Three years and eight months. That's how long it had been since I'd last seen Pablo in person. And yet I remembered everything. My screaming, my reproaches, that silence when he closed the apartment door. He did it slowly, not trying to make it a scene, which somehow made it worse. It was all still so vivid it could have been last week.

I could have followed him down the stairs, stopped him before he got in that Uber. I could have begged him to explain. But instead, I felt that strange quiet that settles in when something is truly over, and it told me Pablo was gone. Really gone. My Pablo, the one I'd grown up with, the one I'd planned a whole life around, was never coming back.

Now, three years and eight months later, here we were, sharing a room twenty thousand miles from what used to be our home, about to see each other again. Except nothing was going the way I'd planned when I got on that plane two days ago, hoping to win him back. I'd imagined every possible outcome, but not this. Never this. Not when we met outside that theater, not when we decided to move in together, not in any version of the future I'd ever pictured.

Brenda burst through the doorway like a whirlwind, a stunning Latina in her mid-twenties, curly black hair, ripped jeans showing half her ass. As she swept past, the pile of clothes on a chair wobbled dangerously, and she nearly pulled me along with her. I pressed myself against the stucco wall and took in the room: a disaster zone of women's clothes, high-end shopping bags, and more beauty products than I'd ever seen in one place.

"Why do you always have to wait until the last minute, bitch?" Brenda said to no one in particular as she rummaged across a white countertop covered with makeup.

The mountain of clothes on the chair beside me tilted further, and I barely caught it before it hit the floor. I tried to catch a glimpse of Pablo past the bathroom door; he'd apparently been holed up in there for a while. Brenda was still frantically digging through the mess on the table.

"I swear this is the last time I'm helping you, you hear me?" Brenda said under her breath, clearing the table.

The place was small. When Brenda had opened the door a few minutes earlier, we'd both froze. The shock and mutual surprise seemed to stretch on forever before she finally pointed at a sofa in the living room.

"You're going to have to wait a while until we're done, honey. You came at the worst time of day. Take a seat, will you?"

But I wasn't about to wait. I'd been planning this for almost three months. When Pablo's mother finally tracked down where her son had been living, I started figuring out how to bring him home. So instead of sitting on that sofa, I walked down the hall.

A massive wardrobe overflowed with clothes in every color imaginable, one door half open, the other crooked on its hinge. Two pink Barbie posters were taped to the wall, the tape glinting whenever the light from the single bare bulb overhead caught it. The whole apartment was deathly hot. The whole building. But the bedroom had a floor-standing AC unit, so at least you couldn't feel that suffocating humidity as bad. How did anyone live in this constant swelter?

I shoved the clothes back against the chair and made sure the pile wouldn't tip over, then watched Brenda toss a phone through the air from the makeup table. It landed on the pink bedspread.

"There you go, you fucking slut," she yelled. "And hurry up, you've only got two minutes left."

Brenda spun around and flicked on an enormous circular lamp by the bed, flooding the room with an intense white light. A camera lens sat at the center of that glow, held by black rods to a professional-looking tripod.

"Remember to mention the party; you forgot it yesterday!" she shouted, pushing another pile of clothes off the headboard.

A sharp alarm started beeping somewhere in the room. The sound bounced off the towers of clothes and piles of purses until Brenda smacked a pink box on a shelf. Then she grabbed my arm and tugged.

"You shouldn't have come without warning, honey," she said, not unkindly. "Come on, let's go to the living room. Want a beer?"

I shook my head as I kept trying to look past the bathroom door, squinting against the spotlight now blinding me. Pablo was coming out of the bathroom, and I felt my pulse race.

"Pablo," I managed to say, but Brenda's body blocked me.

"I mean it, not now," she said, her tone firmer. Then she turned toward the room. "The party, Stella — remember to mention the fucking party or Marcos is going to smash our faces in tonight!" she shouted before slamming the door shut. The darkness of the hallway engulfed us.

"How about that beer while we watch the show?" Brenda asked, flashing a smile. A gold hoop hung from her nose, and two shiny studs dotted her left nostril, standing out against her dark skin. She was striking — sharp features, wild curly hair, heavy makeup that somehow sculpted her face with surprising taste. From the moment I'd walked in, I'd felt out of place. Disappointed in myself, really. If Pablo were going out with a woman like her, what chance did I have? What could I possibly offer him? I was an idiot for coming all this way thinking he'd be single.

"Come on, go turn on the TV while I get the drinks," Brenda said.

I glanced sideways at the door down the hall, wondering if I should just go talk to him. But whatever they were doing seemed serious. I didn't want to make a scene the second I arrived. Pablo was probably working the camera or running the stream. I'd waited three years to see him — I could wait a few more minutes.

