If everything goes according to plan today, I’ll have the perfect junior year.
I’m outside Mr. Harrison’s classroom at the beginning of lunch, the short side hallway an oasis of quiet in the hum and bustle of the school. Beside the closed door is a bulletin board, still displaying a poster advertising last year’s spring musical, an unintelligible tag graffitied next to it on the empty corkboard. On the white wall behind the bulletin board, a threefold racing stripe of the Jefferson High School colors begins, zipping down the length of the hall and around the corner, back toward the rest of the school like a highway of blue, green, and silver.
I’ve been imagining this moment all summer and planning everything that comes after, and now it’s here.
I take one, two, three deep breaths. Three, because odd numbers are just better; they’re symmetrical, with one in themiddle and an equal amount on either side. And they’re more memorable, in my opinion. If you gave me two reasons to do something, I’d be likewhat, only two?Two is a shrug. Three is convincing.
I do another set of three deep breaths, and one more after that. If I do sets, they have to be in threes too; that’s how it works. The repetition is calming, the breaths settling my body and mind. Mostly. All the deep breathing makes me a little lightheaded, so I put my hand on the wall to steady myself, and then I step forward and open the door.
Jayden, Makayla, and Anna are already there, dragging chairs into a circle for the first Queer Alliance meeting of the school year. The classroom is a visual riot, giant posters of famous actors, movie stills, and plays on every wall, the whiteboard covered in scribbles from Mr. Harrison’s theater lessons, three huge bookcases crammed to the gills along the back wall.
“Sidney!” Jayden shrieks when he sees me, face glowing with caffeinated excitement. He grew what seemed like a foot over the summer, and now we’re the same height, even though he claims he’s half an inch taller.
Anna puts a hand on my shoulder. “Good morning, Mx. President,” she says solemnly. Her eyeshadow today is blue blended seamlessly into lavender, bright against her very pale skin and matching her sweater, patterned in swirling shades of teal. If she were an animal, she’d be a butterfly—always dressed in bright colors, usually something she knitted herself. She’s trans, like me and Jayden, but unlike both of us, she’s known since she was a little kid. She’s been on estrogensince puberty, while Jayden just started testosterone last year. Me, I’m not sure what kind of medical transition I want, if any. Changing my pronouns was where I started, and for now, it’s where I’ve stayed.
“Don’t jinx it,” I say, setting my lunch down on a chair and my poster beside it. I hope the poster is enough to convince everyone of what I know to be true: I should be the new Queer Alliance president.
Makayla smiles at me sympathetically. Her light brown skin and black curly hair are a perfect match to Jayden’s, along with her wide nose, her high cheekbones, and, well, just about everything else. The only difference is Makayla’s shoulder-length hair, while Jayden’s is short and freshly faded. They’re identical twins, but their personalities are almost opposites: Jayden is a golden retriever in human form, while Makayla is more like a shy cat. She’s also our token cis person. “How are you feeling?” she asks.
“Ugh.” I make a face. “I just need to get this over with.”
“Don’t worry about it!” Jayden says. “I don’t think anyone else wants to be president.”
“I can’tnotworry,” I say as we sit. “I have anxiety. Worrying is my natural state.” I haven’t been officially diagnosed yet—I only realized it over the summer, thanks to a couple of videos Anna sent me, because she has anxiety too—but it fits. Well, mostly. But it’s the only thing that can explain my thoughts. Or rather, my mental horror movies. They’re anxiety daydreams that pop into my mind without warning and go from innocuous to terrifying in two seconds flat. Sometimes, the thoughts aren’t movies but an internalvoice, babbling about what could go wrong, telling me what I should do or say to make it stop.
Right now, they’re quiet, thanks to the sets of breaths I did before I came into the room. Next to me, Jayden is already halfway through a giant sandwich, Makayla is starting hers, and Anna is munching on an apple, and the rest of the club filters in, carrying their own lunch boxes or trays from the cafeteria. There are a few seniors, a clump of sophomores, and a ton of freshmen; that happens every year, though. Most of them will drop off after a few weeks, leaving the ones who really care.
A chorus of shrieks and laughter makes us all jump, and I look up and see him.
Forrest Hirschler.
I glance at Anna and we roll our eyes at each other. Forrest travels with a gaggle of gays, but they don’t all come to Queer Alliance, just the two with him today: Alexander, who’s Korean and a dancer, and Stef, who’s Black and obsessed with anime. I like Stef; whenever we’ve interacted, she’s been nice to me. Alexander is intimidating, always ready with a snappy reply.
Forrest follows them in, wearing his ever-present oversized hoodie with the hood pulled up even though he’s inside and it makes no sense to do that. The hoodie thing is minor, but it’s one of many things about him that annoy me. He’s always talking to someone in class, or shouting out commentary on the lesson, and the only ideas he ever has for Queer Alliance are distractions that won’t make life better for anyone at this school.
And I’ve never been able to forget what happened freshman year.
It was right after I’d started attending Queer Alliance meetings. Forrest and I were in the same biology class, and we were placed in a group together for an in-class assignment. Right away, I was less than impressed; he spent the first few minutes of our group’s working time face down on his arms, hidden under the hood of his sweatshirt. Anna was the other person in our group, and I’d just started getting to know her through Queer Alliance, so we were talking about it while the teacher passed out materials. A few seconds into our conversation, Forrest raised his head like a swamp monster emerging from a bog.
“You’re going to Queer Alliance?” he said, voice thick with disdain.
“...Yeah,” I responded, confused, stiffening up, wary of what he was about to say.
“That stuff is so corny,” he said, dropping his forehead back onto his arms.
“Um, no it’s not,” I said.
“Oooh, look at us, all the queer kids hanging out together,” he singsonged, voice muffled by the table. “What’s even the point? It doesn’t actually change anything.”
“That’s not true—” I started, but the teacher interrupted.
“Everything OK here?” she asked, smiling down at us.
“We’re fine!” Anna said quickly. The teacher moved on, and Anna suggested brightly that we get to work, and Forrest and I followed her lead. Somehow we managed to get the entire assignment done without ever saying a word toeach other, Anna navigating back and forth between us as if nothing was wrong at all.
“What was that about?” Anna asked after class as we headed to our lockers. They were right next to each other in the freshman hallway, another point of bonding between us.
“Right?” I said. “Like, if you’re going to hate on Queer Alliance because you think it’s pointless, why not join and help us do stuff? What a sad, bitter person.”
