She wound up pulling me all the way across the mall to get to where she was going. Halfway there, I saw Madison, sipping an Orange Julius and still looking at her phone as she sat on a bench outside of Forever 21. I tried to wave and get her attention. “Hey, Madison! Hey, I—”

She looked up at me, her eyes going wide at my predicament. And then Kristen dragged me onward, ignoring my protestations, and Madison disappeared back into the crowd.

When we finally arrived at a store, it was one that was immediately familiar. Threads of Fate was a fixture at the mall, another one of the weird locally-owned places that rented space to sell quirky clothes rescued from thrift shops and outlandish bespoke outfits of all sorts. It was the kind of place that had a mannequin wearing a full maid dress on display in the front window. I had always been intensely curious about it, but a bit scared to step inside, outside of one year where a friend had convinced me to go look for Halloween costumes there. I spent most of that visit floating around the same rack of clothes as I considered crossdressing in this one adorable pumpkin dress, but then I chickened out and… Ugh. I still regretted that.

But now Kristen didn’t hesitate in pushing me across the threshold and into the store. Inside, a bored-looking girl in her early twenties sat behind a counter, flipping through a magazine. She wore a truly hideous Christmas sweater depicting the events of hit song, “Grandma Got Ran Over by a Reindeer,” as well as a nametag with ‘Sarah’ printed on it. When she heard us, she immediately put on a customer-service smile, but then as she saw Kristen it softened into something more authentic.

“Hey, Kristen,” she said. “What’s up? Everything on track for the—”

“I am on a mission from the North Pole!” Kristen announced, pointing one finger skyward for emphasis.

Sarah’s eyes narrowed, her smile dropping. “Uh huh.”

“We need to get this girl a Christmas dress!”

Sarah flicked her gaze over to me and I did my best to shrink and hide behind a rack of scarves. “Oh?” She paused. “Oh. You mean… Okay.”

“In fact,” Kristen announced. “I’m thinking we need the Christmas dress.”

“The dress?” Sarah echoed, sounding alarmed.

“W-what dress?” I chimed in.

But Kristen just grinned at me, looking more like some kind of devil than an elf. “Sarah, I’m going to have you to take care of the measurements while I run and pick up the rest of what we need.”

Sarah gave her a half-hearted salute, and Kristen took that as her cue to set off again, pulling me through the store to the changing room at the back, singing all the while.

“~ Deck the Holls with fancy dresses! ~” She paused, looking over her shoulder. “By Holls I mean you, Holly. It is a pun, a literary device that is a play on words.”

“I-I know what a pun is,” I said. “And wouldn’t it make more sense to keep the ‘boughs of Holly’ part instead?”

“~ Soon we’ll style her chestnut tresses! ~” Kristen continued singing, ignoring me. She reached over to pat me on my head, speculatively eyeing my hair.

“Wait, what?” No one had ever called my hair chestnut before. It was just, like, brown. And… who says tresses?

“~ Don we now our Christmas stockings! ~” She paused for the briefest moment to grab a pair of stockings that were striped red and white like a candy-cane.

“I-I can’t wear those!”

“~ Then your boyfriend’s jaw’ll be dropping! Fa la la la la, la la la LA ~!” She shot me a wink as she pushed me into the changing room, pulling the curtain shut behind me. A second later, the stockings came flying over the top of the divider, hitting me in the face.

“Blugh. Wait!” I looked around in desperation. “What? You can’t just leave me here! Kristen?”

When the curtain pulled back, it was just Sarah. Though frankly, that seemed like a relief. She had a much more manageable level of energy. Across her neck hung a stretch of measuring tape, and across her face was a sympathetic smile.

“You okay?” she asked.

I paused, trying to collect my thoughts. “I… have no idea.”

“Sorry,” she said. “Kristen can be… a bit much. But you’re in good hands. She’d never do anything to harm or embarrass you.” Sarah breathed out a sigh, chuckling. “At least on purpose.”

“I— I’m just at a loss.”

Sarah nodded. “From experience, it’s best to just go along with it, and trust that it’ll work out in the end. Now turn around and raise your arms.”

I did as told, still so confused that I didn’t even realize what was happening until I felt the measuring tape go snug around my chest. Then a blush definitely spread across my face.

“Uh…” I said, desperately trying to think of something else to talk about. “How do you know Kristen anyways?” I chewed on my lip, my voice dropping. “Is she— is she really from the North Pole?”

