You hate standing in line for the DMV. It is busy, the clerks are rude, and the other customers keep complaining as to why no one has given you a wheelchair yet. You do not need one today, and the clerks already offered one, and you turned it down. Your Hypermobile Ehlers Danlos Syndrome is not a convenient all-or-nothing disability this country’s comprehension is built upon. Today you have the energy to use your cane, but your lack of balance is forcing you to put too much of your weight onto your left hand holding that cane, and now you are afraid of falling down. You wish you were the good kind of girl who takes any offer of advice from strangers even when they’re wrong because it is nicer to stroke someone’s ego than it is to correct it. Asking for a wheelchair now would make you look like a phony, or the kind of woman whose nos are capable of being watered-down into a yes after much convincing, so you struggle to stand erect and suffer from the consequences of your actions.
You’ve never made it this far into the building. Five years ago you stood outside the door, peering in shamefully as if an indecent act was going on inside. It sure seems that way, what with all the naked bodies, but this is the new legal normal. A kind teenager on her eighteenth birthday opened the door for you. You are certain of this, because she looked young, and eighteen is the legal mandate to transition to a True ID. You remember how dry her face looked with all that powder and how pale she looked for starving herself for so long, and when she encouraged you to walk in first out of dignity or pity you lied and said you forgot to bring two pieces of mail and escaped with a rideshare. Today you are here simply out of necessity. The rideshare program you use won’t accept customers over the age of eighteen without a True ID. Nor will the public transit system.
“Number 17,” the clerk says with uncanny enthusiasm.
You go up to their desk after watching them eye you up and down. Undressing you with their eyes, which is unnecessary since they will soon be undressing you for real. As you hand over your two pieces of mail and social security card, half-praying they meet the requirements and half-praying they don’t so you’ll be forced to go home, you realize that you are not disgusted by the look down. It brings you a sense of comfort. You have always wanted to be catcalled, at least once in-person. You want someone to find you so desirable that they would risk being chastised or recorded or injured just to make it known that they acknowledge your existence. This is the true beauty test because catcalling is not swayed by the court of public opinion. It holds no rules other than the requirement to attempt to have the called-on hear you. You have never had this experience but know everyone close to you has. It is like when a thin person calls themselves fat in front of an actual fat person. The thin person doesn’t need the validation; they live in a society where it comes forth organically, so it is a reinforcement of their validation that comes at the expense of the existence of fat people. It is here you realize no matter how sick it sounds, the worst thing isn’t to be an object of the male gaze. The worst thing is for them to avert their gaze altogether.
“Why did you wait so long? We have a new government assistance program for low-income families,” says the clerk while ogling your currently covered private parts.
“Is there any place where you can request accommodations?” You wish you were being catcalled instead. There might be some distance there, and the person catcalling probably wouldn’t also be currently reading your home address, phone number, and social security number.
“Yeah, we can get you a wheelchair,” he snaps lazily for someone else to do his job.
“No, not that,” you say too forcefully. You know because he rears his head back like you delivered a figurative blow. “I mean an accommodation on what body parts are shown.” You lean against the glass and bring your voice to a whisper despite the loud camera flashes echoing mere feet away. “I have a condition that I would like to keep concealed for my safety.”
“No.” He clears his throat and fires off a speech with as much confidence as a child forced to say the Pledge of Allegiance in school while unaware that such an enforcement is illegal. “The state of Missouri has to abide by the government mandate that all U.S. citizens over the age of eighteen must obtain a True ID including a full-body photographic scan sans any applicable accommodations or exclusions in regard to disability, race, color, religion, gender identity, sexual orientation, pregnancy, age, and/or national origin.”
When he hands you back your mail and social security card, then forcefully stamps INVALID on your old ID, you know it is over. One security guard is already taking your purse to put on the conveyor belt while a second is beckoning you through the X-ray. You feel defenseless when the first security guard has to stop what she is doing to help the second hold you up under your arms as if you were a piece of furniture they have to maneuver through at just the right angle. You don’t understand why they do this when they could have just X-rayed your cane separately. Perhaps they are new. Or just wanted an excuse to touch you.
After they lower you down to a bench and return your cane, one of them does a poor job trying to comfort you. “Don’t worry, sweetheart, we just need these IDs to keep the terrorists out!”
Although that was one of the key selling points to the public, it is not the primary reason why the True IDs were introduced into legislation with bipartisan support. What started as an apolitical campaign to increase educational awareness and human rights for people’s bodies through the deregulation and desexualization of nakedness was quickly rebranded on the opposing side through the understanding of market plays successful via the commodification of Black and queer rights. Once corporations got a sniff of the possibilities a new social justice-originated mandate could bring, they allowed lobbyists and politicians to cross party lines to work in so-called “favor” of the American public. To force every adult to be photographed completely nude and have their pictures uploaded to a public database subjected to a minimum renewal every five years.
You stand in line for the photographs and contemplate the clerk’s stare. For about minimum wage, you figure it’s a fun game of finding out if your assumptions are correct. As the people in front of you undress, you see your own assumptions constantly being corrected. The woman who appeared to have large breasts does not actually have large breasts. The final security pat down reveals she was wearing a very sticky pair of pasties covered in foundation. The guard throws them in the trashcan aggressively and orders three more guards to give her a full cavity search for all to see. You think that maybe she is here thanks to the new government assistance program because no other person who wants to give the impression of having big boobs wouldn’t have just already gotten a boob job. This is how you actually learn about the microeconomics of supply and demand that you glazed over in your high school personal finance class.
