Jada was a little demon, only about eighteen inches tall, with short horns, bat-like wings similar to mine, short reddish-brown fur, and cute little hooves. I picked her up and gave her a piggyback ride with her legs around my left neck.

 

Britt was an angel of the same height, with feathery wings and mostly-human legs with bird-like feet, wearing a white robe. I picked her up, too, and she straddled my right neck.

Mr. Ramsey was still female, but Mrs. Ramsey had switched back to female already, though her new girl body had blue skin like the guy body she’d worn for a couple of weeks and the body Mr. Ramsey was still wearing.

“You’re heavy. Did it make your bones out of osmium or something?”

On Furry Friday, I had Jill venn me into a two-headed creature with a sheep-like head and a wolf-like head. After some practice, I tried talking with my usual voice with the sheep head and with a fake Scottish accent with the wolf head; I would recommend the meat dishes with the wolf head and the vegetable dishes and salads with the sheep head.

“Let’s try it,” Ms. Paget said. “Joy and I are going to be chibis on Thursday, and I’d like to get some other volunteers to do the same. You don’t have to wear schoolgirl uniforms or anything; you can be chibi mice or chibi dragons or whatever, even chibi robots,” (nodding toward Todd, who was in one of his less humanoid robot forms today). “If it works out, we might make it a regular thing. Chibi Thursdays. Come in anime cosplay, or better yet venned into a chibi form, and get 10% off...”

I finally had my first therapy appointment the Wednesday after graduation. I debated over whether to venn into my human girl body for the appointment — I’d been wearing my dragon-girl body ever since graduation — but decided it would be more honest to meet my therapist in my most preferred body. If she couldn’t handle my being a scaly, it would be good to know that up front so I could start looking for another therapist.

Jada was the only one of our group of lunch friends who was going to college in the fall. I was working for a year to save money and establish residency, Britt was going to take online trade school classes while learning more from her dad about working on cars, and Poppy and Lisette were just going to start working full-time.

The envelope was hand-addressed in my dad’s handwriting, which got my hopes up even though he deadnamed me, but inside there was no handwritten or even printed letter.

Eighteen-year-old Nicholas Hammerstein is at the cusp of finishing high school in his hometown of Los Alamos, NM. He has a seemingly ideal life and is blessed with loving parents, a cute baby sister, and great friends. Nicholas is a gifted student and martial artist who has dreams of leaving for college at the end of his senior year. But, living in a world of Emergent humans, he will soon find his life turned upside down as his life and the fate of a kingdom hang in the balance. His future and theirs will be determined by how he navigates the drastic changes in his body and the magical and superpowered Mergent population he joins.

“Yes!” I said, and babbled on before I could lose the momentary burst of confidence, “I’m interested in —”

“With the way Dad is being, I can’t move back in any time soon. Would it be okay if I came over sometime after you get off work and before Dad comes home, and get a few things out of my room? Or could I ask you to pack up a few things and bring them to the Ramseys’ house, or bring them to work and let me come by to get them when Meredith or Sophia are giving me a ride home from school?”

“So what’s your story?” Poppy asked. “Trans, lesbian, or both?”

 

I gaped at her. “How did you know?”

Happy New Year!
Or should I say, Happy New Congress. I see the news and wonder at the avarice of some people who are supposed to be responsible adults. If the Rabid Right get what they are demanding, the following story might be even truer than my old brain had considered.
Happy Days!
Marianne

29 and Beyond!

“Wake up! It’s Christmas morning! You just missed Santa Claus!” Mrs. Ramsey called out from the hallway.

I thought about what Sophia and Savannah had talked about last night, about their fathers and their long estrangement and how they were trying to be friends again now. Would it be like that between me and Nathan when I made contact again after I turned eighteen?

From the fact that this isn’t their first time, I’m guessing they’re both realizing — or at least suspecting — they’re not as purely cis as they thought.”

“I have a feeling I might see more of... let’s say the Hooters side of that place, if I drop in as a single guy.”

 

“Or if we’re a couple of single guys.” I could hear a smile in her voice.

There were more people in line than I expected for a town that size, more than we usually saw at the Brocksboro library on a weekday. Most were doing boring rejuvenations and improvements in each other’s appearance, as usual, but one couple venned each other into giant matte-black insectoids.

“I said they should venn into amphibious forms and swim out to see the Outer Banks, but Mom just smiled and said maybe.”