I was just grabbing myself a glass of juice when mom came into the kitchen and said, "Don't forget, we'll be gone by the time you get home from school."

"I know mom," I said then gulped down my juice.

We'd been through this a dozen times, pretty much every time her and dad took off for the weekend. But it was their first trip to the cottage this year, so she insisted on going through it again.

It was doubly annoying since I had my eighteenth birthday last month, and as of next month I'd be finished high-school. But she still acted like I was just a kid or something.

"There's food in the freezer, and fresh vegetables in the fridge. Don't just eat junk-food and take-out all weekend long. And no parties! You can have one friend over at a time."

I sighed, "Mom I only have one friend. And neither of us get invited to parties."

She asked "I assume Alex will be coming over then? And you'll both be wasting the entire weekend playing games like usual."

Alex was my best and only friend. We'd been best buds since we were eight. We'd basically grown up together, even though our families weren't all that close. We were the same age, Alex was only two months older than me.

We'd been in the same classes in grade-school, then in high-school we took all the same subjects together. The only courses we didn't share was I took some programming classes while Alex was kind of hopeless with computers and took creative writing classes instead.

The two of us even wound up in a lot of the same after-school activities and sports and stuff. Like our folks kept signing us both up for the same stupid stuff. In the ten years we'd known each other we'd both been on the same soccer teams, the same baseball teams, we'd even had that one awful year we were both forced into scouts together.

That's actually how we met. Our folks sent us to the same summer day-camp when we were kids. Alex fell off the dock into the lake and couldn't swim. I jumped in and did the hero thing, got us both to shore. After that we were basically best friends for life.

Apart from swimming, Alex was slightly more athletic than me. I could barely throw or catch a ball, and tended to trip over my own feet if I tried to do any serious running. My body always felt the wrong size and shape for me, it made me clumsy and awkward.

The two of us were both nobodies in terms of popularity too. Alex didn't have any friends other than me. We both got teased and bullied when we were younger, we were both always the last ones picked for teams and stuff. We both just spent most of our time playing video games or tabletop rpgs.

"Maybe?" I shrugged. "We're definitely going to hang out tonight, but I dunno about the rest of the weekend."

Mom said, "Well you two have fun, but no hanky-panky!"

I made a face, "Mom! Don't say stuff like that."

Usually I tried to play it off as a joke or something. People always asked if me and Alex were dating, but she wasn't into me. She was gay, she'd never even gone through a questioning phase or whatever. She'd always known she was into girls. Unfortunately she wasn't successful about it, she'd never even had a girlfriend.

Same as me of course. We were both into girls, but neither of us got anywhere with any of them.

To be honest it was a painful topic for me, but I wouldn't dare say why. Because the thing was, I really liked Alex. I really wanted to be more than just buds with her. The reason that hurt so much was because of the secret I hadn't yet told anyone.

I was really a girl too. Just nobody else knew it but me.

Mom frowned, "Don't make that face at me, Stephen."

Fuck I hated that name. I rinsed out my glass and stuck it in the dishwasher then said, "I gotta go. You and dad have fun opening up the cottage."

"We'll be home by dinner on Monday night," mom reminded me as I grabbed my bag and headed for the door. "You be good!"

I waved and nodded but left without another word.

School was only a ten minute walk away, and it was still early. I was quickly lost in thought as I trudged along my usual route.

Tonight was going to be the night. I'd been psyching myself up for the past week. This was the May long weekend, my folks were gone for three full days. I had the house to myself, and Alex was coming over.

We were going to order in pizza tonight, then stay up late playing games or watching tv. It was a typical long-weekend thing. Ever since my folks stopped dragging me to the cottage with them, me and Alex would hang out at my place.

Except this weekend was special. If I didn't chicken out, tonight I was going to tell her I was trans.

Just thinking about it set my heart racing and my stomach clenched with worry. A hundred different what-ifs entered my head, and each one was worse than the last.

Realistically, I was pretty sure none of those awful things would happen. I knew Alex well enough, she'd be cool with it. She'd be supportive. She might even help me figure out how to talk to my folks and stuff.

But 'pretty sure' still left a lot of room for being wrong, and of course my brain latched onto that and found all the ways it could turn into a disaster.

When I got to the school I headed straight for the cafeteria. Me and Alex usually met in there. We'd hang out before class, maybe get a soda or something.

Sure enough I spotted her at our usual haunt by the door. She was slouched in her chair, backpack on the seat next to her. She was focused on her phone, probably playing a game or something, and didn't notice as I approached.

"Hey Alex," I greeted her as I pulled out the chair opposite her and slumped into it.

She looked up and smiled, "Yo, Steve."

For a moment my mind went blank. There was something different about her this morning. She'd always been pretty, like ever since puberty she looked kind of awesome. This morning she looked even hotter.

It took me a full minute as I sat there staring at her like an idiot, before I finally clued in.

"Dude, are you wearing make-up?" I asked in a hushed voice.

Alex was a tomboy, through and through. She never got her ears pierced, never wore make-up. As far as I knew she didn't even own a dress or a skirt. She always dressed kind of like me. Baggy jeans, loose t-shirts, running shoes, oversized hoodie. She let her hair grow long, but she never did much with it. Usually she tied it in a messy bun, or just let it hang out the back under a baseball cap or whatever.

