Trick of the Mind — 43 & 44 by Maeryn Lamonte Melanie Ezell's big closet ultimate writer's challenge — Written From The Heart Thanks to Wren Erendae Phoenix for editing/proofing. Pastor Mike turned up for me at the appointed hour. He noticed, but didn't comment as I swept my long skirt out of the maws of the car door. It looked like I was in for a longer conversation than I'd planned.

-oOo-

It took longer to tell the story this time. I mean that's hardly surprising, given the different things that had happened since the beginning of the summer holiday, but even so, we had finished lunch and were on our second coffee by the time I had finished sharing everything that had happened to me with the pastor.

He remained silent and attentive throughout, which helped keep me focused. I finished telling him how the previous evening had come about and stopped. The coffee was lukewarm but drinkable and I drank down half of it while I waited for my incredulous audience to gather his wits.

“So you mean to say... That right now...”

“I'm wearing a full length green dress with no sleeves, yes.”

“Well that explains your odd movements in the car. It also explains a few things that I've picked up from the Talbots in the past weeks.

“And church?”

“Queen Elizabeth the First. I've been watching a lot of period dramas with Jenny and my sister. My subconscious seems to take notice of what I spend my time looking at.”

“Well Richard, I have to say this is fascinating, but I don't really understand why you shared it with me.”

“I have a few questions, and I thought it would be easier for you to answer them if you had the full picture. You seem a decent kind of guy, and the Talbots think highly of you, which is a great recommendation in my book, so I think I can trust you.”

“Yes, well you certainly can do that.” He rubbed his chin thoughtfully. I've never seen anyone actually do that before. Not outside of a film anyway. “I still don't understand how I can help you. I mean I know nothing about hypnotism, and I'm no expert on transgendered issues, so...”

“No sir, it's not that. It's more... well more to do with religion. I mean my parents are Christians, have gone to church for as long as I remember and dragged my sister and me along as well. But then so are the Talbots. And you of course. I just don't understand how two families who say they follow the same God can be so different.”

“Ah, one of the easy questions.” He smiled to make sure I knew he was joking. “At least it's more familiar territory, and yes I think I can give you an answer. There's a park across the road, I wonder if you'd mind taking a walk with me. I don't think my bladder could survive another coffee, and I find walking clears my mind.”

He paid the bill and we crossed over into a moderately sized, tree-lined park. There were grey clouds on the horizon, threatening a violent end to our Indian summer, but it seemed that, for this afternoon at least, the weather would hold. We walked slowly, which was better for me. I could, most likely, have run in that dress, but it moved more freely and more comfortably with the small, slow steps we were taking. I had given Pastor Mike a lot to process, so I left him collecting his thoughts and took a moment to enjoy the warmth and the smell of the flowers.

“You have to realise that, since I have no direct experience of your parents' church, what I am about to say is purely conjecture.”

It was a well considered opening statement and it raised my hopes of a well considered answer to my question. I waited for him to continue. It didn't take long.

“I think what you are describing is what I would call the difference between religion and relationship.”

He looked at my blank expression and decided more details were called for.

“Religion is a man made thing. It has existed almost as long as man's ability to communicate and it has always been a way of providing an explanation, and at least the illusion of control, over the aspects of our lives that we cannot understand. Things like fire and lightning, drought and famine. The early explanations are as varied and as bizarre as man's imagination could make them, and they almost always end up attributing powers to supernatural beings which we end up calling gods.

“Now men have always done things that either please or anger other men, so the natural extension to the thinking that created the gods was the belief that certain actions pleased or angered them too. Out of this, eventually, grew sets of rules, ways of living, which were intended to keep the gods appeased and ensure that none of the terrible things they could make happen did.

“The problem with rules though, is that they don't work in all instances. Even the laws we have today, many of which have their roots in Christian teaching by the way, even those laws are open to abuse. A certain type of person finds ways of twisting them to his own ends so that his life is improved at the expense of others. From your experiences this summer, I would say that you have experienced that first hand.

“But it's not just the twisted minds who twist the rules to their own benefit. There are exceptions to pretty much every rule if you give it serious consideration. One of the Ten Commandments states, 'you shall not steal', and yet there is such a thing in our world as a kleptomaniac, someone who cannot help but take things that don't belong to him. Is such a person to be judged as harshly as someone who knowingly and deliberately steals without compulsion?

“No. Religions and the legal structures they form have always been flawed. Limited by their ability to define right and wrong only in its most primitive form, and vulnerable to abuse by genuinely evil people. Sorry that's a bit of a religious word in itself. Good and evil, black and white. In reality, evil is rooted in selfishness and a conscious decision to choose one's own welfare above that of others.

