#i’ve only ever had the whole ‘so hey fun fact i’m actually trans’ conversation once in my life i think. with my gf actually

[dreamertrilogys]

so i haven’t personally come out to anyone recently bc i’ve been outsourcing it (getting my girlfriend to do it) & one thing i’ve noticed is that ppl will say a lot more than they would if you were there. for example fran from english class apparently said something along the lines of “yeah i figured. i mean they look like a man anyway” & my girlfriend’s sister just straight up guessed it before my gf even told her (“do they use they/them pronouns” literally a couple hours after meeting me for the first time (in a setting where i was introduced as a cis woman). glad i give off the impression of someone who uses pronouns. thank you)

[dorkylittleweirdo]

crazy shit that happened during high school

freshman year:

my favorite teacher (pe coach) ended up being a pedophile. it’s kinda scary to think about bc like,, that was my favorite teacher and i trusted him and if he tried anything with me i don’t think i would’ve stopped him and just yikes. but yeah, it was a whole thing. once the school found out they got the police involved and he fled the state. they got him in the end but i mean,, i spent a lot of time in the secretary’s office crying about it bc i really trusted that dude and i was distraught over it. that might’ve been where my trust issues started??? fun stuff

my school shut down. like i mean,, bc it was a charter school and we had to get the charter renewed. but the board at my school wasn’t using their money the way they were supposed to. it was a whole thing, like the principal left that school year bc he knew what was happening, couldn’t stop them from doing it, and didn’t want to be part of it. so they had a lot of meetings that us kids were allowed to go to so we could see what was happening and all that. i only went to one and it was A Time bc the lady who was recording everything passed tf out and of course nobody was a doctor and my pipsqueak thirteen year old ass went “i know what to do” bc i Did so i had to help her which was a trip in and of itself. but anyways, the school’s charter got denied, and everyone had to transfer, but the district promised that we could go to any school we wanted, not just the one we would have to go to by zip code

sophomore year:

i ended up going to a private christian school. big fucking mistake. absolute disaster. nothing really happened that was crazy by their standards, but it was for me

so they have a house system. think of harry potter, it’s EXACTLY like that. we have points, we have competitions, we have all that extra stuff. it was such a time, like i don’t,, i don’t even know how to explain how fucking weird that shit was

i came out in the middle of class. the principal’s daughter was our sub and she goes “okay so everyone is gonna tell us something that nobody knows about them” so when it was my turn i go “so it’s not a secret and y’all should know this but clearly y’all don’t: i’m not straight”. silence. dead silence. we could hear the class next to us it was so quiet. some girl whispers “i knew it”. another girl leans over and whispers to my friend “i’m so sorry”. principal’s daughter gives me the most threatening, condescending smile i’ve ever seen and goes “thanks for sharing”. i had to come out to my mom that same day bc i told me friends and they panicked on my behalf bc when people found out that they were gay, the principal told their parents. and i was Not about to be outed by the principal. my mom has since told me that the principal never contacted her about it so i came out for nothing but i mean i really like being out so we’re good

so instead of prom, cult school has this thing called “the ball”. sophomores, juniors, and seniors are allowed to go bc there’s less than fifty people per grade so if sophomores don’t come, there’s not enough people. so i went bc my friends were all going and i was like “yeah why not might as well”. three dance lessons. three fucking dance lessons for this stupid ball that i didn’t dance once at. i literally had three panic attacks in the span of an hour at the second one, and then i had swim practice right after. fucking exhausted. felt like i ran five marathons by the time i got home. the last lesson i didn’t do any dancing, just vibed with my friend in the corner. so at the actual ball, same friend and i vibed at the tables the whole time. we went to the bathroom for like an hour and took mirror selfies and tried to make our asses look bigger bc we’re Like That

SO AFTER THE BALL, there was apparently a massive party and there was alcohol and stuff. so my friends and i were blissfully unaware bc nobody liked us bc who tf likes the school sinners. so we walked to get ice cream after in our fucking ballgowns and suits looking like All That. so the principal thought that it was one of us who hosted the party and we were like “??? what party?”. literally almost got in trouble bc the principal thought we were LYING. i told my mom and she takes No Shit, so when the principal called her demanding to know if i went to/hosted the party, she marched her ass down to the school and was like “i know y’all have something against mexicans and people who are different from y’all, but that’s no reason to blame my daughter for something that your so called “perfect” students did”. my mom got Heated, roasted the fuck out of the principal, then LEFT. principal never fucked with my mom after that

so there was a fire like across the street from the school. the fd told us to evacuate, but noooooo the school was like “god will protect us” i’m like “okay but i’m gay and apparently your god hates that so i think we’re gonna Perish”. the fucking POWER went out and they STILL wouldn’t let us go. my mom called to sign me out so i could go wherever the fuck i wanted in the school until my friend’s dad came to pick us up bc she couldn’t get there bc of the fire. so i vibed next door to my friends’ class and i was like “heeeeey god’s trying to kill the gays” and we laughed about that until my gay ass got saved lmaoooo

okay so this is the funniest memory i have. in chemistry once, our teacher took us outside and started digging a lil hole next to the school. and keep in mind, my chem teacher used to be a hardcore atheist druggie, like fucking meth and coke and shit. took a theology course and converted. so he’s really sweet and nice but he’s also Slightly mad scientist vibes. so anyways, he puts something in this little hole, lights it on fire. i forgot why he did it, but i was standing back with him and one of the exchange students and the three of us watch in Horror as the rest of the class makes a circle around the fire and start doing some weird dance and saying something. it wasn’t like a chant, idk what to call it, but they were like counting like “and one, and two, and three, and four” and then the dance would get more intense and they’d get louder. so eventually they were screaming and going apeshit and i looked at my teacher and he’s just,, watching them do this. i’m like “and i’m satan, huh?”. like these kids really trying to summon the devil but i’m the bad one bc i like girls

