My next shift at the store started Wednesday evening. I arrived right on time and was a little saddened to see that Ross wasn't anywhere to be found. Everything checked out as usual, (grocery puns!), and I headed home.

Thursday was nothing of note at school. After Kai sent the text he seemed to avoid one on one conversation in person. I could tell something was up with him, but I figured I'd let him come to me when he was ready. When I got to work I was relieved to see Ross was on for the evening, although he was at the other end of the store. Time flew by, and as things were hitting a lull, I saw a red light flashing on my register. I realized I'd been zoning out and looked up to see where the light had originated.

It was Ross. He'd shot his price gun in my direction, and once I looked up, he ducked down behind the back wall of his register. I raised an eyebrow, aware of what was about to follow. He slowly peeked over the top of the register, and I let him get just high enough before I pulled the trigger. Red light hit his forehead and he mimed falling back as though I'd gotten a headshot.

Then we heard someone clear their throat in an authoritative fashion and I whirled around to see Monica. She only needed to give us one look before we both composed ourselves and were back at attention, behind our registers. My shift came to a close and as I was walking out, Ross gave me one final price gun to the heart. I mimed out another death scene as I made my way out.

By Friday, Kai was avoiding me completely. He was avoiding all three of us in fact. He started arriving at school late enough that he missed the auditorium chill session and refused eye contact in any of the classes we shared. I didn't know whether to be upset and angry, or worried and concerned. I figured he'd figure out what he needed over the weekend, or I was gonna corner him.

Lily asked me out to another date Friday evening and I was ready for something to take my mind off Kai. I was clad in my now typical skinny jeans and t-shirt attire. After our last date, I informed Lily that it was her turn to wear the skirt in our relationship. It gave us both a good laugh, and she looked stunning when she came to pick me up. We went and watched whatever sappy romantic comedy was out. I say watched very loosely. From the get-go, she leaned her head on my shoulder and I found her hand and interlocked fingers by the end of the previews.

We laughed through the first third of the movie because of how ridiculous it was, and around the halfway point, I felt Lily pull me in close to her. I thought she was gonna whisper some funny anecdote, but instead, she pulled me in for the kiss. Then I understood why she had insisted on sitting so far in the back and away from everyone else. It wasn't long before the movie was over and we had to compose ourselves before making our way back to her car.

We drove halfway back and pulled into one of our typical spots. Since we were still building off the back of the movie, things escalated quicker than usual. Before long, my shirt had come off, and she had one of her legs between mine. The two of us were ever so slightly grinding while our mouths did most of the work. My hand was reaching up the back of her skirt, pulling her even closer to me. Clothes were strewn about, bodies were close together, and the windows were fogged up. Then, slowly I started to feel a sensation that I hadn't felt before. There was a slight feeling of wetness between my legs. It had me a little on edge and I pulled back. Lily either misinterpreted or ignored my action as she began to ramp everything up a notch. I could feel the sensation intensifying.

"Lily..." I tried to get out between kisses. I gave her a gentle bit of resistance and that seemed to cue her in.

"Is something wrong?" she asked earnestly, but I could tell that she didn't want to stop.

"No..." I replied out of instinct, "Yes, I mean maybe. I don't know."

She put her arms on top of my shoulders and forced eye contact. "What's up?"

Unsure of how to proceed, I settled on a half-truth, "I... I'm not sure I'm ready to go this fast just yet."

I could see something in her eyes fade, but she gave me a soft kiss on the cheek and said, "Of course."

I'd felt bad for kind of killing the energy, but she assured me that we would go at whatever pace I felt comfortable going. I gave her a coy smile and embraced her in a hug. I pulled my shirt back on, and we made our way back to my house. Before getting out, I gave her a long kiss and said, "I love you."

She smirked and shooed me away playfully. I hopped out into the cold and ran inside. My parents were hanging out in the living room, and of course, my mom wanted to ask me questions.

"How'd it go?"

"Uh... Fine. I'll be in my room if you need me," I shouted back already heading towards the back of the house.

Fortunately, they seemed to let it go. I dashed into my room and closed the door behind me, perhaps a little too loudly. I walked over to the mirror and looked at my reflection. Nothing was amiss, even as I looked down at my pants. Slowly I started to shed my clothes until I was absolutely naked, still starring at myself in the mirror. I looked myself over almost clinically, and for the first time in a while I felt distanced from the person I saw in the mirror.

I'd never really given much thought after I was done with surgery. The physical differences barely even phased me, but this had caught me completely unaware. I'd never really looked at myself this way before either. I was yet again struck with how I looked overall, but my eyes were still fixated on what was below my waist.

The feelings and emotions were hard to pinpoint, much less put into words. I suppose that most cis-people never really think about or, I suppose, feel the way that their bodies line up with everything else. Its... the strangest thing to look at yourself and feel separate from your own flesh (it’s a gross word but that's sort of how it feels). And while I didn't feel anywhere near as strongly as I had several months prior, it was discouraging and annoying to realize that I was still having to work through stuff like this.

Up to this point, I had sort of just gone with the flow, and not looked back. My body stood totally still, and I simply stared in a conflicted wonder. As I took in everything about my body, I felt like I was going through a miniaturized version of the emotions I had at the facility. Fear and anxiety about what this meant, followed by cautious curiosity, and ending with a deep breath and reluctant acceptance.

 

In the interest of figuring out my own body, my hand slowly made its way down to touch, from what I remembered from anatomy, my outer labia. The second my fingers grazed the outer edges I felt a shudder spread across my entire body. In retrospect, a lot of that was probably just nerves. As I felt just past the opening, the wetness returned. I could feel the moisture hitting my finger, and quickly pulled it away. At this point, I became aware of my nipples suddenly hardening, even though the temperature had remained the same.

