Day two. I took the pills once again, placing them in my mouth and taking a sip of water. I swallowed, mildly irritated at the continuing voice in the back of my head. Boygirlboy. Boyboyboy. I chased the thought away. 

The next morning was a hell I'd never experienced. It's a Saturday morning--I love Saturdays. But not this one. The school dance was in a couple months, and I guess my parents decided to take advantage of that. They ran into my room at nine AM, and announced that we're going dress shopping. For ME. I suppressed my grimace until my mom left the room. I pulled the covers over my head. 

-------------------

The dress had frills. I protested as strongly as I could muster, but eventually I had to give up. We bought the dress. I cringed. I hated it more than I thought I would. 

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Gym class is slowly getting worse. Some of the girlboys are coming into the boys' locker room, the ones who are far enough into transition. They flitter and twitter and flutter like true girls but I can see the difference in the way they hold themselves, do their hair, even their body weight distribution signals a male.  

I took too long to get changed. Way too long. I ended up being the last one in the locker room. As I turned to finally leave, I noticed something on top of one of the lockers... One of the girlboys had left herhis bottle of pills open... Right there... Herhis testosterone pills... A thought crossed my mind momentarily. No, I told myself scornfully, that's dumb. They aren't yours. Besides, they aren't tailored to your height and weight, so... I grabbed them off the shelf. Of course, the little voice had something to say about it. 

Good. Good. Fiiiiinally... You give me... And yourself... What you and I really want! Perfect... This is perfect... 

I took a gulp of water from the sink and quickly swallowed multiple pills. More than I would take if they were estrogen. I hoped shehe doesn't notice. Immediately I was filled with regret. What if...? I didn't even know what happens if you take both at the same time. I took a deep breath, and ran out to meet everyone else. 

"May I ask what took you so long?" The gym teacher asked me when I finally appeared. 

"Nothing, ma'am," I muttered back, "I couldn't find my shirt, it turns out someone put it in another locker." 

"How cruel! To mess with a poor boy-- er, girl-- in the locker room when they're already dealing with dysphoria!" She exclaimed, seemingly shocked and annoyed. Yeah... Cruel...

Some girl ran up to me after class. I recognized her immediately. Ruby. She had gone through puberty, and therefore, transition, way earlier than most. She was already a girl. She wasn't a girlboy anymore... Even though, for legal reasons, she hadn't gotten surgery yet. She was a girl. Her transition was my fate. I felt a tingle in my stomach. "Hey Jimmy." It shocked me that she knew my name already. Only October of our freshman year of high school, and all... "Listen. I've been meaning to talk to you." 

I nodded, "Yeah? What's up?" 

"What is up with you? You're nothing like anyone else. You're so... so..." 

"What? What am I 'so'?" I asked. I already knew what she was going to say, but I wanted to hear her say it. 

"So.... HAPPY! You're so happy all the time! Even before you started taking pills! I mean... It's ridiculous. Do you even HAVE dysphoria?!?"

My voice caught in my throat. She found me out, she knows, she's gonna tell everyone, she... "I..." I covered my discomfort with an awkward laugh. Ruby laughed, too. I couldn't tell if she was faking it or not...

"Oh, what am I saying, of COURSE you do! We all do. It really is unfortunate, don't you think? We all have to live with this burden! My cousin--" She paused, squeezing her eyes shut, as though she were in pain. "My cousin... Well, I think he had some sort of disorder or something, but he didn't start puberty. He just never did. It was estimated that he would start around seventeen or eighteen, but he didn't make it that long. I guess the dysphoria took hold of him and he just... lost it." Her voice cut off suddenly. Her eyes fixated on the hallway ahead, as if she could see something or someone... "I'm sorry, I have to go," she muttered, taking off down the long hallway. 

I'd watched Ruby before. Creepy? Yeah, whatever. It wasn't that I had a crush on her or anything like that, she was just intriguing. There's no other way to describe it. And when she mentioned her cousin, I remembered a week in the middle of September when she stopped talking unless the teacher directly called on her, or a friend directly spoke to her. And even then, she would just give short answers. "X=-26" "Sorry guys, I'm not in the mood." "Red represents love and anger," and then she would stop talking again. Her eyes were always angled downward, and her eyes were blank. But by the next week, she was back to herself. She went back to giving long, detailed responses in class and answering her friends with enthusiasm and talking to them all through lunch until the bell rang to start class. 

Her demeanor that week was the same as when she mentioned her cousin. Well, it's none of my business, I barely knew the girl. I shook my head and moved on to math class. Another type of hell. 

As expected, all other classes dragged on for what felt like years. I didn't share any of them with Ruby, unfortunately, but I did share a couple with Rose and Shawna. I think they were happier about it than I was. They continued peppering me with questions that I didn't have answers to, nor did i want to have answers to. 

"Are you SURE you don't have a name preference?" 

"You're waiting to have the surgery, right?" 

"How about female pronouns?" 

"Do you like the pills? Do they help?" 

And I never answered them--because I didn't want to. I didn't want to have an answer. I wanted them to be wrong. I wanted Ruby to be wrong. I wanted to be like the rest of them and in my entire life I'd never wanted anything more. Just to feel the pain they felt. To feel it go away when I took the pills, to feel happy as they did, not the opposite. It's all backwards and I don't like it. I want to relate. I want them to relate to me. Just once.