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Editor Note: The images used for this story were purchased and used under royalty-free license* from Istockphoto.com . ~Sephrena
Author Note: Please email me at AngelJediGirl (at) gmail (dot) com before posting this story to any other site. Posting to a pay site is prohibited.

Comments and suggestions are also welcome at the above email address.

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Chapter 36 - Mary in the Morning

"Do you want to stay for dinner?" I asked Emily as Dad pulled into our driveway. She seemed to be in better spirits after today's studio session than she had been after the all day marathon of yesterday.

"I can't," she told me. "Mom wanted me to come home for dinner. I think she has somebody coming over and wants the family to eat together."

"Okay," I told her. Dad pulled into the garage and stopped the car. We got out and she came over and gave me a friendly hug goodbye.

"I'm going to miss you this weekend," I told her after the embrace. "It won't be the same without you and Ethan there."

"I know," she said with a smile. I knew she didn't feel the smile; she was just putting on a happy front. She had to be disappointed inside. "Don't worry about it. We'll get to see you perform soon enough, I'm sure."

"Still, I wish you could be there," I replied.

"I know," she said. "And that means all the difference in the world. You have fun tomorrow and show them what you've got, okay?"

"Okay," I agreed. "I will."

"Good," she said before turning and walking toward her house. She looked back and waved before she was out of our garage and then turned out of sight. I stood there with Dad, who smiled when I turned toward him and the door into the house.

"Come on, Princess," he said smiling. "It'll work out, I promise. We'll get them to a show soon."

"Will I have another show?" I asked him as we entered the house.

"Of course, Megan," he replied. "Scott is already trying to line up a mini-tour for you this summer. If your concert goes well tomorrow, you could be in big demand."

"Really?" I asked incredulously. I seemed to be getting too popular too fast, in my opinion.

"Really," Dad confirmed. "We'll give you time to have your surgery, and then it will be a whirlwind after that. But I think you're up to it."

The smile he was beaming at me helped to outweigh the fear of surgery he had also instilled in me. I knew that I would be okay with someone like him watching over me.

"Thank you, Dad," I told him while wrapping him in a big hug. I loved him so much.

"You're welcome, Princess," he replied, wrapping his arms around me too.

The rest of the evening was exactly what I needed. The whole family stayed home, and we ate dinner together, played a few games, and I even played a couple of songs for them on my guitar.

I had the best family in the world, and that night was so peaceful and relaxing I fell asleep without a worry in my mind about the concert.

*  *  *

The following morning was hectic. The peace from the evening before was quickly replaced with mayhem as I prepared to make my transformation into Sarah outside of the house for the first time.

I couldn't show up as Sarah at Mary's office this morning, but I also couldn't show up at the airport as Megan because Josh would be there. Therefore, I was going to have to become Sarah between the two, since we were going straight from Mary's to the airport.

Dad was also taking me to Mary's. It was the first time he had taken me in about two years. Mom had always been there with me. Dad had come occasionally when Mary wanted to talk to both of my parents, but left us on our own for most visits.

"Are you almost ready?" Dad asked me from the door to Sarah's room.

"Almost," I replied from the vanity. "I just need to finish my makeup."

"I'll be in the front room when you're finished," he said and disappeared from the door. I turned back to finishing my lip gloss before standing up and stepping in front of the full length mirror.

It was kind of weird to see my image in the mirror. I was wearing a pair of dark jeans and a white cami covered by a vibrant blue top. Seeing me, Megan, in Sarah's clothes was odd, but even more odd was how made up I looked. I'd seen Sarah's makeup almost every day, but seeing it on me was a different experience altogether. It didn't look bad, but I looked a lot more glamorous than how I normally looked. It wouldn't take much more for me to be ready for a dance.

With a quick smile to myself I turned back to the couch, picked up the small bag that held my glam for today's outfit and headed out of the room. I had already packed my small suitcase containing the stage outfit and a couple of other outfits to last me until the flight home tomorrow.

"I'm ready," I said walking into the front room. My whole family was there.

"You're beautiful!" Austin nearly yelled, causing me to laugh lightly at his reaction.

"Thanks for noticing," I quipped. He blushed in embarrassment.

"You do look beautiful," Mom said as she stepped closer and gave me a hug. "Good luck tonight. We'll see you after the concert."

Before last Friday, Dad was stupid enough to think that Mom and Austin shouldn't be at the concert. After yelling at him about how stupid he was being, he had relented and bought them plane tickets. Unfortunately, the flight we were on was sold out, and he had to book them on a later flight. The end result was that Mom and Austin would arrive with only enough time to make it to the venue. I wouldn't get to see them again before I was on stage.

"Thanks, Mom," I replied as she let me go. "I'm glad you'll be there."

She smiled and I followed Dad out to his car, and we were soon on our way.

*  *  *

"Good morning, Megan," Mary said later that morning. "Don, it's nice to see you again."

"Morning, Mary," I said while standing up and dropping the issue of Cosmo I had been reading back on the stack of magazines in her waiting room.

"Morning," Dad also supplied.

