Diablerie Ch. 01: The Morning After

I hadn't visited home since I came out as transgender, and my family (or at least the only family member I've ever had close enough to care) took it better than any could really. I remember the silent breath as I called my only parent and explained to him I had been on hormones for twenty-one months. When I went off to college he had given me some of his old tokens of manhood like the watch he had been passed. He had looked me in the eyes and shook my hand before I threw my backpack into the car. I looked back at him and had felt the tense breath that was restricted by the feminine clothing underneath my usual appearance. That moment I came to peace with it being the last time he could ever accept and see me.

Trying to create some bridge into why I was transitioning now, I lead with the feelings that started before the hormones. The way dysphoria had started to press in on me, the kind friends and therapist who walked me through it all, and the support for the internet which led me to my answer. We never talked when I was a kid about much to do with the LGBT+ but I had no reason to believe he would be upset over it.

Dad was the one person who had an active role in my life, more than any of my friends or partners I tried to have. Sweat coated my palms and in the back of my mind was an evening planned around the possible loss. He was the person I studied with, spent my weekends with, and tried out new things with. He was patient and quiet, and when I finished letting my anxiety do the talking for longer than I intended to he finally spoke.

"Sweetie, you're not the first trans girl I've known. I actually was close friends with one in my college days and watched her change. I'm really proud of you and thankful you felt comfortable enough to share that with me. Do you have a name picked out?"

I was in shock, forgetting my chosen name for a few stammers before blurting out, "Gabriella".

"I love it!" He cheered. "Send me a picture of what you look like now, and if you include some sizes we can start to replace your closet." As Evan, my father, made a list of all of the things we should do, I silently kicked myself for not asking for his help earlier. Early transition was a mad dash for clothing and other things that helped me feel more like myself after the hurdle of who I was sunk in. We went over the kinds of clothing that caught my eye, and I got a healthy reminder that many men were raised without an idea of the fashion industry which included the both of us.

Pictures and styles were exchanged to help him understand what clothing helped me downplay my shoulders and knees (the most dysphoria inducing parts) and show off my other features. Evan picked out a lot of dresses and skirts for me with hasty assurance that we could return anything that didn't fit or make me feel comfortable. He teased about buying sexy clothing but the offer sounded genuine, my anxiety was still in control and wouldn't let me agree despite him pressing that if I wanted to I could pick lewd lingerie. He asked questions without judgment in his heart and I did my best to answer all the ones I could. His information wasn't too out of date except for the terms that were starting to spring up.

I felt the inner turmoil and terror of losing my Dad slide off of me like weights after our phone call disconnected, and from there we started checking back in each month while I was busy at college. Pictures of dresses, advice on how to talk to girls, and even then one night we broke new ground with a few beers in hand on either end of the phone.

"Dad? Did your friend struggle with getting...close to people?" I asked with my heart in my throat.

"Well...yeah." He sounded confused. "Haven't you dealt with people who can't fully grasp it or let go of their ego? I thought transgender and nonbinary people had to wrestle with that all the time?"

"No, that's not what I mean. Did she ever have any trouble being...intimate with someone?" I was afraid of asking too much for his comfort but his voice held no hesitation.

"Well she had to find someone who was going to see her as she was, not someone who came to her with some kind of idea of what girl they were going to get. There's always the people you called the chasers, who only want a girl because of their dick, or the people who expect all trans individuals to be perverts or sex deprived, or even mentally ill. When she finally found them, it was that connection of someone just wanting her for being her that helped her be comfortable. Dysphoria is a huge part of it too. Are the girls at your school not very accepting of trans lesbians?" He sipped again and now was my shining moment to also drop being biseuxual on him.

I didn't know how to tell him so I just let the words drop out of me. "Well neither are the guys. They have that mentality that if they suck me off they end up gay or something. The problem is my hormones keep spreading a feeling through me that points to being with a man. It's hard to tell if this is temporary."

