Promises, promises. They’d said ‘tonight’. They’d said that, as if the world that existed by the pond existed everywhere, as if they could do something as simple as pop into a restaurant, pop into a bar, pop into a party and not cause problems. As if Viola could do that. As if David could without finding himself mobbed. 

Promises, promises. She’d tried to figure a showing of ‘Assassins’, not so subtly asking Annabelle if they had any showings soon, which elicited the expected confusion, which Viola had sort of shrugged off. She’d explained what she was looking for without really explaining why. She’d asked if there were tickets to something that wasn’t ready yet. No, Annabelle had said. No, and not for a while. Not for a month.

Promises, promises. 

She’d missed brunch, too.

And that had been a shame, because then everything had gone sideways. Not, like, especially sideways. Not sideways in the way she’d learned that things could go sideways; there were no particular problems that had sprung anew. It was just the world twisting and twirling and finding a way to ram itself back into her life. 

Lucy had forgotten her laptop in Emerald Point, so she’d spent the Saturday back down with her parents. Margot had a date. Anna had homework.

David had practice. 

Practice, rather than some whirlwind date with Viola. Practice, rather than a showing of… well, she wasn’t exactly sure what ‘Assassins’ was about, but she was pretty sure the title was indicative of at least a little bit of excitement. Practice, instead of kissing her. 

But, whatever. Honestly, whatever. There was so little that could possibly tempt Viola down from her mental perch. She was delirious. If this was hard, having to wait, having to wait to see David, having to wait to hang out with her friends, having to put off happiness rather than be swallowed by an abyss of despair, who fucking cared? Years had already been the price, and she’d paid, and the cherry of a few days was fine.

He’d been so apologetic about it, too. 

No, no. It wasn’t even that. He’d been disappointed. Not like he was letting her down, but that he was letting himself down. Like he was canceling some kind of perfect chance to see her, like he was crushed, and God, maybe he really, really was. Maybe he was.

And so, she’d somehow limped into the week without seeing anyone, and that was insane. Monday, and she hadn’t seen David, and she hadn’t seen any of them. 

She wanted to talk to the girls. She wanted to tell them. It was bursting inside her, this incredible, unsharable information, and she wanted to talk about it. Put it out into the air for once, actually hear the words said. They’d been cooped up in her head for too long. 

Besides, she was going to need them. She was getting better at this, but there was still a fluency missing from her makeup. There was just something about the way the girls did it. And even if that hadn’t been true, and Viola was very confident in her abilities, none of that rectified her closet. And there was no chance she’d see him in Sebastian’s clothing. Not again. Not outside the times it was required explicitly. 

Tomorrow, she’d made them promise. Tomorrow. Promises, promises, but this one for real. Tomorrow, they’d have lunch, because she wanted to tell them this thing, and it didn’t work if they weren’t all there, because she had news! And she didn’t want to go about it piecemeal. 

Tonight, though.

Tonight, she had a different thing in mind. 

The vial had only been in her possession for, what, three days? It’d sat in the back of her closet, along with the remarkably long needles, for three days. And through it all, through Candace and David and all of it, it had sat there. Waiting. Waiting for her to come back and find it. 

Having nothing to do made it worse. This was supposed to be some kind of perfect savior. Estrogen. Estrogen was supposed to do the things for her that her body would refuse to. She’d spent enough time back online to get a better look, to understand those things, to know she wanted them, but Viola still had lingering doubts. 

Not so much doubts about herself. No, no, those doubts, any sort of final feelings that she was wrong about any of this, had been mostly turned away. She was Viola. Of that, she was sure. 

She just wasn’t sure she could do this. This, which would make it all inevitable. The needle in the thigh would be the kind of forward thrust that changed things irreparably. It might, perhaps, be the kind of thing that saved her life. But it would also destroy bits of it. It would be final for so much. Her body would change, and it would change in ways that would make parts of her life untenable. 

It was fine to blend here. She was still getting used to the idea that, one day, she might be able to just be Viola on campus. Viola could walk the quad, walk it in whatever she wanted to, use the voice she desired, and no one would blink. It was still a mostly foreign idea. But it could happen, if all went to plan. 

And the vial would help.

And it would render any possible relationship with her family impossible. 

Here, perhaps, she could pretend to be any other girl. Here, she could be as Annabelle was. Here, she could dodge the stifling world at large, slip through the cracks, blend to the world if she put in the work. The estrogen would help her fall through. But, at home, with her parents, it would do the opposite. From the first day on, she would be starting the clock on that relationship. And she knew she’d done that already, that she was too far down the road to ever entirely turn back, to find her way back into that world, but it had never been so physical before. She’d never been able to hold it. 

Her mom had called again. Twice, actually. They came on a schedule now. She was off work on Wednesdays and Thursdays, mostly, so she’d started calling on both days. And the calls were coming earlier in the mornings, like Viola was slowly moving up the pecking order of tasks.

It was bordering on absurd, but Viola couldn’t bring herself to pick up the phone. Every time it rang, she felt paralyzed. Things were starting to become good here, maybe even better than good, and there was the phone, reminding her that there was a cavernous hole in her heart waiting to be ripped open. It was right there. It was right there, and it was waiting for her to pick up the phone, and she could stitch over it for now, pretend that it was not coming, but it would. She would have to pick up the phone. 

And she would have to pick up the needle. 

Permanence. Real, full permanence. Viola. Alive. 

And Sebastian, gone. 

She’d told Annabelle as much, and Annabelle had ordered her to come to her apartment tonight. Something about it being easier to do it with a friend the first time. She’d even promised to pour her a drink afterwards.

So, just after seven, she left the dining hall, full up on brussel sprouts and grilled chicken and ready to add one more thing to that list, or at least halfway ready, and started towards Annabelle’s. 

It would be okay. It would be good. She would be okay. 

Never mind the rest of the world for a moment. There were small things that were peaking out, and they were good things. Spring was in full effect, nearing a temperature where it would be permanently uncomfortable, and the crickets were chirping, and she could see the moon well before the sunset, and there were good things. She mustn't be dragged down from her perch. Her perch was wonderful. This world was okay. 

Not perfect. She didn’t need it to be perfect. 

Nerves or no nerves, that was okay. 

Her phone buzzed, and she jumped. 

She softened.

 

David: What do we think about this friday

 

Viola: if youll believe it i did make plans

 

David: Are these the kinds of plans I would be allowed to crash

 

Viola was pretty sure that if she invited David to whatever meeting Annabelle Bridges had on Fridays, the group would be none too happy. David was cool, yeah, but she didn’t even know them yet.

 

Viola: im afraid not

Viola: what about saturday?

Viola: im also free during the week my classes are pretty light

 

David: See now I thought you were having a very busy time in chemistry

 

Viola: when did i say that

 

David: Lunch last week

David: Its supposedly why you were quiet

 

Viola: oh lol

Viola: no that was a lie

Viola: anyway pick a day thats not friday and im there

 

David: Can I say tentatively Saturday

 

Viola: only if you promise me that youll be free on saturday

 

David: We must have different definitions of tentatively

David: I might have to do football stuff

 

Viola: well my definition of tentatively is definitely

 

David: Dictionaries are so weird these days

David: So confusing

 

Viola: :)

 

David: I’ll do my best

David: Do you want to just do something at my place

David: Or we could go somewhere out of Garland

David: I do have a car

 

Viola: are you trying to impress me by having a car

 

David: Is it working

 

Viola: a little bit

Viola: the only other person i know with a car is lucy

 

David: Shit she’s prettier than me

 

Viola: dont fish for compliments its not becoming

 

David: And you won’t even call me pretty

 

Viola: scroll back up im sure you can find something like that

Viola: gtg

Viola: talk later!

