Princess For Hire: The Second Semester
By Melanie E.

Part 9: A Princess At Odds

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-25-

It's funny how something can be right there in front of you, staring you in the face, and you can still ignore it somehow until someone points it out.

That was the way it was with me and Swift's reactions to me. I had gone through the last two months oblivious to the fact that he had stopped glaring at me, at least any more than any other student, or trying to disrupt activities that pulled me out of his class.

In fact, if it hadn't been for the muffled comment of "teacher's pet," I heard one day after class, I would have continued on oblivious to his actions.

Had he really been treating me differently since I had begun to dress as a girl full-time?

Yes. He had, and though that fact should have made me happy, instead it disturbed me, not the least of reasons was because of his lack of support for the school's new Gay Straight Alliance.

Stewart's information was seeming more and more at odds with the person who Professor Swift showed to the school. How could he be so blase' about something that this mysterious background said should be important to him? Why did he treat the Princesses so cruelly? It had only been a couple of days since I had seen him chewing out Brittany on a Princess day for forgetting to keep her legs closed in class. She had almost been in tears afterward, and he had done it right in the middle of the hallway!

I had to do something soon.

"Mrs. Henderson, could you please go to the Headmaster's office?"

And what could this be about?

---

"Mr. Uchiha?"

"Yes, Becky, come in."

Mr. Uchiha's face was grim as I walked into his office. Gone were the laugh lines I had always thought were a permanent feature of his, and his glasses sat next to a bottle of aspirin. I had grown used to seeing a volume of manga open next to him any time I saw him at his desk, but today his keyboard had been shoved aside and its mahogany surface was covered with folders and paperwork. When he looked up at me, his eyes were red from strain.

"Sir?" I asked, on guard in case I were about to get in trouble.

"Ah, yes. Thank you for coming at such short notice," he said, trying to smile for my benefit, though it never reached his eyes. "Please, have a seat."

I sat down carefully in one of the wooden seats across from him. "Sir," I asked quietly, "did I do something wrong?" It had been weeks since I had stopped working on the float, so I was desperately hoping nothing had happened there the boys were trying to pin on me. I didn't think I'd caused any permanent damage.

"What?" Shock seemed to cross his features before he visibly relaxed, a soft laugh bubbling up from him. "Oh, no, nothing like that," he said, and this time his smile made it all the way to his temples. "No, this is something... something else. Something I know you've been working on, and I need your help with."

Somehow I instantly knew what he was talking about. "Professor Swift."

"Indeed," he said, the tension returning to his face in a rush. He seemed to hesitate for a second before continuing on. "I have been trying to avoid this for over two years, but it seems that despite my repeated attempts to get him to straighten up Ronnie is still dead set on acting out his own agenda on the student body." He looked at me, as though expecting confirmation that I understood so far, so I nodded. "The fact of the matter is, I know that Ronnie -- Professor Swift -- is a good guy at heart. He is," he said to my unwitting snort. "If it had been anyone else they would have already been fired, but I've known him for so long... you know who Kelly Brice is, I'm assuming?"

"I've read some articles by them, yes," I answered, trying to stay neutral on what I knew.

"Then you know that his actions and his words are at odds with each other. I'm not going to get into why, because it's not my story to tell, but unless we can fix that I've got a list of people waiting to take his job." After saying those words, Mr. Uchiha gave me a meaningful look. It didn't take a genius to get what he was trying to say.

"Why are you telling me all this, sir?"

"Because I want you to help me save his job."

"...Do I have to?"

Mr. Uchiha gave me another honest smile.

-26-

There was nothing I could do to make this any easier, I told myself as I stood outside the Professor's office door. I had been standing there for what felt like an eternity, trying to work up the courage to knock, or to call out to him, but my nerve never seemed to come.

Now or never, Becky, now or never.

*Knock knock knock*

"It's open," came the stressed and angry voice from the other side.

For the briefest of moments I wished I had grabbed Andrew or Leslie or someone to come with me. The last thing I wanted to do with my day was to have to face down one of my teachers, let alone Professor Swift. And yet, here I was. With one last breath to steady myself, I pushed the door open and walked into his office.

