Outro: Last Day at Montrose
I left Montrose on Friday, Feb. 13. Victor met me downstairs and I hugged him for what seemed like an hour.
As Victor and I walked to our car, I stopped in the middle of the street and looked up, my face parallel to the sky, and felt the sun. I stood there for a while because Victor was already in the car honking the horn.
When I got home I took a long shower. I did a hair mask, shampooed my hair twice, and applied a Kerastase shine elixir to it. I exfoliated my face and my skin twice, also, and slathered my entire body in cocoa butter and sprayed on all my favorite perfumes. I used my favorite hyaluronic acid serum, Shiseido moisturizer, and dried and brushed my hair.
I called Victor over to look out the windows in our living room down at the street below and the bare limbs of trees swaying in the breeze. I sat on the couch and drank from my water bottle and reapplied my chapstick and favorite lip oil for about an hour while our dog, Murray, curled up next to me. Then I got my eyebrows threaded, my legs waxed, and my nails done. When I returned home I took a long bubble bath and changed into clean, warm pajamas.
Aside from all the skincare, showering, and shampooing, I thought a lot about what I wanted to say about my experience at Montrose. In Buddhist philosophy there’s no such thing as good or bad experiences: those are value judgments that we impose on worldly experiences to give them meaning. We do this through telling stories, and those shape a certain kind of reality for us.
What is real is that thousands of people pass through Montrose’s doors each year. Some have attempted suicide; some can’t seem to stop thinking about it; some have tried to harm others. All of these people need help, and they don’t get any of that at Montrose.
I write this story, but it does not belong to me. It belongs to Bailey, who never knew when she would leave Montrose. It belongs to Peaches, who barely knew me but gave me the shirt off his back. It belongs to Nick, who missed his mom so much he cried every day.
Nick and I exchanged numbers and we’re still in touch. I’m going to see his drag show this weekend. I hope to see him under a spotlight, shining in sequins, where he belongs.