junior year:

so technically this was during the summer but i’m putting it here. they have like a house party after the school year ends. i made cookies. apparently they “looked weird” so nobody ate them, two of my soon to be teachers kept insulting them. i called my mom to pick me up, took my cookies with me, got back in the car in tears. had to have a whole conversation with the principal and those two teachers so they could apologize bc i wanted to leave the school after that. dw tho, i took my cookies to the guards at my summer camp and they appreciated the hell out of them bc they were Very Good Cookies

so my ap bio teacher was an enabler. i was his favorite bc i wasn’t a religious nut and it was very obvious that i believed in science and not whatever the hell this cult was doing with their creationist bs. also he was a parasitologist and i’m super into parasitology so he had fun talking about it to someone who both understood and was extremely interested in the topic. i rolled up to class one day like “hey so i’m gonna buy hissing cockroaches from amazon, if my parents find out and don’t let me keep them do you want them??” and he’s like “yeah”. i brought them to class a few times and everyone Hated it but my teacher was like ayyyyy. and everyone thought he was either and atheist or agnostic, so when some girl asked how he thought mary conceived jesus to see what he said, he looked at me like “y’all hear somethin/hel p” and i go “parthenogenesis” and he Went With It, talking about how it was theoretically possible in humans but we ignored the fact that the baby would’ve been a girl bc the class is dumb none of them have ever heard of parthenogenesis before jesus is the true trans icon we all need

my art teacher was my favorite and she knows that i’m gay. she’s the only teacher from my school that i’m still in contact with. so every big project we did, i made it gay. and i knew, and my friends knew, and she knew, but the rest of the class had no idea. i’m like presenting my project and the class would get sus and they’re like “so are those two really good friends” and i’m like “so she has a rainbow heart on her choker and she has a lesbian symbol on her shirt”. the class was still confused and my friend yells “they’re LESBIANS”. it was iconic

my brit lit teacher was bi. she never said it, but i know she was. always talked about how much she hated men, then was like “women are very very good”. no way this woman was straight. so we read dracula and it’s got that Subtext, so one time i leaned over to my friend bc he sat next to me and i go “the Homoerotic Subtext”. and i didn’t realize that the teacher was right in front of me until she tapped my desk and goes “it gets better”, told me a page number that i flipped to, and it was Even More Gay and i was like 😏. also she assigned me a gay poet for my poetry project and i talked about that for my whole presentation in front of the class and it was the biggest paragraph in my essay and i got 100% on it even tho i choked at the beginning. also i mentioned in passing that i liked sappho and she goes “ooh i love sappho” i’m like “ma’am please leave this cult and get you a gf”

senior year:

i left the cult finally. went to the one school i actually liked. i made friends who actually like me and they were patient and they were amazing and i love them all very much even if i’ll never tell them. my classmates were great, v friendly, i had a great time. however,

so many fires. school got cancelled like five times bc of how bad the fires were

the school shooting. i don’t think i need to go further into that, it’s pretty self explanatory

covid. again, don’t need to go further into that, v self explanatory

[tumblunni]

Oh fuck i cant stand this

Ive already almost used up my damn mobile data again and i only bought it yesterday. Fuck i want to go home. You guys are like the only comfort i have here and i dunno what im gonna do when i cant message you again

Fuckin hell stupid shit day! I was supposed to go to a therapy class thing today but the stupid bus went past where my abusive father lives and i had a MASSIVE FREAKOUT and had to go home and then ofcourse to go home you have to go back on the stupid same bus!! I fuckib failed and wasted the doctor's time and he had to grab me to stop me from running off the bus crying and back to fuckin hell dad's house because im shit and i deserve everything he ever did to me

AND THEN fuckin same doctor continues the relentless constant tide of everyone misgendering me and making crass transphobic jokes

"You see you've gotta understand the other opinion" he says, as if trans people werent fuckin raised SURROUNDED by cis people's predjudiced opinion of us and taught it was fact. As if it didnt take me SO MUCH WORK to even become confident enough to stand up for myself! I've gotta see the 'other opinion' that "yknow well families and children use public bathrooms and theyre scared trans people will molest their children so its understandable they want to kick you out or even act violent to you". Yknow the OTHER OPINION that MY OPINION DOESNT MATTER and also MY ENTIRE EXISTANCE IS A CRIME but i'm the one being predjudiced for not accepting that OPINION, right?! Im here trying to tell him that no that isnt rational because there have been LITERALLY NO RECORDED CASES of trans people molesting children in public bathrooms, or even "evil men faking being trans" to do the same thing. There's been more cases of actual cis men breaking into women's bathrooms to drag women out for merely LOOKING trans. More cis women have been harassed because of anti trans laws than they ever did before! But hey "respect that other opinion", right? And also "at least its not as bad as russia" and "but gay pride is everywhere now, that one footballer had rainbow shoelaces." Hey wow i never noticed that not only was homophobia totally over but also transphobia was remotely related to that! Wow! I seriously had to bring out the fuckin 1600s historical investigation on pre-british olde englishe that showed the existance of a gender neutral pronoun before the word "he" ever existed, and the existance of transgender pride and pronoun discussions in the 1800s before the word transgender was even popularized. I cant believe i fuckin had to do a 'show your sources that queer people existed before the internet' IN REAL LIFE. WITH A MEDICAL PROFESSIONAL. I can point at the damn NHS website but nooooo!

