The mood was somber, but not sad as Maya and Brielle joined their friends outside of the library. Everyone was clearly still weighed down by knowledge of what Maya was going through. But it looked like they were trying to keep things as light as possible to not upset her anymore. She appreciated it.

Maya and Brielle had talked it over and decided not to share the options they had been given. Not only did the things they said have a tendency to get back to one “intrepid reporter” type, they were pretty firm in their decision to wait for a better answer. There was no need to worry their friends with more depressing news.

“I can’t believe they let him back in,” Amelia said bitterly.

Maya followed her gaze and groaned in frustration. Standing nearby was a slim boy with a square jaw. Lucas was back in school, and he’d already found them.

“I’ll take care of him,” Brielle muttered, eyes narrowing.

But Maya grabbed her by the arm and muttered, “Don’t keep getting in trouble. You know the principal already has it out for us.”

Brielle sighed and rolled her eyes, but nodded.

Lucas walked up with his head bowed and asked Brielle, “Can I speak to you two? Alone, preferably?”

Brielle scoffed and turned away.

Maya replied, “Anything you want to say you can say in front of everyone, Lucas.”

Lucas groaned a little and started fidgeting.

“Alright,” he said. “I was angry at you two for what you did. Really angry. That was a cruel setup and you had no right to bait us like that.”

“I’ve heard enough,” Brielle said, turning to leave.

“No!” Lucas cried. “No! That’s not all I wanted to say.”

“Talk quickly”! Brielle barked.

“I’m sorry for what I did!” he said.

Maya and Brielle exchanged a brief glance.

He continued, “I… while I was suspended, I learned that my cousin is transgendered. He—um, she just came out as a girl on Facebook. My father was so, so angry about it and, at first, so was I. I felt like I was losing my favorite cousin.”

“Get on with it,” Brielle said.

“B-But then I started thinking about the things my dad pushed me to do. The way I treated you two. And… I couldn’t imagine someone doing those things to my cousin. It made me so furious. And I realized that, if it was wrong for someone to do it to her, it must have been wrong for me to do it to you.”

Maya folded her arms.

Lucas sniffed and continued, “It hurt so much to think that I was committing a sin because of what I was doing to you. I prayed and prayed and prayed for guidance and the only thing I could think of to make it better was apologize. So I’m sorry. Both of you.”

Brielle and Maya exchanged a long glance.

“I’m not really in a forgiving mood right now,” Brielle said. “What you did was really shitty. People still think we’re dangerous because of the transphobic shit you put in their minds.”

“It’s going to take time,” Maya added. “If you really mean it when you say you’re sorry, then just leave us alone and stop causing us trouble. And you really shouldn’t be sharing private info about your cousin like that.”

Lucas nodded, replying, “Of course. I’m so sorry. I’ll leave you alone, I promise.”

He retreated with his head still hung low.

“Did you notice,” Brielle said, “how he basically made that apology all about himself?”

“At least he apologized,” Maya replied. “That’s more than I was expecting.”

“Do you believe it?”

Maya wanted to say yes, but her mind drifted back to Charlie and how much it had hurt to be used and manipulated by her.

“I don’t know if we can trust him,” she decided.

The bell rang and Maya said goodbye to Brielle. She said goodbye to Amelia after homeroom and headed to English. Lily was already in class when she arrived, but only took one look at Maya before a hurt expression crossed her face.

When class began, the teacher stood up and informed them that they were going to be working on a project in teams. Maya groaned. She hated having to work with other students.

“Hey…” Lily muttered quietly from beside her. “Do you… do you want to work with someone else on this?”

Maya gulped and nodded.

“If that’s what you want,” she replied.

Lily bit her lip and continued, “We can still work together, can’t we? I understand if you don’t want to, but…”

Maya nodded fervently, and for a moment she thought she saw Lily’s face light up.

They worked together, but worked quietly. Maya didn’t look directly at Lily very much, but it seemed like Lily wouldn’t look at her either. Things were so awkward between them. And it was Maya’s fault.

