Dorothy walked by me down the school hall, surrounded by a small group of other students. I kept my eyes straight forward into my locker, hoping she wouldn’t notice that I had stopped moving when I had heard her high clear voice cutting through the chatter. I realised I was probably safe from being picked out – there was a pervasive tension that had settled in as she came by.

Of my school, Dorothy was that girl who would choose not to enter any of the popularity contests, because she would have won them. And, since she wasn’t participating, nobody else cared who won them, either. Everyone, it seemed, chased after her approval, but everyone feared her attention.

I had been her childhood best friend, before the distance of puberty and high school had placed us on the opposite ends of the universe. So, here I was, hoping that my mostly unchanged face wouldn’t draw her dooming attention onto me from some distant recollection.

 

~~ = ~~

 

As the last bell rang and everyone began to flee the fickle kindness of a helpful teacher who would gladly make you understand concepts for the next three hours if you showed any signs of befuddlement, I was caught up amidst the storm of people. I let it carry me, having no great friends to waste time with, nor any books to grab to work on my assignments. As we passed through the doors into the chilly, just-after-rain dampness that always happens in spring, the crowd’s pressure let up a bit, but I continued on the well-trod paths to the nearest east-bound bus stop. As I entered into the vaguely queue-shaped group of people, I spent the time trying to guess if I would get on the first bus or not. I figured not: I was a whole groove behind the bench, and that’s a lot of people to fit on a bus.

So, imagine my surprise when the first bus is so full it doesn’t stop, and a second bus pulls up soon after, completely empty. I still don’t get a seat, but that’s okay with me. I end up in the no-man’s-land between the handicap seats and the back doors, where nobody can really move out of anyone’s way when they need to. An unlucky five people are left at the stop; one of them stuffs his hands in his coat pockets and starts walking.

The bus ride, lurchy and all too frequent with the stops, still ends before I can really start weighing the possibility of pulling out my phone to start reading fanfiction. As I pile out of the crowd and a few people climb back into the back door of the bus, I notice that Dorothy also got off, from the front door. We both start walking into the residential area we live in, where we spend so much effort usually to never cross paths like this. I’m not really sure why she avoids me, but I’m happy to do my part in avoiding her.

She reaches her home’s driveway, but she’s looking over her shoulder, behind her... at me. She stops, like she’s waiting for me.

What do I do now?

I spend too long thinking about it, and she waves at me a little. “Heya,” she calls, voice weak like she doesn’t want to scare me away or something. It doesn’t work much, I’m still pretty scared. The bus is out of view, but it only takes one random jogging classmate before everyone knows I talked to her.

“Hi?” I reply.

“I-... It’s been a long time, Char, and I,” she pauses, taking a big breath. “I hope you’re okay.”

“Yes I am fine thank you,” I nod, slowing to a stop next to her.

She crosses her arms, but more like she’s trying to stay warm than trying to brag or anything. The day isn’t very cold though. “Prom is coming up.”

“Is it I mean I guess I probably knew that but why would I show up to prom?” I ask, a nervous giggle worming out despite my best efforts.

“No- Nobody wants to go with me.”

“What? That can’t be right,” I double-take a look at her face, but she looks like she’s being honest.

“I don’t get it either, Char. All of my friends asked each other, I guess? And I need to have someone, right?”

“Uh. Sure. Okay.” I nod. I don’t know if I like where this is going.

“Do you think we could go to prom together?” She looks down at her feet, playing this off as if she’s nervous.

I’m onto her, though. This isn’t nerves, it can’t be true that she has nobody else to ask, she’s the most popular girl at school! This is just the start of something elaborate and definitely unfortunate for me. “Okay, fine. We can go to prom I guess,” I sigh, resigning myself to this fate. “...If I get to call you Rothy.” I add with a smirk. It was the nickname I had called her by throughout our childhood friendship.

Her laugh peals out among the houses. “Of course you can call me Rothy, Char! I still call you Char, don’t I?” She placed her hand on my shoulder, like an imitation of a loose hug. “I look forward to it. We’ve really let life get wayyy too busy, haven’t we? It’s been too long since we talked.”

I can only nod. It really has been a shame that life has let me keep away from the doom of my high school life, hasn’t it, yes. I give a small smile, and try to start walking again.

“Well, see you around, then. Good luck on your homework,” She says, and makes her way up into her home.

I am left wondering what sort of scheme I have become the unwitting pawn in. Or.... Can I make it work to my advantage somehow? I don’t even know who she’s trying to get at, but I don’t need to, not to make this prom one that nobody will forget for approximately one summer break’s time!