Oh and yknow what got me the most? YKNOW WHAT GOT ME THE MOST?? "We have sick people here, you cant expect them to remember stuff like that. Dont ruin their recovery by bringing up stuff like that." Like..fuckin..IM A FUCKIN PATIENT TOO. I wasnt even asking the other patients to stop hurting me i was asking you the staff to maybe consider it! And seriously you want me to be so super ultra perpetually prepared and perpetually rational and able to keep my existance secret and out of every conversation yet theyre too ill to learn about lgbt people existing? Just a sentence would be too painful? And me living every day being misgendered doesnt impact my ability to recover at all, eh? Fuckin shitting fuck hell.

And i hate it i HATE IT because he's being nice so i'll be the bad guy if i complain. Likehe fuckin..doesnt even know he's being rude and doesnt want to consider the idea. He says 'i dont like your tone' if i suggest the concept and FUCK in that moment i was so fuckin scared he was gonna hit me like my dad did. Or at tge very least kick me out of the hospital if i dont cooperate with him. He just fuckin..thinks he's perfectly unbiased and accepts everyone and "oh but i like to make fun of everyone equally". And i even fuckin raised the subject that people who say that often only make fun of minorities and never themselves, the majority, or major power structures. And he's just like 'yeah yeh i hate people like that'. Whoosh. Rigjt over the head. God i wasnt even TRYING to be passive aggressive i was trying tk outright tell him why what he said was upsetting me but NOPE. Trying to explain how its just so hard and tiring to have to verrrrrry patientlyyyyy explain yourself to EVERYONE EVERY DAY CONSTANTLY while they sling loads of rude words at you and it should be just allowed because they 'dont know better'. Like you ask me to educate you but at the same time im rude if i actually tell you?? And god i also tried to explain how the fuckin bathroom violence thing isnt an example of 'educating another opinion' AGAIN by saying like... If someone just asked me to explain being transgender i would. If someone just said they were uncomfortable i would leave. That's 'another opinion'. Reacting with slurs and violence to a trans person existing and not doing anything to you is not 'another opinion' and its not someone who 'just didnt know'. He was seriously trying to argue that it WASNT BIGOTED it was just someone rationally being afraid for their children because of a danger that doesnt exist, and rationally reacting with extreme violence rather than doing anything else. Rationally. RATIONALLY. oh just MISTAKENLY committing a hate crime! Cos they just didnt know trans people exist! Not cos they hate us! Oh no! Yeah sure we totally have a fucking DUTY to educate these POOR UNKNOWING PEOPLE while theyre attacking us, and its our damn fault if we didnt...

And just fucking FUCK i hate how someone can say all that stuff and still be "nice" and still not hate me personally? Like its so messed up?? He's not anti trans or anything he just has so much more damn sympathy for cis people than trans people, and puts all the onus on us to somehow prevent our own murders. And he thinks that "i dont have a problem with trans people" means doing LITERALLY NOTHING to change your behaviour to make trans people feel accepted. They should just magically know that your jokes are jokes when theyre surrounded by so many people saying it honestly, in CONSTANT FEAR OF THAT EXACT THING LEADING TO VIOLENCE. And like in order to be "a guy who has no problem with trans people" he has to do nothing, while in order for me to be not bigoted against HIM it means i have to never get offended by his jokes and also never talk about myself and also constantly educate him about things because he doesnt want to learn, even though he works in a hospital thats supposed to have an anti discrimination policy. Like fuckin just NOT HURTING LGBT PEOPLE doesnt make you discrimination free, shit like telling me to misgender myself because my pronouns would confuse the other patients is kinda fuckin fucked up. Also "that's a question for later" is all i CONSTANTLY get when it comes to talking about legal name changes or therapy or even just talking to an lgbt support group. I have to wait until i stop being depressed because oh no im talking about too many mental illnesses at once. Its been seven years and i havent fuckin stopped being depressed, bitch! Ever consider a fuckin symptom of gender dysphoria is a big ol fat depression!!! And just gahhhhh he was so fuckin baffled and angry that i would dare to get emotional about the subject?? Like he just saw DEBATING WHETHER TRANS PEOPLE ARE REAL and WHETHER PEOPLE WHO MURDER THEM FOR USING THE BATHROOM ARE JUSTIFIED as a perfectly normal casual discussion that a Non Transphobic Man could have with his transgender friend. Why oh why would i cry about this casual hypothetical discussion? Hey its not like it fuckin affects me directly! "Well its never happened to you right?" A Ha Ha Ha Ha. Also fuckin "so which bathroom do you use?" and "well you're not really transgender if youre not getting the surgery-oh wait you do want the surgery? How does that work then?" I swear i could just see the gears turning in his head and he was about to say "do you want both down there". Gahhhhhh *cringes myself into a tiny tumbleweed and blows away*

Also the entire time he kept calling being trans a sexuality and also asexuality. "No youre not trans youre asexual right?" Yeah sure ive just been saying im trans and saying im not a girl and wearing a chest binder and talking this entire conversation about my experiences as a trans person in public bathrooms just to pull an elaborate prank on you. And like i know what he meant is that he thought the word for nonbinary was asexual (has asexuality REALLY made so little progress towards getting into the sex ed curriculum in the entire 25 years of my life?) But like seriously he was like "youre not really trans if youre nonbinary". And then fuck dude i dont wanna explain how surgery works to you!! And especially not also my entirely unrelated sexuality that has entirely different equally upsetting predjudices!

