About-face
Willow Campbell
Northeast Ohio Writer
There's a girl in my head and she’s laughing to herself, crouched down (it’s more a huff of hot breath with a smile, not hilarious laughter), because she’s been walking towards this bus stop, in the snow with her head tightly tucked, chin to chest; and it's funny the way a tree branch cracks the bridge of her nose and knocks her out of herself.
And it’s funny, the way she’s glad something touched her. A frosty index finger shows a smudge of blood, and it's funny because the cold doesn’t matter at all anymore. The warmth trickles onto her lip and she smears it there, thankful it's red and sticks to her hand. Thankful she’s standing still now, not moving, not fighting against the wind, and for the taste of the hot drip in the back of her throat.
She crouches down under this outstretched branch, under this stupid little tree, and puts her sticky hand in the slush of the earth and spreads it around. She’ll tell Alana she missed the bus, “another time,” she’s sorry.
Sometimes I see her, or feel the whisper of her voice inside mine, but most times, she stays in the past: places I’ve seen her, things she’s said, my own memory of memories, someone I’ve been before, or someone I might’ve been if I’d stayed a girl.
Maybe there’s someone in there with you, and it’s not so hard to picture.
I used to stare in the mirror and wonder why she was all people could see. Back then, it was the other way around; she was on the outside and I was on the inside. Now, I catch my reflection in the bus window as we pass under a bridge, and wonder who I’m looking at.
Timelapse of how my features change: coarse hair bursts from odd places on the face, chest, back, buttocks, legs; pores erupt fountains of grisly oil; fat slithers from hips to stomach to cheeks; sweat smells, deeper and darker; in the stomach, a hunger for more things; a hunger for more things as the pulsing sex organ grows longer; a tightening of the skin around the bones of my hands, veins pop up and reveal themselves; a feeling like the tightening of a noose at the base of my throat, everything sounds heavy as I learn to speak again, the same words with a new voice (think– I have never heard myself before today and tomorrow I’ll be someone new again).
Imagine not knowing your own voice. Imagine looking at yourself and knowing it’s not you. Nobody would believe you.
Do you ever have stories that pop into your mind again and again?
The girl in my head, she thinks it’s funny, that story about the man who got a private plane ride for his birthday present.
Good friends of his, from the village chess history book club, all pooled their money together to gift him a once-in-a-lifetime tour over the Swiss Alps for his 71st birthday.
Picture all five of these friends, suited up in woolen jumpers and mittens, piling into the back of his 1983 Volvo to see him to the station, their gray mustache hairs practically quivering with the excitement of giving him such a fine gift. They roll down the foggy windows of the Volvo to cheer and wave goodbye as he walks toward the tiny plane.
What they don’t know: this man is terrified of heights. He squeezes his eyes closed as he walks forward, hoping more than anything that the plane will display some sign of malfunction now, and his tour will be canceled.
Having not wanted to disappoint his friends, 71 year old Hans had gasped and held the ticket quickly to his chest, his round cheeks red with nervous smiling, while his friends proudly presented it to him. He could not let them know he did not like their gift. And so, standing just outside the cockpit, and shaking with fear, Hans lifts his arm up to wave again to his cheering comrades in the car, and climbs inside.
Hans is so frightened the moment the plane reaches full altitude, his heart goes into cardiac arrest, and shooting an arm out to steady himself on the wall of the plane, unknowingly presses the passenger eject button. Instantly, he’s plummeting down to the cliffs below.
Happy birthday, Hans.
The girl in my head, she laughs at that all day.
Hans has a face I can picture perfectly. His cheeks bulge when he smiles, his shoulders shake when he chuckles, the top of his head is shiny with a ring of gray, stubbley hairs he sometimes covers with a hat.
I get confused about faces. Some faces you see, and right away you know what they look like. Some faces, you’ll never know even if you stare for 10 years. I wish I could ask the girl in my head if she knows why that is. She might know something I don’t. She might like to talk about faces.
Imagine only a tree branch could touch your face for it to feel good.
Sometimes, I want to ask strangers what they see when they look at me. I wonder, could my words persuade their vision?
