The car stops before me. Claire leans over and opens the door for me and I hurry to get from the relative safety of the bus stop to her car without too many water droplets hitting me.

It doesn’t make much of a difference, really. I’m already drenched anyway.

“Well you look great,” Claire says with a giggle. “Want to go to my place so that you can dry off and change? I’m sure that’d be more-”

“No,” I interrupt her.

“No?” There’s mild surprise in her smile. “Okay then… do you want me to bring you home instead? I’m sure the drive’ll be long enough to talk about whatever you had in mind.”

I nod, relieved. “Yeah, sure. That sounds good.”

With a nod, Claire starts the motor and pulls back onto the street.

I watch her from the side, as she drives, as she squints past the water obscuring the view in spite of the windscreen wipers working to their highest capacity. It’s slowly growing dark outside.

She looks so normal. Like I’d expect her to, had the last few days not happened.

How does she have the guts to act so calm and innocent when she knows what she did to me? When she knows what she did to Alex?

“So, what do you have on your mind?” she asks cheerily as the houses around us give way to meadows and occasional bits of forest.

I frown. My stomach’s clenched up with anger.

“How can you act so happy?” I ask after a moment’s hesitation.

I want to understand. What is it that drives a person like her?

She shrugs. “With Alex, you mean? I thought it might cheer you up a little-”

“I know it was you,” I say, interrupting her. I try very hard to sound normal, to keep the shiver out of my voice but doesn’t work. “I know it was you who put the knockout drops in my drink.”

No reaction.

“Why? Why would you do something like that?”

Her expression hasn’t changed. Her mouth lies even, the muscles in her cheeks are relaxed. Just a flicker of movement comes into her when she wets her lips and looks at the tachometer. But apart from that – nothing.

“Was it because you wanted me to break up with Alex? Was that why you said all those things about becoming a new person? So that I’d have less in common with him? To drive a wedge between us?”

Still, no reply.

My face is growing hot. Why won’t she react?

“I got almost raped, you know? Was that part of your great plan to drive us apart? Was I ever something other than some plaything or rival to you? Was I ever your friend?”

I’ve talked myself into a rage.

“I trusted you, you know? I liked you. But now I know the real you.”

No reaction.

“You’re a horrible person, you know that, right?”

No reaction.

“But what you probably don’t know is just how much Alex hates you. He knew right away that it’d been you who poisoned me. When you acted like you’d become my friend- you know, he thought you might’ve changed. But he was wrong.”

Am I overdramatising? Yes. Am I taking all my guilt and self-hatred out on her? Yes. But I can’t get myself to care. I just want her to react.

“Even though he already knew what a rotten person you are, you still managed to make it worse.”
She breaks so suddenly and so hard that I slam forward and into my seatbelt. The car comes to a screeching hold right at the entrance to a muddy side road leading right into the forest.
In the shade of the trees, it is even darker than on the open road and in spite of the raindrops drumming against the ceiling, there’s a strange silence when Claire turns off the car.

My heart is pounding against my ribs and I look over and a cold shiver runs down my spine.

There’s a cruel smile on her lips.

“Yeah,” she says coldly, “he doesn’t love me. But he’ll realise soon enough that he doesn’t love you, either.”

Both her hands are gripping the steering wheel. So tightly, that her knuckles have turned white.

“You’re nothing, Selena. You’re nothing without me and you’re even less without him. How did you become the person you are now, huh? You’re like a leech, clinging onto people, copying their personality because you are nothing but an empty shell. You-”

“That’s NOT TRUE!” I shout.

“Oh is it?” There’s a dangerous glint in her eyes. I’ve never seen her be like this before. She’s… different.

Reyna was right. This is getting out of hand. My clammy fingers take too long to find the little switch and I begin to panic, but then it is there and my fingernail finds purchase. Reyna’s on her way. Breathe.

“Why did you start dancing, huh?” Her voice is sharp, poisonous. “Who’s idea was it to start playing that silly computer game of yours? Why do you swim? Hell, even becoming Selena wasn’t your idea. It took an accident, Alex and that other friend and even then it wasn’t really your decision, was it? It was the feeling of being loved that really got to you. You put on that pretty body and with a touch of mystery you managed to deceive Alex into falling in love with you. But he’ll realise soon enough that you’re nothing but a fraud. You’re not a real woman and you’re not a trans woman.

You’re nothing, Timothy.”

The sound of my old name rings through me like an electric shock. I feel sick.

But isn’t she right? A small voice asks in the back of my head. You’re not a real woman because you lack the experience of growing up that way. Claire taught you that with knockout drops. I had no idea.

“You’re empty and as soon as Alex realises that, he’ll drop you like the broken toy you are.”

I want to say something, but my mouth is frozen shut. I hate how my throat is growing tight at the sound of her words and I hate even more how I can feel myself starting to believe her.

Alex had been the one to suggest playing League for the first time. Swimming had been his big hobby and I only did it so much because of him. And Isa had been the one to tell me I was trans. Before, I hadn’t even considered it.

