A Christmas Sampler a Christmas Anthology by Andrea DiMaggio Dylan's Story

Dylan sat at the table. Eileen stared at him like he had two heads. She stood with her hand to her chin and tapped the rattail comb against her head in thought. She smiled at him and then set out to comb her brother’s hair while whistling “I Enjoy Being A Girl.” Dylan shrugged once and smiled even as the tears welled up in his eyes thinking about his first date.

The Sullivan home...Portland, Maine...three weeks before Christmas

“Honey…Oh, I’m sorry…I didn’t know you had company. Hello, I’m Eileen’s mom.” The girl in the chair smiled politely but put her head down as she noticed the woman in the doorway.

“This is Kathy Ruff’s sister Dara.”

“Nice to meet you, Dara. Honey, let Dylan know that the school called; he got the Citizenship award. And he needs to call the college about the scholarship….I’ve got to run…they want me to work on the proposal for the youth center…maybe we can get it approved before Christmas.” Margaret blew a kiss to her daughter and left.

“Jeez…that was close.” Eileen pulled the comb from her back pocket and returned to the girl’s hair.”

“This is crazy. I don’t know what I was thinking…letting you do this.” The girl put her head down and began to cry.

“Mom would have a fit if she knew…Dyl…it’s okay. I think we’ll be alright…she’s gonna be at work for the next few hours. Don’t worry.”

“I’d be really worried….the green eye shadow is a bit much, don’t you think?” A voice came from the doorway once again.

“Here…let me help.” Margaret stepped closer and took the comb from Eileen’s hand; the girl stood and gaped as her mother.

“Mommmmmmmm….” The girl in the chair seemed to transform, even though she appeared no different than only a few moments before.

“Shhhhh….” Margaret whispered as Dylan began to cry.

“Honey….didn’t you realize? You can’t hide anything from me...I'm your mother.” She turned to Eileen.

“And you….you think you could trust me enough to know I care about the two of you…more than anything. Now…I think a nice soft brown fading to a gold.” It was wonderful to hear his mother speak so warmly about something so frightening, but he started to cry harder.

“It’s okay, baby….you’ll be alright ….Oh…and by the way, you’ve got two dates this week. I called up Dr. Chelios and she recommended an endocrinologist….you’ve kept this secret long enough.”

“What’s the other date, Mom.?” Eileen looked at her mother and back at the sister that was emerging at her mother’s touch.

“Why…that would be Dara’s date with Jessie Monroe.” Margaret used her new daughter’s name as well as Eileen’s boyfriend’s kid sister’s name as well. The boy shuddered as his mother grabbed his chin, moving his face back and forth under the bedroom light.

“If you don’t stop blushing I won’t be able to tell if this is your color.” Margaret laughed and her son started to cry once again.

A few days later...B Wing, Casco Bay High School, Portland, Maine...

“Are you going to Allie’s party?” The girl almost leaned on Dylan, causing the boy to turn red.

“I…I mimmight.” He shrugged his shoulders. The girl smiled at him and looked over her shoulder at the pair of girls standing in the hallway. She pointed to the pair and said.

“You gotta date? Everybody’s gotta have a date.”

He backed away, but she leaned closer.

“I’m not sure I’m even going…I don’t have anybody to bring…I’m…I’m sorry.”

Jessie Monroe shook her head and smiled.

“It’s okay…you don’t have to have a date…I’m sure you’ll find someone there. It’s okay.” Dylan’s lab partner walked off and he sighed deeply before closing his locker and heading to class.

That evening at the Sullivan home...

“So…what did she say?” Eileen practically tackled her brother when he walked in the front door. He turned and shook his head.

“I didn’t ask her.” He put his head down as if he had done something wrong.

“You mean Dylan didn’t ask her…well, silly that makes perfect sense. It’s Dara who has a crush on her, right?” She laughed softly, but her brother kept his head down.

“You mean neither of you are going to ask her out?” She stared at him as if he actually was two different people. He felt torn in two. His visit with the endocrinologist was frustrating; her testing seemed to show him to be a normal eighteen year old boy, even if he was tall and on the slight side. To be honest, apart from the gender specific 'physical' characteristics, he could easily pass as a girl, which was a dream he only allowed himself when all of his other dreams had been pushed aside. He had wanted to play soccer and track, but never quite impressed the coaches.

“So neither of you feels…”

“No…I gotta talk with Mom’s shrink…Dr. Melbourne thinks I’m …she said I might be transgendered, but she was…she didn’t want to make a mistake…so I gotta take some tests. God, Eileen..this sucks…I thought for sure she’d say…okay..we’ll just give you some hormones and something to keep the boy from getting more…like a boy.” He put his head down again.

“I guess the doctors always wanna make sure you get the help you need.” She shook her head; barely convince of what she was saying for her own sake, much less her erstwhile sister.

