Mildred getting in trouble for using her trick was serious business and I knew I wasn’t supposed to encourage her, but I couldn’t help laughing.

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Twisted Throwback

part 17 of 25

by Trismegistus Shandy

This story is set, with Morpheus' permission, in his Twisted universe. It's set about a generation later than "Twisted", "Twisted Pink", etc. A somewhat different version was serialized on the morpheuscabinet2 mailing list in January-April 2014.

Thanks to Morpheus, Maggie Finson, D.A.W., Johanna, and JM for beta-reading earlier drafts. Thanks to Grover, Paps Paw, and others who commented on the earlier serial.

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Now that I’d had a week of practice at dressing and doing my makeup, I was able to get ready for church in time for Sunday school. I was feeling more cheerful and confident now that I’d gotten my reflection looking more like me. That feeling didn’t last all morning, though.

I went to the Sunday school classroom the older teens used. The youth minister, Ray Evans, had seen me and Mildred last Sunday, and most of the kids there had already seen the new me, either at school, or last Sunday or Wednesday here at church, except for a few who went to the Denby Academy. Ray and a couple of the kids said “Hi, Emily,” as I walked in; but then Terry Madder said:

“Hey, um — I heard somebody saying you didn’t actually change into a girl, you just had a trick that makes you look like one. Is that true?”

“Kind of not exactly,” I said. “It’s complicated... my trick makes me look more feminine, but I really am a girl. Only in my brain, though, not all over.”

He stared at me. “What does that even mean? You’re still a guy?”

“Only physically.”

Ray was staring at me too. Apparently he hadn’t gotten the memo either — well, I guess we hadn’t gone out of our way to explain my Twist, since most people were more interested in Mildred’s. And everybody had heard of physical gender Twists even though there’d never been one in Trittsville, so they assumed that was what I had. A couple of the kids who went to Denby Academy were staring at me too, and Iris Dodd said: “Cyrus? Is that you?”

“I used to go by Cyrus, yeah.”

Ray asked me: “Let me see if I understand this right... You didn’t physically transform, you just got a compulsion to dress and act like a girl?”

“No,” I said, annoyed. “It’s not a compulsion.” Then, thinking of how I’d reacted when forced to wear boy clothes for a few minutes and what Dr. Oldstadt had said, I hastily amended: “Not just a compulsion, I mean. The neurologist said my brain is just like a girl’s.”

“I see,” he said doubtfully, and it was obvious that he didn’t. “If this is bothering you... it’s almost nine-thirty. Let’s get the lesson started. Everyone turn to Ephesians chapter five...”

Afterward, Terry and Iris and several others followed me from the Sunday school room to the sanctuary, asking questions; I answered some of them and refused to answer one or two that were too personal, then found Mildred, Mom and Dad and Uncle Jack and sat down with them.

After the worship service, as people were circulating and talking, I listened to Mom and Ms. Taylor talking about the situation at Mildred’s school. “The teachers seem to be doing what they can,” Mom said, “punishing the bullies whenever they have evidence and witnesses... but I’m not sure it’s enough.”

Nearby, Uncle Jack was telling a couple of old friends he’d gone to school with about his recent travels, and Dad was listening with amusement. Mildred was still sitting in our pew, reading. Mr. Richie came up to Dad and talked to him in a low voice, and Dad moved a little away from Uncle Jack and his listeners to talk with him. I didn’t pay any attention at first, being more interested in Mom and Ms. Taylor’s conversation, but then I heard their voices raised a little, and then my name — my old name, ‘Cyrus.’ I unobtrusively sidled a little toward them while still keeping my eyes turned toward Mom and Ms. Taylor. It wasn’t eavesdropping if they were talking that loud in the middle of the sanctuary.

“— his compulsions aren’t as obviously dangerous as Ryan or Wendy’s, sure — but that doesn’t mean there’s not some less obvious danger. I’m not convinced they’re harmless, like yours.”

“You may well be grateful for my compulsions,” Dad said evenly, “for they are helping me to keep my temper when I hear you speak that way about my daughter.”

“All right, I’ll back off. But just think about it, please. I’m afraid you’re doing more harm than good by working with this compulsion instead of helping him resist it.”

“I see no evidence that Emily’s behavior is dangerous. And I will thank you to refer to her as ‘Emily,’ please, as she is distressed when she hears people use her old name.”

“I can’t bring myself to do that,” Mr. Richie said. “But I’ll shut up about — your oldest child. Just promise me you’ll think about it, okay?”

“I am always thinking of my children’s welfare.”

I moved a little closer to Mom and Ms. Taylor.

