gayannabeth

  Self-denial and internalised transphobia

  [colpse]

  After a couple hours of doing nothing ter, I started heading over to the student centre. The sky was overcast, and it seemed like it would probably end up raining sooner or ter. Preferably ter, once I was home. I liked the rain, but I preferred not to be in it. It was rexing to stay inside, maybe with a cup of hot chocote, and watch a comfort movie while it rained. The sound was soothing.

  It wasn’t hard spotting Liv and her friends — I just looked for a group of pretty girls with colourful hair. I spotted them hanging out by the base of one of the staircases.

  “Hey,” I said to Liv, walking right up next to her.

  “Lilly!” She excimed. “You came!”

  I looked around and the other girls. I recognised Hazel, of course. She was standing there smirking at me. When she saw me looking, she gave me a wink that involved her entire face spasming up.

  “Uh, yeah, of course I did. Why wouldn’t I?” I asked. “Um, are you gonna introduce me to everyone?” I asked.

  “Oh! Right!” Liv said. “Um, you already know Hazel.” She gestured to Hazel, who gave me a wave, wiggling her fingers. “The other two purple haired girls are Cra-” she pointed at the shy looking one, who gave me a smile, “-and Venny-” she pointed at the other purple haired girl, who was wearing a tank top and fishnets.

  Venny pointed finger guns at me. “Nice to meet ya, cutie,” she said loudly.

  “Um, nice to meet you too,” I replied.

  Liv pointed to the final girl in the group with colourful hair — pink on one side, blue on the other. “That’s Quinn. Or Girl Quinn, I guess. There’s a Boy Quinn who shows up to these meetings too.” Quinn held up her fingers in a v, giving me a toothy grin. “That tall blonde is Iris.”

  Iris looked up from her phone, giving Liv a startled look, like she hadn’t been paying attention or something. She was wearing a headband with a pair of white horns attached, except the headband must’ve been transparent or something, because I couldn’t see it.

  “And finally, that girl in the hoodie is Sophie. Seriously, Soph, it’s wayyyy to warm out for hoodies!”

  Sophie shrugged. “It’s cosy.” She turned to me, pointing a finger in my direction. “She’s wearing a hoodie too!”

  Indeed I was. I was actually getting a bit sweaty, and I decided I should probably take it off. It was colder that morning. Goddess, weather got freaky nowadays. I tied it around my waist, then looked up to find Quinn and Venny staring. “What?” I asked.

  “Big boobas…” Quinn said. I realised she wasn’t just staring at me. Specifically, she was looking at my tits. That made me feel a bit self-conscious, but also… strangely proud? Like… Yeah! I have titties!

  Venny snorted. “Quinny, just because they’re bigger than yours does not mean they’re ‘big bonkers’.”

  To be fair to Venny, her tits were definitely the biggest there. Goddess, her back must hurt carrying those jugs around everywhere.

  “Hey!” Quinn said. “They’re still growing. Give them time. And more burgers.”

  Did burgers help with growing boobs or something? Before I could ask, Iris spoke up. “Meeting’s starting soon.”

  We all started heading up the stairs. Hazel leaned over to Quinn to whisper something in the other girl’s ear. Quinn nodded in response.

  There were already a few people waiting when we got to the meeting. There was a skinny dark-skinned boy lounging on a folding chair next to an older… person of indeterminate gender. There was another guy, big and hairy, sitting sideways in an armchair. There was a group of people standing next to a table with some snacks.

  Our group took over a pair of couches near the door. It was a bit of a squeeze with eight of us, but that was solved by Quinn sitting on Hazel’s p, and Iris sitting on one of the armrests. I ended up sandwiched between Liv and Cra, who gave me a shy smile. I noticed her eyebrows were the same purple as her hair. I thought it was kinda cool how she’d dyed those too.

  “Alright, is that everyone here?” The older person said. They looked around. “Looks like it. And we have someone new! You all know what that means, we’re gonna introduce ourselves to them, alright? I’ll go first. I’m Gina, they/them pronouns, and I teach theatre here at York.” They gestured to the boy next to them.

  He looked around before spotting me. “Hi, I’m Quinn, or, uh, Boy Quinn, I guess. I use he/they pronouns. I’m from Thunder Bay, and I’m studying astronomy.”

  Next, the hairy guy on the armchair gnced over. “I’m Matt. He/him. I’m in my final year of civil engineering. I’m from right here in Toronto!”

  The group by the snack table then all introduced themselves. Jonah (they/he), Kyle (he/him), Patricia (she/her), and Ralph (he/him).

  Finally, our group was up to introduce ourselves.

  Iris started. “I’m Iris, she/her. I’m from Vaughan, and I’m in the creative writing program.”

  Venny was next. “Venny! They/she, I’m in the music program, and I’m in a band too! Uh, my bandmates are also trans, but they go to UofT or TMU. I can definitely introduce you to them sometime.”

  Sophie sat up a bit straighter from where she was slouched between Venny and Hazel (plus Girl Quinn on Hazel’s p). “I’m Sophie. She/her only please. I’m trying to become a teacher. I also do a lot of volunteer work.” With her piece said, she slouched back into the couch and snuggled into Venny’s side. Were those two together or something?

