Inappropriation Read online

  Her grandmother looks affronted by Ziggy’s obfuscations, but the word transhuman will not be useful to a loopy sex-elf in sheepskin.

  “You inspired me,” Ziggy says, brightly. “With your colonoscopy videos.”

  Now Twinkles clutches her fur collar. “Pippi!” she rasps, appalled and titillated. “What you filming?”

  “Just interesting stuff at school . . . the social dynamics.”

  Ziggy’s grandmother clasps her hands together then breaks into a rapturous shimmy. “I knew you have the artistic eye! You used to draw those beautiful horses and the ladies with big breasts . . .”

  Ziggy had forgotten her preadolescent coloring pencil phase. It is true that she spent many hours hunched over “fashion sketches” of women with gigantic boobs.

  “I guess it’s kind of like that,” she grants.

  “My Pippi have the eye.”

  Twinkles buys her the GoPro, the glasses, a flexible tripod, and the two straps.

  “Early birthday present,” she says with a wink, though Ziggy knows there will still be several enormous, chintzy kaftans on the actual day.

  Ziggy removes her new camera from its cardboard casing and slips it on, then does the same with the glasses. She takes a slow panorama of the room and experiences a light, dizzying euphoria. Striding to the exit, they meet the assistant again at the doors.

  “Looking good,” he says, grinning sweetly at her grandmother.

  Ziggy nods once and keeps walking, realizing now that the man is merely a beta.

  WHEN SHE GETS HOME, the Wednesday group is in session. Ziggy has been noticing a sociodemographic shift in Ruth’s clients. More blond highlights, less witchy capes. More swollen upper lips and less mobility of the eyebrows. There are Israelites in her house.

  The constellation they are doing centers around a fitness granny in a steel-colored safari suit with a nuclear tan, slicked bouffant, and indoor sunglasses. She looks like a very glamorous moray eel. Like one of Twinkles’s friends; women who sit on the United Israel Appeal board and order gigolos while holidaying in Surfers Paradise.

  “Janet,” says Ruth, “how’s the anxiety?”

  The powdered eel shakes her head aggressively. “I’m afraid I am still struggling to tolerate my own vitality.”

  Within minutes, Ziggy’s mother has diagnosed Janet’s inherited Holocaust trauma. “You’re reacting as if there was still something to fight or flee,” Ruth explains. “But the war ended before you were even born.”

  Now she orders all the blond women into a line of penitent Germans. Once they are assembled—straight-backed and unsmiling—Janet eyes them skeptically. Then, with great vitality, she again rattles her head.

  “My mother is a narcissist,” says Janet. “She gave me an eating disorder.”

  Ruth’s voice is silky. “Sometimes when a child doesn’t get the necessary parental mirroring—”

  “I know all that stuff. It makes no difference. I’m still screaming at waitresses.”

  “Right,” says Ruth, clapping her hands together with spurious pragmatism. “Let’s talk to your mother.” She nods at Rowena, who rises and walks into the center of the circle. The towering woman faces the Germans, her arms slightly rounded in maternal receptivity.

  “Mother,” says Ruth, “how do you feel standing in front of these Germans?”

  Rowena pauses, shuts her eyes, and appears to look inward. She places a hand on her chest. “I feel anxious,” she says. “Like I’m not safe here.”

  “Good,” says Ruth. “And does it feel safe here for your daughter?”

  Rowena shakes her head. Ziggy can see that Janet is cringing.

  “You’ve really tried to protect her, haven’t you, Mother?”

  Rowena nods. “I have.”

  “Let’s tell her that.” Ruth smiles at Rowena and makes a rotating motion with her hand, like she is twisting on a tap. Rowena turns to face Janet. The scowling elder lowers her insectoid sunglasses.

  “I’m sorry,” says Janet, squinting violently at Rowena. “But how am I supposed to believe that this person here knows how a ninety-five-year-old female Holocaust survivor feels?”

  “That’s an excellent question, Janet.” Ziggy can tell Ruth is grinding her teeth. “And the answer is: you don’t have to believe it. But you might want to consider the possibility that there are universal energies we can all tap into.”