 

== ~ ==

 

I work through the rest of the afternoon easily. Homework, as usual, is far more about making sure we’ve paid attention than getting us to actually think. I might almost wish it took more effort than time, but that also sounds like it wouldn’t be great.

As evening rolls around, I get up to help my mom with my part of the food preparation. My parents both work until fairly late – not because we need money, they just like their jobs that much. My mom goes to the effort of making a bunch of meals on the weekends that can be warmed and paired with quicker side dishes. It then falls on me to start the oven heating, and to stuff the food in at about the right time.

The oven takes its time warming up, as usual. I spend the time looking at the fics I follow, to see if any of them have updates. None of them do. I guess I was too voracious with reading them at lunch time.

If I’m going to go to prom, then I guess I’m going to have to get some fancy clothes, or, alternatively, look like an absolute idiot. Even with much as I am an idiot, I don’t think I want to look like one. So some fancy clothes shopping will have to happen.

I take a look at the calendar. Prom is happening... next Friday. So I have a week. Wow. So much time to plan and prepare and stuff. What is planned for this weekend? A lot of things, it turns out. There will be no time for my parents to help me look at any fancy clothes. They will likely just give me a limit and let me find something for myself. I guess any clever schemes I come up with can bypass them entirely? That’ll be nice. Or not, because I’ll still have to come up with something!

How to counter-embarrass a girl who asked me to prom! It is a simple question! So why is it so hard to think of anything?

I mean, I really didn’t intend to go to prom. Life is just weird. I hate attention usually, and especially getting all fancied up for whatever silly event my parents want me to attend sucks, and now I need to get fancied up in a way which draws attention to myself, on purpose? Even if Rothy showed up with a girl, I don’t think people would blink. I need to be more out-there than even a lesbian girl would be!

Wait. I’m not a girl, so why can’t I just go as if I was a girl? Should I get a nice dress? Fancy and feminine, obviously, but not outrageous, I’m not going to go tripping over myself just for a prom counter-prank. Yikes, I’m actually even considering this. I mean, just thinking of the looks on everyone’s faces when I show up in a beautiful dress... it gets me smiling, and my heart warming. And it sounds so much better than going in a suit or something would. Suits are nightmarish prisons that don’t even look that good. But I could live with wearing a dress. Huh. I think I actually have a plan. A plan to show Rothy, to prove that she shouldn’t have asked me to prom on false pretenses!

The oven beeps at me about its temperature, in the most anticlimactic tone. I giggle at it: it had the timing so right, but it has nothing but a sad little drawn-out “maa” to mark the climactic moment in my plot. Still, it did actually beep for a reason, so I stuff the already slightly thawed meal in and shut the door again, noting the current time on the little whiteboard on the fridge.

This is going to be fantastic and there is nothing that can stop me now!

 

~~ = ~~

 

So apparently I lied, there are things that can stop me.

It turns out malls are still terrifying even when you know precisely the sort of thing you want, and especially when you don’t want to be noticed buying things that you know you want but which might be weird for you to buy. I just want a really nice dress, and yet I’ve been wandering around the mall for nearly thirty minutes, just trying to build up my courage and maybe get an idea of what I might bee-line to buy, by looking in the store windows.

It is going to take more time than I wanted. But I knew it might, so I came with plenty of time in hand. I’m just going to have to take as much time as I need. I sigh. Patience.

I pass the most promising store again, and I give a side-long glance inside. There are some really nice dresses. Some that I think should even look good on me. One is seriously catching my attention. A deep neckline and tapering into thin straps over the shoulder and across the back, with a loose, wavy skirt that stops at the knees but dangles a bunch of hanging strips below that to the shin. I could look beautiful in that, I think. Maybe I’m wrong.

I keep on walking, obviously. On my other side, though, I’ve been joined by someone in close sync with my stride. A girl, maybe a bit older than me but definitely not from my school thankfully, in that store’s uniform, with a name tag proclaiming ‘Terra’.

She notices that I’ve seen her, and smiles at me. “Hey, there,” she begins.

“Hi, Terra?” I ask in response.

“You are very shy, and I think I know why.” She says quietly. Some people could probably have heard some of her statement, but she was – very nicely – quite discrete about it.

Still it gets my heart in my mouth, “No uh, you don’t, uh.”

“Whoa, calm down there girl.” She pats me on the shoulder.

