Rio is a boy, just ask and she'll tell you it's true

Rio's Bargain

2. Muppet Homeroom

by Lulu Martine

I finished getting ready for bed, taking a trip to the bathroom to wash-up, unwrapping and rewrapping my chest while I was at it. A little medical miscalculation during an attempt to restart my puberty had left me with small but definitely girly breasts. Seems my body produces an excess of something called aromatase, which turns male hormones into female ones.

They discontinued the treatment when the blood tests showed what was happening, but that took ten weeks, and I kind of started through girl puberty instead. Fortunately, that stopped when they stopped giving me injections. Except, lately, it seemed something was happening there.

I wrap them to avoid having pointy nipples poking my shirt, I do not need that, but I have to unwrap them to wash. And I rewrap to sleep; otherwise, they itch like crazy. They seemed especially tender this week.

I washed my groin, too. I don't have any hair down there, or anywhere else below my neck, but I still have a penis. It's small with a funny bend in it, but it qualifies me as a boy. I've got testicles, too, all shriveled up, not really working, and hard to find. At least, I think they're still there.

Compared to my sensitivity to direct sunlight, eye problems, general enervation, and diet restrictions, my genital oddities are not even nuisance-level worries. I have no sex drive worth mentioning, so if it doesn't matter to me, why should it concern anyone else?

I crawled between clean sheets--an everyday necessity, not a luxury for me--and lay awake for some time, wondering what kind of job could pay as much as a thousand dollars a night. I could only think of a few.

Of course, my dreaming self imagined me cleaning block-long warehouses, delousing giants, and killing snakes using only one of those little cocktail swords.

*

Anyone seeing my sisters and I together for the first time could be forgiven for not realizing we were related. They had their father's coloring, and my step-dad, Art Jimenez, had been a very dark Latino from El Salvador.

Colleen was eight, as feisty and ready to make trouble as any eight-year-old could be who had not already been strangled. She reminded me of Mom. It didn't surprise me to be woken up with Colleen's knee in my middle.

"No sleeping!" she announced. "Time to get up." She emphasized her point by shifting her weight enough to provoke grunts from me and very nearly an accident when she pressed on my bladder. I made it to the bathroom after a tussle. It's embarrassing when your little sister can kick your ass.

Gabriela was more like her dad, Art, quiet and smiling. She'd started kindergarten this year, and going to school still filled her with giggles. So did seeing her sister bully me.

Mom had left for work in the middle of the night, so I made breakfast for the girls, got them into school clothes, packed their lunches, and walked them to their bus. Mom would get off work in time to pick Gaby up after her half-day, but I wasn't sure how she was going to do that without a car.

I debated skipping school myself, but I'm a senior, if I show up for homeroom, nobody cares if I ditch the rest of the day. I was already dressed, munching the other half of the banana I'd cut up into the girl's cereal, waiting for my own bus when Olivio Banderas pulled up at the curb.

The window on his old Cadillac went down, and he leaned across the seat toward me to ask, "You need a ride, chica?"

I bent my head sideways so I could see him. "I'm going to school," I said. "And, you're stopped in the bus lane."

He waved that away. "Focking bus take you half an hour to get to school-- get in."

It wasn't the first time he'd given me a ride. I managed to get the big door open and slide inside, but I couldn't pull it closed. "It's stuck," I said.

He goosed the accelerator, the big car jumped forward, and the door slammed itself shut. "Eep!" I looked at him, astonished that he'd done that.

He laughed. "Don't be scared, querida," he said. "I made sure your hands and feet were inside."

"You still scared the snot out of me," I complained, getting myself buckled in.

He just grinned. "Ah, I would never do anything to hurt mi novia."

"I'm not...." It was no use--Olivio had to know I wasn't a girl. He just said stuff to annoy me. Novia means girlfriend.

*

Olivio dropped me off in front of the school then drove off to find a berth for his land yacht. Monica, the sister of Julie from work, called me over to join a group of her other friends.

"Rio," she said. "You ditching?"

I shrugged.

"You didn't bring your backpack, and you're not wearing your glasses, I gotta assume you're planning to ditch." She and the other girls laughed. None of them had their backpacks, either, but I'd taken my glasses off, so I didn't have to see how Olivio was driving. I pulled them out of my jacket pocket and put them back on.

"I declare this day to be an official, unofficial ditch day," Gwen, one of the other girls, announced. "Let's meet here after homeroom, Naomi has her mom's van, we can get brunch somewhere fine and hit the malls after."