Sarah choked back a laugh. “Yeah. Sure. Santa Claus assigned her here to oversee all of the Christmas celebrations for this year.” Fondness crept into her voice. “Which, to be honest, she does have some really good ideas for. The whole thing tonight is going to be great. At least if she doesn’t keep getting distracted by ridiculous hijinks. I swear to God, one of these days she’s going to get fired for pulling some stunt.”

“Fired… from the North Pole?”

Sarah’s voice was light. “Yeah, those elves should really unionize, huh?” I felt the measuring tape wrap around my waist, and then slide down to my hips.

“I just…” I let out a sigh. “I’m sorry. I’m having a really tough day, and I think my boyfriend is going to dump me, and now all of this is happening…”

“That sounds really rough,” Sarah said. She turned me around again. Her head tilted to the side as she looked me over. “Do you want a hug?”

I grimaced. I mean… yes, of course I did, but wouldn’t that be weird?

“As a platonic thing,” Sarah said gently, seeing my hesitation. “I’m already seeing someone, and so are you. Um. Hopefully. But you just seem like you could use a hug.”

I nodded slightly, and Sarah leaned forward to wrap me in her arms, my head resting comfortably on her shoulder as I let out a shaky breath. One of her hands rubbed my back gently. “It’s going to be okay,” she said. “I don’t know what Kristen is up to, but I’m sure she’s just trying to help. And I promise I’ll try to rein her in if she gets too far out of hand.”

As I took another deep breath, I felt a bit better. More centered at least. “Thank you,” I said.

She pulled back slightly, smirking up at me. “Besides, I think it might be a Christmas miracle: you’re basically a perfect fit for the Christmas dress.”

Oh. Uh oh. Panic was back once again. I tried to fight through it.

“Wh-what dress?”

Sarah smiled enigmatically and ducked back into the store proper. A moment later, she returned, bearing a hanger with a dress on it.

The dress.

I knew it immediately; how could you not?

It was a deep green, patterned with swirls of snowflakes in silver thread that sparkled and glimmered in the light. Fuzzy white fabric lined the top, while the waist had a chunky belt before blooming outward in a wave of swirling cloth. It was beautiful, the kind of dress that took your breath away.

There was no way I could wear it.

Sarah could see the hesitation written on my face, and she let out a sigh. “You’ve got to at least try it on, right? If you don’t, you’ll regret it.” She smirked. “Not the least of which because Kristen will make it her life’s mission to annoy you,” she muttered.

“Did someone say my name?” Kristen called out from behind Sarah, making her jump. She grinned deviously. “I’m baaack! Thanks for texting me the measurements, babe.”

“Wait, what measurements?” I said. “Mine?”

Kristen just winked at me, and she pushed a paper bag into my arms. “Now let’s let this girl get all dressed up.” With that, she drew the curtain shut again, and I was alone, just as bewildered as before.

But… yeah. The dress was just so pretty. I couldn’t imagine myself wearing it. But Sarah had me dead to rights: if I let this opportunity slip away, I’d regret it forever. I let out a heavy sigh. Better to just go through with it, to put on the dress, so I could see how ridiculous and terrible I looked. Then at least I could crush out all of the weird hopes that I had that it’d be nice. I could get back to my real life.

I looked down at the paper bag. And what was this, some kind of accessories to go along with it? I reached inside, and the first thing I pulled out was another note, written on more college-lined notebook paper, in the same terrible handwriting as before.

“This is more of a present for Zach than you,” I read aloud. “He’s on the nice list too. Winky face.”

No, but it actually had the words ‘winky face’ written there. I blinked at it in confusion.

I reached inside to see what else was there, feeling some kind of silky cloth. A bow or something? I pulled it out into the light.

I was holding a deep red bra and panty set that could best be described as scandalously lacy. My face immediately went so red that I felt like I was going to burst a blood vessel.

“I— You— Wh— Kristen!” I choked out, trying not to shriek.

And all I heard in response was a tremendously self-satisfied giggle.

* * *

I don’t know why, but I put it all on. All of it, even though I was blushing up a storm the entire time. And then, before I could even take stock of what I looked like or anything, Kristen was back, sweeping me away to go somewhere else. She paid for the dress, too—”It’s not exactly a present if you have to buy it,” she explained.

Sarah just smiled and mouthed “looking good!” at me as she rung us up, and then Kristen was off on another tear.

It was like being caught in the grasp of a festive, overly-supportive tornado. Kristen was surprisingly good at keeping me distracted, because otherwise I would have been entirely panicked at the thought of being out in public wearing what I was wearing. But as we went, every time I was about to realize my situation and start running complete-and-total-meltdown.exe, she pointed up at some holiday decoration as we power-walked past, telling me some holiday factoid or spinning a wild story about the time her brother got his head stuck in a wreath. It was all so ludicrous, and I felt vaguely like I was having a particularly vivid dream.

