Chapter 1 –

It was a pleasant Saturday in the park. Fall was just nipping at Little Rock’s trees with the luminous wisp of color that would soon become vibrant and rich. Children were running about while their parents were chatting away. Boys were either playing ball, chasing each other, getting into mischief, or helping their dads fire up the communal grills. Girls were congregated either on the swing sets, chatting away in secret cliques, being chased by mischievous boys, or helping their moms set the picnic tables for the neighborhood get together that was being held that day.

In all the turmoil of a neighborhood pot luck, a solitary eight year old child was hiding out in a thicket of bushes playing with a doll out of the sight of everyone that mattered.

From inside the darkest part of those bushes a solitary figure stealthily came up behind the doll’s guardian and smothered the child’s face with a cloth.

No one noticed the figure steal away with the unconscious child deeper into the forest of trees until it was too late. All they found was a doll lying on the ground that afternoon, a cloth that had traces of chloroform on it with DNA on it too that matched the child, and a sad horrible milk cartoon mystery to solve.

“They say you are suffering from a kind of Stockholm Syndrome and we need to let you adjust.” Mrs. Laignaux looked back at the doctor behind the desk who nodded his approval.

“I know Mom. I’m sorry. I’m sorry you found me like this. I don’t deserve to be your child anymore. I am sorry I co-operated so well. But ...” Camille stopped and couldn’t seem to say the next word. She began to shake and cry.

“Please don’t say that Honey! You will always be our child.” Mrs. Laignaux placed her hand on Camille’s knee and caressed it gently to reassure her. The touch of her mother soothed her daughter’s anxiety. Mrs. Laignaux looked towards her husband and ventured, “We more than understand. You had no choice.” The mother studied the hem of her daughter’s skirt and breathed a heavy sigh shaking her head trying to understand it all. Her daughter’s skirt was a nice burgundy pleated tweed. Even though it was more like a formal school uniform, it looked pretty on her daughter, she thought. She wondered if she chose it or it was it forced on to her. Camille looked healthy and fit for all she had been through.

She admired how she was sitting like a proper lady with her ankles crossed and knees pressed together. Her long auburn hair fell beautifully onto her petite shoulders. She had a simple thin braid done on the back of her hair on both sides which were drawn together into a cute burgundy ribbon which was almost too cute for a young woman, but sweet on the young teenage girl she was now. The blouse was a soft silk with embroidered rose flowers strategically placed to enhance the look of her youthful breasts which had clearly had formed on her recently. She looked to be a C cup. It was obvious the bra she wore was fitted correctly. She noted from the outline on her blouse that she wasn’t being pinched and the bra lifted up her breasts nicely forming what had become an ample valley with the cleavage of a woman girl who was leaving childhood behind.

“I love the braid and the bow in your hair.” she mentioned casually as she examined her daughter thinking changing the subject would help.

Camille’s face lit up and she smiled back at her. “Thank you. I saw it in this magazine and just loved it. It is a variation on a fishtail braid.” She turned her head so her mom could get a better look and then turned back. “I have been doing it for a couple of months now. It was hard at first all by myself, but I have learned to do it blindfolded. I like how delicate it is. It gives my hair almost a elf like look instead of a heavy braid. Sort of a Lord of the Rings elvish look I would think. I was hoping it would look good on me.”

Happy that her daughter was so animated, yet concerned as to why, Mrs. Laignaux calmly replied in a fashion not to convey any concern or worry, “Yes, Honey. It does look very pretty. And come to think of it, so are you. You have grown into a very pretty girl. I am glad you got to see The Hobbit and the Elves. You really captured the elvish look from the movie.” Mrs. Laignaux pretended to tweak Camille’s nose playfully like she was still a little child.

Camille giggled and smiled. “Good. I wanted to look really nice for you and Dad when you first saw me again. But, I never saw the movie The Hobbit and the Elves. I read the book The Hobbit though. Was it based on that? I loved the book. And I saw photos in some magazines on how to look like an elf. Although I vaguely remember us watching The Lord of the Rings movies together before I was ...”

