I opened my eyes and looked at the clock. 10:00 am on a weekend. Nice. Great time to wake up. I flipped over on my stomach and I felt no pressure on my chest but a pretty vast amount on something below my midsection.

I flipped back to see I no longer had my b-cup sized breasts. Oh god. How did this happen. I sat up quickly to notice a pretty sizable lump underneath the basketball shorts I wore to bed.

What. The. Fuck.

I had a penis. I instantly felt bad about everyone I ever teased about morning wood because it was happening now and it was scary as hell. I leapt up to look in the mirror. And man, was I hot. Not in a stereotypical excellent physique type of way because I definitely wasn’t. I was lean and I had a full beard and mustache to complement the brown shoulder length hair. I looked in the mirror, looking like myself at the base but also not. I could recognize my eyes and cheekbones and the nose. Now I had a layer of hair everywhere I didn’t usually have it: my jaw, my legs, and worst of all, my pits.

How did I become a dude? And when was I going back to being a chick?

I didn’t really know what to do with myself anymore. Oh god. What if I didn’t switch back?

I was overthinking this. Guys don’t normally overthink things, I don’t think?

Well, I guess...if I was a guy...I would try to be like a guy and try to test out the things that I’d always wondered about. I’d never given birth before but I suppose I could test the age old question on whether or not getting hit in the balls is as painful as men claimed it was.

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, balling my fist. I thought about every time a man told me to smile and those times when they slowed down while I was running around the neighborhood to talk to me. Almost like a reflex, I punched myself. I doubled over immediately and started yelling a string of profanity. Holy shit. Kill me now. I laid down in fetal position on the floor. God. Fuck. God. It felt like...one of my worst cramps. Fuck.

I took a couple of deep breaths until I could think again, and the pain began to subside. God. This was so stupid. Why the fuck would I do that?

Whelp. At least I wasn’t wondering what if anymore.

I took a shower, finding myself only using a three in one product all over myself. Using the same thing to wash my hair and body made no sense to me, but I was very happy with the scent. Man scents were better than the sickeningly sweet things used for women. Trust me, no one needs to smell like a fruit salad. Afterwards, I put on some jeans and found everything fitting conveniently in my pockets: my wallet, keys, and phone. I didn’t need a purse. I had pockets in all articles of clothing. Man. Everything was great and comfortable.

Males didn’t get periods. No bleeding uterus ever. I didn’t have to worry to plan a trip or avoid wearing certain colors because I was an open ketchup packet. Man, they really had the best of luck.

I went to my car, recognizing my blue old 1987 Ford, and I got in. I didn’t know why I was surprised to see it. Changing gender didn’t necessarily mean it would change me or my likes and dislikes. Of course guy me would love this car.

I got into the car and my legs were cramped at the regular settings. I frowned at having to adjust the seat. I was no longer 5’4. Man. I was never gonna get this setting again after returning to being a girl. Safety first, and I also didn’t know if I was ever going to be a girl ever again. I nudged the seat back just enough to be able to drive safely.

I headed out to get breakfast tacos at my favorite taco place. I stared at the menu. Guy me was craving some potato, egg, and cheese tacos. I went up to the cashier and went up to the cashier that was notoriously cranky.

“Hey, can I get five potato, egg, and cheese breakfast tacos?” I asked her. I normally went for three but I was heavier and taller in this body.

She smiled at me for the first time since I started coming here. Then, her smile fell. “Oh. I’m sorry. We stopped serving those five minutes ago.”

“Oh. Well, that’s okay…” I replied and started to turn around.

“Wait!” she called out. She went to talk to someone in the back. She came back a second later. “No problem! Your total comes out to 7.25.”

I inserted my credit card and she gave me a receipt. I went to go take a seat.

She never delivered food. But she did deliver my food when the food was ready.

She smiled at me. “Enjoy your food!” She set down a napkin next to me with a phone number and the name “Amy” and walked away.

Well, how nice of her. But I didn’t think I was attracted to women. I didn’t feel anything that made me wonder about women. So maybe, now that I was a guy...was I gay?

I shook my head before going down that rabbit hole and started eating. I inhaled all of the tacos and did not feel full. This was deliciously disappointing. How much money would I have to invest in buying all of my food?!

I got up and walked to the restroom. It was empty but there were several urinals. Well alright. I undid the button in my jeans and the zipper and found the whole process insanely convenient and quick. Women had to undress completely from the bottom. It was why dresses were so convenient to women. But men, all of their bottoms were convenient as long as they had zippers instead of multiple buttons.

