What you can expect from a story with a title like "a boy named marge"

Before the story begins, some context must be given.

Marge is a young man from Minnesota. He was named before he had exited the womb, when his parents were still under the impression that he was of feminine persuasion.

“Sorry, there was a mistake during the ultrasound. It happens more often than you would think” said the doctor.

Marge’s mother clung to her husband.

“What do we do? We spent so much on that gender reveal party…not to mention the human lives…”

He patted her head.

“Don’t you fret, I’ll figure it out”

The doctor lifted a finger.

“Perhaps you could change the name and tell everyone about the mistake”

The couple stared at him in shock. They were at a loss for words. It was his mother that broke the silence.

‘“You, you…idiot!”

The Mr. patted her on the head again.

“Perhaps, dear, we could keep the name”

She pushed him away.

“Good god Harry, do you want people to think we’re LIBERALS?”

After an ugly argument between the two parents, they decided to tell their friends and family that their “daughter” had died in a tragic plane crash over Borneo. For the next 18 years, they kept Marge a secret, never allowing him to leave the house.

He was raised by his younger sister, Kayla, who taught him what she learned in school. Despite being set back a few grades, he quickly caught up due to his intuition and love of learning.

When he turned 18, his parents decided that enough time had passed. He could finally leave. Not, of course, before they officially and publicly disowned him.

Marge was not invited to Thanksgiving that year, either.

And now, Marge has begun his first semester at Carolton University. This is where things begin to get normal.

When Marge woke up, he found Hlurga raiding his fridge once again. It was his fault for storing so much raw meat in there, honestly. In addition to chewing through the 3 steel padlocks, she had figured out how to undo the child safety lock made of boron carbide.

Hlurga skittered across the floor and out of the dorm, knocking over a wastebasket and spilling crumpled paper all over the floor.

The sound of muffled, frantic, galloping could be heard in the hallway.

Marge rolled out of bed and onto the floor. Gravity was not kind to him today. As usual.

Someone poked their head through the door.

“Sorry! I was supposed to be in charge of Hlurga last night. Must’ve drank too much or somethin’, can’t’ remember much”

The door slammed shut.

If this was a movie, this would be where they’d start playing one of those montage songs.

Teeth brushed? Check. He made sure to wash his face afterwards. And shave. He should have shaved first.

In between getting ready for class, he picked up the pieces of paper and empty meat packaging. Thankfully, Hlurga had licked up all the blood. She was really considerate in that way.

Since today was warm, Marge decided on cream colored palazzo pants with a white collared shirt. He tied a red kerchief around his neck, and changed his earrings. The silver bars he normally wore weren’t quite the “vibe”, as Matt would say. Instead, he chose a cute pair of strawberries that Gwen had picked out for him.

To top it all off, he pulled his curly blonde hair into a messy ponytail. Standing in front of the mirror, he felt the satisfaction of being himself. Mostly. He noticed that his face had some unsightly marks. And that-

It was almost 9:30. He needed to go to class.

Matt was already there, casting looks at Hlurga, who had decided to sit next to a prim Texan this time. She looked hungrily at the woman’s crocodile boots. How recently had the animal been killed and skinned, he wondered. Probably not long enough.

“My man!”

Marge politely “dabbed Matt up”.

“So listen to this. Like hear me out, okay?”

Marge diverted all of his attention towards Matt. This was definitely important, he could feel it.

“So, like, the government is pretty fucked up now, right? Like absolute dogshit. Everyone agrees on that. Rights and lefts, libs and conservatives. You agree, don’t you?”

At this point in the story, we will remind the reader that this is set in the year 203X. I have no idea what the US government will look like at that point, and I don’t find it relevant to the story.

“Um, I don’t know,” Marge said, twirling his hair around. Matt looked at him disprovingly.

“Trust me, it’s bad. You’d agree. Anyway, I’ve got a solution, okay? Are you listening?”

Marge nodded his head.

“Okay, okay. Cool. Anyway, what we’ve gotta do is bring back Kings. Like a monarchy”

Marge stared back at him.

