A Winter in Rome

by Francis Gideon

  "I thought you knew this, Craig."

  "Knew what?" My eyes were wide, panicked. Alan rubbed his thumb against me, and in a sudden flash of our eyes meeting I realized he hadn't been talking about his relationships or how he identified—but how Sybil was something different, something that couldn't be categorized. That was why Rebecca and Sybil were different. "Oh, God. What have I missed?"

  "I can't say a thing, Craig. Just ask Sybil. We've been having some interesting conversations lately."

  "Night conversations?"

  He nodded. I didn't know when he had found time to talk to her on the phone, but that wasn't my place to speculate. His sudden knowledge about someone I had spent so long with confounded me. But that's what happens, right? Sometimes when you're with someone, you don't notice them changing. And they don't notice either, until someone else is around. I knew Sybil had been acting different. She was wearing my clothing more, then going out to thrift stores and picking up small men's jackets she could wear to the crisis centre. I figured she had been dressing tougher, doing something to intimidate the guys who lingered around the shelter trying to pick up vulnerable women. I had always assumed Sybil was a disembodied voice during a night conversation, giving over to other people's stories, collecting and responding to their whims. But I saw her face in Alan's phone again, and I realized there was something hidden, something behind her eyes that I had been missing because I wasn't looking and thinking about it at the same time.

  When my phone buzzed, I knew it was her. Alan gave my hand a squeeze before he kissed me on the cheek.

  "I love you," he said. "I know she does, too."

  "Same for you both," I said back with a weak smile, then picked up my phone.

  Your hair looks good, I texted in response to her message. So good—I want to take you out. Let's make a date, okay?

  *~*~*

  "Hey. Can I just talk to you?" Sybil called out from the kitchen. She stood by the kettle, her arms folded over her chest as her eyes met me by the doorway in Alan's apartment. "Instead of going out tonight?"

  We had made casual plans for dinner and then maybe a movie—typical dating, something we hadn't really done often—when I came back from work. I glanced at the calendar, remembered it was Friday, and that Alan was teaching the same drawing class I had met him in almost five years ago. She had come to see him before his class, then clearly decided to stay until I got there.

  "Sure. You don't want to go out?"

  She shook her head. "Not right now. I think… Can we talk in the bedroom?"

  "Sure. Wherever you're comfortable."

  We smiled at one another as I hung up my jacket in the closet. I didn't even know the name of the movie we'd be seeing, and I figured that was just as well. When Sybil's tea kettle boiled, I brought her and myself a big mug of the loose-leaf tea she had left here, and then carried them into the bedroom. She sat with her back straight on Alan's bed, a book in her lap. She nodded to me as I gave her the tea, though her eyes seemed hazy and unfocused. She wore one of my t-shirts and, from the way the hips in the jeans bagged, I guessed a pair of my—or Alan's jeans.

  "You know, I think Alan has a spare drawer or something. We can put some clothing in there for you."

  "Oh." She looked down at what she was wearing and sipped her tea with a weak smile. "I think he told me about that. I have books for class in there."

  "Ah."

  The book she had now clearly wasn't one from class, but a larger edition with a hardcover. I realized how nervous she was then, her knuckles almost white as she gripped her mug. I should have heard it in her voice earlier, but I didn't.

  "Sybil," I said. "What's up?"

  She gave another weak smile, then put her drink on the floor next to the bed. "Have I ever shown you this? It's a neat mythology book my mom and brothers gave me when I was, like, twelve. I've had it all this time."

  She cracked it open without waiting for my response. I had a feeling she would be talking a lot then, so I just tried to let her go. I placed a hand on the small of her back as she flipped to a particular myth. There was a woodcut drawing on one side of the page of a man with a shawl around his shoulders, walking out of a cave.

  "That's Tiresias. He's part of Greek myth; he turned himself into a woman for seven years. For a learning experience, so he could see how the other half lived."

  "And what did he find out?"

  "That no one listens to women. But sex is pretty good. I always liked him." She glanced at me furtively, then back to the page. "And I'll do anything for a learning experience. I've always been like that. Like Tiresias. Even before I got this book. This was the first time I really understood, you know?"