 

Viola swallowed and stopped on the path. God, she… she was so nervous now. Like, before, she’d felt like she could be anything, so she might as well be confident and flirty. David had been unattainable. He’d been a dream. He’d been a fiction. If she’d fucked it up, sent a stupid text, she’d lost nothing.

Now? 

Now, David Oliver had suddenly become fumblable. 

Shit.

Ugh. 

She thumbed over the little heart. Yeah?

No.

She shoved her phone back into her pocket to avoid any sort of response. Too soon? Maybe. Definitely. Probably. Fuck, she didn’t know. 

Whatever. It’d be fine! He knew she liked him! She didn’t need to send hearts or whatever to him! 

Now, want? 

It was definitely too soon. 

She was very much wishing for the girls again, someone with knowledge on the legibility of boys, on the timelines of relationships. Margot had a boyfriend! Lucy had dated plenty, so she ought to have a good sense. Even Anna, who’d never really been out on dates, well, she ought to have some idea. Some idea better than Viola’s.

There was still no buzzing in her pocket.

Viola set her mind as firmly as she could on the vial in her bag. That, at the very least, had an expert hand soon to arrive, so if she stressed about that, she could resolve that. Not that David was a thing to resolve. Or, like, estrogen…

Whatever! 

She was staying on her perch!

She moved the phone from her pocket to her backpack. There, at least, she wouldn’t feel any incoming vibrations and panic. No, she’d just have to imagine them.

She was very high on her perch and just fine.

The heat really was getting up there. You’d think that, after a whole life enduring the South Carolina summer, the swampy air, April wouldn’t bother her anymore. It was barely above eighty. 

The problem was, of course, that she had worn pants. Double life Viola, the one that clung to masculinity for most of the day, sweat like a maniac. She was now that psychopath who wore jeans into the summer, even as the rest of campus had switched to shorts. Worse, she remembered the comfort of that dress on break. The wind had blown free through the fabric. Eighty would be comfortable in that dress. Fuck, she could stand a hundred in that dress. 

Future solutions. She’d get there. All she had to do first was cross hormones and change her scholarship so she wasn’t, like, totally exposed to the school and reinvent her whole entire life and she had five whole months. Of course, she couldn’t do about half of that for another two, and the whole cross sex hormone thing, if the internet was to be believed, would take a little longer than five months to sort her out, but whatever!

Perch!

She climbed the steps to Annabelle’s apartment. Good things. Vi hadn’t seen her since Friday, since Candace and the ensuing breakdown. 

Come to think of it, Viola really hadn’t seen her outside class during a time when she wasn’t on the verge of a breakdown. 

Huh. 

Well, not today. 

She turned down the hall, headed towards the professor side of the dorm, and squared herself in front of Annabelle’s door. 

Annabelle answered the knock by shouting, “It’s open!”

Open, and occupied by more than just Annabelle.

There was another woman in the room, seated at the table right across from Annabelle, her hair cropped and a smile plastered on her face. It grew when Viola entered. She stood, though, and swung a bag over her shoulder.

“Sorry,” she said, “overstayed.” 

“Deb, this is Viola,” said Annabelle. She gestured towards Viola. Vi tried to catch Annabelle’s gaze. There simply wasn’t a Viola standing in front of Deb. Viola was buried beneath the pants and the layers of sweat. “Vi, Deb.” 

“Hiya,” said Deb, reaching out a hand, unphased, still grinning. “Heard a lot about you.” 

“Oh,” said Viola. She fumbled with her own hand. “Oh, um, hi.” 

“She’s a friend,” said Annabelle, gently.

Viola frowned, then realized she’d been using Seb’s voice. Instinct when she was still in his clothing. Airing on the safe side. 

“Right,” she said, back in her own. “Right, sorry, I just…” 

“Not a problem, dear, not a problem.” Deb was up and pressed her own hand into Viola’s. “Can’t get on you for being all worked up. Anyway!” She pulled her hand away and clapped once. “I’m out of your hair now. I’m out of your hair.” She put slipped around Viola towards the door and grinned back. “Annabelle, dove, mine on Friday?” Annabelle nodded. “Good! Well, don’t do anything dramatic with the needles while I’m gone, right? Make sure you don’t lose any eyeballs or something.” 

“Deb,” warned Annabelle quietly, and Deb winked at her. 

“Just playing!” She tapped her fingers on the doorknob. “Easing her in is all. Oh! Viola, when you come on Friday, don’t wear that, okay dear?” 

“I… what?” 

“Atta girl,” said Deb, nodding. “Atta girl. Okay, well, enjoy the big scary-”

“Deb!”

“Well, they are, aren’t they? Of a cer-”

“Deborah.”

“Goodbye!” Deb pulled the door shut behind her before Annabelle could take another breath. 

Viola looked to her.

Annabelle shook her head, doing a bad job of suppressing a laugh. “She’s never been good at tact,” said Annabelle, settling herself back in her chair. “Actually, she’s always been the least tactful person I’ve ever met.” She gestured for Viola to take a seat, and Viola took the chair opposite her, recently abandoned by Deb. 

“Right,” said Viola. “Right. Right, um, who is she?” 

“She is,” said Annabelle, leaning back in her chair, “my wife. Well, wife’s not official. But, someday, probably.” 

Viola looked back at the door stupidly, as if she might get a parting glimpse. Much too late. Door closed. That was Annabelle’s wife? 

Annabelle had a wife? 

“Huh,” said Viola. 

“She’s been pretty nosy. Basically dragged her feet all day when I said you were going to be over this evening.” 

Viola squirmed. If there was a version that was required for any of this, for meeting wives, she didn’t want it to be the version presented. Surely, the version that would have appeared on Friday would have been far preferable. 

“She seems…” Forward? Nice?

“She’s got one speed,” said Annabelle. “Give her more than a minute, and she’ll win you over, promise.” Then, pausing. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to have her jump you. I… well, she can sometimes take for granted how easy these things are.” 

“Is she…” Uncouth to ask?

“Trans,” said Annabelle, smiling. “Yes.”

“Oh,” said Viola, looking again to the door. Deb had been so… short? And, really, not all that feminine. Not not feminine, either, though. Sure, the hair was short and tight, but her face-

How many times was she going to do this? How many times was she going to look at the face of a woman, trans or not, and analyze for idiosyncrasies? She’d done it with Annabelle, too. And online, in the last few weeks, she’d found herself looking at before and after photos, and she’d studied the afters with depth, as though she needed additional confirmation that it was possible. 

As if, as if, as if. Because, fuck, she had done it herself! With the training wheels of a set of proto-sorority girls, yes, but, God, fuck, why did she keep burying herself in the desire to dig beneath? 

“She transitioned a very long time ago, though,” said Annabelle, her own eyes back on the door. “A very, very long time ago.” She laughed. “But don’t say that to her.” 

“Why?” asked Viola. 

“Because she’s getting old,” said Annabelle, smiling contentedly. “Older, anyway.”

“Oh,” said Viola. “Sure.” 

She looked back towards the door one last time. 

Deb was not that old. But she was older. Older than Viola had ever imagined herself being. 

A lot older than that, actually. Older than Annabelle, too, who could have been half a peer a decade ago, and who was still at least a decade younger than her mother. Deb was older than her mother. She saw that now, saw it in the soft wrinkles at the edges of her mouth and forehead and cheeks, saw it in the way the crows feet bloomed when she had winked. 

She had grown old.

