About time.

I have found a publisher and will soon have a real "Hold in your hands" type of book printed.

If you would like to purchase a copy (estimated to be about 18 dollars- US, including shipping)
please let me know, as I am trying to give the publisher some estimate on pre-orders.

Also, if you would like a personalized – signed copy – we are working out how we might be able to do that as well.

Please send me notes/messages, etc. and I will try to keep everyone up to date as things move along.

Thanks in advance for the support.

e.


updates- thanks to everyone for the msgs. I am making a list- -** updated shipping details -here.

I laid my head on his shoulder, hearing the gentle thrum of his heartbeat. I sighed contentedly as he reached up and idly started running his fingers through my hair. He looked down into my eyes and kissed me, his lips soft and warm against mine.

"You're very beautiful, you know that?" He stroked my cheek, his finger tracing along the edge of my jawline. It scraped quietly as it trailed over a patch of stubble on my chin. My face turned hot with shame and embarrassment, feeling the scrape again as I looked down, away from him. "I'm really not."

"Mmmmmm, yes you are," he whispered into my ear, kissing the top of my head. "You have beautiful eyes and luxuriant hair," His fingers drifted along familiar trails, down my neck and collarbone, then across my shoulders. "Soft, smooth skin." I felt goosebumps under his fingers as they slid down my side, gently following the shape of my breast, my waist, my hip. "These curves." He stroked a small, slow circle around my hip bone. "Even this." He laid his hand softly over the bulge at my groin.

"But...I'm not...my body..." I trailed off, throat closing up with emotion.

"Shhh," he kissed my forehead and wrapped his arms around me, rocking slightly. "You're a wonderful girl. I love your body. I love you." I clung to him as he hugged me reassuringly, protectively. And for the first time I can remember, I stopped being afraid.

Today I was offered a summer job in an area I've never had any interest in working.

Let me start again.

Last year, nearly exactly a year ago, I began rowing.

I still don't really know why. Since then, I've won three medals in two easy races and one that I worked hard for. My erg scores are dropping; today I did one for the first time since a minor but irritating injury and was a few points of a second off my BP.

However. I have no desire to face another competitive season. Australia is hot. I remember sitting out on mirror-like water, sweat dripping down off the points of my elbows, oars already slipping beneath my fingers. Forty degrees before 10 am. Two races later they cancelled for the day. (There are also several social issues, coaching issues, my general desire to get out of this fucking house out of this fucking skin I want a different name and different parents and a different life.)

Today, my coach asked if I'd like to coach school girls. I used to teach. I used to teach kids how to ride horses, and I loved it.

And now I am 22 and scared of everything. No one ever told me 22 was going to be like this. I feel a little let down by everyone else in my life. Why didn't anyone say, you're going to be 22 and lying on the floor listening to New Politics splitting the last of your bank account between comic books and a bottle of wine. I don't know if it would have helped. I just thought it would be a little less me and my friends struggling to stand up against the weight of the world.

"I need to go back to therapy" is something I tell myself no less than twenty times a day.

If I take the job I'm stuck here... Somehow I have gotten it into my head that the most suitable response to defining my own personal issues with gender is to escape from everyone I know. I want to leave.

(Your head is a mess, Alexander. You need to go back to fucking therapy. (It's so much more difficult than that. Money. My parents. The right therapist. In this fucking city? You gotta be kidding me. (I just don't want someone to tell me I'm broken. I get enough of that from myself.)))

I don't want the job. I was offered the job while I lay on the floor still sweating from the first erg I've done in a month, ankle over ice and scarcely able to hear over the sound of the gym's music (my iPod today). I said I would think about it, but I don't want it. I don't want anything to do with the outdoors in the Australian summer. (I want to book a ticket for New Zealand leaving the day after my final exam.)

Look. Sorry. This is a whining shitstorm. I ditch you and then I come back and expect... I dunno. A hug and someone to tell me what to do. I know what to do. I need to finish this year. Graduate, fine-a-fucking-ly. Get a job. A real bonafide 9-5 proper paying job like a real goddamn adult.

Move out. Change my name. Take a holiday. Learn how to have uncomfortable conversations.

I'd ask for a hug, but I'm not really a fan of physical proximities anymore.

In keeping with the E2 tradition...

広島

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