Girl, Woman, Other

Megan’s liberal parents will tolerate anything but her lack of adherence to her femininity. As a mixed-race child, she was required to be adorable, a sign of her parents’ union:

[I]t was the defining aspect of Megan’s early childhood, she didn’t actually have to do or say anything except be cute—an end in itself which reflected well on Mum, who could bask in the glory of the compliments that poured forth as a validation of her love of a African man (308).

Megan’s father is Malawian, and her mother, Julie, is Ethiopian, African American, and English but looks almost white. The only person in Megan’s family who accepts her gender nonconformity is her great grandmother on her mother’s side, GG, whose birth name is Hattie and who lives in the country on a family farm called Greenfields.

Megan is teased at school for being butch and mixed race. She quits school at 16 and begins working at McDonalds and taking drugs. On her 18th birthday, she tattoos her entire body and moves out of her parents’ house. Megan meets Bibi, a trans woman, online, and Bibi soon becomes her longtime partner. Bibi helps Megan realize that she does not subscribe to the concept of gender.