Ans gahhhh fuck i just got no sympathy for crying and he acted as if it was just some wildly unexpected occurance he never could have predicted. And i hate it cos he's nice to me whenever the subject is about anything else. I cant get any symoathey from ANYONE because he's A NICE GUY and why dont i just understaaaaaand other opinionnnnnns

I wanted to fuckin quit this whole thing on the spot and go home. Only reason i cant is because my support worker is off work until thursday auauauaughhh

Fuck at least one positive i guess is that ive made progress in the social anxiety or at least gotten better at giving the impression im making progress. Cos i want to LEAVE AS FAST AS POSSIBLE. And also fuck all my other worries seem less suicide-inducing when im actually getting the closest ive ever been to killing myself on a daily basis because of a stupid other thing that i never could have predicted. Go here for one form of self hate, come home with another! Yayyyyy

And fuck i havent even made a single bit of progress on drawing or writing anything and i cant practise making ganes cos my laptop cant run rpgmaker and i havent even started reading my giant pile of books cos they fuckin LOOK THROUGH THE WINDOW EVERY SINGLE HOUR TO MAKE SURE YOU AINT KILLED YOURSELF. i have no fuckin pribacy and its making me wanna kill myself even more!! I just live constantly on edge looking at the fuckin door window and i cant even do anything to distract myself because im too scared of them looking at me!! Or barging in at no notice to tell me i have to do some big stressful thing RIGHT NOW because i dont even get advance notice of anything aaaa! And fuck i dont have anywhere to go to even calm down from a panic attack cos i have no privacy so at least im getting over being scared of going outside cos outside is the only place i can go to cry. Fuckin strangers in the crowd at least wont cause shit if they see me.

Fuck i want to go home. Fuck i wish i had enough money to keep buying mobile internet. Its like fuckin 750mb a day to run tumblr but its all ive got to talk to any person who doesnt hate me or patronize me or think im faking a bunch of shit or whatever the fuck. And im not even any fun to be around when im like this so im probably just ruining your day too. And im probably gonna vanish again soon and then just go back to crying alone and getting worse and probably never being able to leave

I knew it was gonna be stressdul but i didnt predict any of this.. I just wanna fuckin die. I wanted to jump out the car and go to my old dad's house and have him pull open the door and slap me around a bit. Like call me a fucking dyke, call me a sick retard, be honest about your feelings! I'd fuckin take being abused over this "oh youre the bad one for being mad because i had goooood intentions" reverse psychology bigotry from hell. Either these people are evil geniuses or theyre even more stupid like me. Fuckin shit dad please manifest in my room and slap me, killing me instantly. I feel like being scared of you would at least be a faster emotion than this nebulous sensation of confusing unease and dysphoria 24/7 for 6 fuckin months. One week done, haha! Hahahabahahahahahahahahahahahahshahahahahahshshshahshahahahhahahaaaa

[yenneferw]

@destaribka requested: “something where Peter is a questioning trans girl (Peter -> Pearl) and Tony or someone catches her trying on a dress or something looking in a mirror?”

Man this request just flew by and let me tell you having her sort of argue with the dress was one of the most fun things I’ve written in a while so I hope you enjoy!!

Pearl sat staring at the dress in her suitcase for a long time that night. She had taken it from May and stuffed it in there along with all the rest of the clothes that she was packing for the trip to the Avengers Headquarters. She didn’t know why she did it. Thinking back on it, it had been a stupid idea.

But it just felt less like anyone would burst in on her while she was at the Avengers Headquarters. It felt like the only time to do this in peace.

Tony had been a really good mentor to her since he found her to be Spider-Man. Somewhere along the way, she knew that she had started to see him as a father figure in her life, but she didn’t want to say that aloud. That was too embarrassing. But it was only reinforced when he asked her if she wanted to come to the Avengers Headquarters for the weekend—to check up on the suit and see how things were for the big dogs, he said. But she felt like it was also a way to get closer to her.

Happy had driven her upstate once she was all packed after school, and she wanted badly to be focused during the dinner she had with them and a couple of the others at the headquarters. How cool was it that she was having dinner with, like, half of the Avengers? How cool was it that Tony Stark was just sitting there, talking to her about the science of her superhero suit? Pretty fucking cool. But she was only half-there the whole time, the rest of her mind hidden with that dress.

Of course no one would peek in her suitcase. That would be completely invasive. But it worried her anyway.

She thought she would be relaxed when she was back in her room and alone with the suitcase, but she wasn’t. Every time she tried to do something, like get on her phone and text Ned or MJ, or text goodnight to Aunt May, she just saw the suitcase staring at her out of the corner of her eye.

So finally, she got up the courage to walk over and open the bag.

There it was, and there she was, staring at it. At one point, May texted her goodnight first, so she texted back, but the whole time she kept an eye on the dress like it was going to suddenly stand up and announce its presence to the whole Avengers Headquarters.

She had gone to her room earlier than she was sure Tony had planned for her, so it was only eight-thirty. She felt really bad about denying a movie night, especially because he didn’t seem to buy how tired she claimed she was.