  "As much as I can," I said. "I know you, and I like that you've always wanted to try new things. A learning experience…"

  I trailed off and our eyes met again. Her gaze begged me in a small subtle glance. Please understand. Please understand without words so I know it's real. I wanted to hold her in that moment, but her knuckles were still white from gripping the book and I worried she would shatter if I touched her too much. I couldn't imagine what she had been going through all these years, having these crossed messages, barely recognizing herself. I couldn't imagine being twelve and suddenly realizing that the closest thing I could call a reflection of myself was a myth in a book.

  Then, for some reason, I found myself laughing. Not at her—not at the secret she had just told me—but at myself for being so, so foolish. I had been in love with two people for almost five years, but I had thought that it was just Alan and Sybil. Just Doctor Alan Winters, art professor at OCAD and Sybil Flowers, a counselling school grad student who was also a disembodied voice on the other end of a phone during desperate times. But I was wrong. There was so much more to both of them, so many faces and identities that I couldn't see or name.

  Sybil looked at me again with her begging stare. "Craig? Craig, why are you laughing?"

  "Because I'm an idiot and you still somehow love me." I paused, moving closer to her. "Right, you still love me?"

  "If you love me…"

  "I do, with all of my heart."

  She nodded, biting her lip. She asked again with her eyes, do you understand? Please tell me you understand.

  I kissed her. Soft and quick—mostly because I was still afraid. I didn't want to say yes to her unarticulated question, because I wasn't sure if I did understand. So I did what any good fool does: I kept asking questions.

  "What should I call you? What would make you comfortable?"

  "Call me yours. And Alan's."

  "But what do I call you—to him—to other people?" Every word felt wrong in my mind. Every pronoun, every syllable. "I want to talk about you as much as I want to talk to you. And I don't know what to say anymore."

  She set her book down, still open to the page on Tiresias, and took my hand, kissed each knuckle, each finger. I thought she was going to tell my fortune, but she turned over her own hand. I saw the lines on her palm, heavy and outlined in colour. She had been painting earlier, I could tell.

  "My future is crooked," she said and pointed to a blue line that was embedded in her skin and broken in half like a V. "See? Bent."

  "Is that bad?"

  She shook her head. "I don't think so. Not anymore. Not now that I understand why."

  She kissed me this time—a quick reminder that even if her future was crooked, I was still there. And Alan, too. I tried to imagine our bodies folding together and becoming stardust in that moment. Ad astra, take me to the stars. It was all so beautiful in my mind, but not practical beyond painting.

  "What do you want me to call you?" I repeated, pulling away from the kiss. I needed her to tell me that in spite of being made of stars, there were still things I could do. Things I could say to make it better.

  "I don't know what yet. But I'm transgender, probably." She bit her lip and flipped her hair out of her eyes, exposing the shorn bits underneath. "What am I even saying 'probably' for? Cis people do
n't spend this much time wondering if they are what they are. Do they?"

  She turned to me, and I shook my head. As far as I knew, being a guy sometimes came with baggage, but it was never baggage I didn't want to carry.

  "Right." She nodded, feeling better. "I'm transgender. But I'm not like anything I've seen or read."

  "Other than Tiresias?"

  She nodded.

  "Why him?"

  "Because it was never solid, never a permanent thing. He was one thing and then he wasn't. I like that because it's how I feel right now. I don't want to look back at my life, at anything in it, and think I had made a huge mistake using the pronoun 'she'. I don't want to think that I've fucked up because I didn't always mind being seen as a girl."

  "You haven't. Not at all."

  "I'm okay with my past being what it is. I'm even okay with right now, realizing all of this, because it adds context to so many situations where I felt lost."

  I tilted my head, unable to believe this. Sybil had always seemed like the most put-together person I knew. She saw my glance, and rolled her eyes.

  "To you I looked organized? I made sense?"

  "Yeah."

  "Then that's why I always felt better around you. You and Alan. You were the only people who understood me."

