Easy As Falling Off a Bike.
by Angharad
part: 135

Eventually I recovered my senses from the embarrassment. It had to be one of his jokes, but he continued staring in the jeweller's window. "Do you fancy any of them?" he pointed at several trays of rings.

"I think we need to talk," I said feeling my colour rising again.

"What about?" he looked puzzled. "I thought you said, you loved me?"

"I do."

"So what is there to talk about?"

"Lots. If you were serious, and I am not convinced you were, there are all sorts of complications involved."

"I am not that stupid even though I do work in a bank."

"Can we go and find somewhere more private and warmer, where we may be able to talk this over a bit more fully?" I asked feeling very uncomfortable talking in a public throroughfare.

"Okay," he threw his good arm in the air in a mild protest, but walked on with me, his arm around me again.

We strolled for maybe a couple of hundred yards when we discovered a small Italian coffee shop. "This do?"

I peered through the tinted windows and net curtains, it was busy but there were spaces. I nodded and we went in. We found a relatively private table and ordered two latte coffees and a cake each.

"You didn't answer my original question." Simon looked accusingly at me.

"Which one was that?" I was playing for time.

"My proposition to change your surname."

"Ah! Erm, well that is easy enough, it's the method which is the problem."

"I'd have thought it was the easiest," he said accepting his coffee from the pretty, dark haired waitress.

"If things were ordinary, that might be the case, although with your background it might not be."

"What's my background got to do with it, I thought it was yours that was the trouble?" He said almost angrily.

"Don't go all huffy on me, I'm doing my best here," I said feeling that wet sensation in my eyes again. "Your family, because of the publicity it's bound to receive upon your engagement or wedding, will be anxious to make sure it's all positive stuff."

"Dunno, there have black sheep in the past, my great uncle Marcus...."

"I'm sure that's a fascinating tale Si, but can we keep to the present issue? So you could imagine what they would feel if my history came out?"

"Not if we tell them first."

"If only it were that simple."

"Of course it is. I'll give Dad a ring," he pulled out his mobile.

"Simon, please wait until we've finished discussing this before bringing in other parties."

"He is family." His expression drooped.

"I know and I liked him very much," I lied but well! "I'm not so sure about your step mum."

"She's okay once you get to know her. Once she knows, she might leave you alone." He looked up at my stony glare, "Maybe not."

"Also look at how much publicity I'll receive, which I don't need right now. Besides I don't know what my dad would think."

"Of what, the publicity or getting married?"

"Either or both. Besides we can't, legally anyway."

"Why not?"

I rolled my eyes, thinking, Simon some days you are so thick it is untrue. "I am still legally male," I said very quietly.

"Oh, until you have your op, you mean?"

"No, even after that, until I go through the process to get things changed, and that takes time. Plus, I have to do the life test which means a year before referral to surgery."

"I think Stella can help there," he smirked.

"You've been talking to Stella, about me?" I felt betrayed, although given the circumstances, it was more inevitable than anything.

"Yeah, don't worry, she knows this surgeon and if I slip him some...."

"Simon, it doesn't work like that, they have protocols to follow."

"I'm sure we can get round that," he smiled.

"I don't know if I want to." I shook my head in disbelief.

"What? You don't want this sorted?" He indicated his groin, "Or you don't want to marry me?"

"Why do we have to decide that now, we hardly know each other?" I pleaded with him.

"I know you're the woman for me, or will be."

"That's very flattering Simon, and I love you for saying it, but I need more time."

"Well at least have your op, and then we could you know," he raised his eyebrow a couple of times.

"Have sex," I said bluntly.

He blushed and nodded.

I blushed too, because while at times it felt like the most important thing on the earth for me to feel my body wrapped around this man, it wasn't an absolute priority, earning a living came before that. There was no way I was going to parasitise anyone, however much they wanted me to. There were also the opinions of Dr Thomas to be considered, she could be at risk if she referred me too early and things went wrong. A psychiatrist in London had been suspended because of exactly that. I respected her too much to put her at risk, even though I felt impatient at having to wait for a year.

"I need more time Simon and please don't take that as a reflection upon you. You are a sweet man, most of the time," he opened his mouth to protest but changed his mind, "And I love you dearly. Were things normal, I'd have made passionate love with you, but they aren't, so I can't."

"I'm sure we could improvise," he said hopefully.

"I'm sure we could, but I don't want to. I want to right, to feel right about myself before I offer myself to anyone, and you in particular."

"Oh," he said, and his face fell again.

"I'm still new to all this Simon, I have much to learn about myself and just being a woman."

He nodded, looking rather downcast. "Does that mean you want to play the field a bit?"

"I hadn't even thought of that," I confessed.

"I said I was happy to wait, and I am, you know."

"Yes I know you did and I respect you for that, probably more than you realise." I felt my eyes well up again. His hand found mine and squeezed it.

"Can we still remain friends, or have I blown it?" he said his eyes looking very worried.

"Of course we can. I know, we can buy each other rings, friendship rings."

"I want you to wear my wedding ring, or engagement ring, not a friendship ring. That's something teenagers do."

"I was going to say, which would be a symbol of our pledge to sort this out when I had overcome the existing obstacles."

" I don't know." With that he stood up and went to pay the bill, I got up and followed, neither of us had eaten our cakes and I hadn't drunk my coffee either.

As I threaded my way between the tables I felt ill prepared for all this. I wondered if things would have been better if I hadn't met Simon or Stella and was still chasing my degrees as Charlie. Then I knew that wasn't true, I was just hadn't got time to worry about relationships when I had so much to do with work and just learning to live as a woman.

There were many people at the university who I hadn't dealt with yet, who would need to be brought on board, and although the rumours were whizzing around the grapevine faster than broadband, I needed to make sure they got the picture from the horse's mouth. I needed to sort out so many things, including having some time for me, but with Dad and Simon, that was impossible.

Some days I wondered just what I had got myself into. I was living the dream, but felt somewhere in the shadows there was this thing lurking which could so easily flip it into a nightmare. The pressure seemed all around me, and then there was the malefactor who was sending me the poison mail. I felt like running away, or better still, cycling off into the sunset.