CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX: Retaking the Shot“We’re missing three. Where are Eine, Leia, and Gucci?” said Rafael, starting to panic, as they were clearly scheduled to be on-set more than five minutes ago.

  “Gucci’s out sick, I don’t know what’s going on with Eine or Leia,” said Sam, who was currently repcing Gucci in the camera shot with a rge succulent pnt. “Weren’t you the st to see them, Raf? Jamie, Erin, are you ready and standing by?”

  The two hosts were already in position, earpieces in. Jamie straightened out her dress, let the makeup artist do his magic to her face, and got ready for the next segment.

  “We’re ready and standing by, but unless I’m miscounting, we seem to be severely under-contestant-ed.”

  Sam sighed.

  “We know, Jamie. We’re working on it.”

  Back in the main stage area, Diana sat in a slump. She was slumping. Not just slumping on the outside. Slumping on the inside, if that was possible. Just a big ol stinky pile of slump.

  “Diana,” said Sam. “Could you sit up?”

  “I could,” said Diana, “but I’d like to save it for when the cameras are on.”

  Leia arrived fashionably te, and unfashionably covered in Eine’s foundation.

  “What the hell, Leia?” said Rafael. “What’s that gunk all over your top?”

  “I brought a change of top, don’t worry. Eine’s not feeling well and can’t make it to the recording. I wanted to make sure she was okay.”

  “Was it street tacos?” asked Sam.

  “Yeah, let’s go with that,” said Leia, disappearing into the bathroom to change. She came out quickly, leaving her old top behind in the bathroom to retrieve ter.

  “I don’t understand what’s going on with Gucci,” said Jane. “I mean, I had some street tacos pretty te at night, while I was here, and I was fine.”

  “Yes, but the crucial difference,” said Mara, “is that you got food from a well established taco stand called ‘Virgen de Caridad del Cobre1Virgin of Charity of Copper’. Gucci ate from a van called 'Furgoneta de Carne del Tio Pepe2Uncle Pepe's Meat Wagon’ with a painting of Goku from 'Dragonball Z’ on the side.”

  Leia finally took her pce, and the crewmembers took away the two extra chairs.

  “Okay,” said Jamie. “We’re going to introduce the challenge. Start with the sweeping wide jib shot, come in to a crossfade on Erin, let her do the greeting, cut to the static wide contestant shot to establish when she mentions the contestants, and then from there follow the action of the convo. All else fails, keep the wide recording on a separate track and we can cut in post. You get all that, Raf?”

  “Sweeping wide jib, crossfade on Erin, contestants shot, follow the banter. Got it.” Rafael gave Erin the thumbs up.

  “Good. Clear the set. Roll sound and video. Sam, take the ste. Rafael, you do the honors and count us in when you’re ready. Roll sound and video.”

  Sam ran in with the cpboard and snapped it in front of the camera. They were rolling.

  “In Five. Four. Three.” Rafael pointed with his fingers for two and one, then pointed for action. At the very st second, Diana finally shifted in her seat and forced a good posture and smile.

  “Welcome back to Woman Up!” smiled Erin to the camera, then motioned to the contestants. “So, we’re here with five of our seven remaining contestants - Gucci and Eine are feeling under the weather, so we’re just going to go ahead and expin the next challenge to you now.”

  Erin addressed the contestants directly.

  “As we said, it’s not just about hormones and surgeries, this is about the full feminine experience. Including being judged on your appearance.”

  Half the contestants groaned. Diana just smirked. It would be nice to have a contest that was all about her.

  “You’re going to be participants in a beauty contest and talent show.”

  “That sounds like fun,” said Victoria. “Wait. I meant to say those words, but they came out sarcastic. Sorry. That… actually sounds like fun. Maybe.”

  “Is Jamie going to be the judge?” asked Jane.

  “Oh no,” said Jamie. “I’m going to be your fierce and bitter rival,” she said, rubbing her palms together.

  “We’ll have three guest judges who will judge all of you - and Jamie - on a scale from 0.0 to 6.0 in five separate categories,” expined Erin. “Confidence and self presentation, individual style and expression, life skills and talents, an interview where you will be judged on how well you express ideas, and overall authenticity and integrity.”

  “No swimsuit competition?” asked Diana.

  “If you want to show off how well you can swim as your talent, go right ahead,” said Jamie. “You’ll have a week to prepare your outfits and makeup, as well as prepare your talent portion.”

