Be a girl

“I’m Jaxon. I’m a girl now.”

Jaxon had just come out and told everyone. Like it was no big deal. It was no wonder that the girl seemed familiar; she looked very similar, though not quite the same, as Jaxon’s sister Emily. I stared at my friend in utter disbelief. And I wasn’t the only one. Though everyone else’s reasons for the disbelief were no doubt quite different from my own.

How could he just… say it? It didn’t make any sense. How was he so ok simply telling everyone his true identity, despite the drastic change in appearance? Why wouldn’t he try to hide it? Was he not worried about how people would react?

Jaxon continued, “I’m going by Claire now. I’d really appreciate it if everyone could treat me just like any other girl from now on.”

“Are you really Jaxon?” someone called out.

The girl nodded. “Yeah, though my name is Claire now.”

“Why are you a girl?” someone else blurted out.

“I just am?” Claire answered, somewhat unsure of how to answer the question.

“How?”

“It just happened.”

I was thankful that she didn’t divulge any details. She may not have wanted to talk to me after what I did, but she was at least kind enough to not tell anyone my secret.

What followed was a barrage of questions and accusations from various students in the class.

“You just wanna peep on girls in the changing rooms, pervert!”

“You just wanna cheat at sport!”

“Are those tits real?”

“Do you still have a dick?”

Claire responded to none of them. She looked rather distressed due to all the, quite frankly, disgusting and inappropriate comments people had made. I mean, why were they asking her about her genitals? Why did they suddenly feel comfortable asking that? It was downright rude and invasive.

At the last question, Mr. Manning stood up and shut everyone down. Thank goodness. Claire did not deserve any of what she’d just received. It wasn’t her fault that she was suddenly a girl!

With question time over, Claire made her way to her usual seat right next to me without a word, allowing homeroom to continue as normal from then on. She simply stared at the front of the classroom, completely ignoring me. I wanted to say something, but I refrained. She clearly still didn’t want to speak to me, and I respected that. Plus, what could I even say without someone overhearing? I couldn’t risk my secret escaping.

Eventually, the bell rang, signalling the end of homeroom. As we all stood up to exit the room, Claire finally turned to me and said, “Meet me behind the art building at recess.” I nodded. I was terrified. Terrified of her blowing up at me for ruining her life. But I couldn’t run out on her, whatever it was she wanted. I owed her that much at least.

I couldn’t get my mind off of her throughout the entirety of the first class of the day, even though it was physics, my favourite class. Claire was so much more important. A feeling of pure dread overwhelmed me as I worried about what she would say to me, and it prevented me from concentrating on anything else.

As she had requested, I made my way to the back of the art building at recess. It was a nice quiet spot, away from the rest of the school. It was unlikely anyone would overhear us, meaning Claire could tear into me as much as she pleased.

I arrived first, but it didn’t take her long to meet up with me. My stomach twisted itself into knots as fear began to overwhelm me. She approached me with a solemn expression on her face. Here it came.

Except. It didn’t.

Rather than go off at me for how much I’d ruined her life. She hugged me.

She held me firmly, but tenderly, for far longer than would normally be reasonable for a hug. I had no idea why she was doing this. I didn’t deserve this. I didn’t want this. I didn’t hug her back, but I didn’t force her away either. The entire experience left me extremely uncomfortable. It wasn’t helped by the fact that our height difference meant that my face was buried in her chest.

She eventually pulled away with a deep, heavy sigh. Tears streamed down her face, though I couldn’t tell why. She wiped them away with the back of her hand. With her standing right in front of me, I could get a much better look at her. She very much looked like her sister; the resemblance was uncanny. She was even about the same height as her sister now, making for quite a substantial loss in height. The only real difference now between the two was the different hairstyle.

“I’m so sorry, I know you don’t like hugs,” she blubbered, “but… just like… after everything, you looked like you needed one.”

I had no words. I straight up did not know how to respond. Did she invite me here just to hug me? Why? Why did she hug me? Why wasn’t she grilling me? Tearing me apart? I didn’t understand.

