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One of the best things about being trans - it’s not the best thing,
but it’s absolutely up there among the best things -
is the network.
The rings of us online, in person, in libraries, in workplaces,
in homes across the world, unseen.
Sharing, constantly.
We share everything.
There’s a lot of learning involved in being trans, so perhaps it’s only reasonable.
We relearn how to dress, we relearn how to walk, we relearn how our bodies work.
We learn to adapt to the pain - for example - of an epilator.
We learn how to adapt to the pain of the cynicism of our families.
We learn how to adapt to the pain of bullying, and hatred.
When one person has a victory, a hundred other people celebrate with them.
When one person is knocked down, a hundred people pick them back up again.
From testimonies from her friends, we know that Brianna built one such network around her.
We know that she celebrated her friends, we know that she picked strangers back up again.
We know that she lead others in doing the same.
Trans people share everything.
We share the minute details of the compositions of our blood streams.
We share scripts to read out to psychiatrists, so that they’ll believe us,
and let us through to the next stage of our trials.
We share long strings of hexadecimal,
corresponding to wallets on blockchains that won’t exist tomorrow.
And then, we wait.
We wait and we hope together.
And when tomorrow comes, we hope that discrete brown packages
will arrive in our mailboxes so our lives can start.
And when those lives end. When they end prematurely
- and they frequently do - then we share our fury.
In the month of September last year I woke up, and Brianna woke up to
30 articles a day in the British press implying us to be rapists.
Perverts. Confused. Stupid. Unwell.
Dangers to society.
And now Brianna is dead.
And she is not the last.
This is not the last time we will hold a vigil here.
This is not the last time.
Thank you for your time.
(Then to the police presence, that has now arrived at the vigil)
Good evening, Officer!