Thirty minutes after I graduated from High School the bitter truth of life sank in as my parents told me that I either had to join the military or move out. This was sprung fifteen minutes after pictures were taken with friends and teachers, while the thoughts of what I had planned to do with my life were just a gleam in my eye, this was sprung on me.

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eAPUxhz91BM

Kandahar Province, Afghanistan, mid-May, 2016…

A dream is a wish your heart makes
When you're fast asleep
In dreams you will lose your heartaches
Whatever you wish for, you keep

Almost alone in the midst of friends, the girl was lost in thought over the lingering hurt that eventually drove her to re-enlist.. She breathed in deeply and decided to join in the banter with her platoon.

“Got any plans?” Of course they all had plans of a sort; futures that most of them planned that included new places and new opportunities. And maybe new dreams; or rather new ways of realizing old, almost discarded dreams?

“I am fairly confident that my future will not include anything remotely khaki or camo,” she said.

“In fact, I’m…” She had meant to say ‘pewter’ and ‘copper’, and ‘jade,’ but her thoughts as well as the thoughts of everyone else were interrupted suddenly and severely...

Totally shocked and devastated by the news that my body was intersex, I moped around in my own grey miserable world for the rest of the day, wandering the streets, stopping for coffees, watching the ducks and geese on the lake in the park, generally hiding away, before I had got myself together enough to face people again.

The Courtship of Cerridwen Circe Whitethorn
Chapter 3: Movie Date

Plaza Twin Cinema located at the end of Main Street is the last of a dying breed, it's one of the few remaining mom and pop owned cinema's. Locally owned and locally operated. It has served Benton faithfully since it opened in the late sixties some sixty something years ago. Anyway if you wanted to see a movie in town this was the place to go.

"You know, the way to a man's heart is through his stomach."

"Is that true?" I asked. "I've heard people say that, but is it really true?"

"I don't know," Melissa confessed, "but I do know that men are happier after they eat. If we feed him every night, he's going to associate that happy feeling with you. And that's a good thing."

Allie - The teenage years of Alexander Horten

February 21-27, 2016

It Takes All Sorts

Part Three

Kyle froze when he saw his mother in the kitchen. This couldn’t be right. She wasn’t due home for an hour yet. Had he got the time wrong? A glance at the clock told him he hadn’t. She had come home early. His face paled as he saw the blouse he had borrowed from her and the two lipsticks he had used laid on the table in front of his mother.

“Hello, Kyle. Sit down, please.”

He wanted to say something, but no words would come.

“Please. Sit down. We need to talk.”

I'm posting this early because I have a long day in the saddle tomorrow when I ride from Ulvik to Geiranger in Norway. 240 miles, one ferry, and a tunnel with a roundabout inside! The Arctic Circle is getting closer!

This story is a little different from anything I've written before. I hope you like it.

What if supernatural beings like Witches, Faeries, Demons, and their ilk are all real? Glen Evanston is about to be caught in their many traps in my new work in progress: Magic, Mystery, and Mayhem a Graphic Novel by Raine Monday

Allie - The teenage years of Alexander Horten

February 14-20, 2016

San Antonio, Texas:
Charly stands in the shadows and records what was going on. She watches as a bunch of strange-looking men moves a bunch of women and children to a box truck. She was asked by Dove to scout out San Antonio for men that are being turned into young girls and women. Also, to locate anyone pushing a drug called Blue Lace.

I thought to run the hairbrush quickly through my hair, but right away hit a tangle.
I tried a different spot, and hit another tangle. Oh well! Tangles later! Pool now!

Part One
Yet again Lindsay was dreaming. The dream was strange but as usual vivid and sharply detailed. It seemed to involve being in a bed in a small room with numerous folk dressed in blue and others in white coats looking at inexplicable things that had moving patterns on them that seemed to almost but never quite constantly repeat themselves. They also looked at objects that made strange noises at regular intervals. Lindsay was aware that there were a number of tubes and white string like things seemingly connected to the bed. However, like many of Lindsay’s dreams it was neither totally rational nor totally consistent. Lindsay’s dreams made life a living torment, for dream and reality crossed over, blended and became each other. It was impossible to determine what was a dream and what was reality. Dreaming of dreams within dreams within dreams, and dreams even deeper nested than that, dreams like images in two mirrors facing each other that reached to infinity and drew one into insanity, meant Lindsay had no idea what being awake was like, for all such experiences were probably only dreams too.

Part 2
“I want you to come home with me. I am here to arrange it all. I know about carrying the message to engage the assassin to kill Tomas, and the new dresses made by Serena your fee paid for. I know you are really a girl. I know all about your new dresses and where you keep them. I know how you get past the guards dressing as a girl, but you won’t be able to do that for much longer will you? It will not be safe for you when the guards here discover that you have been tricking them. I said I want you to come home with me, but I want you as my sister, the girl you want to be. I know you wish to be able to read and write, and I can give you that and much more too.”

"I put my self-doubt aside. The question was, who did Liz think I was? And, could I be that person?"

Part 15

Monday morning Sarah went off to work and I sorted out the cleaning, dusting and a bit of washing before getting a light lunch and making ready for a trip into town.

The teller in the bank called the manager when I went to deposit the cheques and he asked me about them, ‘purely as a matter of prudent banking, in case I started to deposit similar amounts in future’.

I told him that the bulk of my cheque was for the sale of paintings I had done and that I would possibly be depositing similar amounts once I had put on a show in a gallery.

Changing Roles
By Julie Dawn Cole
Chapter 7

I rang the number Max gave me and he picked up immediately. ‘Hi Julie are you done?’

‘How did you know it was me?’
‘I asked Sally for the number I should call to collect and when I called and here is your name and your image.’
‘But my name is Julian or Jules not Julie.’

It had all come as a big shock and my mind was totally confused. I had been totally normal and content with my life as a boy and man, but since starting to live as Jane, I had become comfortable and happy with that too. A few weeks ago, if I had been told the same news, the choice would have been easy, Jack was who I was and who I would remain however now that I had been living as Jane and settled into a routine as a woman, the choice was not as clear cut.