15
Slumber Party

“What?” I asked, raising my eyebrows. That was not the answer I expected in the slightest, how did he always like me? “What do you mean?”

“Well, I kind of liked you before, in middle school, before everything with you happened,” he said, awkwardly rubbing his arm. “I didn’t really know it was a crush, but apparently it was. I guess seeing you like this now reignited some of my old feelings.”

“I, are you bi or something?” I asked, furrowing my eyebrows. “I don’t know quite what you’re saying here.”

“If I had to put a label on it, I’d say biromantic heterosexual,” he said shrugging. “I’m not really sexually attracted to guys at all, but romantically if they’re nice enough…”

“S-So you do like me?” I asked, stuttering. My face was a deep red, and for the first time in a while, I knew exactly why. I actually did like him. I didn’t know how or when it started, but I definitely liked him.

“I do,” he said, smiling at me. “I wasn’t ever going to tell you, as I assume you’re not into guys, but since you asked I just had to answer.”

“No, umm,” I said, embarrassed to admit this. “I think I might, actually…”

“You do like guys?” he asked, his mouth slightly agape in surprise. “That was unexpected, I thought you’d be a lesbian now.”

“I didn’t want to admit it either,” I said, looking down at the floor and swaying from side to side. “But I guess the more I look at guys, the more I realize I actually like them. Well, by guys, I just mean you though.”

“Wait,” he said, his face slowly brightening up. “Does this mean you like me too?”

“Maybe?” I said, embarrassed to admit it. “I didn’t think I was attracted to guys either, but the signs kept on popping up. I never had a crush on a girl, nor did I find them particularly attractive. But when I see you, it’s like… different. It’s like I just feel something inside of me, like whenever I hang out with you I just get this fuzzy feeling deep inside of me.”

“Fuzzy feeling, that’s cute,” he said, chuckling. “But yeah, I understand. Those same feelings have been bubbling up inside of me too lately.”

“Ha,” I said, awkwardly tugging at the skirt of my dress. “I would not have expected any of this to happen a month ago when this all started.”

“Me neither,” he said, looking down at me. “Of all people, you were one of the last I expected to become a girl. Let alone be attracted to men.”

“I was born like this, what can I say?” I said, playfully shoving him. “I guess it was just covered up by years of being around the wrong people.”

“Hey, you’re around the right people now, aren’t you?” Matthew said, smiling. “Your friends are all nice and accepting, and you have me.”

“And what are you?” I asked, not sure how I wanted him to answer the question.

“A friend, for now,” he said. “Maybe more?”

“Maybe more,” I said, satisfied with his response.

“I should probably get going now,” Matthew said, quickly checking the time on his phone. “It’s pretty late, and I don’t think my mom will be happy if I stay any longer.”

“Oh. okay,” I said disappointedly. ”Wish you could stay longer.”

“Me too,” he said, smiling. “Sadly, life dictates that I must go.”

“That sucks,” I said, crossing my arms. “You better come back soon.”

“I will, I will. I’ll see you soon, okay Katie?” Matthew said, waving at me.

“Bye,” I said, waving back enthusiastically.

***

I was laying down on my bed, taking a break from all the studying. I opened up my phone, going automatically to Insta. Grace had already added me on my new account a couple of days ago, and I decided to give her a message.

@Katie.Lee117: Grace, I just realized something

I stared at the message screen awkwardly for a few seconds, waiting for a response. I was about to close it to go scroll mindlessly until she responded, but I saw a text bubble appear. A few moments later, a message came in.

@Grace.AA: Ooh this ur new account? Cute username

@Grace.AA: What did u realize?

@Katie.Lee117: I think im a girl…

@Grace.AA: Wow

@Grace.AA: No shit, sherlock

@Katie.Lee117: What???

@Katie.Lee117: Howd u know..

@Grace.AA: Im sorry it was hella obvious to anyone with EYES

@Grace.AA: Ive never seen anyone that happy to be a girl

@Katie.Lee117: Oh…

@Katie.Lee117: I also got on blockers

@Grace.AA: Get some estrogen in your body girl!!

@Grace.AA: You can get boobs and be even cuter

I touched my flat chest, a pang running through me. I wanted something there now, something other than padding. I reminded myself to get some estrogen too.