Mrs. Laignaux bowed her head looking away for a moment at the weight of what her little girl just said. She changed the subject. “Did you pick the clothes yourself or are they borrowed?”

“Oh no, Mom. Mr. Jack, my captor, let me choose clothes from catalogs.” she said excitedly. “I have quite the wardrobe. I guess it was part of his sick plan for me. Sometimes, we even went into the city where he would let me shop. In fact, he encouraged me to ...” She stopped and looked at her dad for a moment and then looked back at her mom with worry written all over her face. “You need to know I didn’t really like to do it at first. I tried to resist. But, soon, I found I couldn’t help myself. It helped me from getting scared and feeling lonely. And to be honest, it became a guilty pleasure. I found I liked looking pretty and how the clothes made me feel.” Camille looked down so as not to see her mother frown at hearing this news. Tears flowed silently down her face.

Mr. Laignaux was leaning up against a wall watching the two of them. He turned away hiding a tear to look at some books on the doctor’s shelf. His lips were pursed and his expression barely hid an unexpressed level of outrage and disgust.

Mrs. Laignaux patted her on the knee. “I’m sorry, Honey. It just is hard realizing how much of your life I missed out on and what was done to you.”

“For better or worse, this is who I am now.” Camille said sorrowfully, shrugged her shoulders, and looked up into her mother’s eyes for reassurance not finding it in her dad quite yet.

“What happened? I mean, I know we aren’t supposed to ask you yet. They say we have to let you tell your story at you own pace. But, we only know that almost six years ago, you disappeared. And one month ago they found you in Mexico and repatriated you after proving you were our child thanks to DNA.”

Camille hung her head low again. “I will tell you soon. I promise. I missed you and Dad terribly. But, I had to ...” She broke down and sobbed into her hands. Mrs. Laignaux put her arm around her to comfort her. It was amazing how this moment felt so right even though it was wrong for both of them.

“Survive, you had to survive.” Cam Laignaux spoke for the first time since coming into the room. “I know that now for sure. It is just hard for me to find you like this. Where did my child go?” With more than a hint of anger, he went on to say, “When did she become a woman?”

Dr. Stanton spoke with a deliberate and measured tone into the melancholy that colored the family reunion. “Mr. and Mrs. Laignaux, here is what we know. About six years ago, a man who called himself Mr. Jack kidnapped Camille and took her to Mexico. There, he transformed her surgically, raised her as a girl, taught her well it seems, fed her properly, and from what we can tell, took good medical care of her. Then, a month ago, he chained her to a pillar in the hacienda she was raised in, left the home, and then notified the authorities where she was and who she was. Before we got in touch with you, we verified who she was before using DNA before we contacted you.”

Cam looked at him. “To what end? Why do all this? And what do you mean taught her and took good care of her?”

Dr. Stanton leaned back in his chair, “What I mean is that she was still schooled. Her captor kept up with her schooling by home schooling her. She is, according to our tests, now at the 12th grade level in all her subjects. She can speak and read Spanish fluently now too. Even though she is fourteen, she could get her GED right now if she wanted and pass it with flying colors. Further, I pulled strings and gave her a SAT exam and she scored a 2170, which could get her into an Ivy League college of her choice even with just a GED.”

“That doesn’t justify this being done to Cam ...”

Dr. Stanton interrupted Mr. Laignaux and said, “We know. The person who did this had a political agenda to justify their actions and we have a good suspicion what it was.”

“What was it?” asked Mrs. Laignaux innocently.

“They wanted to prove their theory. They wanted to show that the conventional medical procedure is antiquated. They wanted to show that parents aren’t the answer for a child that is like yours. And that taking them away from the parents is the best medicine.”

“By changing our son into a daughter against our will and against his?” Mrs. Laignaux shook her head.

“Yes. They wanted to show the world that changing a child into the sex they identified with was the right thing to do.”

Camille looked out the window with melancholy in her voice. “He was wrong. It wasn’t the right thing to do. It should have been my choice. Not his. He stole my family from me.”

