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Image Credits: Title Picture purchased and licensed for publishing from

123rf.com. The model in this image in no way supports nor conveys the issues and situations brought up within the story. The models use within this work is solely for the representation of looks of the main character of this particular story. ~Sephrena

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*Before…

“Oh awesome that’s a good one. So how do we get something to eat?”
“Room service?”
“Okay…whose room?”
“Mine?”
“………………Mmm…okay…”
Oh my gawd I’m going to his room, to his hotel room and…I mean…of wow…I mean…nothing’s gonna happen but why and I so squee over it…!?”
And Natasha’s chuckling and she’s staring at me with that oh snap girl look and I can feel all the blood rushing to my face.
Then Alex offers me his hand again. “Coming?”
I nod like a bobble-head and take his hand and shoot Natasha a look because she’s giggling at the easy to find innuendo.
And Alex is red too as we leave.
Oh my god he caught it too.
Shoot me?

*And Now…

I sort of stumble over my feet as we leave and Alex stops and he looks at me. “You okay?”

“Yeah, I’m just…really, really embarrassed.”

“Yeah, that was…”

I almost cringe. Bad? Was it bad?

“Bad?”

“Well naughty but it was like really assuming stuff.”

“Assuming…yeah I guess that it was right?”

He nods. “I don’t…I mean I’ve never…Jade...”

“Yes Alex?” Oh God, Oh Goddess…

“You’re my first date.”

Blink, blink…Oh…

“Well you’re mine too…I mean this is a date?”

He gives me this sheepish look. “Kind of sort of?”

I nod. I’m nodding because part of me is so confused. I mean we’re actually kind of sort of on a date. One I kind of sort of invited myself to and yet we’re kind of sort of just hanging out.

And while part of me is all happy-yay-squee that we’re on a date, part of me is very…..oh. and it’s oh because he said kinda sort of.

Why can’t I have a normal functioning brain?

I give him a small smile and he blushes and he gives me one back and we keep going and we head to his room and as messed up as I’m feeling about this boy that’s with me in this whole kind of sort of date we’re still holding hands.

Are all boys confusing?

I really, really like him a lot.

Alex gets to our floor and we stop at his room and we let go of each other’s hand while he uses his key card and he looks at me and smiles.

“Hey, we shouldn’t be that embarrassed right? She’s a dwarf and they say all sorts of off colored stuff all the time.”

I smile at that because it’s kind of true in a trope like kind of way and stuff. And he’s trying to break the ice and stuff from the kind of.

“Yeah, I’m sure she was joking and stuff but I guess like if you believe the rumors people do hook up at these things.”

He opens the door for me. “Well I’d say meet and maybe get together more than actually hooking up. I think that that’s a geek-urban-legend that goes around and stuff so we look cool and stuff.”

I nod and go inside. “Yeah? And If Donna was knocking on your door this hour of the morning?”

“I’d hide.”

“No…I mean not knowing what she is actually like.”

He blushes pretty red. “I’m…I’ve never…so I’d probably still hide.”

“Really!?”

Okay now he’s being sincere and embarrassed and cute as all get out and stuff. I feel better…and maybe something about him never but also that he wouldn’t…not with her and that seems to be making me feel better.

Wow…I’m kind of a bitch.

I never knew I could be like this.

Oddly okay with it too.

Oh I know, I know we’re supposed to be sisters and not be all like that with the cattiness and the ways that we get sometimes but hey she’s the one that’s acting in the worst light when it comes to how some people see women and she scratched me and she whacked me in the eye with the scroll case and the way she just tossed aside Alex’s feelings…grrr.

So…yeah maybe I’m being all stereotypical teen girl about it and everything.

And as bad as it is to think it it’s still this little mental kind of “see” you are a girl.

“Jade?”

Oh Derp I spaced.

“Sorry I was just spaced out there for a second.”

“Okay, cool…can I ask?”

“Just some Donna-Grr’s.” I look at him and he’s looking at me his head all tilted and stuff and he’s got that thank you sort of look in his eyes.

Yay…wow I mean it’s just to have someone look at you…while you’re being you with that look and stuff is just wow.

It feels good.

And y’know there are times when feeling good about yourself, your real self without the accompanying guilt and stuff that goes with it sometimes it’s almost like medicine.

“Shouldn’t I be the one with the Donna-Grr’s?”

I hold up my hand with the scratch. “Plus I don’t like the way that she treats people.”

He nods. “Yeah…I really thought that she was into coming with me.”

“Why? I mean she sounds like she really didn’t give you the time of day usually.”

“Well I’ve been crushing on her for most of my life really, she was the girl next door and we were close right up to middle school and stuff. Then it was like a month or so ago I was getting stuff together for my trip and she comes over and started hanging out at my locker and sometimes in the caf where like people could see us and stuff. I thought that she had maybe got over whatever had gotten into her but that really wasn’t the case….”

