Who are the Real Monsters? by: Elsbeth Ken Umeki will learn that not all monsters come out at night.

Getting worked up over clothes seemed rather ridiculous. The stark realization that I literally had nothing to wear told me it was time to shop. One look at the mirror told me what type of clothing I needed to buy. We didn’t have to go far; I was surprised that there was plenty of shopping available in Skogshaven. Since I’ve never had the opportunity to clothes shop in town, it shouldn’t be that much of a surprise. Now Aunt Naomi owns a dress shop called ‘In Stitches’ but that was mostly bridal gowns and costumes, what we were looking for was clothes I could wear to school.

Aya wanted me to go to Anthropologi or Forever21 but was disappointed to find we would need to go all the way to Boston. My cousins Rebecca and Hibiki pointed out that whatever we couldn’t find in Skogshaven, we could always hit the mega mall a couple of towns over. I’ll admit their shopping-Fu was strong so I put myself into their capable hands.

Dragged me into “Love Lace” first for underwear, excuse me lingerie, where the girls happily selected a wide variety of types and colors for me. It was quite the educational experience. There must be at least a dozen types of bras alone not to mention panties. Being a guy suddenly seemed a lot simpler. At least the first stop wasn’t too emotionally scarring; I have been in a lingerie shop or two before although I never thought I would be in one for myself. I did manage to snag some comfortable looking Pajamas. Our clothing conquest continued, invading some place called the ‘The Hangout’, where I was introduced to the mystic world of girl clothing names. The two of them threw words at me like capris and pedal pushers as if I knew what in the world they were talking about.

My cousins were mind numbingly efficient and wouldn’t take ‘no’, or ‘please I’ll do anything but let me out of this store’ as an answer. After that we weren’t even close to being done hitting two smaller boutique, a shoe place called the ‘Chaussures’ and finally Carole’s. Ending up at The Nordic for lunch, I was emotionally, physically and spiritually exhausted. Aya said it was a good start. Looking at the number of bags now in my possession, I thought she was kidding. All three of them said I was an amateur.

“Hibiki, what’s shaking?” A voice rang out over the conversations of the Nordic’s patrons that were sitting with us on the patio. The three of us turned as four boys approached. Looking at my cousin, I could see that she was less than thrilled to see them near our table. The tallest who called out to Hibiki was some sort of Viking throwback. Blonde hair, blue eyes, strong looking arms, wide shoulders and a nice smile and while I was checking him out, the notion that I was checking him out blew my mind. What was happening to me?

“Eating lunch with my cousins.”

“That’s cool; we were heading to Kosta's, but guess you’re not interested. Who’s the new girl?”

Hibiki sighed. “Christen, this is my cousin Kimme.”

“Nice name, you live around here?” He leaned forward giving me a smile.

Was he really trying to pick me up or something? For a brief moment, it excited me and then this mental insight came to me with the understanding that this person was total slime. I looked at him for a moment. “My current residence is in the Shisaa family compound.”

“Current residence, nice...So you interested in seeing a movie with me this Saturday, does six o’clock sound good.”

“No.”

His smile didn’t leave his face. “That’s fine we can make it another time.”

“I don’t think so.” At this moment, I started to hear chuckles from some of his friends. It’s always enjoyable watching another guy crash and burn. Rebecca started kicking me under the table.

“Well, if you don’t like the movies, we can do something else.”

I gave a theatrical sigh. “Christen, I’m sorry if I gave you the impression that I was interested in doing anything with you. If you would please excuse us we are trying to have a nice lunch.”

“Who the hell…” Christen began.

It was at that moment that Aya stepped in. “Kimme-sama is there a problem?” All four boys took a step back. Aya could be a bit intimidating sometimes.

“No Aya, Christen and his friends were just leaving.”

The other three boys had huge grins on their faces as they dragged Christen away. “Dude, did you see that, she has a bodyguard...man you’re way out of your league.”

Watching the boys leave, I regally picked up my fork and continued eating. Hibiki and Rebecca just sat there staring at me. The effect was ruined when I began to giggle; the others soon joined in. “Kimme, that was freaking awesome.” Hibiki said. Giving her a smile, I was now confused, why did the idea of going out with a boy to the movies not sound all that bad.

“So how was your call with your mom?” Rebecca had at least stopped kicking me under the table.

“Nice I guess, strange but nice.”

“What do you mean by strange?”