Mrs. Laignaux quipped, “It’s okay honey. We will find a way to change you back into a boy if that is what you want.”

Camille winced then looked at her mom and smiled. “Please Mom, I am a girl now. I have been one for so long now that I have forgotten even what it felt like to be a boy. At least, that is who I think I am.” Camille face contorted a little showing her acceptance of what happened to her. “And frankly, I like being a girl.”

“How about the others?” came a voice from the door to the room.

Everyone turned to the man standing in the doorway. “I’m sorry. I am Detective Bishop with the Little Rock police department. I have been assigned to the case.”

Cam, her dad, turned to the detective and said incredulously, “There were others?”

Dr. Stanton interrupted. “Excuse me gentlemen. We need to discuss this out of the ears of the ladies as we had agreed upon.” He nodded to Mrs. Laignaux who nodded back.

“Come on Honey. Lets go have some girl time.” The two headed out of the room holding hands and soon were chatting away.

When they were going, Cam asked, “What is this about others?”

“It seems our Mr. Jack was tracking down suspected kids who exhibited transgender traits. Only later did we realize that this person used confidential census files that we asked schools to start keeping because of Obama administration rules implemented in 2010. The fact is that we found that those files were hacked. Your son exhibited transgender traits and it was recorded by a school counselor about six weeks before he was kidnapped. Then his records were hacked too. That meant the kidnapper knew where your son was and could plot kidnapping him.”

“For God’s sake, why? And what was in that file?”

“Well, a couple of girls said to the teacher that they caught Camy trying on their jackets and looking at himself in the mirror. He told the teacher he was wondering what he would look like if he was a girl so she could figure out how his sister might look years from now. She didn't believe him and talked to the school counselor about him. Our suspicion at this time is that the kidnapper is a wealthy individual who may have never married and is an activist as well as a sociopath. He could very well have watched someone he cared about get destroyed for coming out as transgender by his own family according to the profiler. Or he just felt strongly on the issue. Do you remember the tree huggers years ago that would spike trees.”

“Yes, I remember that. They were trying to save trees, weren’t they?”

“Yes. That part is noble. What isn’t noble is that they would spike trees so the chain saws would break and the chain snap back and badly hurt or kill the operator of the chain saw.”

“So, how about these others, then?”

“There were three other boys about the same age kidnapped around the country with similar stories. So, the FBI suspects that they were brought in as a kind of guarantee Mr. Jack would succeed. Camille remembers each of them coming in briefly and her being used to talk to them about her transformation. They would listen and then she wouldn’t see them again. We either suspect they were being raised elsewhere or they were fighting the transformation and were possibly killed off.”

“But, didn’t Mr. Jack realize we would put two and two together?”

“It is hard to tell. We are keeping hush hush about this for many reasons. We can’t use the FBI in the normal way since we suspect that Mr. Jack has an informant on the inside of the Federal government. When Obama left office, he signed an executive order than allowed cross agencies to look into the files easily of other agencies. This means that he had a chance to see who we might assign to this case. That is why we are going off the grid with this case.”

“So, that is the reason I was told that in order for Camille to survive, I have to accept him as a girl or someone might harm him, or rather her?”

“Yes. Who ever let her go wants to see her become a poster child for transitioning a boy to being a girl before the age of puberty. They will do their best to make sure she becomes a poster child for their cause celeb even if it harms her. So, they want us to bring in the FBI and for this to be advertised in the local media. That is one of the reasons we quickly determined that it needed to be kept quiet. We have to assume she is being watched.”

Around the corner from where the men were speaking, Camille and her mother slowly walked into an atrium. Camille smoothed her skirt and sat down on a bench, crossed her legs, and then adjusted her skirt. Her mother watched this and appreciated that she was so well behaved.

“Honey, I hope you weren’t punished severely during the last six years.”

