I knew, going in, to expect incisions and drains, knew to expect I might not wake. “Not my first rodeo,” I said when Dr. Perrault asked if I’d had anything to eat or drink since midnight, asked if I’d taken any pills. I lied and he reiterated the risks, the healing process, the first twenty-four hours of which I would be most susceptible to infection. “Expect to be shocked,” he said, which was what I wanted. I wanted drastic transformation, wanted to watch myself come back slowly in the bathroom mirror, reborn from blood and bruises, all that violence. The in-between time, before results are final, is my favorite of any procedure, a time when I can be sick, but not truly, just stationed in bed, popping painkillers, my body working to heal, my brain acclimating to the bruises and swelling until one day they’re gone and the transformation is complete. I’m old enough to know that this is how true transformation works, in increments so small you don’t notice until one day you wake up and realize you’ve changed.

I touch the bundle around my head, stumble fast toward the elevator. The last dregs of anesthesia in my blood make me feel like I’m sleepwalking, which is not unpleasant. Even when I arrive at the elevator bank and find a family of tourists waiting—a mom and dad and their two boys—I’m okay with it.

“Good evening,” I say, a phrase that leaves my mouth in an awkward clump, each word too formal. “Evening,” says the father. He nods curtly, then wraps an arm around his wife. The children shuffle backward, hide behind their mother’s shorts, and I realize they all bear horrified expressions.

“Go ahead,” I mutter when the elevator arrives. “I’ll get the next one.”

“You sure?” the dad says, turning back once his kids are safe inside. I make a waving motion like please, and the doors close without me.

I zone out waiting for the next ride. Seconds pass but it all feels longer. Then the doors open and I usher myself through them. Inside, my indistinct reflection in the metal walls makes me think of Dr. Perrault, the hand mirror he held for me when I woke up.

“This’ll be a bit scary,” he said, and I brushed him away. I didn’t want to see. Now, in the wavy distortion of the elevator, I’m still hidden, which makes me feel hopeful, on the way to something, some new stage of life where I’ll find myself, wise and appropriate, a woman, a mother, and no longer a girl.