How it feels behind the mask

Chapter 1

I wake up in the morning and put two fingers against my throat. I can feel my heartbeat rising, thank god it was a dream. It didn't happen in reality. I sit up in my bed and check the time 12:36 pm. That means I'm home alone. I grab my phone from the nightstand beside me and text Jake, his name on my phone is "I love you, I appreciate you and I can't make it without you" I know that's a long name but it's true.

I tell him about the dream I just had, how humiliating it was. I was in school and was sitting at a table in the cafeteria with my friends, Lo, Jake and Isablle. We had a break and were playing a card game while we were talking. Then Jessie came by and sat down, since she also knows I'm trans but hasn't come out. It wasn't weird when my friends called me Leo and not Linn, but when she came she said "Hi, Leo" and that itself wasn't a big deal, my friends know I'm trans but havent come out and she knows. She was just using the name I wanted, sadly she said it while some guys in my year walked by. Those guys aren't bad, not at all. They are the only ones that actually kinda like us. Well they don't sit with us at lunch or on breaks but in class their and my friend group can sit at the same table, even disgust things if the teacher tells us to. We're actually happy for that, even if they are popular they do talk with us and don't think we're stupid. But since they're a popular group they can talk with everyone, even though they don't invite any new friends to their group. Almost everyone wants to be in their group but they only let good people in their group, no bullies.

TW - bullying

Since they can talk with everyone and everyone wants to talk to them it didn't take long before the whole grade knew, I know they were the ones telling but it can have been something they told because some students forced them to. When the bell rang I went to my class. When I walked in everyone was standing on the tables shouting "Leo, Leo, Leo though she is a guy, hahaha, that's never happening. You are always gonna be a girl. Hahahaha, where is your boyfriend to save you, ooh I forgot he's gonna leave you now." They're throwing papers on me with transphobic notes. Then I woke up.

TW - gone

TW - gender dysphoria

When I send the text to Jake I go up from my bed and grab some clothes so I can get dressed. When I have my clothes in my hand I accidentally look in the mirror that's standing beside my closet. I stay there, standing still, looking in the mirror seeing the wrong thing, a girl when I'm a boy. It's so wrong. I turn to the side and see my boobs in the mirror, they feel bigger than yesterday, it's horrible, but the worst is that I can't come out to my family. There will be too many problems. I just have to go through this, maybe with help from my friends at least they support me.

I put on clothes and wishing I have a binder, sadly I'm too scared to get one. What if my parents find it I think that would be too much trouble? Today is a bad day, more gender dysphoria than usual.Even though I'm wearing an oversized, black hoodie I feel like you can see my boobs too much, I need to do something about it. Since I don't have a binder I have to do what I really shouldn't, but I don't care, I need to get these boobs away. I take a bandage that's laying under my bed so my parents won't find it and put it around my chest as hard as I can. The only bad things are that I can't really breathe and of course that it may damage my boobs making it harder to perform top surgery later. Or I have read that. I don't bind with bandages everyday, I'm trying to not do it and find a way to buy a real binder without my parents noticing.

TW - gone

On my way downstairs my phone is vibrating, it's Jake telling me it's fine, the students in our school would never do that and telling me to come to school so we can talk. My thoughts are rising away, do he want to talk about my dream or something else, what if he wants to break up. What if he thinks I'm weird and don't want to be my boyfriend anymore. I can't take it, I won't survive without him, I need to do something about it.