Bridges 9

Chapter 9

The Bridgeview Galleria didn’t exist back when I was living here in high school it’s a kind of nice place with three floors and lots of brand name and box stores. I get a Orange Julius and wander around the mall. I’m not in a hurry so I’m just enjoying myself, looking and window shopping while I have a few hours.

My first step is at the Lady Footlocker where I buy myself three pairs of those Reebok shoes that help sculpt you legs and bottom. I buy some new sports underwear, I need a bigger size of bra which I’m happy about. I buy some jogging weights and socks and stuff. I change into the shoes right there.

Next stop is the health food store where I buy a bunch of stuff I’m out of. Woman’s vitamins and really good soymilk, vitamin e, a couple of various boxes of those Nature Valley granola bars and some energy bars and those vitamin caltrate chocolate chews and stuff for various shakes and stuff.

The next is one of those body fit places. I buy a lot, a lot of stuff there like things for the bathroom, scented candles and oils and all of the girly stuff I didn’t really have, I’m running out of the things that mom had in the house and I’m kind of wanting my own scent and my own touch on things.

I take a trip out to my car, I kind of like the bug with all that room in the trunk. I’m getting why these are so popular with girls. These cars were made for shopping. And I have to admit they are pretty cute.

I turn and there’s two guys in my way. I try to move around them but they keep stepping in my way. “Excuse me, do you mind, I still have errands to run.”
“Yer going t’hell you faggit.” one of them says. The other looks like he wants to hurt me. Both are surprisingly clean cut and nicely dressed guys.
“I’m sorry but I don’t even know you.”
“Pastor Lucas said your kind is an abomination and are going to bring us to ruin.”
The angry guy pokes me in the chest. “Stay the fuck away from our children you child molesting bastard.”

I don’t take it. See these assholes have always done this hit and run stuff. I’ve never been actually assaulted until now. They just don’t let it go. The guy who poked me goes to give me a shove telling me to “Get out of town, or else.” I snatch his wrist and twist it fast enough to break it as he get’s put into an armbar and bash his head off my car door. I hear the crunch of his nose breaking. I don’t like the sound, I’m a nurse I don’t like hurting people but I will.

His friend the one with the mouth decides to sucker punch me and slugs me a good one in the face. I get hit hard but he’s got no idea actually how to throw a punch. I duck my head not being able to block it I give him a different area that he’ll connect with and I roll myself with the hit. He’s strong but I survived Afghanistan, I’ve seen combat. I kind of go there and his next swing I catch open handed. Angry, my adrenaline on high I tighten my grip and hear his knuckles creaking. I’ve been attacked by far fucking worse in the field and by a lot fucking better by delirious soldiers in the med tents. This guy has no idea how tough a woman can be. He’s about to learn. My free hand curls into a fist seeing as I’m not wearing my gear.

Then there’s the very loud “Bripp-Whoa!” of a siren right behind the two guys. As I see Constable Andy Mitchell pull in with a screech of tires. The two guys try to run. I don’t let go of the guys hand until Andy has him and Mr. Busted nose tries to run and gets about fifty feet before two of the security guards from the mall corner him for the Mountie.

Very loudly and using their ID’s Constable Mitchell arrests them for assault and reads them their rights. There is a small crowd gathering to watch and one of the girls from Armstrong Insurance asks me if I’m okay.

“Yeah, I think so.”
Constable Andy comes up to me. “Sam, are you okay?”
“Yes, no I really don’t get what the hell I’m doing to piss these guys off.”
“You don’t have to do anything, one of them is not even asking for his lawyer yet just his Pastor.”
“Yeah he mentioned getting this kind of spiritual guidance from this Pastor Lucas.”
“Do you know him?”
“Barely, he and his bunch tries to get a court order to get me out of town as a sex offender,”
“But you don’t have a criminal record.”
“Oh, no apparently being transgendered is against the law according to them.”
“I see, Are you going to press charges?”
“Hell yes, I’m done taking this if I’ve got some support from the authorities.”
“You have it from us. The law is the law in this town and I don’t put up with hate crimes under my watch.”
“Any chance security caught any of this?”
“Yeah, both of the two guys were following you and the guards saw that and began to follow them. They radioed it into their camera room and we’ve got it all on tape from inside the mall and out here. It looks premeditated.”