Exhausted from the trip, I walked to the living room with Brenda right behind me. I'd only landed six hours ago, and between the humidity and the apartment's heavy, perfumed air, I felt like I was moving through a dream.

"You've seen Stella's channel before, right?" Brenda asked, handing me a bottle of local beer as she sat down. Her bare thighs and those perfect breasts made me blush. Since when was Pablo into Latinas? He'd always played it pretty safe when it came to relationships. I only knew of one serious girlfriend before me, and that didn't last. Then we fell in love and stayed together — until the day he vanished.

"What?" I asked, snapping out of my thoughts.

"Stella's channel. Whether you've seen it before."

"Stella? No, sorry. I don't know what that is," I said, setting the blue folder with the house sale documents on the coffee table. Then I glanced down the hallway where we'd left Pablo.

"Input 1," Brenda said, pointing at a button on the remote with a sharp purple nail. I looked down at the remote and pressed the button. The TV turned on with a click.

"So Pablo works on the channel?" I asked innocently. I was dying to ask this woman if they were together.

Brenda was scanning the coffee table for something. I took a drink — the beer was fruity and bitter, with an oddly salty finish.

"Look, it's starting — turn it up," Brenda said as the streaming channel appeared. "Isn't she spectacular today?"

But I didn't answer. I couldn't. When I finally managed to speak, all that came out was a scream.

"Pablo?"

Brenda started on the sofa and put her hand on my arm.

“Shhh...,” she said, pressing her long fingernail to her lips. “Be quiet—the microphone picks up everything from here.”

I stood up and walked toward the television as if floating through a dream, this time for real.

"But..." I started to say without taking my eyes off the screen.

"If that bitch forgets to mention the party again, we're in trouble," Brenda said, taking a long swig.

I finally managed to turn and look at the closed door down the hall. Ten yards away, my ex-boyfriend — the guy I'd crossed an ocean for — was grinning at the camera like a two-bit cam girl.

"Is that Pablo?" I asked in a small voice. Brenda smiled strangely.

"Shit, you didn't know?"

When Pablo started talking, his voice was weak and high-pitched, draped in a strange accent — like the years away had steeped him in some Eastern femininity the way the city's humidity had soaked into everything. If I closed my eyes, I could have been listening to a Thai woman butchering English, not the guy I used to know. But it wasn't the accent or the effeminate voice that made me wonder if this was some sick joke.

On the TV, Pablo — or someone who looked just like him — ran a hand through long, straight blonde hair tipped in pink. She trailed the same delicate path down her bare shoulders, and her black nails — the longest I'd ever seen on anyone — brushed against the latex of a tiny pink top so vulgar it barely covered half her enormous breasts.

The image was hypnotic. Pablo was, without a doubt, one of the most voluptuous trans women I had ever seen.

"Pablo?" I asked again out loud.

Brenda looked up from her cell phone, took the remote from me, and lowered the volume a bit.

"Sit down, come on," she said, tugging my arm. "Fuck, I thought you knew."

I hadn't blinked once, just staring at the screen. Beneath all that heavy makeup, the perfectly drawn brows, the over-the-top gestures, Pablo was greeting the three hundred-plus viewers in the chat.

"Hello, loves," he said in that fluty voice with a Thai accent. "You missed me as much as I've missed you?"

What got me — what actually made me fall backward onto the sofa — was how natural he looked. No one would have guessed that three years ago, this voluptuous woman had walked out of my house as a man. But there he was, phone in hand, fingers splayed wide and glittering with rings, trying to type on a keyboard I couldn't see without hitting every wrong key with those razored nails.

Enormous hoop earrings hung from his ears, tangled in the platinum extensions. They swung as she tossed his head, gesturing obscenely at something in the chat. His lips were lined in heavy black, red and full — definitely filler. His lashes had to be an inch and a half long. The black liner rimming his eyes winged out toward her temples and disappeared under his hair.

"That SuckerSuper guy gives her almost three hundred bucks a month all by himself," Brenda said beside me, finishing her beer. "He's crazy about Stella."

The chat was a blur of hearts, eggplants, water droplets — every emoji in the book bouncing across the screen. Most comments were crude, vulgar, but every so often someone tried to have a real conversation. Pablo worked the camera like a natural — he knew when to smile, when to cup those enormous tits, when to pout and fake a little attitude. It was ridiculous. Absurd. His shiny pink top kept sliding down, and he spent the whole show hiking it back up to keep his nipples covered.

"I told her to throw out that top. The other day one of her nipple rings got caught in the fabric," Brenda said, phone in hand. "She never learns."

