Page 7 of Outside the Lines

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Page 7 of Outside the Lines

"I used to wear them too. Ended up getting surgery," I revealed.

The kid moved closer to the edge of the bed then fixed the dress around their legs. "Because people made fun of you?"

"People made fun of me for so many reasons that my glasses didn't even get noticed. I got the surgery because I'm generally a klutz and kept breaking them. After I figured out that I was paying more to get them replaced every few months than the surgery would cost me, I decided to save up and just be more careful until I got it taken care of."

This was basic talk, I knew that. But I also knew from working with my own kids that digging deep right away wasn't the right way to go for most kids. I had one I could do that with, a brassy little thing I liked to call my bulldog. I went gently with this one and didn't really have a plan. I was just talking, not giving therapy after all, and yeah, there was some small part of me that wanted to show Alex that I was good with kids too. I wanted him to be proud of me, but only partly because of my own ego. I also wanted him to know that I was good at this because he'd made me that way. Not by doing anything direct, but because he'd taken care of me and shown me what it meant to be good to others and myself.

Before Trinity House, I hadn't known what it meant to be like that, but I preferred to think of that time as only darkness, as if I'd been born among my friends and family of this house and anything before that, before Socks was born, didn't exist anymore.

"Do you dress like that because you don't know if you're a guy or a girl?" the kid asked me.

I wanted to smirk and nearly did. Kids were blatantly honest and I loved that about them. They didn't have the same social guidelines as my peers did, and so they would tell me flat out if the shoes I was wearing didn't go with the skirt.

"I know what I am," I answered them. "And what's your name anyway?"

"Naran."

I nodded. It was a nice, gender neutral name. "It's the same back and forth," I realized, smiling now because names and words like that made me happy for no real reason.

Naran smiled too and crept closer, joining me on the floor. I didn't back up to give them more space, letting them decide where they wanted to sit in relation to me. Moving back felt like I was getting away from them instead of being polite. I'd felt that as a kid, but hadn't realized what it had meant until I'd taken a body language class my first semester of college. I was better at controlling my reactions now.

"So then what are you?" Naran continued once they'd found a place on the floor in front of me. Our knees were almost touching.

"Neither." My answer was automatic, but I saw confusion in Naran's eyes. "I don't feel like I'm male or female. I'm not trans, I'm genderless or agender, depending on what you want to say."

Naran frowned and propped their chin up on their knee. "But you have to be something."

"Why?"

Naran squinted at me. "Because you have to be. You've either got a dick or not."

I rolled my eyes. "Yeah. And I know where I go on the reproductive slot. But my sex isn't my gender. No one ever told you that gender and sex aren't the same thing?"

Naran looked at me like I was an alien telling them that they could fly. I'd felt about the same the first time I'd found this out online.

"Alright. Crash course on gender stuff alright?" I asked them. Naran slowly nodded though the dazed look was still there. "Gender is different than sex. You can be trans and be bi. You can be a man and be straight. Right?"

"Of course."

"So think of gender as how you feel. And sex as what your body actually is. And sexuality is who you are attracted to. Making a little more sense now?" I asked them, hoping I was making sense. I had charts up in my office for this sort of thing. I might be able to scrounge up a notebook and a pen here if Naran needed a visual aid.

"I feel like a girl," Naran let me know. It was said almost as an uncertain confession, like she was sharing the deepest part of herself with me. I smiled at her.

"Okay. So your gender is female. Your sex is biological, and you don't have to share that with anyone that you don't want to. And do you know who you like?" I asked her, relaxing my shoulders and releasing a bit of tension that I hadn't known I'd been carrying around.

Naran blushed and ducked her head a bit.

I giggled. I knew that look well enough. "So there is someone."

"Yeah..."

"What's their name?" I continued, feeling like I was gossiping with Andy about his latest crush on a cute co-worker.

She played with her skirt for a bit before answering me. "Her name is Andrea," she said after I'd nearly given up on her answering me.

"Pretty name. Is she pretty too?"

Naran nodded. "She is. She doesn't know I like her though. Should I tell her?"


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