“And be sure to tell us as soon as you know how you’re changing,” Aunt Ellen said, an anxious look on her face.
“Of course.”
“And... if you develop into a girl, be sure to remember everything I told you.”
You Could Go Home Again
part 1 of 16
by Trismegistus Shandy
This story is in my "Valentine Divergence" setting, like my earlier stories "Butterflies are the Gentlest", A House Divided, and "Nora and the Nomads". It begins about nine years after "Butterflies are the Gentlest" and two years before "Nora and the Nomads", but it has no characters in common with any of the earlier stories. I've tried to write it as a stand-alone, but if you find it confusing, reading those earlier stories first, or at least "Butterflies are the Gentlest", might help.
Thanks to Unicornzvi, epain, and Scott Jamison for their comments on the first draft.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License. So are my last several stories posted here, although I forgot to put the CC license notice in some of them.
“Be careful,” Aunt Ellen said, hugging me tight. “And call or write us as soon as you get settled in, and at least once a week for a while after that.”
“I will,” I promised, and when she let go, I started to shake Uncle Tyler’s hand. He grabbed me in a hug instead, and I hugged him back, careful to avoid his horns.
“If you don’t want to talk to us at the same time every week, I understand,” he said, with a glance at Aunt Ellen. “But do keep in touch.”
“And be sure to tell us as soon as you know how you’re changing,” Aunt Ellen said, an anxious look on her face.
“Of course.”
“And... if you develop into a girl, be sure to remember everything I told you.”
“I will,” I said, my ears twitching with embarrassment. Just then there was an announcement over the loudspeaker:
“All aboard!”
“I’ve got to go. See you at Christmas!” And I gripped my cane and climbed the stairs to the train, pausing in the door to wave to Aunt Ellen and Uncle Tyler. They waved back, and even before I found a seat, the conductor was closing the door behind me.
I sat down between a family of Lincoln bison, probably mother and grandmother with two cute little kids, and a Chicago tripod who looked to be about my age. I guessed she was female from the way she was dressed, though with Chicago tripods it’s hard for an outsider to tell the sexes apart.
“Hi,” I said to them. “I’m Joel.”
“I’m Karen,” the tripod said. “I’m going to New Orleans — this is my second year at Tulane University. Where are you going?”
“I’m changing trains in New Orleans to go to Raleigh — this will be my first year at NC State. Are you from Chicago?”
“Originally, but my family moved to Minneapolis a few years after the Divergence. Um... is it okay if I ask what you are? I’ve never seen anyone like you.”
“I’m a Raleigh rabbit,” I said. “There aren’t many of us in the Midwest... I’m the only one in my town, or in all of Nebraska as far as I know.”
“Oh. So you’re going home, then?”
“Pretty much. I was born in Lincoln, but my family moved to Raleigh when I was a baby, and I lived there until the Divergence.” I hesitated; I liked her, but I wasn’t ready to talk about what happened next with a stranger.
The day of the Divergence, a lot of people lost control of their bodies while they were transforming, and were too much in shock right afterward to know what they were doing. There were tens of thousands of car crashes and dozens of plane crashes — that was one of the reasons we were riding a train instead of a plane like in the old days. And when we all changed, I was in the car with my parents. I was young enough that I don’t remember where we were going or why; probably something routine, or it would have stuck in my memory better. But when we were all paralyzed for a few seconds while our bodies changed, my dad lost control of the car and we veered across the divider line into an oncoming truck.
When I woke up in the hospital, I couldn’t remember what had happened just before I lost consciousness; I didn’t remember the transformation itself, or the crash. I was confused and frightened more by my changed body than by the fact that my right leg was in a cast and raised up with chains. The first thing I noticed was the thin grey fur on my arms; then I felt myself all over, under the hospital gown, and noticed the long tall ears sticking up through the bandages on my head, and the smooth absence where my penis and testicles had been.
I think I must have screamed. A nurse came running in and said, “Oh, good, honey, you’re awake.” I stared at her: she had fur and long ears like I’d felt on my own head.
“What happened to me?” I asked. “Where’s my mom and dad?”