He takes my statement as do the two security guys for their own records and they gave Andy a disc. During that time, two other Mounties show up and there’s talking back and forth and Cass shows up. She talks with Andy and she looks pissed. There’s a kind of team break and she comes over to me. “Hey Sam, are you okay?”
“Yes, I’m okay Cass. Either I’m getting better at dealing with it or the adrenaline is still running through my system and I’ll freak out later.”
“How’s your head.”
“Hard.”
“Very funny I’m serious, he wasn’t a small guy.”
“Yeah but he was just…a civilian..?”
“Yeah but civilians are dangerous too Sam.”
“I know but I handled it. He was lucky though.’
“Oh?’
“PTSD, I might not look like it but they train you pretty well when they’re going to send you into combat zones. I might have slipped into being back there and really hurt him. If I was armed It might have happened.”
“…………Sorry Sam I…I didn’t realize. Can I have you sign a waver for access to your medical records?”
“Uhm…why?”
“You’ve been cleared to be in public but they’re assaulting you in a much more serious way we might be able to get a lot more against them if the crown can show this to a judge.”
“As long as I don’t get like dinged for being a public menace.”

She gets the forms and takes some more pictures of my bruise, it’s up in the hairline so it’s not too bad. She takes pictures of my car and where the blood from the guy’s nose is on it. It even gets cleaned off under video and the bloody wipe is put into an evidence bag.
I sign the forms and head back into the mall.

This isn’t going to stop me. They’re not going to win, they’re not going to beat me.
I feel almost high as I’m shopping and that line from Rambo is running through my head that Stallone says. “They started this, It’s not my fault, they drew first blood, They drew first blood.”

The fact I’m wearing white running shoes with pink stripes that are designed to shape my legs and my butt only adds to the weird surreal sense of funny.

I am aware that I’m in shock.

I go to several other stores getting a bunch of stuff that I want, I girl shop, I buy things that I want for no other reason than they are pretty or at least they are to me. I’m going a bit overboard because of what happened out in the parking lot and I’m reacting to it.

I got to let this out.

I go to this in mall spa called Unique and try to see if they have an opening. They don’t and I’m about to leave when this woman in the office comes down. “Let her in, bump Mrs. Hill she’s always late.” She comes over to me and reaches out to check where I got hit. “We’ll have to be careful here ladies, there’s some broken skin here.” Then to me. “I saw what happened outside honey. Besides I want to catch up with you.”
I look at her and slowly recognize her Lacey Grant.
One of my ex-girlfriends from high school.

It’s actually a really great experience. Lacey takes care of me herself and we talk. We talk about everything that’s been going on in my life from all the bullshit here to meeting Kym and the bombshell that I had never been the person I though I was all of my life. Lacey is really amazing and easy to talk to. And the fact she plied me with two chocolate martinis didn’t hurt me loosening either. I get to do what I’ve never really been able to do. Bitch, It’s so therapeutic to be that open and secure about it with somebody. Lacey and I did have sex back then and while I was a lot more caring and sensitive to her needs there wasn’t anything pointing to me being a girl inside. I ask her why she’s so cool with it and apparently she left with a guy she’d been in love with after cosmetology school and followed him to Manhattan. The relationship they had fell apart but she got a job in one of the famous salons there and saved up enough money to come home and start her own place.

Trans-girls are the least of the weird she said she’s seen. I laugh my ass off at some of the outrageous stories she does and the accents she can do from like the different boroughs or the ethnic stereotypes and even some of the Celebes she’s worked on. She done work on so many drag queens her Cher, Liza, and Celine are spot on. Lacey got me laughing so hard I had to go pee.

And she pulls out all the stops for me too. I’ve never been to a salon before and this was a stress impulse stop for me. Sauna, Massage, rubbing the hairs off of me with these gloves that are like the exfoliating pad things…oh that so beats waxing or shaving or Nair which burns sometimes and smells. A body wrap and a facial along with a Mani and a Pedi. It takes awhile and by the time I’m done…that girl in the mirror.

She doesn’t look like me. I look like I’m really my mother’s little girl only with my dads eyes. It takes a whole lot not to cry. Lacey hugs me in the mirror. “Wow, Sam you look…”
“I look like my mom…” There’s a smile on my face that’s never been there before. This, this just takes today’s bullshit and washes it away. “God Lacey thank you, oh god thank you for this…I can’t ever repay you for this.”
She smiles and hugs me again. “That’s right It’s on the house Sam.”
“But, the hours and the time and…”
“It’s my shop and my time Sam, besides I don’t charge my friends.”
“You still think of us as friends?”
“Yeah, we might have broken up in high school because we were going different places then. Like you going into the military instead of to university with me, but I did love you then and care about you now. Sam we were friends even after we were together, I’d love to get back to knowing one of the best friends I ever had. I got back here after NY and I really don’t have too much in common with the girls we went to school with. The ones here all settled down and stuff and kind of treat me like I’m not from here anymore.”
“Oh boy, do I ever get that.”
“I figured you might and honestly I miss you. We used to just hang out even back then.”
“I kind of missed that too Lace.”
“I’ll call you?”
“Definitely.”

