“I swear if your head wasn’t attached to your body, you’d lose that too.” Randy’s mother always used to say to him.
Her laughter echoed in his head as he hurried down the stairs of his one-bedroom apartment.
“What the fuck?! I just had it!” He grumbled as he slid across the hardwood floors and over to the couch.
Plunging his hand into the crack of the cushions, he rummaged around for his lucky rubber ducky tie.
The tie was a hideous vomit green color with white ducks, and everyone in Randy’s family and friend group hated the damn thing, but it really was lucky.
Randy’s grandfather wore the ducky tie the night he fled Germany and came to America during the Holocaust. Randy’s father wore the tie the day he met Randy’s mother, and although she didn’t let him wear it the day of their wedding, he most certainly had it in his pocket. And when Randy came out to his parents as trans, the tie was in the pocket of his Nike sweats; And now Randy, the youngest of five, and one of three boys, is his parents' favorite son.
Today was another important day, and Randy needed that tie.
Making his way back to his bedroom, Randy flung open his closet door. He’d already checked twice, but something in his mind told him to check again. So, tugging the string hanging from the ceiling, he lit up the closet again.
There, sandwich between some extra towels, hung the vomit green rubber ducky tie.
“Fucking hell! How didn’t I see that before!” He said.
He’d checked the closet at least a dozen times, and he never saw the damn thing.
With a huff, he tugged the tie, causing it to slip, but not before bringing the stack of towels it sat between down with it.
“Motherfucker.” He said.
He didn’t have time for this, he had to go! But leaving the mess on the closet floor would bother him, so bending down, Randy went to grab the towel when he felt something hard beneath the fabric. What the hell?!
Picking the towel up, he unraveled it to reveal his first ever video camera, a black and silver Flip Ultra HD.
Running his hand over the camera, the feel of scratches and dented corners brought back a memory that had been locked away. But the sharpest memory of all came from the faded name scribbled on the side of the camera.
“Don’t you wanna remember this moment?” She said, pointing the camera at Randy.
It was the summer after senior year, and after four whole years worth of summer jobs, birthday money, tutoring jobs, and a graduation check, Randy finally had all the money to get his top surgery.
“What, like a vlog?” Randy asked, as he straightened the rubber ducky tie.
Victoria, Randy’s partner, moved to stand behind him. Wrapping her arms around him, she rested her chin on his shoulder and looked at him through the mirror.
“Yeah, we can have it to look back on.” She said.
As a young trans kid, Randy hated the word ‘partner’; of course, he knew why people used it, but he wasn’t a big fan of the word. Then, freshmen year of high school rolled around, and Randy met Victoria Miles.
Victoria, or Vicky, as everyone called her, was the definition of a ‘partner in crime’, and to Randy, meeting Vicky in detention was kismet.
Vicky had moved to New York City from California, and from the moment they met, the two were like a house on fire.
The pair met in detention; it was only Vicky’s third day of school, and as a regular in Mr. Flat’s ‘directionless child’s club’, Randy knew the names of all his fellow detention goers. So when he walked into Mr. Flatt’s classroom that fateful Friday afternoon, and found Vicky, the new girl, whose name had been buzzing around the school all day, now sitting in his usual seat, Randy just had to know; how does one get detention in their first week of school?
When it came to detention, Mr. Flat gave zero fucks, so when Randy slipped into the seat beside Vicky’s, he had no problem striking up a conversation with her.
Randy learned that Mrs. Downing, Vicky’s history teacher, wasn’t a fan of her low-cut shirt and gave her a detention so that she could sit and reflect on what was and wasn’t appropriate to wear to school.
“Ah, she’s just mad cause her husband got a job as a college professor, and now he’s too busy fucking sorority girls to fuck her.” Randy said, causing Vicky to laugh.
The pair quickly fell into deep conversation, and before long, Randy found himself pouring his heart out to Vicky, and her doing the same. Vicky became the fifth person to know that Randy was trans, and Randy became the first to hear about the horrors of Vicky’s home life.
“Moving twice a year? Damn, that’s got to be rough.” Randy said as he looked at her.
Vicky shrugged.
“You get used to it after a while.” She said nonchalantly.
That day in detention, Randy and Vicky swapped phone numbers, and became connected at the hip.
Every day after school, Vicky would hop on the pegs of Randy’s bike, and they would ride to the video store. As they rummage through crates of VHS’s, they would bicker about who’s movie picks were better, and discuss which actors they thought were the hottest.
“Ahh, Adam Sandler is so sexy.” Randy sighed as he held up Click.
“Tell me you wanna fuck your dad, without telling me you wanna fuck your dad.” Vicky laughed, as she slapped the tape out of his hand.
Randy scoffed.
“You’re talking about MY taste in men?! Really? The girl who likes brainless meat heads who can’t even hold a conversation, is talking about my taste in men. Hi-larious” He said with a laugh.
“Wow, I forgot how sassy you get when it comes to your man.” Vicky laughed.
The pair made their way around the store, forming their pile before making their way to the checkout counter; their arms filled with tapes.
After setting the tapes down, Randy slapped a wrinkled receipt down onto the counter, causing David, the cashier and owner of the joint, to set down his magazine and grab the paper.
David Hall wasn’t much of a businessman. After twenty years of working as an English teacher in New York City, David cashed in his 401k, sold all his stocks, and moved upstate to live a quiet life with his wife, Gladys, and German Shepherd, Sparky.
David and Gladys had more money than they knew what to do with, so when David started his video store, he wasn’t looking to turn a profit. All he wanted was to build a community and give the kids somewhere to hang out after school.
David’s spot was more like a library than an actual store. All the locals knew that as long as you were kind and dropped in and said hello every now and again, a return of VHSs, or trading in some of your own VHSs, would get you more VHSs. Sure, he could have called it a library, but then he wouldn’t be able to charge the town assholes, and people from out of town who just came into town to buy some of the rare movies in David’s collection.
David rung up the new tapes before turning to Randy and Vicky.
“Eighty-two cents. Cough it up.” He said, holding out his hand.
Randy dug around in his bag, scraping together the exact amount.
“Pleasure doing business with ya.” David said.
The bell above the door dinged as Vicky and Randy stepped outside and hopped back onto Randy’s bike. That summer, Randy and Vicky went from the best of friends to the best of lovers.
That summer was their last carefree summer, and they took advantage of it. They spent their days at the lake with their friends, and their nights lying in the hammock in Randy’s grandparents’ backyard, staring up at the stars.
Then as the leaves began to change, Vicky began preparing to head to New York City for fashion school, while Randy would be heading to LA for film school.
The couple gave long distance their all, but in the end their demanding schedules, and lack of funds to travel back and forth to see one another led to their relationship’s bittersweet end.
As Randy continued to stare down at the camera, he grabbed his lucky tie, tied it around his hand, and opened up Instagram.
Despite the common name, Randy found Vicky in a single search, and from the looks of it, she seemed to be single. Sinking into his couch, he let the clock run out on his job interview, and instead, he took a shot and sent Vicky his number.
Call it fate, an act of God, a coincidence, or just the incredibly good juju of the tie, in an instant, his phone began to ring.
“I was just fucking thinking about you!” Vicky said the second he accepted the call.
Randy smiled a smile so big that he feared his face would split. He’d missed hearing her voice.
After nearly a decade of being apart, they had so much catching up to do.
For more stories, check out The Royal Blue Network