Still in shock, I leaned closer to the TV to confirm: yes, Pablo had both nipples pierced with gold barbells. When had that happened? Why? Was Pablo a woman now? The barrage of questions that came to mind vanished as fast as Pablo answered the messages.

"Another beer?" Brenda asked. I didn't move.

Below the top, his stomach was flat, a silver ball glittering from his navel, tribal tattoos circling a waist much narrower than I remembered. It was dizzying. Pablo had always hated tattoos. When I wanted a tiny star on my wrist, he spent a week lecturing me about why the human body should never be marked with ink. Tattoos were tacky. He even said I'd end up looking like the kind of woman we both hated. But the worst was yet to come. In all the years I'd known him — nearly ten as friends, three as a couple — he'd also hated smoking. We'd lost friends over how viciously he'd go off on anyone who lit up around him.

The woman on the screen brought a cigarette to her lips, lit it like she'd done it a thousand times, and took a long, slow drag, blowing smoke at the lens with a sly smile.

"That's it, Stella — stand up," Brenda said from the sofa like she was directing the show.

Pablo stood up and stepped back from the camera. The pleated schoolgirl skirt couldn't have been more than four inches long, leaving his fully erect cock exposed. I turned bright red, and Brenda noticed.

"You wouldn't believe what people pay to see your dick live," she said, grabbing a pack of cigarettes from the table. "Want one?"

I shook my head. Pablo was running his hands over his waist now, swaying to music only he could hear. I had to blink a few times when he reached down and started touching himself on stream, cigarette dangling from his red lips. It was lewd. Crass. An absolute scandal. How did he end up like this? Was someone making him do it?

I coughed when Brenda blew out smoke near my face.

"Sorry, girl," she said, getting up to crack the window open. I couldn't decide which was worse — the stale smoke or the wave of humidity that came pouring in from the street.

The doorbell rang, and I jumped in my seat. Brenda glanced at her gold-tone watch.

"It's Steve," she said, padding barefoot to the door. Her ass cheeks swayed under the ripped jeans. I stayed glued to my seat, transfixed by Pablo whoring it up on screen.

A few seconds later, a big guy with broad shoulders and gym-sculpted arms covered in tattoos walked down the hall with Brenda. Short hair, young, handsome, heavily inked, calm eyes — nowhere near my type. The kind of muscular tough I could never have anything in common with. Much less feel attracted to.

"Steve, this is Leticia," Brenda said. "She came from Spain."

"Hi, Leticia," he said to me. But after a second, he looked back at Brenda. "Leticia... that Leticia?" he asked, glancing sideways.

I looked at Brenda, who nodded with a smile, her nose rings moving with her.

"That Leticia," she whispered, blowing out cigarette smoke.

The guy looked me up and down, curious. I shifted uncomfortably.

"Stella didn't tell me you were coming."

I opened my mouth, but nothing came out.

"Total surprise," Brenda called out on her way to the kitchen. "Want a beer, Steve?"

The awkward silence was broken by the city noise drifting through the window and Pablo's high-pitched chatter from the TV.

"From your face I can see you didn't know about Stella," the guy said.

I didn't move. On screen, Pablo stubbed out his cigarette and started pulling up his pink top, flashing his pierced nipples. The Barbie posters behind him made the whole degenerate picture complete.

Brenda came back with another beer, handed it to Steve, and dropped onto the sofa. The sounds of the city wrapped around us — horns blaring, brakes screeching.

"Did she mention the party?" Steve asked, sitting very close to Brenda's thighs.

"Not yet."

"Fuck," he said. "Marcos is going to kill us."

"She'll say it. You'll see."

Steve nodded while giving me an odd look.

"There!" Brenda suddenly shouted. "Good, Stella, good. She said it. Good girl."

That cut the tension, and Brenda and Steve started talking about some event they were planning. I tuned out. On screen, Pablo was dancing now, hands in his hair, hips swaying, his erection swinging under the plaid skirt. Those enormous breasts looked like they were straining her whole back. What happened to you, Pablo? I thought for the hundredth time. How did you end up like this in just three years?

The half-hour show ended, and a pink screen filled with the name Stella Barbie. Brenda turned off the TV and picked up the empty bottles from the table to take them back to the kitchen. Steve stood up behind her and adjusted his jeans.

"And you came to...?" he asked me.

I reached for the blue folder on the table, feeling like a complete idiot.

"Our house," I blurted out. "Pablo needs to sign the papers so we can sell it. I thought I'd come see him in person."

"Ah. The house. I thought that was already settled," Steve said.

"No. Well. Yes," I said, almost stammering. "Only his signature was left."