I didn't say anything, but everyone else seemed down with the plan and headed off toward their various homerooms. Gwen and I walked together since we shared the same homeroom and first period.

"I don't have any money I can spend," I said.

She shrugged. "You never do. You don't eat much--you can save me from some french fries." Gwen had a bit of a weight problem, but the opposite of mine.

It was a gray morning that would probably turn into a bright afternoon, and I was already squinting. I realized my dark glasses were in the backpack I had left at home. Maybe I could borrow a pair of sunglasses, otherwise, I would have a headache in about two hours.

Gwen cocked her head to look at me, sort of sideways. "Your face looks thinner, are you losing weight?"

"God, I hope not," I said with feeling. "There's not a lot of me to begin with."

She made a face. "What did you have for breakfast?" We made it to homeroom and found our seats.

I tried to think. "Half a banana?" I couldn't remember anything else. I often forget to eat because I just don't get hungry.

She scowled at me again. "You skinny girls make me sick."

"I'm not..." I started to say, but the bell starting homeroom rang. Gwen had to know I was a boy, didn't she?

We had a substitute today. Mrs. Phipps was back in Texas taking care of her mother and might not be back before end-of-term, so we'd had a lot of substitutes, but this guy was a new one. He ended up calling my name three times before I realized, "Rye-Organ" was supposed to be me.

"Here," I finally piped up.

He looked over his glasses, and his eyebrows went up. "Nice of you to let us know, Miss Russell," he said but not in a sarcastic way, just trying to be funny. The class did laugh, and I giggled. But, 'Rye-Organ?' Where did the 'g' come from?

"It's Rearden, sir," I said, kind of squeaky-like because speaking up in class to correct teachers is not something I do. "Not how you said it."

"Mm-hmm," he said, still looking over his glasses and smiling. "Stand up."

I stood, wondering why he wanted me to. "I didn't recognize it as my name, the way you said it," I ventured.

"Mm-hmm," he said again and went back to calling the role. I started to sit back down, but he looked at me and shook his head, so I stayed standing up, mystified. Gwen was sitting right in front of me, half-turned around with her hand stuffed in her mouth to stop her from laughing.

When he finished the roll, Mr. Substitute turned back to me. If I knew his name, I'd forgotten it. "Miss Russell?" he said.

I didn't know whether to answer or not! "Most people call me 'Rio,' sir," I said, dodging the gender trap. "It's easier to say."

"Mm-hmm," he said. "Rio? That means 'river' in Spanish."

"Yes, sir."

"You're not big enough to be a river, do you think? Perhaps you're more of a Brooke?" That got a general laugh, and I giggled in embarrassment. Short jokes never go out of style, apparently. Why was he doing this?

"Can I sit down? Sir?" I asked.

"Probably, but I haven't given you permission yet."

More laughs. Cute. Third-grade humor and I mean that in the quality sense, not the educational one. I sighed.

The bell rang for the end of the ten minute homeroom period. A few students who had scheduled classes elsewhere for first period got up to leave. Gwen and I were stuck with this guy, normally for World History, but he seemed to have a different course outline in mind: Torment Rio Russell.

He went to his desk and shuffled papers for a while. Whispered conversations broke out all over the room. It was warm in the classroom after the gloomy skies outside, and I started to take off my coat. Some moron in the back corner started a rhythm, da-da-da, da-da-da, da-da, d-da-da, da-da-da.

There couldn't be a less sexy garment to be removed than a corduroy coat! I got it off quick and hung it on the back of my desk chair, which meant turning my back on the teacher. When I turned back around, it was obvious where he had been looking.

I'm skinny, okay, but I have this little round butt that I'm kind of sensitive about. The girls in Gwen's group actually took everyone's measurements on one of our goofier get-togethers. Mine are 26-22-29. That's about a size 8 or 10 in boys' sizes, which is where I have to shop, except I'm too tall for most boy's clothes. Yes, five-three would be very tall for a 9-year-old boy.

My mind was wandering everywhere while Mr. Substitute went back to looking through his papers. I wanted to sit down, mostly, so I didn't keep feeling like everyone was watching me. At least the kid making the stripper music had stopped.

I decided to try to stealth a sit-down move, but in the middle of it, the teacher looked up and said. "Miss Russell, I'm terrified I'll never remember how to pronounce your name. How about if tomorrow, I just call you Brooke?"

