The treasure of life is in the finding...

Part 8 of 8

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Admin Note: Originally published on BigCloset Classic on Friday, 10-03-2003 - 09:22:51 pm and migrated to BigCloset TopShelf, this retro classic was pulled out of the closet, and re-presented for our newer readers. ~Sephrena
 
Image Credit: Divider licensed for use in publishing from Photoshopgraphics.com ~Sephrena.
 

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Part 8 – Finale
 
An alarm sounded at the desk. The patient in room 232 was in cardiac arrest. The resuscitation unit scrambled, rushing to the room at top speed. The first person in the room stopped suddenly and checked the monitors, but they were all reading normally: EKG, EEG, respiratory -- all normal. The team doctor checked the EKG strip and noted the flatline on the graph, but it only had a duration of 3 seconds, not enough to cause brain damage. Still, the fact that it was there was enough to suggest that the patient's body was starting to shut down. The doctor began a physical examination, but there was no change; he was still in the same condition he'd been in for the last six weeks - the time he'd been brought in.

To the doctor, the most puzzling part of the coma was that the patient had had brain activity the whole time, very high activity, in fact. According to the neurologists, this should not have been possible for someone with such severe head trauma. The doctor shook his head and ordered the crash team to leave the room. There was no crisis now, and the brain activity again gave a very highly agitated motion to the charting needles. He could only wish that he knew what was going on inside this person's mind. However, tonight he realized that he would never know; all signs were pointing to a physical degradation of the body. There was likely little time left before he died. The family had wanted to keep him alive as long as possible, but after six weeks in a coma, even they weren't hopeful.

The heavy sadness of the patient's family was apparent every time they visited. Everyone he'd met had loved this poor man, but there were a few callous people in the outside world that hadn't cared. Because this man was transgendered, they felt the need to commit mayhem. Several brutal blows to the head caused massive swelling in his brain, yet somehow, by some miracle, he still maintained brain function and activity.

'Regardless,' the doctor decided, 'he's not coming out of his coma.' The police put the perpetrators in jail for assault, but they still waited. When the man died, they would file charges for First-Degree murder as well as for hate crimes. The doctor took one last look at the EEG monitor. It was intense activity, as usual. 'What was going on in the patient's head?' the doctor wondered. 'Only God knows,' he answered himself.

I was back in my own house. The feeling of dying had been so calming. I knew every person would die, but to know that that death wasn't mine made it easier for me. I knew that eventually I'd die, but I certainly hoped that it wouldn't be for a long, long time to come. The only thing that I had left to deal with was the last question. This one didn't sound too bad. Choices? I could always make choices. However, I wasn't sure that this choice would be any easier than what I'd been facing so far.

The weird thing about this one was that I didn't have a charm to attach to my necklace. I didn't receive a letter from whomever it was that had been sending them to me. I could only guess that they were going to come to me to let me make my choice, whatever choice I would have to make. Nevertheless, I would have to wait for them.

DING-DONG!

Oops, there went my doorbell. I guessed I didn't have to wait very long after all.

After opening the door, I gasped at the site in front of me. It was Jennifer, only the Jennifer I remembered from her early twenties, except that she had a look of absolute perfection about her, not to mention a sort of glow that permeated her whole being. I could only stand there, dumbfounded at the sight of her. I just didn't know what to say.

"Hi, Michael. May I come in?"

What could I have done except dumbly stand aside and motion her to enter.

"Please, Michael, this is your home. Relax. Or haven't you learned anything about being a good hostess?"

"I'm sorry, Jennifer. I'm just so shocked to see you here. I hope you're not mad at me for living all those parts of your life."

"Michael, shall we sit? I think it would be better for both of us if we were able to be comfortable."

We walked over to the couch and sat down.

"Michael, I know my presence here is a shock to you, but we decided to use someone who would be familiar to you when we finally approached you. Just to let you know, I'm not really Jennifer. I only look like her. Very much like your experience in her body; you were not really her, either."

"What do you mean, only look like her?"

She held up her hand. "It might be very hard to explain things to you, but I'll try to answer your questions."

"I have a lot of questions for you. First, why did you do this to me? What did I do to deserve this sort of treatment? Who are you, and who are you people?"

