As they walk away, I turn to Lennie
and say, “On second thoughts, let’s go back
to yours.”
Back on campus, after another spliff
with Lennie, I stumble to my room.
In my bathroom
I go right up close
to the mirror
as if to kiss
my reflection.
I pull back my hair
away from my face,
trace my left cheek
bone and jawline,
run my left index finger
down my nose, then
pick up the scissors:
This is the change. I cut.
Letting loc after loc
drop to the floor.
I’m shedding
something other
people use to define
me, falling to my feet.
I gather my hair from the floor
and hold up this fistful of me
that I don’t want anymore.
I look in the mirror and laugh
at what I see. Cutting it myself
felt fantastic but now
I need to get it finished professionally.
My poster of Bob Marley
has come unstuck
at the top right corner
and droops down over itself.
I smooth it up and push
the Blu-Tacked corner back
onto the wall. “Nothing’s changed
between us,” I say to Mr. Marley.
In the morning,
I go to the one black barbershop
in Brighton; it’s like any black barbershop
you’d find in London. The barber by the door
has an empty chair, the others
are busy cutting hair. I ask him
if he can give me a trim and fade.
I think of Kieran from school and
how his fade always looked so fresh.
“No problem. Are you a student?” he asks.
“If so, you get a student discount.”
“Yeah.”
He asks what I’m studying as he gestures
toward his chair.
“English,” I tell him as I sit down.
He puts the cutting gown over me
and fastens it at my neck.
He asks, “What kind of job will you get?”
I tell him, “I want to be a writer.
I write poems and one day
I want to publish my own book.”
He asks what I write about.
I don’t say, Coming out as gay.
I don’t say, Sleeping with men.
I say, “Identity and stuff.”
He doesn’t ask me anything else.
Mum and Anna
finally come to Brighton for a day trip.
We’re walking along
the seafront and Mum says,
“We were going to
surprise you on your birthday
but you sounded so
stressed about your essays,
we decided that we
shouldn’t disturb you.
We’ve missed you
so much. I can’t believe
you cut your hair.
I’m so glad you told me
on the phone. It would
have been such a shock.
You don’t look like
yourself anymore.”
Anna scoffs. “That’s a silly
thing to say, Mummy.
If he is himself, how
could he not look like himself?”
Mum replies, “Okay,
clever clogs. Maybe you should
be at university already.”
Anna laughs. “I’ve not even done
my exams yet, Mummy.”
“What I mean,” says Mum,
“is I used to cut your hair.
You look like you did
when you were a little boy.”
I turn to Anna.
“What do you think of it?”
“It looks good but
don’t you miss your locs?”
“Not really. I feel lighter now.
People can’t make assumptions
about me. Like, before I cut them,
I was here on the seafront, right here,
and this guy came up to me
asking if I could sell him some weed.
When I said no, he actually said,
‘You’re a liar!’ Can you believe that?”
Anna replies, “But
you don’t know if that was
it could just be because you’re black
and he might think
all black men are drug dealers.
It was a white guy, right?”
“Yeah, he was
white but . . .” And I pause.
It hadn’t occurred to me
until Anna said it just now:
the assumption
people make that I’m a drug dealer
might not be about
a hairstyle, it could just be
because I’m black.
We walk in silence for a while
but the seagulls
are still talking.
“You don’t smoke weed,
do you, Michael?” asks Mum.
“No, Mummy. Not really.”
“What does ‘not really’ mean?”
“It means I don’t buy it
and I certainly don’t sell it,
but if I’m offered by a friend,
I might have some.”
“You’re here to study,
Michael, not to do drugs.”
After we’ve eaten,
we go to the arcade on the pier.
Anna and I
compete on the dance battle machine
and then the air hockey table.
Then the three of us
take a ride on the roller coaster
at the end of the pier:
Anna and me in a seat together,
and Mum behind.
I feel the chilling
sea breeze on my newly exposed
head and ears,
as we speed the winding tracks.
There’s one point
where it feels like it’s going to launch us
into the sky
and we might take flight for a second before
plummeting into
the water.
I imagine us all dying
like this, strapped
into our seats, unable to get free,
sinking together
in a roller coaster carriage.