That afternoon, after lunch, Mildred basked in the sun in the back yard. I didn’t feel comfortable stripping down like she did, but I kept her company, sitting next to her doing my reading for Mandarin and Literature. Later, Mildred and I practiced our tricks on each other; Mildred told me my reflection was even more feminine than before, though still not quite like my direct appearance.

---

The temperature dropped sharply during the night, and Mildred was grumpy Monday morning. “Sunbathing’s the only thing I’ve found to like about my new body, and that’s probably it for this year. Unless we move to Spiral?”

“Possibly,” Dad said. “I think it very likely you will be able to visit Spiral after Christmas with Faith and Ben, even if all of us do not go just then.”

“Maybe Santa Claus will bring you a tanning lamp for your bedroom,” Mom mused. Mildred brightened a little at that.

Mildred seemed to be itching; she was scratching her scalp a lot during breakfast. Mom said she’d take her to Uncle Greg’s clinic after school if it kept up.

I rode the bus; Dad gave Mildred a ride to school so she wouldn’t have to wait for the bus in the cold. Morning classes went pretty routinely, though I heard some snide comments from people in the halls between classes. I ate lunch with Lionel and Vic, since I’d eaten with Sarah and her friends the last couple of school days and was going to see them again after school. We chatted amiably until Rob came over to our table. Vic got a sour look on his face, and Lionel suddenly took an intense interest in something on his tablet.

“Hi, Emily. I had a lovely time Friday evening; would you like to go out again some evening this week?”

“I’ve got stuff going on tonight through Wednesday night, but Thursday and Friday are free. Yeah, I’d like to go out.”

“What about dinner at Hanging Gardens at five-thirty Friday, and something at the Magnifico at seven? They’ve already announced they’re showing Little Nemo, but if one of the auction winners that hasn’t been announced yet turns out to be more interesting we could see that.”

“...Actually... what about if we just eat supper and talk for a while afterward? Maybe walk around downtown? I don’t think I want to see a movie this time... unless maybe one of the auction winners is a documentary.”

“Oh,” he said, taken aback. “We could do that.”

“It’s my Twist,” I explained hurriedly. “I think it’s made me less interested in movies than I used to be. I think I might like documentaries but I’m not sure, I haven’t seen any since my Twist.”

“Hmm... I can’t afford to bid on an evening slot at the Magnifico again anytime soon, but I might be able to get a documentary shown for a matinee on a weekend in December or during the Christmas holidays. Or if you don’t mind seeing them on a smaller screen, I have a lot of good documentaries at home...”

Vic was seething. I hastily said: “I don’t think my parents would be okay with me coming over to your house. You could bring a documentary to my house and we could watch it there, maybe... I’ll have to check and make sure Mom and Dad aren’t having company over that night.”

“All right. Let’s explore our options and talk again later in the week. But we’re definitely on for dinner at five-thirty Friday at Hanging Gardens, right?”

“Sure.” I smiled at him, and melted at his return smile. He bowed slightly and walked away.

Vic, Lionel and I sat there in silence for a minute. “Well?” I asked Vic.

“I’m not going to say anything. I’ve already said what I have to say about Rob, and I know you don’t agree, and... I think we’d better not talk about it.”

“All right.”

Lionel looked back and forth at us in confusion, but he didn’t say anything about it either.

Morgan drove Sarah, Olive and me to Sarah’s house after school for our study group. Mrs. Kendall invited me to stay for supper, but when I called to check if it was okay, Mom said: “Not tonight, honey. I need you here. Do you need a ride?”

“Let me check.” I held the phone away from my ear for a moment. “Morgan, are you staying for supper?”

“No, I need to get home.”

“Can you give me a ride on your way?”

“Sure.”

A few minutes later Morgan let me out at my house and drove home. Dad and Uncle Jack were working on supper, and they looked grim.

“What’s up?” I asked. “Where’s Mom and Mildred?”

“They are in Mildred’s room,” Dad said. “It seems she is shedding her skin, and it is... not a comfortable process.”

“Should I go up there...? Can I help?”

“I think not. But perhaps you could knock on her door and ask.”

I went upstairs and listened for a moment before knocking at Mildred’s door.

“Don’t come in,” Mom called out. A few moments later she opened the door slightly and peeked out. “Oh, hi, Emily. Did your father tell you...?”

“That Mildred’s shedding her skin? Yeah.”

“Well, she needs some privacy. I’m mostly keeping my back turned, except when she needs my help. We’ll be down for supper when she’s done... however long it takes.”

“All right. Good luck,” I called out inanely. Mildred’s voice came back, a little weak: “Thanks.”

