A loud howl woke me up from the night. It sounded right outside the barn. I sat up and listened closely, I hear patters of paws close to the entrance of the barn. I grip onto my blanket and slowly stand up, the pattering of the feet get closer to me and I take a deep breath as this may be my last. I listen as the creature gets closer and closer to me until it is directly in front of me. It stops moving and light seemingly outlines the creature, I can tell that it's either a small wolf, or a large coyote. We stare at each other for awhile, I feel comfortable around this figure. I kneel down to it's level. It growls at me softly, I slowly put my hand up to its nose and it licks me. I put my hand down and it walks up to me, nudging at my pocket. I take the item out and try handing it to the creature. But the creature nudges at my hand.

"You want me to squeeze this thing?" I say to the creature, and it nudges at my hand again. "Well, okay then." I say, I take the thing and hold it close to my face and smell it again. It still smelt sweet, I start to squeeze it in one hand, the substance seeps through the openings of my fist and my eyesight slowly starts to come back. I take my other hand and begin brushing off the stuff from my hands. Underneath, it reveals a compass. "There, I squeezed it, now what?" I said, looking up from my hand, but the creature has vanished. "Hello?" I say, hoping to hear it come out of hiding, but nothing happens. "Hey, wait! I can see!" I yell excitedly.

I start looking around at everything, it was pitch black outside. I begin walking out of the barn, it got colder as I neared the entrance. I looked outside and I saw the white outline of the coyote or wolf again. I started to walk towards it, with only the light of the moon guide my way. It howls once more, it sounded like that of a wolf. I keep walking towards it and hear the creaking of a door and two gunshots go off. I scream loudly and fall to the ground, holding myself and closing my eyes. The shooting stops and the wolf whines loudly, I cry as I listen to the sound. The shooting quickly stops and I open my eyes. My dad begins walking out into the field and I slowly get up. He yells at me to come to him and I do. When I get closer, he grabs me and pulls me close.

"Are you okay?" He asks, in a more gentle tone as I nod in response. "Good, I hope I injured that wolf and it dies quickly later. I don't need predators around here and my livestock. Now, considering we are awake, we might as well get working on the farm. The wheat on the westside needs to be harvested and the cows stalls need to be cleaned out. It's time you learn how to do this. Especially if the school won't want you back today, I can't allow one of my kids to just sit around and do nothing." He says, walking me over to the shed where he keeps his tools. "So, you will start of cleaning the stalls and feeding the animals. Clean up the shit and put down more hay as needed, then go to the silos and fill up buckets for the animals, if needed, fill the water too. You'll need to go down to the river to do that. Next, grab the hens eggs, and then meet me down in the fields for harvesting. Your brothers will finish up the rest of the barn work as you help me."

"Okay, dad." I say and grab the tools I need to clean out the barns.

I go into the stalls and let the cows out as I clean the stalls, I put the poop in a wheelbarrow and set it outside as I fill the stalls with hay. I then go to the silos and fill buckets full of food and put it in the bins for the animals. The buckets felt as if they were fifty pounds each and I could only carry one at a time. My arms ached and felt as if they were jell-o before I finished. And of course, some of the water buckets were low, so that was my next task. As I was walking down to the river, I noticed it started getting lighter, quickly and the rooster crowed. Which meant school was starting soon. I sighed, and filled the buckets full of water. My brothers met me at the barn and told me to go find dad.

I walked into the fields of mowed down wheat and soon to be hay looking for my dad. When he saw me, he stopped what he was doing and walked over to me. "Hey." I turned to look at him. "I thought you were going to be done awhile ago. How far did you get?"

"Um..." I said, afraid to say. "To the water."

"You only got to the buckets? Jesus Christ. I would've thought that you'd at least be collecting the eggs, or maybe decided to do a little extra work. Well, fine, I can't expect much from a girl anyway. Just grab the wheelbarrow of wheat and take it to the machines. We'll do the rest. Get a change of clothes and get ready for school." He said, sounding disappointed.

