The Talk

Chipita woke up to the sound of knocking on his door. He lifts his head to see his mother standing at the doorway. She had a plastic plate in hand and a fork in the other.

“Hey, sweetie.” She said as she turns on the light, walking towards him.

Chipita groans and sits up.

“How was your nap?”

“It was great until you woke me up.”

His mother gives a soft chuckle as she hands the plate to him. He accepts the plate and looks at it. It was lasagna, his favorite. Chipita takes the fork that his mother was also offering and scoops up a rather large heap of meat and noodles. He shoves the heap into his mouth as picks up his phone. Pressing the button on the side, the screen lights up. It was almost two. He got out of school around nine, so that meant he’s been asleep for some time.

Taking another bite at the food, Chipita turns off his phone. Shoving it to the side as he realizes that his mom was still hovering over him.

“So I was thinking,” His mother began.

This phrase made the food less tasty all of a sudden. If she starts by saying anything about the collar, he’s gonna throw hands.

“Since your, uh,” She points at his chest.

“Top surgery is coming up, I would like to ask something.”

Chipita slowly takes another scoop of lasagna. He shouldn’t be as nervous as he is right now. His mother has always been supportive of his transition, even though she won’t buy hormone blockers, she’s been very supportive of what he has wanted.

“Yeah?” Chipita says, swallowing down the food in his mouth.

“Are you sure you don’t want a bottom surgery first? You know I’m only covering for only one surgery.”

Chipita sets his food aside and stares at his mom. If anything will help him achieve what he’s wanted for the past two years, it will be not looking like a female.

“Yes mom, I’m a hundred percent sure I want this. Besides, I want to get rid of this mass of fat on my body before I get bottom surgery,” he says, adjusting his bra a little.

His mother sighs, then mumble something under her breath.

“Alright honey, just remember that you may experience dissatisfaction in this.”

He nods his head, knowing all the risk factors such as the scarring and the nipples falling off.

“I know mom, I’ve done my research as well.” Chipita chuckles.

“I know, I’m just worried.” His mother says with a weary smile as she cupped the side of Chipita’s face.

Chipita leans on it, which makes his mother give out a giggle.

“My handsome little boy.” She whispers.

She then kisses his head, gets up, and walks out of the room. Chipita stares at the doorway. He was so grateful that his mother accepts him. He wouldn’t know what to do if she didn’t and kept referring to him as her. Chipita picks up his lasagna again and finishes it off with a mighty scoop. With that, Chipita gets up, with the plastic plate and fork in hand, and walks out of his room.

As he walks out he is almost pushed back into the room by a small child passing by. Chipita growls out a fowl word as he looks down at his red hoodie to see if any lasagna got on it.

“Watch where you’re going next time!” Chipita howlers as the thump of the stairs continue to steadily become distant.

Gerbaled words were thrown back at Chipita as he slowly followed the kid down the stairs. As he reached the bottom he saw that everything was normal. Chiwa, Chipita’s little sister, was sitting at the table with their stepfather as their mother was fixing herself a plate. As Chiwa was chewing her food, she looks over at Chipita in surprise.

“Hey, Mom!” Chiwa spits out as small pieces of food fly from her mouth.

“Why did Chipita get to eat his food in his room but I can’t?!”

Chipita looks over at his parents as they glance over in his area.

“Because Chipita had a hard day at school today, that’s why.” His stepfather said, covering for both his mother and him.

Chiwa folds her arms.

“This isn’t fair! I had a hard day at school too!” Chiwa’s defense is then greeted by a fake laugh from Chipita

“I am supposed to believe that a fourth grader’s day was worse than a senior’s?”

“Shut up! Today was super bad! I had no gym today cause the ‘teacher’ was sick!” Chiwa exclaims.”I mean, who counts a gym teacher as a real teacher?!”

“A lot of people Chi.” Their stepfather chimes in.

Chiwa turns to look at him.

“Well, I don’t!”

“Enough, let’s just sit down and eat Chiwa.” Their mother says as she sits down with the rest of the family.

Chipita walks over and grabs a seat next to his stepdad. He looks at his stepdad’s pastie collar. The shiny silver charm hanging off of it was in the shape of a flag. However, time has worn away what could have resembled any flag today and is now just a plain flag on a stick.

Chipita was learning in class about the different meanings behind the pastie charms. So far, he knew that the charm’s meanings are either how they died or their profession before death. His class hasn’t gotten far into the lesson behind each basic charm, but he couldn’t help but wonder why he has a skull as a charm.

“Mom,” Chipita began.

“Why does my pastie collar have a skull?”

Their stepdad looks over at him.

“It probably means that they died a natural death.” He states.

“Speaking of which, why don’t you have your pastie collar on? Alile was just saying to me that you had gotten your one back.”

“It’s uh, not as I thought it would be,” Chipita says, looking the other way.

“Well, whatever the case might be, you know the law. And since I work for the law I can’t let you go on not wearing your collar.”

Chipita snaps back at their stepdad. For all he cares he would rather get arrested than wear that collar. However, what threw him a loop was that he, his usually laid back, stepdad was forcing him to wear the collar.

“You’re seriously forcing me to wear that piece of garbage around my neck?” Chipita bellows.

His stepdad looks at him, surprised

“Yes, I am because it goes against the laws and if I don’t I’ll be in serious trouble.”

“Screw the laws!” Chipita growls, getting up from his chair and walking towards the stairs. As he stomps his way up them, he could hear his parents talking.

“Give him some time Andy. He just needs time to accept that it will be a part of his life.”

“What that kid needs a hard dose of reality, Alile.”