Thinking for a moment, I tried to decide what I meant by strange. “She was very friendly. Not that she’s not friendly but she seemed really concerned about how I was doing. I talked more with her last night then I ever had before.” My mother even apologized to me about not calling, stating that because of time zones and her meeting she couldn’t call. She actually sounded sorry.

“I’m guessing she isn’t normally that way?” Hibiki made a face. “Your mom seems nice when she comes to visit grandma.”

I nodding in understanding, my mother can be very nice. It was hard to articulate. “It’s not that she isn’t nice. Normally she is too busy to deal with me. Mostly it was that children should be seen and not heard.”

“Maybe she always wanted a daughter.” Rebecca said offhandedly.

“Rebecca.” Hibiki chastised her.

“Oh, sorry; I didn’t mean anything by it.”

“No, it’s OK.” Was that the truth of it? She did seem a lot more interested in who I was as a person. Did she really think Ken was a bother? Aya didn’t give any insight, not that I expected her to. “I’m not upset about it. It was actually nice to have a conversation with her. She seemed really excited about my upcoming birthday.”

“We are all looking forward to it, Kimme-sama.” Aya said.

My plan after the shopping trip was to take a shower, crawl into one of my new flannel pajamas and curl up in front of the television and veg. Aya of course had other ideas, which included me being smacked around. It was family night at the dojo. Running and dancing was one thing but the off chance that I was going to be my old self while doing karate seemed unlikely. Aya said I would be fine. So of course, once again, I was proved wrong, going through all of the kata’s from beginning to end with no issues. I did have some problems initially with my weapons forms but I think that was more to the fact I hadn’t practiced since Hawaii.

Still there were a couple of things I didn’t like. First of all, in the Shisaa dojo, my yudansha (black) belt was red with a huge black strip running down the center to signify that I was a female belt owner. Not that I minded the female thing anymore really, it was obvious, so why the different colored belt.

Secondly, I was attracting an undue amount of attention from my male cousins. Of course, I knew what they were staring at; they are hard to miss but still. With this new additional problem added to my life, I could do a few things, enjoy the attention, or get mad; I decided door number three and ignored them. Really, if I didn’t, Aya would place my face on the mat in a microsecond. My cousin Sora unfortunately was not that wise.

“Sora, if you can keep your eyes off Kimme’s tits for five minutes you might learn something.”
Well that was my Uncle Jared, a 6th degree black belt and a master of the English language.

“Kimme-sama, will you please come here.” Uncle Jared called out.

Wondering what he wanted, I walked over and bowed. “Yes Sensei.”

“If you would be so kind to show your Kohai here what happens when one does not pay attention.” Uncle Jared then pointed to the sparring gear.

“Yes, Sensei.” Not wanting to appear nervous, I went over to my bag and pulled out my gear. It was one thing doing weapon katas in this new body; it was entirely a different thing sparring with my hulk of a cousin. Sora just smiled smugly and it didn’t leave his face as he put on his sparring gear. That little smile changed my mind. I planned on removing that smug look from his face. It wasn’t a sparring match vthat my Uncle wanted, but a lesson.

Slipping on my mouthpiece, I looked at my cousin Sora. The guy was built like a brick but we weren’t wrestling. Oh, I was sure if he got his hands on me I would have a rough time but that wasn’t going to happen today. Standing in front of one another, we bowed. The room suddenly got very quiet; everyone was going to watch, just great. Circling one another I began to gyrate my hips, yes it was embarrassing and not something you see during a Karate match but it sure got Sora’s attention. I then began to bounce on my toes. That produced the desired effect. With his eyes firmly fixed to my chest, Sora completely forgot why we were here, too bad for him. At that very moment, I pivoted on one foot and did a flying roundhouse kick to the side of his head. He dropped like sack of potatoes.

“Thank you, Kimme-sama.” Uncle Jared said looking down at my cousin in disgust. My other cousins were less helpful calling out to Sora laughing how some little girl just kicked his ass.

Bowing to Sora’s prostrated form, I started to slip off my gear, the lesson over. Walking back to Aya, my cousin suddenly got off the mat and charged me. “Kimme, look out.” Hibiki screamed. Without any thought, I leaped out of the way. Everyone got really quiet, even Sora stopped looking up at me. Somehow, I had jumped to the rafters above.

“Kimme-sama, will you please get down, we are not done for today.” Aya commented.

Nodding, I grabbed one of the overhanging spars and dropped down right in front of Sora. How in the world did I just do that?

“Shit, sorry Kimme; didn’t mean to get mad.” Sora was taking off his sparring gear.

