Sitting Out
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Long time no see. A new chapter. Experimenting with bouncing between Melody and James. Still hoping to finish this story this year. As always thanks to Trismegistus Shandy for proofreading. 

If you'd like to support my work there is a kofi link and paypal link at the bottom of this page. Comments and favourites are always appreciated. TW Suicidal thoughts, suicidal thought affirmation and dissociation

It was peaceful, sitting under Melody's tree. She was off with Katie and Nick and whoever else and Jamie was there. Under the tree. She'd never been a spiritual person, but she imagined this was what heaven felt like. Her current form matched the one she'd lost almost perfectly and a missing set of junk wasn't the worst thing. Being back in a masculine form was liberating. Even if she was for all intents and purposes, not alive.

Her body was out there doing things and she felt phantom sensations, occasional touches, small bits of warmth. Here she didn't have to think about gender. She wasn't even sure whether she should still use girl language in reference to herself. It likely wouldn't matter much. After all, he was alone under Melody's tree.

The winds blew through him like he wasn't there. His mind tried to make sense of it all, but it drew a blank. People aren't meant to be incorporeal. He touched the tree, but it didn’t provide the warmth and comfort it once did. The memories of him and Nick escaping to the tree flooded his mind, but he tried to block them out to no avail. He was just a consciousness and a part of that consciousness were his memories. He remembered the first time Nick had caught him sulking. How he'd felt so embarrassed as the cute boy tried his best to cheer him up. How his fear of being discovered had overrun all rational thought. 

How dysphoria was different back then. How it seemed to sting when he got a reminder of what he'd lost, instead of feeling like his life had been drained of colour.

He remembered their first kiss. Adam and Katie were obnoxiously flirting and Nick got sick of third wheeling. So like teenagers do, they ran off on their own. To the tree, hand in hand. There was no calming aura or warm feeling that day. Melody was busy elsewhere or thought they could use a little bit of privacy and a little help from a ray of sunshine, Jay forgot he was meant to be acting as a girl, or how his mum said he was meant to act.

For a brief moment as the sun highlighted the warm tones of Nick's light brown skin, he felt himself again. Like they were just two boys, who liked each other. 

"You are still so handsome," Nick had said and Jay, not one to be outdone, responded: 

"Can I kiss you?" 

And for a time, the aches and the stings, the feelings of wrongness and the new pressures ceased to exist. Then the bell rang and he went back to being Jamie. The ache came back and it felt like he'd been living with it forever. He knew it hadn't of course, right now, devoid of responsibility and free from his body, he felt normal. A little numb, but this was the closest he'd felt to his old life in ages. He almost felt ready to face things again. To go back. Until he remembered who would be waiting on the other side.

 The ache returned despite his body. It wasn't the sting of looking at his feminine body, or the thought of returning to it, it was something worse. It was what had pushed him into this corner When did the feelings change? When did it become the dull ache that never left? The struggle against his own body that left him fighting just to sleep.

These thoughts raced through his mind; the freedom from his dysphoria allowed him to see clearly again. The dysphoria sucked. It really did. But in the end it wasn't what caused the nagging feeling in the back of his telling him something was wrong. The stings subsided when he was around Nick, Katie and Adam and them treating him like nothing had changed was able to dull things down further.

He remembered the shopping trip. The waves of anguish that rushed over him as it became clear what his mother thought of him. As it became clear she was trying to erase her son. The aching, the wrongness, the confusion, it was the first time he could remember feeling so devoid of purpose. 

 Sunlight trickled through his ethereal body; there were no cars, no noise came from the streets. Distantly he heard a phone ring and clouds settled in.

"Jay, please don't hang up. I don't care whether you're a guy or girl or neither or both. It's fine if you don't want to be with me. I just need to know you are alright. I'm not stupid, please." Nick's voice gets clearer with every word. The school and roads fade away, leaving him and the tree. 

"I'm not Jay," a meek girl's voice replied.

"Jamie. Please can you just tell me you're okay?" Nick was surprisingly stubborn when he needed or wanted to be.

"No, she's literally not him. She's Melody." Katie's voice disrupted things further.

The area of grass around the tree got smaller. He tried to steady himself by taking mock deep breaths. Small bits of ground came back. 

"I'm coming over." The ground shrunk to a small ring of dirt around the tree.

He didn’t want to go. The space he was in wasn’t the ghost's territory. Where was he? He took deep breaths and bits of the ground grew out. It was almost creepy.

Katie and Melody were talking about something. It didn't really matter. Their voices were muffled; with a little bit more time, he'd be back to not hearing anything. Not dealing with anything. Maybe he could slip back into complete unconsciousness with nothing to bother him and nothing to think about. 

 ---- 

 She'd felt him stir. Small pieces of his consciousness reached out and tried to grab at Nick's voice. She wondered if he might come out if Nick was here. She hoped so. She wasn't sure if she'd be able to face Nick otherwise. As far as he was likely concerned she'd ruined Jay's life and he wasn't exactly wrong.

"You okay, Melody?" Katie's voice stopped her from retreating further.

"I guess. Jay's still here. Maybe Nick will be able to draw him out of his slump."

"You think so?" She didn’t seem to be invested in getting Jay out again. Melody needed him to come back. So he could grow. So she could rest.

"I hope so." There was a knock at the door, hopefully Nick.

"And if not, then we'll need to get to school and I'll try and leave the body. It's not ideal, but it should throw him to the front." 

"Sounds good. I'll get the door and explain things to Nick." 

"Thanks, Katie." 

She sat in silence for a while; she could hear them talking but not what it was about. So she started trying to reach out, thinking words as loud as she could manage. Just simple things like "Nick is here, he's worried."