“You were in a car accident,” she explained. “Do you not remember? You hurt your head, so you might forget some of what happened.”
“But why do I have fur? And why do you have fur, too, and those ears...?” I was assuming I must have lost my boy parts in the accident that injured my leg.
“We don’t know, honey. Lots of people changed earlier today — maybe everybody in the world. People around here got fur and long ears, and... and little boys and girls changed more, they don’t seem to be boys or girls anymore.”
“What do you mean?”
In reply she gently lifted up my gown to expose my crotch, and helped me prop up on my pillows so I could see.
“We don’t know why, but it seems like every boy or girl younger than about eleven or twelve lost their boy or girl parts. We hope they’ll grow back when you’re older, but we don’t know yet.”
“Oh. But where’s my mom and dad?”
“They were hurt in the car accident too.” Apparently telling me my parents were dead was above her pay-grade; she let the chaplain, who came around the next morning after the doctor had examined me, tell me about that. And he told me they’d been in touch with my aunt and uncle, who were coming to get me as soon as they could.
But travel was difficult in the first few days after the Divergence, with planes grounded and roads blocked with thousands of wrecked cars. It took Aunt Ellen and Uncle Tyler over a week to come get me; I had no visitors all that time, except for the nurses and doctors and the chaplain, who came to see me several times.
They never could completely fix my leg and hip; I still have a bad limp, and walk with a cane. It took me a long time to get over my parents' death, but I loved Aunt Ellen and Uncle Tyler, and was glad I hadn’t ended up in an orphanage.
I didn’t tell Karen any of that, but we shared stories of what it was like to be of a minority neospecies in a high school where most of the students were native to the local change-region. Seventy percent of the kids in Karen’s high school had been Minneapolis turtles; ninety-five percent of the kids in my school had been Lincoln bison, and almost all the rest were Omaha sheepdogs, except for me. I’d been asexual since the change, and probably wouldn’t have felt any attraction for people of other species even if I were still male, but I still thought of myself as a boy by default and mostly hung out with boys, who tended to share more of my interests than girls. But as my friends got older and got interested in girls, I felt left out of their conversations more and more.
“Man, that must have been rough. There were ten tripods in my school, but six of us were girls, and one of the guys was a real creep; I dated all three of the other guys at different times, but I broke up with the last one not long after graduation, since we were going to different colleges and I didn’t feel all that strongly about him. And then there was this xenophile, a St. Paul elk, who kept asking me out even after I’d told him I wasn’t interested...” She shook her head.
“There weren’t any xenophiles at my school,” I said. “Or at least none that were open about it.” Xenophilia was pretty rare as far as I knew, a lot rarer than being gay, but in a small town like Hebron xenophiles were even more likely to keep quiet about their predilections than gays. I’d been doing a lot of reading about sexual orientations and kinks in the last few months, as I was looking forward to finally entering puberty and wondering what sex and orientation I’d end up with. After a few moments' thought I asked: “Why didn’t you go to college in Chicago?”
She shrugged. “There are a fair number of us tripods in New Orleans — more than in Minneapolis, actually. There’s enough at Tulane and UNO for a decent dating pool. And I want to try living somewhere warm for a while. What about you? I’m guessing you’re looking forward to finally meeting some girls of your species?”
“Yeah,” I said, glancing away from her. “I can hardly wait.” I’d glossed over the fact that I was prepubescent and asexual; I’d just told her there weren’t any other people of my species at Thayer Central High. She probably thought all Raleigh rabbits were as short as me; I hadn’t grown an inch since I was twelve.
She shook her head. “Good luck. And don’t get so obsessed with girls that you fail your classes.”
“I hope not.” I had no idea what my sex drive was going to be like, but from what I’d read, mature Raleigh rabbits tended to have a stronger sex drive than the average old-style human.
Our conversation drifted to other, more innocuous topics, and then petered out. Karen took out a tablet and started reading, and after looking out the window at the passing countryside for a while I did the same.
Karen and I got out at New Orleans and said goodbye. I went to the nearby hotel where I’d reserved a room, and returned to the station the next morning to board the train that would take me to Atlanta. When I looked around the car, I saw (among people of a dozen neospecies, some of which I’d never heard of) three Raleigh rabbits, two women and a man. They were all a lot older than me, in their thirties or forties, but I sat down next to them and introduced myself.
