of me, but in that moment, I thought theyshouldbe. They should be really fucking proud of me. For leaving their prejudiced opinions behind me at eighteen. For finding my own path in this life. For doing what I had to do to survive. If only they could see how much I’ve achieved, all on my own, then maybe they would be proud enough to love me?
But love doesn’t work like that, does it? That’s the opposite of love. Loving you and Mari has taught me that.
It didn’t happen immediately, but I suspect hearing Keeley say that about Mari was a catalyst for me deciding to save for a breast augmentation. I know I talked about wanting it with you when we were first dating, but then you made me feel so loved, so sexy, so beautiful, just as I am, that I think I let it fall to the wayside. I thought it was more important to love myself as I am, and fuck it is, IT IS! But I also really want bigger boobs. I think they’ll look hot.
And I think I’m allowed to want that.
So I’m saving for it. It’s slow-going but it will happen. I’m not pointing any fingers at anyone, but the last few years have taught me how to be patient.
In case you were wondering, Mari is doing really well. They’re taking Dutch lessons and we go to a shibari workshop every week. You’d be amazed what they can do with a rope these days. We enjoy each other a lot. In bed, on the couch watching TV, dancing in the kitchen while the pasta boils. (Our meals are nowhere near as good as what you used to cook us!) We’re happy. I don’t know how that makes you feel. I hope it makes you feel happy.
Because I think if the roles were reversed and it was you and Mari together right now and I was…somewhere else, I think it would make me happy to know that you were together and enjoying life.
That’s not to say we don’t miss you. We do. Enough that I imagine you in bed next to me, even while Mari is spooning me. Enough that I often go to the bathroom without needing it, just to check the mirrors at work and in the bathroom in home, just in case you’ve magically returned and left me another lipstick message. Enough that sometimes I ask Mari to pretend to be you as they tie me up and call me a bad girl. Enough that I am bribing Joel with cake and cookies to tell me the moment you show up at QISS.
We’re going there for my birthday, by the way. I will leave that information there for you. No expectations. Only hope. But the hope is always there, regardless. I’ve stopped trying to tame it. I like that I keep hold of my hope. I like that that’s who I am.
I’ve got to go now. I don’t know if you read about it in the papers, but Amsterdam’s hospital boards finally asked us to come up with a policy for their approach to trans healthcare. We’ve also been asked to work with them on coming up with a realistic budget for implementation. So yeah, I’m pretty busy. But I’m happy.
And still hopeful. I’m still your hope, if you want it.
Heel veel liefs,