“Oh, and Queens I guess. Them too”

Marge shook his head.

“Sorry, I’m not really into politics. Kings and queens are cool though, maybe you’re onto something”

Matt slapped him on the back.

“Glad you agree!”

The English professor finally arrived. He was eight minutes late, a new record. He had a habit of always being late but not late enough to cancel class. A collective sigh of disappointment rippled throughout the class. The only two exceptions were Marge and Hlurga: Marge, because he was already sitting attentively, ready to write down any important tidbits of information, and Hlura because her mouth was full of Texan.

“Today, class, we’ll be doing a group assignment. You’ll be discussing the book that I hope you all read, That Hideous Strength. I want you to talk about Mr. Lewis’ proposed views on marriage and masculinity. I’ll give you, say, 20 minutes. When you’re done, let’s all share what we’ve found”

The teacher counted off. By a miracle, Marge ended up with Matt, Hlurga, and some other girl he didn’t know.

“I didn’t read the book”

Matt never did.

“I didn’t understand the book”

The girl Marge didn’t know looked like the kind of person who wouldn’t.

“Grain”

Hlurga was concise, as usual.

Marge leaned back in his chair a bit.

“I too found it a bit confusing. The passage about us humans being very feminine compared to God was hard to wrap my head around. I do wonder what Mr. Lewis was trying to say”

“Iunno man. What should we say to the class when it’s our turn?”

“I didn’t understand that part”

“It’s difficult to have a discussion if half of you didn’t read it” is what Marge wanted to say, but he found that the words would not leave his lips. Instead, he hunched his shoulders and mumbled something about the ending. They sat in silence for the rest of the 20 minutes.

***

“Your grades are gonna plummet if you don’t speak up, dude”

Jackie took a long drag from her cigarette.

“I know, I just don’t want to make anyone feel bad”

“Well, you’re making yourself feel bad. You should ditch that douche anyway”

Jane swiveled her head towards Jackie, making a whirring noise.

“Jackie, what does the word, ‘douche’, mean?”

“It means a prick, or a jerk, or something. Someone who needs a good kick in the eye”

“Thank you, Jackie. I’ll add that to my dictionary”

Jane’s face went blank as she processed the new information and saved it to her hard drive. Doing so caused her speakers to play stereotypically wacky beeping noises that were extremely distracting and annoying. They were completely unnecessary, it was just in her programming to be like that.

There was an uneasy silence for a minute.

“Cute earrings. Where’d you get em’?”

Marge brightened and spun his head, causing his curly hair to smack Jane in the face.

“I bought them from Poppy’s, with Gwen”

Jackie let out a disappointed sigh. “Shipping” real people was something she had always tried to look down upon. However, there were times where she wished certain people would date other certain people. Gwen was nice. That was for sure. She was a good friend. But she was also a woman. Which was not an issue, of course. It was just that things might be a bit more interesting if Marge had feelings for a man. Like Ken. Ken was cute.

It would also piss off Matt if he did.

“That’s great. Like I said, they look really cute”

Jane widened her eyes and stared at Jackie.

“Do I look ‘cute’?”

“Of course you do, hon”

Jane looked pleased. Or at least her face looked pleased. Marge still wasn’t sure if she had real feelings yet.

“Ah, time for math. Make sure to send me your notes once you’re done, eh? And sorry again about Hlurga. Hope she didn’t eat too much”

***

Ken was indeed quite cute. He had a certain boyish charm that only those still in their early adulthood possessed. He made a habit of shaving, but never looked quite feminine. He was skinny but not bony, not too muscular or curvy, and certainly not overweight.

Marge noticed none of this, as he was too busy covering his ears in preparation for the coming explosion.

“Hey, ah, it’s okay. We’re just dying the water red”

Matt was in hysterics.

“Ohhhhh dude, it’s literally just water. Bros hydrophobic!”

Jane raised a finger.

“Actually, the correct word is ‘aquaphobia’. Hydrophobia refers to either a more scientific context or rabies. Marge does not have rabies”

“How do you know that? Maybe he does. Probably got it from Hlurga”

“I’ve taken his daily blood test and found everything to be normal”

“Wha? You let her do blood tests on you, Marge?”

