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  [colpse]The Visit, Part 2: Reunion2028 April 9SundayThere she was. My old room-mate. The reason I would sometimes wake up at night in a cold sweat, seeking reassurances from my girlfriend that everything was OK. That we weren’t the same people we used to be.

  The st time I saw her was in the hallway in front of our dorm room at Bradford McKinley. Our RA, Darrell, had to intervene to break us up. And now she was here, wearing a blue dress with her namesake flowers spyed all over it. Back when we were room-mates, I had never imagined her wearing anything like it. But thanks to the passage of several years and a trip across the Atntic, here we were.

  I was standing face-to-face with Rose Thompson, and I wasn’t able to get a word out.

  Rose and Nora started chatting on Consensus about a year-and-a-half ago, and they’d somehow grown quite comfortable with one-another. Rose and I tried to have a few conversations of our own as well, but they never seemed to get anywhere.

  It wasn’t for ck of trying on our parts, either. At least, that’s what I’d tell myself. I wasn’t really mad anymore, even if I couldn’t fully forgive her for what happened that evening. But we’d both changed so much from the people we remembered. It was hard to reconnect. Not that we ever connected well in the first pce.

  But then Stephanie asked if Nora and I wanted to visit during my Spring Recess. And since Rose was here also, Nora insisted we use the trip as an opportunity to resume some kind of friendship with Rose. Or at least an acquaintanceship.

  Nora poked me in the arm and quietly said, “Lily?”

  “Right, sorry. It’s uh… good to see you, too, Rose.”

  She smiled a bit at my greeting and said, “Hi. Um… Huh. Does this feel really awkward to you, also?”

  “Yes.”

  “OK, good. It’s not just me. I mean, not good. I mean… take a seat?”

  She gestured at one of the tables in the dining room we’d entered, and the five of us sat down.

  Nora turned toward the girl who had held the doors open for us and asked, “You’re Bethany, right?”

  “Shoot!” Rose said, “Sorry. I should have introduced you. Yes, this is Beth. She’s the one who cracked my egg and then put me back together again afterward. She’s been like a big sister to me.”

  “I get it,” I said. “You never met her, but my friend Vicky accepted me without question the moment I told her I was a girl. She taught me all about transition and provided me with hormones while I was still closeted and unable to use my parent’s insurance.”

  Beth scoffed sarcastically. “Under the table HRT?! Why I never!”

  Stephanie then punched Beth in the arm and said, “Don’t mind her. We understand having to get medication through… unconventional means. We do live in the UK, after all.”

  “Anyway,” I said, “Vicky was like a sister to me, and after I came out to my parents, they adopted her, and then she became my sister legally!”

  Rose looked engrossed by my talking about Vicky. It was the complete opposite of how she would act when I’d try talking to her in our dorm room.

  Rose said, “That’s wonderful, Lily. Beth had to go no contact with her parents, but we’re hoping that my mom and her can hit it off once the divorce is finalized and Mom has a chance to visit.”

  The five of us continued to talk for a while, filling each other in on all the news that hadn’t been shared over Consensus and some that had been. It was really nice, actually, and I quickly learned that Rose and I had a lot in common. We both had flower-based names, of course, although that probably shouldn’t count since Rose had suggested mine in the first pce. I doubted she remembered doing so, though. We were both huge fans of KSP still. We were both interested in the social and mental sciences.

  My favorite commonality, though, came from our shared experience as trans women. I couldn’t help but notice that when we first came in and Rose was anxiously concentrating on her head voice, she started talking with a funny mix of Texas of English accents. As she rexed, though, her voice returned to the slight Texan twang I was used to, just brighter than before. Just like me, she was a young trans girl still figuring out how to present herself to the world.

  I was sure she took a much more typical path to figuring herself out than I did, though.

  After a while, Stephanie and Beth excused themselves to bring Nora’s and my luggage upstairs and to prep Stephanie’s room so we’d have somewhere to sleep. The three of us that remained in the dining room continued talking, but about twenty minutes ter, Rose’s phone started buzzing.

  “Shoot! Of all the nights…” she said. “Sorry, you two. There’s a minor emergency I need to help take care of.”

  It made sense. Rose had mentioned earlier she worked for her dorm in a sort of RA position.

  Rose started typing on her phone for a minute and then spoke to Nora and I. “There. My friend Lauren should be around soon in case you need anything. Again, I’m really sorry I need to bail.”

  “That’s alright, Rose,” Nora said. “It’s actually really sweet how you’re giving back to the pce that took you in.”

  “Thanks, Nora. Ha. Lily, can you imagine what Darrel would say if he could see me now?”

  I ughed at her question. Then, she walked to the other side of the dining hall and toward a rge door beled Maintenance.

  “You’re headed in there?” I asked.

  “Yep. It’s surprising how many skills you need to pick up for a job like this. Well, I’ll see you both ter.”

  Then, she passed through the door and disappeared from sight.

  A few minutes ter, a group of eight or so women entered the dining hall. One of them, a woman wearing a red dress with bck tights, walked over to introduce herself.

  “Lily and Nora, right? I’m Lauren. Rose said it would be a bit before she could come back, but I can get you some tea or coffee to enjoy while you wait.”

  “It’s getting pretty te,” Nora said, “but some herbal tea could be nice. Lily?”