I swallow. I never really signed on for this term of address? Why is my heart quickening about it like this?

“Do you want to use the back entrance to the store? Nobody needs to see you get your dress, if you want. You’ve been circling this mall for a while now, and if you want I can leave you to it, but I thought I’d offer.”

I hold my answer as we pass somewhat close to another mall patron. “...was I that obvious?”

“We aren’t exactly busy, and I like watching the people that go by.” She coughs lightly. “I also keep an eye out for girls like us. I’ve got a nice job for helping people, so I try to do my best with it, yeah?”

“That is... I- I never... What exactly do you mean ‘like us’?” I hiss in a whisper at her ear. “This is just for a counter-prank!”

“Oh, uh... Maybe I was mistaken, that’s okay too,” Terra waved away my question. “But my offer is still open. Want to take the back way in?”

“That sounds great. And, I’m sorry for the awkward question.”

“Don’t sweat it, girl. Uhm. I mean. Anyways, right down here,” she says, as she leads me down a branch hallway that clearly isn’t intended for public use. “Just through this door,” unlocking a door that is labelled ‘staff only’, and holding it open for me.

I follow, happy to be out of the public spaces on this harrowing journey.

“So, I’m pretty sure I know which dress you were looking at, the deep blue one on display right down the aisle from the door?”

“I didn’t really notice the colour, but I think so?”

“Yep, you’ve got a good eye for dresses that’ll suit you. I’ll just go get what we’ll need for you. Don’t rob us blind, yeah?” She asks me with a wink, and ducks through the door to the front half of the store.

I’m left looking around me, slightly terrified of the possibility of another employee walking in and seeing me standing here.

My fears don’t come to pass. Terra slips back through the door, carefully holding a dress as well as a bag of other stuff, which she drops immediately by the door. “So, I’m guessing you aren’t very familiar with dresses?”

“Very unfamiliar, really?” I say, hoping that answer isn’t too damning for my plan.

“Well, good news: it really is just clothes. Basically a really long shirt, for this one, with a slight complication from that back.”

“Should... I try it on?” I ask, reaching out to feel the dress’s material. It’s very soft. It feels wonderful.

“Of course, dummy! Unless you don’t want to. But I’m here to help you, right now. And, nobody will come back here – I told Jan to stay in the front and ask for stuff if she really needs it from back here. You’re safe here.” She smiles at me, but swallows before she says the next thing on her mind. “So, uh, yeah. Unless your underwear is super disgustingly dirty? Strip down to that, and then work up into the dress from below. Do you want help getting into it the first time?”

I think about her seeing me in my underwear, and shudder a bit, hunching inwards away from her. “I’ll be fine,” I say, looking down and to the side. “Thanks though.”

“Hey, it’ll be okay,” Terra says, putting her hands on my shoulders. “You’ll look absolutely gorgeous. And it’ll work amazingly with your eyes!”

“Can you look away now?”

“Oh, definitely! Sorry!” She says, covering her mouth with the back of her hand and scrambling around a very solid looking shelving unit. “I can’t see you from back here, I swear!” she calls back. “And just say the word.”

I stand for a moment, looking at the dress in my hands. It really is about the right size for me, it looks like. This is really what I am about to do. My heart feels like it is about to explode with eagerness. Is this how people usually feel when setting up pranks? If so, no wonder they try them so often.

Undressing is quick and simple and very much like it always is, and I won’t dwell on it. Putting on the dress also isn’t nearly as complex as it might sound. Somehow I thought it was like getting into a space suit, but it really does work just like a big shirt with some unusual structure at the back.

As I stand in the back of the store, wearing a dress, I honestly can’t figure out how I’m feeling. I’m not supposed to wear stuff like this? It feels amazing! I don’t look right for it? Every movement I make, the skirt floats and dances the bits around! I feel a smile creasing my face, and I don’t even feel happy? Do I?

“Terra?” I call to her softly, “I’m, uh, dressed now.” I laugh softly at my word-choice. How does even laughing feel different when I’m just wearing a different piece of clothing?

She comes around the corner, and stops. “I... you know, I am very slightly envious of you right now? You look completely beautiful in that! You just gotta mess your hair a bit, and you’ll be really... yeah.” She nods, her eyes never leaving me. “There’s a mirror just around this shelf, come on, you have to see yourself!”

I approach hesitantly, my thoughts still racing at how it moves and loving the way the bits swing past my bare legs, and circling around how I’m in a dress.

