CHAPTER 21
It was the start of a much harder year, as we buckled down for the first stage of exams that could have a permanent impact on our ambitions. No O-levels would mean no A-levels; no A-levels would most definitely mean no university, no degree, no opportunities, or at least massively reduced ones. It meant that we had to reduce our social activities, with the added nastiness stemming from the perverse stance of Alys’ shrinks at the gender place.

Real girls want real men, therefore any trans woman who fancied other women must be a man. It was my first real collision with circular reasoning, as well as selection of evidence. Decide what answer you want, then pick whatever you could find to support the desired conclusion. That brought another moment that was a step closer to true adulthood, in the recognition that many adults could be, and were, fundamentally dishonest, not afraid to use the ‘appeal to authority’ of ‘Listen, kid: I’m the grown-up here; you are too young to understand’.

No, I wasn’t, especially when Mrs Preece continued her daily sniping at Alys. Bite your tongue, girl. Not too young to understand at all, and certainly old enough to keep my eyes on priorities. My lover came first.

She actually came second, as my sixteenth birthday was before her own, but there was no wild debauch for either of us. We had Christmas at her place, both of our birthdays at the Cow (with music and extra Woodruffs), and then the weather started a slow improvement, just as our schoolwork really ramped up.

I was feeling frustrated, because it wasn’t just the weather keeping me indoors. I didn’t even get the chance to play in the snow and ice with axe and crampons, because the books and the ‘continuous assessment’ projects were always lurking in my room or, when Mam was home, on the dining table.

That was a time I could see, far more clearly than ever before, the woman who had walked out on Dad for his own good. Such strength in her; I had an awful lot to live up to.

Alys’ birthday was our last day of frivolity before we hit the last and most important of our hurdles. There was no music on that night, but Mr Harries had everything set up on a separate table for us, so we had a meal, followed by a cake with candles and THAT song again. There were only a few tourists in that night, scattered in pairs and singletons among the locals, all apart from one group of women and girls. I recognised one of the women, and older one that Mr Harries called Pat, but the others, another adult and two teenagers, were new to me. What caught my eye was the fact that one of the girls looked particularly nervous, and I found myself smirking as I wondered which of the Scary Bethesda People stories she might have heard. It didn’t matter, because they all sang along for Alys, and that was all I cared about. She, in essence, was all I cared about that evening.

So we laughed and sniggered at the sneaky way Mr Harries let us have a little bit of wine each by selling it to our parents in tumblers rather than stemmed glasses, and Dad got a little bit too merry along with Alys’ own father, and at one point I realised that all six of us were holding hands, in pairs, below the table in the case of Alys and myself.

That hurt, because we had walked everywhere at Shrewsbury visibly joined together, and nobody had seemed to care, unless it was to smile indulgently at the sight. There had been that older woman on the train, of course, but she had been an exception. One day soon, once she had finished with those bigots at the clinic, we would be free to show the world in general what our families already knew.

Yes, I mentally included all of Steph’s horde in that thought.

There is nothing I want to write about our exams. They arrived, we sat at our little tables, I answered what questions I could, and spent far too long comparing my ability to count seconds from one thousand and one to one thousand and sixty, seeing how closely I could match the minute hand on the large clock set up in front of us. More simply, they asked me questions, I did my best, and then I went outside to breathe fresher air.

The hardest part was that Alys and I were apart for so much of it, as she was applying her mind to different sets of questions. It wasn’t until it was all over that we were finally able to look at the weather forecast, grab some food and drink, and simply walk away from Gerlan and up the Afon Caseg towards the bulk of the Carneddau, to find a sweep of hillside where we could spread a rug for a picnic.

Utterly mundane as an act, the sort of thing done in a car park at a wooden table/bench combination, or on some crowded and windy beach, but here it was on a sweep of sheep-cropped turf on the flanks of some of the highest mountains our country held, the sky a vast dome of blue with only a few condensation trails from those foolish enough to want to fly elsewhere, away from this beauty. There were buzzards and ravens above, meadow pipits and wheatears all around, with an occasional call from a sheep to counterpoint the deep kronks of the ravens.

We lay together, only half of our picnic gone, and there was nobody nearby to hide our love from.

“Enfys?”

“Yes, love?”

“Sixteen now. Got a letter yesterday”

“Oh? Who from?”

“That clinic. Doctor said yes”

My heart was starting to pound.

