Be a girl

Suspiciously, there was no Claire to be seen at our usual lunchtime meeting spot. Izzy was here, waiting, wondering, just the same as me. We each shared a glance and a shrug, both unsure of what to expect. Claire sure was taking her sweet time arriving. I even had enough time to completely finish off my lunch without a single sign of her.

“He’s not even here!”

I turned to the source of the voice, Oscar, who was walking alongside Rachel towards Isabel and me. Oscar looked positively grouchy, annoyed that someone – whom I presumed to be Claire, though perhaps in his mind ‘Jaxon’ – had failed to show up once again. Claire clearly had yet to convince Oscar and Rachel that Jaxon was in fact no more. Either that or Oscar wasn’t respecting Claire’s wishes, though I strongly suspected the former. Oscar felt betrayed by his friend, but he wasn’t an asshole like the maths teacher Claire and I had. At least, I hoped not.

Rachel on the other hand looked more worried than anything. In her mind, her friend was still missing, and she was concerned. Oscar was still annoyed at what he considered a prank from Emily, but Rachel seemed to have gotten over that.

“Have you two seen Jaxon at all?” she asked, concern seeping into her voice. Her eyes darted around, trying to spot some glimpse of ‘Jaxon’, but she wouldn’t ever find any.

“Not since recess,” Izzy answered. “Haven’t heard anything since.”

Rachel frowned, the worry never leaving her face. Oscar grumbled something unintelligible.

“So, he is at school then?” she said.

“Yes, she is here today,” Izzy replied.

Oscar rolled his eyes and grunted. “You still believe that bullshit from yesterday?” He sounded especially accusatory, as though Izzy were a fool to believe Claire.

“It’s not bullshit…”

“Of course it is!” Oscar exclaimed whilst throwing his arms in the air. “Jaxon just thought it would be funny to play a dumb prank on us and managed to convince his sister to go along with it. It wasn’t even funny!”

Isabel shrank back from Oscar, pulling her arms tight into her body. “You really hurt her yesterday,” she said softly, the confidence having left her voice after Oscar’s outburst.

“Who? Emily?”

“No, Claire.”

Oscar clamped both his hands on the sides of his head in frustration. He looked on the verge of screaming, though he managed to refrain. “Claire isn’t real! She was just Emily!”

“I resent that.”

Everyone turned in the direction of Claire’s voice. She walked over to us, arms crossed over her chest, looking rather unimpressed. She had tied her hair back into a ponytail since Izzy and I last spoke with her at recess. Oscar copied her posture and huffed, still believing that Claire was actually Emily pretending. She glared down at the boy.

“Doing this again are we?” he snarked.

“Doing what again?”

Oscar rolled his eyes. “Pretending to be Jaxon pretending to be a girl.”

“I’m offended you think I would ever do something so stupid,” she said.

Oscar glowered at the tall girl, pointing a finger defiantly at her. He tried to jab her in the chest with his finger, but she deftly deflected it. Oscar quickly composed himself. “But you did! Yesterday!”

“No, I didn’t.”

She still looked annoyed, arms crossed over her chest, her hip jutting out to the side slightly, and a face that all but said that she didn’t want to be here. She was in a mood I had never really seen from Claire. She wasn’t worried that her friends were disbelieving her like I would have expected. She wasn’t overconfident and giddy. She was stern and done with Oscar’s bullshit. She wasn’t trying to convince him of anything.

This… wasn’t Claire.

“Wait, Emily?” I interjected softly.

“Who else would I be?” she replied, staring down at me, somehow appearing even more irritated than before. I felt really stupid for not recognising her earlier. But she did look remarkably similar to her sister. Practically identical.

So, this was Claire’s plan. Simple, but effective, though her keeping it secret to build suspense was remarkably unnecessary. It wasn’t exactly surprising. In fact, it was most logical. She was probably just being secretive for her own personal pleasure.

“Wait, if you’re Emily, then where’s Claire?” I asked. I wasn’t quite sure what Claire’s plan was here. Wouldn’t it have made more sense for them to be here together?

“Right behind that tree,” she replied, casually pointing her thumb in the direction of a tree not too far from our group.

Although I couldn’t see anyone near the tree, it whined, “Emilyyyy” stretching out the final syllable for several seconds. It sounded suspiciously similar to Emily’s voice.

Claire revealed herself, slipping out from behind the trunk, pouting at her sister. She walked over to us, hunched over with her arms hanging limply by her side. “You ruined it!” she whined.

“I didn’t ruin anything,” Emily huffed. “Your plan was stupid.” Agreed.

“Why are you so mean to meeeee,” Claire wailed. “Mum should have named you E-mean-ly instead.”

