DetectiveRed

I got a little tired of the old cover so I decided to try something a little more eyecatching. Hopefully, y'all like it. I drew it myself out of boredom and I felt like it was better than the old one at the very least. I'm not really an artist or graphic designed but I thought I'd give it a shot.

As always thanks to Trismegistus Shandy. They edited chapter when I first uploaded it to Wattpad almost 3 months ago now. I think this chapter was fine before but I did a decent amount of editing and addition and I feel like it's better now. I'll talk about what I changed below if you're interested.
Check out Shandy's work here. Here are the links to their other places TGstorytime and Big Closet

James put his bra on, an act he still hadn't gotten used to. Then he threw on the rest of what he was beginning to call the "let's hide my weird new body" ensemble. Almost no features of his body came through his clothes; it was perfect. Avoiding giving his mum the chance to look at him too long was becoming a massive pain; it sucked being so dependent on her, but the only way to get to Nick's house was to ask her. 

“Hurry up, and get in the car. I’ll drop you there on the way to work.” Busy and distracted Mum was the best Mum.

“Thanks”

The arrival at Nick’s place was rocky. His mum dropped him without even saying goodbye, and he was left to knock and hope Nick was awake to open the door for him. After Ben mocked his voice James shut himself off. The number of unplayed games in his library was starting to shrink, so that was a plus to this whole debacle. The number of great stories he’d missed by exclusively playing online was pretty terrifying, to be honest. So much content he’d just left ignored. He had Nick to thank for picking up most of them, maybe that was something he could tell him. His chest felt tight thinking about that. All he had thought about aside from the games was how much he wanted to talk to Nick. He kept wondering what had been wrong the last couple of days? Why was he so excited to be around this guy. Getting inside would help. He just had to knock.

“Come in dude.”

The atmosphere was the same as it was at the tree. Well almost at least, they could get food, they could play games and they didn’t have to just talk. Why did that make James feel so disappointed? It might have been that there were a bunch of things James knew they could be talking about instead of putting so much concentration into games. He wanted to tell Nick about what he had been playing, or work out strategies to try with Nick’s friends. Sitting and playing games without talking would be normal if he was hanging out with Ben or Lachie but this was Nick. The guy he liked listening to, the guy with the cute voice. For the first half an hour it didn’t seem like their normal chatting would happen. Nick didn't seem as into talking as he did usually. He wasn’t even playing that well despite his supposed concentration. Something was up and James was too distracted playing and hoping Nick would talk more to realise that should be concerning.

Nick wasn't happy leaving his thoughts ambiguous.

"So what's going on with your voice?"

James tensed. It felt like the world had frozen around him. He seemed to have forgotten how to breathe. How was he meant to respond to that? Maybe denial. Yeah, denial seemed to be the best idea.

"What do you mean, Nick?" He hoped he sounded more nonchalant than he felt. The crack in his voice didn’t help his case. He’d been so careful, he’d stopped talking and of course, it had still been noticed. After last night, how could Nick not bring it up?

"What's with the insecurity? Every time you hear it or someone comments on it, you just shut down. It happened when you got mistaken for my girlfriend and again when Ben made fun of you for it? You know Ben's full of shit." He was relieved that Nick hadn't discovered much. All he had noticed was that James' behaviour had been strange whenever anyone brought up his voice, which highlighted the change in his voice, which made him feel sick. “Also, you ditched everyone last week? I thought the voice might have been a coincidence, but it’s pretty obvious it’s related now. Why does it bother you so much?”

Part of James wanted to tell Nick everything. Since this shit had started, the only people he’d told were Doctor Finnegan and Katie, neither of which he wanted to bother unless it was an emergency. If Nick knew maybe he’d be able to confide in him more. Besides, when people found out, it would be good to know if he would have Nick on his side still. ‘When’ it had only been a week and he’d already given up hope of changing back. 

Every other part of him said that was an awful and terrifying idea. Nick had been amazing the last week, a friend he could depend on. Even if he wasn’t sure he deserved it. Was he willing to risk it now? Dropping a huge bombshell like that could destroy their friendship or worse, make those nightmares a reality. Maybe he could just tell him about the voice; Nick didn’t seem to have noticed anything else. The different parts of him agreed on the compromise. That was settled.  ‘My voice got messed up and I don’t know how it happened,’ was an easier pill to swallow than ‘I'm 99% female now!’

Answering the rest of the question would be tricky. There were a lot of reasons why this new voice bothered him. It was in part because it was a symptom of the general body change, but there was something else that bothered him about it. The best way he could describe it was 'it isn't mine', which didn't feel entirely accurate.

“Earth to James, you okay?” Nick asked, snapping James back to reality.

"I don't know what happened, but my voice un-dropped; my Adam's apple is gone too. I was hoping people wouldn't notice," It felt good, to be honest to him. It felt good to not pedal obvious lies. Knowing Nick wouldn’t mock his voice was the icing on the relief cake. Maybe it would stop there and he would be able to breathe normally again. 

"I'm sorry, dude." Nick was looking at the ground. “I didn’t realise something like that might have happened.”

