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7.

    “Hello!?” A middle-aged woman wearing a flowy, baby blue top and skinny jeans stared at her with a cross expression.

    Dani snapped to attention and frantically tapped on the tablet. “Oh, hi. Sorry. How can I help you?” It took her three attempts before she managed to login to take the customer’s order.

    “Iced hot coffee, not a cold brew, and a blueberry scone.” The customer's frustrated tone made Dani wonder how long she zoned out for.

    “Coming right up, I apologize again.”

    “Sure.”

    Dani scrambled to get the order together as fast as possible. Moments later she handed the woman her scone and coffee. She wordlessly snatched them from Dani and rushed out the door. It was easy to tell people she didn’t care about customers after they were gone. But, in practice the experience of having another human lash out at her, and technically be in the right, was mortifying. Some deep, unmovable part of Dani just wanted to please everyone around her, including people like that customer.

    “You look like shit.” Evan’s voice boomed behind her, making Dani jump again.

    “Dude, can you please just warn a girl first?” Dani snapped back, much harsher than she meant to.

    “Chill the fuck out. I can’t have you getting into fights with everyone just ‘cause you had too much fun last night.”

    “Sorry. Fuck. Sorry. That’s not it. I just haven’t been sleeping lately.” The sudden burst of fight that filled Dani vanished almost as quickly as it came.

    It had been a week since the dreams began. Each night something consumed her while she sat paralyzed. Death didn’t free her – instead she remained stuck, semi-conscious and engulfed in damp darkness. Each morning, she would wake up blind as a bat on the couch with no memory of lying there. One night she snuck out to sleep in Roxy’s car only for Roxy to wake her up on the couch demanding to know why the car door was open.

    "Look dude, just drink some coffee or something. Also, what’s up with your eyes?" Evan stared into Dani's eyes for a moment before she turned away and grabbed a washcloth.

    "Oh, yeah. I don't know. My girlfriend says its dehydration, but it's not going away."

    “Yeah, well if you really aren’t smoking anymore, you should see a doctor. It looks like pink eye. Wash your hands.” Evan headed back to his office, another day of hard work complete.

    Over the last few days, the veins splintered and migrated into her right eye; they seemed too full. Her attempts to look up how many vessels an eye should have returned absolutely nothing. It could have been pink eye if not for the vibrations and the increasingly visible veins on her skin. Evan was right that she needed a doctor, though. Dani had saved up some money thanks to some donations and selling her old laptop. One more week until payday and she could go get it checked out.

    How did Evan notice that something was wrong with me, but Roxy didn’t?

    Dani continued to wipe down the counter, unable to chase the question away. A few days prior, she attempted to move Roxy’s dining table while vacuuming. Those strange eye vibrations returned as she was dragging it along the tile floor. The next thing she knew the table was on the other side of kitchen. The room pulsed and shifted. She sat on the floor and tried to focus on a table leg which had broken off. Roxy was yelling at her. She called Dani aggressive. As Dani stared up at Roxy’s furious eyes, she wondered how her girlfriend could think this was intentional. Even more, she wondered why Roxy wasn’t freaked out that the girl who was barely any help when they moved in together could now throw a two-hundred-pound antique table. Especially now that years of HRT had stolen the little bit of muscle mass she once had.

    The shaking spell took hours to resolve. Once it did, Dani put the leg back on. She hoped the repaired table would serve as an adequate apology. The offering went ignored. Overpowered by the fear of getting abandoned, Dani desperately wanted to know if Roxy meant it when she said they’d stay together through anything, but she was terrified of the answer. In the days after she avoided her girlfriend. Even with all the disgusting veins, her eyes would reveal the growing terror and despair flooding her body.

    One nice thing about how fucked up her eyes were, was that no one could tell how much she had been crying. Tears dripped down her neck as she finished up her cleaning duties. After putting all her supplies away, Dani returned to find Sage standing behind the counter.

    “Hey, what’s up?” Dani tried to sound relaxed and friendly. She had no idea if it worked.

    Sage ignored her and pulled out her phone. Things always ended up like this with other trans people. Dani had wracked her mind for the source of the animosity. Her one lead was an awkward conversation they had after Sage started working there. It was clear from the start that she thought Dani and her had so much in common because they were both trans. Dani asked her to stop talking to her about gender stuff, especially around customers. Things were easier back when she was the one trans person working there. Her manufactured, rehearsed banter with her cis coworkers convinced the customers she was just another normal girl. Ever since they all went back to their busy college schedules, she got stuck working with Sage every day. During those shifts, she almost always got clocked. It wasn’t Sage’s fault, of course. But it made Dani miserable and, no matter how hard she tried to hide it, her eyes sold her out.

    The bell above the door rang. A tall, fit man with shaggy hair, dressed in a floral shirt and a matching blue suit, walked up to the counter. Sage’s demeanor transformed, replaced with a manic joy Dani couldn’t hold a candle to on her best days.

    “Hey! It’s good to see you.” For all her griping about men, Sage seemed genuinely happy to see this one.

    Dani tried to ignore their conversation. But as she cleaned up the espresso machine, she couldn’t help but notice the glances he kept sneaking at her. She stared back, hoping to embarrass him into stopping. It didn’t work; instead, he seemed thrilled. A little game that Dani wanted nothing to do with. Once she heard his order, veggie sandwich and a black coffee, Dani fled under the auspices of preparing it in the back. His expression sent shivers down Dani’s arms to the sandwich she made for him.

    The ingredients seemed to flutter around. A few days back, she noticed the vibrations seemed to be caused by stress. Dani figured it was some sort of heart condition. The symptoms didn’t line up with anything she could find online, so she was left to guess based on the few clues she had and her vague understanding of the human body. The threat of another shaking spell made Dani nervous, but she knew she had to face him; hiding in the back just made her feel weak. She finished plating the sandwich, poured a coffee, and walked it out to the customer.

    “Here you are, let me know if you need any-“

    “Are you trans?” His shaky voice put Dani on edge.

    Perhaps on a different day she would have expertly avoided the question and disappeared, but recent events had worn away Dani’s restraint. Her head emptied and a torrent of anger rushed in.

    “You can’t just ask me that.” Dani hissed back. She put some space between them.

    He broke eye contact with Dani and stared down at the floor. “Oh, fuck I’m sorry. I’m new to this.” Light reflected on the lapel of his jacket. She stared at the little she/her pronoun pin; it was the same one Dani was given years ago when she tried going to the local trans group therapy sessions.

    Fuck, I’m so awful. The warping of her vision took on a red hue as it shook. She could hear Sage’s voice in the distance but couldn’t make out all of what she said. Something about leaving Lily alone followed by a gentler “hey, are you okay?” Dani felt someone touch her arm, and her body jerked backwards, breaking contact. While her usual fear response was to freeze, in this compromised state her hippocampus chose flight. Her leg muscles tightened and then forced her to bolt in what she thought was the direction of the exit. The room blurred and her body slammed into the wall on the other side of the store. Sinuses reeling at the sudden, inhuman displacement, The only source of orientation was the sound of Sage’s screams.

    The room and its occupants teleported around. Red light bubbled as it seeped in from the windows. The stench of puke waded up from in front of her. Lime green entered her vision, and she figured that Evan was standing in front of her. Moments later a siren heralded the arrival of two figures draped in dark green and yellow. An immense ache flooded her body as the shock faded. It was the exact same feeling she got when her breasts started growing in. Two sets of hands prevented her from laying down. Light poured uselessly into her eyes as they popped and pulsed. Her brain gave on up trying to translate it into images, leaving Dani dumb and terrified like a trapped animal.

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