Becky had never doubted, never questioned, never denied, nor felt her faith was wrong. She listened intently, followed intently, and lived a life full of God's Grace and Jesus's Love, praying every day, and sinning as little as possible. She spent sixteen years of her life trying to be a good, faith-filled girl. And then Adam Torres came along.

People told her she was confused. Her parents – her new faith counselor - she was confused and tricked by someone who was so broken off from God that he – no, "she" – wanted to take people with "her". The Devil had tempted this "girl" so far from the Lord that "she" thought "she" was a boy. This "girl" was like any other girl, "she" was made in the image of Eve, "she" would face the pain of childbirth or at least menstruate because that's what "her" body was preparing "her" for, to marry a man under the eyes of the Lord and bring a child to the world in the ultimate act of love and raise them up to believe in Jesus as their Savior. That's what God wanted for His "daughter". Of all His daughters, and for those who He planned to make unable would give homes to the children of mothers who refused His plan for them. That is what Becky would do, she would have children, raise them in the faith of God. But she couldn't with Adam. Because he, too, was "preparing for God's gifts" no matter "how much 'she' rejected it."

But she wanted to. So badly she wanted to, she yearned to be with him – him, not matter how many times she was corrected and spoken over, she knew that Adam wasn't a "she". She knew that Adam was a boy, that God had made Adam feel this way – not the devil. That this was part of God's plan for Adam, that he would have to carry a heavier cross than the rest so he could come out the strong, brave, and brilliant man that God had created him to be. And maybe, just maybe, Adam being the way that he was was part of God's plan for Becky, too. He had opened her eyes, made her realize that maybe her parents were wrong. Even now, this counseling? This was wrong. This isn't what He would want – for His son, his son, to be questioned and slandered and tortured in this way. But Becky knew there was nothing she could do to stop it.

She was trapped, trapped by her family, those who were there for her through everything she had ever faced, anything difficult or awful, they had always been there. And so had God. So now they were saying she was the one who was wrong, that she would turn away from her faith? She couldn't, she couldn't let this happen, she couldn't let her family thing she was turning her back on them, or God. She couldn't let that happen. She couldn't be looked at as the wild child, the one who had fallen from grace. She couldn't be shipped away somewhere far away from "temptations" like her friend has in middle school when she told her parents she was a lesbian. She needed her family. But at what price?

Adam has told her what people did to him, bullied him, harassed him. How different was she now? How different from any of them? "You confused me" she had said, because she knew it would hurt him enough for him to let her go. She was the same as every single person who had hurt him before, who had told him that he was wrong for feeling something he couldn't do anything about, she had contributed to breaking away pieces of him, to breaking his heart further than she was sure it was already broken, and she hated herself for it. Downright loathed herself. But she was stuck. She was trapped by the grip of her father's misconceptions of the Lord's word and the love she still held for her family – no matter what, she loved them. Even now. Even when she didn't like them or what they had done to her.

"Tell me what to do" she whispered after every prayer at night, her face buried in her pillow as she cried because she couldn't hold it in any longer. "Please, tell me what to do because I hate this. I'm sorry. I'm sorry that they think I'm denying you. I'm sorry if I am, but none of this is right. This isn't right, God."

Just another night cried to sleep to dream of the boy she couldn't love but did.