“I’m excited about it,” I say, and I mean it. Devin and I don’t actually hang out outside of work, so I can’t help but feel like this party will determine our status as coworkers or friends. And I didn’t realize it before, but I really do want us to be friends. There’s something about Devin that makes em easier to talk to than anyone else I know. Maybe it’s because e’s the only trans person I know, or because e has this way about em where it always feels like e’s happy to be around me and open to anything I have to say. All I know is that e has the sort of energy that makes each day brighter. E’s like the human embodiment of a vanilla latte—warm, sweet, and exactly what I need to boost my mood.

When the kids come in, Devin sets them up with their art supplies, and then sits me down like a six-year-old and passes me some paper and a pencil.

“It’s easy,” e says, tracing some shapes on eir own paper. “I’ll show you how to draw simple stuff.”

And I watch em trace lines across the white, but wow, yeah, that’s not easy. I don’t know who convinced em it is, but it all kind of looks like nonsense to me, until a detailed flag starts appearing in all the graphite marks. I consider telling em that I’m a lost cause and art is definitely not my thing, but there’s something calming about watching em draw, humming a slow tune as e works. Almost like this is the one place Devin feels truly comfortable, and I can’t help but get lost in it too.

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Anonymous asked: Dear Noah, there’s been a lot of talk about the Diary stealing stories recently, but this isn’t true, right? I’m a huge fan of the Diary, and I want to believe it really is a genuine source of goodwill for trans people. Please say that this is just some troll and it isn’t real.