Part of what compels me about Transmasc Xue Yang is that he might not even realize that’s what’s going on. This is the man who spent literal years convinced that his cottagecore found family setup with Xiao Xingchen was purely a revenge plot. Transmasc Xue Yang has been presenting as a guy and using male forms of address since childhood, and it doesn’t even occur to him to switch back, and when he does think about presenting as a girl it makes him profoundly uncomfortable, but that just means he’s street smart! Guys have more freedom of movement and people are less likely to mess with them on the street! Everyone would want to be a guy, obviously!
“Hey, how come you’re always being a girl?” Xue Yang asks A-Qing.
“Because I am a girl? What the fuck else would I be doing?” A-Qing says indignantly. “What’s wrong with being a girl? Are you making fun of me?”
And Xue Yang, to his great dismay, must now do some introspection.
