When the boy was born, everyone was confused about the fact that he was a boy. They called him Lucille, a girl. When he was five he started trying to correct them, but every time he did his parents would laugh like he was telling a funny joke. Eventually they stopped laughing, and the boy learned to stop correcting anyone. That was okay, though. Maybe they would believe him once he figured out a name.

Thankfully, the boy had someone who understood him perfectly. His neighbor and best friend was just like him, but the opposite. They had been inseparable ever since they told each other who they really were. It was weird, though. She kept getting called a boy by everyone, but unlike the boy she never told anyone they were wrong. He asked her why, all the time, and she always said it was because she was scared her dads might be upset with her if she told them, like his mom and dad were.  

The two of them stuck together through thick and thin, no matter what the universe threw at them. When the girl’s family died in a horrible fire, the boy begged and begged for his parents to take her in. They refused, and he was scared this meant he would never see her again, but in the end he didn’t need to worry. Her new family lived close enough that they still went to the same school. 

They stayed together even when they were eleven, and their families started complaining about them spending so much time together, without any other friends their age. The boy didn’t mind, though. She was his best friend, he didn’t need anybody else.  

They clung to each other in tears once their bodies started to turn against them. His parents started telling him he was becoming a young woman, and should be proud. The girl’s father (she never called him “Dad”) gave her the talk and cut her hair the shortest it would ever be. If they were isolated from others before, it was nothing like the loneliness that followed. 

Their parents started forcing them apart in the summer just after the boy’s thirteenth birthday. The boy wanted, no, needed his hair cut, and his mom kept telling him no. The girl helped him, and together they cut his hair in such a way that he was almost happy with the increasingly wrong face staring him in the mirror. His mom wanted to murder them both for that, but settled with keeping the boy in his room, keeping his only interactions with the outside world limited to the one meal he was brought a day. 

Thankfully, the summer alone gave the boy all the time he needed to think of a name. He might not have had access to the internet, but the books he kept hidden under his bed were all he needed. Eventually, he settled on a name that felt unbelievably right to his ears—Dylan.

Dylan was old enough by that point to recognize that nobody but the girl would believe him if he told them his name, so he held it close to his chest. There was no point in getting his hopes up about the love of the people around him, it was just going to get him hurt like always. 

Even after his summer of isolation, Dylan and the girl barely got to spend any time together. He was, according to the girl’s father, too feminine an influence on her. They both wanted to laugh when the girl told Dylan that, but the surrounding implications took all of the fun out of the joke. They would only see one another at school, unless something changed. 

In the time leading up to Dylan’s fourteenth birthday, the girl told him she had a brilliant plan. She wouldn’t tell him what it was, that it was a surprise, but every time he asked about it the girl’s face would turn adorably red. 

Dylan received his surprise on his fourteenth birthday. It had, for the most part, been the depressing day it usually was. He’d been forced into a floral dress his mom ‘just knew he’d look beautiful in’, and the family who showed up reasserted his femininity what felt like every five seconds. He had been prepared to write off the day as a complete waste of time when the girl appeared, wearing a button up shirt and khakis that didn’t fit her in the slightest. Dylan had to hold back a laugh at how absurd they both must’ve looked, in clothes that were so obviously wrong.

The girl seemed kind of quiet for most of the hour they were allowed to be alone together (‘With the door open!’ his mom’s voice was still ringing in his ears). He tried prying something out of her, but the more he pried the quieter she got. He eventually gave up completely, and settled with reading silently, comforted by her presence alone.

He was in the middle of his favorite book when their lips met. 

It was clumsy, exactly what anyone would expect of two teenagers sharing a first kiss, but to Dylan it felt so perfect. It was as if there was an explosion of bliss in his heart, stronger than what he felt every time the girl called him by his name. 

“If they think we’re dating, they’ll let us keep hanging out,” the girl whispered in Dylan’s ear, and all of his joy faded in an instant. Was this her surprise? Did the kiss really not mean anything to her?

Dylan didn’t risk jeopardizing their one chance to spend any time together. He went along with the girl’s idea of having a fake relationship, no matter how much he wanted it to be something more. Painfully often he had the urge to hold her hand, or kiss her, or just hold onto her in an embrace for longer than normal. But he always held back, kept telling himself she didn’t feel the same way.

When the two of them were fifteen, the girl finally had a name for herself: Tatyana. It was a beautiful name, he told her over and over and over and over. When her voice started to deepen (they had both hoped it had skipped her, that she would never need to suffer that) he would call her a beautiful girl. He’d remind her of how gorgeous she was every time she came to him.