Then I heard the door at the end of the hallway open, and my heart started racing.

Steve smiled, excused himself politely, and walked down the hall. Pablo's silhouette appeared against the light. He looked taller than I expected, but then I saw the shoes — enormous clear platforms. His body was sculpted. Naked from the waist down, skin smooth and taut, the kind of body that came from hours at the gym. And I had no idea what to do. Less than an hour ago, when I'd walked into this apartment, I'd had a plan. I'd bring him the papers. I'd tell him he still mattered to me, that I still loved him. That there was a life waiting for us on the other side of the world. But now? How was I supposed to approach him? What could I possibly say?

At the bedroom door, Pablo let Steve take his hands, and he pulled him into a deep kiss. I stood there frozen as he slid his hands onto Steve's ass like they belonged there and pressed his body into his, tilting his head to let him in deeper. The kiss went on forever — their tongues sliding together, visible outside their mouths — until Steve grabbed him by the neck. Pablo went completely submissive then, dropping his arms, closing his eyes, letting the kiss swallow him whole. And then, in the last second before they disappeared into the room, our eyes met. Just a flash — curiosity, surprise, shame. Beneath all that mascara and makeup, Pablo flicked his head back, platinum hair swinging, and turned away without a word. Steve was squeezing Pablo's ass, where a tan line from sunbathing in a thong was still visible, and before he shut the door, he slapped it — right on a black and red tribal tattoo — whispering something in his ear. Pablo let out a high-pitched giggle as the darkness swallowed the hallway again.

"Stella gets super horny after livestreams," Brenda said as if that explained the scene I'd just witnessed. "Did you come with your partner?"

My mind was still reeling. My ex was locked in a room with some buff stud, probably letting Steve fuck him like a horny teenager right that second.

"Me? No. I came alone," I said.

Then the moans started drifting out from the room — Pablo's high-pitched little cries.

"They don't usually take long. Want another beer?"

I shook my head. I was dizzy from the flight, from the heat, and most of all, from Pablo.

"So she just needs to sign those papers?" Brenda asked, lighting another cigarette with a practiced flick.

"That's... that's it," I said, wrinkling my nose at the cigarette smoke.

"And you had to come all the way here in person? Couldn't you have sent them?"

"I guess... but Pablo's mother asked me to... if I came in person... maybe..."

"Ah. His mother," Brenda said, like that explained everything once more.

I fell silent again, not knowing what to say. What would his mother think if she ever found out? Pablo's moans drifted through the hallway, pulling my attention back.

"Harder! Yes! Harder!" echoed through the hallway, punctuated by thuds against the wall that made the whole place shake.

This went on for at least ten minutes. Another half hour crept by before I heard movement in the hallway. I was staring at the TV — some news in a language I couldn't understand. I still had no idea what to do with the folder, my plan, or my life. Brenda had been glued to her phone the whole time.

"Aren't they coming out?" I finally asked.

"They will now. The party starts soon. Marcos wanted her there early to set up. Stella has a special shift on Thursdays."

"Pablo works at a club?" I asked.

"Stella," Brenda said pointedly, phone still in hand. "Yes. She works as a waitress at Marcos's pub. She's been there almost a year. It's a good job, and Marcos pays her well. It's not some dive, if that's what you're thinking. Between the job and the videos, she lives a lot better than plenty of people back home, that's for sure."

I tried to picture Pablo behind a bar. We'd both studied industrial engineering. He'd graduated with marks good enough to land a job anywhere in the field. In fact, before leaving home, he'd already been working as a junior tech for months. The thought of him now slinging drinks at a nightclub only made my head spin more.

A few minutes later, the hallway lit up again. I stood up immediately. Steve came out with wet hair, combing it back with both hands. He still seemed sweet enough, but he had that muscle-bound nightclub-pimp thing going on — the kind I could never stand. Behind him, I heard heels clicking.

Pablo came out of the room. That long platinum hair from the stream was now pulled into two pigtails that stuck out like white fountains, with thin pink strands framing a face longer and sharper than I remembered. He wore a one-piece latex dress, shiny black and barely covering anything. The strapless neckline skimmed the areolas of his surgically enhanced breasts; the hem barely reached the top of his thighs. His garish tattoos disappeared under the latex, only the simpler ones showing through. The dress had two cutouts — one exposing his entire cleavage, the other his pierced navel. On her feet: chunky white boots, glossy, with enormous square heels that rose past his knees. Pablo looked like an ultra-erotic club girl dripping with obscene femininity, a strong transsexual aura radiating off him. Heavy pink eyeshadow, lips lined in deep black. Had he gotten his cheekbones done too? Two enormous gold hoops hung from his ears, with a row of small studs trailing the edge of his cartilage.