I sighed and walked back to the house, at this point, my legs felt as if they were about to fall off from all of the walking and pain of yesterday. I got into the house and mom had food on the table. I ate my food as she fed the baby and then I changed my clothes. I helped her finish up a few more chores, such as cleaning and sewing some of the clothes. Mom walks up to me and looks at my cuts and bruises, she cleans them with a warm cloth and then gets ready to leave.

"I don't want to go to school today. I don't want people looking at me like I'm a freak." I say.

"Unless you can get yourself a job at one of the sewing or bakeries, I don't see that as a possibility, and you don't want to work on the farm with your father. You're just not strong enough for that kind of thing." My mom responds.

"I wish I could work with dad though..."

"You're not a boy, so I'm sorry, but that kind of work is left up to men. I know that is upsetting, but that's how things ended up and we can't change that."

"Yes we can. I just have to find that guy."

"Wishes don't just fall out of the sky. It sucks, but that's just the way it is. If they did, we'd be living in the Kings castle by now. Now it's time to go, unless you get a job, you have to go to school. Your dad doesn't pay for it to just go to waste."

"Isn't school supposed to allow us to get better jobs than just the typical sex roles?"

"Not in this castle unfortunately. All it does is help us learn our history, be able to add, read and write. But none of that will help you get further in life. But your skills will."

"Then I want to learn a skill."

"And what would you like to learn?"

"I want to be a Knight."

"My child," She sighs loudly. "You just can't be these male roles, how do I get you to understand that?"

"Then what skills can I learn that would get me a job that I actually enjoy? Something other than cleaning, sewing, cooking? What's the point of doing anything if I don't enjoy it?"

"Life doesn't give you what you want. It gives you what you need and can handle. Certain people get a good deck, but us, we didn't get a good hand. So we rough it until we either make it or die. Now, lets go. I'm not going to sit here and argue with you Ashley, you know the rules."

"Rules are just made up for power and hateful reasons."

"Rules are made for order and stability. Now get on that damn horse so we can go."

We walk outside and get on the horse, the pits of my stomach is filled with anxiety It quickly creates nausea and I puke up my breakfast before I knew what hit me. My mom yelled at me before taking off. It was a quiet horse ride into the castle. But when we got closer to the entrance, we saw a carriage and Gwen crying hysterically. My mom stops the carriage and we ask what happened. It turns out Gwens father died last night, they said the most likely cause was his heart exploding. But they couldn't be sure. I instantly fell into a cry. I couldn't help but to feel like this was my fault somehow.

I got off the horse and pulled down Gwen to hug her tight, she just sobbed as I held her in my arms, quickly soaking my entire dress.I can feel her getting more weak as she stands and soon we both fall to the ground, she lands on my lap and holds onto my waist tightly, I just whisper to her that it'll be okay. I look at my mom, trying to hold back tears the best that I could and my mom nods. She too gets off the horse and picks us both up. She hugs Gwen and whispers something in her ear to make her stop crying. My mom wipes Gwens tears off.

"Honey, is there anyone else who is able to take you in?" My mom asks Gwen.

"No..." She says quietly, trying to hold back tears. "There's nobody."

"Then, you can stay with us. I'm sure my husband won't mind." My mom says, smiling slightly. Gwen nods and then looks at the person waiting in the carriage. "Go, mourn your fathers death and then go back to school. One of my sons will pick you both up and bring you home after school. Now, come on Ashley, let's give Gwen some privacy."

I give Gwen one last big hug before getting back on the horse. Gwen gets back on the carriage and I watch her as we both go our seperate ways until I can no longer see her in my sight. We get to the gates and the guards stop us, they push me off the horse and put their weapons to my throat, I cry out in fear and my mom yells at them to leave me alone.

"This filth isn't allowed back in this castle." One of the guards say.

"On who's orders?" My mother demanded to know.