As I squeak around her, Terra reaches out and gently ruffles my hair, just enough to get it out of the fierce parting I usually force it into. My hair is just a bit wavy on its own, which tends to turn my head into a nest unless I work it hard.

But when I get around and see the mirror at the end of the aisle of shelf-access, I see what she meant. There, standing next to Terra, is a definitely pretty girl, in a dress eerily like the one I put on, her hair untamed but beautiful in its wildness. From that distance, my face wasn’t super obviously mine, but I knew it well enough to know that the girl I was seeing smiling so widely, eyes tear-glossy in the bright lights of the back room, was me. My eyes, a brighter blue than the dress, still matched its colour very nicely. Why am I nearly crying just from seeing this? Maybe the last feelings were just what pranking is, but this has to be more than that?

“Yeah, girl! That’s you!” Terra says from beside me, bonking my shoulder with her own. “Whoever is bringing you to prom is about to be the luckiest one there!”

“I don’t – I don’t know about that,” I giggle.

“Yeah, okay, maybe not the luckiest. But they will be very lucky. Take my word for it. You’re absolutely beautiful.”

“How much is this dress?” I ask, looking away from the mirror to face her directly.

“Oh, uh. I... honestly don’t remember? The machine will know. You can pay for it?”

“My parents can, yeah.”

Terra held back a laugh. “Ooh, how daring of you! Don’t let ‘em hold you back too much, okay?”

“They’re happy enough to let me be, as long as I don’t start failing in school. Or at least it seems that way.”

“Well, nice. We don’t really know each other and all, but I’m proud of you for taking this step.”

I look behind me to see if I stepped over anything, but I don’t see anything she might be referencing. Walking around the corner to look in the mirror? I don’t know.

“I’m guessing you’ll want to change back before you come to the front to buy it? I can put it in a nice, unlabelled bag for you here, but the machine won’t move. You have to buy it out there.”

“Yes, I will change back,” I nod quickly. Even though the thought of a normal shirt and pants is kinda a bit uncomfortable now, it still is so much better than the idea of returning home in my counter-prank surprise dress. That would be spoiling the surprise! As well as look weird to anyone who could recognise me. But mostly the surprise part. Definitely.

 

== ~ ==

 

On Monday, I don’t see Rothy at all – our paths just don’t cross, or whatever reason there is. Still, my heart is unsettled from the events of the weekend. I had bought the prank equivalent of a nuke, and I was going to look beautiful at prom! The thought made me honestly smile.

On Tuesday, I pass by Rothy in the hall. She winks and grins at me. I quickly look around to see who she might be playing things up for, but I don’t see any of her usual crew around. Though, I’m not sure if I could actually put any faces on her usual crew – I’m usually stealing glances right at Rothy.

On Wednesday, we stand awkwardly next to each other in the bus stop queue. We share a nod, and a few idle words, but she fits exactly onto the bus, leaving me behind to wait or walk. What we said was definitely very superfluous. Nobody would’ve thought it weird at all, even when she’s Dorothy the Socially Unmatched, and I’m a very socially matched nobody. It honestly made me rethink my plan for while. But, that evening, I look at the dress again, hanging carefully in my closet that I never open, and I remember what it felt like, and what I look like. I end up falling asleep curled into a ball, softly crying about that moment of beauty.

On Thursday, I nearly call in sick. I feel like I’m huddled up into a ball of un-dress-ness, like it is some sort of drug that I’m in withdrawal from. Why does just standing and waiting for the bus at the side of the busy road hurt? Why do I want to hide from the cars passing by? Why can’t I just vanish? None of this is right!

In the middle of the day, I actually start daydreaming, as if this was grade 8 again. I can’t stop thinking of walking down the school halls in a skirt, happily laughing with Rothy at the confused looks around us. As if my femininity was a surprise, hah! Rothy had made sure of that being taken care of, with that potion made of pine-needles and grass in the big puddle by that plugged street drain. I hadn’t drunk any of it, obviously, that would’ve been silly, but there wasn’t any guy left in me!

I startle from my thoughts, as the bell has just begun ringing, marking the end of my classes for the day. I stuff things into my backpack, but take the wrong path to leave the building, and find myself staring out at the forest path through the light rain.

Just what all did I do with Rothy? Did she somehow remove all of my guyness?

I mean, of course she didn’t. That’s ridiculous. I didn’t even drink any of that potion! But I remembered that potion now. And, some other things we did back then. Rothy hadn’t just not let me be a boy. We were girls together. And everything that I could remember was a wonderful time.

