The line went dead and Tina cursed. She knew this was probably about Marie acting like a boy. She knew Marie had gel in her short hair today; she had boy shorts and t-shirt on. That wouldn’t be a problem right? Marie had gone to school like that before.

Oh, no, today they had gym. That meant that boys and girls had to be split in different changing rooms. Marie had probably thrown a fit when she had to go with the girls. One, because she didn’t feel like a girl and two because almost all the girls were mean to her.

That was another thing, Marie only had two friends. Edward, a boy in the neighborhood and Justine a girl at school that was brave enough to admit she liked Mario. They were three friends all very different but a joy to watch interact. They were so kind to each other.

Edward’s parents were very rich and never home so nannies and family raised him. He only saw his parents a few weeks a year.

Justine had two dads and knew how it was like to be different from anyone else. Marie was also very happy to play with the two men who were the only adults that called her Mario.

Tina refused to call Marie Mario until a therapist had confirmed that Marie was indeed transgender. 13-year old Tabitha did call her sister Mario. She had told her mother that she had always known that Marie was different. She had looked on the internet and found out that Marie had all the sighs of being trans. Tina had read some of those ‘symptoms’ and had to admit that it was almost a description of her daughter. She looked at the clock; 9.20AM. She wouldn’t be able to get any work done and the drive to the school was 15 minutes. It was better to be early than to be late. She stood up and took her vest. She walked out of her office ignoring Alice and went to her car. She stepped in and took off towards the school.

She walked into the familiar building and went to the desk where she saw a woman sitting behind at the reception. She had long, brown curly hair and deep brown eyes. She was concentrating on some papers and her brow was furrowed in concentration. Her hand went through her hair and Tina found her the most beautiful woman she had ever seen; even more beautiful than her red headed, blue eyed Sophia. She shook her head trying to get rid of those thoughts. She walked to the woman and cleared her throat, which made the woman look up and smile.