I nod but turn around and take him by his hand and pull him into his room now that he’s just hit himself with a bunch of Donna-funk.

“Some people are like that Alex they just do for them and they look around to see who’s going to best give then what they want and then they’ll use someone else. It sucks but I see it all the time home.”

“That’s just so…”

I nod. “I have this theory that the really pretty people, the ones that seem to be born with it all either go a few ways. They either get so exposed to people saying stuff and acting all friendly and maybe even too friendly and they become introverts. Then there’s the girls that get all of that and they take a lot of that getting hit on and sucked up to by fake people and they rebel against it in a counter culture way and act like nice people…and then there’s the one’s that revel in it, they get so much of it and so much attention and stuff that it warps them. They love and need the attention and they need the power and the control and they like to use their looks to use people.”

Alex looks at me. “Wow…that sounds like they’re sociopaths.”

“Dude, they made the movie Heathers for a reason. The whole fact that there are movies like Mean girls and they’re really not far off from reality says a lot too.”

“Well I’m just glad that you’re in group two of that then.”

I…oh wow…oh blush.

“Alex I’m not…I mean…” I’m so flustered and I’m in his room and almost sitting on his bed.

And it’d be like he was really trying to be one of the guys that uses a line on a girl but the fact that he’s blushing pretty hard and stuff has me thinking that it was just something that he had just said because he’s Alex and he’s just that kind of guy.

Which actually just makes it all the more amazing.

We even just sit there a few seconds in awkward blushy silence until I see the model kits.

High end Gundam models.

Macross and Gundam are pretty much the mecha franchises when it comes down to it that are like not silly and stuff. Both pretty much were before my time but still really classic stuff. Well except for Gundam which has gotten a few incarnations of the kiddified version markets…bleech…just garbage.

“Cool you’re into the whole Mecha thing?”

“Some, most of those are actually buys for the guys in my gaming group that couldn’t make it to the Con.”

“Oh well that’s like really cool of you.” It actually is I did a whole lot of everything to save up my cash for this myself.

Alex shrugs and smiles a little easier. “Well they actually gave me cash to pick everything up and stuff.”

“But how are you going to get all of this back?” I’m not just looking at the models but there’s a lot of other stuff there too.

“It should all fit in the van.”

“Wait…you drove here?”

“I…uhm yeah I don’t live too, too far away and it’s a lot easier to get stuff that I wanted to get while I was here and stuff.”

“Did you drive Donna?”

“No, actually she has her own car. I did offer though.”

Yeah, maybe she brought her own wheels so she had a ride in case she was going to trade up and ditch him.

Easy…easy…that’s not the way you should be thinking Jade.

And I’m me and I’m weird so there’s this thought of me, and Whately me and the whole good version and bad version and “Shoulder Angels.”

And I’m snerking and have to hand to mouth myself.

And Alex is looking at me like I’m crazy.

“Sorry I made myself laugh.”

“About?”

“Well….”

He grins. “C’mon tell me.”

“Okay I was having one of those moments where you sort of talk to yourself and one part’s good and the other part’s bad and it like in cartoons and stuff. Well those stories Natasha and I were talking about has this whole thing where the Jade character there comes up with shoulder angels and stuff and it was just pop-culture meets me brain and geek reference and then I’m laughing and snerking.”

“Snerk? What’s a snerk?”

“It’s like a snick instead of a laugh with a short snort.”

“Wow…”

“What…..?” Okay and cue more self-conscious blushing.

“You.”

“Me?...Me what?”

“You’re charming…”

“I’m what?”

“You’re charming…and I mean it. I don’t think that I’ve met a woman before that was like actually charming.”

“I…I am not…I mean I’m not….”

“Not in a bad way…not like prince charming and stuff but way more like….”

“Like?”

“You ever read Tamora Pierce?”

I nod, I love those books and Alanna the others.

“You’re like Alanna mixed with Daine.”

Super blush.

I love Alanna because she was sort of like me in reverse, she dressed as a boy to become the first lady knight in here realm and she’s just awesome on so many levels but Daine, she’s so sweet and she’s so heartful and down to earth…

And Alex is smiling at me with that casual sweet boy smile that he doesn’t seen that he knows he has…

And he thinks that I’m charming.

I can’t help but to kinda hug myself a little and sit on the bed but like all in a good way.

“Alex…”

“Yes Jade?”

“Thanks.”

“What for?”

“All of this. This has probably been the best night that I’ve ever had in my whole life.”

“Me too.”

Okay that makes me smile and I sort of relax and he grabs a seat on the other side of his bed and grabs the remote.

The room service stuff is through the remote and on the hotels TV network thingy.

It’s pay-per-food.

I make myself laugh and snerk again.

I’m such a dork.

“Pizza?” He asks.