How had I forgotten? She calls me Char, even still! Because Charles is a terrible name for me. A terrible name for a girl, I mean.

But then we’d gone our different ways. Except why did it feel like she hadn’t wanted us to? She seemed apologetic for how high school had split us. Was it my fault somehow?

I start taking the forest path home, careful to make sure I make enough noise that no bears will be caught off guard by me. It had been several years since we last saw a bear in the area, but there was always a chance.

High school had started off weird. That’s what it was. I had been so stuck in daydreams that I didn’t have any time to spare. But I couldn’t remember anything I had daydreamed about. But, if I tried to piece these things together, there was a big elephant in the room.

Why would puberty be so rough that I would crawl into my own head and stay there for so long? Why would I let my closest friend drift away when I maybe began to need her the most?

I realise that tears are coursing down my cheeks.

I think I realise what exactly is going on. Rothy actually does have magic. Somehow, she took my guyness and who knows what else with those potions of needles and grass and the occasional rock, and now she was going to finish whatever plans she had started back then.

But maybe I really am not a guy. Maybe she doesn’t realise it, but she’s just made herself a girl friend who won’t let her magic do a single thing more! And when she sees me, the real me, she’ll finally know that some friendships can’t be broken by time, or gender, or anything! Whatever her plans were for me, to show just how shabby of a guy I make, perhaps, or whatever. They will be destroyed! Because I’ll be a girl!

When I get home, lightly drenched from the rain, I curl up on my bed and cry at the thought of another partial day before I can wear a dress again, and see that girl in the mirror again.

It just hurts.

Why does it hurt so much?

 

~~ = ~~

 

The Friday arrives with a sunrise like any other. At least the rain doesn’t look to come around and ruin any plans for the prom. It was planned to mostly be an inside thing, but that doesn’t help with getting to it.

Our school had decided to go all-in on the day: no classes, just a ceremony for the graduates and a party for everyone “old enough” later in the day, but not too late that some parents could complain. For me, that was perfect – I could go slightly earlier than the actual prom (I had no reason to go to the graduation part), and get dressed (literally! I shiver with anticipation at the thought) in privacy there. Then I just show up, and reveal my counter-plan to everyone at once!

So I get dressed in my normal sorts of clothes, comb my hair into submission, eat breakfast, and settle in to wait until about the right time. I figure it would be better to go earlier than I technically need to, but that still puts it definitely in the afternoon. And while I did let myself sleep a bit longer that I usually do on Fridays, I didn’t sleep in that much.

I work some more at my homework, but focusing is hard. Still before noon, I take the time to carefully place my dress into my backpack so it won’t be too messy when I take it out. Even though it would have less chance to get messy if I did this later, I kept on thinking about it, so I just did it anyways.

Finally it is late enough that I won’t have to spend too much time waiting. Slipping on my coat and backpack, I exit my house and begin to walk down the suburb road to the nearest school-bound bus stop. To my surprise, Rothy exits her house as I approach.

“Hey, Rothy!” I call out, happy with anticipation.

“Hello, Char. Are... are you heading to the school?”

“Yep.” I nod, gripping my backpack straps a little bit harder.

“I hope you aren’t just going to show up like that, Char.” She says, looking down at my boring, everyday clothes.

“Don’t you worry about that.”

“So, why-”

“You’ll see there!” I shake my head at her. I then realise she probably hadn’t been asking the question I thought she would be asking. “I, I mean- You-”

“...Just, go ahead, I’ll meet you there, at the north-west entrance,” she nods along the road, then continues in a mumble, “I really hope you don’t make me regret this...”

I start walking, slightly perturbed about that last comment. I must’ve misheard it. Some word got lost or mumbled too hard, obviously. It doesn’t make sense otherwise.

 

== ~ ==

 

I find the deserted bathroom exactly as deserted as it always is. For whatever reason, either nobody else has found it, or everyone thinks it is too far out of the way. It is kinda nice to have a bathroom that you can be pretty certain nobody else is in. I think I’ve only ever seen one other person in here, and at the time we had avoided each other in absolute silence – the way it should be, and the way nobody else ever seems to.

I might use it more often than every other bathroom at school combined. It was worth the time.

Back to the moment. I enter a stall, lock the door for safety, and undress. The room is spotless and bone dry, as I hoped it would be. School janitors are part of the foundations of society! Still, I try to minimise contact, because bathrooms are kinda weird on the scale of cleanliness, even at their cleanest.