Pablo moved easily on those heels, silent, following close behind Steve, who was holding his hand. His fingers were heavy with rings, his nails long and painted black. Dozens of bracelets jangled on his wrists, swaying with his hips. From his right shoulder hung a small white purse with the Chanel logo in big letters.

When they reached the living room, an awkward silence fell. I couldn't stop staring — at his eyes, perfectly made up, his sharp cheekbones, his breasts straining against a dress that screamed raw sex. The way those hoops swung, nearly brushing his bare shoulders. Pablo was a trans woman with a masculine undercurrent so faint you'd miss it if you weren't looking. You had to really search to find my ex beneath all that Stella.

"Pablo?" I asked. "Is it really you?"

Pablo blinked once with those mile-long lashes, then bent gracefully to the table, picked up Brenda's pack, slipped a cigarette between his lined lips, and waited for Steve to light it. He brought the tip to the flame and inhaled slowly, calmly.

"How did you find me?" he asked, his voice soft and light — it vaguely reminded me of the way he used to whisper in bed after sex. Then he blew the smoke to the side, such a feminine gesture I almost laughed out of sheer disbelief.

The silence broke when Brenda came back from the bathroom.

"You're going to be late for the party, sweetie," she said to Pablo. "Good thing you didn't forget, girl," she added.

Pablo took another drag, letting the smoke out slowly, never breaking eye contact. The gold hoops caught the light and sent sparkles across the wall as he moved. He was pressed against Steve, gripping his hand like they were a couple. I still couldn't speak. I had so many questions, and not a single one could make it past my lips.

"Pablo..." I finally began.

"Stella," Steve corrected. "Her name is Stella."

"Pablo... Stella," I stammered. "I came because... look..." I fumbled for the blue folder on the table. "You need to sign both copies... it's about your mother's house. They're selling it, and she asked me to come..."

Pablo stood there, pensive, and brought the cigarette to his mouth. The makeup had killed the shine on his forehead, the foundation smoothing over his strong features to emphasize a contrived femininity that his sharp brows only heightened.

"You should have told me you were coming," he said, blowing smoke at the ceiling. "I would have liked to explain."

"Well, you know," I said with the papers in my hand. "It's your mother... well, she told me..."

"My mother," Pablo repeated, pulling his latex dress up over his breasts and shaking his head, ironic. The hoops danced on either side of his neck.

Brenda cut the conversation short, clapping her hands and making us all jump.

"Look at the time. Stella, you need to go to work right now because the party starts in just two hours. And you, Leticia, I assume you have a hotel for tonight, right? You didn't come just to give Stella the papers and take off."

"I have... a few more days," I said. It was true. I knew this might take a while, so I'd booked the whole week.

"Good. Well, those papers can wait a bit," Brenda said. "You two, get going to the party. Leti, you and I will go to the hotel so you can get some rest — that jet lag is really settling into those under-eye circles of yours. Then we'll stop by the Pub, have a drink, and we'll all chat for a while, sound good?"

Pablo nodded, trying to smile. Steve tugged him forward, guiding Pablo ahead of him. He stumbled on his heels and clutched his little white purse. It was something else, watching him let that man push him around.

"We'll all see each other tonight, okay?" Brenda said.

Pablo took another deep drag, those black-lined lips wrapped around the cigarette, and shot me a strange, fixed look before Steve slapped his hand back on his latex-clad ass and steered him toward the door. How had Pablo ended up like this?

"Let's go to the hotel, gorgeous," Brenda said. "Tonight you can talk to your ex all you want, okay? That was a lot to take in. Wait for me outside while I grab a few things. I'll be right out."

I nodded and headed for the entrance. The heat and humidity hit me like a wall. When Brenda came out a minute later in her ripped jeans and tight shirt, I looked down at the street. Two floors below, Pablo was crossing the asphalt, purse in hand, white boots clicking, holding Steve's hand — him leading as always — toward a red-and-black convertible parked on the corner. He flicked his cigarette onto the sidewalk after a last drag, hitched up his shiny dress over those fake tits, and they slid into the sports car like any other couple. One more kiss, and the car roared to life and disappeared down the street.

"They're crazy about each other," Brenda said, slamming the door shut and turning the lock three times. "Stella got really lucky with him. He's a real sweetheart. They make a wonderful couple, if you ask me. So there's nothing to worry about. Tell her mother that, will you? And don't take this the wrong way, but Stella's happier now than she ever was in her past life. She'll tell you that herself tonight. What hotel did you say you were at?"

N.A.

Part one... ;)