A young man, feeling totally unwanted by his family, runs away. He needs to find a way to survive, and eventually, he stumbles into an Op Rescue clinic.
Page has one loose end to try to tie up.

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The woman looked up from the small table, set among so many similar tables in the food court of the mall. It wasn't close to lunch or dinner time, so the area was reasonably quiet and not crowded. She stared a moment at Paige before recognition dawned. "You're the girl who talked to me before, aren't you?" she asked hesitantly.

Paige pushed her stroller, with her son, beside the table, and eased into a chair. She was very visibly pregnant again, too. "Yes."

"Why ...?" the woman began, her voice hesitant and fearful. "Do you know anything else ... about my son?"

Paige looked impassively at her. "What's all this about?" she asked. "I understand that he ran away. Why?"

The woman stared at Paige, and then her gaze fell to her intertwined hands atop the table. "I guess it's fair to tell you, since you _did_ help put some of our fears to rest. We didn't know for the longest time," she said softly. "But then, after you told me he was alive, I got an e-mail from him."

"Oh?"

"He told us why he'd run away." The woman shook her head sadly, wiping at a tear on her cheek. "At first, it felt like he was trying to hurt us more." She stopped, biting her lip for a moment. "But then, after we all thought about it, we realized that he was right." She shook her head sadly. "All those years, we couldn't see how much we were all hurting him. We just couldn't see that we were making him feel unwanted and unloved." She wiped at both eyes. "I guess he was right. We were awful parents to him. Everything he said was factual and precise, and we couldn't deny it. It's no wonder he ran away."

"Did ... did you have more e-mails?"

"Yes," Mrs. Franklin said softly, "but he made it clear that he didn't want to ever see us again. He told us that we'd never find him, and to not bother trying." She shook her head, letting her tears flow. "I hoped that, someday, he'd be able to forgive us for what we'd done." She stopped, shaking her head slowly. "I still hope that, someday, maybe he will."

Paige sat silently, looking at Mrs. Franklin. She glanced nervously to one side, where Beth sat a ways off, giving Paige a supporting look.

"After he left, we ... we had problems." She shook her head. "His father ... had a heart attack." She heard the gasp from the girl. "He's okay, but ... we can't help thinking that, if we'd have been better parents, he wouldn't have left, and Tom wouldn't have had the heart attack. His brother blamed himself. After the letter, we understood why Chuck — that's his older brother — started drinking a lot. And Maggie — his little sister — she went from a happy, outgoing girl to a rebellious, angry, reclusive girl. They blamed themselves, because of all the things they'd done to him." She looked up at Paige. "I don't know why I'm telling you all this," she apologized. "I should save it for my counselor."

Paige glanced at Beth again, who simply nodded. When Paige looked back at Mrs. Franklin, she reached out and tenderly put her hand on Mrs. Franklin's hands. "It's been long enough, and I've been through enough. I don't know if I can forgive everything, but I'm ready to try." Mrs. Franklin looked up, puzzled. "At the very least, I can finally accept your apology, Mom," Paige added softly.

Mrs. Franklin's confusion slowly changed, until it was anger. "Is this some kind of cruel trick?" she snapped.

"No. Would you like to tell me about when you and Grandma were telling me that I was such a good cook that I'd make someone a wonderful wife someday?" Paige asked calmly. "Or the time Chuck used my bicycle on the bike trail, and then after he ruined it, I got in trouble for wrecking my bike, even though I'd been sick that day?" She saw the stunned expression of disbelief on Mrs. Franklin's face. "Shall I go on? I can tell you all about what happened when I was growing up, with you and dad and Maggie and Chuck."

"But ..." Mrs. Franklin was thoroughly confused.

"I'll take a DNA test if it'll help you believe that it's really me," Paige said unemotionally.

"But ... Pete was my _son_!" Mrs. Franklin cried. "And you're ...." She was staring at Paige's round, very pregnant belly. "How ...?" She stared, her mouth hanging open in stunned disbelief. "What the hell is going on?"

"You all hurt me so badly that I wanted to hide forever and never see you again." She glanced to the other table, and nodded for Beth to join them. "There's a clinic that helps unwanted babies. They'll even let men into the program, but they have to make some ... adjustments. It was what I needed to get past my fear of being found, and to let me build some self-confidence."

"That's ... impossible!"

Beth sat down at the table. "Mrs. Franklin," she said calmly, "I work at the Morris Henderson clinic. We create ... cloned organs, so that even men can ... carry a baby." She handed Mrs. Henderson a couple of pamphlets. "What Paige is saying is true. When she came to us, almost three years ago, she was a frightened boy who needed to feel like he belonged and was loved and wanted. He had surgery — including some cosmetic surgery — and became Paige. Legally, Pete no longer exists. Only Paige."

