misnomer
by Harley Wilson
2026, May 27th.
I never really thought I’d get here.
I flip through my photo app, a grin growing ever wider across my face. Glistening selfies of my boyfriend and I greet me with their beaming smiles—me on Halloween, wearing white bunny ears, me at a party, with my hand in Grant’s, me surrounded by family after winning a leadership award, me. My hands shake as I trace my fingers across the screen.
Even after all this time, after everything I’ve done, it still doesn’t feel real. I keep thinking that I’ll wake up one morning and discover that it’s all been a dream, that the past couple years were just… some elaborate hallucination.
But I know they weren’t. I was there, for all of it.
My lace train flutters in the wind, as if on cue. My whole outfit—my lemon-yellow gown, my citrine earrings, my dainty jeweled shoes—it looks beautiful. It looks perfect.
I look perfect.
I open my text messages again. My mom’s sent me something.
Enjoy the prom! she’s written. May all your wishes come true. It’s addressed to a name that is not Jay and therefore not mine.
I stare at the glowing letters for far too long before I realize I’m crying. A single teardrop lands on the screen, staining the otherwise perfect image. I laugh happily, the sound butter-light.
May all your wishes come true.
How ironic.
2024, November 8th.
Not even two hours into my family’s impromptu trip to Myton, Utah, and I’m already sneaking out the side door.
My uncle’s house is big—the husk of a farmhouse, nestled inside a recently renovated structure. Big enough to comfortably house eight people. Big enough that nobody should think I’m missing.
There’s at least one American flag hung in every room. They look newly-bought and cheaply made. Apparently, they’re celebratory. I don’t need to ask what my family is celebrating.
The wire hinges creak as the door opens, and I grasp the painted wood, holding it still. A gust of strangely room-temperature air floods into the house. It’s November, it shouldn’t be this warm.
And I shouldn’t look like a girl, I think, but this is the life I have.
The taxidermied animals in my uncle’s living room stare at me as I step outside. I wonder, if they were given life, whether they would run with me or hunt me down.
Behind the town’s postal office is something that everyone but the city council considers a park. It’s a sea of grass and scattered leaves, helmed by crimson-colored trees and a flimsy chain-link fence. Luckily for me, it’s empty.
I lean against the sun-drenched bricks and dial the one person who I can confide in.
She picks up on the second ring.
“Hey, Jay.”
Warmth blooms in my chest. She’s the only one I’ve ever told that name to, and it was the best decision I’ve ever made. The smile is audible in my voice as I unmute and say “Hey, Aspen.”
I try to drag down my voice, make it sound deeper, stronger. More me.
“How’re you doing?” she asks in her rose-petal drawl. Static crackles around her words, and I silently curse my uncle for living in a town with such shitty connection.
How am I doing…?
“I’ve got you a couple dresses,” my mom calls, “One for tonight and the other for tomorrow’s brunch. They’re in your backpack.”
I pointedly look to my red hoodie, sweatpants and basketball sneakers. An unspoken gesture of ‘are you fucking serious?’
I leave the car without responding.
My mom yells what she believes is my full name. I turn, face impassive, arms crossed.
“This is your uncle’s house, okay? He’s here. Your grandparents are here. Whatever tomboy shit you’ve been doing recently—I want none of that here. Got that?”
With a glare intense enough to melt steel, I nod. “Sure.”
“Good. Dinner’s at six.” She turns away. “Be ready.”
Well.
“Same as ever,” I respond. I don’t want to waste another thought on the world around me or the caustic feeling of wrongness that threads through me when I look at my new yellow outfit. “What’s up with you? How’s, uh… how’s Vancouver?”
“God, you don’t even know. The football team held a party, and Tom—the guy with the Miku binder; I think I told you about him—he stole someone’s car…”
We go on like that for a while, flycatchers singing in the sparse tree cover, sun slowly painting the autumn sky a deep red. The warmth flees from the air just as steadily, but with every casual dude and my guy Aspen drops in conversation, the more I’m lit from within.
For a moment, the rest of the world falls away.
For a moment, there is nothing but my voice, Aspen’s voice, and the scarlet sky.
Eventually, in the time that comes after eternity, my phone’s clock ticks over to 6:00. I end the call, jog back down the sidewalk, and slip back in the back door.
Nobody notices my return.
