the intimacy of scrutiny.
This is my coming out story, and y’all will be the first to read it.
I’m queer, as in, don't use the lenses of heteronormativity, patriarchy, or so-called whiteness to assess anything about me. Queer as in, everybody needs to mind their own fucking business and let me figure this out.
I never said that online before. So. Excuse me if this rambles.
“As we learn to bear the intimacy of scrutiny and to flourish within it, as we learn to use the products of that scrutiny for power within our living, those fears which rule our lives and form our silences begin to lose their control over us.” - Gamba Adisa 1
i.
I struggle with maintaining eye contact with people. It’s hard to pinpoint when it started—maybe it’s a trauma response from all the times my parents would say, “Look at me when I’m talking to you!” in that tone of voice that meant a whoopin’ wasn’t completely off the table. Maybe it’s just the ADHD. But I do have formative memories of withering beneath someone’s gaze.
Once, during recess in second grade, I caught a little girl staring at me from across the playground. Okay, “playground” is a stretch—it was a patch of asphalt, surrounded by a chain-link fence, and a handball court. I went to an inner-city public school. They just sort of tossed us outside into that aimless nothing and told us to go play. Despite the handball court, P.S. whatever-the-fuck didn’t offer any handballs. We had to bring our own. All that to say, there wasn’t much for either myself or the other little girl to do on the playground besides stare at each other and run around trying to avoid getting roped into a game of booty tag. But, I digress.
And maybe the little girl wasn’t really staring at me. But when we naturally locked eyes, my good sis locked in.
Her gaze felt so heavy on me. I carried the metaphorical metric tonnage of each of her cherubic lashes. I remember whipping my head around - a hazard with the amount of hard-plastic beads and barrettes that came standard with 90’s Black girl hairstyles - just to see what she could possibly be so focused on. I remember saying to her,
“Girl, why are you staring me straight in my eyeballs like that?”.
She scrunched up her nose and ran off, calling out over her shoulder, "I like your hair!"
In my discomfort, I couldn't fathom that her gaze had stemmed from good feelings. Compliments were rare for me; I was never called pretty. I cut an odd figure - a too tall tomboy, who still had curves. My Payless sneakers and oversized Tommy Hilfigure jacket that we bought off-season at Marshalls (“so you got room to grow into it” my momma had said when she brought it home, rolling up the sleeves so they didn’t hang off my wrists) often drew puzzled looks and teasing rather than admiration. I didn’t have the kind of hair that drew compliments in 1998. That kind of hair was brandished on boxes of Just For Me brand children’s perm.
The girl’s words left me even more confused, questioning whether there was something wrong with me for not seeing myself the way she did.
ii.
In fourth grade, I had this best friend, named Janelle. We’d been friends for two years by that point, and my momma had done her rounds with the family, and she gave me permission to go over to her house for a sleepover. It was a typical affair — we danced around to songs from Usher’s My Way album in our PJ’s, ate copious amounts of pizza, and fell asleep hours earlier than we’d planned. I considered the whole thing a resounding success.
The following Monday morning at school, I walked into our classroom to find Janelle displaying my nightgown to the class.
It was a shapeless, ankle length situation with a dog on it. The front of the nightgown sported a picture of a brown dog, with long floppy ears, and a big red tongue lolling out of his mouth. The back had, you guessed it, a tail.
Before that incident, I loved that nightgown. I’m telling you I thought it was the cutest thing. At the sleepover, the other girls and I had all pretended to be animals, laughing and dancing in the living room. But here was Janelle, in the harsh light of day, her grin widening as she showcased my nightie for everyone to see. The room erupted in laughter. My cheeks burned, and I wanted to shrink away, to disappear.
I wasn’t popular in fourth grade. Somehow, the way I presented told everybody that I was poor, fat, and worst of all masculine. My tall, broad, body was wrong. My discount brand of style was wrong. My family life was wrong, wrong, wrong. Janelle was cooler than me, and her friendship had granted me access to cooler circles. But I realized, as she stood in the center of the room, positively beaming from the attention she was garnering from my shame, that this girl didn’t really like me like that. Not only wasn’t she my real friend, she was the first person to question my femininity to my face.
“What girl wears this to a sleepover? She was probably going to bite us in our sleep so we woke up mannish like her!!”
Despite my towering height, I couldn't shake the sensation of being swallowed up by the crowd, a mere speck in a sea of faces.
iii.
The woman who turned me out, did so over an Economy textbook.
Maya and I had always shared a special bond, one forged through late-night study sessions and deep conversations about life. She was a short, plump AfroLatina. We would walk the campus together, arm in arm, giggling, gabbing, and gobbling snacks. Her hair was curly and smelled like cinnamon, but the thing that always got me, was her mouth.
All the best things in my life at the time came from Maya’s mouth. She would smile, and the sun would come out as her lips parted. She would laugh, and I would remember myself. And that night, when we kissed (at least a thousand times) I remembered myself as a lover of women for the very first time.
The next morning, I tried to rationalize everything that transpired between us as mere experimentation. After all, if you’re going to kiss a girl, college is where you do it, right? Never mind that we had done way more than kiss (that woman fucked the dog shit out of me. Respectfully.) This wasn’t just a one-off experience — Maya wasn’t even the first woman I had been intimate with.
I confided in my sister, who had always been my mirror—reflecting my truths, often before I even recognized them myself. When I recounted the night with Maya, she listened quietly, her eyes thoughtful. She had never had any intimate experiences with women, and while she was supportive, she wondered about the different paths we had taken.
iv.
For a long time, I internalized the societal narrative that Black femme-presenting women like me were, by default, heterosexual. But how many women do I have to make out with, fall in love with, and see the soul of, before I get to claim “gay”. How much of my identity is female based purely off of gender-based violence committed against me?
I am not sure yet. I’m still defining and refining what it means to be.
Flourishing under scrutiny requires that we let them see us. That we stand ready to be received with love, or revulsion, or passion, or boredom, and that regardless, we will thrive.
“What are the words you do not yet have? What are the tyrannies you swallow day by day and attempt to make your own, until you will sicken and die of them, still in silence?” - Gamba Adisa ; Your Silence Will Not Protect You
These are the words I have not yet had. This is one of the intimate scrutinies I must withstand. The bravery it takes to publish this essay amidst other writers on Substack is immense. It's a declaration of my truth, a testament to my resilience, and a reclaiming of my narrative. As we learn to bear the intimacy of scrutiny and to flourish within it, we invite others to do the same.
Coming out here with you is a transformative moment in my journey—a declaration of my true self in a world that often demands conformity. Each step toward self-acceptance is a triumph over the fears that once silenced me, illuminating the path toward authenticity and empowerment.
Long live the she/they's.
Love yall. Mean it.
-B
Gamba Adisa is more widely known as Audre Lorde, but, I call women by the names they give themselves.
Felt! No, this doesn't sound like rambling. You're sharing your truth and it is respected. Continue showing up and being your most authentic self.
🥰🩷✨🐝
This is so beautiful. Thank you for writing. Thank you for sharing. Fuck, the world needs your authenticity. Feel honoured to read incredible writers and souls speaking their truth on here, it further inspires my own.
“Each step toward self-acceptance is a triumph over the fears that once silenced me, illuminating the path toward authenticity and empowerment.”