Charlotte sat down, opened her lunch box, and with carefully manicured hands and perfectly painted fingernails, she picked out a dainty sandwich with an equally dainty finger and thumb and then looked at me.

‘Well Tannie?

by

Susan Brown

Previously from Chapter 6…

I sat eating my sandwich, looking inward and wondering about Miss Busby and the subtle differences in this world to the one I knew, when I looked up and with some surprise, I saw a smiling Charlotte Rhodes.

Charlotte was one of the popular girls in my world and had little to do with me, a social outcast. She was devastatingly pretty even at the tender age of twelve. Older boys and a few even at my age had wanted to be her boy friend, but she was a no go area as far as boys were concerned. Her parents were strict and religious and wouldn’t let her do anything and probably wouldn’t until she was eighteen, at least.

‘Hi Tammie, how are you?’

Tammie, why is she calling me that?

‘Don’t you mean Tommy?’

She looked around and then sat down beside me.

‘What do you mean Tommy; since when have you been Tommy to me?’

I didn’t know what to say. What was going on here?

‘Look Tammie, we both know that you are a girl inside and that we are BFF’s. It’s not one of your silly jokes is it?'

Things were starting to get complicated!

And now the story continues…

Charlotte sat down, opened her lunch box, and with carefully manicured hands and perfectly painted fingernails, she picked out a dainty sandwich with an equally dainty finger and thumb and then looked at me.

‘Well Tannie?

What could I say; that I was a being from another dimension and that I had fallen through some sort of time/space whatsit and wasn’t really the person she thought that I was?

‘Look Charlotte, things have changed.’

‘What do you mean?’ she asked, nibbling delicately at her sandwich.

‘I…I thought that I was a girl, I know and I have tried hard to be a girl, but things are going on in my head that I can’t understand and I need to sort out who and what I am.’

‘I don’t understand.’

‘Neither do I. Look, I have thought for ages that I am a girl, right?’

‘Yes, you are more girlie than me, and that’s saying something.’

‘Well, I’m beginning to think that I’m wrong and I have to try to be a boy for a while to see if I am wrong. My shrink thinks that I should start to take blockers soon, so I don’t develop as a boy any more than I am and in preparation for girlie hormones when I’m old enough, but she thinks that its quite a big step. Before I go down that route, she said, that I should try being a boy 24/7 and see if I was sure about what I wanted to be. I agreed with her and that’s why I need to act and be a boy for a while.’

All right, I was telling her a few white lies about what the shrink may or may not have said, but I needed to get her on my side, as I needed all the friends I could get.

‘So now you are trying to be a boy to see if you might have made a mistake, being a girl all these years?’

’Yea.’

‘An’ your going to be Tommy not Tannie?’

I nodded sadly.

She looked upset.

‘So, we can’t be BFF’s any more?’

‘Course we can, we are best friends. Does me being a boy make that much difference to you?’

‘Well I can’t talk about girly things with you any more, can I? Apart from Mummy, you were the first person to know about my starting having periods and you know lots of things about me that no one else does. You were the one who always had the cool dress sense and could tell me about what looks good and what doesn’t. Oh I knew that “down there”,’ she waved vaguely at my groin region, ‘you had boys stuff, but you were so girly that it didn’t matter about that. Out of school, you wore girls clothes whenever you could and now, I suppose it’s all changed.’

She looked about to cry and I felt awful. I grabbed her hand.

‘Look Charlotte, we are still best friends, if you want to be. It will be a bit different, but does it really matter if I’m a boy or girl, my heart’s the same?’

She looked at me doubtfully, tears in her eyes and then stood up.

‘I have to think about things. You seem different, somehow and it’s not just about the boy, girl thing. I don’t know if it can be like before. I’m having nasty thoughts about if you are being selfish and not thinking about others. I bet that your dad and nan don’t really know what’s going on. You should think about that before changing into a boy.’

With a final sad look, she picked up her lunch box and walked off, leaving me more upset than I thought I would ever be.

I wanted to cry, but boys don’t cry, do they?

Hart and Furbin were waiting for me at the school gates; that was all I needed.

I had intended to go home on the school bus, but I was a bit late as I had an interesting discussion with Mr Roberts, the history teacher, about a late bit of homework that should have been in that day. It was so unfair, as I had no idea what he was talking about. I had to wing it a bit and just said that I had left it at home. I promised to hand it in the next day and just hoped that I would find the offending item at home in “my” bedroom somewhere.

