Work weekend continues and Caitlin figures out more stuff about herself. But what is the problem now?

Disclaimer
This is a work of fiction. There should be no way that these characters are like anyone else, but if that isn’t the case, it has definitely been unintentional. Also, if you happen to find that your life is represented in these pages, I’ll be impressed.

Sorority Boy
By poetheather
Chap 19

Lunch was pretty tasty and instead of doing more dishes afterwards, I was set to work polishing the wood in the Chapter Room. I was alone, which was a good thing as I figured I had a lot of thoughts to go over concerning all of this. I was still fairly sure that telling everyone the truth about me was a good thing, even though things seemed better with Holly before than. I didn’t know for sure yet if they were better or not, but maybe she didn’t want to beat me up or something any more. I could only hope that were true.

Everything I had told her, every reason I had given her about why I was doing this had been true and I was doing my best to be someone who this House would value. Things still didn’t feel all that natural yet, even after months of being Caitlin rather than Richard, but I could tell they were becoming that way. Walking didn’t require concentration, nor did my voice and I was pretty okay with all of this and with the exception of the bras, which apparently everyone had a love hate relationship with, I really was good. Granted getting to here had been an interesting journey in the Firefly sense of the word, you know ‘Oh God, Oh God, we’re all going to die’, but I could really say that as of right now I was fine living as a girl.

And you know what? That didn’t really bother me anymore, the being fine with being a girl. I was a girl in most ways right now and it didn’t really make my life worse. Well, okay maybe I wasn’t one between my ears and legs for the most part but outside of that… who could tell that I had been a scrawny geek at the start of this journey? I still had to wonder why other people hadn’t caught on about the me not being a girl thing? Was I more girl between my ears than I had thought and why didn’t that question bug me as much as it had before? Did I really come across as that much of a girl? I shook my head to clear it and got back to the dusting.

There were a lot of pictures in this room, of various Sisters of this House and from the history of the Sorority, including one fairly good sized picture of the founder. These women had really worked hard at making something good out of an untenable situation back in the day. Women’s education used to be a bit of a joke back then but they made it into something more, they made it into something that worked and helped women get to where they wanted to be. How could I not be impressed by that? How could I not feel honored to call these amazing women my Sisters?

That got me wondering about what other options I could have gone for in all of this. What if I had tried to join a Fraternity? Would I have even made the cut? Would it have been as fulfilling if I had made it? Would it have had as profound an effect on me as this had? Would I have made as many friends? Would that have made me become a better person to the same degree? Would joining a Fraternity have brought me the happiness I now had? Would it have done anything close to what this House and these women had done for me so far? Then again, would I have even wanted to do anything like that? Would I have wanted to join a Fraternity? Probably not. I mean, after all this started out as an attempt at justice and not anything more.

I worked hard, trying to make sure the wood glowed, which was not as difficult as you would think as I gathered it wasn’t really allowed to get all that dusty in here. The spray they gave me worked great and it was just a matter of spraying on and wiping off for the most part to make sure everything looked good. That certainly must have been what made this harder work easier. I couldn’t imagine what it would have taken before they had the spray stuff to get the same effect out of the wood. I had heard about people using wax or something on wood to make it look like this or oil and that kind of scared me. It must have taken forever to do a room like this, let alone a whole house. The amount of suck involved must have been tremendous. Looking at some of the pictures of the older Sisters and thinking about it, I figured that they must have known that fact intimately. I sort of felt sorry for them for that.

This really was an amazing bunch of women I had managed to hook up with and I was honored to be here, but I had to stop standing there woolgathering and get back to work as this wood wasn’t going to clean itself. In a short while, when I was pretty close to finished, Nadia came and got me, “Caitlin, that looks great. Once you finish this up we have something else for you to do.”

“Oh?” What did I have to do now? I only hoped it wasn’t more wood polishing as my arms were really tired.

“Come on. Follow me.”

I followed her to the sitting room where all the other girls in the pledge class were already waiting. Once I took a seat near Alison, Nadia began. “Okay. You girls will have a few hours to rest before dinner and the start of tonight’s fun. Be prepared as you will all have to sing the House song and then you will get your Big Sisters. After that… well, we’ll get there when we get there.”