“Hi, Joel, I’m Rachel,” said one of the women, who had lighter fur than mine, almost white. “Are you traveling by yourself?”
“Yes,” I said. “I’m going to NC State — as a freshman.”
“You don’t look old enough to be starting college,” the man said.
“I’m eighteen,” I said. “But I haven’t started puberty because I’ve lived in Nebraska since I was a child, and there weren’t any other rabbits around to trigger it.” Unconsciously I took a deep breath; it must have already started, though I couldn’t feel it yet, my body finally absorbing the pheromones of other Raleigh rabbits and starting to grow up.
“Oh! That must have been terrible,” said the other woman. “What were your parents thinking?”
“My parents died in a car crash,” I said, “and I was raised by my aunt and uncle. They’re Lincoln bison. I don’t blame them for not relocating to Raleigh when they adopted me, their jobs and all their friends were in Hebron. And it wasn’t that bad, I was able to make friends with some other kids even though I was different.” I wasn’t sure why I told her things right away that I hadn’t wanted to talk with Karen about; maybe she gave off a motherly vibe. It was a powerful experience, meeting people of my own kind for the first time in nine years.
“But still — to be going through puberty while you’re dealing with leaving home and living on your own for the first time... I can’t imagine how hard that will be. Here,” she said, pulling a card out of her purse, “call me if you’re having trouble and need to talk to someone.”
The card read “Terry Davenport — Counselor,” and had her contact information in smaller type; it was a Raleigh address.
“Thanks,” I said. “I guess the school has counselors too, though.”
“Yes, that might be more convenient. Still, if you don’t feel comfortable with whoever the school assigns you, feel free to call me.”
The man introduced himself then, as Jason Davenport.
“Were you changing trains in New Orleans or staying here for a while?”
“I had some business meetings in town, and my wives took a few days of vacation to join me,” he said. I nodded; I’d heard that a lot of Raleigh rabbits were polygamous, since the sex ratio wasn’t even. The odds were about seventy-thirty that I’d develop as a girl, but it depended a lot on who I hung out with. If a group of people who spent most of their time together had too many or too few of one sex, some of them would change; if I spent most of my time at college with girls, there was a decent chance I’d develop as a boy. I wasn’t sure how strongly I wanted that; I was used to wearing pants, but there was no reason I couldn’t keep doing that if I were a girl, and I’d long since gotten used to not having a penis. Either a penis or a vagina would have to be a big improvement on my nerveless little pee-hole.
Rachel and Jason started watching a movie on her tablet, but I kept talking with Terry for a while; she asked me more questions about growing up in isolation from others of my species, and gave me some advice about dating.
“Don’t,” she said. “Not for a while after your body settles down in your new sex, at least. Maybe spring semester, or next fall might be even better. I know you’re eighteen, but if you’re like most people going through puberty, you won’t be sure of your sexual preferences for some while after your body starts developing. Homosexuality is rarer among Raleigh rabbits than in some neospecies, but it’s not unheard of...”
“Yeah, I’ve been reading about stuff. I think I sort of know what to expect.”
“And... are you going to be okay if you develop as a girl? It looks like you identify as a boy.”
I shrugged, my ears twitching. “Well, yeah. I was a boy before the Divergence and I guess I’ve been acting like a boy ever since even though I know I might turn out to be a girl.”
“Your aunt and uncle should have encouraged you to explore your gender more, to try different things and see how you liked them. That’s what we generally encourage parents to do nowadays, since we don’t know what sex children will be when they grow up and we can’t be sure they’ll stay the same sex their whole lives.”
I nodded. “What about you? Have you always been the same?”
She shook her head. “I was a man until the Divergence and for a while afterward. I was married, and my wife was running some errands in a neighboring change-region when the Divergence happened; she became a Cary hyena.”
I’d done some reading about the other neospecies that I might meet in the Triangle area, and I gasped at the implications. “Oh.”
