“You know damn well what I’m talking about young lady!” he told me as he turned scowling at me. “Or should I say young man?” Mean Girls 3026 Part 12 Written by Toni Trepasso Edited by Gwen Brown, with my many thanks to her.

Graduation came quickly following that day we tested our projects. Ms. Hagar announced to the graduates and our families that she was pleased at the effort and time this years motorsports engineering students took on our finals. I won’t bore you with the rest of the ceremony, since it was much like you’d find at any school around the world. We all stood, one at a time and walked across the stage to get our diplomas, but it was when Grace and I took our turns that Ms. Hagar gave both of us a surprise that almost caused me to twist my ankle in the heels I had on.

“Amy Smith.” she announced as I started to walk across the stage. “Amy will be joining Lang Motorsports upon graduation as both one of their lead fabricators and driver of the very car she built for her senior project.”

I hadn’t yet told Mark and Amanda that I would be moving to Canada to work for the team, and was hoping I’d be the one to break the news to them. I watched as Grace had the same reaction as I did upon hearing that she’d be a lead fabricator at Lang also and they were going to have her campaign her motorcycle right along with my car.

After we did the traditional tossing of the caps in the air, I quickly retrieved mine and went to go find mom and dad. I found them standing outside the auditorium, and both of them met me with hugs and kisses, like any loving parents would do.

“We’re so proud of you Amy.” mom told me as she about hugged the breath out of me.

“We both knew you’d be a good fit at this school honey.” dad said with a nice kiss on the cheek.

“Yeah, well I figured that I’d get a job before I headed off to college.” I told them with a blush.

“I thought you said you didn’t need money?” mom asked as she pulled me in close to whisper.

“I don’t. I just hate sitting around not doing anything like a bump on a log.”

“So you gonna put in a good word for your old man when you get there?” dad asked me with a grin.

“That depends.” I said with a Cheshire cat grin.

“Oh, and what’s the condition?” he asked chuckling.

“Well, do you think you could work for your daughter? I mean I can be pretty demanding of my workers. Especially when my life is going to be in their hands.” I said with a giggle.

“If it’s your life in my hands, you better believe that I’d do everything I can to make sure my baby girl is safe.” he told me with a hug.

We left and went back to the apartment so I could get the rest of my things. Grace and I had decided that we’d meet up there, since the post ceremony crowd can get a little large and it’d be easier to find each other at the apartment. When I got there, I saw a man standing in the livingroom dressed in a Navy dress blue outfit. I walked up to him and introduced myself, since the times I’d gone to Grace’s house last summer, he was on deployment and I was only able to meet her mom.

“Admiral Mangano?” I asked as I walked up behind him. “I’m Amy, Grace’s roommate.” I told him as I held out my hand so I could offer it to shake. “Grace has told me a lot about you sir.”

“I see.” he said continuing to look out the window at the earth. “Has she told you that I do not approve, in the least, that you and she are dating?” he asked me as if he were scolding one of his midshipmen.

“I don’t think I understand what you’re asking sir.” I told him, trying to hide my shock at this.

“You know damn well what I’m talking about young lady!” he told me as he turned scowling at me. “Or should I say young man?” I couldn’t say a word back to him from the shock of being outed. “I know all about you Josh. And I don’t think its right that you parade yourself around as a young girl when you and I both know that you’re really a man in there.”

I’ve never felt so small and helpless as I did right then. Here I’d gone almost two years in this body, and Grace’s father was the first person I’d met that wasn’t accepting the fact that I was for all intense and purposes, an eighteen year old girl now.

“Sir, I understand your concern,” I said as I could feel the tears forming in my eyes, “but I assure you that Grace is my best friend and I would do nothing to harm her in any way. I never asked for ANY of this to happen, but it has, and there is nothing I can do to go back to being how I was before. If I had it my way, I’d never had been hit by that truck a thousand years ago. I’d never had been frozen, and I’d have been there when my mother and father died.” I said looking him in the eyes with the most contempt that I’d ever felt for any one person in my life. “That is what hurts more then anything sir, knowing that I’ve lost everyone who was close to me from that time. I came here with nothing. I didn’t have a single person in the world who I could call a friend. Your daughter accepted me for whom and what I am. I’m an eighteen year old girl with the mind of a thirty one, sorry its thirty three years old now, man.

Do you have any idea how difficult it is some days to have the memories of the ones you loved and know that you can never see them again? Or worse still, have someone treat you like they’ve known you your whole life and all you can remember is two years ago meeting them for the first time?” I asked as he stood there slack jawed at my confronting him. “No, I don’t imagine you can. You live in your perfect life. You order your sailors around and have them do whatever you tell them to. And you just go on living as if your shit doesn’t stink. Well guess what SIR!” I said to him with as much anger as I could come up with behind the hurt I was feeling. “Your shit makes me want to puke. If you don’t want anything to do with me, that’s fine, but know this. If I hear you’ve taken your dislike for me out on that sweet girl of yours or her mother, I will hunt you down and make you BEG me to end your sorry excuse for a life. No one deserves to be treated with disrespect, except those who disrespect others.” I told him as I poked him in the chest with my finger. “You understand me buster?”

“Y y y yes ma’Am.” he told me stuttering.

I stormed off to my room to help Mark and Mandy finish packing my things, and tried to calm down. Once I got to my bedroom, they could tell something was wrong, but I kept insisting they drop it. I just focused on my packing to make sure I took everything with me, so I wouldn’t have to come back to get it. I might have had more money than God, but I didn’t want to have to waste money on a trip to the moon when I could just as easily double check to make sure I retrieved everything now.