  “And why would I want to do that? I don’t want to know how my mother feels or how he thinks my mother feels, and I sure as shit don’t want to know how that stupid-looking line of Germans feels. Especially when they’re just depressed housewives from the Eastern Suburbs.” Janet stands. “Sorry,” she says. “And also: not sorry.”

  The women watch Janet charge across the room, up the stairs, and out the front door. A petite redhead frantically pets the Shiba Inu scratching itself in her lap.

  “Sybilla,” Ruth snaps. “Please take Fennel outside.”

  The woman springs up, scolding her insolent fluffball all the way out to the yard.

  Ziggy can’t believe her luck. The GoPro has captured everything. She pans across the room: from her mother’s flushed grimace to the scandalized Israelites to Rowena’s calmly contemptuous glare. Then, for no discernible reason, Ruth looks up. She sees Ziggy peering down at them, the red light winking from her forehead.

  “Jesus, Ziggy!”

  Ruth calls an emergency tea break and comes bolting up the stairs. But Ziggy feels prepared, braced on the Sofa of a Thousand Tears to reject her mother’s life philosophy. Now she is excited to come out. Ziggy has the upper hand: her transformation has nothing to do with the human body.

  “Firstly, no borrowing Jacob’s stuff without his permission, and secondly, no cameras when the women are here.”

  “It’s mine and it isn’t coming off.”

  “It’s yours?”

  Ziggy nods. A dull electricity buzzes through her. She gets Ruth squarely in the frame. “I’m trans.”

  “Gender?” Ruth’s eye is twitching.

  “Mostly human.”

  “Well, that’s a relief!”

  Ziggy’s death stare lets her mother know this is not the time for levity. “Transhuman.”

  “What’s transhuman?”

  “Like cyborgs.”

  “Like robots?”

  “I’ll send you a link.”

  “A link? Is this an art project?”

  “No, actually, it’s a type of identity.”

  Ruth’s face goes soft and rosy. She giggles. “Zigs, what?”

  “I’m sorry that I don’t subscribe to the Magnetic Poles theory.” Ziggy glances down over the railing. She has a perfect aerial of a beige bob scrolling through her Instagram. “Gender is more existential for me,” Ziggy says with heavy condescension. “As in, it doesn’t exist.”

  Ruth nods at the camera. “I don’t see what that has to do with gender.”

  “Because you’re dated.”

  “Dated?”

  “You’re not even on Facebook, you think all women have to have vaginas—I could go on.”

  “You were watching that constellation!” Ruth whispers forcefully. “If I’m so dated, why would I let a transgender woman with size-sixteen shoes play a nonagenarian female Holocaust survivor?”

  Ziggy shrugs. “Because you believe in magic?”

  “I chose Rowena to play Janet’s mother because she’s a woman and because she is a survivor.”

  Ziggy waits for her mother to continue, but Ruth goes quiet, rubbing her forehead roughly, perhaps realizing she’s said too much. Ruth looks down at her hands and pinches the skin around her wedding band. They have the same fingers, but Ruth’s nails are painted, her skin is looser and pearly with cream.

  “This might be hard for your generation to understand,” says Ziggy, “but I refuse to submit to your biological categories.”

  “So you’re not a girl?”

  “Or a boy.”

  “Are you Jewish?”

&
nbsp; Ziggy considers this. “I guess so.”

  “Are you white?”

  “Obviously.”

  “But if it’s all just imaginary, couldn’t you also be black?”

  “That’s offensive.”

  “So you’re a white Jewish transhuman?”

  Ziggy knows she is being mocked. “Transhumans are orphans.”

  Her mother laughs sharply. “So who’s paying your school fees now, Google?”

  “GoPro is an independent company and you are not the boss of me.”

  Ruth’s hurt pours amoeba-like into the camera lens. But even in her mother’s pain, Ziggy still sees the smug puff of her beauty. She turns away, angling the camera down between the railings.

  Ruth’s voice is small. “Stop. Filming. The women.”

  Ziggy tilts the camera ceilingward. “I’ll send you the link.”

  Ruth nods stoically then begins her woeful descent to the living room. When her mother is out of sight, Ziggy slinks back between the bars, points the camera down, and continues to film the women.