Yep. That was the Claire I knew.

Oscar and Rachel stared at the two near identical sisters in utter disbelief. Oscar’s eyes darted back and forth between the two, his mouth hanging wide open. While Rachel’s mouth was closed, her eyes were wide open in shock. They both knew Claire and Emily well enough to know that the siblings only numbered two. And they hadn’t looked so similar before last week. Stood before them was indisputable proof that Claire was in fact real.

I had to admit, with the sisters standing beside each other, it was somewhat difficult to tell them apart; they almost looked like identical twins, despite the two year age gap. They were about the same height, their hair was the same colour and of similar texture and waviness, although Emily had her hair tied up, while Claire had hers hanging loosely at her shoulders. Their faces were almost the same as well. The only difference I could really see from this slight distance was that Claire had a slightly darker tan than Emily. A detail I likely wouldn’t have noticed if the two were not standing right next to each other. In essence: it was actually fairly reasonable to assume that Claire really was just Emily playing a prank.

Of course, that assumed that Emily would want to pretend to be her younger sibling, and I got the feeling that she didn’t. Despite their similar appearances, the difference in their personalities could not be more stark.

“There’s two Emilys!” Rachel exclaimed.

“I find the comparison to my sister offensive,” Emily said snidely, “She wishes she could compare to me.”

“Stop being so rude!” Claire whined.

Emily booped her sister on the nose. “No,” she said with a cheeky smile causing Claire to pout.

Rachel shook her head in disbelief. “Since when have you had a sister, Emily?”

“Ever since this one was born,” she said, wrapping her arm around her sister’s neck and pulling her in close. “Of course, we didn’t know that til last week. Because this complete dumbass” – she rubbed the fist of her free hand roughly over Claire’s head. Claire yelped in pain, struggling to break free from her older sibling’s grasp. But Emily’s grip held fast – “required literal magical intervention to realise that she’s a girl.”

Claire finally managed to escape, gently rubbing the top of her head to help ease the pain. “Yeah well, it’s hard to realise that when everyone tells you you’re a boy your whole life!” Claire exclaimed, scowling at her sister.

Emily shrugged nonchalantly. “It still took magic for you to realise.”

“Ok, yeah. I can’t deny that the magic helped Claireify some things.”

Emily groaned, throwing her head back in annoyance.

“Pfft oh my god!” Rachel said, “You’re definitely not Emily lmao!” She burst into cacophonous laughter, and Claire joined her with some soft giggling. Rachel was now fully on Claire’s side. That was good.

Oscar huffed loudly to get everyone’s attention. Once he had it, he crossed his arms over his chest, more annoyed than ever. He didn’t look impressed – by Claire, or her silly pun. “You’re really gonna come here, looking like a completely different person, and expect us to act like nothing has happened?” Oscar snarked.

The smile disappeared from Claire’s face in an instant. “I mean, yeah. I’m still me. I’m just a girl now.”

Oscar scrunched his face in frustration, appearing as though he wanted to rebut Claire, but was unable. He quieted down as he processed the information presented to him. “I… need some time to think,” he eventually said. Stuffing his hands in his pockets, he walked away hunched over.

“Ok, bye Oscar.”

Everyone watched as he took his leave, but no one followed after him or tried to stop him. We all understood that what he needed was time and space to mull this over. It was a lot to take in, no doubt. Your friend disappears for a week and comes back as a girl? Magic is real? And the evidence that she really is your friend transformed by magic and not some imposter is so overwhelming that you cannot refute it? Yeah, that’s a lot.

“This is unreal,” Rachel said, interrupting the brief moment of silence that had befallen the group. She had her hands on her temples as she struggled to comprehend the information presented to her by Claire and Emily. “You’re a girl now? Magic is real!? You’re a girl now!?”

Claire giggled. “Yes, yes, and yes.”

“How did it happen? Is there some witch going around transforming people? Or was it like a potion or something? Did it hurt? Or did you just wake up as a girl? Wait, if magic is real can it be learnt? Do you know magic? Can you teach me?”

Claire looked like she was going to be dizzy after being hit by the whirlwind of questions from Rachel, a feeling with which I could empathise. There was no way that Rachel seriously expected Claire to actually answer all of those questions, did she? I could barely keep up, and I doubted Claire was better at storing so many questions within her short term memory. Rachel herself looked to be short of breath after her barrage of questions.

Claire took a moment to collect her thoughts, rubbing at her forehead pensively. “Listen Rach, I don’t really wanna talk about how it happened.”

Rachel gave Claire sad puppy dog eyes but didn’t question her response. She surely knew that this was a very personal matter, so it was understandable that Claire might not want to talk about it. And unlike Isabel, she didn’t let her curiosity get the better of her.

