(Revised and reposted)

----

"Just 'cause ~you're~ not the kind of daughter to bring Daddy to tears isn't any reason to assume ~I'm~ not!" I tried to look proud, or something not... not too stupid.

"Umm.. thank you."

I think Dad meant me, or to me, I think... I was trying to remember what I'd said. Or when I'd made him cry.

But I smirked at Val anyway and said he was very welcome and kissed his cheek too, since he was beside me and hugging his arm didn't seem enough. And 'cause I wasn't sure I didn't just say something stupid.

Jerri, Brenda and Carson started snorting, just like our family, so maybe.

But Daddy looked happy.

----

After supper, when they had to leave, I had such a good idea I almost couldn't wait.

I went out with Carson on the front step and I put both arms around her neck and whispered for her to hold me really tight, to hold me up.

I tried to stand on just my hurt leg, pushing down with those toes for the first time in forever. So when I kissed her I could bend my knee and lift my good leg. Just like the movies.

It was almost like it hurt, just thinking about it, or I was afraid it would and so it felt it that way, but...

But I couldn't. I couldn't move my good leg. I couldn't even push my toes down.

It was like my nerves and muscles weren't even connected to my brain anymore. The worst feeling. That I was more afraid of pain than I loved Carson. And like my leg wasn't real, either...

Carson hugged me even harder. Lifted me up so I almost didn't even touch the porch. So my stupid toes didn't matter. She just held me.

I whispered so quietly that I almost made no noise at all that I'd wanted to do... a movie pose....

She pulled back and looked at me. Her eyes got so wide she almost looked funny, and then she smiled.

-

Jerri had to sit down on the sidewalk she laughed so hard.

Everyone laughed, I heard them, but I didn't care. After a few seconds I didn't even hear them.

Carson dipped me back even more.

----

Brenda stayed a while longer and Val and her fooled around with my hair. Val she said I could wash it out in the morning and they tried out mousse and spray and pretty well every hair thing she had. She wanted to see what looked best and Brenda kept making weird suggestions that Val said weren't weird.

Mom came by and said my main problem was I didn't have a proper style, just longish hair. Val kinda grunted no kidding.

"What! I had a nice haircut! You said it was, Mom!" I didn't even know why I cared, or was hurt or something.

"That was almost five months ago, honey." Mom sounded sorry she'd said it. "Haircuts don't grow out evenly and yours is a few inches longer than then."

-

"I think you're just- you have reflexes to keep your leg safe is all." Brenda didn't think my leg was the problem.

"Just ask your physio about it." Val thought so too, maybe. She didn't look like she thought it was bad, anyway. "Here..."

She stood up and then kneeled in front of my feet and put her hands flat on the bottom and pressed on them so I put them like I was standing. Mom and Dad looked up, too.

"Okay, press down with your toes."

With my legs on the ottoman it didn't feel like I was standing, and my feet didn't feel like they were on the floor, but I saw what she meant and tried a bit.

It was the same. One foot pushed her hand away without me even trying. The other one just... just barely moved. Barely touched her hand back. Her hand didn't move at all, or I didn't push it at all. I felt a cold shiver.

"Now do it again." She took her hands away and sat back on her heels. She didn't look like it was bad.

It moved. I moved it. Like nothing. I could feel the muscles in my calf and shin and everything. All the movements I always did and the physio made me.

I could move it, waggle it. I realized, remembered, that I always could, and when Val or Mom or Dad massaged it... or....

"It's just you learned not to move it, like Bren said, or not to put weight on it, to protect your leg." Val smiled. "I bet it'll get stronger fast, now."

"Yeah." Brenda smiled like I shoulda listened to her, but she was happy she was right, too.

----

"Can I have your blue one instead, please? The one with the blue flowers?"

Val looked back at me from her dresser and smiled yeah. She put my Strawberry nightie back and pulled her flannel one out from under, instead. It was the first one she'd ever loaned me and I still liked it.

It wasn't cool or anything, or like thicker or warmer, and she said she knew why I wanted it. That it was the first.

All the makeup had come off pretty fast, with the eye wipes and all, and it was almost too fast to get undressed after it'd taken so long getting dressed, but I felt like it wasn't so much ~fast~ as... maybe too much.... It was all gone too fast.

"Stick 'um up." Val had the nightie all gathered up and ready and I just had to put my arms over my head and ~poof~, I was ready for bed.

In the pretty blue-flowers nightie she'd put on me... the night I figured out I was in love with Carson.

The night Val made me sleep with her. That I hadn't even really noticed, really, until after a long while. The nightie.

And it was like being in love was something that had just happened, and...

It wasn't. It didn't. It was just that I took a long time to see.

It'd taken me a long time to see Carson. That she was a girl. And I'd been in love with her a long time before I knew it. Saw it. Before I knew what to call it.

My leg didn't work right and it'd been broken, but it might've just been that it'd been getting better and I hadn't figured out how to see it right. How to ~not~ have a broken leg. Maybe just having a broken leg for so long had made it seem normal.

I smoothed the front of the nightie down past my flat, boy chest and remembered Carson's hands moving on my sweater. My chest felt wrong. Like I was used to something that wasn't right.

Like I hadn't noticed that I was getting better and I was, and I needed to...

Like maybe I needed new reflexes.

Like Brenda said.

----

Val said something I missed. "Hunh?"

"Is that what you were thinking about?"

"What?" I guess I missed something more. Val hugged harder.

"I said you looked pretty tonight." It sounded like that wasn't what she'd said before.

"I-"

"You ~did~, and stop saying that." She sounded tired and settled back more normal against my back.

I did.

-

"Val?"

"Mm?"

I breathed. It was hard to say it out loud, even whispering. She stayed quiet.

"My weight... all... all the doctors say I'll put it... back on...."

The flannel on my waist under Val's arm was soft. Where it pressed in one place like that I could feel it. All the rest, even all over my whole body, I couldn't feel very well. As soon as I got used to it, I lost the feeling.

Val didn't move or say anything. I thought a while more. What I wanted to say, what I wanted to ask her. If I really did.

I almost couldn't, but I had to. I pulled her arm closer, up to my chin, so I could feel her hand on my skin. I had to open my eyes, too, and look at the dark.

My leg was different than I thought. Like Carson, before. Like I was, before. When I was a boy. Like Scout was, a little girl and a grownup. Like that whole book was. I loved it, but before, I... read it... I didn't know, before.

I couldn't go back to what I was used to, before.

I didn't want to get used to feeling like, like... I had a normal boy's body. Like I used to.

I didn't want to be big and have boy reflexes anymore. That I didn't even know I had.

Like when I couldn't feel softness, or Carson's hand, or see her. For real.

Like when I couldn't even feel my own self. That I loved her.

Being a boy was getting used to it and then being blind to what it was, and not seeing... reality.

She was beautiful, and I never saw her beauty until I saw her girlishness, or even knew what beautiful even was....

And she said I was beautiful. And I was girly.

Val and Mom and everyone said....

I leaned my chin down so I could feel Val's hand more, all warm.

I tried to be really, really clear, even whispering.

"Do you think, if... I could put on weight... more like a girl... than I used to?"

I didn't stop as much as I ran out.

"If I took hormones, like Carson's going to...?"

-

End of Part 27