They sat in silence for just a moment. James started panicking about what he might be thinking about. Could he have noticed something else? Was he going to ask about his chest or something? Maybe everything was a mistake. Nick thankfully broke that small period of silence.

"You know that trans girl you and Ben talk shit about?"

Being reminded of his bad behaviour was the last thing he needed right now. He knew he sucked. Thinking about Ben also wasn’t too welcome. Not when he was still trying to get over last night.

"Yeah?" he asked hesitantly.

"Well, it might be worth talking to her.  She likes to talk about the weirdness in the school; maybe she can help. That is if she is willing to talk to you." Nick had never used that tone to him before. He sounded disappointed in James. 

Katie had mentioned it last weekend; it was a nice reminder. If he hadn't already talked to her, this information would have been very helpful.

"Thanks, Nick, I'll ask her."

"She might not want to talk to you, though. You'd have to be upfront with her, and if you misgender her, you probably won't get too far. She's a nice girl though, I've talked to her a couple of times."

James needed to distract himself from the guilt that was welling up inside him over how he had hurt Katie. Asking about what had happened to Nick was as good a distraction as any.

"What's happened to you?"

"It happened pretty frequently before last week. When I went to meet with everyone, something almost always delayed me like it didn't want me to hang out with you guys. It happens almost every time I go near Ben or Lachlan."

It sounded like superstition to James; if something was delaying Nick, how come he was always on time to hang out with him last week?

"You don't believe me?" Nick asked.

"I think it's more likely you're just clumsy, Nick."

"Remember how I tripped on Monday? Something tugged at my back." 

"Still, I don't know how talking to her would help."

It was quiet for a second, James didn't know how to carry on this conversation without risking more exposure. He didn't want to talk about his voice anymore. He didn’t want to be reminded of how badly he’d fucked over Katie again.

"If it helps, your voices, new and old are both nice, you don't need to go mute again."

"I don't care if it's nice, I want it to be mine again. But thank you, I guess." It was nice that Nick tried; it made him happy that he had someone who liked to talk to him even when he didn't want to open his mouth.

"Hopefully you can get your voice back, then."

They continued playing their game in silence. There was a lot that seemed to be hanging in the air. Questions that Nick didn’t seem to be prepared to ask. It was still nice to be quiet because he had nothing to say rather than fear. Nick’s silence wasn’t comforting though. They were playing together and yet he was saying nothing. He desperately wanted it to be nothing. His chest had been feeling tight since he got here and everything they had talked about had only made it feel worse and now everything he wasn’t saying was making it worse. Nothing was making him feel better.

That’s when he felt it, the stabbing pain in his chest. That was the last thing he needed. Was he dying? Did the sudden changes to his body cause damage or something? Why couldn’t he catch his breath? Another sharp pain in his chest rang out. His bra felt like a prison squeezing his chest and making it impossible to breathe. The air wasn’t coming in. 

"I gotta go to the bathroom," he wheezed out. His bra was holding him hostage, and he had to get it off.

“James, wait, are you okay?” 

He ran down the hall, which was surprisingly easy considering he couldn't breathe. Adrenaline was a hell of a chemical. The door to the bathroom slammed behind him, and without a second thought, he began peeling off his hoodie and tops. Looking down at his chest, he noticed it seemed slightly larger; had they not stopped growing since he got them? Was the bra too small? God, they seemed huge, he couldn’t breathe. Part of him wanted to throw everything back on and just suffocate. Survival instincts kicked in and he desperately started scratching at the back to try and pull it off. This had to be a nightmare. Looking at them again, they were bigger than they had been. Every rapid breath he took made them rise and fall. The disgusting flesh lumps and the compression they required were going to kill him. More than ever he wanted to wake up from this nightmare. 

He heard a knock on the door of the next-door toilet.

"Dude are you okay?"

Why the pain now, why not when he was at his own house? He had to get it off, but it had to be compressed. If they weren’t compressed, then someone might notice. Why did this have to happen when Nick was standing on the other side of the door?

The knob on the door to the bathroom began to turn, he needed to lock the door.

"I'm fine," he yelled as convincingly as he could while struggling to breathe.

James tried to get to the door to hold it closed, but the shirt and hoodies that he had left on the floor tripped him up. As he fell, he thought about what was about to happen. Nick would come in. He silently prayed he’d land on his face and get knocked out, but instead, his survival instincts kicked in and he put his arm out to break the fall.

"James! What happened? I'm coming in!" 

He braced himself for the worst.

DetectiveRed

The new stuff for this chapter was basically making James a bit more friendly with Nick. I didn't feel like the original version got their current friendship down right. I also wanted to make the stabbing pain in his chest make more sense. It's based on my own experience with bras that were too small but I felt like it would make sense to reincorporate his panicking which was something I hadn't really used more than once when I wrote this chapter the first time. Heavy breathing plus small bra (or in the future for this series, a binder) sucks. I feel happier with this version than I did before even though this chapter wasn't bad like some of the other stuff. Also, unrelated, but I really wanted to say thanks to those who read and enjoy my stuff and talk about it in the comments or in group chats. I really appreciate that people enjoy my work.