"Yeah Gabby, that assumption of being gay is such a mental pitfall. I know you're probably surging with hormones and just need attention, but you deserve someone who doesn't flinch at your identity, and lifts you up for it. You have a wonderful form and I can't even believe how much you've changed. It makes me wish I could have known you differently, it's also making me feel like a dirty old man." I didn't know what to say when he finished talking. It felt like in that moment he sounded almost sad he couldn't be the partner I was hoping for every night. "I mean, if you're needing to you could always buy some sex toys along with the clothing."

"Dad, don't worry so much, you're handsome. I always wondered if you would bring home someone who finally saw it. Please don't ship me dildos, I'm pretty sure I can make do with what I have, or whoever I can find. I've actually never had someone...you know...inside me." I giggled into the phone but my face was filled with sensitive pinpricks of shame as I told him about my more sexual side.

Stretching and groaning he laughed. "I doubt it. Besides, I don't really go out and look for people like that. I believe love and lust come for you when you least expect it. You're gonna get so many people after you that you won't need a dildo." He hadn't even addressed that I hadn't taken someone before, which left me nervously wondering if I had shared too far. The rest of the phone call was pretty normal but I had a deep blush covering the tops of my cheeks that stuck for hours. I tried to lie and tell myself it was just the comfort of finally being accepted, not interest in my Dad.

My father was a reclusive man with few friends he had ever kept over the years, often ending up sipping a drink quietly with a book in hand. When I was a child he would wait in his bed from when we finished dinner and sit until almost two am like he was waiting for someone to warm the sheets with him. I always wondered why he never brought a girlfriend home or hadn't gone out with any of the colleagues from work. Instead I rekindled the willingness to know him when that first conversation rang out from our home back in Oregon to my college in Washington.

After hearing his comment on my form though, I'm ashamed to admit my taste for older men started to increase with most of my porn habits drifting to men in their forties with girls in their twenties still. There was the tantalizing idea of finding a man who thought of the younger days and letting him awaken it with me.

I had been studying Computer Science (with my specialty in networking) at Washington State University for the last two years and since that phone call my Dad sat with every hormone change, every weird boyfriend and even the girlfriends. He never dated that I saw but he had a lot of good advice, having most of his fun young and watching as the relationships of our friends and neighbors changed over the years.

We'd pick a film and a book for the month and catch up on life when I had free time, and finally I got the nerve to ask him one night why he was so patient with the amount of oversharing and lonely venting that I had been afflicted by during most of our conversations. Evan didn't even flinch when I came back from a date and called him to exhaustively complain over a boy who left my cock sore from an inexperienced and toothy blowjob.

"Dad, isn't it kind of weird to talk to your daughter about her second puberty and all her dates? Or the state of her probably bruised dick? That guy did a number on me."

He laughed and I heard him sip his evening beer. "Your first puberty was stranger than this one, and I'm just happy to know you're alive and safe out there. You know I still smile when I pass the old patched drywall your first girlfriend left behind."

"It wasn't her fault!" I happily shouted into the phone. Jumping up and down I then had to grab my crotch and groan.

"Gabby if you want to bring girls into the dorm you should avoid letting them kick holes in the wall when you fuck them." He chuckled into the phone but I scoffed.

"At least I brought home girls! She was so cute and I was just strong enough to hold her up for that long. You can't honestly try and tell me you wouldn't do the same. Aren't you supposed to have burned my eyes out with a girlfriend or something when you brought her home? Keep your kid up all night making some girl scream for you?" As soon as I said it I felt embarrassed, and wondered if I should apologize.

"You're the prettiest girl I've seen in a long time missy, but I have enough holes in my walls." His words sent a tingle I didn't expect down my spine and made me shiver. He continued when I didn't respond. "Really though, passing as a woman is bullshit that hasn't fallen out of society yet, and I had to watch my friend go through it. I don't envy trying to meet that standard of feminine appearance pushed on you, especially at that age. When you get older either people stop caring or you begin the endless task of trying to pretend you're still young. I'm glad you get to tackle this while you're younger and then grow into the person you'd like to be.

