Tug of War 50.2

"Umm... Hey, Martin. C-can we, like, talk for a second?"

Martin, who was putting some books in his locker, didn't even bother to turn around to face Timothy before answering, "What do you want to talk about?" he asked, and Timothy couldn't remember ever hearing his friend sounding that cold before.

"L-look, Martin, I'm sure you must be, like, totally mad at me, but I... well, I just want to say I'm sorry, okay? I'm sorry for not replying your messages. You... you have no idea how confused and lost I was. But I shouldn't have done that. Gosh, you have been my bestie since forever, and… and I also know you were kicked out of the basketball team, and it was, like, totally my fault! But even then you keep defending me when someone offends me and you are around. You... you are an amazing guy, Martin. You definitely are! And... well..." Timothy continued, in a faint whisper that sounded more like a meow. "…I'd like to know if you still want to be my friend. I miss hanging out with you, like, so much..." he finished, insecure. 

Martin, who still had his back to the feminized boy, finally finished putting his books away, and closed the locker door harder than necessary, making Timothy squeak and jump a bit. "Why would you want to waste time hanging out with me, huh? Don't you have a boyfriend now?" he angrily asked, facing his old friend for the first time. 

Seeing how furious the other boy was, Timothy got overwhelmed by his emotions and tears started to flow from his eyes. Martin was completely stunned by that reaction. All his anger seemed to disappear in a second, as if by magic. Feeling ashamed and guilty, he kept looking at the Timothy, who was covering his face with his hands. 

"I'm sorry, Tiffany" she said, embarrassed. "I don't know what was wrong with me. I shouldn't have yelled at you" he tried to explain himself, patting Timothy on the shoulder awkwardly. But seeing that it was having no effect at all, he took a step closer and hugged the feminized boy.   

The two of them remained silent for some time – Timothy sniffing on the other guy's shoulder, while Martin tried to console him by stroking his back and hair. When Timothy finally calmed down a little bit, he looked at his friend again. 

"Wait a minute..." he started saying, an curious and confused expression on his pretty face. "How did you know?"

"How did I know what?" 

"About my boyfriend…" the words had barely left Timothy's pink lips when he covered his mouth, horrified. "Oh, my gosh! What am I even saying?  Matt isn't my boyfriend, okay? He totally isn't!" 

"That's okay" Martin said, sounding resigned. "All girls have the right to have a boyfriend, right? You don't need to explain me anything." 

Timothy wanted to insist that he didn't have a boyfriend and that he wasn't a girl, but he decided to leave it for later. "Who told you I went out with Matt?" he asked, hardly believing he was having that kind of conversation with Martin, his best friend since childhood. 

"Kate" Martin simply answered.

"Kate? Have you been talking to Kate?" 

"Of course I've been talking to her! I... I wanted to know if you were okay but you weren't replying my messages" Martin explained, and Timothy felt his stomach sink. "Kate has been telling me what is going on."   

"I see" Timothy said, looking at his high-heeled feet, his face burning. "Well, like a told you, I'm so sorry, Martin. I totally should have replied your texts." 

"Yeah… but let's forget about it, okay?" Martin suggested, in a sudden change of mood. He was now smiling, his old dreamy expression on his face. "That's past. I'm happy we're talking now."

"Me too. But still... gosh, I'm truly sorry you were, like, kicked out of the basketball team. I know how much you enjoyed playing basketball." 

"I won't lie… that was tough, indeed. But this isn't bothering me anymore. Football is cool, as well… and we can play this outdoors, which is good for the chakras."

"So you're still working on your chakras?" Timothy asked, giggling in an extremely girly way – something he noticed a bit too late. 

"Absolutely!" Martin exclaimed, smiling even wider. "And answering your question, of course I still want to be your friend, Tiff! I missed you a lot, too" he finished, caressing Timothy's hands in a way that he would never have done in the past. 

"Oh, that's wonderful! I'm, like, so happy to hear that! But… umm… why are you calling me Tiff?"

"Kate told me that's how you like being called now… Or do you prefer Ti-Ti? I heard some people are calling you that." 

"No, Tiff is fine…" Timothy said, annoyed. "…not fine, but better than Ti-Ti at least" he added in a whisper through his teeth that Martin didn't seem to hear. 

"But now that we are good again, I'd like to know... Is this boyfriend of yours treating you well?"

"I told you Matt isn't my boyfriend!" Timothy protested, his hands on his hips.

"Oh, really?" Martin raised his eyebrows. "That's weird, 'cause Kate told me you even let him kiss you last Saturday." 

"She what?!" Timothy got wide-eyed, feeling outraged. "Kate should mind her own business! She... she is so…" but the feminized boy was angry that he couldn't even put into words what he thought that Kate was at that moment. 