I went back to my car. I kept the phone number in my pocket for future reference in case I did keep my current genitals. Let’s be real, the tacos were good. I needed to keep coming back. Now that I noticed that Amy actually smiled, I’d like to help keep it that way.

I went back into my car and looked at the potential of the rest of my day as a man. Truly, the sky was the limit. That scared me a bit. I felt that fear as a woman. I just wasn’t allowed to cry so much about it in this gender according to my grandpa. Life truly sucked for everyone. I didn’t know what that meant and where my place was in the world if I was stuck in this body for the rest of my life.

I decided to go back home. I took off my clothes as I walked from the living room to the bedroom. And I crawled to bed. I still thought too much whether my gender was male or female. I failed to want to do anything else and submitted to the slumber to keep the thoughts running.

#girltoboy #womantoman #depression #confusion #birthvspenis #emotions

I hate my life. I hate my life. I hate my life. Fuck. One more lap left, I think. Oh god, I hate running. I hate cardio. I had to take deep breaths, I needed to get to the mile. God. I both heard and felt my feet slap on the ground. My heartbeat pounded in my ears, loud enough to cover the sound of my necessarily labored breathing. How did I used to do this? My legs hurt. Can legs suddenly stop working? How did I let myself get this way?

But I knew very well. I overcompensated treating myself and comforting my feelings with food after the trauma of an inappropriate and abusive relationship. Anytime the stress of my college classes fell and crushed my shoulders, I reached for a snack that was not necessarily healthy. I don’t really remember a lot of veggies in my diet. My absolute favorite thing was the after 8 pm happy hour at Sonic. They had half off shakes, and I could drink an entire large strawberry ice cream slush if I didn’t control myself. And if the thoughts were bad, then I would fall into the bottom of the supersized cup.

I wasn’t huge, but I was also the heaviest I had ever been. BMI marked me red and obese as I stood at the scale and watched the numbers run up to 177. I wasn’t a tall gal. I stood firmly at 5’4 and ¾. I needed to let go of my own insecurities and truly wanted to avoid being featured on TLC. I figured that enough was enough and I needed to go ahead and not let my life hold me back from moving forward from a very unhappy existence. I was super uncomfortable in my own skin. I needed things to change in my life. In order to accomplish that, I needed to lose at least 30 pounds to be what the scale and most doctors considered “normal” and in the nice, neon green safe section weight indicated for my height.

Unfortunately for me, that started by running alongside one of my close friends, Leila, who worked out in military caliber with her father for years growing up. I was thankful to her for helping me get into shape but I also had a string of profanity I needed to hold back every time I had some new workout to do or another lap to complete. At least this was free.

“Almost there, Rose,” she said to me.

My lungs damn near exploded. I allowed my legs to push me forward faster and longer, so I could finish earlier.

“Shoot me,” I said as I collapsed on the ground a sweaty mess after finishing my laps.

“You did it though,” she said and extended a hand towards me.

“I did.” I took her hand and stood up.

“Well, time to go hit the weight room,” she said with a smile.

I knew torture was soon to come, but hey, it wasn’t cardio. “No more running?” The weight room had some treadmills we could continue the punishment in a stationary method.

“No more running,” she promised. “For only today.”

“Fine.” Weights were fine on the day of. I could breathe easier. Besides, the soreness or tomorrow was future Rose’s problem. We took a light stroll towards the weight room on a long journey towards me losing 30 pounds. I could at least take a moment to breathe before the training was unleashed on my arms and abs. I had no upper body strength so I was about as good at weights as I was at running. Even though I knew it wasn’t going to happen overnight and there would be a lot of pain and suffering in the journey, I was okay with light jogging my way to happiness.

Heat and bright lights radiated through my closed eyelids, waking me from a deep slumber. Pain from the angry, radiating sun sent alarm messages to my throbbing brain, and I felt nausea build up quickly and pulled the trash can to me so I could empty the contents of my stomach. Those contents happened to be a lot of old, slightly processed alcohol and some bits of stuff I didn’t want to think about too much. It reeked. I pushed the trash can away from me when I finally felt I was done. Welp, today was going to be full of baby steps. I needed to clean myself up. I tried to shield my face with my arm as I got up but my forearm was insanely sore. I sat up slowly and realized it was strange that light was shinning from my left. I didn’t have a window on my left in my room. I was not in my room.

I didn’t know where I was.

Okay. Okay. Okay. Alright. Okay. Everything was fine. Everything was fine. I just needed to find out where I was and holy shit, what happened last night. I was on the floor, next to a bed. I quietly got on my knees to look up at the bed and check to see if this was the product of an abduction or sex trafficking.

