18
Planning

Ryan and I walked into Ms. Castillo’s classroom with our hands interlocked for yet another GSA meeting. We were running a little late, but the hallways were empty so we took our time together. We walked into the classroom to see everyone else was already there.

“Wait,” Jasmine said, sounding wary. “Why are you two holding hands?”

“Umm,” I said awkwardly, quickly jerking my hand away and into my pocket. “No reason.”

“Sureee,” Thomas said, narrowing his eyes. “Does this possibly mean?”

“They’re totally dating,” Zoe said, laughing hard. “Oh my God.”

“Easy,” Ryan said, motioning his hands for the room to calm down. “I’m surprised you all figured out this quickly.”

“Wow, yeah, like you were subtle about it,” Jasmine said, rolling her eyes. “You walked in holding hands and expected us not to know?”

“It could’ve been a friendly gesture,” Ryan said, chuckling.

“Friendly gesture my ass,” Jasmine said, laughing at us. “Like any of us would believe that.”

“Language, Jasmine,” Ms. Castillo said, pulling down her glasses and staring straight at her.

“Sorry,” Jasmine said. “Ryan’s excuse was just too funny.”

“Anyways, congratulations you two,” Alex said, clapping. “I’m glad we have a second GSA couple.”

“Yeah, for real, congrats,” Thomas said.

“Thank you everybody,” he said, smiling. “Anyways, today we’re finally getting to raising LGBT awareness.”

“Ooh,” Jasmine said, leaning forward in her seat. “How are we going to do that?”

“We’re going to design posters and such,” Ryan said, walking up to the front of the room. “We have some resources here, such as the school counselors, supportive teachers, and the GSA you are currently all in.”

“I have an idea,” Zoe said, raising a hand. “How about we design something for supportive teachers to put up on their doors or somewhere in the classroom? That way, people will know who they can go to for help.”

“That’s actually a really good idea,” Ryan said, nodding. “Yeah, we should do that. Anyone good at graphic design here?”

“Umm, I can do some basic stuff in Photoshop,” Alex said, after a few seconds of silence. “I don’t know if it’d be great, but I can help out.”

“Got it,” Ryan said. He grabbed his computer out of his backpack and opened it up. “We can just provide supportive teachers with like a sticker to put up somewhere to show they’re supportive.”

“Yeah, or we can do pins as well,” Thomas suggested. “Like, for a day students can have a pin on that shows they’re supportive. It should help any LGBT students feel a lot safer.”

“You all are on fire,” Ryan said, laughing. “These are all super good ideas. We just need some budget from the school, and we can do it.”

“I have an idea,” I said, raising my hand. “How about we try and make an open house based around LGBT stuff for people to show up and interact with members of the community? We’ll try and get a guest speaker and some pizza, so people show up.”

“All great ideas,” Ryan said with a lopsided grin. “Let’s get working on it.”

***

“That looks very nice,” I said, peeking over Ryan and Alex’s shoulders. They were working on a design for the pin, and they managed to make it look quite pretty.

“It does, right?” Ryan asked, smiling. “Alex undersold themselves, they’re actually really good with image editing.”

“I do my best,” they said, chuckling slightly. “I hope I can manage to make a good design so that students participate.”

“I think it’s a good design,” I said, looking at the rainbow flag background and some text that read ally.

“We’re just about done then,” Alex said, exporting the file. “I’m sure we can find some company that makes pins that would be willing to make these for us.”

“I’ll try and find some way to get funding,” Ryan said, scratching his head. “I’m sure there’ll be some way.”

“The sticker is up next,” Alex said. “I’ll get working on that.”

I wandered over to the other group of people, who were planning out the event.

“Do we know of any decent guest speakers in the area?” Thomas said, looking at his computer.

“Hmm, I don’t know,” Jasmine said, searching up query after query.

“You know, you can get in contact with the local LGBT organization here and see if you can get them to send someone over,” Ms. Castillo said, gently walking up behind us.

“That exists?” I asked as Jasmine quickly searched for something.

“Oh, there is a local LGBT organization here, and they have some people who have done speeches before,” Jasmine said, scrolling through the website.

“That’s good,” I said, taking a look at the website. “We should try and contact them and see if they have anybody that can do a speech here.”

“Yeah, that sounds good,” Zoe said, smiling. “Let’s contact them.”

***

“Okay, this is the first of Julie's tutoring,” I said, clapping my hands together. “I can’t do your homework forever, you know.”