“What religion does provide, which is so attractive to many, is a structure for belief. If you're unsure whether something is right or wrong, then you refer to your chosen religious text and accept the right or wrong that is written within its covers. It takes away the uncertainty of whether you are acting justly, because you are only doing what your particular god or gods tell you is right.

“Is this making any sense?”

“I think so, but I'm not sure yet where you're going with it.”

“Patience, Richard, we're getting there.

“Now imagine that in the midst of all this, there actually is a creator God who wants to have a relationship with his creation. Imagine that the most important gift he gave human beings is free will and the ability to choose their own way. He knows that leaving them to their own devices is going to result in a lot of selfish choices, which in turn will result in everyone turning against everyone else with destructive results. He also knows that providing a set of rules, while pushing them into more co-operative behaviour, is going to result in people following him because they are told to, not because they want to. So instead He comes up with a different plan. One that involves relationship with Him.

“Now it's not my intention to proselytise, at least not until you're prepared to listen of your own free will, but that is essentially what the Bible is about. Yes there are laws in there. There are the Ten Commandments I already mentioned, and there are all the Mosaic laws that follow in Pentateuch, the first five books of the Bible. There is the statement Jesus made in Matthew five that not the smallest letter, nor the least stroke of a pen, will disappear from the Law. But at the same time the Bible tells us that upholding the Law isn't enough to make things right with God — Romans three, I think you'll find.

“What the Bible does say throughout is that what God wants from us is for us to act justly, love mercy and walk humbly with Him. He wants to give us a new spirit, a new heart; to replace our hearts of stone with hearts of flesh, and with his Spirit in us we will want to do things His way. That's loosely Micah six and Ezekiel thirty six, in case you're interested. It may sound a little like brainwashing, but from my experience and that of others I've met, it actually isn't.”

We found a bench facing a large boating lake and sat down.

“If you think about it — and I'm not sure how well you know the Bible, or even the Gospels — if you think about it, Jesus broke the law, allowing his disciples to pick and eat corn on the Sabbath. It may sound like a small thing, but it was actually one of the original big ten. His Justification? He asked if man was made to serve the Sabbath or the other way round. He also healed someone on the Sabbath, he allowed a prostitute to wash his feet with perfume and tears and dry them with her hair, he went to share meals in the houses of tax collectors, and they still have a lousy reputation today. He even told a criminal on the cross next to him that he would have a place in heaven, just because he recognised Jesus as God's Son and asked to be remembered.

“If Jesus had anything against anyone, it was teachers of the law, who converted people to follow an increasingly convoluted and unfair set of rules which did nothing to help them get any nearer to God. Them and rich people, because wealth has a tendency to make people selfish.

“Christianity is a powerful basis for religion and has been twisted by a great many people over the years. Most modern cults, in the West at least, derive from Christianity. There is no religion in the world that has so many denominations — slight differences in emphasis for the most part — because religious people want to twist it to their own preferred beliefs. There is no religion in the world that has been the cause of more terrible atrocities in God's name, because people believe in it so strongly, but when they believe the structure, the laws, to be more important than the relationship with God himself, they become rigid, unthinking, unfeeling, and they apply what they believe the law tells them without considering the humanity they are destroying.

“Religious thinking is unbending. It forces people down rigid and uncompromising channels which result in the sort of action your father took against you. Ironically, I'm sure he felt that what he was doing was right at the time, that he had your best interests at heart, as well as his own, conveniently.”

“My sister said something to my dad when we last saw him. She said that the Bible wasn't so much an instruction manual as a guide book.”

“That's a very good way of putting it.”

“So do you think God would accept me as I am?”

“He's accepted thieves, murderers, adulterers, all people who've broken those first ten laws he gave to Moses. How can you think that He would turn you away?”

I looked out over the water, lost in thought. Mike left my wandering mind to its drifting for a minute, then decided on adding something.

“There are some Christians who consider that God is an embodiment of both male and female. They argue that man was created in God's image and then woman was taken from man, so the original man would have contained both male and female aspects. I'm pretty sure there aren't many who'd see it this way, but if you consider yourself to be a mixture of man and woman in your mind, your spirit at least, then you could argue that makes you closer to God than most. I'm not so sure about that myself, but if it helps encourage you to answer the door when He comes knocking, then I'm not sure I care that much.

“You know the story of the prodigal son?”

I nodded.