  I felt a heavy weight on my chest. It was a lot of responsibility to hold someone's image like that. I was already the person manning our corkboard to make sure archivists didn't fuck up our love life. I didn't know if I could share the responsibly of Sybil's gender, even if Alan was there, too.

  "But the future," she added quickly, squeezing my hand. "I don't know what the future is like. That's when it started to feel as if I've fucked up."

  "Crooked. As if you've broken it."

  Her lip trembled as she nodded, then pulled me close to her. I went easily, arms wrapping around her shoulders. Our breath fell into succession soon enough and it felt, for a while, like we were one person.

  "I still want to be Sybil," she said. "I still don't mind using she—or they—or really anything. Pronouns are not some weighted thing to me. I am who I am, but I'm realizing more and more that I'm not who everyone else thought I was. That there had always been a disconnect between how people perceive me and how I view myself that I never really noticed until I met you and Alan."

  "Even when we called you 'she'?"

  "Yes," she said unequivocally.

  I smiled, feeling relieved. I didn't want to think that by loving her and thinking about her as Sybil, as a 'she' in my mind, that I had done her harm. As if words were tiny bullets that could slice deeper, to the bone, and stay in the soul. "So I haven't hurt you?" I asked again, to be sure. "Even if I talk to Alan about you, and I say you're the most beautiful woman I've ever met?"

  She flinched then. I hugged her close.

  "I'm sorry," I said. "Tell me what I've done wrong."

  She scrunched up her face, tried to find the words. "I don't mind beauty, but woman. Woman is weird. So is man, really. I'm… I'm Sybil."

  "You are. And I get that."

  "You do?" Her eyes were wide, so wide, and I felt as if I could do nothing wrong. "You do get it? Language is hard sometimes."

  "But we need it," I said, quoting her.

  "We do," she laughed, knowing. She grabbed my hands again and kissed my fingers. "I'm still figuring it out."

  "I am too," I said. "But I'll be here."

  She smiled and nodded. We grabbed a blanket and wrapped ourselves up. Outside, the sun had set. I didn't think Alan would be back tonight, not until much later after his class. He was teaching his students, and no doubt, he would talk about us in some way. He used to show me sections of his PowerPoint and notes he'd write, usually with scrawled notes in the corner with my name—and now hers—to remind him to tell a particular story that could help illuminate a concept. Maybe tonight he'd give a lecture about Tiresias or pronouns, or the importance of knowing the meaning and intent behind art. I felt Sybil's breath next to me change as she fell asleep. But I was still awake, watching the stars come out and thinking of Alan. I wondered if he would be proud of me. I hoped he'd be proud of us both.

  Just before I fell asleep, I remembered something Sybil taught me from our language class. Trans, as a prefix, meant across—as in switching sides—but also beyond. Across or beyond. I liked that a lot. I looked at the stars, and thought of Sybil again. She was there, perfect, not across from what a woman was or what a man was, but beyond it entirely. She was my star.

  "Ad astra," I said, whispering into her hair. She shifted against me, kissed me in her sleep, and then with a sigh, I joined her.

  *~*~*

  "Sit back," Alan stated. "I have a painting to show you."

  Sybil and I were on the couch, our palms clasped together. I felt my bones shake with excitement. It was so rare that Alan found the need to brandish or display his art. Only his PhD project and his other grad school works took space up on any wall anywhere. But ever since Sybil had started to spend the night more, Alan had been painting into early morning. Usually, he'd stay out and sleep on the couch she and I sat on now, since Alan's bed was only a queen, and if Sybil was with me, he didn't want to disturb.

  "You've probably seen this," Alan said. "I wasn't trying to hide, but humour me and ooh and ahh, okay? Okay, thanks."

  Alan pulled back the sheet and gave us a crooked smile. Sybil made some hums of approval, but I was stuck silent. I knew this painting; the canvas was black, stretched out and filled with dotted gold stars. It was the same canvas that Alan had been working on when he and Sybil decided to be together, the same one that, according to Sybil, had been inspired by Sagan's notion that we're all star-stuff, and because of that, maybe gender was also star stuff, too. The canvas was built up now more than before. The constellations had depth, and so did the black space around them. I felt as if I could fall into the painting and disappear before I was found.