Professor Swift's office was a huge surprise. I'm not sure what I had expected, exactly, but the wild swirl of papers and books covering every free surface was not it. A decrepit laptop sat on top of the desk, and behind it sat Professor Swift himself, glaring at the screen while furiously writing on a legal pad.

“Sir?” I almost whispered, a little afraid of what would happen if he turned that same vicious concentration on me.

“What is it you--” he began, with the acid tone he normally used on the princesses, but stopped when he saw it was me. “Yes, Becky. What is it?” He said instead, in what was far from being a kind tone of voice but was still far better than his usual attitude.

We stared at one another in silence for a few seconds. The professor was obviously impatient to get back to whatever he was doing, and I could see the frustration building in his face as I continued to stand there doing and saying nothing, but I was too busy trying to reconcile the man before me with the person who's articles I had read.

Where was that person now?

I could almost feel the lightbulb going off over my head as I figured out how I was going to tackle my project.

“I just had a few questions, sir.”

“Well?”

I swallowed the lump that was trying to crawl up my throat and straightened my back. “It's about this civil rights journalist I've been reading. Kelly Brice?” I said as innocently as I could, shifting my eyes away from him and to the floor, but not fast enough to miss the color draining from his face at the name. I swallowed again, then forced myself to continue. “I've been reading a lot of their stuff, and it's all really good! And they obviously care a lot about people who are, umm, different?”

Professor Swift's hands began to shake as he stood up from his desk, the confident sneer and the vicious scowls I, and every other student, associated with him long gone from his face. “I think you need to leave, Miss Henderson.”

“But--”

“NOW!” He bellowed, slamming his hands down on his desk hard enough to send the antique green glass lamp that had been sitting on the corner crashing to the ground, shattering.

I let out a shocked gasp as I stepped back, surprised and afraid at the violence of his reaction. Then another emotion overwhelmed me instead, one that drove the other two far back in my mind.

Anger.

“No!”

“I SAID--”

“SHUT UP!” I screamed, seeing through the haze of my anger the same surprise I had experienced at his earlier outburst echoed on his own face. “I'm not leaving until you tell me what the hell your problem is!”

“Excuse me, girl, but you have no right to demand anything of me,” he said, obviously fighting to remain in control as he circled around his desk to stand face to face with me. “I owe no one any explanations, especially not some nosy little...” he stopped himself with a hand to his chest. “What do you think gives you the right to talk to me like this?!”

I could tell from the gleam in his eyes he was hoping to intimidate me into backing down, but there was no way. I'd seen him hurt my friends too many times, and seen the results of letting him keep doing things his way. I glared right back at him, standing as tall and straight as I could, then said the words I hoped would put him in his place. “I'm trying to save your job, you jerk!”

Professor Swift started to say something, then stopped. His mouth still hanging open he took a step back, bumping into his desk and knocking a paperweight off this time, though luckily it remained intact.

“I don't even know why I'm bothering,” I continued, taking a step forward and poking him in the chest. “You've been a cruel, malicious bully. So you're Kelly Brice too, big deal: all the writing in the world doesn't stop you from being the least accepting, most narrow-minded asshole in the school. Why Mr. Uchiha wants you to stay I'll never know, but he ASKED me to talk to you,” I finished, putting as much venom into my words as I could. Seeing I had him pinned against his desk with a look of bewilderment on his face I backed off, then gave an unlady-like snort. “Forget it, get fired for all I care,” I said, turning away from where he was frozen in place and starting for the door.

“Stop right there.”

“Why?” I asked, resting my hand on the door handle but not opening it.

“You want to talk? Fine,” he said in a defeated tone. I heard a scraping sound, and when I turned back around he was cleaning the papers out of one of the leather chairs that had been pushed against the wall. “Sit,” he ordered me quietly, starting to walk back around his desk but then instead pushing another pile of papers from another chair and sitting down across from the first one he had emptied.

I was still angry, almost as angry as I had ever been, but....