"The Kings, who elses?"

"My daughter was told that she wasn't sick, that there was nothing wrong with her. He made an entire statement about it."

"Do you take the King to be an idiot? He knows better than to believe your kid is okay. The only reason he didn't go through with your kid being hanged is because the person who killed Alice was more important and he was doing Ezekeliah a favor. But you better believe that if anyone causes trouble about your daughter, we will come after you. As well as, we were told to tell you that we can't accept your crops this year, not until your daughter leaves your home and your crops are rid of her disease."

"What are we going to go? We can't survive without the towns people giving us money. We can't do any repairs or feed the animals. We would'nt even be able to feed ourselves on a diet of wheat and vegitables. We need meat."

"I guess you should of thought about that before allowing your daughter to mouth off about her disease. Now, get her out of here before we kill her where she lays."

My mom gets off the horse and picks me up, we lead the horse away from the guards before getting back on. Mom sits on the horse for awhile and cries. I felt bad, but I didn't know what to do. This was all because of me and now I have to leave in order to make sure my family survives. I apologize to my mom and hugged her from behind, I never meant for this to happen. She told me that it was okay and that we would figure something out. But I knew as soon as dad found out, I was as good as gone anyway.

"Well, I guess you don't have to go to school afterall. Let's go meet Gwen and see how she's doing." Mom said, gaining her composure and taking off.

The wind from the speed makes a tear from my moms face fly off and land on me. I stare at it, blowing up my arm and my cheast gets heavier. I look up at the sky, it's getting darker and darker outside. I think it's going to rain. I kind of wished it would, despite the misery it would bring my dad, because at this point, the rain would be the only thing to give me the comfort I so desperately desired.

We soon find Gwen in the field with the man, and it seems like she's struggling. As we get closer, we see that he is pinning her down and yelling at her. Mom rides towards him quicker and tells me to stick out my foot. I do so and my mom grabs onto me, we jump over Gwen and my foot hits the guy in the face. He is knocked out stone cold and I jump off the horse, running to her. She starts screaming and I pick her up, holding her close. My mom looks down at me and smiles with tears down her eyes. She tells Gwen that we have to go to the house and I help her get on the horse. I walk beside the horse as we go back to the house. I just stare at Gwen the entire time as we move, her face is puffy and wet from the tears. Inside my chest I felt complete pain, I wished I could take Gwens away.

We get to the house and I sit on the porch, my legs feel like jello from all the walking. Gwen sits down next to me and lays her head down on me. I kiss her head softly, my mom looks at me with a discouraging voice and walks into the house. Gwen picks up her head and looks at me, she smiles and thanks me. I wipe off her tears, I lean in to kiss her when mom comes back out. She has a chair with her, she sets it down on the ground and tells me to get in it. I slowly stand up in fear and wonder, I look her in the eyes and she has this small smile on her face. I get into the chair and I see she has siccors in her hands. She starts snipping at my hair and I start crying out of joy. She tells Gwen to go inside and grab a blanket out of one of the cabnets and make a bed somewhere in the house. She nods and leaves the porch.

"For the first time ever since you brought up being a boy, I finally saw you as one, and I want to make you feel like one. I'm sorry I've been so focused on fixing you instead of making you feel better. I thought I was helping, but I was just prolonging what I can't change. I'm sorry." My mom said as I cried.

"It's okay. I still want to find that mysterious guy though." I said.

"What would you wish for?"

"I don't know. I want to make everyone happy."

"You need to make yourself happy honey. In the end, people won't be around forever. But do you know who will be around? Yourself. Your stuck with yourself. Don't you want to be happy with who you've become?"

"Of course, but I don't want the King to kill me."

"If he tries doing that, then you need to find a Kingdom that will accept you. Besides, he wold enver know."

"Then I'd ask the mystery man to make me be born as a man."

"What would you name yourself?"

"Henry Nickolas Weston..." I said quietly.