“You’re a sickness that befalls everybody around you, taking their joy and making it your own, making everybody secretly miserable. Nobody likes being around sad people, Timothy.

Everybody’s just too damned nice to tell you that, but they’re better off without you. They might not know, but it’s the truth.”

I have to get away. Reyna isn’t enough. How do I know how long it’ll take before she arrives?

I have to get away from Claire because I can’t make her shut up. I have to get distance between us and everything will be fine. If I can’t hear her, her words can’t hurt me.

With an unimaginable effort, I manage to throw the door open and stumble out into the storm. The wind hits me like a wall of bricks, my shoes sink into the mud and the raindrops are big and hit me hard.

It doesn’t matter. Everything is better than staying in there. With her.

Through the storm I hear the driver’s door slamming shut.

I don’t turn. So what if she follows? I’m not going to listen.

“TIMOTHY!” her voice booms. Demanding.

“YOU DON’T GET TO WALK AWAY FROM ME LIKE THAT, TIMOTHY. LIKE YOU’RE SOMETHING BETTER.”

And then something hard hits my shoulder. I’m thrown slightly off balance and then the explosion of pain hits me.

She’s attacking me.

My brain is slow to take in the information; my body isn’t. Without turning, I begin running. I break into a sprint but she hits me again and this time, it’s my leg.

The impact comes right as I’m about to take a step and I just fall. I barely even realise what’s happening until my face hits the mud.

I try to get up on all fours but she kicks me in the side and I fall over onto my back.

In the dim light of the storm she’s nothing but a nightmarish dark silhouette. In her right, she’s holding a baseball bat.

“HE TOLD ME HOW YOU’D DO NOTHING ON YOUR OWN ACCORD,” she shouts over the howling of wind and rain. “THAT’S WHY HE WAS EVEN INTERESTED IN A RELATIONSHIP WITH ME. BECAUSE YOU ARE NOTHING, TIMOTHY. I’M GOING TO DO HIM A FAVOUR BY KILLING YOU!”

So that’s how this is going to end. It’s a sober observation. She’s going to kill me. There’s no time for fear or anger. Just the facts and my brain going, oh, right.

And then suddenly there’s light and the look on her face turns from pure hatred to surprise as a car roars closer and comes to a skittering halt next to us.

I’m still frozen in shock when Reyna jumps out and shouts, “POLICE! DROP THE BAT RIGHT FUCKING NOW!”

But she isn’t from the police, I know that and Claire calls the bluff.

“SO WHERE’S YOUR GUN, WOMAN?” she calls with a sneer.

She’s going to kill her too, isn’t she? With the bat, Claire has a clear advantage over Reyna. And as soon as Reyna’s dead, it’ll be my turn to go.

For a second there’s a gruesome picture of Reyna in the mud before my inner eye, face bloodied and lifeless eyes staring into empty space.

But Reyna doesn’t stop at Claire’s words. She runs at Claire who swings the bat and hits her in the shoulder, but can’t keep Reyna from running right into her and taking her to the ground.

The bat falls. I try to get to my feet, but my head grows really dizzy really quickly so I stay on all fours, watching the fight.

Claire tries to fight but she doesn’t stand a chance.

Methodically, Reyna hits her, once, twice in the face until Claire’s movements slow just enough for Reyna to be able to get a hold of her arm and twist it until the girl screams in pain and goes limp.

Quickly, Reyna pulls metal cuffs from her blazer’s pocket and cuffs Claire’s hands behind her back. Then she gets up, hurries over to me.

“Are you okay?” she asks and I nod because I’m still alive and I can probably stand with a little help.

“Okay. I’m going to call the police and get her properly arrested, then we’ll go from there. Do you want to wait in the car?”

I nod and she helps me to my feet but before we can start moving, Claire’s voice cuts through the storm.

“GO AND RUN, TIMOTHY, BUT YOU’RE NEVER GOING TO FORGET ME.” As her voice climbs higher and begins to crack in on itself, Reyna hurries me over to the car, briefly letting go of me to open the trunk and get a blanket.

“YOU’RE GOING TO THINK OF ME WHEN YOU KISS ALEX, WHEN YOU DRINK AT A CLUB OR PARTY, WHEN YOU PUT ON MAKE-UP OR WHEN YOU GO AROUND SCHOOL WEARING A GIRL’S UNIFORM. BECAUSE I’M THE ONE WHO TAUGHT YOU WHO YOU ARE. I MADE YOU. NEVER FORGET THAT. HATE ME AND THE ONLY ONE YOU’RE REALLY HATING IS YOURSELF.” And then she lets out a manic laugh and I look over, seeing a wild gaze on a face smeared with mud and blood and… tears? No way to be sure with the rain and the light.

Reyna has thrown open the passenger’s door and thrown the blanket over the seat, beckoning me to get in.

Claire’s laughter grows louder and higher until it’s hysterical shrieking and she’s rolling around until her hair is slick with mud.

And then the door slams shut and the noise of the rain hammering against the roof blocks out her laughter and I’m looking at my dirty hands, trying hard to get my breathing steady.