The trio had quickly left the piercing shop afterwards, eager to get back to their previous activities. It was already getting late, and so everyone agreed that going to the cinema right now would be a good idea. With fall coming, the days were getting shorter, after all.

After the relatively intense moments they’d gone through during the day, relaxing in a dark room while watching a movie sounded heavenly, and so they did just that, basking in the comforting atmosphere reigning around them.

Unfortunately, all good things must come to an end, and so, once the movie was over, Erin and Sarah parted ways with Allison, though with the promise of seeing each other again very soon. Erin felt a little sad seeing her new friend leave, but glad to have gotten the chance to know her. Wordlessly, she and Sarah made their way to the nearest bus stop, ready to get back home.

- - -

“Whew, I’m exhausted,” commented Sarah, once the two of them had made it back home, and were back in the bedroom they shared. True to her words, Sarah was sprawled on her bed, with Erin sitting on her mattress next to the bed.

“Yeah, me too,” Erin agreed, “thank you for getting me out of the house, though. Allison is a really nice friend.”

“Yeah,” Sarah nodded, “I’m really glad to be friends with her. I hope we can see her again sometime soon.”

“Plus,” Sarah continued, sitting up and looking at Erin with a small smile, “Allison wasn’t the only interesting discovery you made today, was it?”

“That’s true,” Erin said, gently reaching a hand towards her right ear.

“…You know, if that’s something you enjoyed, we could do stuff like that again.”

“I don’t know,” Erin frowned. “It feels like I’m doing something wrong, you know?” Sarah didn’t know, but felt it was best not to interrupt Erin. “Like I’m intruding, somehow,”

“But you’re not. You do know that, right? You’re allowed to do things that you enjoy,” Sarah said, coming down to sit besides Erin.

Erin looked at her for a few seconds, torn. “You don’t think it’s weird?” She asked timidly.

“Why would it be weird?” Sarah asked, having a good idea of what the answer was going to be.

“Because I’m a boy,”

And there it was. The one big problem. She’d been hopeful that Erin had finally figured it out by herself, but it seemed like that wasn’t the case. Something in Erin’s mind was causing a block, preventing her from even considering the idea that she wasn’t a boy, and Sarah didn’t know what to do in that situation. She was hesitant to push her friend any further, as she was worried about throwing her friend even deeper in denial than she already was.

She’d been doing some research over the past few weeks, learning more about Erin’s issues and how to approach them, and had learned that she shouldn’t try to force an epiphany, but just gently guide her friend towards the answer.

The only problem with that was that Erin seemed to be extremely dense when it came to her identity, so much so that Sarah worried it would take her years to figure it out if she didn’t intervene.

After a few seconds of hesitation, Sarah decided that she couldn’t outright tell her friend that she wasn’t actually a boy. However, there were other ways to guide Erin towards an answer. She just hoped she wouldn’t make a mistake on the way.

“Erin,” she started hesitantly, carefully gauging her friend’s expression. “I have questions I want to ask you, and I’d like you to really think about them before giving me an answer. Is that okay?”

“Uh, sure?” Erin replied, not sure what her friend was getting at.

“How do you feel when we’re in school?”

“What do you mean?” Erin asked, confused.

“I mean, how do you feel during the day, do you enjoy being in school?”

“It’s alright, I guess. I like studying,” She replied, looking down thoughtfully.

Sarah frowned. She was in a difficult position. The only people Erin ever regularly talked to besides herself were her parents and Becker, both of which she was on bad terms with currently. Erin rarely, if ever talked with her classmates, and she didn’t have any friends that didn’t know her as a girl. She wanted Erin to realize that being called a boy by other people was painful, but if she did this by talking about Becker or her parents, then Erin would simply say that she didn’t enjoy talking to them because of what they’d done to her.

“What about when teachers ask you a question? How do you feel then?”

“What are you getting at? I don’t understand,” Erin said, looking at her friend, getting more and more confused.

“Just think about it, okay? Think about the last time a teacher asked you a question and what they said,” Sarah said, comfortingly putting an arm around Erin. “Tell me if you want to stop and we’ll talk about something else, but I think this is important.”

Erin returned the embrace, staying silent for a few seconds while pondering her answer. Confusion slowly made place for a slight grimace, one that could easily be mistaken for thoughtfulness. Sarah was sharper than that, however, and could see that her question was having some amount of effect.

“I…I don’t like it?” Erin finally said, though framing her answer as a question, like she didn’t understand why she’d come to that conclusion.

“Why not?” Sarah pressed, keeping her tone gentle.

“Because…because…” Erin stammered, unable to find a conclusive answer.

“What’s the first thing a teacher says, when they want to get your attention?”

