Chapter 26 Summary

Jess finds her voice at a gay pride rally where she says that as a "he-she," she wonders if she is welcome as part of the gay movement. "Couldn't the we be bigger?" she asks (page 296). If gays and the transgendered raised their voices, it would only make a bigger impact. After she speaks, people of all types, gay men, drag queens, butches come to praise her words.

Duffy is now a union organizer. Jess had not seen him since he inadvertently revealed her true sex and cost her a job. He asks Jess if she would like to be a union organizer, too. It's difficult for Jess to see herself as a leader, but if she can speak out in public the way she did today, anything is possible.

Jess wakes up and sits on the fire escape. Everything she has experienced...