Now that I was looking at her though, I realized she'd definitely changed. It was subtle, but noticeable. She had some lipstick on, some eyeshadow, even some mascara. Her hair looked nicer too, like she'd styled it. And no baseball cap.

It was like I was seeing her again for the first time.

Her eyes were brown, but with flecks of green and gold. Her eyebrows were thin and perfectly shaped and arched. She had a cute little nose. Her lips were full and had a slight pout to them. Her cheekbones were high but didn't stick out like on some of the skinnier girls. Her face was just nicely soft and rounded. Her slightly tanned skin was absolutely flawless. Her hair was brown, but this morning it had a shine to it, and there were some faint red tones in the light. It almost looked a little more auburn than brown.

As I stared, I started noticing other things. She wearing an oversized dark grey hoodie like usual, but it wasn't done up. Beneath it I could see a small tight green t-shirt. I couldn't even see much of it, but I knew it was a girls shirt. The deep scoop neck on it did nothing to hide her cleavage. It was a huge change from the loose t-shirts she and I typically preferred.

She blushed slightly and shrugged, "Yeah. I uh, felt kind of different when I woke up this morning, and figured I'd give it a try."

She rolled her eyes and added, "It sure made my mom happy. She started going on about how I was finally starting to act like a girl after all these years."

I stared at her for another few seconds, then finally forced a smile. "Ok, who are you and where's the real Alex?"

She blushed again, "C'mon Steve. It's no big deal, man. It's just a little make-up..."

Her voice trailed off and she looked like she was embarrassed or hesitant about something. Then she bit her lower lip and holy crap did that look cute. I don't think I'd ever seen her do that before.

Finally she asked "Hey Steve? Do you think maybe you could stop calling me Alex? I was thinking, if you want to use a nickname maybe Lexi would be better. Or you could just call me Alexis."

I wound up just staring at her again as I had to process that. She'd always wanted to be called Alex. I never questioned it, she'd always just been Alex to me. Now, between the make-up and the name, it felt like she was suddenly shifting gears. Like she was suddenly going to stop being the tomboy I'd known all my life, and now she was going femme instead.

There was a pang of jealousy. It was so easy for her. Just put on some makeup and switch from one nickname to another. And if she did wear a skirt or something, people would probably appreciate it. Her folks definitely would. If I did any of those things, I'd probably get beaten up at school and maybe even get kicked out of the house.

I pushed my feelings aside and finally nodded "Sure Lexi, no problem. Do you prefer Lexi? Or would you rather I used Alexis?"

"Thanks Steve," she smiled. "Either works I think? Whatever you're more comfortable with."

That melted my heart a little. Her smile, the gratitude in her voice. It even sounded like there was a bit of relief in her tone? Maybe she'd worried I wouldn't go with the new nickname. The only thing that would have made it perfect is if she hadn't said my name. Or if she'd said my real name.

I felt another wave of anxiety. If everything went well tonight, I might actually tell it to her.

"Hey, are we still on for tonight? My folks are heading out at noon, trying to beat the traffic. Got the place to myself till Monday night."

Lexi grinned "Perfect! I've got my stuff in my locker so I can come over right after classes."

I almost breathed a sigh of relief. "Sweet. I've been looking forward to this all week."

"Yeah," there was a flicker of something in her expression.

Was that doubt? Was she having second thoughts? It was gone before I could really say for sure.

Her grin was back as she added, "Me too. I almost want to just cut classes this afternoon and get a head start, you know?"

That brought a smile to my face, "I'm totally up for that."

She was about to say something else when her smile faded. "We better go to math. Keebler's going to hit us with a surprise test, if we miss it we'll get zero and I can't afford to flunk that class. We can totally cut English though. Brooks isn't gonna show, so it'll just be filler with some substitute."

"Fucking Keebler and his pop-quizzes," I griped. Then I frowned at her, "Wait, how do you know there's gonna be a test?"

Alexis blushed and bit her lower lip again. She sounded almost embarrassed as she said "Uh... It's like deja-vu or something? I guess I don't really know. Intuition, maybe?"

I smiled, "Freaky. Ok tell you what, if he does hit us with a test then I'm gonna assume you're right about Brooks too, and we can totally blow off English. Get out an hour early, anyways."

"Cool," she grinned.

It was nearly time to get to class now, the halls were getting crowded and we had about five minutes till the bell. The two of us got up, and as she started walking away I kind of froze in my tracks and stared again.

Her baggy jeans and old sneakers were gone. She was wearing blue skinny jeans and black ankle-boots, with a bit of heel on them. Normally I was about three or four inches taller than her, but the boots gave her a two-inch boost. They also did some amazing things to her legs, and the skin-tight jeans did everything to show them off.

I almost wished she'd take off the hoodie so I could see her figure. There was another huge pang of jealousy too, but once again I shoved it down.

I hurried to catch up, and forced myself not to say anything. I knew she'd probably be getting enough stares and maybe some comments from everyone else, she didn't need it from me too.

It made me worry though, that I was losing my best friend. Like Alex the fun nerdy tomboy I'd known most of my life was gone, replaced by the smoking hot Lexi.

I stifled a sigh and forced myself not to worry, as the two of us made our way to our first class of the day.

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