"Come on back," Mary said and led me to her familiar office where I took my regular place on her sofa. Once she was seated, she spoke again.

"You look very good this morning," she said. I think it was more of a query for information than it was an insight.

"This is Sarah," I explained. "Her makeup is more dramatic. I'm going straight to the airport after this, and I won't have time to change. Add the wig and some glam, and I'll be set to go."

"That's right," Mary remembered. "You've got your first concert this evening. Are you excited?"

"Excited...yes," I answered. "But I'm also really nervous. I've never really sung to an audience before. I think it's going to be scary."

Mary chuckled a bit, and she seemed amused at my reaction.

"I think you'll do fine, Megan," she said. "You're an outstanding young woman, and I believe that you will get through this without any problems."

I was more than happy to hear her say that. She knew me better than almost anyone else, possibly even more than Emily. I greatly appreciated her vote of confidence in my abilities, because I was becoming more and more nervous as the day continued.

"Anything happen this week that you would like to discuss?" Mary asked.

I thought back over the last week. It had been a pretty good week, and I really didn't have any concerns to talk about. Emily and Ethan had learned about Sarah after our last visit, and that had eliminated just about every negative concern that I had.

"Not really," was my reply. "Emily and Ethan found out after our session last Friday, so there wasn't really anything bad that happened."

"Emily and Ethan didn't know about Sarah?" she questioned.

Hadn't I talked to her about this? I could have sworn that I had. I was so mad at my dad last weekend that I thought I had mentioned it to her.

"Didn't I mention how mad I was at my dad last week?" I asked for clarification.

"No," she replied. "You didn't mention anything about it."

"Wow," I replied. "I swear that I did."

"Why were you mad at your father?" she asked the obvious next question.

"He didn't want me to tell anyone about Sarah," I explained. "That meant not telling Emily and Ethan. Last Friday, he told me it was all to prove that I could keep the secret. I was so mad at him! Emily and Ethan weren't talking to me anymore because I wouldn't tell them, and it was hurting our friendship."

"What did you do?" Mary asked.

"After I finished yelling at him, I avoided him as much as possible. I had never been that mad at him. He wasn't even going to let Mom or Austin come to my first concert!"

"Are you still mad at him?" she continued gathering information.

"No," I replied truthfully. "He had made me promise not to tell Emily and Ethan about Sarah until after tonight's concert. We did agree that I could tell them that they could be involved after tonight, but he wanted me to prove that I could keep it a secret. I couldn't, but it wasn’t my fault.

"Emily found out last Saturday. I was really tired after we got home from the recording session that day, and I managed to walk into the front room still dressed as Sarah while she was talking to my mom at the door. When Dad saw how relieved I was, he backed off on our deal and let me tell them everything."

"That was enough to curb your anger?" she queried.

"No," I said. "But it was a start. He looked really bad after he saw how relieved I was for Emily to find out. But I still tried to avoid him for most of the weekend. We spent some time together alone on Sunday night, and we worked things out."

"That's good to hear," Mary said. "I think it would be wise to bring both of your parents next week. It's been a while since we had a group session, and I think there are some things we will want to talk about."

"Okay," I replied. "I'll let them know. I'm sure they'd be happy to come."

"How did Emily and Ethan react?" she asked next.

"They were really surprised," I replied. "I thought Emily would be mad at me, but she seemed happy to be included instead. Ethan had a crush on Sarah, apparently, and he took it a lot harder."

"How have you handled that?" she asked.

"We haven't," I said frustrated. "He won't talk about it. He's been bottling it up inside, and I don't know how he feels. I caught him looking at me in a way I'm not ready to deal with while we were at the food court in the mall, but he hasn't done or said anything."

"How do you feel about him?" she wanted to know next.

"I don't know!" I said loudly. "He's been my best friend since kindergarten. My best guy friend! I've never even looked or thought about him that way before. I don't know what I would do if he expressed any interest."

Mary chuckled at my response.

"You know what, Megan?" she asked.

"What?" I replied with a question of my own. I had no idea what she was getting at.

"This is a turn of events I wasn't expecting," she chuckled some more. "We are now talking about a problem that I have talked about with many of my female clients, and not my transgender clients. I thought that progression was interesting."

"Oh!" I remembered the really big news that she definitely should know! "Well, that might be because I am a real girl!"

I chuckled this time at the confused look that she had. "What do you mean?" she asked.

"I went back to that specialist yesterday," I said and Mary nodded to tell me that she knew who I was talking about. "Apparently I am a girl. I've got all the internal organs, I just don't have the external parts to go with them."

"You mean..." Mary looked slightly at a loss for words. It was obviously not what she had been expecting to hear.

"I have two ovaries, a uterus, and a vagina," I explained. "I just don't have an external opening connecting them to the outside."

She sat back, stunned. I knew that she had other transgender patients, but apparently she had never experienced anything like this before.

After a moment of silence, she found her voice again. "How are you taking this news?"

"This is the best thing that's ever happened to me," I said excitedly. "I was beginning to consider hormones and future surgery...this was totally unexpected, but totally perfect."

She laughed again.