I grinned. “Don’t worry about it, worry about Uncle Jared.” We both turned watching him approach with murder in his eyes. Getting angry was one thing you never do in the dojo.

“Crap.” Sora dropped his head and waited for the expected verbal assault. Thirty minutes later picking up my bag, I could see Sora getting ready to clean the entire dojo under the watchful eye of Uncle Jared.

Later that evening with everyone out of my hair, I finally had some real alone time. Reaching for my cell, I called the person I wanted to speak to the most.

“Sile.”

“Thank goodness, Ken…I mean Kimme. What in the hell is going on.” She sounded more than a little angry. What’s funny is that it’s exactly how I felt a few days ago. With more than a little trepidation, I began to explain to her what exactly had been happening to me for the last few days.

“And you had no clue this was going to happen?” She sounded tired.

“No.” I began but that’s not exactly true. Something told me that there were signs if I could just remember them. Most things that happened during the time right before my transformation, I couldn’t remember at all. “Well, I don’t know, it’s all fuzzy.”

“So you’ve just accepted it?”

“Well no, there doesn’t seem much I can do about it. My parents are looking at a way to change me back. My grandmother might be able to do something.” I hoped however, a certain part of me now thought that turning into a girl wasn’t all that bad. That confused me even more. Where was that coming from? But right now, I wanted to know how Sile knew that I was really Ken and not his cousin. “Sile, are you some sort of Priestess like my grandmother? Is that the reason why you knew I was Ken and not Kimme?”

“A priestess?” She laughed. “If you mean a Witch, no, but I do have some powers. As to why I have these powers it’s a little complicated to explain.”

I wasn’t surprised, how does one explain to someone else that they can cast magical spells. “Aya said that my mother and grandmother are coming for my birthday for some sort of ceremony. Hopefully that will switch me back.” So Sile was like my grandmother but she called them Witch powers. Does that mean that there were real Witches roaming around? Well if there were pony sized green dogs and sex-changing woods, it would make sense that there were also Witches. In addition, if there were Witches, what else was in the world I don’t know about?

“Do you believe them?”

“Excuse me?” What was she saying, why wouldn't I believe my own parents? ”Who, my parents?”

“Doesn’t your mother seem a little too accepting about what is going on?” Sile asked. Unfortunately, I couldn’t argue with her about that. My mother actually seemed excited. She continued. “What do you really know about your family, Kimme? What do you know about the Shisaa family?”

I was about to say quite a bit, then realized that wasn’t true. I didn’t even know what my parents did for a living. It was some sort of secret that they have kept from me for the last seventeen years. “My grandmother is a Priestess, my mother goes around the world buying antiques and I’m not totally sure what my father does. The Shisaa, well they’re my cousins.” What she was asking? Was she saying my parents had a hand in my transformation? It couldn’t be, it was the forest.

“Do you trust them?”

“My parents?” I trusted my grandmother and the Shisaa but my parents; I really wasn’t too sure anymore. “I think so, maybe.” Now that really concerned me. Everyone had been acting a little strange but then again the circumstances were really strange. What was I to believe? However, for me to suddenly not trust my relatives didn’t seem right. There was no reason my parents were behind my transformation. Maybe Rebecca was right, my mother wanted a girl and now she had one. It seemed the most logical explanation.

“Sorry ma bien-aimé, I didn’t mean to upset you. I just want you to be careful. I also want to see you.” She said in a very soft voice.

“But I’m a girl.” This was something I was dreading. Even though I found some boys interesting, I was still extremely attracted to Sile. “I mean, I’d understand if you just want to be friends. It’s not..." Tears started to run down my face. Angry with myself, I wiped them away.

“I like girls, too.” Sile said, I could tell she was smiling on the other end of the line.

“Really?” Wiping my face with my sleeve, I smiled as well. “Good.”

“Wednesday, I’m taking you out to dinner. My treat, I’m picking you up.”

Aya probably wasn’t going to approve but I really didn’t care. “I’m looking forward to it.” We talked for another half an hour. She was amused I was going to school in the morning but more than a little concerned. When I told her that Aya was going to keep an eye on me, it didn’t help any. Hanging up, a sense of relief washed over me. For some reason, I no longer felt so alone.

Authors Notes: A special thanks to djkauf for a little elvish editing. If you like the story please leave a Kudos, if you have the time I would love to hear from you. Thanks to all for reading! - Elsbeth

 © Copyright - Elsbeth2011/2012