“This mall is always so busy,” Mason complained as we pushed out way through the crowd. “You’d think there would be a Gamestop that ISN’T in a mall…somewhere at least.”

“Aren’t you enjoying the social experience?” I joked, squinting in the light pounding through tinted glass far above. My feet pounded softly against the marble below as we walked alongside a glass barrier, the only thing that separated us and the marble two floors below. My shoes were comfortable. I yearned for the tight, forbidding grip of Tiffany’s heels. I reflected back on the first time I’d worn them, a slight grin formed as I remembered the way I’d fallen in front of the refrigerator.

“What’s with you and that?” Mason glanced over at me. The Gamestop was just ahead, across the food court. “You used to be a complete hermit, lately you’ve been talking to people and acting…my god like a normal person. What did those GAT girls do to you?”

I didn’t even realize it, but maybe it was true? Maybe I felt more comfortable talking to people and going out now, and maybe it was because they’d pushed me. Maybe that was a good thing, right?

“I don’t know,” I shrugged. “Hey you want to stop and get something to eat? I’m a little hungry.”

Mason stopped dead in his tracks and stared at me as if a black cat had just crossed his path.

“What?” I asked him, frowning.

“In all the time I’ve known you,” He said. “I swear those words have never come out of your mouth. You want to EAT?!”

“Well I mean…I guess?” I shrugged. “If it’s too much trouble though.”

“No,” He shook his head. “It’s…not too much trouble it’s just…what did those GAT girls do to you?”

“Nothing,” I reassured him. “I just…mow their lawn.”

“That’s a euphemism for something, right?”

“There are like a billion places to eat,” I craned my neck to see around the crowd. “Which one do we want?”

“Let’s just do fast food,” Mason said conclusively. “We need to eat and get out of here, got a lot to do today, you know?”

“Yeah,” I agreed. When he said ‘a lot to do’ he was referring to our game, Dark Pantheon. Our guild was planning a raid and that should have been exciting, but it really wasn’t. I was caring less and less, the only place I wanted to be was the GAT or Tri Pi house. But then, why was I here? Why was I bothering to keep up appearances? I could end this, right now. I could look at Mason and confess that I was transgender. He would either accept it or react the way Chastity had. Either way I would be free, so why didn’t I do it? I wanted to be free, right?

“Right,” He clapped his hands and moved toward the Burger King on the other side and to the left. “I’m hankering for a Whopper.”

A girl passed by us, draped in a tight orange sundress patterned with cumulus clouds. I closed my eyes for a moment and waited as the pang of sorrow for who I could have been creeped through my conscious mind and stabbed me in the gut. Who I could have been. It was worse lately, so much worse. The pain had always been there really, but I was able to ignore it to an extent. Ever since Tiffany and GAT had shown me what was possible it was just…it was becoming unbearable. I want to be her. I want to be Audrey.

“I want to be Audrey,” I muttered under my breath. My eyes widened as Mason glanced toward me.

“Sorry, what?” Mason asked over the hum of the crowd.

“What? Oh nothing, I was just clearing my throat. Mason looked at me oddly; he’d heard me, he knew what I’d said but for some reason he turned and continued to walk toward the Burger King. I was facing an impossible enemy: me. I had to overcome myself, I had to come out, but I couldn’t. Another girl passed us, I closed my eyes and turned away. Who was I? I was Audrey. No, I was Todd, I had to be Todd.

“What the hell is this?” Mason looked to the floor, I glanced down and noticed he’d tripped on something, a pink backpack.

“Oh just walk around it,” I snapped. “I’m hungry.”

I wasn’t hungry, I just wanted to get out of the mall. I wanted out, I had to get out. Mason bent over, reaching downward to grab the backpack by its handle and hoist it upward.

“Well look at that,” He mused. “Has a name on it…Makayla. Hey is there a Makayla around here?!”

I waited in silence for him to either stop screwing around or someone to talk to him and reclaim the backpack.

“Let’s just go,” I said, a quiet exhale escaping my lips.

“We should just open it up and—”

I couldn’t take it anymore. I didn’t want to be there, I didn’t want to be dressed like this, I didn’t want to be called Todd. I wasn’t Todd, I was Todd. I wasn’t. I broke with reality; my feet turned toward the exit and took off running, my upper body seemingly a passenger. I thought I heard him call out after me, but his voice was absorbed into the crowd of disembodies ones, making it easier to run really. Yeah, he was everywhere, but I was in control of the situation. He couldn’t stop me. No one could stop me. I couldn’t stop me.

Keep going.

I slipped, my feet sliding across the floor, a harsh impact with the glass railing, and a thud as my body ricocheted back into the crowd. I learn a few curses, a person telling me to watch where I was going, at least one gasp, a female voice asking me if I was okay. I didn’t have time to stop. The world was closing in around me, the exit to the upper level of the parking lot was ahead and stretching further away, the light at the end of the tunnel fleeing in my presence.

Like swimming through molasses I finally pushed my way through the crowd, ducking and dodging until my body pressed through the airlock and blasted into the parking lot. The open air around me depressurized my being, I was free, but I wasn’t done yet. I took a sharp left and made a bee line for a patch of trees off in the distance, beyond the curb at the edge of the parking lot. Jumping the curb and nearly falling again, I breached the treeline and collapsed in a small clearing. A branch smacked my face; I dropped, hands and knees onto bare ground, my strife witnessed by trees, rocks, and the open blue sky. I was alone.

“I’m Audrey,” I spoke to the ground, breathing heavily, my saliva dripping from dry, chapped lips. “I’m Audrey. My name is Audrey, my name is Audrey, oh god.”

I said it, I said it as many times as I could but no matter how many times the words escaped my lips they were lost on the wind. It wasn’t true, it would never be true no matter how many times I said it. I pounded my fist against the dirt, pain shot down my wrists and spread across my closed palms. God dammit no, no I was Audrey.

“Come out Audrey,” I pleaded. “Just let me be you, please.”

“Todd?” Mason’s voice came from behind, I questioned whether it was even real. I turned, dropping onto my butt and supporting my weight with open palms behind me.

“Mason,” I said, gasping for breath. “I…I need to tell you something.”