Fey

Feys Pronouns

"Uh, Ms. Lenai?" Basil asked, standing awkwardly in front of her desk as the last class of the day streamed out the door, chattering away.

"Mm?" She asked, turning to face him. "Oh, Basil. What do you need?"

Basil, having forgotten, began reading the notes scribbled on his hand. It wasn't there, so he checked his forearm, and then looked up a little sheepishly. "You emailed me and said you wanted to talk."

"Ah, yeah," she said, then looked at those remaining and announced to the mostly empty classroom, "Alright, go on home. You don't want to be here anymore than I want you here." The kids gathered their stuff and scampered out the door.

Basil stood there, shifting from foot to foot, fiddling with his arms and fingers, and for the first day, bracelets, hidden under his sweatshirt sleeves. He wasn't nervous, mostly because he was trying to pay attention to the world around him, which was a struggle.

He began counting desks, then pencils, then lab tables, then going through the periodic table in his head. Someone he had bumped into had had the entire thing memorized.

"So Basil," she said, sitting down in her chair and leaning back so she could look at him and not get a crick in her neck. "What's happening?" Ms. Lenai was blunt, but she honestly cared about her students. "Your grades are dropping, and you're going to be put in remedial lessons or summer school if you can't get it together."

"I'm sorry," he apologized, thankful that today he wasn't too dysphoric, even though he certainly didn't feel like a boy. "I've been distracted lately, and I think I have my feet under me again."

The chemistry teacher leaned back and appraised him openly, making him fidget all the more. "Are you sure you're okay?" she wanted to know. "I know your friend died..."

Basil looked down at his feet and mumbled, "He did. It's been rough," he managed to get out, reminding himself that the teacher knew some of what was going on, and he couldn't pretend everything was alright. "But my family's been helping out."

"Okay," she finally accepted his answer. "If you get your work in by the end of the week, you'll get full credit for it."

Basil nodded, and ducked his head. "Thank you so much! I really appreciate it. I'll get it all in," he promised, and after standing there for an awkward second picked up his bag and left, almost tripping on a desk.

He walked out into the hallway, and decided that since he had made arrangements for Marty to be taken care of, he would take some time to wander around.

So he slung his bag over both shoulders and began wandering around the third floor, because that way he could look out of the skylight.

So he began walking aimless laps, allowing his thoughts to wander as they wished, at least until he started thinking about Tim.

Basil instinctively shied away from the thoughts, but he couldn't stop thinking about the dead boy.

He sat in a classroom, looking down at the standardized test in front of him. Realizing that he had forgotten to steal some of his brother's school supplies (his mom had gotten pink for him so that she could tell her kids' stuff apart) he looked around and saw a girl with a plain gray mechanical pencil.

"Hey," Tim called. "Can I trade pencils?"

"Is it out of lead?" the girl -no, they could be a boy like me- asked, a little suspiciously.

"No," Tim said, a little shortly. "You can check if you want."

"I'm kinda attached to this one," the girl -no, kid- said, a little apologetically. "Sorry."