Big Sisters? Wha? Oh… now I remembered. Meredith mentioned something or other about us getting mentors at one point in this whole process. This had to be that. I wondered who I was going to get as my Big Sister? If it were Meredith, would I be committing some sort of strange Sorority Incest thing? I stopped thinking along those lines and tried to think of something else. That way led madness.

All of us sighed and sank into the chairs and couches, happy to be doing something other than standing up. A couple of hours of rest would be nice after all of that work. Nadia continued, “I will come back to get you guys in a few hours. You are not to leave this room and if anyone needs to use the restrooms Gwen will escort you. I will have some drinks sent over and some snacks. By the way, the House looks beautiful. You all did an excellent job.”

I got a warm fuzzy from that, as I had worked hard both yesterday and today and to have someone recognize that effort was a good thing. She left and all of us sort of slumped even more. After a few minutes of silence, Amy looked around and asked, “Does anybody have a clue about what they’re doing tonight?”

Dawn shrugged, it was clear that she really didn’t care. “I doubt it. My guess is that it will be fairly low key as all we are really doing is getting our Big Sisters.”

Esperanza smiled at that. “That might be nice. This weekend has been too exciting already.”

A couple of the others chuckled at that and I looked down and blushed when I caught the smirk and the wink directed my way. Was it really my fault that my confession had been a bit more exciting than I had hoped for? Okay, it probably was but I didn’t have to like it. I had just been trying to be honest with them.

“Well, excitement or not, I am just glad for the break right now.” said Megan, her eyes closed and her face towards the ceiling. “Besides, I have a few new fic ideas in my head that I want to work out.”

A few of the others giggled at that, me included. Amy asked, “So what’s this idea about?”

“Uhm… well… you don’t want to know, do you?” asked Megan, clearly hoping for a no. She would certainly be disappointed in that one.

“Yeah, that would be great.” replied Dawn. The others agreed. I smiled at her apologetically.

“Well… I am doing something about one of the ponies entering a special group of them and all the stuff that they have to go through to become members.” Megan’s face was pretty red by then, the color even going to the tips of her ears.

A couple of the girls snickered at that and Dawn chuckled out, “My Little Sorority.”

Holly, ignoring Dawn said, “So… writing about what we’ve been going through?”

All she could do was nod and examine her shoes, her face glowing like a beacon. The slight teasing wasn’t bad natured and it seemed as if Megan knew that as well. I had read her fic but I still hadn’t gotten the whole My Little Pony thing. It must be one of those girl things that I cold only get if I had grown up a girl rather than sort of become one later on. What was weird was that despite a lot of prep work that the House had helped me with there were still gaps in things I knew about being a girl, things that were connected to simply growing up as one. Maybe I needed to bring this up with Meredith or maybe even the girls here? I wasn’t sure and I furrowed my brow in concentration as I thought. Would this be a good thing to discuss or not.

As I pondered this, Kerry came in with some cold iced tea and some snacks, smiling at us as she dropped them off. I barely glanced at her, since I was still running things through in my mind and not really paying attention to anything else.

“Are you all right Caitlin?” asked Esperanza, cocking her head to one side.

“Uh… yeah… well, mostly. I just don’t get the whole My Little Pony thing and I was wondering if it had to do with the whole issue of me not growing up a girl. It makes me wonder what other stuff I don’t really get because of not growing up a girl.” I admitted a bit hesitantly. It was one thing telling them the truth about me; it was another to share the deeper things about this situation.

“You mean like periods?” asked Amy curiousy, which caused me to blush.

“No, I have heard a lot about those, way too much about those in my opinion but I know I needed to know that. Hell, Meredith makes me keep track of a calendar and what that means. I know abut the bloating, clotting, cramps, and all that fun. No, I mean things like games played, movies watched, books read, that sort of thing.” I did know way too much bout that particular subject and how it would apply to my role as Caitlin. Like the fact that if you left a tampon in too long you could get toxic shock syndrome, or that there was often water weight gain. Or even the sorts of thing like what made a person choose between pads, tampons, sponges and Diva cups. As I said, too much information.

Everyone sort of blinked at me when I said that. Devin looked at me about as surprised as the rest of them but asked, “You keep track of a non existent cycle?”

I nodded.

“Why?” It was a fair question.

“Meredith and Nadia thought it might be a good idea for me to have a better idea of the bodily cycle that women go through. It is a bit odd, you know, not actually feeling that, but it has made me more aware of other people and their cycles.” I replied, growing mortified. Could we not talk about periods?