True IDs mean true naked bodies. Sure, on a date, anyone can bring their wired bras and tight pants and padded underwear and cock rings, but after two seconds on the internet the other person can tell if you’re bluffing or not and if such bluffing is a turn-off or a turn-on. Added with the realization you have five more years to go to maintain your appearance—or any day you can afford another stop at the DMV to update your license with your new surgeries—lying is simply outdated. If one cannot afford such surgeries or is waiting to recover from a recent operation before being eligible for another one, you have to go the old-fashioned way and promise to be good in bed or willing to compensate with money. The surgeons, doctors, and gyms love this because business has never been better. Body shaming is the new religion everyone can’t wait to bandwagon on, and celebrities are forced to find new ways of proving to be worthy of mainstream attention either in the form of talent or shock value.
“Next.” The word echoes down your spine.
You stand behind a green screen. One filter will be used for your printed plastic ID that you will receive immediately that will include your weight, height, birthdate, home address, and date of mandatory renewal. This is what you will use to finally pay for public and private transportation again. Another filter will be used for the government website that will only include your photos and name and any pending charges you might have.
You wait for the security guards to strip you since they lifted you without consent in the X-ray machine. Instead, they stare at you. And the customers in line stare at you. And the customers who have finally gotten the okay to dress themselves stare at you. And you realize you have to do this yourself. Everyone wants to see what a disabled girl looks like naked. You lean against the wall and take off your jeans first, slowly, like in a stilted, shameful stripping kind of way, before making it to your shirt.
The bra comes off easily. You wear oversized sports bras not because you exercise but because they are the most comfortable and do the job of keeping your nipples covered from the public eye. It’s your white briefs that you struggle taking down. Some people call them granny panties, but that’s just an ageist and ableist term you’ve come to embrace; like a disabled grandma, you don’t just let anyone access down there, and you judge anyone you do invite with the utmost scrutiny.
“We need you off the wall for the 360 lenses to work,” the cameraperson says. You know that is a nice way of saying hurry up, and the last thing you want is to make this situation take any longer, but your hands aren’t working to push the panties down.
“I can assist you.” An eager young officer prepares to tackle your lady bits.
“No!” You fall back against the wall and hold your pelvis. The young officer hands you your fallen cane and steps back cautiously, probably afraid of the social repercussions of making a disabled woman upset. The cameraperson eyes you again and you know it’s time to comply. You close your eyes and struggle with one hand to drag your spacious underwear down while steadying yourself on nothing but your cane.
You feel the cotton fall to your ankles, but you hear the gasps from the guards and customers first. Only the cameraperson is able to contain themself, either from desensitization or through professionalism. You feel the light brush of skin from the young security guard removing your underwear by lifting your feet one at a time.
“Open,” the cameraperson says in an even tone. You only realize later they meant for you to open your eyes, but for some reason you open your mouth too—and that is when five bright cameras flash in front of you while a drone circles your entire body like the interior hose of an automatic car wash. And as much as you worry this moment will last forever, it is soon over with and no one is waiting to comfort you. The old man in line is walking in your direction while the young security guard sheepishly hands over your undergarments and clothes without making eye contact.
You make it to the bench and start dressing yourself. You are surprised by how much attention you are still receiving despite the old man now asking a security guard if he can “fix” himself before the photoshoot. You don’t want to be there a second longer, so you make as much of a dash a woman with a cane and shooting pains can before the young security guard has to insert himself into your life once again.
“Sorry, miss, but you almost forgot,” he says as he hands it over.
There it is. Printed for you; digitalized for all the world to see. Your True ID, showcasing your once privately concealed uterus didelphys, AKA two vaginas, is now available for instant download for the public.
When your best friend, Tattoo—a stage name that turned into an identity—opens the door, you can’t be more relieved. You are thankful he offered to drop you off while he completed his photoshoot for an up-and-coming hipster cat food commercial down the street. The leering clerk sees him down the hall and waves him over.
“This will be your third time this week, Tattoo! A new record.” The clerk doesn’t eye Tattoo the same. It’s like looking at a red light. Tattoo is not his type. This gives you a disturbing sense of superiority.
“I gotta wait until my contract with this new gamer energy chocolate bar gets signed, then I’ll be back. I think I deserve a punch card for a free one by now!” Tattoo waves the clerk goodbye before walking you to his car.
Tattoo, of course, never has to pay for updating his True ID. Before the mandate went into effect, Tattoo thought like a businessman and inquired with advertising companies to buy patches of his skin to market their campaigns on. He wasn’t doing too well with his acting career, but neither was anyone with all of the strikes and such; poverty made him bitter and wise. He decided being a sellout was his only way to buy into his career, and since he did something before anyone else thought to, it worked out big in his favor. Financially, anyway. It didn’t take long for Tattoo to start selling big patches of skin—he didn’t have an entertainment lawyer yet—before he realized how quickly he was running out of spaces. After getting counsel and attention from managers and agents, he went from selling by the foot to by the millimeter and gained a dedicated audience eager to watch his white skin turn blue and black and colored by major and indie name brands, sports teams, production companies, political campaigns, and the like. He didn’t realize how limiting getting his entire body tattooed in advertisements would be for auditioning though, so like any good businessman, he essentially gave up on his dreams and dove full-time into his career.