"That's a beautiful name son. Look, you're all done, it looks beautiful." She handed me a little mirror so that I could see myself.

I wiped the tears from my eyes and slowly looked in the mirror, when I saw my hair all short, the dry face didn't last long. I have never loved anything more than what my hair looks like now. I smiled so brightly and thanked my mom a million times, and then I started thinking about all the bad. I thought about what dad would think, or the village, my brothers, everything. If the village knew I was a girl with short hair, they'd hang me. And if they found out I was a girl after pretending to be a girl, they would do the same thing. I dropped the mirror into my lap and looked down.

"What's wrong?" My mom asked.

"What will everyone else think about me?" I cried.

"Let's not worry about that, I will make something up and everything will be okay." She said, as I nodded slowly. "It's okay, I promise." She hugs me

She cleaned me off and sweeped off the hair from the porch before we walked into the house. Gwen saw me and smiled widely, saying I looked great. Mom poured us up some water and we sat down while mom cleaned. I helped change Lilly and change her clothes, she just babbled away with her little vocabulary that she has.

Dad soon walked into the house and when he saw me, he just stood there and stared at me for what seemed like forever. My two brothers walked in after him and saw me, then looked back at dad. I could see my dad couldn't tell what kind of creation to have, he then walked over to mom and picked up the siccors she used. He slammed them back down onto the counter and stared at my mom. He said nothing for awhile, he put his head down for a few seconds and then raised it up agian.

"What the fuck is this?" He says, pointing at my hair.

"What do you mean?" My mom asks.

"Why is it short!" He yells.

"She had bugs, I didn't want the rest of us getting them, so I cut her hair. What's wrong with that?"

"She looks like a god damn boy!"

"Well I'm sorry I didn't want our child infesting the house. Remember when Tyler had bugs? Then Rodney and Brandon got them? It took an entire season for them to go away. You better hope that cutting her hair works instead of yelling sensesly at everyone."

My dad makes a cigarette, but before he could walk outside to smoke it, he notices Gwen. "Who's this and why is she here?"

"Gwen just lost her father, she needs a place to stay."

"In my house? Does this look like a charity? Because of our boy looking daughter, we most likely will have no money because none of the village people want to buy from a family that has a weird child in it."

"I think you're worrying and thinking too much about this honey. Just go smoke, we will figure out things as they play out."

"I'm the bread winner of the house, I'm supposed to protect this family, not starve it. Don't tell me I'm worrying to much." Before my mom could responsed, he left the house.

"Well, welcome to this lovely and dysfunctional home Gwen, It's nice to meet you." Rodney said.

"Thank you." Gwen says quietly.

"Ashley, why don't you take Gwen and go get water from the river, we are running low." My mom says.

"I got water this morning though." I responded.

"I know sweetie, but you got only enough for the animals, not us, and I need to boil it before dinner tonight. I need at least three buckets."

"Alright mom, we will be back soon."

"I love you."

"I love you too."

We walk outside and pass dad who is standing on the porch, my dad stares at us as we start leaving the house but says nothing. He only has the look of disappointment streamed across his face. We go to the barn and each grab a bucket and begin walking to the river. It was a long walk there, and I enjoyed it. I loved watching the birds fly and chirp, not only that, but the squirrels running up and down trees all the time too. I looked over at Gwen who was looking down at her feet. She looked sad, understandably, but I still wish I could make her feel better.

"What's wrong Gwen? Is it still your dad?" I asked.

"Yeah, but it's also you..." She said, quietly.

"What? What did I do?" I asked, confused.

"I just have some questions, lately you've been acting weird."

"What do you mean? What are the questions?"

"Why did you get your hair cut so short for?"

"I didn't ask for it, it was kind of just out of the blue."

"But you like it."

"Of course, it's a lot cooler, and it looks nice." I said, trying to hold back my true feelings.

"What about at the library when your mom was talking about needing a book and that person was getting angry? What did she say and why did you get so upset about it?"