I helped Dad and Uncle Jack set the table for supper, and then studied for a while. We kept supper waiting for Mom and Mildred. Finally, at fifteen past seven, they came downstairs. Mildred was wearing a bathrobe and looked exhausted, but her skin — her scales — were shiny and as beautiful as I’d ever seen them in indoor light.

“I hope I don’t have to do that very often,” she said. “If it’s anywhere near as often as my period, it will really suck.”

“I guess that’s what your itching this morning was about?” I asked.

“Yeah. Sorry I was so grumpy. Kind of like having your period, I guess.”

“But... you look really nice. Your scales are shinier than ever.”

“Thanks.”

“Let us eat before we discuss the other issues,” Dad said. We sat down and he said the blessing. I wondered what the “other issues” were; I found out when we’d finished eating.

“Mildred, I have not told your sister yet about your issues at school today. I will allow you to tell her yourself, if you wish.”

“Oh... um.” She looked down at her plate, and said: “I got suspended.”

“What for?”

“For using my trick on those girls who hid my towel and locked up my clothes last Thursday.” She looked up and smiled. “It was worth it. They screamed and ran out of the locker room naked and soaking wet.”

Mildred getting in trouble for using her trick was serious business and I knew I wasn’t supposed to encourage her, but I couldn’t help laughing. I noticed that Uncle Jack and Mom were smiling a little too.

“So... how’d you find out? You said nobody knew who did it.”

“Irene heard them talking about it, and she told me.”

“You should have gone to a teacher or the principal with this evidence, Mildred,” Dad said.

“I was going to — I asked Irene if she’d tell them what she told me, and she said okay, we’d go tell them during lunch. But then P.E. was next period, and I was so cranky because of all the itching, and then in the locker room after P.E. I heard them — Josie and Tara — talking trash about me, and I got so mad... I waited until they were in the shower and I made them see snakes coming out of the drains and vents and heading for them. A lot of snakes.” She smiled.

“Tara and Josie did wrong,” Dad said, “and yet, now that you have punished them yourself, it is unlikely that the school officials will punish them much more for their prank on you. Certainly not as severely as they are punishing you for your prank on them. Further, by using your trick without sufficient provocation — so most people will see it — you have probably strengthened your classmates' prejudice against Twisted, and against you in particular.”

Mildred hung her head. “I know. I’m sorry.”

“Your mother and I have discussed this, and we have decided to ground you for the three days you are suspended.”

“Okay. It’s not like I have anywhere to go anyway.”

“You are not to watch television or play games, or to use the Internet other than for studying. And then — we shall see.” He looked toward Mom, and she said:

“We’re thinking about taking you out of school for the rest of the semester and home-schooling you.”

“Would you?” Mildred’s face lit up.

“Probably,” Mom continued. “We’re not sure how to handle it... We can’t afford for either of us to quit work right now. We’ll have to teach you in the evenings, and let you study on your own during the day. For now you can stay with Uncle Jack, but after he leaves, maybe you’ll spend the days sometimes with Grandpa and Grandma or Aunt Karen... they offered to help with this, but we need to talk to them again to work out details.”

“And then we’ll move to Spiral before next semester, or next school year?”

“It is too soon to tell,” Dad said, “but we are considering it.”

“Ah... there’s another thing you need to keep in mind, if you need me to stay with Mildred while you’re at work,” Uncle Jack said. “I went to Atlanta Thursday, but I’ve been here ever since, and I’ll need to go somewhere before the weekend. Should I call Mom and Dad and drop Mildred off at their house, if I find I have to get on the road for a while? Or is it okay if I take Mildred on a field trip to a museum or historic site?”

“Let us discuss that when the time comes,” Dad said. “You will be able to give us a few hours' notice, I hope?”

“I hope so too, but sometimes it comes over me all at once and I have to get moving.”

“You can get some road time in tomorrow,” Mom said. “Dr. Underwood messaged me this morning, and I talked to one of the endocrinologists on his list, and made an appointment for Emily tomorrow afternoon. One of us needs to pick her up at school at lunchtime and give her a ride to the endocrinologist’s office in Rome — can you do it?”

“Sure. I’ll bring Mildred with us, right?”

“Remember she’s grounded. No shopping or movie while you’re in Rome, just the endocrinologist’s office and a place to eat. And we made another appointment with Dr. Underwood — we’ll be going down there Saturday.”

I smiled at the thought of finally getting the hormone blockers I needed. I hoped we could get back in time for gaming at Lionel’s house, but I wasn’t going to push Uncle Jack to hurry.

Later, after Mildred and I had practiced our tricks on each other and I was getting ready for bed, someone knocked on my door.

“Come in,” I said. Mom opened the door.