Anyhoo, I was late for the bus, and I had rung Dad up so that he could come and collect me. Unfortunately, as I said before, Dumb and Dumber were waiting for me. I had kind of hoped that they would have caught the school bus, but then I remember hearing somewhere that they had been banned from using it for some sort of minor indiscretion like threatening to kill the driver or something.

As I walked up, I got sort of angry. I had thought from my previous encounters with these two that they just might get the message and leave me alone.

Evidently not.

‘Right Tommy, you are dead meat,’ said Furbin rather nasally, with a humourless grin on his face.

I noticed that his nose still looked a bit enflamed and that somehow pleased me. Also his shirt had splatters or is that spatters of blood and I hoped that his mum would ask searching questions about how his school shirt looked like that. It was also nice to see that Hart still looked somewhat bandy legged so the knee in the groin treatment was still showing its affects.

‘Look, I haven’t got time for this. My dad is about to pick me up and I do not want to keep him hanging about. For the last time will you let it go?’

‘Let what go?’ asked the practically brain dead Furbin.

‘All this attempted bullying nonsense. I’ve got the better of you twice in two days. Do you really want some more of the same?’

‘You’re a fairy.’ said Hart.

‘Do you think so?’

‘Yea, you like to wear dresses an that.’

“Am I wearing one now?’

‘No, but you would if you could,’ said Furbin, butting in on the conversation. I don’t think that he liked Hart to think; that was his job. Hart was the muscle and most of that was between his ears.

‘I was just pretending, just to wind you up.’

‘Wot, since you were in infants school?’ asked Hart.

‘Yea, got you to believe it, didn’t I?’

‘I’ve seen you in a dress,’ said Furbin, ‘you looked more girlie than my sister.’

‘Good actor aren’t I?’

They looked confused, which was exactly what I wanted.

I looked at my watch. Dad was running late and if he didn’t get here soon, these two would get there respective brains into gear and I would probably have to defend myself. The last two times that they had caught me; I had had the element of surprise. This time, despite their injuries, I would not have that advantage.

With relief I noticed in the distance, my dad’s car coming down the roads towards us.

‘Oh, here he is now.’ I said brightly.

As he drew up, I could see the look of disappointment on their faces, a bit like lions or tigers deprived of a juicy meal on the hoof.

I turned to them as I walked over to my dad’s car and said, ‘Oh, by the way, if you try anything on again, I would have to use martial arts on you.’

‘What do you mean?’ snarled Furbin.

‘I been taking lessons for years and I have a black belt in Origami.’

They looked a bit scared of that and I just hoped that they didn’t have the brainpower to look up what that meant.

Dad looked at me strangely as I got in the car.

‘What wrong with those boys, they don’t look happy with you?’

‘They didn’t like me answering them back.’

‘You aren’t bein bullied again, are you?’

‘No, I won’t let anyone bully me any more.’

‘Good, I have been telling you for years that you must stand up for yourself.’

We drove off and in about twenty minutes later, we were home.

‘Your nan has gone walking on the moor with the other W.I. women, I don’t know where they get the energy from,’ said Dad as we walked up the path.

Thinking about the state of health of my other Nan “over there” made me wonder how she was at that moment. I had a strange feeling that all was not well with her.

I shivered; those uncomfortable thoughts were all a bit too much like a cheesy horror film for me.

It was a nice day and still early. Dad was working in his study and I didn’t fancy trying to sort out the history homework quite yet; I hoped and prayed that Tannie had done it. I would try to find it that evening when my mind, hopefully, wouldn’t be in such a turmoil after all that had happened that day.

I decided that I would go for a run. I had liked running as my other self and once again, I had a feeling that Tannie did too. This was confirmed when I found some running shorts and a singlet, thankfully in sort of neutral white, not so thankfully in a material that was rather shiny, almost like satin. I also found a pair of well worn trainers in the bottom of the wardrobe. They had pink laces, but beggars can’t be choosers.

I quickly dressed in the running gear and then told Dad that I was going out.

He was a bit distracted and just waved goodbye.

Soon I was running down our lane, through the village and out into the countryside.

I found that when I was running, I could reflect and mull over things and this time was no different.

I was a bit upset over what Charlotte had said to me. All right, technically, I wasn’t the Tannie she knew. Her Tannie was “over there”, but she didn’t know that. All she could see was that I had done a U turn regarding my gender and she felt hurt and confused. I sensed that Tannie had been closer to Charlotte than anyone else. Whether that closeness would stand the test of my apparent changes, I had no idea.

It was all so complicated. I didn’t know where I really fitted in here. I was not the person that others had always known me to be.