  “In this challenge, like always, you’ll be competing both individually and as a team. Beat Jamie in any of the five categories, and you’ll add 3,000 to the pot - beat her in all five and you’ll add 15,000, each. That means that there is a potential to put 105,000 in the pot.”

  Jamie grinned mischievously. “But there’s a catch.”

  It was reality TV. There’s always a catch.

  “Whoever scores the highest, whether or not their score is higher than mine, will walk away with an individual prize of 15,000.”

  There were some stunned looks at the size of the individual prize, and Rafael was very gd that at the very st second he was able to direct camera three to capture the contestants’ reactions.

  “So, you can work to help each other out. Since I’m going to be working alone, that gives you, as a team, a huge advantage over me. But with that much individual prize money up for grabs, will you decide to help one another, or will you tear each other apart? And even if you think someone might be helping you - can you really trust them?”

  Jane looked around, and realized the only one that she could really 100% be certain of was Diana, and Diana was absolutely going to be out for herself. Mara? Victoria? Who knew? Even Eine and Leia might rationalize with their advanced mathematical strategies that it was better to go for the individual prize than to try to build the pot, especially going up in a talent contest against a celebrity who was performing on one form of stage or another for twenty years. And Gucci? Jane might trust Gucci with her life, but she had a much better track record of making good stories than making good decisions.

  “Thoughts? Questions?” asked Erin.

  Leia raised her hand. “Just one.”

  “For the talent portion… can we team up? Like… sing a duet, or do ‘Who’s On First?’ or something like that?”

  Erin looked at Jamie, who shrugged.

  “Sure,” said Jamie. “Why not? Just know that you’ll both be judged as individuals in the talent portion, so this can’t be like a group project where one person does all the work.”

  The little hamster inside Leia’s brain, perhaps feeling sorry for letting Leia down earlier today when she was trying to process Eine’s coming out, started running full speed, and the hamster wheel started cranking out a pn.

  No. Better than a pn.

  A scheme.

  ***

  Eine, alone in the hotel room, having finally cried herself out, washed her face and changed her clothes into something more casual. There was a gentle knock at the door.

  “C’mon in, Leia.”

  “Sorry Eine, it’s, uh, it’s Mara. And Victoria’s here too. Can we talk?”

  Mara and Victoria? Not exactly the two you’d expect to come by for a welfare check.

  “I guess. Is the kitchen still open?”

  “There’s some sandwiches in the fridge, but maybe we’ll go out? Jamie recommended a taqueria that she and Sam went to the other day,” said Vic.

  Eine opened the door a crack.

  “Is everyone going?”

  Victoria looked down the hall, and scratched the back of her neck, prevaricating.

  “Well…”

  Mara shrugged. “Normally I’d say, sure, but… something… I kinda wanted to talk to you and Victoria, just the three of us. I don’t know if you’ve noticed this… but something’s different about the three of us.”

  “Different? Different how?”

  “I don’t know, but it has to do with the hormones.”

  Uh oh.

  “And it’s… concerning.” Mara looked left and right, conspiratorially. “Have you noticed that everyone’s been on edge tely?”

  “No. Yes. Maybe,” said Eine. “A little.”

  “A little?” Vic was incredulous. “Jane is like, the chillest person, and she is starting to get a little antsy and paranoid.”

  “Whereas you, you’re getting more confident and ballsy,” Mara added.

  “Ballsy?”

  “You know. You’re… less like the scared little bunny rabbit you were when you first came here, talking about game theory and shouting numbers to get our attention. You’ve even come to breakfast without Leia. I never used to see you without Leia,” said Mara.

  “Though I have seen Leia from time to time without you,” said Vic. “I just figured that, you know, you’re more comfortable with people when people you know well are around. On account of your, you know, autism.”

  “Well, that’s kinda true,” Eine admitted.

  “I think we need to sit down and talk,” said Mara. “Figure out a reason why the hormones aren’t affecting us the way it’s affecting the others.”

  ***

  Eine realized that Mara had at least one thing right - she wasn’t very comfortable out here in the ‘real world’, - the real foreign country world, at that - without Leia. And another thing Mara had right - Eine was feeling more ballsy, forgive the irony. Before the hormones, she knew she probably would have said no and settled for a night back at the Casa reading books on one of her special interests instead of eating out.

  On the other hand, if she didn’t go out, she would have missed out on the turkey tacos. It was so tender and juicy that she had to be very careful not to let the juices run down her chin and ruin her re-applied makeup.

  “What do you think?” asked Victoria.

  “Delicious,” said Eine.

  “Well, yes, but I meant - do you have any theories about why it’s affecting them and not us?”