"Michael, let me make this clear to you. We did not do this to you. We have been assisting you. The whole thing came from your own mind." I started to say something. She stopped me with a motion. "No. Wait, please; don't say anything. I know what you're going to say. I know it doesn't make any sense for all this to be coming from your own head. However, I'm afraid it's true. You didn't deserve this sort of treatment, either. I will explain more a bit later. Who I am and who my people are... that is a bit complex to explain. First, I have to show you something that I hope will bring things into clear focus for you. Come with me."

She took my hand, led me down the hallway to my room, and stood me in front of the mirror on the door. I was confronted with myself. She was not in the mirror at all, yet she stood next to me. This was weird.

"Michael, please tell me what you see."

"I see myself, but it's Dan looking back at me. I don't see you at all. Why is that?"

"Because I'm not really here. I'm just in your mind. What else can you tell me about your reflection?"

"I'm sorry, I don't really know what you're trying to ask me. This is all very confusing."

"Let me show you something, Michael." She put her hand to my forehead and held it there for a moment. "Close your eyes a moment." I did so. "Ok, you can open them. Now, what do you see?"

"I see myself, but I'm homely, overweight and my eyes are very sad. What did you do to me? Why did the reflection change from what I was before to this ugly person?"

"Michael, what you saw in the mirror before was your idealized self. It is how you want to be able to be seen by others. Your inner beauty was reflected. What you see now is what you actually look like. In reality, you're a very tender person and all the people you meet like you. They are able to see past the shell and see the person inside. That person is a wonderful person to be around. However, he is so sad because of his inner turmoil. Do you know what that is?"

"Yes, I'm transgendered. I hate what I look like. I'd never be able to pass as a woman because I'm too ugly as a man."

"Yet, people see the real you and they like what they see. Come with me again, please."

She took my hand and led me to the bedroom door. She opened it and we walked into what looked like a hospital room. There was a person lying on the bed, hooked up to a variety of monitors and tubes. This person looked very sick.

"Jennifer, who is this man? I can't tell through all the bandages."

"Michael, this is you. You've been in a coma for six weeks now, but your body is failing. The doctors have been doing what they could, but it hasn't been enough. What you went through in the last challenge, dying there, caused your heart to stop for a few seconds. It will only cascade further."

"How did I get to be here? Everything seems so real."

"It does to you, but it's all in your mind. This is what happened: One night you were trying to cross dress to see how good you could make yourself look. You had friends helping you, and you even had enough courage to step out of your house and sit on your porch. But before you could go back inside, a gang of young toughs prowling around looking for trouble spotted you and made you their target of opportunity. They beat you severely, took a baseball bat to your head, and tried to kill you. You were long unconscious before the neighbors heard them laughing about the queer they had just bashed. The police were summoned immediately and the gang was caught a few blocks away. You were brought into the hospital emergency room in extremely critical condition. Somehow, you not only survived the night, but you have survived for six weeks now. Nevertheless, it's ending. Your body is dying and there is nothing anyone can do to stop it."

"Why are you telling me this? I don't want to die!"

"Figuratively speaking, you already have. When Dan died, it was your mind releasing your masculine side to its inevitable demise. However, that's why I'm here now. My Father has sent me to make an offer to you. You will have to make a choice. Yes, it's that choice. Life has been unfair to you and your soul was not meant for the body it was imprisoned in. Moreover, I do mean imprisoned. You were supposed to have been a woman and live to an old age with many family members around you. The woman you have always called mother was meant to give birth to a deformed stillborn baby, but the carrier of the souls mixed things up, your soul was put in this body and the body you were meant for was not given anything soul-wise. That meant that the little girl you were supposed to be was stillborn. It was too late to correct the problem after the girl child died. You were both born at the same moment, at the same hospital in rooms next to each other."

"Jennifer, when I was looking in the mirror in my bedroom, I looked so handsome and then I became hideous. I understand the hideous part, but why was I so handsome?"

"Dear Michael, that's simple. What you were seeing is the person that you always wished you could have been instead of who you had always felt yourself to be. Dan is your desired self and that is why he became your boyfriend and husband. Your deepest desire was to be a normal-looking man and not a transgendered monster, as you felt yourself to be. Dan is how you perceived your ideal self to be inside your head."

"Why was I Jennifer when I was going through all the challenges? That's puzzled me most of all."

"That's why I'm here. As I said, my Father sent me to make you an offer. Every thing that you experienced as Jennifer is what you would have experienced if you had been born as that baby girl. However, your adult mind made the choices and took the actions she did. You filled in many of the blanks, such as dialogue, from your mind. It all occurred because of the mistake that was made so many years ago. My Father had made the decision to let you live as long as possible. He even had it written into your fate that you were to live as long as your destined body would have lived, but it was cut short when you were attacked in your yard."