"She was saying that people should die, and I don't agree with that."

"Why? What kind of people?"

"Just people that are different from you guys. The weirdo's, the deformed, whatever."

"People like us?"

"Yeah, normal people."

"Aren't you normal?"

"No, I don't think so."

"Well, I'm not normal either." She said, smiling.

"Trust me, you're more normal than me, and that's a good thing."

"She frowned, I just have one more question, why did you stick up for those boys being lit on fire?"

"The King wasn't doing right. Those guys did nothing wrong to anybody. Hanging and staking are meant as a punishment, to show people what not to do."

"So you think being homosexual is normal?"

"No, I wouldn't say normal, especially around this land. Everyone wants to hurt people who are homosexual here. But I don't think homosexual is wrong, I think it's acceptable. Especially since it makes them happy. They are the perfect definition for gay, they're lighthearted, carefree, and most of all, happy. That's what any King should want for his people." I look over to Gwen to see her smiling again.

"Thank you." She says.

"For what?"

"Just for being a good person. Come on, I can hear the river, lets hurry."

We both run to the river and study the water to find a good spotto fill our buckets up at. We eventually find a spot and put our buckets in. With the quick stream of running water, it doesn't take long for the buckets to fill up. We take the heavy buckets out of the water and inspect them for any algae or bugs that might of made their way inside. Gwen starts yelling in excitement and tells me to come look.

"I caught a fish!" She yells, as I quickly walk over to go see.

"Wow, that's not a small one either! Maybe we can have fish tonight, but we would need to catch more if we wanted to feed all eight of us, take the fish out and set it in the grass. Make sure its far enough away that it can't flop back in the water and grab your bucket." I said, excited.

She dumps out the fish and we grab our buckets, this is the oddest way that I've ever fished, but soon it proved to be a successful way. Within a half hour, we ended up catching about twelve fish and a handful of twenty shrimp. I looked at all the food we got in amazement. I truly felt like a man providing for my family in this moment. We filled up the buckets again and stuffed what we could in our pockets and carried the rest on our shirts. We wobbly made our way back home with smiles on our face.

"I can't believe how much we got." Gwen says.

"I know, I hope everyone's going to be happy. That means we won't have to eat one of our animals tonight because none of us except Brandon can go inside the castle. I doubt he would even think about buying us anything to eat."

"Well, that's okay, we have food now, and that's all tha-" Before Gwen could finish her sentance, we heard a loud noise in a nearby bush.

"What was that?" Gwen asked.

"I don't know. But I'm sure everything will be alright."

"Do you think it might be a bear?"

"No, we would've heard a bear before now if that was so."

"I hope you're right He-Ashley."

"What was that?"

"Let's walk fast okay? I don't want to be out here londer than I have to."

"Okay." I said. Was she going to say what I think she was going to say? Well, I guess it doesn't matter right now. All that matters is keeping her safe.

We walk faster to the house. I can see everyone standing around outside. I see my mom pointing at us in excitement. I didn't think we were gone that long. Somebody hooks a carriage onto our horse and starts riding to us. We keep walking as it gets closer, and I can see it's my brother Tyler.

"You guys alright?" He asks.

"Yeah, we're fine." I respond.

"What you got there?"

"Some fish and shrimp."

"That's nice, everyone got worried about you two out here."

"We didn't mean to, we just wanted to get some fish for everybody."

He nods. "Well, hop on, we don't got all day."

We both get in the back of the carriage and set the buckets and fish down. I'm so glad I didn't have to walk all that way back home. My legs had about enough of walking for one day. I dread the thought of having to come up all this way one more time. I really hoped the water we have will be enough until tomorrow morning. Luckily the ride home was smooth enough it didn't make the water fly out of the buckets. That was always a big help.We quickly get to the house and mom is the first one to greet the end of the carriage were we are at.

"Are you guys okay sweetie?" She ask's.