I find my way into the dress again without any trouble. The light, heavily artificial, and fluorescent bluish-white, seems to draw out all of the problems with my plan. I try to catch my breath again, as it seems to have escaped me. My plan will work, I’ll look great, and Rothy will be forced to acknowledge that I do make a pretty girl, and whatever plans she had laid will fall apart. This will work. I put on the elaborate, strappy sandals that Terra had slipped in with the dress, nearly but not quite heel-less and far easier to get my feet into that I might’ve suspected. They match the aesthetic of the dress, and they look good on my thankfully basically hairless legs – at least from my angle.

I swallow the knot in my throat, and unlock the door, picking up my backpack to move to the sinks and the mirror. I remember just in time to ruffle out my hair, and I try to mimic how Terra did it. And then, there in the mirror is me! The lighting is very different, and my skin looks clammy and the colours don’t look right, but there in the mirror is a pretty girl, in a nice dress, awkwardly holding a backpack at her side.

Why does this feel so much better? Eh, maybe it’s just how people normally feel when they’re dressed up. It would explain why people do it, if it feels so great. I nod. I am ready for prom. I just need to stash my backpack in my locker, and then I can head to the northwest door, where Rothy said to wait for her.

The school is effectively deserted. I slink through the hallways, trying to get used to and at the same time minimise the faint clack that echoes when my heels tap against the hard floor. I’m so used to being able to move stealthily when I want that it’s unnerving to have such alarm-bells on my feet, but at the same time I know I’m grinning because of what that noise points out. I’m wearing heels, in a dress, and waiting (well, nearly at the point of waiting), antsy and jittery, for my prom-date to show up.

Wait, are we dates? Is this more of a friend prom pairing? I should’ve asked her this sort of thing. Too late to figure out now, I can only wait now.

I get to my locker, stuff my backpack in, and start back up the hall towards the correct entrance. It is an odd entrance to specify, being the farthest one from the designated prom area, and away from the road. There will be others using it, some because it is handy and some because it is the out-of-the-way entrance, but it is making me reconsider Rothy’s intentions once again. She couldn’t have been just honest, but I have no idea what to suspect about what she was planning. I have to wait and see.

I arrive at the door without seeing anyone, though I did hear an echo from around a corner at one point. The first pair of people to come through the door barely note me, though I do catch a smile and a brief eye contact from the girl (I think her name is Emily?), even as she keeps whispering something in her partner’s ear.

As they turn a corner, I nearly break down. What am I doing, I can’t fool anyone, can I they’ll just see Charles doing stupid things again and how on earth would this ever defang a prank it’ll just make it worse somehow and Rothy will just look at me with laughter in her eyes, mocking my effort and relishing my social destruction and I’ll spend the next year unable to shake this off and the tale of what ‘that one guy did at prom’ will stick around forever and-

“...Hello?” A voice breaks through my thoughts, derailing a train that I honestly don’t think would’ve stopped.

I turn my head to look at who addressed me, before my brain can panic at the idea.

“Charles?!” exclaims Kayle, her voice carrying far more surprise than shock. She’s a good friend, as much as anyone is. Good at helping others understand material.

I lock eyes with her, and I feel a tear at the edge of my left eye.

“You’re, well, you’re beautiful, and I’m so proud of you!” She smiles, taking my hands.

“I- I, I, uh, you, please?” I break down. “Thankyou, but p-please.”

Her eyes go wide, like she suddenly understands something. “Got it! I won’t say a word until you give a signal though how you’re here and hiding I don’t quite get, but I’ve got your back, okay? You’ve got an ally in me. And you are beautiful, even at the edge of tears. See you around, though, I need to, yeah!” She squeezes my hands, and then continues on up the hallway with quick, determined steps.

I am very confused. If she’s my ally, how did she connect the dots that I was trying to pull a, what, full-on coup against Rothy? I won’t turn down help, but Kayle must be far better at understanding stuff that I thought!

The door swings shut again, and I freeze, almost fearing that it might be another random classmate. But there’s a quick intake of breath, and then a near-whispered word that drops into the absolute silence of the hall.

“Char...?”

 

~~ = ~~

 

I gulp.

“Char!” Rothy cries, and I find myself nearly falling forward wrapped in a very fast-moving hug. My foot swings out, and an unmuffled footstep rings down the hallway.

Rothy’s head is buried in my shoulder, and I think I feel some wetness.

“Rothy?” I whisper into her hair, balancing precariously with a fully grown girl leaning on my back. “Why are you not panicking?”