Our next stop was, as promised, at a hairdresser’s. The older lady there obviously knew Kristen too, because as soon as we walked in, she rolled her eyes and said, “What now?” But she had a smile on her face too. It seemed like everyone knew Kristen, and they all found her exhausting, but somehow endearing too. Kristen explained—okay, no, actually, Kristen didn’t explain anything. She just said to give me “the works” and the lady nodded like that made sense.

I was going to protest, but… Well. I was in this now, wasn’t I? I just let out a sigh and sat down in the chair, Kristen beaming in my direction.

The two of them chattered about some recipe for eggnog as I got my hair cut. Or… touched up, maybe? My hair was stuck in kind of an awkward, medium length. I had always hesitated to cut it, but also hesitated to do anything more ambitious or feminine with it, so it could only be described as a mess. But I guess it was also plenty to work with. When she finished I—

Found myself immediately being dragged somewhere different, again before I could get a good look at myself. “Have fun, girls!” the hairdresser called as we left, and I felt a new wave of confusion mixing with a strange kind of validation.

Everyone was just being nice, right? Or, well, she saw that I was wearing the dress and stockings, so she knew who I was trying to be, and she was acting polite about it. Even though it didn’t actually work, I was sure. It couldn’t. Could it? I mean, everyone had to just see me as… as a guy in a dress. And that thought curdled in my stomach.

But then Kristen started quizzing me on the proper number of marshmallows to put in hot chocolate and I found myself pulled into a heated argument—I’m just saying, if you try to put six in a regulation-size cocoa mug, there’s not going to be any room for the hot chocolate at all.

And then we were at some fancy makeup shop, the kind of place where even I knew everything had to cost an arm and a leg. Some intimidatingly fashionable salesgirl with tight leather pants and winged eyeliner you could cut yourself on caught sight of us, moving towards us like some kind of predatory gazelle who sensed fresh meat. But then when she saw Kristen, her whole face lit up, and she let out a squeal of delight.

“Heyyy!” Kristen said in response. “My friend needs to be ready for a hot date.”

“Wait, what?” I asked, but Kristen winked at me again. That was getting sort of annoying.

“Ohhhh…” the salesgirl said, drawing out the word. “For the…?” She wiggled her eyebrows, and Kristen nodded smugly.

“I— I don’t know what—”

“Don’t worry, sweetie, you’re in good hands,” she said, and pounced.

The girl grabbed my chin firmly, turning my face back and forth as she sized me up. “I— I’m sorry,” I said, though I wasn’t certain for what. For… existing?

“You have good skin,” she mused to herself, ignoring me. “I think you want to go for a natural look. Accentuate your best features. I could totally murder you for those cheekbones.”

“Please don’t,” I squeaked.

She just laughed, in a way that was mostly not threatening. And then she sat me down, piling up an intimidating collection of brushes and tubes and pencils and palettes as she got to work.

* * *

Between the dress, and the hair, and the makeup, and my nails—the salesgirl here had painted them white, and was now using a toothpick to draw little red candy-cane stripes across each one, because Kristen insisted she was way better than the nail salon down on the first floor—I had totally lost track of time. It had definitely been a while though. We had to be slipping into the evening hours, and I still hadn’t seen any sign of Zach. Primarily because I was being dragged around constantly, but I had to worry that he was looking for me by now.

I hoped he was at least. He wouldn’t just leave without me, would he? But even with all my anxieties working at full force, I knew better than that. Zach was a good guy. The best guy. He wouldn’t just run off. He’d find me, and sit me down, and hold my hands, and then break up with me as kindly as possible. That’s what he was doing: figuring out the exact way to let me down as easily as possible. I didn’t deserve a guy like him. But good news: soon he’d be free to date someone better.

“Hey, you okay?” Kristen broke in, disrupting my train of thought. “You look sad all of the sudden. And this is a no-bummers zone.”

I tried to force myself to smile. “Oh. Sorry.”

Her eyes narrowed even further. “Yeah, that’s not gonna cut it. What’s wrong, girl?”

That word hit me in the center of my chest, pricking at my heart in a place that I felt particularly tender. I didn’t feel like I quite deserved it. I… I knew I was a girl. But it felt like that was just something I should keep to myself, you know? I didn’t want to bother anyone else. I should just lock myself away so no one else had to deal with this whole mess. And yet here I was, dressed up ridiculously, having all of these super nice people humoring me even when they had to see how awful and pathetic I looked.

