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Chapter Five
Summary: Chapter Five
By the time Therese Anne Carter arrived in Los Angeles from El Dorado, Arkansas, he had become Reese. On the journey from Arkansas to California, Reese cut his hair, changed his wardrobe, adjusted the way he walked, and began covering his breasts with bandages. Through Reese’s cleaning job at a local gym near UCLA, Reese learns where to get testosterone injections. A muscled man named Thad tells Reese to come back to him when he has enough money to buy the steroids. After a month of saving, Reese returns to Thad and shoots up steroids for the first time inside a dingy bar bathroom. Seven years later, after numerous other shady purchases of steroids, Reese scarcely believes that Therese Anne Carter is anything other than a name on a birth certificate.
After the Halloween party where they first met, Jude discovers that Reese works at the local gym, and begins running there, even though she prefers running outside. Reese recognizes Jude as the girl from the party. As they begin to talk, Jude learns that Reese’s dream is to become a professional photographer. Reese offers to show Jude his work and the two begin meeting on Saturdays in the campus darkroom. One Saturday, Reese tells Jude about his transition. Jude responds that this is all new to her but understands the desire to be someone else.
As a child, Jude believed that through magic she could lighten her skin. When magic didn’t work, she obsessed over a skin cream that she found advertised in Jet magazine that claimed to lighten skin. Unable to raise the money for the jar of cream on her own, Jude showed the ad to Adele, who proceeded to create her own skin lightening concoctions for Jude. After a week of using her grandmother’s products, however, Jude’s skin did not lighten, leaving her instead with a greasy face. Reese tells Jude she has “beautiful skin,” making Jude uncomfortable, as she believes that people are only called beautiful out of a sense obligation.
Reese and Jude become inseparable, spending more and more time together. On the weekends Jude accompanies Reese as he takes photos around town of decaying buildings, graffitied walls, and herself. Though Reese and Jude are not romantically involved, Jude begins to develop feelings for him. Brushing off Erika’s insinuation that Reese and Jude are together, Jude wonders if they aren’t more than friends, having shared so much of her personal and past life with Reese. When Reese asks, Jude tells him about the first time she kissed a boy. Jude was sixteen, running laps behind a barn, when Lonnie, a bully from school, approached her. Contrary to what Jude thought, Lonnie had actually paid attention to Jude, remarking impressively about her unique running style. When the lights of the barn flickered on, Lonnie and Jude ran behind the barn and kissed.
Jude shares this story of her first kiss on the rooftop of their friend Barry’s apartment building. Earlier that evening, Barry had performed drag as Bianca at a nightclub called Mirage. During the day, Barry is a schoolteacher, but twice a month performs drag as Bianca, and typically has an afterparty at his apartment with “the girls,” the other drag queens. Reese does not go into detail about his first kiss with a girl from church when he was Therese. Jude does not tell Reese about meeting with Lonnie at night for weeks after their first kiss, feeling safe that they would not be caught in the dark of the night. When Early eventually caught them, Jude acknowledged that Lonnie was not her boyfriend, because a boyfriend would not have needed to hide their relationship. Jude felt it was enough that Lonnie had even noticed her. On the rooftop, Reese notices a shivering Jude, and offers her his jacket.
Backstage at the Mirage, Barry expresses his incomprehension regarding Jude and Reese’s relationship. Reese convinces Barry to tutor Jude, who is falling behind in chemistry. In exchange for Barry’s help, Jude accompanies Barry to the mall when he needs to buy makeup. Jude learns how Barry and Reese met seven years ago at a disco club. Barry boldly approached Reese, but Reese politely declined his advancements. Barry continues to suggest that there is something more to their relationship and Jude recalls moments when she felt like Reese’s girlfriend and a moment when Reese said as much jokingly.
Jude does not return to Mallard for the summer. Instead, she moves in with Reese, and during the week Jude works at the music library. On the weekends, Reese and Jude explore the city, going to the National History Museum, dancing at Mirage, or whale watching in Long Beach. One night in July, Jude walks in on a shirtless Reese, and notices the bruises on his chest caused by the bandages. Jude remarks that she doesn’t care what Reese looks like and asks him to remove the bandages if they are hurting him. Reese lashes out at Jude, saying it’s not about her, and closes the door in her face.
Jude flees to Barry’s apartment and spends the night on his couch. At three in the morning, Jude awakens to a drunken Reese knocking on the door. Reese apologizes to Jude and tells her about an operation to remove his breasts. Jude apologizes for suggesting that she was special. Reese kisses Jude and assures her that she is special to him. The following evening the girls throw a party that Jude reluctantly attends. Jude avoids Reese, worried that he regrets kissing her. When a city-wide blackout shuts off all the lights, Reese comforts Jude by telling her that the kiss was not a mistake, and the two go back to their apartment and spend the night together.
Analysis: Chapter Five
In this chapter, Bennett explores the theme of creating an identity in the face of social disapproval. Reese has left behind his family in order to physically embody the male identity he has always had. In doing so, he is able to shed the female identity that has trapped him his entire life. His physical appearance as male is crucial for living as his true self. When Jude walks in on Reese binding his breasts, Reese’s anger indicates his shame of his body. Jude tells Reese that she doesn’t care what he looks like, but Jude doesn’t understand that for Reese, appearing masculine and being masculine are integral to his identity. Jude, however, never sees Reese as anything but the man he is. For Jude, growing up dark-skinned in a light-skinned town meant that who she was or wanted to be was often in conflict with how she was perceived. Her attempts to lighten her skin are an endeavor to gain societal acceptance. As she grows up, she seeks places where she can inhabit her Blackness in glory and love. She finds these moments of pleasure and power in being perceived just as she is with Reese. Together, Reese and Jude find a way to affirm each other in the identities that society has criticized and marginalized.
This chapter also explores the theme of the past living on in the present. Jude’s relationship with Lonnie is like her parents’ relationship in reverse. Jude’s father Sam was a sweet talker who showed affection to Desiree to woo her and win her over. But once he had her love, he became abusive and even homicidal. Lonnie starts off by being abusive to Jude. He taunts her ceaselessly about her skin color for her entire life and hurts her physically before wooing her into a secret relationship as a teen. Afterward, in the same way her mother is ashamed of her relationship with Sam, Jude is ashamed of her relationship with Lonnie. Early also plays a role in both relationships. Just as Early helped Desiree escape Sam’s abuse, Early helps Jude escape someone who is taking advantage of her. Jude even draws the parallel between how special both Lonnie and her father make her feel. Her feelings suggest that in submitting to Lonnie, Jude was repeating her mother’s past and seeking out a way to be closer to her absent father.
The dual ability of darkness to both obscure and protect shows up in Jude’s romantic trysts. Both of her romantic moments in this chapter take place in the dark. When she is with Lonnie, the darkness hides what they are doing, and Jude convinces herself that the darkness removes the racial inequality she suffers during the daytime. Jude doesn’t want to see, or even truly acknowledge, that she is with a boy who abused her, and the darkness provides a cover for her shame. She feels secure in the dark, and it isn’t until Reese shines a metaphorical light on her that she begins to acknowledge her pain. When she starts to move toward a romantic relationship with Reese, the two find each other in a blackout. Even in the dark, she recognizes Reese, and she realizes that Reese is someone who sees her intrinsic worth. Like his camera lens, Reese understands Jude’s unique beauty and identity. In this scene, darkness provides safety and comfort as Jude and Reese begin to navigate a complicated romantic relationship.