@Katie.Lee117: I guess that would be nice…

@Grace.AA: U know what lets meet up in a few days

@Grace.AA: Ill congratulate u on realzing ur a girl

***

“You know, Matthew’s actually a really chill guy,” Lauren said. She closed the notebook she was doodling in and put it in her backpack. “I’m a lot more confident in Katthew now..”

“We actually had a conversation about that yesterday,” I said, smirking in anticipation of their reaction.

“What?” Lauren said. All the girls leaned in closer to me at once, making me scoot back in surprise. “Tell us what happened.”

“Umm,” I said, a little frightened by how close they were to me. “Well, he told me he always has liked me.”

“Excuse me?” Liz said, furrowing her eyebrows. “So he liked you even when you were, you know?”

“I guess that is what he said,” I responded, shrugging. “Apparently he’s attracted to guys and girls romantically, but only girls sexually.”

“Oh, that makes sense,” Sam said. “So is this a classic friends-to-lovers scenario?”

“Are you two together now or what?” Lauren said, so close to me that I could feel her breath on my face. “Has Katthew become real?”

“No, we’re not together yet,” I said. “And get away from me, you’re all way too close.”

“Fine,” Lauren said, leaning back in her seat. “We were just curious.”

“But do you not realize the severity of this?” Liz asked. “It’s like, basically a confession.”

“Sure,” I said, rolling my eyes. “Anyways yeah, I admitted I kind of sort of liked him too, and then he left.”

“He just left?” Sam asked, tilting her head. “You two admitted you liked each other, and then he just left?”

“Yeah,” I said nonchalantly. “What did you expect?”

“I don’t know,” Liz said, shrugging sarcastically. “For you two to get together?”

“Exactly,” Sam said. “When is Katthew becoming real?”

“Maybe soon,” I said, smirking.

***

“Hi, Grace,” I said, waving at her. A few days had passed, and it was Thursday now. “What’s up?”

“Katie!” she said, smiling. She walked up to me, her skirt flowing with each step she took. “I knew it, I knew you were a girl.”

“Ha, it was that obvious, was it?” I asked, chuckling. “I thought I was pretty solid at pretending to be a guy pretending to be a girl.”

“Yeah, sorry girlie,” Grace said, clearly not feeling sorry in the slightest. “It was very obvious that you were a girl.”

“Darn,” I said, kicking at the floor. “Wait, my shoes, no.”

The shoes I was wearing were all white sneakers, and they had just gotten slightly covered in dirt after I kicked the floor. I desperately tried to wipe it off, but the damage was done. There was now an ugly brown mark on my right shoe.

“Yeah, calm down over your shoe there,” Grace said. “Come on, let’s go inside.”

“What do we even have to do at this point though?” I asked, walking into the mall. “I think I’ve done about everything there is to do here.”

“Look, there’s always more to do,” Grace said, smiling at me. “Plus, I haven’t been to this mall in ages, I’m looking forward to the nostalgia.”

We walked through the mall, looking at the same boring old stores. I trudged along, bored that there was nothing to do. Suddenly, Grace stopped in front of me.

“Ooh, what’s this store,” she asked, walking in. “Experience VR?”

We walked in to see several people wearing virtual reality helmets and looking around with the controllers in their hands. “Ooh, let’s try this out,” I said.

“Let’s do horror!” Grace said. “You can go first, Katie.”

“Can I do adventure instead?” I asked, looking at the game options on a poster.

“Nope, sorry,” she said, laughing. “Come on, don’t be a baby. Let’s go for some horror.”

“Fine,” I said. I asked the shop attendant if I could play the horror game, and he helped me put on the helmet and taught me the basics of how to use the controller. I felt a little dizzy at first but got used to it. “Woah, okay, do I press start?”

“I can see what you see from this screen,” I heard Grace’s voice say. I turned around to look at her but the only thing that changed was the screen in front of my face. It was a weird sensation, to say the least. “Go press start.”

“Okay,” I said shakily. I moved the controller up to the start button. I was then moved into a dark hallway in a home. It looked fairly normal, but the creepy music and dimmed lights made it have a rather terrifying atmosphere. “Should I move forwards?”

