PONY, a 15-minute short film, follows Zoe, a genderqueer 12-year-old growing up in semi-rural Pennsylvania in the late-90s.

The film begins with Zoe in her locked bathroom, holding a pair of scissors to her ponytail, as her Mom (40s) frantically tries to break in. Zoe, in a moment of stress, sees a preteen (11), appear behind her in the mirror, wearing a My Little Pony sweater and a baseball cap, before Mom crashes through the door. Mom makes Zoe hand the scissors over and leaves, exhausted. Zoe, defeated, looks back in the mirror; the preteen is gone. Zoe stares at the words “TONY” written in bubble letters on the mirror. She rips the ‘T” sticker off and writes a “P” in its place. “PONY.”

The next day, Mom and Zoe play a tense game of Jenga as Zoe wears her twin sibling Tony’s baseball cap (from the mirror), and Mom disapproves. Zoe’s best friend Kayley (12) arrives for a sleepover—it’s Zoe and Tony’s birthday the next day. It becomes clear that Mom wants Zoe to dress more feminine, Tony isn’t around anymore, and that Zoe may have recently gone into the garage, which is off-limits.

Later that evening, Mom forces Zoe to wear a birthday dress. Zoe crumples. Kayley sides with her, which ignites Zoe’s crush feelings, eases her dysphoria and pushes her toward a decision.

At night, Zoe leads Kayley away from Mom and into the forbidden garage. It is in the garage where the circumstances of the death of Zoe’s twin—renamed Pony by Zoe—are revealed, along with Zoe’s grief; where Zoe’s burgeoning feelings for her best friend end in disaster; and where Zoe’s gender-clashes with her mother come to ahead. When finally confronted by these challenges, Zoe lets go of the past to find new beginnings.