“Let’s go eat at my place,” he says. You can’t help but stare at his bloody neck, which is now sporting a crude tattoo of an animated cat licking his butt. “I got all my cameras set up there.” He’s often followed by influencers boosting their passive income through affiliate marketing or crazed bigots complaining about how he has become just another object oppressed under capitalism’s reign and an example as to why this immoral law must be repealed.
After you’ve made it to his studio apartment, he sets up his phone to project a live video. You check down to your britches despite knowing full well that you are covered up before sitting down to eat your plate of honey sweet chicken. “We want to thank today’s sponsor, Amazing Asian, for providing tonight’s mukbang. Viewers can get 25% off a weekend buffet by scanning the QR code on my left ankle!” Several summers of theatre camp facilitate Tattoo’s ability to project and enunciate his words with the confidence of the cheeriest news anchor. You try not to sneer when he props his left foot on the table so the people watching the live can easily download the coupon. Viewers could also leave the live and hit up his Linktree that keeps an updated 3D digital model of his updated True ID instead.
He turns his head from the camera so that you know he’s ready to gossip. “Did you hear that girl from the upcoming Thomas More biographic series is using temporary tattoos to promote the franchise? It’s like, okay, we get it, you’re too good for tattoos. But like, come on, either jump into the pool or lounge in the chairs and just watch like everyone else.” You know this is code for “the celebrities are finally diluting themselves into my business practices that cannot be trademarked—I tried—so this could be the end of me,” but as his friend you know you are supposed to comfort him through gaslighting.
But you are failing at that because you cannot get the white camera flashes out of your pupils, and you keep one hand hidden under the table to pull your jeans up even though the metal button is digging into your skin, and you use your other hand to hide your face between bites of sickly-sweet chicken and overcooked rice.
“Are you okay? Is it because of the True…” Tattoo stops himself in time.
“I don’t know yet.” You finally put your hand down and see the comments and response emojis on the live feed. So far they’re mostly about people reviewing Amazing Asian. Some make negative comments despite never eating there just to fight. No one says anything about your True ID yet.
“But think about the good this could be to your dedicated fanbase. The new journey you could provide them, and the new audiences that will flock to listen to your story.” Tattoo isn’t gaslighting you because this is a fact. As a fellow influencer, any way to strengthen the bond of your original fanbase while also reaching new audiences should be at the forefront of your mind. But you aren’t a savvy businesswoman.
You became a disability influencer. You don’t like how that sounds. Becoming a disability activist would’ve been sacrilegious, so you aim for the low bar and rely on the vagueness of being a public figure. Turning on a camera and talking about your Hypermobile Ehlers Danlos Syndrome at first felt like a coming out story, and in many ways it was. Your changing need for mobility aids made it easy to be bi-disabled: some people see you as able-bodied, other people see you as disabled, and then you see yourself as both since you benefit from both parties.
That pisses a lot of people off. Having an online presence is much easier than a public one, so you are sure to change your look when you leave the house to lessen the chances of getting recognized. While being a vlogger by no means provides the same financial security that Tattoo’s operation brings, it has brought you some company, even if said company is an array of avatar faces. It let you quit that paralegal job you hated because everyone thought you were a client instead of an assistant.
“Disability is my life. It’s my identity and my experience. I love being able to share that with my fans to show how disabled people don’t need pity or saviors or shortcuts to make it in this life.” While you don’t give yourself credit for being the next Judy Heumann or Alice Wong or Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha, you do truly believe in this movement and would like to think you do more than rant on the internet about problems that only affect you. “But as to everything else…”
“I get it, and we don’t have to talk about it,” Tattoo says with the utmost sincerity. You are certain he would have said this even if the two of you weren’t on live, and even if he wasn’t still an aspiring actor waiting for some random bighead to notice him and take him out of his dreary, billboard-twirling lifestyle. You don’t even bother turning to check through the comments to see if they picked up what you were about to talk about, and you reassure yourself the only viewers left are solely there to listen to the smacks and slurps of your free dinner or find out how they can get a discounted one of their own.
In Tattoo’s true fashion, he continues on as if he is interviewing himself between bites. Since his follower numbers are constantly being recounted by deleted bots and his algorithm monetized he most certainly is always in the works of presenting himself to be worthy of a continued or new brand partnership deal. “I’m just glad you got that taken care of now. This vigilante investigation podcast just had an episode where this woman was seeing this guy for like four months, but he kept putting off doing the…you know…and the woman was like, ‘Oh, what a gentleman!’ and didn’t ask to go further…until it got to the point she was ready to go further or find someone else to go all the way immediately…and so the guy was afraid she was gonna leave him, so he’s like, ‘Okay I’m ready,’ but she sees him naked and she’s like ‘Nuh-uh!’ She excuses herself to the bathroom, looks up his True ID, and guess what?”
“What?” you say nervously, disappointed the discussion again as turned to IDs.
“He hasn’t gotten his I.D. updated in over ten years and has a warrant for his arrest! So she calls the tip line and goes back into the bedroom all sexy like until BAM the cops burst through her windows and pull the guy away. He’s serving a minimum of three years behind bars now.”
“How is that possible?” You say this with too much conviction, and soon you regret agreeing to this live video dinner at all, even if the dinner is free and Tattoo promised to split the viewership profits 50/50.
Tattoo laughs. “I guess the lady gets off on almost being shot and arrested along with the guy. No matter how many years of acting school, I do not think I could have gone back into that bedroom with a straight face—or in her case, a sexy one!”