Someone calls me ma’am and everything powers off in my brain while I try to reboot; they’re talking to someone I’ve forgotten about, someone I purposely left behind, in a photograph two years ago. The picture: the wall behind her is a cold lilac and she stares you in the eye with her mouth tight, the flattest it can go. She looks like a shiver in the snow, like she already knows she’s fading away. That’s the last photo I took as a girl.
I started weekly intramuscular injections of testosterone cypionate into my upper thigh at age 19. What you do is, you put a thicker needle on the end of the syringe so you can draw the viscous oil up from the vial, and then you switch it out for a thinner needle so you don’t rip your muscle up when it goes in. You’ve got to whip the needle down fast enough to slide it into the skin before your brain can stop you.
The first time, it takes me fifteen minutes to work myself up enough to do it. Sometimes, your mind fakes you out and decides not to go through with it, but momentum jabs the needle two centimeters into your leg anyway, so you’re stuck pushing it down slowly, until it hits the muscle.
Imagine you depend on this process to look like yourself. Imagine you don’t exist without this substance.
I step off the bus at my stop and see Alana leaning against the shelter, waiting for me. She looks older, longer, like she fits into her body now. She sees me and straightens up. For a moment, confusion wrinkles her face and I hold still, rigid with guilt. I’ve never known how to tell her (I’m someone else now). We both stand there watching, unsure.
The girl in my head, she’ll only talk on the phone. She doesn’t want you to look at her. She wants you to stomp on her foot when you pass her on the street, and she wants it to be an accident. At night, she wanders around in the dark, she digs in the dirt with her fingernails and drags mud up her forearms. The skin on the back of her hands is cracking and flakey. She thinks it’s funny not to moisturize.
I lift my hand and give a small wave: an invitation, an apology. Alana’s face hints at the faintest smile and she steps towards me. She branches an arm out to meet mine.
“You made it,” she says.
“I made it,” I say, and we clasp hands.
And it’s funny, the way she’s glad something touched her. A frosty index finger shows a smudge of blood, and it's funny because the cold doesn’t matter at all anymore. The warmth trickles onto her lip and she smears it there, thankful it's red and sticks to her hand. Thankful she’s standing still now, not moving, not fighting against the wind, and for the taste of the hot drip in the back of her throat.
She crouches down under this outstretched branch, under this stupid little tree, and puts her sticky hand in the slush of the earth and spreads it around. She’ll tell Alana she missed the bus, “another time,” she’s sorry.
Sometimes I see her, or feel the whisper of her voice inside mine, but most times, she stays in the past: places I’ve seen her, things she’s said, my own memory of memories, someone I’ve been before, or someone I might’ve been if I’d stayed a girl.
Maybe there’s someone in there with you, and it’s not so hard to picture.
I used to stare in the mirror and wonder why she was all people could see. Back then, it was the other way around; she was on the outside and I was on the inside. Now, I catch my reflection in the bus window as we pass under a bridge, and wonder who I’m looking at.
Timelapse of how my features change: coarse hair bursts from odd places on the face, chest, back, buttocks, legs; pores erupt fountains of grisly oil; fat slithers from hips to stomach to cheeks; sweat smells, deeper and darker; in the stomach, a hunger for more things; a hunger for more things as the pulsing sex organ grows longer; a tightening of the skin around the bones of my hands, veins pop up and reveal themselves; a feeling like the tightening of a noose at the base of my throat, everything sounds heavy as I learn to speak again, the same words with a new voice (think– I have never heard myself before today and tomorrow I’ll be someone new again).
Imagine not knowing your own voice. Imagine looking at yourself and knowing it’s not you. Nobody would believe you.
Do you ever have stories that pop into your mind again and again?
The girl in my head, she thinks it’s funny, that story about the man who got a private plane ride for his birthday present.
Good friends of his, from the village chess history book club, all pooled their money together to gift him a once-in-a-lifetime tour over the Swiss Alps for his 71st birthday.