“Yeah, our marriage didn’t last long after that. And I was working in an office where more than half of us were male; I changed, and my orientation changed too though it took me a while to realize it. I dated one of the guys from my office who remained male, but we didn’t click. A year or so later I met Jason and Rachel, and I joined their marriage a few months after that.”
I took that in silently. It wasn’t any of my business to ask about their sexual practices, though I had some clinical curiosity about it. “What about your... gender identity? Did that change too?”
“Gradually, to some degree. I’m still have the same interests, pretty much the same personality, but after I fell in love with Jason I started experimenting more with clothing and jewelry, trying to look nice for him. Don’t feel like you have to do the same if you become female, though. It’s up to you whether and how fast you change your presentation.”
“I’ll keep that in mind.”
I spent the night at a hotel in Atlanta, and got on another train to Raleigh the next morning. The Davenports were on the same train; I waved to them and Terry waved back, but there wasn’t a free seat next to them. There were a few other Raleigh rabbits around, though, and I found a seat near some who looked to be near my age, a girl and a boy. I introduced myself, but they didn’t seem interested in talking to me, and after chatting a little bit with the man on the other side of me — an Allatoona otter who was going to Washington, DC on business — I took out my tablet and read for a while before taking a nap.
I woke up when the train stopped. I was in Raleigh for the first time since I was nine, when I was discharged from the hospital and I got in Aunt Ellen and Uncle Tyler’s car for the two-day drive to Nebraska. The young people sitting next to me had already grabbed their luggage and gotten off by the time I was completely awake; I grabbed my backpack and my cane and made my way to the door and down the stairs to the platform.
I looked around for signs pointing me to the shuttles, and saw the Davenports making their way toward the parking deck. Terry saw me and said something I couldn’t hear to the others, then came over to me. “Don’t forget what I said. Call me if you need someone to talk to, and good luck with college. And puberty.”
“Thanks.”
A few minutes later I found the NC State shuttle, and got on. I looked around; I recognized the girl and boy who’d sat next to me on the train, and another person who’d been in our car, of a species I wasn’t familiar with. He or she looked pretty much like an old-style human; she had long hair and wore an ankle-length skirt, so I guessed she identified as female, though she had very small breasts or none, and her hips and waist weren’t very pronounced.
“Hi, I’m Joel,” I said as I sat down in an empty seat across the aisle from her.
“I’m Amy,” she said, confirming my guess. “Are you a freshman?”
“Yes.”
“So am I.”
“Can I ask why you picked NC State?”
“I wanted to go to school a good distance away from my family,” she said. “Close enough I could visit for holidays without breaking the bank, far enough my parents wouldn’t drop in all the time without notice. And close enough there might be a few people of my species in the city, if not at the same school.”
“Sounds good,” I said. “I grew up here, but I’ve lived in Nebraska since —”
Just then the shuttle driver got on and spoke up loudly. “Okay, we’re fixing to leave for the NC State campus. I can stop at any of the dorms, or at the administration building. Who needs to stop where?”
I dug through my backpack for my registration packet. While I was doing that, the girl and boy sitting in front of us called out the names of different dorms, and Amy said: “Alexander Hall.”
“I’m in Alexander Hall too,” I said, finding the paper I wanted.
The shuttle driver made a couple of notes on a pad, then sat down and told the shuttle where to go.
Amy and I chatted a little more on the way to the dorm. The driver stopped at the other kids' dorms first; when he let us off, Amy got a couple of big suitcases out of the shuttle’s luggage compartment.
“Don’t you have anything else?” she asked, eying my backpack.
“I shipped everything else to the dorm,” I said. “The UPS tracking system said it’s already arrived; I just hope the university hasn’t misplaced it.”
We walked up to the dorm entrance and found the registration area. The desk clerk was a female Raleigh rabbit, probably just a little older than us, with dark grey fur. I let Amy get herself checked in first; she got her room assignment and waved goodbye to me as she headed down the hall to our left.
“I should have a big package to pick up,” I said, after I’d given the clerk my name. “And I’ll need help getting it to my room.”
