Thirteen: Photo Op
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Content warning:

Spoiler

(Unintentional) misgendering, slurs (related to sexuality).

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After Josh and I finally straightened things out between us, our relationship changed. Not radically, mind you, we were still hanging out every time we could, spending each lunch period and a few afternoons together; it was just that the underlying tension, the unspoken question of does he like me or not was just gone. I could concentrate on our conversations, on just talking to Josh, without the constant background noise of uncertainty.

That and, of course, we could barely keep our hands off each other.

Not a day went by that we didn’t find a moment to be alone, in a secluded spot, to just kiss, while embracing each other. Like I’d said after our first time, Josh was an excellent kisser; every time our lips met I felt a thrill run down my spine. We limited ourselves to kisses for the time being – it would’ve been extremely inappropriate, not to mention dangerous, to do anything else at school – but it always was the highlight of my day.

Still, we had to be careful not to give anything away yet, and I learned it soon enough: one time I went to the study group after meeting Josh for lunch and more, and Aggie blinked in surprise when she saw me. Followed by Mark and Nick’s puzzled stare, she had gotten up from her seat, grabbed me by the arm, and dragged me in the corridor, where she’d warned me in a low voice that my clothes were ruffled, my face was flushed and my hair was completely unkempt – and to be careful in the future to take a few moments to make myself presentable, to avoid arousing suspicion. “But I’m happy for you,” she added with a smile.

Josh and I tried to be careful about being seen trying to suck each other’s face off, but apparently we weren’t careful enough. Everything came to a head about a week and a half before prom: the two of us were having lunch, like we always did, when someone sat down at our table. This wasn’t uncommon, since while we purposely tried to radiate a ‘please don’t bother us’ aura while we were together, there were only so many seats in the cafeteria; that day, though, plenty of them were open, so it was weird that someone would choose to sit next to us.

I looked away from Josh, and gave the person who’d sat down a glance. I recognised him immediately: it was the same guy who, a few weeks previously, had come to find me to tell me McPearson wanted to talk to me.

“Oh, it’s you,” I commented, my voice flat. “Get lost.” I turned to Josh. “So, as I was saying…”

“Troy wants to talk to you,” he said, cutting me off. “To both of you.”

I turned back to the guy. “No,” I said.

“What do you mean, no?” he demanded.

He was staring intensely at me, but it was Josh who answered the question.

“It’s a word, you can look it up in the dictionary. It means… Well, it means no,” he said with a smirk.

“We have exactly zero energy we’re willing to spend on McPearson’s bullshit, whatever it is,” I added. “If he really wants to waste our time, he can come here and speak to us personally. Otherwise, our answer stands: no, get lost.”

Troy’s crony just stared at us.

“You got all that?” Josh asked. “Or do I need to write it down for you?”

The guy hesitated for a few moments more, then stood up and left without another word.

“Wonder what McPearson wanted to talk about,” Josh said. “He doesn’t usually call out people like this, right?”

“Right,” I nodded. “Usually he’s more underhanded. When he does this it means he thinks he can get one up on us just by talking, which was never his forte in the first place.” I smiled. “A dollar says he won’t even show up.”

“No bet,” Josh replied, smiling back. “Because that’s what I would put my money on, too.”

We resumed chatting and eating our lunch, but a short while later we were interrupted again; Josh looked over my shoulder as I was saying something to him, and I saw his eyes go wide. I turned around to look, and spotted Troy McPearson walking through the cafeteria, making a beeline for us, his henchmen following close behind him.

“Guess we both lost that bet, huh?” I said, putting down my fork and wiping my mouth on a napkin; Josh just nodded silently.

Troy strode towards us until he reached us, and then stopped right in front of our table; he didn’t say anything, but his eyes kept darting between me and Josh.

“McPearson,” I said curtly. “Didn’t expect you to show up.”

Again, Troy was silent: he just looked at us.

“Your friend mentioned you wanted to talk to us,” Josh said, motioning to a chair. “Well, have a seat.”

McPearson paused for a moment, but then complied and sat down; his cronies, however, remained standing.

“You’re going to regret making me come here,” he muttered, almost under his breath.

I snickered. “What, is this going to be some sort of my vengeance will be slow and prolonged speech? If so, we’re not interested.” I paused. “You had something to say, didn’t you? Well, out with it. And then fuck off.”