But I didn’t know how to say that, exactly. So I sighed, and pushed it all down deep inside, and tried a bit harder to smile. I’ve had a lot of experience looking outwardly fine while feeling dead inside, and this wasn’t any different.

Kristen still looked unconvinced, but she remained silent, frowning.

“All done!” the salesgirl said, looking up from my nails. “Just be careful with them for a bit, okay?”

“Sure,” I murmured. “Thank you. I… I know it must be kind of a hassle to spend all this time on someone like me.” I tried to affect a joking tone. “I’ll go and stop scaring other customers away.”

The girl gave me a weird look. “It’s no problem.”

Meanwhile, Kristen gasped, snapping her fingers as if she had just made a crucial deduction. “That’s what this is, isn’t it? Of course you’d get dysphoric. You feel bad because you don’t feel cute. But really? Really?”

I looked at her blankly. I was… supposed to feel cute? I know the dress was beautiful, and I believed the hairdresser and the makeup girl were good at their jobs, but it was still me underneath.

“Come on, Holly. Have you seen yourself?” Kristen demanded.

My mouth twisted. “Um. No. Because you keep rushing me off before I get the chance, remember?”

Now the salesgirl had turned to glare at Kristen. “Hold on, what exactly are you doing to this poor girl?”

Kristen threw her hands up. “I don’t know, I figured it’d be better to wait for the big reveal!”

“Well, we need to get her some validation, stat. C’mon, sweetie, there’s a mirror over here.”

I sighed. “I guess,” I said, trying to muster up some enthusiasm for it. If I had to be honest with myself, I was making excuses. I was in a hair salon and now a makeup store: there were mirrors everywhere. There was no way that Kristen would really have been able to keep me from looking if I had really wanted it. I just… I just knew what this had to look like to other people. I wanted to preserve the tissue-paper-thin illusion that maybe it was okay for just a bit longer.

But it was time to face the music. I tried to convince myself that it was better to know for sure how bad things were, so that way I wouldn’t be surprised at how people treated me when they saw me.

So I followed, my head hanging as I stared down into the floor. Should I pretend it’s good? So Kristen doesn’t feel bad? But if it really was rough, trying to fake enthusiasm would really wreck me. How exactly was I supposed to deal with this and still protect my heart? My stomach churned.

“Oh, hold on,” Kristen said. She pulled something out of a pocket—a red ribbon?—and ran it through my hair, pulling it snug and then tying a bow. I kept my eyes downcast, preoccupied with my own thoughts.

“Thanks,” I murmured.

“You can look up now,” Kristen said softly. “It’s going to be okay, Holly.”

And begrudgingly, I did. And then I suddenly couldn’t breathe.

There was a girl there. And as is the way with seeing a certain kind of beautiful but also approachable girl, my heart immediately started into awkward, pained jealousy. But then my brain said that that girl had to be me. And my heart didn’t quite understand, and decided the only proper response was to double down on feeling all the feelings twice as hard.

She was just so pretty. The dress was gorgeous, somehow managing to disguise my horrible blocky shape: the flared skirt portion provided the illusion of full hips that I knew I didn’t have, the belt gave me a well-defined waist, and in harmony with everything else, my shoulders looked positively normal. My face was still recognizably me, but a better me, someone who appeared soft, vibrant, interesting. My eyes looked ever so slightly bigger and more expressive, and my lips were more full and red. And my hair! Kristen had tied an adorably cute red bow in my hair, helping hold part of it back to properly frame my face, and the rest fell in wavy curls almost down to my shoulders. It was the kind of hair that ‘chestnut tresses’ felt appropriate for, not some kind of flowery overexaggeration. I looked unmistakably feminine.

I never thought I would be able to look like this.

“Okay, normally, I’d say crying is good and healthy and positive,” the salesgirl said. “But you’re going to ruin your makeup so hold it in, kay?”

I blinked rapidly, doing my best.

“Now that’s the reaction I wanted,” Kristen said, her voice dripping with satisfaction.

“You’re the worst,” I whispered back. I couldn’t tear my eyes away from my reflection. “Thank you so much.”

SecretTransWritingLair

Rooibos Chai writes trans fiction in the romantic comedy genre. Her most popular work is Trolls and Tribulations, which follows the world's most oblivious and ineffectual misanthrope as they try to help out a trans girl and wind up entangled in gender feelings of their own. You can find her stories on Scribblehub and download ebook versions at rooibos-chai.itch.io