She needed him to stir. She needed his help to face this mess. Not much of a response. Maybe she needed to wait until night. Or maybe James was stubborn. The door creaked open and Nick walked in. She gave him an awkward wave and his face dropped. 

"This really isn't him."

"I'm sorry. I--" His face stirred a mix of memories. Hers and James'. Observing him from a distance with his shimmer. Playing games with him in the library. Watching over them from the tree. Cuddling underneath the tree. The two sets of memories ran parallel until James' slowly faded. He had to be in here somewhere. 

 "It's fine, Melody." His voice was quiet and less gentle. 

"Have you been taking care of his body?" 

"I've been trying to. It's hard."

"I guess it would be." His voice is uncharacteristically monotone. In the back of her mind there's guilt. Not hers. 

"Katie says you want to help bring him back. Why?" 

She looked at him in shock. James' guilt began to stir more feelings. More memories. "What do you mean, why? Why wouldn't I?"

"You could just take his body and live and no one but us would be the wiser. You changed his body into a girl and now it's yours." 

 "That would be murder!" An image flashed in her head of her final moments. The punch to the temple. The ambulance sounds. The laughs and the snickers. James reached out to her. Maybe to calm her? Why would he do that? 

 "And? You'd be alive. Allowed to go off and live a completely new life. Why should I believe you want to help?" James' mother screamed in her head. Ranting about Katie and Adam. The fact that her son was a freak. Her voice blended with the kids from years ago. The slurs, the othering. All of it. She couldn't remember their faces. She didn't want this. 

"Because I don't want to be here! I was fine behind the scenes, quietly trying to help. What would I have to gain by stealing his life?" Observation, monotony, loneliness. Still better than hurting others. 

 "Well, you'd have life." 

 "And no friends, no family. Can you imagine if I tried to find someone I used to know? They'd think I'm crazy." She couldn't fathom these accusations. She was just trying to help. She couldn’t even remember her family's faces or their names. Stealing James' life wouldn't fix that. 

 "I'm sorry, but I'm not sure I can believe you." 

Why not? Why couldn’t he believe her? 

 "Nick, she's been through a lot." She appreciated Katie’s attempt to calm him down. 

 "So has Jay." James felt closer than ever. Maybe he could explain himself. Maybe he would realise that people cared about him. Or maybe he would go back to hiding. 

"Even if she is lying, she's our only hope of seeing them again." 

 "I'm not lying. Why would I tell you who I am if that was my plan? Why would I be asking to transition?"

"Look, I'm not…" 

"Why would I set you and James up if I wanted to take his life?" 

"You set us up?" Nick raised his voice. 

She should have closed her mouth. "Kind of," she responded sheepishly. "Just here and there, little things, you know…" 

 "You said you didn't change him mentally!"

 "I didn't! Just subtle stuff like tripping you up and making the tree more comfortable. You did most of it. I just wanted to help." She explained. Well she tried. It was getting harder and harder to focus.

 ---

 Since Nick had entered the room, his island had shrunk. It was almost non-existent. The sky had completely made way for Melody's point of view. He could see what she saw, hear what she heard.

 He could try if he wanted to, to reach out. Even if it was just to clear things up. Their arguments were keeping him from fading and sleeping. How would he start?

 "I told you to forget about me." The monotone early-change voice slipped out of Melody's mouth.

 This was the right decision. Melody's memories proved it. He'd seen his bullshit from an outside perspective. He'd seen Ben. He'd tried to get better, but it just wasn't possible. He was a fraction of his old self. A shadow, a ghost, nothing. Even the piece of shit version of him had at least felt whole. Now he was just numb. His disappearance should barely be mourned. His life had ended two months ago. 

"They aren't going to just let that happen, James," Melody retorted using the more feminine voice she’d altered for him.

"What's going on, Melody?" Nick asked. He held up a finger to pause his question. This was between two ghosts. 

"It seems James has found his voice again." Katie sure seemed smug, but she needed to shut up too. 

"I'm giving this to her. She can do whatever she likes. I don't care."

"I'll fix everything. I promise." She somehow still hadn’t gotten it.

 She’d seen his memories and still thought she could fix him. This wasn't her fault. This wasn't something she could fix. 

"We both know you couldn't put yourself through testosterone-induced puberty again." He'd seen her counter-plan. It wouldn't work.

 Not with what he'd seen of her living memories. He'd seen her feeling towards her stubble and her body before she died. 

"I'll do it, James." Her voice was squeaking. She sounded desperate. 

"And all you'll accomplish is hurting yourself. I'm not coming back. I'm dead." 

"You aren't. Please, James. They care about you." Her pleading was undercut with something else. She sounded tired. Exhausted even.

"It doesn't matter, Melody." He could feel himself getting more aligned with her body. The bed he was resting on. Nick's hand resting on his shoulders. He had to retreat again or she'd… 

"Melody?" Katie asked.

"Unfortunately not." He slumped into the bed. His planning had been ruined. He was back in his body. Hopefully temporarily. Melody wasn't gone, it seemed. She'd be back soon. Hopefully.

Otherwise he'd have to see his mum. He'd have to pretend to be a girl again. A cold shiver went down his back as he thought of being Jamie again. 

This body wasn't even the biggest issue anymore. Having breasts wasn't the worst thing. Pretending, acting, living. It was all so exhausting.

He wanted to drift off again, but was stopped by an intense warmth. Nick had thrown his arms around him and despite his best efforts, he couldn't help but smile. He put an arm around the other boy, hoping that he could at least remember this when he went back to being nothing. He was trying to slip away with just a memory. A warm wet drop hit his shoulder as the boy embracing him started to shake. His boyfriend was crying. He didn't really know what to do. It was his fault, after all.

"Please don't go," Nick sobbed.

"I won't," James lied, as he fell asleep again.

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