She felt really bad about the whole thing. She shouldn’t have brought the dress.

Besides, why would she want to wear it? She wasn’t a girl. She knew that. She knew that she was a boy. She was Peter. She was Spider-Man.

Except the amount of times that she had sent the name “Pearl” to some of those name affirmation blogs said something else.

So she was maybe a girl.

Maybe it would be easier for her if everyone didn’t already know her as Spider-Man. Maybe it would be easier if her middle name wasn’t Benjamin, and she didn’t feel like she was leaving behind a final piece of him if she changed her name. Maybe, maybe, maybe, but no maybes were as good as a definitely.

She had thought that maybe the definitely could be found in trying on the dress, but she was so scared of what she would find in that mirror.

She let out a breath and summoned the courage it took to come over to the suitcase in the first place. She was Spider-Woman. She was Spider-Woman, and damn it, if she could kick the Vulture’s ass, she could sure as hell kick this dress’s ass too.

Or she could just put it on and enjoy it. She didn’t think the dress needed its ass kicked. It was a very nice dress, even though May never wore it—which was the whole reason she had brought it along.

She tried to think of nice things she did as Spider-Woman to compare with instead of kicking its ass. She could have a polite conversation about frozen custard with the dress while she waited for the police to come. She could give it directions while it wore old tennis shoes and a tourist-y t-shirt. She could certainly do a flip for it while it recorded her and put it on YouTube. Yes, that’s what she would do to the dress. Its ass could remain very much un-kicked.

So now she was definitely just procrastinating putting it on.

“Okay, dress, prepare to be politely chitchatted with,” she said to it, slipping off the t-shirt and shorts she had put on to sleep in. She took the dress out of the suitcase and stared at it for a long moment. And then she pulled it over her head and let it fall down over her.

For a moment she was frozen, and then she realized how much she liked how it felt to wear it. And because she had always wanted to, she swished around in the dress so the bottom flowed out.

“Cool,” she mumbled.

Time to look in the mirror. Maybe.

“Okay, okay, okay, Parker. You got this! You’re Spider-Woman! Politely chitchat the hell out of this mirror!” she whispered as she walked over to the mirror in the room Tony had given her to sleep in.

Wow. Okay. She really liked this dress.

She had started growing her hair out a little bit recently—not too long, but long enough. She positioned it how she wanted, not swept back like she usually kept it in front of everyone else. She liked that too.

“Ah, good. I hope both of you, dress and mirror, feel properly politely chitchatted with,” she said. She looked up into her own eyes for a moment. She felt good. For this sliver of a moment, she felt really good. “Hello, Spider-Woman. What a lovely dress. Where’d you get it? Oh, you stole it, you say. Well, that’s not very Spider-Woman…ly. Maybe, though, it’s Pearl…ly. There’s gotta be a better way to say that.”

It felt good to call herself Spider-Woman. It felt even better to call herself Pearl.

She heard footsteps outside the door and her eyes widened, but she was frozen to her spot. There were more rooms further down. Someone was just passing through the hallway.

Knock-knock.

Shit, shit, shit. She still didn’t know what to do.

The door opened.

She scrambled to move away from the mirror, but she didn’t know where to go, so she ended up just leaning against the wall next to the mirror, her best “casual” pose in place.

It would have been okay if it was someone like Vision, who would probably just be confused and decide it was weird human stuff he couldn’t understand. But no, it was Tony.

Of course it was Tony.

“Ah, hey, Tony, what are you, uh— what are you doing here?” she asked, scratching her head. She instinctively swept her hair back when she felt it out of place.

He looked more confused than Pearl had ever seen him before. And he seemed to get pretty baffled at some “teenager stuff.”

“Uh, hey… what are you doing?” he asked.

“Oh, me? I’m just leaning against this wall here.” She looked back at the wall and patted it. “Nice walls you have. Very… sturdy.”

“Right.” Tony frowned at her. “And the dress…?”

She had some sort of line forming in her head, some dismissive What, a guy can’t wear a dress around? but even thinking of it was upsetting. She didn’t want to say that.

“Oh, this? Well, you know. Uh.” She had no fucking clue what to say. She wanted to tell someone, the more that she thought about Spider-Woman and Pearl Parker and shes and hers when referring to herself, but she figured the first person she would tell would be May. And not in this circumstances. The pause was growing long. She blurted out the first words that came to her head. “Girl clothes.”

“Yep, that’s— you’re wearing a dress, so—” Tony was cutting himself off more times than the increasing number of heartbeats per minute Pearl’s heart was skyrocketing to. Her face was as red as the Spidey suit, and she didn’t even have to look back in the mirror to tell. “Sorry, I’m really confused. Am I missing something? You’re going to have to spell this out for me.”

“Sure, uh.” She was still floundering. “D-R-E—”

“Normally your smartass comments are, admittedly, a little endearing, but right now I feel like you’re just asking me to get out,” Tony said. “Which I can do, if you want.”

He seemed sincere, really. She did appreciate how much he respected her privacy. But right then, she really just wanted him to yank the truth out of her so she didn’t have to say it, but so that he would know.

“No, I just—” Why was it so hard to say? Well, she knew why, really, but she wished that it weren’t. “I was just— Okay, I took this dress from Aunt May, and I wanted to try it on here because I thought it was less likely that anyone burst in on me here than at home, because I’ve been thinking— well, I’ve been wondering— I’ve sort of been questioning… uh… everything?”

“Everything,” Tony repeated, nodding his head a little bit. “Do you want to elaborate?”