It was a few minutes later when I heard a commotion in the other room. Before mom or dad could react, I had my bat in my hand and was out my bedroom door. Something told me that it was Grace’s dad, and I knew that I was about to end the life I’d just been given. Well, the free part of it. If he laid one finger on Grace or Gwen, I’d wrap the bat in my hands around his fucking neck. When I got to Grace’s room I couldn’t help but drop the bat and double over laughing my ass off.

Apparently he had confronted Grace about me, and our relationship. He started to berate her about being a... how did he say it? Oh right. “No daughter of mine is going to be a God Damn faggot!” That’s when Mrs. Mangano kicked him square in the nuts with the pointed toe of her dress shoe. Now I don’t know how many of you reading this have ever had the chance to experience this kind of thing. However, next time you’re at a shoe store, look at a pair of women’s pumps, with a pointed toe, you know the ones, and take a close look at it. Then write me back and let me know if YOU’D ever want to be kicked in the sack with one of those. Oh, did I mention that Mrs. Mangano had started to work out with mom? Or the fact that she plays rugby in a women’s semi-pro league? Yeah, go with that thought.

“Oh shucks.” I said giggling “You guys didn’t let me have any of the fun.” which caused Grace to giggle as she saw the bat I had with me. “Did he touch you?” I asked as I became serious.

“No Amy, he didn’t lay a finger on me. He just yelled.” she said me hugging me. I hugged her back then grabbed my bat again and walked over to the admiral still lying on the floor in the fetal position holding his groin.

“I warned you.” I told him as I placed the bat under his chin so he could look at me as I spoke. “Didn’t I tell you that if you did anything to harm that sweet girl standing over there I’d make you beg for me to end your life? But NO! You didn’t listen. You just had to be the macho asshole and try to take out your frustration for not being able to get me to break down on that innocent girl who calls you daddy. Say good by daddy.” I told him as I brought the bat up over my head.

As I was about to swing for the fences on his face, someone grabbed the bat from me and almost caused me to fall on top of him as I swung without the bat in my hands anymore. I turned and saw Gwen, Grace’s mom standing there holding the bat in her hands shaking her head.

“No.” was all she said as she tossed my bat onto the bed.

“He needs to learn that no one hurts people I love.” I told her as I reached for the bat, and Gwen stopped me.

“Oh, he’ll learn alright.” she told me with a smile and pulled me into a whisper.

She laid out her plan. Her sister runs the very lab that did my brain transplant. And she knows that her sister and husband don’t get along, for the same reason that her husband and daughter don’t get along. Her sister was worried that meeting me would cause him to do something rash, and had given Gwen a sedative that would last until they could get him into the lab. She was hoping it wouldn’t come to this, but since he left her with no alternative, even after promising that he wouldn’t say anything bad today, she was going to have his brain transplanted into the body of a twelve year old girl.

At first I was shocked that she would actually want to subject him to this sort of thing. But then it dawned on me that the biggest reason I was considered a lesbian now was that I was still attracted to women. I was still the same brain, but with different packaging around it. Then I broke out in laughter when it finally sank in about the age of the girl she was putting his brain in.

It was this time that I looked over and saw Grace looking at me with her jaw hanging open. I stopped laughing and walked over to comfort her, thinking she’d just heard everything her mom and I had just talked about.

“Grace, it’s going to be alright.” I told her as I put my arms around her.

“Amy, did you just say you love me?” she asked as she looked me in the eyes with tears forming in hers.

I paused for a moment and it finally became clear. I’d never really thought about it before now, but I did love her. I mean she is my best friend, and she and I have done some things that decorum dictate that I not mention here, but my feelings for her were more then a friend. I do love her, with all my heart. It just took me trying to kill her father for me to be able to verbalize it.

“Yes Grace. I do love you.” I said as I pulled her into a tight hug. “With all my being, I love you.”

“I love you too.” she told me sobbing into my shoulder. After a couple of minutes of holding each other, she looked up at me and wiped away her tears. “Would you really have killed my father if mom hadn’t stopped you?” she asked me.

It took me a few moments to register what she was asking me, but I just nodded and started to cry myself. I’d never felt the rage I was feeling upon hearing what he did to her, and I scared me that I almost took a man’s life.

“You really would have killed him, just because he yelled at me?” she asked me.

“No, not because he yelled at you, but because of WHAT he yelled at you.” I told her. “Look, who does he think he is, to be able to judge you based on his ignorance? Just because he doesn’t like the fact that you prefer to be with a woman, doesn’t give him the right, even if he is your father, to try to make you feel any less about yourself because of it.” I told her as I looked right into her eyes. “You are an amazing person. And I consider myself the luckiest person in the world to have you in my life. I know I can’t speak for your mom, but I’m sure she feels the same way I do. That’s why she gave up her career in the navy to raise you.” I said as I looked over to Gwen to see her nodding at my comments. “Anyone who hurts someone as special as you needs to be wiped off the face of the earth.” I told her hugging her.

“But we’re on the moon.” she said with a giggle.

“Moon,” I asked as I picked her up and carried her to the couch in the living room. “I’ll moon you.” I told her as I started to tickle her. After she was begging me to stop, I cuddled her and we shared the first kiss, as a real couple. We’d kissed before, but this was the first time we’d done it, after telling one another we loved each other.

To Be Continued...