The author was inspired by these words in writing the title and this novel and gives thanks to THE ONE above.

Chapter 2: Echoes of Before

The rain had started by the time Delores reached her apartment, fat droplets that matched the tears still threatening to spill from her eyes. She fumbled with her keys at the door, her hands still trembling from the afternoon's devastation. The familiar weight of her purse felt different now, heavy with the legal documents that had just redefined her existence—or rather, denied it entirely.

Inside her small but carefully curated space, Delores dropped her purse by the door and leaned against it, finally allowing herself to breathe. The apartment was her sanctuary, every piece chosen to reflect who she truly was. Soft pastels and flowing fabrics, photographs of friends who saw her for who she really was, books on gender studies and theology that had helped her understand herself. This was Delores's world, the life she had built from nothing after walking away from Timothy's prison at eighteen.

But tonight, even her sanctuary felt fragile, as if the legal papers in her purse could somehow contaminate the authenticity she had worked so hard to create.

She moved through the living room like a ghost, her fingers trailing over familiar objects that suddenly felt like artifacts from a life that might not legally exist. The framed photo of her college graduation—her first milestone as Delores. The small ceramic angel her friend Maria had given her when she'd been baptized in the progressive Methodist church downtown. The rainbow flag pin she'd worn to her first Pride parade, terrified and exhilarated in equal measure.

All of it real. All of it hers. All of it apparently meaningless in the eyes of the law and her parents' final judgment.

Delores sank into her favorite armchair, the one she'd found at a thrift store and reupholstered herself in soft lavender fabric. She closed her eyes and let her mind drift backward, not to the painful present but to the memories that had sustained her through the darkest times—the moments when she had glimpsed who she really was, even while trapped in Timothy's life.

Christmas morning, age six. She had snuck into her parents' room before dawn, not to wake them but to try on her mother's silk nightgown. For ten precious minutes, she had stood before the full-length mirror, seeing herself—really seeing herself—for the first time. The flowing fabric, the way it made her feel graceful and right. Then her father's voice from the bed: "Timothy? What are you doing, son?" The shame that followed had burned for weeks.

Easter Sunday, age ten. The church had organized an egg hunt, and she had desperately wanted to join the girls in their pastel dresses and patent leather shoes. Instead, she stood with the boys in their stiff suits and clip-on ties, watching from across an invisible divide that felt as wide as an ocean. When little Sarah Mitchell had offered to share her chocolate bunny, Delores had felt a warmth that had nothing to do with the candy and everything to do with being seen, even briefly, as one of the girls.

Her sixteenth birthday. The last birthday party as Timothy. Her parents had tried so hard to make it special—a cake shaped like a football, gifts that screamed "masculine teenager." But all she could think about was the calendar on her bedroom wall, where she had been marking off days until her eighteenth birthday like a prisoner counting down to freedom. Two more years. Just two more years of pretending.

The memories were bittersweet now, tinged with the knowledge that her parents had never truly seen her. Even in those moments when she had tried to show them glimpses of her real self—the time she had asked for a doll for Christmas, the day she had come home from school with painted nails courtesy of a sympathetic friend—they had responded with gentle but firm correction. "Boys don't play with dolls, sweetheart." "Let's get that polish off before your father sees."

They had thought they were protecting Timothy from the world's cruelty. They had never understood that Timothy was the cruelty, that forcing her to live as someone she wasn't was the deepest wound of all.

Delores opened her eyes and reached for the photo album on the side table—not the one with family pictures, but the one she had created herself. Pictures of her real life, her authentic life. The day she had legally changed her name. Her first job interview as Delores, terrified but determined. The moment she had met her chosen family at the support group, people who understood what it meant to live your truth despite the cost.

She turned to a page near the middle: a photo from her twenty-first birthday party. She was surrounded by friends who loved her exactly as she was, wearing a dress that made her feel beautiful, laughing at something someone had said. The joy in her face was radiant, unguarded. This was who she had become when freed from the prison of other people's expectations.