“I can’t keep this up…I don’t have it in me to live a lie, and if the doctors don’t want to help?” He looked up and his eyes were red. Eileen pulled him close and hugged him.

“We’ll figure somethin’ out, kid…I promise.” She held him as he wept, wondering if she had been too hopeful for his sake; nothing she could think of could help her brother and she began to cry along with him.

The office of Dr. Kathy Petrone, Margaret Sullivan's psychiatrist...

“Now the testing Dr. Melbourne had you undergo seem to be inconclusive. I understand she wants you to have another series of bloodwork? Your personality seems to be right there between the two…boy or girl; you could go either way?” Cathy asked the boy. Like any personality testing, much of the criteria was somewhat subjective. She wanted to know more about the boy's convictions.

“But I don’t want to go ‘either way.’ I’ve felt like Dara was who I was supposed to be all along. I’m sure of that. Just as I’m sure I….”

“For someone so sure, you seem hesitant. What aren’t you sure of?” Cathy had an idea, and she wanted the boy to express it..to own his own feelings and beliefs.

“I’m….it’s not that I’m not sure…but if it’s this hard to be accepted as Dara…how hard will it be to have someone…I want to be…but what if? Is it more important to be who I am….or be with someone who I care for…Do I have to choose?” The boy put his head down, discouraged.

“Well, Dara…may I call you that?” The boy…the girl nodded; her countenance almost seemed to soften and grow demure...

“Dara…life is filled with choices…some very easy and plain to see and make. Some choices are easy to see but remain hard to make. And then some choices are not at all easy to see, and also are difficult to make. All of us must make choices. But in this case, it’s not so much whom you will be as from whom you may received acceptance. Do you understand?” Cathy tilted her head slightly and smiled.

“Not..sure…What do you think? Dr. Melbourne seems to think I’m probably just confused. That it’s more part of my…development as a man.” Dara winced at the word, ‘man’ as if it were a curse. To her it was.

“Let me turn it around…because if you are to enter into a contract…to put it in concrete terms. If you are to live as a woman for a period of time…the real life test we discussed; you first would have to convince me and the other doctors that you actually believe what you’re saying. Dara…it doesn’t matter if I think you’re a young woman if you don’t believe that yourself.” She shook her head no as if to deny the girl any more help. But it was important for her to make sure for herself once and for all.

“I’m a girl…I’ve always been a girl…I don’t care what the tests show…I feel like this part of me...” she pointed to her head and then her heart.

“These parts of me matter more than anything than some chemical or hormone level…like when I close my eyes and see myself….I’m sorry…when I see myself naked I look at what I am and it makes me cry…like that isn’t mine…who stole my body…what happened?’

“Other boys might say the same thing…but that doesn’t make them a woman.”

“I’m not a boy…I’m not even a girl…I lost that…being a boy for all those years when I wasn’t…having to live like this…without hope…You know something?....”

Her voice trailed off and she looked at the door; as if something waited for her outside the room.

“Does this sound crazy? I was walking in the mall over the weekend...I saw this girl...woman about twenty-five or so? She was expecting...I imagined..." Dara began to cry. She shook her head and continued.

"I’m going to go to college…I’m going to do everything I possible can to help myself be the woman I’m supposed be…even if I have to live like this….without help…I’m going to live my life as a woman…If I have to get help elsewhere…if I have to wait…okay, but I’m not going to spend the rest of my life…I’m sorry…I know you have to do your job.” She was crying, but she was more frustrated than scared or sad.

“Dara…I’m convinced…and if you are this articulate with the other doctors, I don’t think you’ll have any trouble…I believe in you , and I’m relieved to see you believe in yourself.

In the end, they decided, along with her mother and Eileen's support that she would wait until after she graduated. The school guidance was quietly made aware of Dara's decision, and supported her by helping her connect with a local support group for transgendered teens. She would live; not 24/7, but assume her Dara persona after school and on weekends. Unlike the delightful stories we've all read and loved, there were no tea parties or dances or slumber parties. Dara worked as a volunteer at the womens shelter, where everyone knew her and her sister Eileen as sisters that cared. During school, she worked and studied and interacted as Dylan, though most of her friends...all of them in fact, knew about whom she was to become...or rather whom she was already. And every once and a while, Dara got to have some fun.

The Monroe home...December 22...

"Oh great...I'm glad you could make it." Jessie pulled her in quickly and shoved her toward the dining room.

"We sorta started without you, Happy Birthday." She giggled. Dara looked past her to see several friends sporting conspiratorial smiles.

She shook her head; her birthday wasn't for another two weeks.

The girl giggled once more before dragging Dara under the archway of the dining room. Jessie pointed once to the mistletoe hanging from the woodwork before drawing Dara close.

"Merry Christmas," she said whispered softly and kissed her girlfriend.

Julia's Prayer for Christmas -
a Christmas Sampler Interlude