“Well, okay, you know how my name’s Peter? I mean, of course you know my name. It would be a little weird if you asked me to come over to your highly-protected headquarters for the weekend with all the rest of the superhero buddies that aren’t, like, war criminals if you didn’t know my name.”

She hadn’t meant to say any of that except the first bit, but all of that sort of got away from her.

“I think I might have a bit of an idea about your name being Peter,” Tony agreed, though he seemed very uncertain. Definitely not because of using her deadname, though, because he didn’t know it was her deadname yet, and anyway he was in this confusing situation with her, so she was sure that it was just because whatever Pearl was letting come out of her mouth was hardly any language yet invented, let alone what she was actually trying to articulate.

“Well, you wanna know something really interesting and totally unexpected?” she said.

“I think I might.”

“Okay, cool fact, then: I think my name’s actually Pearl and I’m a girl and also Spider-Woman so I tried on this dress and I totally politely chitchatted the fuck out of it and the mirror too—and I’m talking, like, if polite chitchatting were the mirror and the dress’s kryptonite, you can bet they’d both be dead by now. Well, metaphorically dead, because I didn’t mean to be violent, which was the whole reason I kicked absolutely nothing’s ass—”

“Slow down, slow down,” Tony said, shaking his head and holding his hand up to her. He shut the door behind him and took a step closer to Pearl. “Say that whole first sentence again.”

“I think it was one sentence.”

“Say the first part.”

“The part about me being a girl named Pearl a.k.a. Spider-Woman?”

“That’s the one.” Tony pointed to her as if he was pointing to that being the right first part. “Does, uh— Well, no, May wouldn’t know, you said you took the dress from her.”

“No one knows,” she said. She realized how hard her hands were shaking and suddenly it was a lot harder to think of anything remotely smartass to say. She was terrified.

“And you said you want to be called Pearl?” Tony asked hesitantly.

She nodded. Everything felt a little muted suddenly. She was so scared of Tony being against this.

“I can do that,” he said. He paused for a moment. “Hey, you look really pale, kiddo.”

She didn’t know when he face stopped being so hot, but now she felt how the blood had drained from her face and her hands had clasped to avoid shaking so hard.

“It’s okay.” Tony stepped forward again, still hesitantly, and when Pearl didn’t protest, he came and put a hand on her shoulder. “Hey, Pearl, this is nothing, okay?”

Hearing her name aloud from someone who wasn’t her felt really good. But she didn’t know what to say, so she just nodded.

“This doesn’t change how I see you. This won’t change how any of us see you.” He seemed unsure of his words, like he wanted badly to say what was right. It meant a lot to hear that. All of this… meant so much. She didn’t know how to put it into words, not even in her thoughts. “It’s not going to change how May sees you, either.”

“You really don’t care?” she asked.

Tony shook his head. “It doesn’t matter to me if you’re a girl or a boy or what. You’re a good kid. That’s what I think is pretty cool.”

She nodded a little bit.

“Do you want to tell everybody else?” he asked.

“In the morning,” she told him. She looked up at Tony. For as bad at dealing with teenagers as he acted like he was, when she needed to it, he always had an arm to put around her shoulders and the right words to say. Well, not always the right words, but always good words with the right intentions. “Thanks, Tony.”

“Hey, no problem.” He patted her back but seemed to waver for a second. Then he put his arm further around her to tug her into a hug. She hugged him back and smiled. Yeah, Tony was a really good dad. When they pulled away, he said, “Well, I just came in here to ask if you wanted some ice cream or something.”

She was glad that he didn’t push her to talk more. She didn’t know what she would say. But ice cream sounded great, so she nodded. “Yeah, I’ll be out there in a second.”

“I’ll have a bowl waiting, kiddo,” he said. He smiled back at her and left the room, shutting the door behind him.

She really wasn’t thinking when she didn’t lock the door before trying on the dress, but with how well that went—if one could call the beginning half well—she was kind of happy that she hadn’t.

But anyway. She had some ice cream to go give directions to, or maybe even do a flip for.

[tommot5]

they don’t know about us (OT5 kidfic)

thing i wrote for @citricac1d​‘s birthday. ot5 are freddie’s parents. non-famous au. trans girl harry, nb girl zayn, the rest of them are cis boys. first person, harry’s pov.

Freddie’s birthday was one of the rare occasions I got to see Briana. Lovely woman, but she doesn’t come around often. Understandable, really. I mean, besides all the awkwardness about her and Louis, and that whole thing, she’s got us to wrap her head around. And if you’re not us, you can’t really know about us. You can know of us, but not about us.

I stood in the middle of us, between Liam on my left and Niall and Zayn on my right. I mean, no, there’s no middle in a four, I know. Louis was standing next to Liam until he went to go help Freddie toddle towards his little birthday cake, which Briana held, kneeling. As Briana cooed and Louis laughed with pure joy and endearment, oblivious to the world outside their son, I noticed Briana’s family shift here and there uncomfortably. Louis’s family were less outwardly awkward, but, I mean, we all knew they couldn’t quite “get” it either. Besides Fizzy, I mean, who actively tried to educate the rest of them on polyamory.

And I’m grateful for that. Fizzy’s an amazing young woman, wickedly brilliant. She’ll be a great aunt someday. I mean, she’ll be great at being an aunt. Obviously I have no idea if she’ll be a great-aunt.