-~⬫⬪◆⬪⬫~-
I know, logically, that the dinner could have gone worse.
I could’ve yelled, or outed myself, or said anything about my uncle’s “opinions”. I had no delusions of them being supportive of me, but hearing them say so confidently that people like me shouldn’t exist…
I grip my arm over the fingernail marks that are already there.
Yes, it could have gone worse. But just the possibility of that happening, that static tension hanging in the air was enough to make the two-something hours drag on like they were frozen in amber.
I hadn’t even eaten enough. So here I am, at midnight, hunting for snacks.
The scent of bleach and leather is thick in the air of the living room. I’d thought the lack of light would dull the taxidermied animals’ gaze, but if anything they look more alive now. One—a rabbit with bone-white fur and a golden plaque beneath it—catches my gaze.
I decide the snacks can wait.
I step over to it and run my hand across the engraved text on the plaque. What do you wish for? it reads.
What do I…
Who would write that on a plaque for a rabbit, of all things?
Despite the absurd placement, the question burrows into my mind like mold.
I wish…
I wish I was the girl my parents want me to be. I wish I could just… be normal, like the popular kids in teen movies. I wish I had friends at school, to talk with and party with.
Screw it, I wish I was loved.
The rabbit’s velvety fur is warm beneath my fingers. Something feels… off, about it, but between my trying to hold back tears and trying to keep my focus in the moment, I can’t figure out what it is. I close my eyes, timing my breaths to the steady pace of the rabbit’s heartbeat, and—
I yank my hand back.
Is it—
No, that’s not possible.
And yet, here it was, glaring at me with inky eyes that should have been made of glass.
“Hey, kid.”
I whip around to find nobody but my grandfather behind me.
He coughs. “What the hell are you doing awake?”
“Oh, just grabbing a glass of water,” I lie easily. “Don’t worry yourself.”
If he notices the utter lack of water in my hands, he doesn’t comment.
-~⬫⬪◆⬪⬫~-
“No daughter of mine is going to brunch in a hoodie and jeans.”
My mother, somehow already dressed and in full makeup at 8:15 AM, glares at me from my bedroom door. She pulls out a ruffled sundress the color of buttercups. “You’re wearing this.”
I want to snap at her, to tell her that there’s no way I’m wearing that, that I’d honestly rather cancel the entire event—
“Oh, it looks beautiful. I’d love to. Thank you so much!”
What.
I clap my hands over my mouth. I didn’t say that. It was in my voice, the taste of the words still sour on my tongue, but I didn’t say that.
My mom is staring at me, brows furrowed, hands outstretched. “Liz? Are you alright?”
That’s not my name, I want to say. I’m Jay, and I’M NOT YOUR DAUGHTER.
“I’m a bit nauseous,” my mouth says, the feeling turning the lie into a truth. “I might’ve eaten something weird.”
What the fuck.
My mom is saying something about skipping the brunch and I am trying desperately to agree, but all I can choke out is a placid hum.
“I’m sure I’ll be fine. Just give me a few minutes to do my makeup.”
She gasps, eyes widening. “You’re going to do makeup?” She grins, eyeing me like a blossoming tulip. “I’m so, so happy for you. Let me know if you want any tips!”
Something clicks in my mind.
Oh.
Oh, no.
-~⬫⬪◆⬪⬫~-
The brunch goes well.
The restaurant is straight out of the seventies. The ceiling’s low, and the walls are adorned with faded posters. The carpet is a spiralling fractal pattern that I’d intended to keep my eyes on but end up barely glancing at. There are so many people, way more than would normally come in November, and they’re all chatting about the country and putting things right and that pronoun shit and I’m almost glad for whatever’s taken over me because otherwise I would’ve screamed aloud.
Aspen calls me three times throughout the brunch. I can’t answer her.
Everyone compliments me. On my outfit. On my hair. On my makeup. I say thank you, and yes, I’ll gladly help them with their style, and no, my mom actually picked out the dress, isn’t she incredible? My parents are staring at me like they’re seeing a new person. Only they don’t look horrified, or repulsed, or concerned. No, they look amazed.
It’s the only look I ever wanted them to give me.
Still, I keep waiting for somebody to scream out “That’s not him! He’s never acted like this! Something’s happened to him!”