  Well, yes. Eine had one theory. But she wasn’t sure how well they would take it. Especially Mara.

  “Could be that we’re all so masculine that we’re just taking longer to process the estrogen,” said Eine.

  Mara and Vic nodded.

  “That could make sense,” Mara pointed out. “But that doesn’t expin Jane. The guy’s a personal trainer, for crying out loud. And it doesn’t expin Vic.”

  “Wait. What do you mean, it doesn’t expin Vic?” said Vic.

  “Victoria, you’re a theater nerd,” said Mara.

  “We prefer to be called actors.”

  Eine decided now was a good time to break it up.

  “Maybe masculinity on a hormonal level isn’t what we think masculinity is on a social level? Like, maybe the amount of manliness you do has surprisingly little with how manly you present.”

  Mara snapped her fingers. “Ooh. Rafael.”

  Eine raised an eyebrow, cautiously. “What about him?”

  “Rafael’s like us. Like, he used to be acting like the others, almost as if it was like a preview of coming attractions, and now, he’s like… normalish.”

  “Ooh, that expins a lot. Rafael is more comfortable in his skin because he’s on testosterone. We’re more comfortable in our skin, because we’ve not used up our testosterone reserves yet!” said Mara.

  “That… does make a certain amount of sense,” said Victoria.

  Eine started weighing the pros and cons of correcting Mara, of just telling her what she knows.

  Pro: She’d be out of the closet. No more hiding.

  Con: Mara could freak and revert back to type if she even suggested there might be something eggy about her.

  Pro: Maybe the two would be better off knowing something about themselves.

  Con: Or they could retreat even further in their shells.

  Pro: Which might cause them to drop out, which equals more money.

  Con: If everyone else drops out before they get to the surgeries, will the production company even go through with the surgeries? And Eine wanted those surgeries…

  “Eine?” Victoria finally said.

  Eine shook her head. “Yes. Sorry. What?”

  “You’ve been staring off into space for the st five minutes, emitting a high pitched whine,” said Mara. “Are you okay?”

  “Yes? Very, but… if I told you what I was thinking right now, would you promise not to beat me to a pulp?”

  “Eine, why would I beat you to a pulp?” said Mara.

  “Especially here. In front of so many witnesses.” Victoria helpfully pointed out.

  Mara gave the side-eye to Victoria. “No, Eine. If I think what you have to say is stupid or insulting or whatever, I’ll just ignore it.”

  “Well, is it possible that… Rafael is doing well on testosterone because Rafael’s brain works well on testosterone? And Jane, Leia, Diana… their brains might… not work well on estrogen, because they need testosterone?”

  “Yeah,” said Victoria. “But that still doesn’t expin us.”

  “I think… I’m doing well on estrogen, because… my brain might need estrogen.”

  Bnk stares.

  “My brain might need estrogen… because… it’s… not a normal man’s brain.”

  Mara and Victoria should not have been able to figure out a way to make their stares even bnker, but they did.

  “In fact, I… know it’s not. I… the production team knows this. I’m a trans woman. I’m actually… getting the right hormones. I’m not… doing this for the show, I actually am doing this to get the treatments. I’m actually looking forward to it.”

  Mara scratched her head. Victoria tilted hers.

  “Even the…” Mara made a scissor motion with her fingers.

  Eine nodded.

  “And the…” Mara mimed breasts over her chest with her hands.

  Eine nodded.

  “And the…” Mara mimed the operation of a hand crank.

  Eine was puzzled.

  “The… gatling gun?”

  “The… the vaginopsty. I was doing a hand drill. You know, to drill the hole in the… in the you.”

  “To be honest, Mara, I thought you were going for ‘pop goes the weasel.’ Victoria sat and thought about that for a second. “Though I guess that would also kinda work with vaginopsty.”

  “Oh.” Eine paused. “Yeah. That too, maybe. I haven’t decided,” she finally admitted.

  “Well, crap,” said Vic. “Maybe I should just go for second pce, then.”

  “I’m shocked,” said Mara. “Shocked.”

  Eine blushed in embarrassment. This was not going well.

  “Me too,” said Victoria.

  “I can’t believe that all this time…” Mara said, pointing a finger, accusingly.

  Eine grabbed a napkin to wipe away tears that she knew were going to come next.

  “...you were a ringer.”

  “Honestly, though, I’m not that shocked,” said Victoria. “I mean, it’s pretty much a reality TV staple that someone is secretly the mole, or the pro, or something like that. Like when they enter undercover cops or poker pros in ‘the Traitors’. It’s just that I thought it was going to be Gucci.”