Marge uncovered his ears for a second.

“No?”
Matt’s face fell. He moved away from Jane and closer to Ken.

Ken shook the test tube until the dye had dispersed. He flipped through the lab textbook until he found the next step.

“Let’s focus, guys and gals. It’s fine, Marge. This isn’t a dangerous lab. Trust me”

Marge slowly uncovered his ears and sat back down on his chair.

Ken cleared his throat.

“Step 4. Take tube 3.1 and place it in tube holder 2A. Make sure to do this slowly and carefully. Take tube 3.3 and place it in tube holder 2B. Take the contents of bag 3.1 and empty them into the bowl provided. Take tube 3.1 and unscrew the cap. Empty the contents into the bowl. Take tube 3.2 and 2.3 and place them in tube holder 2A. Take bag 3.3 and empty the contents into tube 3.4. This step is critical, and failure to follow instructions exactly could result in serious injury or- MARGE!”

Ken grabbed Marge by the collar.

“It was a joke, just a little joke. Sit down, we need your smarts if we wanna get this done”

Marge rubbed his neck and sat down. He looked over the instructions slowly and carefully, making sure to note the difference between the bags and tubes and tube holders. It was all a bit much.

“Okay, let’s start with tube 3.1…”

***

Before his final class, Marge had lunch. Usually, he would eat it with his friends: Jackie, Gwen, Ken, Matt, Hlurga, Jane, and Mei-Mei (who is not in this story, but will appear in future adventures). However, today, he needed some time alone. He wasn’t quite sure why, but something was off. His stomach didn’t feel right, and he was having trouble focusing. When Jackie complimented his earrings, he had been happy, but only at that moment.

An empty computer lab was suitable. While the lights were turned off, someone had left the blinds open, so warm sunlight flooded into the room. The air was warm, and it was almost entirely silent when the door was closed.

Marge took a chair from the corner and dragged it over to a table, making a screeching noise that broke the serenity of the room.

He began to eat his lunch, which had been diligently prepared by his own self the night before.

Despite the eccentric nature of some of the students, Carolton University was a pleasant location. The campus was beautiful, and the amenities agreeable. It was one of the few lucky colleges that had both decades of experience and the willingness to “get with the times”, as it were.

Despite the sandwich containing just the right ratio of tomatoes, mayo, ham, and cheese, it didn’t taste very good. He checked to make sure that the tomato wasn’t rotted (it was fine), or the cheese moldy (it was also yet to decompose). Nothing. Perhaps he was developing a cold.

His next class was art. Gwen would be there, as well as Jackie and Ken. It was his favorite class, even though he wasn’t very good at drawing.

Despite all that, he found himself back at his dorm, eating ice cream in the bath and reading Yuri. Rin-chan confesses to Mio-Chan in this volume. Confessions always made him tear up a bit. She was so happy that her beloved said yes. Too wholesome.

Unfortunately for Marge, he was brought back to reality by a phone call from Gwen. The whole illusion of being “fine” was quickly shattered, and now he had to answer the phone without getting it wet, which is difficult when bathing.

“Uh, hello?”

“Why aren’t you at class?”

It was Gwen.

“I don’t really know myself. I was eating lunch, but now I’m taking a bath and reading Gal + Lady”

“What the hell, dude. Are you okay?”

“I think so”

Gwen sighed.

“Look, you never miss class. You’re either sick or lying”

Marge put the phone on speaker and got out of the bath. The conversation continued as he dressed himself.

“I’m sorry, Gwen”

“Don’t apologize unless you’ve done something wrong. It’s fine. You’ve got perfect grades, so this won’t really affect anything. I’m just worried, that’s all. Sometimes you’re hard to read”

“Oh, sorry for making you worried”

“Marge?”

“Yeah?”

“Stop saying sorry, okay?”

“Okay, sorry” 

Author's Note

This was mostly written as a personal exercise. I would love to turn it into a full series, but I still have MMG to finish as well as a few other projects.