“So… people are working on finding a cure for me,” Maya said. “I don’t know how long it’ll take, but it’s happening.”

“I’m glad, Maya,” Lily replied. “I want to see you get better.”

“Yeah… can I tell you something?” She shouldn’t share it, if for no other reason than she hadn’t consulted Brielle. But it was weighing so heavily on her mind. “They’ve found a couple of other possibilities. There’s a spell that can fuse the two of us together, and a spell that will let me escape my body and share Brielle’s with her.”

Lily looked horrified.

“Maya, that’s awful,” she whispered. “No matter what, I’d be losing you.”

It seemed to take her a moment to realize what she’d said, but then Lily’s face turned a deep red.

“We’re not going to agree to either of them,” Maya said. “It’s just… there’s nobody to talk to and I can’t stop thinking about it.”

“I can imagine.”

They were quiet for a moment, then Lily reached out with her hand and placed it on Maya’s. Maya stopped writing. After a moment, she squeezed Lily’s hand back.

“Hey you two!” Charlie had appeared at their desks and was boring her gaze into Maya. “Are you talking about something to help Maya? Rumor is you’re still sick, cute stuff. Is there any truth to that?”

Maya grumbled and looked down at her desk.

“Go away,” Lily told Charlie.

“Are you two together now?” Charlie asked.

Maya pulled her hand away from Lily’s and dropped it in her lap.

“Charlie,” Maya said, “Please go away. I don’t want to talk to you?”

“Don’t want to talk to me?” Charlie asked. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means I don’t want to talk to you,” Maya growled. “I asked you to go away.”

“Cute stuff…”

“I won’t ask again,” Maya said, locking eyes with Charlie.

Charlie looked hurt.

“Fine,” she said, stuffing her hands in her pockets and walking away.

Once she was out of earshot, Lily muttered, “I can’t believe she’s like that. Why can’t she just leave us alone?”

“I don’t know,” Maya replied, placing her hand back on the table.

She continued working. After a few minutes, though, she felt Lily’s hand on hers again. Without looking up, Maya took Lily’s hand in her own. They held hands like that until class ended.

When class ended, Maya bid goodbye to Lily and headed toward Math. She had another coughing fit in the middle of class. The look on her teacher’s face made Maya think he wanted to scold her for interrupting him.

Once lunch began, Maya met up with Brielle and they headed to the cafeteria together. They found their usual table and sat down with their friends. Maya felt a little lightheaded, but otherwise things felt normal for a change.

Then a voice came over the loudspeaker, asking, “Will Brielle and Maya Patterson please report to the front office?”

“That’s always great,” Brielle muttered, standing up. “I’m just going to leave my stuff here. You guys watch over it.”

Maya also left her bag at the table and followed her sister to the front office. They were ushered into the principal’s office, where they were met with a surprising sight. Their father was there in a full suit, along with a well-dressed lady neither Maya nor Brielle recognized.

The woman glanced at the two girls, then turned her attention to the principal and continued talking, “—so there’s no reason why these two young women should be barred from using the same facilities as every other student at this school. They’re female in the eyes of the law now, regardless of how they started. You have no legal grounds to bar them from the restrooms.”

The principal let out a very long sigh.

“Thank you, Mrs. Freeman,” he said. Then, addressing the room, he continued, “In light of this, I’m rescinding the school board’s decision. Maya and Brielle will be able to use the women’s restrooms again.”

“Really?” Maya asked, perking up.

Principal Crawford nodded, but he didn’t seem to want to look at Maya or Brielle directly.

“Now if you’ll excuse me,” he continued, “Mr. Patterson, Mrs. Freeman, I have a school to run.”

Maya was still a little stunned as she followed her sister and father out of the office.

Her father turned to Mrs. Freeman and said, “Thank you, Moira. I know it was out of your way—”

“Nonsense, Mathias. It’s always a pleasure to show up a bigot.” Turning to Maya and Brielle, she continued, “We haven’t met yet. I’m your parents’ lawyer. From what I’ve heard, you two have been through an awful lot lately. Take care of yourselves, okay?”