“There's that bit at the end of it where the son comes home, all covered in pig shit.” He smiled at my startled reaction. “The father doesn't care. He comes running out to the son and throws his arms around him, leads him back home and puts his best robe on him.

“You acknowledge your need of God and come to Him, he will welcome you. He may want some changes from you, but none that you can't manage with His help. If He doesn't take away that bit of you that wants to be a girl, then I don't know, I guess He doesn't see it as that much of a problem. He may even have plans for you to use it, reach out to others like yourself. As I say, I don't know. All I do know is that your sister is right. The Bible is little more than a guidebook to finding God, and what matters after that is your relationship with Him.”

“Isn't there a bit where the Bible calls people like me abomination?”

“That's actually how it refers to people with abnormal sexual practices. I believe the passage you're thinking of says that God despises people who do what you do. It's kind of harsh, and it doesn't match up with God's otherwise loving, forgiving and accepting nature which is mentioned far more than the one instance of the other thing. I like to think that Moses was having a really bad day when he put that to paper. It's smacks more of a man's reaction than that of the God I've come to know.

I couldn't help the tears. I'd spent so much of my life thinking I was something disgusting because of this thing in me and the way my parents had made me feel about it. Could I believe this guy?

“I'll tell you a story. I doubt it's true, but it's worth the telling for the point it makes.

“This missionary goes off to some distant land where he lives amongst a tribe of cannibals. One day the chief comes up to the missionary and asks what he can do to become a Christian. The missionary tells the chief, 'You can't become a Christian because you have eight wives. The Christian faith requires you to have just the one.' So the chief goes away thoughtful, and declares a week of feasting. At the end of the week he comes back to the missionary and asks, 'Can I become a Christian now?' 'I told you, you can have only one wife if you wish to become a Christian,' the missionary replies, to which the chief asks, 'What do you think the week of feasting was all about?'”

“Euw, that's sick.” It really was.

“I know, but it makes the point. We all have our different cultural hang-ups. In this part of the world we have a tendency to get caught up on sexual immorality, and there is some good reason for that. The problem is we tend to go too far with it, chucking in anything that looks like sexual immorality into the same melting pot and despising it with all our strength. You say you can't help the way you are, right?”

I nodded.

“Then at the worst that puts you in the same category as the kleptomaniac; someone who does something everyone else considers to be wrong, but can't help it. It's not even that bad, because what you do doesn't directly affect other people, and the rejection is more from the way they refuse to accept you than because you are doing anything that causes them harm.

“Tell me, how would you feel if God were to take away your desire to put on women's clothing, to express your feminine side?”

“I don't know. I guess I would miss the feeling it gives me, but it would make life a lot less complicated.”

“So essentially, it's something you'd be prepared to give up if He helped?”

“I suppose so.”

“Then you've nothing to lose from coming to meet Him properly sometime. And I now find myself having to apologise, because I'm overstepping the mark. It's just that when you feel so strongly that there are answers in my faith to problems such as yours, you get a little eager to share.”

“No, it's alright. You've given me a lot to think about, and you've answered my main question.”

“Enough for one day then?”

I nodded, and followed him back to the car. The trip home was silent, with me swimming around in all the new thoughts and ideas he had given me, and Pastor Mike allowing me the quiet to think.

-oOo-

Jen was waiting for me when I got home, but suppressed her usual exuberant self when she saw my expression. I was comfortable enough in the green dress, so didn't change back into Rachael. Instead we sat quietly on the sofa, Jen with her nose in a book, only glancing up occasionally to check if I was ready to talk yet. Me, I sat staring blankly at the wall, still very much feeling my way through all the new information I had. At least this explained why Mum and Dad had treated me the way they had. It probably didn't excuse it, but it did make it easier to forgive them. It also fitted in with what Uncle Stan had said. There seemed to be such a truth ringing through everything the pastor had told me that afternoon, I was almost ready to give it a capital T. Almost.

The afternoon was coming to a close by the time I’d had enough chasing my thoughts. I looked down at Jen who smiled back, still not willing to break the silence. She rubbed my arms and hugged it to her, waiting for some reaction from me. I reached down and kissed her. We were still lip-locked when the door opened and Mr and Mrs T walked in laden with bags.

“I'd say get a room, but I'm afraid of what you two might do, tucked away by yourselves.” There was only humour in Mr T's voice, but it broke the afternoon's spell. Jen and I separated and went out to help unload the car and to fill the freezer.