“Mr. Jack was tough. I was to behave and act appropriately. He scared me. But, he said that I was to act like a lady and be a girl all the time. If I was and I did something wrong, he would punish me as a girl. If acted like a boy, I would be punished like a boy which meant a belt. I didn’t like those belt punishments. After a couple of months, I found that getting his approval meant I would have more freedom too. And, once I was healed from all the surgery, he even let me do things. I learned ballet and had special tutors that would teach me how to do make up, how to dance, and how to cook. After a while, I stopped fighting him if I fought him at all. I was pretty scared. He had a temper. Still, he promised me that if I worked hard in my studies, I would see you and Dad again. Then, for my birthday this year, he said that I had done very well and would see you in a month or two, but, he had to set the stage first.” Camille bowed her head and a tear fell from her eye.

Mrs. Laignaux didn’t say a word. She just sat down and hugged her and stroked her hair.

After a few minutes of quiet, Camille spoke out in a soft voice and said, “I love you, Mom.”

“I love you too, Sweetie.”

With trembling in her voice, she said, “Even as I am now?”

She smiled. “Yes, even as you are now. You are a very pretty and nice girl. Any mother would be proud to have you as a daughter.” Camille rested her head on her mother’s shoulder and closed her eyes.

Back in the Dr. Stanton’s office, Dr. Stanton was explaining, “Your child identified with the kidnapper. This is entirely normal in many kidnapping cases. Her sense of worth came from pleasing him for the last five years. What you will have to do is to become a replacement for him first and then let her decide if she was to remain as she is or change back to what she was.”

“How long will that take?”

“No one can say. It could take a year or five more. But, this is crucial, she needs your acceptance most of all, Cam. She needs to know you love her unconditionally and will do what ever it takes to help her recover her own identity, whether it be female or male. Let her explore and if she tries being a boy for a week and then goes back to being a girl, be supportive saying you will love her or him regardless.”

“What will be the sign that Camy has come around to be who Camy is supposed to be?”

“When she gets comfortable being angry and you let her. For the last five years, she has had to suppress her anger for fear of punishment. She needs to let that anger out now and she needs a safe place to do it. You have to be that safe place.”

“I will try Doctor. But, I can’t promise a thing.”

“Then tell her that too. She will understand if you are having trouble. So long as you make it clear that at the end of the day, she is still your little girl or your little boy.”

Elsewhere, breaking the silence of the atrium, Mrs. Laignaux turned to Camille and asked, “Who did your make up?”

“I did. It was one of the first things I was taught to do by Mr. Jack.” Camille pulled out her purse and showed her mother the inside. “See, all that is mine. I just don’t know what I would do without my purse.”

“I don’t know either. I love mine. You’re really good at make up. Anyway, have you thought about going back to school?” Mrs. Laignaux started going through her daughter's purse.

“I don’t know. Do you think the kids at school would accept me? I should freshen my lipstick.” Camille grabbed the tube of lipstick and redid her lips while looking into a compact. Then she grabbed a tissue and pressed her lips together on it and put everything back into the purse after tossing the tissue into a nearby trash can.

Mrs. Laignaux smiled at how well her daughter did. “I don’t see why not. What grade would you like to go into since I gather you could graduate right now if you wished?”

“I guess I could do 9th grade and pick up where I would have been anyway. But, what will the kids say about my being a girl?”

“I don’t see any reason to tell them about who you really are. We can get your birth certificate changed. And the family can cover you. Even Sammy and Jessica.”

“The twins. I forgot about them. They are what now, eight?”

“Yes. We haven’t explained you to them yet. They only know that their brother was taken from them years ago. We haven’t even explained to them that you are a girl now. I guess we will have to take it one day at a time.”

Camille looked off into the distance. “Do we still live in the same place?”

“No, we moved a few years after you disappeared. By then, we feared you were dead. Hearing that you were alive was such wonderful news.”

“And how about hearing I was a girl?” She gave her mother a look of worry.

“Hard. But, part of me already knew. I felt the doll in the bushes had to be you. You liked to do girly things.”

