Which brings me to today, I’m 13 now and about to start highschool. Can’t say I’m looking forward to it, since it’s probably exactly the same as earlier. Me being a social leper for being a boy with a girls’ name. It probably doesn’t help that I got a haircut yesterday and with me being distracted with trying to think of ways for damage control, I accidently agreed to my hairdresser to give me bangs. By the time I noticed it was too late to go back. I was either going to sport bangs, or a girly bob. I chose the bangs. Sigh, hopefully it isn’t worse like the usual crap at least.

Author's note: Text spoken in Japanese is printed between <> Also there is some minor swearing and racism present in this chapter.

A boy named Alice, chapter 1

I’m about to enter school when I hear someone calling my name, I recognise the voice and my stomach contracts. Please, please, please let it not be her.

[Oi Alice! Alice! Good morning, seems like we’re going to the same high school, nice I was afraid I’d be all alone here. Nice Hime-cut btw. Eh? Something wrong? Why are you so silent?]

Of course it had to be her, my best friend… At least until she discovers that I’m not a girl. I managed to keep silent about my gender in the Japanese Saturday school we both attend, but now it’ll only be a week tops before she’ll hate my guts. Can things get any worse?

Oh you’re wondering what this Japanese school is about? Well in this town there is a fairly large amount of Japanese immigrants and they feel that their offspring should be able to read and write proper Japanese so all the kids go to the community centre on Saturday where they get to learn Japanese. There are also classes for calligraphy and stuff for when the language classes are over, it’s pretty neat. So how did a white American boy enter this school you ask? Well when I was seven it became evident that I was bored with school. It was too easy (well spending every second of free time on schoolwork because you have NO FRIENDS will do that to you) and the headmaster suggested to my sire that I attend the Saturday school to give me something to do.

Considering that his offspring was smart enough to get recommended for this he was, of course, elated. I have to say I was glad too. The kids knew me as Alice of course but since there are no locker rooms there I managed to keep my gender hidden and have some sort of normalcy there. Having spent 6 years now at that school I’m pretty much fluent at Japanese now, and Yuri has become my best friend. I do wonder why she’s here though, I thought all the Japanese kids went to the private school. Well regardless of the reason she IS here, and that means I have a good chance of losing not only my best friend, but losing my other friends at Saturday school too. So the big question is do I pretend nothing is wrong and let her figure it out when it’s time for gym, or do I tell her now and pray that she’s willing to listen to reason? She’s (I hope) my friend, I better tell her now, a couple of extra days won’t matter anyway.

[Morning Yuri, nothing wrong just lost in thought. Say I have something important to tell you and you’d probably hate me for it but please hear me ou—OOF! What the heck?!]

Just about when I was to tell Yuri my back-story some big jerk interrupted me by slamming into me and I fell on the ground. Being somewhat used to beatings I knew that laying around in the fetal position was NOT the way to go. The way to go was to stand up ASAP and run away, I had of course some experience in avoiding more hits when getting up but what happened here threw me a curveball. Instead of preparing to kick me when I was down he instead chose to yell at me.

“WHY THE FUCK ARE YOU ENABLING THAT STUPID MEXICAN FOR, BITCH?! THIS IS AMERICA AND WE SPEAK AMERICAN HERE, THAT BITCH BETTER LEARN THE LANGUAGE AND BITCHES LIKE YOU SHOULDN’T MAKE THINGS EASY, IF THE MEXICAN BITCH CAN’T LEARN AMERICAN SHE SHOULD JUST LEAVE!!!”

This was by far the most stupid thing I’ve ever heard, and considering I live with HIM that’s saying something. In fact this was so stupid that I was completely dumbfounded and could only goldfish at the gorilla as he entered the building. Yuri meanwhile looked scared and came to my side.

[ I’m so sorry about that Alice, I figured that since this is highschool that the other kids would be more mature. Maybe it’s better if you stay away from me so that you don’t get crap for associating with me…]

[Don’t worry about that making me a bullying target, they’ll have far better ammo for me in a few days anyway. Even if they didn’t this is no reason to ditch my best friend… at least if you’d still have me as a friend when I tell you the dirt they’ll find about me?]

