Felix Ever After

by Kacen Callender

What does it feel like, to love someone so much that you’re willing to publicly bare your heart and soul with a black Sharpie?

I know that, as a trans person of color, my life expectancy is in my early thirties, just because of the sort of violence people like me face every day.

People are dancing against each other, against the walls, against the bar, against the speakers, as if everyone’s been cursed to dance until they die.

Go on, Once More, with Feeling 🧛

There’s a song that Declan tells me played in that Amy Adams alien movie that has me burying my face into my pillow so he won’t hear me cry, because there’s something about that song, the highs and lows and depth,

Max Richter’s On the Nature of Daylight, breaks my heart every single time I hear it. Castle Rock, season one just about killed me. Seriously, who cries that much for fictional characters 🥹

Changing this world, yes—we need people who will fight for our rights, fight for justice in the courts so that it will be better for the next generation. But creating our own world, not just for ourselves in our bubble, but one that can spread to those who need it most—one filled with our stories, our history, our love and pride—that’s just as beautiful. That’s just as necessary. Without that, we forget ourselves. Crumple under the pain of feeling isolated, unaccepted by others, without realizing that, above all else, we need to love and accept ourselves first.”

“I’m not flaunting anything. I’m just existing. This is me. I can’t hide myself. I can’t disappear. And even if I could, I don’t fucking want to. I have the same right to be here. I have the same right to exist.”

The people he’ll never be able to meet, to learn from and love.