The Half-Elf

1.

It starts in a club, as so many crucifixions do.

-

Seven years ago, today.

Neon spills on my chest like fake blood.

My wife—full lesbian, full moon—orders something tart, something red.

I order nothing. I drink her gaze.

She’s always been better at restraint,

while I suck at silence like it’s a kink.

I’m the one who talks during movies, cries during sex,

and flirts like I’m daring the world to prove I don’t belong.

-

And when the femme at the bar makes a joke—

“Wait—you let her marry a bi girl? That’s… bold. I mean, I love bi babes, don’t get me wrong, but I could never sign up for all that uncertainty. Too many open tabs, you know? One minute it’s you, the next it’s Chad from accounting with a vape and a Spotify playlist.”

She laughs like she’s just said something empowering.

-

I laugh too loud.

-

Because if I don’t, I’ll say something like,

“Sweetheart, your trauma’s showing. Tuck it back in.”

(Suck at silence—remember?)

Which won’t help.

She doesn’t want a conversation—she wants a confirmation.

-

But the label sticks like a parking ticket on a stolen car.

Bi.

Two-lane traffic. No destination welcome.

A fencepost to piss on by both sides.

Too straight for lesbians. Too queer for straights.

Always asked for credentials I never agreed to carry.

-

2.

We go home and I bed my wife like a protest.

My mouth, a banner. My fingers, a chant.

She comes like an apology she didn’t owe me.

And afterward, I cry.

-

Not because she doesn't love me—she does.

She loves with the intensity of someone who once had to claw her own name back from silence.

But she loves me despite the shady gender options I present.

She doesn’t say it. She would never.

But I can feel it: the world pressing through her fingertips, asking her if I’m

enough.

-

Because even inside love, I am a glitch in the matrix.

A creature of the seam, stitched from contradictions.

I tell her I’m fine, and she kisses my forehead like a lie she’s agreed to believe.

I fall asleep feeling like a border checkpoint.

-

3.

Pride Month.

-

I wear my fishnets like battle armor and a cropped tee that says “FULLY BI-FURIOUS.”

And I dance like I’m trying to set the rainbow on fire.

My hips chant. My boots testify.

I don’t sip drinks. I devour them.

-

A drag king slaps my ass and says “That’s our girl.”

A gay boy calls me “our emotional support slut.”

I say nothing because being wanted in fragments still counts as presence, right?

-

Until the dyke collective girlies pull me aside—

Leather jackets, shaved temples, moral clarity as rigid as a strap-on.

“You really shouldn’t take up space here,” one says. “Go back to your husband.”

-

I say, “I don’t have one.”

She sneers. “Same thing.”

-

And there it is.

That bone-deep reminder that no matter how queer you prance,

if they can’t box you, they’ll exile you.

That bisexuality isn’t proof of solidarity—it’s treated like a smudge on the lens.

Something to wipe away from the pristine gender spectrum—for the sake of a goddamn unicorn-fart rainbow.

-

I want to slash her with my words,

but my mouth is full of ash.

I am loud in the wrong key.

A song they don’t recognize.

Not queer enough to love, not straight enough to leave alone.

-

4.

My wife finds me later, exiled under a blinking neon pint,

where even the dark feels homonormative.

She touches my wrist like she’s reading my pulse for messages.

She asks what's wrong, and I say, “I think I’m a ghost.”

She says, “You always were. That’s why I saw you.”

-

She kisses me like exorcism.

And for a moment, I exist.

Salt and skin. Bone and bruise. No prefix required.

-

5.

But you can't make a home in someone else's ribcage.

Even when they leave the door open.

Even when they hand you keys and say stay.

Even when they paint their heart in your colors.

-

Later, I join a band.

We’re called Polyphonic Spite—

because Polyamory was taken and Fuck You wasn’t on Spotify.

-

We play dive bars and queer co-ops.

I wear elf ears and sing in broken Latin.

Our drummer is trans and deaf in one ear.

Our bassist is ace and plays barefoot with a prop knife between her teeth.

Our lead guitarist is nonbinary and writes riffs like they’re breaking spells.

-

We write songs like rage bouquets.

We scream open letters.

We make noise like it owes us backpay.

-

At our first gig, I yell into the mic:

-

“This song is for the bi girls who got called tourists.

For the fluid boys they said were confused.

For the nonbinary babes who took off their pronouns like armor

just to survive one more dinner with family.

For the ones who loved loud and were told it wasn’t real.

For the ones who didn’t stay in one lane—and got hit from both sides!”

-

The crowd howls like wolves.

I howl louder.

I howl until I burn out memories.

I howl until my knees buckle and the lights bloom into stars I can name.

-

Until the speaker shorts out.

Until I burst a vein in my throat and taste copper.

Until I realize I’m crying and I don’t remember when it started.

-

I go home alone.

Wife’s on a work trip.

I lie in bed with the bass still ringing in my bones.

The room smells like salt and feedback.

I curl around the ache like it’s a familiar shape.

-

And it hits me—

-

They don’t hate me for being bi.

They hate that I survive it with glitter in my blood.

They hate that I still dance.

That I write love songs without permission.

That I make noise.

That I refuse to shrink.

That I didn’t choose a side and bleed allegiance.

-

The pressure wants a diamond.

And I’m not a diamond.

I’m a bloody Molotov.

-

6.

Weeks later, I get invited back to that same Pride collective.

-

Not as a guest.

As a performer.

-

Same girl from before is running sound now.

She won’t look me in the eyes.

-

I play anyway.

I leave the elf ears at home.

Wear my scars like mascara.

My truth doesn’t need a costume—just a mic.

-

And when the set ends, I don’t wait for applause.

I say:

-

“I am not your mascot. I'm not your myth.

I am not your buffer zone between real gay and straight girl gone wild.

I am the thing you couldn’t cancel because I was never on your schedule.”

-

Silence first.

Then a scream.

Then a ripple of claps like thunder with bad timing.

It’s not gratitude—it’s recognition.

Which counts as a win, right?

It has to.

-

7.

That night, my wife texts me.

“You still up?”

I reply: “I’m always up. Too loud to sleep.”

-

She sends a selfie—smiling, lipstick smudged, a little drunk.

Then: “You’re a legend.”

-

I text back: “Legends are dead things. I’m still causing problems.”

She replies: “Good. Stay unsaintly.”

-

So here I am.

Seven years later.

Unsaintly, as ordered.

Still dancing.

Still slutty.

Still inconvenient.

(OK, granted, a mum as well, but—)

Still a glitch.

Still a problem.

-

And goddamn it, I never looked more divine.

.

Author’s Note:

This isn't fiction—it’s a field report from the bisexual front lines.

I’m a bi woman married to a lesbian. You’d think that’d be simple: two women in love. But apparently, the “B” in LGBTQIA+ still stands for “Bullshit assumptions.”

People expected me to cheat. To leave. To “realize something.” Because, you know, being bi means I’m just one awkward brunch away from ruining everything. Spoiler: I didn’t cheat. I didn’t leave. I just committed—radically, beautifully, inconveniently.

But let’s not pretend it was easy. I’ve been policed by both sides: Too queer for the straights. Too straight for the queers. Gatekeeping dressed up as community. Side-eyes served with rainbow cocktails.

And I’m not imagining it—studies show bi folks face higher rates of depression, anxiety, and partner violence than anyone else on the damn spectrum. We’re also the least likely to be out. Because y’all make it a minefield.

So here’s a radical idea:

Stop treating us like the villain in your breakup origin story.

We’re not confused. We’re just done explaining ourselves. Give the bi’s some room.

We’re not tourists.

We live here too.

.