"And this is my baby," Paige said, looking down at her napping son. "Your grandson." She looked back up at Mrs. Franklin. "I guess he's the reason I finally decided to meet with you. I realized, by taking care of him, how tough it is to be a parent, and how easy it is to make mistakes."

"This _can't_ be true!" Mrs. Franklin wailed. "This is impossible."

Paige shook her head. "No, it isn't. If you want, I'll show you the name and gender change records at the courthouse. I'll show you the surgical records at the clinic."

"Why did you do this? Why did you stay away for so long? What were you trying to do to us? Why wouldn't you come home?"

Paige shook her head. "You hurt me too badly," she said, trying but failing to hide her pain and bitterness at all the emotional abuse she'd suffered. "You probably don't know how close you all drove me to suicide — several times." She let that comment sink in, watching Mrs. Franklin's shocked expression. "At first, all I wanted to do was to hurt you back. All of you. Mostly, though, I needed out of that emotional hell I was living in. This program — and the counseling that went with it — gave me a way out. It gave me a place where I felt wanted. After I got some self-confidence, I wouldn't contact you because I didn't understand about being a parent, and I wasn't ready to forgive all the pain." She shrugged. "The clinic gave me a way to hide — in plain sight, as my friend Tommi put it. I didn't have to live a hermit out of fear that you'd find me, like I did for almost two and a half years."

Beth decided to add something. "Pete was so emotionally scarred that he lived in very, very primitive conditions, shunning outside contact, for over two years, before he found us."

"What ... what now?" Mrs. Franklin asked fearfully. "Are you going to come home?"

Paige shook her head. "No. I don't know if I can go that far. My ... changes would probably give dad another heart attack. And I can't trust Maggie and Chuck to not tease me or pick on me. Not yet, anyway." She tried to smile. "Maybe we can meet for dinner, someplace that doesn't have ... bad memories. And someday, maybe, I'll be able to come home. Steve wants to meet my family, and my son Michael deserves to know his grandparents."

"Steve?"

Paige smiled. "Steve's ... my son's father. He's a friend. I think he wants to marry me, but I'm not ready for _that_, either." She saw the skeptical look Mrs. Franklin was giving her. "Mom, it's not like that. I'm one hundred percent, head-to-toe, completely female. I'm a woman now. And I'm happy."

After another few minutes of conversation with Mrs. Franklin, during which she slowly accepted that Paige was never going to be her son again, but that Paige was reaching out to let them know she was okay, Mrs. Franklin excused herself. She had a _lot_ to think about.

As Beth and Paige walked from the mall, Paige pushing the stroller, Paige leaned her head onto Beth's shoulder for a moment. "I know that was hard for you," Paige said.

Beth started. "Oh?"

"I know you think of me as your daughter," Paige admitted with a smile. "And I like to think of you as my mother. Meeting with my biological family doesn't change that. You're the one who's been important in my life." She glanced down in the stroller. "You and Michael," she added.

"How do you feel?" Beth asked.

Paige smiled. "Like a weight has been lifted from my shoulders."

Beth wrapped her hand around Paige's waist. "Let's go to the deli for lunch. My treat."

Paige smiled. "Sure thing," she answered, "Mom."

**********

FIN

Author's notes:
Pete / Paige started as a visceral reaction to Morpheus' Twisted story, "Not My Sister's Shadow". In that tale, a boy who'd felt tormented by his family and his 'perfect' older sister Twists into her clone — and then the abuse really starts. What really bugged me about that particular story was that the protagonist was too quick to forgive and patch up things with her abusive family, who had been clueless about what they were doing. After some reflection, I understood why it struck me as so trite and fairy-tale — because I could relate to the main character. I'd suffered significant emotional abuse during my childhood, at the hands of my parents and siblings. I never heard that I was good enough. I never got praise. My siblings tormented me, and got away with it. What I realized is that if I were in that story, I wouldn't have been quick to forgive — if I ever could. I was viewing the story through my own experience, and it didn't fit. I needed a story that wasn't a fairy-tale ending for someone escaping such abuse.

I came up with the idea of an abused child running away young, to escape his emotional hell. He wasn't going to 'forgive and forget' — he'd suffered too much. Next, how to fit it in this genre? Op Rescue. It took some work and a couple of revisions, but I got the story to fit. Every single episode that Pete / Paige describes in her life is directly from mine. If it seems real, it's because it was very real to me - I lived it. Had I catalogued all the abusive events, the story would be thirty chapters in length. In a way, it felt good to have Pete tell his family to get stuffed, that he hated them, and didn't want to ever have anything to do with them again. At the same time, he had something to learn about how parents can make mistakes, and are sometimes blind to what they're doing. The story presented a great way for Pete to grow, and for me to come to grips with some of my own personal demons.

A couple of my early reviewers preferred the story ending without the epilogue. Some like the closure the epilogue brings. It's up to you. You can always pretend the epilogue never happened if you want.