I lay in bed reading Updraft by Fran Wilde for a couple of hours until Dad called me to help fix supper. When I came into the kitchen, he said: “Get out an onion and a couple of tomatoes and start —” He fell silent, looking at my hands, and I realized I’d forgotten something. “You painted your nails,” he said after an awkward pause.

“Actually, Julianna did — she was kind of showing me how, and then I practiced on Sophia.”

“I see.”

I more than half expected him to tell me to go clean the nail polish off, but after another long pause, he said: “Like I said, chop up an onion and a couple of tomatoes.” He’d been peeling and chopping potatoes when I came in, and he went back to work on that without another word on the subject of my cute glittery purplish-pink nails.

After all the ingredients were mixed and the stew was simmering, I sat at the kitchen table reading for a while, getting up to stir the stew every few minutes. When it was ready, I went to tell people supper was ready, starting in the living room, where Sophia and Julianna were playing Mario Kart. “Supper’s ready,” I told them.

“This round is nearly over,” Sophia said, not taking her eyes off the screen.

“Sure, it’ll take that long to get everybody else.”

I knocked on Caleb’s door and hollered that supper was ready, and he called out that he’d be there in a minute, so I went down the hall to Mom and Dad’s bedroom. The door was open and Mom was working on her computer; at a glance, it looked like she was checking on the progress of some of the auctions they had going. “Supper’s ready,” I said.

“I’ve been smelling it for a while,” she said, standing up without a pause. Then she took in my nails. “I see you’re enjoying the sleepover already,” she added with a faint smile.

“Yeah, Julianna painted them and explained how and stuff. Do you like them?”

“Yes. Did your father say anything about it?”

“...Not really.”

She hugged me. “He’ll come around, Meredith. Just be patient.”

We hugged for a few more seconds and then went to eat supper.

---

I hung out with Julianna and Sophia for a little while after supper until they started to watch Walking with Dinosaurs. (Mom and Caleb were washing dishes.) The next morning, Mrs. Keller came by to pick up Julianna just before the rest of us were about to leave for church. I still had the same nail polish on, though I wondered if the glitter might be too informal for church, and asked Mom what she thought.

“It should be fine,” she said after glancing at Dad, who looked resigned, and didn’t say anything.

Almost nobody at church noticed my nails, as far as I could tell; at least only a couple of people commented on them, both near my age — Hadley Pryor, one of Sophia’s friends, who complimented me before the service, and Joseph Wallace. We went out to lunch after church with the Wallaces, Crystal Southers, and her boyfriend Mark. He was visiting our church with her, though he usually, he said, went to the non-denominational storefront church in the Food Lion shopping center. I was kind of hoping that Crystal’s blasé attitude toward gender transitioning with the Venn machines would rub off more on Dad and on Joseph’s parents, but as far as I could tell, the adults weren’t talking about me or venning or gender dysphoria or anything related. That suited me fine, too.

Joseph shyly offered, “I like your fingernails. I’m glad your parents are letting you use nail polish now.”

“Thanks,” I said. “Sophia’s friend Julianna did them.”

That led to Sophia telling him more about the sleepover, which led to Sophia not being grounded anymore and me still being grounded.

“Oh,” he said. “I’m sorry. When are they...?”

“A month plus however long I stay a girl,” I said, glancing down the table past Caleb at Mom and Dad. “But I think they might back off on that.”

“Huh,” he said. “Somehow I had the impression they’d un-grounded you when they started letting you wear girl clothes. — Have they bought you any dresses?”

“No, not yet.” I had just two pant suits for church, and I’d alternated between them the last few Sundays. Part of me wanted to ask for more variety, but I figured if I played my cards right, I could get actual dresses before long; it wasn’t like I really wanted more pant suits for their own sake. Tuesday after my next appointment with Cheryl Hewitt would be a good time to ask, I figured.

There was a brief awkward silence, and then I started telling him about Updraft, and that led to Joseph and Sophia talking about books they’d been reading for a while. After the waiter brought our drinks and took our meal orders, I went to the restroom, and when I came out, Joseph was standing there.

“Hey,” he said, not meeting my eyes for more than a moment. “I, uh, wanted to talk to you for a minute without other people around... if it’s okay...?”

“Sure,” I said. We were shielded from view of the table where our parents and siblings were sitting by a couple of walls separating the restroom area from the dining area and different dining areas from each another. “What is it?” I asked, thinking I probably already knew.

“I, um, well... Nathan and I went to the library to do some research for school, and we tried out the trust booth. He turned me into a little dragon, about the size of a squirrel, I guess? And flying was really awesome, but we didn’t stay changed for very long because we had to get home, but I want to do it again, and change into a more humanoid dragon next time, but... like, a girl dragon?” He was blushing bright red, and I nodded sympathetically. “But I don’t think I can ask him.”