She is great at being an aunt. After Lottie had a turn congratulating the birthday boy, he was all giggles being passed to Fizzy, who let him eat a bit of frosting off her finger. Louis was in front of us, beaming; Niall beamed right back.

Liam said what Niall meant: “We’re proud of you, Lou. Jesus, look at this.” He smiled crinkly-eyed, gesturing to the party, the emotion, the everything of it all that emanated classic Tomlinson-brand celebratory vibes if I’ve ever known them.

“Thank you, Liam,” Louis smiled in a semi-sarcastic way, while still unable to hide how purely happy he is. “But remember, I’m not the one turning one full fucking year old.” He said it, punctuated, in italics, like he always says it; like an outrageous fact you keep reading over and over, accepting it, but still sustaining disbelief. I wonder if he’ll ever look at the passage of time the same way.

“It’s not my special day,” he reiterated, turning to look at Freddie. He was in Briana’s arms, entertaining her friends by giggling and clapping. He wandered over to join them, but we all hang back. We must have looked so cliquey. Really, we were just nervous. We wanted to impress the in-laws, if they are that. It’s complicated, with us. That’s what I mean.

--

It was alright. We all get to spend plenty of time with Freddie, when Louis has him. “Sometimes I think Briana and them are just jealous,” Zayn had whispered to me once, leaning against the churning dryer with a swaddled, sleeping Freddie pressed to her chest.

“Why?” I asked, popping another cinnamon almond in my mouth. Have you ever had those? From Trader Joe’s? They are terrible. Too addictive. And I probably would’ve gained a lot more weight on them if Niall didn’t do all the shopping, ‘cause if you say, “Niall, never buy these again!” he just won’t, ever. Even if it’s just a joke. So I’ll never see another cinnamon almond again.

“‘Cause there’s five of us. I mean, it’s probably easier, right? Takes some of the stress off Lou, like.” She breathed out and the smell of fabric softener wafted over to me, which I’m sure was just a coincidence.

“She’s rich, though,” I said thoughtfully. “She can hire, like... nannies.”

“Nannies…” Zayn mused, rocking back on her heels. “I mean, I dunno. I guess so.”

“But?” I prompted, popping another almond into my insatiable maw.

“It’s better this way. Five real parents.”

“You’re right,” I said, smiling warmly. I liked the thought of that.

Zayn smiled back in a way that silently conveyed, “I know.” That was one of the most attractive things about her -- how she could speak without saying anything. I felt a little awkward thinking that with Freddie in the room, though.

“Hey, have you had these?”

“What, almonds?”

“Cinnamon almonds. They’re from Trader Joe’s.”

“Oh. Yeah, I don’t like them.”

“Oh.”

--

Liam kept watching other people, but leaned over to talk to me. “Are you feeling a bit uncomfortable?”

“I love parties,” I replied, truthfully. “And I love Freddie. So…”

“That doesn’t answer my question.” His eyebrows knit into an expression so iconically LIam that it should probably have a name. I’m naming it ‘autumn.’

In reply, I just shook my head. Sometimes Liam had a hard time not thinking in black and white terms. I mean, it was either you were having a blast at the party or you were completely miserable and wanted to go home. That’s why he had trouble reading Zayn sometimes. Actually, most of the time. Luckily, I’m here as a sort of emotional translator for everyone. I know how to read Niall’s finger-chewing anxiety, and Louis’s quick anger, and Liam’s soft misunderstanding, and, of course, I know how to read Zayn’s stony indignancy. Not to be arrogant, but I think I’m valuable like that.

Anyway, I wasn’t having fun at the party, but I was glad to be there. Like, it’s no Tomlinson’s New Year’s Bash, but it’s not supposed to be. It’s like Christmas, if you have relatives you’re not crazy about, and they bring a bad pudding or something, but you’re still happy to catch up with your cousin, who’s your age and always has seemed a bit gay to you. I mean, so, you could relate. I think that feeling is somewhat universal, having a similarly gay cousin.

--

Last year, I came back home to LA after Christmas and Liam was sitting at the kitchen table, looking autumnally through a Pottery Barn catalogue.

“There’s no way we could afford any of that, you know,” Niall said flatly from behind him. He was still feeling a bit down, because we could only afford to send three of us home for Christmas, and Liam had to go, ‘cause his mum’s getting antsy about him being overseas, and Lou had to go, and I’m the baby, so I get whatever I want. But I did feel bad for Niall, and I kind of regret not letting him go instead of me, ‘cause he does miss Ireland all the time. But what’s past is past, I guess. I’ll make it up to him and share my cinnamon almonds next time I sneak them in the house.

Niall looked up from a catalogue of his own -- or maybe it was the Trader Joe’s Fearless Flyer -- and smiled at me. “Harry,” he said in that warm, gruff voice of his he uses sometimes when he’s not quite ready to speak. “When’d you get home? Just now?”

We could hear Zayn sigh loudly in the other room, followed by the pwoomp of her body hitting the sofa sideways. She wanted to be loud, just to emphasize just how tired she was helping me and Louis carry in our bags. We heard Louis laugh and flop on top of her.

“Yeah,” I said. Liam looked up at us autumnally.

“Hi, Liam.” I touched his hair affectionately. The table wobbled as Liam’s weight shifted from it. He was supposed to fix that a million years ago, but then the holidays came around. I made him say that one of his new years’ resolutions was to fix everything broken in our little house, and not just ‘cause I like seeing him get all sweaty doing it. It was Niall’s idea to get a fixer upper; it was a better deal. I liked the idea of getting to customize it, make it our own. I think Zayn was wary of the idea of having to do work, but Louis got her to be a bit more enthusiastic once he explained the concept of self-demolition. She didn’t really end up doing much, though. But Louis definitely did.

