DetectiveRed

  After 5 years of writing this story, and uploading it, I think it's finally done. Had to do some minor edits to previous chapters because i noticed a timeline error. Thanks to everyone who has been reading it for so long. Thanm you to everyone who donated and helped keep me motivated AND FINALLY MASSIVE thanks to Shandy for editing and encouraging me to post my work here. Without Trismegistus Shandy this story would be so much harder to read and would still be sitting on Wattpad. Shandy's work can be found here and here are the links to their other places TGstorytime and Big Closet. 

Getting away from Jay’s mum for a few days had helped him, to no one's surprise except his. He’d thought that he would just play along and then go back to his Mum like a good little girl and everything would be just as awful as it was before, but now laying on the uncomfortable makeshift mattress on Adam’s floor, he dreaded going back. 

Adam was the weirdest one of his new friends. Mostly because Adam was normal. He was the kind of guy who goes to the gym, flirts with his girlfriend, would be on the football team if the school let him. That kind of guy. Unlike Nick and Katie, Adam had no real reason to be as helpful and kind to Jay as he was. It was confusing. It wasn’t like he could get angry about it, that never seemed to work. Pushing him away didn’t work either. He was left to conclude that Adam gave a shit about him. Gave enough of a shit to let him sleep on his floor, at least. 

After everything Jay had done to avoid being a burden. After everything he'd done to avoid being a freak. After trying to be a normal girl for eight months, three months of hyper-femininity and trying to push everyone away for two, all in the hopes of avoiding transitioning, he was back to wanting to be a guy again. Adam, a normal guy, saw Jay choose to wear dresses and makeup and still treated him like a guy. 

Because Adam cared. 

And so did Nick. 

And so did Katie. 

And he didn’t get it, but maybe that wasn’t important. He couldn’t force them not to care. Trying to force them not to care only hurt them and it just wasn’t worth it. Trying to be normal wasn't working and just hurt everyone but his mum. If changing didn't work then he'd be dead in the end anyway.

Adam’s alarm went off, scaring him out of his thoughts. 

“You okay, Jay?” Adam asked, as he wiped the sleep from his eye. 

“What why?”

“You’re crying.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah. You alright?” 

“I should be.” Jay smiled. 

He was going to have to talk to everyone once he got to school. None of them would be surprised by his revelation. This was going to be tough. He got something comfortable out of his bag; Melody’s packing had been perfect. Everything he wanted to wear was in there, aside from his favourite dress which he’d have to take when he went home. He'd gone from being a normal guy to having a favourite dress. Once dressed, he headed to the kitchen and made himself some burnt toast before packing his bag again. 

“You can stay longer if you want,” Adam said, between bites of his toast.

“What?”

“That’s why you were crying, right? You didn’t want to go home.”

“Nah, it wasn’t that,” Jay said. 

“Then what was it?”

“I’ll tell you when we get to school. I really don’t want to go over it twice.”

“Are you sure, mate?”

“Definitely.”

After breakfast was done, he messaged Katie and Nick. He was going to need their help if he was going to go through with this. It was the right move. It was the only move. As they headed off to school, Jay tried not to think too hard. Would Melody be able to help? Was he going to have to explain Melody’s existence to his mum if she brought up whatever did this to him? 

Katie was waiting for them at the school gates. Something told him there were going to be a lot of ‘I told you so’s. It wasn’t like he could avoid them. 

“So we’re just waiting for Nick?” Adam asked.

“He might not come,” Jay said. Nick had probably been hurt the worst in Jay’s recent spiral. He’d probably never get over the guilt of that, but in the end that was just another thing to add to the pile. He had fucked over so many people at this point and he wasn’t sure if any of them would actually hold him accountable, so from now on, he was going to try avoid making the pile bigger. 

“Do you want to share with the class why you summoned me?”

“I’d like Melody to be here as well if possible; again, I really don’t want to repeat myself and I need everyone here.” It felt weird actually reaching out, instead of being reached out to. “Let’s head to the tree.” Jay sent a quick message letting Nick know where to meet them. 

Melody’s tree was gorgeous in early Autumn, when the leaves were a mix of greens and  oranges, but it wasn't unbearably cold. In four months it would have been a year since this had started. He’d even had a birthday while trying to be seen as a girl, not that he’d really registered it. His downward spiral had been in full swing by then. He sat at the base and the other two sat down next to him. They started talking and flirting, while Jay just waited. 