We hug and kiss and exchange numbers and e-mails and she gives me her Facebitch and Twit-ster stuff too.

I head through the rest of the Mall oh sorry Galleria. I feel better, maybe it’s looking the way I do now which so called for a new dress and I couldn’t wear my sneakers with those so new shoes to go with them.

Oh, shoes…I’d never really spent any time in a quality shoe store. I always though I was going to be a Payless type of girl. Not that there’s anything wrong with there…I actually go there too right after getting some work clothes from Marks Work Warehouse. I really love the look of a really well crafted shoe and wearing them…well there’s a feeling that unless you want it, need to be a girl deep inside you just won’t get. Even I didn’t until I stepped into my first pair of Armed Forces dress shoes. Before I was sent off on my PTSD leave my doctor had me dressed, and dressing for awhile as a female soldier and nurse. I loved/love the way I look and feel in my uniform and stepping into them for the first time was such a formative moment for me.

Sneaky hooking my mental image of my female persona to my military life. But I still get that feeling of real femininity when I slide my feet into really lovingly crafted Italian leather pumps. I don’t go for the crazy big heels but still a heel about 2inches, I bought some threes. I live the click of heels on the tiled floors as I shop. I just hit a few more shops and get some odds and ends. I even hit one of the bookstores a place called Wordsworths and pick up some of my favorite novels by some of my favorite writers, pick up some DVD’s of movies that I’ve wanted. I’m slowly replacing my and Mom and Dad’s movie collection of VHS with the DVD versions. It’s slow going because Dad was a movie buff. I should do something with…yeah.

I quit while I’m ahead and head out and over to Cost co. And with the help of several decent young guys get all the paints and varnishes and glues Brandon wanted and several other handy odds and ends that I know I didn’t have at home so before heading over to the grocery section of the place. I get the hot dog buns and the hot dogs, I splurge for the Ball-park franks and a whole lot of fixing for the dogs like coleslaw and 4 mustards and ketchup, sauerkraut and all the stuff I’ve ever seen on a hot dog. It’s a lot of stuff, when you eat hotdogs with American troops you really get a hotdog.

The boys were great because they helped me repack the stuff in the car. Sigh this, this is why I drive a truck. I tip both of them $20 for being a couple of great guys. I know that’s a lot but honestly I’m buying cool points, I’m buying some positive PR.

I pull out and drive for home and see there’s a RCMP car that pulls in behind me and follows me until I’m just about home. There’s a wave and a little flash of the cherries as they pull around at the four way stop.

I pull into Brandon’s and see a lot of stuff done since I left the roof is nearly done being shingled and the walls are getting done really quickly too. I see Brandon putting up plywood inside the house and honk the horn before getting out.

He comes over all…he looks so good when he’s working. The plaid shirt over the white t-shirt the old faded work jeans with that really…uhm…he’s got a really nice package and it’s only kind of framed and accentuated by his tool belt…wow…even thinking tool belt feels kind of kinky. His hair’s all loose and long and thick held only by the bandanna he’s wearing and he’s wearing his glasses…He smiles that little smile of his. “You look great.”
“Thanks an old friend of mine runs a salon and spa in the galleria.”
“You okay?”
“Uhm…you heard?”
“Chuck did, he has a scanner on his bike.”
“Oh, uhm yeah…They were kind of those I hate you because “My Pastor/God” said you living’s gonna send us all to hell types.”
“Still, you don’t need this shit.”

I was going to say something but he actually stepped right up to me and gives me a kiss. And wraps his arms around me and squeezes just right holding me. It takes me a few seconds before my mind and body get what’s going on and I let go and just let this kind of full body sigh and it’s there…I really don’t have to be strong right now. Brandon’s got me. He’s got me and even if it’s just for a little while I’m safe…safer and really cared for.

It feels so good.

***
Henry Wade…..

I can’t fucking believe it. That thing, it, she, he…what ever…I thought it was like some fucking pansy nurse or something after Blacklock and Murray fucking things up and Those new fucking cops. Pastor Lucas didn’t need much convincing that the faggit bitch was trouble. The pictures with the booze and Brandon’s friends on the bikes paint a picture of the town going to hell.

I even played the dirty Indian card with the guy in the truck and his kids.

I didn’t expect the freak to fight back against Lucas’s tough guys. I’m going to get them out of here. I have too, that deal is worth millions to me. The cops, those fucking new cops! “Shit, fuck, Dammit!”

I was following the freak out of town behind the cops and them giving her an escort and a wave. I turned too as he did but he’s turned and accelerated and I’m being motioned to pull over. I turned around from looking at him and that New Cop Cunt in the Bronco pulls up in front of me too.

One in front of me and one in back of me.

That’s why I’m swearing.