“Hi, honey. I just forwarded you a message Dr. Underwood sent me — he’s recommended a couple of places to buy prosthetic breasts. I didn’t want to tell you in front of your father and uncle.”

“Thanks,” I said. I looked at the message on my tablet, and followed the links. It looked like the customized prostheses I really needed, to be sure the color matched my skin tone exactly and so forth, would cost more than I could afford right now. But after my Twist stipend came in...

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I told Lionel, Vic and Morgan about my endocrinologist appointment between morning classes. Vic listened and said: “So... that’s the doctor who’s going to fix your body?”

“Just barely starting,” I said. “Dr. Underwood — my psychologist — hasn’t ordered full hormone therapy yet. But I’m supposed to start getting the drugs to keep my body from developing any further... in the wrong direction.”

Vic looked at me and nodded. “I’m still having a hard time wrapping my head around this. But I know this is what you want; I can see how strongly you care about it... I hope it goes well.”

“Thanks.”

After Modern History, I went to the school office to check out. Uncle Jack was waiting for me.

“Where’s Mildred?” I asked. “I thought she was coming with us?”

“She wanted to wait in the car,” he said with a sad little shrug.

We joined her and were soon on the road to Rome. “Do you want to get something to eat on the way out of town, or wait till we get to Rome?” Uncle Jack asked. “Either way we’ve got enough time before your appointment.”

“I’m not hungry,” Mildred said. Her appetite was a lot less since her Twist.

“I could wait a while,” I said. “And there’s more restaurants to choose from in Rome.”

We talked for a few minutes and then quieted down. I worked on homework for that morning’s classes, then on my term paper. Before long we were in the outskirts of Rome.

“See anywhere you want to stop?” Uncle Jack asked. I looked up from my tablet and saw we were passing some fast-food restaurants and a diner.

“Isn’t there a Fresh Air Barbecue closer to downtown?” I asked.

“I probably won’t be hungry until suppertime,” Mildred said. “Don’t stop at a barbecue place just for me.”

“Oh... then what about Mrs. Annabelle’s Porch?” That was a home-style place just east of downtown that we liked to stop at sometimes.

“That suits me fine,” Uncle Jack said, with a glance in the rearview mirror at Mildred. So a few minutes later we were parked behind the restaurant, a converted late twentieth-century house.

“I might stay in the car,” Mildred said.

“No, you should come in with us. If anybody gives you any hassle, I’ll have Mrs. Annabelle throw 'em out, and if Mrs. Annabelle gives you any hassle, we’ll walk out and shake off the dust from our feet. But you don’t need to sit in the hot car by yourself that long.”

“I’ll keep the windows rolled down slightly,” she said, “and I can stand higher temperatures than a normal human. And I can hit the alarm if anybody tries to mess with me.”

“No. Come on in.”

She gave in with bad grace and followed Uncle Jack, dragging her heels. I squeezed her hand and smiled encouragingly at her.

The waitress who seated us was shocked at Mildred’s appearance and didn’t try to conceal it. But she didn’t say anything mean or condescending; from a transcript of her actual words you wouldn’t have guessed there was anything odd about us. Uncle Jack and I looked at the menus for a couple of minutes and ordered different assortments of vegetables with fried chicken; Mildred just asked for a glass of water without ice. She was quiet and subdued, looking nervously at our waitress and the other diners. I felt terrible for her; if I didn’t have my trick making me look okay, I’d be just as shy and embarrassed about being seen in public, the way I’d been for the first couple of days after my Twist.

When our waitress brought our food, Uncle Jack got into a conversation with her. She was from Flovilla, a tiny little town in middle Georgia less than a tenth the size of Trittsville, and was a junior at Berry College; she liked Rome and was thinking of staying there after she graduated, if she could get a job that suited her.

I remembered that Vic had said something about applying to Berry, and I asked her what she thought of it — would she recommend it? Did they have a good political science or history program?

“I know a girl who’s majoring in history,” she said; “she seems happy with her professors, but I don’t know how it compares to other colleges in Georgia. I’m majoring in Early Childhood Education, and they’ve also got really good nursing and music programs...”

“How do they treat Twisted?” I asked. She looked thoughtful.

“I’m not sure... I think there are some Twisted students, but I don’t know any myself. I’m pretty sure there’s nobody like, um...”

“My sister?” I asked, nodding at Mildred.

“Yeah. If there are Twisted around, they probably look normal, or I’d have noticed them.”

Mildred winced at that, but I don’t think the waitress noticed.

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The ebook edition of my novel Wine Can't be Pressed into Grapes has a map, list of characters, and other supplementary material that's not in the free version that was posted here on BigCloset. It's available from Smashwords and Amazon.