But even as she looked at the photo, she could hear Craig's voice in her head, the words he had spoken so coldly in the lawyer's office: "Timothy was our brother. We don't know who this person is."

The rain was coming down harder now, drumming against her windows like an accusation. Delores set the photo album aside and walked to the kitchen, needing something to do with her hands. She put the kettle on for tea, going through the familiar motions that usually brought comfort. But tonight, even the simple act of making tea felt loaded with meaning. Timothy had drunk coffee, black and bitter, because that's what men did. Delores preferred herbal tea, chamomile and lavender, flavors that soothed rather than jolted.

Such a small thing, but it represented everything. The freedom to choose what she put in her body, how she moved through the world, who she loved. Freedoms that her parents' will now sought to revoke, as if eighteen years of authentic living could be erased by legal language.

The kettle whistled, and Delores poured the hot water over her tea bag, watching the golden color bloom in the clear water. Like her transition, she thought. The slow transformation from one thing to another, the gradual revelation of what had always been there, waiting.

She carried her mug to the window and looked out at the storm. Somewhere across town, Craig was probably celebrating his legal victory, already planning how to spend his increased inheritance. Somewhere else, Beau was sleeping in a military barracks in Iraq, unaware that his family was fracturing even further. And here she stood, the daughter who had never been acknowledged as such, holding a cup of tea and wondering if she had the strength to fight for her right to exist.

A memory surfaced, clearer than the others: the last real conversation she'd had with her mother, three years before the cancer took her. They had been sitting in this same spot, actually, when her mother had visited the apartment for the first and only time.

"I don't understand it," her mother had said, her voice careful and pained. "I don't understand how Timothy could just... disappear."

"Timothy never existed, Mom," Delores had replied gently. "I know that's hard to hear, but he was just a costume I wore because I thought it would make you happy. This is who I really am. This is who I've always been."

Her mother had cried then, quiet tears that spoke of grief for a son who had never been real and confusion about a daughter she couldn't bring herself to fully accept. "I loved Timothy," she had whispered.

"I know you did," Delores had said. "But you loved an idea, not a person. I'm a person, Mom. I'm your child, just not the one you expected."

They had parted that day with careful hugs and careful words, both of them knowing that something fundamental remained unresolved. Her mother had died still grieving for Timothy, still unable to fully embrace Delores. And now, through the will, that rejection had been made permanent, legal, inescapable.

Delores sipped her tea and felt the warmth spread through her chest. Outside, the storm was beginning to pass, the thunder moving off into the distance. But inside, the storm was just beginning. She would have to decide whether to accept the pittance her parents had left her—the crumbs thrown to someone they couldn't quite bring themselves to disown entirely—or fight for recognition of who she really was.

The thought of going to court, of having her identity dissected by lawyers and judges, made her stomach clench. But the thought of accepting their final judgment—that Timothy was real and Delores was not—made her feel like she was suffocating.

She finished her tea and walked to her bedroom, where she kept the journal, she had maintained since her transition. Page after page of her thoughts, her struggles, her victories. Proof of a life lived authentically, even when the world insisted, she was wrong.

Tonight, she would write about the will, about the choice she faced. But first, she would write about the memories that had sustained her—the moments when she had glimpsed her true self even in Timothy's prison. Because those memories were real, even if her parents had never acknowledged them. Those moments of truth were hers, and no legal document could take them away.

Delores picked up her pen and began to write:

Today I learned that my parents' love came with conditions I could never meet. But I also remembered that THE ONE's love doesn't. I am real. I am their daughter, whether they could see it or not. And I will not let their final rejection erase the truth of who I am.

The words felt like a prayer, a declaration, a battle cry. Tomorrow, she would have to decide how to fight. But tonight, she would remember who she was fighting for—not just herself, but every person who had ever been told their truth didn't matter.

Timothy had been a lie. But Delores was real, and she would not be erased.