CHAPTER 54
I was crapping myself as I did the final touches to my eyes and lips.

The two bags left for me were actually rather nice, one a big and saggy thing in glove soft brown leather, the other much smaller and on a long thin strap, something I could almost envisage wearing on the bike. The smaller one would do for tonight, it matched the shoes nicely and had enough space for what I had to carry. I mean, sanitary products would never be needed, would they?

That one actually hurt. I was reminded of my loving grandmother, and what she had done to the flesh of her flesh, and here I was unable to do what she had done without thinking. I wanted to nurture, I yearned to hold, to love, and there she was…words failed me in all senses, my mind wanted to shut down in protest. Concentrate, Annie, make this a good evening for Eric, for Dennis, for Kirsty my sweet harpy. Fuck it, Annie, do it for yourself.

“Eric, can you zip me up?”

He was looking tasty in slacks and a short-sleeved blue shirt. “Ready?”

“No, but this will have to do”

The sound of my heels on the pavement was deafening, but Eric had my hand, and off we went down the early evening streets. Wepassed and were passed by several people, but nobody seemed to give us a second glance, apart from one older woman who smiled at our hand-holding. All too soon we were at the gate to Kirsty’s small house, where Eric stopped. He looked at me, and I nodded. Up the path, ring the bell…a small mountain of cleavage with a seriously black eye seized me in a hug.

“Annie! Come in!”

She was in a blouse and skirt combination, and I was surprised (in what I realised was a catty way) that the skirt was knee length and not shorter. The blouse struggled, though, but the whole effect was capped by the pink and fluffy bunny-faced slippers on her feet. Den was in the kitchen, and called hello through the doorway as Kirsty sat us down. She gave me the once-over, head tilted to one side as if weighed down by the shiner.

“A bit Laura Ashley, Annie!”

“A bit ‘me’, Ruthy!””

“You know what I mean. When I get you clubbing we’ll have to spice it up a bit”

“You trying to frighten me off?”

“No, girl, just welcoming you to my world. Ah, fill the glasses, lover. Eric?”

He nodded, and I drooled. Den was dressed much as Eric was, men’s clothing being so constrained, but he filled it very nicely, very nicely indeed, and it was just like the first time I saw him. Kirsty saw my expression, and slapped my knee.

“Taken, and so are you, you tart!”

There was still a definite awkwardness about things. Through dinner, which was chicken in crá¨me fraiche and tarragon, Kirsty kept up her ‘welcome to womanhood’ thread, but there was still a distance to them both, as if they were trying to fit Annie to Adam. Kirsty made more jokes about adjusting my fashion sense, and shorter skirts, but it came across as a little stilted. It wasn’t till afterwards, when I made a point of settling into Eric’s embrace on the settee as we finished the wine, that I could see their perceptions adjust that little bit more. The wine, the time spent together, and my complete relaxation into Eric’s cuddle finally seemed to bridge the gap, until Kirsty had to ask the question.

“Eric, look, just curious, sort of, and a bit concerned about Annie here, but how, you know, do you deal with knowing she’s…she’s still got her danglies, like?”

Eric stroked my arm, calming, reassuring.

“That was my hang-up, Kirsty. I am about as straight as they come, and everything physical was just, well, it pushed all the wrong buttons, yeah? I was so confused, I mean, anyone can see she’s a girl, no matter how she dresses. What was that phrase, love? Leaking round the edges?”

“Yeah, that’s the one”

He squeezed my knee, thanking me, and continued. “I don’t want to get all personal here, but the more I live with her, the more she allows herself to just, I don’t know, leak like that, the easier it gets. And she has changed, physically, already”

He suddenly got a big grin as Kirsty’s eyes went to my chest a split second after Den’s.

“Yeah, and I like that too! Look, we have a long and hard road ahead, and that is why we really appreciate you two doing this. So many others would have turned their backs”

Kirsty nodded. “Yeah, like we talked about it a lot, me and Den, and what it is we sort of came up with is that we would probably have done just that. It ain’t natural, that’s the way I always felt when I heard about these things, and my Den here, he was the same. But, oh I don’t know, it is you, my Sarge Price, not some odd nutter in the Sun or the Screws, yeah?”

I nodded. “Makes all the difference?”

She was a little shamefaced. “Yeah, it does, and then I think to myself, if it is OK for her, him, whatever, why is it wrong for others? Am I being an arsehole about it, sort of thing”

Eric spoke. “No, love, you’re no arsehole. The fact that you have enough humanity and decency to ask the question in the first place says that. Look at how long it took me to understand. We are nothing special, just ordinary people, we take time to learn”

I squeezed him back. “Well, I think you are special”

Eric blushed, and continued. “You know who IS special? Ginny, that’s who. She didn’t just let a friend fall through the net, she went after them, found out what was wrong and promptly put everything else away till she was sure her friend was safe again. That’s special. I mean, people like the Woods, and Steph’s family, they are good people, really good, but Ginny goes above and beyond that, and I owe her my lover here”

Den was also nodding hard. “Aye, there’s no way I could ever have tolerated a gender bender, like, not even Annie here, till she rubbed my nose in what she is. It was that kid, and we now know how bloody right she was. How right you were, Annie. Oh, it’s like that equality and diversity bollocks, aye, value someone because they are different, which is a shite idea. Why does being different make you more valuable? Now, not being an arsehole, as Kirst says, just because someone is different, that makes sense. Ah, you know what I mean. Now, are we going to get properly wrecked tonight? It has been a shit week, and if my lass here agrees, there is a spare bed if you get too wobbly”

I smiled back at him. “Wrecked would be good, but we have our own bed not too far away, and it will make morning ablutions easier, aye? More wine, garçon!”

We were walking back in the cool night air some time later, and Eric asked me why we hadn’t taken the offer.

“Two things, my love. One, by all accounts Kirsty gets a little vocal, and I really didn’t fancy that tonight. Secondly, I want you, in our bed, to understand that it is our bed, and to make it our bed properly, and all sorts of other stuff that involve the word ‘our’, and, well..”

I couldn’t speak any more, you can’t when you have another tongue in your mouth, and my nipples needed soothing after that, and so he did, and I soothed him, and as I did so, in our bed, I wondered if the joy I was feeling could ever leak out to people like Darren, or poor, abused Chantelle.

Lucky, that was the word. So, so lucky.