  “Oh yeah,” said Mara. “I guess that makes sense.”

  “I’m not a ringer,” said Eine, starting to choke up, “I didn’t have any information you didn’t. I just… when they told me what the show was, I pyed along so that… I’ve known I was trans for a long time. But I only told the production crew yesterday. Even kept it a secret from Leia until this afternoon, and I was so… it was so hard to tell her that I…”

  Mara and Vic immediately realized something was wrong just from Eine’s face.

  “Oh, shit,” said Mara. “I, uh… I think I might have… I mean, I didn’t mean to…”

  “Yeah, Eine. You’re… shit, I was so focused on the competition, I didn’t realize that you were coming out to us,” said Vic, apologetically. “Us! Well, mostly Mara. No offense Mara.”

  “None taken. I have pretty much been getting trans people completely wrong this entire time, so… yeah, that’s… entirely reasonable to make as an assumption that I’d like, fuck this up,” said Mara. “Which I did. Look, uh, don’t mind me. I’m an idiot.”

  “Yeah, don’t mind her,” said Victoria. “She’s an idiot.”

  Okay, that made Eine ugh.

  “This has been a hard day for me,” said Eine, in the understatement of the year.

  “Sorry for making it harder,” said Victoria.

  “Yeah. Look, I, uh, still think you’re pretty cool,” said Mara.

  Eine tried to process that.

  “Wait, you thought I was cool?”

  “Still do - in fact, it’s kinda cooler now that I know you’re gaming the system. I love how you find puzzle solutions and loopholes. You’re like, one of those ‘magnificent bastards.’ Or whatever the woman version of bastard is,” said Mara.

  “I think ‘bastard’ is gender neutral,” said Victoria.

  “Then you, Eine, are a magnificent she-bastard,” said Mara. “And I mean, hey, that’s another reason why we wanted to talk to you tonight. And hey, you did help us solve one bit of the puzzle. Why you’re doing okay on the estrogen. So that just leaves Vic and I.”

  “Oh,” said Eine.

  “Maybe it’s just metabolism? Maybe we’re absorbing it into our liver or something faster,” said Victoria.

  “Wait, uh,” Eine stammered. “Did you not… follow what I was getting at when I mentioned that my brain needs estrogen, that it might be possible that… your brains also need estrogen?”

  Mara and Victoria thought about it, looked at each other, furrowed their brows, squinted… and…

  “Nah.” said the two, almost simultaneously.

  “Nah?” said Eine.

  “No, it doesn’t make any sense,” said Mara. “I’ve never thought of myself as being a woman, never wanted to be a woman, never even like… well, one time I used that faceapp thing to switch my gender. I thought it was interesting, but didn’t dwell on it. I mean, why would I want to be a woman? I mean, there’s no reason I guess I wouldn’t want to be a woman, but I mean, I’m a… GenderBuzzer aside, I’m a man, always have been. Just a 50/50 coinflip. If it had gone the other way, it would be no big deal.” Mara shrugged and took a bite of her taco.

  “For me, it’s… not quite the same. I mean, I have thought about what it would be like to be a woman. A lot. I mean, especially when I get into the role of a woman character. But when I py a manly man, I think about what it would be like to be more manly, more strong, you know. Sometimes I feel like I wish I was a little more feminine. Sometimes I feel like I wish I was a little more masculine. What I’d really love is if there was a way to, you know, switch from one to another on command.”

  “Ooh, like that anime that the weebs watch. ‘Rambo one half,’” suggested Mara.

  “Oh?” said Eine, in a tone of voice that was usually reserved for the line ‘Does Not Compute!’ in a 1950s sci-fi telepy.

  “Yeah, I mean, we know what eggs are,” said Victoria. “Kinda hard to not ask yourself if you’re secretly trans, what with being in close contact with so many trans people, including a host who famously didn’t know she was trans, on a game show literally about transitioning,”

  “Sheri even expined to me that she thought I might be a ‘spiky egg’, whatever that is. So I mean, we have thought about it, it’s just that it doesn’t make that much sense,” said Mara.

  “Yeah, if the key factor in being transgender is an overwhelming desire to be someone of a gender you weren’t assigned,” said Victoria, “then we just don’t fit the definition. Maybe we should talk to Dr. Vadekar about this. Maybe do some extra blood tests or something.”

  “I don’t think you can test for transness,” said Eine. “Although I guess: ‘Try these hormones and see if they make you feel better’ is probably pretty effective.”

