“Yes, sir,” the trio mumble and wander off.
When I see that they’re out of sight back in the sports hall, I pull on Benji’s hand to bring him standing directly opposite me. “They like you.”
“Whatever gave you that impression? They were borderline rude to us both just then.”
“That’s how I know they like you.”
Benji finds my other hand. “Oh, I see. Is that your way of telling me you actually really liked me in our last year? Because you were so rude to me?”
“I have no clue what you’re talking about,” I say with a sly smile before pushing up to brush a kiss against his lips. “Come on, Mr Smith. Let’s go make this Leavers’ Ball a lot better than ours was.”
“Deal,” he says before he lets me pull him towards the sports hall.
When I agreedto come to the Leavers’ Ball with Benji, I didn’t really know what to expect. I had this idea of being required to intercept teens trying to spike punch bowls or stopping heavy petting in corners from gettingtooheavy, but in reality, I spend most of my time with Benji standing in the dark edges of the dancefloor which is striped with the markings of indoor tennis courts. Holding plastic cups filled with flat cola, Benji tells me stories about the pupils we watch dance, talk and occasionally act up, but it never escalates beyond playful shoves and pushes. He knows a lot about them. About their home lives, their interests, their ambitions, their dreams. I find myselfwondering if any of my teachers had anything like the same insight into my life. I wonder if any of them picked up on my transness. I wonder if any of them could have helped me.
I think then about Mrs Kim and how she would always make herself available to me whenever I needed her. I think about her giving me access to the art room after hours. Maybe she did that so I had a place to explore my art, yes, but to find myself through those explorations.
“Benji,” I stretch up close to his ear, “can we go to the art room?”
He blinks at me slowly, and I wonder if he didn’t hear me over the blasting music that I don’t recognise. I guess that officially makes me old.
“The art room?” he repeats eventually.
“Yeah. I want to go and see what it looks like now. Is it still in the same place?”
“It is, actually.” He smiles, but it doesn’t feel like it’s for my benefit. “Come on then.”
Holding my hand, Benji leads me out of the sports hall once he’s told one of his colleagues we’re going for a short walk. A couple of the pupils make teasing noises as we pass them, but it sounds more like they’re cheering us on than tearing us down. Benji doesn’t bother to hide his broad grin as he dismisses them cheerfully.
We don’t talk as we cross the car park and then enter the school’s main building, which is older and darker than the gymnasium. Motion sensors make the corridors light up as we walk down them, but when we finally reach the art room, Benji needs his key to open the door, and then he switches the overhead lights on as I enter.
After taking a few steps inside the space, I stop. I look around me, at countless canvases and boards displaying all manner of art. Inhaling, I catch whiffs of instantlyfamiliar smells — acrylic, oil, clay, pencil shavings, pencil lead. They are the scents of my final two years of school.
“It feels smaller,” I say.
I hear Benji close the door behind me. “I know. The whole school felt that way when I first got here.”
“That’s strange, isn’t it?” I turn to ask him. “I’m the same size I was when I left here. We haven’t grown since then.”
“Oh, Dee.” He steps closer and takes my hand again. I’m not sure how long this will last, but he always wants to hold my hand. “We’ve grown,” he says with emphasis. “We’ve both grown a lot since then.”
I know what he means.
Honestly, I think I’ve grown just as much in the last eight months as in the last sixteen years. I’m not completely comfortable with that fact, with the reality that being in a relationship changed me. In many ways, it goes against everything I used to resist about having a partner. I don’t think romantic partners should make you grow, or complete you, or force you to change.
But that’s the difference. There was no forcing. There was no completing. There was no need for me to grow.
Instead, Benji offered me something new, something different. And I accepted it. It didn’t complete me, but it still added something to my life. He didn’t force me to change, but he did make me see ways in which change could be good for me. For me first, and then in turn, for him.
“Do you remember when I found you in here one evening?” Benji has his phone in his hand and is tapping on the screen.
“When?”
“That year. Our final year. At the startof the year, I think.”
“I don’t remember,” I say, and it’s only partly a lie. I do remember us being in this room together. I remember him seeing the painting I was working on — the one that represented my struggle with gender at the time — but I can’t remember what we talked about. I can’t remember anything other than feeling like he was looking at the painting and seeing all my thoughts, my feelings and my secrets. It’s easy to forget conversations but it’s not easy to forget it when somebody makes you feel that way.
“You were in here after school one day. The same day I had football training. You were sitting at a table listening to cool French disco music and working on a painting,” he says and he sets his phone down on the nearest table just as a familiar song starts playing. Daft Punk,Something About Us. “It was pink and blue, and they merged to make purple. Abstract, I guess you’d call it. It was beautiful.”
