In a
film that shows some of the darkness people can be capable of, this
relationship is a spot of light. The
warmth of care between these two, their slow, simmering attraction, is simply
gorgeous, and it’s a travesty that their love would put either of them in
danger from those find it abnormal or wrong.
Their
meet-cute isn’t exactly one for the ages.
Before they physically meet, each has caught the other’s eye – Barry is
instantly taken with Callie when he sees her perform at the club where she
works, and from her onstage vantage point, she picks him out of the crowd – but
their actual introduction leaves something to be desired. Surrounded by Barry’s drunk army buddies, who
alternate between leering at Callie and making jokes at her expense, Callie
pulls Barry aside mainly to prevent a fight between him and one of his
belligerent friends. As the two walk off
together, Barry’s friends jovially remind him of his “mission”: ascertaining Callie’s genitalia.
But in the
midst of that boisterous, sexist, transphobic setting, something begins to
happen. Callie is friendly and
self-deprecatingly winning, and Barry is shy but kind in a gentlemanly way. Right off the bat, Barry makes no question of
Callie’s gender identity. If anything,
she’s the one who’s preoccupied by it, flirting offhandedly but never thinking
he’ll honestly look twice at her until he asks for her phone number. And when he calls, they fall almost immediately
into a lovely, comfortable relationship.
They joke and play around, they share details of their lives, Callie
introduces him to her friends, and Barry brags about the strides he’s making in
the army.
It’s
not a relationship without no
internal troubles; they can both be insecure (Callie about her looks, Barry
about his intelligence,) Callie can lash out when she’s feeling vulnerable, and
Barry tends to bottle up his fears or worries until they explode. However, by and large, they simply are.
Barry reminds Callie how beautiful she is when she doesn’t feel it. Callie celebrates Barry’s gentleness and
sensitivity, which, the army tends to view as liabilities. Each wants the best for the other, pushing
them toward their full potential, but each also recognizes when the other is in
a fragile place and needs a little slack.
I
really like that Callie being trans isn’t a huge thing in their relationship,
but it’s also not completely ignored.
Early on, Callie tries to avoid reminders of it, fearing that Barry will
get scared off. In fact, the first time
he tries to attend to her in bed, she begs him not to, insisting that it will
ruin everything. As their relationship
progresses, however, Callie starts, slowly, to be more comfortable with letting
him see her as she is, trusting that her trans status doesn’t affect his love
for her. She opens up about the last
time she saw her mother, she shares her hopes for further medical transition,
and her pre-transition history in the military becomes an inside joke between
them – they teasingly give each other orders, and Barry admits to being a
little jealous when he finds out she outranks him. It’s part of their relationship, because it’s
part of Callie, but it’s only that: a
part. Not a problem. Not a complication. Not an issue.
Just a part. As much a feature of
their relationship as Barry being a soldier, Callie being a performer, or both
of them being from the south. It’s
others looking in from the outside that magnify it and try to twist it into
something insidious. When it’s just
Callie and Barry, that’s all it is, one of many pieces that contribute to the
whole of their love.
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