She sighed. "My Father cannot maintain the body any longer and you will have to leave it."

"Could you explain what you mean?" I asked.

She smiled brilliantly. "Sure. Father wants me to offer you a new life right here and now. You can live from birth to death as the person of your choice. You can choose to live as a male or as a female. Your soul was destined to be female. If you choose to be male, we will have to modify your soul to fit your body. The body you choose will still be beautiful when it grows up and you will always be favored and guarded throughout the life you will live. But unfortunately, time grows short and the decision must be done within the next few minutes. Your old body is nearing terminal and will die. At the moment, no one can see us. If you look at the heart monitor, you will see an irregularity in the beating of the heart. The brain activity is decreasing as we stand here talking. The alarms should start going off any second now."

As she said that, the alarms sounded, warning the hospital staff of the irregularity of my heart functions. The team came running into the room, preparing for an attempt to resuscitate the patient on the bed. There was a flurry of activity and I was hard pressed to keep track of anything.

"Michael, come with me now, please. We must go. We have two different babies in the process of being born right now. They are in two different cities so you will not have to worry about where they are. They'll be born within a minute of your body dying. We will only have that short time in which to have you safely inside the new body. You will not remember your past life, but you will have a clean slate with whomever you choose."

Jennifer took my hand and we were suddenly in what seemed to be two different rooms at the same time.

"On your right, the woman is about to give birth to a girl. She will grow up to be very beautiful and intelligent. The woman on the left is about to give birth to a boy. If you choose him, we will change your soul to be content to be a male. He will grow up to be intelligent and handsome. Michael, there is a standby soul waiting to be placed in the body that you do not choose. You must choose now."

I couldn't believe the choice was needed so quickly. In my mind, I could hear the doctors in the room working furiously on saving my body. They were getting desperate, from the sounds of things. They were fighting hard, but they knew they were losing. I turned to Jennifer.

"I've made up my mind." She smiled at me. I nodded to the one I wanted.

"Come, let us proceed." She took my hand and approached the woman who was about to give birth to the chosen baby. "All you have to do is touch the spot where the baby is and you will be drawn into the new body. Congratulations. I'll see you when you come back to us. Goodbye, Michael."

I touched the woman's tummy. I heard the sounds in my room. Voices were asking for the time. The voices faded out, as I was absorbed into the body of the child I was meant to be, waiting to emerge into the world. . The last thing I saw was a beautiful smile on Jennifer's face.

The sound of a crying newborn filled the room. The people gathered in the room cheered. A voice declared, "It's a girl!" An ethereal voice sounded in the room, "Whole at last!" The baby cried; tears streamed down the mother's face as the happy parents welcomed their new addition to the world. The baby continued to cry as she protested the parent's loving handling.

Someone asked the parents, "What are you going to name her? Have you chosen yet?"

The proud mother looked up at her husband. "We had decided to name her Rachel, but I no longer want to call her that. Honey, if you don't mind, I have a deep desire to call her Jennifer. Is that ok?"

The proud father beamed at his beautiful wife. "Sweetheart, I didn't know how to tell you that I didn't like Rachel anymore and wanted to name our daughter Jennifer. She just looks like a Jennifer, a beautiful young girl. Would you look at those beautiful eyes! They are the most beautiful color of violet that I have seen!"

The doctor looked at them and said, "Ok, Jennifer, it is."

And Jennifer, it was.
 
 

 
 
Authors Note: This story has been a work of heartache and thought. It is also dedicated to those brothers and sisters in the Transgendered community who have suffered the most and have paid the ultimate price for trying to be who they were supposed to be. I weep for those lost souls and pray that they have been able to find peace and hopefully wholeness is given them in their next life. Thank you for following me in this journey.

Jerrie

Strange Items: After this part was completed while I was eating lunch, I was sorting through the work for the remainder of my work day, I came across a work order that shocked me to no end. One of my customers that I was supposed to work on caught my eye, big time. The name on the order was Ronald Banks and his wife's name was Almyra and he had a daughter by the name of Jennifer. Sometimes fiction nearly coincides with reality. Sometimes too close for comfort.
 
 
Note: TG magic borrowed-body rated-R
Posted by: Admin on Friday, October 03, 2003 - 09:22 PM