Just please be safe as you explore all of this okay? Plenty of girls like you go missing or worse. I'm sure I don't have to tell you about the way some people treat even the gay community, let alone the trans community." I hadn't thought about that before. A large portion of the campus had been accepting on the outside but he was right, and the more I connected with the community I began to hear of what was really out there.

"So what if I bring some guy or girl home you're not going to think anything of it?" He was quiet for a minute.

"Look Gabby, I've never been one to judge. I've had boyfriends too, I actually preferred most of the guys I dated before your mother, but it's fifty-fifty for me. I really enjoy sleeping with women but if I see a cute twink I have to cover my pants." I tried to think of times when I might have seen my Dad flirting with men as a child, but the intricacies of adult sexuality beyond a societal guide to "what was normal" had evaded me until I began hormones. "Just stay safe out there, it isn't exactly the kindest world we could be in.

I just want you to be safe and happy. You're close to a huge community for the LGBT+ but you're also close to some of the less accepting people out there. If you meet someone who cares about you as a woman and not as an object or some kind of fetish, and they treat you right, feel free to bring them home if you like. This is assuming of course I don't just over spoil you now."

Evan had never joked with me about how he flirted but now I sat on the other end of the phone with my cheeks turning red. College boys were seldom sweet and almost always focused more on sex, so their compliments were aimed that way. The way my Dad could slip something like that into our talks almost every phone call made me start to get butterflies in my stomach when I'd hear his voice, listening for the next time he turned me to putty.

His encouragement and worry were always topped off with a sweet comment from then on. He would talk about some the guys he met with for a quick fuck and how hard it was to see his friends get caught between those worlds, how managed by tight lips and a healthy journal.

"I expect at least some flowers if you're going to spoil me." I teased back at him.

He had a hearty chuckle. "Yeah nothing says embarrassing like getting flowers from your Dad in college!"

He continued to laugh but I stretched out my first attempt to see what he was willing to do with unraveling my calm. I put on my best quiet and sad voice as I mumbled, "But no one has ever given me any flowers."

"None of your dates have?" He sounded disappointed.

"No. I'd love even old gestures like that if someone sent me flowers and a cute card with a poem in it would mean the world to me. I guess I want to make up for the highschool feelings and guys right now don't know how to do that."

"Gabby...do you really want that? I'd be happy to spoil you. I didn't want to make you uncomfortable." He went quiet.

"Well then everytime I see them I can remember that at least there's a handsome guy in Oregon who likes me." My heart was throbbing anxiously as the flirting took the lead, and now all I needed was to wait for a reaction that might be indicative of interest.

"I...I'd love to." I threw my first into the air and grinned when he said it. "I'll find you something you like, but until then go home and rest your sore dick okay?"

"I'm gonna go have some drinks tonight with a friend from class. I'll be lazy instead of horny. Promise."

"You can be as horny as you like." His tone gave away the smile covering his face even over the phone.

"Well I promise Ill drunk dial you all horny." I was turning even redder at the thought. "Not that I would, I mean..." My awkward mouth had its way with me before I knew what I was doing again.

"Alright sweetie. I love you, have a good night." Evan wasn't phased by my terrible flirting or the dirty comments.

I walked from the dorm to my favorite bar in town even with my fathers warnings just a few hours after, and only after putting an ice pack to my crotch and sitting on my bed in agony. It didn't take much for me to realize how close the discrimination and danger mixed into the people around me really was. I didn't go down bloody from fighting, and I didn't even stand up for myself. A drunk guy at a bar crawl saw me with a large trans pin and decided to come up to me with his breath already stinking of whiskey and his eyes wandering with anger instead of lust. "Hey."

I looked up at him after trying to keep from meeting in hopes that he might go away. "Hello." I continued to sip my beer and looked around the room clawing for anyone that might notice I was beginning an uncomfortable situation. Tamara, local friend and drinking buddy had stepped away to the bathroom, so I sat with the drunken troll.

"What are you?" He asked with a glare.

At first anxiety took over and stunned my words but in a moment of brilliance I let the beer do the talking. Twisting my face into a frown and looking him up and down in disgust I scoffed. "The fuck are you aside from one beer away from laying on the sidewalk? Asshole." I turned away and then I felt his hand grip my shoulder.