I internally thanked Claire for not revealing my involvement. Rachel didn’t need to know, and since she wasn’t pushing the matter like a certain someone else, I felt reassured that my secret was safe. Even Isabel knowing was too much, but there was nothing that could be done about that now.

“As for magic, I don’t think it can be taught,” Claire continued, rubbing at her chin, “I think it’s just something some people are capable of? I mean, I was just suddenly capable of it on my seventeenth birthday. That sure was an interesting day.”

Claire got her power on her seventeenth birthday as well? What an odd coincidence.

“Not this again,” said Emily snidely. “Claire, you don’t have a gaydar.”

“You have a gaydar!?” Rachel exclaimed.

“No, she doesn’t. She just thinks she does.”

“Well, she knew that I’m gay,” Izzy interjected.

“Holy shit Izzy, you’re gay!? High five girl!” Rachel was just a bit too excited about this in my opinion. She held up her hand for Isabel to high five. Looking unsure of herself, Isabel raised her hand in kind, and Rachel gave it a hearty slap. Why that deserved a high five, I didn’t know. Seemed Izzy didn’t know either. And now her hand hurt, but for what?

“That doesn’t prove anything,” Emily retorted.

“You’re just jealous cause your sister is cooler than you,” Rachel said in a smug tone. She then stuck her tongue out.

Emily just rolled her eyes. “She wishes.”

Rachel inhaled deeply, in an attempt to calm herself down. It didn’t work. Instead, she started bouncing around, vigorously shaking her hands to help deal with all the excited energy she was currently experiencing. “This is so cool. I mean, magic is fucking real, and it turned you into a hot girl!? Like holy shit that’s so fucking wild!”

“Yep, it’s great!” Claire exclaimed proudly. “Now Emily doesn’t have to worry about insects in her food anymore.”

What? “What?” Emily said, confused as all hell.

“Because I no longer serve ants!” Rachel and Claire both laughed joyously together, while I couldn’t help but shake my head. That did not stop me from smiling, however. She sure did have a way with words.

“Nope! Nope, nope, nope!” Emily griped, throwing her arms up into the air, “I’m done here. You’re weird, and so are your friends. Goodbye.” She gave us a curt wave and left.

Managing to contain her giggles to a somewhat reasonable level, Claire called out to her sister, “Thanks Em!”

Emily didn’t even bother to turn around. She simply gave us another wave while continuing to walk away.

Rachel bounced around excitedly, barely able to keep still. She had so much energy, and needed to expend it however she could. “Ahhh!” she squealed, “I can’t get over how cool this is! Plus, your name is super pretty.”

“Thanks, I chose it myself!”

“This is quite the turnaround, I must say, Rachel,” Isabel commented, “Before you were having trouble believing Claire, and now you’re… well…” she gestured vaguely at the girl who was vibrating in delight.

“Well yeah, I mean, what was more likely?” Rachel answered, “That Emily was pretending to be Jaxon pretending to be a girl for a prank, or that fucking magic is real?”

“Fair point.”

“I’m glad you’re excited for me,” Claire said calmly, “I was worried after yesterday.”

“Yeah, sorry about that. But you don’t gotta worry about me anymore, girl.” Rachel gave Claire a thumbs up and a hearty grin.

Claire smiled warmly. There was a relief to her expression; she was glad that another of her friends accepted her. The question that remained now was to what conclusion Oscar would come in regards to Claire, after he’d taken the time to himself to mull everything over. I hoped he would come around, sooner rather than later. For Claire’s sake, and for the sake of the friend group.

“Ooh, ooh, Claire, Claire,” Rachel said, lightly and repeatedly tapping at the tall girl’s upper arm, “You should join the school softball team!”

“Softball? Why?”

“Well, one: we’d be playing on the same team which, hello? How awesome is that? And two: you can’t very well play cricket with the boys anymore now, can you?” She shot a cheeky smirk at Claire. She knew she was right on both counts.

“You do make a good point. I’ll think about it.”

“You better.”

After that, the conversation devolved into the usual lunchtime chatter. Rachel continued being a bundle of exuberance, and we all happy for her, especially Claire. It was going to be interesting to see how the dynamics of the entire group would change now that Clare was a girl and was accepted as such. At least, accepted by everyone except Oscar, whose opinion was still to be determined.

But most of all, I was glad that my friends didn’t hate me. That I hadn’t actually ruined anyone’s life this time, as I had done in the past. Sure, Rachel and Oscar didn’t know about my involvement in all this, but that didn’t matter. The fact that both Isabel and especially Claire still supported me, and didn’t abandon me as their friend, filled me with such relief.