“And I am back with groceries!” Angela said cheerfully as she walked into the room. I had resumed my original position on the bed and Meredith was pretending to be busy with her phone, acting like she hadn’t just forced me to lick her feet for the last hour. I kind of wanted to say something to Angela, in fact I was pretty sure I could have, but I just didn’t want to. I was tired, I was hungry, my body felt like it had been hit by a truck. I just wanted to lay here on the bed and drift off to sleep. “Wake up over there or it’s going to feel worse later!”

I begrudgingly opened my eyes to see Angela pulling items from a grocery bag and placing them on the bed before me. One of the items that caught my attention was a green glass bottle of lemon juice. Straight lemon juice, I’m not talking about lemonade.

“What?” I asked, trying to sit up again as she pulled a sack of tomatoes from the bag. “Why lemon juice?”

“You like it now,” She explained. “Your tastes are going to be a little…different because of what was done to you. Sorry about that.”

I laid there and watched her pull out a cup of yogurt, three onions, and a container of hummus.

“Couldn’t you have gotten a steak or something?” I muttered. “I just spent eleven years cleaning your house.”

“We don’t EAT meat, Steve,” Meredith chided.

“We’re vegetarians?” I didn’t like the sound of that, I seriously wanted a hamburger.

“Pretty much,” Angela said nonchalantly, handing me a tomato and the bottle of lemon juice. “Sit up to eat, you won’t die from choking but I want you to make it into your mouth, k?”

Meredith gently helped me to rise from the bed, allowing me to fold my legs out in front of me. She smiled and told me it would be okay which was a stark contrast from how she’d acted before Angela had finally come home from the store. I made eye contact with her, watching her as she gently worked out the wrinkles in my dress before smiling softly and handing me the bottle of lemon juice with the cap off. She placed her hands under mine and helped me to lift it to my lips, keeping a hold on it as the liquid splashed onto my tongue and poured down my throat. I’d expected it to burn or at least be extremely bitter, and while it was bitter I actually liked it. It tasted amazing, like it was the best thing I’d ever tasted. What was happening to my body? I tried to push the bottle up higher, Meredith and Angela giggled a bit and allowed me to drink a little more before taking the bottle away. As they lowered it I suddenly felt better, my muscles were a little less sore, and the pain in my skull was starting to subside. What was in that stuff?

“Now,” Angela said, slicing a tomato and handing it to me on a plastic plate. “ You need to tell us about this new form of yours. Why don’t you want to go back to your body?”

“Does it matter?” I asked, shoving the tomato into my mouth. “I mean you said that all of our bodies are just fake anyway.”

“It matters,” Meredith nodded, placing a hand on my knee. “They’re fake yeah, but they represent very different aspects of the soul. There are male and female souls, it doesn’t have anything to do with genitals, obviously, but you could actually be transgender. There are two types of transgender in this world really, one is where a person was just given the wrong body, either on purpose or on accident. The other is where your soul is actually formed in such a way that it conforms to the characteristics of both genders. The second is way less common than the first because it’s easier to give someone the wrong body on accident than it is for the universe to screw up.”

“If it’s really screwing up,” Angela added. “It could always be on purpose and you know it.”

“Yeah, well…” Meredith trailed off. Clearly they had two different opinions about that.

“So what about you?” Angela said, looking directly at me. “Why do you want to stay like this?”

“I guess…” I started to stall with my words but then I realized that after eleven years, and sitting in front of these two women, however they were, I didn’t really have anything to hide. “I always wanted to be a girl…I wanted it forever, but my parents were…”

“Your parents are fundamentalist Christians,” Angela finished. “I remember. They hate anything that’s not white, straight, and Christian. I was actually really fascinated with you back then because you really didn’t follow their path. Most people who are born into families like that…don’t change unless they’re just different or if they have a reason to be someone else. Maybe you did.”

“Not exactly girlfriend material for you though,” Meredith said, running a finger through my hair as I blushed. “Way too submissive for you. Why would you date her back then?”

“Trying to prove a point,” Angela shrugged. “She was too submissive, she needed to make a change…you know, for reasons.”

“Wait wait, hold on,” Meredith said. “This was an assignment? She was supposed to DO something?”

“Unfortunately,” Angela shrugged. “It wasn’t anything big or consequential, just…a quality of life thing I guess.”

Meredith suddenly burst out laughing. I couldn’t figure out what they were talking about but I could tell by the way Angela was glaring at her that something serious had happened.

“If you’re done being a bitch,” Angela said sharply. “I want you to know that first of all, I agree with you, and secondly, we need to come up with a new identity for Steve here.”

“New name and finding a way to get rid of that natural submissiveness?” Meredith suggested.

“I think I have just the thing,” Angela took me by the hand and grinned. Oh god, what was she thinking? What was about to happen? “Do you think you can walk? Let’s go to the bathroom.”

I stiffened for a moment, the last time she’d taken me to the bathroom, I’d been sent off to clean the house for a decade. What could she possibly have planned now.

“I like this idea,” Meredith laughed as she placed a hand on my back and pushed me in Angela’s direction, down the hallway and toward the huge master bathroom. As we walked in I cringed a bit as I beheld the massive cast iron tub – I was really familiar with it.

“So it’s way easier to do this in front of a mirror,” Angela explained as I stared into the full length mirror next to the sink and examined my feminine form. I was a girl, about eighteen with black hair that hung just past my shoulders. I was thin, really thin. I’d caught glimpses of myself in the mirror over the years but I’d never had a chance to really look at my body, I’d never seen how beautiful Angela had actually made me. As I looked myself over, I noticed that my features had started to change. They were softer, much less mature. Was I getting shorter? I suddenly noticed that I only came up to Angela’s chest. What was going on? The girl I was seeing in the mirror was much, much younger than eighteen. She was more like…twelve.

“Angela what are you doing?!” I shrieked, I started to turn and run, but with a single look, Angela forced me to stop moving and turn back toward the mirror. I still couldn’t disobey her, she could control me with a glance.

“It starts at childhood,” She explained. “We become who we are with experience and I think you’re a new soul. Most new souls grow up and die without really learning anything. We’re going to give you the opportunity to learn, from the beginning, and maybe teach you how to say no. It could take a long time dear, I hope you’re ready.”

“Angela, you can’t-“ I started to protest, but she held a finger to her lips and shushed me. My mouth immediately snapped shut and my head dropped. Squatting down behind me, she placed her head on my shoulder and held my head up, grinning at me in the mirror.

“I don’t think that’s what you should call me anymore dear,” She said softly. “Come on, you know what to do.”

“Oh…my….god….” Meredith began to laugh hysterically. “This is way better than anything I could have imagined.”

“Mom…” I whispered, my lips trembling as all illusions of dignity and independence melted away.

“That’s right honey,” She said, kissing me on the cheek and standing up, placing both hands on my shoulders. “Now let’s talk about your name.”