There was only one person on the bed. I squinted through the pain that threatened to tear my head apart and noticed there was a very nude and pale butt staring back at me. This was a very naked body. I looked down at me and exhaled in relief. I was fully clothed. My jeans didn’t seem to be tampered with. I crawled around the bed to look at the face belonging to the butt. Thankfully, the front was covered by the sheets.

I immediately relaxed when I saw it was just my best friend, Apollo. I didn’t understand why he was naked but the fact that I wasn’t gave me some comfort. His shoulder length hair was framing his face and he was still peacefully asleep. Lucky him for facing away from the sun. At least it seemed we were safe.

I nudged him awake. “Apollo? Gahh..” I groaned at the pain my own voice brought me.

His snores stopped and his eyes fluttered open. He seemed to take my face in and pushed away from the loud noise and the brighter lights. “Dear god, woman,” he groaned at me.

“I know. I know. Where are we?” I whispered.

“What do you mean?” he said, pulling the covers towards his face.

“I mean what I mean. Where are we?” I whispered aggressively. “Why are you naked?”

He sat up very quickly. “What do you mean?” He looked under the covers. “I’m naked. Were you naked?”

“Nope...and I apparently slept on the floor. So we don’t need to worry about that part of all of this. Does this look familiar to you?” I gestured to around the room.

He squinted and his gaze rested on my forearm. “You would think I would remember you getting a tattoo.”

“Huh?”

He extended my arm in my direction, forcefully but gently in my direction. I peeled back the wrapper to get a better look at my arm. There were some intricate five-petal flowers outlined in black. It was overall quite beautiful and minimalistic. BUT HOLY SHIT I HAVE A TATTOO.

My Salvadorean mom was going to kill me.

He looked at my dismay and a humorous smile appeared. “Hey. At least it’s work appropriate.”

I exhaled, not wanting to go down the loop of desperation. “Where are we, Apollo?”

He looked around. “It looks like a hotel room.”

I nodded and used the bed as support to stand up. I went against rational judgement and my complaining brain and walked to the window, using my non-tattooed forearm to shield the glaring sun from my eyes. The heat intensified my headache, but I fought through that and opened my eyes wide until I could see past the bright surrounding. I saw a beach.

“We aren’t in Texas anymore, Toto,” I said as I read some signs with both translations in English and Spanish. It could technically be Texas; I knew areas that were highly populated with Latinos but I thought the line added flair. If there was one thing that Apollo and I had in common, it was our use of humor to deal with life.

I looked around the room for a name for the hotel or whatever place we were at. I walked carefully to the restroom. His clothes were hanging on the shower rod. They looked like they’d been left to dry in there. I touched them and they were cool to the touch. I pulled them all off of the hanger rod and walked over to Apollo, leaving them on the bed beside him.

“I’ll go use the restroom and you can get ready and we can see where we go from here,” I said through the pulsating in my brain. I walked back and splashed water on my face. It was considerably a nice room. I just didn’t know where I was and that freaked me out. I used the tiny toothpaste provided for us and brushed my teeth with my finger. While rinsing, I tasted the water and it seemed safe enough to drink. I spat everything out of my mouth, though, remembering the all-famous phrases and jokes surrounding drinking water in foreign countries.

I checked my pockets for everything. I had a couple of 20 dollar bills. I didn’t have my ID in my pockets. Where was my ID? Oh god. Where was my phone?

I half-ran out of the bathroom. “Apollo, do you have your wallet?”

He was pulling on his shirt and quickly checked his pockets before shaking his head.

“I don’t have my purse or my wallet...or anything but 40 bucks.”

We both looked at each other a bit dumbfounded. What happened last night?

We both started looking in around the room to see if we could find anything. We looked in the cabinets and under the bed. But there was nothing that was ours. Okay. Okay. Okay. Alright. Okay.

“Crap,” we both said at the same time.

“What do we do now?” he asked after we stared at each other for a bit, dejected.

I shrugged. “Let’s...let’s go to the front desk and ask what is going on.”

We both stepped out of the room and headed to find the front desk.

There was a lady there, dark skinned and dark haired, flipping through a book and making notes in the margins. I looked at her name tag before I started talking.

“Umm...hi. Do you speak English?” I asked, in a hesitant tone.

She nodded, barely looking up from her book.

“I was wondering, where are we? Like, what city?”

She looked up from her book and did a double take. “Ah. Crazy Americans.” Her accent was quite thick. “Welcome to Cancun.”

“Mexico?!” I overemphasized and I noticed Apollo flinch at the sharpness of my voice.