“No, the arrest.” You say this with a whisper, but you remember you have a microphone taped to your bra to ensure every breath and burp is audible to the donating audience.
“They just passed a state law in Florida. Abide by the government mandate or serve three years prison time with no bail. Other states are already filing the paperwork to follow suit.” An alarm goes off in Tattoo’s head, and he addresses the camera directly. “Which I fully support.”
You take a deep breath and realize what trouble you have narrowly avoided. It comforts you on your way back home via the rideshare service you are finally able to utilize and reassures you when you remove your underwear for the last time before going to bed.
#
When you wake up, all of the details and stories you used to comfort yourself have dissipated into the air like sprays of cat urine. What lingers is the stain of realization of what must now always remain. The notifications on your phone alert you to what you have feared would come into existence all along since getting your True ID uploaded. A door once opened that can never be shut, especially for a woman. And that is the door of sex.
You have had the joys and disappointments of being desexualized all your life. Of being taken seriously. Of not having to turn a man’s offer to a dance down because you were never asked. Of people getting to know you because they enjoy your presence and personality. Of being seen as a person instead of an object or experience. You want to force yourself to smile to hide the burning sensation building in your throat and blink away oncoming tears. Less than a decade ago, you would be on cringe sites for talking about wanting to have sex while clothed. People who did want you as you were would be shamed for fetishizing your genetic condition. Now, with your unclothed body on display for all to see, you will be hypersexualized for the rest of your life.
You immediately book a rideshare to talk with Tattoo. You know it could go both ways: he could comfort you or proposition you with a pitch deck. Either way, you want to shut your phone off as soon as possible and do whatever it takes to try to remember your old life when only you, your parents, your doctor, and Tattoo knew about your second disability or what the internet trolls are calling the “Twin Southern Belles of Taint County.”
Upon opening the door to your female driver, you feel relieved until you realize she is turning her phone to you. Your True ID has been enlarged to your private regions.
“This is you? Are your menstrual cycles in sync?”
You slam the door in her face because to hell with niceties. Tattoo is far away, and today you are flaring up, and what you really want to do is stab your cane into the back window of this lady’s car, but you can’t because then you’d fall down. You decide to try public transportation instead because this newfound fame has not gone to your head even though you’ve started to think that everyone you’ll ever come across has seen your new ID. Sure, there are websites and broadcast television shows that do nothing but track new and updated True IDs for content, but surely not everyone looks into that stuff with as much dedication as a reality show.
You are desperate to sit on the park bench but it is taken by at least one anti-True ID protestor. On one side of the bench is a mother breastfeeding her baby with both breasts out. Another is a fully naked male holding a sign that reads “Public Breastfeeding and Public Peeing Deserve Equal Rights.” While you do not fully keep track of the constantly changing laws by county and city and state and country, you do know that breastfeeding in public was legalized a long time ago, and that sex offenders have wanted to piggyback off of such legislation for themselves ever since. They stoop to using any example of legalization—like marijuana or same sex marriage—to prove that they deserve the same rights to pee and masturbate and be naked in all public and private places without criminal recourse. Their biggest campaign is to say such criminalization works to sexualize necessary human bodily functions and encourages sex-based violence: if tits can be out for milking, why can’t dicks be out for spraying? You know they understand that you can’t desexualize sex, but like any other group of self-righteous men intimidated by the expansion of a historically marginalized person’s rights, they have to find a way to take the spotlight and use extremism to scare people into advocating for the ways of the past and thus the restriction of rights for the future.
The mother begins to tuck in her breasts. You see them leak into her braless undershirt as her baby gnaws at the cloth, still desperate to eat. “You should consider surrogacy. One for work and the other for pleasure! I wish I had a spare vagina,” she laments.
You turn to face the empty road and await a bus. Enacting the True ID into federal law has some perks. With everyone’s nudes on public demand, more people are forced to see the acclimation—or degradation by some—of prenatal and postpartum bodies. Birth control and abortion reform have been put in place to eliminate the pressure of being forced to confront these deteriorating bodies, except for the absolute need to keep the human race populating. However, this also means that people considering pregnancy are highly discouraged from the practice. Hiding pregnancies from an employer is difficult if one is expecting near their True ID renewal deadline—a slogan for one of the cheapest over-the-counter birth control testing strips—or switching to new jobs. Lawsuits never make it to court because discrimination provides little tangible evidence and employers of all sectors are ready to transition viable pregnancies from outside of the womb and eliminate the need for the anachronistic natural system and paid postpartum care. It’s no wonder the mother approached you; many sex workers are having to move into the surrogacy industry due to loss of business and to take advantage of government subsidies granted by the Proliferation of American Families Act. Many non-sex workers are also having to move into the sex industry while pregnant due to loss of employment opportunities.
“I haven’t thought about it,” you muster with your back towards her.
The presence of a tall shadow accompanied by a much smaller small shadow appears next to you.
“All that is hidden will come in the light,” the naked protestor says. His poster is now clamped tightly between his asscheeks.
You’ve had enough. You hold one arm against the railing of the bus stop sign and the other to lift your cane as a weapon. Once he’s taken a few steps back, his sign still tightly held inside him, you make your way across the street to the police station.
You request to file a report and are promptly asked to wait by the police officer AI after signing in. Too many people have the opportunity to be famous now to risk their lives being paid salary with a high chance of getting murdered. The True ID government server became the official casting website for every manager, agent, and up-and-coming producer where underdog regular people are lauded as A-listers. While violence and misery never go out of style, romance and sex-driven content dominates the streaming world where actor retention is low and deviance from convention is high. You hope that the robots that will be forced to take over the jobs of first responders and landlords and construction workers will not only do a safe job but take over jobs that no human will need to work anymore to survive.