McPearson glared at me. “You’re going to regret this, too,” he said, and he made a gesture; one of the guys standing behind him handed him a cellphone, which he placed firmly down on the table.

On the screen was a picture of me and Josh, in the middle of one of our make-out sessions. The picture was a bit blurred, it was clearly taken with a cellphone camera at a distance, but there was no mistaking it. There was no way we could deny we were the two people in the picture.

“…Oh,” Josh said.

Troy’s face twisted into a cruel grin. “Yeah. Guess you…” he glanced around, and saw that no one else was within earshot, so he continued, “…you fags should’ve been more careful.”

Josh and I exchanged glances, then I looked at Troy again. “Yeah, guess we should have. But it’s done,” I said with a shrug. “What’s it to you?”

“I should be asking that question,” McPearson replied. “What’s it worth to you? What are you willing to do to avoid me telling everyone about this?”

Yeah, that was the point, wasn’t it? Troy was probably going to have a list of demands, most of them quite unpleasant, which we would have to satisfy to avoid him blabbing about our relationship. We would have to go to significant lengths to keep the secret…

Wait, hold on.

I looked up from the cellphone at Josh, at the same time as he looked up at me.

“Josh…” I began, at the same time as he said, “Wilson…”

We stopped suddenly, and burst out laughing. “Go ahead,” he said.

“No, you go ahead,” I replied.

He looked at me for a moment, then nodded. “Do you actually care about keeping this a secret?” he asked, pointing at the cellphone.

Well, looks like my boyfriend had had the same exact idea as me, at the same time even.

I shrugged. “You know what? Not really,” I replied. “After all, it’s not like dating is forbidden in this school. And no one worth listening to will have any issue with it.” I turned to Troy. “Yeah, you can go right ahead and send that picture to everyone in school,” I continued. “Print it out in large format and post it on all the walls. It’s twenty-twenty-one. No one cares.”

McPearson blinked in surprise. “Wait, what? You really think…”

“Here, I’ll prove it to you,” Josh said, standing up from this chair. “Yo! Y’all!” he called out at the top of his lungs, cupping his hands by his mouth for good measure.

All background noise in the cafeteria died off, and everyone turned to look at us.

I grit my teeth. Here it comes…

“Me and Wilson are dating!” Josh shouted. “Just wanted y’all to know!”

There was a moment of dead silence in the room, then a voice called out: “Hey, good for you guys!”

“Yeah, congrats!” someone else shouted; there were a few loud whistles of appreciation, and a couple people started clapping, but no one else picked up the applause and it soon died out. I blushed a bit, and I had to push down a slight bout of dysphoria at being included in “guys,” but that was it – everyone knew about us dating now, though they didn’t know about me being a girl.

Josh sat back down in his chair and fixed his gaze on Troy, as did I; we waited a few seconds, and then the normal sound of students eating their food and talking to each other resumed.

“See?” I said. “No one cares. You have no power over us, goblin king.”

“Hey now,” Josh said. “That’s an insult to goblins everywhere. Apologise.”

I grinned at him. “I was making a reference, you doofus,” I said. “But you’re right, this idiot is nowhere nearly stylish enough to be a goblin, let alone a king.”

I turned my head to face Troy again, who was staring wide-eyed at us, clearly bewildered: he probably hadn’t thought things would go this way. Behind him, one of his henchmen snickered, but was quickly shushed by another one.

“Was there anything else?” I asked in the sweetest voice I could manage.

Troy just stared at me.

“Good,” I said. “Fuck off, then.”

It took a few moments for him to recover, but then his expression turned into a glare of pure hatred.

“This isn’t over,” he said, standing up and grabbing the phone off the table with a sweeping motion. “Not by a long shot. Come on,” he told his cronies, turned around, and started walking away.

“McPearson!” Josh called out; Troy stopped and turned around, looking at him. “That was a really nice picture,” Josh continued. “Any chance you could send it to me?”

“Josh!” I said, in a falsely-scandalised voice, reaching over and punching him in the shoulder.

“What? It is,” he replied.

Troy didn’t say anything: he just glared at us again, turned back around, and strode out of the room.

Josh and I exchanged glances, and then we burst out laughing. Not minding the stares the other students in the cafeteria were giving us, we laughed hard, until tears started falling from our eyes, and then we laughed some more.