  “Then that clinches it,” said Mara. “I’m not trans. The hormones didn’t make me feel better. Maybe a little different, but not good different. Or bad different.”

  “Actually, there are two things I noticed that are improvements,” said Vic.

  “Oh?” Mara looked at Vic.

  “One. Chocote tastes amazing now. Not that it tasted bad before, but it just hits different.”

  “And the other?”

  “I smell better.”

  “Yeah,” said Eine. “I noticed that too, almost immediately. I never liked how I smelled before. All testosterony.”

  “No, I mean, I smell better. Like, with my nose.”

  “Oh.”

  Victoria lifted her arm and gave herself a sniff.

  “Okay,” corrected Victoria. “There are three things that are improvements.”

  ***

  Leia and Jane were in the dining area, drinking some iced coffee they had made by making coffee, then putting ice in it.

  It was one of Leia’s favorite secret family recipes.

  They needed the caffeine. It was getting difficult to sustain much enthusiasm for anything these days.

  “So, Jane, I don’t really care about winning the big indie prize, but I think we all don’t want Diana to win it. And this is kind of Diana’s challenge to lose. She’s already been performing, professionally, in women’s clothing, in public, for years. Probably just going to do whatever act she does on Venice Beach. Which she has down pat.”

  “Right, but what can we do?”

  “Individually? Not much. But I’ve got wit, Eine’s good with the makeup, Gucci has creativity, Victoria can… act… sometimes? It’s weird with her, she runs very hot and cold. Mara’s got…”

  Leia paused.

  “Mara’s got… no, hold on I had something for Mara.”

  “Money?”

  “Thats it! Mara’s got resources, and you - I bet you’re a whiz with costumes and making clothes and stuff.”

  “Why would you think I would be good with costumes?”

  Leia shot her a knowing stare.

  “Aren’t you good with costumes?”

  “I mean, yes, but how do you know that?”

  “You’re kind of a furry, no?”

  “If I was a furry, that would not be the kind of thing I would want discussed on National TV.”

  “Oh.”

  “But yes, I’m good with costumes.”

  An awkward pause.

  “I think Gadget Hackwrench is pretty sexy,” offered Leia.

  “Everyone thinks Gadget Hackwrench is sexy. That doesn’t mean anything. There’s even a sex cult in Russia centered around her,” said Jane.

  “Really?”

  Jane stared down Leia, angrily.

  “Leia. Your point.”

  “I say that instead of trying to do everything ourselves, we divide the bor up. Work as a team so that all of us put on a presentation for the beauty pageant that is better than any of us individually.”

  Jane sighed, deeply, sadly.

  “Leia, it’s a good pn. It makes sense. But I’m out.”

  “What?! Why?” Leia was not expecting that. “Jane, since day one, you’ve been the… well, pretty much the glue holding us together. You inspire! You lead! You push for us to go the one extra more mile… I mean, it’s your choice, but I’m kinda shocked.”

  “Leia… I think I’m out, out.”

  “Oh.”

  “I love… I loved… I don’t know how to expin it. Like, yeah, I like leading people, inspiring them. That’s why I became a personal trainer. To get the best out of people. And… I just don’t wanna anymore. I just… don’t get any joy or satisfaction out of it. Out of anything, really. I kinda just want to lie in bed and eat an entire Ben & Jerry’s.”

  “I’m starting to feel that way myself. I mean, I kinda deal with it by shifting it to humor, but… I’ve already kinda found myself shifting to a darker tone,” admitted Leia. “And god knows what I’m going to do about Eine.”

  “You really care about her, don’t you?”

  “Yes. Which is, how do I put this… I think she cares for me in a different way than I care for her. But I don’t not care for her in some same ways. But I’m not sure if that’s… like, what is that? And what’s me, and what’s the hormones?”

  “Exactly. I’m just not me on the wrong hormones. I’m everything I hate. Lazy. Unmotivated. I think I’m getting fat.”

  “You’re not getting fat.”

  “Yes I am!” said Jane, on the verge of tears. “I’m getting all fat and fbby because I’m stress eating and not exercising like I should and I’m just… existing.”

  “Hey hey, that’s temporary, you know it’s temporary, right?”

  Jane tried to blink back the tears, but one ended up rolling down her right cheek.

  “C’mon. Do you want me to get Sheri?”

  “I should tell Gucci first. Then Sam.”

  “Tell me what?” said Gucci’s voice, which seemed to come from behind a column.

