Bipolar disorder -- it’s a condition where you oscillate between depressed and hyper excited. But you didn’t have to suffer from this disorder to occasionally have these extreme highs and lows.

Take me, for example. Going from hating myself and everything I stood for, to basically flipping off the entire world and doing whatever I wanted to. And now… as the saying went, what goes up, must come down.

Honestly, it all began nicely. Nobody commented on me wearing the Aster outfit. But as the day went on, I felt the guilt and self-hatred return. It certainly didn’t help that I decided to make a female character for our roleplaying session. Again, nobody said anything about it, even though I usually played slimes or other non-humanoids.

I mean, sure, at the time, it seemed like a great idea to make my character a bunny girl mage. But as we played, I was ready to dig myself into a deeper and deeper hole.

“You think three little girls can stop me? laughed the dwarf,” said Troy.

“Your overconfidence will be your downfall, Grymduk!” yelled out Miranda. “Uronette prepares her sword and looks at her teammates. Let’s do this, girls!”

“Yeah, let’s go!” Kelly enthusiastically added.

“Uh… yeah. Let’s go,” I forced myself to say.

Everyone in the room turned to me, concern visible in their eyes.

“Hey, are you alright? You’ve been kinda down…”

“I’m fine…” I sighed.

The trio exchanged glances before Miranda spoke up. “Come on, Aster. You can talk to us if you need to. We know you’re dealing with a lot right now!”

Aster. Again, she called me Aster. On one hand, it felt nice to be called that. On the other, I felt like an ass for letting myself be called that.

“Stop calling me Aster!” Miranda flinched at my outburst. “Just… fuck…” I covered my face with my hand.

And now I’d shouted at a friend who was genuinely concerned about me. I really was the worst of the worst, wasn’t I?

I pulled my shaking hand off my face and met the gazes of my friends. Guilt flooded me once again and I let out a breath through my nose as I closed my eyes.

Maybe I should just tell them? Was there any reason why I was keeping my crush and my feelings from them? Yeah, I wasn’t used to baring my soul. Men weren’t supposed to show their feelings, after all. Stupid stereotypes… but I didn’t care about stereotypes, did I? No… screw them.

I took a deep breath and opened my eyes. “I… have a crush… on… I-Iron Pack.”

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Oh god, halfway through the sentence, I’d already regretted opening my mouth. Maybe if I shifted my eyes around they would suddenly forget I’d said something? Sounds like a plan.

A moment of silence followed until Troy finally mumbled, “That’s… uh, not what I expected.”

I frowned and lifted my gaze. “What did you expect?”

“Umm… nevermind. How did this happen then?”

I sighed. “The punishment game…”

“What? But she… she held snake’s fangs to your neck!” Miranda shouted.

“Yeah but… it was just a show for the heroes… she told me she never intended to hurt me.”

“But still… to develop a crush on a supervillain after being held hostage…?”

“Stockholm syndrome?” Troy asked.

“No, it was too short for it to be Stockholm syndrome… more like the suspension bridge effect?” Kelly added.

What the heck? They were theorising about why I’d developed a crush now? Damn Kelly and her psychology knowledge!

“No! She was just really nice to me! Very gentlemanly once we escaped the heroes. Carried me like a princess… even called me… c-cute…”

Aaaaaa, what was I saying?! Mouth! Stop it! Why did you always have to ruin everything?!

“Oh… so you like being called cute?” Miranda asked with a hint of mirth in her voice.

“What?! No! I… I don’t!”

Guys weren’t supposed to be cute! So no! I didn’t like being called cute! M-my cheeks igniting had nothing to do with this!

“Hey, it’s okay. There’s nothing wrong with wanting to be cute.” Kelly beamed at me.

“There’s plenty wrong with it! I’m a guy! I’m not supposed to be cute!”

“Do you like being a guy, then?”

“Of course, not! I hate being one! I…” For some reason, my vision had gotten blurry. “I hate it… but it’s not like I have a choice in the matter…”

Damn it, I’d overexerted myself. Now my eyes were sweating.

Someone put an arm around my shoulders.

“Hey… it’s okay. You always have a choice. If you hate being a guy then you don’t need to be… Aster.”

Dammit, Kelly… calling me Aster was cheating.

“That’s not how it works… I can’t just change who I am.” I shook my head.

“Maybe you can’t. But what if you don’t need to change anything. What if you’re already a girl?” Miranda added as she sat next to me.

“What?” I looked at her. “That doesn’t make sense.”

A wry smile. “Didn’t you befriend someone similar just yesterday?”

What was she… Fern? Was she implying I was like her? That I was…?

“I’m… not transgender,” I deflected.

“Why do you think that?”

“I… well, why do you think I am?!”

“Because you want to be a girl,” Troy said as he came closer. “Guys don’t want to be girls. At all.”

What the hell? Were they playing a prank on me again? Guys didn’t want to be girls? Why wouldn’t you want to be a girl?!

“That… doesn’t prove anything. I’m nothing like Fern. She already knew when she was little.” From what she’d told me, she’d run away from home just so she could be herself. I was nothing like Fern.

“You’re different people with different experiences. Figuring it out later doesn’t invalidate you.”

That kind of made sense. But I still didn’t believe I would be transgender. Seriously… I couldn’t… just… be a girl… right? Was there a way to tell for sure?

A genius idea sparked in my head. I wiped off my tears and reached into my pocket to fish out my phone. I ignored the trio’s stare and dialed a certain number before putting the phone next to my ear.

“Hello?” greeted the voice on the other side.

And what better way than to ask someone who had personal experience on the matter for her opinion?

“Hey Fern… It’s me, the g… uh, the person from yesterday.”

“Oh, hey! What’s up?”

“I… well… there’s been something on my mind… can I… ask you something?”

“Sure? What is it?”

“Do you…” I swallowed. “Do you think I’m transgender?”

Silence.

Followed by intense giggling.

What the heck?

“F-Fern?”

“Sorry sorry… ah, what was the question again? If I think you’re transgender?”

“Y-yeah?” I stammered out, for some reason dreading the upcoming answer.

She took a deep breath.

“Yeah, definitely.”

…

Oh.