"They're fine, just catching fish for our dinner tonight." Tyler answers mom as he gets off the horse.

"You got us fish?" My dad confirms in a question.

"Yeah, twelve of them and a lot of shrimp." I answer.

"Good job." He says.

"Thank you." I said. That was probably the most weirdest conversation I've had with him yet, and I didn't enjoy it.

"Are you fine to go get another bucket of water?" My mom asks.

"Yeah, of course."

"Alright, let me go get the buckets dumped and I'll be right back. Gwen, bring in the fish, we will need extra water if we want to cook this up tonight. Do you know how to cook?"

"Yes, I do." Gwen responds.

"Good, I'm glad we have another cooker in the house. Ashley doesn't know how to cook. That's mostly my fault I guess." My mom says as Gwen laughs a little bit.

I sit down on the porch next to my dad, he is smoking with my two brothers. It's really silent out here with them. I didn't know if this was a guy thing or not, but it felt uncomfortable. I'm always around girls that are talking, come to think about it, I never really hang out with any guys. It kind of makes me sad now that I think about it. I looked over to my brothers who were standing, they all looked so cool from where I was sitting, but literally doing nothing at the same time.

"Hey dad, do you think I can have a cigarette too?" I asked.

Everyone stared at me. "You really are striving to be one of us aren't you?" My father said, jokingly. "Here, you can have the rest of mine." My dad said, as he handed me his.

"What, dad, why are you giving her that?" Tyler says.

"Just let your sister have it, go ahead, take a puff." He says, I shyly smile and put the cigarette in my mouth. I can feel the hot tobacco on my lips, I inhale a puff. It tastes weird and I instantly cough. It burns my throat on lungs.

"Ew, this is gross." I said, inbetween coughs.

"And that's why I let your sister have it." He says, grabbing the cigarette back.

"Don't get into these sis', they're nasty and addictive." Brandon says.

"Then why do you smoke them?" I said.

"Uh, you know, because I decided to make a bad decision."

"Here you go sweetie." Mom says, coming out of the house with the bucket.

"Thank you, I'll be back." I said, half sighing as I grab the bucket.

Everyone waved at me as I walked away, I looked out to the horizon at how far I had to walk, and felt my feet ache with every step. It was lonely walking all this way by myself. I touched my hair, I had almost forgot that it was short. But quickly remembered, I felt completely happy again and kept touching my hair. I still couldn't believe that it was short. I finally got to the end of our seemingly endless field and walked into the forest. The sun started to go down so the squirrels and everything were all gone and the night birds started to come out. They made a much different sound that I didn't really like than the song birds. I hurried through the forest and got to the river, I went to the same spot I went last time to get the water. It was much colder than earlier.

The bucket was filled up pretty quickly, and shivering, I did my best to hurry back to the house. I kept hearing russling in the bushes, which gladly helped me hurry up. I started sweating and I went to go wipe it off. But as soon as I did, I saw something go across my eyesight. I dropped the bucket of water and looked around. I got fixated on this one part of the forest. I slowly started walking towards it and then felt a push. Somebody got on top of me, I started screaming. They turned me around. This person looked familiar, but I couldn't put my finger on who they were. They started hitting me and telling me that I was a disgrace. They pulled out a knife from their pocket, and at that moment, I felt as if I was going to die. Ii closed my eyes, Gwen showed up, I knew this would be the last time I'll see her. I felt the knife go into my body, I yelled again. Then I heard a growl, and felt the man fly off my body. I opened my eyes and saw that same wolf I saw earlier attack the man. Blood started going everywhere, I heard my family call out for me, but I was too hypnotized by what I was seeing.

When the man was positively dead, the wolf looked at me and drool began pouring out of his mouth. He walked up to the dead man and drooled all over his face. Soon, I saw something completely unbelievable. The dead man slowly started transforming into this deer? I couldn't understand what was going on. I looked in complete shock at this now dead deer on the ground. I felt a hand on my shoulder and I jumped, my dads voice surrounded me and he held me.