 

This was extremely new territory for me, so I sat against the foot of my bed. I could tell what my body wanted me to do, but I was wary of doing anything. I laid back on my bed and I made a second attempt at understanding my body. My fingers again grazed along the surface of my vaginal opening and then slowly I pushed them ever so slightly inside. I was excoriatingly delicate, but it was enough for me to get the gist.

 

Now of course I'd had plenty of time and experience exploring my old body, but I really wanted to make a concerted effort to take things slow. Naturally, my body was telling me to just jump in the deep end. Even with the smallest amount of penetration, I could feel an intense wave spreading across my body. I once again pulled my hand away and just lay spread eagle, taking up my whole bed. I felt satisfied that I could infer the rest of the process, without having to go any further (at least for now).

 

I pulled on some fresh underwear and a comfy shirt. My breasts were very sensitive as the cotton fabric moved over them, and I groaned... out of annoyance of course. I really had thought I was done with my body deciding when I was aroused. That was supposed to be like the one unequivocally nice thing about all this. I tossed and turned for a while, but eventually fell asleep.

Saturday was full of meandering and rotting my brain. I figured I owed it to myself after two full weeks of school to sleep in and relax. Megan texted sometime that afternoon and she made plans to come over Sunday.

 

My parents called in another round of pizza and the three of us ate as a family while we watched the newest episode of some show we were watching.

I fell asleep on the couch and around 3am I woke up and moved to my room.

Megan showed up as planned on Sunday, and I gave her tour, although there wasn't much to show. We crashed in my room and decided to go through my wardrobe. While I wouldn't admit outright, I was glad for any fashion advice I could get. The more eyes that I got things in front of, the better I felt about them.

She picked out one of my skirts and held it up eyes wide. I groaned.

"This needs to work its way into your rotation more often. It's so cute!"

"Eh, that was one Lily made me get."

"It looks like it’s been worn once or twice," she eyed back at me.

"I... Uh... I wore it on our first date since I got back... for her mostly."

She chuckled and repeated the last word I had said with a smile.

"No dresses? They were the first thing I reached for once I transitioned!"

"Yeah, I'm not sure..." I said, "I don't think I'm ready for that just yet. I mean don't get me wrong, I'm happy with who I am, I just feel like dresses are gonna be, like the final nail you know?"

She nodded her head, but I could tell from her expression she felt awkward about it.

"I keep forgetting that you were happy before..." she said unsure of herself.

I gave her a forced smile, "Girlhood kinda got thrust on me."

"So I've sorta already asked but, did you ever feel any dysphoria?" she asked. When I gave her a blank look she realized she needed to elaborate.

"Like you were in the wrong body? Things didn't match?" she motioned to her head and her body at large.

"Ahhhh" I said as I understood. I had a small flashback to last night but since it was such a small blip I neglected to bring it up, "Umm, not really. Like I said, my brain tended to keep up with my body most of the time. Perhaps I had a little at first, but that was before any changes were really happening, and I think it was just from the shock. It helped that everybody around me was going through the same thing." I chuckled, but she seemed to keep a more serious look on her face.

"So they really did give you an entire place for just people going through that?" she asked, and I could almost sense a bit of an edge.

"Yeah, just like regular school for the most part. We had classes specific to what we were going through and daily therapy to make sure we were okay. And there was essentially a hospital tacked on to one side that we'd stay in during the final bit."

"So they just gave you a free ride to private school for a semester and footed the medical bill?" she said with clear disdain in her voice.

"Well it’s a pretty serious medical condition," I replied back, wary of where she was taking things.

"And what the rest of us go through is just made up?"

"That's not at all what I meant!" I said, trying to calm her down.

"Okay what did you mean?" she said on the verge of yelling.

"Our bodies literally start killing themselves off. Tissue just breaks down in certain areas unless they do something about it."

"Ah, so you just get a perfect face, perfect butt, perfect boobs because of loss of tissue... That makes sense," she yelled sarcastically.

"Are you serious?" I shouted back. Things were escalating really fast.

"And it’s all no wonder why you think you're above us."

"What!?"

"At the meeting. At coffee. You think that because you got shipped off and pampered for a few months that you're different than us!"

"Aren't I different?" Now we were both outright shouting at the top of our lungs.

"You know what? You’re right! You never spent years thinking that you were freak! You didn't wake up every day of your life having to convince yourself to live a lie because you were too scared to admit the truth even to yourself!"

I had to admit that her words stung. She was speaking her truth, even if it was aimed at hurting me.

"You're right! You had a worse life! I get it. But shouldn't we be on the same side? Everyone we know looks at the two of us and thinks, 'There goes that girl that used to be a guy' 'She's pretty... considering' 'I'd never date somebody like that'! Yes, you've spent you're whole life struggling with what I've only gotten a taste of over the past few months. But how dare you cite my body as something to hold over me! If you want to be angry about me getting sent to a place designed to make me feel accepted and mentally stable, then blame the ones who make the policy, not the ones who were given NO OTHER CHOICE. It sucks that because my experience is somehow seen as 'more medical' I get special treatment and you have to jump through hoops, but you aren't allowed to invalidate me or my experience. And not every one of us gets the happy ending like I did, for some it takes years before they get to accept themselves, if at all. And unlike us, they literally can't do anything to change that! Yes, I am different than you. And if that's all you want to see... then I'm done."

I don't know at what point the two of us started tearing up, but after I finished we stood, crying in silence until Megan ran out of the room and out to her car. I collapsed on the bed, bawling into my pillow. I just laid there contemplating how things had gone so poorly until I drifted off into a crying induced slumber.