Mr. Uchiha wanted him here. Mr. Uchiha had asked me to talk to him. And, what the hell, Mr. Uchiha was paying me for this.

I sat down in the chair he had prepared for me, smoothing my skirt under me as I did so and hoping that papers were the only thing that had been left in the seat. “Fine,” I said petulantly, crossing my arms over my chest and managing to almost completely ignore the reminder I had breasts.

“Why would the headmaster send a student to talk to me about this instead of coming himself?” Professor Swift asked me, staring intently into my face.

I gave a shrug in answer, but when I saw the old sneer begin to return I decided to give him a bit more. “I'm not entirely sure. I think it has something to do with keeping things unofficial.” I gave him a long look of my own, not bothering to try and hide my unhappiness. “He said you used to be a good teacher, until the princess program started up, and that that's when you turned evil.”

“Evil?!”

I glared at him. “What would you call outing a student to bullies, or punishing students for doing what they're supposed to? If you're Kelly Brice, then why do you hate the Princesses so much?”

Swift wrung his hands as he began to mutter through gritted teeth. “Why do I hate the Princesses? I don't hate them. I hate what they stand for!”

“What?”

“It's a mockery!” He bellowed, slamming his palms into the armrests of his chair. “It's a drag show for the amusement of the boys. It's disrespectful to those who truly have gender issues, and makes a laughingstock of the school's history of tolerance and acceptance!”

I shook my head. “The only one making a laughingstock of the school is you!” I yelled back, barely holding myself back from standing up so I could look down on him. “We've done nothing wrong!”

“You and Sarah are different,” he said with a negligent wave of his hand. “The two of you see some benefit from the program, I'll admit, but the others? Mr. Stone, for example, going out of his way to tease and show off whenever he can. It's people like him who cause the trans community so much trouble!”

“And what about outing Stew? All he did was write a paper, and you made him the biggest target in the school!”

“He presumed to understand what being trans means, all because he is gay. They don't understand, none of them understand what we have to deal with! He deserved what he got!”

“Nobody DESERVES that!” I screamed, fed up with the man before me. Before I knew what I was doing I had stood up and had my hand raised to smack the professor, when something else he had said struck me. Wait a minute... “We?”

Through my anger I had failed to see Professor Swift's own emotions shifting, but when I looked down now, my hand still raised in the air, I saw that his head was hung low, and I could hear sobbing.

No way. I can't deal with this. This isn't my job to....

But I was the only one there.

“Professor?”

No response, just more sobbing.

“Professor?” I asked again, putting my hand on his shoulder. He still didn't answer.

Of all the emotions I had expected to feel during my encounter with Professor Swift, pity had never been among them. Still, my anger still lingered, and I had to say my piece.

“I don't know what's going on for you,” I said, taking my seat and looking on as Swift continued to sob. “But, geez, listen to yourself! Is that really what you think of what we've been doing? I don't think Mr. Uchiha would have ever allowed the program to go as long as it has if he thought like you do. And no matter what you say, you did the absolute worst thing possible to Stew, and he didn't deserve it. How can you talk about acceptance then turn around and do that to someone?!”

“I....”

I leaned back in my chair and closed my eyes, taking a few deep breaths to try and calm down.

“You're right.”

My eyes snapped open. Had Professor Swift just said what I thought he did?

The man looking back at me now was not the same professor I had entered the room to talk to. Instead of the cruel, angry face I'd come to recognize I saw someone who was broken, and hurting. “I'm sorry,” he said, looking to me for forgiveness.

I shook my head. “I'm not the one you need to say that to.”

A spark of the anger I had grown to expect from him returned, but just as quickly it disappeared. With a defeated expression on his face Professor Swift nodded. “You should go back to your dorm. I need to talk to the headmaster.”

I stood up, unsure of what to say, and started to walk toward the door when I paused. “Professor Swift?”

“Yes?”

“Good luck.”

I didn't wait for an answer, but closed the rest of the distance between me and the door as quickly as I could, and left the room.

-27-

Why me?