“Yes, ma’am,” Maya replied, and Brielle nodded.

Mrs. Freeman said goodbye to their father and started walking for the door.

Their father turned to them and said, “I’m sorry I didn’t take care of that before now. I—”

He was interrupted by Maya, who had walked forward and grabbed him in a hug. After a moment, he wrapped his arms around her as well. When Maya pulled away, there were tears welling up in her eyes.

“Thank you, Dad,” she said.

He grinned at her, then accepted a quick hug from Brielle.

“I have to actually get to work today,” he told them. “I’ll be a little late getting home, but I should still be there for dinner.”

Maya and Brielle bid him goodbye and returned to the cafeteria with their heads held high. Their friends were waiting with baited breath to learn what happened, and Brielle was eager to tell them. The rest of lunch was a buzz of excitement after that.

That night, their father was a little late for dinner, but he was still smiling when he walked through the front door. Dinner was relaxed and jovial. Everything was right in the world for once in Maya’s life.

Once dinner was over, Maya and Brielle returned to their room. Brielle sat down at the table and opened her computer. Maya curled up on the bed with her own laptop and started looking through social media.

“Me and Amelia are going makeup shopping tomorrow after school,” Maya said. “I won’t need you to drive me home.”

“Cool. I’ll text Eric and see if he wants to hang out.”

“Have you kissed him yet?”

Brielle didn’t turn around, so Maya couldn’t see if she was blushing. But she did tense up, which made Maya giggle a little. Then she coughed again and the reality of her situation came back to her.

“Brielle,” she said, “we have to talk about this.”

“No, we don’t,” Brielle replied. “We don’t have to talk about anything. There’s nothing to talk about. Someone is going to find a cure for you and everything will be fine, Maya.”

“Please don’t do this,” Maya said, setting her computer aside, “You asked me to trust you. Please don’t ignore this. I’m getting worse.”

Brielle stopped typing and turned to face Maya.

“Listen,” she said, “we’ve got a few months, okay? If you get sick enough, they’ll just use the spell again. And even if they don’t find a cure, they’ll find something. We can wait for a better option. End of story.”

Maya blinked and tears streamed down her face, and she shook her head.

“I’m afraid, Brielle.” She wiped the tears from her eyes. “I don’t want to get sick again. I can feel it. I can feel myself getting worse. And it’s only going to get worse and worse and there’s nothing I can do and…”

She was hyperventilating. Brielle got out of her chair and sat down on the bed next to her, then grabbed her by the shoulders and told her to breathe slowly. It took Maya a few minutes, but she managed to get her body under control even if she was still shaking a little.

“I’m not losing you, Maya,” Brielle said softly, resting her head on her sister’s shoulder. “No matter what, we’re not going to be fused together into one person.”

“I don’t want that either,” Maya admitted. “But the alternative is that I’m stuck in your head for the rest of my life.”

“I think you’d be able to take control. I’ve been reading up on plural systems and how they work. I don’t know what it will be like for us, but you won’t just be stuck as a passenger.”

Maya didn’t respond for a while. She opened her mouth a few times, but always closed it. Brielle didn’t say anything more either, leaving the question hanging unanswered.

Finally, she asked, “So, does that mean…?”

“If it saves your life, Maya, I’ll let you share my body with me.”

Maya sniffed, then grabbed Brielle in a hug. Brielle lost her balance and fell back onto the bed, dragging Maya with her. They laid still for a while, until Maya started to sob.

“Maya, what’s wrong?”

“I’m sorry,” she replied, sniffling. “It’s just… I’m going to lose my body, Brielle. My life just started and it’s over. I’m never going to be entirely my own person ever again.”

Brielle didn’t answer. She just pulled Maya into an even tighter hug. Maya continued to cry, sobbing until her voice was hoarse, and then eventually fell asleep in her sister’s arms.