" I can see why this would make you happy," she said. "What happens now?"

"We're scheduling some time into Sarah's schedule to have some surgery to...correct the problem," I said. "I'm apparently a late bloomer. Dr. Holbrook is worried that I will start my first period before we have the surgery if we don’t do it soon."

Mary looked shocked again. I don't think I had ever seen her this flustered in one of our sessions before. She eventually saw my grin, and started laughing outright. It wasn't long before I had joined her.

"Wow, Megan!" Mary was finally able to speak again. "I don't think I've ever had anything like this happen before. I'm sorry if I seem unprofessional. I just wasn't expecting you to tell me that."

"Mary," I said sincerely. "I don't care if you sound like a professional or not. I think of you as more of a friend than a therapist anyway. This is big news! I would have been worried if you weren't surprised."

She chuckled at my response. "Thank you," she said eventually. "I'm glad that you can see me as a friend, too."

*  *  *

"Ow," I said for the fourth time. I was learning the hard way that trying to pin on a wig while sitting in a moving vehicle was a painful experience.

"Sorry," Dad said again, but he was just going through the motions now. There was no way that he could control every bump the road was giving us.

Eventually, after a few more pokes, I was able to get the wig pinned and turned back to the bag I had brought with me. I pulled out a long, beadlike necklace that was going to serve as my glam and slipped it over my head. I also swapped my plain black belt for a white belt that had small fake gems on it. A few bracelets and bangles and a small white watch were next. When I was done, I looked like any other teen pop star out and about for the day.

I glanced out the window. It wouldn't be long now until we reached the airport.

"All set?" Dad asked me with a grin. Honestly, I think he enjoyed hearing me cry out in pain every time he hit a bump.

"Yeah," I replied. "But next time we should stop to put the wig on."

He chuckled at my mishap, but he didn't respond at all.

"You look beautiful," he said instead. I glanced over at him, and he was smiling at me.

"Thanks," I replied sincerely. "I love you, Dad."

"I love you too, Princess," he replied and then signaled to merge into one of the lanes leading into LAX. "Are you ready for this?"

"I don't know," I said. "Josh was going to call me last Sunday, but he didn't. I haven't heard anything from him in a week and a half."

Dad started laughing, which was unexpected. After a minute he calmed down and explained himself. "I was asking if you were ready for the concert, not about your boy troubles."

"Oh," I blushed. I had been so worried about the lack of contact from Josh and the prospect of seeing him again that I hadn't even thought about what his question really meant. "Sorry, I know how much you like to avoid that topic."

He laughed again. "I'm sorry, Megan," he eventually said. "It's just a bit awkward. I don't really know how to deal with one of my kids dating, let alone my only daughter. I never thought that I would be playing the concerned father, but I've really started to worry about your safety lately. I still don't understand how Josh got your number."

"I gave it to him," I mumbled.

"What?" he responded in a concerned tone. I think he might have gotten the gist of what I meant even if he hadn't understood the words.

"I gave it to him," I said louder so he could hear me.

"When?!" he exclaimed in the startled tone I expected.

"When he came by the house last week," I explained. "I gave it to him when I shook his hand goodbye."

"Why?!" he asked.

"I don't really know," I told him truthfully. "I didn't want to hang up when we were on the phone. It seemed like the right thing to do at the time."

Dad chuckled at my explanation.

"You're a devious one," he admitted. "I'm going to have to keep my eye on you."

This time it was my turn to laugh.

We chuckled a bit and talked as my dad weaved his way through the maze of roads to get us to the parking structure that served Delta Airlines, our airline of choice for the day. I remember being surprised that Josh would be flying on a commercial airliner, but then Dad pointed out how much cheaper it was than chartering a private jet. I didn't mind, because we were still flying first class.

Because I wasn't arriving in a limo, Sarah Carerra was making her first trip into the airport by walking through the parking structure and over the connecting ramp. It wasn't how I pictured a rock star entering an airport, but that's what we did.

Once inside, we made our way to the ticket counter where we had to check my bag. Dad had a small carry-on, but my suitcase, with all the outfits I likely wouldn't wear, was too big. After my bag was checked, I began to worry about it. My stage outfit was in that bag and losing it would make finding a replacement difficult without Julia around.

Dad then led me up to the security checkpoint, which we quickly went through after joining the first class line. Faster security screening was definitely one major plus of being a rock star and flying first class. But on the other side came the first downer in my experience of flying as Sarah Carerra. I had hoped that we'd get to wait in Delta's first class lounge, but apparently travelers had to be at least 18 to qualify for purchasing a one-day pass, and Dad wasn't ready to commit to a longer membership. Neither Josh nor I was going to be permitted entry, no matter how well known, or not-so-well known in my case, we were.

We were also flying out of Gate 50A, which was immediately on the other side of the security screening section. This meant that people were going to be able to see Josh and me from the moment they left the screening area, assuming they looked in our direction. I could just imagine the screaming fans wanting to approach us, or at least Josh, on the way to their own gates.

But none of this was as bad as seeing Josh sitting there in a small, first-class waiting area with another girl.

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