“I don’t know, maybe I am, I just thought you’d drifted away, not shut yourself in, Char!”

“I thought you were planning something with this!”

“I, uh, what?” Rothy pulls back from hugging me, and I turn to face her.

“This wasn’t some prank to make me look like a fool?”

“I was planning to have a nice evening with an old friend, one I never forgot!”

“Or were you planning on some sort of magic reveal where you show how I don’t have any guy left in me after all those potions you made for me?”

“I.. What? No, wait, what?” Rothy searches my eyes for something, I have no idea what. “I invited you to prom, not to, like, the Festival of Decade-long Backstabbing Pranks! I thought you’d believed me? I thought you’d agreed to go to prom with me... not just accepted your fate or something!”

“You... hadn’t? No plans at all?” What. What. This isn’t right, this isn’t how anything is supposed to go.

“...just plans for a fun evening afterwards maybe?” Rothy smirks at me. “I got tickets to a re-showing of a movie. One we watched really often back then.”

I pull away from my childhood friend, who just wanted to have a good time with me. She says the name of the movie, but I don’t hear it. What have I been thinking, that I’d repay her offer with this ridiculous ‘counter-prank’ plan, that I’d accuse her of having magic and using it on me despite the fact that she’d done stuff only with very normal rain-pool items, I mean if that removed masculinity then everyone would be a girl, what am I thinking I’m so stupid I just need to GET OUT.

I break into a full sprint, and slam through the door leading outside, out into the forest, I don’t even see the turns I take, the underbrush blurs into flat green, and I am heavily breathing, leaning with my hands against a giant tree trunk. I pant, trying to force air into my lungs. It just doesn’t make sense, why would I ever have jumped to that conclusion. I mean, yeah, Dorothy is that social terror, but also she’s just Rothy, who always helped me up and hugged me when my... parents yelled at me for some reason? I can’t remember, and I let it slip away with a sigh.

Rothy trusted me, and I just shoved that back in her face.

Why do I even try to do things.

“CHAR!” Rothy’s following me.

I turn to start running again, but I’m still out of breath from the burst of speed I put on.

“Char!” she comes around the corner, running carefully. I finally actually look at her, rather than just her face, and she’s in a dress that matches my own, the same blue, though hers is styled far differently, with a much shorter skirt without dangly bits, and a more normal shape at the top, like sleeves for example.

I have no idea what to look at when it comes to dresses. I just know they look really pretty.

But she is beautiful. I think she spent a lot of time trying to balance a young girl vibe with the social cornerstone role that our school has in, ...maybe partially against her will? Or is it just a normal, pretty dress?

“Rothy,” I say, uncertain what is going to happen. Uncertain how to apologise.

“Char, you are, first, a very good sprinter, what the hell,” Rothy says, breaking down to pant. “And second, I am very glad neither of us are wearing much heel!”

I laugh, and then try to hold it back. This isn’t the time for laughter! I should be apologising!

“And third, don’t you dare hide away again. I don’t think either of us can sit on this now.”

And, somehow, she’s lost me? “...What can’t we sit on now?”

“Um. You. Um. Okay, Char, I’ll spell this out very carefully. What are you wearing?”

“I am wearing a dress.”

“And, way back when, who kept on insisting that I should make them a potion to ‘remove the guy from me’?”

“...would that be me?”

“And what the hell sort of guy goes out, buys a prom dress! And then wears it! To! Prom!?”

“I don’t follow?”

Rothy stares at me for two seconds. “I want to slap you so hard, but you can’t actually slap sense into people. I don’t know how to say this. This really is your realisation to make! But, I do not want to have to wave off everyone’s immediate assumption, so we’re going to make you think this through, right here.” She approaches, her movements hesitant like she’s approaching a cat who might just run away when startled. “So, Charles is a boy, right?”

“Y-yes.” I nod, blinking at her using my full name.

“What is Char?”

“Um, also a boy?” I ask, not seeing her point.

“Why do you say that?” She asks, taking me by my shoulders.

“Because Charles is one?”

“But I’m not asking about Charles, am I. What is Char?”

“That difference doesn’t matter!” I snap back.

“Then you don’t mind if I, sorry, call you Charles, do you Charles!” she hisses the name at me.

I flinch, but I don’t answer. Normally I’m fine with the name. I mean, it is a name. But right now? I’m in a dress. I’m beautiful, despite all the reasons that shouldn’t be true. So why am I still stuck with that name and not something nicer?

