Standing Up To Life Book 2 Chapter 24 Pt 2

All of the students that went on the trip were in this class. Unfortunately that included Jarred. Midway through the class I saw him looking up with a group that had five people who hadn’t been on the trip. He pointed to me and I saw people shake their heads in disbelief. Ws he outing me? Out of all of the guys he had been the one I was most worried about. I looked at Amy next to me and whispered to her what I suspected, but it didn’t take him long to take care of confirming my suspicions.

“Yeah, that ‘girl’ over there isn’t really a girl guys. She’s really that freak Brandon.” He started to say at the top of his lungs before Ms. Damien told him to join her outside in the hallway.

I was dead. People knew now.

Kyle wasn’t going to have any of that though, he walked over to the group that Jarred had talked to. He said something to them, I wasn’t sure what, but they all kind of nodded their heads and looked a bit scared. Not as scared as when Jarred walked back in though - I don’t know what Ms. Damien had told him, but he was on his best behaviour through the rest of the class period.

Kyle walked with me to band, along with Nikki, and I took my seat in the saxophone section. Mrs. Remar said to get our horns out and so I warmed up - glad I had spent a bit of time recently practicing. I watched some of the other players try and play - they seemed to be in a lot of pain.

While we were warming up I heard some whispers from behind me and knew that the jig was definitely up now. Word had made it around quickly - likely to the whole school by now. One of the girls that I didn’t really know that well stood up from the clarinet section, walked over to me and asked, “Tiffany is it true?”

“Is what true?” I asked trying to play dumb.

“That you’re really Brandon?”

Yep the cat was out of the bag and on a rampage. “I’m not anymore, I’m Tiffany now,” I told her firmly yet softly.

She looked confused, but nodded, “Okay, you’ll have to explain that to me sometime. You do understand this is really weird right?”

“Maybe, to others. But I am who I am, and I know who that is now,” I told her. She appeared to chew that over as Mrs. Remar told everyone to sit down and began warming us up as a group. 

The sounds we made that day as a group were terrible! She berated everyone and told them all to go home and practice that night. She didn’t want that sound to ever happen again.

As I was getting ready to leave class Mrs. Remar asked, “Tiffany can you come here for a moment please?”

“Sure,” I replied.

I went into her office and she closed the door. “How are things going so far today?” she asked me.

“I suppose they could be going worse,” I started off. “No one had figured it out until one of the guys that I didn’t trust from the trip told people about me last hour. Up until then the day had been going perfect. I’m sure tomorrow will be bad enough.”

“Keep your chin up Tiffany, things’ll work out. I think you’re very brave to be true to yourself like this.”

“Thanks.”

“Nice job today, I’m glad to hear that at least one person practiced this summer,” she told me as I left her class. That last comment kind of made me smile again as I walked out.

At that point I realized that I needed to go back to my locker really quick to grab something I’d left there earlier. As I approached it I felt a hand push me against the locker. I spun around and saw it was Lucas, a kid I’d had problems with the previous year. I turned back around and began opening the locker, grabbing what I needed.

“So not only were you a wuss last year, but, you really are a *** like I thought,” he told me. It was just like a situation I’d run through several times with Dr. Reynolds.

“Get lost Lucas, you’re just mad there’s one more girl in school that wouldn’t go out with you even if you were the last guy on earth,” I said smartly to him with a smile on my face. I watched his face go ashen, go into shock, and turned around before her could responded to anything. I began walking down the hallway when I heard running steps towards me. He came up in front of me, and I saw a fist fly towards me.

“How dare you fa…” he started to say before I saw a hand catch his hand in mid air. In the blink of an eye he was on the ground with his arm pinned behind his back.

David looked at him and said “You will leave Tiffany alone, you will not call her names, and you will certainly not attack her again.”

“Or else?” He sneered trying to maintain his tough guy image, even though he was lying on his face in the hall looking like a frightened little baby.

“Or else me, and several other football players are going to be paying you a house call. Do you understand? Tiffany is under our protection, and you’ll pay dearly for not remembering that,” Kyle said from behind him. 

David released him and Lucas scampered down the hallway like the rat he was. “Thanks, that was a little scary.“ I said to both of them.

“You’re welcome Tiffany, you’d better hurry or you’ll miss your bus,” David told me. I hurried off down the hallway and out to the bus stop. I made it onto the bus just as she was closing the door.

I ended up sitting down right behind the driver as that was the only seat left that I could see. “You must be Tiffany?” the driver asked.

“Yes ma’am,” I told her.

She handed me a card and said , “Would you please fill this out with your information?”

“Okay,” I replied. I filled it out and gave it to her when we got to my bus stop.

As I got off at that bus stop I heard, “Hey Tiffany,” I turned around and saw a new sixth grade girl that lived just down the street from me.

“Hey,” I said politely. She began walking with me down the block towards our houses.

“Is it true?” she asked.

“Is what true?” I asked. I wasn’t trying to play dumb… but I didn’t really want to spread things farther than they already had.

“You know…”

“Oh well, so much for damage control. “That I used to be Brandon?” I asked her.

She nodded.

“Yeah, I used to be, but I’m not anymore.”

“How did this all happen?” she asked me.

She was being nice enough to me, ‘the least I could do was be civil about it and explain some of it,’ I thought. I began explaining things as we walked down the block. We ended up sitting outside my house for a half-hour or so talking and after all was said and done she told me. “Tiffany, this is really strange… But you make a really pretty girl, and I’m okay with this. I doubt many other are going to be though,” she told me.

“Well, we’ll see how much David’s threat against Lucas holds them back,” I told her.

We parted and I went inside to collapse into a blob on the couch. I had made it through one day… but it was going to probably have been the easiest day since they hadn’t know the whole day. I ended up crying just because of all of the pent up stress before falling asleep in a ball.