“Does a hotel make good pizza?” I look at him kinda dubious. Then again I’m not really sure that I’ve even had good pizza. There’s not a lot of amazing pizza in Greenwood, Nova Scotia.

Actually you don’t period we have a pair of home grown shops with Mimie’s being better than Valley Pizza or to me it is and the rest are like chain places though some aren’t strictly in Greenwood but Kingston and stuff and the rest is just fast food and stuff.

But chain pizza hone is gross…Greco does this soft doughy crust that is a good ninety percent cooked and the sauce is pretty much thinned out tomato soup barely put on. And Pizza Delight I don’t like because they’re really expensive and they are really skinflinty with their toppings. Though I will say I do like the lasagne.

Okay…okay the fact that you can order think or thick crust as an option is pretty awesome and makes me feel okay with what we’ve ordered.

Thin crust twelve inch pizza with double sauce, double pepperoni, sausage and double cheese. It’s sinful and it’s likely going to be greasy and stuff since we really didn’t order stuff like veg on it just thin crust, sauce, cheese and Italian sausage and pepperoni.

Alex is grinning at me again.

“What?”

He shakes his head but not in a bad way but like bemused… “You…you’re so different and stuff from all the girls I know.”

“Like how?”

“I don’t know just all the girls I know aren’t that much into the geeky stuff so much and even the ones that do are like so into like eating healthy.”

“Pfft…sometimes and we do gotta watch what we eat sometimes but trust me a lot of teenage girl eating is done when there’s no one…no guys watching us actually be pigs.”

“Really?”

I give him the eyebrow. “Other that Demon-Donna how many girls do you know?”

“I uhm…a few.”

I laugh a little. “Look I might be the way I was born but I’m still a girl and we stuff our faces and do all sorts of just regular stuff too it’s just there’s this whole social expectation for a lot of us not to be like that.”

“Like what?”

“Y’know be polite, don’t get mad, be pretty and dainty and look this way or that way and stuff like that when really under all the society stuff we’re not that different than guys in a lot of ways it’s just society kind made up a lot of these rules that aren’t rules and we go along with them or at least in public.”

“Sounds messed up.”

I nod. “It is, that’s part of the whole feminist thing y’know. It’s rebelling against the box that we’re put in and trying to be equal and stuff. It’s a lot more complicated and stuff and a lot of it gets all turned around and bent by people and stuff but it’s just that there are these gender roles that guys and girls all sort of have in like a general way that we kind of adhere to unless you takes like steps way away from that.”

“You know a lot about this stuff.”

“I have to, I’m a girl but I’m a transgirl so there’s a whole other bunch of crap that goes with my shoebox and if I didn’t learn it…”

“Bad?”

“Yeah on both sides there’s the guys and bigots that don’t like people like me and then there’s women that don’t like people like me and stuff like that.”

“But you’re just trying to be yourself.”

I sigh and nod. “Yep, and that’s the thing we’re all just trying to be ourselves and we’re all kind of told what to do both guys and girls and stuff. So when we’re alone or home or with like our really close friends the fake stuff we show to the rest of people kinda gets dropped and we act pretty much the same.”

“So the whole girls eating all dainty and stuff stereotype thing is…”

“One that we keep to pretty much unless we don’t have to. You see a girl eating just little bird amounts it’s usually in public, or she’s scared to put on weight…and that’s because we’re told all the time to look a certain way…and sometimes that’s an eating disorder thing, sometimes it’s because she’s dating a jerk and sometimes it’s because she ate before she went out so she could keep up the image.”

“But…it’s just eating, everyone eats.”

I nod grinning. “And everyone farts and grows body hair and all those other things but we all put of our faces and stuff.”

“Okay…you’re complicated and charming.”

I blink…. “Uhm is complicated a good or a bad thing?”

“It’s a good thing I mean you’re so definitely a girl and stuff being into all the feminism stuff and that. It’s like you’re really emotionally invested and stuff.”

I nod. “It’s more than that it’s stuff I need because I’m a transgirl and more than likely when I start to really transition I’ll have to defend myself a lot and the way I act and the choices that I make it all goes under scrutiny unless I pass and can go stealth and have people not know and stuff.”

“Is it really that bad?”

I nod a few times. “Well just too really start treatment I have to talk to a mental health specialist and stuff to actually get permission to transition and stuff not to mention like I said before people.”

“Wow…that…that sucks.”

I was going to nod again but Alex does something that surprises me and he slides over on the bed more and he gives me this really big hug.

“I believe in you Jade, you’re the only version of you that I’ve met and you’re probably the most real girl I’ve ever known.”

I…It…all of it the stuff I was just talking about and trying to explain and the frustration I have from trying to even be me online sometimes and running into or seeing so much hate and the fears I have of all the bullshit that’s going to come at me from the stuff I have to face in the future and this unexpected and unasked for acceptance and sweetness.

It all starts to hit me and I’m starting to sniffle and then I’m starting to cry.