“I know you ain’t two bitches.” His voice sounded low in my ear, so close I felt his breath on my neck, just briefly before his hand smacked the back of my head, hard, pitching me face first into the shop window I’d been browsing while waiting for the bus. The change in my hand rattled to the ground as my forehead hit the metal shutter.
The first time I was physically assaulted for being a queer woman it came out of nowhere. This was ironic because, looking back, my entire 20s were lived to a relentless soundtrack of homophobic abuse. With my shaved head and DM boots, I was a very visible dyke. My girlfriend looked similar. We were accustomed to harassment and quick to judge whether a situation had the potential to turn nasty, united in our willingness to return fire if the culprits seemed to be all mouth, which they usually were. “Oi, dykes!” “Yeah, well spotted! Ten out of 10, lads!” Nevertheless, you might say I lived my life always primed for attack. Now here it was and I was completely unprepared.
He hit my girlfriend next. In the face. Suddenly everyone who’d been standing around us melted away. We were alone, reeling with shock, on a street that had been teeming with people. Our attacker disappeared up the road. What I recall was the paralysing shame; for the first time ever I was afraid to reach out to my lover in public. I forced myself, she batted my hands away. We had asked for it. Two short-haired women in jeans and boots and no make-up. Obvious lesbians. Of course someone had decided to teach us a lesson.
Leggete l'articolo completo e molti altri in questo numero di
DIVA Magazine
Opzioni di acquisto di seguito
Se il problema è vostro,
Accesso per leggere subito l'articolo completo.
Singolo numero digitale
December 15
Questo numero e altri numeri arretrati non sono inclusi in un nuovo
abbonamento. Gli abbonamenti comprendono l'ultimo numero regolare e i nuovi numeri pubblicati durante l'abbonamento. DIVA Magazine
Abbonamento digitale annuale
OFFERTA SPECIALE: Era
€29,99
Adesso €23,99
fatturati annualmente