Picture all five of these friends, suited up in woolen jumpers and mittens, piling into the back of his 1983 Volvo to see him to the station, their gray mustache hairs practically quivering with the excitement of giving him such a fine gift. They roll down the foggy windows of the Volvo to cheer and wave goodbye as he walks toward the tiny plane.
What they don’t know: this man is terrified of heights. He squeezes his eyes closed as he walks forward, hoping more than anything that the plane will display some sign of malfunction now, and his tour will be canceled.
Having not wanted to disappoint his friends, 71 year old Hans had gasped and held the ticket quickly to his chest, his round cheeks red with nervous smiling, while his friends proudly presented it to him. He could not let them know he did not like their gift. And so, standing just outside the cockpit, and shaking with fear, Hans lifts his arm up to wave again to his cheering comrades in the car, and climbs inside.
Hans is so frightened the moment the plane reaches full altitude, his heart goes into cardiac arrest, and shooting an arm out to steady himself on the wall of the plane, unknowingly presses the passenger eject button. Instantly, he’s plummeting down to the cliffs below.
Happy birthday, Hans.
The girl in my head, she laughs at that all day.
Hans has a face I can picture perfectly. His cheeks bulge when he smiles, his shoulders shake when he chuckles, the top of his head is shiny with a ring of gray, stubbley hairs he sometimes covers with a hat.
I get confused about faces. Some faces you see, and right away you know what they look like. Some faces, you’ll never know even if you stare for 10 years. I wish I could ask the girl in my head if she knows why that is. She might know something I don’t. She might like to talk about faces.
Imagine only a tree branch could touch your face for it to feel good.
Sometimes, I want to ask strangers what they see when they look at me. I wonder, could my words persuade their vision?
Someone calls me ma’am and everything powers off in my brain while I try to reboot; they’re talking to someone I’ve forgotten about, someone I purposely left behind, in a photograph two years ago. The picture: the wall behind her is a cold lilac and she stares you in the eye with her mouth tight, the flattest it can go. She looks like a shiver in the snow, like she already knows she’s fading away. That’s the last photo I took as a girl.
I started weekly intramuscular injections of testosterone cypionate into my upper thigh at age 19. What you do is, you put a thicker needle on the end of the syringe so you can draw the viscous oil up from the vial, and then you switch it out for a thinner needle so you don’t rip your muscle up when it goes in. You’ve got to whip the needle down fast enough to slide it into the skin before your brain can stop you.
The first time, it takes me fifteen minutes to work myself up enough to do it. Sometimes, your mind fakes you out and decides not to go through with it, but momentum jabs the needle two centimeters into your leg anyway, so you’re stuck pushing it down slowly, until it hits the muscle.
Imagine you depend on this process to look like yourself. Imagine you don’t exist without this substance.
I step off the bus at my stop and see Alana leaning against the shelter, waiting for me. She looks older, longer, like she fits into her body now. She sees me and straightens up. For a moment, confusion wrinkles her face and I hold still, rigid with guilt. I’ve never known how to tell her (I’m someone else now). We both stand there watching, unsure.
The girl in my head, she’ll only talk on the phone. She doesn’t want you to look at her. She wants you to stomp on her foot when you pass her on the street, and she wants it to be an accident. At night, she wanders around in the dark, she digs in the dirt with her fingernails and drags mud up her forearms. The skin on the back of her hands is cracking and flakey. She thinks it’s funny not to moisturize.
I lift my hand and give a small wave: an invitation, an apology. Alana’s face hints at the faintest smile and she steps towards me. She branches an arm out to meet mine.
“You made it,” she says.
“I made it,” I say, and we clasp hands.
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Willow Campbell graduated from Kent State University with a B.S. in Filmmaking and a minor in Creative Writing. Their fiction has appeared in American Literary Review and Glass Mountain Magazine. In 2020, they wrote the short film “Bending” which premiered at The New York Lift-Off Film Festival and was chosen as an Official Selection at the My True Colors Film Festival in NYC. Willow is an emerging writer, 24 years old, and lives in Lakewood, Ohio.
Social Media Instagram: @unbroken.blue |
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