  Quinn was up next. “I’m Girl Quinn, they/she/it pronouns. I-”

  “Hang on,” I interrupted. I pointed at Venny. “What’s the difference between She/they and they/she?” I turned back to Quinn. “Also, it?”

  Quinn nodded. “Yeah, it/its. Also, the order is typically, like, a way to show which is more preferred. Both Venny and I prefer they/them over she/her.”

  “Oh,” I said. “That’s cool, I guess.” A part of me wasn’t sure why anyone would be ok with being called ‘it’, but I wasn’t going to argue with Quinn if that’s what, well, it wanted.

  Quinn gave me a thumbs up. “Anyway, as I was saying, I’m from London, and I’m studying physics!”

  Hazel kissed Quinn’s cheek before speaking. “Right! I’m Hazel, I’m in computer science in my final year. I use any pronouns, but that’s only for close friends. Any other trans person I’ll accept she/her or they/them, and for cis people, only she/her.”

  “Any pronouns?” I asked.

  “Oh yeah,” Hazel said. She did her spasmy wink at me again. “You can use any pronouns you want with me if you want, by the way.”

  “Oh, um…” I trailed off. I resolved to only use she/her for her, since I was only pretending to be a trans girl and was actually just a cis guy.

  Cra spoke up. “I’m Cra, I use she/her. I’m studying geography.” She turned to me, and I realised it was my turn to speak.

  “Hi everyone,” I said. “Um, I’m Lillith. Lilly for short. She/they for pronouns. I haven’t, uh, decred a major yet.” It was the embarrassing truth; I’d only just started university, having lived at home for the first few years following high school. I’d applied to York, expecting myself to have decided on a major by the time csses started up, but I still hadn’t. I had no clue what I wanted to do with my life. Rachel, on the other hand, had been pushed straight into York’s business program by her parents. I knew for a fact that she hated it.

  Liv, thankfully, broke through my awkwardness. “Well, you already know me, but, I’m Olivia, Liv to my friends. She/her. I’m also in computer science with Hazel.”

  “I didn’t know you were in comp sci,” I said.

  “Well, now you do,” she said.

  “So!” The one girl not in our group, Patricia, said. “Lillith, I have a question: what’s your magic?”

  “W-What?” I said. Magic?! How the hell did she know?!?!

  “Oh, yeah,” Venny said. “Magical transition. All of us have gotten one, ‘cept Gina. My bandmates and I split a magic joint back in high school, then we all woke up the next morning as hot busty girls!” She jiggled her titanic titties to emphasize her point. “Caused a lot of stress for us, since we were so in denial, but it worked out in the end!”

  “Oh,” I said. All of them? Really?? “Uh, I guess, well, a friend of mine and I started pying this game, and as we’ve gotten further along, we, uh, started looking more and more like our characters.” It sounded crazy saying it out loud, but no one was looking at me like I was crazy.

  “Yeah, thought so,” Liv said. “I remember you made that joke about video games turning you into a girl. That plus how rapidly you’ve been changing and how obsessed you are with pying that new game of yours. Also, um, if you don’t mind me asking, whose this friend of yours and are you pnning on inviting them to this group sometime?”

  I thought back to Rachel’s reaction to me suggesting she might be trans. “Uh, I’ll invite her, yeah. Um, how did you, uh, magically transition then?” I asked, trying to change the topic away from Rachel.

  “I got an enchanted soda from a convenience store,” she said. “Also, as a side note, these magical transitions tend to leave you in your ideal form. Not always, but most do.”

  Cra sighed. “Yeah, uh, my hair is just stuck purple now.”

  I turned to her. “How did that happen?”

  She blushed and shook her head. “I, uh, I might tell you some other time.” She wouldn’t look me in the eyes, and her blush made me assume it was probably something super embarrassing. “I mean, I don’t mind my hair being purple, but it would be nice to be able to go back to my original colour sometime. Dye, uh, doesn’t really stay in my hair that well. Part of the magic.”

  “Why don’t we all tell Lilly how we magically transitioned, then,” Hazel said, smirking. "You don’t have to, but you can if you want. I’ll go next.” She giggled, and suddenly her hair changed colour, going from a vibrant pink to completely white. Two big fluffy ears grew on top of her head. She nudged Quinn off of her, and stood up, revealing a big fluffy white tail sticking out under her skirt. “I’m a foxgirl!” she excimed. “I touched this glowy statue thingie that I found, and it melted and turned me into this. I can also shift to a normal human form sometimes. The pink hair is dye by the way, although it disappears and reappears when I shift.” She sat back down on the couch, shifting her tail so she wasn’t sitting on it, and Quinn sat on her p again. “Quinn,” she said. “You next?”

  Quinn nodded. “Borger,” they said. “Magical borgers. They give me tits.” They did not eborate. Then again, what was there to eborate on? Magical burgers that give her boobs. Nothing complicated.

  “I’m a magical girl,” Sophie said quietly. “I found this bracelet, and when I put it on…” she gestured to her body. “Zap. Tits.”

  “Oh! Show her your transformation!” Venny shouted enthusiastically. “Show show show!”