“I’m so sorry,” Claire repeated, “I’m sorry for poking and prodding you to find out your secret. If you don’t want to speak to me anymore, I can leave. You’ll never have to see me again.” She pointed with her thumb to the corner of the building, toward the rest of the school.

I still didn’t respond. I simply stood and stared at her, frozen on the spot. I couldn’t comprehend what was going on. She was apologising to me? I should be apologising to her.

“Ok, I’ll leave,” she said after a moment, and started to walk away.

I couldn’t let her go. I needed answers. “Wait!” I finally said, causing her to stop and turn back to me. I gulped nervously, unsure of myself. “Don’t” – I took in a breath to steel myself – “Don’t you hate me?”

Her expression softened, and she smiled at me sweetly. “Why would I hate you?” she said, her voice tender and soothing.

“Because I” – I blurted out before choking on my own voice – “I ruined your life!” I managed to sputter.

Claire cocked her head to the side, and stared at me, bewildered. “You didn’t ruin my life,” she said, shaking her head.

HUH!? How did I not!? I’d ripped away her old life, and made it impossible for her to lead a normal one henceforth. “But I…” I stammered, “I mean… You’re… I turned you into a girl!”

“Oh, I don’t really mind that.”

“Wait, what?” She didn’t mind? But why? I mean, I would love for it to happen to me, but I was a freak. This was a well established fact. Everyone I’d transformed prior had loathed what I’d done to them. It didn’t make sense that Claire wouldn’t feel the same way as the others. She couldn’t be like me, could she? No. Absolutely not. She was not a freak like me. I wouldn’t allow myself to think so lowly of her.

“Yeah, I mean it’s new and different, you know?” Claire shrugged, “Super weird, don’t get me wrong. But like, I like this.”

“I… but… you didn’t talk to me at all! I thought you wanted nothing to do with me anymore!”

“Oh.” Claire drooped her head. “I’m sorry. I… I thought you needed some space. I mean, I figured this was a pretty sore spot for you, given, you know, your dad. If I’d known… I would have contacted you sooner.”

“It’s fine, I only thought I’d ruined my best friend’s life and made him hate me. No big deal.”

Claire slapped herself on the forehead. “God, I’m such an idiot. I’m so so so sorry.”

I shook my head. “Why are you apologising to me?” I asked, “I should be the one apologising to you!”

“No, Ben! You didn’t do anything wrong. It’s not your fault.”

“Ugh,” I groaned, “You sound like my dad.”

“I can live with that,” she giggled before letting out a deep sigh. “Listen, Ben, you’re my friend, and I don’t want this” – she gestured at her feminine body – “to get between us. I don’t want to lose you. Can you promise you’ll remain my friend?”

“I… ok.” Truth be told, I was glad that she didn’t hate me. It relieved immense stress from me. I still felt guilty about what I’d done, but if she wanted to remain friends with me, then I wasn’t going to deny her that. I needed her.

Claire wrapped me up in her arms again, squeezing much more tightly than before. Thankfully, this hug lasted much less time, so I wasn’t gasping for breath. Still, it was rather awkward, if less so than the first hug. I still didn’t appreciate my face being in her boobs.

“Thank you, thank you, thank you!” she said as she released me from her clutches. She let out a deep sigh of relief.

“Let’s, um, refrain from hugs from now on,” I said.

“Right, sorry,” she replied, scratching the back of her head nervously. “So, um, I’m gonna tell the others about this at lunch. It would, uhh, be nice if you could be there with me. I mean, you don’t have to of course, if you don’t want to. I don’t want to force you to do anything. But I would appreciate you being there.”

Did I want to be there for that? I probably should. I was her friend, right? I should be by her side for something like this. That’s what friends were for.

“Ok.”

Claire let out an excited squeal, looking like she wanted to hug me once again. But she managed to restrain herself. “Thank you, Ben!”

“But,” I added, “We can’t let them know I was the one who did this.”

“Oh, of course of course of course. I’ll be super Claireful about it.” She winked at me, while I groaned at her terrible pun.