Later, over dinner, Mrs T asked me what Pastor Mike and I had talked about, unless it was personal, of course. I told them, going over at least most of the things Mike had said. The three of them exchanged glances across the table, but apart from a few nondescript comments, they said nothing more. I guess they figured, like Mike had, that decisions and choices in this regard were mine alone.

The short silence was broken by Mrs T leaning over to a couple of bags that had been set aside from the rest of the shopping,

“I saw this and thought of Rachael,” she said pulling out a sparkly, green flapper dress, complete with feather headband. “We've been invited to a Charleston party on Friday. I know it's a bit presumptuous of me, but since Jen's coming, I assumed you'd want to as well. If you'd rather go as Richard, we can take this back and sort something else out, but it would go so well with your eyes, I couldn't really resist.”

Well there's a first. Not every day that your girlfriend's mother buys you a dress.

Jen wanted me to try it on, and I have to admit that deep down, and even not so deep down, I wanted to as well. We'd just about finished eating, so Jen sat squirming excitedly until Mr T gave in and let us go upstairs.

If Thoroughly Modern Millie is anything to go by, the flapper era was marked, at least in part, by flat chested girls. Even so, Jen insisted that I needed my boobs, and properly stuck on given the lowish neckline. They were attached before I remembered that I'd used up the last of the solvent that morning. By then there was nothing to be done, and no-one to complain to since Jen had dashed off for her own costume.

It took a while to sort out my hair with the headband, and to find a pair of tights and shoes to match the dress, but by the time Jen returned for me, sparkling in her own very similar dress, I was all but ready. She helped me sort out a few last stray hairs then, giggling and jiggling, we headed downstairs.

Mr T put some period music on the stereo and for the next hour or so, they took me through some of the moves. In the end we collapsed, exhausted as much from the exercise as from the laughter.

“Do I take it that Rachael will be coming with us to the party then?” Mrs T's enquiring mind wanted to know.

“I guess so. I didn't remember until Jen had stuck my boobs on, that I'd run out of solvent.” Jen's slightly guilty look suggested that she had.

“Well, do you know where we can order some more?”

“I guess there'll be somewhere on the Internet, but I don't know how long it'll take to deliver.”

A little research on the family computer found us a place in Europe with a delivery time of three to five days. Mr T put in the order on his credit card and I promised to pay him back the next day. Three to five days wasn't so bad, I'd been Rachael for longer on the boat.

It did mean that the outings that week, when we met up with Jen's friends, it was Rachael who went along, Rachael who was introduced to everyone and Rachael who Jen said was going along to the party. It didn't bother me that much, as I loved the dress and doing the Charleston seemed so much more fun as a girl than a guy. The same with most dancing to be honest, but maybe that's just my opinion.

The dance was as good as expected, and I got to know Jen's girl friends really well. Some of the guys tried it on with me but, with Jen as my wingm... er woman, they didn't really stand a chance.

“Sorry guys, we're both spoken for.” Which was truth enough.

The solvent had arrived on Thursday, but it hadn't seemed worthwhile removing my enhancements, just to put them back on again a day and a half later. Besides, Jen had arranged to meet up with some of her friends Thursday afternoon to get in some last minute supplies for the party, and it would have raised questions had I gone as Richard one day then not turned up to the party the next.

Still enough was enough. It may well have been all the energetic dancing, but by the time we returned to the Talbot residence in the small hours of Saturday morning, I had a definite itch going on in places I couldn't scratch. The solvent worked its charm in no time and I returned to the lounge, a considerably less well endowed flapper, just in time for late night cocoa.

“Any chance Richard can be around to help tomorrow?” Mr T asked. “I'd like to get the garage cleared a little while I have some extra muscle around the place.”

“Sure. As long as we don't have to start too early.”

“I hate to waste daylight, so I'll be starting about eight. What say I knock on your door at, say, seven thirty?”

Everyone laughed at my heartfelt groan. Mr T waving his hands and shaking his head.

“No, it's alright Richard, I doubt any of us will be up for much before ten. I'll knock on your door then or thereabouts, if you’re sure you won't be needing any more beauty sleep.”

I drained my mug.

“Well if that's all I'm going to get, I guess I'll have to start early this side of it all.”

I said my goodnights and headed up the stairs with Jen in close pursuit. She stopped me at my room.

“Thanks for tonight, and for all of this week; it's been fun having Rachael around. I hope you can forgive me for the thing with the glue.”

“I just hope you haven't been missing your boyfriend too much.”

“Well it has been a little odd having to sneak cuddles and kisses with you all week, but it's not as if Rachael's around now, is it?” She traced delicate patterns around my very flat bust.

