Chapters 50 - 52. The continuing story of Jason, a young boy that is coming to terms with his transgendered nature, and his mostly supportive family.

Authors Note: Thanks to Joni W for editing this section for me!

Chapter 50

That night while Jason lay in bed, he thought about all the changes going on in his life and how he had gotten to this point. Earlier in the day, Julie, Julie's mother, Kathy, Sue, his Aunt Sally and his mother were all with him as Michele did her magic. He had spent a lot of this summer fully as Kelly, but had kept away from the general public as much as possible.

Mostly he and his friends had gathered at one of their houses. Julie's family had a pool, so a lot of the time was spent there. He laughed as he thought that at least he had not had to worry about the tan lines.

Of course he had gone to the school to meet with the principal and the superintendant as Kelly. He had thought the butterflies that he felt that day were bad, but they did not hold a candle on what he had felt tonight.

This was different, he had thought that he was going to be seen by just about every person in town, and he was not too far off with that estimate.

As he sat there and listened to each and every person that got up to speak, knowing that he was at the center of the division, he kept wondering if this was the right thing to do. Sitting there and listening to the horrible things that some of them had to say about his parents, hurt him and made him angry. "Who the hell are these people to judge my parents? What do they know about how hard this has been for them and how hard they try to do what is right?" Jason thought to himself.

Then he thought, "Maybe I should just put it all aside and be what they all expect me to be. Could I do that?"

He thought about taking all of Kelly's things, bagging them up and taking them to good will. He knew of course, that he would be teased about it forever; even if he did at least it would be over. Even as he was thinking that, he knew it would never be over.

His heart ached as he thought of never being able to be Kelly again and he knew that if he tried to completely remove Kelly from his life, he would never be happy. He thought about Chris Fienberg and knew without a doubt that without the acceptance that he had from his parents, that he could easily be Chris. A wave of empathy for Chris washed over him. He began to cry for what could have been and should have been. A feeling of guilt came over him wondering why he had so much support and why Chris had to fight his way alone.

As he was crying for Chris, and feeling unworthy of the support he was receiving, he suddenly realized that it was not a matter of being worthy or not. In fact, he realized both he and Chris were worthy of the support of their loved ones and the shame was not on either he or Chris, but on those that could not or would not give them support. This was Mr. and Mrs. Fienberg's failing and he realized that Mr. Fienberg knew that too. In fact, it is what he had said. For himself it was his Aunt Jessica's failing that she and Tom could not handle this. They may never recognize that, but he knew it now and knew it implicitly.

He could forgive them, as he was sure that Chris would forgive Mr. Fienberg, if he could.

"God, please let Chris Fienberg's soul be at peace. Please let her find what she was looking for and could not find here on Earth; and please tell her, I won't let them get me down. I'm going to overcome them for her, for every transgendered person that never got support, I will be strong."

With that, he fell asleep exhausted.

Chapter 51

"Well this has been a pretty big week. I understand there was a big debate at the board of education meeting. How did that go?" Dr. Daniels asked Jason.

"I was really nervous going into it. It was quite difficult to sit there and listen to everyone arguing over me. Some people said some truly nasty things about my parents, and that made me angry, others came to their defense. Then Mr. Fienberg talked about his son Chris and why he had killed himself, which was very sad." Jason replied.

"So how did this make you feel?"

"A whole range of emotions, angry, sad, angry, guilty, angry, proud, angry, did I say angry?" Jason laughed.

"That sounds about right."

"I thought a lot about it later that night. At first I started to think about whether I should just give it up and just bag up Kelly's things, and put her in my past. The thought of doing that just makes me so unhappy; I cannot see her not being a part of my life."

"What about Jason. Can you see giving up being Jason for the rest of your life?"

"I don't know. It's hard to imagine not ever being Jason anymore. I don't really think of Kelly and Jason as being different people anyway. I like being called Kelly, it feels like I'm being accepted, but it still feels a bit strange to me when I hear it, like it's someone else."

"Forget about the names, because you are right, you are not two different people. If you were, we would be treating a very real psychiatric problem. But can you see giving up being identified as male, forever? You have already realized that you can't give up being identified as female, forever. Basically you have three options, one of which you have ruled out. So of the remaining options, you can work towards becoming fully your female persona, or you can try for a balance."

"I don't know." Jason said.

"And yet you have embarked on the path of being Kelly full time. Are you certain this is what you want?"

"Yes, I'm sure. It's a bit scary, but yes, I have to do this."

Chapter 52

The first day of school came too quickly for Jason. The night before he had gone to Michele's salon and she worked her magic. Since Jason no longer had to preserve the appearance of a masculine hairstyle, Michele had much more freedom. Jason's hair, while still somewhat short, had grown out some over the summer giving Michele more to work with, without having to resort to the extensions.

Julie, Kathy and Sue had all helped him pick out the perfect outfit for the first day of school. They decided that Jason needed to avoid any ambiguity by dressing as feminine as possible that first day. He could settle into the comfort of jeans, once their schoolmates got used to seeing him as a girl. In a show of support, all three girls agreed that they would also dress up, until he was ready to relax.