That was the thought that ran through my head over and over as I sat in my room, waiting for dinner time to roll around. After dinner I had a mini-date with Andrew, all part of our whole “getting to know you again” period after my immense foul-up, but until then I had plenty of time to sulk and feel put-upon by the world around me.

What would happen to Professor Swift? I hoped Mr. Uchiha would be happy with how I'd managed things, though I found it doubtful that he would approve of me yelling at Ol' Swifty like I had. What could he do, though, give me detention? I was there on his behalf, so I had leverage if he tried to punish me for how I had handled the situation, not that that helped me feel any better about what had happened. Instead, my mind kept going back to the things Swift had said, and how vehemently he had defended his position at first.

He had said “we.”

What did that make Professor Swift? Did he want to be a woman? I was unsure of how to interpret what he had said. Being a Princess and, more importantly, Sarah's best friend, I had started to have more and more exposure to information about being transgendered, so I knew that there was a whole lot more than just the two extremes of boy and girl going on with things. Heck, most people would say I was proof of that, and as much as I wanted to argue there was little point, not in this skirt anyhow.

Still, he said “we.”

Whatever his situation, he obviously felt that I fell into something of the same boat. Was that why Mr. Uchiha had sent me to talk to him? Did he know that Professor Swift would rather be a Rhonda than a Ronald? Surely not. Then again, Mr. Uchiha seemed to be pretty good at knowing everyone at the school, and he had known about all the Kelly Brice stuff too, so maybe?

It was all too much, and more than I wanted to deal with. I may have been smart enough to get into a private school on scholarship, but I was still only fourteen.

I heard a commotion in the hallway, and nearly jumped out of my skin when someone began pounding on my door excitedly.

“BeckyBeckyBecky!” Sarah's muffled voice came through the woodwork, followed by more pounding. With a groan I got off my bed, straightened my skirt, and checked my hair in my mirror before finally unlocking and opening the door just as she began to try and knock again, nearly tripping into my room in the process.

“Becky!” She said again when she regained her feet, grinning widely at me and oblivious to her near disaster. “You'll never guess what just happened!”

“You're right,” I said with a grin of my own, feeling her bright mood begin to pull me out of my funk. “What's up?”

“Swifty just resigned!”

“What?!”

“Really!” She said, mistaking my look of shock for one of disbelief. “Winston said he saw him collecting his personal stuff from his office, and when he asked around one of the seniors told him Swift was leaving the school!”

“Oh. Wow,” I said, trying my best to stay calm while on the inside I wanted nothing more than to curl up into a ball and hide away.

Mr. Uchiha had asked me to help him save Professor Swift's job, and instead I'd driven him away.

“Becky? Are you okay?” Sarah asked, not waiting for an answer before she wrapped me in a hug. “What's wrong?”

I couldn't tell her what had gone down between me and the Professor. It was too personal, and even after everything he had done it would not be right. Instead, I grabbed my stomach and twisted my frown into a grimace. “Nothing, just hungry is all.”

“...Okay,” Sarah said quietly, giving me some space. I knew she could see through my lie, but until I could figure out how I felt about what had happened I thought it wise not to talk to anyone about it.

Swift was gone, and everyone else was happy about that.

So... why wasn't I?

-=-

(End of Part 9)

Well, if THIS hasn't been a long time coming!

Yesterday I figured if re-reading The Right Hand of the Devil had been enough to inspire me to work on it and finish it, then maybe the same could be true of PFH! And, whaddaya know, it's working! Naturally this isn't the very end, but this is the beginning of it, if that makes sense.

Two more parts. Six more chapters. That's it, and the story will draw to a close. And I'll be starting writing them as soon as I post this. I had considered waiting until I had all three finished, then posting them all at once, but then the greedy needy side of me told me "hey, you'll get more comments if you post 'em separately!" So, here we are.

Unproofed, unedited, with the exception of the fact that, per Jill's suggestion (thankew!) chapter 26 is completely different than I'd originally written it.

As always, lemme know what y'all think, and IF YOU COMMENT, MORE WILL COME. Hopefully soon!

Love y'all!

Melanie E.