I opened the door to my room and pulled her in. Bedtime was delayed briefly while we rediscovered how much more amorous kissing as Jen and Richard could be, even Richard in a dress. We were interrupted a few minutes later as Mr T banged on the door and shouted something about thinking I wanted to get to sleep. The suppressed laughter from the other side of the door suggested that they weren't angry, but it was a definite hint that Jen and I should separate. I wiped a lipstick smear from her face and slipped her out into a now deserted corridor. She tried to sneak past her parents' bedroom door, but got a 'goodnight Jen' as she passed even so.

-oOo-

I spent the last week at the Talbots as Richard. Helping Mr T on Saturday highlighted a bunch of DIY jobs that needed doing about the house, and it seemed that Paul was more of a thinker than a doer. It was mostly stuff I knew I could do, since I'd been doing similar things at home for years. It was how I'd started the summer after all.

Mr T had some great tools, and they were in perfect condition — probably because they had hardly ever been used. I threw myself into the jobs, doing as much as I could and as well as I could. It seemed a poor enough way to say thank you for everything these wonderful people had done for me, but it was something. I think they saw how grateful I was from the effort I put in, at least I hope they did.

The only downside was the ridiculous outfits I ended up doing it all in. At least the hems were on the rise again. They were still below the knee, but I would hardly have felt safe climbing a ladder in an ankle length dress of any sort. Not to say that I didn't horribly feel exposed the day I cleaned out the gutters wearing a dirndl. Jen held the ladder for me and couldn't stop giggling at the way I kept trying to smooth down the very full skirt all the time.

Eventually the weekend arrived. Mr T and I loaded up their car and trailer with all Jen's stuff and everything of mine she and I had managed to haul up from my home. There was space in the car for all four of us, so we made a family trip of it.

Jen's cover story was that, since I had lost my place in the house with Dave and co, I was starting off the term in temporary accommodation, and she and the girls had offered to look after my stuff until I got settled in. I didn't like lying to the Talbots, but Jen persuaded me that it would be easier than explaining our plan for me to live with her and the girls as Rachael.

We didn't carry of the subterfuge very well though. After we'd unloaded our stuff at the house, Mr and Mrs Talbot took us out for lunch. There was that stretched feeling of impending separation through the whole meal, which put a dampener the conversation. We were all a bit subdued, reluctant for the inevitable parting. Halfway through dessert, Mrs T spoke up.

“You know, it's a shame Richard can't stay with you and the girls. You know, as Rachael I mean. I'm sure he could carry it off.” Our faces must have told them all they needed to know. “Oh come on you two. Did you really think we we wouldn't work it out?”

“And you're OK with it?” Jen was quietly incredulous.

“I would hardly say that, sweetheart,” Jen's dad chipped in, “but you are an adult now. You're both adults. You'll do what you want regardless of what we say or want, and in a way that's as it should be. Personally, I think it's a mistake, what you're doing, but it's your mistake to make and your mess to clean up when it all goes horribly wrong.”

My face must have been a picture, because he visibly fought down a smile before continuing.

“Richard. My daughter has been at university for a year and has another two to go. She doesn't have — neither, I hope, does she need — our supervision and guidance. Overall we think she's a responsible and intelligent young woman. However, we do know the sort of trouble she could get herself into, and we do worry, which is why we are very happy that the two of you have linked lives.

“I doubt I need to tell you what I would prefer for my daughter, but when it comes down to it, the choice should be hers now. That's not a free pass, but more a passing on of a responsibility. So share a house, live under the same roof, dress as a woman if you need to, and I can see how this arrangement would allow you to do that. All I ask is that you take the responsibility seriously, and always remember, if you do end up getting into a mess that's too big for you to handle, we're always on the other end of the phone. That goes for both of you.”

“You don't mind that we lied to you?” From my point of view the cat was out of the bag, so no sense in pretending otherwise.

“A little disappointed, but I know how persuasive my daughter can be. She'd make a pretty good barrister, if only I could lure her over to the dark side. You never know, this psychology thing of hers might even be an asset.”

Jen gave her dad a look but, having been so recently busted, her heart wasn't really in it. Nobody felt like coffee, so Mr T paid the bill and they dropped us off back at our place before heading home.

We watched the car disappear down the road and I gave Jen a hug.

“You OK?” I asked her.

“Yeah, you?”

“Better knowing we aren't lying to your folks anymore.”

“Yeah. You needn't have folded so neatly under Mum and Dad's cross-examination though.”

-oOo-