“Exactly. So, Charles isn’t you. What are you?”

“Are... you... You aren’t saying I can be a girl? Are you?”

“Char. Trust me.” She takes me into a hug, gently wrapping me with her arms. “I’m saying that you can tell me if you are a girl. You always could have. You almost did back then, but never quite.”

“...Fuck.”

“Yep,” Rothy nods into my shoulder. “Just a little bit. I’m sorry, Char.”

“I’m... I’m really sorry too, Rothy. I thought terrible things of you. I think I mostly forgot just how good friends we were back then?”

“Yeah, it’s fine.”

“I think I forgot a lot of things.”

“You don’t even have to be a girl if you want. That’s an option.”

“No, I... I think I’m a girl.”

“Well, then. I have a beautiful girl to go to prom with. Does she want to go, or do we skip away, while away the time, maybe show up to that movie, have fun together?”

“You know, I am pretty confident we’ll have fun whatever we do. But I think we should go to prom. I might have been a little bit silly in what I thought was going to happen, but it does seem hilarious to show up as me, with you.” I lean back, and ham up the scenario. “I’m a nobody! You’re the most popular girl at school! Together! As girls? Shock! And that one... is she... oh, the scandal!”

“Apart from the fact that we’re properly into the 21st century, and there will be plenty of other LGBTQ+ kids there? Also, I don’t think I’m the most popular girl at school?”

“Oh, hush. There will be plenty of scandal. I mean, I call you by a nickname! Such impropriety!”

“What century do you think we live in, Char?”

“Well, okay,” I grumble. “It does still sound fun.”

Rothy slumps into my shoulder, giggling. “You’ve got me there, girl. And, thank you for trusting me with who you are. I’m proud of you.”

“...this is what they were talking about, isn’t it?”

“Who?”

“The girl who sold me the dress, and, um, our classmate Kayle?”

Rothy freezes in place, then brings her head up to stare at me, her head tilted back. “You mean you have had two girls mention that they’re proud of you, probably also dropping hints that they see you as trans, and that you still didn’t see it?”

“... Yes I am.”

“Are we certain that slapping doesn’t make people understand stuff? Because you really do need some slapping after that. But come on, we’ll be pushing it for being late to the actual but pretty much arbitrary start of prom.”

And so we go back to the school, and to prom.

 

== ~ ==

 

My expectations, which were pretty outlandish I will admit, were very well and truly not met.

I think, honestly, I had been putting Rothy on too high of a pedestal, and mostly the other students had been too busy with their own lives, not actually cowering from Dorothy. Maybe I had been doing it because she was very beautiful, and because I was not as beautiful as her?

But that’s okay. Because now I know I want to be beautiful, and because we’ve agreed to stick together until I am, and then we get a free re-evaluation of what we want. Because that is definitely not rigged sightly in favour of sticking together forever.

Also there aren’t any popularity competitions among the students not because it was “too lopsided,” but because those are a completely stupid idea. I was utterly wrong about that. I know better now.

I also know now that Rothy gives amazing kisses.

Kayle really did prove to be an ally. The two of us managed to beat Rothy and Kayle’s partner thoroughly at Dutch Blitz. The real loser of that game was the table, actually. Um. Long story, too long for here, moving on, you can prove nothing!

Yeah... Maybe that prom will live a long life in the folklore of the school. Just, not for any of the reasons I thought it would.

That evening, we find our way to our assigned pair of seats and we spend at least half of the runtime watching the classic Mulan. I don’t even remember having those memories, or all of the other ones that poured in alongside the movie’s ever so familiar scenes. If the rest of the audience hadn’t been so relaxed about having quiet conversations during the movie, I might feel guilty at how much we were giggling into each other’s ears about the shenanigans we’d gotten up to.

As we return to our neighbourhood, I find to my own surprise that I’m still in my dress, and that I’ve left my backpack at school, which is definitely locked up by now.

I come to a stop, as we walk along the sidewalk. Weirdly, I’m not at all self-conscious with Rothy by my side.

“...You haven’t come out to your parents,” Rothy looks at me, coming to a stop alongside me.

“I hadn’t come out to myself before you slapped sense into me.”

“Yeah, well, okay.” She works her hand into mine, and squeezes. “Want me along? Moral support, yeah?”

I nod. “Moral support,” I agree, looking at her. Her smile is amazing. Her eyes show so much compassion.

I don’t really know how my parents will take the revelations about me. But I think I can get through whatever is coming, with Rothy at my side.