“I feel weird…” Liam said suddenly. “Cheryl said she might be pregnant.”

Cheryl was a not-quite friend-with-benefits, not-quite girlfriend we all agreed it was okay for Liam to have. It turned out that they’d only end up being involved for a few months until November. Like I said, it’s kind of hard to wrap your head around us.

“But she wasn’t,” Liam added quickly, not leaving any room for drama or suspense, as usual.

Niall looked up, looked at Liam and then looked at me, waiting for me to say something. Which was flattering, and, I think, the right thing to do.

“How do you feel about that?” I asked.

“I… dunno, like,” Liam said, his voice wobbling in the middle of his sentence. “I dunno how I should feel.”

“I think that’s normal with a pregnancy scare…” Niall said mildly. I could tell he was coming down off of the momentary pang of anxiety he felt when he thought another unplanned baby might be entering into our lives. I wonder if he knows the whole thing is so visual. He must, being a doctor. I bet gynecologists are even trained to notice that type of thing. I guess that doesn’t mean he applies it to himself, though.

“I wouldn’t -- I mean, that’s just it,” Liam explained. He spread his hands out over the Pottery Barn catalogue, palms-down. “I don’t know whether I’d call it a scare.”

“Mm…” I hummed, prompting him to elaborate.

“Like, I was… getting ready for it. Being a dad. Actually being a dad.”

“Again,” Niall corrected.

Liam nodded, unsure. “Again, yeah.”

“I mean, we have been dads,” Niall continued, reiterating. That was his strategy when he was trying to make a point, like saying the same thing more times in different ways would weaken the other person’s resistance to his correctness. He picked up his Fage yogurt cup from the counter and ate a spoonful.

“You’re always discounting stuff you do, Liam. Like, just ‘cause no one’s told you explicitly doesn’t mean you’re not a dad.” He shifted, leaning his weight back on the counter. “A good dad,” he added.

“You are good with Freddie…” I was sleepy from the long flight, and Niall was better at talking anyway, even if I was better at starting conversations. We’re a good team that way.

Liam nodded thoughtfully. He really seemed like he was taking all this in. “Thanks…” was all he could say.

“Sometimes,” Niall said after a couple more bites of yogurt, “Life just… hands you shit. Like, roles. Relationships. Shit you didn’t know you’d ever be doing or want to do... And I know you’ve had your life planned out since you were a kid, but, I mean, we weren’t in your plan either, right? It’s not a bad thing to have to adapt. And you shouldn’t resist it.”

I smiled, thinking about how Louis has really changed us all.

“Thanks, Niall… I dunno. I get in my own head, I guess, and…” Liam said quietly.

“And you feel inadequate for changing your grand life plans. Like, ‘cause you’re not a famous singer yet. I get it. I know you. Sometimes, though, life just… life just…”

“Brings you something better,” I supplied. I tried to soften the harshness of Niall being passionate.

“It knows better than you,” Niall shrugged. “Fate, or something like that.”

I smiled, thinking about how I’ve changed Niall. I can’t help but feel like his little impromptu pep talk to Liam was also, a little bit, for himself. Liam nodded and picked at his hangnails autumnally.

--

One hour later, the party was winding down. It had been a while since Freddie was laid down for a nap, and without the birthday boy things were getting pretty subdued.

“Ready to go?” Louis yawned, appearing in front of us and slipping his hands in Zayn’s jacket pockets. Zayn pushed him away so he tried it on Liam instead, who complied obediently. Niall chuckled involuntarily like he did any time Louis did anything at all.

“Yeah, ready,” Niall said.

“Off we go, then,” Louis said cheerfully, ushering the four of us to the front door. “Let me just say a quick goodbye to Briana, and I’ll meet you in the car, yeah?”

We all made our way out into the twilight, across Briana’s green front yard. Liam got in the driver’s seat and started the car, leaving the passenger seat empty for Louis. I leaned on Zayn in the backseat and she kissed my head, resting her cold hand on my thigh. Niall, on the other side of me, looked out the window, while Liam tried to find a radio station.

“I miss Freddie,” I mumbled into Zayn’s shoulder.

“Already, babe?” she smiled quietly.

“Secrets don’t make friends,” sang Liam, but at that moment Louis loudly entered the car.

“Right, all, let’s go home.” He rubbed his hands together for warmth. Having to actually leave Freddie at Briana’s after a whole week with him and the adrenaline of a party had sobered Louis a bit, but he still had the afterglow of joy about him.

“By the way,” he said as Liam backed the car out of the driveway. “Uh, I really appreciate you all coming today.”

“‘Course we would, Lou, we love Freddie.” Niall sounded genuinely surprised at what Louis had said.

“No, but you easily could’ve not. I just want you to know… like, I do think of you as his parents. All of you,” he said. “Think he does too.”

His voice was soft, vulnerable in the way he got when he was being embarrassingly sincere, that mood where it was impossible to deflect or hide his true feelings, no matter how much he might want to. But he was growing up. I don’t think he wanted to hide them just now.

“Even if the rest of ‘em don’t,” he added after a moment. “They just don’t know, you know? They don’t know about us. What we do. How we are.”

After an agreeable silence, Zayn -- who I thought was asleep -- mumbled, “They’re jealous.”