Viola hadn’t paid as much attention to the older women in those online pictures. She’d never bothered. For some reason, in her brain, they’d belonged to a different class, were distant enough that they hadn’t been all that relevant. She was looking to see what her peers could do, what they had done. And God, fuck, there was motivation in that, but there was motivation in the Deb of it all, too. She was an adult. Not, like, a young adult, or a woman in her mid-30s, but like, an adult adult. Her body had aged. Aged as a woman’s. Aged as it ought to. 

Viola’s family aged poorly. It was one of the curses of South Carolina. They spent so much time in the sun. And there was the drinking and the smoking and whatever, but they’d always wrinkled, and the men had lost their hair, and their feet had swollen. 

And Viola had always assumed she would be her father.

Not, of course, in the ways that had mattered. But it had been so impossible to imagine her body one day, to see where she would end up, that she had defaulted to her father’s. Genetics. She’d have his hairline, and she’d have his gut, and she’d have his wrinkles and his teeth and all of it. She’d be an old man. Friendlier, perhaps, than her father, and kinder. But just as hollow. And the body, broken by time, had always been unimaginable.

But her mother’s body…

She searched for it, for the vision of her mother, harried by age but steadied by a consistent resolve to a hairstyle, to the same pants and the same God-fearing necklace and the same sallowing makeup. Carol Collins had remained steady. Steady in all the ways her father had, really, even as touches of gray had started to fleck her hair. But it was different. All of that was so, so, so different. 

Being her mother. 

Well, no. 

No, she didn’t want to be her mother. Of course not. 

But she could grow old in that body. She could live on the gray flecked hair, relish it, turn the necklace that dangled from her mother’s neck upside down. That was a future. That was an aging world she could make her own, a body she could replicate, a body that did not force her towards death. 

She could grow old.

Fuck, she could make it past graduation. Way past it.  

“I’m going to order food,” said Annabelle. She was standing now, and Viola nodded absently. “Pizza okay?” 

“Sure,” said Viola. 

“Pepperoni?” 

“Mmhmm.” 

Maybe she’d live near the water, closer than she was now. Walking distance. And close to the girls, and they could go down to the water, wrinkled and halfway broken and tired, and they could sit and watch the waves. And she could sit in the sand. And she could live for another twenty years after that. 

“Can we do the injection?” asked Viola. It was a sudden burst of bravery. Fleeting. She could feel that it would subside. Right now, though, she was imagining two worlds. Two worlds. There were two future worlds, two worlds from here, and not picking was not an option. It had never been an option. 

What she was doing now, straddling the line on the benefits of her androgyny, well, it would end. Annabelle had said so. Maybe she could soldier on for some years. But age would come. It would have to come. 

Annabelle glanced up from her phone, smiling. “After you eat,” she said. “Better to have something in you first.” 

“Oh,” said Viola, registering. “Oh, I ate before I came.” 

“Okay,” said Annabelle. She frowned, set her phone back on the table. “Okay, well, I haven’t eaten yet, and I’m going to eat first.” 

“Okay,” said Viola. 

Annabelle planted herself back in her chair. “Also, just to let you know, they don’t send any sort of information off about offenses for alcohol. I talked with a couple of people in the Conduct Office, and they said it’s all internal unless someone’s going to the hospital or jail.” 

Candace had slid so far to the back of Viola’s mind that it took a moment to register what, exactly, Annabelle was talking about. “Oh. Yeah, no that’s good.” Viola nodded. “That’s great, actually.” 

“I think as long as you stay out of that RA’s way, you’re probably fine,” said Annabelle. 

Viola nodded again. Easy enough, provided they didn’t bump into each other in the bathroom at the girls’s dorm. Which, shit, that might be a problem. Viola couldn’t very well walk into the guys bathroom like that, but if Candace was going to be weird, or if she thought, like David had, that it was just a cross-dressing adventure, then she’d need to figure out a plan for those nights.

Details. 

Besides, here, in this apartment? Here, there was someone to take care of her a little. And there wasn’t any risk of someone freaking out about her being in the bathroom, because Annabelle Bridges had her own. Viola imagined the whole ‘live in a dorm’ thing would be much less enticing for a professor if they had to do the communal bathrooms, too. 

After almost a year, Viola still really wasn’t used to that bit of school. Viola had shared, of course, at home. But the difference between sharing with her brother and sharing with twenty-five people in a facility that resembled a gym locker-room as much as it did a bathroom was substantial. It was much less private, and much more intimidating, and she was sort of grateful when she ended up anywhere where there was an actual door between the toilet and someone else.

But she’d gotten as close to used to it as she could. 

Adaptable. Viola Collins had always been adaptable. 

But, of course, Candace catching her wasn’t exactly something that she could adapt past.

“So,” said Annabelle, tapping her fingers on the side of a glass. “What else is going on? Good weekend?” 

Shit.

Viola bit her lip. She’d rehearsed introducing the full knowledge of the David situation to the girls. It involved, for the most part, a substantial amount of breaks to allow the girls to jump in, chances for them to stare at her with mouths agape, opportunities for them to ask eager questions. She had not, however, rehearsed telling Annabelle, who would be more appropriately disinterested.

Still, if the answer to ‘what else is going on?’ didn’t lead to this reveal, she was pretty sure that constituted lying. 

“Well,” she started, “I… it was a good weekend.” She paused, considering exactly which way to spill the most ridiculous information out onto the table. 

Annabelle raised an eyebrow at her. “Uh huh,” she said. 

“Well,” said Viola again, “well, there’s just a big thing that happened, is all.” 

Annabelle sat forward. “Uh huh.” 

Shit. Why was she so nervous about this? “I ran into David on Saturday. Um, out by the pond you recommended? I’ve been going there for a while, just because it’s all quiet and stuff. You know, a chance to get out of the dorm and sort of ‘be Viola’. Not, like, in a dress or whatever, but there’s this clearing, and I’ve been practicing my voice out there. Makeup too, a little.” Annabelle was staring at her, as if the idea that she hadn’t led with this was insane. 

Shit. Maybe it was. 

Soldier on. 

“Anyway,” Viola continued, “I… well, on Saturday, David sort of… found me there?” 

Annabelle’s elbows were fully on the table. “He found you there,” she repeated. 

“Yeah,” said Viola. Shit. She was making this sound like a bad thing, wasn’t she? Of course, she… well, she wasn’t keen on relaying it in the same way she was to the girls. “It went fine!” Stubble. Hands. “It went well.” 

Annabelle rubbed a finger around her temple. “You know, you’re not a very good storyteller,” she said. “When you say fine, that could mean almost anything.” 

“I’m getting there,” argued Viola. “Shit, I just… I never really expected to be telling anyone something like this.” The idea of presenting a, what, boyfriend? Partner? They hadn’t even kissed. 

“Something like what?” prompted Annabelle. 

“He- He knew from the start? Like, at the party, he knew it was me the whole time, and then… uh, well, he knew when we were texting and… stuff.” 

Annabelle’s tongue was stuck between her teeth, and the spreading grin was unrepentant. 

“Texting and stuff,” she said, teasingly. “Basically, you’re telling me that when you and David kissed-”

“We did not kiss,” argued Viola, heat rising in her face. “No, just, uh…” Stubble. Hands. She swallowed. “No kissing.” 

Annabelle looked the exact same way the girls might, and the woman started to giggle. Giggle, like a teenager. Viola dropped a shoulder, trying to pout, trying to force her not to push further into embarrassing Viola, but she couldn’t. 

Her shoulders were so light. 

“And he was just playing along?” asked Annabelle, still halfway laughing. 

“Sort of,” said Viola. “Sort of. But he, well, he sort of thought that I knew what was happening? Like, he thought that I knew that he knew.” 

“Sure.” 

“Don’t laugh!”

Annabelle did her best to stop laughing, fixing her face. “It’s sweet.”