***

Before lunch rolled around, I had a chemistry lesson with Isabel. She immediately picked up on my more upbeat mood, but I refrained from telling her the reason. I simply told her to wait until lunchtime. I received a raised eyebrow for that, but she didn’t push it any further.

When lunchtime finally arrived, I first met with Claire at our lockers, since they were right next to each other. We walked over to the usual meeting spot with our friends together. I was nervous, and it showed. Claire told me that everything would work out and that she was here with me and she wouldn’t abandon me if anything went wrong. It seemed rather backwards to me. She was the one who’d had her life completely upturned, I should be the one reassuring her! I had no idea how she could remain so calm and steadfast in a situation like this. And yet here she was, with a soft smile on her face.

We made sure to take our time getting to the meeting spot, so that everyone was already there by the time we arrived. Our three friends were chatting amongst themselves. Oscar was the first to notice our approach, and he gave me a quick greeting, interrupting the conversation he was having with the girls. I waved at all of them in return.

“Hey Ben!” Oscar said, “Who’ve you got there with you?”

Oh God, I did not want to be the one to answer that. “I, um,” I stuttered, but didn’t manage more than that.

Claire giggled beside me, clearly having too much fun over her friends not recognising her. As we got closer, Oscar squinted at Claire, and she returned a playful smirk. He looked confused. Once we were close enough for him to get a proper look, Claire evidently seemed familiar to him, though he couldn’t quite put his finger on it.

The others had that sort of confused expression too; like they recognised her but couldn’t tell from where. Claire was not helping matters. She hadn’t spoken a word, just letting them try to figure it out on their own, all while having perhaps a little too much fun.

“Wait, Emily?” Oscar said, “What are you doing here? Where’s Jaxon?”

Claire snickered at being mistaken for her sister. “I’m not Emily,” she replied coyly, “My name is Claire.”

“Oh, I’m sorry, my mistake. It’s just, you look very similar to our friend’s sister.”

Claire’s grin only became even cheekier. I wished she would stop being so coy right now and just say it. Why was she running our friends in circles like this? She was definitely having way too much fun now.

“Weeeeeeelllllll,” Claire said, all long and drawn out, like a child would, “Emily is my sister, so it makes sense we’d look similar.”

The reactions to this statement from the other three were all quite varied. Oscar looked rather confused, Rachel taken aback, while Isabel furrowed her brow pensively.

“But Emily doesn’t have—” Oscar began to say, but he was quickly interrupted by Isabel.

“JAXON!?” Isabel blurted out. Oscar and Rachel’s eyes both went wide as the realisation hit them too.

“Hi Izzy,” Claire smirked with a wave.

“Wait wait wait, back the fuck up,” Rachel interrupted, waving her arms frantically to get everyone’s attention. “You can’t be Jaxon. That’s not possible. I mean, you’re a girl, and Jaxon is not.”

Claire nodded vigorously. “Mhmm, mhmm. I was Jaxon, but now I’m Claire. I’m a girl now.” She shot all three of them a broad grin, and posed with her hands on her hips. Finally, she came out and said it plainly. She should have started with this.

Rachel looked at Claire like she was insane. Which, to be fair, what she was suggesting did sound rather unbelievable. “Boys do not simply turn into girls,” Rachel insisted.

“She’s got a point there,” Oscar added.

“Well, I did,” Claire retorted, crossing her arms over her chest and pouting.

“Emily, please stop this. We’re worried about our friend who hasn’t been at school for ages, and has been acting really distant. We don’t need you here to pretend that you’re him and that he’s magically turned into a girl.”

“No, but, I’m not Emily. She’s my sister.”

“Emily doesn’t have a sister!” Oscar growled, glowering at Claire.

“She does now!” Claire exclaimed.

“Listen, Emily,” Rachel said, lowering her voice, “To have you come to school pretending to be your own brother turned into a girl is actually pretty fucking insulting. I thought you were better than this.”

“No! I’m not Emily! I’m Claire! Please, you have to believe me!” Claire pleaded. Oh. Oh no. The others weren’t believing her. This wasn’t good.