-----

As the bell rang, the teacher shut her book. “Alright, that’s all for today. Be careful on your way home,” she said; she gathered her things, and left the classroom.

Like always, I stretched my limbs to drive away the kinks; then I stood up, and walked over to Aggie’s desk, where she, Mark, and Nick, had started a conversation.

“Hey, Aggie,” I said. “Can I talk to you for a sec?” I asked.

“Sure,” she said, smiling up at me from her seat. Then she glanced around, at the other students who were slowly filtering out of the room. “…In private?”

I nodded. “Yeah.”

Nick blinked in surprise, and he and Mark exchanged a glance. “Uh… Should we… You know, leave?” Mark asked.

I thought about it for a moment, and then shook my head. “No, you can stay. It’s not something I want just anyone to overhear, but you’re my friends.”

Mark smiled. “Okay,” he said.

We waited for a few minutes, making small talk, until everyone else had left the room; then, after a moment, Aggie turned to me. “So?” she asked. “What did you want to talk about?”

I nodded, and took a deep breath. “Okay. So, you know how prom is next week, right? On Friday,” I said; when she nodded, I continued, “Well, since we need to be dressed appropriately, I’m going with my mom and sister to pick out a dress this Saturday, the day after tomorrow, and I was wondering if you wanted to come with.”

Aggie smiled. “Yeah, sure. Sounds like a plan, it’ll be a nice day out.”

“No, hold on. Excuse me,” Nick said.

“Yes?” I asked, turning to him.

“You…” he began, then hesitated. “You’re going to pick out a dress?”

“Yes?” I asked again. “What of it?”

“A dress?” Nick repeated; he and Mark both sported identical, undecipherable expressions on their faces.

“Yeah,” I nodded. “A dress.” I paused, then put a finger to my chin and smiled. “Oh, didn’t I tell you? I’m a girl.”

Their mouths fell open. “You’re what?

“A girl.” I turned to Aggie. “Right?”

“Right,” Aggie nodded. “Wilson’s a girl. Her name’s Emily.”

I nodded in confirmation. “I’m Emily, guys. Nice to meet you.” I gave them a small wave.

Their faces were absolutely priceless: their expressions were a mixture of shock and wonder and amazement and incredulity, all churned together to give an extraordinary result. They were really a sight to behold.

I heard the snap of a camera from beside me; I turned my head and saw that Aggie had her cellphone out, having taken a picture of Mark and Nick’s faces.

“Got it,” she said. “It’s a masterpiece. I’m going to make this my lock screen.”

“Aggie!” I exclaimed. “That’s mean!”

“Not nearly as mean as you springing the news on them like this, without any kind of a warning, Emily,” she replied, smirking at me. “Right?”

“Right,” I conceded. “But it was fun.”

“Hell yeah, it was,” she said, raising her hand, clearly waiting for a high-five, which I gave her.

By that time, Nick and Mark’s faces had become unstuck: it seemed their brains had had enough time to process exactly what was going on.

“Okay… Whoa,” Mark said. “This is, like… super unexpected. How long have you known?” he asked Aggie.

“’bout two weeks,” she replied. “She came out to me when I asked her to prom.”

“So that’s why you’re not going together,” Nick said, to which Aggie and I both nodded. “Well, you could’ve told us, instead of letting us do the Surprised Pikachu in real life.”

“No,” Aggie said, shaking her head. “I’m not about to out anyone to anyone else.” She put a hand to her chin in thought. “Though I did tell Emily you two are dating. Sorry.”

Nick waved his hand dismissively, and Mark said, “Nah, don’t worry, literally everyone in class knows we’re gay.”

“I didn’t,” I said.

“You didn’t, but until recently you were a misanthropic and antisocial gremlin who didn’t talk with anyone in class,” Nick said.

I frowned a bit at the comparison, but conceded the point. “Fair,” I replied. Then I looked at my watch. “Sorry, I have to go now, or I’ll miss the bus home,” I continued. I turned to Aggie. “In any case, we’re on for Saturday, right?”

“Right,” she confirmed. “I’m looking forward to it, it’ll be fun.”

“Great,” I said. “See y’all tomorrow, then.

“See you tomorrow, Emily,” Mark said with a smile. “Thank you for trusting us, and congrats for being you.” Nick and Aggie nodded in agreement.

I smiled at them, grabbed my backpack, and walked out of the classroom.

 

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