Being You

Chapter 7

When lunch came around, Jeremy searched around for his sister. Now that he didn't have to keep up a sociable facade with that pack of bitches Ella had called 'friends', he was going to hang out with someone he could actually stand to be around. He checked his phone, but there was no message from her. He quickly sent her a text:

1:03pm

Where are you?

He continued his search, scouring the playground, the library, even the smokers' den behind the science block. Nothing. Then it finally came to him: the only place one could find peace and quiet was in the boy's bathrooms.

The least used bathroom would have to be the one near the woodwork classrooms, Jeremy concluded. He quickly checked the hallways for witnesses before darting into the boy's bathroom, pleated skirt swishing after him in a manner that still felt unnatural. He shook off his discomfort and stepped around the corner, finding a closed cubicle. As he expected, his own worn black lace-ups rested on the floor, visible beneath the door.

"Ella, I know you're in there," he said softly. "Open up."

The latch clicked and the door opened slowly with a whining creak. Ella was sitting on the closed toilet lid, her gaze flat and absent.

"Ella? What's going on? What're you thinking?" Jeremy urgently felt the need to break through this invisible wall that she had put up.

"Um..." Ella seemed slow and ponderous, dramatically different to usual. The hairs on Jeremy's arms prickled as goosebumps spread across his skin. "I have a dick," she said finally. "That's pretty fucking weird."

"Tell me about it." Jeremy tried to keep her talking, anything to keep her out of this terrifying stupor.

"It's not just weird. It's insane. Impossible." She shook her head, eyes glazed and directed over his shoulder at something only she could see. "I don't want it."

"I know how you feel Ella—"

"No," she said suddenly, her eyes wide and glaring at him, drawing out the single syllable. "You don't. You don't feel absolute revulsion at every aspect of the body you're in, do you? You don't feel threatened by the very fact that you're a male, do you?"

Jeremy didn't get it, not one bit. "Help me out here, Ella. Why do you hate being a guy so much?"

He would never forget the look she gave him at that moment, a look of total disgust and disbelief at his utter inability to comprehend her situation. He swallowed, feeling tears rise in his eyes at the sudden wave of hurt that assailed him, but he tore himself away from the emotion. No way, she's upset, and I need to be here for her.

"I have to see this freaky penis every time I need to pee. Every time I see myself naked. I can hardly bear to change my clothes, Jer. How do you do it so easily?"

He winced. "Surely it's not that bad?" he asked weakly.

Ella chuckled mirthlessly, clutching her face in her hands. "It's awful. There are no words for how awful it is."

"Do you have, like..." Jeremy hesitated, "...I dunno, a phobia or something?"

Ella let out a small cry and started to dig into her skin with her nails. Jeremy clutched her wrists desperately in an attempt to stop her from hurting herself. "I don't—I don't know!" she wailed, voice breaking. Her fingers were shaking and her eyes were wide with fear and confusion.

"Sorry, sorry, bad question!" Jeremy sighed heavily and closed his eyes almost as in prayer. Please, Ella. Please be okay.

. . .

When Jeremy didn't hear Ella hop punctually into the shower at six-thirty the next Monday, he knew something was wrong.

He knocked softly on his bedroom door, careful not to wake their parents, and entered the room."Hey, El?"

There was no response.

"Come on, El. School today, remember? We even have biology together. Up you get."

Still nothing. He strode to her bedside and sat on the floor, peering up at her face in the dim, almost wintry light. Her eyes were open, but he wasn't sure she was really awake. And if she was awake he wasn't sure that she was aware.

"Say something, El. I want to help you."

Ella made no sound. Jeremy was unnerved to see her so expressionless, even though he found her face harder to read when it wasn't on her natural body. Still, he didn't recognise the utter emptiness in her eyes, the defeated slump in her lips. This wasn't Ella.

Uneasy, Jeremy started to speak again. "I—"

Ella broke in so quietly that he couldn't hear her at all.

"What did you say?" he prompted, cocking his head to bring his ear closer to her barely moving lips.

"It's not a dream, is it?" came her whisper.

Jeremy shook his head slowly. "No. I don't think so." He answered almost to confirm it to himself; he was fairly sure Ella was practically speaking to herself, hardly aware that he was present.

"I thought... that if I went along with it... then I'd wake up. Or something."

Jeremy swallowed painfully. He couldn't speak.

"But it goes on, and on, and on," she mused, voice hoarse and broken. Her eyes were glassy.

"El, you're freaking me out," Jeremy said, on the verge of tears. He had never been more afraid for someone in his life before.

"Oh, it's nearly seven." Jeremy blinked in confusion as Ella briskly pushed herself out of bed, grabbed a shirt and a pair of pants, and breezed past him to go shower. He sat, frozen, replaying her change of expression in his head, unable to understand how her mood had flipped so quickly. There is something seriously wrong with her, he realised, covering his mouth with his hands in horror.