Phoenix (2 page)

he’d made up some bullshit about having to use legal names

when referring to roommates. Blake thought that was

complete bullshit, of course, but he hadn’t been able to talk

to anyone about it. Not that people really cared anyway.

Most people didn’t hear him when he tried to talk about it.

Ethan opened the door and shot Blake a confused look

because he’d just left his best friend to meet Devon. His

bright eyes widened and he got a smile on his full lips.

“Didn’t you just leave?” he teased.

Blake scoffed, running his hands through his hair and

walking into the dorm without even being invited. “Yeah,

but I just met my new roommate,” he said, glancing over his

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Joey James Hook

shoulder just in time to see Ethan wince a little. “Yeah. The

RA said my name was Jillian, so he was confused and kind

of a dick about it.”

“Maybe he just didn’t understand?” Ethan offered, and

Blake shrugged. It made him wonder how different they

were from each other and still best friends.

“Maybe, but he totally went about it the wrong way,” he

said, moving to collapse into Ethan’s computer chair and

pulled his long legs up to his chest again in a protective

movement. “He got all pissed off ‘cause he was confused

with the names and pronouns and shit.”

“Well, it’s not exactly a well-known thing, y’know,”

Ethan offered with a shrug, sitting against the desk beside

Blake. He shrugged and sighed a little.

“Yeah, I know. I just wish the RA would just fucking

listen to me and stop calling me by my fucking legal name.

That way none of this would happen. It’s not my fault I can’t

fucking afford to change my birth name yet,” Blake seethed,

running his hands through his hair again and gripping at the

strands angrily. “God, he fucking pisses me off.”

“I know, babe,” Ethan said, rubbing Blake’s shoulders

bracingly. Blake sighed and let himself relax under the other

man’s hand, cursing him and thanking him at the same time

in his head.

“I wonder if he’s gonna request a transfer,” Blake

muttered in a bitter tone, and Ethan chuckled a little from

behind him.

“Did it go that badly?” his best friend asked, still rubbing

at his back to calm him down still further, and he felt some

of the tension start to melt away.

“I dunno. He seemed pretty pissed off when he figured it

out,” Blake replied, letting his head fall into his hands as he

scrubbed at his face in frustration, “Why are people so

fucking ignorant, Ethan?”

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Phoenix

“Because they haven’t been exposed to this kind of stuff

in a positive light? When they think transgender, they think

drag queens and butches, not people who really, truly feel

like they belong as the other sex?” Ethan offered, and Blake

chuckled.

It was almost funny how Ethan seemed to understand it

better than he did sometimes, and could put it in better

terms than he could, and
Blake
was the one going through it,

he was the one that always had to explain it.

He hated the idea of just being like ‘oh, yeah, you know, I

was just born a girl and I’m turning into a boy because I

don’t want to be a girl anymore,’ not that he’d ever say it

that way. He didn’t like thinking that he was once female

because that made him want to crawl out of his skin. It just

didn’t mesh right in his mind. Honestly. Never had. Never

would.

He breathed around the flare of bitterness and swallowed

hard. “You know, sometimes I wish I could go back,

y’know? Just give up this fucking trans thing and say I give

up, I’m a fucking girl,” Blake spoke softly out of nowhere,

swallowing hard against the rise of emotions that followed

the admission. “It’d be so much fucking
easier
.”

His chest clenched tight and his eyes stung with an

overwhelming surge of emotions. He had to look away

because he knew the second he looked into his best friend’s

eyes, it’d all break loose and he didn’t want to get all

blubbery and emotional on him today. He felt like he needed

to keep it all in, even though he knew he could talk to Ethan

about anything.

“Blake…don’t ever think that, okay?” Ethan said in a sad

tone, wrapping his arms around Blake’s shoulders and

hugging him close, kissing his head. “I know you are what

you are, and I know it’s hard, but you’ve at least got me,

right?”

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Joey James Hook

Blake just smiled a little and bit his lip with a nod. “Yeah,

at least I’ve got you,” he said with an affectionate smile,

looking up at him for a moment before relaxing against the

chair again. “Thanks, Ethan.”

Ethan laughed gently and slunk down to sit in Blake’s

lap, sliding his arms around his shoulders as he perched

there, crossing his legs femininely, one over the other. “Of

course.” he said, and the effeminate way with which he said

it made Blake laugh and wrap his arms tightly around his

waist, hugging him gratefully.

“You’re ridiculous,” he told his best friend, who just

grinned at him so widely that his snakebites bit into his full

bottom lip. Blake’s eyes flicked to his lips before glancing

back up at Ethan.

“Only for you,” he told him with a firm nod.

Blake just laughed and rested his forehead against Ethan’s

shoulder with a soft sigh. He felt like his energy had been

like a rising and falling tide as of late, but he knew that was

probably the hormones shifting his moods around. It got

pretty bad right before the beginning of the month.

“Whatchya thinkin’ about?” Ethan asked as he ran his

fingers through Blake’s hair. He sighed and shook his head.

“Just how much the hormones fuck with my head near

the end of the month. Can I just stay here ‘til I get my shot?”

Blake asked, looking hopefully at Ethan with a small smile.

He knew it wasn’t going to happen because Ethan’s

roommate didn’t really care too much for him.

“You know Dominic would hate that,” Ethan lamented,

and Blake quirked a rueful sort of smile as he shook his

head.