He really didn’t expect Nick to show up. Things had been complicated between them over the last week. Nick and Jay had kind of decided to alternate who would hang out with the group and generally avoided having to talk to each other. There weren’t really words that could make up for what Jay had done. He hadn’t even tried or thought about trying since he had been so sure that nothing was going to change. Now he was going to make things change and he really hoped Nick would eventually come to forgive him.

A text came through to his phone and he sighed.

“I’m gonna come out to Mum,” Jay announced.

“What?" Adam and Katie exclaimed in unison.

"Just like that?" Adam asked.

"Five days is all it takes to do a complete one-eighty?" Katie laughed. 

"If you won't fuck off, it's my only option," Jay said.

"I mean you can start smaller. We can fully commit to calling you a guy if that's what you want," Adam said.

"And what good would that do?" Jay asked. 

"It would be more thought out." Adam said.

"What do you need?" Katie asked. Of course she'd get it. She was way more used to this brand of bullshit.

"A place to crash and Melody to take over if I'm going to fall apart after."

"Easy. I'll text my mums."

"Katie, he's being reckless."

"What's new?" she responded.

Adam rolled his eyes.

"So what changed?”

“It’s the only option now,” he explained. 

“I know dysphoria is a lot, but we could still try to magically get you back to normal, over the next week or so,” Adam said.

“It wouldn’t solve shit. Mum thinks me liking men is the natural result of my body changes. When she finds out that’s not true she’ll know I’m the sissy faggot she was worried about.” Adam and Katie looked at each other, mouths agape. Had he ever told them about that? No, of course he hadn’t. Why would he? He’d assumed Katie would have figured it out, or Nick might have told her. He’d assumed they knew. “And besides,” he said, trying to salvage the conversation from the bombshell he had accidentally dropped, “maybe I don’t want to go back to normal. I barely fucking recognise who I was before.”

“You could just leave?” Katie suggested.

“Maybe she’ll surprise me,” Jay said. After everything he was still a Mama’s boy and he desperately wanted to go back to the happy memories. Maybe she’d give him that. It was a pipe dream. The pained look on her face from when she found his bra flashed in his mind and he had to take a deep breath to not lose it. Melody’s tree was the only place this conversation could happen.

“The option to stay longer is still open, but I want it on the record. I think this is a bad idea," Adam said. 

“Obviously, but I should rip the bandaid off early," Jay argued. This reckless bullshit had gotten him this far. If he had to run away, he would. 

“Should you, though?" Adam asked.

"Adam!" Katie said.

"What? Look, you are really lucky your mums were supportive off the bat. Jay's mum isn't going to be." 

"What do you suggest then, Adam?" Jay asked. If Adam could supply an alternative it would be grand.

"You could do what I've been saying you should for the last eight months, socially transition at school."

Adam had brought it up as an option so many times Jay had tuned it out. There was no way it would be that easy.

"I literally came out as a girl, do you think anyones going to believe me if I come out as a guy again."

"Yes!" Adam and Katie both shouted.

"Jay, literally no one would be surprised. You went from a confident loud douche to barely speaking and never smiling," Adam said.

"He has a point."

"You were so pathetic that all the frustration I had built up for a year dissipated."

"I tried so hard, though," Jay argued.

"Tell the counsellor. This school may have let you and Ben get away with a lot, but it still accepted me, and I was born this way. I was a better actor as well."

Melody's voice rang through Jay's head.

"Melody says you weren't that convincing." 

"I'm comparing myself to you, bro." 

"Touché."

"My point is, you'll be taken seriously. The school has proper safeguards for this situation. I was going by Adam here way before I told my parents," Adam explained.

"But what if she finds out?"

"We prepare for that."

"It can't be that simple," Jay said.

"It's more simple than running away as a seventeen year old."

"What about transitioning?" Katie asked. 

"This is transitioning." Adam responded.

"What about my body?" 

"Oh. Yeah," Adam said.

Jay could feel Melody listening in on them. 

"We're on a time limit," Melody thought.

"Do you wanna just talk to them together?" he thought back.

"I'm tied to the school," Melody said using his mouth. "I can't fix this if he isn't at the school. Once he graduates, I'm useless."