  Sophie sighed, but stood up. She rolled up the sleeve on her hoodie, then twisted a purple bracelet she had on her wrist. The bracelet started glowing, which spread to the rest of her body. Suddenly, there was an explosion, and all of us were covered in purple glitter. When I could see again, I found that Sophie’s brown hair had changed to be light purple, and her casual outfit of a hoodie and shorts had been repced by a low cut top, a short skirt, leggings, and high heels, all purple. She sat back down, sighing. “And now there’s purple glitter everywhere.”

  Venny giggled happily.

  Iris was next. “I’m a demon,” she said simply. “I mean, I was born human, then an ancient demoness named Ariadne transformed me about a decade ago. And, before you ask, yes, the Ariadne, princess of Crete. She’s actually a demon trans girl. Funny how the myths never picked up that part."

  My eyes widened. “Wait wait wait! Does that mean the Greek gods are real too?”

  Iris shrugged. “Maybe? Would be funny, since I share a name with one of ‘em.” She smirked. “Wanna see my true form?”

  “Uhh… sure?” I said, a bit confused.

  She stood up, straightening out her jeans. Suddenly, where she was standing was a tall muscur purple woman, with rge curly white horns and a long, spade-tipped white tail. On her back was a big pair of leathery white bat wings. I could see fangs poking out of her mouth. Her hair was still blonde, but had grown longer to scale with her new height, which I estimated to be at least seven feet tall.

  I looked around, but no one seemed the least bit shocked that there was suddenly a seven foot tall purple-skinned demoness standing next to us. Of course they weren’t, this probably wasn’t the first time they’d seen Iris’ true form.

  After us, the other six people expined their own magical transitions. Matt was a werewolf (he couldn’t show us his transformation since it was far too close to the new moon), which expined how hairy he was. He said after his first full moon, he’d transformed back to human into the body he had now.

  Boy Quinn had apparently gotten some shapeshifting powers about a month before, and he showed off by changing his hair colour from bck to green and back.

  Patricia, it turned out, was a witch, and had brewed a potion for herself. Jonah had apparently been turned into a fae, simir to how Iris had been turned into a demon (apparently there was this whole thing where a bunch of fae would go around turning trans guys into fae and a bunch of demons would go around turning trans girls into demons). Kyle and Ralph were friends from high school, and both of them had gotten cursed by some jock wizard or something, but they’d been happy with their so-called ‘curse’ and decided to stay this way.

  After that, we started mingling. Iris and Sophie both transformed back into normal human forms — Sophie’s powered up form would be able to pass for normal human if it wasn’t for the subtle purple glow she gave off. Fortunately, transforming back did not create more purple glitter, although the existing purple glitter didn’t go away. Hazel decided to keep her ears and tail out. With a start, I realised she didn’t even have normal human ears anymore.

  Also Iris wasn’t fully human in appearance. Her horns were still there, and I realised now that the reason I couldn’t spot any headband was because there was no headband at all. The horns were just horns. She also kept her tail out, using it to wrap around Sophie’s leg while the two of them went over to grab some snacks together.

  “Want something?” Liv asked me. “Jacob baked cookies, and his cookies are fucking amazing, you should really try some.”

  She stood and held out a hand. I took it and she led me over to the cookies.

  “So… magic soda?” I said, trying to act as if my entire worldview hadn’t been shattered. Sure, magic was one thing, but I’d just found out that there were demons and fae and werewolves and possibly even gods.

  “Mhm,” she said. “It was a bit over a year ago, actually. It wasn’t anything special, to be honest. I bought a soda, drank it, and suddenly I had my ideal body. Wasn’t that much different to how I looked at the time, although there were some changes that definitely helped my mental health a lot, I’d already been on estrogen for a bit over a year, but I still got misgendered a lot.”

  “So, like, how does this all, uh, work?”

  “It’s called an affirmation enchantment. Patricia could probably expin it better than I, but basically, it’s an enchantment pced on something that, when activated, gives someone their ideal body. It does, of course, work on cis people, but their changes typically aren’t nearly as drastic. Sometimes they activate instantly, sometimes it makes changes more slowly. So, for example, your video game would have the enchantment attached to the executable file or something and linked to story progression or something. For a cis guy, they’d just… stay a guy. Only a trans girl like you or me would get such drastic changes.”

  Wait wait wait wait wait.

  WAIT

  My mind kept skipping, the obvious conclusion appearing, but then immediately falling apart. It didn’t make sense, it was impossible.

  I couldn’t… just be trans.

  And yet, somehow, the best conclusion I could get from Liv’s words was- No, it couldn’t be. There had to be some other expnation; there had to be some other enchantment being used. Yeah, that was right. It wasn’t this affirmation enchantment Liv was talking about, it was some other enchantment leading to the changes I was seeing.

  Why was I hearing cracking noises?

  “Liv, can I really… just be a girl?” I asked quietly, feeling more nervous than I ever had in my entire life.

  Liv gave me a soft look at the same time she handed me a cookie. “That is how it works. That’s it. You want to be a girl? Congratutions, Lilly, you are one. It’s that simple.”

  CRACK!

  gayannabeth