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Back in 1980, in college, my best friend was Gerry Sangster: six foot, two inches of supermodel, only with a horsey, live-out-loud laugh.

I wasn't nearly as tall, and not a tenth as pretty, but we saw eye-to-eye on a ton of things. We'd met in a book store line on the first day of our first year, started laughing at almost everything either one of us came up with and were inseparable ever after.

We enjoyed a lot of the same things; we adored the new music and going out to the dancier clubs. We haunted vintage clothing stores together and tried on everything (even if we'd hardly ever buy anything). And we loved motorcycles and everything bike - which neither of us could afford as impoverished students. Stuff like that, and a million others. We lived across town from each other with our parents, but our moms said we should just choose one bedroom or the other to stay in, and save all the commuting. My dad was just confused, I think. But he liked Gerry.

Unlike me, Gerry wasn't a natural student, and we had to cram to keep her marks up, and our only-sometimes overlapping course loads meant group sessions were the only way to go. Our study group varied, but had a core of Cathy Ford, a smily, cute blonde who knew every lyric she'd ever heard, Beth Thompson, a shy, quiet single mother who was always desperately behind, but still trying, Dennis McNaughton, a certifiable genius and guitar whiz, Gerry, and me. Sometimes (exams) we'd gather enough people to take over someone's parent's house (usually mine or Dennis') for all-nighters. Sometimes it was just us five.

Also unlike me, Gerry was a natural girl, and I was just slightly, ah… male. As in, well… that's what everyone thought I was. Effeminate, probably gay (though there was only circumstantial evidence of that) and skinny as hell - but a man.

And not really everyone thought I was. I was pretty sure the biggest part of me, the part I felt when I closed my eyes and concentrated on just the inside, was just as much a woman as Gerry. Not that I'd ever tell anyone.

So we were an odd pair. Going out dancing at a new, hot gay bar, she'd wear some silly flapper dress and I'd wear a silk blouse that just might be taken for a mod shirt. Or a mod shirt that looked like a blouse. I didn't care which. She'd wear a touch of eye shadow and some blush, I'd wear mascara… and maybe a touch of liner, too. And Lip Smacker. I just loved Lip Smacker back then: Strawberry. Gerry borrowed it sometimes, but she didn't really like all the taste and preferred dry lips.

Unfortunately, another thing we shared was anorexia. We weren't sick or anything, yet, but other people saw very different bodies than we saw.

Gerry thought she was too mannish, too muscular, too-often noticed for her size, her knees and elbows… thousands of grade school taunts had left their mark. Somehow, being lighter felt better. She never believed she was beautiful, despite offers for modelling careers.

I just never wanted my body to grow - up or otherwise - and somehow in college (and maybe because Gerry was doing it) I found myself happily starving into a place where I was… more me. My mother was upset, her mother was upset, and I imagine our friends were, too, but we were oblivious.

By Christmas exams of our first year, we were both becoming far too skinny, though we still felt gross and squidgy. I was, at my lowest, probably somewhere under 140, though I refused to ever get on a scale. Gerry, who weighed herself every day, had reached a near-skeletal 153. (At 6'2", 153 lbs is skinny!) Also she was turning orange from all the carrots she filled up on instead of calories. It was her orange skin and yellowing eyes that finally broke us out of our mutual famines. Well… that, and Cathy Ford calling me out on my eyebrows.

It was in the big cafeteria during a study session for a nasty chemistry exam, just the fab five of us. We all had trouble with the course, the prof somehow garbling even the most basic stuff… but that was just why we were there. Not what happened.

Cathy was staring at me, and more particularly, me above my eyes. I knew I'd overdone my brows the week before, but we'd been planning a last free weekend of partying at the clubs, and I just hated my brows.

"Michael? Do you pluck your brows?" Karen wasn't the most tactful of girls, but she didn't have a mean bone in her body, either. In fact, the only thing I think I ever saw her get mad at was a DJ singing a parody of one of her favorite songs!

I went hyper-tense at her question. Beth and Dennis looked up at the both of us, Beth probably puzzled and Dennis probably just to see what we'd do next. Gerry put her hand on my arm. Don't panic. Well, before I could panic, Cathy went on.

"Yes! You do, I can see the little dots from re-growth, and they're different, and you polish your nails, too."

They all looked, before I could curl them under. They were buffed into a gleaming shine. And rounded. I might've started to shake, but Dennis spoke up before I could.

"And Gerry, you've got to see a doctor about whatever's wrong, but I looked up what I think it is and you're getting way too much keratin and not eating enough of anything else and you're starving yourself. And you," he looked at me, "are about twenty pounds lighter than you were in September, and it's not healthy."

We all just sat there, almost frozen. I can't remember much more than that nobody moved, really, and I wasn't able to even process what was happening. What would happen...

It was quiet, little Beth who spoke, who put everything in clear, dead-on accurate words.

"Well, Gerry needs to eat more and get over feeling too tall. I'd kill to be half as pretty as you, or half as tall, and now you just look sick all the time! And Michael, you need to stop pretending and making jokes about what you want to wear and look like. And EAT something else than salad! You dance for like five hours a night and all you eat is lettuce! You can't be a girl someday if you're dead!"

We all sat for another three or four seconds. Me, because I had no idea…

"Girl? Cool, and I guess it fits, if you pluck and all…" Cathy grinned at me. "What do you want us to call you?"

"Michelle."

We all looked at Gerry. She smiled at me. She didn't look all that well... Yellow. Sallow.

"If you'll eat with me, or we'll try, okay? If… then you should be 'Michelle,' not Michael."

I'd dreamt up a hundred names but had shied away from Michelle. Too close. Too the same. Besides, it was a boy's name, almost, in French. But it wasn't.

Dennis pushed his half-eaten plate of fries and gravy across the table.

We both looked at the greasy mess and burst out laughing. She still sounded like a horse when she really laughed. And she was way too skinny.

I looked at my own arm. It didn't look too bad…

Michelle?

I smiled at Gerry and thought, 'I could live with Michelle...'

"Michelle?"

I looked up at her, "Hunh?"

"Very lady-like." She grinned. "Would you care to split a burger platter with me?"

I looked at the grey-vy.

"Maybe just the burger?"

"How about fries, just salt?"

I grinned back at her. I could live with that. Or one or two of them, anyway. She grinned at me like she understood, that there was no way I could look at too much food right then, and that she felt the same way.

"And a side salad?"

"Whatever the lady wishes." Dennis bowed like a waiter and headed off to the cashier.

Beth and Cathy both laughed. Gerry laughed even louder.

Deborah Harry looks, and that laugh...

My looks and… Michelle?