  “Gucci?” Jane and Leia said in unison.

  They were answered when a naked ass stuck out from behind the column.

  Gucci mooning Jane should have been funny.

  It would have been funny.

  Jane just moped.

  Gucci pulled her panties up and lowered her skirt back down, then came over to the two of them, putting a hand on Jane’s shoulder.

  “Yeah, Jane. If that didn’t get a ugh out of you, you’re done.”

  “How long were you behind that column, Gucci?” asked Leia.

  “Long enough for it not to be funny. Yeah man–” Once again the GenderBuzzer fshed a warning. Gucci ignored it. “There’s no point in doing this if it’s not still fun.”

  “You’re not disappointed, Gu?”

  “I’m a little disappointed that you shortened my nickname.”

  Leia nodded. “It didn’t sound great.”

  Jane shrugged. “Didn’t have a good mouthfeel either.”

  “Gucci, you stay here with Jane. I’ll fetch Sam, Jamie, or someone here to make it official. You do want to make it official, right?”

  “I do.” said Jacob, who got up from his chair, and offered a handshake to Leia.

  “What’s this for?”

  “Tradition.”

  “Tradition?” Leia shook Jacob’s hand, and Jacob looked Leia straight in the eye.

  “Good game,” he said.

  Jacob then turned to Gucci. Gucci took the hand with both of hers, and shook it vigorously.

  “Good game, Jacob.”

  “Good game, Gucci. Best of luck.”

  As Leia went off to fetch a member of the production team, she ruminated on what Jacob said.

  “Hunh. Tradition.”

  ***

  Leia knocked on the door to Video Vilge, and Rafael opened it.

  “Hey, Leia.”

  “Hey, Rafael. I have some bad news.”

  “Jacob’s dropping out, yeah, we saw on the cameras.”

  “Oh.” said Leia.

  “Sam’s already on her way over, getting the paperwork signed and Jacob’s payout amount processed.”

  “Ah. If you don’t mind me asking, how much did he walk away with?”

  “7,700. Well, technically it’s 7,697.13 but we’re rounding up. Makes it easier to write on the giant novelty check. How have you been holding up?”

  “Honestly, Raf? I feel like shit. I’m sticking around for the talent show, but I think I’m next to go. Actually, can I ask you a question?”

  “Sure.”

  “You’re gay, right?”

  “Leia, you need to stop trying to set me up with Eine. It’s not going to work out.”

  “No, no no. I… I wanted to ask, let’s say that you really liked someone, they were your best friend, and like, you really care for them and don’t want to see them hurt, is that, like, can you be romantically attracted to someone… you know what, I can’t even get my head straight enough to ask the question.”

  Sam arrived at that point, back with a clipboard.

  “Hey, Leia. Nice to see you here.” Then she turned immediately to Rafael. “Rafael, we’re going to have to prep Jacob’s goodbye interview for tomorrow morning, make sure the set’s ready and that Erin and Jamie are ready for it. Jamie will probably be behind the camera for it, so you just have to keep an eye on the monitors and call out anything wrong with the shot.”

  “Got it. Oh, actually… you and Leia should talk.”

  “Oh? Leia, are you also dropping out?”

  Leia tilted her head a bit in thought. “Not quite yet. Soon. I’m actually looking forward to the talent show and beauty contest. And one more shot wouldn’t kill me. But I don’t think I’m coming back next month. We’ll see.”

  “Remember, it’s always an option. As Sheri likes to say, it’s just television. Anyway, what is it you need to talk about?”

  “This might be more a question for Sheri,” said Leia.

  “Trust me, Leia.” Rafael gave Leia a knowing gnce. “For your particur problem, Sam would give you better advice.”

  Leia shrugged. “Do you have a moment, Sam?”

  “Sure. Let’s step into Sheri’s office, I’m sure she won’t mind us using it for the moment.”

  “I call dibs on the hammock!” Leia said.

  They arrived at Sheri’s office and quickly settled in.

  “So, what’s up?”

  “Do you think you can be… like, romantically attracted to someone, like, for years, and not realize it, because you’re not sexually attracted to them?”

  Sam scowled. “Is this about me and Jamie?”

  “What? No!” said Leia in surprise. “It’s about me and Eine. I mean, I have said to her on multiple occasions, ‘why can’t I find a girlfriend as cool as you.’ And now… holy shit, that’s an option. It’s just, you know. Penis.”

  “God, tell me about it.” Sam slumped in her chair. “Yeah, I think everyone knows I have the exact same problem with Jamie. She’s just so funny.”