I closed my eyes, unbelieving that this was happening. Titters, giggles, snickers, and chuckles traveled around the room. "You could call me Rio? Like I said?"

"I'm afraid that Rio sounds to me like a boy's name, and it just doesn't seem right. But if you'll agree to answer to 'Brooke' in this class, you can sit down."

I sat down as quickly as I could, conceding the name thing because what did it matter?

"Very well, Brooke," he said. "Now, I have some homework papers that have been graded to hand back." He started calling people to come up and get their papers, and I knew what was going to happen when he got to 'R.'

"Brooke Russell?" he called when he got to me. I went up to collect my paper, expecting to hear more laughter, but this time there was only one embarrassed giggle, which seemed to be coming from me.

"Eighty-eight is a B-plus, Brooke, very nice," he said. "You actually knew what countries made up the old Yugoslavia and who Marshall Tito was. I ought to give you extra credit."

He took the paper back, scribbled out the 88-B+ and wrote in 96-A. Then he handed it to me. "One for each country you named and one for Tito. Good work, Brooke," he said.

I couldn't believe it. Was I being rewarded for letting him torture me in front of the class? "Thank you, sir," I said.

When I got back to my seat, Gwen turned around and asked, "What'd you get, Brooke? I got a seventy-three."

"Uh, ninety-six," I said.

"Well, sure," she sniffed. "You're clearly teacher's pet. Mr. Hinson likes you, and he did the grading."

Hinson? That was his name? Well, he'd sure made me feel like a muppet.

*

We all met at the quad gate after first period. Turned out, Naomi had been waiting for us. "Where were you guys?" she complained.

"We had first-period class in homeroom," Gwen explained. "And Brooke here got promoted to Teacher's Pet."

I groaned.

"Brooke?" asked Monica. "Is that what Riordan means?"

"No, it means poet-king," I said, glaring at Gwen, who was doing her impression of one of those giggling coffeemakers we had at SvensKafe.

"I didn't stay for first-period," Naomi was still complaining. "I came here right after homeroom--like we said."

She waved her phone around with one hand, accusingly. She'd probably left messages on everyone's phone but, of course, being in class, they couldn't answer. You weren't even supposed to have your phone out on school grounds at all, so she was technically violating that rule by being just inside the gate.

"Well, you had P.E. First period, so you just walked away," Monica pointed out. She put her phone away, probably seeing that the messages she had were all from Naomi. "The rest of us were all in class and couldn't leave. Oh, by the way, shotgun!"

"I already called it," said Jennifer, the fifth member of our group. She was the tallest and always wanted to sit shotgun. She was also the only other driver in the group since Monica, Gwen, and I did not have licenses yet. She still had her phone out and was looking and poking at it while she walked.

"It doesn't count if no one heard you," said Monica. "Did anyone hear Jenny call shotgun?"

No one spoke up, but Jennifer said, "Naomi heard. I was the first one back after her, and I said 'Shotgun' first."

Monica asked Naomi, "Did you hear her call shotgun?"

"Who cares?" grumped Naomi. "You guys wasted like a whole fucking hour, getting back." She dumped her phone into her purse without even looking.

By this time, we were outside the gate where the security guard nodded at us, saying, "Have a good time ditching, girls," which made us all laugh and put Naomi in a better mood.

We headed toward the parking lot. Seniors are allowed to use the closest one if there are any spaces left after teachers and admin park. Naomi actually apologized to Jennifer. "I'm sorry, Jenny, I was so mad about everyone being late getting back that I didn't hear anything anyone said."

Gwen was the only one who hadn't pulled out her phone. Well, me, I didn't have one. "We weren't late," she protested. "Brooke and I were in class."

I knew she was calling me that on purpose, so I stuck out my tongue at her.

"Brooke? Who's Brooke?" asked Naomi. The other girls all pointed at me. Naomi laughed. "Cute. Hi, Brooke!"

I rolled my eyes.

"Shotgun disputes are settled by Roshambo!" announced Monica.

"I'm not going to ching with you!" Jennifer protested. "You cheat!"

"How can you cheat at Rock-Paper-Scissors?" asked Gwen.

"She's a mind reader!" Jennifer accused. "She always knows what I'm going to do!"

Monica did not deny this but just smiled. "Shotgun rules say disputes must be settled with RPS. There's no alternative. Isn't that right, Brooke?"

"Me!? Leave me out of this." She was right, though, but I was not going to confirm. Then I realized I had just answered to Brooke and I knew I was doomed.