“When they found my body, no one called me Julia. As if a little plastic card with a photo on it meant more than a whole lifetime of transformations. A trannie was found naked and brutally beaten in a vacant lot. Man dressed as a woman beaten to death. On Sunday morning, the dead body of a transexual was found in an abandoned building. Extra! Extra! A fairy was killed!
They plunged a screwdriver into my neck. Dressed as a woman. They raped me. Victim of an alleged hate crime. They tortured me. He went by the name Julia. My body was found facedown and half-naked with cuts on my breasts. They removed his fake tits. They slashed my face. With cuts on his botoxed face. The neighbors said I was a prostitute who went out at night dressed as a woman. There were six stab wounds on my neck and three on my torso. My body showed evidence of sexual assault, but the investigator recommended I be checked for drugs and HIV. I was asphyxiated. Extra! Extra! Transvestite strangled with his own thong. Acid on my face. There’s nothing glamorous about death because death isn’t sequined. My black dress stained with blood.”

Reservoir Bitches, Dahlia de la Cerda