  “So kind,” said Leia.

  “So gentle,” said Sam.

  “So smart,” said Leia.

  “And yet, sometimes so, so dumb,” said Sam.

  “And you want to have their back,” said Leia.

  “And you know they have yours,” said Sam.

  “They think the world of you,” said Leia.

  “And you think the world of them,” said Sam.

  “And, you know, in the right light… they’re even like, kinda cute,” said Leia. “And they’re getting cuter. Like, I’ve noticed the eyesh thing.”

  “The eyesh thing?” asked Sam.

  “All the contestants are getting thicker eyeshes. It’s like, the first physical change I noticed, along with the aching nipples. On me it looks silly, but on Eine, it… kinda suits her?”

  “You don’t have a problem with the smell?”

  “What smell?”

  “Eine’s smell. The boy smell.”

  Leia thought back to when she was holding Eine in her arms after the phone call with her mother.

  “I haven’t noticed any smell. Not a bad smell, anyway. I mean, sure, maybe before, but, yeah, no bad smell.”

  “No bad smell?”

  “No. Doctor Vadekar expined that that’s one of the first changes we’ll notice on the estrogen.”

  Sam blinked, then got up from the chair in a hurry.

  “Leia, you need to go to Eine now, tell her how you feel, before she does something stupid like get drunk and kiss her corporate liaison!”

  “I’m pretty sure Eine doesn’t have a corporate liaison… She’s a student.”

  “Then go to her before she finds one! I have to go!”

  Sam ran out of the room with all deliberate speed, running down the hallway, leaving Leia in the hammock, wondering: A) what the hell happened, B) what, exactly, a corporate liaison does, and C) why Eine would kiss one while drunk.

  ***

  As she ran down the hallway towards Jamie’s suite, Sam thought: If this was television, she would be stopped by every conceivable obstacle and annoyance. Everyone would want something of her. Camera operators asking about faulty equipment, sound engineers asking for room tone, contestants asking about rule nuances, caterers asking about food allergies.

  Possibly there would be two people carrying a sheet of break-away gss between them, or maybe even a fully-loaded fruit stand that would explode in a visual spectacle of color, complete with the scrunching, wet sounds provided by a foley artist having fun throwing overripe watermelons onto hard surfaces, and pressing their hand into wet sponges, for that satisfying banana-peel “squish.”

  And the soundtrack would either be a driving, pulse-pounding, dark cinematic track composed by An Silvestri, or ‘Yakety Sax’. There would be no in-between.

  (Actually, the soundtrack would depend entirely on whether it was an American or a British television series that she was in, now that she thought about it.)

  There was none of that.

  But there was still pulse-pounding excitement, as she knocked on Jamie’s suite door, and Jamie opened it.

  “Sam? What’s wrong? You alright?”

  She had something prepared for this. Hell, she had it prepared ever since that night on the beach, the night that all went wrong. About how she loved Jamie romantically, if not sexually, but that might change with time, and even if it doesn’t, Jamie was the one she wanted to grow old with, and old people in marriages don’t always find each other sexually attractive, and if it didn’t matter to every old couple sitting on a park bench looking lovingly into each other’s eyes for peaceful minutes, just enjoying spending time together and…

  “I need to smell you!” she blurted.

  …not that.

  ***

  Leia always felt that deep, meaningful conversations were best mitigated with light, entertaining distractions, so she handed Eine the controller to the Nintendo Switch she brought with her from home, and had hooked up to the TV they had in their room.

  “So, uh, here’s the deal,” said Leia, settling down with one of the two game controllers. “There’s something important that I have to… hunh.”

  “What?” said Eine.

  Leia pointed at the TV screen in their shared room, to which they had hooked up the Nintendo Switch that Leia brought from home.

  “I can’t believe I didn’t notice it before.”

  “What?”

  “You always choose Toadette in Mario Kart.”

  “Well, yeah,” expined Eine. “That’s not a gender thing. She’s got the best acceleration.”

  “Okay. But you always chose the female trainer in Pokemon Sword & Shield.”

  “You mean, the Scottish one? That’s why I pick her. For the memes.3”

  “I guess. But what about Zero Suit Samus in Smash Brothers?”

  “Oh, yeah. That’s because I like thinking of myself as a hot blonde girl in skin-tight tex.”

  Leia snorted a ugh.

  “Hey, you asked!” said Eine.

  Fuck it, there was not going to be a better time, so she might as well just come out with it.

  “Eine, how serious are you about crushing on me?”

  Eine frowned.