“Yeah. All the more incentive for you to do it,” he teased,

nudging Ethan with a small smile, but it was obvious he was

teasing. “All right, fine, I’ll deal with Devon through my

temporary insanity. But if I kill him, that’ll be my plea and

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Phoenix

you can testify, all right?”

Ethan laughed and shook his head, brushing his fingers

across Blake’s cheek affectionately. It always made him feel

so much better when Ethan did effeminate things, because it

made him feel less weird about being femme himself.

“Okay, Blake, whatever you say,” Ethan said in a teasing

tone, but then his facial expression sobered up. “Just try and

make it through the week. Maybe you can negotiate a

transfer if you really don’t like him.”

Blake sighed, but he knew Ethan was right. He had to

actually give the guy a chance to damn himself after he’d

been educated. “All right, fine. You and your logic,” he

teased with a smile.

Ethan rolled his eyes and said simply, “Look who’s

talking?”

God, he was so glad he had his best friend.

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Joey James Hook

evon had been dozing, eyes half-shut and listening to

D music through one side of his headphones. When he

heard the door open, he opened his eyes the rest of the way.

It was a struggle, because it felt like he had weights on his

eyelids. It’d been a long trip here.

He groaned grumpily and sat up, rubbing his eyes and

looking over to the door where Blake was stepping past the

light and toward his bunk.

“Hey,” he mumbled, trying to get his brain to work. He

really wanted to apologize to this guy. Guy. Yes. His brain

was going too slowly for his liking.

Blake looked up with a half-smile, nodding to him as he

replied with an equally simple, “Hey.”

“Look, dude,” Devon started, pushing himself into a

standing position and stumbling over to Blake’s side,

wrinkling his nose in distaste as Blake laughed at his

stumbling. “Hey, don’t laugh at me, I just woke up.” He

about rammed his head into the bedframe as he spoke.

“Sorry, it’s just kinda funny,” Blake said and bit his lip on

what he assumed was another laugh, and Devon could hear

the smile in his voice as he rubbed at his eyes with his fists.

“Look, I’m really sorry about earlier. I’ve just been so

fucking confused by this place and I guess the whole

Jillian-Blake thing was the last straw,” Devon said,

collapsing down onto Blake’s bed and reclining back. He felt

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Phoenix

Blake’s eyes on him, but he stretched out anyway, figuring if

Blake didn’t want him over here, he’d tell him.

“It’s okay. Just…don’t call me Jillian, okay? I hate it,”

Blake replied in a quiet voice, and Devon smiled a bit,

nodding.

“No problem, dude,” he replied, turning onto his side to

look up at Blake, whose head was blocking the lamp light so

it kind of looked like a halo to his sleepy mind. “That book

you handed me was pretty helpful, but it got super-boring

after a while.”

“Yeah, but the content is pretty interesting, at least to

me,” Blake said with a shrug, brushing his hair back from

his forehead. “Thanks…you know, for apologizing and

trying to understand. A lot of people wouldn’t.”

Devon shrugged. “It’s cool. I mean, I dunno. I’ve never

faced this before so I guess I was ignorant, but I’ll definitely

be more careful about it from now on,” he said, and he saw

the relief wash over Blake’s face even though most of his

expression was veiled in darkness.

“Thanks, I appreciate that,” Blake said with a smile as he

moved to lean back against the wall, letting the light shine

into Devon’s face.

“Ah!” he let out a sound of displeasure and shielded his

face. He writhed around dramatically and shook his head,

thrashing on the bed and tangling the bed sheets around his

legs. “I’m burning! The light, it burns!”

Blake snickered and Devon looked up just in time to see

him rolling his eyes but not unkindly in the slightest.

“You’re ridiculous,” he told him with raised eyebrows.

Devon just grinned widely, blue eyes sparkling as he

replied to him with a decisive, “You’re damn fucking right

about that.”

Blake burst out with a high but oddly endearing giggle

that he immediately covered with his hand, looking away

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Joey James Hook

and pulling one leg up to his chest as he kind of curled in on

himself. Devon furrowed his brows and cocked his head at

the reaction.

“Hey, man, you okay?” he asked.

Blake just nodded as he lowered his hand from his mouth,

revealing that he’d caught his lip between his teeth “Y-yeah,

just don’t normally do that,” he said with a sheepish laugh.

“S’fine, my best friend back home cackles like that all the

time, I’m used to his dumb ass doing it,” Devon explained,

and he watched the way Blake seemed to visibly relax with a

tremulous little chuckle that was a bit deeper than the one

he’d let out.

“So, um,” Blake started a little awkwardly, toying with

his jeans and looking at Devon through sidelong glances.

“What’re you studying?”

“I dunno just yet. I got in on a general studies

scholarship,” Devon said. He’d never really known quite

what he wanted to do when he grew up, if he ever grew up

at all.

“Oh,” Blake said with a light laugh, running his hand

through his hair and scratched at his scalp as he looked

down. “I’m a psych major.”

“Oooh, sounds fascinating!” Devon replied with a wide

grin, rolling over onto his stomach and pretty much

perching his chin on Blake’s thigh. “What, so you examine

brains and try and figure out what’s wrong?”

“Kind of?” Blake laughed, still watching Devon very

closely as he shifted his thigh out from under his chin.

“Right now we’re working on behaviorists, and that’s

basically just observing behaviors and compiling analysis for

our final projects.”

“Wow…sounds complicated,” Devon said.

Blake just shook his head with a smile, biting down on his