“Yes to what, Alys?”

“Yes to hormones, Enfys. Got to see the GP to have some tests, and then it’s two things”
“What sort of things?”

She wriggled a little where she lay with her head on my arm, both of us staring up into the brilliance of the day.

“Some blood tests again, and then it’s a sort of switch over”

She paused for a few seconds, then reached for my spare hand.

“Been on the blockers for a while, and that’s going to sort of continue, with what they call anti-androgens. Stuff to stop me getting hairy and that. I can stop those when… when they do something to sort my anatomy out, and you know what I mean. It’s the other things. Hormones”

She snorted, something amusing her for a moment.

“What Ifor said that day, love, when you brought those biscuits in, about growing a pair of tits”

“I remember!”

“Yeah, well. The other thing is… Enfys? The doctor says that I will get lots of mood swings for a while. Please, if I get silly, please understand it will never be because of you”

I lifted my arm to roll her towards me so that I could embrace her properly, a single bee humming across the turf nearby as I kissed her, my nerves almost stopping me from saying the next thing. Almost, but not quite.

“Alys?”

“That’s my name”

“Seriously… You say the hormones will… that you’ll change? Physically?”

“Yes. Might get a better bum, if I’m lucky”

My heart was hammering now.

“You mean if we are lucky?”

She nodded, squeezing me, wordless.

“Alys?”

“Still my name”

“You said you’d grow… breasts”

“Oh yes”

“But you…”

Deep breath.

“You already have a pair”

I took her hand, and moved it to my own breast, and, well, oh. Very, very much ‘Oh!’. It was nearly dark by the time we got back down into the village. My heart was still in my mouth, my soul was flying somewhere up with the buzzards and ravens, and my bra was in the bottom of my rucksack.

Three days later, Dad answered our house phone at about nine o’clock.

“Can I help you? Hi, Nansi!”

“Er, no. I’ll ask. Enfys?”

“Yeah?”

“Seen Alys today?”

“Er, no, not today. She was going to be doing one of those insect mapping things, over by the zip wire place. That’s what she said this morning. I went up towards Gwenllian”

He frowned slightly.

“Hang on. Putting this on speaker. Nansi?”

Her voice was tinny, but clear enough.

“Yes?”

“Enfys is here with me. She hasn’t been with Alys today. What’s up?”

“She was supposed to be home for tea, Keith. That was three hours ago”

“Oh shit. What do you want to do?”

“Vic wants to go out and have a look, but one of us needs to stay in, just… just in case”

Dad was nodding.

“I’ll give Pen a shout. Enfys can stay here; me and Pan will pick Vic up in a few. Called the police?”

“Not yet. This will sound silly, but, well, I don’t want her embarrassed. This is a small place, and she gets enough silliness”

“Okay. Understood. Pen and me will be down as soon as we can get moving”

“Thanks, Keith”

“No need, love”

He hung up abruptly.

“PEN!”

Man came in from the kitchen.

“What’s up? I only caught some of that”

“Alys is missing. Hasn’t come home. Nansi is staying by the phone, Enfys can do that here, and us two are picking up Vic as soon as possible”

“Okay. I’ll grab some head torches and a space blanket. Got time to make a hot flask?”

“Good call. Towels… You do the flask, I’ll grab the kit. Stay here, Enfys. We’ll have our mobiles, but you know what this valley can be like”

He disappeared upstairs, as Mam filled two flasks, one with hot chocolate, and then Dad was back with two small rucksacks, and my parents were gone, along with half of my soul. I fully understood the need for someone to stay at home, but surely there was someone in the bunkhouse that we knew well enough to trust?

I sat and fretted for two hours, logging onto the internet to check for news, trying her mobile more than a dozen times, and managing to fight back my tears only about a third of the times that they needed to burst out. Not a word from anyone…

The doorbell rang, and I was out of my seat immediately, knowing that it would be her, wanting to hold her and kiss her and slap her all at the same time, and…

There were two of them, all in black, caps on.

“Hello, police. Sorry to disturb you. May we come in, please? I am Constable Amin, this is PC Simms”

I led the way into the dining room, dread starting to take control of my hands, the shakes coming on along with the fear. The two coppers settled themselves on their feet, both ignoring the chairs I offered them, and then the second one, Simms, opened a little notebook.

“Do you know someone called Alys Edwards? We found your name and address in her purse”