As you wait, you are forced to overhear a daytime TV paternity show. They are all the same. The possible parent’s nudes are posted side by side next to a live video of the baby in question. You see the child in the middle and suddenly realize this is more important than the world knowing you, an adult, have two vaginas. While on this broadcast the nudes are lightly censored, the ramifications are still disturbing, and anyone can access the uncensored versions on streaming. The only unscripted shows left on the air not about sex are ways to exploit people’s True IDs as a feigned effort to talk about health, news, and sports. But children too? You shake your head about how stupid you sound. Children have always been exploited. It’s just now there is a more open space to talk about such exploitation and how to take advantage of it sooner.
A female police officer with a handmade designer uniform and a hand covered in rings ushers you in. Police officers are still salaried, but thanks to the decline of applications, their take home pay has increased to the millions with government aid. She sits down in her recliner and sprinkles strands of saffron into rolling paper. She lights it up and you are enchanted by its sickly-sweet aroma, which causes you to make your statement too calmly and thus downplay the severity of your own case.
“I need protection. Ever since getting my True ID, everywhere I go someone harasses me about how I look and what I should do with my body.” You wonder if there’s a calming agent in that saffron, if the police officer wants to find a loophole to do as little as possible given the fact that she is desperately understaffed, or if you’re simply realizing as you talk that you have no case to fight for.
For a moment you think she is going to offer you a hit. Instead, she drops the ashes into a coffee cup that she then drinks. “And what does your True ID look like?” She opens her hand to take your printed badge of dishonor.
But you don’t want her to see it. You want her to believe that what you say is enough. You are afraid that your ID will only prove that your fight is unfightable. So you pretend to struggle to find it in your purse until she changes the subject.
“No worries, I can just look up the name you gave signing in.”
It’s too late. Her look flashes from shock to disgust to arousal. “I’m sorry, ma’am, but stalking and harassment is simply a part of the human condition. As much as unruly weather and property taxes.” Throughout the rest of the conversation, her eyes don’t leave the computer screen. “I think social media is to blame. We put all our info out there and then are surprised to see some wackos wanting to create their own primary source off it?”
“Well, can’t you at least censor it? Don’t I have a right to privacy?”
“What you do with your body outside of a True ID is your choice.” You hear her mouse click and drag, surely zooming in the 360-model feature. “But what we do with your True ID is our choice, as established by amendments nine and ten.”
You stand up too quickly and start to lose balance. The police officer gets up from their desk and you panic. You imagine handcuffs over your wrists, and you drop your cane. Before you fall back, the police officer catches you with both hands. As your cane cracks against the ground, you are forced to interlock hands with this blushing officer who isn’t even trying to conceal her gaze at your pelvic region. You ignore it, because at least now you know you have the right to leave.
“What do you do for work?” she asks without looking up.
“I’m a disability activist.” You don’t mean this, but you want to be taken seriously.
She looks into your eyes with a child’s lack of shame. “You should simply lean into it. You’d make a lot of the disableds proud strutting your stuff and making a living off it.”
You release your hands and fall firmly into your seat. You know you’ll pay for it with sore legs tomorrow thanks to your kneecaps being born on the sides of your knees where they aren’t needed. You pick your cane back up without any offer of assistance from the police officer. “This isn’t fair,” you muster while holding in a gasp of air for your aching tendons.
“Then call your local politicians.” The police officer sits down, done with you. She returns to her screen where you can be an object eager for the touch of her cursor, whispering the sweet responses she wants you to say in her head.
You walk out of the police station defeated. Politicians are nothing more than models competing in their next beauty contest because the slogan “If He Can’t Take Care of His Body, How Can He Take Care of Our Country?” is forever in style. You call a rideshare, this time with a gentleman that only takes the time to look at your True ID during stoplights and dares to share his phone number on an energy drink wrapper with a mint before you exit the vehicle and asks that you rate him based on “compatibility.”
You arrive at Ink Yasself Queen tattoo parlor as specified in the directions Tattoo sent. You wonder why he isn’t being loyal to his original shop, SquidInk, who has his VIP chair and a sign that reads, “When Tattoo enters, you become second in line—sorry, he pays us too much.” Tattoo is chest down on a chair with his head uncomfortably propped up on his chin. This must be to showcase the glasses he’s wearing, which advertise a service for ordering a home test kit to donate your ear wax to for experimentation. His phone streams the scene from a lit tripod in front of his face.
You sit uncomfortably in the wobbly stool next to him. Before you can blink, the tattoo artist removes themselves from the bend of flesh behind Tattoo’s knee and props open a metal chair for you. You thank them with a smile and they hastily return to work. Despite your initial hello at the door, Tattoo hasn’t said anything to you, and it becomes apparent that perhaps he’s wearing his work glasses off the clock to avoid showing his terrible poker face.
“SquidInk wouldn’t allow me to do another tattoo right next to the cat ad. Says it needs to heal. I’d thought they’d be more chill here, but no, they got protocol and crap, so here goes my leg,” Tattoo fires out.
You look at the tattoo artist shamefully. You would never talk smack about someone who has a needle to your back. Searching for something to say to appease them both, you look for open skin for new ads. “Surely you got more space for the next one,” you reply, hoping increased business for the tattoo artist will allow them to forgive the diss, and that the reassurance of new opportunities will get Tattoo out of his funk.