But time keeps moving forward, dragging me with it. Lies drip from my lips like water, my soft voice feeding my family’s parasitic dreams of my blossoming into a beautiful, perfect girl. And I smile all the while.
-~⬫⬪◆⬪⬫~-
As soon as I get back, I want to sprint to the rabbit and beg it to reverse that goddamn wish, but, of course, I’m not able to. I can’t even enter the living room.
I stop trying.
My body, apparently considering it unbecoming to mope in the middle of a hallway, turns and walks towards my bedroom.
The second it gives me control back, I call Aspen.
“Hey, Jay. What’s up?”
magicwishesposessiondysphoriamindcontrolwhateverthefuckthisis—
“Oh—Aspen, that’s not my name.”
No.
No, no, no.
“What? Ooh, wait, did you pick a new one? Let’s hear it.”
Don’t do this. Please, don’t do this. Not to her.
“Don’t be silly. You know my name is Elizabeth.”
I say it sweetly, but it tastes so bitter I want to gag. The word stays there, hanging in the air like a rotten lemon, and Aspen is silent for a long moment.
Aspen, please. You know me.
“...Um. Okay,” she stammers, the static once again corrupting her voice. “I mean—if that’s what you want, sure. You’re still, like, a guy, though, right?”
Yes.
My jaw unhinges. I throw my head back.
And I laugh.
It’s a manic cackle that sears through my bones like venom. The rough, jagged edges of it tear apart my life millisecond by millisecond, burning the only bridge I’d thought I could escape by. I want to stop, to close my mouth, to rip out my vocal chords, anything to stop hurting Aspen. But I can’t.
Aspen doesn’t laugh along like she always does. She’s silent as the dead, and the absence of her voice just as haunting.
I need to apologize I need to apologize let me out—
“Oh, get over it,” I snark.
Aspen hangs up.
I let the phone slip from my hand onto the carpeted floor. The beige shag is comfy, I think idly as I kneel down. It smells of old plastic and dust.
I scream. I scream and scream and my mouth remains shut and I remain silent.
I’ve known Aspen for five years. Five amazing, sunshine-filled years, burnt and twisted and broken in a few seconds.
With my own voice. With my own laugh.
How dare you. How DARE you do that to—to her. Call her back. Let me apologize. Let me speak, damn it.
“You don’t need her,” I mutter against my will. “Your new friends will be popular. They will be perfect.”
Fuck “perfect”. I don’t care what I wished for; I didn't mean it. Give me my voice back. Give me my body back.
“You need this. Or did you forget the news from last Tuesday? How much danger you’ll soon be in?” It chuckles softly. “And don’t tell me it’s not nice to be wanted.”
That. The entire reason I was desperate enough to spell out my wish in the first place. I won’t be safe much longer if I’m true to myself. I might not be safe ever.
I’m a terrible liar. I wouldn’t have been able to keep up the conservative-girl act much longer if I’d tried. And this way… I don’t have to act at all. I can just fall away into my mind and let my body handle the rest.
I didn’t think this was where I’d die. In Myton, Utah, to a rabbit of all things.
I’m so tired.
Do what you wish.
2026, May 27th.
The prom is something out of a fairy tale. Grant and I dance, hand in hand, gaze fixed on each other’s. In his suit pocket is a small yellow carnation that I’d picked from my mom’s garden. Its curling petals haven’t yet withered, and I wonder if I’ll still remember it when they do.
The ballroom’s vaulted ceilings are illuminated by elegant, crystalline chandeliers. The floor is poorly varnished wood, but all of the dancing students—all of my friends—treat it like it’s marble. A slow, romantic song thrums through the room, rattling my heart. Some kid’s vape cloud drifts over, its sweetness cloying. I don’t cough nearly as much as I want to.
Sometime during the night, Grant suggests that we take a photo with our friend group. I agree immediately, one of the few decisions I make myself, and he runs to get a camera.
Instinctively, I pull out my phone to check my appearance. It’s flawless, save for a loose strand of hair that I easily fix. It’s perfect.
A single tear traces down my cheek.
This isn’t me.
I turn around and wave to Grant.
But without this, where would I be?
He waves back, dragging three of our friends forward.
I can act, I can lie, I can change everything about myself to fit in. Nothing’s wrong now.
We gather for the picture.
Nothing’s wrong.