It’s just a momentary
thought but it feels so real.
I take a sharp intake of
cold air and grip Anna’s hand.
To have a loving family
is to feel afraid and yet believe
you are going to be all right.
Mum and Anna
want to go shopping
in The Lanes
and North Laine.
A bunch of quirky boutique shops.
Mum says if I come
she’ll buy me something.
And this is always
how she gets me
to come shopping.
Once, when I was still
in school, Mum said to me,
“You’re gay, you’re meant
to like shopping.”
I didn’t speak to her
for a week.
Two hours later,
Mum and Anna
have four shopping bags each.
I am wearing a new
black woolly hat,
and in my shopping bag
I have a pink shirt,
black trousers, and shoes
that Mum picked for me.
I walk them back
to the train station,
where I met them
five hours earlier
and when I hug
Mum, she does
not let go—when I do,
or when I drop my arms
to my sides, she squeezes
me tighter.
Anna says, “Mummy, we’re going
to miss the train.”
Mum mumbles
into my shoulder,
“I don’t care.
There’ll be another train.”
I realize Mum is crying.
I wrap my arms back around her.
I hadn’t realized she missed me
so much.
When she finally lets go,
she says, “Oh, I almost forgot.”
Mum reaches into her handbag
and pulls out the flamingo toy.
“Why did you want me to bring this?”
“To remind me of home,” I say,
because I think it sounds right.
Really, it’s gonna be part of my drag act.
When Drag Soc meets the following week,
it feels like a homecoming.
My drag family try to help me
develop my character more fully.
I’ve picked my lip-sync song:
“Back to Black” by Amy Winehouse,
but the version sung by Beyoncé
on the Great Gatsby soundtrack.
I’ve brought my heels with me,
and Mzz B lends me a black feather boa.
I haven’t decided on my dress yet,
so I rehearse my lip sync for them
in my regular attire—jeans and a sweater—
but with my high heels on my feet
and borrowed boa around my neck.
I feel a little closer to becoming.
A lip sync is a mime
to someone else’s voice,
or even your own voice,
but it must be prerecorded.
It could be a pop song;
a famous speech from a film,
a soap opera, a politician—
something familiar—
but your performance
should feel original.
You’re not trying to be
that person, you’re using
their words to say
something new.
David says he can lend me a black
tutu and leotard to wear for my drag.
Outside Drag Soc, David is Katy.
As we walk to her room on campus
to pick up these items of clothing, I ask,
“So, why do you have a tutu if you’re
a drag king?”
“I just have a tutu,” she tells me.
“I just wear it sometimes for fun.”
Katy’s drag king act is David Peckham.
Modeled after the soccer player David Beckham?
“You do know who David Beckham is,”
says Katy. “Victoria Beckham’s husband.
I wear the uniforms for the different teams
he’s played for but I do Spice Girls lip syncs.
I add a bit of facial hair.” She pauses.
“Are you gonna shave off your beard?”
“No, that would defeat the point,” I say.
“But what is the point?” she asks
bluntly—it doesn’t feel offensive.
“You don’t seem to want to change
much about yourself for the show,”
she says. “You want to keep the beard
but still pretend to be Beyoncé?”
“That’s not it,” I reply. “I don’t want to
pretend to be anyone, not anymore.”
“So who is The Black Flamingo?”
asks Katy, with genuine curiosity.
I reply,
“He is me, who I have been,
who I am, who I hope to become.
Someone fabulous, wild, and strong.
With or without a costume on.”
Katy’s wardrobe is full of color;
it reminds me of Camden Market.
I look down at my gray sweater
and navy jeans and think about
the rest of my wardrobe. This is
my uniform. I have left school,
but look at how I still conform.
The only bright thing I own is the
pink shirt that Mum bought me.
A pink faux fur coat catches my eye.
I ask, “Can I borrow this as well?”
“Yeah, of course,” says Katy. “There’s
a matching handbag, if you want it.”
It’s coming together, I think. All I need
now is a wig and makeup.
First, I do the easy part: I go into town
to the party shop and buy a pink wig.
