Young Love with John and Raphael in I am a Rose

Raphael's Point of View

I’m not really into sports, but I found myself reading an article about trans athletes, I never heard the term. I did some research and found out that that’s what I am. I’m not a girl I’m a boy. I always knew that I was, but I never told anyone not even my therapist. At a loss as to how to continue, my poetry journal wasn't within reach but I need to write something now so I grabbed a random to write on. Letting my subconscious take over as I scribbled out the poem

I

Finally know.

What

I am.

I am

not Broken.

I am

Trans.

I am

A Boy,

born

Into,

the body,

of a girl.

That is

what

I am.

That is

Who

I am.

But

How

do I

Tell

everyone?

Do I

tell

everyone?

How

do I say,

what

I’ve known,

for years.

While,

lacking the

word.

Lacking

the will,

to stand out.

To be

noticed,

To be

the center

of attention.

What if,

they

laugh

at me?

What if,

they

don’t

believe me?

What if,

they

Hate me?

What if,

they

kick me

out?

What if,

he

doesn’t

like me

anymore?

What if

he

dumps Me.

What if,

he

doesn’t

want,

to be

my friend,

Anymore.

I looked out at my poem; all of my worries made me tremble with anxiety. Half of the poem's what-ifs were about John, we’ve been dating for two years and he’s straight so he probably will dump me and not want to be my friend anymore and then I’ll go back to having no friends. My parents, I don’t know how to tell them. John seemed less scary, he said that he’d love me no matter what so this should be ok, but he’s straight so how would this work he never did anything homophobic, he even stood up for the gay kid at school so maybe it wouldn't be too bad but gay is different than.

I got my journal and scribbled out another poem hoping it would make telling him easier. Then I steeled myself and texted him, with shaky fingers: “We need to talk”

He replied immediately, “What’s wrong baby? Do you want to meet in our usual spot, I can be there in like 30min” he punctuated it with hearts and kissy faces, making me blush.

It was a twenty-five-minute walk to our spot, which was a small clearing in a forest a little bit off a hiking trail.

“Ok,” was all I could respond with. I nervously left the house to meet John. I ran through scenarios in my head as I walked, some good, most were bad, I tried to only think of the good ones but anxiety doesn't work that way.

I sat on the grass. There were tears in my eyes by the time he showed up. He immediately pulled me into his arms and kissed away my tears. When they didn’t stop, he asked me what was wrong. There were so many things on my mind that all I could do was hand him my poetry journal that I brought just for this situation. It was open to my latest poem.

A

Rose,

by any

other name,

Would

still smell

as sweet.

The smell,

doesn’t

Change

with

the Name.

So,

Why

should

People?

Smells

aside,

A Gender,

is

a Label.

A

Person

stays

a

Person.

As

a

Rose

stays

a

Rose.

Nothing

has

Changed.

Inside.

Where

It matters.

The

smell,

remains

Unchanged.

A body,

may

change.

Morphing,

over

time.

Someone’s

Name

may change.

Maybe,

more than

once.

But,

A

Rose,

remains,

a

Rose.

I saw confusion in those beautiful blue eyes. “I don’t really know what that was about, but like always that was a great poem, Sara," he could be really dense sometimes.

I closed my eyes so I couldn't see his reaction. “I’m t-transge-gender I’m not a gi-girl I’m a b-boy, don’t h-hate me,” I stuttered. There was a terrifying silence as he processed that.

“I don’t really understand, but if you say you're a boy then you're my boyfriend,” he kissed my forehead. I opened my eyes in shock, “like you said, a rose’s smell stays the same,” John comforted.

“I-I th-though you w-were str-right?” my nervous stutter remained, everything was going so well but my anxiety was still too high to talk normally.

“Well, I guess I’m bi now,” he chuckled as he whipped away a stray tear. “You’re still the same person I fell in love with, Jes-” he trailed off, not knowing what to call me. It was going better than I could have imagined then again, most things are better than the scenarios that my anxiety loops through my head.

“What do you want your name to be, you can't be a boy with a girl’s name,” he smiled. I was so overjoyed I almost didn’t hear him.

“I-I haven’t th-thought about th-that... I only f-found out that this was a th-thing a litt-tle bit ago. I always knew I wasn't a girl, but I thought th-that was just one more thing that’s wrong with me-” I was interrupted by feeling his hand gingerly placed over my own.

“Can you look at me or are you too overwhelmed to make eye contact?” he asked knowing that the latter happens way too often, even with him, just one more thing to add to the list of my problems, I didn’t understand how he could like someone as broken as me. I slowly lifted my head to look at him. “I know you have a lot of mental health stuff, but they are part of you, and you are awesome just the way you are,” I was taken aback by how serious his voice was. “I have a name you might like,” he smiled a sweet uncharacteristically awkward smile, knowing how weird the request was, or would be to anyone else...s

I looked wide-eyed at the most amazing person I had ever met. And that person chose me as his boyfriend, and he wanted to name me. A smile appeared on my face at how lucky I was. “What is it?” I knew that a few years ago he was looking at possible names for his much younger brother.

“Raphael, it’s the angel of healing, cuz to me you’re a real life angel and are always working on healing yourself.”

I didn’t know how to respond so I just stared at him, dumbfounded.

“If you don't like that one, I’m sure we can come up with another one babe.”

“I love it” I whispered still in shock at how well this went.

He looked into my eyes, “can I kiss you, Raphael?” he asked sweetly, this wasn't our first kiss, far from it, but whenever I don’t do my version of asking for one, he asked permission. Raphael, it felt right, like that is what my name should have always been. I nodded happily letting the gap between our lips disappear.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Both of those poems are written by me, I have several poems posted for you to look at.

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~~Ben

Raphael and John are based on Mirio and Tamaki from My Hero Academia