“Oh… that makes sense. So the other stuff?” continued Devin, dropping the subject to something less… well bloody actually.

“Well, I have only had since this summer to learn things and I figured things must have fallen through the cracks. I mean Megan is all about these My Little Ponies but I really don’t know anything about them or any other dolls or toys or books or anything that a girl might have read or played with while growing up. From things I have overheard, that sort of thing comes up every now and again and I am at a loss for what to say if asked about it.” I confessed. This was one area in which I was at a complete loss and it was something that had apparently gone past my trainers, which was a surprise.

“Well, we can help with that.” offered Alison. “I mean, between the group of us we can cover the basics of a lot of that stuff and help you to decide what fits you best and what doesn’t.”

“Good point. I mean, there are a lot of different books out there and shows and the like. It would make sense that you would have some favorites that were different from others. Okay, here’s one, what is your favorite Disney movie?” asked Dawn, clearly getting into this whole idea.

“Uhm… Beauty and the Beast. Belle is totally awesome and the music is incredible. I think it should have won an Oscar.” I admitted.

Megan smiled. “That one works. I really loved that one as well. What about books? What was your favorite book growing up?”

I had to think about that one as I had read all sorts of books while growing up and narrowing down a favorite might be difficult. “I had several. I love The Lord of the Rings and I did get a kick out of Alice in Wonderland.”

A few people chuckled at that. Alison replied, “Yeah. I liked both of those. I kind of wanted to drown Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm and Anne of Green Gables though. They were far too chipper for me.”

“I loved them.” whined Megan to no one’s great surprise. “They are both great books and the characters are great. There are some really sweet moments in them.”

“I preferred Nancy Drew myself.” commented Amy.

“I was a big Winnie the Pooh fan. Tigger totally rocks.” said Dawn.

“Judy Blume was much more my style.” answered Holly.

“Alf layel wa layla was my favorite.” said Thuriya. “As well as Khalil wa Dimna.”

Everyone turned to face her, clearly confused by what she had just said. “Hunh?”

“Oh… right… A Thousand Nights and a Night and Khalil and Dimna.”

That seemed to click with everyone and got some laughter once people realized what the books were. Well, all except for one. I had never heard of that last one. Alley quipped, “What were you favorite stories? Sinbad?”

“I liked almost every story with a Djinn in it. The magic was pretty awesome, though I have to think that Ala-a-din was a bit of a dork for using magic like he did.” replied Thuriya.

“Yeah, magic shouldn’t be used to bring you a happily ever after.” commented Esperanza.

“Brittany, what was your favorite book growing up?” I asked, noticing that she hadn’t really joined in on the conversation which was a bit odd, as she was usually all over things.

“I really liked The Lorax.” Her voice was a bit subdued, which was a bit strange and got everyone’s attention.

“Are you okay?” I asked.

“I don’t know. I am wondering if I did the right thing by joining up.”

This immediately got everyone’s attention focused solely on her. A couple of worried looks passed between several of the others as she continued, “I mean, sometimes I wonder if this time is being well spent. I mean, I could be going over lines or something but instead here I am cleaning some place that isn’t even mine.”

Holly sat forward in her chair, looking right at the actress. “Is that the real problem? I mean, after this semester is over there aren’t these kind of constraints on our time any more. It is just one semester of this stuff and then we are in. Can’t you hold out for a few more weeks? We really are at the end of this.”

Brittany looked down at the floor, her hair covering her face. Her voice sounded so sad. “It’s just that, well, am I really a Sorority girl? I mean, are any of us?”

I sat forward to talk. I think I had a pretty good grasp of this particular situation. “Brittany, remember that this House is different from the others. This House accepts all of us for who we are. We don’t have to fit into a specific mold here, we just have to be ourselves, live our lives our way and go after our dreams. I mean, hell, they accepted me and I am generally the wrong gender for a Sorority. If they did that, don’t you think that you are what they are looking for in a Sister as well?”

“Let me think about this, okay?”

We all gave her the space she wanted but unfortunately, that also took the wind out of the previous conversations sails. We spent the rest of our break time talking in small groups, eating and drinking. Alleycat and I talked about various things, like her favorite films as a kid and the like. The only downside is that it wasn’t the same as talking with everyone else. All too soon, time passed and now we had to get ready for the party. Brittany still seemed a bit down and that made me worried. Was I going to loose a near Sister?