“You know him better than I do,” I said, “but he seems pretty okay with me being trans, so maybe he would be find with you wanting to be a girl? Whether it’s just trying it out for a while, or for good,” I hastened to add. “Is that a form you think you’d like to live with if your school would allow it and all?”

“I don’t know... maybe not. Ideally...” He looked down at his feet. “I guess I could be a human girl on weekdays and a dragon-girl on weekends? But there’s no way I can do that until I’m grown up and living somewhere else.” I started to say something, but she kept talking after just a moment’s pause — she was still looking down and probably hadn’t seen my mouth open. “And Nathan is nice to you in person, but you haven’t heard him talking about you behind your back.” My stomach sank. “The way he and Dad were talking a few weeks ago, on the way home from lunch...”

I hugged her. “It’s going to be okay,” I said. “You might have to wait until you’re eighteen, or even a little longer, but then you can get exactly the body you want without saving up thousands of dollars, begging a psychologist for permission, or risking heart problems. We’ve got it a lot better than trans people used to, even if it’s still a long way from perfect.”

“I guess.”

“We’d better get back to the table. Just remember I’ve got your back. Whatever I can do...”

“Thanks. Uh, maybe we’d better go back separately?”

“Yeah, you go ahead first.”

I waited a minute or so before returning to the table, brainstorming ways to find private occasions to talk with her, and not coming up with much.

---

I didn’t tell Sophia what Joseph had told me, even though she’d been the first to figure out that Joseph might be trans. Joseph had told me in confidence, and maybe the next time we could speak privately, I’d ask her if I could tell Sophia, but I wasn’t going to say anything without her permission. I’d also try to remember to ask her if she’d come up with a girl name yet, something for me to use when we were alone — which couldn’t be very often, not anytime soon.

I talked to Carmen on the phone for a little while that Sunday afternoon, as I’d forgotten to call them on Saturday with Julianna visiting. I wanted to talk to them about Joseph, though obviously not mentioning any identifying details, but I decided against it, since Mom was nearby and overhearing my end of the conversation.

Monday morning during homeroom, I told Lily and Emilia about the sleepover with Juliana and Sophia. Lily took pity on me and said the glittery nails were a little too juvenile for someone my age, and offered to lend me a bottle of some nail polish that would suit me better. (Later on, when I wasn’t grounded and could use the Internet more freely, I found differing opinions about the merits of glittery nail polish, but I won’t bore you with that.) Emilia told us about her date with Andrew that Saturday; he’d taken her to the wildlife preserve over on the other side of Greensboro. I was getting used to that, and it didn’t bother me as much as it had a few weeks earlier; I could tell from what both Andrew and Emilia said that they were getting pretty close.

Tuesday, Lily brought a bottle of peach coral nail polish and let me borrow it. I hadn’t had a chance to use it yet, of course, when Mom picked me up after school (Sophia was riding home with Caleb again) to take me to Ms. Hewitt’s office.

“So,” Ms. Hewitt asked me when we were alone, “how has your week been?”

I read a couple of bits aloud to her from my diary, one about doing the paperwork to register my transformation with the school, and one about hanging out with Julianna and Sophia during part of their sleepover. “And I haven’t missed a day,” I pointed out. “I haven’t had an episode of depression in over six weeks — since more than a week before Sophia and I used the Venn machine.”

“That’s good to hear,” she said.

“So I think you have enough evidence by now that being a girl is good for me, mental-health-wise, right? I mean, I can’t remember when was the last time I went a whole month without having at least one episode of depression. Probably before puberty hit.”

“I can see a lot of evidence that doing feminine things has been making you happier, like when you told me about clothes shopping a few weeks ago, or about your makeup and nail polish lessons this past weekend. And I remember how you told me that having your femininity questioned, like in the ladies' room last week, upset you a lot. You wouldn’t consider that an episode of depression?”

“I mean, you’re the mental health expert, but I don’t think so? It didn’t last anywhere near as long as those used to last, and it didn’t really feel the same.”

We went into the differences in how my old depressive episodes used to feel and how I’d felt when Wyatt insulted me or the girls in gym gossiped about me or Mrs. Dirksen said I “didn’t belong” in the ladies‘ room. “Back when I’d feel depressed, it was mostly like nothing was worth the energy it took to do it, and there wasn’t always any obvious reason why I’d feel like that sometimes and not others. I mean, I had the wrong body all the time, so wouldn’t that mean I’d feel bad about it all the time? I never cried like I did in the ladies’ room last Sunday. I’m not happy all the time now, I get frustrated and sad and angry sometimes, but there’s an obvious reason why I’m feeling that way, and the feeling passes when the reason goes away, or sometimes sooner.”

Ms. Hewitt nodded. “That does sound very different. I think you’re right; being a girl has been good for you.”

“Can you convince Dad of that?” I asked. “I mean, I’m pretty sure Mom is already on board with me being a girl, but Dad still seems to think I’ll grow out of this.”