He and his friends walked into the high school for the first time as students. They all shared the same homeroom. Superintendent West had pulled strings and made sure that the assignment of classes insured that Jason and Julie had supportive students in each of their classes.

As they walked through the halls looking for their classroom, other students looked at them and pointed at Jason.

"Look there he is..."

"He actually looks pretty good..."

"Faggot..."

Jason and his friends just tried to ignore it, as he held his head up and walked into his homeroom.

Mrs. Kaufman was their homeroom teacher. They sat together towards the middle of the classroom. Once the final bell rang, Mrs. Kaufman asked for their attention.

"Welcome to Jefferson Regional High School. I'm Mrs. Kaufman and I will be your homeroom teacher this year. I'll begin by taking roll call and passing out your class schedules. Your locker assignments are also listed on your schedule."

She began calling out each of the students names, when she said, "Kelly Anderson?" a few of the students snickered.

"We will have none of that! Kelly will be treated with respect in this school, do you all understand?" Mrs. Kaufman said, as she stared at the students that had snickered. The room got very quiet. "Well?" she asked again.

"Yes, Mrs. Kaufman" the class responded in unison.

She continued her stare for a moment and then said, "Good. Now, Kelly Anderson."

"Here, Mrs. Kaufman." Jason replied.

She smiled at Jason and handed him his schedule. "Here you go, Kelly. Welcome to my classroom. If I can be of any assistance to you please let me know."

"Thank you, I will." Jason smiled back at her.

Shortly after the roll call was completed, the intercom crackled with the morning announcements. They began with the reciting of the Pledge of Allegiance, and then Principal Martin came on and said, "Welcome to a new year at Jefferson Regional High School. I hope that all of you will take time to welcome our incoming freshmen and to help them ease into this transition from middle school to high school. I'm sure all of you remember how excited and nervous your first day was here. To our seniors, congratulations on making it to your final year! This year will fly by for you; before you know it you will be graduating in June and preparing for college or for whatever career you choose. It should be lots of fun and I hope that you will have many happy memories of your senior year to look back on."

Principal Martin paused, and then added, "I know that many of you are aware that this year we have a situation that is new to all of us. First period this morning, we will have an assembly to address what we expect from each of you. Thank you."

The room again got very quiet and everyone looked at Jason. He could feel the blush come to his face. Forcing a smile as he broke the quiet by saying, "That sounds like fun; I wonder what that could be about?"

The rest of the class laughed.

The homerooms were dismissed by grade to head to the auditorium. The freshmen classes were seated in the upper left hand section of the mezzanine area, sophomores in the center, juniors in the right, while the seniors were seated in the orchestra seats.

As they took their seats, Julie held Jason's hand and said to him, "Kelly, it's going to be ok."

"Thanks, I know it will. I just have to get through the next couple of days, and things should settle down."

Principal Martin soon called for their attention.

"Good morning everyone. As many of you know, this year we have a transgendered student that is enrolled in our school, undergoing real life trials. For those of you unfamiliar with the term, transgender refers to one of a number of things, but in general it refers to a person whose physical body's gender does not match their perception of who they are. It could be a born male that knows he is a female trapped in the body of a male, or a born female who knows they are really a male trapped in the body of a female. There are many theories as to what can cause this to occur. This condition is more common than you might think; though no one is certain how common. Although, it is often thought that it could be as high as ten percent. Even if it is not this high, in a school with an enrollment of around 1500 students, it is very likely that there are at least several other students that are transgendered. For many transgendered people, the anguish caused by the perceived gender and physical sex is very real. Changing the way that a person perceives themselves is very, very difficult, if not impossible. There are methods however, to allow the physical sex attributes to be changed, to bring the body and mind into harmony. As you might suspect, this is a rather drastic approach to resolving the problem, so transgendered people are required to live at least a year full time in their chosen gender role, before such a solution can be considered, since it is pretty much a one way street. This is referred to as their real life test. Our student is currently going through this test. I know that many of you are already aware of this, because most of your parents were at the school board meeting a few weeks ago. I also know that there were some very strong feelings, both positive and negative expressed at the board meeting, so we are going to review the guidelines."

Principal Martin paused for a moment and looked over the students.

"This is a place of learning and we welcome a diverse student body. No person shall be discriminated against on the basis of race, religion, gender or sexual preference. Our state law provides for this and we will uphold it as it is the basis for community. We will have ZERO TOLERANCE of harassment towards ANY student, and that includes this student. Let me make this perfectly clear, the staff has all been instructed to be vigilant about any form of harassment and action will be immediate. "

He again paused to allow that to sink in.

"Finally, if you have any questions or concerns about this, Mrs. Grey, the school psychologist, is available to meet with you on a one on one basis. You may also speak with any of the staff. Thank you for your attention. Hopefully we will have a great year."

With that, Mr. Martin walked off the stage and the teachers began letting the students leave the auditorium by class, first the seniors, then juniors, sophomores and finally the freshman.