"If he gets kicked out or has to run away, school might not be an option," Adam argued.

"So what do I do?" Jay asked.

"Right now, I don't know," Adam said. His objections were all annoyingly solid, and Jay welcomed any excuse to avoid seeing his mother like that again, but Adam wasn't a procedural thinker.

"Talk to the counsellor and we can start arranging with teachers," Katie said.

"What she said. I know it might not feel like much right now, man, but it makes a difference."

"Thank you for the reality check, Adam," Jay said. 

The tension drained out of Jay's everything. Who would have thought that not having to come out to your homophobic mother could relax someone so much. Adam's solution was really obvious and he'd been so stubborn in trying to force himself to be a girl that he'd just ignored it.

"So do you want us to call you James?" Adam asked.

"Jay is fine."

"You sure?" Katie asked.

"I mean still treat me like a guy, but you've been calling me that for the last eight months and it's comforting at this point," he explained.

James felt so alien to him now. His mum had erased him from their house and Jay was complicit, since he’d given up on being James. It was hard to be sad about it. He was a piece of shit, but part of Jay wondered how things would have gone if this hadn't happened. Who would he have been?

Would James have realised what was wrong with him eventually? Would he be able to make up with Katie or have friends that actually cared about him or would he just push them away? Maybe he wouldn't have even noticed that his friendships felt hollow. As horrible as it was, Jay figured this was the best outcome for everyone else, even if he had to suffer to make it work. Katie was happy and healthy. Adam and her were happy together. Nick wasn't locked in the closet having to hear homophobic bullshit from his so-called friends. Even Melody now had a voice. If he could go back in time and stop it from happening, would he? 

Probably not.

"Classes are going to start soon. You two should go," Jay said.

"What about you?" Katie asked.

"I want to talk to Melody."

They waved goodbye, and Jay sat down at the base of the tree.

He closed his eyes. He wished it was easier to talk to Melody. It would be so much easier if they could just sit down together.

"So you're finally going to let us help?" she asked.

"I wish I could nap right now so we could talk face to hazy silhouette."

"Is that a yes?"

"I don't really have a choice, do I? If it doesn't work, I can just play in traffic anyway." 

"Not the best reason, but I'm glad you're trying."

"It's the best reason we're going to get." He shrugged. 

"So what did you want to talk about?" she asked.

The last week had been confusing. Trying to readjust to being around people again. Having to confront the possibility of actually trying again? It was all so daunting.

"Can we start with the time limit thing? I mean, I can't change my body too much or Mum will notice."

"You turn eighteen next year, right?"

"Yeah, but will anyone take me seriously as a guy for a year?"

"I'm sorry."

"It's not your fault," he said.

"It quite literally is."

"You didn't know this would happen and well, what you did worked. The school is better now."

"We are not having this conversation again. You didn't fucking deserve this, Jay." She sounded frustrated. 

"Even if I didn't, it worked out well."

"You didn't."

"So I have a year to plan how to leave and figure out what I want." Jay wasn't really sure how to convince her that she was right. It was amoral, but based on how she'd acted over the last few months and how she talked about it, he had started to believe she'd lied about the transformation being intentional.

"What do you mean 'figure out what you want'?"

"Well, I'm a guy, but it's not like I'll ever be normal again."

"Sorry.

"You've been helping Katie and Adam get their ideal bodies, right?"

"Yeah? So?"

"And you want to do that for me."

"Yes."

"But I don't know what I want. I've been trying to be what Mum expected, but I don't think she's going to be in my life when this is over," he explained. 

"I don't understand."

"I don't either. I mean it should be obvious, I want to go back to being how I used to be, but I don't have to, do I?"

"If you don't want to, I guess. But why wouldn't you? I took that from you. You would have been fine if I hadn’t fucked this up." She still sounded so guilty.

"I don't know if I want to go back to how I was."

"This isn't you trying to convince me you can be a girl, is it?"

"No! Just I don't know. Half of what caused last week was the realisation that maybe I don't want what I thought I should. Or what I thought a man should."

"What do you mean?"

"Like guys should be tall, strong, protective and stoic you know. It's a lot of pressure."

"You don't have to…"

"Exactly! Like I can cry. I don't want to lose that again, and maybe I don't want to get taller anymore. Do you get it now, Mel?" he asked.

"I guess."

"Good, cause after all of this I don't."