Chapter 2 Part 1: The Unravelling Chapter 1: The Walk of Shame
Joel’s consolation feels hollow, a series of half-hearted platitudes that do nothing to mend the fresh wound of his transformation. He hadn’t meant to be cruel, I know that, but his words, meant to reassure me for not trembling, for not yet finding my gender, only make me feel more alien. I gather my things, my movements stiff and deliberate, a stark contrast to the emotional chaos churning inside me.
“Wait, please,” he says, his voice now a deep, resonant baritone that feels unfamiliar in the small room. He reaches for me, but I flinch away. I need space. I need time to think. And the truth, a sharp and shameful shard in my chest, is that even though Joel now possesses the most impressive anther I have ever seen, I liked him better when he was a Changeling. I think I had loved Polli-Joel, her quick laughter, her intuitive grace. That person is gone now, and Nate-Joel, for all his new strength and stature, feels like a poor substitute, a stranger wearing my friend’s face.
I leave with a mumbled “See you around,” or something equally empty, and take my tattered soul out into the damp, indifferent street. With draw to collect oneself strategy of my old mentor Doctor Norton.
I have always been more thoughtful, more emotionally raw during my Polli cycle, my senses heightened and my heart closer to the surface. But tonight is different. This isn’t sensitivity; it’s a void. A hollow, aching nothingness. At twenty-two, I am a Changeling failure, two years past the age when most people experience their Trembling and find their permanent gender. What the hell is wrong with me? My father’s solution is clinical “see a doctor” while my mother pleads with me to seek the guidance of the priests. But the thought of the doctor’s prodding hands and the priests’ scornful pity makes my skin crawl.
A cool trickle traces a path down my inner thigh, the last remnants of the salt of life. It’s a sticky reminder that I need a waterdrop, and a crueller reminder of the biological trap I am in. I catch my reflection in the darkened window of a closed shop: a pale, pretty Polli with eyes red-raw from crying. Could I endure a lifetime of this? The thought is a prison. I have always known, with a certainty that feels as fundamental as my own heartbeat, that I was meant to be a Nate. My father had taught me how to throw a punch almost before I could walk. I was captain of the dieball team, the fastest and strongest kid on my block.
But tonight, that certainty has deserted me. I am just a crying wreck, a Changeling without a gender, without a direction. I know the theories, of course; everyone does. They say you can manipulate the outcome of the Trembling. Surround yourself with one gender, and you have a ninety percent chance of becoming the other. They whisper that if you can find and control your bliss, you can seize the reins of your own transformation. But hell, I’ve never even found my bliss, let alone learned to control it. Hence, the silence within. Hence, the stillness.
“To tremble, you must have a quickening of both the body and the soul.” I can still hear my old Bliss Teacher’s chant, her voice a steady, melodic rhythm. Most teachers were Clams, people who never got to experience a Trembling, who lived their entire lives without a gender. They had no flower, no stigma, and certainly no anther. But my teacher had been very much a Polli, her own bliss long since mastered and solidified. Maybe that is my true fate. Not a Nate, not a Polli, but a freak Clam. A dud. A body where nothing ever grows, and everything just… shrivels.
The realization did not arrive with a bang, but with a slow, sickening unspooling in my gut. That closed confectionery on the corner, the one with the gaudy pink sign… I’d passed it before. Fifteen minutes ago. My pace, brisk and purposeful until then, faltered and died completely. I stood on the glistening pavement, the fine, icy drizzle collecting in my hair, and felt the world tilt. Fifteen minutes. I had been walking the wrong way for fifteen entire minutes.
A low, frantic curse escaped my lips, swallowed by the misty evening air. I spun on my heel, my heart hammering against my ribs. The hopper. The 21:15. The last one that wouldn’t leave me stranded for an eternity.
I launched myself back the way I came, my wet shoes slapping against the concrete slabs in a pathetic, hurried rhythm.
I rounded the final corner, my lungs burning with the cold, damp air, and there it was: the red rear lights of hopper. Already moving. A lumbering beast pulling away from the curb, a puff of exhaust smoke hanging in the wet air like a ghost. I broke into a final, hopeless sprint, my arm flailing, but the pilot stared ahead, shifting gears. The hopper lights receded, turned the corner, and vanished, leaving me alone in the sodium-yellow glow of the hopper stop.
The defeat was a physical weight. I bent over, hands on my knees, gasping. The cold seeped through my jacket, a deep, penetrating dampness. Straightening, I fumbled my com from my pocket. The screen glowed: 21:17. The next hopper wasn’t until 22:45. An hour and a half.
A groan escaped me. An hour and a half in this. The cold wasn’t just cold; it was a clinging, wet chill that found every gap in my clothing. The drizzle misted my glasses and beaded on my sleeves. Dampness seeped into the shoulders of my coat.
My first thought, automatic and desperate, was Joel’s. His dwellings was only a ten-minute walk away. Warmth, dry socks, a cup of leaf, shoved into my hands. But as quickly as the thought arrived, I recoiled. No. I couldn’t. Not again. Not tonight. Not more talk about my trembling.
I could already hear his voice, laced with that toxic blend of concern and condescension: Are you still thinking about it? You should really try that meditation app I sent you. You should stay…
I couldn’t handle him. Not again. Not tonight.
I was adrift, shivering now, trapped between a miserable wait and a miserable refuge. I zipped my coat up to my chin, a futile gesture against the biting chill. And that’s when I saw it.
Across the street, warm light spilled onto the wet pavement. The faint, inviting clink of glassware. A neon sign glowed deep red: The Apostrophe. A bar.
It wasn’t just a light. It was a sanctuary, maybe. The sort of place where the only conversation required was a simple order. A single drink, something strong, something that would burn a trail of warmth down to my frozen core. It wouldn’t solve anything. It wouldn’t conjure a new hopper or dry my clothes. But it would make the next hour, and a half feel less like punishment. The cold would bite less sharply. The wait would seem less long.
The decision was instant. Without giving myself another moment to think, I stepped off the curb, my footsteps carrying me straight toward the door.