She looked me up on her computer and said: “This says we already put your package in your room. You’re in 114, by the way... for now.” She eyed me curiously. “If you or your roommate change sex, we’ll move one of you.” She gave me a keycard, a sheet of dorm rules, and an invitation to a dorm party the following evening.
“Okay.” I looked at the signage and saw that 114 was down the hall to the left, and went that way.
But when I stepped into the open door of 114, I had a surprise. “You!”
Amy was unpacking one of her suitcases on the right-hand bed. There was a big packing crate on the left-hand side of the room, one Aunt Ellen and I had packed and shipped a week ago.
“Oh, hi, Joel. You’re on this hall too?”
“I’m in this room — or so they said.”
“That can’t be right. Let’s go complain about it.”
“That’s my stuff in that packing crate right there.”
“Then I’ll ask them to move me to a different room, so you don’t have to move all that stuff. It looks heavy.”
“It is...” We walked back down the hall to the clerk’s desk, Amy going slow to match my pace. There were several Raleigh rabbits checking in at the desk, and we waited our turn.
“You made a mistake,” Amy said when we got to the head of the line, “you put Joel and me in the same room.”
The clerk looked stuff up on her computer and said: “Oh, I think I see why they did that. You’re registered as a hermaphrodite, and Joel Hampton is registered as asexual. Is either of those incorrect?”
Amy and I looked at each other appraisingly. I was wondering what she had had under that skirt; there wasn’t an obvious bulge in front. “No, that’s right,” I said.
“Yeah, I’m biologically hermaphrodite, but I identify as female. And Joel — I had the impression you identify as male?” she asked, turning to me.
“More or less,” I said, and shrugged. “So far. But I guess I’ll probably be a girl in a few weeks.”
The clerk said: “I’ll make some calls, but it’s probably too late in the day to get a change made. If Mr. Hampton develops as a male, we’ll certainly move him to the other hall, but for now... just try to make the best of it, please?”
“All right,” I said. “I guess we can keep our backs turned while the other one’s changing, at least for a day or two.”
Amy looked dissatisfied, and said: “Who do I need to talk to if they won’t let us change roommates?”
“The housing authority — here, I’ll give you the number. But talk to whoever’s on duty here first, tomorrow afternoon.”
Amy and I walked back to our room, casting curious glances at each other. “So,” she said, “asexual... do you mean you’re not attracted to anybody sexually, or that you reproduce asexually, or...?”
I waited until we were inside the room with the door closed before I answered. “I’m sexless myself,” I said, sitting down on the bed next to my packing crate, “and not attracted to anybody, like you said, but most people of my species are male or female. Like that girl at the desk, and those kids on the bus. It’s because I grew up in isolation, and Raleigh rabbits need exposure to other rabbits' pheromones to start puberty.”
She stared at me. “Oh. And you said you’d probably be a girl in a few weeks?”
“I don’t know — kids start out asexual and develop as boys or girls depending on what pheromones they’re most exposed to when they get to the right age. I’m not sure how it’s going to work for me since my puberty’s so delayed. But seventy percent of Raleigh rabbits are female, so yeah, I’m more likely to be a girl.”
“And yet.” She looked me up and down, probably thinking of the comfortable loose jeans and T-shirt I’d worn on the train. “Well, like you said, we can keep our backs turned while we change until we get the housing authority to listen to us.”
“Is it okay if I ask you what kind of hermaphroditism the clerk was talking about?”
She flushed. “Yeah, I guess so, since I asked you... Athens magnolias are hermaphroditic when we’re in heat, which is only for a few days every summer. The rest of the time we’re asexual... kind of like you, maybe. We don’t have any reproductive organs except when we’re mating or pregnant.”
“Oh. Then maybe we don’t need to change rooms.”
She sighed. “Maybe. Let’s see how this works out.”
I opened my crate and started unpacking, and Amy unpacked the rest of her stuff.
Four of my novels and one short fiction collection are available from Smashwords in ePub format and from Amazon in Kindle format. Smashwords pays its authors better than Amazon.
Comments
"Let’s see how this works out.”
I hope it does. I am so glad you're writing another story in the universe its one of my favorites!
Interesting and very
Interesting and very different indeed.