“They call me Ry-“

Erin stopped mid-sentence, unable to continue. She obviously didn’t want to say it, and Sarah decided right then and there that she shouldn’t go any further. She’d planted the seed in Erin’s mind, and now needed to let time do its own thing.

“It’s okay, Erin, I think that’s enough for tonight. Just try to think about things, alright? Think about how you feel when you’re in school and compare it to when you’re home with mom and me.”

Rubbing Erin’s arm absentmindedly, Sarah added one last thought. “And remember that you can choose who you want to be, no matter what anyone says.”

With that last bit of wisdom, Sarah smiled at Erin, giving her a last squeeze before slowly standing up and turning the lights off. It was already late, even for a Saturday evening, and the day had been long.

Still confused, Erin sighed and lied down on her mattress, Sarah’s words still swirling in her head. Still, fatigue eventually won, and she fell asleep, her dreams swiftly erasing her worries, if only for a few hours.

- - -

You can choose who you want to be

Sarah’s words had been stuck in Erin’s head for the rest of the week-end, like a cryptic enigma that she couldn’t solve. She’d asked Sarah what she’d meant, but had gotten no clear answer out of the girl. She’d seemed very apologetic but insisted that Erin had to figure things out by herself, for her own good.

Erin knew how insightful Sarah could be at times, which was why she had decided against pressed her friend further for answers, and so had been doing a lot of thinking on her own, to no avail.

Time had passed, and it was now Monday morning, and with that came the last week of school before the 2-weeks holidays that were now fast approaching.

Once the two of them reached the school Erin parted ways with Sarah for a little bit, as she needed to go grab some books from her locker, which was on the other side of the building.

Once arrived at her destination, Erin kneeled in front of her locker, hurried to unlock it and started picking the books she needed, carefully storing them in her backpack as she went.

“Ryan”

Erin started, whirling around. Behind her stood Becker, a few paces away, looking down at her with a grave expression on his face. Getting called that name was enough to put her in a bad mood already, but she did her best not to show it. Slowly, she stood up, staring back at Becker. She didn’t want to give him any sort of satisfaction, or even make it seem like she was tolerating his presence, and so she decided to remain silent, content to wait for him to speak up. She also was worried he’d figured out she was the one who’d broken into his house, but she did her best not to think about that.

Becker’s mouth twitched in annoyance, seemingly not expecting this kind of attitude from Erin. “We’re leaving on an expedition next week. The Core of the forest is getting more agitated, and this will be the perfect occasion for both of us to go without our absence being noticed. We can’t afford to wait any longer” He stated gravely.

Erin raised an eyebrow, inwardly incredulous. “And what makes you think I’ll agree to go with you, exactly? You’re crazy if you think I’m going to risk my life so that your precious magical abilities won’t be revealed to the world. I don’t trust you, and I certainly won’t throw myself into the most dangerous place we know of just because you asked me to.”

As she was speaking, Erin could see Becker getting increasingly agitated. His hand formed a fist, and his face colored a deep scarlet, his jaw was tense. Erin felt a sliver of fear within her, subconsciously readying her magic just in case.

“And what about the other consequences, Ryan?” He said with a low, dangerous tone. “What about the people that could get hurt, since you seem to care about them so much? What have you been doing for them, while I was fending off all the creatures that were trying to escape the edge of the forest? Laying traps all day long and fighting monsters that would eat an Amarok in a single bite? What have you been doing? Don’t you understand what’s at stake, you stupid brat?” He practically screamed, his tone having progressively increased with his anger, a powerful thrum of magic rising in the air.

Instantly, Erin called forth her own magic, weaving it efficiently into a shield, against which a spell crashed only instants later. Erin gasped at the strength of the spell. She’d barely been able to counter it, and she was pretty certain she wouldn’t have been able to only a few weeks prior, before she’d been able to refine her spells.

From the shape and feeling of the spell, she was pretty certain she would have been fine, even if it would have hurt a lot, but that didn’t reassure her that much. Becker had never attacked her physically before, and the thought of what he could do to her made her tremble in fear.

She didn’t want to retaliate, as she was certain Becker would crush her if they came to fight, and so she kept her shield up, trying to quell her fear, waiting for Becker to do something.

Becker, meanwhile, had his eyes wide open. Erin couldn’t be certain, but she thought he’d been surprised by the speed and strength of her shield. Unfortunately, there was nothing she could do about it now. She just hoped Becker wouldn’t figure out she’d been the one breaking into his home.

Without saying a word, Becker regained his composure and walked away, the only sound in the hallway being his boots echoing against the ground.

Erin kept her shield up even seconds after he’d turned a corner. Once she couldn’t hear him walking anymore, she let go of all the magic she’d accumulated and crashed knees first on the floor, panting and shivering all over.