Warm-up Fuck-up
Hi! This is a little blurb I wrote as a warm-up and I really like it. So, here. You can have it. I might continue it for fun, but the stuff I post here will be mostly unedited. So, don't hurt me. I'm thinking I might make it like Animorphs, but like ... with trans kids. And only four people. And only one guy.
“Hey! Are you coming to the party?”
I laughed as Dani draped an arm over my shoulders, coming up behind me. I turned to kiss their cheek and embraced them with the arm closest to them.
“What party?”
They scoffed. “Ppphhbf! Are you serious? You haven’t heard?”
I shook my head, my hair swishing over my shoulder. “Nuh-uh, baby, I’ve been too busy scooping ice cream out of a two-liter bucket and watching Bridget Jones’ Diary to talk to anyone.”
“Oh.” Dani frowned, their eyes softening as they looked me up and down. “Did you and your girlfriend…?”
“Oh, no, no, we’re fine.” I laugh loudly, throwing my head back as I look up at the evening sky. Colours of orange and pink had started mixing together, making me think of a strawberry daiquiri. It was the first drink I had ever bought for myself on my eighteenth birthday. “I’m just clinically depressed, don’t worry.”
Dani snorted. “Oh, god, same. Anyway, the party’s at Sophi’s place. It’s not really a party, so much as, like, three people eating a whole cake. Four, if you come. Anna will be there too.”
“Booze?”
“No booze.” Dani shook their head. “It’s a party for Sophi. He’s been sober for two months, and Anna bought a cake. It says, ‘Wow, you’re as dry as your cooch!’” We both burst out laughing, a grin spreading so far across my face, I felt it pulling at the muscles in my cheeks. I reveled in the way it hurt a little, like my face was doing something it wasn’t used to anymore. It was the fifth time this month that I had laughed so loud and so hard. Somehow, that knowledge made it a little easier to breathe.
I would have to mark that down in my journal.
Dani and I have been friends sinced I moved to Toronto. They were the first person I came out to, the first person who knew I was a woman. They were the first person in my adult life to make me feel safe, and they introduced me to other people who made me feel safe. Then, I met people that I could help feel the same way. Anna was the latter. She was a budding demigirl, straight out of the cisdom, and growing on me like a sister. Sophi, I met in college, in a program we both dropped out of due to transphobia from the other students, and it wasn’t getting addressed by the faculty. It was a story as old as time.
This was my chosen family, one I would never let go. Little did we know that tonight, we would find chaos that would just bring us closer together.



