  THAT NIGHT, ZIGGY SENDS the Haraway essay to her whole family. Subject heading: FYI. Jacob has tricky follow-up questions and ridicule; her father says she should enroll in a photography course then signs off with a gay sequence of emojis. Ruth doesn’t respond at all. Ziggy assumes her mother thinks this is a phase and the less attention you give it, the quicker it will die. Which is fine with Ziggy. The less seriously Ruth takes her, the less likely it is Ziggy will be forced into psychotherapy. She knows her mother has too much pride to refer Ziggy to a psychiatrist. Ruth writes the school psychological evaluation note on her own letterhead, using terms like aggressive super-ego and healthy id expression.

  Newly trans, Ziggy returns to her subreddit. She tells them that she has finally started wearing a strap-on and stopped straightening her hair.

  as a jewish ally,

  she clarifies. The subreddit are very supportive.

  jew-fros welcome!

  warning ziggy: now white ppl will try 2 touch ur hair.

  She is moved by their inclusion. It feels too late now to explain that she is not exactly like them. And for the purposes of a unified front, it even feels unnecessary. Ziggy has read enough to know her struggle is similar to theirs. At least metaphorically. Which gives her new confidence to post comments on a wide range of issues. She even responds to a thread about abolishing incarceration—offering loose facts and a creative interpretation of Australia’s own racial genocide.

  theyre trying 2 end the aboriginal race,

  Ziggy informs the Americans.

  they send all the men 2 jail so theyre forced 2 turn gay and all the aboriginal wives have 2 become lesbians.

  whats wrong with being gay or lesbian??

  nothing but our opposition leader thinks all lgbtq should be electrocuted . . .

  #@$%*!!!

  . . . so it seems like part of the plan 4 a whiter australia.

  Ziggy’s queer friends are horrified but credulous. Australia, they agree, has always seemed an intolerant place. They applaud Ziggy for being brave enough to call herself trans and wear what sounds like a very pronounced codpiece.

  Riffling through her wardrobe, Ziggy decides trans means black hoodie paired with baggy shorts or tracksuit pants. She feels anonymous and free in her new uniform—as though she is part of some large technical crew setting up an important scientific instrument like the Hadron Collider. Ziggy is not dressing like any particular gender. She is dressing like she has more important things to do than get dressed up.

  THE NEXT DAY, ZIGGY GETS permission to wear the glasses and the GoPro with its FPV strap at school. The Chesty, she has to keep for weekends. The teachers are briefed on Ziggy’s apparatus, and an email goes around to all the girls, a kind of press release on the sudden advent of transgenderism and the enduring tolerance of Kandara’s community. There are various links to supplemental reading material—the Haraway essay as well as Amazon pages for Philip K. Dick, Transgender History, and several celebrity memoirs. That morning, Ziggy explains to her English class that these texts are more of a gateway drug to understanding her singular condition.

  “I’m not saying I feel like a boy,” she verifies, cautiously, for Dr. LeStrange. “Or even a robot. The point is: my experience is unique and nobody can understand it.”

  Her teacher nods wearily. “Yes, I can’t think of a single book from the perspective of a GoPro. But I’m sure the genre is imminent.”

  The rest of the class seem too annoyed to argue. Which Ziggy finds a little disappointing.

  The only person who demands more information is Tessa, despite the fact that Ziggy’s old friend appears to no longer identify as anything aside from a heterosexual nymphomaniac. After class, the former cyborg confronts Ziggy at her locker.

  “Did you even read Haraway’s essay?”

  “Better than you, apparently.” Ziggy’s confidence continues to surprise her; she has never stood up to Tessa before. Admittedly, the camera gives her a few extra inches. “Haraway says you dissolve borders by sharing metaphorical affinities.”

  “You think you’re dissolving borders by wearing a camera on your head?”

  “You think you’re dissolving borders by being a fag hag?”

  “Feminists don’t call people hags, dickhead.”

  “When will you learn to take a joke?”

  “Maybe when I don’t need a prosthetic but decide to start wearing one anyway.”

  But this is Ziggy’s point. It’s about staying open. And staying up-to-date.

  “Feminism is redundant.”

  Tessa shakes her head. “You’re mental.”

  “Ablest.” Ziggy is smiling, but Tessa has started slowly backing away.