It’s the classic pink bob: the pinkest pink
and iconic bob style. It’s a short bob
with bangs, like the one Natalie Portman
wears in the strip club in the movie Closer,
like the one Scarlett Johansson wears
in the karaoke scene in Lost in Translation.
But I know when people see it on me,
they’ll automatically think Nicki Minaj.
Next, to Debenhams
department store, to the makeup section.
No one else in Drag Soc has my complexion;
Mzz B is several shades
darker than me. So I know I need to buy
my own foundation. I’m not sure what else.
There are so many brands to pick from
but behind one of the counters
I see a person with a beard and a full face
of makeup. I approach them, smiling.
Their name badge says: “Eden.”
I tell Eden about the show and how I want
to look. They give me a tutorial:
concealer, foundation, contouring,
highlighting, blusher, lip liner, lip color,
mascara, glue-on lashes, eye shadow,
and finally nail polish.
I notice two girls in school uniform watching.
They approach us.
“You look amazing!” one of them says to me.
“Can we take a picture?”
I feel elated!
Both of the schoolgirls take
a selfie with me and them together,
on either side of me.
When the girls go,
the tears begin.
Eden hands me a box of tissues.
I wipe my tears and see the black and brown
makeup on the crumpled white tissue
in my hand. I look in the mirror.
I don’t feel fabulous anymore.
My first time in a full face of makeup.
I feel self-conscious and overwhelmed.
I ask Eden to pass the makeup wipes,
which they do. Then Eden says,
“I get fifty percent staff discount,
if you want to use it?”
Costume Confidence
I masquerade in makeup
and feathers, and hope to be applauded.
I evoke you as a metaphor;
attach my meaning to you.
Oh, Black Flamingo, here I stand
in your shadow. You are
my costume, my muse,
my poise and my strut,
my poetic and my purpose
but when I am naked
and plainly spoken
I don’t feel so worthy of attention.
I have it all here,
laid out on my bed,
wig and makeup,
leotard and tutu,
tights and heels,
feathers, faux fur,
but I’m not ready
to put it all on yet,
I’m not sure what
I’m putting it on for,
I’m still not sure exactly
what I’m trying to say.
Drag Soc’s show is tomorrow
&
nbsp; and I’ve invited Mzz B round
to my flat to see my act in full.
I wanted to be ready before
they got here but I’m not
happy with my makeup,
I’ve put it on and taken it off
three times. I know it’s not
the most important thing.
I imagined opening the door
looking perfect, in character
being shady and charming
and confident and fierce,
but right now I’m a wreck.
My desk is covered in makeup
and wipes with the brown,
black, pink, red, silver, and gold
I’ve been trying to apply
to my face, and now I’m a mess.
When Mzz B arrives, I explain,
“I’m not ready. I can’t do this.”
Mzz B slides
my makeup and wipes
to one side of my desk,
and perches on the space
they have cleared.
“Your lip sync is great,
your choreography is good,
and your poetry is wonderful!
Makeup isn’t what makes your act.
Your passion and story are what
the audience really wants to see.
Believe me, honey, you are ready.
Look, I’ll do your makeup myself,
if I have to.
Actually,
I won’t have time for that.
But one of the others will.
We’re a family.
We’ve got your back.”
They get up to leave.
“Before you go,” I say, nervously,
“I want to add something to my act.”
I go over to my bed and open my laptop.
“A PowerPoint presentation?” scoffs Mzz B.
“Kind of. It’s some people I’ve found
online who I think are inspiring. Can I
show it to you, please?” I hand Mzz B
my laptop.
I watch them clicking through and nodding
in approval. “This is pretty good, honey.
I mean, you’re never gonna get everyone.
But this is a good start.”
“I was thinking I could add you to the list,
if you wouldn’t mind?”
“Me?!” Mzz B says, exaggeratedly,
“Well, I don’t see why not,” handing me
back my laptop with a big grin.
When Mzz B leaves, I’m feeling excited
and I decide to call Lennie to invite him
to the drag show.
Before I get the chance to speak,
Lennie says, “You must be telepathic.
I was about to message you.
My cousin Kim is here from London