“Go on,” Grace said. I slowly crept forward until I reached a point where I had to turn. I peeked past the wall to see if anything was there, but it was clear. “Go, there’s nothing there.”

“Okay, okay,” I said, starting to walk forward. Just as I was walking, a creepy lady appeared on the stairs and began staring at me. She was all in tattered white clothing, the bottom of it covered in blood. Her face was brown with something that looked like vomit. I screamed, and almost fell down as I tried to move backward to get away from her.

“Oh my God,” Grace said, laughing. “She didn’t even attack you or anything, she was just staring.”

“I’m done, I’m done,” I said, wanting to rip the VR helmet off of my head. “You go do it, Grace.”

***

“I want to do adventure!” Grace said, putting on the VR helmet that I just took off.

“That’s unfair,” I said, crossing my arms. “You should do horror too.”

“I’m good, it looked too scary when you did it,” she said, giggling. “You can play more if you’d like though.”

“Ugh, fine, go play adventure,” I said. “Can’t believe I was forced to play horror.”

Grace ended up having a lot of fun playing and shooting aliens, especially compared to the very little fun I had playing the horror game. I grumbled to Grace about her making me play the horror game as she laughed.

***

“How were you going to congratulate me on becoming a girl again?” I asked.

“Oh, let me think,” Grace said, stroking her chin. “Umm, you already have plenty of dresses and skirts… Hmm…”

“Can’t think of much?” I asked.

“Nope, I can’t,” she said, desperately trying to think of some way to congratulate me. “I do want to get you something, but I don’t know what.”

“More clothes are never bad,” I jokingly said. “How about you buy me a bag from Gucci?”

“Do I look like I’m made of money?” she exclaimed, laughing. “No, I’m sorry, I don’t have that much cash on me.”

“What are we going to do then?” I asked.

“How about…,” she trailed off, stroking her chin. “A slumber party! Every girl has got to have a slumber party at least once before they leave for college.”

“Just the two of us?” I asked, tilting my head. “Wouldn’t that be a little boring?”

“No, stupid,” Grace said, rolling her eyes. “We invite your school friends.”

“Oh, okay,” I said. “I’m sure at least a few of them would be up for it. I’ll message them and see what they think.”

***

“Hi, welcome back,” I said, opening the door for Sam, Liz, and Lauren. Luckily, my Mom had agreed to let the slumber party happen.

“Glad to be here,” Lauren said, smiling in her white pajamas with bears on them. “These are my favorite pair of pajamas, they look cute, right?

“They are, mine look decent too, I think,” I said, doing a quick twirl. I was wearing a pink pair of pajamas with strawberries on them that my mom chose for me.

“They look great! I brought some clothes for tomorrow too, since we’re sleeping over,” Lauren said, pointing at her backpack. “It was a bit of a pain to pack everything, but I can’t exactly go to school without makeup.”

“Yeah, that makes sense,” I said, nodding. “Come on in.”

“So, what is there to do here?” Sam asked, walking inside of my house. “Oh, hi Grace.”

“Hey,” Grace said, waving. She stood up from looking at her phone and walked over to greet everyone. “I had to do this to give Katie some girl time.”

“I already have plenty of girl time,” I said, crossing my arms. “I go to an all girls school.”

“Yeah, but now that you are a girl, we need to give you the full girl experience,“ Grace said. “Come on, let’s go up to your room.”

***

“Ooh, what is this?” Sam said, looking inside my open closet. Most of my male clothes had been moved to a spare room, leaving it mostly full of dresses, skirts, and blouses.

“My clothes, why?” I asked, taking a peek inside the closet.

“No, no, this,” Sam said, pointing at an Ouija board hanging out in the corner of the closet. “What do you need this for?”

“Oh, I bought it in middle school because I thought it was cool,” I said, taking it out of the closet and wiping the dust off of it. “Nothing happened though, it’s fake.”

“I’m sure it works,” Liz said, snatching it out of my hand. She took it out of the box and looked at it. “I should ask it a question.”

“Go on ahead,” Grace said.

“Oh, Ouija board, is Lauren dumb?” Liz asked. She then exaggeratedly moved the planchette to yes. “Wow, Lauren, even the spirits agree that you’re dumb.”