  “Very dramatic,” Ziggy teases.

  “I am seriously not acting now.” And even though her sliding feet resemble the somber glides of a Noh theater performer, Tessa’s disgust looks disturbingly authentic.

  SOME OF HER PEERS GIVE ZIGGY understanding smiles and winks of encouragement; others cower from the camera in shame. Several girls want to know why, if she’s trans, Ziggy isn’t switching to Randalls? So Ziggy informs them, again, that they have misunderstood; technically she could attend either Randalls or Kandara but just prefers to be around girls. Ziggy is stealthy with her filming, but her schoolmates still seem leery. A buzz follows her through the halls, and though she can’t tell if it is fear, disgust, or pity, Ziggy finds she can coast along on a heady mix of all three. At recess she sometimes sits in a toilet stall and just records the audio, but her lunchtimes are solely reserved for stalking the Cates. Ziggy trails the four girls around as they sunbake all over campus. She makes a game of it—filming from behind drink fountains and trash cans as they expel year sevens from the tennis courts or stake out the oval’s coveted far corner—the only lunch spot visible to vehicular traffic. During Tuesday detentions, Ziggy captures Cate and Kate yoga-stretching in a sliver of sunlight outside the hot young history teacher’s classroom.

  Every afternoon, observing the Cates also constitutes Ziggy’s homework. She replays her footage, listening for veiled insults and gossip and language that could be construed as racist. It is painful to hear Lex laugh at Cate’s jokes, but it is also motivating. Ziggy makes a folder on her desktop and fills it with clips. She isn’t sure why, but collecting footage of the Cates feels necessary. She also just likes watching them. The way they use each other’s bodies to lounge and pose, the physical symmetries they create, and their pure abstract girliness are all strangely pleasurable to her. Watching the Cates on her screen, Ziggy’s head rings with shrill purpose, her whole body humming. It is, she imagines, the closest a computer might get to masturbation.

  Ziggy’s hobby only starts to feel political two weeks later, when the Cates announce their self-appointment to the formal committee and the evening’s multiple locations and costs. The committee has chosen the Double Bay hotel where Michael Hutchence auto-asphyxiated, for the glamor and sens
e of event. There will be mocktails in the lounge, followed by a three-course dinner and thank-you speeches to the formal committee. The after party is at Embassy, which will be closed to anyone not wearing a fluorescent-yellow wristband. Alcohol will be served because Suze Lansell-Jones plays doubles with the club’s owner and he agrees that girls just want to have fun—especially when the event is private and the local cops owe him favors. Lex will choose the music; the floral arrangements go to Kate; Fliss has already decided on the deconstructed Pavlova to be served just after Cate Lansell-Jones presents Tiffany bracelets to the four of them for organizing such a fucking great formal. Right now, the evening comes in at three hundred and fifty dollars per head. Girls should pay for their dates unless they bring their boyfriends, and then the boys—assuming they attend Randalls and aren’t scholarship students from the Western Suburbs—should pay for them. Because they can only get the club on a Sunday night, Monday will be a holiday for all year-ten students.

  It is clear to Ziggy that the formal committee is not representing the needs of their constituents. The Double Bay hotel is now dull and stuffy; most of them don’t even know who Michael Hutchence was. A lot of students will go into debt paying for themselves and their formal dates—or worse, not be able to attend at all. Embassy is not a place many of them will feel comfortable—especially with the doorman judging their apparel as Cate has threatened he is paid to do. The Christians and girls with strict parents will have to forfeit the after party altogether. Gone is the lively tone and thrill of possibility that accompanied early talk of the formal. Everyone is now religiously following Cate’s formal fashion Tumblr. Daily, a different girl arrives at school with a shopping bag spooling receipts, hoping to return an erroneous purchase after class. Ziggy, of course, will not be going to the formal. But she has an acute sense of the unfairness inflicted upon her peers. At certain unhinged moments she’ll catch one of them scowling at a Cate or an otherwise disengaged student will challenge some female stereotype in class discussion. And then there are the anonymous frustrated screams that carry over hourly from the bathrooms. From her favorite stall one recess, Ziggy listens to the violin prodigy telling the stoner card players that she’s heard some girls are refusing to pay their formal deposits.