“Can’t you though?” he said, grinning. “I’d rather not do all this on my own.”

“No, now that you’re my boyfriend I can’t really do your homework anymore.”

“Damn,” he said, looking down at the floor. “Maybe we should’ve held off dating a little longer.”

“No!” I said, annoyed. “We are dating now, and there’s no changing that.”

“Fine,” Ryan said, rolling his eyes. “So what are we learning?”

“We’re going to do some precalculus,” I said, putting down a precalculus textbook on the table. “We’re going to cover the current unit.”

“Which is?” Ryan asked, raising his eyebrows.

“You don’t even know what the current math unit is?” I asked, sighing. “We’re on trigonometric functions.”

“Oh,” Ryan said, scratching his head. “I didn’t know that.”

“Of course, you didn’t,” I said, rubbing the bridge of my nose. “Okay, so anyways we’re going to start with angles.”

“Okay, angles, I’m ready,” Ryan said.

“Okay, so as you hopefully know, there are three types of angles, obtuse, right, and acute.”

“Acute, just like you Julie,” he said, a lopsided grin appearing on his face. “You’re cute.”

“S-Shut up,” I said, immediately blushing bright red. “I’m trying to teach you here.”

“Fine, go on,” he said. “I was just trying to compliment you.”

“Okay, so we’ll cover a few more of the basics of angles,” I said, reading aloud from the textbook. “A ray consists of one point on a line and all points extending in one direction from that point. The first point is called the endpoint of the ray.”

I saw Ryan lean his head on his arm and pretend to snore.

“Ryan!” I said, “waking” him up. “You have to focus, I can’t do everything for you forever.”

“Julie cute,” he said, pretending to be sleep-talking. “Want to kiss girlfriend.”

“Fine, how about you get a kiss for every few problems you solve,” I said.

“Great, I’m ready now,” Ryan said, waking up exaggeratedly.

“Okay, so the first problem is to convert five pi over six into degrees.”

“How do you do that?” he asked, blinking.

“You multiply the top by 180, and then divide the top by the bottom.”

“Okay, so multiply Ryan by 180, and then divide Ryan by Julie,” he said, nodding. “Got it.”

“Are you calling me a bottom?” I said, embarrassed.

“It’s one way to remember things,” Ryan said, shrugging.

“You know what, if it helps you remember, sure,” I said. “Now go solve the problem.”

Ryan quickly multiplied and then divided, getting to the answer of 150 degrees.

“I got it!” he said happily. “Now kiss.”

“I said a few questions,” I said, rolling my eyes. “Not just one.”

“Yeah, I’m done then,” Ryan said, standing up. “I’ll study a day before and barely pass, good enough.”

“Wait, no,” I said, catching up to him. “We can kiss then.”

“Great,” Ryan said, leaning in and kissing me. I couldn’t help but blush again as I felt his lips on mine.

“That was good,” I stuttered out. “Now let’s get back to studying.”

“Fine,” Ryan said, sitting back down in his seat. He solved some more problems before he randomly tickled me.

“Stop,” I said, giggling at how itchy it was.

“Make me,” he said. I ran away to his bed, trying to hide under the sheets. Ryan kept on managing to tickle a part of my body that was peeking out though, which made me giggle even harder. Eventually, we ended up with me lying flat down on the bed with Ryan on top of me, panting. Then, we heard the door creak open.

“Umm,” Ryan’s mom said, looking at us. A few seconds passed before she awkwardly closed the door.

“Crap,” I said, sitting up as Ryan rolled over to the side. “Let’s clear things up.”

“Yeah,” Ryan said. “We should do that.”

***

A few days had passed, and it was now the weekend. An awkward explanation that nothing weird between us had happened, but I wasn’t sure if Ryan’s mom believed us.

“Hey, kids,” Ryan’s mom said, peeking her head into Ryan’s room. We were having another tutoring session but made sure to keep things more related to studying. “Do you two want to come down and help me cook?”

“Oh, sure,” I said, leaping at the opportunity to cook. It had been too long since I’d been able to, considering how much I liked doing it.

“Come on downstairs,” she said, “we’re making fried rice.”

I went downstairs and to the kitchen, ready to make some food. I saw that Ryan’s mom already had all the ingredients out, and started microwaving some jasmine rice.

“Okay, I’ll cut the chicken breast and vegetables,” I said, getting out a knife.

“What should I do?” Ryan said, awkwardly standing around.

“Just sit around while we do all the work,” I said, giggling. “Considering how you cut those apples last time, I’m not sure how much I’d trust you with this.”