“Anyway, I sort of wanted to go see ‘Assassins’ with him. Which is why I asked. And, like, I know that I can’t just go or whatever because they aren’t putting it on, but, you know, when they do put it on.” It was the exact kind of thing he would like. It was the exact kind of thing that he would want to do, that he never got to do, apparently. 

The smile faltered on Annabelle’s face. “Right,” she started, slowly. She pushed her chair back a couple of inches. “Right. Shit. Look, Vi, I think you should probably hold off on going anywhere with him for a while.” 

“What?” Viola stared at her. She’d just been giggling. 

“I just… sorry, I don’t mean to rain on your parade here. Shit.” Annabelle scratched at her cheek. “Shit.” 

“What?” 

“I just think you need to hold off,” said Annabelle. She frowned. “If your plan is to come back in the fall and be an entirely different girl, it’s probably not a good idea for the future transfer student to already be going around the quarterback of the football team. I don’t think most people will bat an eye at just a girl being at a play, or at a party, but if you start showing up places with David now, people will know you.” 

Viola frowned. She wasn’t going to be famous. David, sure, but the association wasn’t that strong. “It’s not like there’s paparazzi or something,” she argued. 

Annabelle scratched her cheek again. “I… I don’t think you’re fully appreciating how famous David is.” 

“I know that he’s famous,” she argued again. She’d known that the day she’d met him. The day he’d come into class, late and smiling. 

“Viola, it’s not just people on campus,” said Annabelle. “It’s more than just people here. It’s… Do you know who AJ McCarron is?” 

Vi crossed her arms. “No.” 

“Well,” started Annabelle, falling further back into her chair and grimacing, “he was a college quarterback. Good one, too. I was just out of school then, and I had a friend who was super into… whatever, the point is, he was famous. And his team was playing in a big game. Televised. Bells and whistles and all that. And, during the game, the broadcast started showing his girlfriend. And when I say showing his girlfriend, I mean the broadcasters were basically slobbering over her.

“And, look, I’m not saying you’re dating or whatever, or that going to a play is exactly the same as that, but that girl? That girl got famous. I think she was a model before that, but she got famous famous. And…” Annabelle shook her head. “And she was is, so it was just standard sexual harassment. That’s fucked up to say, but it could be worse for you. A lot worse. I mean, God, AJ McCarron didn’t even play in the NFL. I mean, I think he got drafted, but he wasn’t really good enough for any of that.” 

Shit. Shit. The idea of being…

Not famous. Not famous on her own merits. God, she wouldn’t even want that, but the idea of being famous for being looked at, for being watched…

Viola was coming around on her body. At least a certain version of it. Not the version that was out here now, and not the version she was normally pressed into, but a version of it. But the idea of presenting any version of herself to thousands made her stomach turn.

It wasn’t possible to be entirely immune from the world. It wasn’t possible to miss what people thought of people like her, people like Annabelle. Maybe, potentially, on an individual level, people might be okay. After this weekend, she was coming around on that idea. But she had evidence to support the idea that the world was less okay. She had mountains of it, mountains that she could scroll through on a moment’s notice, and the idea that she might become the face of something…

“Oh,” she murmured. 

“I don’t mean it in a scary way,” said Annabelle. “But I also don’t not mean it in a scary way. It’s just one of those things.” 

Viola nodded. “Yeah.” 

“I’m not…” Annabelle frowned. “I’m not saying you can’t see him. Or even that you shouldn’t. I’m just saying that, you know, given that there’s supposed to be a version of you coming back in the fall that isn’t this version of you, maybe don’t be seen with him in public for a while.” Her frown deepened. “Shit. Not easy, is it?” 

There was pain in her stomach. “Yeah.” 

“It’ll be alright,” said Annabelle.

“Yeah,” said Viola. She slumped back in her chair. “Yeah, it’s just… you know, I sort of was riding a high. You know, things sort of seemed good for a second there.” 

“They’re still good. That’s still good. You’re… well, you have a… boyfriend?” 

“I’m not even sure it’s that serious,” admitted Viola. “We haven’t even really talked about it.” 

“You just want to take him to the theater,” offered Annabelle, a little teasing back in her voice.

“It’s so… fuck, I don’t know anything about dating,” said Viola, leaning back in her chair. True. Still true. And, God, honestly? 

It made her want to laugh. 

Like, yes, the fact that she didn’t know what she was doing sucked. It sucked. She wanted to text him, to see him, and yeah, she wanted to kiss him, and it sucked that she didn’t know exactly what manner they were talking in right now. They’d been so esoteric about it on the beach. Something. 

But, God, there was this part of her that dug the sheer banality of that problem. Not knowing how to date. Not knowing how to date was something other people struggled with, wasn’t it? People who weren’t currently trying to avoid the phone calls of a soon to be estranged mother and weren’t trying to navigate a small, but not insignificant, fear of needles. People who weren’t trying to relearn their lives. 

People struggled to date. They wrote whole freaking columns about it in Cosmopolitan, in the newspaper, for fucks sake. People struggled to date. And Viola, Viola was struggling to figure out what the fuck was going on with some guy she wanted to see, and she could write that up as a question, submit it to Cosmo, and if she omitted the little part about how they’d met when she was a boy, and that she was still sort of, kind of figuring that out, and he was a weird sort of E-list celebrity, it would be indistinguishable from anything else. Hey, is it too soon to take this guy to a play? Hey, why haven’t we kissed yet? Hey, what kind of emojis can I use with a guy who I’m just talking to?

It was so normal. They were such normal problems. 

God, she could laugh.

“David’s a good egg,” said Annabelle, grinning at her. “I don’t think you’re going to get in trouble for not knowing how to date.” 

“Do you have opinions about all your students?” Viola was happy to revel in her inability to date on her own. 

“Just the ones that are worth having an opinion on,” said Annabelle. “They have to drive me crazy or make my day.” 

“Which was I?” asked Viola. 

Annabelle’s phone buzzed, and she snapped it up. “You,” she said, glancing down at the phone and standing, “were unnoticeable until I caught you at the bus stop.” She grinned, slid open the phone, and turned. “Hi!”

 

* * * * *

 

They ate. Or, rather, Annabelle ate, and Viola talked her through the David thing even more. There was something normal about that, too, even though the story was ridiculous, and even though the situation in which it was being relayed — lest she forget that she was here to have a needle poked into her thigh and cut off all possible future with her parents — was not. 

She talked through the party again. Told Annabelle all the things David had filled in, which reduced Annabelle to humored groans in her pizza. Told her about the things they’d said on the beach, the things they’d said, the things they’d done. Or, rather, hadn’t done. 

And then, it was time, and Annabelle was washing her hands, and she was talking about anything but the needle and the estrogen and the thing she was about to help Viola do, but Viola could feel it. 

It was time.

She wanted to do this. She wanted to do this. 

At some point, there was only so much hemming and hawing she could do about her past. Because, fuck, she couldn’t not. There was no backwards from here, was there? She’d tried everything else, tried to hold back the bits of herself that might stop her from ending up here, tried to barricade herself out. She’d tried everything short of actually walking into the ocean, everything short of boarding the bus to the strange city with no plans and no money. 

This was it. This was what there was. And it would do the trick, because she’d had a taste of what it could do, even if it was mostly held on with glue and elastic. It would. It would. 

And she could grow old, probably. Old and wrinkled and gray. 

And if she didn’t, it wouldn’t be because she walked into the ocean. It would be something else. Cancer. Car accident. One of those things that happened to everyone, one of those things that wasn’t this. A normal death. 

