Chapter 43

Appetite gone! Maybe it was my interpretation but I left Charles feeling there were 4 possibilities:- infertility, infection, incapacity or death from infection or inaction.

Rather than wait for Litara in reception I phoned to say I was going to Tower Bridge and would call later in the day to arrange a get-together. I turned my phone off and walked first to Westminster Bridge back-tracking the route I taken the first time I'd gone to the clinic and then decided I wanted to cross as many bridges as was practical on my way downstream to Tower Bridge.

Bridges are special: much water flows under them; they are not to be burnt before or after you cross them; to be tested before you cross them; but not to be crossed before you get to them, and they're rarely repaired before someone falls in! There were a lot of similarities between my situation today and Bill's nearly 60 years earlier in being unexpectedly confronted with infertility then making a new life with a huge amount of financial power to wield. Bill's life didn't seem so bad and he was even going to marry the love of his life. I had more possibilities than him for with surgery, including a hysterectomy, I could choose to live as either a man or a woman, something unrealistic for Bill when young even if he wished it.

What possible rationale would lead me to risk either a life of sexual incapacity or even death on an untested, possibly crackpot, medical treatment? Three hours of that I had going around my head with my feet and back hurting more and more. Being a woman is a pain!

At last by Tower Bridge on the North side of the river I found St Katherine's Dock where I sat and phoned Litara.

"You inconsiderate, self-centred bitch! Where the hell have you been and why did you turn your phone off?"

"I love you too Sis! Can we play some music together tonight?"

My hearing may take a little time to recover from the shriek Litara let loose down the phone but in our usual way having let her vent I agreed to pick up some food and meet her at the flat at 5:30pm and we'd go to the pub for their 'film-folk night' at about 8:30pm.

* * * * * *

If I were a proper considerate sister I would have made something special to say sorry but I saw some beautiful mushrooms that looked lonely for some zingy beef and cream along with a fresh baked baguette so stroganoff it was which I must say Litara didn't complain about. As I cooked and picked clothes for the evening and cleaned the kitchen, which Litara had let get into a bit of a state, the details of my day came out. Over dinner we even discussed the options which got silly when she told me look into the mirror opposite us and imagine myself as a man.

"I can't do it! I don't even have a picture in my mind of what a man is - Sylvester Stallone, Michael Jackson, William Hague… ? They aren't exactly easy to identify with."

"Try Dad… Try our father."

"OK, I can see Dad in a second but I'm nothing like Dad. He's the nicest person I know and I'm nothing like that."

"Yes he's nice and I love him but there isn't a sane man on the planet who wouldn't be afraid to make Dad angry. With him protecting you those men in the car park have got to consider themselves lucky to survive in one piece!"

"How does that help me visualise myself as a man? Comparing myself to Dad is like a gazelle comparing itself to a grizzly bear."

"Yet, my sweet little gazelle, nobody but mum and I has ever bullied you. Have you never wondered why? Nobody teased you when you swapped trousers for skirts. Do you think that is normal? Living as Dai you couldn't see who you were even though it was plain to others but now you have seen that you are Venus that part of you that you ignored is staring you in the face and you are scared shitless by who you are!"

"No. Sorry Sis but I just don't get it. Let's go party down the the pub before they call last orders!"

Once there I saw several people I recognised from my last visit but without Serena to bounce off or Jean-Luc to get angry at I probably drank a bit to much which is how Litara got me to sing to her guitar playing the song I'd wallowed in when I was about 14, Stevie Nicks' Landslide. How far did I get into it? Not far before it made me want to throw up in self-disgust so I stopped Litara playing and got the karaoke guy to put on a track and climbing first onto a chair and then a table started to clap my hands over my head to the beat. Some moments are just right and in a bar where over half the customers were men everyone was singing Sisters are doing it for themselves.

Every evening has to end but but I was still on a high when back at the flat I looked in the mirror that defeated me earlier and said "Who loves ya pussycat?"