“I remember that day as if it was yesterday. A couple of the neighbor girls playing that day were talking about how they loved their dolls. I liked what I heard. I had to go in the bushes and see what it was like while they were distracted. Then suddenly, everything went black. I woke up, I was told, three days later. Mr. Jack already had already removed my testicles. A few days later, I had lady parts and my boy parts were officially gone. Then a week or so later, he did my face surgery. It was all so fast.”

“Do you know if he was a doctor?”

“The police think he is. I figured he must be. Or, he is trained to be a doctor. I don’t know. All I know is that turned me into a girl rather quickly.”

“Were you angry?”

“Of course I was. But, I was far more scared of him than I was angry. I didn’t understand until a year or two later what he had really done to me. Then I knew if I asked to be a boy again, he would hurt me for sure. So, I played along and hid my anger.”

“Do you like being a girl?”

“To be honest, I am comfortable with being a girl now. During the last few weeks, I found it nice to get up and not be told to act like a girl. That is when I discovered that there are things I really do like about being a girl. I found I enjoyed having my hair and nails done at a real salon. I liked dressing up and doing my make up to please me. But, I also found that I was able to watch television for the first time in years. I enjoyed watching baseball again. Dad and I used to watch the Chicago Cubs. It was comforting to watch it because Dad and I used to watch it at home together while you took care of the babies. I liked catching up on a superhero movie at a movie theater. There is a part of me that would love to be Iron Man and zoom around in that suit of his fighting bad guys. And then, I saw the new Beauty and the Beast too. I would simply love to be in that yellow dress Belle wears at the end of the movie dancing with the Beast. I found it all confusing. I asked them not to take me there anymore. Just bring me a book and I would be fine.”

“I love that dress too in the movie. Jessica wants to be Belle for Halloween.”

“I can’t wait to see them again. Oh, there is something I didn’t get to do. I never went Trick or Treating. Mr. Jack didn’t want me to celebrate Halloween.”

“Did you celebrate Christmas or Easter?”

“Yes. Christmas for sure. Mr. Jack wanted me to play Mary and made arrangements for me to dress up as Mary in a Las Posadas if I was very well behaved. And, I was and I got to dress up as her for about two or three years. I loved pretending to be pregnant and searching for an Inn with the other children. I was so afraid if I said anything about being kidnapped, that I wouldn’t get to see the other kids, so I stayed silent. And, we had a tree and presents.”

“Did you have other children to play with?”

“Yes. But, Mr. Jack placed microphones around the hacienda and I was constantly monitored while I played with them. I knew because he would ask me about conversations I had with the other children that let me know he heard everything that was said. Plus, he made sure the children didn’t know how to read and write well. So, I couldn’t sneak out a message. I didn’t even try because he promised that I would go home soon if I co-operated.”

Looking at her daughter's developing chest, she mentioned, “I wish I had been there to talk to you about your breasts. Did he explain to you about your growing them or did someone else.”

“No. He did. He started giving me hormone shots about four years ago. I started changing. Then, this last year, my boobs really started to grow. I felt awkward when he had me take off my clothes and he examined me. But, he never molested me. I really do think he is a doctor of some kind because it was clear his examination of me wasn’t sexual. It was the last time he did something to change me too.”

Mrs. Laignaux shook off the last comment. “How does having breasts make you feel?”

Camille blushed. “Well, a little scared. Excited. Different. And … um ….“

Mrs. Laignaux gave her a coy smile and said, “Sexy?”

Camille blushed an even deeper shade of red. “Yeah. I started to notice the way the boys in the village would look at me. I learned that if I leaned in front of them in just the right way, I could make them nearly trip as they walked by. It was a neat feeling.”

Cam , Detective Bishop, and Dr. Stanton wandered into the atrium.

“Hey Sweetie,” Cam cooed, “is my little girl ready to go home?” Cam walked up to her and took Camille’s hand. He beamed as she stood up. He leaned over and kissed her on the head.

The two embraced. Cam hugged her like he never wanted to let her go. Camille melted into his arms and softly cried with a big smile on her face as she rested her head on his chest knowing that she was accepted.

Copyright © 2017 by AuP reviner