And, God, it might give her all the things she wanted here, too. Not just the future life, not just the life of a retired woman, but it might let her wake up as Viola. Not paint her on. Not force herself to find her. She might be able to peel out of bed, tired and croaky voiced and unmade, and be her. 

Right?

And the rest of it was sort of irrelevant. It had to be. This, or back to what she’d been trying before. This, or cooping herself up. This, or nothing. 

“Can I do it myself?” asked Viola, quietly. 

“It’s the best way to go,” said Annabelle. “Better to not need someone to do it for you, I think.” 

So she did. She washed her hands, came back to the chair, sat and listened to Annabelle explain the mechanisms of injections — dosage, the cleaning wipes, the drawing needle and the injection needle — and then hovered over her thigh with the needle herself. Her thigh. Her needle. Her body to change if she wanted to. 

It was easier than she expected. Past the skin, once it had gone through it was all just pushing. And then, it was deep enough, according to Annabelle, and then it was done. 

No going backwards.

No being Sebastian. Only putting him on. Never being.

 

* * * * *

 

David: So

David: Saturday

 

Viola: saturday?

 

David: Saturday

David: Its blocked off its clear we’re hanging out

 

Viola: can’t wait!

Viola: ive been informed that we shouldn’t do anything super public

 

David: I’ll cancel the parade

David: Any particular reason?

 

Viola: ill explain it promise

Viola: mostly just about the fact that i will eventually need to pretend to not be this girl

 

David: You have experience

 

Viola: dick

Viola: im not sure why i like you

 

David: You love to neg, you know that?

David: You’re like one of those annoying guys on the street

 

Viola: first of all i think that’s just called flirting

Viola: second of all im way cooler than those guys right

 

David: I don’t know

David: I haven’t seen you harass strangers yet I can’t evaluate

 

Viola: i have an amazing idea for saturday

Viola: is there a nearby park

Viola: do you have a microphone and an offputting personality

 

David: See now I was thinking something like a ‘picnic’

 

Viola: lucky us both our ideas involve parks

 

David: You’re sort of fixated on the idea of starting a podcast as a joke

David: Or like

David: Something podcast adjacent

David: This is the second time you’ve brought it up

David: Which says something

 

Viola: just what are you accusing me of david

 

David: Nothing

David: Just making an observation

David: I would still prefer the picnic

 

Viola: fine

Viola: (that sounds lovely)

 

David: (Is this supposed to take us out of the joke)

David: (Are you couching being genuine in parenthesis)

 

Viola: no i was just trying to be funny

 

David: By couching being genuine in parethises?

David: Parenthesis

 

Viola: i don’t know what you’re talking about

Viola: (…yes)

 

David: I’m very excited for our picnic

David: (I’m very excited for our picnic)

 

Viola: youre such a dork

Viola: (me too :))

 

* * * * *

 

Not the dining hall. The dining hall wouldn’t work. Honestly, if there was a blessing to having missed brunch, it was that the dining hall would not work for this. Oh, codenames and all that stuff, but, seriously, they could not talk about this around that many people. 

So, inspired by Annabelle, and also regretful of being too wrapped up in herself at the time, Vi pitched pizza in the dorm. There, any sort of, like, outbursts would be contained by muffles. People might hear words, but they wouldn’t provide anything more than annoyance.

Anna had seemed suitably disturbed by her insistence at dinner away from everyone else. She’d said so in class, said it was all ‘wiggy’, and when Viola had laughed at her, Anna had declared her unfit to remain in class. She’d tried to drag her outside and pull the information out of her, an action only amplified in intensity upon finding that it made Viola laugh harder. 

So, by the time that she’d made it to their room, Anna was rabid. 

“You’re starting,” said Anna. It was just her and Lucy. “We’re not waiting for Margot, because you’re being so weird and you’re not allowed to be weird. You’re not allowed to be weird.” 

Viola grinned and flopped down onto the floor next to Lucy. They traded smiles. 

“Hey,” said Lucy. “What’s up?” 

“Nothing,” said Viola. “What’s up with you?”

Lucy smiled, sat up a little, clearly relishing. “Oh, well, since you asked-”

“Lucy,” whined Anna. “I know you want to know.” 

“Okay, well,” said Lucy, kicking a foot out as if it might keep Anna, who had slid closer to the pair, at bay, “I just figured it would be best not to try and pry.” 

“Too private to talk about in the dining hall!” Anna crossed her arms. “And then, she was a little freak about it-”

“I was not a little freak,” said Viola, laughing. “I was not.” 

“You so were! You were! What kind of thing can you not tell me in a public setting? And what kind of thing that falls under that makes you blush like that?” Viola was pretty sure she wasn’t blushing now, but it was impossible to be sure. “Because I have guesses, and those guesses involve you being incredibly stupid and also involve a certain boy.” 

Lucy giggled, and Viola shrugged. 

“It could be a lot of things,” said Viola. “Truly, the category of ‘I can’t say this in class’ is pretty broad these days.” 

“So true,” said Lucy. 

Anna glared. “But it’s not those things, because those things don’t precipitate an emergency dinner!” 

“This is not an emergency dinner,” said Viola. “It’s more, like, a makeup for brunch.” 

“Which you were also evasive about missing!” Anna uncrossed her arms, recrossed them, and narrowed her eyes. “You’re all evasion.” 

Viola grinned. “I want to wait.” 

“Look,” said Anna, flopping back. “Who knows when Margot is going to get here. Like, honest to God, who knows. It could be hours! That girl is always off being, like, a good student and a loving girlfriend and I love that for her. But! She might not be here, and then we’re going to have to sit around and pretend like you’re not being weird.” 

Viola shifted, still grinning. True. True, and also, God, she wanted to talk about it. She’d gotten a taste with Annabelle, a little one, but the news, the weirdest, strangest, most beautiful news had been building behind a dam for days now. For days. 

“Fine,” she relented. “But if Margot gets mad-”

“If Margot gets mad, she can get bent,” said Anna, leaning forward. “For the love of God.” 

Viola laughed. Then, she twisted her thumbs between her fingers. God. God. It was almost more fun than the rest of it. 

“Well,” she started, “the reason I didn’t come to brunch was because I fell in the pond.”

Anna frowned. “You didn’t want to tell us you were-”

“It’s not the full story,” said Viola. 

“Well, why are you-”

“If you let me actually talk,” said Viola, giggling, “I can tell you what happened. God, it’s just part of it. And it felt like it made sense to-”

“Viola.” Anna was glaring. “Seriously.”

“Fine,” said Viola. She bit on her tongue. “So, I fell into the pond. And!” Anna tried to jump in, to complain again, so she sped up. “And, um, the reason I fell into the pond was that David sort of… caught me?” 

It was Lucy’s turn to lean forward. “What? David was by the pond? I thought the whole point was that you could be alone?” 

“It was,” agreed Viola. “It… well, apparently he’s been running by the pond. For a while now. Actually, I’m pretty sure he’s been running by the pond for longer than I’ve been going there. Like, it’s sort of close to the practice facilities, and he likes it because no one goes out there. He’s not super likely to be stopped or whatever. I mean, that’s what he said, anyway.” 

Viola paused for a second, if for no other reason than to let Anna find a way to close her mouth. She did, then swallowed, then spoke.

“Just to be clear,” said Anna, slowly, carefully. “David saw you by the pond. He… he saw you by the pond.” 

Viola nodded. “Sort of halfway, actually. Like, makeup on. But not all the way or anything. I still don’t really have clothes, obviously, and the wig and stuff are-”

“Just to be clear,” said Anna, again, this time louder, less carefully, “He saw you by the pond and you’re not dead. And… And…” 

“I’m not dead,” agreed Viola. 