“Shut up, you obviously moved that on your own!” Lauren said, playfully shoving Liz. Liz just laughed, clearly finding the entire situation hilarious.

“Dear spirits, is this house haunted?” I asked. I then, as subtly as possible, tried to move the planchette to yes. I tried to sound as terrified as possible.“That actually moved on its own, what the hell?”

“Oh my God,” Grace said, subtly winking at me to show she was in on the joke. “It’s actually real.”

“Woah,” Sam said, looking spooked. “I didn’t think this actually worked.”

“It does, I think,” I said, acting scared.

“There’s no way that’s real,” Liz said, crossing her arms. “This place is not haunted.”

Suddenly, the door to my room creaked open. Liz jumped a little, clearly scared. Lauren and Sam screamed and Grace stared at the door with wide eyes. My mom walked into the room, furrowing her eyebrows. “Am I that scary?” she asked.

“Oh my God,” Lauren said, laughing. “I actually thought there was a monster or something.”

“I was scared,” Sam wailed.

“Are you all playing with the Ouija board?” she asked. “It’s a waste of time, I wouldn’t recommend playing with it. Anyways, I was going to ask if any of you were hungry.”

“I’m full,” I said, laying down on the floor and stretching. “Some Oreos would be nice though.”

“Sure, I’ll bring some of that up,” she said.

“Okay,” I said, getting back up. “What should we do then?”

“First off, I hate this board,” Liz said, packing it back into its box and throwing it into the closet. “Let’s do something more fun.”

“How about truth or dare,” Grace said, sitting down. “Come on, get in a circle.”

“Okay, you go first then, Grace,” Lauren said, as the other girls and I sat down.

“Umm, fine, I choose truth,” she said.

“What was the last relationship you had and how did it end?” Liz asked.

“I had a girlfriend, and it ended because I messed things up,” Grace said, idly looking at her nails. “Little sad, but things happen.”

“You had a girlfriend?” Lauren asked, raising an eyebrow. “I’m surprised you’re not more broken up about it.”

“Life is tough,” Grace said, shrugging. “Unfortunate that it happened, but whatever.”

“Okay,” Sam said. “I’ll go next, give me your best dare!”

“How about I tickle you, and see how long you can go without laughing,” Grace said, smirking.

“Okay,” Sam said. “That’s an easy one.”

It turned out to not be an easy one. Sam ended up giggling like crazy after only a few seconds.

“You’re really cute when you do that, you know,” Grace said, laughing. “Good job though, you held on for a decent while.”

“T-Thanks,” Sam stuttered out, clearly embarrassed.

“I’ll go with truth,” I said, a little worried about what they would make me do if I chose to do a dare.

“Umm, what school did you go to before Rosewood?” Sam asked, tilting her head.

“Grandview,” I said. That was an easy question, I don’t know what more they expected.

“Wait, wait,” Lauren said. “I thought there were two guys there who got expelled for stealing panties.”

“Umm,” I said awkwardly. Crap, just when I thought I got away with an easy question.

“Was that you?” Liz asked, laughing. “You got expelled for stealing panties, so you became a girl. What a fitting punishment. Are you wearing them now?”

“Umm,” I said again awkwardly. I was, but that wasn’t something I wanted to particularly admit. “No.”

“She totally is,” Lauren said, sniggering. “Hey, at least you learned your lesson now. I doubt you’ll be doing that ever again.”

“I won’t,” I said, looking down at the ground in embarrassment. “I don’t know what was going through my mind then.”

“It’s okay, as long as you know what you did wrong,” Grace said, smiling at me. “Anyways, who’s next?”

“Me!” Lauren said, raising her hand. “Give me a good question for truth.”

“What’s the most embarrassing thing you ever did,” Liz said, an evil grin on her face.

“I don’t know,” Lauren said, blushing bright red. “Maybe that one time I asked a guy that I knew in real life out online and got rejected.”

“You asked a guy out online?” Liz asked, laughing hysterically. “First, you should wait for the guy to ask you out first. Secondly, if you’re going to ask him out, at least do it in person.”

“Shut up, I was scared,” Lauren said.

“Okay, Sam, you’re up last,” I said.

