“I’m back!” I called into my apartment as I opened the door.

“Sup’ Haze!” My roommate responded, rounding the corner into the common area. “Oh, and sup, Allie.”

“Yo,” she greeted. “What’s good, Ethan?”

Yes, I was sharing an apartment with a guy. No, it wasn’t my choice. I blame student housing for requiring legal documents proving you’re the gender you say you are. Legal bullshit and all that.

At least Ethan was one of the good ones. He didn’t mind my identity one bit, and he’d even defended me from the occasional bigot whenever we went out together. I was really thankful for that, honestly. People tended to fuck off much faster when you were standing next to somebody as tall and subtly intimidating like Ethan. He reminded me of a stereotypical surfer dude from the eighties, but with a more modern hairstyle and updated slang.

“Same as always,” my roommate said, plopping down on the sofa. “So, what’d Haze do this time?”

“Hey!” I grumbled. “Allie’s allowed to be here when I’m not freaking out about something,”

Ethan raised an eyebrow. “Well, yeah. Is today one of those visits then?”

“Uh, well-”

“Dude, you’ll never believe the mess Hazel got herself into this time!” Allie said with her signature mischief-making smile. Said smile told Ethan everything he needed to know, and he looked at me expectantly.

“Yeah yeah, shut up, Ethan,” I groaned. “Okay, so before I say anything, are you willing to bet your memories of this conversation?”

Ethan shot me a quizzical glance. “Um, yeah I guess? How would- Oh, what the fuck!?”

“Yeah.”

“Hazel. The hell didja do now?”

I shrugged. “I met a fairy, and then she made me bet my memories of her in return for the body of my dreams. No real risk for me, and she was just gonna take my memories anyways so I just kinda went with it?”

“I mean sick I guess, but what the hell!? What was the bet?”

“I have to answer the question ‘how do you speak like a girl’ in two days, whatever that means.” I sighed. 

“Okay? That’s it? Why don’t you just copy Allie then? She’s a girl.”

Allie rolled her eyes. “Yeah, cause I’m the model example of female vernacular. If anything, I think I speak more like you, dude. The two of us are far more alike than Haze and I are.”

Ah, shit. That’s what's been bothering me. Ethan and Allie did speak in similar ways to each other. If it’s not pitch, and it’s not slang, then that would rule out word choice and inflections from the things we’ve talked about so far. 

“If that’s true, that puts us back at square one,” I said. “We’re going to have to dig deeper than slang and pitch, I suppose.”

“Crud, you’re totally right, aren’t ya?” Allie agreed. “Ugh, well we’d better get to work to find something else, then.”

“We’ve totally got this, dude! Lemme grab my laptop and we can do some research.”

I smiled. Nothing beats the power of friendship. “Thanks, I owe y’all. Let’s get to work!”