“Yes.” She spun around in her rollie chair and pulled out of a cabinet my purse and Apollo’s wallet after double checking our faces in our IDs. “You were very drunk last night. You left these in the hallway.” She looked at me. “You look older in your picture. Short hair is not pretty for you.”

I looked away from Ximena, trying to disregard her comment about my hair since I had no ground on which to judge.

“How long will you be staying for?” she asked. “We have an open account for you.”

Apollo and I looked at each other. We didn’t even know how we got here. We were both exhausted and hungry and thankfully, not broke now that I had all of my things back with me.

“Well, we have free breakfast. Decide by 12 if you want to stay or leave. You should be out of your room by that time.”

“Thank you,” I replied and walked into the direction that Ximena had motioned towards.

It was a complimentary breakfast type of situation. I picked up some pancakes and loaded my plate with chorizo, other meats, eggs, and loads of fruit. I grabbed some coffee and poured some milk in the mug and plenty of sugar.

Apollo only got meats for his first round. His philosophy was to allow food to remain warm instead of letting it get cold on the plate. Mine was to eat it before it was eaten by someone else.

My body welcomed the grease of the food and my hangover decreased in potency. I looked at Apollo after we both had a couple of mouthfuls in our system.

“What do we do?” I asked.

“Is my phone in your purse?”

I looked around to find my phone first and then his. They were both off. I handed him his and we turned them on. Pieces of the night started falling into place, with flight emails and Discover purchase confirmation messages.

“We had dinner last night,” I said squeezing my eyes shut as if that would make the memories flow easier or the numbers of amount spent disappear.

“According to my phone, we got very drunk.”

“According to mine, we flew here. Our flight back is...tomorrow night.”

“Well, another night here it is,” he said, accepting our reality with another bite.

“Only if you go get a tattoo so we can both remember not remembering this trip.”

He chuckled slightly. “Fine.”

He picked up his orange juice and I picked up my coffee and we sealed the world’s weirdest and shortest vacation with a clink of glass.

I had awaited and dreaded this day. I both wanted to graduate and didn’t. I wasn’t ready to leave the place I knew as home for three and a half years to go back my parents’ house. Most of all, I didn’t want to stop being a couple of miles away from him.

I looked at him as he slept, hoping this wasn’t too stalkerish. But we did have different sleep schedules. I was an early riser due to work and school and research, and he did his best work at night. He would always come to bed when I went to bed, and I would try to stay up for him so we could spend more time together.

Our relationship wasn’t always the easiest and there were times when we weren’t together but through it all, we had each other. He was unlike anyone I’d ever met before. He understood the word ‘No.’ He asked before kissing me. He asked before touching me. He was my first time traveling on a motorcycle. He was simply freedom and respect and beauty, a unicorn with pink hair and a ginger beard.

I wrapped my arms around him and tried to embrace him the best I could without waking him up. He stirred but his soft snores indicated he was still out. He loved it when I was the big spoon. So whenever I could, I would hold him just as he held me through the intense recollections of past traumas. Because of him, the everyday thoughts that used to suck me into a pit of despair and tears were replaced by livelier memories and happier adventures. He taught me how to live. I stopped spending all my time hiding in my apartment and explored the town with him, opening myself up to more experiences. I could trust again, not just other people but myself.

Not only was I afraid to lose him with my impending move, I was afraid of losing myself and the happy, free person I was with him. I knew that losing him, I would lose the safety net I had embraced myself with, and I would be likely to fall again. And the thought of that threatened to send me into this all-around panic where I can’t breathe and I have to clutch at my throat and my chest and my skin gets itchy and tears fill my eyes and I need to--absolutely positively need to--wrap myself with my own arms or with something resembling warmth. And I was living under threat of having to do that.

A shift in his breathing pulled me away from my mind, and I decided to do what I always did with him: living in the moment. I ran my fingers in his hair and kissed his shoulder softly. His eyes gently fluttered open, and I felt a bit guilty at waking him up.

He looked at me and smiled. “Good morning.” He leaned over to meet my lips.

“Morning,” I said, smiling back.

“Ready for graduation?”

I groaned. “I’m excited for my dress but it’s going to be cold and I may freeze tonight.”

“You’ll look great though.”

I shrugged. “True.” I leaned down to nuzzle his jawline and his arms held me tighter to him.

“You know, I’m really happy you’re graduating but...I really love the way things have been going.”

“Me too. But I’ll be back as soon as I get a job,” I promised with every bit of my being. Wait for me, I thought.

“I’ll hold you to it,” he said, confirming my thoughts that he would.