“I want a dare!” she said, sounding all excited.

“How about you pretend to be Liz for ten minutes,” I said, giggling at what Lauren’s reaction would be.

“Two of Liz?” Lauren asked, shaking a little.

“Lauren, Lauren, Lauren,” Sam said, laughing.

“What is it, second Liz?” Lauren asked.

“You’re ugly,” Sam said.

“That is not how I bully Lauren,” Liz said, sounding almost offended by Sam’s terrible impersonation of herself.

“I’ll try and improve,” Sam said, giggling.

“Okay, should we go for another round of truth or dare or do something else?” I asked.

“Something else,” Lauren said. “Truth or dare gets more boring the more you play it.”

***

“Would you rather, ugh what’s something Liz would say,” Sam asked, thinking. “Would you rather go to jail for a month or have to kiss Liz on the lips ten times, Lauren?”

“Ten times?” Lauren asked, balking at the suggestion. “Yeah, I’d rather go to jail for a month.”

“Is kissing me that bad?” Liz asked, crossing her arms. “I’m a rather good kisser, you know.”

“Sure,” Lauren said, rolling her eyes. “That is something I never want to find out myself.”

“Okay. Katie, would you rather show us your phone’s photo album or show us your phone’s photo album?” Grace asked, laughing with a hand over her mouth.

“Those are not fair options,” I said, crossing my arms. “But if you really want to see, go look. I don’t have anything to hide.”

“Ooh,” Lauren said, taking my unlocked phone from my hand. She was scrolling for a few seconds, the other girls all behind her, when she stopped. “You have a lot of selfies recently, Katie.”

“I like taking them when I feel cute,” I said, shrugging. “I don’t see the issue here.”

“Wait, this is what you used to look like Katie?” Sam asked, her mouth agape. “No way.”

“Wow,” Liz said, gasping. “I can’t believe this dirty-looking guy ended up becoming our cute and proper Katie.”

“Who’s this guy?” Lauren asked, showing me my phone. “He looks ugly.”

“Umm, that used to be my friend, Jack,” I said. “He is not the best, and I’m trying to forget about him.”

“Oh, okay,” Lauren said. “Oh hey look, is that you and Matthew in middle school?”

“I guess so, I said, taking the phone in my hand. I smiled a bit, a wave of nostalgia crashing over me as I saw my old self. ”That’s when we were close, yeah.”

“Who’s the third person?” Liz asked, pointing at Grace.

“That’s me, surprise,” Grace said, giving some jazz hands. “Yeah, I’m also trans.”

“Oh, cool,” Liz said. “You look a lot prettier now, by the way.”

“Thanks,” Grace responded, smiling brightly. “I do my best.”

“I think that’s about it,” Lauren said, scrolling to the top. “I’m a little disappointed there wasn’t more though. I thought there would be something juicy.”

“Nope, sorry,” I said, shrugging. “I just keep photos of myself and my friends, not much more than that. Hand me my phone back, please.”

I took back my phone, putting it next to me on the floor. For all the love I had for my new dresses and skirts, it was annoying that they had no pockets for the most part.

***

We ended up doing a few more staples of the slumber party experience, such as giving each other makeovers, doing nails, and watching a horror movie. Time went by so fast that I didn’t even notice that it was getting late.

“Kids, you should probably go to sleep now,” my Mom said, walking into the room and leaning on the doorframe. “Tomorrow is a school day. Not for you Grace, but it is for the rest of the girls.”

“It’s not too late,” I said, rolling my eyes. I picked up my phone to look at the time. “It’s only, oh. It’s 11:30.”

“I told you,” Mom said. “I’ll set up some bedding in the living room so you all have somewhere to sleep, and then you all get some good rest, okay?”

***

“First one to sleep is lame,” Lauren said, yawning. We had all lied down now, and I was honestly pretty tired.

“I’m sleepy though,” I whined. “I’m going to sleep.”

“Lameee,” Lauren said, giggling. “Fine, I’m pretty tired too. I guess we’ll just go to sleep.”

I snuggled in to sleep in my blanket. I smiled, recounting everything that happened in the past few weeks. Something I had once hated had come to be the best change in my life. I slowly drifted off to sleep, looking forward to what the next day would bring.