Lucy’s turn. “Now, hold on. Now.” She sat up further. “Now, did he… recognize you? Like, okay, I guess that works in both senses.” She frowned. “What I mean is, did he know it was you on the beach?”

“Yes,” said Viola, nodding. “And, he knew it was me at the party.” She grinned. “And, he knew it was me when I was texting him.” 

Anna’s mouth hung open. “Excuse me?” 

“What does that mean?” asked Lucy, reaching forward and digging into Viola’s wrist with her nails.

“Excuse me?” repeated Anna. “Excuse me, does that mean the whole-”

“The whole time,” said Viola, shaking her wrist to dislodge Lucy before she drew blood. 

Lucy disentangled, reluctant. “On the couch even?” she asked, falling back onto the floor. “Wait, even during the game?” Then, she sprung back forward, eyes wide. “Wait…” Viola giggled, and Lucy pressed forward. “Wait.” 

“Then, too,” said Viola, and Lucy renewed her grasp. 

“Oh my god? Like, oh my god?” 

Viola didn’t bother trying to pull free. “He’s known the whole time,” she said, and her voice floated a little. She pulled that down, because, okay, she had some shame. Can’t go floating away before she’d even kissed him. 

“Wait,” said Anna, regrouping, catching up, “okay, so… wait. So you’re going to date then, right? Or, like, fuck, wait! What’s going on?” She sort of boggled at Viola, and Viola laughed. 

It was delirious. She was delirious. All of this was so insane.

“I know,” said Viola.

“Holy shit,” said Anna, covering her mouth. “I mean, he knew it was you when you kissed.” Viola opened her mouth, but Anna waved her off. “Almost kissed, whatever. Whatever. The follow through doesn’t matter. It’s the intention!” 

“The follow through matters to me,” said Viola, grinning.

Anna rolled her eyes. “I don’t mean like that. I mean, like, he wants you. And not just in the bad way, the scary way. Like, he wants… he wants you.” 

If Viola had been wearing the wig, it would have been the perfect time to do something extraordinarily haughty with her hair. Toss it. Twirl a finger into it. Her natural hair was long enough to twirl, but not enough to toss, so she adopted a little smile instead. 

“Yeah,” she said, and despite the desire to look haughty, her voice floated again. That could never come out when he was around. God. 

Anna grinned. “Damn. Damn. Damn, you really should’ve kissed him that night. I mean, the whole reason-”

“Given the information at the time,” said Lucy, loudly, and both Anna and Viola laughed. 

“Given the information at the time,” conceded Viola. 

“You’re going to see him again,” said Lucy. She loosened her grip. “I mean, you’re going to see him again, right?” 

Viola nodded. God willing. God willing, and also football coach willing, and also societal pressure willing. “We said Saturday, but he’s, like, all tied up with practice right now.”

“Pity,” said Lucy.

“How is it,” asked Anna, thumbing her chin, “that Cam has all this time to hang out with Margot, and David doesn’t have any time earlier in the week to see you?” 

Lucy snorted. “David’s a much better player.”

“Still,” said Anna. “Still!”

“It’s sort of getting to me,” said Viola. Really, it was starting to dawn that the next time she was going to see David, she’d have to pretend to be Sebastian again. Saturday wasn’t all that far, sure, but it came after a Friday. Friday, where she had to go to class. Friday, where she’d have to deepen the voice and put on Sebastian. And she could manage interacting with him like that, but it wasn’t perfect. It wasn’t perfect.

It had been easy to forget that he would see Sebastian again. And, fuck, David wouldn’t begrudge that, and she knew that. There was the whole… lunch thing last week. It had never seemed to bother David all that much. 

But it bothered her. There was a certain freedom to how she was able to act at the party with him, different from any of the versions she’d been forced into since. Even on the beach, when everything had spilled so plainly into the open, she’d had trouble remembering which voice she was supposed to be using. She’d wiped her face clean because she wanted to pick a version. And the version that she would need to be on Friday, the one that had to be seated in all of her classes, was the last one she wanted him to see.

Perfect would have been the play. Perfect would have been her at the play, her hand in his, her wearing that didn’t belong in the men’s section at The Gap. That would have been perfect. 

Yes, it wasn’t possible. The play wasn’t ready, and they couldn’t go even if it was, but still. Perfect. 

“It’s a ways away,” agreed Lucy. “What are you guys going to do?” 

Viola shook her head. “Nothing crazy. Annabelle… well, Annabelle thought it might be a good idea to keep everything under the radar for a while. Um, at least until the next semester. A picnic, I think.” 

“Sure,” said Lucy. “That does sound nice.”

“Sorry.” Anna was frowning. “Sorry, but why are you even waiting if it’s just for a picnic?” 

Viola shifted. “You don’t think the picnic is cute?” 

“No, no,” said Anna, waving a hand, “of course it is. It’s adorable. But, like, if it’s getting to you not seeing him, why don’t you just… I don’t know. I don’t know. You could totally hang out before then. Do the picnic too, but it’s not like you’re doing something totally crazy. It just feels unnecessary to wait.” She shrugged. “Surely he’ll have time to chat for like an hour or something.” 

“Chat,” said Lucy, grinning. “Oh, yeah, it’ll be all chatting.” 

Viola’s face went a little hot. “It just… well, I don’t know.” 

“Why even bother waiting?” asked Anna, now clearly coming around on the idea. “Seriously, like, just go see him.” 

“He’s so busy,” countered Viola. 

“And,” said Anna, pointing a finger, “he would be less busy if you asked him to be. Text him!” 

“Isn’t it too soon?” asked Viola. They hadn’t even been on a date, and as much as Lucy insinuated it, she couldn’t just go have sex with him. So, what then? What came next? What were they supposed to do? 

Even if this had been a standard scenario, even if all the options from a perfect first date, one in public, to casual, messy sex were on the table, she’d still have no clue. She still had no idea what this all looked like. 

Answer that, Cosmo.

“Who gives a shit?” asked Anna. “If he says no, you’ve lost nothing.” She stood from the floor. “Besides, tonight is the perfect night to see him.” 

“Tonight?”

“Yeah,” said Anna, back turned, already flying to her wardrobe. “Yeah, because if you can see him tonight, you can raid our closets right now.” She laughed. “Tonight is perfect.”

 

* * * * *

 

Viola: hi

Viola: are you busy tonight?

 

David: Hi!

David: I have lifting but nothing crazy

David: Whats up?

 

Viola: do you want to hang out?

Viola: it can be after or before and it wouldn’t have to be for long

 

David: I should be done around like 9ish?

David: I have to be up at like 5 but if you want to hangout for a bit that’s cool

David: Everything arlight?

 

Viola: yes

Viola: (nervous about you seeing me as sebastian friday)

 

David: Oh

David: I mean I like Sebastian he’s a good guy

David: Big fan

David: (bigger fan of Viola though)

David: Do you want to just come over after I get home?

David: I’ll probably pick up food if you want to come with there or something

 

Viola: your place rocks

 

David: How do you even know that

David: My place could suck

 

Viola: see i was sort of making a general guess on the vibes but sure your apartment could suck david

 

David: Well it does rock so

David: Not very nice of you to say

 

Viola: 9:30?

 

David: Let’s do 10

David: They’re slow at the Popeyes sometimes

 

Viola: see now i thought you athletes only ate grilled chicken and barley

 

David: …Barley?

 

Viola: is that not a food?

 

David: More of a grain I think

 

Viola: 10 is perfect

 

David: Do you want any food?

David: I can ask if they have barley but I doubt it

 

Viola: fries!

Viola: oh and a diet coke

 

David: So no barley then

 

Viola: see you at 10 :)

 

* * * * *

 

There’d been options. Dresses that fell to her ankles, dresses that would result in a public indecency charge, and everything in between. Not dresses, too. Pants and skirts and tops, anything that she could possibly want. Anything at all. 