"What happened? How did this buck die?" My father asked.

"There was this wolf, it attacked him." I responded.

"Well damn my child, you sure are the little food charm today aren't you? Come on, help me load up this deer for dinner. Can't let a nice thing like this go to waste now can we? Maybe throw the carcass into the woods as a little thank you." He said. And without thanking I helped him pick up the deer and set it in the back, where I sat next to it.

On the way home, I stared the deer in the eyes, or person, the thing... I wondered who it was and why they attacked me. I didn't think it was those same people who cold heartedly killed Alice, but maybe it could've been. We got to the house, my dad called out to my brothers to help him with the deer and they took it to the shed. I walked inside and laid down on the ground. Gwen sat down next to me and patted my shoulder.

"What happened honey?" My mom asked.

"A wolf killed a deer in front of me, dad scared the wolf off." I said.

"That must've been scary. Dinner will be done in an hour if you want to go nap for a bit?" She responded, I nodded my head and went to by bed upstairs. I got into my covers and wrapped them around me. I soon fell asleep to the sound of people talking.

I wake up to my mom nudging me awake, she has a plate of fish, shrimp, and a deer person on the table waiting for me. I look at it and instantly feel sick, but I get down to eat the fish anyway. I slowly eat it, my mom asks me if there's anything wrong and I just shake my head no. I still couldn't wrap my head around what had happened.I just wanted to sleep it away. I finish what I could, espeically leaving the deer meat alone, and told my mom I wash finished. She told me to take my food out to the pigs pen and then I can go back to bed. I got up and went outside, it was freezing out here, I walked over to the sleeping pigs and dumped the food in. They didn't even notice. I then quickly ran back into the house, hugged my mom and went back up to my bed where I saw Gwen. She was laying down and ready for bed as well. I laid next to her, I was too shocked to feel the butterflies of her being in my bed next to me. I laid with my back to her and attempted to go to sleep. Soon, everyone started snoring and I slowly felt a hand come across my waist.

"What are you doing?" I asked.

"I like cuddling, do you want me to stop?" She asked.

"No, it's fine I guess..." I whispered.

"What's wrong? What really happened out in that forest?"

"I don't want to talk about it." I said.

She pulled me closer and looked me dead in the eye, I could feel her warm breath on my face. She held onto me tightly and started breathing harder. All the sudden her face swoops in and kisses my lips. My stomach turns from the butterflies and I feel paralyzed from this connection. She keeps her lips on mine for a very long time before pulling back. I instantly have a ignormous smile on my face. She doesn't let go of me, but instead pulls my head into my chest and lets me smile out my shyness. After what seems like forever, I lift up my head to see her face smiling back at me.

"What was that for?" I asked.

"Don't you know already silly? I've loved you ever since I met you." She whispered.

"I've always had a crush on you too..." I said.

"I know, I just had to ask those questions though to make sure."

"Make sure of what?"

"That I was right about you. That me loving you didn't some how keep me from knowing who you really are. But you did lie to me. And I understand why."

"What do you mean?"

"I know you want to be a boy. I overheard what your mom said while she was cutting your hair. You're also a loud crier." She said as I laughed. "Shhh, you don't want to wake anyone up." The snoring stopped and we both got really quiet.

"We should go to bed, we can talk more about this in the morning... Away from everyone else." I said.

She didn't say anything, she just laid her head down on my chest. I felt hear body relax as she slowly drifted off to sleep. Unfortunately, now I couldn't sleep. So I laid awake listening to her breathe as she slept. Every time she held onto me tighter in her sleep I felt complete joy. I loved this feeling, I never wanted it to end. I looked up at the ceiling and watched as it slowly began getting brighter and brighter. Morning is when I began getting tired. I listened to my dad leaving to attend the farm with my two brothers, and after they had left, I fell asleep. All my dreams were about her.