Trophy 19 - I read the news today, oh boy

Bunny fluf on my duvet is tickling my nose, my feet are freezing, but what's keeping me awake is a headline I read in Metro this morning: “Woman who posed as 'perfect boy' given 30-month custodial sentence.” Twenty-year-old Gemma Barker has been jailed for 2.5 years for dating girls who were at most 4 years younger than her - while in drag.

Shocking story, people say on Twitter.

It shocked me too. But not as much as the host of hateful tweets about Gemma.

As as boy, Gemma seduced two of her own friends, who fell hook, line and sinker for her disguise. Of course Gemma had quite a lot to hide – so the relationships couldn't advance much further than kissing, cuddling and a bit of one-sided groping. The girls even introduced their new boyfriends to their parents. They had no issue at all with the levels of intimacy, until one of the two began to suspect that her boyfriend might be the same guy as her friend's boyfriend (but still didn't recognize their friend Gemma). To my surprise, that's when they decided to get the police involved. I can imagine it's not great to find out your partner has been two-timing you with your friend, but that doesn't make it a case to get the police involved, does it?

It does, of course, when the heartbroken girlfriend is 15 years old – because she hasn't reached the age of consent yet. So the cheating boyfriend was arrested, and that's when his true identity was discovered. Now, the girls feel disgusted, sick and suicidal. Though they were attracted to Gemma in drag at the time, in retrospect, the cuddling and sexual touching has become assault.

I wonder whether a “real” boy would've received the same sentence for two-timing Gemma's friends. I hope so. I really do.

Stilll, the story scares me. I know it's got nothing to do with me – I'm not sexually active at all, nor am I attracted to kids. But I worry about all the people who know me as a man. Would my colleagues, clients and friends be disgusted with me if they saw on my passport that officially, I am a woman? Would they take me to court for misleading them? When is the right time to tell someone? Is there ever? Could I end up in prison for going on a date with Angel, pretending to be a guy? Or should I wear a badge that says “freak of nature” to make sure she knows what to expect?