And she repaid the favor. When he complained about how awful his damn periods were, or how short and small he felt compared to everybody around him, she was there. When he was forcing himself not to cry because he didn’t want people to see him as a crying girl, she was there. He could always cry with her, because he knew what she saw never changed. She would call him handsome, promise him that the world would see him for who he was soon enough, and they would stay in that embrace for as long as they could.

A name appeared on Dylan’s wrist when he was sixteen, just before school started, and he didn’t need to see it to know whose name it was. He kept it covered with bandages every day since it appeared, refusing to show it to even his parents. They threatened him, of course, but he still refused. He spent more than one night in his room without food as a result, and even that wasn’t enough to convince him to reveal the name on his wrist. 

The name of the girl he’d fallen in love with. Even the universe seemed to think that they were meant to be. What a joke.

When they saw one another in school again, Tatyana’s wrist was severely burnt. He asked, over and over, what happened, but every time she refused to give a straight answer. It was obvious, from where the burn was, that her soulmate had been revealed. Dylan hoped, in his heart, that the timing meant his name had been there, but there would be no way of learning that without a witch to heal her.

Dylan had many sleepless nights in the weeks that followed. Tatyana didn’t self-harm; they’d both promised one another they would never do that without first asking for help. He knew her father was abusive, though the scars and bruises Tatyana had from him were always well hidden. Dylan didn’t know which was worse, but either way, he knew she wasn’t safe at her home anymore.

It didn’t take long for Dylan to save up the evidence he needed. Every time he was at her house, he looked for more proof that her family hurt her. Between her father’s screaming even while Dylan was there, the bruises all along her ribs, and the countless cuts and burns around her body, the evidence came quickly. 

But it wasn’t enough. Tatyana spent maybe a week with another family, before being shoved right back with her abusers. There apparently wasn’t enough proof of wrongdoing, and as soon as eyes weren’t on him, her father gave her hell. He accused her of not hiding things right, of calling Child Protective Services, everything. 

Thankfully, though, she stopped getting hit. He took the threat of CPS seriously, and limited his abuse to screaming loudly and constantly. Dylan wondered often if her hearing would ever recover after leaving home.

And they did leave. When Tatyana was eighteen and Dylan’s eighteenth birthday was weeks away, they pooled together what little they had and left in the night. Dylan had managed to hold on to a part time job for the entire time after CPS did nothing, and had a good amount of savings. Tatyana had done the same, except her father had apparently demanded a third of every paycheck as payment for an ancient, beat up truck he’d spent $400 on. 

Altogether they had about fifteen thousand dollars, but both of them knew that money would vanish fast if they weren’t careful. They rented an apartment an entire state away. It was cheap, filled with problems that popped up every other week, but it was safe. Both of them knew they could come home to a place where they were loved and wanted.

One of the only things Dylan missed about living with their families was the relationship they pretended to have. Without the need to pretend to be together, Tatyana didn’t bother being as cuddly or close as she often was around others. Dylan pretended not to miss it,  but he felt like his true feelings were clear as day. And if he tried to forget how he felt, all he needed to do was take a look at the name on his wrist to be reminded.

They settled into a comfortable norm, eventually. They both had full time jobs that, together, gave them enough to make more money than they spent on bills. In time they had enough to pay for a gender therapist, and after three months with her she recommended they see a medical witch about transitioning. 

Thankfully, the magic that surrounded a gender transition was incredibly simple, so long as the target was willing. It would be an hour, maybe two, and then the spell was set. After a month without it being dispelled, it was effectively permanent. Dylan went first, and could barely remember what happened during the casting itself. 

He remembered waking up with Tatyana by his side with tears of joy in her eyes. She didn’t let him go until the witch declared that it was her turn, and Dylan took his turn waiting patiently for her to come back. He couldn’t believe how perfect his new body seemed to fit him. He didn’t have facial hair—it didn’t grow that quickly, to his displeasure—but everything else was perfect. He was nowhere near as small as he once was, and he suspected that, if he and Tatyana had compared heights he would be her height, if not a little bit taller.

Near the end of his hour of waiting, Dylan realized the bandages that normally covered up the name of his soulmate were gone. He was terrified that Tatyana had seen it. If she had, how did she feel about the truth? Was that why she’d held so tightly to him? Or was she just sharing his joy at finally having a body to call his own?

When Tatyana was released, Dylan got his answer. The burn that had once hid away the name of her soulmate was gone, replaced with a name he was overjoyed to see. He couldn’t help but smile as he held tightly to her much smaller form. 

As soon as they let go, Dylan knew he couldn’t leave things at that. He steeled himself, and their lips met for a kiss. It was still clumsy, thanks in no small part to their inexperience, but he wouldn’t have traded it for the world.