His long pause assures you it won’t. “You and I both know I ain’t got no space left. Not unless I start going over these bitches.” His stark capitulation startles you.
“Alright, so get in touch with your manager. Surely some of your contracts have an open clause for departure or revision. Half of these brands don’t even exist anymore!”
“Fine.” Tattoo instinctively hears the tattoo artist tear off plastic wrap indicating the completion of his time here. “Can you hand me my phone?”
For a moment, you feel betrayed. Then you remember who you are here with. Just about every moment with Tattoo is videographed because his profession forces him to be. You find his phone and take it off of the lit tripod. As the tattoo artist begins to cocoon Tattoo’s leg, you fear they’ve wrapped it too tightly. Tattoo’s face is strained. Then it deflates. He hands his phone to you.
“I’ll split my viewership views for today’s session too.” He rests his glasses on the back of his neck and plops his face against the seat. “Since you’re all they’re talking about.”
Forced to face your fans and your fanatics, you hesitantly read the comments on his live feed.
Do they queef like a symphony orchestra?
Which one you use as a coin purse?
You gonna add your geysers to the National Register of Historic Places?
You hover your finger over the End Live Button. The constant movement of quickly adding comments and hearts distracts you. The number of viewers is too big for you to pronounce correctly. Your eyes turn away from the X in the corner and back to the parade of cesspool infesters—yet it isn’t fair to say that in entirety. It doesn’t take you long to find treasures worthy of recycling pouring in.
Living proof that the Pink Tax is TERRIBLE out here. I’ll protest for you 😉
Fellow disabled and proud femme girl here! Keep up the content—me and the ableists need it! #ourdisabilityisbeautiful
I never knew Hypermobile Ehlers Danlos Syndrome existed until I saw you. Thank you for helping me become an ally!
You lower your hand and ignore Tattoo brooding over your shoulder. You realize that this kind of attention was something you always secretly wanted, but never allowed yourself to imagine attaining, so that you wouldn’t spend your entire life desiring something you may never get. You will do more in this life than complain about things that only irritate you on the internet and subtly beg for donations.
Until one comment guts that idea right out of you.
Somebody working on her IP address?
You end the live and turn Tattoo’s phone off. You are ready to leave until the tattoo artist loudly folds back the metal chair you were on and stands in your way.
“Look, I’m all about the freedom of expression…” they say.
You and Tattoo look at each other nervously but do nothing to move. Tattoo hasn’t tipped them yet.
“…but this True ID expansion talk is taking things too far. I got a flyer from my children’s school about supporting a public vote to lower the age to five. Five. Arguing it ain’t so different from a sonogram. I’m all about children learning about anatomy and physiology and consent, but not because their bodies are projected on a public website as if they’re for sale.”
You leave before you can see how much Tattoo tips them.
The rideshare costs twice as much as it should because you ordered the party-sized van that’s available immediately. You finally feel a sense of comfort until they pull up to your apartment and you see the crowd huddled outside of your door. Some wear knitted double pussy hats for solidarity, most likely reused from the recent Women’s Day March. Others have posters of your private parts with requests on what to do with them.
So you promise the rideshare driver you’ll tip handsomely if they drive you anywhere but here until you can figure out where else you can go. They scoff, hand you a basket of candy once hidden from your view, and slowly begin the descent back into the highway.
You take the time to finally look at your social media apps all hidden in a folder on the third page of your phone screen. With all of the apps combined, you have over 100,000 notifications. Instinctively you check your third-party banking app because Tattoo warned you about leaving paper trails with bricks and mortars. You choke on your own spit. You have never had so much money in your possession your entire life—and it isn’t solely from your cut of Tattoo’s live videos. You check the receipts and find donation after donation. You finally have such a large fanbase that your content monetization platforms will allow you to do more than just barely pay rent this month.
You switch over to your business email account. There are several notifications that your inbox is too full. Big name brands catch your eye between the subject lines of death threats and marriage proposals. Politicians that want you to join their campaign party. VR headset companies want to buy the rights to your likeness to build a video game. Religious fanatics want to burn you alive and remove the abomination you are from existence.
You call your gynecologist for an immediate booking. The receptionist says that you need an appointment but could be added to the canceled list for now. You mention that price point is not a problem, and you can gladly go insurance-free if your provider is unwilling to pay. Suddenly availabilities start popping up like weeds. She asks for your name. You hear a few clicks. Then silence. You look at the rideshare driver in the rearview mirror. The radio has suddenly turned silent too.
“I’m sorry,” the receptionist says, “I was actually looking at the wrong month. We won’t be able to schedule anything for you today.”
“Alright.” You hear the receptionist prepare to cut the line, so you talk fast. “When will the next availability be?”
“We’re not sure. I think it would be best if we just call you back if there is one.” She hangs up hastily.
Urologists. Otolaryngologists. Plastic surgeons. Gynecologists from out of state. All of your phone calls end the same. You give them your name; their availability disappears. Aggravated, you have the gall to call the out-of-state plastic surgeon famous for being a repeated felon in the public’s eye for botched surgeries on senior celebrities using a hidden phone number. They mention they got a tipline from their competitors that you were calling around and finally provide the answer you should have suspected all along.