"Come on, Tiff" Martin started saying, and for an instant he looked serious again. "I told you I don't care if you are a guy or a girl. You're my friend no matter what! You don't need to keep saying to me you don't like being Tiffany… or dating guys."

Timothy opened his mouth to reply but closed it again almost immediately. It was happening all over again… He and Martin had stopped talking some weeks earlier because Martin had thought Timothy was lying to him when the feminized boy insisted he didn't enjoy being a girl. And to Timothy's despair, things seemed even more complicated now...

Martin knew that Timothy had dated a guy, and had even been kissed! As if that wasn't bad enough, Timothy had cried in his friend's arms just a minute before, and then giggled like the girliest girl in the world. He also kept talking and gesturing like a kind of living Barbie doll, something that had already become second nature to him – He even feared how hard he would have to work in the future in order to be able to behave like an ordinary guy again.

Timothy concluded he had no chance of convincing Martin about the truth right now. It was sad, but if he really wanted his friend back, he would have to swallow his pride and admit that he enjoyed being Tiffany. Later, he would need to find a way to show Martin that this Tiffany's thing was just a charade to torment his father. 

"Fine, you win" Timothy started, after taking a deep breath. "I admit it! I've always wanted to be a girl. I totally love being Tiffany… I love wearing cute outfits and getting all dolled up… I'm so sorry I wasn't honest to you before. Gee, the thing is that we've, like, known each other since we were kids, and you always thought of me as a boy, right? I was soo afraid you freak out seeing the new me... But I know I was being totally silly… You told me over and over again you had no problem with me being Tiffany… Anyway, I just want you to know I'm still the same person I've always been… nothing needs to change between us, no matter how I look now, okay?" 

That was it. Feeling it had been the most difficult thing he had ever done, Timothy had succeeded in telling the lie in a way he judged convincing. He then got slightly desperate realizing that – at least for now – he would have no one to vent about the pain of pretending to be a girl when in truth he didn't want it… On the other hand, he was overjoyed to know that he and Martin would be friends again, and this fact alone made him more confident in facing the challenges of the crazy situation he was in. 

"See?" Martin smiled again. "That wasn't so hard, was it? Thank you for trusting me, Tiff. However, about you being the same person as before, I'm not so sure... I mean, you're a girl now, right? I guess I have to open doors for you, carry your books now and then, and stuff like that…" Martin kept talking, more to himself than to Timothy, and then seemed to get lost in an existential reflection. 

"Uggh" Timothy exclaimed, frustrated. "There is no law that forces you to do any of that, you know that, right?" 

"Oh I see... Yeah, I also need to remember that girls are hard to understand sometimes" Martin commented, thinking out loud again. "But tell me, Tiff... How is it?"

"How's what?"

Martin made some vague gestures around his body, but since Timothy didn't seem to get the idea, he put it into words, "Being a girl."

"Well… It's alright... once you get used to the heels, of course!" Timothy said, in an attempt to make a joke, but Martin once again seemed in deep thought upon hearing that. Timothy sighed; he had forgotten how his friend's inability to understand irony bothered him sometimes. "Wait a minute... Are you checking out my legs?"

"Umm... What? Yeah, I guess I was… I'm sorry. It's just that I noticed how great the heels make your legs look. Man... I mean, girl... I've never realized you had such beautiful legs before..."

"T-thanks, I guess" Timothy said, blushing. "But can you stop looking at my legs, please?" he added, looking angry, but deep down he felt an edge of excitement for being praised by his friend like that – so much that his nipples tingled uncomfortably under his breast forms again. 

"Is everything okay?" Martin asked, seeing Timothy poking his chest. 

"Yeah, yeah, fine" Timothy impatiently said. "It's just that I have real breasts growing under my forms and sometimes this is so uncomfortable that it drives me crazy..." he added, not really thinking about what he was saying. However, when he fully understood what he had just told his friend, he covered his mouth one more time, shocked. 

Martin didn't seem the least bit alarmed by the information that his lifelong friend was growing breasts, though. Leaving this aside as if it were the most ordinary thing in the world, he said, "Oh, I just remembered! I have a gift for you!"

"A gift?" Timothy cried out, feeling deeply relieved by the change of subject. "What kind of gift?"

"That is..." but before Martin could talk about the gift, Timothy's phone rang, filling the hallway with Ariana Grande's latest release (Gabriella had choose his ringtone for him). "Oh, I see. This is your boyfriend calling" Martin said, looking at the phone display before Timothy could hide it, and trying his best to talk about it casually. "I guess you have to answer him, right? That's okay... I need to go to my next class, anyway."

"Wait, Martin, I..."

"Don't worry, Tiff. I talk to you later, okay? Glad we're friends again" and saying so, Martin walked away down the hall…