  "It's beautiful," I said. "What's it called?"

  "Ad Astra," Alan said, smirking at me. "I was going to call it something more dynamic like Alone in the Universe or Seeking Orion. But I liked the simplicity of Latin. It allows some of the meaning to be obscured."

  I nodded, still somewhat speechless. It was so odd to see all the conversations we had had with one another displayed without an origin point. I had been so sure that Sybil was asleep when I had mused about the stars and the phrase ad astra. And Alan—he hadn't been around when I told Sybil about Carl Sagan. But here he was, in front of me, with his canvas full of impeccable, intimate details. He had created a universe of us—and for Sybil especially, it must have felt like a self-portrait.

  "I've never done space paintings before," Alan confessed. "I was up online studying nebulas for the past week, and now I'm pretty sure aliens exist. Also, did you know you can make your own galaxy online through a program? Kind of like Microsoft Paint in space. Really cool. But I'm getting ahead of myself. What do you think?"

  "I love it," Sybil said. She stood up from the couch and walked over to Alan with a hug. "Thank you so much."

  "You're welcome, dear." Alan rubbed his hands up and down her back, and then waved me over, too. I wrapped my arms around both of them, eyeing the painting behind us on the easel long after the embrace was over.

  "Don't get too attached, though," Alan stated. "Because I think Rebecca wants me to sell it. Knowing her, anyway. She hates it when I keep any painting project for myself because I'm not 'networking' that way, or something."

  I was about to argue for the painting to stay when a knock echoed through the apartment. I heard Rebecca's laugh right after the knock and Alan's demeanour shifted. He pushed his shoulders back and straightened his jacket, before giving Sybil and I a quick kiss.

  "Be right there, Becca. Just be patient."

  More laughter from the other side. Alan's long legs quickly moved across the apartment, but I wasn't ready to let him leave. Rebecca's sudden presence felt like an intrusion—I wasn't ready to share this with t
he world yet, even if it was just her and her grad students.

  "Surely you can't sell it." I grabbed Alan's shoulder before he got to the door. "It's too important."

  "Why not? It would give me an excuse to paint more. To paint both of you again." When I was still unconvinced, he added, taking my face in his hands. "We have our corkboard, Craig. We can add to that. We have control over that. Paintings are never really the artist's alone. That's why I can let it go—because I have to."

  Rebecca knocked again, tapping out a pattern. Alan rolled his eyes, kissing me again before opening the door. He greeted Becca with a quick hug, before extending a hand to the graduate student, Ashleigh. I had met her before in passing, but Alan still introduced us, along with Sybil. He didn't explain our relation to him, but I still felt exposed. Why else would two people be in someone's apartment Saturday morning, if it wasn't because we were in love? Sybil didn't seem too distressed by anything, even though she had her hair pinned back and was wearing an old dress shirt of mine. She actually seemed more relaxed than I had ever seen her, quickly greeting Ashleigh and then taking her into the kitchen for a drink. I figured they had common ground as graduate students. Or maybe Sybil knew her, too. I couldn't keep track of who knew who anymore.

  Rebecca took only three steps inside the apartment before she spotted the canvas. She gasped a little in her boisterous way and then turned a keen eye towards Alan. "So this is what you've been up to when you don't answer my emails? Well, aside from the obvious."

  Rebecca gave me a glance, before she nodded to Sybil by Alan and Ashleigh's side.

  "You know, you're really lucky. We had someone drop out of the show last minute. We were just going to stick nothing up in their place and have the audience question their expectation of a show and what really counts as 'art', but there's only so many times you can do that before people lose faith in us as a serious institution."

  "And question our personal credibility," Ashleigh added.

  "Pfff, we never had that. But this. I like. I'll take." Rebecca grinned and pulled out a binder from her shoulder bag. The OCAD logo was printed down the spine and she used one of the university's pens as she filed though some paperwork. "What's it called?"