“It’s not that we don’t want to help you. It’s just that if anyone found out that we did, we could lose business. Even to the extent of losing our licenses,” the doctor says with the utmost sincerity—or maybe the utmost disappointment of not being able to see your circus of a spectacle in person. “But if you are interested in perhaps accentuating your outer labias—
You hang up and block his number. Needful of gratification from strangers, you return to your social media pages and see they’ve been bombarded with checkmark account commentators. Between smut, pathetic attempts to piggyback off of your fame, and even more pathetic attempts to piggyback off of your disability movement, you find names of people you have admired your entire life. Real life disability activists whose books you’ve read and interviews you’ve watched and podcasts you’ve listened too, even though you admit you don’t like podcasts that much, because it proves that you like them so much. Offers of collaborations. Panels. Protests.
That is what you have always wanted. It sucks that you don’t want it anymore. You ask the bus driver to take you to the nearest Greyhound bus station and they do so out of pity—it is not their designated route. Surely seeing you there by yourself with your cane drew sympathy. At the station, you buy a ticket for Jefferson City. Close to the capital is supposed to be one of the last settlements of anti-True IDers left. Although they go by the acronym D.I.E.I.D.S., they have no explanation as to what each letter stands for. They have protections from the state solely by being peaceful protestors or by being unhoused. You’ve heard about the community for years, but it’s hard to find verified information about it because social media platforms ban their name and likeness due to breaking community guidelines about being a “dangerous extremist group.” Your last resort is to trust the slush of conspiracy theory websites promoting the group and influencers who eagerly claim participation with the D.I.E.I.D.S. through code words and self-censorship to avoid being deplatformed. You don’t trust half of them, because some are ex-D.I.E.I.D.S. who left the movement after claiming they were a cult with evil intentions to disband the safety and security of state and international governments. You are certain those people were simply always proponents of the True ID legislation eager to use any tactic to disband followers of the movement. You just hope that it exists.
After bouncing from connecting bus to connecting bus, living off of stale gas station fast food and expired painkillers because you couldn’t grab your medication before setting off, you make it to the campsite you got off of a Reddit channel. You find several compounds made out of tents and plastic sheds and oversized dog houses. You inquire with the first couple you see. You spell out the acronym three times. Their faces still do not unwind from confusion.
You walk to the next group of people lying in the grass. Their cell phones should have tipped you off. The movement was meant to be the new wave of Neo-Luddism. While they lend you one of their wheelchairs to continue your investigation well rested, it is clear that no one here knows what you are talking about.
On your phone, you check back the videos of so-called D.I.E.I.D.S. and check their analytics. Their newest videos have thousands of likes, shares, and reactions. You scroll through their older posts. They talked about other readily debunked conspiracy theories that resulted in a substantially smaller amount of engagement. Their oldest videos weren’t so different from yours: boring vlogs and badly written comedic skits and thirst traps for sympathy likes. Close to no views. It clicks. The D.I.E.I.D.S. is a carefully constructed conspiracy for fame and camaraderie.
You decide to live with the rest of the unhoused people here because you don’t want to go home. You take all of your money out of your accounts and place it in tin cans. You gather the people and tell them your situation. They adore your honesty and hide your money in various locations throughout town. You financially support them; they emotionally support you. While you quickly become tired of never leaving town and the limiting places of entertainment, you enjoy the willingness of your new twenty-eight-person family to cut your hair and give you a new fake identity and denounce any outsiders who come along and question if you are who you really are. They never ask you about sex. You appreciate that because you identify as “none of your business or mine” and have the libido “of a firework after being extinguished by a fire extinguisher.” Nor do they stare when you take group showers. You start to realize that you have created your own true community of D.I.E.I.D.S., and perhaps that was how it was meant to be all along.
Right before your phone dies for the last time because you didn’t pay the bill, you come across a legitimate news source talking about Tattoo. Apparently in the beginning of his career he didn’t read his contracts well enough, because he had to learn in a settlement that all of his contracts were for life. So one day, merely a week after you left for Jefferson City and blocked him on everything, he went on a live video and disclosed NDA secrets about the companies he wanted removed from his body. He claimed that anyone who bought from these companies had been scammed. He apologized that the money blinded him from feeding into their ways and declared that he was on track to fix his wrongs and become an honest person for his fans.
A day later, Tattoo’s apartment was broken into. His body was rubbed raw with sandpaper and lemon juice. The next-door neighbors said they called the landlord when the electricity went out for hours and presumed any noise thereafter was coming from the electricians working on the powerlines. It wasn’t until the repairman welcomed himself into Tattoo’s apartment to finally answer his request to fix the garbage disposal that his body was found. The landlord described to a reporter that Tattoo’s body looked like “a dried-up slug, stabbed a million times.”
#
Your savings lasts for five years before you and the twenty-eight others you’re supporting exhaust your stashed cash. Of course, the group dwindled down to four once it became clear that you were not going to spend your savings more quickly, and money started to disappear, and many people grew tired of the fringe lifestyle and went on to become successful reality show stars documenting their rise from homelessness to mansion ownership. You knew you had to dip because despite not signing any waivers, the producers and camera people could tell your true identity and wanted to put you back on air.
You ask to borrow someone’s phone at a dive bar. A stout, suspicious man hands his over on the condition he can see everything you do. While searching your social media accounts without logging in, given the patron’s head practically resting on your right shoulder, you aren’t surprised to see how few followers you have left. You are certain that your ad streams have dried up because you haven’t created new content and so others haven’t used your posts to make their own. All of the sponsorships offered to you years ago have surely expired too. You sign into your digital banking accounts and are relieved to find they were left open. Followers sent a few thousand after your last withdrawal. A quick Google search shows that some people think you are dead. Most people think you never existed to begin with.