"Fucking shemale!" He gripped me hard on both sides and started to shake me. His breath made me want to vomit as he screamed.

"Get off!" I screamed and made the bar turn, the distraction of the bartender yelling at him by name for his likely repeated mistakes gave me a chance to run out of the bar doors. The cracking in my voice from the fear continued in high pitched gasps as my heart hammered. Patrons had stood to help me but I panicked, my fear overriding everything in my head.

I continued in a swift walk and looked back to see him following me down the road, screaming and even throwing his beer on the ground. It shattered within a foot of me and I broke into a steady run with him right on my tail. My thin and beaten shoes were ripping as I hit the pavement, getting back up in terror as my drunken stalker got closer. Somehow I found my balance and the energy to run was back in me, if only powered by the booze that polluted my veins and the bits of asphalt embedded in my palms from the fall. Light that trickled into the alleyway reflected enough to give me a small gleam of his face when I looked back, my eyes turning next to the large knife tucked into his ripped pocket.

My brain struggled to process his unnatural anger towards me as I scrambled to stand at the cost of my knees gaining a similar engraving of shredded skin. Getting to my feet I slipped for a second from too much force put onto my shaking and bleeding legs to get away as fast as I could. His voice echoed with ringing frustration as I rounded a corner and gripped the wall for momentary balance but left behind a wincing gasp of pain and a bleeding handprint across the brick. I still haven't gotten those words out of my head that he screamed at me.

His threats made me fear that by the end of the night I wouldn't even be recognizable from what he would do when he caught me. I screamed for help as I ran and heard his cruel laugh close behind me. Trying to take in the scenery while running on a quickly wearing body was harder than I thought, my painful need to catch my breath leading to a greasy set of fingers grasping the trails of my hair. I let out a pained shriek and ran for the nearest building with no understanding of what it actually was. Blurs of tile, flashes of industrial lights, and suddenly I was curled in a ball as a door to my back was being pounded on. Some kind of bathroom was dimly lit and my memory started to fade.

I opened my contacts on my phone and tapped as quickly as my shaking hands would allow. "Dad, I don't know where I am, someone is trying to kill me, please, send anyone." My sweat slipped the phone against my face and minutes started to link into a choppy video of memory I couldn't escape from as the excessive amount of whiskey and beer won out against my weak and panic stricken body.

"Gabby, where are you? What?" He fumbled as he threw himself out of bed and was quickly walking the house with loud thumps on the floor.

"I don't know Dad, I don't know. Please help me!" I panted with my head suddenly shooting forward from the banging on the door. Like counting backwards before an operation, my vision faded out and was given snippets that were blanketed in the foggy feeling that follows a dream.

I remember my Dad having me pull up my digital map and read him cross streets as he hurried to the car, the engine turning over in my ear as he continued to listen and assure me I'd be okay. Snippets of memories were blinking in and out as I struggled to stay sitting upright. The pounding on the door would jolt me back to consciousness with fear and adrenaline but wasn't enough to do anything more.

I mumbled to my Dad that I felt like I was falling asleep. Sirens and a thumping that shook my body were the last pieces of that night, turning into flashes of a police car, yelling, and the feeling of my closed eyes with something warm all around me.

The funny thing about blacking out is waking up where you didn't expect. The first sensation was the sunlight pouring into my dorm room, and the second was a warm breath as I was gripped by a sturdy but comfortable bed I knew too well. For the first time in almost two years of transition I was face to face with my father, who had fallen asleep in my bed with me. His arm was half curled around me, and sandy blond hair covering the light wrinkles forming in his face.

I felt the pull from my body I had known when hormones began and his sweat staining my bed ran a pillar of tingles through my body. I stared, my body roughly shaking from the hangover and my nipples hardening beneath my shirt. I had been one of the lucky trans girls who was never too bothered by her clit, but now mine was coaxed into complete stiffness as my Dad lay inches from me. I looked at his lips and bit mine, wondering if it was the booze, the hormones, or the experience from last night that caused me to awaken so aroused.