“Quit it!” Oscar exclaimed.

Ok. I needed to speak up now. I couldn’t let this go on. This was going far worse than Claire had anticipated. She probably thought our friends would simply believe her. And a part of me thought so too, probably because I’d transformed so many people in the past. But I couldn’t ignore that her claim of being turned into a girl was really quite absurd.

“She’s telling the truth,” I said quietly. That got their attention. Though I was staring at the ground, I could feel their eyes burning into me.

“What makes you so sure?” Oscar snarked.

“Please just trust me,” I replied nervously, not looking up to meet his gaze. I could feel him glaring at me even without looking.

“That’s a tall ask,” Oscar grunted. Claire snorted, but everyone ignored her.

“I know.”

“Oscar, leave them alone!” Isabel interjected.

The short girl scowled at the boy furiously. He walked right up to her, angrily towering over her, staring her down. Isabel did not falter, however. “You expect me to believe this shit?” he growled down at her. “I’m not some gullible idiot, and I don’t like being taken for a fool. Don’t tell me you actually believe them?”

Isabel shrunk back at the accusation levelled upon her. “I mean… um… I just don’t see any reason for them to lie.”

Oscar laughed. Cackled, almost. “Oh, I get it. You’re both in on this,” he said, pointing at both Isabel and me. “You almost had me there. But your big mistake was thinking I would fall for something so outlandish. I mean, Jaxon suddenly turning into a girl? Absurd.”

“This isn’t a fucking prank, Oscar!” Claire yelled, glaring him down in much the same manner as Oscar glared down Isabel. “This is real. I’m a girl now, and you’re going to have to accept that.”

“I’m with Oscar on this one,” Rachel chimed in. “This is all too unbelievable. You’re basically asking us to accept that magic is real, and I can’t do that.”

“Magic is real!” Claire exclaimed exasperatingly. Oscar scoffed. Rachel looked unsettled. Claire turned to me. “Ben, tell them magic is real.”

“It is,” I replied.

It did not help at all. “Well now it’s obvious that Ben’s in on the bit. You really expect me to believe that physics boy over there thinks magic is real? What are you on?”

“So, your friend comes out as transgender, and you refuse to believe she is who she says she is?” Isabel interjected, placing both hands on her hips.

“Look at her, Izzy,” Oscar shouted, aggressively pointing at Claire, “She’s at least half a foot shorter than Jaxon. I don’t know about you, but I’ve never heard of any medical operation that can shorten someone by that much.”

“Ok, yeah, that’s fair,” Izzy said meekly, backing off from him.

“I’m done here. Goodbye Emily. Tell Jaxon that if this is his sick idea of a joke, it’s not funny.” Oscar then glowered at me and shook his head. “I expected better from you,” he said directly to me, before storming off.

“Oscar, wait!” Claire called out after him. Without even turning around, he raised the middle finger at her, not slowing one bit.

Rachel stepped in front of Claire and placed a hand up to stop her. “Leave him,” she said.

“But… ok…” Claire said, defeated.

“I think I’m gonna go too,” Rachel said softly, “I’m really not sure how to feel about all this. Either my friends are lying to my face, or they’re telling the truth about something completely insane. And I don’t know how to feel about either. I… need some time to process all this.”

“Rachel, please,” Claire pleaded. Rachel simply shook her head and walked off. Claire hung her head limply, staring towards the ground. I really wasn’t sure what to do. I should comfort her, right? Two of her friends had just left her, thinking she was a liar and a fraud. It must have hit her hard. But I had no clue how to comfort her in a situation like this.

She sniffled and looked over towards Isabel. She had tears slowly trickling down her face. “What about you Izzy?” she asked, wiping away some of the tears.

“I…” she began, though she never finished. The words remained stuck in her throat.

“Forget about it,” Claire said dismissively, before sniffling once again. “I think… I think I need some time to myself.” She addressed me directly next, “Ben, I’ll meet you at the usual spot at home time.”

“Ok,” I replied, and my friend dismissed herself, leaving me alone with Isabel.

Well.

That was a complete and utter trainwreck.