This was casual, wasn’t it? So unbelievably casual, just her going over to David Oliver’s apartment, just eating french fries on his… well, she was guessing he had a couch, but she’d just had pizza on the floor, so she was happy to eat fries with him on the floor if she had to. Casual. Easy. Nothing to stress over. Just her, David, and no one else, and none of the inhibitions that came with the social mores of the world. 

So, so, so casual.

So, it had been a casual outfit.  She’d picked jean shorts — shorter than she probably would have thought casual if Lucy hadn’t pointed out that she was already wearing shorter shorts, and that she’d worn them to class — and a flowered top that ended right above her bellybutton. That, and the wig and the breasts, because duh. If she was going to do this, she was going to do this right.

Which meant she’d also recruited Lucy’s help on makeup. Not like, all the way. She’d still done the parts she’d found confidence in, which was pretty much everything but the eyeliner at this point, and then she’d had Lucy help fix up the creeping blush and the unevenness that remained with her foundation. 

And then, she was ready, and it was almost ten, and she’d called an Uber. The girls had promised to stay up, to wait for her so she had a place to go if she needed to come back, even as Anna had smirked. 

The car had arrived, and she’d climbed in, alone.

God, she was so nervous. 

God, she was so nervous. 

It was all the Cosmopolitan problems rolled together.

Was she supposed to text him when she got there? Or knock? He’d said it was at an apartment complex, and so there might be, like, a guard or something. One of the buildings on Briarwood Ave had a front desk. Would she need to buzz him? She’d never used a buzzer before. Was it just a button? 

And then, she’d actually have to be in the apartment, and, okay, she’d asked for this, and she’d set this up, but what was she supposed to do? The whole point was so that David could remember that this was who she was when she wasn’t typing notes about the cinematic importance of some weird movie from 1940. So, what, she showed up, they ate fries, and then she left?

Stupid question. 

She knew exactly what she wanted to do. The problem, of course, was making sure that he wanted that too. And, okay, she wasn’t really sure what the mechanics of any of that would be. She figured bits and pieces, but the actual potential of sex was elusive. What would she want? What would he want? Would he want?

It had been yes at the party. And it had been yes at the pond. And it had been yes every time they texted. She could feel that. 

So. 

So, it was whether she wanted. 

Things she’d wanted had always bee sort of out of focus. People, too. And even when they’d come into focus, they’d been complicated and they’d been obstructed by the whole entire world. Want, in all other scenarios, had been a factor, but it had not meant anything other than just that. Want. 

She could want to be a girl. And she was making headway on turning that to a daily reality, but she could not always be her. Sometimes, things stood in the way. And for weeks, she had wanted David. She had wanted him, wanted to touch him, to be touched by him, to feel his skin against hers, the warmth of his body, the gentleness of his hands. But they had remained elusive. The want had not been enough.

But now.

Want was the only factor tonight. David wanted her, she was sure of that. And she wanted him. She was absolutely positive of that. 

She checked her phone. Six minutes to David’s. Six minutes. The only thing now, the only thing that separated them, the only thing, was pavement. 

“Shit,” she murmured. 

The car hummed along in silence, and Viola twisted her thumbs. 

Good things were allowed to happen to Viola Collins. 

They’d figure out the mechanics of sex if they wanted to. They’d figure out what all this looked like if they wanted to. They’d figure out how to make anything work, everything work, if they wanted to. 

And then, quicker than six minutes had any right to be, she was pulling up next to a five story concrete building, completely at odds with the marbled campus she had just left. The driver stopped next to the curb.

And there was David. Out front, lounging on a bench by the entrance, his hair still a little damp. He was staring at his own phone, twisted a little so he could recline a bit against the arm rest. 

She swallowed. 

Good things were allowed to happen to Viola Collins. 

She stepped out of the Uber, gave him five stars, and turned off her phone. For now, for this hour, for however long, she wanted to get rid of the outside world. Close it off for a moment, just like it had been at the pond. She wanted to forget that there were things that were supposed to make this hard. She tugged briefly at the bottom hem of her top, and then started towards him. 

Two steps in, David looked up, looked up and saw her coming across the sidewalk towards him, and smiled. And Viola smiled back. 

Good things were allowed to happen to Viola Collins. 

 

* * * * *

 

“Your place is nice.” 

He’d gone to the kitchen for plates, which made Viola giggle a little, because there could not be a meal less worthy of plating than Popeyes. She’d said so, too, and David had scoffed. 23 secret herbs and spices, he’d said. That’s KFC, she’d said, but he’d gone back around the little pillar that separated the kitchen from the rest of the apartment and pretended not to hear her. 

It was a nice apartment. Not, like, the nicest thing she’d ever seen, but it was big, and it was clean, and David had hung unframed prints along the wall, which struck her as remarkably adult, even sans frames. Really, it was just much better than the freshman dorms. Not a high bar, but still! Not everywhere passed it. 

She wandered a little, poking at the prints. There was one of a cowboy on a horse, done in charcoal. One of a wobbly sort of skyline, a city she didn’t recognize. Then, an oversized one that seemed to be a recitation of the alphabet with the letter ‘G’ missing. Viola was certain there was supposed to be some sort of meaning to that, but it wasn’t clear to her. 

“Did you make these?” she asked. 

“Huh?” called David, from the kitchen. 

“The prints. Did you make them?” 

“The… Oh, no.” David returned, now carrying a plate of french fries, along with a hilariously well-organized plate of sauces. “There’s a professor in the College of Arts that’ll give some away if students don’t want their projects and they don’t mind people taking them. And when I moved off campus, I suddenly had all this wall space.” David sidled up next to her. “I had posters and stuff in my dorm, but it all just… it just looked so empty in here. Anyway, a guy on the team mentioned you can go pick them up for free if you want. There was a whole pile, too.” 

Viola reached out and grabbed a fry. “Why is the G missing?” 

“The G?” 

Viola grinned and pointed to the spot where the G was supposed to be. 

David blinked. “Shit,” he said. “I, uh, I never noticed that. Huh.” 

“See now,” said Viola, turning to face him and taking another fry. “I thought you were supposed to be perceptive.” 

“It comes and goes,” said David. He smiled at her, and Viola’s stomach turned a little. “Sometimes I miss things on the wall art.” 

“But not things everywhere,” finished Viola. 

“Sorry,” said David, smiling. He took a fry of his own, then nodded back to the couch. “I’m all sore.” 

Viola followed him. “I like to think the missing G was done on purpose. It feels sad if they just forgot to put the G in. Like, I want there to be a reason.” She flopped down gracelessly onto the couch next to him, picking the same half he had sat on. Close.

They were, at this point, right where Viola was comfortable with him. Next to her. Right next to her. Exactly as it had been in class for all those weeks, exactly as it had been next to the pond, exactly as it had been on that couch in Sigma Pi. And, okay, maybe it was a little different than it was in Sigma Pi, but she was vibrating with energy in the same way. 

He was right there. His body. His lips. The hair on his arm was tickling hers, even as they talked about nothing. 

“I always liked it as a sort of educational thing,” said David. 

Viola laughed. “Are you doing a lot of teaching of the ABCs in your apartment? I know football players are dumb, but-”

“Rude,” said David, but he was smiling. His stubble had started to grow into a genuine beard. “No, I just liked the idea of it being used to teach kids, you know? I always thought it would be fun to be a teacher.” 

“Fun to be a teacher?” asked Viola. She couldn’t think of a job that seemed less fun. Managing children…

David ran a hand through his hair. “Fun to be a teacher,” he agreed. “I worked at a summer camp and liked it. It’s just the next step up, isn’t it?” 