“We’ll discuss it when I meet with your parents in a little while,” she said. “Is there anything else you’d like to talk about?”

I thought about it, and I decided it was okay to say, “Well, someone else came out to me as trans. I don’t want to say anything specific about them, but... well, I’m worried about them, because their parents are even more conservative than mine, and I figure it’s gonna be a long time before they have a chance to venn into a body that suits them better.”

“Hmm. I’m not sure how much advice I can give you without asking for more details that might involve violating confidentiality on your part, and I won’t ask you to do that. I’ll speak in generalities, I suppose, and you can use whatever bits of advice apply to their situation and ignore the rest.

“Keep being a friend to them, and encourage them to be patient. If they don’t feel safe telling their parents that they’re transgender, it’s possible that they could talk to a counselor at school, or some other sympathetic adult about it. Or they may have some related issue, like your depression, that they would feel more comfortable telling their parents about; in that case, they could potentially get help for their gender issue indirectly.

“Perhaps at some point, you or another friend can transform them into an opposite-sex body for a short time, an hour or so, and change them back before they need to get home. That could allow them to get a better idea of whether they’re transgender or have some other, superficially similar issue. An hour or two of transformation might not give them a definitive answer, but it could point in the right direction. Of course, if they are too young to use the machine, or their parents are too strict to allow them to meet up with friends without adult supervision, that won’t work now, but you and they could reconsider it later on.

“Do you think some of that might help?”

“Yeah,” I said. “Thanks.”

---

When I returned to the lobby, Dad had arrived and was sitting with Mom. I sat and waited while they went back to talk to Ms. Hewitt; I did some reading and homework for Spanish, which led me to wonder what pronouns Carmen used in Spanish. The textbook didn’t say anything about gender-neutral or non-binary pronouns in Spanish, but I figured somebody must have come up with some.

Eventually, the receptionist called me back and I joined Mom and Dad and Ms. Hewitt.

“M-meredith,” Dad said, and my heart skipped a beat. Even with the little stutter, it made me feel so wonderful to hear Dad use my real name for the first time. “...We’ve been talking, and... I can’t deny that you’ve been happier, more energetic and outgoing since you transformed. Even with all the... What I’m trying to say is, we’ve decided it doesn’t make sense to stick to the original punishment we meted out after you used the trust booth without permission, a month plus however long you spend as a girl.”

“So I’m un-grounded?” I asked hopefully.

“You and Sophia both used the machine without permission,” Mom said. “But you are older, and you were the instigator. So it makes sense that you should be grounded a little longer than she was... but not that long, because it’s clear you’re going to be a girl for a long time. Your grounding will end this Friday night, a week after Sophia’s.”

“Thank you thank you thank you thank you...” I burbled, and hugged them both. But they had another wonderful surprise for me a few moments later: Mom would take me shopping for some skirts and dresses Saturday!

Ms. Hewitt said we didn’t need to keep seeing her every week, but she thought it would be good for us to come in once a month or so for a while longer. We made an appointment for a month later and went home.

---

All my friends were happy for me when they heard about my impending freedom. During homeroom, Lily invited me to come over to her house and hang out with her and a couple of other friends the following weekend, after Mom took me shopping, and I said I’d like to and would talk to Mom and Dad about it. Between Biology and American Literature, Andrew and I made tentative plans to hang out sometime when I wasn’t busy shopping or hanging out with Lily and her friends and Andrew wasn’t on a date with Emilia; we talked about Sunday afternoon after lunch, and promised to ask our parents about it.

Lunch rolled around, and Hunter sat with me, Andrew, Evan and Ian — Wyatt was out sick, I think. I told everyone the good news, and they all congratulated me. For some reason, Hunter looked especially happy to hear about it. Then, when we bused our trays, Hunter said, “Meredith, do you have time to talk for a minute before you go to P.E.?”

“Sure,” I said.

“Now that you’re not grounded... will you go out with me sometime? I know you’ve got plans for this weekend, but...”

I was speechless. I’d somehow completely missed the signs that Hunter was interested in me that way, probably because I was obsessing over Andrew. Hopelessly obsessing, as my conversations with Andrew and Emilia had made increasingly clear over the last few days. I spent a few frantic moments thinking about Hunter and whether I had any feelings for him in return... he’d become a good friend over the last few weeks, and he was at least as good-looking as Andrew or any other boy I’d ever crushed on, but did I...?

Did I need to? It was just one date. And maybe it would help me get over my hopeless crush on Andrew, and even if it didn’t go anywhere, it could still be a nice evening. Now that Dad had pretty much accepted my girlhood as a fait accompli, he and Mom would probably be ready to accept the further revelation that I liked boys. And had accepted an invitation to go on a date with one particular boy.

“Yes,” I finally said. “I’d like that.”