[You don’t have to pretend for me Alice, I appreciate your kindness but you have no idea to what kind of hell you’re condemning yourself if you hang out with me. There is no way they’d pick on you if you don’t, I mean you’re smart, you're white, you’re pretty…]

[…and a boy.] I finished her sentence for her. [As soon as I have to raise hell for not wanting to use the girl’s locker-room, everybody in school will know that I’m a boy named Alice. Bullies will flock to me like sharks to blood. In fact you’d probably catch more flak about hanging out with me than for being a “Mexican”. Bloody idiots can’t even get the continent right. Anyway now that you know you’d probably hate me like everyone else who knows about my name… I’ll respect your privacy, farewell…]

I turned around, tears starting to flood my eyes and was about to run away when I was tackle-hugged by Yuri.

[Whu..wha?] Yeah really eloquent.

[OMG Alice I’m so sorry to hear that, please don’t leave. I’ll still be your bestie if you want to.]

[You don’t think I’m a freak? You don’t mind?]

[Of course not, silly! Not your fault you have that name, although I do wonder why. I have to say I’m a little bit hurt that you didn’t trust me after all those years, but I can only imagine what you must have gone through… I can understand that you didn’t want to tell. And it would be pretty hypocritical of me to condemn you for you being girly, even in name only. After all I’m Yuri.]
[yes I’ve known your name for 6 years now I don’t see how that’s relevant?] Of course as I said the last words it downed on me what she meant. For those of you who don’t know Japanese, Yuri is not only a girl’s name (and some boy’s) but it’s also slang for lesbian. […ooooooh I get it now. Yeah that would do it. I should slap you for that pun though.]

[ Sorry,] She giggles. [I’ve always wanted to say that from the moment I knew I was a Lesbian and since we were confessing things about ourselves this seemed like a good time. Now I do have a question for you though, why did your father name you Alice if you’re a boy? That doesn’t seem like good parenting.]

[THAT…. THING IS NOT MY FATH…] Blurgh I started to dry heave and was about to lose my breakfast, but I managed to recover. [Ugh, can’t even say it in that context, he’s not fit to be called the F-word. That monster named me Alice precisely because he hoped I would be the target of bullies. He ruined my life before it even started, it’s indeed not “good parenting” as you put it. And he’s realised that too, but instead of feeling sorry for me and getting me a name change instead he tries to protect his sorry ass by trying to make sure as few people as possible know that he named his son Alice.]

At this point I told her everything, from why I had my hair this way to him grounding me for the headmaster finding out. Yuri in return was looking shocked at my sire’s deeds.

[He grounded YOU because the headmaster at your previous school found out you are a boy? What were you supposed to do anyway?]

[I tried asking, but he extended my punishment for another month for that question, I never did get an answer. I hope I can convince the head here to not call him since I don’t really fancy a repeat of that. Actually with a bit of luck my previous head has informed the head of this school so that things might be a bit more subdued.]

[He extended your punishment for asking what you should have done to avoid the situation? Talk about stupid. That’s not a human, that’s a yokai. No that’s an insult to yokai. I don’t know what to say, except that I’ll stick by you. You sure my parents shouldn’t call child services?]

[And take the problem away from him? If I’m taken away he might be a bit embarrassed by that and probably forced to move but also, he wouldn’t have to pay for my upbringing anymore. I’m going to suck every penny that I can out of him. Despite everything he values being seen as a good parent, or rather he’s very weak to peer pressure so I get good food and clothes and stuff. I have the latest computer for starters, and he hires a maid to do the cooking and the cleaning. I’m going to prepare myself to emancipate me just in case, but if at all possible I’m going to wriggle out a full Ivy League university ride out of him.]

[Ooooh that’s going to cost him a fortune, I like it. Anyway it’s getting late, we should head inside to assembly. I hope we get to be in the same classes]

[Yeah me too, let’s go. You know I have the feeling that this year isn’t going to be all bad.]

Author's note: So in this chapter we meet Yuri who is going to be a massive support for Alice and vica versa. I'm using [] to denote Japenese since <> results in code issues. If anyone has a suggestion for something better it's highly appreciated. Please leave a comment about what you think of this chapter, constructive critisism is also highly appreciated.