“Except you have to actually teach them things in school.” 

“I was very good at teaching those kids low level arts and crafts, thank you very much.” David bit into another fry. 

“Your students are going to struggle with their letters,” said Viola. 

“25/26 is an excellent grade,” said David. 

Viola giggled. “I’ll log it into your backup career list,” she said. “Right under ‘actor’.” 

“It’s more achievable than actor,” said David. His arm brushed against hers again. 

Viola slid closer. There wasn’t any pretense here. She didn’t need to pretend that she wasn’t here because she wanted to touch him. She didn’t need to pretend that this was all something that was something that it wasn’t. She was here for the kiss, for the moment that she had not been able to have because of all of the things that stood in the way. She was here because of want. 

“Don’t fish for compliments,” she said.

David grinned down at her, and Viola had to fight the blush from overtaking her face. “I’m not fishing,” he said. “I’m just saying.” 

“Right,” said Viola. It was supposed to come out combative. It didn’t. “Right.” 

“Can I ask you a question?” asked David. 

“Sure,” said Viola. The word floated. Floated, just like the word had floated back in Lucy and Anna’s room. 

David shifted, turned to face her a bit more. “I get a lot of what happened that other weekend,” he said. He paused. He’d straightened out his face, but there was still the hint of a smile. “And I think I get a lot of it. Really, I do. And I think pretty much all of this makes sense, you know? Like, you make sense.” David stopped again, thinking. 

Viola giggled. “Spit it out.” 

“I just don’t get why you went to that party,” said David, shrugging. 

Viola blinked. “What?” She’d explained. Trans. Girl. She’d showed up at the party as Viola because she was Viola. 

David smiled. “I just mean, I know that it was your first time being out or whatever. I think you said that. But, I don’t know, I keep thinking about the fact that you went. It just seems crazy, is all.” He shifted a little. “I just sort of can’t believe you did it.” He ran a hand through his hair. “I just… I’m glad you went. Obviously.” 

“Obviously?” teased Viola. 

David’s hand brushed against her thigh, and Viola fought a shiver. “Obviously,” he repeated. “It just seems crazy.” 

Viola tamped down the stirring in her navel, at least for a moment, at least for long enough to get some sort of coherent answer out. “Well, it’s all thanks to our mutual friend.” David raised an eyebrow, and Viola smiled. “Cam.” 

“Cam?” asked David. “Did Cam know before-”

“Cam doesn’t know at all,” said Viola, still smiling. “No, Cam just showed up and I was… well, I was sort of already dressed like Viola. I wasn’t planning on going anywhere or anything. He just shows up at their room.” 

“And you decided that the best course of action was…” 

“To pretend Viola was just a girl going to a party,” said Viola. 

It felt a little stupid to think about now. Maybe it was that the dynamics of everything had flipped so quickly. At that point, it had been just a couple of weeks. Viola hadn’t even known yet, hadn’t even put together all of the pieces that had hung above her neck. But explaining it out loud, out loud to someone who wasn’t in the room and hadn’t been privy to the swelling panic of the moment, made it sound incredibly silly. 

But it had worked, hadn’t it? In every way, it had worked. Even the ways she’d never meant it to. It had brought the knife down, finally, and it had warded off Cam, and it had brought her here. 

“That’s a leap,” said David, grinning. 

“Don’t complain,” said Viola. “I’d be in my dorm room right now if I hadn’t gone to that party.” 

And this time, she brushed his arm with her hand. 

Want. Viola was consumed by desire, by want. 

He was so pretty. Even after the shower — and the dampness had mostly dissipated from his hair by now — there was still the smell of him. It wasn’t even a distinct sort of thing, something she could put a finger on. It was simply enveloping. And there was his hand, running small circles on his own thigh right now, as if he was nervous to put it back on hers, as if he was unsure if the brush he’d made before was too much, but she wanted it back on her leg, back on her leg and further up it. 

She didn’t care about the mechanics. She didn’t care about them. 

She interlocked her fingers into his, stopping the circles on his thighs. 

He looked at her. 

“I’m glad you went to that party,” he said, gently. “And I’m glad you’re here.” 

She was all want. 

“Me too,” she murmured, and her voice floated again. “David, I…” She tried to formulate exactly what she wanted to do with him. The words were so impossible to grasp at this second. Anything. Everything. Things she’d never really imagined fully, things she’d imagined a million times. 

“‘I wish you should have kissed me?’” asked David, teasingly. 

Viola rolled her eyes. Or tried to. Fuck. “Something like that,” she said. She swallowed. “I should have kissed you.” 

“There’s still time,” said David. 

And then, without thinking, she pressed herself up and kissed him.

The suddenness seemed to surprise him, so she pressed harder, allowed her body to come further up off the couch, further into him. The smell of him really did envelop her now. Fully. Completely.

And now, David seemed to have caught up, because his hand had slipped from hers, and it had ranged to her lower back, and his tongue was up against hers.

It was desperate and it was messy and Viola had no doubt that she had completely failed to capture any sort of romance, to maintain any sort of tact. There was no romance in this. They’d surrendered the perfect picnic for this, for Popeyes on the couch, surrendered a slow, soft kiss for this. 

A perfect trade, then, because the perfect kiss on a perfect picnic blanket on a perfect day wouldn’t happen until Saturday, and she wanted him now. She pulled her body as tightly against him as she could. Every inch of his skin ought to be flush with every inch of hers. Every bit of him ought to be melded into every bit of her. She pressed desperately again, hoping to get more of him, hoping to feel more of him.

His hands had wrapped around her waist now, and she was on his lap. Quick, steady, and she kissed eagerly. 

Forward. She didn’t want this to stop. She didn’t want to ever have to turn her phone back on. One of his hands was on the back of her head, pulling her closer to kiss, keeping her body locked to his. She braced against his chest with her hands, trapping them between their bodies. She wanted to explore. She wanted to push on. She wanted to touch him. 

And then, she slowed. 

She pulled her lips from his, put her head on his shoulder, and breathed. 

Shit. The mechanics of all this. She still didn’t understand the mechanics of all this. 

“We’re sort of a million miles an hour or nothing,” murmured David into her ear. 

Viola swallowed, nodded. That had been building in her for so long though, with such urgency, that it hadn’t felt sudden. She’d wanted to jump him for weeks. Probably for longer, if she really thought about it. 

“Sorry,” she said, quietly. 

“No,” said David, and his hand reached for her chin and tipped it back. And there was the gentle kiss, the one that was always assured, the one that she had craved almost as much. Almost as much. It was sweet and it was soft and Viola wanted to turn it immediately into something more. David held it, though, and then pulled back again. “Don’t be sorry.” 

“I really didn’t come over here to have sex with you,” said Viola. Why, exactly, that was a thing she felt the need to say, she wasn’t sure. Some sort of false modesty? God, it wasn’t like she’d been drilled into about sex. Her parents had never-

She wasn’t going to think about her parents right now. 

David smiled. “I know.” 

She pressed her forehead to his, still breathing heavy. “I think whatever sex we have will be pretty terrible,” she admitted. She’d never done this before, and she was willing to guess David had never done something like this before. 

“Why?” asked David, frowning. 

Viola closed her eyes. “Well, I’m sort of new to this. And I think you’d… it’d just be different.” 

David’s hand ran down her back, slow, and Viola shivered a little at his touch. “All sex is just making people feel good,” he murmured. “I’m pretty sure you could make me feel good.” His hand crept lower. “And I know I can make you feel good.” 

Viola opened her eyes. “Promises, promises,” she whispered. 

“I’m good at keeping my promises.”