Although I was a real boy now, and believe me, I loved that; I was not Tanya. I had different dreams and ambitions to her that were poles apart from where I wanted to be. I kept seeing people who thought that I was Tannie or Tanya (obviously) and I could see the confusion in their faces when they saw the new, and to my mind, improved me.

Even my father and nan didn’t really know the real me and the explanations that I had given for the changes didn’t seem all that convincing. It would only be a matter of time before I let something slip and land myself in the doo-doo.

Without thinking, I had gone up onto the moor and was heading in the general direction of the cottage on the common where I had arrived into this world that was so similar to mine but slightly different.

As I ran, memories of the love that I had for my mum and nan kept popping up in my brain. I missed my mum; after all I had just seen her a few days ago, so she had been very much alive to me. I was convinced that she was still alive, but in another place. For my part, it was lovely to be with Dad and Nan and wonderful that Nan was so healthy and full of life; but I wanted Mum too. Although a boy, I still wanted the occasional cuddle.

Tanya, on the other hand had lost Dad and in a way Nan too. Now, in her reality, she had a mum she had never known and a nan who was just not the same as before. Before changing places with me, she probably would not have really remembered Mum. To her, Mum had died when she was only three; a time when memories would be sketchy if not non-existent. Now she was with a Mum she didn’t know and a sick nan, who sort of lived in a world of her own and was no longer all there.

I didn’t know who was worse or better off or even if I could think in terms like that.

Thinking of myself, there were swings and roundabouts being where I was now. I still couldn’t get my head around what had happened to me. They say truth is stranger than fiction and I could well believe that after what had happened to me over the last few short days.

I continued running, getting myself out of breath as I went up and down over grassy hills trying to avoid the outcrops of rocks and many rabbit holes that were dotted about on the beautiful moor. The sun was still quite strong and there was hardly a cloud in the sky. The breeze was light and the warm air did nothing to help me keep cool. I had brought with me a fist grip water bottle that contained an electrolyte orange drink. I kept taking sips to keep myself hydrated and I was glad that I had the foresight to bring it with me.

I started to run as fast as I could, trying to outrun my thoughts and emotions. I didn’t want to think anymore.

Gasping, I stopped for a moment at the top of a hill to have a drink. Over in the distance, were the coast and the glittering sea. Nearer, only about half a mile away, up on the common where sheep had been grazed freely for centuries, was the strange cottage which had been my gateway to this new world which was very similar but not quite the same as the one I had left.

I had another drink and then, after I had regained my breath a bit, I ran on. Without realising it consciously, I was drawn to the cottage like a magnet. As I got nearer, I felt even more of an urge to go there. What I would do when I arrived, I didn’t know but I just knew that I had to go to the cottage and go now.

In just a few minutes I had arrived. Nothing had changed; the cottage still looked run down and unloved. I wondered if it had once been a holiday cottage, there were loads of those in Cornwall and there had always been complaints that locals could not afford housing due to incredible price rises due to these cottages being snapped up by people who lived miles away and rarely visited. Maybe the owner had died and that was why it all looked neglected.

I stopped at the gate, my breath heaving. I was obviously not very fit in this reality. Tannie probably spent more time painting her nails rather than keeping fit.

As I recovered, I felt hot and sweaty and then suddenly, without warning, strangely cold.

I shivered slightly. Something felt wrong.

Looking at the cottage, I could sense that it was still empty. There was no car outside and the once pretty front garden looked like it needed a lot of attention.

Without thinking, I opened the garden gate and walked up the path to the front door. As I went, with gravel crunching under my trainers, the sun dimmed and clouds appeared in the sky where a few minutes ago it had been bright and clear.

The wind came up and started to make me feel all the colder. The sweat on my thin running vest and shorts felt cold and clammy against my glistening skin.

I sensed…something. I found it difficult to put it into words. Words could not adequately describe my feelings. It was, I suppose, almost like I was at home in bed and was dreaming. Everything felt suddenly so unreal. Maybe I would wake up in a moment and I would realise that this had all been a figment of my rather overactive imagination.

Was this all a dream?

I was aware that I could no longer feel the wind. I couldn’t hear the wind either; it was as if I was in a vacuum without any external senses to help me interact with the world around me. The door handle was polished brass, although why it was polished when all else looked shabby and unkempt I didn't know, and it started to glow pulsatingly... dim then bright, dim then bright…

My hand was drawn towards the handle. I couldn’t take my eyes off it.

With a shaking hand that almost didn’t seem part of me, I reached out and touched the brightly pulsating handle.

The handle felt hot…there was a blinding white light that surrounded me and I felt a shock as the door opened and I was being sucked in through the doorway...

I think I screamed.

Please leave comments and kudo thingies...thanks! ~Sue