You have turned into a living conspiracy theory. One theory states you were made by the CIA. Sex sells anything, and disability sells to the conservative population that’s too uptight to admit they were sold the moment they learned about your anatomy. Another claim states you were an AI puppet created to deter people from getting their True ID Beware! that one says. All of your most shameful secrets will be revealed. You’ll become a laughingstock and certified incel because of your twisted dick. You could get plastic surgery to fix it, but your ego won’t let you, and thus you’ll plummet into the eternal suffering of desperately searching for someone to accept—or even prefer—your twisted dick in a world full of straight ones! Either way your sudden physical appearance now will surely cause a stir, and a stir is exactly what you need.
You go to the ATM in the corner of the bar with the patron still hanging onto you like a parrot and withdraw everything left from your accounts. You give him a measly $5. He opens his trap and you tap your cane down firmly on the ground, gathering the remaining crowd of patrons not already staring at you to pay attention. Comfortable beneath their public gaze, you are able to walk out without a stalker and approach a parked vehicle driven by a gentle woman somewhere between her late teens to early sixties. The plastic surgery is getting too good these days. You’re able to convince her you lost your printed True ID and that the website is down so you can’t take the bus. She takes your story as truth and drives you to the station herself, all while pitching how much you could use some Botox on your forehead wrinkles and knuckles and elbow creases. She gets a 50% off a ten-minute session of palm crease laser removal for every referral.
You take her card and promise to schedule an appointment after she drops you off at the Greyhound bus station that brought you here five years ago. You go to the desk and offer to pay double to get a printed ticket back home. But there are no people left, and digital tickets are the only form of currency. The doors are blocked with a metal carousel. Next to it is an emergency entrance door that will blare an alarm if you open it.
You open it anyway, triggering a rush of patrons on the paying side run out fearful of a shooting. You take your time walking through the emergency entrance door, muttering “Anyone but the police,” like a chant as you make your way through. You are lucky to only be met by a bus driver.
“Do you need help entering the bus?” he couldn’t be older than ten. You realize you’ve haven’t kept up with the news and all the changing laws, and you wonder if there are new rules about child labor. With so many in-person jobs being lost to computers and internet fame, the only workforce left are the children unable to become internet famous themselves due to their uncool, strict parents.
You simply nod and point to the bus terminal headed for home. You step on and hand him your cane, thankful that no question of your True ID or ticket has been made. You are fearful it won’t always be like this.
When you make it back home, you ask the child bus driver to drop you off at the library. You don’t know where else to go. With all of $3,500 in your pocket, you decide that maybe the best stop is a homeless shelter. Somewhere to get you an address you can tell potential employers is your home. Thankfully the bus stop is now void of any bitter mothers or naked protestors. As the child bus driver leaves, you are surprised to see a driverless public bus slow down at the stop. This time the door is closed. You find that there is no door on the back. The automated bus says, “Please insert your True ID.”
You dig inside your sports bra. All these years you’ve kept it, even though it could have fallen out and you would have been outed. It’s a mysterious thing to keep evidence of the object that had ruined your life. Perhaps keeping it is a way to get control back. To put yourself in a position where you defended yourself and came out on top, rather than being a victim. You insert your True ID into the slot.
“Your True ID has expired. Your True ID does not meet the standards of the Constitution’s 28th Amendment, which established that all United States Citizens must renew their True ID once a year. This ID has been flagged for committing a Class E felony and local authorities have been dispatched to your location.” The bus sets off an earth-shatteringly loud alarm.
You hobble away despite seeing police lights beam against your right shoulder. You have moments to decide your next move. Somehow you are able to make it inside the library right as the cops swarm the parking lot. There are barely any patrons inside the library. You rush up to the front desk. A senior with her head in one of the last remaining print books looks at you from above a romance book, the cover of which depicts full nudity rather than the suggestive attire and unbuttoned shirts of the olden times.
She recognizes you immediately. She drops the book and gasps. “You’re—
“Please help me,” you whisper. You hear the sound of footsteps echoing on the laminate floor tiles.
She beckons you from behind the counter. She covers your body with a raincoat right as the other librarians intercept the police officers, laughing at each other’s True IDs. After hustling you out through the backdoor, she puts you in her van and drives off right before the rear lot is blocked off by police cars.
She gives you her phone without saying anything. You decide to try to log into your social media platforms now that you have access to a phone without a drunk hanging over your shoulder. Your password works. It is followed by a prompted message: BLACKLISTED. Every social media page of yours says the same after you sign in. You turn her phone off and nervously check the review mirrors for any undercover cops that might be following you.
“What’s your plan now?” the librarian asks.
You shrug. You know it is not safe to let a stranger know you are a criminal out of options.
“There’s always one avenue left.” She rests her hand on your left thigh.
The sex worker community has always been good to you, even though you always ignored them. The parts of it built off of consent culture, anyway. They’d message you invitations explicitly asking for your enthusiastic consent. You are certain they would have overpaid you. They are the type of community that would denounce anyone who would use their platforms to pressure you into changing your mind.
This is not the type of industry this sex hungry librarian is talking about, however; to people like her, your “no” is what made them insatiable. They would’ve waited forever to convince you to change your mind.
You place your hand over hers.
“We knew you’d come around,” she says as she drives you farther and farther into the rich part of town.