“Fine,” Ryan said, making his way to the dining room table and taking a seat. “You two cook it up.”

“I’ll start frying the rice,” Ryan’s mom said, getting a stick of butter and putting it on the pan. “Butter always makes everything taste better.”

We worked together quite well, preparing the food in silence. Ryan spoke up though, wandering back into the kitchen.

“Mom, did I tell you we’re having a GSA event?” he said, leaning over a counter. “You should come over, I’m pretty sure we’ll make it so parents will be allowed.”

“Oh, of course I’ll show up,” Ryan’s mom said. “What’s going to happen?”

“Well, we’ve gotten most of it planned out, and the school’s approved it,” Ryan said. “We’re planning on having a guest speaker be the main event, and have some activities like making your own pride flag.”

“Sounds exciting.”

“It is.”

“I hope it goes well,” I said, a little nervous as to how it would go. “I’m scared nobody will show up, or the guest speaker will get sick, or whatever.”

“It’ll be fine,” Ryan said, hugging onto me from the side.

“How’s things been going with your parents, Julie?” Ryan’s mom asked as she moved the vegetables and chicken around the skillet.

“My mom’s become accepting, which is a relief,” I said, taking the rice out of the microwave and dumping it into the pan. “I got off a phone call with her a couple of hours ago and she seems to be fine with it now. My dad though, I don’t know. He’s still being his old self.”

“It’s good to hear that your mom has come around. But your dad, he really is going to have to come around soon,” she said, sighing.

“I just really wish I could get on hormones,” I said, wiping a tear from my eye. “I’m lucky to look how I look right now, but I don’t know when puberty will hit me.”

“I’m so sorry dear,” Ryan’s mom said with a distant, sad expression in her eyes. “Will it be okay if we give them a call?”

“I mean you can,” I said. “But I’m not sure if that’ll change their mind at all.”

“Your dad probably won’t be so easily persuaded, yes,” she said, looking disappointed. “But maybe a call from me will help him understand the importance of being accepting of a transgender child.”

“I hope so,” I said, scratching my ear. “I just don’t see a way I’ll be able to get on hormones before I turn eighteen.”

“Well, if your mom is accepting, there may be a way,” she said. “But I understand it must be difficult.”

“It is,” I said. I cracked some eggs on the counter and put them on the frying pan. “I’m just hoping he’ll come around, although that may just be a dream at this point.”

I watched as the eggs bubbled up and turned white. I quickly scrambled it and mixed it into the rice. We finished putting the rice in bowls and put it on the table. Ryan’s mom called down her husband, telling him it was time to eat.

“Oh, what a surprise,” Ryan’s dad said, smiling as he saw the home-cooked meal. “Did you all make this together?”

“Yup, I was the greatest contributor,” Ryan said, grinning.

“Shut up, you did nothing,” I said. “All you did was stand around.”

“That’s emotional support,” Ryan said, laughing. “I helped motivate you.”

“Sure,” I said, rolling my eyes. “Believe what you’d like if it helps you feel like you contributed.”

“Great, thanks,” he said, taking a seat at the table. “Let’s eat now, I’m hungry.”

We all dug into the food, and it tasted really good. The sweetness of the butter really mixed well with the rice. I was taking a bite of some chicken and rice when Ryan spoke up.

“This tastes really good,” he said, already having finished his share. “Is there any more?”

“No, you ate it all,” I said, looking at his empty bowl.

“My bad. I was hungry, football player and all,” he said, laughing with an arm behind his head. “That was really good though, thanks for dinner you two.”

“Oh, you two, so you realize you didn’t help at all after all,” I teased.

“Julie was quite the help,” Ryan’s mom said.

“But seriously, thanks,” I said, taking another bite of the fried rice before speaking again. “I like cooking and baking, so I’m pretty good at them.”

“You’ll be a good wife one day,” Ryan’s dad said, chuckling.

“Wife?” I asked, blushing immediately. I imagined myself in a wedding dress, with Ryan standing next to me in a suit. I blushed even more and looked down at the floor to hide it. “I hope so.”

“You’re that embarrassed by that comment?” Ryan asked, using his hand to gently lift up my face.

“No,” I said, staring straight into his eyes. “I mean, I just, you know.”

“Yeah, I know, don’t worry,” he said, a lopsided grin on his face.

I saw Ryan’s mom and dad smiling at us, clearly approving of the relationship. My own face broke into a smile as well, despite everything, I was quite happy with day-to-day life.