  “Sure,” I answered. “Some herbal tea please.”

  “Of course!” Lauren said through a smile. “Honey or lemon?”

  “Pin is fine, thank you,” said Nora.

  “Same,” I said.

  Lauren walked into the nearby kitchen that we had passed through earlier. We were treated to the sounds of mugs clinking together while we waited.

  We were also treated to the occasional gnce from the group of women who came down with Lauren. One woman—a girl, really—couldn’t keep her eyes off of us or me in particur. I was starting to feel pretty uncomfortable from all the staring when Lauren returned from the kitchen, sans tea.

  “Sorry you two,” she said. “I’ll have to run to the second floor. I couldn’t find any mugs.”

  “What was all that noise, then?” I asked.

  “Right. I meant to say I couldn’t find any clean mugs. I’ll be back soon.”

  Lauren whispered something to one of the other women that came in with her, and then she exited the dining room directly up a set of stairs.

  As soon as Lauren was out of sight, the same girl from before started staring at me again. I gave her another minute, and then I waved her over.

  “Um… hi,” I said in a neutral tone. “I feel like you were staring at me.”

  “Oh! I’m so sorry. You’re, uh, Lily, right?”

  “Yes,” I answered. “And this is my girlfriend, Nora.”

  “Hi, Nora,” the girl said, “and sorry again for staring. It’s just that I’m really good friends with Rose, and she talks about you a lot. Like, she really looks up to you. I’m Violet, by the way. Rose helped me start transitioning.”

  “Wow, how is it that one college can attract so many trans women?” Nora asked.

  “I’m sorry,” I say. “Rose talks about me?”

  “Yes, Lily,” Nora said. “Rose asked through me if she could talk about you to a friend of hers. You said you didn’t mind. You don’t remember?”

  “No,” I answered. “I’m sorry for forgetting, Violet. It’s nice to meet you.”

  I was beginning to realize that Rose and I weren’t as bmeless in our previous failures to reconnect as I had thought. She had been avoiding direct conversations often, going as far as to talk to me through Nora. And as for me, I had been choosing to ignore what little bits of conversation got through. I knew that sometimes strained retionships couldn’t be mended, and ours was certainly strained. Rose and I had been given a new opportunity to make amends, though, and I wanted to start putting in a more honest effort to make that happen.

  “So Violet,” Nora asked, “do you live in this dorm with Rose and the others?”

  “Yep,” she answered. “I moved in um… about a year and a half ago. It’s how I met Rose!”

  I started to grow more curious about her.

  “So you knew you were a woman before you met Rose then?” I ask.

  “Right, but I hadn’t told anybody yet. Rose was a huge help in getting me to come out and start medically transitioning.”

  “Huh. I suppose you’ve met Beth and Stephanie, right?”

  “Of course! I don’t know either of them too well yet, but Beth at least is hirious, and I’m so happy she was there for Rose. You know, right? First Steph helped Beth start transition. Then Beth helped Rose. And now Rose is helping me. Rose told me once to ’pay it forward’ when I can, and I can’t wait to help another trans girl out.”

  It was a nice sentiment at least. I put on a half smile to show Violet how I felt about it.

  “Anyway,” Violet said, “I should head back to the others. It was nice meeting you two.”

  Nora and I both responded in kind, and then Violet went back to sit next to the woman—also young—Lauren had spoken to earlier. I spent the next few minutes thinking about the conversation we’d just had, and I was interrupted from my thoughts by the sight of Lauren descending the same stairs she had ascended earlier. She was now holding two pin white mugs full of steaming hot tea.

  “Sorry about the wait,” Lauren said. “It takes time to make a proper cuppa.”

  Nora smirked and replied, “You don’t just drop the tea bag in the mug, top it with cold water, and then throw the mug in the microwave?”

  Lauren looked aghast, so I chimed in to save face. “I’m pretty sure she’s just joking.”

  Lauren walked over to spend more time with Violet and the other girls. After a few minutes of silently enjoying our tea—it had quite a nice fragrance—we saw Stephanie enter the dining room from the same staircase Lauren had used.

  “Hi you two,” she said. “It sounds like whatever has Rose held up is going to take longer than she thought. She recommends I show you to my room—yours for this evening—so you can get settled in for the night. If you’d like to talk some more, she can meet you for breakfast tomorrow.”

  “That’s a shame,” I said. “We were actually having a good time. But sure. Breakfast sounds nice.”

  “I’ll let her know and have her message you with a recommendation of where to meet tomorrow. She really is sorry,” Stephanie added.

  We followed her up three flights of stairs and down the hall to her modestly rge private room. She and Beth had already id out our luggage. Stephanie gave us the (admittedly quick) tour, wished us a good night, and we listened as she walked one door down to what I assumed was Beth’s room.

  “Well, Princess Lily, now that we’ve surveyed this new domain, shall we take our rest for the evening?”

  I giggled. “That sounds lovely, Queen Nora,” but then I started to frown.

  “Are you alright, Lily?”

  “Mostly, but I can’t get over how odd things were downstairs.”

  “Odd?”

  “You mean you didn’t notice anything unusual?”

  “No, I didn’t… Wait. Lily O’Connor! Are you of all people accusing Rose of having ulterior motives?”

  “What? No! Of course not. Rose seems lovely.

  “It’s Violet that I’m worried about.”