I was, indeed, in trouble. The whole family -- mom, dad, little sister, big sister, and even my seldom at home big brother Lawrence -- had gathered in the living room. My mom looked angry, my dad and Lawrence looked confused, Sam looked supportive (she gave me a thumbs up), and Pig looked victorious.  Mom opened her mouth to, I assume, begin the interrogation slash beratement, but I held up one hand and cut her off.

    "As the accused, it is my right to speak first, so here goes. I am now, and will be for the next year, a girl.” Everyone besides Sam looked shocked, stunned, and/or angry at this, but I pressed on. “Please hold all questions to the end.” And I told them the lie. I know its wrong to lie, and if this was one of those stupid teen fiction books, there would be some corny lesson about how the truth is this all powerful good thing and that lying is bad and a betrayal and would eventually come to bite you on the ass. Well, this isn’t that book and lying and telling the truth can bite me. I did what I had to do, to protect myself, to protect my grandfather, and to protect my family’s feelings. I also did it because I wanted to, cause I thought then, and still think now that it was the right decision, and that’s enough of a reason for anybody. There were rules to this game, after all, and I wasn’t ready for the adventure to end. Not with the score at 1 to 51, not with the game barely begun.

    So, I talked for a long time, then answered their questions. Lawrence and Samantha were both supportive, Mom and Dad were too, but mad at me for not telling them and for experimenting on myself, even with Grandpa’s help and supervision. I didn’t loose my lab rights, but I had to promise to give daily reports of my experiments and processes until further notice. And yes, I have to go see a councilor. But that’s it. They agree that it’s my life, and I can do what I want as long as I don’t hurt myself or anyone else. They didn’t even ground me. Hell, dad wants me to submit the process to the Journal of the American Medical Association. I reminded him that I’d already done that, and he reminded me that that article had been on gender reassignment in a hamster, not a human. So I agreed to talk to the interviewer who’d done the first interview and made a mental note to bug grandpa about how he’d modified my process. Pig, who’d just sat there throughout the whole monologue looked daggers at me, clearly displeased with me for ruining her plan to get me in so much trouble that I’d need scuba gear just to breathe, finally stomped into the kitchen to help Ya Wei with dinner.

    By that time diner was ready but as I wasn’t very hungry I excused myself and went upstairs to do some homework. I flopped down in front of my computer and turned the monitor on. I had seven new emails, so I figured I’d check them first. They’d probably be from Karen anyway. Three were in fact from Karen, one was from my cousin Kim, and the other three were from senders I didn’t recognize. I opened the first, which was from [email protected].

    It was from Ty.

     Hey Layne, its Ty.

     You know, from school and stuff. I got your addy from the School Netsite. Anyway. You were so quiet on the bus I hope you weren’t mad at me or the guys or anything. I hope you are okay. See you in school on Monday?

Love Tyrone

PS - Be my Girlfriend? Please say yes.

    I sighed and transferred the message into the reply later folder. I had to think about that. Was I ready to be a girlfriend… and have a real, official boyfriend? Was I that kind of girl? I didn’t know, so I opened the next one, from [email protected]. I was thus not surprised to discover it was from Kristen Duncan, though I was surprised to learn her middle name was
Scott. She’d sent me an audio file of her singing both parts of the duet and asking me if I wanted to go to Everland with her and Karen (who she’d cc’d) on Sunday (i.e. tomorrow) instead of on the boat. That I could answer and said “sure.” I looked back at Ty’s letter. Maybe I wanted a girlfriend? I certainly liked Kristen, but was it like, or something more. And was it anything less with Ty. Still no answers, so I opened the last.

    It was from [email protected] and it had only these ten words in it

     I KNOW YOUR SECRET AND I WILL GET YOU RUBY

    I remember thinking, “Who the hell is Ruby?” and “Which secret?” and “Get me? Why?” I deleted the message with a shrug, must be a
malf, a mispage. In hind-sight, if I’d just gone down stairs and told Lawrence , who’s in law school and all, about the email, I’d have saved myself and my friends a lot of trouble. But that’s another story.

    I went to bed and the last thing I remember thinking was, “At least next week will be a lot calmer than this one was.” Boy was I wrong.

To be continued in Book 2, Watch Out Here I Come