  “Pretty darn serious, sorry. I mean, you made it clear that you’re not interested…”

  “I take it back,” said Leia.

  Eine blinked.

  Leia pre-empted the ‘WTF’ that she knew was coming.

  “I can’t be your boyfriend right now. Or your girlfriend. Right now. Because right now, I don’t know how I feel about you. Like, genuinely.”

  “Okay? Where are you going with this?”

  “Eine, I’m being pumped full of wacky girl juice and it is destroying my brain, and I can’t tell what are my real emotions and what’s just the estrogen messing with me, and while it’s great that you are a girl and are getting all the girl stuff you need here, I’m not a girl,” said Leia.

  “Established, yes.”

  “But I mean, you are a girl. And you’re my friend. My best friend. And I really, really care about you, you know that? And I’m like, well, wait a minute, what’s the difference between that and a ‘girlfriend’? And maybe there isn’t a difference. And maybe there is. But I don’t think that there’s a way of knowing that until I get back to normal.”

  “Leia, where are you going with this?”

  “I’m saying that your crush… at least right now, is… not, strictly speaking, technically… unrequited.”

  “Oh.”

  Eine thought about that for a second. She was never the best with social interactions, and while she was better with Leia than with anyone else, she still wasn’t quite sure what the proper response to that was.

  “Wanna try making out?” said Eine, finally.

  “JESUS!” said Leia.

  “Sorry,” said Eine. “I didn’t know what I should ask.”

  “It’s okay. I mean, I’ve even been thinking about it. But we can’t make out.”

  “Right,” Eine nodded.

  Then sat in the awkward silence.

  “Because,” said Leia, unprompted.

  “Right. Because.” agreed Eine.

  More awkward silence.

  “Because what?” asked Eine.

  “Well,” said Leia, reluctantly, “what happens if we make out, really enjoy it, and then when I get off the estrogen, I just… don’t feel the same attraction to you?”

  “Hmm. That is a toughie,” Eine conceded. “But what happens if we don’t make out, we would have really enjoyed it, and then you don’t feel an attraction to me anymore. Wouldn’t we have wasted that opportunity? Wouldn’t that have been a happy memory that we never shared?”

  Leia blinked, and silently sat there, trying to make sense of that.

  “Would it help if I drew a Nash table and tried to find an equilibrium?” asked Eine.

  Leia looked over to Eine, realized that Eine was absolutely right and that they were already awkward and were going to be awkward and that this couldn’t possibly be more awkward, so what was there to lose?

  “On the other hand,” said Eine. “We do already have Mario Kart set up.”

  Truly, a dilemma for the ages.

  “Eine?”

  “Yes, Leia?”

  “You’re not going to get drunk and kiss a corporate liaison, are you?”

  “That’s a very specific question. I mean, how cute is this hypothetical corporate liaison?”

  “Nevermind,”

  “Cause are we talking more of a Bradley-type or more of a Victoria-type?”

  “What?”

  “Is the corporate liaison into bondage? That might affect the answer to the question.”

  “Oh my god, Eine. Please stop talking!”

  Eine smirked, and raised her eyebrows. And then the magnificent she-bastard pyed her masterstroke.

  “Make me.”

  Leia never had a chance. After all, Eine had done the math.

  ***

  Standings: ContestantStatusWinningsPenaltiesCash-outTotalPyers Remaining: 6Diana (Jett)Active100-5 95Prize Pot: 94,863Eine (Ethan)Active10500 1050Cash-Out: 7,905Judi "Gucci" (Jude "Gooch")Active1000-5 995 Leia (Leonard)Active10500 1050Zolodex Treatments: 2Mara (Oscar)Active250-5 245Estrogen Doses: 3Victoria (Victor)Active650-105 545  JacobCashed Out: Month 2, Week 340007,2977,697 RafaelDisqualified*:Month 2, Week 1000 0 BradleyCashed Out: Month 1, Week 3100-203,4213,501  * Rafael voluntarily disqualified.

  AnnouncementWhile everyone on the discord has been contributing, special thanks go out to these contributors who helped while I was live-writing this chapter.

  BreefolkR.R. Rosecolour. So, some good news in my life for once. Met with Bree from the discord in person at a coffeeshop, just hung out and talked. It was so weird. Good weird.

  First time I've met with a person who was a "fan" of my writing. Such Wow! Much Validation!

  And a special thanks to Skye who produced the first piece of original artwork for WITT. It's so good, I couldn't NOT include it in the text here. You'll know it when you see it. :)